While his third evolution hadn’t been as substantial a change as his first two, it was nonetheless enthralling to take in the upgrades. At his right the Device now extended down from the half-gauntlet it had once been to cover the entirety of his right forearm and elbow, the intricate black steel there not as thick as the defensive plating of his left, but still a cry better than the emptiness of scarred skin. His other elbow, too, had been covered, as had both of his knees, forming true half-greaves around his legs that matched Aria’s own set, now.
It was a good thing, too, because as the path began to move under his feet, Rei got the impression the upgrades to his lower extremities where about to become particularly useful.
The first obstacle, luckily, was a simple one. From the end of the path a single broad pillar appeared in the middle of the way, forcing him to make a quick decision to move right or left. Choosing the latter, he flattened himself and half-skipped through the high gap of space between the wall and the barrier, letting it pass him by without issue. He heard Sense whoop from above him, and would have grinned had the hologram beneath his feet not started speeding up at that moment, demanding that he concentrate.
Next came an up-down repetition that had him jumping, then ducking over and under several flat half-walls, followed by the short rise of an awkward staircase that cut across the path at an angle. Clearing both, he hit the ground at a jog, now, and momentarily had to dive through a broad ring that only offered its center as a reasonable place to pass. Rolling to his feet once again, he found himself facing a hill like the one Emble had stumbled over, and so instead of trying to leap over the incline Rei simply took it at a run, dropping down the other side with a little more momentum than he would have liked. It was fine, though, because the path was now moving at a true clip, and as he dodged a wall that bisected the way Rei found himself soon almost sprinting.
Before he could get going all-out, though, the path fell out from under him.
“WHOA!” he yelled as he stumbled, then fell, and shouted again when all of a sudden he was being flung back up, into the air, even as the track continued to race by beneath him. He realized, flailing in nothingness, that he’d been duped by a series of rising and falling pillars just like the ones that had beaten Gisham, seeing them piston up and down below him for a moment before his momentum brought him slamming back down to the ground just past the obstacle. The landing hurt, but wasn’t unbearable, and Rei shoved himself to his feet as quickly as he could.
Just in time to take a broad, flat wall straight to the face.
As the barrier impacted him, he heard the rest of his group “Ooooh…” from above, but his reactive shielding had long since risen enough to take this sort of hit without too much trouble. Any concern about the wall fell away as Rei found himself being bulldozed backwards at a breakneck pace, and he yelled again as he registered just how fast the path must have been moving beneath him.
A flash of red, then an odd, wrapping pressure that was first soft, then hard, and Rei rolled out of the catching perimeter wall a little stunned. Once his neuroline had helped catch his thoughts up to what had happened, he started to smile, completely getting the thrill Sense and Gisham had enjoyed.
His amusement, however, was cut short when he realized that a figure was frowning down at him, standing with his arms behind his back in full regalia just outside the limit of the Dueling field.
“Your course time was barely forty-seven seconds, cadet,” Major Dyrk Reese said dryly. “I can’t imagine why you would appear to have any cause of amusement when two of your group mates ran for nearly twice that long.”
Scrambling up, Rei rose in a stiff salute before the higher officer.
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. It was my first attempt.”
Reese’s dark eyes flashed, and Rei knew at once that he had said something wrong.
“Do you always give excuses when criticized, cadet, or do you ever consider opening your ears and actually listening on occasion?”
It was Rei’s turn to frown, but he said nothing in reply. The accusation was hardly fair. He hadn’t been attempting to make any excuse, just stating a fact. And besides, if what Reese said was right, hadn’t he just run for longer than Emble had? So why was he the one getting reamed out?
“No answer? Good. Maybe that means you’ll think twice before being impressed with yourself next time. Get back to your group.”
Rei had to work very hard now, not to snap something back, but managed to control himself.
“Yes, sir,” he answered simply, dropping his salute to turn and move swiftly back to the stairs, where he took them two at a time in quick succession. Reaching the top, he recalled Shido quietly, his mellowed mood not helped by the grim looks on the faces of his groupmates.
“What did the major want?” Sense asked him as he reached the Brawlers.
“Apparently he wasn’t a fan of the fact that I looked like I was having fun,” Rei answered, unfortunately unable to keep some bitterness out of his voice. “Guy seems like kind of a d—” He caught himself, looking sheepishly around at Michael Bretz, who was eyeing him in warning. “Uh… Sorry, sir.”
If Bretz had known where he was going, however, the man chose to feign deafness, because he looked instead to Camilla Warren. “Warren, you’re up. After that it’ll be Senson again for a new round.”
“Yes, sir!” Warren answered cheerfully, and as she passed Rei she treated him to a dazzling smile and quiet “Nice job. Keep it up.”
It surprised him yet again, though not unpleasantly. Of the Brawlers, the dark-skinned girl had been the last holdout to treat him like one of their own, so it was a nice change to see. A little abrupt, maybe, but if she was coming around to his presence among them, then his concerns about the attention Shido’s progression was gaining him might be less warranted then he’d thought.
Then again…
Feeling eyes on him as Warren dropped down to the field—glancing briefly as she did to where Major Dyrk Reese still stood in rigid observance at the starting end of the path—Rei looked around to find Emble watching him. It startled him a little, because beneath his rows of brown hair the boy’s expression was tight, unsettling. They locked gazes for only a moment, then Emble offered what had to have been the most stiff attempt at a nod Rei had ever seen before looking away again.
It struck Rei, then. Harder than he had thought. 47 seconds… If Reese had been right, and his own guestimation of Emble’s run was correct—which he suspected it likely was—then Rei had just, for the first time since the start of term, bested another User specifically…
It was a pathetic comparison, in the grand scheme of things. The course was as far from combat as one could get. It wasn’t even one of the parameter tests Rei had failed so abysmally on the first day of classes.
And yet… It was still his first real, tangible victory. His first real proof of his own improvement.
A little at a loss as the realization took him, Rei looked away from Emble’s turned back to take in Shido’s band around his right wrist. The black-and-white steel of its slim rings hadn’t changed—nor would they ever, he knew—and the glimmering blue of the vysetrium, bright with the Stryon particles that gave the loops and diamonds their light, seemed to wink up at him knowingly. For a moment that constant, unerring heat that had driven him so hard so fast dimmed just a little, allowing him to experience in truth the wonder of his own accomplishment.
It was happening… He was actually, truly climbing…
And then the exclamations started up around him, and Rei shook himself free of his awe to hurry to the edge of the wall, joining the others in cheering Warren on as she ran.
CHAPTER 29
In an odd display of awkward balance and counterbalance, Emble’s displeasure at Rei’s performance over the course of the rest of the training session seemed only to swell even as Camilla Warren grew more and more excited for him. Not really sure what to make of either of these two shifts in t
reatment, Rei took Warren’s compliments and cheer in stride, and chose not to make comment on Emble’s sullenness. The boy’s black mood didn’t go unnoticed by the others, either—especially after their second and third runs had Rei basically tying with him despite all efforts otherwise—and while Sense had the wherewithal not to push Emble on the topic, Gisham was less tactful, asking him if everything was okay several times throughout the period. Michael Bretz, too, seemed to take note of the shift in tone, but like Sense he appeared to read the situation a little better, Rei catching the instructor’s sharp gaze shifting from him to Emble on occasion over the course of the class.
Altogether they each got a good half-dozen attempts at the run before Dyrk Reese announced with a booming voice from the center of the combat space that the training session was over. The major had lingered near Field 1 for nearly a third of the class—then passed by several more times even after finally taking rounds about the other groups—but Rei had been careful to give the man no more cause to snap at him, and Reese had never bothered making too much of a comment on anyone else’s performance. Indeed, when they finally called it a day, Rei and the Brawlers—apart from Emble, at least—had long since been having an excellent time once again, and it was in high spirits that Bretz dismissed them back to the locker rooms with words of praise for their day’s work.
Sense clapped Rei on the shoulder as they started along the wall of the subbasement, choosing to go around the outside of the Wargames zone rather than cut through the fields where the Lancers and Duelists were wrapping up their last runs. “I don’t think I’ve had that much fun since school started!” the tall boy said excitably. “Nice job on those attempts, by the way. Another few tries and I feel like you were gonna get close to passing me.”
Rei laughed. “Fat chance. Pretty sure you and Gisham both had the rest of us by a good twenty seconds or so.”
Sense smirked amicably. “Maybe. Still… You’re a far cry from parameter testing, isn’t it?”
Rei opened his mouth to answer, about to admit that he certainly wasn’t displeased with his progress over the last 6 weeks, but a girl’s voice cut in from behind them before he could say a word.
“Seriously, Ward. It’s pretty damn impressive! I feel like you’ll be better than all of us in another month!”
Rei and Sense looked around together to find Camilla Warren tailing them closely. Gisham was nowhere to be seen—having stayed behind to ask something of Bretz—but Emble was following rigidly along a ways back, and didn’t meet either of their gazes when they glanced at him.
“I don’t know about that…” Rei replied tentatively. “Getting through the Es was definitely a lot easier then climbing the Ds has to be.”
Another half-truth, but a necessary one. He wasn’t strong, yet. Not even close. Even if he had to start lying outright, he was going to buy himself every day he could, for as long as he could.
“Sure, sure,” Warren nodded along with a bright smile. “Whatever the case, Senson’s right. It’s seriously impressive how far you’ve come. I kinda feel bad for giving you the cold shoulder at the beginning of the year, now…”
At Rei’s side, Sense frowned, eyeing the girl curiously.
Rei, though, had decided it was clearly a day for extended hands.
“No problem.” He did his best to return her smile. “You were hardly the worst of it. And it’s not like it wasn’t weird of me to be here. Even now I’m still behind the curve, what with all of you gaining two or three ranks since the start of term.”
“Yeah, well…” Warren grimaced a little. “It’s not like you deserved any of it. I really could have been nicer.”
“It’s seriously no problem,” Rei insisted, looking forward again and catching a glimpse of red hair near the opening to the hall. “Things have worked out pretty well anyway.”
No one said anything else, after that, because at that moment the rest of them, too, noticed Aria Laurent leaning against the wall beside the exit. With a muttered excuse Warren vanished rather quickly, as did Emble. Gisham hadn't yet caught up to them, so by the time they reached her only Sense was still at Rei’s side, and even he seemed a little hesitant.
“Hey!” Rei said, catching Aria’s attention as she scanned the departing students.
“Oh. Hey. How’d training go?” Rei might have imagined it, but he thought the girl looked relieved when she caught sight of him, stepping away from the trickle of cadets to meet him quickly. He was sure of the fact when Aria started looking Sense up and down nervously as she approached.
It was amusing to witness, like watching a lioness pawing at a housecat in trepidation.
“Fun times, but I think I might have rubbed one of my groupmates the wrong way.” He glanced around to find Sense standing tensely at his side, having some obvious difficulty being so close to the Aria Laurent as his gaze darted about. Smirking, Rei decided it was safe to make introductions. “Aria, this is Bahnt Senson. He’s a Brawler in my group.” He turned a sharp eye on Aria in mock warning. “Behave. He’s a nice guy.”
Expectantly, Aria’s cheeks flared immediately red as she sputtered. “W-What? What’s that supposed to mean?!”
Rei, unable to help himself, grinned and looked to Sense, now. “You can stop shaking in your boots. She’s seriously too easy to tease.”
Aria tried to splutter out another protest, but failed to do so, and the sight of her in that state seemed to do the trick. Sense relaxed a little, looking like he was taking the girl in in a whole new light.
In the end, he even managed a crooked grin.
“I-If he’s ever too mean to you, just let me know. I… uh… I’ve got some pretty good stories of Rei’s training fails I could share with you.”
It was Rei’s turn to stiffen, and all at once he realized his potential mistake. “Whoa! Wait! Hold on!”
Too late, though. Aria stood with her mouth open a moment, looking between the two of them.
Then her green eyes settled on Rei with a gleam he distinctly did not like.
“Oh really?” Aria followed up with interest, sheer anticipation bloomed into a wide smile. “One of these days we’re going to have to have a chat, then. I can use as much ammunition as possible, with this guy.”
“For what?!” Rei demanded, distinctly regretting having acquainted the pair. “Blackmail?! You’ve definitely been spending way too much time with Viv if that’s the first place your head goes!”
“Who’s been spending too much time with me?”
Rei started, whirling to find Viv coming up behind him, pulling up one shoulder strap of her combat suit to wipe sweat off her cheek as she approached.
“Rei’s just been kind enough to introduce me to Cadet Senson,” Aria answered, motioning to Sense as the boy stood sheepishly by, and Rei thought he could hear the evil in her voice. “Apparently there’s anecdotes to be shared about his struggling in class.”
“Oh, this I gotta hear,” Viv joined in eagerly, stepping up beside the Brawler and slipping an arm flirtatiously into his. “Spill, big guy.”
Sense had literally opened his mouth to answer—his face going so red at Viv’s touch that even his shaved head flushed—when Rei interceded.
“NOPE!” he exclaimed, taking Viv by the other arm and lugging her off the Brawler, moving towards the exit. “HARD NOPE!”
“Awwww!” Viv protested, but even without looking around he could hear her grin. “You’re no fun!”
“It’s okay, Viv,” Aria said, sounding like she’d stepped in behind the pair of them. “Now we know who to go to when we need dirt.”
“You two are the worst,” Rei muttered, glancing around. Sense was standing where they had left him. “You coming?”
The cadet—who’d been watching the three of them go with an awestruck sort of expression—seemed to rise out of whatever reverie he’d fallen into. “Uh… Nah. I’m going to wait for Leron and Kay.”
Rei waved an acknowledgment as
he hauled Viv away, Aria right behind them, both giggling, and as he led them around the corner of the exit he could have sworn he’d heard Sense mutter “Lucky bastard…” under his breath.
It wasn’t until after they’d showered and regrouped at their lockers that the girls finally managed the stop laughing, but even then Rei could still hear the pair whispering behind his back as they all got changed. He would have rolled his eyes, but again he was visited by that odd sense of content, listening to the two of them chattering quietly. As fun as training had been, it had proven a wholly unproductive day when it came to Shido’s improvement, and his disappointment at the lack of spec progress was outweighed a little by the sounds of the girls having fun, even if it was at his expense. Aria’s grin—as wicked as it had been—was stuck in his head a bit, and Rei smiled to himself as he pulled on his boots, eyeing the lines of his pant legs hovering a little too high above the laces. At last checkup, Willem Mayd had measured him at gaining nearly another half-inch and a few more pounds.
He was going to have to get his uniform adjusted again, pretty soon…
“Dinner, then East Center?” Viv asked suddenly, and Rei took her addressing of him as an indication that he could look around without fear of being murdered in his sleep later. Sure enough, plucking his jacket from the steel locker and turning to face the girls, he found them in the process of tucking their shirts in, Viv with her feet still bare, Aria with her hair wrapped up in a towel to help it dry.
“Eh. Not hungry just yet.” He pulled on the jacket one sleeve at a time. “I actually kinda want to head back to the dorm and get some reviewing in for Markus’ class. I got interrupted this morning.”
Viv looked immediately downcast at this suggestion, but Aria perked up.
“Are you doing the compression equations? Can I join?”
Rei, not expecting such interest, was about to answer with an eager affirmative when he hesitated. He blinked at Aria, considering the fact that it was extremely unlikely Viv or Catcher would want to join them.
Iron Prince: A Progression Sci-Fi Epic (Warformed: Stormweaver Book 1) Page 45