Chapter 11:

I finally began to open my eyes, to my surprise the person I least expected to be by my side was Mari, but there she was, snoozing off slouched over from the chair to the bed. The thing that I didn’t expect was her holding onto my hand.

It reminded of me when Yuki would get a hard fever, I would always stay by her side the entire night. This made me smile a bit, I patted her head and got up. Taking the blanket that was covering me and I put it onto her.

After that I exited that room, it seemed like it was a med ward of the base. I began walking down the corridor, looking for where maybe Nina or Mertias were. There was no one around, it must’ve been night time then. A bit of time passes of me just pacing around this massive underground base, till I finally reached the entrance to the control room.

Opening the door revealed only Mertias to be there, “It seems like you finally woke up after your encounter with the Reaper of power bearers.” I walked up to him, “The reaper of what now?”

“The man you fought back there.” Finally I figured what he was talking about, “Yeah he gave me a good beating, who is he anyway actually, he mentioned Mari but nothing more.” Mertias took a seat on his chair, “Yeah, he is the older brother of Mari, as to his real name, that is classified info and Mari doesn’t want to talk about him.”

He takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes, “He awakened as a power bearer a few years ago, but unlike the most, he went to the government directly, asking to become a weapon for them.” Mertias seemed really in the dumps talking about him, “He has been the thorn in our sides ever since a long time. Normal soldiers aren’t too much of a problem for stronger power bearers. But he is a danger amongst dangers, his power makes him pretty much unhittable, but he is atop of that extremely strong. The worst thing is that many power bearers joined the government like him as a weapon.”

“So they’re willing to fight and kill so to say their own kind, just to be safe?”

Mertias looked up to me and sighed deeply, “Yeah that is the gist of it.”

“Then is there a way to beat them?” Mertias shook his head simply back to me, “Then what about me? I still have room to grow this my power, so could I beat him?” Mertias put on his glasses and grabbed a clip board, scribbling some calculations onto it. After a few moments he put it to the side, “Well in theory you could, but you would need to be around three to four times stronger and better at using your ability. Which of course isn’t easy.”

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That brought a nice smile to my face, as long as my chances aren’t zero, then there is a way, “That sounds like some wonderful odds to me, don’t you think?” Mertias smiled to my words, “You really are something, you got your ass whooped by him already, but he doesn’t scare you one bit eh?”

“Of course not.” I answered acting all confident even though internally I still held fear of him and his strength.

He tapped my shoulder, “Follow me. No one ever gave you a tour of the place?” I began tailing behind him as he showed me the base they had. At first I only saw him as a person trying to write his wrongs away, but I understood him a bit more and grew to respect him. He isn’t just trying to fix what he broke, but also to take care of it.

We walked back into the medical ward to check up on Mari, just to see her snoozing away still, “You know she was really worried about you once she heard what happened. She rushed into the med ward and hadn’t left your side since.”

“Weird, when we first met she was kind of hostile to me, then after I came here she acted quite different and now hearing this. Seems like it doesn’t add up.” Mertias turned away, “Boy, human emotions aren’t a good equation to calculate, there are too many variables. But come on there was another person that was worried as hell about you. I am pretty use you can guess who it is.”

I traced behind him again, talking about anything that either of us wanted to, then it popped into my head to actually ask him on how I would go about improving my power. “So you mentioned that I would need to get my power to be around four times stronger than it is now. But how the hell do I even get around to doing something like that?”

“Hmm, well lets start with the obvious stuff, you would need to get way better at hand to hand combat. But then to your actual power, I would say that you need to increase the power of the energy created by each of your teleports. Other than that it is hard to improve on your power, so focusing on quality over quantity is your best bet.”

I was surprised by his quick answer, I mean he was a researcher of Power Bearers, but damn to be able to find a way to improve my ability in such a way. Even I didn’t think about it, “You really are something, I guess that is why you were considered to be one of the best of the best.”

He didn’t seem to be proud of that at all. Being connected to the mass murder of innocents still haunts him to this very day.

“Hayato, let me ask you honestly. Do you think I have gotten over my time with the government?” His question was sudden yet expected, and I didn’t really know, at first my first answer would be no, but looking at him now, I would like to say yes, so that was also my answer to him, “Yes, I think you have.”

Mertias stopped, leaning over to a wall and dropping to the ground, “No I have not, during my time there we were forced to conduct inhumane experiments on power bearers. And I mean crude stuff. Ranging from dissecting people alive to forcing them to overuse their abilities to the point their bodies give out. I will never get over what I did. What I did is unforgivable, but I wish now to at least lessen the suffering of all the power bearers I can.”

I stood full in shock there, unknowing of how to answer to such an answer. Mertias sighed and got up,

“Hayato, you are strong,” he extended his hand towards me, “could you help me save as many as we can?”

TO BE CONTINUED…