Dynamis | Chapter 26 - Awkward (Patreon)

To say that Karl felt stupid the other night would be a massive understatement. It was incredible what one good night’s rest could do to reset the mind. He found himself replaying the night’s events over and over again in his head, chuckling at how foolish he must’ve appeared to Lilibelle. The fact that she was able to temper her anger as well as she had on so little sleep was nothing short of impressive.

Lilibelle waved to him on occasion, and he would reciprocate with a wave of his own. After class was over, they made their way up to Admiral Chovek’s office and had a word with him. He was much more accommodating than he’d expected. Sharp and firm as usual, yes, but he was reasonable, and saw no reason why Sean couldn’t speak with Kalki. That was peculiar.

“Then am I to understand, sir, that Kalki is still alive?” Karl asked.

“You assume correctly.” He kept his hands behind him as he strode back and forth across an invisible line in front of Karl and Lilibelle. “For the time being, she will remain our prisoner. However, I will see to it that Sean is made aware of the situation and is granted permission to speak with her.”

There was something about this situation that didn’t sit right with him. He’d expected some form of pushback; an argument, outright denial, something. Chovek was suspiciously compliant.

“Thank you, sir,” Karl said.

Lilibelle repeated the phrase while Chovek took his seat behind his desk. “If that is all, then you are dismissed.”

Karl refrained from requesting time off to visit Cever. They were fortunate to catch Chovek in a good mood as it was, and something in the back of his head told him that if he were to ask now, then Chovek would misinterpret it and assume he was taking advantage of him. Besides, Captain Veren would be a much better person to ask.

“That was weird,” Lilibelle said when they were back in the elevator. “He’s never that nice.”

“Should we report him as a body double?” Karl joked.

Lilibelle laughed lightly through her nose. Karl had to stop himself from gasping. No, it wasn’t a full blown laugh, giggle, or chuckle, but it was a part of one. Which meant the other half was hidden somewhere in that body of hers.

“We can’t do that,” Lilibelle said, the smile still plastered to her face, “or else he’ll replace us next.”

“Not if only one of us reports it.”

“Oh?” Her expression changed to one of amusement as she leaned against the wall, arms crossed under her bust. “And who would report it? Me?”

“Who else? And directly to his face. He’d expect nothing less from you. You see, if you report it, he’ll just see it as another silly thing some rookie said to him. He expects that from you.”

She cocked one irritated brow. “How do you figure?”

Karl grinned. “Well, just think of all the times you’ve disobeyed him or the others. Would it really come as a surprise to hear those words out of your mouth?”

Lilibelle’s gaze veered. It seemed she was thinking about this. “No, I guess you got a point. Hell, he might not even hit me or reprimand me.” She shrugged. “To him, this is just another day that Lilibelle has a problem with the status quo.”

“Exactly.” Karl lifted his finger as if he were teaching her something valuable. “He won’t take it seriously, but someone else will. The word will travel down the chain of command, until someone investigates it further.”

“What if that person gets replaced?”

“Then suspicion grows. The report will have been catalogued somewhere. It’s only a matter of time until they’re unveiled.”

Lilibelle shook her head, but the smile remained. “You’ve thought about this.”

“In much greater depth than I care to admit.”

“You focus on some weird things.”

The elevator arrived at the bottom floor. Karl and Lilibelle stepped out. They walked around the corner and came to the main hall that led to the classrooms and the hangar. Once they gained some distance, Karl turned around.

“Have you ever been to Cever?” he asked.

“Twice,” Lilibelle said, tucking her hands into her jacket pockets. Karl thought about what he’d said to her the other night about running warm. Part of him wondered if she ran cold. “My daddy and—er…” Her cheeks burned a brilliant shade of red. Karl pretended not to notice. “My father and aunt used to take me there when I was little.”

“Oh, that’s great! You see, I’ve never been to Cever before.” He flicked his head behind him, then gestured to the doors leading to the hangar. “A few of my friends invited me to see it, and since you’ve been there before, why not give me the tour?”

Lilibelle gaped, and the red in her face somehow brightened. Her eyes veered to a pair of men in white lab coats who walked by. She didn’t utter a word until they were well out of earshot. “W-Why me?”

Karl struggled to explain it himself. Even though they weren’t going to be full-time partners anymore, some part of him still wanted to see her smile. A person didn’t avoid contact with others for no good reason. Everyone who had joined Deadeye had their reasons for fighting, and Lilibelle couldn’t have been any different. Whatever her reasons were for ostracizing herself, he hoped that maybe he could pull her out of her shell a bit.

He shrugged. “Do I need a reason to invite you?”

She sighed. “Things are going to be very busy around here for who knows how long.” She nudged the front of her shoe into a rut on the floor, casting her gaze alongside it. “I haven’t been to Cever in years, so I don’t know how much of a guide I’d be.”

“Then it’ll be an experience we can share together.”

Lilibelle looked up. Her lips formed a small ‘o’ and her eyes dug into him like a pair of scopes, as if he hadn’t been forthright with his intentions. “Karl—”

“I think everyone could use a break. I know I could. If I look at one more diagram or node, I’m going to lose my mind. I love these machines, but even I want to see more of the world.” Was he being a bit too mushy? Too forward? As the seconds ticked by, his cheeks began to burn. “Don’t you?”

“Fine,” Lilibelle said after an awkward silence. “I’ll put in the request. When is it?”

“Sev—” The words squeaked in his throat. He patted his chest, coughed into his fist, then tried again. “Seven days from now.”

“Hmm. Okay.” She nodded, then smiled slightly. “Who’s going to take notes for us?”

“We’ll figure that out after we get approved.” His first thought was of Millie, but until he had a look at her notes, he couldn’t be sure.

“Right. Yeah. That makes sense.”

The awkward silence returned.

“Well, I should get going,” Karl said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m going to meet up with a few of my friends from the hangar.”

“Y-Yeah, I should too. I have another report to contest.”

“That same one?”

Lilibelle nodded her head and grunted.

After they each waved, Karl quickened his pace and made for the hangar. He hadn’t planned on meeting up with Jark and the others just yet, but he needed someone, something to take his mind off of this situation. He didn’t want to get his hopes up, but was it his imagination or were they actually becoming friends?

—

Lilibelle felt like a moron for allowing herself to get so flustered over nothing. All Karl had done was invite her to go to a city; nothing more. In fact, there’d be other people there, so it wasn’t as if she was going with him alone. They’d have plenty of company. It was an outing with friends. So why in the hell was she making such a big deal out of this?

She slipped into her room and shut the door. Her body was hot, her head was pounding, and she struggled to maintain a thread of coherent thought. She pressed her back against the wall, then slid slowly down until she was seated on the floor. She pulled her legs to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, tucking her head between her knees.

What happened to me? she wondered. This isn’t what I had in mind. I was supposed to come here to defeat the Fiend threat, not make friends. Making friends will just… hurt.

Then the visions came.

Karl’s stupid smile continued to slip into her thoughts against her will, sweeping over her like a cloud refusing her the sunlight. Scenarios where Karl was slashed by Fiends, killed by gunfire, blown up in explosions, anything she could think of, haunted her. His unassuming voice accompanied the visions, making the experience nearly unbearable. In an effort to drive away the images, she raised her head, eyes snapping open, darting around her room in search of anything that could distract her. A tear she had barely noticed slipped out of the corner of her eye. Huffing a sigh, she wiped it away and brushed the moisture onto her pants. 

It’s not real. It’s not happening, she thought.

Whenever the images appeared, they always portrayed a person experiencing some form of pain or dismemberment. The person was always somebody who had been kind to her, showed an interest in her, came to her aid whenever she needed help. Then she could hear them scream, cry, plead for a quick death. She would stand there, like a useless puppet, watching, unable to say or do anything to help. Sometimes she could run, but without fail, her voice always caught in her throat.

There was never any consistent sign or hint, no method or pattern that warned her of when these images would come. All she knew was that when they happened, she had to find a quiet place; preferably one without people. That usually calmed them down.

She focused on the hum of the refrigerator, the feeling in her toes, the cold air on her fingertips. Her heart began to slow, the needles in her chest vanishing with each second that passed. The rate at which the visions repeated themselves slowed. Her head screamed in agony as she fought back the urge to cry. When the last of the visions disappeared, her shoulders slumped and her mouth gaped. Slow, uneven breaths spilled out of her mouth. Her eyes hung half-open. Licking her lips, she wiped what remained of her tears from her face, then used the wall beside her to push herself to her feet.

Clapping a hand to her forehead, she lurched forward, hobbling toward her bed. A picture of Karl standing beside his bed, explaining why his room was so tidy, came and went in a flash. She collapsed onto her bed, pulled out the ties that kept her pigtails together, then turned her head to the side where a wall scroll she’d saved from her father’s estate hung.

It was an old thing, chipped at the edges and stained with yellow. Two dark wooden blocks held the scroll straight, one at the top and the other at the bottom. It depicted a reptilian creature flying through the air. It bore eight pairs of limbs, eyes that scaled around the circumference of its skull, and a body long enough that it wrapped itself around Mount Galgatro, the tallest mountain on planet Nesharis.

She never liked the scroll when she was younger. The dragon had always appeared selfish, especially the way it wrapped itself around Mount Galgatro; as if the mountain belonged to it. Its eyes looked hungry and its claws sharp enough to disembowel anything that stood between it and its desires. It was a monster to be feared, not revered. Her father, however, had viewed the creature differently. To him, it resembled a loving parent watching over its land and protecting its young, providing them what they needed. A watcher; a protector.

But no one was watching over her anymore. No god, no guardian, and most certainly not her father. It was just her now, all alone to take vengeance upon the creatures who robbed her of her protector. How could she move on when the one person who believed in her, the one person who did everything in their power to see to her every need, was no longer alive?

Lilibelle clutched the blankets and whispered, “I miss you so much, Daddy.”