CHAPTER NINE: MEETINGS
Random scrolled down the list of names and faces once again, just to make sure he didn'trecognise any of them, before starting to feed them into the Lightning Knight database.
Hilde stood beside him, watching.
"This is really all I can do for now," Random said. "It shouldn't take more than twelve hours for the check to complete. Have you assigned me a security patrol?"
"Not yet, but that should be easy." Hilde pulled out a device resembling a complicated electronic calculator from her coat, and punched a few buttons on it. "You want to get in on the ground level, so to speak?"
"I'll be more useful if I actually have a patrol."
"Understood." A printout spooled from the device, and Hilde handed it to him.
"You haven't given me anything until tomorrow night."
"I assumed you'd need the day to settle in; as you said, there's nothing here you can do for the time being. You have family here, correct?"
"How did you know?" Random felt a familiar angry paranoia sweep through him, and struggled to contain it, clenching his fist and claw.
"You're from around here. I just guessed. I meant no offence." Hilde looked embarrassed, a slight pink tinge making its way across her face, and Random forced himself to calm down.
"None taken. It's just…" I haven't seen them for two years, and the last time wasn't pleasant, and they've never replied to any of my letters, and I shouldn't get angry at this woman for bringing it up…
Hilde nodded sympathetically. "I won't pry," she said. "Do you need anything else, master Virus?"
"No, thank you. You've been…very helpful." He started to wheel himself out of the door. "I should be back this evening, well before lockdown." I nearly let anger get the better of me a few seconds ago. She's not an enemy. Random turned, and tried his best to smile at her. "Call me Random," he said, before disappearing out the door.
-
Master Remus—a man Ceres knew distantly, partly from stories told around the campfires—strolled in casually, smiling at her as reassuringly as he could.
Ceres made the traditional signs of obeisance and greetings, and started to busy herself with getting him refreshment, before Remus stopped her with a raised hand.
"It's all right," he said. "I won't be here for long."
He noticed her painful thinness, and the drained look in her face. He'd seen that before, in his travels through the dimensions.
"Tell me," he said gently, "has your husband been talking to…strange people?"
"No," she replied. "He used to trade with people from other dimensions, I know, just to stay alive, but we keep to our own people these days, as we should."
Remus nodded. "You are ill," he said gently. "You should rest."
"There is a revolution. Nobody can rest." She was quoting her husband, he knew. Can I get her to talk? I fear it's a wasted cause…
"And your husband? What does he do to you?"
She's far too thin, and pale, and almost controlled…I hope I am not right.
"That is not your concern, master Remus," she said, her tone reasonably polite. "I think you should go." Her face would have been solid stone if not for the slight tremble of expression.
"If you want, I'll go," Remus said gently, "but if you ever need me I will be there."
"I thank you for your kind offer," she said, stiffly and formally, and made the traditional gestures of farewell. Remus interrupted her in the middle of them, swiftly knocking her out. Before he left the tent, he carefully placed her on the sleeping roll, briefly rolling back her collar, just to check.
She will wake knowing nothing, I think, but for me, my worst fears may be confirmed, Remus thought.
-
Random Virus stopped and shook his head at the sight of steps outside the front door of his old home; they never used to be there. He turned and made his way up the narrow passageway that led to the back yard, opening the gate before he reached it and smiling for a moment when he saw the old clothesline that he had swung off as a child. He turned for the back door, and had to stop himself from banging it with his claw. It was his mother who answered his knock, and Random was glad; he would at least make it through the door.
"Hello, Mother." He smiled down at the small woman who looked up from her book in shock at his voice.
Celina stared at her son for a moment, before dropping the book and embracing him. "My Randy, my baby!"
Random lifted her easily with his one hand, and she hugged him tightly.
"Is father home?" Random set her back on the floor.
"Yes, baby, but . . ." she sighed at the look on her son's face, and turned to the lounge room. "Euphrates, dearest."
"Whatever they're selling, we aren't buying!" Random heard his father's voice, and the knots began forming in his stomach.
"Hello, Sir." He rolled past his mother and stopped in the door frame, tilting his head to the side to avoid hitting it.
The old man sitting in the tattered armchair, which contrasted sharply with the rest of the tasteful furniture in the room, stood up slowly, settling glasses on his nose. He looked Random up and down for a long while.
"Randy," he nodded. "You've . . . grown."
Random self-consciously moved his claw, trying to hide it behind himself.
"Yes, sir." He felt his mother take hold of his bad arm and stand beside him.
"Come away, Celina. It could malfunction."
Random tried not to let the hurt show on his face as his mother squeezed his arm, before standing next to her husband.
"Did you get my letters, father?"
"I did," said Celina, avoiding her husband's gaze. "I read them to him."
"Why didn't you reply?"
"I had nothing to say," replied Euphrates sharply.
"His eyes aren't what they used to be," began Celina. "The doctor says he'll be—"
"That's enough, Celina. Go make yourself busy in the kitchen." Euphrates watched her leave, and then turned back to his son. "I thought I told you not to come back and upset her like this!"
"I have a right to see my parents before I die!" Random looked down at his father, now old and frail, not the tall, confident man he had grown up idolising. But still as proud.
"I told you before; you are no longer my son! You are dead to me!"
The words stung twice as much the second time around. "Why? What did I do?"
"Look at yourself! You aren't fit for human contact! They should've locked you away when they had the chance! I wouldn't have stopped them then, and I wouldn't stop them now." Euphrates sat back down. "Now go, and don't waste paper by writing." He picked up a newspaper from the floor.
Random rolled through the house to the front door, which he punched off its hinges to form a ramp down the stairs. He was halfway up the street when he heard his mother calling him. He stopped when she called a second time.
"Randy, wait!" She ran towards him. "Baby please, he doesn't mean it, not really."
He turned to face her, and she saw the tears on his cheeks.
"Darling, don't cry," she said, beginning to do so herself. "Your father loves you so very much, he just doesn't know it." She reached up and wiped the tears from his cheek, and then the metal part of his face. "Look at my big strong boy." She stood back and looked him up and down, her eyes filling with pride. "I know you're a wonderful Lightning Knight, I've kept a scrapbook of newspaper clippings about you and your friends."
Random smiled down at her, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "I don't think you'll see me again, mother. Tell father goodbye." He reached down and hugged her, before turning and rolling away.
"I love you, Randy."
"I love you too, mother."
-
Remus looked at the nondescript young man, and sighed.
There weren't any obvious errors in his garb, and the male appeared to have a slight stutter preventing him from saying much, but Master Remus was sure this was an imposter.
He stepped up next to the young male, and whispered a few phrases in the ancient formal language of the Atmos, reserved for ceremonial occasions. "Isn't it true that the sun is colder than ice and that you're looking for something you shouldn't be?"
The young man acted as though he had not heard, and started to walk away.
"Stop," Remus called, and the young male paused. He knew that Remus' garb marked him as one of fairly high status among the Atmos despite the man's age, and obeyed him.
"You are not one of us," Remus spoke in quick Atmos.
The stranger appeared to understand, and replied in the same language. "What do you mean, respected father? I do not know you."
Remus decided he'd deal with the situation in his own way. He is likely working against Phoebus Ares…I do not know if his masters have better intentions, but he will have information.
"You have two choices. Follow me to the Zarata Valley, not far from here, where we will be undisturbed, or I will expose you to this gathering."
The stranger shrugged. "Respected father, I would prefer to take the former alternative rather than face your public displeasure."
"Then watch where I go, and follow me after some time has passed."
The young man nodded, and made the formal gestures of obeisance towards one of higher status.
-
Master Remus stood in the middle of the Zarata Valley, waiting for the spy to turn up.
He was surprised when the explosion hit him, and leaped as high as he could to avoid the blast, turning to find the attacker.
Using the Atmos control over airwaves, he swept himself towards his opponent, and lashed out with his staff.
The young male didn't appear to have expected an old man to have such abilities, reacting slowly to the attack.
"Who are you?" Remus asked, landing another blow with his staff.
The stranger's form changed, and Remus noticed a green face under the hood. He'd seen a few of those people before—Dark Elves, Sixth Dimension, most of them able and willing to kill with blades or sorcery—and decided that this was a little more than he'd expected. Still, he was a master of the fight, and remained confident.
The elf materialised a sphere in his hand—her hand, Remus noticed suddenly—and threw it at him. He dodged quickly—faster than a man as old as he should be moving, Remus hoped she noticed—and responded with a few swipes of his staff. It was her turn to avoid him, and she did so with agility.
"You're one of Reinhard's spies, am I correct?" he challenged her.
"Precisely, which is why I have to kill you." She threw another sphere, and Master Remus blocked it with his staff. I do not think she knows that Reinhard wants to imprison me. Good.
"And do you have any experience with the…bloodwalkers, spy?"
She didn't seem to know the word. "I don't know. I do know that your leader has a very pretty piece of jewellery though. Mind if I steal it?"
"Bloodwalkers." He didn't know the word for it in the common tongue of the dimensions. "The night prowlers. The sharp-toothed. The bleeding dead."
"Vampires," she said. "Perhaps."
"You saw the woman Ceres?" She dodged another blow from his staff as he spoke.
"Briefly. I see your point. What's your agenda in this?" He'd thought he'd backed her up against the valley's side, but she disappeared and reappeared behind him.
"There is a right way to destroy the shackles of a tyrannical human Lord, and there is a wrong way. Phoebus Ares and his followers will encourage mass bloodshed. I believe there are other ways to peace."
"Wars are always brutal, regardless." She drew a dagger, flashing in the moonlight, to hold back the blows from his staff.
"You're paid for death."
"What soldier isn't?" She dodged again, gracefully and surely, the kind of movements Remus knew he'd been capable of in his own youth.
"Your style of fighting is familiar," she said, easily countering his moves. "Tell me, do you know a Sparx?"
Remus was shocked, and almost botched an attack. "How do you know her?"
"We're…old enemies," she said. "Small world."
"My daughter always had excellent taste in foes." Whatever else this woman was, she was at least competent, Remus knew.
"You're not her father," the woman said, stating it as a fact.
How much does she know? he wondered. It was the second time she'd managed to shock him. She jumped in a neat spin kick—young and strong, he thought, not that much older than my daughter—and Remus felt his staff flying out of his hands. He took a step backwards.
She gestured with her dagger. "We might have some aims in common, and for…personal reasons… I don't think killing you would be a good idea. Consider a jewel heist?"
A/N: Thank you to Eclair: A Psychotic Confectionary, Hyperpsychomaniac, and Moondream1016 for your wonderful feedback.