Stronger Than Fire

By: Aviantei

Chapter Seven

Renzo began his third week at the Illuminati headquarters with a yawn and Emília leaning over his temporary desk. She wasn't glaring at him, but the height advantage still gave her an imposing aura. It was just too bad that the jacket portion of her layers was zipped to her neck, keeping Renzo from getting anything close to a nice view of her chest. He would settle for his still blurry vision's rendering of her face.

"I knew it," she said without any preamble. Renzo went to ask the obvious follow-up question, but was too slow to get anywhere. "Your reaction time's been seriously slipping, and Arlie said you've been spacing out half the time. Ugh, you've got bags under your eyes, too, how did I miss that?" Renzo wondered why she cared about a barely filled information bag like him, then he remembered he was supposed to be the boss's pet. "Here."

A shake and the impact on his desk made Renzo realize that Emília had pulled something out of her pocket. Now in front of him was a bottle, the glass dark green and clouded to keep him from seeing inside. Tentatively, he picked up the bottle and it produced the tell-tale rattle of—

"Pills?"

"It's a sleep aid," Emília said, matter-of-factly. At her full height, she widened her stance with hands on her hips, elbows extended. "You've been tired, not sleeping. I should have noticed sooner, but things have been crazy, so I didn't. That's my own short-coming as a leader. But that being said, you take one of these, and you won't even have any time left to consider whether or not it's a good idea to lay down. That being said, try and at least sit on your bed when you take it, okay?"

The implications caught up with him, and Renzo shook his head, trying to force the bottle back onto its owner, who easily leaned out of his reach. "No, I can't," he said. Taking them would admit his weakness more than he already did, make it obvious that he couldn't get over the nightmares he had been having on his own. "I don't need them, really, I've just been busy with this project you gave me, so I pulled a few all-nighters."

"Meirei da," she said, the sudden language switch throwing him off. Still, his native language resonated, and Renzo nodded blankly at the order. Emília continued in Japanese, "Don't lie to me, Kid. You've been spending two weeks straight with me, and I watched you in Inari. I may not notice everything, but I can tell this much. So do you want to try that again?"

It was a hard tone in her voice, one he hadn't heard before. Renzo liked the sound of her voice when she was taunting him better than this.

"Sorry," he said, switching the conversation back to English. "Thanks a lot. I'll be sure to use these." He looked back to the bottle, then put it back in his pocket before he could start to think too hard. She didn't use that sort of language much, but an order from Emília was still an order from a superior. "Sorry if this is prying a bit too much, but why did you have these on you?"

"Huh? I made them of course," Emília said it like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"That means…"

"In True Cross terms, you could count me as a Doctor. Though, besides Demon Pharmaceuticals I did a lot of self-study, so I can make all sorts of stuff. Besides, if I go into the labs when no one's around, no one bitches about what I make. And in a place like this, you don't really have to deal with health regulations or anything, so it's super convenient!"

That only made Renzo more nervous about the bottle of pills; he swallowed even though his mouth was dry, feeling his muscles scratch against each other. "Don't give me that look," Emília said. "I wouldn't give you anything I wouldn't take myself. I'm an Intelligence Officer, not one of those Science Division perverts."

"Right…" Deciding he wasn't going to get better at tricking Emília with his smile if he didn't at least try, Renzo chuckled. "Though that brings up the question I was really getting at: Why do you have them on you?" he asked, part of him hoping that, maybe, she wasn't as flawless as Arlie made her seem, that she had the same sorts of flaws that he did.

That maybe she's just as insecure as I am.

Emília tilted her head, sending a ripple through hair and beads. "Oh, that," she said with such casualty that Renzo knew he hadn't struck a nerve at all. "The thing is, I believe in getting a full night's sleep, no matter what. But the workload's been pretty busy lately, and sometimes I go to lie down and can't stop thinking about it, which means it takes forever to fall asleep." She put a hand to the side of her head and sighed through a scowl. "So I brewed up a stash that'll just turn my brain off for me. I really don't mind sharing, though."

Renzo frowned a little. It hadn't been that calculated of a movement, which meant she was actually being generous. It was an almost soft spot that he hadn't seen before.

It's actually pretty cute…so she's not just a knock-out beauty.

"Really, thank you," he said, hoping that she wouldn't think he was faking generosity.

Emília shook her head, then leaned forward, delivering a well-placed flick to the center of Renzo's forehead. "Don't get so worked up," she scolded. "I get that you have some combat ability, but you're an Intelligence Officer first. If we don't take care of ourselves, then we're not really worth anything. Your body's key to participating in infiltration missions, so you better take care of yourself, got it?"

Ah, it had been a professional interest, then. Still, "You're that worried about me, huh?" he teased. "Well, I guess that if you're so concerned, then I can put a little effort in. Though, since you're qualified, would you nurse me back to health? Ah, Emília-chan, you're a cute girl, so you should wear a nurse's uniform, kay?"

She smirked, a startling contrast from Renzo's expectations. Almost shamed, he realized that he had been waiting for Izumo's traditional outburst. Really, wasn't a month enough time to get over a girl? In this case, he guessed not.

Still, that had to be more than a taunting smirk, right? Meaning, if the circumstances were right, she would actually do it…

"I do appreciate your enthusiasm, though," Emília continued, not once faltering in her expression. "So I'll at least respect your hard work and let you report to me first. I read over all your main assessments from Arlie, since that would be boring to report, so I figured I could spend time listening to your personal assessment instead." Placing her hands on Renzo's shoulders, she adjusted him into a proper upright position, then plopped herself down on his desk top, thighs narrowly missing his tablet.

"R-right," Renzo stammered, not quite sure if he could get away with touching her leg in an excuse to get to the technology. Not quite ready to risk that much, he settled for enjoying the view of her thighs instead. "I think, right now, I'm feeling a bit unstable. Nikita said it came from an overconfidence in my abilities and getting placed in a new environment." The only reason he gave that much detail was that it had been the whole point of the exercise, and Renzo wanted to spend his brain power on other things besides getting scolded. "From that standpoint, my current greatest weakness is detaching myself after performing an infiltration.

"So, I think field experience would be the best option. It could maybe be my inexperience, or maybe I'm just a coward, but maybe pulling off a series of smaller projects? In that case, there's a hole in our information concerning a minor branch hosted in Britain that we've been considering closing in on."

"Ooh, yeah, that is a better fit," Emília said. She had mentioned beforehand that she would be developing her own theories as time went on, but it was still disconcerting. "You know enough English to function, so you won't look completely out of place, even as a foreigner. And the whole point is to assess their information stock and eliminate them… Oh, though are you going to be okay with that?"

If you're going to fight in this battle, you need to be prepared to fight other humans.

Renzo nodded. It would be a test for him, but he would go through with it. He would have to if this whole thing was going to work. "I can do it. Besides, I'm sure there will be a backup team if I screw up too much." In some ways, he was almost counting on it.

"Some people say that planning for failure is the first step in failing," Emília said. "I, however, tend to disagree. If you make yourself be too confident, it can affect your psychological output, though the percentage is too low to be reliable. You may be a kid, but sometimes you have a good head on your shoulders." She nodded, looking pleased. "Now go take a nap. In fact, you can have the next two days off. I'm not sending you into a mission half-dead, so your next mission is to get some sleep, got it?"

"Yes, ma'am," Renzo said, standing and taking wobbly steps towards the door.

Making it back to his room, Renzo knew he should be sleeping. He wanted to sleep, tired of the pressure on his eyelids. But this was a golden opportunity, and, even with the next two days to himself, Renzo knew that the world of information was one of timeliness. If he wanted to get anything done, taking the effort to report now could make a major difference.

He was lucky enough that the dorm rooms didn't have any cameras—at least, if they did, they were well hidden, and a sweep of the room with Yamantaka had been enough to clear that. Beyond that, given that nobody had burst in on him on the Dominus Liminis, Mephisto's altercations to Renzo's Academy cellphone seemed to prevent bugging, alongside keeping the battery at full percentage despite not seeing a charger in weeks.

Renzo plopped onto the bed, removing his jacket and going to toss it aside. Something in his pocket rattled, and he pulled it out, finding Emília's pills. He placed the bottle carefully on his nightstand, then finished stripping until he was comfortable in an undershirt and boxers. His uniform formed a pile on the floor—one he knew he would probably keep there until a panic the night before returning to work—and Renzo leaned back against his pillows, tablet in lap, cellphone in hand.

"It's nice to hear from you again, Shima-kun," Mephisto's voice said, familiar in Japanese. Despite the speaker, hearing his native language drained a considerable amount of tension from Renzo's shoulders. "Judging by the fact that you're not panicking at the moment, I'd say that things are going smoothly?"

"I…" Renzo started in English, then swapped back to the familiar boku. Even when given the chance, Renzo hadn't switched back before, but he had wanted to. It was the ease of the language that made him hesitate, worried that he might reveal something that he shouldn't. "I've been doing pretty well. Things aren't exactly inactive here, but for now everything seems quiet."

"Yes," Mephisto said, "Lucifer always was the cautious one. Even in a declaration of war situation, he's taking his time. I do wonder where he got that habit from. It certainly wasn't from our father." That…was a nest of information that Renzo could go without entering. "I'm sure he's biding his time, and the declaration was more to make his presence known than anything else. Still, he's crafty, which is why I'm sure you've collected some interesting morsels for us."

Renzo powered on his tablet, double-checking his mass of files, making sure they were the most up to date versions. Most of the data updated on its own, and Renzo let the tablet run its own system checks. "I've gotten access to the main interface of the Illuminati's data core," he reported. Emília had granted it for his project, and she didn't seem interested in taking it away. "I have a secure connection, too, so I'll be sending it your way."

He had to hand it to the Intelligence Head; she knew how to eliminate a data trail like no other, and had shown him trackable information bits that Renzo hadn't even known existed. He had mastered the skills early on, and would use it get rid of his data transfer to the True Cross's proxy once he was done. The added benefit was that the Intelligence Division's tablets were mostly untraceable, a function to make infiltration missions easier. That being said, it ironically made it easier for Renzo to infiltrate the Intelligence Division itself.

"Oh, that's quite the impressive feat you've done there," Mephisto praised, and Renzo let his ego accept the stroking. "I knew you would be the right person for the job, Shima-kun."

Smiling, Renzo tried to play it humble, at least a little. "To be honest, I lucked out. The department head likes me, so I made it in a key place pretty quick. She's even been giving me pointers." Forceful lessons was probably a more accurate description, but it the result was the same.

"Then you made a wise choice, Shima-kun. I don't think that any other agent would have had such luck." There was a crackle, and Renzo assumed that Mephisto was shifting the phone, or, perhaps, adjusting the magic. It didn't seem to impede the call any, though, so he ignored it. "Although, getting taught how to deceive the enemy by the enemy… I quite like that."

Renzo chuckled, suddenly feeling cleverer than he had thought of himself before. "I figured you would," he said. This sort of style was the kind the headmaster excelled in—Renzo had known that since the Exwire exam. The compliment gave him a sense of validity, probably fixed his confidence more than the upcoming mission would. Right. "I'll actually be going on a mission, soon. Something small, and it's against a minor opposition; nothing True Cross related. We really didn't discuss this, but my orders in these situations are…?"

"You are to act as any Illuminati officer would," Mephisto ordered, and Renzo had been afraid the headmaster would say that. "We can't compromise your position over something like holding back. If you wish to do any work at all there, you must give it your all. We are counting on you, Shima-kun. I trust you'll be able to do what you need to."

"Yeah…" Feeling disconcerted, Renzo looked back to his tablet. All of his data was up-to-date, and he began the external connection to the True Cross's proxy. "Okay, I'm sending the data packet now," he said. "It's got a lot of information, but I'm sure you'll find something useful in it. Anything specific I should dig into this time?" Bored, he watched the transfer screen increase one percentage at a time.

A negative sound from the other line. "Just continue as you have been. That should be enough," Mephisto said, and Renzo wasn't sure if the lack of direction made him feel better or worse. "If we need anything specific, I'll contact you."

"Got it," Renzo said. "Want me to stay on the line while the data sends or…?"

"That will also not be necessary. I think you should take advantage of your good fortune and get some rest."

And like that, Mephisto hung up, leaving Renzo alone with his thoughts and pixelated numbers.

What was this feeling? A sort of dissatisfaction had risen in his throat like bile, dancers churning his stomach again. It was a feeling that had subsided over a few days, only to come back in a startling amount of force. Renzo dropped his phone to the bed, pushing his laptop off his lap, and fell to the mattress on his side.

In the low light of the tablet's glowing, he could barely make out the silhouette of Emília's pill bottle.

Renzo squeezed his eyes shut, wondering if something like tears would come. He had gone into this for himself; it was supposed to have been for him. But the headmaster spoke as if he had a responsibility to others, like this whole infiltration mission was supposed to be for other people instead of what Renzo wanted to do.

And it was, he realized. No matter what he told himself, this entire situation was only possible because of Mephisto, because of the True Cross. Renzo would have never been able to do this sort of thing on his own; once he had gotten the business card, he had gone and shown it to his family instead of acting on his own. And now they were all pressuring him to do them some good.

Emília wouldn't do that. Emília didn't do that. She may have had other motives, but she let him do things for himself, forced him to do things that he would have found excuses not to do otherwise. In her eyes, it was just a happy coincidence that the upcoming infiltration mission needed to be done. Her true intentions were in helping him improve himself.

He reached out to the pill bottle. Emília hadn't given him any instructions on how to take them. Did he need food or water? How many should he take? Renzo considered calling her for the answers, but remembered his Illuminati phone was still deep in his jacket pocket on the other side of the room.

It was Emília, right? And she had made these for herself, so that meant they would work with the least amount of hassle possible.

Renzo fumbled with the lid, his thick fingers struggling to secure the pill, almost knocking the whole bottle over. He didn't bother to replace the lid, bringing it to his mouth.

He paused, pill pressing against his lips. Was this really okay? Was it alright to cheat, just to get some rest? Could he really run away from everything he had left back home, back in Japan?

Whether or not it was okay, he took the pill, small capsule brushing against his tongue. Renzo coughed, a bitter taste searing down his throat.

Almost instantly, his eyes shut.

[ ]

[NOTES] The brackets at the end are not an error. I repeat, they're not an error. It's just figuring out what they mean that's up to you. :P

That being said, thanks to patamon642 and renjutori for your favorites and follows! patamon gets to be my shout-out buddy for also checking out Karma and tossing down some love on that!

Speaking of Karma, I got to revamp some scenes from that for this chapter, mainly the pills. Oh, and a mission is coming up. The plot is doing stuff!

I'm not gonna spend too much time rambling here since I really should be working on drafting out my Lit Theory project, so I'll leave it at this. Thanks for reading, and the next chapter will be in two weeks!

[POST] 012716