Sabas paced the canyon, letting his eyes rove over the stone, sand residue, blood, and acid still bubbling away in crevices. The platform was all but quiet. Asimina was talking with her commanding officers. Mihail was muttering to himself. Beyond that, he could hear the remains of Asimina’s squad killing the monsters encroaching on the land, scenting the blood and gore.

Overall, he did what he could to look busy and contemplative, calm and collected. Asimina was still new to her post as squad-leader and she was doing a remarkable job of keeping her distress out of her voice. He glanced towards her again as he walked around Mihail.

Asimina looked like any other fighter who was dealing poorly with the loss of a comrade. The tension sat in her back, and forearms, in her eyes, and spirit. But she spoke with the voice of a leader. For now. Their eyes met over the shoulders of her team and they positively burned with intent. She was raging beneath her mask.

“What have you found out?” Sabas asked, turning away from his officer and looking towards Mihail.

His tracker looked up from where he was crouching before an opening. His tongue wetted his lips before straightening.

“It was an ambush,” Mihail gestured to the cavity in the wall. “The Sentinel had been hiding here for a quarter flare, maybe longer, before the team got on the platform.”

Sabas tracked him as he stepped away from the wall and into the middle of the battlefield. They’d known it was an ambush. The surviving members had said as much. Mihail turned slowly, his soul-sight and Abilities stretched out.

“I’m not entirely done, but here’s what I’ve got so far,” Mihail waved his hands about. “They fought. Quite viciously, if I’m not mistaken. Initially, the Sentinel had the upper-hand, but training overcame his surprise. In the close confines, our people’s best bet was playing for time and attempting to overwhelm him.”

Sabas frowned. “Couldn’t he simply have blasted them away? I’ve seen how much power he can throw around.”

“Only if he can catch them all,” Mihail replied. “I think. His powers are lumbering and heavy. It takes time for them to gain momentum and even longer for them to overcome their inertia was in motion. By the time combat had broken out, the Sentinel didn’t have the space he needed without risking his defense.”

“Sir,” Asimina said, approaching them. “I’d like a word.”

Sabas nodded. “One moment, Mihail. Phineus, with me!”

The mildly addled logistics captain looked up from where he’d been scraping a bit of moss off some rocks. “Sir? Coming.”

“If you’ll follow me,” Sabas said to Asimina, keeping his voice and demeanor as neutral as possible. This close Asimina’s presence was a like hissing and spitting vat of oil to his senses.

With Phineus in tow, the widower’s scarf flapping lightly in the salted breeze, they rounded a bend in the canyon. No longer within sight of their men, Sabas turned to his Squad Leader. Phineus, having been on these kinds of trips a few times before, already knew what to do.

Silently, the Logistics Captain raised a barrier of wind that obscured and hid any noise Asimina and he might make. “What can I do for you, Squad Leader?”

The young woman, her new officer’s uniform still looking fresh, breathed in deeply a few times. Sabas judged she was trying to stifle her emotions, trying and failing.

“I was just wondering what we’re going to do about it?”

“Do about it? We’re already hunting the Sentinel.”

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Asimina clenched her jaw and jammed her lips together to stifle and outcry. “Are we? Nearly a third of our people are simply chipping away at some stupid stone…” she took in a deep breath. “While you, our strongest combatant, spend most of your time back at headquarters. What is the point of hunting the Sentinel if he’s stronger than our people?”

Sabas cleared his throat. “What good do you think adding another fifteen people to our patrols would do? Sure, they might find him faster, but are you certain any of them would fare any better against him? Wouldn’t they perhaps do worse?”

Asimina bit her lower lip and swallowed hard.

“They are our youngest and least trained. They are just as likely to impede a more experienced team as they are likely to get hurt or killed by accident.”

She threw her hands up and started pacing, shooting the occasional glare at the wall of air defining the limits of her anxious energy. “It’s not enough! You saw what he did to them!”

Sabas recalled the sight that had first greeted the crew as they reached the platform. One corpse, slowly being dragged away by those crab-like monsters. The other being picked out from the runnels and rivulets made in the stone as the monsters passed over.

“I remember—“

“Then why aren’t you anymore fucking pissed? He fucking killed my people! And you’re just walking around like nothing’s fucking changed! He has to fucking die for what he did!”

Sabas had expected her outburst and didn’t outwardly react. Instead, he let her speak. Yell, really. She continued for a while, before running out of steam. By the end, she was out of breath, her eyes red-rimmed, spittle staining both her lips and Sabas’ face.

“Nothing’s changed,” Sabas said slowly. “That he killed two of your people, of my people, doesn’t matter. We were hired to kill him and we’re still hired to kill him.”

“Are you going to go to our people’s families and explain what happened? Why you didn’t go into the fight?”

“Of course,” Sabas said. Asimina startled at his response. “Are you going to go to his? It’s easy to stand here, play pretend and call him ‘the Sentinel’, but that’s not who or what he is. His name is Ranvir. He is an apprentice. There’s a community out there that knows and cares about him. He’s a son and a father. Are you going to explain how you killed him?”

Asimina cleared her throat. “That’s not my responsibility.”

“So why does he have to answer to us when we try to kill him? Which of us are in the wrong? Me or Ranvir? We who’ve been planning to betray and kill him since we met, or he who restrained from killing us for as long as he could?”

Asimina blew out a long breath and stepped away. “This isn’t what I expected.”

Sabas shook his head. “The world is hardly ever as clear cut as we want it to be. Sometimes you have to make choices no one likes.”

“So why don’t you fight him?”

Sabas licked his lips. “I know I may not look it, but I’m coming up on my fortieth birthday.”

Asimina didn’t reply, simply looking at him.

“You were supposed to act shocked.”

“That you’re lying to me?”

“I am turning forty.”

“And you look fifty.”

“Asshole,” Sabas let a little smile play across his lips to let her know he didn’t mean it. “I’m not the ruthless son of a bitch I was in my twenties. Too much has happened. I’ve lived too long, and know too many people. I don’t want to kill Ranvir, make his daughter an orphan. Sometimes I wish I could be more like Stelios. How that man remains such a bastard after all these years, I’m not sure. I’m not out there for the same reason I have our youngest out mining. I might hesitate when the moment calls for it.”

“I can hardly believe you would hesitate.”

“I have before,” Sabas ran his fingers along the wooden haft of his spear. The grain told a story almost as old as the mercenary captain himself. “That’s why I’ve been taking a more off hands approach with the company.”

Asimina nodded slowly.

“Also, I’m not as young as I used to be. You’ve seen what happened to Stelios after his fight with the kid, and that old goat is arguably stronger than either of us.”

At that moment, Mihail came around the corner. Sabas sighed. “Do you think you can still pick up a weapon against the Sentinel?”

“Of cou—“

“I’m not looking for reassurance, Asimina. I’m looking for honesty. If you’re just blindly agreeing, then your words aren’t worth the air it takes to form them.”

She actually seemed to genuinely consider what he was saying. A few long moments passed before she nodded. “I can.”

“Good,” Sabas nodded to Phineus, and the barrier fell. “Knowledge is perhaps the greatest burden an officer carries, at least in our line of duty. Mihail, got a report for me?”

The tracker nodded. “I believe I know his injuries,” Sabas nodded for him to continue. “Acid burns to his shoulder, shallow arrow injuries to his side, burns in the same area. However, his forearm seems to have recovered.”

Sabas nodded. “Anything else.”

Mihail nodded. “I could not fully confirm this, but I believe the blow he delivered to the group leader at the very least strained his hip.”

“Very good. Make sure the information gets out to the other squad leaders. Asimina, make sure you spread the information to the rest of your crew.”

“Yes, sir.”