Promise of the Honest

“GET BEHIND ME!” Peony shouts as she swiftly pulls me away from the oncoming hail of bullets, using her massive ballistic shield to cover us as we retreat back.

Shit! I cursed, my leg…

As she carries me back to where Hazel had set up her outpost, a few allied Espers rush back into the conflict.

The attack was unexpected. It was the day of the Equinox Festival, and some soldiers were sent out to patrol the surrounding area. Despite being ordered not to engage any Wilted they saw, one thing led to another and shots were exchanged, leading to a quick escalation into an all out attack on the village.

As we make it into the tent, Peony lets me down on the ground in front of Hazel who was stitching up a bullet wound on Iris’ left arm.

Upon seeing us Hazel gasps and shouts, “Lily! Peony! Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Peony grumbles before collapsing on the ground from fatigue.

“Like hell you are!” Hazel says before stitching Iris’ wound close with one of her strings and rushing over to help Peony.

Unlike mine, Hazel’s Esper infusion—based on a spider—was actually useful in that it allowed her to produce strong spider webs from the tips of her fingers. The only downside was that it made her sleepy and drained her hunger, with the latter being mitigated by her Esper power that allowed her to have an improved metabolism.

“It’s okay Hazel, I just need a little rest that’s all,” Peony assured her, her body tensing a little as Hazel wipes some blood off of her cuts, “I can get back into battle in about 5 minutes. You should take care of Lily first, her sprain looks bad.”

Through her tattered combat jacket, I could see the glint of her silver exoskeleton that essentially bulletproofed her entire backside. In terms of the most useful Esper infusion, she was second only to Hyacinth’s, but judging it based on aesthetic alone, hers was by far the coolest.

Hazel slaps a bandage on top of Peony’s wound, and says, “well if you’re so insistent on not getting help then I’ll leave you be.”

She then crouches down and begins taking a look at my ankle, while Iris peers out into the battlefield to assess the situation.

“We can definitely win this battle,” she said, her words carrying a powerful soothing weight behind them as she uses her powers, “we already outnumber them by a lot, and the average Esper is able to take out at least 3 before becoming incapacitated. Once we’re done resting up, we’ll regroup with the other squadrons and make a decisive push against them.”

“Yes, Captain!” we say in unison before I wince in pain from Hazel tightly pulling my ankle back into its proper position.

“We might have to do the charge without Lily though,” Hazel says, creating an ankle brace with her strings, “this sprain looks pretty bad.”

“That’s alright,” Iris says, “we only need a few capable soldiers to make the real push while the rest of the soldiers pick them off as they scatter. I’ll have Lily switch her gun into single fire mode and snipe them from a safe position. I need to run this plan by the other team captains first though before we do anything, but I’m sure they’ll agree with it. The last of the Wilted are grouped up on the mountain and we have the entire base of it surrounded.”

The three of us looked up towards the winding path that led up the mountain. The area was covered in trees and bushes that made it hard to see through, and at the very top was a strange fortification made from some weird black material.

“I wonder why they’ve decided to set up camp here though,” I murmur, “the Wilted aren’t known to attack civilian areas, so why here of all places?”

“They probably don’t know that there’s an entire city underneath the mountain,” Iris says, “from the outside, the parts of the town that aren’t beneath the mountain look like some sort of encampment to the enemy.”

We looked around at the broken walls and fortifications that were built around the city back when the war first started. They were made because at that moment in time, humanity didn’t know that the Wilted had a morale code to not attack civilian areas, but after 2 years of fighting, such fortifications were now working against our favor.

“I’m just glad that we evacuated all the civilians into the mountain beforehand,” Hazel says as she finishes making my brace, “we would’ve had a lot more casualties on us otherwise.”

The three of us nodded in unison, and the click! of Peony’s shotgun as she reloaded it, reminded us that we needed to get going.

Suddenly, we hear a large explosion detonate from the top of mountains where the alien fort was as we look up to see a large cloud of fire and smoke coming from the top.

“Iris!” a man with red and purple hair shouts as he runs up to us.

“What is it Captain Zinnia? What’s going on up there?” she asks.

“We’re not completely sure, but have reports that the Wilted have a large amount of explosives up on the mountains, and they’re planning to detonate them all to try to cause an avalanche! We need to get our troops away from the areas where the rocks can roll down.”

“Those bastards! I get that they’re losing but to resort to something like this…” Peony curses, standing up and getting ready for her next orders as the Captain Zinnia runs off to warn more squadrons.

“...the civilians,” Iris suddenly murmurs as everyone turns to look at her, “the explosions at the top of the mountain can risk causing a cave-in on the city beneath the mountains! We need to get everyone out of there ASAP!”

She picks up her assault rifle and begins running towards the entrance of the cave.

“WAIT!” Peony shouts, “I’ll go evacuate them, there could be falling rocks, and it’s too dangerous for you. With my Esper powers, I can withstand a few—”

“No,” Iris says “Lily and Hazel need you here to protect them. There could still be more Wilted lingering around this area taking advantage of the chaos. Lily’s too injured to fight properly and Hazel and I aren’t trained enough in close combat.”

She then walks over and gives Peony a pat on the shoulder.

“I’m counting on you to keep them safe. I’ll be back before the mountain collapses.”

“And if you’re not…?” I ask hesitantly.

I was tired of losing teammates. Two was enough. It should’ve just stopped at one, and it would’ve been better if it was none.

“Just promise us one thing Iris,” Hazel says, “that you’ll focus on your safety first. If the cave looks like it’s about to cave in, I need you to run out as fast as you can with the people you saved so far. Promise me you won’t sacrifice yourself to save them all.”

“That’s… too high of a demand,” she admits, “given how I normally act and all… but if it makes you feel better, I’ll try to keep that in mind.”

“And if you don’t?” Peony asks in a worried tone.

Iris turns towards me.

“Then make sure that the horns of the mountains blow for me.”