"How do you think that you can help?" Claus's anger boiled, "You've done enough already, no one wants your help."
"I've done too much now," Ninten sighed shamefully, "I can't live with knowing that I'm partially responsible for ruined lives. I know you'll never trust me, but I need your help, and you need mine. We aren't going to get your brother back unless I help you."
"Why would you even want my help?" Claus threw himself onto the bed, his anger turning into hopelessness. That hopelessness was something he knew would last if he didn't take his chances now.
"You're the only other one who can think clearly here," Ninten answered, "The only one who isn't a slave to Porky."
"Well it's your fault they're like that, even if it wasn't your idea. You're bringing mindless people, and even children, into battle where they're actually willing to die." Unfortunately for Ninten, Claus was right, and it made him feel worse.
"Please," he begged, "It will get Lucas back for you."
Claus realized this was the only way. "Fine. I'll do it. Destroying the pigmasks is worth associating myself with you."
"No, we aren't destroying the pigmasks," Ninten explained, "We're fixing the people's destroyed lives. I still support King Porky, and I want us to win, but not like this."
Claus was thinking about taking his decision back, but he knew that Lucas was gone now, and to get him back... "Okay," he agreed hesitantly.
Ninten just was about to leave Claus and come back later, but then someone knocked on the door. It was Fassad. "Oh, general, I was just looking for you a minute ago, but I decided to see how our special guests enjoyed their- Wait, where's the other one?" Fassad looked around confusedly.
"He got captured, you evil, fat bast-" Claus got cut off.
"He was captured," Ninten said, interrupting Claus's poorly made insult.
"Oh, well that's a shame. We still have the other one though," Fassad laughed. "But I need to talk to you, boy," Fassad pointed to Claus, "General, go to the meeting room, I'll be there momentarily."
"Yes sir," Ninten used 4th d-slip to completely vanish.
Fassad, knowing that he and Claus were the only ones there, started approaching the redhead slowly. "So, how do you feel about joining our side?"
"Are you stupid?" Claus was becoming enraged, "You just made me lose my brother, and you think that I'm going to help you?"
"Not even if the price is to get him back?" Fassad grinned slyly.
Claus's eyes widened, then he snapped back to his senses, "No."
"What about your parents?" Fassad tried to add more appeal to his offer.
"No, they wouldn't want that," Claus told him, "Neither would Lucas. You never even told us what this war is about."
"Oh, it is just over some.. simple things," Fassad clearly lied.
"What simple things?" Claus's anger mixed with a curiosity.
"King Porky wants to make the world better. He wants his world to be made," Fassad told him.
"And what does 'his perfect world' involve?"
"It involves the world being all his, under his perfect ruling. Everyone will serve him. There will be no more sadness, and no more pain. Everyone will get along with each other," Fassad sugar coated his statement.
"Yeah, because everyone will be brainwashed, you stupid old man," Claus saw right through his lies.
"You are a clever boy," Fassad laughed and clapped sarcastically. "It's too bad no one will hear it." Claus sat on his bed amazed that someone could be as inhumane as Fassad or Porky. "I'll come back later when you've thought about it." Fassad left him, and Claus remained by himself.
Claus groaned mournfully and put his face down on his bed. "Everything is not right," Claus was crying, "Lucas, please come back, please something happen to make you come back. I need help now, and I don't know where to get it."
There was a rustling underneath the bed. Claus got up quickly when he heard this, and got a PK Fire ready to launch. He kicked the sheet that hung past the rim.
"Ow!" a somewhat familiar voice came from under the bed.
"Dude, what are you doing under my bed!?" Claus realized that Ninten had heard his entire soliloquy.
"I was suspicious," Ninten made a poor excuse, but given the circumstances, Claus let it slide, "After what Lucas told me on the ship, and what you just told me now, I'm starting to second guess things."
"Well did you second guess that one right?" Claus's edgy question made Ninten feel guilty for being so naïve. Ninten had let his sense of right and wrong go before today, and he just grasped that concept again.
"No," Ninten answered. "I need to go," he just realized he had an appointment with Fassad in a matter of seconds, "I'll talk later." He vanished.
Ninten appeared in the meeting room where Fassad said. He entered an instant before Fassad opened the door. "What took so long?"
"Oh, I just had some business to attend to with the PK Love user," Fassad told him, "But as long as the other countries don't know we're using the Dark Dragon as the whole scheme, they won't be able to beat us to it with the other boy."
"Fassad, I need to talk to you about something," Ninten finally said, "I don't think that the way we've been going about winning this war is right."
"You question the methods of King Porky?"
"Yes. I do," Ninten boldly stated, "He's using lives to win the war; lives of people. Human beings. We're destroying people's families by doing this. We're destroying people's houses and sending children into war. None of our soldiers have any idea what they're doing, they're all brainwashed."
"What's the point of one human life?" Fassad's irrationality spoke a lot in one word.
"It's hundreds and thousands, don't you get it?" Ninten was yelling now, "What if it was your life we were taking?"
"I am a servant of King Porky, and what he says goes," Fassad answered.
"If you want to give your life for a cause you believe in, that's fine," Ninten shouted at the top if his lungs, "But don't make people do that."
"Impatient, immature child," Fassad laughed, "I think you can go now, general." Fassad's tone implied that he was telling Ninten to get out.
Ninten didn't have anything left to say, so he left.
"Wake up!" someone shouted. A bright light glared at Lucas's face. He squinted just to barely see. Lucas tried to get up, but he was bound to a chair. An overwhelming fear flooded over his body.
"Where am I?" Lucas was just about to faint.
"You're our prisoner now," an angry female voice shouted again, "You are going to answer a few questions for me, or your life is going to be very short." Lucas tried to make out the face of the woman, but the light in his eyes only allowed him to see a silhouette. "Now, where is the base?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. Please let me go," Lucas begged.
"The pigmask base! Tell me where it is."
"I don't know! I wasn't awake! I was there for one day and-"
"So you chose to be deployed into a base whose location you didn't know?" the woman asked, not believing Lucas's alibi.
"No, they captured me," Lucas's face was red and covered in tears, "Please, don't kill me."
"Hey! Stop messing with the prisoners," someone yelled to the woman interrogating Lucas.
"I was just having a little fun," she laughed, "Give me two minutes, I can probably make this one piss himself."
"No, he's telling you the truth," the man told her, "Let him go."
"Fine," the woman undid the bindings on Lucas's body and he got up. "Sorry about that," she apologized. Lucas seemed unsure whether to accept the apology.
"How many other ones did do that to?" the man asked.
"About three. They didn't want to talk though. They just stared at the light and didn't talk. It wasn't any fun."
Lucas realized he was a prisoner of war now. He knew the others that they mentioned were others from the same battle he was captured in. They were brainwashed, probably taught to not talk under interrogation. "E-excuse me, ma'am," Lucas nervously began to ask, "The other's didn't talk because they were brainwashed by the pigmasks."
"That's what they've been doing?" she asked. Lucas answered with a tacit 'Yes.' "Why didn't they brainwash you then?"
"Erm-," Lucas didn't really want to answer this. If these people were savages like Ninten told him earlier, he wouldn't want them to know. They seemed mostly humane though. He decided it would be best to tell them, "I-it's because I can.. um.. use PK Love."
"Hold on a second," the woman seemed confused, "I thought that was a myth."
"But," the man who was standing nearby spoke up, "Flint sometimes talks about how his son can use PK Love, why would it be so strange if more than one person can use it?"
"I guess you're right," the woman, nodded in somewhat agreement.
'Flint?' Lucas thought, 'That's...'
"Excuse me," Lucas respectfully addressed the two again, "I'm sorry if this sounds a bit strange, but Flint is my father."
"Really? He said that you weren't captured by the pigmasks."
"I was two days ago, ma'am," Lucas answered.
"Stop calling me ma'am, I hate it," she seemed easily frustrated, "It's Kumatora, not ma'am or whatever old formal word you want to use."
"Sorry ma- I mean Kumatora," Lucas apologized.
"Thank you," Kumatora thanked him sarcastically, "Flint said you were loud and obnoxious, but I think he was playing games with us."
"Oh, that's my-" Lucas stopped and realized something, "brother.." Claus was gone, and he couldn't get to him.
"Well, I think you should see him then," she brought him out of the interrogation room. "Duster, where's Flint right now?" she asked the man.
"I think he's sleeping. He's been a bit lacking in vitality lately," the somewhat tall man, Duster, pointed to the sleeping quarters. Lucas noticed that he was limping, but Duster didn't seem to mind it much.
"Alright kid, you seem trustworthy," Kumatora decided, "Come with me." They walked down the long well-lit halls for what felt like a mile. They finally arrived at a hallway lined with doors equally separated by about fifteen feet of space. Kumatora knocked on a door loudly. Someone opened the door almost immediately.
"What is it?" Flint was the one who was asking this, but Lucas barely recognized him. He wasn't wearing his cowboy hat, and he shaved his goatee. But it was still Lucas's father
"You tell me what it is," Kumatora pushed Lucas in front of her. Flint's jaw dropped when he realized his son was standing in front of him.
"Lucas," Flint embraced his son, and was speechless.
"Dad.." Lucas seemed a bit more sullen than what both of the others expected.
Flint picked up on Lucas's tone, and became curious. The answer was very simple, and Flint figured it out instantly. "Where's Claus?"
Lucas hugged his father tighter, "Dad.. he's with the pigmasks." Lucas cried tears of sadness and joy. He was extremely happy that he could be with his father again after almost a year, but his brother was gone. "I wish he were here right now."
"I know, Lucas," Flint tried to support his emotional son, "We'll find him, don't worry. How he get caught?"
"We were both out after curfew the other day and the pigmasks arrested us. Then they inspected us for PSI and.. and I.."
"Lucas, it's alright, I'm here for you."
"No, dad," Lucas was crying even more now, "Claus and I are the only ones who can end the war."
"What are you talking about?" Flint thought that his son became crazy.
"They're trying to wake up the Dark Dragon with PK Love," Lucas told him. "They've been looking for people like us, and they finally have Claus."
"But Lucas, you can't-" something switched on in Flint's mind, and he was very surprised, "You learned PK Love?"
Lucas's silence answered itself. "It's too much power for me to handle."
"Well I know some people who can help you," Kumatora was still standing by, feeling extremely awkward with the exchange of father and son.
"Kumatora, I'm not letting those weird things get near-"
"No, trust me," Kumatora asked of him, "They can help."
Sorry, this would've been done one day sooner if I wasn't sick on Friday night. It was really weird trying to transition from Claus and go into whatever Lucas was doing. I decided to just break it. I thought about adding more to this chapter, but then that would make it about 3000 more words. I guess it's a longer portion next time then.
Reviews/Comments/Criticism is/are appreciated. I really like seeing what you think about this. Thank you for your support.