~October 30th, 138 AH~
~Sector Aries, inside the Mothership~
Zelen struggled against his own weakness, against his limitations and mortality. His legs pushed and his arms flung about wildly, and he made excruciatingly slow but steady progress back up the darkened corridors.
At some point, however, something dark and ponderous stirred within the hidden depths of his consciousness. It was a warning. But about what? The only things here were the dark corridors, the approaching water, and the faintly glowing figure of his—
The figure of Glasswing ahead of him disappeared, into a whirlwind of metal, smoke, and blackness.
The monster that had burst out of the wall looked like the aborted obsidian mutation of a model ES-V. It half-limped half-bounced on one intact leg and a stub that barely reached past the knee. From a deformed central chassis with missing plates rose another stub: just a shoulder piece and shortened cables that should’ve made up an arm.
Yet the one intact arm—svelte and muscular like a bona fide Eidolon’s—had pierced Glasswing’s central chassis clean through, its end unmistakably manifesting a red version of [MISERICORDE].
Unidentified enemy unit ahead. Glasswing… is dead. How will you proceed?
Zelen screamed.
~October 30th, 138 AH~
~Sector Aries, inside the Mothership~
Zelen pushed through his own weakness, pushed past his limitations and set his mortality aside.
He caught up to his friend, just as the latter was about to turn a corner. He reached out a trembling hand. He gave voice to the amorphous fears of a fractured mind.
“Wait, Megha, I don’t—”
The figure of Glasswing ahead of him disappeared, into a whirlwind of metal, smoke, and blackness.
The monster that had burst out of the wall looked like the aborted obsidian mutation of a model ES-V. It half-walked half-limped on one intact leg and another that dangled nearly to the floor before ending just above the ankle. From its cracked central chassis rose bundles of writhing cables, twisting and consolidating into the shape of a functional arm.
Its one intact arm had pierced Glasswing’s central chassis clean through, its end unmistakably manifesting a red version of [MISERICORDE].
“NO!”
Zelen bellowed into the Nexus. Rage clashed and fused with despair until his consciousness frayed at the edges.
~October 30th, 138 AH~
~Sector Aries, inside the Mothership~
“Glasswing! Listen to me! Don’t go any further!”
“What? What’re you talking about?”
His friend hesitated, but only for a moment. The faintly glowing figure of Glasswing continued to advance through the darkness, and Zelen hastened to follow, pushing past his physical limitations to do so.
“I just—there’s—you just can’t, okay? I don’t know why, I just know you’re not supposed to go any further!”
“Where else are we supposed to go? If we don’t hurry, this passage will flood too. Any moment now.”
“Please, Megha! Just listen to me on this. Just this once…”
A pause, in both speech and progress. It was the opening Zelen needed to catch up to his friend. He reached out a trembling hand. But then—
“You’re a little out of it, which is understandable, considering you’d nearly drowned.” With that, Glasswing started moving again. “Just relax, alright? I know what I’m doing. My Spiegel has the whole route memorized, and we just need to—”
Glasswing disappeared into a whirlwind of metal, smoke, and blackness.
The monster that had burst out of the wall looked like the obsidian mutation of a model ES-V. It glided on two svelte and muscular legs that were lined with powerful, functioning thrusters. From a gleaming central chassis rose two arms that glowed faint red from the energy fluxing therein.
One of these arms—the left—had pierced Glasswing’s central chassis clean through, its end unmistakably manifesting a red version of [MISERICORDE].
“No! Fuck! Why…”
~October 30th, 138 AH~
~Sector Aries, inside the Mothership~
Zelen! Your ER is dropping rapidly despite minimal activation. What’s going on?
“Shut up.”
At this rate, you’re going to shut down within minutes. You need to get a hold of whatever’s causing your disturbance, right this instant!
“Shut up! This isn’t about me!”
Then who? And why was he so certain that it was about Megha?
Zelen purged whatever fatigue, stupor, weakness, fears, pain still held him back. His leaden legs flexed and launched into the most laborious of forward thrusts.
His Eidolon sputtered and skidded and jerked through the air, until he collided bodily into Glasswing. The two of them crashed onto the floor in a heap of metallic limbs, in a bizarre imitation of their Arenaball tackles from two days past. The impact from this tackle, however, was far more jarring and expensive.
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“What has gotten into you, man? We don’t have time for this!”
“You don’t understand! You can’t go further than this. You just can’t!”
“What don’t I understand? You’re not making any sense!”
The wall to one side suddenly collapsed, and out burst the obsidian monstrosity that had haunted Zelen’s unknowable dreams. It was something he’d never seen before. It was something he’d seen far too many times.
“What the fuck?”
With that, Glasswing threw Zelen off of himself, and jumped back to his feet. Zelen fell away limply, both body and mind all but utterly spent from the earlier effort.
He watched from the floor as Glasswing squared up to the Syntropic Eidolon.
The Reiter made the first move, firing off a burst from RA [FUSILIER]. The Syntropy dodged this with a casual lateral thrust, then moved in, leading with a naked right arm—and prompting Glasswing to activate LS [SCUTUM] in anticipation.
This was a feint, however, and the Syntropy quickthrust a second time, this time to round Glasswing from his right unguarded side. Glasswing spun to keep the enemy in frame, but this only brought him straight into the path of the Syntropy’s bladed weapon.
A quick jab, all but disdainful in its brevity and lack of flair. The red dagger of [MISERICORDE] buried itself into Glasswing’s central chassis.
Zelen wanted to scream, and found that he didn’t even have the strength to do that. As his consciousness faded, he heard something whispering back to him from the Nexus.
Please, Zelen. No more…
~October 30th, 138 AH~
~Sector Aries, inside the Mothership~
Zelen’s world was darkness, bubbling water, and a machine that needed reviving. Immediately. He forced his eyes to snap open. He forced his mind to clear. He forced his hand to find the lever to purge his Eidolon.
Constriction. Release. Clarity. His was a mind that needed no time to recover, for the pain and hurt it had borne were forever etched within its bony cage. Within vaults of Bone rest the Mind’s secrets.
“Holy shit. That was quick. But good thing you’re up and running already, because we need to—hey, what are you—”
“Listen to me!” Zelen shouted as he pinned Glasswing against the wall. “I don’t care if the whole fucking ship is flooded. I don’t care if you have to leave me here to die. But you are not to proceed down this corridor! Do you hear me? I won’t let you go any further. Even if I have to tear the limbs off your Eidolon, I will stop you. I’ll fucking do it.”
“Whoa, man, slow the fuck down! You’re spewing some wild shit, but how about we take it from the beginning, huh? What is it? What’s waiting for us down this corridor?”
“I don’t fucking know! I just… The only thing I do know, is if we go any further, you will die! And I can’t stop it! I can’t stop it from happening! I don’t even know what the fuck that means, but it’s true, you’ve got to believe me, please, fucking believe me!”
Glasswing reached across and placed a metallic hand upon a metallic shoulder. Both Eidolons shook violently—one from sheer unknowable terror, and the other from the effort of propping up his friend.
“Alright, man,” Glasswing said, remarkably calm. “I believe you. But… where does that leave us? We can’t go back the way we came. I just pulled you out of that mess.”
“Couldn’t we find another way? Maybe push out from one of the hull breaches?”
“Sorry, but I used up the last of my submersible armour fishing you out. We’ll both drown if we leave the ship anyway else but up. But maybe… if we radio for Violin… he might still have a bit of armour left to—”
“No,” Zelen shook his head firmly. “No. Don’t.”
Don’t risk another Reiter. Don’t drag another soul into this watery abyss. Glasswing understood readily.
“Alright, then that means… we have to push through. Keep going. We have no other choice.”
“No! You… you hang back. I’ll scout ahead, deal with whatever… whatever threat is waiting for us. Then I’ll come back for you.”
“No can do. And I’ll pretend I didn’t hear it, so I don’t have to punch you in the face.”
“But you don’t understand! This is—”
“I understand perfectly, Zelen.”
Zelen’s world was a film of tears over hazy green.
When was the last time Megha had called him by his name? Had there been a last time?
“I still don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, but I believe everything you’ve said. Must have something to do with… how special you are. How you’ve gone so far ahead of the rest of us.”
“No, Megha, listen—”
“No, you listen to me. This situation is all kinds of fucked up, and maybe I’m way in over my head. Maybe there’s something waiting down there that can and will kill me. But that means it can do the same to you. And that means we’re going down this corridor, both of us, together.”
Zelen’s hand slid off Glasswing’s chest and fell limply to his side. Glasswing promptly turned toward the exit. To darkness. To death.
“Now, if you’re done moping, let’s get a move on. All this water isn’t going to wait for us. I’ll go ahead. You watch my six.”
Glasswing didn’t wait for a response, and Zelen had no choice but to follow.
The path was uniform in its darkness and quietude, with no signs of the dangers and horrors that had been etched into Zelen’s bones. But as the two Reiters reached a corner at the end of the corridor—
Watch out, Zelen! Something inside the wall!
Zelen grabbed Glasswing by the shoulder and pulled him back. The wall to one side suddenly collapsed, and out burst the obsidian monstrosity that had haunted Zelen’s unknowable dreams. It was something he’d never seen before. It was something he’d seen far too many times.
Determined to shield his friend from the nightmare, Zelen quickthrust forward and shouldered Glasswing out of the way. LA [GATLING] was answered easily by a red [SCUTUM]. RS [HARPOON] fell by the wayside as the Syntropic Eidolon dodged with its own precise quickthrust.
The Syntropy transitioned smoothly into a forward thrust, reaching with its left arm as it did. Zelen’s instincts told him to meet it with RA [BLUNDERBUSS], but his knees chose this moment to buckle under his intense fatigue.
Forced into a kneeling position, fumbling inside his Nexa-Suit, Zelen was forced to watch as Glasswing took centre stage. The teal Eidolon tackled the Syntropy from its side, barging with his own blue [SCUTUM] held aloft. He got a burst of [FUSILIER] off at the same time, but the Syntropy dodged this again, this time disappearing from the narrow arc of Glasswing’s light source.
The Syntropy entered a blind spot shared by both Reiters. Yet both Reiters instinctively knew what it was doing. And both Reiters simultaneously moved toward victory in the only ways that made sense to each of them.
Zelen held up RA [BLUNDERBUSS], steadying himself for the moment the Syntropy re-entered his vision. Across the darkness, Glasswing spun in place, to meet and capture the enemy as soon as it went in for its kill.
Something flashed red within the darkness, and the Syntropy shot across Zelen’s field of view. He willed himself to fire, taking care to lead his moving target. But then the target suddenly stopped completely, and when Zelen saw why, his hand on the trigger froze.
Two teal-painted arms—svelte and muscular like an Eidolon’s should be—wrapped themselves tightly around an obsidian chassis. The Syntropy still had one arm free, one that glowed red with [MISERICORDE], and this was buried deep inside its counterpart. And still, Glasswing held firm.
“What are you waiting for?” Glasswing’s voice broke through the static, strangely choked. Strangely fading. “Finish the job. I can’t hold on much longer.”
And still, Zelen’s hand trembled with indecision. With terror. With remorse. With longing. Then—
Do it, Zelen! End this, right now! For your sake… and Glasswing’s too!
Zelen’s world was a path that had split in two—then come back and converged into one. Only one.
A flash of ghostly blue within the darkness. [BLUNDERBUSS] tore through both intertwined bodies. One slid limply to the floor. The other—the obsidian one—lurched and twisted, still determined to finish its hunt.
Yet, by then, Zelen no longer had a reason to waver. To hesitate. For his world had condensed and crystallized into one enemy that needed to be removed. Nothing more, and nothing less.
Zelen rushed forward and swung with [SCUTUM], knocking the Syntropy off-balance. Then he unloaded both [HARPOON] and [GATLING] at the same time. Then once [BLUNDERBUSS] came back, he fired that too. Then [HARPOON]. Then [GATLING]. And again and again and again and—
That’s enough, Zelen. Save your energy for the escape.
Zelen snapped back to himself. Or was it that he’d left himself behind, only to come back into this nightmare? Before him lay the molten pieces of the Syntropy, mangled beyond all recognition.
And thus, the Warrior stands tall where his Enemies lie.
Unidentified enemy unit eliminated. The kill has been awarded to Kingfisher. But we can’t stop now, Zelen. The ship is still sinking as we speak.
Almost as soon as Silon reminded him, Zelen heard it too. Water rushing from somewhere farther back in the corridor. The sound brought with it memories that didn’t feel like his own.
He remembered the cold. He would always remember it. For he tucked it inside a hollowed-out space somewhere within the core of his being—a hollowed-out space now utterly bereft of its erstwhile warmth.
Let us go, Zelen. There’ll be time later to mourn and rage and reflect. But right now… it’s time for us to move forward.
Zelen obeyed. For these were his Spiegel’s words. And she was the one and only entity he trusted in the world.