Chapter 66: Chapter 59: Cristobo and Daion

“Haven’t seen you in years, Cristobo,” laughed Maxim Puchkov, a heavy man in his early sixties.

Time hadn’t left a single black strand in his formerly brown hair, and he’d gained weight, tiptoeing closer to being called burly. However, years of proper medical care had faded his patchwork of scars; his typically reddish eye, which had suffered from exposure to a rare neurotoxin, had regained its pristine whiteness, and his keen eyes had scanned the captain.

“I’d read the reports, but I had a hard time believing them. A commissioner, really? How did you get this rank?” Cristobo surveyed the office.

For some reason, the former sergeant in charge of the anti-New Breeds unit had abandoned the sunny and cozy office at the top of the police building and retreated to a cramped, narrow room that had once been used to store ancient archives. On his orders, every case in here was pulled for a review, and the whipped into frenzy police force had found several hiding criminals and proved the innocence of a group of citizens, releasing them from prison against the advice of the Investigation Bureau. Maxim personally offered his earnest apologies to the falsely accused and instituted several Iterna and Oathtakers’ practices to prevent such a travesty from occurring.

The walls bore no marks of office or merit badges; instead, Maxim’s hand casually pinned up letters of gratitude from citizens, photos of his old military buddies, and dragged a full set of riot gear into the corner of the small room. A gruesome shardgun with two notches left by a deceased warlord hung behind his table. The skull of the previous commissioner, a woman caught embezzling funds and tampering with evidence, had been bronze-plated and welded to the office’s staff. Their gracious host didn’t disappoint. He pushed a table into the middle of the room, and bottles of vodka, steaming cusack sausages, and fresh bread awaited the guests.

“You tell me.” Maxim shrugged. “I’m more suited to quelling riots and winning urban battles. I was thinking of spending my days toiling on the Oaksters farm and raising kids, but I wasn’t foolish enough to refuse the gig when it was offered to me.” He twirled a finger at the temple. “Lemme tell you, the Investigation Bureau is queer. They’d petitioned me to assist in finding two missing agents…”

“We have missing people?” Jacomie slammed a bottle down on the table. “Why wasn’t I informed? Sir, do you need the aid of my troops to do a city’s wide sweep?”

“Nah, one of the lost lambs had reported back. Apparently, they are on an undercover mission.” Maxim waved his arm and clicked glasses with the officers, gulping the alcohol down. “Nice to see everyone again, in fine health. Shame about Terrific and Margery. Can’t believe Duck didn’t make it. Fuck, I’m missing the old bugger. He saved my butt more times than I can count.” They held a moment of silence to honor the fallen. “Truth be told, today was the first day I felt like I knew what I was doing.”

“Yeah, right.” Cristobo grinned.

“No, really!” Maxim insisted. “Ensure safety, apprehend criminal elements…”

“Apprehend?” Cristobo raised his brow. “I wasn’t aware that any of the protesters were taken in.”

“Ain’t no one arrested them. The Dynast will have my ass grilled over blazing coals if I so much as infringe on free speech. Those bozos will be fined for public disorder, reckless driving, and littering.” The commissioner yawned, and red tin appeared on his cheeks. Maxim had never been much of a drinker, but Cristobo was happy to see his former soldier doing well. On his table was a carefully dusted family photograph. The photo featured two smiling women, six children trying desperately to look serious, and the overjoyed commissioner himself. “We caught four shooters.”

“There will be immolations tomorrow, then,” Jacomie said.

Whore. A voice uttered inside Cristobo’s skull. His hand no longer even wavered when his ‘passenger’ offered her input. He first heard this voice after Ravager’s ‘lover’ tap, which not only changed his lungs forever but also grew an extra organ near his heart. Little R, as he called this strange phantom that had taken up residence in his brain, paid her rent by offering advice and alerting the captain to potential dangers. When Bogdan and his crew bravely volunteered to repair the recycling system, she warned him about a pipe that was about to burst and spill digestive waste into the corridor.

He came to tolerate her behavior and even visited the commander, requesting her to ensure that Little R would stay a permanent guest in his mind, after her voice began to fade. Ravager inquired if he was certain about this desire, and then she did something.

Cristobo wasn’t sure how to comprehend what he had experienced. It was as if the commander’s chambers had suddenly turned hot and a cloud of storm had enveloped him. But these lightnings didn’t scorch him; they imprinted something in his very DNA. Shortly thereafter, he visited Maxence, carefully avoiding telling him anything. After an electroencephalography, the shocked doctor checked Cristobo several times, worried that the man might be suffering from epilepsy. His bio-signals spiked, far exceeding beta waves. Little R was sour about it, claiming it was wicked to prolong a natural life span.

She despised Jacomie ever since their first meeting, cursing the officer for being ugly, unpleasant, and brutish.

Yeah, sure, have your fill, stinking drunkard. Little R growled in his head as he drank another glass of vodka. Maybe you’ll learn manners when you pass out in your vomit, shitting and pissing.

Pot calls kettle, lassie. Cristobo thought.

What was that, dipshit?

Then again, being disliked by Little R meant little. She hurled insults at everyone, not sparing even the Blessed Mother. But Cristobo was wise enough to know an asset when he heard one, and having a speck of the divinity in him was inspiring. He never shared the belief in the Spirits, not fully anyway. His occasional religious gestures and words were more of a slip of the tongue. He no longer doubted the shamans.

That cowardly bitch is no god! Little R growled.

Just a messenger of gods. Cristobo responded, enjoying the infuriation emanating from Little R. Why are you so rude to your mom, spirit?

Because I am an aberration. I should not exist. My very presence may violate your freedom of will, fool. She, more than anyone, should know how horrible and disgusting it is to subject me to the constant temptation to take you over. Grumbled his inner angel.

Well, I don’t mind you existing. Cristobo told her. As for taking the helm, we might…

We won’t. Never. I have principles, shit for brains.

“Nah, nobody’s going to burn,” said Maxim.

“Elaborate.” Jacomie’s face hardened.

“I will not inform the Investigation Bureau.” The commissioner drank from the bottle and tapped on the bronze skull. “They can flay me like that traitor, but I will not condemn minors to their deaths. I was put here to protect and serve, not to murder and torture. The teens made a bad decision, thinking to land a shot at the commander for clout. There will be a trial, free from the influence of the Bureau. Two-three years in a quarry will set them straight, and the whip will knock any foolish thoughts out of their heads. Gonna report me?”

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Cristobo tensed, preparing to order the lieutenant to ignore this oversight. The army and the Investigation Bureau had a long and strained history. Soldiers believed investigators to be bloodthirsty bastards who solved every inconvenience through excessive violence. The investigators not only set fire to the corrupt governors but also to their families. The captain, using the Blessed Mother’s name as a shield, secretly rescued several infants and many children from such a fate.

The Bureau believed the soldiers to be too soft and tolerating to the problems that risked turning a cut on a society into a festering wound that could risk them potentially seeing the horrors of the Extinction once more in the future if the rot reached high enough. Even if it was true, Cristobo opposed taking part in culling children for the crimes of their parents and regularly voted to repeal these antique laws. The time of barbarism had come and gone. They had to be better than this.

“No.” Jacomie touched the sagging skin on her cheek and frowned. Her skin was loose in many places and the color of wax. “It isn’t pretty, being engulfed in flames. Guess you found yourself an accomplice, sir.”

“Accomplices,” Cristobo corrected her, raising his glass. “Cheers to a common conspiracy and to reunification!”

“To serve the state!” Jacomie flashed a rare, shy smile.

Not a total bastard. Little R grumbled.

Is that an approval in your voice? Cristobo asked slyly.

Go die in a ditch!

“True that!” Maxim joined them. “Jacomie, I don’t mean to be a dick, but have you ever considered visiting a surgeon to have your skin repaired? I know several; they helped me get rid of the scaly patches on my back.”

“The language and culture of my people are gone, and they don’t seem to care.” Scowled Jacomie. “The Second can have my hide as a bonus. I am functional and live still.”

Bitterness. Mood shifts. Don’t trust her. Little R warned.

The vodka speaks in her. Cristobo dismissed the worries.

Why drink it if it turns you into a babbling clown?

Alcohol has been man’s companion for thousands of years. Cristobo raised his glass, catching electric rays on its surface. In shared times of unity, it bridges gaps between us and helps subordinates speak truthfully to their superiors. It lets us mourn and rejoice alike. It truly is a friend, if taken in moderation. How can I abandon a friend?

Self-deceiving alcoholic. Little R accused him. You itch to suckle from the bottle like a cub from a mother’s breast.

“Irrelevant.” Jacomie shook away the memories. “Sirs, we need to talk seriously. Commander Ravager has left, leaving a bored, wild army at our hands. I mean no disrespect,” she addressed Cristobo, who nodded amiably, “but we must formulate a strategy to prevent incidents. I am particularly concerned about the protesters. If they annoy a Wolfkin enough and blood is spilled....” She rubbed her head. “What a mess. There are also those Horde bastards. I refuse to believe that no one has heard of them; you don’t get to show from nowhere, wielding top-of-the-line weaponry and assaulting our settlements…”

****

Welp. I am officially no longer the ugliest person on the ship. Decided Sergeant Daion, a heavily augmented member of the First Army. Till Ingo requested a New Breed test subject for a stress run of a new type of power armor, and his Excellency Outsider commanded Daion to arrive in Houstad and participate in the trials. The Sergeant took the humiliating assignment in stride. Yeah, he’d miss the glories of the current conquest, but if the new battleplates are as hot shit as Ingo sold them to be, they might help him stick around for longer.

In front of him stood a young girl who moved her mechanical fingers uncertainly, as if struggling to believe that she had arms. Prosthetic limbs had replaced her arms and legs and were attached directly to her spine. There were no longer any pelvis or clavicles in her worth speaking about; the surgery had removed most of her internal organs, going so far as to replace her trachea. She sat on an examination table, her head bald and every inch of her skin covered in a thick layer of scars and freshly healed incisions. Daion gave her his coat to wear.

He saw her frightened eyes as she floated in a healing tank, and instinctively he reached into the green liquid and pulled the girl out. She thrashed and pleaded not to be seared anymore in a broken language of some crushed country, and Daion held her steady until his old translator adjusted to her speech, then he seated her so the child could relax.

“Commander Ravager won’t like it.” A man in a white lab coat licked his lips nervously. “She insisted for every wounded to remain asleep…”

“Well, I don’t see her or Till Ingo on board, and as the highest ranking officer, I have personally decided to remove the restraints from the completely healthy individual to facilitate her further integration into civilized society. Commander Ravager is free to direct her ire at Commander Outsider, so he can slap her across a field again. Okay? Great. Glad we reached an understanding. Now hop-hop away and bring the girl food and you,” he pointed at a female doctor, “towels, now. Why the hesitation, egghead? Haven’t you matured to motherhood yet?”

“And you’re not overripe for it, loudmouth?” the woman snapped and hurried to the girl, gently helping her to clean herself of the sticky liquid.

“Nope.” Daion’s bombastic laughter filled the medical bay, echoing off the wall. “Raised sixteen orphans. Let’s see if your womb ever matches that number, girlie.”

Whether it was his comrades, commanders of the Dynast himself, he wasn’t afraid to speak his mind and never minced his words. New Breeds of his abilities and closeness to the superiors had access to the rejuvenation injections, and this led them to become tamer as a potential eternity stretched before them. But Daion was finite. Acrid mucus gathered in his mouth, clogging his windpipe and overwhelming his filtering system. Patches of sickly yellow hue covered his skin; he was losing hair, and his joints ached. Short of a miracle cure to heal his poisoned brain, his time was finite. The sergeant came to terms that he’d shamble and break at some point. What’s the point of crying over a natural order? His life hadn’t been that bad, and he still had decades ahead of him.

“How are you feeling?” Daion asked the kid, and the translator repeated his words with a slightly snarling, feminine accent. Soulless One from the Third had taken on the task of recording the language and storing it in the databases, and no real linguist had yet corrected her mispronunciations.

“Weird,” the girl said. She pressed a metal finger against the table and gasped. “Is this a dream? I have fingers, but I don’t feel them.”

“You will,” Daion promised, and the girl shrank in terror. “Not like that!” For the first time in his life, he yearned to be a member of another army, to have a go on the bitch who did this to these poor souls. He knelt and took the girl by the jaw. “Listen, the nightmare is over. Hard to believe, I know, but there will be no more pain.”

“P-promise?” the girl whispered. Her face lacked color, and there were no eyebrows over her gray eyes. She clenched her hands over her chest, clutching the coat closer.

“I swear.” Daion put a hand over his heart. “Feel scared or threatened? Call me, and I’ll arrange a meeting between the face and the ass of a creep who does it to you. How about we read a book while we wait for a late breakfast?”

“I… I don’t know how to read,” the girl admitted. “Techno-Queen took me… She took me.”

“About time to learn, then.” He didn’t tell her to forget. There were things impossible to be banished from the memory. The creaking of rusty metal cages, the stench of rotting flesh, and the moans of dying slaves haunted his dreams to this day. Daion used his traumatic past to spite himself into living the best life he could. In time, the little one would learn to do the same, but for now, she needed other memories, and fast. “We have a road ahead of us.” Daion let go of her and gave her a pat before addressing the doctor. “Wake up the rest of the kiddies, sweetheart; the kindergarten is open. And where is the food, dammit!?”

“Will…” Daion halted his commands and turned to face the girl, who swallowed and asked, “Will I see the night queen? The one who toppled the mistress!” She clarified, noticing the confusion in the sergeant’s eyes.

“Ah, you mean that stinking animal…” A flash of anger appeared in the doctor’s eyes, and Daion conceded he was being too rude. “The great Commander Ravager is not here. Doubt you’ll ever see her again; she tends to go places.”

“She spoke to me,” the girl stated. “The mistress tormented us, never showing mercy, and then it ended. And there was a voice that sang a beautiful but so sad song to me while someone freed me from the metal. It somehow took away the pain and gave me hope.”

“Okay, time to learn new words,” Daion snapped his fingers, ignoring the girl’s obviously muddy memories. There was no way she could hear the commander. Every patient was put into a coma. “No mistress. Say bitch instead.”