Chapter 11

!” And he took exception to that. But ya know, I kept my cool, rallied my men, and at the end of the day I think I really pulled them out of the fi-” He stopped mid-brag as a heavily robed figure bumped into him, a small clink of metal hitting the ground filled the air.

Apparently, the hooded figure had accidentally knocked off one of Cassius’ medals. They raised their hands in a gesture that resembled a prayer, and uttered an indecipherable word that seemed like an apology. Though she had no record of it in her language banks, how strange. If it was a known language, it would’ve auto-translated.

As the figure bent down to pick up the medal, letting loose their hand, which seemed oddly… alien. It was long, thin, the fingers were different sizes, and it seemed to be missing some. It was like someone had quit building this human halfway through. Their hands shook as they stretched it out slowly to reach for the metal.

Cassius’ whole frame shook, as his teeth audibly grinded in rage. “How… dare you…” he started, raising his foot over the figure’s head, and just when its bony fingers grasped the medal.

Then he slammed it down on its body, a sickening crunch cut through the silence as his foot smashed the figure’s body into the dirt. Nearby people took notice, some of them hadn’t quite registered what just happened.

HK just stared in disbelief, trying to come up with a logical reason for what just happened.

The figure twitched as blood spurted from beneath its mask, it still clutched the medal, and with considerable effort tried to present it to Cassius. Perhaps they were hoping this would appease him, that it would soothe his wrath so he doesn’t hit them anymore.

However, this groveling gesture only enraged him further, his face turning beet red as his eyes bulged out like a madman. “How DARE you! You, with your filthy, DISGUSTING, DISEASED, MUTANT HAND TOUCH MY MEDALS!” He was now screaming at the top of his lung while continuing to stomp down on the figure, drawing the attention of onlookers.

Despite being brutally beaten and disfigured, they still tried to give him back his medal, all while desperately uttering an unknown word over and over again in increasingly cracked and broken speech.

“YOU AREN’T EVEN FIT TO STAND IN MY PRESENCE, AND YOU THINK YOU CAN TOUCH ME! YOU MONSTER, YOU ABOMINATION, YOU TAINTED HERETIC! THINGS LIKE YOU SHOULD JUST CURL UP AND DIE TO SAVE US THE TROUBLE OF HAVING TO SAVE YOU, YOU PATHETIC WRETCH!” He just kept screaming, shouting more obscenities, his speech becoming more and more unhinged, deranged, and incoherent, all while subjecting the figure to increasingly vicious acts of violence.

HK’s vision flashed and faded in and out, her head… it felt like it was cracking. She placed her hand over half her face and winced as unwelcome images started appearing in her feed.

“Clouds of gray overhead, a rift cuts through the sky. Fields of luminescent blue energy and unknown metals surround her. A figure sits huddled in a heap as a dark monster tosses them like a ragdoll. They try to crawl away, try to run, try to beg forgiveness, but they can’t escape. There is no escape.”

The images fade, but the brutal scene was still happening. She scanned the area, Mariposa’s hands were covering her mouth, holding back a scream, as her eyes were wide with disbelief. Sofia’s knuckles whitened as she gripped the cane’s handle, her face a grim visage of disgust. As for HK, everything was just happening in slow motion for her, Cassius’ indiscriminate rage, the figure laying flat on the ground as Cassius boot smashed into its frame.

She saw him huffing and wheezing from the physical exertion, any rational man would’ve stopped ages ago, but he wasn’t a rational man. He reached for his holster and withdrew his sidearm, did he even know where he was anymore? Several onlookers, upon seeing the gun ducked into their homes in terror. He was saying something to the figure, but it wasn’t responding anymore.

HK wasn’t even really thinking anymore, just acting. It all happened within a single breath, one moment Cassius was holding the gun and pointing it at the broken figure, but then HK felt something click in her mind as she thrust out her hand to the gun.

Cassius didn’t even notice it happen at first, until he tried to pull the trigger but found that was holding just the handgun’s frame.

“What the-” He spun to face HK, who was holding the rest of the gun in her closed hand. She then just let the pieces drop to the floor before her senses returned to her.

His face twisted in a maddening fury as he glared at HK’s blank expression. “Y-You! You! I, Y-You defective piece of! You attacked a superior officer! I’ll see you court martialed, dismantled, turned into scrap, I’ll-”

Sofia stomped her foot in the stone, making a loud, deafening noise sound through the air. Sofia pulled her foot out of the newly formed crater, and stepped between HK and Cassius. She looked at HK with an imperceptible expression, while glaring at Cassius. No verbal words were exchanged, but Cassius shrunk from her gaze despite being the taller one.

Cassius eyes looked around at the people who’d come out to see the commotion, many of them who had seen the whole thing stared at him with death in their eyes. He gazed down at the person he’d just brutalized, Mariposa was there, using her lap to support his neck as she shed tears over his battered form.

She clutched her pendant with a shaking hand and uttered a mantra while her other hand tried to clean the blood from their shattered face.

A smart man would’ve sensed the mood and left immediately, Cassius was not a smart man. So he just readjusted his cloak’s collar, and bend to pick up his medal, still clutched in the figure’s hand.

He flinched as Mariposa spun her head to face him and said in a low growl, barely above a whisper: “Leave it.”

“Th-That medal was presented to me by-”

“She said, leave it, Cassius.” Sofia’s voice lacked any hint of kindness or diplomacy. He’d lost the right to wear that medal, plain and simple, and while a Gatekeeper couldn’t kill a man of his rank and status… she definitely didn’t need to save him from the locals or their guns.

“Tch, you…” he gestured to one of his men, “pick that up.” He pointed to the medal.

The soldier looked to him incredulously, his gaze flittered between Cassius, the people in the settlement, and the medal. He hesitated, so Cassius tightly grabbed the young-man’s shoulder and whispered in a barely audible whisper. “Pick it up, or I’ll have you reassigned to a frontline pillbox in recaptured territory. Do I make myself clear, soldier?”

With gritted teeth, he sucked in a breath and sighed. “...Yes, sir.” With careful actions, he knelt down carefully, eyes on Mariposa as if expecting her to stop reciting her prayers and slice his neck. He slowly pried open the palm, and grasped the medal. He uttered several quick apologies to Mariposa, who glared at him, and then sprang around next to Cassius, he deposited the medal in his hand and returned to his place in the bodyguard group.

And with that, he and his crew entered the meeting building, perhap just to get out of the dangerous situation or maybe he was so drunk on his own untouchability that he still felt that he’d be useful to the negotiations.

Sofia placed a hand on Mariposa’s shoulder, still praying over the still figure. “Let’s go.” She helped Mariposa to her feet and guided her into the building, she looked back at HK and gestured for her to head into the building as well.

As she trailed behind her companions, she noticed that a group of robed people were gathering the broken figure onto a stretcher and disappearing around the corner with them in tow.