Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy: Unlimited or its characters, settings etc.
Discord of the White Knight
May it be when darkness falls
Your heart will be true.
You walk a lonely road
Oh, how far you are from home.
-- May It Be (Enya)
"You're really the one I can depend on most, aren't you, Makenshi?"
Kumo bowed his head with an expressionless "Thank you", not allowing himself to feel either relief that his cover had not been blown, or vague hope that he seemed to be making progress earning the Earl's trust.
It was a good thing Black Wind hadn't managed to thaw out the Magun in time. Not that Kumo could really blame him for thinking that the SwordDragon was about to attack the submarine rather than the satellite. But it was hardly surprising anyway, particularly considering Black Wind's tendency to rashly jump to those sorts of conclusions.
On the subject of making presumptions, Kumo reflected that Oscha's explanation for his actions really proved that people saw what they wanted to. Of course, the obsequious Deathlord probably just assumed that if Makenshi had done something to aid the ship, he wouldn't dare show his face in Guadium. Which was possibly what the Earl had really meant about being worried about whether Kumo would come back.
Perhaps he should be grateful to Oscha for providing such a plausible excuse to the Earl, but Kumo was a long way from feeling anything charitable towards the person who had forced him to kill his own brother.
No, he wouldn't let himself think about that…
The man he'd faced was not his brother. He was merely a puppet, not unlike Crux, which had been given his brother's appearance and memories but little of his personality. True, Kiri had always been the more rash and impulsive one; after all there was no way he would have been able to play the role of the Earl's faithful sidekick, any more than Kuroki Kaze could have. But his brother would never have blamed his death on their sibling rivalry, intense though it often was. The only explanation for his behaviour was that his spirit had been completely tainted by Chaos.
Or at least, that was what Kumo kept telling himself. Anything to keep his pain from being served up to his enemy.
He'd learnt long ago that it wasn't just a question of hiding his feelings. Emotions did not need to be overtly expressed in order to feed that all-consuming evil. The only way he was able to bury his pain deeply enough was to force himself not to feel anything.
It had left him largely emotionless, a shadow of himself, but it was the only way he could survive. It was the only way he could keep up his façade as the Earl's lackey, which he had to do in order to learn enough of the Earl and Chaos to be able to destroy them. And that was his only reason for wanting or needing to survive.
But the last thing he'd needed was for Black Wind to wake up and keep interfering. The outer world children and the kigen artist were irritating to the Earl, but Kumo doubted that they would have been considered that much of a threat if it hadn't been for the Warrior of the Wind protecting them.
Which made Kumo's present task even more difficult.
Over the years Kumo had learnt a few tricks for deceiving the Earl into believing that he was carrying out his orders. He was good at causing a good deal of apparent destruction, while turning a blind eye to escaping people in order to spare as many innocent lives as possible. If he hadn't been holding back considerably, he could have completely destroyed the Comodeen's underground base and killed almost everyone down there, but instead he'd just made a large impressive-looking mess of their decor.
But very soon the Earl was going to start getting suspicious about the way that Kumo continued to 'fail' to finish off the Black Wind and his companions. Of course, it helped that none of the other Lords of Guadium had succeeded either. But even after his promotion for collecting that sizeable piece of Omega, Kumo knew his position was still quite tenuous, and he couldn't afford to allow the Earl to doubt him.
However, despite all that he had done for the past 12 years to ingratiate himself with the tyrant, despite all that he'd learnt about Chaos, he had yet to discover a weakness. But he had a very strong feeling that he was running out of time. There was something about the way the Earl was greedily collecting Omega crystals that made Kumo fear that he was going to have to reveal his hand soon, before he'd managed to complete his mission. There was only so much he was prepared to do in order to keep himself in the Earl's favour. Pretty soon he was going to have to start fighting back.
Either way, he knew he wasn't sure how much longer he would be able to continue being the Earl's pet Makenshi. His mask was slipping more and more lately, and he was struggling to keep his emotions properly buried.
He despised himself for the things he'd done in the Earl's service, but even that was largely an emotionless, intellectual hatred. Sometimes he wished that he'd died with honour in the battle against Chaos, along with the rest of his people, but what good would it have done? It would have been just another futile death that would have done nothing to hinder Chaos in the slightest.
All he could do was keep hoping that his years of undercover work would somehow help to tip the balance against their enemy, and that in the end his motives would at least somewhat justify his actions.
It was a desperate hope, but it was all that he had.
Some days it was all that kept him going.