by Vu, Andrew
I had never seen Simon so intense. Not during our first mission, not during our many meet-ups and outings. He’s usually a professional guy with a cool exterior. But perhaps the pressure was getting to him, especially after Borton’s death. He didn’t want anyone else to die on his watch.
Once Curtis had been subdued and Fenrir had him at gunpoint, that’s when things went into chaos. We heard Fenrir have a conversation with Curtis, but it was hard to make out what they were saying exactly. There was too much interference, probably from some kind of transmitting device. Then, without warning, a large boom echoed through my communicator. It blared into our ears like a fireball. Commander Trevor and I looked at each other confused, but we were thinking the same thing - a bomb must’ve gone off.
After that, it was static and the sound of silence. Commander Trevor immediately looked at me and said, “Apollo, how are you feeling now?”
“I’m better,” I responded.
“Good, because we’re going to the Gonzalez station on the double.”
Both of us quickly assembled our gear and high tailed it out of there. There was no time to do anything about the bodies, we had to leave them. Our transport wasn’t parked nearby, since we entered on foot, so we rushed over as fast as we could. I’ve never seen a human run so fast, even I could barely keep up with him.
When we got to his vehicle, Commander Trevor powered up his hovercar and in seconds we were in the air, charging to the Gonzalez station.
I’m now sitting in his transport in silence. I look at the Commander and I see him doubting himself. It’s something I never expected to see.
His eyes are slanted and his mouth is quaking. He wraps his hands tightly, too tightly, on his controls, and under his breath I can hear him mumbling out curses.
Ever since I met him as a young, naïve operative of the Dog Alliance, I’ve admired him. He was my role model, what I wanted be like in all facets of life. His career, his honor, his ability to make his team members feel welcome, inspired me. But to see your idol on the brink is disheartening. You realize he’s not perfect, not indestructible.
His shoulders were carrying an amount of guilt I had never experienced and I could tell his head was filled with questions. What if I had done this? What if I hadn’t? So many choices were being evaluated in a matter of seconds.
“Damnit!” Simon yells in frustration.
“Commander?” I ask him in a concerned tone.
“What the hell was I thinking? Why didn’t I see it earlier. Fenrir pointed out the obvious and I still ignored the signs.”
“Commander, what are you talking about?”
“It was a trap, Apollo. From the beginning, Fenrir said it was a trap and I didn’t listen to him. Now he might be dead because I made the wrong call.”
“No, don’t think that. Your judgment was right. It was the smartest move to make at the time. I mean, they couldn’t hide forever, they had to act. The transportation station was the only way out and we all knew that.”
Commander Trevor appears a little calmer, but the frustration on his face still shows.
“But I should’ve been more careful,” he says, his head leaned to the side, his elbow pressed against the window. “I shouldn’t have split us up. If Colbo, Erawan, and Fenrir had more reinforcements…”
“Then we all might have been dead,” I say. “Splitting up the team was right. We had no other option, especially since we were on our own mission to the casino.”
“And that turned out to be a red herring, one I should’ve seen a mile away! But I didn’t!”
He punches the side door in frustration and it startles me a bit.
“What the fuck was I thinking?!” he yells. “There’s so much I did wrong! I bit on the wild goose chase, I lead my other team into an ambush. Years of experience and I walked into it like a dope.”
“Commander…”
I don’t know how to respond. He glances over and sees me blanked with a half confused, half scared expression.
“I’m sorry, Apollo,” he says. “I shouldn’t lose my composure like that, especially as a leader.”
“It’s okay, Simon,” I respond.
“It’s just, I don’t know. We’ve known each other for a long time, right, Apollo?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Can I ask you something then and get your honest opinion?”
“Sure.”
“After what’s happened tonight, do you still have confidence in me?”
I’ve never seen the Commander as vulnerable as this. The mere notion that he’s coming to me with uncertainties in himself is crazy. And the fact that he’s asking me for advice is nuts.
Any of these actions would be preposterous on any other night. But then again, it’s not any night, it’s a night where the mission has gone awry and over half the team could be dead. Even the greatest of men are only human.
“Of course, I do,” I respond instinctively.
“Apollo, this isn’t some kind of test, you can be honest with me.”
I hesitate to say what’s on my mind because I don’t want to distress him any more in this fragile state, but I know he wants a real opinion.
“There’s one thing I think Fenrir was right about, ever since we started this mission,” I say.
“And what’s that?” he asks. His voice is accepting, so I know there won’t be any hard feelings if I speak my mind.
“We’ve underestimated these halfkinds greatly,” I say bluntly.
“I see.”
“We came into this situation headstrong, with little time to prepare. The strategy you made was fine, but our attitude towards it, Coblo’s, Borton’s, hell even you and me were arrogant. After we first killed Lombardi Lawton, we were handfed all these leads in a matter of hours. Sure we were cautious, sure we considered that it might be a ruse, but we overlooked it. Why? Because we didn’t think our enemy to be capable of such ingenuity. You thought it, I thought it, the only creature who didn’t was Fenrir. We saw how easy it was to kill the birdman and thought it’d be the same for the rest. But these halfkinds have proven to be much more dangerous than we thought. Their planning has been meticulous and they’ve been able to figure out our moves. Us, a highly trained group of soldiers, and we’ve been played so easily. It’s because we let them play us.”
He doesn’t look angry or sad. He simply processes what I’ve told him.
“After our encounter with them at the casino,” I say, “I’ve learned not to underestimate them. I mean, when we came in, we had them captured, the mission should’ve been over.”
“But it was Borton’s fault, he charged in and caused the chaos,” he says. “He disobeyed me.”
“True, but even after all that, you chose to take on Oscar one on one, without a firearm. It was reckless. If you saw him as a bigger threat, I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t have tried to be a hero.”
“So you’re saying I should’ve killed him, like a murderer? Like Borton did, in cold blood?”
“No. What you should’ve done was treated him like any other hostile and not like some scared civilian.”
“I see your point.”
He doesn’t seem disappointed by my words, but rather regretful of his actions.
“I’m guilty of this, too,” I say. “I chased after those twins like a rabid dog chasing frightened kittens. But I could’ve very well been killed.”
“But they did spare you.”
“True, which shows you the power they possess. They made the decision not to kill me, like a god over a mortal. And it shouldn’t have happened in the first place, but my carelessness allowed it to happen. All I’m saying is we have to start realizing that these halfkinds are a lot more cunning than we anticipated. We can’t let our guard down anymore.”
He is about to say something, but pauses first. He then speaks. “Looking back on things now, would you have done everything the way I did?”
“I probably wouldn’t have and I’m not just saying that to be
kind. As I said, I had the same cocky attitude as the rest of us and we really didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into. But looking at it now in hindsight, we made the wrong moves. The important thing is we learn from them and move on.”
Commander Trevor turns his face to mine. “Apollo, I appreciate your honesty. As always, you’re someone I can rely on. And I’m not saying that to be cordial, it’s from the heart. I’m glad you’re on this mission with me.”
In the beginning, I was fearful that my words would have strained our partnership, but it looks like they strengthened it.
“Unbelievable,” Commander Trevor says while looking at the view ahead.
In the distance we see a partially destroyed building, smoldering, smoke leaking from its wreckage and rising to the sky. Debris is scattered about everywhere. It’s a sea of metal, wood, electronics, and death. We’ve arrived at the Gonzalez teleportation station.
Commander Trevor lands his car immediately and I jump out to survey the damage. Whatever explosive they used was powerful enough to take down the whole station. There are so many things crackling in flames that it makes it hard to identify a source. There’s a glow coming from the edge of the wreckage, the remnants of the power generator. It smells like sweltering metal and the wind blows ashes into our faces.
The Commander puts on some goggles and assesses the damage while I continue to survey the area.
“Apollo, use your skills to see if you can locate the others,” he says.
I equip my scent booster and get to work. There’s so much wreckage, it’ll be hard to sort through everything. Luckily for me, I’m able to catch a scent right from the get go. It’s Colbo.
I press my nose on the ground and sniff furiously. I breathe in deeply and walk up and down until I home in on a trail. From there on, I tread steadily, examining every inch and crevice until I can locate Colbo.
Sure enough, I find him and he’s dead. His body is smoking, the hair on his back charred to a crisp. I see dried blood and slightly torn pieces of flesh. Half of his face is scared, small chunks seem to have disappeared from it. His mouth still flashes his trademark frown, but some of his lip has been ripped apart, making his teeth very visible. There’s a small cavity in his chest, but it’s blackened and burnt. Most of him remains intact, nothing seems to be dismembered, but he didn’t go peacefully. When the blast happened, he must have been engulfed in the flames, as his weight was too large for force to fling him.
“Commander!” I yell. “Colbo is over here and he’s gone.”
Simon sprints to my location and sees his remains. He doesn’t say a word, he just kicks a nearby piece of debris across the carnage.
“We’ll find something to cover him with,” he says sternly. “For now, see if you can locate Fenrir or Erawan.”
I once again sniff the ground to see if I can catch a trail. I walk toward the perimeter, past a bent and scorched teleporter until I’m able to pick up Erawan’s familiar odor.
I don’t have to do much digging for him because I already see part of his body sticking out from the ground. His head seems to be buried beneath the piles of rubble. The rest of his him is turned over on one side and is under some scattered metal and wood. I swipe the ruins away with my paws.
His body isn’t charred like Colbo’s. It’s actually relatively clean and as I scan it with my eyes, I find it hard to figure out what happened to him.
“I found Erawan!” I yell to Simon. He runs over and sees what happened.
“He doesn’t look as bad as Colbo,” Simon says to me.
“Yeah, but something doesn’t look right.”
Commander Trevor looks closely at him, eyeing every inch available.
“You’re right, Apollo,” Commander Trevor says, “something looks off. Help me lift his body out from the wreckage.”
He goes over to lift one leg and suddenly jumps back. I don’t understand why he does it until I sniff under the corpse. It smells like embers. His body isn’t turned over on one side, it’s the only side. The other half of his body is completely black. And his head isn’t covered beneath the piles of rubble, it simply isn’t there. Erawan’s body had been disfigured beyond recognition. He didn’t deserve this.
Commander’s reaction to Erawan’s death is different from his reaction to Colbo’s. He looks utterly disgusted by the sight in front of him. It is the kind of mutilation you wouldn’t wish up on your worst enemies, the kind that stays with you forever. He was a member of the highest guard in his society and there he lies before us, a barely recognizable corpse of his former self. You never think such warriors can go out this way, but he did. Simon gets on one knee and lowers his head in respect. I lower mine as well.
“I’m sorry that things ended this way, my friend,” Simon says, “but don’t worry, your death will not be in vain.”
We stay there in silence for a few minutes. Commander Trevor then gets back to his feet and looks around.
“Were you able to pick up the scent of the halfkind responsible for this? Curtis Lawton?” he asks me.
“No,” I reply. “He probably was vaporized since the bomb was in his possession when it went off.”
“Good,” he says.
Commander Trevor drops his gun and puts his hands on top of his head.
“I can’t believe this happened,” he says to himself. “All this destruction, it’s my fault.”
I want to console him, but I feel that silence is the only appropriate response.
After a few moments, he turns to me and asks, “Did you find Fenrir?”
I shake my head no. “There hasn’t been a single trace of him. If he died, I would’ve found his scent or something.”
“Lucky for you, he didn’t,” a familiar voice says. It’s Fenrir and he looks like he’s been through hell.
Chapter 27 – Fenrir Snow - Recovery
November 17, 3040 3:46 AM
I feel like shit. My fur smells like ashes, while specs of blood spot it red. My legs hurt, my back hurts, my head is pounding, and I can’t even move my tail without feeling pain. I look around and see only the scattered remains of the teleportation station. That Curtis Lawton sure did a number on us.
The instant he let go of the trigger, I thought I was done for. All I could do was run as fast as possible. By the time the bomb exploded, I was already near the exit where I had cleared out the mines. I was fast, but not fast enough. I felt the ground shake and a ripple of wind jettison past my legs. Before I could get farther, I was in the air, head facing down, ass facing up. I remember flying straight forward until I felt a violent thud hit my back. After that, it was lights out.
When I woke up, I was greeted by murkiness. My vision was obscured by debris. Once I lifted my head, the rubble fell off, and I saw the carnage that had unfolded. The whole station was demolished. The smell of soot hit my nose so abruptly that I sneezed it out. Fires raged on and smoke filled the air.
I looked at myself to survey any injuries I might have obtained. I felt funny on the inside, so I pulled out the bioscanner and gave myself a quick read. A few minutes later, the results came, some broken ribs, a hairline fracture on my hind leg, and cuts on my back, nothing big. But I do have a large trail of blood running from my face. I must’ve been cut pretty deep, I’m lucky that one of my eyes wasn’t taken out.
I was healthy, for the most part, so I started to look for the others. If I was able to survive with no major injuries, I was hopeful that they did, too. But it didn’t take me long to discover their bodies. I found Erawan first. The discovery I made was grim. He didn’t talk much, but I respected him. I knew of his reputation and I knew the warrior’s heart he had. And now he lies before me, his body defiled like vermin.
Then I found Colbo dead under some other junk. I didn’t like his smart ass attitude, but I did owe him my life. I will remember that. Two team members’ lives ended so suddenly, it left me wondering how I was still alive.
I also wondered what Curtis Lawton was trying to say w
ith his final words. He mentioned something about being a pawn, about being betrayed. From what Trevor told me, the halfkinds he encountered didn’t know about any proposed meeting, that they were set up. Then this halfkind tells me in his dying breath that he was a fool who was played and rats out the location of his brother.
Tiago - that was the name he mentioned. According to his files, he was the oldest and most likely the leader. He must’ve orchestrated all the events that happened today, from Lombardi’s raid to Oscar’s standoff to Curtis’s kamikaze mission. Judging from Curtis’s change of heart, he wasn’t playing nicely. He probably used and abused his siblings in some kind of master scheme.
With my thoughts and realizations coming to fruition, I decided that it was time to run back and warn Commander Trevor. He had to know what Curtis told me. Only problem was I didn’t have my communicator on me, it must’ve been destroyed during the explosion. The only way I could inform him was if I left on foot. I was injured, but I could still run like the wind. I darted in the direction of the Spades and Diamond Casino.
I didn’t have far to go. After a minute or two of running, I saw a familiar hovercar in the air approaching the wrecked teleportation station. It was Commander Trevor and Apollo.
They landed and were inspecting what was left of the station. I hear them talking and I barge into the conversation.
“Lucky for you, he didn’t,” I say. I’m exhausted and aching, and it’s the only line I can think of at the moment.
Both of them stand there astounded by my appearance. I don’t think they were expecting me to be alive.
“You found Erawan’s and Colbo’s remains, I take it,” I say.
“Unfortunately we did,” Trevor responds.