Fukuro looked at him under the lavender tree they both resided below as the once-blooming flowers quickly rotted away, she watched him tremble in his unconscious state on the floor.
She appreciated the cutthroat with which the squad acted. Absolutely. Ruthless, brutal, and cunning.
But... her master would never be any of those. No matter how much he tried to the contrary.
Seriously? Why did the one guy with a conscience get chosen to pilot her?
Sometimes she wondered what life would be like if she had another pilot. More danger? more daring escapes? More cutthroat brute force action?
The water below their feet on their little island changed, more visions of past hunts and successful targets.
It´s funny. It´s never the moments of heart-pounding near-death encounters, not the brutal deaths of those who dared oppose him, just those he deemed innocent.
Again? thee coin-flip nightmare AGAIN? her master has been through the song and dance multiple times, in fact, the other birds in his flock always egged him on to do it because almost everyone agreed that he would because he was the most unbiased.
Funnily enough he rigged the games from the start, no one else knew, maybe even he didn´t know. But she did, she was always watching.
He could close himself away from his humanity all he wanted but she saw them, the nightmares, the slight shaking after seeing the trigger pulled, all that violence outside of the hunt.
He couldn´t just give a pass to everyone he saw. It was commendable how he executed his methods to keep his effect secret, anyone in even a mile´s proximity were practically already dead in their presence, and if he did it too many times the others would notice and uncover his other actions, But he practiced and practiced and managed to stage it all perfectly just to let people live.
Except in those times he didn´t, the times he let the coin land on tails. Oh, those haunted him whether he knew it or not.
An old man who probably had kids that were hiding, an old woman with a mouth, a possible mother or just a really fat woman, two dumb men who wandered down the wrong side of the road late at night. Thankfully not any kids. he convinced his squad much more easily with those cases. Even she could agree that young blood needed to prove itself and not be snuffed out immediately.
Wow, he really was rubbing off on her. She assumed it would be the opposite when the connected for the first time.
He just had to choose who lived and who died. A very beneficial status to have, for anyone else.
The water shifted into a darker swamp color, and more images were imposed on it.
Just more muzzle flashes, more limp bodies, more thoughts of ruined families. nothing she/ they hadn´t seen before.
Still, no one noticed those moments when he snuck away for a late-night flight. Especially since they were handcrafted to be undetectable.
Not to say she didn´t enjoy them, it wasn´t nearly as satisfying as killing. But stretching her wings was one of the moments she enjoyed with him in nonviolence.
Oh here was a big one, The village which was too dangerous to investigate due to the rumor of Anti-IS gear, he thought it probably held only insurgents, no way a family would stay in there. It turns out it had both.
A sister and a little brother, the father dying personally hands.
More prey that couldn´t pick up even a stone to fight back, not that it´d even do anything. Disgusting.
...she wasn´t even going to pretend that she dislikes killing innocents.
Fukoro grabbed the slumped body of her owner and dragged it to a small makeshift hammock she made just for these scenarios. An odd experience making something out of the internal consciousness of her owner. Still, it was one of the few things she could do outside of fighting.
Actually, she once requested for him to just read a book extra slowly just so she could experience something other than stasis, she was disgusted by the fact that she enjoyed it, so much so that she gained a preference for older books. Something she kept very close to her, in fact when he asked her over whether or not she enjoyed it a forceful silence came upon her, just so he wouldn´t stop, but also wouldn't continue.
She never wanted to experience this. Oh, she loved her master. She loved serving under him. But he didn´t use her as the weapon she was born to be.
The nightmare was getting worse. The wind around her was blowing harder and harder. The leaves and branches were shaking and the flowers had this rotting mildew smell. Her connection with his ego was weak and she knew he would break and wake up in a cold sweat, not something good for either of them.
The old man popped up again, great. She could use this.
With a sigh, she bent down to his ear, and then she whispered the word ¨medicine¨ into his unconscious ear. He didn´t react, so she slapped him in the face and yelled ¨MEDICINE¨, seriously this guy is thicker than an oak tree.
A vision of him slipping out at night to recover the body. They just left him there. He was searching around looking for any confirmation they were right. Just so he might have a good night of sleep.
He found a satchel of money, the old man seemed to be lying, probably moving his money to another bank. He should´ve given up and gone back but after a depressingly closer inspection, hidden under his robes was a small vial of medicine. The old man was telling the truth.
He was too numb to be horrified, especially after the day´s earlier events. He really should´ve just gone back and gone to sleep throwing it away with the knowledge of another statistic casualty.
But no, he spent an hour quietly slipping past the defenses of a village that was probably not even the right one, avoiding the watchmen, all hoping to find somewhere to put the medicine.
She made sure to restrain herself. To the best of her ability. She could´ve probably gotten there faster. But-
Well, he did. He snuck in there with a stolen covering he found on a drape and silently approached what appeared to be a hospital in this small area.
He peered through a window.
On a shoddy bed, he could see a sick girl in a med bay choking with each breath. He saw a nurse in a crumpled uniform trying to comfort her. She was visibly overworked with eye bags. Along with being on the verge of tears, those faces of anguish were universal. Was this even the same person the old man was referring to?
there were no other patients in the area. Just them. the small building was almost empty.
He approached cautiously making sure to not be seen, in and out job. Just place it near the door and make her notice by his footsteps.
A calm placing of the money and the medicine and it was over, then he just made sure to stomp his feet on the ground harder.
She turned around rapidly with a rabid glance of protection. And seemed surprised to see what seemed to be a cloaked figure.
She took one look at the medicine and instantly moved to reach it. She ran with deep precision to a small cabinet that held syringes with a fire in her eyes.
She proceeded to open the bottle and squeeze it into the needle, It took up almost all of the minute amount of medicine in the vial.
Carefully, and ever so slightly she walked forward and injected it into the girl, making sure not even to waste the opportunity by a misplaced injection.
The girl almost immediately relaxed, she seemed to be breathing calmly, as if the sickness was washed away by the purity of the medicine.
The nurse seemed to release more tension than he thought was possible, actually releasing a slight giggle from the ecstacy of there seemingly being good in the world done to the innocent.
Ichicka brought out the small carry-on food pilots were given. An energy bar and some chocolate-covered coffee beans were rationed. He put them on the small nightstand next to her and turned to leave.
The nurse said something in a language he didn´t understand and grabbed him on the shoulder.
This action revealed some of the body armor he was wearing, it was instantly revealed he was not the old man.
She jerked away as if she might be poisoned by continued touch, guess it was still easy to distrust foreign soldiers.
It was a very stern reminder that a ¨good¨ action did not come without consequences.
He walked out the door, and she didn´t stop him.
He flew back to base as fast as he could without being noticed.
No one even knew he was gone, it was a long operation and the only person doing the guard shift was Monika. He greeted her with the same smile and wave he always saw her with.
¨Ënjoy yourself?¨
A pained sigh came out of him.
¨Place too ugly to even enjoy a good night´s flight.¨
He spat on the ground to emphasize his point.
¨Cheer up, we can make smores tomorrow, we managed to smuggle in some chocolates and crackers.¨
¨No marshmallows?¨
¨too much of a hassle, we´re just using fruit.¨
¨weird.¨
¨ I know right!?¨
¨ Yeah, why not just call it fondue at that point...¨
Their conversation lasted into the remainder of the night, it was an enjoyable rebound from his last escapade.
But he wasn´t the only one who knew. Fukuro did too. something that she wondered if he thought about too.
Kindness was great at bringing hunters together, but too much of it would make them abandon the hunt altogether.
Visibly relaxing, his body lost that tension that was with him for most of this nightmare. The ravaging wind calmed.
He was just rocking on a tree in the middle of her slice of home, or under the safe blankets of his new home.
She climbed up the tree, rested on the strong wood, and closed her eyes. Since when did she even need sleep as well? what happens to her when she rests and relaxes?
That thought stayed with her as she drifted away.
It was a better night than most.