Bri had not been expecting much when she started sparring with Val’s friend. Users with body enhancement and weapon construct subroutines were extremely common, and while that didn’t mean they couldn’t be effective, it did mean they were rarely interesting. Bri couldn’t do anything about her experience advantage, but she had restricted the output of her nanosystem to be more commensurate with an E-ranker. She didn’t want to make it easy, but there was no reason to completely crush him. Begrudgingly, Bri had to admit that the boy was pretty good, given that he was as new a User as Val was. Clearly someone competent had been training him for years. While she wasn’t sure if the boy would make Celedon’s ridiculously high bar for achieving E and D ranks, he was likely in the top ten percent of his cohort.
Bri was just starting to fall into a routine of kicking the boy around and getting bored when the pattern had suddenly been broken. He had taken one of her kicks and used the momentum to blast backwards towards Val and Celedon. She had called out a warning to Celedon and followed at a leisurely pace. Now that things were getting interesting, it wouldn’t be fun to end it too quickly.
As expected, letting Val and the boy team up had been extremely entertaining. Considering they had never fought together as Users, they used their abilities exceptionally well together. The boy’s classic sword-and-board build let him protect the duo, and while Val was still coming into her element, she was an effective, if nontraditional, mid-ranged damage dealer.
Of course, the outcome of the fight had never been in question, but Bri had been forced to go harder than expected when they teamed up on her. The Scout Guildmaster sidled up alongside her, his feet settling back on the ground as the air currents dispersed around him. Or at least visibly disperse. Bri had no doubts that he kept some form of sensing and defensive techniques engaged at all times.
“You had to let your stats go up to D-grade there at the end, didn’t you, Cambrisa?”
Bri shot Celedon a look with a raised eyebrow as they watched Val push herself to her feet and offer a hand to her friend.
“Yes, because you totally were using just E-grade levels of control and power to recover from Val’s grenade? Eh, Celery?”
Celedon chuckled as his emerald eyes flashed in amusement. “Fair point. We probably shouldn’t encourage those sorts of tactics by admitting how hard they pushed us, though.”
“That’s true,” Bri acknowledged with a nod. “They did good for a few weeks under their belts, but they need to be smarter.”
“Also, don’t think that I’m going to let your nickname slide. I heard it in the middle of combat too. I would have thought you had a little more respect for a Guildmaster.”
“And I thought I made it clear I like going by Bri. If you can’t remember that, you aren’t worthy of my respect.”
Celedon gave Bri a sideways glance, but Bri just stuck her tongue out back at him. Realizing she wouldn’t budge, Celedon raised his hands in mock surrender.
“Alright, you win. Gaia protect me if I manage to piss off the Tower of Tress.”
The smile immediately dropped off of Bri’s face as she glowered at him.
“You know damn well I like that moniker even less. Especially since it hasn’t been true for years.”
Celedon’s expression and tone stayed pleasant, but there was a sharp glint in his eyes as he responded.
“Your problem is that you think people will have forgotten. Trust me, the masses may not remember but everyone who matters does. Including our newly… awakened friends.” Celedon waited until it was clear his message was sinking in before he spoke again.
“Val will need all our power to protect her while she comes into her own. We can hold nothing back to achieve that goal, Bri. Nothing. Even if we would much rather leave the past behind, sometimes it has an unfortunate way of rearing its head at the most unpleasant times.” Celedon inclined his head towards Val, continuing softly, “In fact, she might already understand that more than you might think.”
Celedon turned on his heel and trotted towards the door. His upbeat persona back on display, he yelled back over his shoulder, “See you all here at the same time next week! I expect the two of you to fight Bri and I at one subrank higher. And do better – try to last more than a minute next time.”
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It was two more hours before Val and Bri took their leave as well. Val watched with a heavy heart as Fynn disappeared around the corner of the hallway, but she understood why she couldn’t afford to go back to her old life yet. And with the promise that this would be a regularly scheduled training session, it wouldn’t be nearly as long until she saw her best friend again.
“Alright, I guess we should head back as well,” Bri said as she started down the hallway in the opposite direction.
Val caught something in her tone, but still hesitated before asking, “Is… is everything OK, Bri?”
The older woman stopped walking and looked at Val in surprise. With a sigh, Bri ran her hand through her hair.
“Yes, everything’s OK. Celedon just reminded me of something that I usually don’t like thinking about.”
Val snorted. “I should have guessed it was Celedon’s fault. I swear, that man just can’t stop himself from pushing everyone’s buttons.”
Bri barked a short laugh. “Yeah, that’s true. I’d say that at least he’s good for something, but even I have to respect how competent he is, both as a User and as a Guildmaster.”
“That doesn’t excuse him from ruining my friend’s mood, though. If there’s anything I can do to help, let me know. I’m always willing to listen, even if we’re just complaining about Celedon.”
“Do you really mean that?”
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“Yes, of course. Actually complaining about Celedon is one of my favorite pastimes.”
“No, I meant about you being my friend?”
“Oh.” Val blushed slightly and looked down at her feet. “Well I know we haven’t known each other for that long, but frankly I don’t have that many people I’m close to, and of those, you’ve consistently had my back. So… yeah. I consider you one of my friends.”
They walked in silence for a few more feet before Val couldn’t take it anymore. She snuck a glance at Bri and was relieved to see a massive smile on the other woman’s face.
“Oh, that’s so great, Val! I consider you one of my friends too!”
Faster than Val could react, Bri wrapped her up in a big hug. Val returned the hug, which quickly turned into frantic taps on Bri’s back as the chestpiece of her exosuit started whining under compressive stress. She breathed a sigh of relief as Bri lessened up the pressure, although the friendly embrace lingered for another moment before they separated. Bri looked uncharacteristingly serious as she continued speaking.
“I… I’ll probably take you up on that offer of yours. It would probably do me some good to talk through what’s weighing on my mind, and it might be useful to you to hear about another Defect’s experiences too.” Bri struggled to get her next words out before letting out a heavy sigh. “It might take me a little bit to open up, though.”
“I can’t imagine how hard some of these things are for you and others. No worries, Bri. It’s not like I’m planning on going anywhere,” Val responded with a wry smile adorning her face.
“That’s true… Oh! You know what we should do?” A familiar gleam entered Bri’s eyes.
I don’t like the look of that at all.
I think I’m going to enjoy this.
“Field trips!”
The sinking feeling in Val’s stomach intensified. “Now, hang on just a mome–”
“Sparring is great, but really the problem is that you don’t have enough experience against E-ranked opponents. You need more hands-on time with them, really get a feel for how strong and fast they are compared to the F-ranked ones.” Bri’s characteristic smile had returned with full force. “But that’s easy to fix. We can just take some field trips out and get you that experience!”
“I don’t know if that’s the best idea,” Val protested. “I still have so much fine-tuning of my equipment and subroutines to do, and it hasn’t been that long yet. I thought I was supposed to be lying low.”
“Ehh, it’s fine,” Bri replied with a dismissive wave of her hand. “One of us will come with you. But I think real combat experience will be good for you. We just need to convince Zavis.”
Oh, thank Gaia. I’m sure he’ll take a more measured approach.
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Val’s fork clattered to her plate, the delicious meal that Wallon had cooked immediately forgotten. “What do you mean, Bri’s right?”
Zavis shrugged. “The risks are low with one of us nearby, and you’ve already shown that you thrive and grow under pressure. If you want to catch up as quickly as possible, this is the right play.”
Wallon cackled. “Being a Defect means being thrown into the deep end over and over. We’re just starting you a little earlier than usual. Plus, taking on some E-ranked missions is just the thing to do if you want to start paying back your debt.”
Kaya stopped eating just long enough to give Val a thumbs up before diving back into her plate of food.
Refusing to glance over at Bri’s victorious smile, Val looked over to Bell for support instead. The unassuming receptionist had the appropriate amount of pity in his expression as he met her eyes, but he kept his mouth shut. Val didn’t blame him. It had quickly become clear that this would not necessarily be a quiet assignment for the up-and-coming spy as Zavis had mercilessly slotted Bell into some of the Defect’s lower-ranking missions to make up for the fact that one of them had to remain behind with Val. His apparent joy at finding such an easy in with the group had been almost immediately wiped out after the first mission. It seemed expectations from the Defects was high, and Val suspected she was about to have more than her fair share of those expectations heaped down upon her. She could count on Bell to commiserate with her, but apparently not to come to her defense.
Your food is getting cold.
Thanks for your support, Noir. Despite her retort, Val picked up her fork and started eating again. It’s really not fair how good of a cook Wallon is. Val shot the portly man another glare, but he simply waggled his eyebrows at her and patted his satisfied belly, as if he could read her thoughts.
It’s possible he can. Wallon seems to have some sort of political upbringing, and there are a lot of subroutines that are a little more… intrusive than publicly acknowledged that see widespread use in those sorts of circles. I don’t detect anything, but that only means that he could be very good.
And there’s the paranoia I’ve been missing from my life. Thanks, Noir, now I have another thing to worry about.
No problem. I’m glad you are coming around to my world view.
I KNOW that your programming is sophisticated enough to detect sarcasm.
Oh really? I must still be calibrating.
Ha-ha. Very funny.
Besides, if you really understood my programming that well, we would have performed much better against Bri and Celedon.
Resisting the urge to fire back a sharp retort, Val silently frowned instead. While Noir still needed to work on how they delivered feedback, they were not wrong. She had a huge advantage over other Users with her high sync, but she was still a long way from using it properly.
You mentioned you have routines running to analyze my performance, right? Anything that can help me figure out what I could have done better?
I thought you’d never ask. With a single engagement, my analysis routines can only do so much work. But we can go back through the recording and I can show you where you missed openings or could have cycled your nano more fluidly. In the future, I’ll be able to build a model for your opponent’s actions and we can run combat simulations, but for now it’ll be playback only.
Ok. Take me through it.
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The Defects watched as Val’s facial expressions quickly flickered through the five stages of grief before settling in on a focused determination. Her eyes glazed over in the tell-tale sign of a User looking at a virtual screen, even as she continued eating mechanically. When her fork started missing the bulk of her remaining dinner, Bri reached over and nudged the plate until Val’s fork was centered over another pile of food. Kaya finished wolfing down her own dinner before nodding in approval at Val and leaving the table, heading back towards the firing range. Wallon stood and collected the dirty dishes before walking over to the sink, humming a little ditty as he started cleaning. An amused Bri stayed next to Val, occasionally moving and rotating the plate around or pushing a glass of water into Val’s outreached hand. Zavis pushed back from the table, his large frame towering over Bell as he made his way over to to the receptionist.
“Tell the Council to start giving Val some missions. Peak F grade next week, low E grade the week after.”
Bell swallowed noisily before responding weakly. “I’m not sure what you mean. Wouldn’t it be easier for someone like you to get in touch with the Councilmembers?”
Zavis glared at the young man before lumbering off without responding. Bell sighed and started making his way back to his usual spot in the lobby. “Watch over the spoiled Peakcour, they said. It’ll be an easy posting, they said,” he grumbled under his breath as he started composing a message to Zyra. He paused to look back at Val before shaking his head. “Well, at least I’m not her. Gaia watch over you these next few weeks, Val. I have a feeling you are going to need it.”