Alusion
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Chapter Thirty-Four: The Mercurials
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Chapter Thirty-Four: The Mercurials
The bottom floor of the GDF Headquarters is filled with an ever-flowing tide of blue-white mist as the door outside slowly opens. I only know that the door is still slowly sliding open due to the sound and my connection with my mist allowing me to somewhat feel the location of it.
Luckily, due to the sheer amount of mist I’m generating, the toxic smog that had flowed in when the door first cracked open had been driven back. This left the air clear of smog, if extraordinarily humid. It also had the small side-effect of making it so pretty much no one could see what was happening through the blanket of twisting white and swirling blue.
For me, though, extending my mist leaves me with a feeling I hadn’t had the last time I’d done it. A sense of safety. With Mist Step, this is now my domain, in which I can safely vanish away from any danger and appear where I am most needed at will. I’ve been a sentinel for a little while now, but this is the first time I’ve felt truly powerful.
The others all have combative abilities, and Haruto has his shield manipulation. But for me, all I’d had was my ability to generate some mist and to heal with a touch. Theoretically, I could also infuse my Living Mists with Hands of the Healer to get an area of effect, but unless more than one person gets injured at once or they are out of reach, it is more effective to just touch them. This left me feeling a bit useless when compared to my teammates. My theoretical ability to grow into my Living Mists power is amazing, but until now, it has just been theoretical.
Now, though, I truly feel as if I can make a difference for the team beyond just shooting my bow. I want my mist to be a beacon of safety for my teammates to hide in and always trust that I’ll be there to support them. This is just the first step down that path, and I’m certain that each new ability I gain will further cement my role on the team.
I’m broken from my thoughts as Kayne turns towards me once more. “Is it possible for you to make your mist thinner so we can see through it? It won’t clean the air as well that way, but it will be required for us to navigate.”
I nod, thinner I can do. Gradually, I lessen the amount of mist flowing from me until it is more of a gentle haze in the air than the thick fog I usually go for. As I lessen the thickness, however, the feeling of connection to my mist also lessens accordingly. I feel as if I could still transport myself using the mist, but it would take much longer and be more costly.
Considering this — and trying to move past the lingering mental image of Kayne terrorizing the guard captain, I ask, “Is it possible to get some kind of item for my teammates and me to be able to see through the mist, even when it’s thick? The less-dense my mists are, the weaker I’ll be if fighting breaks out.”
Kayne frowns but nods. “I’ve heard of alchemically treated contact lenses that sentinels who come down here frequently use to see through the smog. They might work for mist, and wearing them frequently will almost certainly give you some kind of ability to see through your own power. We’ll ask around when we arrive. Speaking of which, it’s time to start moving.”
I follow Kayne’s gaze out the now-open door and to the dark monoliths of the buildings outside. Shrouded as they were in my thin haze of mist, it’s hard to make out any fine details or to see anything hidden in the dark shadows.
Kayne starts forward towards the door, and the rest of us follow reluctantly behind. There’s not a person in Shinara who hasn’t heard the horror stories about what happens to people down here. Murders, kidnappings, and robberies were the best you could expect. At worst, nightmarish experiments performed by the Apostles of the Maw or being captured and kept as a pet by the most ruthless of the gangs.
My heart starts a trilling dance in my chest, and my hands clench and unclench repeatedly. For some reason, I feel like I’m once more stepping back into that horrific incursion zone, and we won’t make it out of these dark depths without losing someone. But… no. We are all sentinels, and the worst we will find down here are people. People can be plenty dangerous in their own right, of course, but I’d still take a person over a powerful volcora.
I long to thicken my mists as we exit the GDF Headquarters — the men behind us are all too eager to shut the door as quickly as they can. Around me, my teammates look around warily before looking to Baylee for guidance. In response, Baylee’s body flashes with pink light as she shifts into her assault state. The others don’t wait to follow suit, and soon, we all move into the same formation we had in the incursion zone.
Kayne glances back at the flashing lights to see us all clad in our assault state regalia. Part of me expects him to shift as well, but he just rolls his eyes and keeps striding deeper into the gloom.
Baylee, however, isn’t playing around. “Let’s form up tighter. Visibility is bad, and we don’t want to get caught apart from each other. Send out your familiars to scout for potential threats.”
There isn’t a comment or word of dissent from the team. Baylee had guided us through hell and gotten us home alive. While before there had been distrust and even animosity between some members of the team, now, we know that we can trust each other absolutely.
Instantly, my teammates crowd around me, and Celeste leaps off my shoulder to fly off into the darkness unprompted. Without my weapon and being the team’s most vulnerable member, I find myself unable to see past the tall bodies of my teammates as I’m kept in the center of the formation.
That fact doesn’t hinder me as much as it once might have, however. With my mists spread out around me, even thinly, I suspect I might have a better idea of the terrain around us than those who could actually see.
Despite our caution, we don’t actually encounter much as we move. Occasionally, one of our familiars spots an individual or a group watching us pass, but those people never approach. You would have to be suicidal to attack a full sentinel team and Voidfire Warden — unless you were bringing an army.
As such, I’m slightly alarmed when the number of people around us starts to build. We’re still deep under the civilized part of the city, but it seems that this place has a community of its own.
Everyone we encounter gives us a wide birth, shooting us glares but seeking to avoid the dangerous sentinels — at least, at first. It isn’t long until the people seem to notice that the air within my mists isn’t quite so heavy. Not all, but a few reluctantly allow themselves to be swallowed by the mist. These seem the worst afflicted of those present, the ones wearing masks and breathing heavily even through them. Lung cancer, like my mother had suffered from.
The life forces of the people around me flicker and dance like candles burnt too long — their colors are muted and weak. I bite my lip as I consider, I might not be able to do much for these people. But perhaps I can at least do something.
For the first time, I begin to infuse my Living Mists with Touch of the Healer. I don’t push a ton of power into the infusion, only a trickle. My mana toxicity is still not where I would like it, and I don’t have the raw power to throw around that an older sentinel might. Still, though, I can do something to help.
The blues in my mist deepen in color as my healing power flows out from me. Suddenly, peoples’ light forces expand into networks of shining stars, but not so vividly as I’d seen when healing Claire and Akari. Instead, they look dim and ghostly. As if they were painted onto the world with a gentle brush.
Still, I can feel my mist helping the people within it — just a little. When it’s breathed in, sores inside mouths and lungs begin to mend, and lacerations on skin begin to knit together. A few people let out breaths of relief as, for the first time in years, the mere act of breathing is healing them rather than harming them. I can’t do anything about the potential for lung cancer these people may have, but anything would help.
No one seems to notice what I’d started doing, but a touch of the strain on my soul begins to lessen at the knowledge. No one else needs to know. Besides, in the incursion zone, I’d dreamed of sweeping through hospitals like this. While infusing that amount of healing power into my mist feels like a distant dream still, this is at least a start.
As we walk through the deep shadows and swirling mist, I begin to notice little dwellings placed around. They’re simple things as the bottoms of the buildings here mostly don’t have any floors or entrances. However, I see the occasional box or tent with dirty blankets and bottles of murky water.
“Celeste, can you see where we’re going?” I question, not loving the whole, blindly follow Kayne, part of this expedition.
[There are a number of large concrete structures nearby what appears to be a small settlement,] Celeste responds. [The structures look like they used to be used for housing construction workers, but they seem to have been converted into some kind of shop. I imagine that is where we’re heading based on Kayne’s description.]
I frown at Celeste’s words before rubbing irritably at my eyes — the smog in the air is starting to make them burn ever so slightly. “I can’t imagine why he’d think buying equipment here rather than from Ratchet is a good idea,” I comment.
Why would people choose to live down here? A place where the smog is so thick that without abilities like mine, you might literally choke on it. Why not live out in the slums? The air isn’t great there, sure, but living this close to the center of the city is practically a death wish.
Celeste sends me the mental equivalent of a shrug, [Not sure, the men at those concreate buildings look professional though. They certainly have enough weaponry that I’d recommend turning away if Kayne weren’t with us.]
I grimace; Kayne had said that these people made weapons that made even the GDF squeamish. “I suppose we’ll find out soon enough.”
True to my words, the buildings Celeste had described appear as distant shapes soon after. The buildings are small and squat compared to the monolithic towers that loom all around us. However, they seem to be professionally made and well-maintained. Essentially concrete boxes, they have crude tunnels that lead between buildings in an imitation of the skyway, likely to keep out the smog while in transit.
The largest of the buildings is the one that Kanye strides towards. It has a large, closed off metal door and has two guards in all black body armor and holding mildly terrifying assault rifles. With the padding on their body armor and the full-face masks that they wear to protect them from the smog, it’s hard to tell if they are men or women. From general body shapes, I would guess one man and one woman, but I could be completely off.
On either side of the door — and on the black body armor of the guards — is a symbol I’d never seen before. It appears to be a turned hourglass with silvery sand falling from the top to the bottom. As the sand passes through the narrow opening, though, it turns into silver coins that fall in a pile at the bottom of the hourglass.
A small part of me smirks at the symbol, even as the rest of me stays on high alert. Once again, my hands close on empty air as I try to grip a bow that isn’t here. Strange that I’d already grown so attached to my old bow after just one incursion zone with it. But… well, it had saved my life, again and again. Why wouldn’t I miss it when in a potentially dangerous situation? Even if the danger is only nominal.
As we move up to the guards, Kayne glances back at me. “Cut the mist, Serena. Obvious displays of power will make people jumpy.”
Glancing towards the guards staring in our direction, I immediately recognize that Kayne is right, they regard the approaching wall of blue-white nervously, their hands fidgeting with their weapons.
Internally, I sigh; I can still sense all of the now dozens of people hanging at the edges of my mist to get a breath of the healing-infused vapor. These people don’t seem to be Mercurials but are here for some other reason, and they don’t have the masks that the Mercurials do. As much as I’d like to help them more, though, there is only so much that I can do. Getting us into a fight with these guards certainly isn’t worth keeping the mist up.
With a breath, I allow the flow of power emanating from me to relax. The mist lingers in the air for a few moments longer, but quickly begins to dissipate. Swirling away as the heavy toxic air rushes back in to fill the void.
Not long after, we reach the guards and the apparent entrance to the Mercurial compound. One of the guards, the man, I think, gestures to his partner and nods to the door. A moment later, the female guard slips through the door and inside the compound.
The male guard steps up to us; he still nervously fidgets with his gun but doesn’t seem inclined to point it at us. “Welcome, sentinels,” the guard says. His voice is gruff and slightly muffled behind his mask, giving it a surreal quality in the poor visibility of the dissipating mist and oppressive smog. “Please wait one moment while my partner fetches your guide.”
Kayne levels his black glare on the guard. Despite not being in his assault state, he still seems the most threatening among us. I briefly wonder if we’ll see another appearance of his violet familiar, but Kayne just nods to the guard, clasping his hands behind his back and waiting.
Behind Kayne, the rest of us exchange wary glances. My teammates all seem to be asking themselves the same question that I am, why are we here? Could this Mercurial compound hidden in the smog beneath the city proper really have better equipment than Ratchet? It just feels strange.
That is, until the door bursts open once more, and a young-looking man with golden blonde hair steps out into the smog.
“Sentinels! Come in, come in! Welcome to our humble shop!” the man exclaims, throwing his arms wide.
I give the man a cautious look, but I have to admit that he looks professional. Wearing a crip, stark-white business suit, the man has flawless tan skin, a face that’s more pretty than handsome, and bright blue eyes filled with enthusiasm. If I hadn’t known better, I’d say he was a Skyway merchant ushering me into one of those boutique stores for the insanely rich.
Kayne nods to the man, “Crispin, it’s good to see you. Please, show us your wares, we have a tight schedule today,” he says curtly.
The golden-haired man nods, his bright smile completely unaffected by the gloom of the undercity. “Of course! Right this way!”
Comments
Alusion
Thanks so much for pointing those out! I do my best to catch all spelling and grammar errors, but sometimes, they slip through the cracks. Both errors should be corrected now. ❤️
xIron Gamerx
"There isn’t a comment or word of (descent) from the team. " The appropriate word for the intent i believe you are conveying is dissent. "'Please, show us your (wears), we have a tight schedule today,” he says curtly." The correct spelling is wares. Good chapter. <3
