Hello and welcome to the all new, greatly improved, freshly rewritten edition of To Fight Without Fear! This fic went on hiatus for a long time but now it's back and better than before.
For those of you who read the original version of the Prologue and Chapter 1 and Chapter 1 Part 2: welcome back!
To new readers: Greetings! This fic will follow everyone's favorite Commander Catshark through the timeskip and the second half of the series, and perhaps even a bit further than that! It'll have action, adventure, and a lot more! So please enjoy the story.
PROLOGUE—WHAT THE HELL AM I HERE FOR?
Viral had never wondered about his purpose in living. He was a soldier. Lordgenome had created him to fight, and he was damn good at it. He had served the Spiral King faithfully and with great pride. In his years of service, he'd risen to the rank of Commander. But now there was no Spiral King. There was no Human Eradication Army. Not anymore.
When he opened his eyes, a rare sight met his bleary stare: stars glittering across the blue-black sky, cold and still. Strange, twisted shapes loomed all around, stretching high above him. The crumbled shapes of buildings and massive beams of metal reached up like broken hands to block out patches of stars. It made a strange picture: the peaceful night and the remnants of a fierce battle.
How much time had passed? There was no way of knowing. He could barely keep his eyes focused, much less think about time. His mind was too hazy for that. His entire body felt heavy and numbed, and then there was something else, slicing through the fog, something sharp and burning and much more familiar… Ah yes, it was pain.
Heaving his head up from the back of Enkidudu's pilot chair, he forced his eyes to focus and looked down the length of his body. There was a thin, jagged spar of metal, and it had plunged right through his stomach. The pain was inescapable now as his senses came back to him. He dug his claws into the edges of the seat beneath him as a struggled to stifle the agonized shout that threatened to tear out of him. Even after all that had happened, he was still a trained soldier and his carefully honed instincts warned that the enemy might not be far away. He couldn't risk drawing any attention while pinned like this.
He clenched his fists so hard that his claws bit into the palms of his hands. There was nothing for it; he damned well couldn't stay here, but he wasn't going anywhere until that spar came out. His hands felt like stone as he lifted them up and wrapped his massive fingers around the cold, blood-spattered metal. This was going to hurt tremendously, to make a disgusting understatement. Immortal or not, he'd have to get it out in one go. Gritting his teeth, he clenched the metal in his fists and yanked hard. Pain exploded along his nerves, searing the flesh around the wound. A harsh yell choked out from between his teeth as the metal wrenched free. He slumped back against the seat, winded, stars that had nothing to do with the sky bursting in his vision.
Mercifully, the pain faded quickly—along with a bizarre hissing sound and a wholly unfamiliar tingling feel. He glanced down just in time to see the wound knitting itself back together, torn flesh melding back into place without so much as a scratch left behind. It was certainly a strange sight, although he probably would have found it more notable if he hadn't already witnessed firsthand the fall of an empire just hours earlier.
"So this is immortality, huh? Still hurts like hell," Viral growled bitterly.
Now that the pain had subsided and his mind had cleared, the memories of that night began to return to him. They were chaotic, harsh, but one truth echoed in his thoughts: The Spiral King was dead. He'd seen it happen right before his own eyes. That accursed child, Simon, had killed him with that little drill—plunged it into his chest and drilled a hole right through him. And the warped metal spires above him, the shattered structures… they were the ruins of Teppelin.
Viral lay there under the stars, sheltered within the shattered cockpit of Enkidudu, and he waited for the grief, for the anger… but what he actually felt was a heavy, deadening numbness. It burdened his whole body like a metal shell and wrapped around his heart like a shroud. He just felt empty.
With a loud grunt, he lifted himself out of the cockpit and stood atop Enkidudu, taking stock of his situation. For a moment, he simply stood there and looked up at the stars. Military life didn't leave much time for stargazing. Besides which, most Beastmen rested at night. As soon as the sun set, they usually halted their operations. Only the nocturnal breeds stayed awake to see it. But now Viral had a body that needed no sleep and would never grow tired. He could look at the stars all he wanted now… for the rest of eternity.
His mind went back to that day, when Lordgenome had brought him into the stasis chamber… the day he'd learned the truth… and then mere hours ago, when he'd faced off against Gurren Lagann one final time, and the words that the Spiral King had said to him… Again he waited to feel something—fury, loss, guilt, anything at all. And again, all he felt was a gaping hollowness like the weight of a Ganmen sitting on his chest.
"Damn it," he muttered. Off in the distance, he spotted the flickering orange lights of several large campfires and the glow of Ganmen eyes—the victorious apes were celebrating, no doubt. Viral stared at the gleaming, flickering lights, unmoving for a moment, mouth pressed together in a tight line. Tearing his eyes away, he turned his attention to Enkidudu's condition: There was rubble piled atop its legs and both of its right arms—nothing it couldn't have handled under normal conditions, but it'd taken a beating in the fall from Teppelin's heights.
"Hmm." He strode down Enkidudu's upper left arm and started heaving away all the debris he could lift. Some of it was beyond even his own considerable strength; he'd have to coax his Ganmen into movement if he hoped to free the mecha and leave this hellhole. He lost track of time as he worked, but eventually, he'd cleared as much debris from his Ganmen's arms as he could manage.
Hiking back up its arm, he dropped back down into Enkidudu's cockpit and laid back on the seat, slipping his hands into the control handles. At his practiced touch, the mecha's display screens lit up, their vibrant colors shot through with cracks and gaping, dark holes.
"Good. You're not dead, either," Viral murmured. He gently pulled the handles back. The Ganmen shuddered beneath him, but didn't stir from its place on the ground. "It's up to you now, Enkidudu," he growled, pulling the left handle back. "I did all I could on my own."
The Ganmen's right arms gave a spasm and low, metallic groan. Slowly, the arms lifted. He maneuvered the arms across the Ganmen's chest and seized a long, twisted beam of metal lying across its right arms. Its two sets of fingers closed on the beam, dragging it slowly upward. The gears and mechanisms in the left arms let out a grinding whine as they strained against the beam. Viral gripped the handle even more tightly, baring his teeth. Finally, the beam lifted up into the air. The corner of Viral's mouth tugged up in a grimly satisfied smirk. Nothing was going to keep Enkidudu down for long! He gave the handle a shove and the right hands shoved the beam away, letting it crash down among the rubble beside the Ganmen.
Once all four arms were free, all he needed to do was get its legs cleared—and that'd mean getting the damn thing partially upright. As he thrust the handles upward, the Ganmen shuddered and its mechanisms screeched in protest.
"Come on!" Viral snarled. "I know you can damn well do this!" He pushed the handles harder still and at last, the Ganmen stirred, quaking as its torso lurched up off the ground. He braced it with its battered hands against the ground, pushing it up to a sitting position. Shards of warped metal and shattered screen fragments rained down as the cockpit came upright once more. Once he'd stabilized it, he gingerly cleared away the debris pinning its legs, careful not to stress its fractured arms too greatly.
"Get up, Enkidudu," he growled to the Ganmen. He pulled the control handles up again and the Ganmen rocked forward, rising slowly. Its legs groaned under the weight of its body as it clambered upright, standing tall amid Teppelin's wreckage. He could only hope the humans were too busy celebrating to take notice of his less than stealthy escape. The Ganmen swayed dangerously but Viral steadied it with a skilled hand. He wouldn't be much of a pilot if he couldn't handle a damaged Ganmen.
After a bit of searching he found his four swords scattered nearby—all of them miraculously unbroken. He found them one by one and sheathed them.
He glanced over at the humans' camp again, and decided to go the opposite direction. He wasn't in the mood to deal with them again so soon, nor was his Ganmen in any fit state for a fight. The humans had taken everything else from him; he wasn't going to let them take his Ganmen, too. As he turned Enkidudu around, though, he gave a moment's pause. He contemplated the destruction spread out before him—the remnants of the empire he'd known his entire life. It was nothing now—just warped metal and shattered glass. And beneath it, jumbled in with the rest of the refuse… the bodies of countless Beastmen soldiers. So many generations of Beastmen had fought and died and strived to protect this empire, to serve the king who had given life to them. They had guarded the Spiral King for all that time, and now they lay entombed beneath its ruins. The sudden thought sent a cold rush down his spine and raised his hackles.
"I'm standing in a graveyard, aren't I?" he murmured to himself. Coldness gripped him, and he told himself stiffly, "Even more of a reason to get out." What place did an immortal have in a graveyard, anyway? It was almost a mockery of the natural life cycle—a mockery of the Beastmen whose corpses now filled the ruins, their lives sacrificed for the Spiral King and all of his secrets… secrets that now rested with Viral. The coldness grew around him and he bared his teeth in a snarl.
He gave it all one last look; he took one final account of what had been his whole existence. He guided his Ganmen through the destruction to its very edge—and then, Viral turned his back on the ruins of Teppelin.
He knew he'd have to find his way to a military outpost next. Enkidudu wouldn't last much longer without proper repairs. His mecha was all he had left; he'd be damned if he let it fall apart now.
It was a two-day journey traveling east to the outpost. The whole way there, he tried to prepare himself for what he'd find. How much would they know of what had happened? When he arrived, the gorilla Beastman in charge of the Ganmen maintenance hangar thankfully skipped the pleasantries and got right to the point.
"Viral! What the hell is going on at the capital?" the gorilla boomed, his heavy brow furrowed in alarm. "We got some garbled transmissions here from Teppelin two days ago, and we've been picking up scraps of fucked-up communications from troops in the field. None of it makes sense!"
Images flashed in Viral's mind at those words—the battle, the core drill, the collapse. His upper lip twitched, revealing his teeth for a second.
"Of course it doesn't make sense," Viral muttered. "It isn't something that should've happened. It shouldn't ever have been possible."
"Quit talking in circles! What's going on in the capital?!" the gorilla demanded.
"The capital…" The debris field filled his memories again, that warped graveyard and the bodies it hid. His stomach twisted, but then that heavy numbness deadened it again.
"Well? What about it?" the gorilla pressed, his heavy, jutting brow furrowing in confusion.
"There is no capital! Not anymore," Viral shot back angrily.
The technician snorted, his wide nostrils flaring. "Don't bullshit, Viral."
"As if I would! Teppelin—" He froze, just for a heartbeat of a moment. The words stuck in his throat, as if saying them would give them a power they hadn't possessed till this moment. The gorilla gaped at him, still waiting for an answer that wouldn't even begin to make sense of the questions he was asking. Viral leveled his chin and spoke again. "Teppelin has fallen. Lordgenome is dead. I… witnessed it myself." His jaw tensed, his claws flexing.
"Huh?!" gasped the gorilla. "Dead? But how?! No one can kill Lordgenome! He's lived for a thousand years, who could ever-?"
"It was the humans. The resistance." Viral's voice sounded distant in his own ears, as if someone else were saying these bizarre words.
"The humans? You mean—that little brat, Simon?! That whelp and his half-assed crew? Th-that's impossible!" the gorilla sputtered. Impossible… He'd used that word himself quite a few times in his dealings with the arrogantly named Dai-Gurren Brigade. He'd always been proven wrong.
"Oh, impossible? You think so? Then you're another one who underestimated the naked apes," Viral sneered. He brushed past the gorilla and walked through the hangar, his steps dragging and his chest like lead. He'd see to Enkidudu's repairs shortly; right then, he'd have killed for a glass of cold water. His throat was parched and coated in dust.
Two more days passed. It took that long to find certain replacement parts for Enkidudu. He'd overseen most of the repairs himself; as a pilot, his mecha was his own responsibility. Now, as a technician finished up a few last repairs, Viral gathered supplies for the days ahead. He entered the Ganmen hangar with a load of food and ammunition, passing by a wolf female who gestured him over.
"The repairs are finished, Commander," she called to him.
"There's no use in calling me that anymore," Viral commented as he walked over to his mecha.
"Oh—I… I guess that's right," she agreed morosely, her pointed ears drooping. Viral climbed up, dumping his newly acquired supplies into the cockpit. "What do you think will happen now?" she wondered.
"Hell if I know," Viral replied shortly. Then he reined in his temper and nodded to her. "Thank you for your assistance." And with that, he walked his Ganmen through the doors of the outpost's hangar and out into the sunlight.
After some time had rolled by, he paused and turned Enkidudu back for just a moment. The outpost had nearly vanished from sight already; it was little more than a black lump in the distance. And ahead of him, there was… nothing. Just the vast, sprawling, rocky emptiness of the desert wastelands, with some dark mountains rising high on the horizon. He'd been on his own in the wilderness before, of course—but never like this. Never without orders. He had no directive, and there would be none coming. He'd have to make his own directives from now on. His upper lip curled back and he scoffed under his breath. There was nothing for it; he shoved the control handles forward and guided Enkidudu out into the wastelands.
A few weeks passed. The days crawled by in agonizing boredom. With literally nothing to keep him busy, Viral did whatever he could to piss the hours away… and to stop himself from thinking about that night, the final hours of Teppelin. The final hours of his entire life's purpose.
Sometimes he'd switch on Enkidudu's scanners and sweep for life forms—human, Beastman, or otherwise. Sometimes he'd study the digital maps of whatever barren stretch of rocks he found himself trekking across. Sometimes, to keep his fighting skills sharp, he'd practice his Ganmen combat expertise on the terrain—which really just meant he'd stomp the hell out of whatever rocks and plants were around. Not that they put up much of a challenge. Hunting became a welcome break in the monotony, and he'd put as much energy and skill into it as he possibly could. He knew he'd hit a low point when he spent so long stalking a grape-hippo that the sun set and the damn thing went to sleep. He hadn't even bothered to kill it at that point.
And on the subject of sleeping: he just flat-out didn't. There was no need, and when he did, all he got from it was swarms of hideously guilt-laden dreams—he'd see himself back at Teppelin, or at Adiane's side, or at Thymilph's, failing at all times to do his duty and protect them. Sometimes he'd picture the day that he'd disobeyed Cytomander, the very moment that had led him to question Lordgenome and bring this immortal curse down upon himself. Only it was even worse in the dreams, of course. Everything was off-balance and ten times more appalling than it had been in reality. So why bother with sleep?
Eating and drinking were another matter. He knew he didn't technically have to do either anymore. He would never have to worry about starvation or dehydration again. It was a pleasant habit, though, so he kept doing it. Sure, he didn't need it, but there was something so satisfying about freshly butchered meat roasted to perfection, and he had precious little satisfaction in this new life of his.
But then, when his supply of arrows and ammunition ran out after a few weeks, a brand new thought entered his mind: what if he simply didn't eat? What would happen? So, he gave it a shot. He'd gone without food before, after all. There had been a few times during his career as a soldier when he'd found himself out in the wilderness, in a particularly desolate area without hunting ammunition and only his claws and teeth to catch what little prey he could find. It wasn't a particularly dignified way to keep food in his belly, but it had sufficed. The most recent time, of course, had been after the battle that had killed Thymilph. Enkidu had been flung away from the battle, hurled across the landscape by an errant hit from Dai-Gunzan's arms. Viral had been left to limp out of the wastes in his battered Ganmen, barely able to hunt from his injuries. It had taken days (although it would've taken far longer if not for his considerable survival skills).
As such, he figured it wouldn't be too hard to go without. The feelings of hunger he got now were just remnants of his mortality, surely. He told himself that, much like his mind, his body simply hadn't adjusted to its new reality yet. He would learn to ignore them. It was easy enough, at first. He pushed the hunger pangs out of his mind, telling himself it was just a memory, nothing more. His body would surely come to recognize the new status quo sooner or later.
And then it all went downhill. As the weeks passed, he felt his strength sapping more and more. As his body weakened, time seemed to slow to a crawl. Without the energy to keep himself occupied, all he could do was sit there in Enkidudu's cockpit, barely able to pilot and with only his thoughts to distract him. Basically, his experiment in foodless living had turned into a disaster.
"Damn it all," he growled. After a month without food or water, he sat slumped inside the cockpit, dragging Enkidudu along one agonizingly slow step at a time. He knew he wouldn't have any strength at all soon; he had to get himself fed and watered or he'd end up stranded in the middle of nowhere, too weak to move but unable to die.
Of course, just his luck, he'd ended up in a dry, desolate area without the water or vegetation to draw in prey species. The few rodent and lizard species that scampered between the dusty rocks were too quick for him to catch in this state, and too small to be blasted with any of Enkidudu's weapons. It was at the edge of his strength, just as he was wondering how long he'd be stuck out there, that he finally had a break.
He found a tiny stream winding its way out from a jumble of rocks. It was muddy and sluggish, barely a trickle, but he followed it like it was the path to paradise. Eventually it grew, joined by a bigger creek as more and more shrubs grew up around it, and eventually it led him to a pond, and not even the thick algae choking the water's surface could disguise the darting shapes of fish swimming within. He knew he wasn't going to be doing any fishing in his condition, so there was nothing else for it: he powered up Enkidudu's right shoulder turret and blasted the pond. With an earth-shaking boom, steam sprayed up like a geyser, and boiling water and a hail of dead fish rained down on the mecha.
It must have taken at least half an hour, but he managed to drag himself down from Enkidudu's cockpit and gather a heaping pile of dead fish. It was a regrettable waste; normally he'd never do something so drastic—but then, these were unusual circumstances. He devoured two smaller fish raw, forcing himself to withstand the cold, slippery meat, and then he had the strength to build a fire. He cooked three more fish, savoring the smoky flavor and mentally deriding himself for letting it get to this point. Still, he hadn't risen to the rank of Commander by repeating foolish mistakes. Lesson learned.
Three months passed. Left to their own devices, the Beastmen had reluctantly begun to carve out a life for themselves beyond the military. Some had set up their new homes in the old army outposts; he'd even heard rumors that some were eking out a living on the edges of the Teppelin ruins. But many had set up new settlements, small but quick-growing villages that peppered the deserts, mixed in among the ever-increasing numbers of human towns.
Once again, Viral found himself wandering towards one of the Beastman settlements that had sprung up in the wilderness. This was one of the largest settlements he'd seen thus far. He left Enkidudu at the perimeter and passed through the gate under the watchful eye of four guards. They sat in two rickety towers on either side of the gate, clutching rifles and staring down at him warily. He knew there'd be other guards on duty around the hastily built perimeter wall. He'd already seen one skirmish between the citizens of a Beastman town and a ragtag force of vengeful humans. Lordgenome's troops had faced attacks from renegade naked apes many times, but that was before the humans had unlocked this hidden power of theirs. It was before the apes had started stealing Ganmen… before anyone besides Lordgenome himself knew the words "Spiral power"…
Now, after the defeat, Viral found that his fellow Beastmen were afraid of these damned apes. Oh, there was certainly anger, too; in every village, he heard furious words being flung around, bitter cries of foul play and enraged threats of reprisal. There had even been a few disorganized counterattacks, or so he'd heard. But only a few.
He never stayed in any of these places for long. Once, half a month ago, he'd remained in a Beastman village for two weeks. That was the longest he'd stayed put in any one spot since Teppelin's defeat. He always usually ended up leaving after a day or two; and now, he remembered why and was beginning to think that this excursion would end the same way.
He sat at the bar of the village's tavern. He kept his head down, mostly, his eyes on the mug of ale clenched in his hands—but his ears were wide open, listening carefully.
"Those damned naked apes!" slurred an extremely drunk anteater. The Beastman slumped against the bar next to Viral. With one hairy hand, he gripped a battered tin mug of ale that he slurped from loudly; with the other, he clutched at Viral's sleeve while he ranted woefully at him. "We was the… the greatest! Our unit was the greatest… ever! No… no de—no def… We never lost not once! Then those ugly naked apes stole—They stole from us! They…what'd they steal? The thing, what's the thing…The big things?"
"Ganmen. They stole Ganmen from us," Viral muttered bitterly, taking a swig of his own ale. Drinking, he had to admit, had lost some of its charm. He hadn't liked to get drunk too often, but now he couldn't even do that properly anymore. His body metabolized the alcohol so quickly that the buzz didn't last very long.
"Yes! Our shiny mechas! They stole our shiny mechas!" The anteater let out a sob and pressed his long-snouted face against Viral's shoulder, sniffling noisily. Viral grimaced and gave the anteater a light shove with his knuckles. The weeping Beastman slid off his shoulder and his head plunked down on the dirty, sticky bar.
"Those filthy ape idiots, they never would've had the courage to rise up like that if they hadn't stolen our Ganmen from us! To think they'd attack us with our own mechas," snarled a rabbit female, sitting at a table behind Viral. He spared a brief glance at her over his shoulder, seeing her ears twitch in fury. He could've pointed out the contradiction there—that stealing the Ganmen was really the cleverest decision that the reckless humans had ever made. But there was a barb of truth to her words that struck deep in his mind and burned there, stirring up memories from those last days of the empire.
She was right—without the Ganmen, the human rebellion never would have made it out of Ritona Village. They'd have been annihilated, just like all the other humans that had found their way to the surface. And to think, he'd been there when it all started. He'd been a witness to the beginning of the empire's downfall. Kamina and Simon… they'd been the first to steal Ganmen. Viral had lost his chance to end the rebellion; and the worst part was, he'd had no idea what that one failure would lead to.
His fingers clenched around the tin cup. There were secrets we never knew about them, he thought bitterly. Secrets that the Spiral King had deliberately kept from them… His grip on the cup tightened even more, his claws denting the thin metal.
"We… we oughta go and show 'em what happens to apes that mess with Beastmen!" the anteater snarled, thumping his fists on the bar.
"These apes think they're so mighty, after Teppelin," the rabbit scoffed. "It'd be as much as they deserved if we gathered ourselves up and went after them!"
Viral's claws dug into the grimy wood atop the bar. Futile… it'd be so futile… it always was, right from the start! he thought, his gut churning with the frustration and rage that had simmered in him for months. Victory was never an option for us!
"That new capital city they're building, it's not too far from here," the rabbit went on. "And there're plenty of other towns like this around here. We should strike now, while their attention is on rebuilding!"
Viral flexed his claws, gouging the top of the bar. "So do it, then!" He could feel the eyes of the other Beastmen latch onto him at his growled outburst.
"What's that?" snapped the rabbit.
"If the humans piss you off so much, then go strike back at them," Viral said, not even bothering to turn around. "Go ahead and do it, and be cut down before you've even laid a scratch on Gurren Lagann."
"How dare you!" exclaimed a crow, jumping up from a table behind the rabbit. "Are you on their side, huh?!" The bird Beastman clacked its beak furiously at him.
"Even if we're killed, isn't it worth it? Isn't it right for us to risk our lives to avenge our leader—the man who gave us life?!" the rabbit demanded.
"Oh? You're really so eager to die pointlessly, just like the rest?" he shot back, his upper lip curling to show his teeth.
"Pointlessly?!" The rabbit eyed him coldly for a moment before she spoke again. "I know who you are. You're former Commander Viral, isn't that right?"
"Hm." Viral drained the last of his drink and set the cup down firmly.
"Weren't you at the battle of Teppelin? A gorilla in the east told me you were there," she said, her tone heavy with suspicion.
He stared at her through slitted eyes before he replied. "There… were many Beastmen at Teppelin."
"And most of them died. The battle of Teppelin was a massacre, that's what I heard." Her eyes narrowed. "So few survivors… how is it that you were one of them, hmm? Someone like you, who ranked so highly? I heard you were there when Lordgenome fell. How was it that you survived when so many didn't?"
"I won't let you sit there and talk about something you don't understand!" Viral hissed. "You don't even have any idea what they all really died for!"
"They died for their King!" the rabbit shouted. "You couldn't even do that much, like a proper soldier should!"
Viral snarled and leaped to his feet, blood pounding with rage, reaching back for his cleaver—only to find himself grasping empty air. Ah, of course—he'd left it with Enkidudu. He'd gotten out of the habit of carrying it, these days. What was the point, when he had no need to defend his life anymore?
The rabbit had sprung up from her seat, too. In the dim light of the bar, her bared claws glinted from the white fur of her paws.
"Get out of here, traitor," she hissed, "Before I rip your eyes out and feed them to you! Mangy cat!"
"Tch!" He straightened his back, lifting his chin to glare at her. Pathetic pipsqueaks like this weren't worth his time. Without another word, he tossed some coins on the counter to pay for his drink and strode out into the blazing sunlight. He could feel their cold, angry stares knifing into his back.
As he stalked back to Enkidudu, the rabbit's words echoed in his mind. You couldn't even do that much, like a proper soldier should! That was right… he'd been denied the chance to die for his King—denied it by the very man he'd tried to protect. The man who had given them all life… the man who had designed those lives to be incomplete—to be inferior… That was the man he'd been unable to die for.
The town grew distant behind him as he reached his Ganmen. He stopped in his tracks in Enkidudu's shadow, his entire frame quivering with fury. "Damn it…" he hissed, claws digging into his palms. "Damn it all!" He sank to a crouch and pounded the ground with his fists. His shout echoed in the still, quiet air around him.
A year passed. The solitude was starting to grate on his nerves. Even in the army, his solitary forays into the field had always ended with his eventual return to his unit, or to Teppelin. He began venturing into Beastman settlements again. Mostly, these forays ended in fights. That was all right; Viral missed fighting. It had been too long since he'd faced a worthy opponent. Tempers ran high in these settlements, and Viral's failures against the so-called Dai-Gurren Brigade had become well known.
It was after a year and a half that he first approached a human settlement. He had been deep in the midst of the southern desert wastelands for a month, and his hunting choices had dwindled from "limited" to "almost nonexistent". He'd fed himself mostly with bony, little lizards—and the last of those had been a week ago. His arrows were gone, too, which sure as hell didn't help.
Of course, he'd already learned from experience what would happen if he ran out of food; he had no intention of repeating that mistake. He knew that if he didn't find some food soon, he wound run out of strength entirely. The wastelands didn't go on forever—he'd be out of them soon, though that wouldn't do much good if he lacked the strength to pilot Enkidudu out.
And unfortunately for him, the nearest village happened to be full of naked apes. Still, if he wanted to keep eating, he'd have to stifle his pride and deal with them. His hands were already beginning to shake with hunger.
He left Enkidudu about half a mile outside of town; it wouldn't do to cause a panic before he'd even arrived. With a tan scarf wound around his head to disguise himself, he walked in on foot. As usual, he found himself getting odd stares from the humans passing by around him. His face may have been covered, but his hands weren't and they were quite noticeable. Still, no one was attacking him yet, and that was always far easier than the alternative.
He made his way through the town till he reached a store with a crude image of a slab of meat painted on its rough, wooden sign. Arching his eyebrow, he thought to himself that it was at least a very direct way of advertising the butcher's wares. That was good; he didn't relish the thought of staying here any longer than needed. He pushed through the swinging door, just as hastily constructed as the sign, and into the interior of the shop.
His nose twitched as the cooled air inside hit his face through the gap in his scarf. Sure enough, he heard the distinct whir of electric fans. These new cooling gadgets that the humans had started using always seemed to stir up every speck of dust in whatever space they were implemented. For a moment, he thought longingly of the much quieter and more refined cooling systems of Teppelin and the Beastmen military bases. Still, the incessantly blowing air couldn't cover the enticing smell of fresh meat; it filled his nostrils and made his mouth water, making the edge of his hunger even sharper.
An old woman looked up at him from behind the counter as he entered; the woman's thin, white eyebrows hitched upward in surprise for a moment, and then her leathery face relaxed into an easy smile.
"Well, well! A Beastman visitor, now there's a rare sight in this town," she remarked.
Viral paused and inclined his head slightly, a bit taken aback. The woman's words were frank but her tone wasn't unfriendly. He was accustomed to a more guarded reception on these infrequent visits to human villages. Regardless, he had business here, so he'd put it aside and get what he needed. He was too hungry for human oddness. He tugged down the part of the scarf covering his nose and mouth.
"I'd think you humans would be used to uncommon things by now," he commented dryly.
"That's just what makes things uncommon, isn't it?" the butcher asked, chuckling. "If we get used to them, they're not uncommon anymore."
"Hm. I suppose that's true," he muttered, still a bit off-guard. "Tell me, butcher, what is the freshest cut of meat you have right now?"
"Ah! Well, just this morning we received a grape-hippo that one of the hunters in this village caught. He went all the way out beyond the wastelands to get it, too." the butcher said, tapping her finger alongside her nose knowingly. His stomach rumbled at the thought of all that tender grape-hippo meat. "How much do you want?"
Viral slung his knapsack down from his shoulder and hurriedly dug a couple coins out from a side pouch—the last of his money. "How much will this pay for?"
"Hmm…" The butcher took the coins and examined them, then handed them back with a sad shake of her head. "I'm sorry. Coins aren't much use to us here. We trade for what we need."
"Ah," he muttered. Damn! he thought bitterly. How the hell was he going to buy food here when he had nothing to trade for? Frowning, he pocketed the coins and dipped his chin to the old woman. "Then, I'll leave you to tend to your shop. I'm sorry to have wasted your time," he grumbled. He turned to walk away, but before he could get more than three paces towards the door, the old woman piped up again.
"Now, now, don't go off in such a hurry," the butcher said, her tone lightly chiding.
"Hnh?" Viral paused and glanced back at her, his eyebrows furrowing.
She studied the countertop for a moment, tapping her chin. "I won't be losing much if I spare a bit of meat," she said, as if to herself. Spare a bit? Viral thought, his frown deepening in confusion. She considered for another moment, and then smiled. "Ah, that's right, that's right. Maybe some of those raccoon-birds… Wait there for a moment, please."
He lifted his chin, trying to steal a peek behind the curtain to see what the hell this human was up to, without any luck. The butcher returned to the counter a few moments later, carrying a thick bundle wrapped in heavy parchment. Smiling, the old woman stretched out her arm to hand it to Viral. He stared at it, keeping very still as he tried to figure out the human's aims.
"Don't stand there with that sour look!" she told him. There was a slight reprimand in her tone, as though he were a sullen child sulking for no reason. He cocked his head at her, puzzled and utterly at a loss.
"What are you…" Viral started, bewildered.
"Take this," she said.
"What?" he said under his breath, eying the bundle warily. What kind of trick was this?
"Go ahead, take it. It's not likely to sell today, anyway," the butcher encouraged.
He stared at the human, not moving an inch but holding himself at the ready nonetheless. "You'd give this to me, a Beastman? A former soldier wandering into your town?" he asked dubiously.
The butcher waved her hand casually. "The war is over, isn't it? In this place, we're all able to live as we want and do what we want. To have even that much, after all those years underground, is all that anyone in our village ever wanted. We don't have any further quarrel with the Beastmen," the old woman said simply.
Easy words coming from the mouth of the victors, Viral thought sourly. Still, the gentle smile on her face… it looked alarmingly genuine. He looked down at the parchment bundle.
Even from a few paces away, he could catch the scent of the meat. He quickly figured out why she was willing to give it away; with his sharp nose, determining the freshness of meat was an easy task. The bundle she was handed him still smelled edible, but it certainly wouldn't be in another couple of days. He guessed it would probably go to waste if she didn't get rid of it soon. He frowned at the parchment bundle.
"Humans around here… might start expecting handouts, if they hear you're giving meat away to strangers," he pointed out cagily.
"If that's the reputation I get, then that's not such a terrible thing," the butcher replied, smiling. "Just go ahead and take it. If I can be honest, you look like you could use it," she added,.
"W-what?" he sputtered, gaping at her.
"I hate to see anyone go hungry," she said softly. "I had enough of that in my younger days, in the darkness underground. Simon the Digger gave so much to let all of us live how we want in the sunlight. I think he meant for everyone to have that kind of a life, even you Beastmen."
The mention of Simon stung at his pride a little, but something in her words struck a chord within him. Still feeling utterly at a loss, he looked down at the bundle again and back up at the butcher. Slowly, he crept back over to the counter and raised his hand, grasping the bundle and tugging it from her unresisting fingers.
"The common thing to say now would be 'thank you'," the butcher prompted, half-smiling. Viral caught himself and shook off his befuddlement. Soldiers of Teppelin were trained to have good manners, after all.
"Th… thank you," he said, his voice low. "I… appreciate this." Quickly, before this situation could get any weirder, he lowered his head in a stiff, jerky bow and hastily took his leave.
Once he was out of there, he headed straight back to Enkidudu. He had nothing to trade for the arrows he still needed, and he wasn't about to hope for a repeat of… whatever the hell had just happened inside the butcher's shop. He felt strangely off-balance as he hurried to his mecha, his head spinning. Scrambling up to the cockpit, he stowed the meat away in the cold food storage locker and sank onto the pilot's chair, digging his claws into the sides of the seat.
"What the hell was that about?!" he growled, pressing his forehead into the palm of his hand. "That human… she gave me food I couldn't pay for…" Sure, it was meat that was on the verge of spoiling, but it was still a damn weird thing for her to do. Why give anything to a stranger who couldn't even compensate her for it? Deeply perturbed, he fired up Enkidudu and took off southward at a fast clip.
By the following morning, the weirdness of the encounter had subsided a bit. He'd found a thin, muddy little stream trickling its way out from between some rocks, and he was following it, hoping it might lead him to fresher water. And by midday, it did—the much wider river before him plunged over a ledge to a cool, gleaming pond below. He left Enkidudu at the top of the ledge and climbed down to fill his water reserves from the pond. Once that was done, a thought occurred to him and he sniffed at his clothes.
"Tch!" he snorted, wrinkling his nose at his smell. He may have been a Beastman, but that didn't mean he enjoyed stinking like an animal. It was time for a bath. Stripping off his clothes, he gave every inch of cloth a good scrubbing before laying them out on the rocks to dry, and then dunking himself in the water.
As he cleaned himself up, his mind went over the previous day's events again, still trying to pinpoint exactly what had happened. The butcher had been… kind. Kindness. That was the word for it, the word that had escaped his memory earlier. She had been… kind to him. He'd seen plenty of human anger, fear, panic, fury… but kindness? That was sure as hell a new one. Humans going out of their way to help one another wasn't anything new, but what reason did a human have to be kind to a Beastman?
And the way she'd spoken to him… it brought up a memory, of a time when he'd run surveillance on a group of humans that had dared to venture to the surface. He'd observed a mother scolding her young boys. With the tech at his disposal, he'd been able to overhear her exact words. Her tone had been very much the same… Now that he thought about it, she'd sent the boys back into the underground village, telling them it was too dangerous. That had been a wise move on her part; he'd been under orders to stop the humans from going any further, and he'd done just that. The boys had been spared by their absence. The memory prickled in his mind, in a way that it never had before.
He pushed the feeling away, but the thought remained with him; the butcher had talked to him in a motherly way. What kind of game was this? Humans were inherently selfish creatures— that was what he and his fellow soldiers had always been taught. And yet, here he was.
"Hnh…" He scowled, and as he did, he caught his own reflection in the water. "Is that really what I look like these days?" he murmured, prodding at his ribs with one clawed fingertip. After eating so poorly for so long, he was definitely looking scrawnier than usual. It seemed all his time in the desert wastes had caught up with him. And his training routine had fallen by the wayside in the last few months, mostly due to lack of motivation.
Suddenly, the butcher's words came back to him. If I can be honest, you look like you could use it. Had she actually thought he was starving to death?
"The human was worried about me?" he muttered. Of course, hunger couldn't kill him anymore, but she hadn't known that. A human who was kind to him because she was concerned for his health… now that sounded like some sort of bad joke. He sat down in the cool, clean water, staring blankly at the gentle ripples flowing across its surface.
Deep in his mind, a tiny little notion drifted above the others: would any Beastman have been as kind to a human if Lordgenome had won the war? The thoughts whirling through his head felt like a swarm of flies. He smacked his fist against the water's surface, forcing the thoughts away. The whole thing was starting to give him a headache and he wasn't much interested in considering it any longer.
Another year passed and Viral wandered onwards. He watched Kamina City grow and spread where Teppelin once stood. He'd snorted and laughed when he'd learned what they were calling it. Of course the naked apes would name it after that idiot. He stuck around the area for a while, mostly out of boredom, but partly from a sort of morbid curiosity. Observing the city was bizarrely fascinating. Freed from their captivity, these humans were advancing at an almost alarming rate.
Two and a half years had gone by since the fall of Teppelin. It was another cold night in the high desert. Viral stared listlessly out through the open hatch of the cockpit, watching the moonlit sand and rocks roll past under Enkidudu's long stride. The Ganmen had been walking almost nonstop for nearly three days now… but it wasn't until that moment that Viral realized something: he didn't even know where he was going. He was literally wandering aimlessly.
"Damn it," he hissed, bringing his mecha to a halt. He growled and dropped his head, then took a deep breath, trying to regain his bearings. He let go of the controls and climbed out of the cockpit, scaling his Ganmen head until he stood atop its head.
The view from this height was spectacular. The desert stretched for miles all around him. To a human, it might have been deathly quiet; his sensitive ears picked up all sorts of sounds, though—the scratching of animals on the ground, the quiet rustle of a nightbird's wings. He tilted his head back, searching the expanse of the night sky.
He sat down on Enkidudu's head, his eyes still fixed on the stars as he wondered where exactly he was going. But then a better question rose up in his mind: rather than where, he asked himself… why? What was the point of even picking a destination? He wouldn't do anything when he got there, except to eat, drink, and maybe get in a fight. If he really wanted to change things up, maybe he'd even seek out a female's company. And then he'd leave and wander aimlessly to the next town, where he'd repeat it all. He clenched and unclenched his massive, clawed hands, gritting his razor-sharp teeth.
Far up above him, billions of stars glittered coldly.
"What the hell am I here for?" he growled. The stars didn't give an answer.
Chapter 1 Part 1: Coming Soon!