Descent of Nightmare (Chapter Thirty-Four)
Mar. 3rd, 2017 06:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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saladloveChapter list: https://tanadin.dreamwidth.org/650.html
Map of Kaldriel: https://i.gyazo.com/332b0c0172dcc60acb46
Rough map of Hatu: https://i.gyazo.com/ea4f9f51b9dc7b9d8b86
Chapter Thirty-Four
Traitor
Akrar, Kaldriel. November 14, 2277. Time instance 842N.
He didn’t know what time it was.
It got dark, here on Kaldriel, and that scared him more than almost anything. He’d been captured- like some kind of idiot!- by humans, not even demons, and he was ashamed to say that he’d told them everything he’d known.
But that creature’s wings… what was it? What was that thing?
A shiver ran down his spine and his wings twitched. He tugged uselessly at the metal collar around his neck and sighed, leaning against the wall. Whatever it was, it suppressed his magical abilities, leaving him as helpless as a fallen angel. It made him feel weak and worthless, as if he needed any help with that right now.
If these monsters didn’t kill him, his Archangel surely would. He folded his wings tightly against his back and lowered his head, feeling shame wrap around his heart. How could he have told the demons, the humans, their enemy about their battle plans? Those metal men- cyborgs, he had learned- were more dangerous than anything else, and he had been unwilling to resist them for long, especially with the black-winged angel standing behind them. But he wasn’t an angel, how could he be? His horns rang of demon, as did his eye and everything about him except those damn sharpened feathers.
His repeating train of thought was interrupted by the sound of quiet footsteps. His head snapped up and he narrowed his eyes, trying to see through the bars of his cell into the darkness. The footsteps didn’t sound like they belonged to a cyborg- they were too light- but he still tensed when the figure stopped in front of his cell.
They fumbled with keys and growled quietly under their breath as they struggled to find the right one. He blinked in confusion and spread his wings slightly, hopefully. “Why are you-”
“Shh! Do you want to get us both in trouble?” the other man whispered, finally unlocking the cell door and swinging it open. “You’re damn lucky you’re in one of the cells with physical keys or I would have never gotten you out! IAL is still as shitty as ever despite the name change and the mayor never bothered to fix this place up.” He stepped into the room and the angel stood, frowning in confusion.
“Why are you doing this? Why would a human betray his own kind?”
The man’s eyes flashed faintly in the darkness as he smirked, pulling a device from his pocket. “I’m not human. I’ve just been stuck on this stupid fucking planet for twenty-five years or so.”
The angel’s eyes widened as the man raised the device to the collar. “Twenty-five… are you… are you an angel?” The man activated the device and the collar’s light shut off. It clicked softly and popped open, allowing the angel to pull it off and set it on the ground.
“Yes. I am.”
“How… where… what…”
“Now is not the time to explain,” the man hissed. “We still need to get you out of here. Can you turn invisible?”
“I… no?”
“Dammit! What class are you?”
“I’m an Avenging angel.”
“Fuck! Okay, look. What’s going to happen is I’m going to go down a hallway first and if it’s clear, I’ll come back for you. Rinse and repeat. Got it?”
“Have you done this before?”
The man grinned cockily. “Plenty of times. Come on.” He led the way out of the cell and down the hallway, motioning for the angel to stop as he peered around the corner and walked halfway up the hall. He motioned for him to follow, leading the way through the halls down to the first floor.
“Okay. There’s an old tunnel in here back from before the revolutionary days. It leads to just outside of town and it should be safe, assuming that the cyborgs still haven’t detected it.”
“Are you not going with me?”
“No. I can’t risk being seen with you.” The man stepped into an empty, unused cell and pressed his hand to a section of the wall. He mumbled something under his breath and the bricks crumbled, revealing a tunnel behind them. He stumbled, almost falling, and carefully sat down.
The angel nodded. “I understand. Thank you. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you for getting me out of here.”
The man gave him a tired smile. “Tell Hex’el he fucking forgot me.”
“Hex’el? Archangel Hex’el?”
“I’m assuming that sack of worthless garbage is still in control of the Punishers, yes?”
“He is, but-”
“Tell him,” the man insisted. “He sent me down here twenty-five years ago to gather information and let me tell you I have far more than he bargained for. Alien invasion, my ass!”
The angel nodded. “Very well. I’ll try.” He stepped into the tunnel, ducking to accommodate his height and folding his wings tightly against his back.
He felt the man’s eyes boring into him until he was completely out of sight.
~~~
Twelve was awoken by someone knocking on the door to her room.
She sat up immediately, blinking and momentarily disoriented by her robot eye before remembering its existence. She growled in quiet annoyance and jumped out of bed, approaching the door and throwing it open with an eyebrow raised.
A cyborg offered her a package. “Sent from the Mainframe by Seven. He said he forgot to give it to you.”
Twelve accepted the package and thanked the cyborg before shutting the door, walking over and sitting down on her bed once again. Everex grumbled and pulled one of his pillows over his head, pressing his face into the other. He mumbled something unintelligible and probably rude that Twelve ignored in favor of opening the package.
She was greeted by the sight of two small handheld guns. She pulled one out and noted that it fit perfectly in her grip, and she guessed that it had been made for her. It was clearly an energy weapon, evidenced primarily by the charging port. She set both down on the bed and withdrew the chargers, raising an eyebrow and wondering what they plugged into. The last items in the package were holsters for both of her new weapons and a folded piece of paper addressed to her. She unfolded it and read carefully.
‘Twelve,
I realized shortly after you left that I forgot to give you these. You have no means of fighting long-range except for your kirinax powers, and I know from watching Tanadin that they’re not particularly effective out of a short range. These are energy weapons, similar to those carried by one thousand units and the ones in Everex’s hands. I have provided chargers that will allow you to plug them into the charging ports on your legs.
This might be a good time to mention that we had agreed that I would not change the function of any part of you other than your eye and, technically, I have not changed the function of your legs. I have only added ports to allow the charging of your weapons, and therefore did not break our agreement.
Tana said that Everex might be bitter over not getting a ‘gift’ and while I don’t understand it, feel free to tell him that I cleared his system of a couple of viruses that were probably not life-threatening but were causing some issues with his internal systems. I don’t know when he had the opportunity to get viruses, but he did, and they were specifically designed to attack Hatuian systems.
Seven’
Twelve growled under her breath and re-folded the letter. That douchebag. She pulled her pant leg up to get a better look at one of her legs and, sure enough, he’d added charging ports compatible with her weapons to them.
Technically, he was right, he hadn’t broken their agreement. He had, however, broken the spirit of their agreement, which allowed her to be mad but not to actually retaliate.
He was clever, she’d give him that. She grumbled under her breath as she put her gifts away, determined to get a little more sleep before getting up for the day. She could figure out how they worked and get some practice in later.
~~~
Geluu was pissed.
Their angel prisoner was gone. Stupid awful Akrar/IAL/whatever locks used physical keys for some godsforsaken reason, meaning anyone with the physical key could get a cell open. They couldn’t be lockpicked, thankfully, but it meant that someone had taken and returned the key- without anyone noticing, and there was no way the prison guards- especially the cyborgs!- could have missed an angel sneaking in, unlocking the cell, getting the collar off of the other angel, and sneaking them both out!
Geluu kicked at a rock. It was troubling, because that meant that it hadn’t been an angel. It had to have been one of their own- but why? And how had they gotten the angel out? Getting in wouldn’t have been easy, but not impossible, and he couldn’t figure out how they’d gotten the key or the collar removing device, but getting out should have been impossible without someone noticing.
The cyborgs hadn’t turned up anything so far, but Geluu had other plans. When hunting magical beings, you want a magical hunter.
And what kind of hunter is better than one specifically designed for it?
He’d asked around and had gotten a general idea of where M and Q were right now, so he was headed that way. He wasn’t entirely sure where they were staying, so he couldn’t wait there, but he’d heard that they had been heading towards the nearest orchard fifteen minutes ago, and that was good enough for him.
He weaved his way between the trees, listening and watching for any signs of them. Inhuman voices, distorted as his ears heard one language and his mind another, caught his attention and he turned, heading towards them. It took a few seconds for him to make out what they were saying, but when he did-
“That?” M hissed. “You have that in the toaster? Q, what were you thinking? How did you even bind it? And why?”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time!” Q protested. “Look, I didn’t have much of a choice, alright? I was just-”
“Shh! We’re not alone.” Raising his voice, M called, “Who’s there?”
“Just me,” Geluu replied, stepping around a tree to finally see them. Q shoved a toaster into her cloak and he raised an eyebrow as M looked at him intently, trying to gauge how much he had heard.
“What did you-”
“Not much,” Geluu promised. “Something about some kind of thing being in a toaster. I’m going to assume it’s a powerful piece of demonic bread. We’ve got bigger problems.”
“What?”
“The angel prisoner escaped. Someone that isn’t an angel broke him out- they had to have.” Geluu crossed his arms. “I just don’t understand how they got him out. I guess I can see how they got in and maybe how they got the key and collar remover-”
“Key?” M questioned. “Akrar still has the key locks?”
“Apparently. Scott’s lazy.”
M growled. “Clearly. Did you check the old tunnel Cap used before the revolution?”
“Tunnel?”
M sighed. “Assuming no one bothered to close it in, there’s a tunnel that leads from just outside Akrar. Cap dug it and used to use it for breaking various Black Market members- usually Fan- out of jail. I don’t know exactly where it’s located, but I know it opens up on the bottom floor and was probably just covered up with bricks because caving it in would be too much work and Scott likes being able to sneak around without anyone seeing him.”
“Well, you know more about it than I do,” Geluu mumbled. “Would you be willing to come with me to try and track this angel and whoever freed him? He might have left magical residue-”
“Or a scent,” Q put in. “Raptors have far better noses than you do.”
“Unfortunately,” M mumbled. “Humans produce too many awful smells.”
“I’ll ignore that and assume you’re willing to come with me.” Geluu rolled his eyes. “Tell me, is Shawn better or worse than most people?”
“Better.”
“He’s literally half-rotten.”
“He doesn’t smell like it.” M stepped forward, shooting Q a look that Geluu couldn’t read. “Let’s go. The thought of someone on our side helping the angels is… unsettling, at best.”
“So was you turning out to be an alien.”
“I am not having this conversation with another person. Let’s just go.”
Geluu nodded, shifting back into serious mode. “Right. Q, are you coming with?”
“Nah. I’ve got some stuff I need to take care of.”
“Alright.” Geluu shrugged and motioned M forward. “Let’s get going, then.”
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Date: 2017-03-04 03:31 pm (UTC)“That?” M hissed. “You have that in the toaster? Q, what were you thinking? How did you even bind it? And why?”
“It seemed like a good idea at the time!” Q protested. “Look, I didn’t have much of a choice, alright? I was just-”
“Shh! We’re not alone.” Raising his voice, M called, “Who’s there?”
“Just me,” Geluu replied, stepping around a tree to finally see them. Q shoved a toaster into her cloak and he raised an eyebrow as M looked at him intently, trying to gauge how much he had heard.
“What did you-”
“Not much,” Geluu promised. “Something about some kind of thing being in a toaster. I’m going to assume it’s a powerful piece of demonic bread. We’ve got bigger problems.”
All hail the bound toast! XD
“Well, you know more about it than I do,” Geluu mumbled. “Would you be willing to come with me to try and track this angel and whoever freed him? He might have left magical residue-”
“Or a scent,” Q put in. “Raptors have far better noses than you do.”
“Unfortunately,” M mumbled. “Humans produce too many awful smells.”
“I’ll ignore that and assume you’re willing to come with me.” Geluu rolled his eyes. “Tell me, is Shawn better or worse than most people?”
“Better.”
“He’s literally half-rotten.”
“He doesn’t smell like it."
I now have a mental image of M with a nosegay attached under his hood that got him through the years living in Kyir's basement. XD
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Date: 2017-03-04 05:44 pm (UTC)Yeah Geluu's just like 'fuckin,, whatever guys i'm not gonna pry F O C U S'
M: yall fucks need showers
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Date: 2017-03-04 09:47 pm (UTC)Geluu's saving that bit of information for later in case it's relevant.
XD
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Date: 2017-03-07 04:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-03-08 07:16 pm (UTC)