Valiant

[Valiant #10: Sanctuary, Pt. 2]

Log Date: 10/9/12763

Data Sources: Feroce Acceso, Kiwi

Event Log: Kiwi

Wisconsin: New Bridsgard Quill Sanctuary

3:14pm SGT

I can hear the shouting by the time I reach the ground floor.

Quills are calling orders to each other while Masklings run through the halls, guiding others away from the front of the Sanctuary. It doesn’t look like there’s a plan in place; the guards are just getting the Sanctuary’s occupants away from where the mob is, but it doesn’t look like they know what to do after that. If Songbird wasn’t in danger, I would probably stop and start giving them orders, but right now, Songbird is my priority. He’s critical to the alliance we have with the rogue Challengers, and besides, I have my own reasons for needing him to survive.

Skidding over the tile floors, I duck and dodge around Masklings heading in the opposite direction, away from the main foyer. Most of them are civilians; they’re not trained to fight, even if they have the potential to be dangerous. Besides, so many Masklings are obsessed with cultivating a non-threatening image that it’s hard for them to do anything aggressive, even in self-defense. They’re so afraid of reinforcing negative stereotypes about Masklings that they’d rather run than stand up and defend themselves.

I’m not like that, though.

I’m not going to apologize for what I am, and if people are gonna try to hurt me, then I’ve got every right to hurt them back.

Skidding into the main foyer, I see now what the goat-eared Quill was so panicked about. The mob is at the doors, which are currently being bottlenecked by guard Quills, but there’s problems all across the front of the foyer. The mob isn’t waiting to push through the main entrance; people on the porch of the Sanctuary are using their flagpoles to bash in the windows of the foyer, knocking them through and starting to climb through them. And at the main entrances, they’re attacking the guards with whatever they can get their hands on. Flagpoles, chunks of masonry, glass bottles, batons taken from the guards, yelling and screaming as they do so. It’s an ugly sight, and there’s no question that these people plan on drawing blood and taking heads.

I take a deep breath and look down at my hands. The rune circles orbiting around my wrists start to morph at a mere thought, each rune lengthening and solidifying into a glassy green feather with bladed edges. Once they finish morphing, I’ve got twin orbits of feather blades hovering around my wrists, just begging to be used.

Looking up again, I start sprinting across the foyer, shouting to the security staff that are still in the room. “Deadly force is authorized, per Forecast! Do whatever it takes to keep them from getting inside; we need to hold them here long enough to evacuate the rest of the Sanctuary!”

“We’ve only got stunners!” one of the security staff shouts from where he’s using his baton to swat at rioters trying to get in through a window.

“Then use them!” I snap back at him. “If we get lucky, they’ll trample each other trying to get inside!”

Dashing past the dais in the middle of the foyer, I skid to a halt when I see blood dripping onto the floor in front of it, and follow it back to where it’s pooling around a person crumpled at the feet of one of the statues. I recognize the dark longcoat, the splash of tropical blue hair at one end of it; taking a hard right turn, I slide to a stop in front of the dais, my heart jumping in my throat. Songbird’s lying on his side, most of the front of his shirt burned away and a massive scorch crater in his chest. The smell of burning fabric and flesh is strong, but it looks like he’s out cold, blood trickling from his nose and the corner of his mouth.

“Dammit.” I mutter as the sound of breaking glass echoes in the foyer, another window being smashed in. I don’t think I should move him in this state, but this is one of the most dangerous places to be right now. Until I can get him out of here, I need to hold this position and defend it at all costs.

Standing up and turning around, I see that more windows are being broken in, and rioters are starting to climb through them. There’s not enough security staff to guard all the windows, and at the main entrance, the mob’s starting to yank at the Quill guards blocking the way, trying to separate and drag them into the crowd. They manage to peel one of them off the blockade, yanking her into the crowd, and her screaming is lost among the shouting of the mob as she disappears under the heaving mass of bodies. I see flagpoles and signs being swung, the telltale jerks of movement that hint at stomping something into the ground, and I have a pretty good idea of what happens to Masklings that get dragged into that crowd.

I open my hands, a glass feather sliding down into each one where I can grab them. On one hand, most of these people are armed with nothing more than homemade protest signs and wooden flagpoles. It almost feels unfair to treat them the same lethal brutality that I would use against a fully trained soldier.

But hearing the threats they’re shouting at us, seeing their faces contorted with hate and rage, I know I’m doing the rest of the galaxy a favor by giving these people a quick ticket to the morgue.

I start with the rioters crawling through the windows, flicking the glass feathers at a pair of them. The blades leave neon green trails through the air as I guide them with my eyes, sending them curving around to hit one in the eye and another in the neck. As they reel and stumble, another pair of feathers slide down between my thumbs and forefingers as I turn and throw them at more rioters coming through windows on the other side of the foyer. I’m not going to waste more than a single feather on each rioter, and I don’t need an instant kill on any of them. I just need them to regret that they tried to breach the Sanctuary, and maybe bleed out later.

“Feather!” someone shouts behind me. I look around as another couple feathers slide into my fingers. It’s Cahriu and two of the handler candidates that were presented to me down in the lab; they’re coming around the dais, rune circles flaring to life around their wrists in different colors. “Forecast sent us up here to help you hold the line while the others evacuate civilians from the upper floors. The plan is to get everyone downstairs and retreat through the emergency tunnel. What are your orders for holding the foyer?”

“Do I look like a strategist to you?” I reply, holding off on throwing a feather as one of the security staff stuns a rioter climbing through the window. “Plan’s simple. Kill or maim anyone that tries to get past us. I don’t care how you do it. Forecast authorized deadly force and we’re gonna use it because these people aren’t here for a chat and a cup of tea.”

“Aren’t you worried about optics?” Cahriu demands as the other two handlers generate tower shields and melee weapons from their rune circles. “If we kill a bunch of people here, even in self-defense, you know how it’s gonna play out in the media. It’ll reinforce some of the narratives that the partisan networks are peddling, and we’ll be in for a hell of a news cycle.”

“Screw the optics.” I growl, throwing another feather blade. “If we don’t defend ourselves, we won’t be around to see the bullshit they’re gonna pump out. These people are Mask-smashers; if you get killed here, you might not survive long enough to get another Maskbearer.”

“Well, when you put it that way…” Cahriu says, stretching his fingers. The air around his rune circles starts to shimmer with heat, licks of flame starting to curl inwards and forming a ball of fire over his palm.

“Try not to set the Sanctuary on fire.” I mutter, flicking another feather blade and curving it around into another rioter’s chest.

“Most of the building is made of stone. It should be fine.” he says, pitching the fireball towards one of the windows that the rioters are trying to break. It explodes outwards, raining glass on them and catching the curtains on fire. “Most of it.”

I don’t reply, putting my focus on nailing the rioters that are spilling through the windows, while the handlers patrol the windows, taking swipes at anyone stupid enough to stick their head in. There are more of them than I can keep up with; some are managing to get through, even with the security staff stunning those that make it past the handlers. Those that manage to get through the windows charge straight for the security staff, while at the main entrance, another Quill guard gets dragged under as the pressure of the mob keeps pushing them back. When I run out of feather blades, I have to generate a fresh set of rune circles and morph them again. While I’m doing so, I see a muzzle flash at one of the windows, and one of the security staff is thrown on his back with a smoking crater in his chest.

“They’ve got plasma rifles!” Cahriu shouts, slinging a fireball at the window where the muzzle flash came from.

“What the hell?!” one of the security staff shouts as he fumbles to load another power cell into his stunner. “Non-stun firearms are banned within the city limits!”

“Police didn’t do their job, then.” I say, ducking a plasma bolt from another window. Jumping back onto the dais, I take cover behind the statue that Songbird is crumpled at the foot of. After crouching down, I peer around the legs of the statue, at Songbird; the scorch crater on his chest is shrinking, and so is the pool of blood around him. It seems to be running backwards, soaking back into his skin as his body slowly heals the damage it’s taken; I can feel the heat coming off him from here.

“Feather, we can’t keep this up!” Cahriu shouts as another one of the security staff takes a plasma bolt to the face. “We can’t hold this position; we’re gonna get overrun! We need to fall back and reposition!”

I look up; the mob is close to bursting through the main entrance. The other handlers are backing up, using their tower shields to block the plasma bolts being fired at them. Rioters are starting to spill through the windows, and the security staff can’t stun enough of them to keep the mob from coming through.

We’re out of time. If we keep trying to hold this room, we’re all gonna end up dead.

“Alright, Blueberry. Can’t wait any longer; you’re just gonna have to heal on the run.” I say, moving around the statue’s leg and crouching down to grab his arm and put it around my neck. I wince at how warm he is; it feels like he’s burning up beneath his coat. “Pull back! Fall back to the dais! We retreat from there! Cahriu, help me get him up.”

“This Songbird?” he says, moving over and getting Songbird’s other arm over his shoulders. “He’s smaller than I expected. I could probably carry him on my own, if you need.”

“If you don’t mind him bleeding all over you, then sure.” I say, slipping out from under Songbird’s arm as the Quill guards retreat from the main entrance, and the mob comes spilling through, screaming and howling and swinging their flagpoles and signs. Opening my hands, I start slinging glass feathers left and right, nailing rioter after rioter as I try to buy the guards enough time to fall back to the dais. I can’t hit enough of them to stem the tide, and some of the guards go under, and are dragged into the crowd.

“C’mon, if we don’t go now, we’re not gonna get out of here alive!” Cahriu says as he slings Songbird over one shoulder, and backs across the dais to the hallway where the rest of the Quill guards are retreating to.

“I’m coming! Go!” I shout, following behind him. I throw my last few feather blades; I don’t even have to aim at this point to hit someone. Once the last one’s gone, I ignite another rune circle around my wrist, starting to tap and drag the runes I’ll need for what I’m about to do. All the glass feathers I’ve thrown start to glow as I back up towards the hallway; raising my hand, I clench it into a fist.

Across the foyer, every feather overcharges and shatters, exploding and sending glassy shards of light flying in every direction. The result is grisly, since many of those feathers are still buried in their targets; hardlight shrapnel goes flying everywhere, much of it tearing into the loosely-clustered rioters. The screaming in the lobby switches tenor, going from rage to pain in the space of seconds. It doesn’t stop the foremost rioters from chasing after us, but it does a number on everyone behind them, introducing an element of hesitation to the mob as they try to figure out what happened.

“Dear Dreamkeepers…” Cahriu mutters as I turn and to catch up with the others. His orange eyes rove over the carnage in the lobby. “No wonder you’re the Council’s pet.”

“Shut up and move.” I reply as the handlers cover our retreat, forming a wall behind us with their tower shields. “We need to get to the basement. This is your assigned Sanctuary; what’s the fastest way there?”

“Should be right around the corner here—” he says as we come up on a nexus of halls, but he’s drowned out as the Quill guards moving ahead of us start shouting warnings. Rioters come into view from one of the adjoining halls — not in the same numbers that they were swarming the lobby, but still just as savage. They immediately go for the Quill guards; the foremost rioter takes a spaceball bat to the skull of a Quill guard that’s already been heavily injured from trying to hold the main entrance.

“Shit okay nevermind.” Cahriu grunts, changing direction. “That route’s cut off, we’ll have to take the left hall now, go upstairs to get to the elevator, then take the elevator down two floors to the basement.”

“Seriously?” I demand as the surviving Quill guards struggle to keep back the rioters coming from the right hall. “We couldn’t take the stairs going down to the basement?”

“The stairs going to the basement are that way.” Cahriu says, pointing down the right hall, where rioters are pouring in a broken window at the far end of it.

“Alright, point taken.” I say, edging through the nexus and moving into the left hall. I turn and shout to the others as I go. “Controlled retreat down the left hall!”

The sound of shouting on my other side has me whipping around, and I see a rioter pelting down the left hall towards me, flagpole in hand. I’m in the process of igniting my runemarks when a stun pulse rushes past my ear, so close it sets my hair whipping, and slams into the rioter’s face, dropping him like a stone in the middle of the hall. Turning around, I can see Songbird lowering his stunner from where he’s woken up on Cahriu’s shoulder.

“Would someone mind letting me down from here.” he rasps as Cahriu shepherds Quill after Quill into the right hall with us.

“It’s about time you woke up.” I say, moving over and pulling him off Cahriu’s shoulder, who’s more than happy to drop him on the ground. “What happened? When I found you, you looked like you tried playing dodgeball with a grenade.”

“Old friend.” he grunts as he gets up, a little shaky on his feet. “Not so friendly anymore. Where are we? What’s happening?”

“Sanctuary’s been breached.” I explain, helping him up as the handlers retreat into the hall we’re in, trying to keep their shield wall up. The prospects don’t look good; their tower shields are cracked and chipped from where they’ve blocked several plasma bolts. “We’re retreating to the escape tunnel in the basement. Forecast and the others are evacuating everyone from the upper floors but we’ve already lost a lot of the Quill guards.”

“What a mess.” he coughs, raising a hand and touching it to the blast crater in his chest. It’s continued shrinking, but it isn’t all the way gone yet. “I’ve burned through a lot of my blood reserves recovering from that hit I took. Some of my bones are still fractured, but I can keep going. I heard we’re going upstairs to reach the elevator?”

Before I can answer, a shout from the other end of the hall draws our attention. The Quill guards that were heading that way are skidding to a halt; rioters are starting to come around the corner, at first a few, and then in a thickening stream. It looks like the mob in the foyer found another way around, and is moments from cutting us off from the stairs at the end of the hall.

“Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me!” Cahriu snarls, backing up as the rioters behind us start pushing into the hall we’re in while the rioters on the other side start to close on us. “It’s like fighting the goddamn Collective!”

“The Collective would assimilate you; these guys are just gonna tear you to pieces.” I say, backing towards the middle of the hall. Songbird’s firing pulse after pulse, dropping a rioter with each shot, but I know his stunner’s going to run out of charge soon. We’re down to less than ten Quill guards, and Cahriu’s frying any rioter that manages to make it around the shield wall of the other two handlers, but the handlers themselves look like they’re nearing their breaking point. We have no way out of this hall, and if nothing changes, we’re going to get crushed in the middle, and eventually ripped to shreds as the mob pulls us apart from each other.

It’s time to see if Songbird really can keep up with me.

“Songbird.” I say without looking over my shoulder. “You remember the museum?”

I can hear him pause, before firing another couple of pulses. “Yeah.” he answers, still sounding ragged. “What are you planning on doing?”

“I want you to prove that I didn’t make a mistake, tangling with you.” I say, igniting my runemarks again. This time, I can feel Songbird’s runemarks glow to life in response; now that he’s no longer unconscious, I can sense his feelings and emotions; his fleeting, surface-level thoughts; and most importantly, I can sense his soul — a dense, compact little star that radiates determination and hope. That sends light running through my veins, supercharging me and leaving me breathless with exhilaration.

We’ll see if it’s shining as brightly by the time I’m done with him.

“Everyone get down!” I shout as my rune circles start crackling and snapping with energy. Green lightning starts arcing between my fingers, then starts roving further, snapping against the walls and floors. Cahriu looks over his shoulder and sees what’s happening; he reaches forward and pulls both of the handlers to the floor with him, while Songbird does the same on the other side with as many Quills as he can grab. As the mob spills over them on their way to me, I open my hands and shove them out to either side, pulling as much of Songbird’s radiant soul into me as I can.

The lightning explodes down the hall in both directions, a snap-second blast that rips through the tightly-packed bodies in an instant. Even as fast as it happens, I can feel a level of resistance every time the lightning arcs to a new body, but I ignore it, shoving more energy into both ends of the lightning, forcing it further and further. It races down the hall in both directions, spreading and jumping from person to person, tracing back along the halls the mob is still streaming through; reaching all the way back to the foyer and out onto the porch of the Sanctuary. By rights, this would be more energy than a full squad of Masklings would be able to muster, but with Songbird as the source and me as the conduit, I can amplify that power several times over.

It’s only when I feel him flicker and falter that I stop, closing my hands. And even then, the entire ordeal only lasted two seconds, but lightning is a greedy element, and it can eat up massive amounts of energy in milliseconds. That Songbird was able to last that long is… well, it’s impressive, really.

As the last of the lightning leaves my fingers, the rioters start toppling and crumpling over. The entire hall drops, and I can hear people in adjacent halls falling over as well; the smell of burning fabric and skin fills the corridors. The sudden silence is jarring; most of the rioters are out cold, and didn’t even have time to process what hit them. Those that are still conscious are groaning and twitching; I’m sure some of them have suffered cardiac arrests, but that’s not my problem.

I drop my hands, letting out a breath. Looking down, I can see Songbird kneeling on the floor, clutching his arm. The sleeve is pulled back; his runemarks are glowing a white-hot blue around his wrist, and cracks are running down his forearm away from them, glowing that same furious, white-blue hue.

“Might want to hide that.” I remark idly, walking past him. “The Lieutenant might have questions about it otherwise.”

He looks up at me. There’s wordless questions in his dark red eyes, things he wants to demand but daren’t say out loud while we’re in the company of others. Reaching down, I brush my forefinger over the tip of his nose, letting it drift down to rest on his lips as I smile at him. An unspoken command to hush, and to keep this our little secret.

“Feather!” Cahriu shouts as he helps the other two handlers up. “You hit some of the Quill guards!”

“Collateral damage was inevitable.” I say, grabbing Songbird’s hand and pulling him back to his feet. “Lightning’s volatile, and hard to control. Get them up; we’ll take as many as we can with us.”

“Since you knocked out everyone on this floor, we can take the shorter route the basement now.” Cahriu says, moving past me to pick up one of the Quill guards that got caught in my attack. The handlers do the same, as do the surviving Quill guards. “You think you could do that again if needed?”

“Maybe.” I say, starting to move back down the hall in the direction we came. “Would depend on Songbird. He gave me the juice I needed to do that.”

“Dayum.” Cahriu remarks. Songbird doesn’t say anything, keeping his stunner in hand as he escorts our wounded and battered party to the set of stairs leading to the basement.

Once we arrive downstairs, Cahriu takes the lead, guiding us through the corridors; we eventually reach a hall that other Masklings and Quills are being evacuated through. Folding the wounded Quills into the straggling stream of escapees, I look up when I hear my name being shouted. It takes a minute for me to see Tarocco’s pixie haircut behind some of the taller Masklings.

“Hey there, pixie sticks.” I call back as she leaves the stream of people to join us. “What’s the situation? Where’s Forecast?”

“Forecast is upstairs, trying to get everyone down here. Venox is leading them down into the sewers.” Tarocco says, squinting at Songbird and his mostly-destroyed shirt. “What happened to him? What happened to you all?”

“I nuked the ground floor.” I say, glancing down the hall behind us. “Knocked out pretty much all the rioters that were in the building. Maybe SCORN’s sycophants will take a hint and back off.”

“Allow me to disabuse you of such a misguided sentiment.”

The digitized voice echoes down the hall behind us; I start to turn, but Songbird shoves off the wall, slamming into me, a half second before a pulse of yellow light rams into him. He’s hurled into the adjacent hall as the pulse explodes, throwing the rest of us back. When the light fades, I cough and try to regain some of the breath I lost from being knocked back against the wall. Coming down the hall is some dude in white and gold power armor, a yellow circle glowing on his unmarked helm, with ceremonial robes flowing around him.

“The hell is that?” Cahriu demands, struggling off the wall.

“It’s an Anayan ecclesiarch.” Tarocco hisses, helping up some of the people that Songbird knocked down when he was blasted into the hall. “High priest of a xenophobic religion. I’m not surprised there’s one here.”

“Cahriu, help Tarocco get everyone out of here.” I say, igniting my runemarks again. “I’ll keep this guy busy.”

“No.”

It’s a wheeze that comes from the adjacent hall, and I look back. Somehow, Songbird’s getting back to his feet, clutching his side. Pushing off the wall, he crosses over and walks past me, using his free hand to pull one of his hilts out of his coat. “Find the Lieutenant and Ridge. Make sure they get out of here safe. I’ll handle this.”

“Seriously?” Tarocco calls. “You’ve got to be kidding. Is he seriously pulling the hero card?”

“I’m a Challenger, and this is a friend I haven’t seen in fifteen years.” Songbird rasps. “We’ve got a lot to talk about. Isn’t that right, 5381?”

The man in the suit of power armor slows to a stop, the butt of his staff thumping against the floor like a death knell. “If by talk, you mean confess your sins before I render judgment, then yes — we have much to talk about, 5377.”

“We need to talk about that stick that’s gotten stuck up your ass.” Songbird mutters, mostly to himself. “It wasn’t there last time I saw you, and someone needs to do you a favor and pull it out.” He looks over his shoulder. “Lieutenant and Ridge. Go. I’ll catch up to you later.”

I open my mouth to say something, but I can see something in dark red eyes that tells me this isn’t up for discussion. After a moment, I turn to step back into the adjoining hall, but hesitate and look back at him. “Five minutes. I’m coming to get you if you’re not at the tunnel by then. And don’t try pulling a fast one on me.” I tap the glowing runemarks on one of my wrists, watching as the ones on his wrist flicker slightly in response. “I’ll know.”

He quirks the corner of his mouth and nods, then turns back to the ecclesiarch. I look back to Tarocco and Cahriu, stepping back into the adjoining hall. “Cahriu, you keep the evacuees moving and make sure they get out. Tarocco, head back upstairs and find Forecast. I’ll go find the Lieutenant and the kid.”

Cahriu nods. “See you on the other side.”

I nod back to him, and take off running down the hall after Tarocco, pulling out my phone.

Event Log: Feroce Acceso

Wisconsin: New Bridsgard Quill Sanctuary

3:23pm SGT

I feel like shit.

Between getting blasted through the doors of the Sanctuary, and getting blasted again just now but at a lower intensity, I feel like I’ve been run over by a trash compactor on wheels. Most of my bones have healed, and the scorch crater in my chest has mostly closed up, but I’ve not had time to really focus on regenerating. I’ve also burned a fair amount of blood recovering from the damage I’ve taken so far, and I know that after this, I’m going to need to finish that thermos of Dalayu blood that Sierra gave me a couple weeks ago.

And then there’s the question of why Kiwi’s runemarks are expanding into glowing fissures running down my forearm.

But I don’t have time to really dig into that too deeply. Right now, my attention is focused on the person in front of me: Thomas Aberdini, Challenger 5381, also known as Prophet, and a dedicated high priest of Anaya.

He’s also my childhood friend.

“So. Let’s get down to the brass tacks. What is this?” I demand, motioning with the hand that’s got my ninjato hilt. “You weren’t like this last I saw you.”

“Like what?” The voice, filtered through the helm, has digital overtones. If I didn’t recognize the armor, I might not even know who was wearing it. “If anyone has changed, it’s you. You threw away for your humanity for nothing.”

“Don’t even start with that.” I retort. “What I did, I chose to do on my own. And you know what? I regret it. I regret what I did. I’ve had to live with that for the last seventeen years, so I don’t need you rubbing it in. Yeah, I’m a vampire now. And I really wish I wasn’t. But I didn’t think you, of all people, would try to beat me to death over that.”

“We were raised side by side. You know well that what you became is a blight upon this galaxy.” Prophet says, taking his staff in both hands. “It gives me no pleasure to do this. I grieve that you fell to this state, and of all the tasks required of me, this is one of the hardest I will ever have to undertake.”

“Yeah, that’s your conscience telling you this isn’t right!” I snap at him. “You’re right, we were raised side by side. I’m not going to stand here and debate the finer points of Anayan doctrine with you, but I know damn well that none of those sermons we listened to in church mentioned anything about going out and killing non-humans that the apostles declared abominations against nature. I heard plenty about how dating, marrying, or even supporting equal rights for them was a sin. I heard plenty about that. But nowhere did the apostles or the orthodoxy say anything about actually going out and killing them. Nowhere in Anaya’s scripture is there anything saying you need to rile up a mob to hunt down and kill Masklings.”

“What room do you have to speak, as one that broke sacred commandments and forfeited your humanity?” Prophet demands, starting forward. The tip of his staff starts glowing, and I kick backwards, out of the way as he swings it at me. “You committed an unforgivable sin, for it is something that cannot be reversed! Did you think of your parents? What would they say if they could see you now?”

I grit my teeth. “Don’t bring my family into this.” There’s a flare of prismatic light as I ignite the hilt, a kaleidoscopic blade crystallizing out of it. “We all have to walk our own way eventually. I’ve done my best to be the sort of person my parents could be proud of — regardless of what my race is.”

“Is that what they told you? Or is that just what you tell yourself?” Prophet demands as he swings the staff at me again; I bring my ninjato up to swat the blow to the side. “Have you told them what you became? Did you see the disappointment in their eyes, the grief as they realized you will no longer be a part of their eternal family?”

“Don’t you even start that with me.” I growl, yanking out my other hilt and igniting it. “I told you not to bring my family into this. That’s a personal reckoning, one that I will handle on my own. I’m asking about you. What happened to you? You weren’t like this last time I saw you! You were devout, but you weren’t some psychotic hardliner!”

“I found the truth, Feroce.” I have to lunge out of the way as he charges at me, the directional thrusters on his suit kicking in as he shoulder-rams the spot where I was a moment ago. Cracks go racing through the concrete. “I found out how my father died, and he died slowly. And that it was a Maskling that took him from my family when I was young.”

I wince as I struggle back to my feet. “Okay, that’s— that’s understandable. I get that. I’m starting to understand it a little more now. But that was one Maskling, and that was over three decades ago. That doesn’t make it right for you to try and kill every Maskling between here and the edge of the galaxy!”

“It doesn’t?” Prophet demands, marching towards me. I duck as he swings the staff at my head, but when I come back up, he takes the staff in both hands and shoves the haft at my neck. I have to jerk both of my blades up to block it, and he bears down on me, using the staff to pin me back against the wall. “I now see the Masks for what they are, what they have deprived others of, and what they continue to deprive others of. I grew up without a father because of what Masklings did to my family, and my story is the story of so many others across the galaxy; stories of grief, and loss, and stolen loved ones. Those that have been killed by the Masklings, or seduced and led astray by their lies. How many others across the galaxy can say the same? How many families have been broken and torn apart by these parasites?”

I grit my teeth. There’s no way I can win a battle of strength with him; my blades are the only thing that are keeping his staff from crushing my neck, and I can hear the servos in his power armor whining as he keeps amping up the pressure. “These Masklings have families just like you did.” I hiss. “Just because yours got torn apart doesn’t mean you should do the same thing to other people.”

“They’re not people.” Jerking his staff back, he slams the butt of it into my stomach, doubling me over, then slams the mace-like tip into the side of my face, throwing me onto the floor. “They’re parasites that steal the lives of others—”

“That’s actually not true, they’ve got a whole system set up with consenting Maskbearers and stuff—” I wheeze from the floor, before Prophet’s metal boot slams into my ribs and sends me sliding across the floor, into the adjoining hall.

“And I come here, to find you working with them and defending them.” Prophet says, slowly clomping into the hall as I struggle to push myself up. “I don’t enjoy this, Feroce. It doesn’t bring me any satisfaction. Everything about this is disappointing, and my heart aches to see what you became. You walked the path better than I ever did when we were children. I never thought you would stray so far from it in adulthood.”

Working past the ache in my side, I plant a fist on my knee and use it to help push myself up. I put my other hand back, using it to brace myself against the wall. “I can’t reason with you.” I pant. “And that’s what I hate more than anything else. I know you never got over losing your dad, but you can’t see beyond the cage of hate you’ve built for yourself. I see you trapped within your own warped sense of righteousness, but it’s not your place to decide who deserves to live and die. If you could just let go of your grief, you would see how wonderful this galaxy and its people are.”

I let my hand slip off the wall behind me, now that I’m able to stand on my own. Rolling a shoulder, I stare down that yellow circle emblazoned in his helm, wishing I could see through to the eyes behind it. “It hurts me to see you like this. Because I’ve been there, where you are. It’s a miserable place to be, but you don’t realize that until you step outside of it. And that’s not something I can force you to do. It’s something you have to choose for yourself.”

“I know the path, and it leads to joy everlasting.” he says, taking his staff in both hands again. “You have left the path, and you are blinded now to the sins of this galaxy. It has left you weak, a mere shadow of yourself. I was expecting more from this confrontation, but these fifteen years you have spent wandering in carnal darkness have robbed you of your skill and your former glory, Songbird.”

With that, he swings his staff up and over, aiming to bash my skull open with the business end of the metal stick. I jerk both of my ninjato up, forming an X that catches the staff before it can reach me. The servos in Prophet’s armor whine, but his staff stays locked in place between my blades.

“Did you think you were winning this fight because I’d gotten rusty?” I rasp. “You were winning because I didn’t want to hurt you, Thomas.”

Twisting his staff off to one side, I whip my blades back in the other direction, both of them catching him across the helm. Sparks go flying as I follow up with a series of short, heavy slashes that cut into his robes and score across his armor; I stay on him, up close and giving him no space to bring his staff to bear. When he positions it across his chest to try and block some of the hits, I flip both of my blades reversehand, then hook them over and behind the staff while jerking a boot up to plant it against his chest. I kick off his chest at the same time that I jerk both of my ninjato back towards myself, tearing the staff out of his mechanized grip. As it drops to the ground, I kick it down the hall, then launch myself back at him, slashing at his raised forearms.

“Enough!” he shouts a moment later, using one arm to bat both of my blades aside, with his other arm shooting out to seize me by the throat and lift me into the air. I grunt at the sudden hold; he twists in place and slams me against the wall, pinning me there. “You have defied the commandments of Anaya for long enough. The aid you have rendered to these abominations is obscene in her eyes, and I—”

I don’t bother letting him finish; even as he’s speaking, I bring my starglass blades up and cross them over each other, atop the arm he’s using to pin me. Then I slash them across in opposite directions like a pair of scissors, both blades meeting at the neck of Prophet’s power armor and ripping across it. Sparks fly as the blades cut deep, tearing through the exterior armoring, gashing the underlying servos, and razoring through the body cavity to leave a slight graze on one side of Prophet’s neck.

His grip on me releases as he staggers away from me, clutching one hand to the twin gashes in the neck of his armor. I drop to the ground, bracing myself against the wall behind me as I rub at my neck; he starts to look at me, only to be piledriven by Sierra slamming into him with a stolen riot shield, knocking him flat on the ground. Looking to the side, I can see the others arriving: Forecast, Tarocco, Ridge, Kiwi, and a few straggling Masklings and Quills.

“Guys.” I pant, struggling off the wall, then looking as Prophet shoves Sierra back and clambers back to his feet. Kiwi runs past me, one of her rune circles glowing, and positions herself where she can discharge a displacement ripple that throws him back into the hall that we’d originally been fighting in.

“Go!” she shouts to the others, charging her other rune circle as she does so. “I’ll keep him pinned here until everyone’s gotten past!”

Forecast starts herding the remaining evacuees past her, with Sierra digging in her Challenger jacket and pulling out a three-tipped disc. Ridge keeps casting glances at me, as if he’s dying to tell me something, but Tarocco steers him down the hall as Kiwi discharges another displacement ripple into the hall that Prophet’s in. Once everybody’s down the hall, I move to stand with Kiwi and Sierra. “What are we going to do about him?” I ask as Prophet starts to struggle back to his feet. “We don’t have a way to keep him from following us.”

“This should keep him busy.” Sierra says as she finishes arming the disc she was fiddling with. She throws it like a frisbee; it flies down the hall, seeming like it’s going to sail right past Prophet. But when it gets near him, it curves in towards him, clanking against his armor and sticking to it. By the time I’ve realize it’s a magnetic grenade, Sierra’s already grabbed both me and Kiwi and is pulling us down the hall after Forecast and the others. The explosion feels amplified in the confines of the the basement halls, a gout of fire rushing out of the hall and some chunks of drywall flying out along with it.

“Are you sure it’s safe to be using explosives underground?” I ask as Sierra drags both of us down the hall after the others. “Structural integrity and all that…”

“I swear, Songbird, you worry about the strangest things.” Sierra mutters. “A mob of several thousand xenophobic nutjobs are milling around aboveground, and you’re worried about structural integrity? And what took you so long with Prophet? You’re the goddamn Songbird, you should’ve beaten his ass like a bass drum instead of getting ragdolled like you were his personal punching bag!”

“I was trying to figure out what happened to him—”

“Are you out of your mind?” Sierra seethes as we turn a corner. “I’ll tell you exactly what happened to your friend: he got radicalized! He’s an extremist now; you’re not gonna ‘reason’ him back from that. Things like ‘reason’ and ‘logic’ don’t factor into extremist ideologies. Your friend’s gone; there’s nothing left of him but a SCORN sycophant.”

“Well I think that’s a terribly reductionist view—” I start.

“You can think what you like; it doesn’t change the fact that he incited a mob to march over here and start killing innocent people.” Sierra says, letting go of both of us so we can walk on our own now. “You’re not going to save him, no matter how much you want to. Let me ask you this instead: why didn’t you get amped? If you had, that fight would’ve been over a hell of a lot quicker, and I wouldn’t have needed to waste one of my magrenades. Those things aren’t cheap, you know.”

“I, uh.” I say, returning a hand to my aching side. “I forgot to bring my earbuds or my headset. And I wouldn’t have had time to get a song picked out.”

Sierra glares over her shoulder at me. “You’re not someone that just ‘forgets’ those sorts of things, Songbird. You chose not to bring them. We’re going to be having a talk later.”

Kiwi gives me an inquisitive look, the sort where I can tell she’s going to be asking questions later, but she’s canning it for now. We all slow down as we come up on a section of the hall that’s partially blocked by an open vault door; moving around it, I can see what looks like a cold storage room with shelves within, and a few Quills milling around inside while Forecast gives orders and helps them load up bags.

“The hell is this, guys?” Sierra demands as she comes around the vault door. “We’re supposed to be gettin’ outta here, not robbing the bank!”

“This is where we store the Masks that don’t have Maskbearers yet.” Kiwi says, peering around the door. “We can’t risk leaving this here. If we do, those zealots aboveground will smash every Mask in here if they manage to breach the vault.”

Sierra huffs a gusty sigh. “Okay fine. I guess that makes sense. Hey you, mutt! You look big and strong. How many of these bags can you carry?”

Cahriu squints at Sierra as he comes around the vault door. “Did you just call me a mutt?”

“Yeah you. Wolf ears, wolf tail. We can slap a bandage on your wounded ego later. Get in here, we need you on pack mule duty.” she says, motioning him over and pointing inside to the shelves. “Forecast, how much more do you have to pack up? How many arms are we gonna need here?”

“The Quills should be able to carry most of it.” he answers, shoveling more Masks into the canvas bags that they’re using to transport them. “Cahriu, I have a few bags here for you with our heaviest loads. I wish we could take the other items in here, but the Masks take precedence.” He starts hustling Quills out of the vault, loaded down with bags. “Make your way to the tunnel. Tarocco will be there to help you in.”

“Is there anything we can do to help?” I ask, finally turning off my starglass blades and tucking the hilts back into my longcoat.

“Stand guard, and escort the Quills as they head back.” Forecast says as he starts hanging the last bags on Cahriu’s arms. “Once we get in the sewers, we should be safe. Each Sanctuary has an evacuation plan, rendezvous points, and prearranged safehouses in the event of a breach. This isn’t the first time we’ve been driven out by mobs or attacked by local government forces.”

“That is clever and also somewhat depressing.” Sierra remarks, placing a hand on Ridge’s back and giving him a push towards the vault. “Grab one of those bags, rookie. It’s about time you pulled your weight instead watching all of us do the hard work.”

Ridge gives a distasteful look to the last bag that Forecast holds out to him, but he takes it anyway. With the last of the Masks removed from the vault, Forecast moves to rejoin us in the hall.

But there’s a flash of yellow light, the clang of something striking the vault door, and it swings closed, pinning Forecast against the vault frame right as he’s stepping out.

Kiwi and I twist around to see Prophet at the end of the hall. Much of his ceremonial robes are shredded or burned, and most of the armoring on his right arm is stripped away, the servos beneath blackened and mangled by the magrenade that exploded on him. But he’s still standing, staff pointed our way, the yellow light within its mace-head burning brightly.

“Go, you two!” Sierra shouts to Cahriu and Ridge as she moves to pry the vault door open and free Forecast. Another pair of rune circles spin up around Kiwi’s wrists as I reach inside my jacket to pull out my stunner; I’m bracing myself to dodge out of the way in case Prophet takes aim at me, but he lifts his staff instead. I realize too late that he’s pointing it at the ceiling over us.

The pulse of yellow energy fractures the stone ceiling; dust filters down as the cracks spread. Chunks of stone start falling, but Kiwi puts her hands up, a ring of viridian runes forming on the floor around her as a bubble of green light forms overhead, shoving against the crumbling ceiling. It holds for a moment, but the weight of dozens of tons of stone and rock is a lot to hold up. The ceiling starts to cave, the dome of green light bending under the weight, and Kiwi lets out a shout, going to one knee even as she keeps her hands up, hands quivering with the strain of trying to hold up the collapsing ceiling.

I freeze with my hand on my stunner as Prophet lowers his staff and starts marching towards us. Sierra is still trying to pry the vault door open to free Forecast, and Kiwi is trembling with the effort of slowing the ceiling’s collapse; fissures are starting to race across the green dome as it’s slowly forced downwards. Even if I could fend off Prophet, Kiwi won’t be able to hold up the ceiling for more than another few seconds. But if I help Kiwi, it leaves all of us exposed and vulnerable to Prophet.

After another second, I let go of my stunner. None of us can do this on our own. We need to support each other, help each other fight our battles.

Kneeling down in front of Kiwi, I rest my forearms on her shoulders and cup my hands around the back of her head. She looks up; I can see the strain in her wildfire eyes, that wild defiance I’d seen back on Valcorria, when she was trying to fight her battles all on her own. My eyes flick to one side; I can see the runemarks around my wrist glowing a bright blue, so our entanglement is probably active. Looking back to her, I let my thoughts form, a series of emotions and intents I hope she can hear.

Take what you need. You can’t do this on your own.

Her lips peel back a little, baring her teeth, and I can feel that pull again, like something being drained from deep inside me. Heat builds from my runemarks, then starts to race along my forearm again; I can feel it pushing further than it did before, starting to creep along towards my elbow. Kiwi lets out a long shout as she starts to push her hands back up, a second ring of blue runes blazing itself in the ground within her ring, and the dome shunts upwards once more, forcing tons of rock and stone with it.

Then a shadow falls over us, and I look up to see Prophet looming behind Kiwi, the tip of his staff glowing like a yellow star.

He starts to wind his staff up for a swing, but burst of crimson energy slams into his shoulder, sending him staggering back. I whip my head around to see that Sierra’s freed Forecast from the vault door, and Forecast has in turn pulled out a massive handcannon with runes inscribed along the barrel. Those runes glow a wicked red as he pulls the trigger again, and another hefty blast slams into Prophet, forcing him to take another step back. He pulls the trigger again, and again, and again, a steady and punishing series of blasts that threaten to knock Prophet over with every hit.

“Feroce! C’mon, let’s move, she can’t hold that up forever!” Sierra shouts, backing up and out from beneath the region of crumbling ceiling. Forecast is doing the same, even as he keeps firing at Prophet, and looking back to Kiwi, I take my hands from around the back of her neck and loop my arms under hers instead. Getting a good hold on her, I kick backwards, throwing both of us in the direction that Sierra and Forecast are moving.

The green dome flickers and evaporates as soon as I pull her from her spot, and the ceiling instantly starts caving into the hall where we were. Forecast drops his handcannon and crouches down, his fingers sinking into my coat as he yanks me down the hall away from the cascade of stone, and I keep a tight grip on Kiwi. He doesn’t stop dragging me down the hall until the cave-in has started to settle, and I don’t relax my hold on Kiwi until his fingers leave my coat.

“Well, I don’t think he’ll be chasing us through that.” Sierra coughs, waving away some of the dust drifting from the cave-in. “Feroce, get up. We don’t have time for you to lay around cosplaying a mattress for Kiwi.”

“Shut up.” I wheeze, making no effort to shove Kiwi off me. “I’m going to just take a moment and if you don’t like it, you can go lie in a ditch and die.”

“Feather, get up.” Forecast orders, walking past us to pick up his handcannon. “The Lieutenant’s right. We need to keep moving.”

Kiwi makes an exhausted, nondescript grunting sound directly into the shoulder of my coat, and puts up one hand, elevating her middle finger.

“You put that finger away or I’ll break it, little miss.” Forecast warns as he tucks his handcannon back into his suit. “On your feet. We need to move.”

Kiwi reluctantly plants her hands against the floor on either side of me and pushes up, shaking her head. “Never get a moment’s rest around these hardasses.” she mutters. Getting to her knees, she stands up, then offers a hand down to me.

I reach up to grab her hand, but do so with the arm that doesn’t have the runemarks on it. Because that arm is twitching and trembling, and I’m doing my best to hide it. Kiwi notices, and offers me her other hand instead; I take it, and haul myself to my feet with her help. “We should go.” I grunt, keeping my runemarked arm pinned against my side. “A cave-in won’t stop Prophet.”

“You don’t honestly think that he’d keep trying—” Sierra begins, just before there’s a dull boom from the other side of the cave-in. More dust shivers down from the ceiling.

“He just doesn’t know when to stop, does he?” Kiwi says, hitching a hand on her hip. “I hope he brings the rest of the ceiling down on himself.”

“Looks like your friends are just as crazy as you are, Feroce.” Sierra says, shaking her head and turning to head down the hall. “Well, let’s blow this popsicle stand. We got better things to do than wait for the galaxy’s most heavily-armed missionary to blast his way through that rubble.”

“Agreed.” Forecast says, wincing as he presses a hand to his side. Looking to Kiwi and myself, he motions for us to follow Sierra. “After you.”

“You okay there?” I ask, raising an eyebrow at him.

“I would ask the same of you.” he says, arching an eyebrow at the arm I’m keeping pinned to my side.

“Alright, that’s enough.” Kiwi says, moving around behind us so she can plant a hand on each of us and start pushing us forward. “You’re both very tough and manly, now let’s move it along. You can flex at each other later.”

I roll my eyes as I start to trail after Sierra. “I wasn’t flexing.”

“And I was merely expressing concern for an ally.” Forecast says loftily, limping along as another muffled boom sounds from behind the pile of rubble.

“You’re both horrible liars. C’mon, we’ve got a long way to go and a lot to do, and I don’t want to end up eating dinner down in the sewers.”

Event Log: Feroce Acceso

Wisconsin: New Bridsgard Sewers

7:38pm SGT

“Alright, so the Commander’s going to have a team down here tomorrow for extraction.” Sierra says, pacing in the maintenance room that we’re currently in. We’re still in the sewers, but this is one of the rooms that the Masklings had designated as a temporary safehouse in the event of an attack on the New Bridsgard Sanctuary. The rest of the Masklings and Quills have been scattered to other safehouse points throughout New Bridsgard’s sewer infrastructure. “They’re still working on an extraction point, but they’ll have that to us by midnight.”

“I’ve apprised the Council of what’s happened. Local Mask Knights are being mobilized to collect the evacuees and get them safely to the other Sanctuaries on Wisconsin’s surface.” Forecast says from where he’s sitting in a rickety chair against the wall, his eyes fixed on his phone and the texts he’s been receiving for the last two and a half hours. “Much as I’d like to stay and supervise that effort myself, we have more consequential matters to tend to.” He looks up from his phone to look at Sierra. “I assume you’ll apprise us of when the extraction team is ready?”

“Yeah, we’ll let you know.” Sierra says, swiping away another message from her own phone. “The Bulwark’s not done resupplying, but we might have to hit the road anyway. Local news is already reporting on the fact that Songbird was sighted at the Sanctuary, and once that makes it to galactic news stations, you can bet CURSE and their Peacekeepers are gonna be hoofin’ it this way.”

“Sorry about that.” I apologize from where I’m crouched by the wall, unplugging my stunner’s power cell now that it’s been recharged. “I probably shouldn’t have gone out there…”

“No, you shouldn’t have!” Sierra says, wheeling on me. “What were you thinking? A mob shows up on our front door, so you go out there to show your face to everyone? Yeah, I get it, your old battle buddy was being an asshole and you wanted to call him on it. I get that, I really do. And any other time, the publicity would’ve been great for us. But the Dussel Mercforce is blacklisted now, and the Masklings pulled strings to get us discounts on resupplying the Bulwark here, and now we’re going to have to cut that resupply short and hightail it out of here.”

“While it is not ideal, I believe he may’ve bought us time we would not have had otherwise.” Forecast states at this point. I blink and look at him; it’s surprising that he’s sticking up for me. “Besides, even if he had not stepped outside, the mob very likely would’ve noticed him as he was defending the Sanctuary. The outcome would’ve largely been the same, with the only difference being that the public reaction would’ve been slightly delayed. We knew this would happen at some point — the galactic public was eventually going to find out the Masklings were working with Songbird and the rest.”

Sierra squints at Forecast. “I did not expect you to stick up for him.”

Forecast holds up a hand. “Let’s not get carried away. I was merely observing that this result likely would’ve been beyond anyone’s ability to prevent, given our circumstances. In any event, we had planned for this eventuality, and we’ll have a response ready for it on the media landscape. In fact, today’s events actually give us an excellent context for justifying our working relationship with the Dussel Mercforce — and you all will stand to benefit from the Maskling government’s official response as well.”

Sierra raises an eyebrow. “If you all can spin it, I won’t complain. I’m sure Commander Dussel will appreciate it if you can help rehabilitate the mercforce’s image some.”

“We’re certainly going to try.” Forecast replies before one of the doors to the maintenance room opens, and Kiwi and Tarocco step back in. “How are things going? Was the handoff successful?”

“It went well. We’ve gotten the Masks to the first response teams, and they’re taking them to the other Sanctuaries on Wisconsin’s surface.” Tarocco answers. “Last I heard, Ridge and the handlers were still divvying up the emergency rations to the Masklings and Quills, and getting them settled into the temp saferooms. They should be getting back soon.”

Kiwi comes over to me as I stand up, bumping her shoulder against my arm. “Hey there, Blueberry. Feelin’ a little better now?”

“Now that I got some blood in me, yeah.” I answer, slotting the power cell back into my stunner and holstering it inside my longcoat. “I drained my emergency flask, but it was enough to fix up the last of my wounds. I’m still runnin’ low, but I can hold out until we get back to the Bulwark.”

“Well, if you need a sip or two…” she says nonchalantly.

“I could definitely do with a little more than that, but like I said, I’m all out.” I say, winding up my power cell’s charging cord. “I’ll survive, though.”

She raises an eyebrow, then tilts her head to one side. “I said, if you need a sip or two…”

I blink owlishly at her, and it takes me a moment to connect the dots. The way she’s looking at me, how she’s tilted her head to one side to expose her neck. “Oh. Oh! That’s what you meant!” I stutter. “No, no I’m… that’s— I’m good, thank you, seriously, I’ll be fine…”

“Feather.” Forecast calls across the room. “Stop tormenting the poor man. He’s already been through enough today.”

Kiwi huffs an irritated breath, turning her head towards Forecast. “Seriously, Dad? Do you always have to butt in when I’m enjoying myself?”

“Turning down a live sacrament from a cute girl.” Sierra mutters, shaking her head as she puts away her phone. “You’re the worst vampire I’ve ever seen. We need to get you some help, Feroce.” Stretching her arms over her head, she grabs her dress jacket off the back of a chair as she goes on. “Think I’m going to turn in early, since we’re probably going to be up early tomorrow morning. Predawn extractions usually draw less attention. I’d recommend y’all do the same if you don’t want to be groggy tomorrow morning.”

With that, she heads along the wall and opens one of the doors leading to the bunk rooms that line one side of the maintenance room. As the door closes behind her, I give a shrug to the Masklings. “I should probably do the same. Once Ridge gets back, would you all mind telling him what room I’m bunking in? I don’t think he’d be comfortable bunking in the same room as Masklings; there’s still some residual prejudices that I haven’t had the time to scrub out of him yet.”

“Fine by us; none of us want to bunk with the little punk either.” Tarocco says, tugging on her jacket. “Kiwi, we should probably hit the hay. The vampires don’t even need sleep and they’re turning in early, so we should do the same.”

Kiwi lets out a gusty sigh. “Fine. Dad, you mind telling that little guttersnipe what room Songbird’s staying in once he and Cahriu get back?”

Forecast doesn’t bother answering, merely offering a thumbs-up without taking his eyes away from his phone.

“Thank you. I appreciate that.” I say, heading down the wall to the door next to the room that Sierra claimed. Pulling open the door, I pause before stepping in. “Hey Kiwi? Thanks for everything you did today. I’m not sure I’d still be alive if you hadn’t gotten me out of the way of mob when they broke in.”

She stops outside of the bunk room Tarocco’s opening the door to. After a moment, she smirks. “Don’t thank me. I need you to be my new handler.”

Tarocco twists around to glare at her. “Kiwi! He can’t be your handler!” she hisses. “We discussed this, you’re not allowed to tangle with non-Mffmph!”

Kiwi plants a hand on Tarocco’s face and another on her shoulder, fumbling her into their bunk room and grinning at me the whole way. As the door closes behind them, quiet falls in the maintenance room once more; I glance at Forecast to see what his opinion on the exchange is.

He doesn’t move, though his eyes flick up towards me, daring me to open up the topic.

Deciding that that’s probably not the wisest conversation to have right now, I retreat into my bunk room with a polite nod, closing the door behind me.

Event Log: Kiwi

Wisconsin: New Bridsgard Sewers

8:24pm SGT

“Of course, the one day you get new clothes, the Sanctuary gets attacked by an angry mob and we have to escape into the sewers.” Tarocco says, hanging my high-collared jacket on the back of the door to our bunk room. She picks over it, checking the hem and brushing away soot marks on the back. “It’s a miracle it didn’t get splashed while we were tromping through the sewers.”

“This is exactly why all my clothes need to be combat-proofed.” I say from where I’m lying on the bottom bunk, hands laced behind my head. Despite settling in, neither of us can sleep yet. “Show that jacket to the Council and tell them that I’m not some mannequin they can dress up to show off whenever we stop by a Sanctuary.”

“They do it because you’re a legend among our people.” Tarocco says, brushing down the rest of the pristine white jacket before stepping back from it. “You’re one of the few advantages we have over the rest of the galaxy. Other nations have massive fleets, advanced technology… we have you. When our people see you, they see hope. They see the person that protects our people from those that want to drive us to extinction. We can’t have you looking like a slob.”

“If people see hope when they look at me, they need to go see an ophthalmologist.” I reply, watching as she climbs the ladder up to the bunk above me. The room we’re in is tight and narrow, with barely enough room in here to walk between the bunks and the opposite wall. There’s nothing else beyond that, outside of a few coathooks - these rooms weren’t made for extended stays. “If they really knew why I’m so powerful…”

“But the common Masklings don’t.” Tarocco says, her bunk creaking as she sits on it. “And it’s going to stay that way. Only our unit and your handlers need to know. We need you to keep being a symbol of hope, not something they fear.”

“I don’t need any other handlers. I found one I like.” I say, puffing a lock of hair out of my face.

Tarocco’s head swings down over the edge of her bunk, her blond hair hanging down as she glares at me. “He’s a non-Mask. You know what’s going to happen to him.”

“He’ll be fine. You’ve seen what I’m capable of when I’m tangled with him.”

“No, he won’t. I saw how he was clutching his arm while we were making our way through the sewers, and Forecast did too.” she accuses, narrowing her eyes at me. “It’s happening to him slower than it would happen to other mortals — even other Masklings — but it’s still happening. You know what’s going to happen to him, and if you believe otherwise, you’re telling yourself a lie.”

I scowl at her, rolling on my side to face the wall instead.

“What happens when he finds out, Kiwi?” Tarocco demands. “Sooner or later, he’s going to realize you’re slowly killing him. If you don’t tell him, he’s going to confront you about it. What are you going to tell him then? Are you going to lie to his face that you didn’t know?”

“He can take it.”

“And what if you’re wrong?”

I don’t answer that. Tarocco’s got her points, but I don’t want to hear them. I don’t want to confront the possibility that Songbird might not be able to handle this, might not be able to handle me. I need him to be able to handle me; I need him to be able to survive me.

I need to believe that I won’t kill everyone I end up tangling with.

Above me, Tarocco’s bunk creaks some as she rolls back onto her mattress. “Do yourself a favor and stick to the handlers the Sanctuary gives you.” she advises. “They know what they’re signing up for. You don’t have to feel bad about it when they burn out, because they knew what they were getting into. But don’t do that to someone that doesn’t know what they’re signing up for, Kiwi. That’s not right. It’s not fair to him, and it’s not fair to you.”

“He can take it.” I repeat softly, quietly.

Tarocco doesn’t reply, just letting off a soft huff. The bunk overhead creaks as she rolls over on her side, and goes quiet again. Aside from the distant humming of machinery in other parts of the sewers, there’s nothing else to break the stale, chemically-treated silence.

Closing my eyes, I curl up and try to go to sleep.

Event Log: Feroce Acceso

Wisconsin: New Bridsgard Sewers

8:32pm SGT

Rolling the shreds of my shirt through my hands, I have to come to terms with the fact that it is definitely beyond repair.

Most of the front is gone anyway, with the edges of the massive hole burnt and ragged. Not even patchwork could save it at this point; I just have to accept that it’s not good for much beyond oil rags now. Setting aside, I look at my hooded longcoat lying on the bunk beside me; it smells a little smoky, but it didn’t take the brunt of first blast from Prophet. Aside from being a little sooty, it’s no worse for wear; a cycle in the wash will have it good as new.

But all things considered, laundry is the least of my worries right now.

Raising my left arm, I study the damage to it. The runemarks have gone dark once more, burned into my skin darker than any tattoo could ever be, but now erratic, jagged lines have spread away from the runes, extending down my forearm to just a little past the elbow. The way they twist and wind and split apart, they seem to have spread through my skin as if it were a fractured chunk of stone, being cracked apart from the inside out. The marks won’t go away when I rub at them, but nothing happens when I focus on circulating blood into that arm — which means my body doesn’t think it’s an injury, otherwise it’d be burning blood to try and heal it.

I haven’t shown it to anybody else yet, but based on the way Kiwi and Forecast looked at me, both of them are aware of it. And I’m willing to bet that both of them know what’s happening to me, even if I don’t yet. Though it doesn’t hurt now, I remember how it felt when the link was active, and Kiwi was drawing on me — it felt like something was tugging on the innermost part of me, siphoning it away. That itself hadn’t hurt, but whatever was happening to my arm did hurt, and that couldn’t mean anything good.

I’m distracted by the door to the bunk room opening and quickly closing again; looking up, I see Ridge slipping in. “Songbird, I have to talk to you, it’s import…” He pauses when he sees me without my shirt on, his eyes going to my left forearm, and the marks on it. “…tant…”

I reach down, quickly grabbing up my longcoat and starting to pull it on again. “What did you need to talk to me about?” I ask. It’s going to be a little weird, sleeping in my coat, but with my shirt toasted, I don’t really have anything else to wear.

“Hey, what was that?” he demands, scooting down the narrow space between the bunks and the wall, and grabbing my sleeved arm. “I saw the marks, they look like the glowy symbols that the Masklings use for their magic! What did she do to you?”

Reaching over, I gently pry Ridge’s hands off my left arm. “It’s nothing.” I say calmly. “It’s nothing I can’t handle.”

He isn’t accepting that, though, grabbing my sleeve and yanking it down so the runemarks and the black fracture marks are visible. “What the hell is that supposed to be?!”

I remove his hands again and pull the sleeve back down, looking directly at him. “Ridge. It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

He stares back at me, those muddy-green eyes disbelieving. “It’s not nothing! She’s gonna kill you, you know that?”

“Well, she certainly tried the first few times we met.” I say, pulling my arm away from him. “Things are different now, though. The Dussel Mercforce has a working relationship with the Masklings, so—”

“I’m not talking about that!” Ridge interrupts, pointing back towards the door. “I did some sneaking around while we were in the Sanctuary and I spied on Kiwi when she was getting her tests. When they brought out her handlers, she told them point-blank that if they partnered with her, they were going to die! Straight to their faces! Told them the she reason was so powerful was because she drained their souls out of them and used it to power herself. Her handlers are nothing but batteries to her.”

That’s a lot to take in. Some part of me wants to deny it right off the bat. Another part of me thinks there’s some truth to what he’s said, because it matches what I’ve experienced. And still another part of me thinks that maybe Ridge is just misinterpreting what he heard. None of this lends itself to a coherent answer to the accusations he’s leveled, so I instead look down at my left arm, trying to gather my thoughts.

“You need to stop messing around with her, dude.” Ridge says, going on after a moment of silence. “She’s gonna drain you dry, and it’s gonna kill you. Just look at your arm—”

“Ridge.” I say quietly. “It’ll be fine.”

He stares at me. “C’mon, are you crazy? Your arm—”

“I’ve had worse than this.” I say calmly. “I don’t know what’s happening, but I’ll deal with it. Kiwi’s a lot of things, but I don’t think she would try to kill me on purpose. I’ll see if I can discuss it with her later, but for now, we need to get to bed. We’re going to be getting up before dawn tomorrow, so you’re gonna need all the sleep you can get.”

“Dude, don’t treat me like a kid—”

“I’m not.” I cut him off before he can go on. “I’m treating you like a recruit. We’ve just had a tense day that included an unplanned combat event and a forced retreat, and we need to be up in less than seven hours so we can get to our extraction point. You don’t realize it yet, but you’re tired, and your body’s gonna crash the moment you hit that bed. You need to get as much sleep as you can, because waking up in six, seven hours is not going to be easy.”

He stares at me for a moment, then looks away and sighs. “Fine.” he mutters, turning and scaling the ladder up to the top bunk. “But I’m tellin’ you, dude, she’s dangerous. And crazy. And you know what they say about stickin’ your dick in crazy.”

I make a face at him, or rather, his legs, just before they disappear over the edge of the top bunk. “Whu— why is that suddenly part of the conversation? How is that relevant to anything we were just talking about?”

“Don’t play dumb, dude, you know exactly what I’m talking about.”

“Hey, you little punk, don’t get sassy with me!” I protest. “She’s a working partner, not a romantic interest. My interest in her is strictly in the context of helping her find her people’s lost arkship, and her helping us find the rest of the Challengers.”

“That’s not what Sierra says.”

I scowl and lie back on my bunk. “Sierra runs her mouth the way some people run marathons. Now go to bed. We’re done with this conversation.”

“Not my fault you’re a kinky Mask-licker.” I hear him mutter.

I jack my leg up and kick the underside of his bunk, bouncing the mattress. “One more word out of you and you’re sleeping on the floor, recruit.”

“Okay okay fine! Sorry!” he says, scrambling to keep from rolling out of his bunk. As the bunk’s creaking subsides along with his unintelligible grumbling, the room grows quiet once more. Closing my eyes, I draw in a deep breath, then slowly let it out.

I don’t know what it is Kiwi’s doing to me, but I’m feeling more alive than I have in a long time.