Chapter 62: Chapter 24: Test of Skill - Deal
'Valerie! Watch out!' As Valerie turned around with a hands raised above her head in a victory pose with a big proud smile on her face, Rydel looked on with horror as he saw the Aquarian shed herself away from the now completely locked up exoskeleton suit, revealing the slimy body underneath, snatching away one of the blades and sending it straight through Valerie's slim torso.
Though Rydel cried out with everything he had, the speed of sound has failed him here. Valerie's facial expressions were paused and locked up in place, and then she looked down to see the blade piercing through her body, with her very own blood dripping from the silvery tip. The once carbon reinforced skin surface was slit open by the cold sharp Aquarian blade and sent through.
Valerie tried to look up, but found herself slowly losing the control to her own body. She has thought about how and when she would fall in battle, perhaps it would be in a blazing glory of fire, perhaps being taken out by poison while sitting at home... She thought she would continue to fight on and survive with her fighting spirit, the will to never give up, and how much she wanted to avenge her father.
But when she lied on the ground, her consciousness slipping away like blood coming out of her wounds, nothing matters.
Rydel lost it. The memories of Valerie flashed quickly inside his mind like a movie being played at ten times the speed, and then it all began to fade. With his breathing getting sharper and shallower, anger and guilt spiraled within his mind and threw him into a frenzy. His hands are shaking, his hearts are pounding, and he reached out with his left hand towards the Aquarian that's trying to escape the rest of her bound exoskeleton.
'You stay away from her!' Rydel snapped, then he grabbed her.
With the power of his artifact no longer lying dormant and being suppressed, an unprecedented amount of concentration and shear force of will are being put into this very action. The space curved around the mercenary as she tried to run away and screamed in horror, then her screams were cut off as any evidence of her being in this place were erased from the universe.
If Rydel's theory about how the Glove of Summoning operates is correct, then the Aquarian would have been in a pocket dimension that is warped out from the spacetime continuum. Her fate, is quite literally in his hands.
Without a single moment of hesitation, Rydel turned and threw her out into cold space. He didn't need to feel how far he has to release his grasp. He doesn't need to think about where the vacuum of space is, he just turned and threw.
With his palm open, the sensation of a slim Aquarian figure within his hand gone, he just realized that the glove was flashing a brand new color, instead of a warm yellow, it was glowing red, the color of Valerie's blood.
There are no times to think, now, Valerie will need to be treated. Rydel quickly sat down and felt for Valerie's breaths, it was weak, barely something that was registered by Rydel's shaking fingers. He looked up towards the end of the corridor and saw the smoke finally fully dispersing.
Then, Rydel checked her wounds. The physiological enhancement would offer some degree of enhanced healing, but the effect of blood loss will still be extremely severe. With the medicine packs prepared and ready around him, he tried to breath as slowly as he could and calm himself. With his hand hovering the stomach of Valerie, he closed his eyes and tried to feel for the shape of the Aquarian blade.
He needs to warp the blade out of her and then stop the internal bleeding as quickly as he can. A combination of his artifact control skills and his hard skills.
The power of the artifacts extends Rydel's will, and sends his senses into the space around the blade. His fingers are shaking slightly, but it's still something Rydel can control and suppress.
He has felt it! The sharp edge of the blade, the thin cross section, but somehow, Rydel couldn't grasp it. He tried, and tried, and tried.
His fingers are shaking more than he anticipated, and as a result, the blade kept slipping in and out of his focus, always escaping within inches of him establishing true control over it.
Come on! Valerie is depending on me! I have to do this! Rydel screamed at himself internally as he forced himself to relax, while simultaneously tensing up even more.
Eventually, he opened his eyes violently, and lets out a frustrated curse.
He won't be able to do this.
Not now, not here.
'Help us! HELP US!' With all the energy he has, he shouted as loudly as he could hoping to get the attention of someone, anyone that would have the connections to the medical staff and supplied that can operate on Valerie and save her life.
And just like that, a whole group of people showed up from behind the end of the corridor, and started running towards them.
By then, the blood coming out of Valerie's stomach has spread around, and surrounded Rydel within.
'Look who we have here.' A figure emerged from the crowd of people coming towards them, as two other squatted down and started helping Valerie with some emergency treatment before putting her gently into a hovering stretcher, 'the naughty boy.'
'What?' Rydel looked up at the figure, his facial features obscured by the light above, then a fist was swung at him and he was out cold.
Lights flash, darkness rises.
The images of Valerie laying in the pool of blood, with blades piercing through every single limb of hers remained in Rydel's head. He was pinned against something, and looked down at the horrible sight. Though seemingly lifeless, Valerie opened her eyes, twisted her head mechanically like an animated robot, moved her mouth stiffly and spitted out two fragmented words with the kind of rage and anger Rydel has not seen just yet, 'You! Failure!'
Then the images changed. Now, Rydel found himself stranded in the endless void of space, suspended among the stars with not physical ties to anything anchoring him down. Then he turned to his side, and saw the frozen up corpse of the Aquarian mercenary he just murdered floating closely in front of him, one of the crusty arms holding a bloodied blade and sending it straight through Rydel.
With a scream of agony and a massive gasp of air, Rydel opened his eyes and found himself being tied to a metal chair in an empty room. It looked like a sort of room for interrogation, with a mirror in front of him reflecting the failure of a human that he is. He couldn't step in and help Valerie. When it came down to it, he hesitated about using the artifact to snatch away the blade, even though it was well within his abilities.
He hesitated, and now Valerie might be dead because of it. And then, when Valerie's body lay on the ground, he lashed out at the powerless Aquarian and killed her in cold blood. He was angry at the Aquarian's tricks, but more angry at himself, for his inaction, and then his reaction.
The artifact gave him power, and he used it not to save his friend, but for revenge. He gave in to his anger and the primal impulses, and Rydel feared that the karma has already come back to haunt him. The price for his actions would have to be paid, starting from this very moment.
'Tell me, why have you come to disturb the Wolf Pack?' A voice asked. This must be whoever is sitting on the other side of the see through mirror.
'You are from the Wolf Pack...' Rydel murmured to himself while a varieties of options and responses went through his head, but before long, a joult of electricity was run through his body and he twitched so hard that he banged his head against the chair behind him. Rydel winced in unbearable pain and clenched his teeth hard while forcing himself to breath slowly in order to keep his focus.
'Answer the question, or you won't get a chance to say anything at all.'
'You at the Wolf Pack...you are here for the Chariot.' Rydel shook away the dizziness and said, continuing with what he deemed to be the best solution right now. In order to get himself out of this mess, in order to help heal Valerie, he needs to make a deal.
'That's right. Everyone on that very station is here for the Chariot.' The voice answered mockingly, unaware that he gave away the vital detail that is the fact that Rydel and Valerie are on a space ship, instead of being on the Space Station anymore.
'Then I will make you a deal.' Rydel said, 'save my friend's life, prove it, and I will make sure no one else will get their hands on the Chariot this time around.' He looked up and looked right in the direction of where he believed the person sitting across from him would be at.
'And how would you do that?'
'The reason I have done what I did, was to create a rift between all of the forces on this space station.' Rydel organized his words the best he can, and delivered it, 'I knew there would be tension between all of you, and all it took would be someone picking a fight for chaos to ensue.'
'Well done, you have done that.'
'But all of that were to distract you from the true target, that the fact that the prediction everyone has been following was altered, because we destroyed one of the data collection satellites. With that, the predictions would alter enough for most people to miss the best opportunity to get on board.' Rydel continued on, and then there was silence from the other side.
After what felt like an hour of discussion behind closed doors, the person sitting in the opposite side continued, now with an even more impatient undertone, 'neat trick.'
'So if I am to help you get the right timing for the Chariot, and help you secure most of the payloads, you will heal my friend and let us back onto our vessel.' And with that, Rydel brought out the final part of the deal, praying that it would go through.
'Neat trick, I said.' The voice from the other side now said, with less of an impatience, but more of a mocking tone, and Rydel's heart sank to the bottom with every spoke nword, 'but we have noticed. Unfortunately, this deal wasn't good enough, and I am afraid nobody significant is going to be fooled by your stupid tricks.'
'So, as of right now, you will pay for the amount of pain and chaos you have caused us, and your pretty friend would be left for dead.'
'No! I have one more bargain for you!' Rydel thought quickly, and threw out the very last thing that would work in his mind, 'I would help you steal the mines from the other forces! Just give me a chance, and I will steal them for you! Fully mined ships, I will get those payloads, and I will deliver those to you!'
'And how would you do that?' The voice asked, 'what could you possibly do, with a single person and a single ship?'
'With a technology beyond your understanding, and I will make it happen.' Rydel said, 'listen, you have nothing to lose. Show me that you will take care of my friend in proper facilities, and take her as hostage. I will go deliver you all of the mines I would have managed to get, and then we will meet in a point where I hand over the extra metals stolen from your enemy forces, while you give me back my friend.'
'Oh...' The voice sounded genuinely intrigued, then he blew a whistle. A door was opened from the side of the room, and the figure that knocked him out to begin with appeared. He was the one that leads this expedition by the Wolf Packs, 'I guess I will take the deal. But you know what is going to happen to your friend if you ever tried to run. And if you didn't show up to the rendezvous point in exactly two and a half days, then you also know what's going to happen. It looked like you were fighting a mercenary back there, but imagine what's going to happen when a swarm of mercenaries is coming for your head.'
Rydel simply nodded as the several guards came and then untied Rydel's hands from the bind. Then, those people took Rydel to the medical center to see Valerie being operated on and her vitals settling back to somewhat normal levels before yanking him into a transport shuttle and throwing him back onto the space station, alone.
'Valerie...' Rydel sighed as he headed straight for the transport shuttle. Now with the deal being made, he needed to get to work. One of the reason the boss agreed to the desperate plea of Rydel was because of how ridiculously sounding his proposition is, but given how much he cared about Valerie, the Wolf Pack literally have nothing to lose. Now, he had better get this whole thing sorted, or god knows what's going to happen to both him and Valerie, and by extension everything else.
In order to get this misison underway, Rydel needs to prepare. He needed to gather as much intelligence as possible on the movements of the White Hawks, who had the biggest gatherings of any forces from the region of the White Crows, and they seemed determined to get at least a sizable chunk of the pie here.
It is know that due to the lack of natural resource rich planets within their region, the economy of the White Crow's region has been rather stagnant, and there have been rumors regarding civil unrests and complaints about the lack of progress and improvements, and the hastily pieced together colonies simply cannot compare to the grandeur that is the home world of Aquaria. Despite the ideological disagreements from higher ups and the Aquarian societal elite, one cannot deny the living conditions on the planet being one of the best in the galaxy, only second to the most developed human galactic capitol world, Beacon Zero.
For the small markets within the regions of the White Crow, an large input of rare heavy metals would provide a shot of adrenaline to the economy, and allow for accelerated developments for at least a little while, perhaps providing enough time for the leaders of the White Crow to figure something else out before they get overthrown.
With that, Rydel knew that the White Crows are desperate, not too dissimilar to him. At this stage in the mission, he realized that things might have to be done through use of his artifacts. Realistically, it's basically impossible to pull off what he promised the Wolf Pack Company all by himself, and he neither has the time nor the trust to put together a team of thieves.
Maybe now would be a good time to call for Zel? Rydel pondered the idea and then put it forward with Cellica, but she replied with a disappointing no.
'Zel has reported in recently, but it seemed like he is being hunted in the wild regions by someone from the organization. Somehow, his identity is masked by some sort of device and Ol Kon couldn't use his artifact to figure it out.' Cellica said as she sat deeper into a yoga stretch. Rydel called in during a rare time off for Cellica, and he felt slightly guilty for disturbing her rest, amongst many other things.
'Intriguing.....I have suspected that was the power of one of the pseudoartifacts made here. The Aquarian Gold that I once fought on B1, he is now strongly enhanced by nanotechnology as well as possessing an artifact, and he seemed to have been able to freeze time in an localized space? That's only an theory but perhaps that's what keeping Ol from being able to tap into the information.' Rydel answered, thinking back to his most recent encounter with Gold.
'But a time freezing artifact shouldn't be able to hide the information of oneself...' Cellica pondered on the thought of that, 'as far as I know, Ol Kon should be able to access all of the information throughout the galaxy.'
'Well, maybe his artifact's power is to withhold information, I don't know haha.....' Rydel jokes, but soon stopped chuckling as both him and Cellica realized the likelihood of his throwaway line actually being accurate. Given how bizarre some of the powers of the artifacts are, it really wouldn't surprise Rydel now if an artifact of that power really exists.
'Jokes aside, if they were able to create pseudoartifacts with that sort of power, I doubt Ol would be able to help much from now on out...' Cellica said with a serious look on her face. Then she looked right at Rydel and asked, 'How are you doing? Everything okay?'
'...Thing will be better.' Rydel replied, as he sat the course and disengages the magnetic lock, 'I need to really make this plan work so I can pass the test of skill and keep moving up. Talk to you later!'
'Alright.' Cellica nodded with an understanding and polite smile on her face, 'be careful.'
In the next few minutes, Rydel then piloted the ship towards the cluster of ships where the White Hawks's ships and cruisers are being parked. In flying the ship through a standard maneuver, he attached a tiny tracking beacon to the exterior of one of the biggest ships, and slipped a little recon droid into the haul of the ship using the Glove of Summoning. Courtesy of Valerie, the droid is already pre-programmed to hide itself within the ship and then start transmitting key audio information. This should give Rydel a good idea of what is going to happen next.
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