Chapter 15: A Separation of Parties

Like I said: I have piss poor luck…in varying fields.

April 7

In the day to follow the meeting, the Iscariot warrior was left somewhat disturbed. Though he never let it show in the congregation the day before, the Judas Priest was to a decent degree unnerved deep inside about the idea.

Alagadda, though a legend and myth in some regards, the scarce stories told of them were disturbing to say the least.

Described as depraved—using humans both Magus and non-Magus alike as little more than playthings. Subjecting any unfortunate enough to find themselves in their reach for unspeakable acts. Some stories told of them indulging in acts of physical and mental torture. Other claimed they forced their victims to act out actions said victims would have preferred to die rather than commit. There have even been stories of them sending agents to earth to assassinate and murder mortals. Thus, why are there legends like that of the original gunslinger?

Clitus mused over what was discussed at the meeting.

Liliana and Marcus were talking, mostly about Elric.

"What an ass hole."

To this Marcus replied facetiously. "Really? You seemed to have trouble keeping your eyes off of him."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You were certainly enjoying his little comments about your appearance."

Liliana blushed but denied Marcus' comments.

"You need to have your eyes checked, Marcus!"

The conversation was soon cut short, just as Clitus was preparing to disrupt it, when a sudden loud explosion was heard in the distance which caused him to stomp down on the break hard in surprise.

Clitus saw the smoke, and only one thought came to mind before his hands and feet began to move on their own—this cannot be good.

Elric awoke, his head feeling like a gorilla had been pounding it as if it was a drum repeatedly.

He could have sworn that he had heard Luvia's screams of protest. But by the time he had awoken on the train floor, Elric found that she and the rest were not nearby. His head rang as he felt an instinctual desire to rise to his feet and seek out where his friends had gotten to.

Resting himself against a wall, the freelancer drew Knall pulling back on the chamber as he made the first staggering steps forward. Finding the bloodied bodies of the other passengers—many of them having bullet holes in their foreheads and faces. All with horrified and sorrowful expressions on their visages.

The sight of it all instilled a feeling of anger in Elric. Such brutality was unnecessary—as needlessly cruel as it was monstrous.

Elric's face continued to sower as he walked through the train's wreckage, finding more and more corpses.

The scum who did this were going to pay.

Looking at it all, it reminded him of something his mentor Zed once told him—luck isn't really luck, it's preparation meets opportunity. It made Elric wonder if this was the case for the soon-to-be dead men who did all of this.

Lead out from the wreckage with a gun to her head, the gunmen rested Luvia on her knees near said wreckage of what had been the train she was riding, alongside Richter Belmont, and Trish. Both of whom had guns trained on them as well.

Kairi and Elric's Servants had disappeared during the exploration of the train.

Richter and Trish had called the individuals waving the guns around them Wolf Pack. The name had some vague familiarity to Edelfelt's recollection. As she recalled once hearing of them as a collection of maguses who work as mercenaries.

Freelancers who work in teams. Performing assassinations, participation in wars, setting explosions; overall nothing was too questionable for them. So they were the type of people her family often looked down upon.

The leader paced around impatiently, giving the impression the matter of the train had not transpired in a way which he preferred,

Asking the ones to return from searching the train, with a very aggressive tone, "Anything?" Growing more frustrated.

"Nothing, sir."

"Damn it!"

He grew more agitated, swearing every swearing word he knew in various European languages.

"Problem?" a familiar voice suddenly inquired. Then one of the mercs was felled with a shot to the head. "You seem stressed."

One merc gasped "Belmont!"

"That's Belmont?" one asked. "The Magician from Bristol."

Their awareness of his alias amused Elric. "You've heard of me? Fantastic." Though he was disappointed by all the names he was known by, they had to use that one. "Now that introductions are out of the way—I think I'll show you why the Belmont family crest is the demon of death."

"Ah-ah!" one of the men then pressed the barrel of his assault rifle against Luvia's throat. "One move and Edelfelt dies."

That gave Elric pause. He could have taken the man out—kill him with a single shot to the head—but the chance that it could result in Luvia's death made him hesitate to act.

Luvia was telling him not to listen, but the thought continued to nag at him.

"Drop the pistol, or she dies!"

Elric reluctantly complied after ten seconds of pause. Then one of the mercs knocked him to the ground.

"Ouch."

"Hello, Elric." one of the mercenaries approached, kneeling on one knee. "Long time no talk." Removing his mask.

It was a face Elric recognized with contempt—an old associate of his mentor Zed—and soon gave voice to his contempt as he said with a hiss "Bragg."

Mordred was tearing through the mercenaries with Enkidu, all while Mordred observed—or as he phrased it, "Supervising"—only dodging the attacks from the mercs and attacking those who came after him.

They were constant, relentless.

It made little difference to Mordred. She would slaughter them all if she had to.

The Knight of Betrayal did feel a pang of guilt for leaving her master unconscious after the crash, but needed to clear the way for Luvia and Trish to escape with Richter and matters simply snowballed from there beyond her control.

As she was in the midst of slashing through her enemies one of these mercenaries manages to get the drop on her and took aim with a assault rifle, but before he could pull the trigger (not that it would have mattered if he did since the Secret of Pedigree armor would deflect it all) a bayonet's blade tore through the merc's skull.

As the man collapsed forward, Mordred looked to see Clitus Stark standing with the gesture of his arm and hand indicating that he was the one to throw the blade while his protege and colleagues were finishing off what remained of the hired guns which the knight had yet to dispatch.

Aiming her sword at the Iscariot, Mordred asked one of several questions which were screaming in her mind. "What are you doing here?"

Clitus initially did not respond. Retrieving his blade from the dead mercenary and wiping both sides of the weapon on his right leg, he ultimately would reply "We were in the midst of departing when I noticed this disturbance." Whilst he looked around, examining the Saber of Red's handiwork. "Though I was unaware you and your master were present."

The iscariot then began looking around, as if something was amiss, before asking "Where is Belmont?"

"Why?"

"I'm curious if he survived."

"I and my fellow servants are still present…so yes."

"Then you may want to collect him." Clitus told her. "I am as proned to mood swings as your master."

Another Iscariot inserted himself into the conversation after finishing off one of the mercs. "What my associate means is you should probably go collect Belmont. Some of the other mercs we encountered earlier made it clear they were interested in grabbing him."

"What?"

Without hesitation Mordred ran to find the spot she and Gilgamesh had decided to leave Elric on—unconcerned if the Iscariot was lying just so that she would lead them to her friend who was in a vulnerable predicament. The idea of Belmont being in danger was enough to concern her.

Though she struggled to understand why on some level. Reasoning that there friendship was the cause.

When she returned to the train car where she had left the resting Elric, to her horror, he was nowhere to be found.

Master! she called out telepathically but only silence returned her call.

The Iscariots Clitus and Liliana were making comments about the appalling sight of the corpses, but Mordred paid little attention to them—all she cared about was finding her master. But by the time they located him, they arrived just in-time to see Elric being loaded into a car along with the others.

Mordred was prepared to go and free him, but Gilgamesh and Enkidu suddenly restrained her.

"Be still, mongrel saber." Gilgamesh told the Knight of Betrayal. "Let us follow them. There is little to be gained in dispatching more of these lesser mongrels. We will just have to deal with more of them later. Better to deal with the problem at its heart."

Mordred tried more to break free, but could do nothing and watch as Elric was carried away. All to her vehement frustration.