Chapter 36: Trust

“We have no idea where he is.”

Once more, Meyer had stated the obvious. It took Eli a lot of self control to not nudge him on the head again. Deep down, I couldn’t help but think that if Evian was indeed alive, he would have tried to get into my head by now, to communicate with me. But he hadn’t.

Does it mean he is dead?

“Who is General David J. Marshall,” ventured Eli.

Yuki’s jaw tensed up but didn’t answer.

“General David J. Marshall is the one who found me, washed up on the coast of West Antarticum. He wasn’t a General back then, but he had already made a name for himself.” Dejection tainted every word as Fiori spoke.

“If General Marshall is here, do you think… is there a chance… do you think Ted came too?” Yuki asked concerned.

Fiori weighed his words carefully.

“I don’t know. He might have. This is the kind of entertainment he likes, but he won’t get his own hands dirty. He won’t be the one hunting us down. If we ever get to see him face to face again, it will be on his own turf; in his own kingdom.”

He paused, struggling to come up with what to say next.

“Look,” he said quietly. “It doesn’t matter whether we know where Evian is or not. I know Marshall. This is a game to him; he is playing with us. Toying with us. Chances are, he’ll find us, before we find them. We’ve already fallen into his trap, our only chance of getting out of it alive, is to outwit him. Beat him at his own game.”

“But how do we do that!” I questioned.

Yuki smirked: “We have to be unpredictable. We have to be quick….”

“…but more importantly,” added Fiori. “We have to trust each other.”

With that, Fiori asked once more: “So Fenn…”

All eyes turned to me.

“…do you believe Evian to be alive?”

With all the conviction I could muster I replied: “Yes!”

“And, do you think we can trust Evian Li?”

“No. No I don’t. I don’t think anything my General. I am merely waiting for your command,” I replied with a sneer directed at Yuki on my face.

Fiori extended his hand. I shook it with confidence. There was only one person I could trust with my life right now, and he stood in front of me. Eli, Meyer, Yuki, Arno, Doran, Hardi and Evian had all been important to me in the past few months. But none had earned my confidence the way Fiori had.

Yuki put their hand on my shoulder, a bittersweet smile on their face. They understood what had just happened. They knew what I had just given away. There was no turning back. If I was to put my trust in Fiori, then it meant my hands would never be clean again. It meant, I would obey blindly his command and have faith that it was the right thing to do.

The moon shone low in the sky, enormous looking with an orange glow. We’d make no fire this evening. We’d spend another night wet and cold. We’d be fine though. Thanks to our aethereusian characteristics the cold won’t kill us.

But Fiori… Fiori was only human… Fiori was shivering.

Yuki took their jacket off and inconspicuously laid it on Fiori’s shoulders.

We all pretended not to notice.

I was eager to find out what kind of plan Fiori would come up with. He was a brilliant tactician after all. But Fiori kept to himself. He picked up a new stick and resumed his rudimentary drawings in the snow.

I dozed off to the sound of Meyer and Eli quarrelling over the estimated distance between our small hideout and the main building of Centrum Agricultio. Their voices were soothing to me, like being home.

Home.

I never had a home.

Yet this feeling felt familiar.

My home…

A fleeting feeling. I desperately tried to hang on to that feeling, but a wave of anxiousness came over me.

I was back on the overpass, destruction at my feet. The wind unleashing sand and ashes at my face. My breathing became shallower. It was hot. Too hot. In my chest, my heart was thumping at a frightening speed. A whirlwind of fire. I was back at Centrum Agricultio, embers covering the ground ubiquitously. Once more, devastation all around me. Evian was there, standing before me. We were separated by the flames of the firepit. I extended my hand… I reached out to him.

“Don’t move,” he instructed me in panic.

I looked around. My friends were gone. There was only him and I.

“Evian?”

He looked frightened and exhausted. The wind encompassing me was loud and powerful, preventing me from connecting to my surroundings.

“You’re alive!”

This dream wasn’t as vivid as usual. He wasn’t letting me in, at least not fully. He was keeping me at arms length. I had to strain my ears to understand what he was saying.

“They know where you are. They will be coming as you rest… but they will not kill you,” he said.

He looked around quickly. He was definitely scared. Scared of something that wasn’t in this space with us.

“Don’t fight them. Let them catch you. They will NOT kill you. They will bring you to me. Together we will be stronger. They do not know what I know. Together, you and I, we will destroy them.”

The flames died. The wind abruptly stopped. I launched myself forward in a desperate attempt to grab onto Evian. Quicker than me, he took a step back.

“I have to go,” he insisted.

“Wait!” I screamed. “Where are you? Are you ok?”

But he was gone. It was too late. He had vanished leaving behind his fading memories. As my surroundings vanished under the cover of darkness, I desperately looked around; trying to find a clue, anything, to help locate his where abouts. A repressed memory maybe, but there was nothing. Nothing significant. And at that moment, I felt the weight of being alone. Scared and alone. I wished piano girl would appear; the yellow bird, the lonely boy too. I wished I could have gone back to a time where my mind was still connected to Hana’s.

Home.

I woke up. It took me a few minutes to realize where I was. The moon had gone below the horizon. Fiori was still mindlessly drawing in the snow. Everyone else was asleep. I sat up, trying to remember what had just happened. What was it that Evian had said?

Something about them coming for us.

Soon…

I gasped!

Fiori lifted his head and saw me: “What is it?”

In a panic, I stumbled over to him. “They’re coming,” I whispered. “They know where we are.”

“I know,” Fiori murmured back. “I’ve been sitting here, waiting for them.”

“You know?” I muttered aghast.

“As I said, they’ll find us before we find them.”

“We have to go; we have to run! We have to be unpredictable!” I pressed.

“Yes! We must be unpredictable, which is why we are going to stay right here and wait for them. They want us to be scared, they want us to use up our energy running away. But we are not going to do that,” Fiori spoke confidently.

“I saw Evian,” I said. “He’s alive. He talked to me. He told me to stay put. He said not to fight them. Evian said, together, him and I are strong enough to take them down. But it doesn’t make sense. They will kill us. You saw what they did to Ashe!”

“He said not to fight them?” Fiori asked without flinching.

“That’s ludicrous!”

“Then we shouldn’t fight them. Or should we? What do you think?”

“I don’t know. There is a chance he’s working for them. Perhaps they sent him to me. Perhaps they want us to stay put, so we can be captured. In which case, we would once more, play right into their trap. I think they are using him. If we want to be unpredictable, then we should run.”

I blurted out my entire hypothesis in one breath. Fiori listened but seemed unconcerned with what I had just said.

“We stay put,” was all he answered, unwavering in his apathic behavior.

I closed my eyes and sighed completely demoted. I prayed he had a plan. Because right now, our future looked grim.

I didn’t go back to sleep.

I sat.

Waited.

Fiori kept on drawing in the snow.

My blind trust was already being tested. It was a hard pill to swallow.

Then it started.

Branches rustled behind me.

Yuki stood up, right on cue.

They had arrived.

Fiori didn’t move. He didn’t stop drawing either. But he bellowed: “General David J. Marshall, Sir! It’s been a while.”

Only then, did he stand up. Strong and proud, just as I knew him.

Yuki moved and placed themselves shoulder to shoulder with Fiori. I did the same. Behind us, Eli and Meyer both stirred unaware of the change of events. Thankfully, they were both quick to their feet. Meyer put his back against Fiori’s and kept an eye on our rear. Eli swiftly moved to the front and prepared herself for combat. She was close enough for me to establish skin contact with her, but for now, I kept my hands to my side.

“I didn’t believe it when they told me you were behind the attack on Nova Terra…”

A short, stocky man stepped out of the dense bush into the clearing. He had a deep voice. A voice you didn’t forget so easily.

“…civilian casualties just didn’t seem your style; but I’m impressed. Perhaps we have more in common than I thought.”

Fiori didn’t respond.

“Yuki Nishimura, of all people I never understood why you left me for this dirty human. I see you are doing well! It pains me, that I will be the one taking your life! I always had the utmost respect for you. But you leave me no choice.”

He wasn’t sorry. The tone of his voice was arrogant. As Fiori had cautioned, he was toying with us.

I noticed from the corner of my eyes, as the General talked, his men were encircling us.

“12 men,” whispered Meyer, “all armed.”

He was counting too.

“What do you want?” queried Fiori.

“Oh, but it’s not about what I want. I am merely the right-hand man of the government. You could say, a peaceful life is what I want. But I don’t see that happening. They ordered me to arrest the people responsible for the Nova Terra bombing. So here I am, in the middle of the God forsaken, frozen, wilderness of Antarticum, face to face with the man I despise most in the history of the world.”

“They ordered you? No, you mean Ted ordered you!” Fiori defied him.

The General laughed before continuing: “We have already recovered the body of the late Shan Li’s daughter. And today, we were able to cross off another name from the list that was provided to us. Ashe O’Donnell. Does that ring a bell? Of course, there was collateral damage! But it’s nothing compared to what you achieved in Nova Terra! Once more, I’ll always be second best to you! I show you clemency, and what do you do? You climb the ranks faster than me and become General! I’ve always taken great pride in my kill count, but now… now… look at YOU… The whole continent is talking about you! The single deadliest attack on Antarticum. Ever! And you get all the credit.”

I could feel the rage in his voice. The pitch had become slightly elevated. His jaw was clenched, and his eyes were blood thirsty.

Fiori remained composed.

“What is it that you want?” Fiori asked once more.

“I WANT TO KILL YOU!” answered the General in a burst of anger.

“Then what?” Fiori asked casually while scratching his head.

“ENOUGH!” The General raised his hand in the air. “MAKE READY!”

The twelve soldiers raised their guns/weapons/ and took aim.

Shit!

Fiori smiled.

“FIRE AT WILL!” Marshall barked.

The twelve soldiers answered as one.

Like a machine, they responded.

Orders had been given; triggers had been pulled.

Unlike that day… on the beach… none of the soldiers hesitated.

I reached out to Eli and Fiori with each hand. I had to establish a skin to skin contact.

As I dove forward, I lost my footing. In my fall, I caught from the corner of my eye, the shadow of Evian, standing behind the enemy line. That’s when I noticed, no bullets came our way. None. I looked around. I could hear the gunshots. I could see the guns pointed at us. But I didn’t feel the bullets.

“Blank cartridges,” Fiori whispered. “Do not move.”

I was in a precarious position, spread between Eli and Fiori, but I obeyed my General.

“They don’t know?” uttered Eli. “They don’t realize they have no bullets. How is that possible?”

“Fenn?” Fiori spoke. “Do you trust Evian now?”

“I…” but before I could answer, a bullet pierced right through my arm hitting Eli in the back.

I turned and there stood Eva; the gun still smoking in her hand.