Knights Apocalyptica

Chapter 49: Past

Clouds began to consume the sky as the last of the insects tumbled away to their death. At some point, the damned things broke through Colin's barrier and came at the roof from two separate angles. By the end of the battle, everyone was coated in purple. The fight had been similar to the thrashing mites. However, those metallic bugs had a lot more power and defense.

Erec's Vallum took significant damage; not enough to render it inoperable. Yet the entire left arm malfunctioned after one of the fuckers broke through the plating and exposed its inner workings. The further attacks on it didn't help.

His cloak also took damage. It was missing pieces and filled with new holes. Everywhere they'd damaged the fabric, the cloak returned to its natural green around the edges. It didn't return to the 'camouflage' brown tone until roughly half an inch out from the missing sections.

He took a heavy breath, his hatchet dripping purple insides. Somewhere down below on the stairwell was his war axe.

Even though it wasn’t needed, it was well missed. The hatchet and a fist didn’t do the same level of damage.

With a wary gaze, he considered the other humans on the roof. Alister was at an eased posture, and that annoying cold fire had begun to erode his power. That mechanical voice and that other one were desperately telling him to stand down.

Perhaps.

Maybe he might take a rest for a while until the next battle.

In the end, another blinking notification sat in the corner of his vision; he glossed over it as he slipped to his knees. The adrenaline waned, and Fury fled in an instant. He gasped. Those choices, the desire for fighting, the pure power; by the Goddess, he’d taken a swing at Alister.

Alister pressed the side of his helmet—a dent was present on it, no question it was from Erec’s hatchet—and revealed a forced smile. “Hey, Erec. You owe me a sparring session once we get back to the Academy, alright? I’m going to put you on your ass and teach you to never screw with me again—“

“Hush.” Robin said as that second skin of steel had once more reformed into the custom Armor model she’d had before. Erec didn’t understand what her ability was exactly; she’d mentioned slipping into another state like him—but what was that? His head split, and everything started to shake. Robin moved over—and then gestured for Colin to stand front and present, right next to where Erec sunk to the ground.

“We’re due some explanations.” She said.

Colin looked down at Erec, a bit shocked, or so Erec assumed from how he responded to the order so mechanically. It seemed the trauma of the fight and his fears were still fresh even if he’d faced them.

With fire.

Erec wanted to laugh or maybe cry. Because he didn’t know how to answer the questions Robin was about to ask.

“Why did we charge up here?” Robin started with the obvious first question.

There was a Stalker corpse half-hanging off the side of the building, three legs anchored into the concrete from where it dived the pointed weapons into the concrete. Colin continued to look down at Erec, who remained silent.

VAL didn’t offer anything up. If he had to guess, after the fight, the machine had devoted itself entirely to sorting through the data it stole from that android. Android? Erec unconsciously turned his head to look at the metal man splayed out on his ground. From a certain distance away, it did look eerily like an actual person, dismembered and dead on the roof.

“I—“ Colin started and then stopped. “I dared Erec to see how fast he could get to the roof—and then—“

He lied? Did he just try to lie for me?

“Please.” Robin shook her head. “That is a horrible lie.”

“Y-you dare question my integrity, wench? D-do you know who my father is—“ There was the default response and sort of tone he was too used to. It seemed despite the shock, or maybe because of it, Colin slipped back into his normal behavior.

Erec grabbed Colin's arm, yanking it; his body shook too hard to do much else. Colin looked down at him before grabbing and hoisting him up. It seemed VAL was too busy to help by using the Armor to keep him steady, like usual. No. But it'd sure control it to get what it wanted when it wanted.

“I knew we had to come up here,” Erec said. It was a piss poor explanation, though the truth. He was almost angry enough to try to out VAL, but that was a spiteful and short-sighted decision that was unlikely to succeed. No doubt VAL would be paying attention to this conversation, even if it didn’t offer any of its processing power to help him at the moment; he was sure it wouldn’t hesitate if it had to silence him.

Robin remained silent, her head turning towards the dead Stalker.

Garin and Olivia kept thankfully quiet. Meanwhile, Alister scrunched up his brow and looked plain confused.

How’s she going to react? Would he be censured? Punished? Would Boldwick find out? And what would he think?

Was it worth it?

“…Did you know that was up here?” she finally asked.

Erec kept silent. Confused, but seeing from her tone that she read something in the situation, he couldn’t see. Was she referring to the android VAL killed?

“…Yes,” Erec said, half expecting VAL to intervene.

“I knew you were having the dreams like Boldwick…To think. I just wonder why it was attacking that thing—“ she pointed to the corpse of the metal man. “I suppose we won’t know. Regardless, this scavenging mission is now concluded. We’ll haul that and report directly to Boldwick. We’ve now obtained vital information.”

— - ☢ - — - ☼ - — - ☢ - —

It turned out nobody saw them murder the android. Or if they did, they didn’t mention it. Had VAL known they were unseen on the battlefield? Had it picked the perfect moment when everyone’s attention was devoted to the fights to kill and steal the data it’d wanted? Was ending the android even killing?

As Erec got a better, more lucid look, at the corpse of the android, it was clearly not human. Its skin was metal with bits of melted silicone, yet the wired entrails hanging free from it spoke all that needed to be said.

It’d known VAL by name. Had it been from wireless communication? Or was it from the past?

The worst part was, with Colin helping to drag him back, he couldn’t dig into the machine in his head and make it give up the answers he desperately wanted. He felt… Betrayed. It’d promised that the information wasn’t confidential, yet it went radio silent once it’d obtained it.

But he couldn’t do anything about that yet, so he busied himself by checking the notification. The one definitively positive thing came from the fierce and ill-advised fighting.

Agility Advancement: Rank E - Tier 1 → Rank E - Tier 2

Grand. Something to be pleased about, even with the threat of explaining himself still hanging over his head. Robin was one thing; Boldwick was something entirely else. And he still didn’t understand why she’d dropped it after he’d said he knew he had to climb the building.

If he were in her boots, he’d have gotten more pissed at the egregious procedure break and unwarranted risk.

They reached the encampment and quickly deposited their Armor for repairs. Dame Robin flexed her authority to have lesser ranking Knights take care of that problem—it seemed there wasn't time, even if it would be a good learning opportunity. No. This report was urgent. She dragged them, and the steel man, directly to the command center.

It was there that the three Master Knights argued.

They’d gathered around a large wooden round table; a map of Worth splayed out in front of them; they’d populated it with different pawns and colored blocks. They'd pinned hastily scribbled notes to different sections of the map.

At their arrival, the arguments stopped.

Boldwick gave them a tired glance; the man was decked out in his Armor, though the helmet was on the table on an unused section of the map.

"What the hell?" he asked as Alister tossed the metal man's corpse on the ground.

"Brought a present for you," Alister said cheerfully, giving a thumbs up.

The two other Master Knights shared a look. "…A robotic man…?" one of them muttered.

Boldwick cleared his throat, his eyes landing directly on Robin. She stood straight and made a fist to her chest—the first proper sign of respect, which cued everyone else to follow suit. Though Erec's was sloppy, his body still felt unresponsive after abusing Fury.

"Explain," Boldwick commanded.

"Initiate Erec suggested a small scavenging run; I decided to indulge his request in order to pass on some lessons. He wanted to attempt to lead an operation, and I'm very familiar with your stance on rewarding initiative. The operation began smoothly, as we were still in safer zones, according to the reports. No major conflicts until we reached a building. Initiate Erec looked startled and then ran full speed up the stairs…" Dame Robin launched into her report.

Boldwick’s face grew longer and longer, his dark eyes shuffling between Erec and Robin as she gave an account of the battle.

He couldn’t meet the man’s eyes. He couldn’t stare back at the ferocity. He’d had his reasons, and upon reevaluation, perhaps he should have questioned his judgment in following VAL’s wishes. At the time… it seemed so promising, like a way to get approval, to have an adventure, to get free and do something rather than hiding with that oppressive evil hanging over his head.

“…We found a silent one on the roof—a Stalker. I’ve fought Stalkers before, sir. Several. This one did not fight like any Stalker I’d faced before. It made the barest of noises when wounded. It died with barely a whimper. Hence why I classify it like those; we fought outside the wall. Like the thrashing mites from your report.”

But the entire atmosphere of the room shifted. Boldwick’s eyes lit up; there was a smile. “So you found one out here?”

“Yes. It was busied attacking that—“ she pointed to the machine man. “Which appears to have been irredeemably damaged by the time we reached the location. I believe that Sir Erec had an inkling of the silent one being up there, which is why he acted with such haste.”

One of the Master Knights walked over to a bag—pulling out a cigarillo and putting it in his lips, still unlit. The man let out a sigh, then touched a button on a radio. His voice was like gravel as he spoke into it. “This is Sir Fulton; I’ll be needing six chairs, and a stack of clean paper, some refreshments as well. We’re going to be holding a meeting; no one is to disturb us. Particularly those priests.”

The old man lit the cigarillo as his requests spilled in.

In short order, their small group was pressed for information by three Master Knights.

Erec would have to do his best to lie about what he couldn’t talk about; his fingers shook as they began to take down notes and force everyone to give their accounts.