Why am I awake right now, but not being harassed? That’s not normal, TJ always forces me out of bed early in the morning so he can go screw around and make me watch or force me to participate. I open an eye hesitantly, and sure enough the sun is shining. This isn’t my room, yesterday runs through my mind quickly. “Damn…” I sit up and yawn, cracking my neck and tossing the blanket off me and onto the floor, where it thumps against TJ’s sleeping body. He went back out last night when I went to bed. I have no proof, besides the various souvenirs that now decorate the dresser of our hotel room that were definitely not there before. I can’t believe he coaxed me into buying some clothes, I feel like such an idiot. With that being said when I open the dresser I admire my new sherwani. Never even heard of it before now, but I can’t imagine my dresser without it anymore. Looking in the mirror, my hair’s pretty disheveled, and my eyes are kinda bleary, a sign I slept too long. “What…” I murmur deliriously, looking a little closer at myself. I stretch my cheek a touch to make sure I’m not imagining it, and sure enough somebody decided it would be a good idea to graffiti my face. Red dots are all over my nose and cheeks and I have the word 'dunce' in black sharpie on my forehead. “Oh,” I’m rapidly waking up now. “Oh, TJ!” I call boldly, turning around and clenching my fists, “TJ, old buddy old pal.” I loosely quote him, as I stalk the bedroom over to him and kick off his blankets. He snaps up, his hair standing up with several cowlicks, waving dramatically with every moment he makes.
“Hm?” His bleary green eyes look up to me, and then his face breaks out into an impish grin. “What’s wrong old buddy old pal?” He says with a small hint of a nervous undertone to his voice.
“I don't know, maybe my FACE?! Given you’re the only other person in this room, there’s exactly one person to blame. Do you understand my line of reasoning?” I explain, trying my best to keep my rage and annoyance out of my voice. TJ puts a finger to his chin and thinks pensively, nodding quickly.
“Ah, yes yes yes, I understand the rough situation. I’ve gained a good grasp of it. And, you know, WOAH DUDE LOOK OVER-” He points behind me and then makes a mad dash to the door, but his stupid tactics haven’t worked on me for a month. He doesn’t make it three feet before I tackle him onto the bed and we start battling. It’s more accurate to say I just started beating him up, given he seems to have accepted this as his punishment and doesn’t fight back. While he does scream some stuff about how unfair this was and how irrationally angry I was, I don’t think he minds too much. Which is good, because after a minute of playful punches and actual slaps I feel much better. “You done?” TJ asks brightly, sitting back up from the bed and staring at me like a hesitant rabbit.
“I hate you.” I remark with a tired smile on my face, shoving him in his chest back onto the bed. “I’m taking a shower. Pack up while I do, we have to be ready to leave by ten.”
“It’s the words that hurt you know?” He calls after me, laughing in the bed while rolling around like a kid. “I call the bed next time we go on a mission ok? The floor was hard.”
“Go rot.” I tease while rolling my eyes, heading into the bathroom and shutting the door.
I shower and clean my face, get my hair moderately styled, and then have to make a hard choice as to what to wear. I have no idea, which is why when I head back out to meet TJ I’m just wearing our uniform that we came to India in.
“You’re such a goodie two shoes man! Why do you always wear that stuff?” He calls out with a smile, sitting on the bed with his legs up on the wall.
“Theta, Jones, this is White. Do you read me?” The intercom sown into our jacket’s shoulder screeches out in a muffled voice.
“That’s why,” I remark to him with a smirk as he rolls his eyes, defeated. I respond to the communications, “Yeah we hear you White.” I have to stifle a snort as TJ desperately rummages through his pile of clothes which he somehow accumulated over one day to find his jacket.
“Loud and clear Leo!” He exclaims loudly having finally found the uniform.
“Call me White, TJ.” The intercom echoes over to him, and I have to make an effort not to retort about the obvious hypocrisy of Mr. White calling TJ…TJ.
“Understood, White, what’s up? Why’d you ring? Miss my voice?” TJ says brightly, sticking his tongue out playfully to me. He was trying his hardest to get me to laugh on record, but lucky for me I’ve had some time to adjust to all his stupid tendencies.
Mr. White laughs sharply on the other line, “Not quite, right now we need you guys. Target’s been spotted on the Narol-Vishalla bridge.”
“Understood, on our way.” I respond to him, giving a small sigh as I look around the room that’s not packed at all. “TJ, go find the bridge, and if you get lost I’ll kill you. I’ll pack up, summon me when you’re there.” I barely finish my sentence before he’s out the door, like a kid who thinks I’m gonna forget he didn’t pack up just because he’s not in the room. He’s so irritating. There are so few redeeming qualities and moments about him that it astounds me, I’ve met nobody like him before. I can’t tell whether I like him because he amuses me or because he’s a good guy. Honestly I don’t think I like him much at all.
Granted I can’t really keep him off my mind, but that’s more because his presence has become so synonymous with mine that we’re kinda brothers. “Bull.” I say to myself, sitting on the bed and lying for a moment to think things through. When I do end up packing our stuff I notice a small trinket TJ bought, wrapped as though it’s a present. “Who..?”
- - - - - -
I stand on the roof and let the wind baptize me. “TJ, it’s almost noon…” I call out to nobody, admiring the city while I shift my weight from foot to foot. I can’t help but get annoyed at the distinctive lack of TJ summoning me to the bridge. Something specific to get annoyed about I know, but here we are. The mark on my chest suddenly lurches and my stomach feels tight, before I start flying through the air above the city roofs towards the large concrete bridge that stands over a broad brown river.
TJ’s the first person I make out, given he’s waving to me and I’m on a direct collision course with me. I slam into him and we both fall to the ground with a thud, but at least I could quickly get across the city. “Mr. Theta, TJ.” Mr. White calls out, a small smirk on his face as he crouches next to the two of us. It never fails to baffle me how such a tall person can simply appear and disappear at will. It has to be his Emblem.
“Hey Leo!” TJ exclaims with a grin, shoving me off of him and rising to his feet in a boxing stance. “I’m ready to go, who we killin?” He asks with a Brooklyn accent he’s never shown off before.
“My dignity, to start.” I murmur quietly, getting up myself and brushing the dirt off of my uniform. Seriously, TJ’s such an, “Idiot.”
“Both of you, are idiots.” Nia pipes up from behind us, her arms crossed and an exasperated expression filling up her face. “Get it together, the bearer is already in labor. The doctor’s on standby. Now let’s go, the target’s being led to the bridge by Crystal.” When I turn around I see our entire class, my face instantly flushing. They actually just saw us enter that way, didn’t they? I can already hear Thomas snickering.
“Oh, great…The gang’s all here.” I whisper to myself, shoving my hands in my pockets and raising my shoulders in a vain effort to try and hide myself.
“Awesome! The gang’s all here!” TJ shouts over my shoulder, an impish grin on his face. Why was I even remotely worried? He’s here, people are barely going to take notice of me. Why is everybody here? I get that it’s our first mission but in all honesty it seems a little extreme. There’s only one target, if anything this feels way too much like a field trip.
Mr. White starts explaining our offense, and I’m doing my best to ignore this annoying whisper in my ear. “Mercuryyy..!” It whispers a little louder.
“What!? I’m trying to pay attention, this is really important.” I curtly respond with perhaps a touch of hostility. He needs to take this seriously, we have a mission to accomplish.”
“I’m multitasking, listening and talking.” He defends himself with a small smirk, “But anyways, what’s a bearer? Is that a person?” He asks innocently. He’s such an…
“Idiot…” I mutter under my breath with a small sign, before I turn to him and pull his head down so we can talk a little louder. His green eyes are staring intently at me like I’m a zoo exhibit. “Look, a bearer is a girl who’s pregnant and kept in a catatonic state. They have a doctor on standby to deliver the child exactly when we kill the target, and a shelter to stay safe in.”
There’s a loud crackle, as though a thunderstorm started right next to us. My head snaps back up to attention, and I spot Crystal dashing down the bridge. She glances back for a second, and then looks forward to us desperately. “Move. Now.” Mr. White says flatly, before disappearing from my vision and moving in front of Crystal. He pats her shoulder once as she runs by him, and she nods in response to something he said before turning invisible. Our class moves into our most aggressive formation, even TJ moving without a word.
“….No way…” I whisper to myself, my eyes wide as I see an Indian with a thin mustache come to a stop in front of Mr. White. The whole bridge goes silent, several members of our class were ensuring that everybody in the vicinity leaves. Plus…Something just seemed off, given the way those two were looking at each other after Crystal’s mad dash. But there’s no way that’s our target, he’s too skinny. His eyes are too warm, almost like melting chocolate. Rahj couldn't possibly be the person we have to kill.
Mr. White’s jacket shifts around slightly in the wind, making the US flag plastered across his back seem to wave in the breeze. Rahj’s black hair and his baggy clothes both follow suit, and he has a nervous expression on his face that contrasts immensely with Mr. White’s confident smile. The two start having a small dialogue, and I’m sure they’re clearing up the confusion here. A small laugh escapes Mr. White, he turns around and starts walking away. He raises his left hand and mimics shooting the sky. It’s the signal. Rahj is our target, not a person. The asshole tried to trick me.
Thomas is the first to initiate an attack, he had retreated under the bridge and used his Emblem to collapse it. The ground under me shakes and a nearby lamppost falls to the ground with a crash, but Nia does her duty and leaps across the railing. She catapults towards the target with a fire in her eyes, and a flaming kick sails towards the guy. He does his best to regain his balance on the bridge, and in his efforts to do so can only throw his arms up to try and defend against Nia. She slams into him and he flies back, collapsing against the metallic railing which folds like a bendy straw. TJ’s right there next to him, and kneels next to him with a pale face, grabbing his arm and shouting something or other. The target’s eyes widen as well and after a moment he nods, then he gets back to his feet. Why isn’t TJ attacking the target? Our mission isn’t over.
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Two of our classmates rush towards the target, and there’s a moment of tranquility while those three fight that I abuse to run towards TJ. “Hey, what was that? Nerves? Come on, you could’ve killed the target there.” TJ looks up at me with a pale face and his eyes shake slightly.
“The…Target?” He says slowly, seeming to be really surprised. I get it now, he was just being stupid. I can’t help but snicker as I grab his arm and pull him to his feet.
“Dumbass, that’s the target. Now let’s go, we gotta kill him.” I explain, before turning towards the target myself. One touch is all it’s going to take. The target’s getting overwhelmed by two of our classmates, but then he screams out and activates something crazy. Lightning. It arcs off every part of his body and slams into the two close to him before they can react. I barely have time to freeze the air in front of me to create a shield against it, which explodes upon contact and sends me back into the lamppost that crashed before. I felt my back crack and my neck hurt from some whiplash, but nothing broke, so I just spit out some blood and got back up. That destructive power is crazy, no wonder we’re trying to get that Emblem.
“HEY!” TJ shouts loudly and flies towards the target, before landing a solid punch to his stomach and sending him flying through the air. He must’ve used his Emblem to repulse the target away, because he actually disappears from our view. TJ looks down at the classmates and reaches down before looking up to Mr. White who’s only watching from a distance. “Leo! What were you doing!? Tristen and Irene, they don’t have a pulse! They’re not going to die, right? Come on, do something!” What’s he talking about? I walk over to him but Nia gets in my way, staring daggers into my eyes with a cold face.
“Leave it Mercury. You can save him in class, but he’s on his own here.” The air around us gets hotter, and that raven black hair starts to slightly rise, giving Nia the appearance of a predator.
I clench my fist and the air around us cools. “Nia, get out of my way. Go kill the target, get some more credit. Don’t tell me-” The floor smacks against my ear and my jaw splits open, blood spilling out for a few moments. My eyes are wide and I reach to my cheek, which is swollen from Nia’s punch.
“He’s going to get in the way of things as things stand, and then the Principal is going to kill him. So leave it.” She announces flatly, and I sit up slowly as my chin starts to heal up. She might be right…But TJ’s going to be fine. He’s not going to do anything that’ll get himself killed. Mr. White is standing with him over our classmates.
“Their pulses have stopped, yeah, that’s a good way to put it.” He remarks casually, standing up and talking into his intercom. “Tristen Charlie and Irene Mew have both been taken out by the target at 18:12. Moving forwards with elimination.”
TJ grabs Mr. White’s arm, and the two stare at each other for a moment. “That’s it?” TJ whispers to him, “They’re dead, and all that means is a report?” His head rises and he tries to stand tall in front of the imposing Mr. White. “Why didn’t you help? Why didn’t you do anything?!” TJ exclaims, with a hint of desperation in his eyes.
Mr. White simply grabs TJ’s hand and takes it off his arm. “We’re on a mission, this is what you’ll be doing until you die TJ. Get used to it. I won’t help, I’m a supervisor, you won’t have me all the time. Why didn’t you pin down the target earlier? You could’ve saved their lives TJ. What’s your excuse? This isn’t a game, there aren’t any safety nets.” The words echo across the broken bridge and TJ falls backwards like he received a physical blow, turning towards me with a desperate expression.
“Wait…No but, it’s Rahj. He, I couldn’t…”
A stomp silences his words, and Mr. White leans over TJ. “You could. You didn’t. If you don’t kill Rahj those two will die for nothing, and then the academy is going to ensure you’re killed and replaced with a better user of your Emblem." Leonidous's face softens slightly, "So, prove they shouldn’t do that.” He leans a little closer and whispers something further to him. TJ gets up shakily, and takes a few steps backwards, before falling down again, tripping over nothing. Thomas isn’t even laughing, he’s just looking annoyed while he sits on the bridge’s rail and watches him,
“Nia. Get out of my way.” I stare defiantly up to the girl, and she crosses her arms with just as much determination. What the hell is she doing. I’m going to kill the girl if she doesn’t move. It doesn’t make sense to pile on TJ like this. “Now.” I say flatly, getting to my feet and walking into her, our foreheads banging against each other.
“Mercury.” TJ calls out with a slightly weak expression on his face, turning towards me. I glance over to him, looking over Nia. “Will you kill Rahj if I distract him?” He asks meekly, a confused smile on his face.
“Yeah.” I’ll kill the target. That’s not a big deal. I don’t understand why he’s making such a big deal out of this.
- - - - - -
I’m surprised that TJ came up with our plan, it’s too high risk and high reward. The target’s in a lake, we have visual contact, TJ found him no problem because of his mark. Then he refused to report it back to Mr. White, probably because he still feels guilty over the bridge earlier. I have an ice Emblem, this seems like an easy capture, but he has a lightning Emblem. It suddenly becomes way more complicated. Which is why TJ’s going after the target first, I’m coming in as back up to freeze the water if things start to go awry. “TJ, you can do it. I’ll intervene the moment he uses an Emblem. Set your marks.” I call out, before submerging myself in the mud of the shallows, breathing through a small straw. I feel like a ninja. I remember TJ talking about that when we took the lesson over stealth and surprise attacks.
TJ nods curtly, sloshing through the lake and moving towards the target, who finally notices him. TJ throws his hands up, and smiles. The two start talking, for some reason or another. It kinda reminds me of something Mr. White would do.
TJ talks into his jacket, saying something I can’t quite make out from underwater. Probably reporting in, given that the target’s eyes widen.
The first blow wasn’t TJ. The target’s arm bullets towards TJ’s chin, in response he reaches out. The hit lands hard, and TJ’s finger caresses the target’s chin and his mark appears. TJ falls back and bounces across the lake for several meters, clawing against the muddy water to finally get some footing. He glares up and dashes, throwing an uppercut that flies forwards in a predictable line. The guy tries to dodge him, but there’s no such luck. His chin juts forwards suddenly, slamming into TJ’s fist and starting the world’s most brutal game of bounce back. It takes four firm hits before the target regains composure, and throws his arms out, screaming something incompressible as lightning arcs off his arms. TJ flies into the air straight over me, repelling from his marks, and my time strikes. I lurch out of the mud and reach out, freezing the air in front of us. I’ve never technically done this before, but it should work. I can freeze solids, I can freeze liquids, and even gas. Why should plasma be any different?
The lightning zaps my hand and sends my hairs standing straight up, trying to jump out of my skin. There’s a small moment of suspense while our two Emblems clash, followed by a second of silence. The lightning is encompassed completely in a veil of ice, beautifully arching through the air and stopping at the target’s and my own hand.
His eyes widen and then narrow as he shoots a glare at me, opening his mouth to talk. It’s drowned out by a large explosion from the lightning popsicle the two of us were holding, sending me back into the mud and taking him out of sight. When I manage to spot the target he and TJ are together, both have an arm on the other's chest. TJ’s smiling brightly, or looks like it. I can tell he’s faking it, his eyes aren’t all there. The two simply wait while staring at each other, and then the target drops his arm. “I could’ve killed you. Why? Why would you put your life in my hands like that?” He murmurs.
TJ laughs, his arm still not moving. “Because Rahj. You’re a nice guy! I really like you, and if I don’t want to kill you I bet it goes both ways.” What the hell is TJ talking about? He needs to kill the target right now, this is a golden opportunity.
“Yeah…? You’re nice too. Thank you, TJ.” The target says with a small smile, his nonexistent mustache spreading thinner across his upper lip. He turns around, and takes one step.
“No…No I’m not Rahj.” TJ whispers, I barely manage to catch it, I could’ve imagined it. He leaps forward and reconnects his arm to torso, this time his back. The target turns around with his eyes wide, and before he can do anything else I see his eyes fade to a glossy fish-like state. His shirt suddenly seems three sizes too big as his stomach and chest both cave in on themselves as if a hydraulic press powers through him. The target falls to his knees, and then splashes into the lake. His body spreads a crimson color to the otherwise light brown water. When the body passes me I have to wade through a warm patch of water to get to TJ. He’s on his knees, and he’s giving himself a small hug.
“Target down," I report, before wading over to TJ, "TJ, come on.” I kneel next to him and put a hand on his shoulder. He’s pale, and he’s shaking. The warm water comes up to our stomachs and soaks our clothes, the mud making movement annoyingly resisted. “We have to go.” His eyes are locked on the target’s body floating lifelessly in the lake a few meters away from us. I’ve never seen him this quiet, his green eyes are always sparkling and enthused. He always has an energy about him, like a flame that wouldn’t go out no matter what. I don’t get it, what he’s doing right now. We did it, we did our mission, now we need to go home. “We get to go home, come on.” I say boldly, putting some force into my words and pulling him up out of the water. He instantly reacts, smacking my hand off his shoulder and splashing back down into the now red water, dyed with the target’s blood. “TJ?” I murmur lightly, the water splashing around my feet being the only noise that interrupts the silence the two of us maintain.
He shakes his head slightly, reaching up and wiping the target’s blood from his face gently. He stares back down at the lake and holds himself, sitting down and starting to shake slightly. I’m supposed to do something about this. I’m supposed to report him, or something, and force him to come back to the meet-up spot with everybody else. Check the new baby, make sure he’s evolved, get back to Jasmine and head back to the academy. I can’t though, I can barely think straight, why is he acting like this? He did great, we did perfectly. Is the target still alive?
I go back over to it, and reach out, touching the neck. It’s cold and without the fluttering pulse of life, his stomach is concave with blood spilling out into the lake. His jaw is hanging on by a thread, flesh dangles down from his upper teeth. “He’s dead, for sure. We can go, TJ.” I trod back over to him and hold a hand out, and raise an eyebrow. He doesn’t take my hand, and I look at it, maybe it’s because of the blood that’s stained it. I wave my hand around in the water and then reach back out to him. “Come on.” He still doesn’t take my hand, and I don’t know what to do in the situation actually. He’s usually good about keeping the ball rolling. Making sure we’re moving and going things, why does he look…broken?
“Theta, Omega is a success. Where are you, report now.” The voice crackles through our intercom, and I take a step back. My mind feels blurry, and my vision is cluttered. TJ still is down, but the target’s dead. The mission, it’s successful. Our evolved got the Emblem.
“Battleground. TJ’s down, but physically he’s fine. I don’t get it, I think..I think maybe the Emblem fried his brain for a minute? I’m not sure.” I report back, barely thinking about my words.
Silence greets me, broken by brisk wind that hits hard against my wet uniform. I barely process that it’s cold, and look up at the orange sky as the sun starts to set. I don’t know what to say. I can’t say anything actually, I try to talk to TJ and my throat just doesn’t let me. I sit down next to him in the lake, and I reach out gently. When my hand reaches his shoulder I keep it firm to contrast his shaking body. I try to say his name, but I can’t, so I reach further and wrap my arm around his shoulders. He stops shaking for a minute, and looks up to me, his eyes wide. I didn’t notice that before actually. His eyes, they’re wide. He looks almost like a rabbit. “You ok?” I whisper down to him.
He looks back over to the target, and he shakes his head. “Mercury, we killed Rahj. He lived a life, he had a job, he had a family, he influenced other people. People liked him, I liked him, he probably helped a lot of people, but we killed him just because we were told to. That’s all. What gave us the right to kill him? He was a person, just like everybody else.”
“We had to.”
“Why?”
“We were told to.”
“Why?”
“Because he could’ve attacked us with that power.”
“Does that justify murder? What are we going to do with that power? He was a good guy, we shouldn’t have killed him.”
“He could have misused it.”
“But he didn’t, that’s just a stupid unfounded fear. We killed a person, he wouldn’t have died today if not for us.”
“….Maybe not.” The target drifts by us in the lake, before it finally starts to move away and out of our sight. Maybe he’s not a target, he’s just a person at the end of the day. And we did kill him. We killed a person, I think I see where TJ’s coming from. If somebody killed TJ I’d be pretty mad, and if another country did it to steal his Emblem I’d be pissed. What’s different between TJ and this guy? Between TJ and the target? TJ and Rahj?