Hey guys! I'm back with another chapter up! The plot outlining is finally finished and the updates will continue as usual, whenever I can find the time to write.
Thanks for the patience and thank you for the extra favorite for this story!
The disclaimer is back: No, I still don't own GE.
Spirit of the Sky
Chapter 19 – Strength of an Intel
The crescent moon was shining brightly in the night sky, decorated by a sea of stars.
The lone brunette had found himself on top of the fortress, looking around the empty path. He saw a few patrolling soldiers passing by, giving them a quick but quiet greeting. While he was a little curious about the patrols' sleeping hours, he had an important thing to do.
"Private Kamui, good evening," The voice of the team's operator caught Hiro's attention and he was met with her small smile. "Captain Visconti is already waiting for you up ahead."
The brunette looked over her shoulder, spotting a tall tower on the side of the path, with a familiar blond standing inside the tower.
"Please don't hesitate to let me know if you need anything," Fran gave him a light bow. "I shall be on my way now."
Hiro responded with a nod and a smile, "Got it. I'll see you around… uh… Private Bourgogne, isn't it?"
"Yes," the operator gave him one last nod before walking away, leaving the brunette to stand on the foot of the tower.
Hiro looked up once more, seeing the wind blowing the captain's short blond hair. He was facing the camp, most likely watching over the camp as some of the soldiers were still having their dinner. The position made the brunette envy him a little as it must have felt good to look down from a place that high. But at the same time, he assumed that the captain wasn't there just to hang out and enjoy the view.
The brunette stepped inside and climbed the only set of stairs to reach the top of the tower, where Julius was waiting. The moment he stepped outside, he could feel the cold wind blowing and the two layers of his clothing weren't enough to keep him warm. He could only wish that the team captain didn't have to take his time with his business or he might be freezing to death up there.
He rubbed the sides of his arms and stepped closer to the captain, who didn't look like he had noticed the extra person on the tower.
"You're here, Kamui… no, Hiro," the captain spoke up, correcting himself to refer the brunette by his given name, without turning his eyes off the camp. "You can come and join me here if you wish so."
Hiro stood still and watched the captain for a moment before nodding and walking to join him by the edge of the tower.
The weather was cold, but he got the chance to view the camp from high above. The soldiers looked so small as they gathered around the campfire and the tents looked like they were lanterns. The glowing night sea was visible in the distance, reflecting the moonlight from above. Even the forest between the camp and the docks looked like it was glowing, as the crescent moon was shining on the tree leaves.
"This tower is one of the few places we can view the entire camp from," Julius spoke up and turned to look at the brunette beside him. "Tell me, Cadet, what is in your mind when you look at the soldiers from here?"
Hiro looked at him with a raised brow before gazing at the view of the camp, seeing nothing too extraordinary to him, "Uh… they're… small…?"
The brunette wasn't sure what kind of answer the captain wanted. While he believed his response to be the truth, he couldn't shake off the feeling that it sounded a bit silly. He could try and think about it more to understand the context of Julius' question, but it was hard to think when the cold air was slowly freezing his brain.
"Correct, they are small," the captain responded sternly as his gaze returned to the camp. "Elites or not, we are all humans. We may reach for the sky and aim to be the most powerful person, but compared to the size of the world we live in, we are insignificant."
Hiro was even more confused. Why did the captain suddenly start talking about comparing people and the world?
"As insignificant as we are as humans, we can still make a change that affects the world itself," Julius continued. "An important person in my life once promised a world free of war, one which came from the hatred residing in human hearts. He died before he could reunite with his family… with his son… and that promise of his seemed to have disappeared as if it died along with the person himself."
A person who had promised a peaceful world that was free from wars and fighting. He recalled hearing someone like that many years ago, but he couldn't remember his name. All he could remember was the blond hair that stood out among the black and brown heads of his troops, the same blond hair the captain had.
Then it hit him. The person Julius meant would be…?
"I want to carry out his promise and protect everyone," Julius' words snapped the brunette from his thoughts as he continued and looked at Hiro. "However, some people don't have the same vision. This is the very reason why Romeo and I have been trying to fight our own battles without the rest of Blood knowing."
The brunette was surprised, as the captain's words had made him realize something about his teammate, "Then the reason why Romeo hasn't been himself all this time… is because he's been fighting in his own battle?"
"Precisely," the captain responded with a slight nod. "The reason behind Blood's founding is still a mystery, but I have a feeling that Romeo has found something and refused to say anything. His findings must have been clouding his thoughts that he failed to realize his own role in Blood. This is why I want you to keep an eye on him."
Hiro was left in more confusion, "But… I'm just a regular soldier… I'm not the team captain or the general. I don't know how to be a leader at all."
"You have a talent to connect with others, which is something I don't have," Julius put a hand on the brunette's shoulder. "Please, make sure Romeo doesn't stray away from his path."
Hiro wasn't sure how to respond to the captain's request. He wasn't purposely trying to get to know his teammates' past as he only wanted to know them better to communicate better in battles. He only put some extra effort to get to know the vice-captain because of his adoration for her, but he felt like he had already grown closer to the others at this point. Was that the kind of talent Julius was referring to?
The brunette wanted to ask him, but the captain was already leaving the tower. He looked back at the camp area and looked around, spotting Romeo on his own as he was leaning against a dead tree on a small hill. While he couldn't see the blond's expression clearly from the tower, he could guess that Romeo was troubled by how Julius asked him to talk about Romeo himself.
What made him curious the most would be the envelope Romeo was holding and staring at intently. He wasn't sure if the envelope's contents had something to do with the blond's findings that Julius mentioned, but it would probably be better if he could take a look at it later on.
That was if he had the chance to 'borrow' it without Romeo himself knowing.
It was still early in the cold morning.
The camp was covered in fog, though not as thick as before. The rising sun was still covered by the tall fortress, causing most of the camp to be covered in a blanket of darkness. The soldiers in the camp had started coming out from their tents for their first meal of the day, with a few people excluded.
Romeo let out a sigh as he looked around the tent, where he was left on his own as Gil and Hiro were already assigned to another mission and were gathering with most soldiers for an early breakfast. His backpack was sitting by his feet, already packed with various supplies for his own mission, before he took it with him as he walked out of the tent.
As soon as he stepped outside, he could smell the faint scent of food coming from the campfire. He could hear the sound of his stomach growling from the good smell of the cooking he was already familiar with, but his mind was already set on where he had to go. He would have to skip on his best friend's homemade meal, even though it wasn't necessary so that he could get an early start on his own mission.
The blond looked around the empty path, heading straight for the captain's tent. The female operator was standing outside as if she was already waiting for his arrival.
"Private Leoni," Fran opened the tent as she stood next to the entrance. "Please, this way. Captain Visconti is waiting."
Romeo responded with a nod, "Okay…"
The blond entered the tent before the operator followed him inside, heading towards Julius as he stood in front of a strategy board. He took a deep breath as he stood behind the captain silently, feeling the pressure of the special mission he was assigned to. The atmosphere in the tent was tense as the people inside were among the few people who knew more about Blood's history.
Fran suddenly cleared her throat, getting the captain's attention as well as breaking the silence in the tent, "Captain, Private Leoni is here. Should we start the mission briefing?"
"I personally don't mind starting now," Julius turned to Romeo. "It's still very early. You should have something to eat before the briefing."
The blond curled his fists. He wasn't going to obey his rumbling stomach when he could get an early start for a mission. He wanted to leave as soon as he was given the details about what he was supposed to do and without anyone in the team knowing. Knowing them, they would most likely be worried about him going off on his own when he couldn't fight properly.
"I'll be fine," Romeo spoke up sternly. "I can still eat some ration packs on the way to that camp."
He could feel that Julius was staring right into his eyes as if the captain was trying to read his mind. Didn't his response convince the captain enough that he was ready?
"If that's the case, then the three of us should get moving to the air force base," Julius picked up his bag from the foot of the strategy board. "The rest of the scouting team will be waiting for us in the base."
The blond didn't get the chance to ask anything as the captain walked out of the tent, leaving him with Fran on his side. The operator gave him a small smile and an apologetic bow before she went over to the board and unpin a few notes on it. He wasn't sure what those notes were as they were taken down and he was confused when the operator handed them over to him.
"Our informants have observed the characteristics of the terrain around the area and that information is summarized in these notes," Fran told him with a smile. "Captain Visconti told me that I can trust this information to you in order to learn more about the enemy's communication network."
Romeo looked at the notes in his hands, seeing detailed descriptions of the enemy camps in the area around the one he wasn't assigned to for the mission. Each note had information about the number of combatants and facilities in detail, including the specialties of each camp. The dense information wasn't the type of information he could gather at all times, which hurt his confidence more until he realized the exact area of the camp's network.
"Aren't these the camps located around the place where the others are going today?" the blond asked the operator. "Wouldn't these notes be better off in Vice Captain's hands?"
The operator's smile faded as she turned to the strategy board, which held fewer notes on top of a map. "Captain Visconti and I discovered a hidden network line between our camp and somewhere around the cluster of enemy camps last night. There is a high possibility that there is a traitor among our military units and we need your skills in tracing this hidden network from the enemy side to prevent any unnecessary attention within ourselves."
"A traitor…" Romeo repeated the words, finally understanding what the captain wanted from him.
The blond wasn't formally educated in terms of technology as it was still rather new in the country as well. All of the knowledge he had came from his late mentor and his skill wasn't anything greater than Lindow's. If the captain trusted him that much, then he was probably better than he believed he was, recalling the words Lindow had told him as he went through Blood's profiles.
"You can probably handle things better than I do, from what you have within."
Maybe both Lindow and Julius saw something in him that he couldn't see himself. The possibility didn't clear away most of his doubts, but he felt a sliver of hope that he could do something that nobody could.
This was probably the fight that only he could do for the team.
Romeo stuffed the notes into his pocket and took a deep breath, "I'm ready to go. Let's get the mission started!"
The blond took a glimpse of Fran nodding in response before he headed out of the tent. He saw that Julius was still nearby as he was most likely briefing the rest of the team. The rest of Blood was present when he and Fran came out, but the captain was just finished with the briefing.
From the looks in their eyes, his friends didn't notice his presence outside the tent. It gave him some sort of relief as he wasn't sure how he could face them when he was being too secretive to them. He didn't really want them to know about the mission, because he felt like they would ask to join when they knew about it. They were just being considerate to him by trying to help and protect him.
The blond knew about that fact, but it hurt his pride at the same time. He didn't want to be the one they always had to save and protect all the time. He wanted to fight alongside them as equals, fighting enemies side by side.
Romeo noticed that Fran was watching him stare blankly at the place where the rest of Blood used to be. He didn't know the operator very well, but like the rest of his closest comrades, he assumed that she was just trying to look out for him as well.
He gave her a comforting smile, at the moment when she wasn't expecting it, "I'm counting on you too, Private Bourgogne!"
"Ah!" Fran looked a little surprised before responding with a nod. "Y-Yes, I am counting on you as well."
Romeo looked back at Julius, who gave the two one last nod before he started walking out of the camp. He and Fran soon followed him into the forest, heading for the air force base once more.
His fight was just starting, even if he wasn't involved in direct combat. He would be fighting on a different battlefield, but it was the kind of field he was better at.
It was his chance in proving his own capabilities as a member of an elite team.
The rustling sounds of leaves and grass moving around from the blowing wind were echoing in the forest. The area was rather dark even as the morning was slowly changing into noon, leaving only small gaps between the lush trees for sunlight to come through.
Romeo's panting was drowned in the sounds of grass and bushes he and Julius walked through as the now big bag of supplies on his back was weighing him down. The weight of the bag soon made him regret his decision on packing too much in the air force base as carrying it while walking miles through the forest had burned down the calories contained within the ration pack he had. The ration pack gave him more energy for long travels compared to Nana's delicious and sometimes simple meals, but he wished that he had something good instead of something energizing that tasted like dirt.
The blond stopped for a moment to catch his breath, ignoring the fact that Julius kept on moving and left him behind. He looked at the captain, who carried fewer supplies in his smaller backpack, as he walked through the forest without a problem. He wondered why they didn't end up teaming up with the other scouts when they left from the base together, but one side of him thought of the possibility of attracting more attention when moving in a bigger group.
The captain's walking suddenly came to a complete stop as he reached for the radio in his ear. Romeo quickly ran to his side and caught up to his position, expecting to hear more information about the surrounding area.
"Yes? What is the situation, Private?" Julius' voice had broken the silence in the middle of the woods.
Romeo quickly straightened his back as he expected the captain to turn his way to check on him. He ignored the heavy load on his back and looked at his superior officer, who still had his hand over his ear.
"I understand. Thank you for informing us," the captain responded before letting his hand fall to his side and turned to Romeo. "We have a change of plans. There are civilians in a nearby enemy camp who were captured after being assumed to have been spying on one of the enemy's military facilities. I'm required to head there to help, but we cannot miss our chance to slip into that certain camp…"
Romeo could see the confusion on the captain's face. He was sure that Julius would be able to handle it without problem on his own, but that would mean that he would also be on his own to head for the enemy camp. He could recall the information about the enemy's scouting teams and a little about their supply network in the area from the notes earlier, but he wasn't completely sure that he could find a very safe route for him as he couldn't even fight when he was carrying too many things on his back.
But on another hand, it could be his only chance to prove himself.
"I'll… I'll do it…" the blond didn't sound too confident, which earned him Julius' attention. "I'll… try and figure a good path to move in from the notes Private Bourgogne gave me this morning."
Romeo expected the captain to respond in the form of rejection because of his inability to fight or something similar, but all he got was silence. Julius was looking at him without any notable expressions for a moment, which was starting to make him worry. Did his proposal sound too illogical?
His worry soon faded when Julius gave him a small smile and nodded, "Very well. That information came from a very reliable informant of mine, so I'm quite certain that it's very accurate. Use that to your advantage and come back alive."
Romeo froze in his place, completely unexpecting to hear Julius' immediate approval. The captain had walked away before he got the chance to say anything else, but to him, his trust was enough. Julius trusted him for his skills to process all sorts of information and he had to prove that the captain's trust wasn't misplaced.
The blond took a deep breath and looked in the direction where he and Julius were initially heading to. He was on his own in the middle of the forest with a big bag on his back, but he felt that he could ignore the weight. His determination gave him the strength to push himself into a sprint, breaking through the greenery around him and to the clearing with many tents set up.
Romeo concealed himself into one of the nearby bushes and watched the situation in the enemy camp.
For a military camp, the blond was surprised to see very few soldiers in the camp. He assumed that most of the camp's residents were gone and fighting on the battlefield, but the number of soldiers left in the camp wouldn't be enough when the camp itself was a big one. There wasn't enough manpower to defend the whole camp if they were attacked.
Romeo carefully removed his backpack and dug through it to get the binoculars he brought with him. They allowed him to see the group of people in the camp from his position, but all he could see were people dressed in white lab coats walking around. He could easily guess that they were scientists, but their number was at least three times the number of soldiers he had seen around the camp so far.
Something wasn't right in there. He was sure that something was definitely going on in that camp.
The blond decided to leave his bag there to give himself more freedom of movement as he snuck through the entrance of the camp. He carefully made his way deeper into the camp without being noticed, until he crashed into what felt like iron bars.
"Ow!" Romeo turned around while wincing in pain, coming in direct contact with the surprised faces of people behind bars. "W-Whoa!"
The blond fell on his back when he saw people while stealthily trying to navigate through the camp but then noticed that they were trapped inside a cage. Their clothes were mostly tattered, most likely from being kept in there for an unknown period of time, and their bodies looked like they were skeletons wrapped by human skin.
"A-Are you here to help us…?" an old man by the cage door asked weakly. "I… I want to go home…"
Romeo walked over to the cage, getting hushed cheers from the caged people, as he looked at the rusty padlock keeping the poor people inside. While he was sure saving trapped people wasn't in the mission description, he definitely wasn't going to leave them in that state. Not when he could do something about it.
"Don't worry, I'll get you guys out of there!" he told them confidently as he tried picking the old padlock.
Relieved sighs could be heard when the padlock opened with a click, giving the people their freedom. Romeo couldn't imagine what it felt like to be trapped inside a small cage like an animal, but it wasn't the time to think about it.
He looked around the area cautiously, but his actions didn't seem to have caught the scientists' attention. He dug his hands into his pocket for the notes, reviewing the safe routes they could use to get back to the camp. He looked back at the old man from earlier and took his hand, putting one of the notes on it.
"Here," Romeo smiled at him as he spoke in a whisper. "This is the safest way out to our campsite. I'm sorry I can't escort you back because my business isn't done here!"
The old man shed some tears before the blond was wrapped in an unexpected hug, "Thank you… thank you very much, young man…"
"U-Uh…" Romeo wasn't sure how to react, but the smiles on the others' faces brought one to his own face as he patted the old man's back. "Stay safe, Sir. I'll come back to the camp once I'm done here."
The old man released him from the hug as the other prisoners gathered around them. Even without words, he could see their gratefulness towards him as they left one by one and headed for the camp's border with the forest. It was those kinds of smiles that lifted the burden of his incapability and reminded him that he was still doing the right thing even without actually fighting.
When he could help others, even if they were strangers to him, it made him feel better about himself.
Romeo slapped his face hard, forcing himself to get his focus back on his mission. He looked around the area, looking for anything which looked like they were out of place in the tent. The sight of an enemy soldier nearby had surprised him and made him retreat to the back of the nearest tent he could reach. When he poked his head slightly to look, he saw that the soldier was carrying a big metal box to be handed to a different soldier.
"Don't lose the box, rookie," the soldier handed over the box to a younger soldier before giving him a hard slap on his back, straightening it up. "This box has to be delivered safely to our general. If you lose it on your way, losing your head will probably be the best thing you can wish for."
The younger soldier's face looked pale as he stomped his foot on the ground, "Y-Yes Sir!"
Romeo watched the soldier as he ran out of the camp and out of his sight. While the box and how it was treated felt suspicious, he wasn't going to chase the soldier outside to prevent getting himself into a fight he couldn't win. He chose to shift his attention back to the older soldier, who had started walking away in the other direction.
The blond managed to follow him while keeping himself hidden all the time, stopping when the soldier entered a semi-permanent building in the middle of the camp. He snuck closer to the building, which looked like storage until he was forced to hide once more as the soldier came out moments later with a pile of documents in his hands.
The pile of documents which was then given to a familiar-looking old scientist.
"T-T-Thank you for the h-help, Captain," the scientist stuttered in response and fixed his sliding glasses as he took the documents. "P-Please do a-as good as u-usual…"
Romeo's eyes watched the scientist as he left to gather with the others, feeling that he had seen the scientist from somewhere. He could've sworn that he saw the Susano'o flag on the scientist's name tag, which made him question why a Susano'o scientist was working in an enemy camp.
He shrugged off the question for a moment, seeing that the building was left unguarded. He made his way into the building, carefully opening the door to prevent anyone in the camp from hearing him enter. While he felt that he hadn't been caught sneaking around the camp, he wasn't aware of the pair of eyes behind a pair of glasses watching him as he closed the door.
Shelves of documents. The smell of paper and ink. Dozens of broken cables and spare parts.
Those were the things Romeo didn't expect to be inside storage located in the middle of a warzone. The storage he initially expected to be a storage for weapons turned out to be a storage for records and archives. He walked around the shelves, looking over the documents which were starting to smell like mold because of the humid air in the room.
A single document inside a black folder caught his attention that he had to take a look at, finding detailed explanations about experiments he had seen inside Rachel's journal. There were mentions about animal genes and modifications for human genes, which were similar to the ones mentioned in the journal. Without a mistake, the blond was certain that the document was something that might become useful.
He slipped the document into the inner pocket of his uniform jacket, unveiling a piece of rolled paper on his feet. He wasn't sure where it came from, but he assumed that it must have fallen off when he took the document. His curiosity got the better of him as he unrolled the paper, revealing a map similar to the one he saw in Julius' tent. What surprised him the most would be the fresh markings on the map, located around the area his teammates were supposed to be heading.
"That's… that's the location of the landslide from before!" Romeo subconsciously shouted.
Romeo quickly reached for the radio in his ear to contact Julius or Fran, but all he got was a deafening static sound. He couldn't connect to either of them to warn the others before it was too late, but he hadn't run out of options just yet. If he couldn't get in touch with them through the radio line, he could still try and run as fast as he could to the camp.
The blond's eyes quickly shifted to the door as he ran to get outside, only to find out that the door refused to budge.
"Damn it! It's stuck!" Romeo completely ignored the fact that he was supposed to stay low until he got what he needed and pounded on the metal door. "Hey! Is someone outside?! I'm locked inside!"
A loud clang interrupted his loud banging, getting his attention. He turned to the side to see a small object on the ground on the other side of the room, right below a small window. It was too high for him to try and climb, but it gave him a sliver of hope to escape the humid prison. That hope of his only lasted for a few seconds as the small object started bursting into flames and burned the flammable documents nearby.
"F-Fire!"
Romeo watched helplessly as the temperature of the room spiked while the fire spread quickly. His head went crazy as he looked around for another exit, but all he could see was the locked door in front of him and the windows located at least twice the height of the shelves. He had to get out of there and fast, but he couldn't think of another way but to use brute force on the locked door.
He wasn't going to die there in the fire. He still had to prove himself to be useful to the team, but he couldn't do it when he couldn't get out of the building. He couldn't warn the team when he couldn't even get in touch with anyone on the radio or get out to warn them in person.
Was that everything he could do in the end?
He felt his knees grew weaker as his lungs were filling up with smoke. His head was starting to get dizzy as his consciousness was fading away, but the familiar voice of his captain in his ear snapped him back into reality.
"... riv… eoni…!"
Romeo weakly reached for the radio in his ear as the static from before was slowly fading and Julius' voice was getting clearer and clearer.
"Private Leoni! Can you hear me?!" Julius asked from the other side, sounding more desperate than usual. "Can you give me a status report?! Private Bourgogne and I couldn't reach you or track your location for the past half hour!"
He tried to respond but inhaling more smoke only caused him to cough even more.
"Romeo! Are you okay?!" the captain asked by his given name with a worried tone. "Please, answer me!"
Romeo tried clearing his throat while watching the burning flames closing in on him, "I… I'm still okay…! Just… I need to warn… the others…!"
"Private Leoni!" Fran's voice was heard on the radio next. "I've managed to connect to the Blood Unit heading for the cliff area. I can pass on the message to Vice-Captain Alencon!"
"Get them out of there! It's a trap!" Romeo coughed out the smoke he had been breathing in. "T-They… they're planning on burying the whole squad alive…!"
Fran's gasp was heard clearly on the radio before Julius' stern voice was heard, "Get Blood and the rest of the soldiers out of the site! Quickly!"
"Y-Yes Sir!"
Romeo fell to his knees from the lack of clean air, but his mind still refused to accept his fate. He had to come home and see his friends back alive.
The blond suddenly saw one of the nearby shelves crumbling from the flames, letting the iron skeleton of the shelf fall and break upon hitting the floor. He had his attention distracted by one of the iron poles from the broken skeleton, which were rolling to his side. He grabbed the pole and stood in front of the door, determined to get himself out to see his friends coming back safely.
"Private Leoni! I'm coming to your aid! Stay safe!"
Romeo felt a slight hint of relief when he heard that Julius was coming, but another side of him felt that it only made him feel like he had to be rescued all the time. At the very least, he wished that he could get out of the burning building on his own before he arrived.
The blond looked at the door and held the iron pole firmly, before letting out a yell as he charged towards the door.
The day was slowly turning into night.
The sky was darkening with each passing second, but it was clear of any clouds.
Romeo couldn't remember how long he had been sitting by the campfire and staring at it, but the silence around him was making him more and more nervous. Julius, Fran, and he came back to a quiet camp as most soldiers were out on the mission with the rest of his teammates. The jammed signal prevented him from getting any news about his teammates and the situation had been mostly the same while Fran was trying to get in touch with the team.
A glass of water suddenly came to his sight, blocking his view of the burning campfire. The blond looked up to see an expressionless Julius offering him some plain water to drink before Romeo hesitantly took it off his hand. The captain joined him by the campfire, looking up at the sky as he sat next to the younger cadet.
"I apologize for not realizing your situation sooner," the captain spoke up calmly. "Even so, you had done well in retrieving some valuable information from that camp."
Had he really done that well? All he could save from the burning building was that document that contained information similar to the one he had shared with the captain before.
"I find it quite odd, to be honest," Julius continued without a change in his tone. "For some reason, something unexpected like this happens every time Blood is involved in a major operation. Did you happen to find out something which might be related to this problem?"
Romeo saw that the captain had turned to look at him. He didn't get the chance to look over more than the document and the map for the rescue operation from the landslide months previously, but he did see someone who wasn't supposed to be there.
"I think… I saw someone from our side working on the enemy side…" The blond's response made the captain raise a brow, prompting him to continue. "I don't remember his name, but he looked like he was about in his late thirties and he stuttered when he was talking… Oh, and he wore a pair of frameless glasses!"
Julius didn't look surprised at all as he continued to look at the blond before he finally nodded, "I see. From the descriptions you provided, it seemed like you encountered one of our former researchers named Sohei Kujo."
"D-Doctor Kujo?!" Romeo stood up in surprise, spilling some of the water in the glass he was holding. "But… but he was one of the researchers involved in Doctor Rachel's projects! Why did he–"
"The reason remains unclear at this point," the captain responded with a sigh as he stood up from his seat. "For the time being, we need to be very careful about our missions. Other than Doctor Kujo himself, I suspect that there must be another spy in the army. Your finding of the doctor inside one of the enemy's facilities confirmed our initial suspicion of a spy being present."
Romeo didn't know how he should respond, knowing that he had to be one of the few who would know about a spy when he could track communication lines. If he didn't know about the existence of a spy, he must have failed in playing his part to be the intel of the team.
"Don't feel too discouraged, Romeo," Julius spoke calmly as he looked at him with a small smile. "Your contribution to the intelligence part of the team has been very good and you have saved a lot of lives in the process. The people you freed from that camp sent their gratitude before they left to a much-secured location."
The captain wasn't completely wrong, though. He did save them from being held in a cage when he went into the camp. He knew that he made the right decision when he found out that they were actually being used in various experiments performed in that camp. Still, he kinda wished that he could do better to save his friends.
"They've finally made it back," Julius suddenly spoke up once more, getting Romeo's attention. "Don't you want to greet your friends and let them praise you for what you did for them?"
"Huh?"
Romeo wasn't sure what to expect after hearing what the captain had to say until he turned to the forest side of the camp entrance.
Torches were lit to provide some light in the darkening path, but the darkness couldn't cover the familiar looks of the teammates he had tried saving.
"Hey! Thanks for the quick warning, Romeo! We won't make it back here without your help!"
He could feel something warm on his face. He was crying, but those were tears of joy. For most of the time he spent on the battlefield, he wasn't feeling confident enough to be helpful to his teammates. The day when he almost died in a mission was the day he finally found his place in the team.
He was an elite, an expert in finding useful information. He was a soldier, one who would protect his friends and country. He wanted to protect people, especially his friends, and he knew that he could still protect his friends with the information he gathered.
He was no longer a failure.
Author's note:
And that's all for this chapter!
Romeo finally finds a place for himself in the team of elites and his achievement gives him a boost of confidence compared to what he was before. His side of the story isn't over though, because he's just started walking in the path with an unclear ending! As the plot develops more, more of his story will come too along with Julius'.
One thing to note before I end it here. I've started using a grammar checker, so some terms might be written differently starting from this chapter. Not that it'll change the entire story though, just a few terms and grammar issues I haven't been able to notice up to this point. It helps in a way to maintain the quality of the chapter while cutting down the time I need to look up correct grammar uses because... well... I don't really know any trustworthy people to be my beta reader and I need to know them before giving them the task.
Anyways, thanks as always for reading!