Chapter 73

For the Record

Well.

I had to copy/paste the last Record entry so I could get it in the right spot, after the one before I went to fight Cinder in Beacon, and so you could understand what simultaneously did and did not happen.

I really don't fucking know what to say or what to think about this. I'm at more of a loss now than I was when Cinder coined the term 'Master'.

I just...

Wow.

I fucking died! And there's some random asshole running around wearing my face! Apparently I trust him? Or at least I did, I sure as shit don't right now. Who the fuck is he? Why didn't I see fit to tell myself that information?

And it was me that wrote that Record entry, too many things lined up for it to be someone orchestrating the whole thing. So now I'm so dedicated to my fourth dimensional hyper-chess game that my grand plan includes keeping secrets from myself. It's a fucking Memory Gambit!

Jesus Christ, did things really get that bad? I mean, a Human Grimm? Or... Terran - whatever. That sounds terrifying, but would such a thing really be that dangerous?

I just... God, what do I do with all this?

Well, actually, I know exactly what to do with all of it - absolutely nothing. Apparently the entire plan was to just make sure I lived just so I could keep on doing what I was doing, only now with a few extra tidbits of knowledge.

And really, Past Aldric (I'm thinking 'George', if Future-Aldric is 'Marty') only saw fit to tell me three important things:

Firstly: Aldric Black.
Apparently all my whining and worrying about 'running out' of my soul wasn't unfounded, because if a human runs out or otherwise loses their soul... They turn into a Grimm! And if Aldric Black was any indication, they're STUPID powerful, implacable on the level of fucking Terminators, and don't fucking care for bravado or anything else - they do what they need to and will kill anything in their way, without hesitation... Which no one, on Earth or on Remnant, is psychologically built for, or strong enough to resist.

Take your goddamn pick: They're John Wick shooting everyone's head when everyone else is trained and used to shooting at the body. It's Frieza blowing up the goddamn planet to avoid fighting Goku or Vegeta. It's someone whipping out a fucking machine gun to take down a bunch of swordsmen - nobody's ready for that!
Fucking! Wonderful!
Now I need to come up with plans for if that happens to me, and come up with plans for if it happens to someone else!
I might as well actually go ahead and start calling myself Batman too, at this rate. Fuck.

Secondly: Venom Aldric.
Apparently I'll recognize him when we run into each other.
And apparently it's someone I don't trust.
Let's list off the men in my life that meet that criteria:
Ozpin - not likely as Venom appeared to not know about RWBY, the show, and he would never allow me to command him... But he would more than anyone else have a list of people he'd be watching over that he'd want to give the chance to change and/or redeem themselves, as they had done in his timeline, while being smart enough to be convinced that it couldn't happen.
Torchwick - interesting, but no, he wouldn't have thrown himself into the line of fire to fight Aldric Black in the first place, to result in him getting tossed into the DeLorean.
Qrow - Maybe, but not likely, as, again, Venom didn't know about RWBY, and who would Qrow want to undergo major the personality changes George mentioned?
Adam Taurus - Very likely. Dude's strong enough to fight in the big leagues, has a semblance that lets him stand above a lot, and now he has a vibranium katana to boot, basically making him Jetstream Sam with superpowers. He'd also fit the bill for desperately wanting to give someone the chance to undergo the same changes they would in his timeline, while also being smart enough to realize such a thing couldn't really be expected to happen anymore. But the biggest question I would have would be how did he find and enact my contingencies?
Thor - let's be honest, would anyone really be surprised if he was alive? He'd fit the bill, and I wouldn't trust him simply because I know he wouldn't trust me.
Ironwood - It's a stretch, but I could see him surviving everything, knowing what to do with my plans, and fighting Aldric Black to the DeLorean. Question would be how, and why would he have left Atlas? And who would he want to change?

If it's not someone on that list, I don't know who would fit the bill. Chainsword? Maybe? One of the other Masters?

Eh, anyways, moving on: Venom is someone I'll recognize and not trust at first... But won over George's trust by sacrificing himself fighting Aldric Black, and now George brought Venom deeply into the Fold: Venom has seen everything I have on the show, and even has a copy of The Record, such that he can operate as my double while I'm getting in close with Cinder and Salem.
Sidenote: I guess that makes me Big Boss. Cool.

Time will tell who Venom is and if George was right to trust him, but the secrecy around him begs me to not do so... And I honestly wouldn't be surprised if that was my plan to begin with. That George didn't fully trust Venom, so he kept his identity from me as a means of fostering distrust, while also supplying me an easy method of killing him such that, should he turn out trustworty, everything turns out fine, but if not, I can take him out with no regrets and no effort.

Finally: Ozpin.

Dude hijacked Oscar Pine's body and then tried to get Venom Aldric to give his soul to him.

Does that sound familiar?
He tried to get Venom Aldric to sell his fucking soul!
And in case it hasn't settled in - he HIJACKED a FOURTEEN YEAR OLD'S body to do it!

I fucking called the whole 'mind reading' thing - I knew Ozpin had to have something of a dark side to him - but this? This is...
Fuck, all this time I've been worried about Adam Taurus turning out to be an enemy in disguise, but not once have I considered what Ozpin's postgame is. He's spent entire generations fighting and resisting Salem, but there's no way he'll just rest and watch the sun rise on a grateful universe once she's down.

And consider this: All I know about Salem is what Ozpin's told me, what Cinder's let slide - which she's admitted more than once is mostly a fabrication during the time she was trying to win my loyalty - and a collective forty five minutes of footage from an internet show that has little use but as reference material. And here it occurs to me that two people wouldn't fight each other for as long as they have unless they have a reason.

So what are their reasons? Why is Salem fighting Ozpin? What does she want or need the Relics for?
Why is Ozpin fighting Salem? What does he intend to do after she's gone?

Am I willing to war against both of them if I have to?
Or am I willing to take a side?

Ugh, fuck's sake - the more this shit piles on the more mentally exhausted I get. I need some sleep.

Side note: In the efforts of attempting to bottle up an existential crisis and pretend to forget it exists until such a time as I die or am done with this whole WateverWe'llCallIt with Salem, I just realized something important:
Past Aldric called this guy Venom Snake and not Future Trunks, which I argue would fit better.
Aldric of YesterWhenever is a fucking moron. He almost died, can you believe that? What a tool! If we'd ever met I'd kick his ass.

Would punching myself in the face have the same effect?
Will have to think on this further.
Also: Ow.

"Aldric!" He heard, before he felt something shake his shoulder.

Aldric awoke with a start, his arms and legs swinging wildly as he pushed himself upright and reached for his gun. Cinder, however, had his gun-hand caught and pinned to the wall before he could make it, and she kept it there as his brain finished booting up and he realized what was happening.

"Oh..." Aldric groaned, rubbing his eyes with his fleshy hand. "Fuck." He took in a deep breath, "what's up?" He asked, before Cinder dropped his hand.

Cinder stood upright, and nodded towards the lowered ramp leading outside. "We're here." She said, the tensity of pain still in her voice. "You slept through the landing."

Aldric looked out the ramp, and pushed his radar out, and damn. They really were here. A land of darkness, its ground appeared dusty, covered in settled soot and fractured like burned oak, it was scorched a deep black and reflected a low red light from the bloody sky above, giving the area a purple hue where the light bled from one extreme to another.

And, of course, there were Grimm everywhere. All shapes, all sizes, all species - some he'd never even seen before, some which appeared neither animal or humanoid. They all wandered aimlessly about, avoiding eachother and sticking to packs made of similar species, and through it all there was this oppressive haze. Not a physical one like a fog, but a feeling in his mind, like this was a place of equal amounts importance, evil, and power.

Aldric began to understand what Cinder meant, as his heart picked up, his brain woke up, and he pushed himself up.

"Big Boss ain't here to meet us?" He asked, pulling the suitcase with the Relic out from underneath the bench with his semblance.

Cinder took it up, and shook her head. "We will go to the castle anyway... Why have her meet us here?"

Aldric nodded to the side, "fair point." He shrugged, and followed Cinder out.

Walking out into Salem's domain, Aldric was hit with a sudden wave of cold, like the land was stuck in a perpetual winter.

Hm... Aldric thought, casting his eyes on the horizon and seeing a huge pack of humanoid Grimm lazily carrying themselves across the ground. I would've thought this place would be humid as all get-out. He looked up to the sky. How in the hell did the Terrans not find this place before now? He wondered, following Cinder. For fuck's sake, finding the place that looks like it was firebombed for sixty three years shouldn't be too difficult... Especially if the sky is bleached red. He looked down, and saw the gigantic castle looming overhead in the distance.

A beat.

Eh, I'll forgive that one, actually. He thought, we can barely see the Great Wall from orbit. That castle would have to be the size of the Imperial fucking City in order to be seen that high up. He thought, wondering from where in there Salem would be, and gulping through a dry throat as he anticipated their first meeting.

All thoughts boiled down to one thing: If she could read minds, he was screwed.

Salem and Aldric approached the castle, the wastelandish ground below them crunching with each step. It took them several minutes to make it from their landing zone to the castle's main entrance, where two great doors, each easily the size of a building, loomed over them.

Aldric frowned, "I've always wondered... How the fuck do people expect to open those?" He asked, "yeah they're big and grand and intimidating... But they're also impractical..." He turned to Cinder, who was ignoring him. "I mean... They usually... Have... Smaller..." Wow, she wasn't even humoring him.

Looking ahead, it wasn't hard to figure out why.

There she was - standing at the threshold to the castle, right in front of the smaller doors Aldric had just been about to make fun of for their mere existence. Six and a half feet tall, her clothes a deep black and contrasting with her bleached white skin. A single, unbroken robe hung from her shoulders and cascaded down her body, clinging to its curves, while its back end, alongside a black and red shawl, dragged lightly against the ground behind her. But Aldric, befitting the role he'd created for himself, felt his eyes zero in on her hair, a tight, bleach-blonde bun with six tightly bound branches that framed her head, from each of which a small black gem hung, dangling freely. To her credit, the red-eyed demon woman actually looked somewhat pleasant, all things considering - greeting the two of them with a convincingly warm smile.

"That her?" Aldric grunted, leaning towards Cinder.

Cinder nodded, finding her confidence again and approaching Salem, bringing the suitcase to her front and holding it with both arms.

"Why the fuck does she insist on those plugs dangling from her hair?" He rumbled, low enough for Cinder to hear.

But apparently, Salem heard it anyways, and as Cinder rounded on him, eyes wide with outrage and warning, Salem's gaze shifted from the suitcase, to him, her smile dropping to one of amusement.

"What?" Aldric asked, meeting Cinder's outraged expression with one so dully neutral he knew he'd make Saitama proud. "Maybe I'm not up on my million-year-old demon fashion but I figure it'd get annoying after a while -" He whipped his head back and forth, "turning all the time only to have a bunch of plugs swinging around, weighing down your head, annoying the shi -" He was finally silenced when Cinder roughly thrust the suitcase into his stomach; his vibranium suit took the impact, but the air was still pushed out of his lungs, resulting in the rest of his words being drowned out by a grunt.

"Fine!" Aldric grunted, straightening up, "point taken!"

"You said he had a mouth." Salem intoned, her voice warmer and friendlier than Aldric expected - he would even call it pleasant to listen to, her cadence slow and methodical, not unlike Ozpin's. "I must admit I thought you were exaggerating." She hummed, the amused smirk still on her face, as she watched Cinder and Aldric approach, the former trying to recover her grace, the latter absently rubbing at his stomach.

"I apologize, my lady." Said Cinder, "I had thought he would know to whom he spoke." She bowed her head.

Aldric looked at Cinder, an eyebrow raised, then to Salem, realizing that her head turned as did his - they both had been staring at Cinder, bemusedly.

Salem's smirk widened a fraction of an inch, and she shook her head, turning her gaze back to Cinder. "Think nothing of it, Cinder. I find it refreshing, more than anything." She admitted, eyes briefly dropping to the case being presented to her.

"Ma'am, consider your next words very carefully, because you do not want to encourage me. I can go from zero to Deadpool in a second" He chuckled, "I suppose you're the Big Boss?"

Salem nodded, gliding across the ground towards Cinder, and taking the case out of her hands, running her own ashen fingers over it, reverently. "Many people bestow upon me many titles... I am a queen to some, a witch to others... It has been a very long time since someone gave me such a... Practical title." She said, as Cinder retreated a step and straightened up.

Aldric noted with amusement that Cinder had placed herself within gut-punching range.

Salem opened up the case, revealing inside that which was the literal object of her desires: The Crown of Choice. Her amused smirk turned to a victorious sneer, as she nodded.

"You two did wonderfully." She said, taking in a deep breath through her nose, before shutting the case, and giving it to a Seer, who retreated inside the castle with it. "Defeating the traitor... Obtaining a Relic..." Her smile returned to its previous neutral warmth, which sent chills down Aldric's spine. "I am proud of how far each of you have come in so little time." She nodded to the both of them, "though... It is not without your fair share of scars... Some healed..." Her eyes met Aldric's, before sliding down to his arm, and then running over Cinder. "Others... Healing." She lifted her hand and caressed the side of Cinder's face.

Aldric wondered if the woman's skin was as cold as the air around him.

Salem let out a soft sigh, "it will take some time for you to recover... The damage dealt here was one of a more metaphysical nature." She said, letting Cinder's face go, and turning to the castle. "Come." She said, entering, followed by Aldric and Cinder, each flanking a different side. "But our greatest boon is that you both yet live."

"Despite Ruby Rose's best efforts." Cinder growled.

"Is that her name?" Salem asked, "the one with the eyes that did that to you?"

Aldric let the two talk, splitting his attention between them and following the Seer with his radar, until a thought occurred to him:

"So, Big Boss." Aldric grunted, attracting Salem and Cinder's attention, the former with a look of curiosity, the latter with one of warning and worry. Aldric didn't share the latter's feelings, as he had an actual question, he wasn't trying to fuck with anyone. "During my travels with Hot Stuff there -" Not too much, at least. "- I decided the best way to hide the fact that I was spying on the Wizard of Oz was to tell him I was spying on him." He began.

To which, Salem nodded, "oh, I remember." She said, "I must admit I was impressed... And am now moreso, that I see it bear results."

Aldric nodded to the side, "I bring it up because Ozpin said something to me that... I admittedly don't fully believe, but it makes enough sense that I am curious. Since you two have been fighting so long and you have..." A beat, "well, less of a reason to lie to me, I wanted to ask: Is Ozpin originally from Earth?"

Salem's smile turned humorous, as though what Aldric had said was a great joke, though it still failed to even place a wrinkle in her otherwise flawless, albeit bleached, face. "Is that what he told you?" She asked, folding her hands behind her back, a curious glint to her eye, as Cinder let out a sigh to steady her nerves. When Aldric nodded in the affirmative, Salem hummed, a musical halfway-point between laughter and giggles. "I do assume the reason you do not trust him would be some combination of your reason being there..." She examined him, "and because you determined he can use his abilities a bit mischievously?"

Aldric dropped the hammer: "And he outright told me he could read surface-level thoughts."

The Grimm Lady nodded, acquiescing the point. "Well, I can confirm to you that he was lying bold-facedly." She said, "he has never set foot upon your world, young Aldric." She said, "he, as were all of his hosts in the time since, was born on this world, though he answered to a different name at the time."

"Of course." Aldric nodded. "I thought as much, but it's nice to hear it be confirmed." He said, noticing that they had stopped moving, a stone spiral stairwell looming above them, leading up to the higher levels of the castle, and down below the ground. "So did he actually meet God, or was that BS too?" He asked, watching as Salem began ascending, followed closely by Cinder.

Salem slowed a moment, her hand lazily resting upon a railing, eyes lowered to the ground and smile briefly washed from her face, leaving a neutral, pensive expression, before it returned, and she looked to Aldric over her shoulder, a playful expression in her eye.

"Which one?" She responded.

Aldric rolled his eyes, and followed the two of them. "So now I've got two billion-year-old immortals with literal magic trying to convince me that God exists, and they're on speaking terms."

"Oh no, young man, we haven't been on speaking terms for a..." She let out a long sigh, "very... Long time."

"You're not helping my skepticism."

"Aldric!"

"Cinder." Salem cut in, "it's alright... Say what you will about his attitude, but there is a reason he has lived so long... And indeed, you would do well to remember that he has only been a part of this life for two years, and Ozpin has spent the latter half of that time filling his head with lies. He knows not our ways or our secrets... So skepticism is to be expected."

Cinder gulped, her brow furrowed, "I just... Do not want him to anger you with his flippancy, ma'am."

"I remember reading a comic once. This guy got tied up on some alien planet with an evil uber-god's henchman. The henchman kept referring to the evil uber-god as 'my lord' this, 'the great' that, and 'the unstoppable' whatnot... The guy tied up promptly spent the next two minutes making fun of how all of the uber-god's he's run into have such low senses of self esteem and self worth that they demand their henchman prop them up with words." He said, "I subscribe to the same idea: If they're so insecure as to demand something like that from me, they don't deserve my respect." And he was so unbelievably nervous and paranoid in general that acting so blatantly assholish to literal demon masterminds entertained him enough that it took the edge off.

To which, Salem said, "while I can respect the thought, you would do well to remember who's house you're in." She intoned, warningly.

"There are a lot of things I could be saying, my dear, lovely, beautiful, illustrious, powerful, demonic uber-demon goddess." Aldric pointed out.

To which, Salem cracked a grin, and hummed.

Aldric also privately loved seeing Cinder desperately trying to stave off a meltdown in the face of him blatantly fucking with the woman she was so scared of. Ever since he saw her bow before the demon woman he may or may not have been pushing his luck just to see where her limits were.

"Cinder." Said Salem, as they reached the next floor. "You know where your room is." To which she nodded, as Aldric marveled at how the castle managed to be brilliantly lit and yet depressingly dark and foreboding at the same time, like a clear night sky where the ground was lit by the stars and the moon. "Mister Aldric... I shall show you to yours."

Not missing a beat, Aldric leaned into Cinder, "if I die, if she kills me, I've got something set up. Just wait, like... An hour? Some complicated comic book bullshit will happen, a dude from the future will harvest my soul, come back in time with a magic car... Or maybe a phone booth... Or a space-pod... Or something - point is, he'll finish the job."

Cinder, quietly, said through gritted teeth, "I will look back on those quiet months in the Garden, without you, fondly."

Aldric grinned, "I love you too." He said, poking her in the cheek before following Salem, who had continued walking.

He sensed Cinder roll her eyes and pull open her door, before disappearing inside the room that appeared larger than some houses.

"So now you've got me alone." Aldric said, rushing forward to catch up with Salem. "Gonna pull some kind of... Suddenly pin me against the wall and threaten my life, imply you know I'm an octuple agent to see if I reveal anything, and then drop me to the ground and keep going like nothing happened... Kind of stuff?" He asked, stowing his hands in his pockets.

Salem snorted, "it sounds as though I needn't at all, so why put forth the effort?"

Aldric grinned, "I like you, lady." He had to admit he wasn't lying, either - she was starting to grow on him. So far she was showing that perfect mixture of snide playfulness and no-nonsense.

Reaching another room halfway down the hallway, Salem stopped in front of the door, and as Aldric rounded on it, she stopped him by placing a hand on his shoulder, "besides, I feel any methods of teasing out your secrets would best serve tests of loyalty... For which I have no doubt." She said, "not after you murdered your father in my name."

If there was a sound for one's entire world coming to a screeching halt, Aldric was pretty sure it sounded like a heart thumping in one's chest.

"Uh..." He said, dumbly buying time. "That was..." His head felt light, and it was only through sheer momentum that he kept speaking. "That Thor guy..." He looked up at Salem, noting that her expression hadn't changed - the same warm smile, the same hint of playfulness, the same undertone of amusement and air of ice.

Despite this, she appeared completely darker, the context of that expression having been changed with one sentence. She was still smiling, but the warmth was born of thousands of lifetimes of growing her skill in lying and numbing herself to human life. The playfulness was still there, but that was because she was playing with him in much the same way he'd just been playing with Cinder, but with much different intent behind it. The amusement was still there, because she reveled in seeing him off balance for the first time since he'd arrived, loved making absolutely certain which of them was in charge, here; and the ice? The chill in the air around her? The absolute lack of temperature in her skin that left a marked lower temperature on his shoulder? That was still there, and it felt all the colder as she displayed to Aldric that as much as she was willing to play along with him, he wasn't dealing with Torchwick, or Cinder, or Ozpin - he was dealing with a Human Grimm.

She had no problem putting him in his place, and she didn't have to resort to dumb threats or physical harm - especially not when it was clear to her the person she was putting down didn't care for any of that.

Aldric cleared his throat, "that was my Dad?" He asked, pushing some strength from an unknown source into his throat.

Salem's brow furrowed - creating the first wrinkle on her face Aldric had seen since his arrival.

"Did you not know?" She asked, tilting her head, and causing the plugs and dark gemstones hanging from her hair to tilt with her.

Aldric shook his head, "I saw he'd taken off his helmet, but I was unconscious for it." He patted his chest, "I'd done something stupid - as I'm wont to do - and had a heart attack because of it." Suddenly the question of how Cinder had been able to simultaneously fend off Thor and also restart his heart had a good answer - she hadn't. Thor had used his magic hammer to restart his heart. "When I woke up, I saw him fighting Cinder. Vision was still blurry, but she was in trouble, so I pulled out a big fucking gun and shot him with it."

The frown that now curved Salem's features looked so real that the deepest parts of Aldric's mind thought it was genuine. That brief flash of horror that had graced everything about her vanished in the blink of an eye, and returning now was the warm human facade she'd had beforehand, now accented by the sorrow of having unintentionally delivered debilitatingly bad news.

But Aldric couldn't forget that second - that moment - that instant of terror that had flashed over her when she'd dropped the bomb, just like he couldn't ignore the frigid hand still on his shoulder, chilling it through the vibranium armor and down to the bone.

Salem looked down to their feet, briefly breaking eye contact before looking back up into Aldric's eyes. "I..." She paused, "I'm sorry I told you that way, Mister Aldric." She said, slowly, the frown even evident in her voice, the way she'd dropped it low, how each syllable was said deliberately. "I wish I had known about your lack of knowledge... I would have said so more gently... Allowed you to sit down beforehand."

Through a dry throat, Aldric gulped. "Ah..." He nodded, "yeah." He said, airily. "That would've been nice." He let out a long sigh, "so... My Dad was the one who betrayed you?" She nodded, "fuck." He breathed, "alright... I'm going to lay it out on the table for you." He said, pushing her hand off of his shoulder, and leaning against the wall. "I really don't fucking care about what it is you're doing." He admitted, managing to shock her enough that she blinked, her head recoiling a fraction of an inch. "Maybe it's because this isn't my world and as such I don't care about it... Maybe it's because I was never one for big grandiose 'save the universe' plot when things like Doom told better stories with way less... Or maybe it's because I don't believe in what it is you're fighting for and I've just been lying to Cinder that I do." He said, "the truth is, I owe you. All of you." He said, "and something my Dad taught me was to repay my debts." He nodded to the Demoness looming above him. "You saved my life, gave me the kind of power that no one where I'm from could ever have otherwise... And gave me the chance to see and do things I've only ever seen in stories.

"For all that and more, I owe you... So if telling me my Dad was dead was both your counter to my joke earlier about pinning me to the wall, and also your genuine test of loyalty... let me assure you: I owe you, so I won't stop until my debt is paid." He said, nodding. "If it's my Dad or my best friend that gets in the way..." He sighed, shaking his head. "That's how it's gotta be. So this... Hurts, but it won't change things. And if you're worried, though we'll be square when you have the relics and do whatever it is you want to do with them, my intent afterwards is..." He grinned, "to borrow a quote, to rest and watch the sunrise on a grateful universe." He said, "so even when we're done, I won't stand against you...

"Or I'm completely wrong about all this, that was a genuine accident, and my paranoia is getting to me, in which case - fuck." He chuckled, "and please forgive me. You just dropped a bomb on the guy who's spent the last year walking a tightrope that was greased in oil and on fire. This is the first break I've had in a while and I'm still kind of wired." He admitted.

This brought the smile back to Salem's face, which smoothed the wrinkles away and returned the otherworldly smoothness to it. "As you are so blunt with me, I shall afford the same to you... As much trust as I have in you for your actions, I was aware you did not know about your father. I wanted to see your reaction... I wanted to see how similar to his it would be."

Aldric frowned, "oh?"

"When I told him you were alive, he took his hammer and vowed to find you after he took the relic." She said, "I suppose he did, just sooner than he'd intended." She said, "but the encounter instilled within me a worry, that you would do the same when you learned... So I intended to head it off at the pass." A beat, "and kill you if necessary."

Aldric pursed his lips, then tapped his chest, "ouch." He said, rubbing at the area where his heart should be. "Right here, Big Boss." He sighed, and pushed off from the wall. "Any more shit-tests I need to pass, or can I take a shower and deal with things?"

Salem shook her head, "no, Aldric." She said, "I thank you for your honesty, and your loyalty. You will be rewarded." She said, before turning, and walking away.

Aldric absently flipped her off as he opened the door and slid into his room, the door shutting with the loud 'thud' of wood hitting concrete.

Walking inside, Aldric found the place appropriately spartan, with little but a bed stuck against the far wall, drawn curtains blocking windows that led to a balcony outside, and drawers devoid of clothing. Turning to his right, Aldric pushed open a second door and found himself entering a fully packed bathroom almost as big as his dorm in Beacon. He tugged a towel off of a rack hanging off of the wall, tossed it towards the shower, and approached the mirror.

For the first time since before he'd gotten into the ring for the Vytal finals, Aldric got a look at himself. His face was still covered in his and Cinder's long dried blood, and he was caked with dust, soot, and sweat, leaving him to appear gray and brown and red, with tanned skin underneath. His nose had the distinct appearance one got when it had been broken and healed repeatedly, however muted and hidden it was by his natural healing abilities. His hair was matted down, practically pressed to his skull in places, and frizzed out and wildly unkempt in others, while his clothes were damaged, torn, scorched, and shredded, revealing the dark mail suit underneath, itself sporting a small hole right over his chest, and missing an arm entirely over his cybernetic arm.

Aldric unclasped his belt, the mobile armory with all of his tricks. He dropped it on the carpeted stone floor, where it fell with a light 'thud'. Next he removed his armored gauntlets, one revealing the skeletal robotic hand beneath, and the other revealing the ethereally dark suit of vibranium chain mail underneath. They too fell to the ground, as Aldric reached for his damaged and torn shirt, pulling it off and over his head before letting it crumple down. After this, he peeled the top half of the suit off of his body, reaching for a seam in the back that, when popped, decompressed the suit from its skin-tight state, and allowed him to slide his arms out of it, and then peel it off of his chest. He let go of it, and it fell around his waist - appearing as though he were wearing a hoodie tied around his hips.

Aldric looked at himself in the mirror again, seeing his bare, pale chest. He saw tiny pinpricks where he'd been shot, long, thin strips of pale flesh from where he'd been cut, curdled skin from where he'd been burned, all stretching across and criss-crossing his chest in a macabre painting of his previous battles and conquests. Looking over his left shoulder, Aldric saw his back was no better - in places worse, where his numerous stabbings and impalements exited and created the more grotesque exit wounds. Turning back forward, Aldric's eyes stopped at his shoulder, and he looked down at his robotic limb. The dark metal absorbed a lot of light, but he could still see the remnants of the many signatures, messages, and other well-wishes that the others from Beacon had left him.

Aldric grabbed at his robotic arm with his fleshy one, and with a light tug, it popped off with a small 'hiss,' before falling to the ground with a heavy thump.

Back to the mirror, Aldric examined himself again, now sans an arm, a dark expression settling on his face.

He leaned forward, looking at his face, eyes scanning over the blood and soot and grime, lowering to his neck, where was visible the area covered by his suit, clearly marked by the clean skin beneath, and the dirtied skin above. After a moment of this, Aldric looked up, making eye contact with his reflection. He looked deeply into these mechanical eyes, nearly perfect recreations of his old ones, down to the color.

With his only hand, Aldric reached up and plucked the warm metal orbs out of each individual socket, and dropped them into the sink, leaving naught but dark pits in their wake. He leaned further forward, grabbing the sink with his arm to balance himself, curving his back and his neck until his forehead touched the cold glass.

Aldric shut his eyes tight, his entire face screwed up as he, struggled still to avoid what he felt in the depths of his soul. He tried to push it down, to force it away, to bury it until he was done with all of this.

But it wouldn't be resisted, not now.

Alone with nothing but his injuries, scars, and two years of trauma, murder, and his own choices, Aldric felt a tear push its way through his clenched eyelids.

Soon joined by many more.