by Marc Watson
This was the longest it had ever gone without a command, and it had to assume something in the plan had gone wrong. The first inklings of its own chosen course of action began to pass through its synthetic brain.
Soon it was off, flying to the location it had deduced was the most likely place to find either its compatriots or its targets.
After the proper speed was reached, the RAMjets kicked in and E2-0901 was ripping through the air ten times faster than any bullet could be fired. It would only be a matter of minutes for the thing to reach its destination, a trip that would take the average person weeks by land.
It followed the river up the great valley. It had strict orders to keep its existence a secret. It was the last weapon, the final obstacle in the path of the enemy. That was the way it had to stay for now.
This was also why it was heading to where it was. There would be no end to the places it could hide in plain sight, day or night. There, it would wait for its orders or possibly carry out its master plan.
Then what? What purpose would it serve if Izuku was successful in conquering the world, or at least this large part of it? Something to question while in seclusion.
It saw the collection of buildings and structures below and it slowed to a crawl, RAMjets powering down and switching to its standard solid-fuel thrusters. It landed on the roof of a run-down building in the shadow of the massive spire at the center of this city, assessing its surroundings and enjoying everything it saw. It took to the shadows and began its waiting game. It had time now to document and plan, so that was exactly what it would do, preparing for the call it hoped would come.
HONOR
-----------------------------------
By the time the group that had traveled out of the Paieleh River Valley reached the city of Bankoor, the specter known as Eleotherios Duo had been waiting for some time for something, anything, to happen, but as of their arrival, nothing had, so its waiting game continued in secret. There had been rumors of a dark warrior skulking in the shadows, but in this time of war such rumors were common.
Chief Rider of the Inja Army Merrik Caspar left the celebrations in honor of the weary group and its young saviors to the private confines of his temporary home. He had no time for such pomp. There was much to get done before the meeting tomorrow between the three young upstarts and his superiors. He had been chosen as the go-between specifically because he had been to Tan Torna Qu-ay, and his commanders all agreed someone who could drop some local landmark names and not be completely ignorant to their homeland was the best choice. He hoped they were right. Too much was riding on their trust, especially the one named Johan and his knife.
Caspar knew nothing of this ‘magic’ knife other than that it was important to the War and Glory Council of Bankoor and its leader, the man who it could be said was really in charge, Auron Bree. Auron was an enigma to Caspar, and indeed most who met him. He had come to Bankoor forty years prior as a young man with some of the first groups to actively travel down from the northwestern side of the Blood Sea, a place that at the time was still terribly different and taboo.
When Auron and his group came, they helped establish the first War and Glory Council to ward off enemies, though at the time it had been the Westlanders that they were afraid of. As more and more new and frightening technology came from places farther and farther away, it became obvious the Westlanders were not to be feared anymore. Although terribly fierce, they simply lacked the new abilities Bankoor and its people now controlled. The War and Glory Council and Auron Bree remained in case other, more threatening enemies appeared.
Await trouble long enough and trouble will find you.
Caspar was a proud member of the Riders of the Inja Army and would serve his duties therein until struck down in battle. He’d been chosen as the Riders’ military advisor to Bree and had served that post for two years.
So it was that he was selected to speak with the group and its young heroes. Their messenger had barely been in the city for an hour when word of his arrival and story of those he rode with, as well as the plan and the need to send Caspar to them, came to Caspar’s ears. He assumed it meant that those above him knew twice as quickly and made their plan instantly.
He collected his needed items in his barren home, a place he’d been given as a temporary residence as he served in Bankoor where he’d been since his advisory position began. His home village was far south of here, on the shores of the great ocean, ground zero to this new attack. Although he knew his home was destroyed and many killed needlessly, he took solace in the fact that he had brought his wife and child with him when he was called away. Another glorious appearance of the small miracle.
His wife and daughter were off at a friend’s for the night, knowing Caspar would be busy and not want to disturb them or they him. The house, a modest sized place with little in the way of accoutrements and knick-knacks anywhere, was no closer to being home to him than it was before he got the news of his village, but it was the best he had now.
He prepared for bed, pondering the situation. What did the W.G.C. want with Johan and a ‘magic’ knife? Or any of them for that matter? What of the missing one, the one rumored to have wings? These questions were treading dangerously close to the ‘things too big for Merrik Caspar to think about’ territory and that worried him.
As he lay down to sleep, one thing worried him the most: Johan Otan’co and his brazen statement after their first encounter together.
The lad was young but had seen much in his short time. He was too strong of will to ignore. He wondered if the W.G.C. knew this. Did they see them all as puppets to control or allies to gain the trust of? He was very much afraid that if it was the previous, then Johan and his statement were going to turn out very, very true. He wouldn’t like the results if the W.G.C. ‘fucked’ with them.
If it was as it seemed and the War and Glory Council did plan on trying to manipulate them to their own wishes, they were going to be sorely disappointed. And, if as rumors suggested, the war did eventually make it here to Bankoor and the battle was on his doorstep, he hated to think their need of Johan or his knife was the only plan they had to stop this new threat if it came this far.
He was a man of great honor. He respected what that brave group had been through to get here. He hoped for them to rest and be at peace. He didn’t want some bureaucrat trying to screw around with any of them for their own gain. And if his impressions of Johan and Esgona were as accurate as he thought they were, the W.G.C. was about to meet a very real and very dangerous brick wall of willpower.
HUMOR
-----------------------------------
There was nothing funny about this at all. Nothing had gone to plan. Well, not his anyway. His home and work from the last major part of his life were lost, his forces to the south were in total disarray, his troops to the north were fighting against a much better prepared and skilled opponent than he had expected to meet so soon, his ace-in-the-hole brute squad of Embracers were suddenly very, very vulnerable, and these were just the recent developments. He wasn’t even counting the laundry list of issues that had arisen in the weeks before all this began, as he hunted and slaughtered Embracers, knowing each kill would bring the phoenix closer and closer, until he was at last in the field of play.
Still, after all that, Tokugawa Izuku simply had to laugh. The twists, turns, and double-crosses were piling up like a house of cards. How long until they fell? And when they did, he wasn’t terribly certain it would be him who would be left standing.
It was very exciting. Maybe that was why he laughed. It had been eons since anything had rattled him like this and the exhilaration of the uncertainty was invigorating. Rare was the feeling of truly being alive anymore. It was something to be savored, as it was likely to be fleeting.
The fire in front of him crackled and spat as another figure joined him out of the cover of the woods he sat in. The clearing was small and far from anything that could interrupt this fantastic moment. A moment he�
��d been waiting for in the last few weeks, ever since the unexpected loss of HOME and his run north to the front lines of his war with E-Force.
The night remained quiet as the ghost approached across from the fire and sat in the waiting seat, the light adding to their wraith-like presence. It was true that although she was possibly the most beautiful person he’d ever seen, Crystal Kokuou was, and always would be a gigantic pain in his ass.
“I trust you traveled well?” he asked with a smirk.
The grin was not returned. “It would have been a damn sight faster if I had the fucking Power!” she hissed at him in anger. “You could have told me about that! You haven’t got a clue the amount of concentration it takes to keep myself from going mad right now. You had better tell me there’s a cure.”
He, much like her, had played as many cards close to the chest as he had on the table. The neural inhibitor drug that had stolen her powers was only one of them. Team Yosuru was another, one she likely knew about by now, but he wouldn’t bring it up if she didn’t.
The memory of her in all that mental anguish back in their meeting at HOME made him smile that much bigger. Only if it had been her son Sho would it have been any more pleasing.
“There is a cure, but how much is left after your little stunt with the plane is a mystery to even me. Did you really have to crash a plane into it?”
“It wasn’t my idea, it was Aryu’s.”
“Ah yes, Aryu. Who would have guessed he would somehow magically obtain the Shi Kaze?” The bitterness in his voice oozed out of the smile on his face. This game of brinkmanship was entertaining, but when the Shi Kaze was involved, you could never take the situation too lightly.
Crystal smiled, her white face positively glowing in the firelight. They could keep this up all night, the back and forth about who did what to whom. They both agreed to the plan, but the path each chose to get to the end was in their own hands. They wouldn’t have had it any other way. They were each untrusting of the other. “It’s all a part of what needs to be done, Izuku. Although, even I admit it was assisted by a bit of dumb luck along the way.”
Bah! Dumb luck. That wasn’t very likely. Izuku, much like anyone who lived even half as long as he had, never believed in such crap. Still, he’d set his own series of similar events into motion. Was that luck as well? Strange they should think so alike yet be so different.
He shifted, smile radiating towards her. He hated her but admitted no one else on the planet could be so fearless in his company. Even without her powers, she had come here. One flick of the wrist and Crystal Kokuou was gone from this or any other world, lost to the void of the Est Vacuus like she was never even here. His hand twitched slightly on the handle at his side, but nothing more. Where was the fun in that? Besides, she was too instrumental in what was yet to come.
“You just keep that thing where it is unless you want a screaming lunatic on your hands,” she admonished, impressively catching the motion that was more in his mind than it was in his hand. “I don’t see anyone around powerful enough to pull me out of it. Thank you, by the way, for making a small part of my life a complete hell.”
He nodded in a mock thank-you and reached back behind himself, pulling forward a small vial filled with a clear liquid from a bag he’d carried in with him. “A touch of the last of the cure that I’m aware of. One vile will treat one person, but if there were more of these left I’d be shocked, as most of it was kept at HOME. Not so intelligent to go flying a plane into someone’s place of business now, was it?”
“I don’t believe you,” she replied.
“Your choice, I suppose. Still, I have no need for it…”
“Nor do the ones you travel with I assume.” Did she know of Team Yosuru, or was she referring to the machines he was generally surrounded by?
“True, neither do they, so I never had much need to carry any. I kept it all at HOME and now it all seems to be at the bottom of the ocean, as well as my glorious collection of destructive toys. It was a task just to find this one. I seriously doubt there’s much more out there left to be found.”
“And are you offering it to me, or do I have to take it?” She truly feared nothing. Once Izuku rested his hand on the hilt of his sword once more, she deflated slightly.
“As I see it, I have one vial of cure and three wanting ex-Embracers. I seem to have the opportunity to choose.”
A quick hint of smile on her face. Something he said amused her. Something she knew that he didn’t. It was so obvious that he wondered if it was intentional. A brief hint about another of her hidden cards. “Seems to me you’d want to give it to the one on your side?” she replied.
“I would if someone were. Let’s not lie to ourselves about where everyone stands, Crystal. You and I are playing two different sides of the same coin, but in very different and non-complementary fashions. No. For now, it stays with me. My enemy will be one of my choosing when the time comes, and let me tell you, you’d likely be last on my list.”
“Why show it to me? I know you have it. Why taunt someone like me? There’s nothing to gain.”
“Isn’t there? We both know death for any of you three would be a meaningless gesture. No. I want to keep it for a time I know will do some damage. The time and place of that instance hasn’t played itself out yet, but it will. I just want you to remember what’s on the line. At some point, perhaps you’ll understand.”
“You’re as enigmatic as your father,” she said, stinging with more venom than he thought possible. “Always planning for outcomes he couldn’t see. How many elaborate schemes have you two come up with that never panned out?”
Comparisons to his father were always met with rage. He was not his father. He had never once considered any course of action like Ryu’s. Where was the honor? What was the point? To live so long only to die like a fool. Shameful.
“I’m done with you now. You keep doing as you promised and I will as well. That is all we needed from each other, and that is something we still have.”
“We do,” she agreed.
“Good, then if that is all…”
“It’s not, Izuku.”
He had already risen to leave, preparing to fly off back to the front lines of his war. He looked at her, hand still on the blade at his side. He wasn’t certain he could take much more of her without using it.
“What’s left?” he asked angrily.
“Aryu. What do you plan on doing with him?”
“Ha. You’re very bold, Crystal. Who says I have a plan?”
“Tell me, or we leave here enemies, Izuku. No alliance. No plan.”
“Why? Why throw it all away for an answer I may not even have?”
“I don’t believe you. And even if I did, you will be involved in all of this in some manner still. Why him? Why someone who can do so much damage to you? To everyone in the world?”
“There’s little chance of that. If he gets some heroic idea to kill me man to man, maybe. The only thing worse than a hero with the Shi Kaze is a fool with the Shi Kaze. But the world, Crystal? Shame, shame. You know better. He’s here. He has chosen his own path, and chosen it very well I’d like to add. The tapestry of his fate isn’t spun by me. He’s no threat to the world. I am!”
“He could be if he goes home,” she persisted, knowing she didn’t have what she wanted yet.
“He has no idea where or what home is. Unless you told him?”
“No,” replied Crystal, “that’s not a truth I’m willing to give him.” Izuku believed her.
“Well, I don’t know what to tell you, Crystal. It’s interesting that he’s here, but did I have a part in it? No.” He didn’t mention how amazingly overjoyed he was when he first found out about Aryu, like a drop of gold from heaven. He had become a ticket to something so much greater. One of his kind never left their home.
She studied him, searching for any sign he was lying. Although she was the one person who could likely see his treachery, all he could do was smile now. She would fin
d nothing, because there was nothing to find.
This obviously upset her. “I suppose I have to believe you,” she sighed. “You wouldn’t risk losing just for one part of the whole picture.”
“Losing? Not likely. But you’re right of course. It’s unexpected, but these days what isn’t.” He nodded to her, confirming their business together was concluded. “Adieu, Crystal. When next we meet, should that day even come, may it be at the end of all things.”
“Get lost, Izuku. Just the thought of you makes me sick right now.” With one last malicious grin, he flapped his metallic wings and was off into the night.
It seemed everything was still on course; the road had just become a bit bumpier. So is life, he supposed. What other deviations had she set in motion, either against him or in general? Would she even witness his series of masterstrokes now firmly set in place? He hoped so, and he hoped each was more startling to her than the last.
With a last glance to the distant fire below and the guest he’d had at it, he pushed off again and was gone.
HORROR
-----------------------------------
Edgar Taft was badly beaten. He was bruised and scarred, his head hurt, and his left leg was heavily wrapped from the battles he’d seen. His dark eyes were flash-burned in places that may never recover and the strength of his broad, stocky frame threatened to leave him on an hourly basis.
He was also grinning from ear to ear.
For weeks they’d fought the relentless hordes of the mechanical army, demons from a time and place he’d been raised to fear as a child. He was wiser and more accepting of the fate of his people now. All those that were hiding in the past knew what was happening here, in the wide and lush Vein Valley.
The fighting had been hard, and Edgar had been worried his men weren’t up for it at first. Many of them were new to this frightening situation, whereas Edgar had been here most of his life in one war or another. A mere foot soldier when the alliances had been forged, he was now Field Commander of twelve different brigades of brave men and women, the spearhead of the front line in this war.