Capítulo 13: Earth
The pure humans in the line turned and saw Beatrice as well as Dante. Their cold expressions softened significantly, like seeing an old friend. They even greeted them with respect when they saw their attire.
"Greetings, Admiral."
"Hello, Vice-Admiral."
They greeted Beatrice as an Admiral and Dante as a Vice-Admiral, which left him stunned. He was not even a cadet yet, how did he suddenly become a Vice-Admiral?
Beatrice nodded to them amiably and introduced the two of them. She introduced Dante as the Vice-Captain of the Inferno, and when she mentioned her own name, the expressions of the surrounding pure humans changed subtly.
Even the AI robot that was handling their details with utmost respect paused and glanced at Beatrice for a second before continuing.
Dante noticed this and guessed that Beatrice likely had some other special identity, maybe from a powerful faction or most likely, her clan.
Thinking about it, it should be obvious. Dante may not know her age, but she seemed young enough. Not only was she admitted to the number 1 Academy's Elite Branch, but she was a fucking Admiral of the Prime Fleet and had her own Dreadnought class battleship which she alone managed.
Dante doubted that just being clever would allow one such privilege. She could even fearlessly tamper with his details and sign a contract on behalf of the entire human government, not to mention she could easily produce a serum for him that upgraded his genes without melting him into primordial soup.
He looked at Beatrice's lovely side profile and remained silent. He would wait until she was ready to tell him… as if!
The moment he got access to the Etranet, he would investigate everything about her, down to what underwear she liked to wear. There was no way he would remain ignorant about someone like her no matter how good she was to him.
Surprisingly, they were given priority in this relatively short queue and fast tracked. They even got on the elevator alone, forcing those who passed through the normal line and even pure human VIPs to wait for the next round.
Beatrice seemed to treat this as normal, and Dante did not act out of place. As a bourgeoisie kid, he too was given such treatment in select places in America, especially in his city.
The space elevator was quite large and wide, with seating areas within. Beatrice stood to the side and beckoned to Dante, who glanced at the seats with narrowed eyes.
"Don't bother sitting, that's for the weaklings. Stand like a man and feel the G's." Beatrice taunted with a look of provocation.
Dante quickly scrambled and seated himself before tightening the buckle, making Beatrice chuckle.
"If you had been stupid enough to think you could do something like that, I could have watched you excrete everything within your body all over again."
Dante ignored her and listened to the countdown then braced himself. Luckily, when it hit zero, it wasn't like some rollercoaster or amusement park ride, but rather a feeling similar to sliding down an inclined slope.
When they arrived at the bottom around 30 seconds later, the door opened to show a passageway that led to sunlight. Dante unbuckled and followed Beatrice out and into the world of… earth.
It was… pretty normal? Like, Dante had watched enough scifi and played enough games to see what futuristic earth would be like, and this was like that.
Eerily pristine white coatingon everything, unnecessarily tall everything, most buildings shaped like mushrooms, walkways that looked like tunnels surrounded by glass, and flying cars.
Of course, it was marvelous to see in person, but the very predictable setting made it a bit… dull. Dante was tugged by his collar to see Beatrice pull him into a nearby car that was driven by force propulsion.
It was black and sedan-like, with a comfortable interior meant for high class passengers. Dante and Beatrice ended up sitting opposite each other, and the space here was even narrower than the shuttle.
Dante sighed and ignored Beatrice who was smiling at him provocatively. He then looked outside as the car began moving rapidly, heading to their next destination.
As he noticed the passing scenery and the large volume of cars, Dante couldn't help but ask: "Why so much traffic? Why not just use teleporters?"
Beatrice laughed softly. "Teleporters are banned on Earth. We have used our best space technology to lock down the entire space in the solar system around earth to prevent enemies from jumping in."
Dante thought about it and felt it made sense. "How many wars were won using that method before they developed counter measures?"
Beatrice smacked her knees together, which naturally smashed one of Dante's legs and made him wince in pain.
"All of them. Every war using this method was a massive victory."
Dante was shocked by this. "Then who used it the most?"
Beatrice glanced at him as if he was dumb. "How do you think humanity became the number 1 rulers of the universe?"
Dante was speechless.
As they say, no one hated the taste of medicine more than the one who dished it out. After using this cheap method to invade countless systems and win all their battles, it was natural that humankind would be the first to develop countermeasures for it.
After all, no smart scientist created a poison without making the antidote first.
It was simply toxic behavior to the extreme, bullying everyone with a big stick then later wearing three layers of armor so that no one could use that same stick to beat you back.
Dante was proud to be human.
Eventually the car slowed down and landed before a giant building. When Dante looked at it, his eyes narrowed as he felt it was familiar.
When they got down and walked through the front gate which was heavily guarded by many cyborgs with laser weapons, Dante's face showed shock as he recognized where he was.
This was the White House!
It had been modified greatly and expanded quite a bit, but it still had the familiar shape and outline.
When they walked to the entrance, Beatrice was scanned from head to toe, and then Dante too. The door then opened for the two of them and admitted them into a straight, neat hall with cyborgs standing on either side with weapons low.
Dante looked at the hall and observed many technologically advanced devices and changes that he could barely comprehend, until Beatrice pushed one of the various doors open and took him into a small office.
Seated at the end of the room was a dark-skinned male with square-faced features and a relatively stocky build. He wore a set of navy blue military armor that looked similar to kevlar but had glowing lights all over.
When he looked up from his documents to check who entered, his eyes lightly scanned Beatrice before fixing on Dante and staying there. A frown seemed to appear on his features, but was soon suppressed into neutrality.
"Admiral Portinari, its good to see you. I take it this is the fellow you reported about? Dante, I believe?" He asked with a surprisingly lighter tone of voice.
Beatrice's smile was gone, only replaced by a coldly indifferent demeanor that made Dante feel strange. "That's right. I was informed that his ID is ready and his bank account has been issued?"
The man glanced at her and nodded. "That's right. But before I give them out, I would like to ask a few questions."
Beatrice's face became colder and even bore a hint of hostility. "Director Johnson, are you trying to cause trouble? Remember your place!"
A hint of anger crossed the man called Director Johnson's face for a split second, but he clearly suppressed it and focused his gaze on Dante.
"Mr Dante, I'd like to know if you were coerced by the Portinari family in anyway into signing a contract on behalf of the state?"
Beatrice's face paled as she slammed her hand into the table. "Bastard, how dare you claim such a thing?!"
Director Johnson forcibly ignored her and stared at Dante. Dante's expression was slightly confused but he knew what to do next anyway.
"Beatrice, please allow me to speak to the director." Dante asked Beatrice with a calm expression.
Johnson smiled as if he had won something big while Beatrice froze. She turned to glare at Dante, but he maintained a cold face and looked her back in the eye without any fear.
Beatrice felt her chest become stuffy and stomped to the side, not even looking at Dante any more as she felt her emotions go out of control.
Dante then focused Director Johnson. "Sir, please explain what you mean."
Johnson glanced at the fuming Beatrice and felt things were strange. Why was she showing such a strong emotional reaction just for this guy? Could the rumors be true and the famous xenophobic admiral had found a boytoy?
Whatever the case, Johnson pursued his success further.
Capítulo 14: Director Johnson
"As far as I have been told, you were discovered by Admiral Portinari on the remote Planet Etonia?" Director Johnson asked with a smile.
Dante's eyes narrowed. "Director, I asked you to explain what you meant about being coerced."
Director Johnson's face froze as he clenched his fists under the table but maintained his smile. Beatrice glanced at Dante with a surprised look for a split second before feeling angry again and looking away.
"To answer that, we need to build up facts, I'm sure you understand, right?" Johnson answered with a forced smile.
"No. I just want to know the raw details of what you meant without adding anything else. Otherwise, I'd like my ID and passage to leave." Dante spoke as he folded his arms.
Johnson's eyes twitched. He clearly didn't expect this fellow to be so difficult to deal with. Was he really an uneducated person?
"When a pure human born outside the control of the Earth Bureau's purview is found, they are supposed to be handed a standard contract from the Human Council in order to grant them special rights and protections afforded most pure humans." Johnson began after taking a deep breath to calm himself.
"However, the terms in your contract are vastly superior to what is usually offered to any pure human of your stature. So I am liable to believe that they offered you more benefits in exchange for something else, which would invalidate the contract and free you of such unlawful terms." Johnson finished with an amiable smile.
Dante listened to it all and went silent. He lowered his head and closed his eyes, taking deep breaths before opening them again. He glanced at Beatrice, then at Johnson, then sighed.
"Director, with all due respect, if I wasn't so weak, I would punch you in the face."
Director Johnson, who had assumed Dante was about to say what he wanted to hear, froze and became confused.
What the hell, where did this come from?
Even Beatrice was surprised and finally stopped sulking to glance at Dante, who looked at Johnson with direct hostility.
"You're a really good fellow. You clearly have some beef with Beatrice and want to undermine her, having chosen the weak and unremarkable little me as the tool to achieve this."
"First off, your words made it seem like signing a contract in the first place is something illegal, trying to drive a wedge between us and make me doubt her."
"Secondly, you say 'offered to a pure human of my stature', so clearly in your eyes, I am a lower class being and have been from the moment I crossed that door. You only smile at me because you want something from me."
"Thirdly, you want to undermine Beatrice through the contract and probably claim she abused her position, which would have the effect of voiding the contract we signed. Even if you were right and I was tricked into doing something extra, you yourself said it, the terms are extremely good. Losing that would be more harmful than good."
Dante sneered. "So in this entire farce, the only one benefiting would be you. Under the guise of freeing me from oppression, you would be able to get evidence to attack your opponent while either swallowing up the extra benefits meant for me or passing them to someone else."
Director's Johnson face changed greatly as he exploded and slammed his hand on the table.
"How dare you?!'
Beatrice had a look of suspicion as she glanced at Director Johnson and quickly manifested her holographic browser to check something. When she saw what she wanted, her expression became frosty.
"What a good ploy Hector Johnson. You have a nephew who is 13 and in the queue to enter the Eternal Academy!"
Just by revealing this, everything could be understood. Dante's heart became cold because he had only said those conjectures out loud to close any gap that appeared between him and Beatrice.
In truth, he was as lost as a lamb. When Director Johnson first spoke, he suspected that Beatrice was guilty of foul play which was why he resolutely did what he did. After all, he didn't have any side in this conflict except his own.
My guy, he only knew Beatrice for a grand total of slightly over 24 hours. There was no way he was going to trust her like a life-and-death friend when he didn't even know everything about her.
She had seemingly done him good, but Dante couldn't gauge the value of her 'kindness' because of his ignorance. It could entirely be that everything she did so far was an obligation and she was stringing him along.
It could also entirely be that she was strangely generous to him and that wasn't any better. Whatever the case, good or bad, he would be able to tell once he had access to the Etranet and could understand the information posted there.
This was why his citizen ID was necessary. This fellow spoke as if what Beatrice did was wrong from the onset, something Dante suspected already, so he took the risk of offending Beatrice to find out more.
However the moment the fellow spoke, Dante knew that this was just a meager political spat between two factions or two persons, and he was just a medium to execute the ploy.
When he understood this, he panicked slightly because while it didn't absolve Beatrice of any doubts, it meant that he had estranged their relationship for no fucking reason and that was detrimental.
So he quickly made his stance clear, directly insulting the fellow and displaying hostility to show he was on Beatrice's side. His later conjectures were to make it seem he was a clever bloke who had seen through the ploy from the start and wanted to out him.
But hearing Beatrice reveal this information, his heart went cold because he realized he was likely right. It was that feeling when you swerved your car and avoided a fatal accident, and realized that you could have died just then.
If Dante didn't have a architect as a father who taught him the importance of understanding the minor details as well as a chemical engineer for a mother who taught him to always observe and deduce, who knew what he might have done?
Dante stepped back and stood beside Beatrice. "I thought as much. The moment I entered, he frowned when he saw me, meaning that I was far less than he expected, which probably gave him the idea that he could deal with me."
It made sense, but Dante was not sure of this. He was just speculating, but given the circumstances, a speculation like this sounded like damning evidence.
Beatrice snorted. "I've already reported everything that happened here to the Human Council. Expect their answer soon!"
Director Johnson paled. How the hell did things reach this point? All he did was try to use a mediocre-looking pure human without any background to try and one-up Beatrice, his rival from the Eternal Academy.
As far as he knew, even if he was right, Beatrice would only receive a slap on the wrist for the offense and he would be able to torment her verbally whenever he saw her, relieving some of the dissatisfaction in his heart.
But things had spun around and he was now the one frying on the pan while his backing was nowhere near as solid as hers. Before the human council, even Beatrice could be a little fearless, but he was the same as any dog on the street!
His eyes flashed with hatred. Sitting in a position like this involved a web of interests and decisions that no one could easily account for.
In other words, in his tenure of working for the Earth Bureau, he had definitely offended some people who didn't dare touch him because of his position and those he offended them for.
But once he lost his position, he lost his value. Who would waste energy to protect him? What benefits would they get from it? He was basically an abandoned dog without even losing his job yet.
He and his entire family might suffer a calamity. They certainly will not die since every pure human was as precious as a 1000-year-old ginseng.
They also would not be forced too low since every pure human had sufficient welfare, but even if you had money in your pocket, it wasn't nice to be beaten up every day by hooligans, was it?
Director Johnson breathed deeply, but did not do anything. Attacking Dante or Beatrice would yield even worse consequences and trying to tamper with the system for petty revenge wouldn't work with Beatrice's background.
As such, the man took a small tube and tossed it to Beatrice, pointing to his door.
"There is your ID and your AI Chip infusion. Now get the hell out of my office before I call security!"
Dante and Beatrice shared a look and left the office, smiling smugly on their way out.
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