Mask of Humanity

Nicolai almost laughed but inside he knew this was wrong, his Mask was still there and it was fighting hard. He couldn’t kill them. The Contract prevented it. The darkness writhed through him, pushing and pushing, but it met his drive to survive, slipping out from the depths of his mind and Soul. If I kill them, I will be killed. And beyond that, his possessiveness. They were his! Why would he break such useful tools? Insanity!

And the hole, he remembered, was not a good thing. He couldn’t let it stay open. His mindset experienced a dizzying shift as he cut himself away from the darkness and then he drove it back. He did better than the last time, his experience fighting it before aiding him. The Mask, fighting alongside him, was fuelled by its own need to save Jo and Beth.

The darkness beneath his skin faded from visibility, the shadowy claws dispersed, and it went, fading, dwindling, pressed back into the cage, and the hole was closed once more. In fact, this time was noticeably easier, the hole resisting far less. As it went the world returned into focus, walls and shadows stilling. He shook his head and his Mask was back in place.

‘I’m fine,’ he told Beth who didn’t move, staring at him with wide eyes. ‘We need to help her!’ he urged whilst lifting Jo a little higher, ready to use her as a shield if necessary.

Her Soul Sense played over him and she seemed to accept his words, lowering the gun.

He’d memorised this area the last time he was here and headed immediately to the nearest room with a secret exit-tunnel, where he felt a tingling of deja-vu, a sensation that momentarily rendered everything oddly unreal until he shook it off.

He carefully set Jo onto the floor in the room, then gestured to Beth. She stared at him, confused. ‘You’ve got the medi-kit,’ he told her, pointing to where it was attached to her light-weight backpack. She threw the backpack off and leapt at it like a dog at a bone.

As she did so he opened the hidden exit, MP5 at the ready. He remembered how it had opened before and been full of Chosen and didn’t intend to suffer a similar surprise. It was empty.

Beth had ripped the medi-kit away from her back and now approached from behind, presenting it to him. Nicolai took it and settled beside Jo.

Nicolai carefully cut Jo’s shirt open, looking over the wound. A big red hole in her stomach. Deep. An unhappy grunt was pulled from him before he could stop it. Jo’s face was tight with pain, slick with sweat, and she was silent but for her rapid breathing, staring up at the ceiling.

‘Is it bad?’ Beth’s desperate cry burrowed into his ears.

He shot a glance at her, seeing her clutching tight at her shotgun with white-knuckled hands. She was in too much a state to be of any use in this situation.

He smiled. ‘It’s not too bad,’ he lied. ‘Go and see if the bird’s really gone. If it is, get everything we left in the tunnel, guns and weapons first then drag those dead archers here. I’ll take care of this.’

She gave him a wide eyed look that turned into a frown, ‘I’m stay—‘ she began.

‘If you want me to help her, then go. I will save her. Trust me.’

Beth appeared conflicted, but ultimately turned away.

As she left the room he turned to Jo, then had her put her hands on the rip in her stomach.

‘Apply pressure,’ he told her, then he started digging around in the medi-kit.

It was bad, unfortunately, but this wasn’t Nicolai’s first time dealing with such wounds, and the medi-kit he’d bought was one of the more expensive versions. It should have everything he needed, but if her bowels were torn… the situation would become more complex.

He mopped as much of the blood away as he could with clean cloths from the pack, then aimed a combined coagulant, anti-bacterial and numbing spray at her wound and sprayed it liberally inside and over. That done, Nicolai set to work.

###

Beth finished dragging the last archer into the room, barely noticing the weight as she grunted and snarled, desperate to get back in and see Jo. But as she turned to see Nicolai with his hands buried in her sisters stomach, she felt what could only be relief. There was an expression of calm, confident focus on his face, and his hands moved smoothly in the bloody mess she couldn’t make sense of.

He looked like he’d done this before. He looked like he knew what he was doing. He looked like he was going to save her sister.

She let out the strained breath she’d been holding, leaning against the wall. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

His cool eyes flicked briefly up at her. ‘Keep watch. This place is lousy with undead and Chosen. If any come, you’ll have to hold them off.’ He grasped a white cloth and mopped some blood up, then took up the needle and thread he’d been using. The needle flashed as he worked, calm and controlled.

Beth nodded, and turned to poke her head out into the corridor, shotgun at the ready.

Nicolai was a sneaky bastard playing some game she couldn’t wrap her head around. He was demanding and controlling, and despite his attitude, that fake-friendliness, she was sure he saw Jo and her more like tools than people.

Then there was… whatever the fuck it was. This time she had seen it. Beneath his pale skin there had been something moving, as though he were full of strings of black ink, and it had seemed that his hands had twisted and grown claws. She thought she’d even seen something like red eyes, forming like mirages on his skin.

Then the eyes had closed and faded away, along with the black strings, and the claws were gone. She had the impression none of it had been physical, all of these things had been oddly immaterial, more like parts of his Soul or Soul Sense. She doubted anyone who wasn’t a Cultivator would even be able to see what had happened to him.

But we’re stuck with him. We’ve got the Contract. She chewed her lip, turning her head and watching him very, very carefully. She worked hard to keep her Soul tight, to reduce any emotional leakage. She’d come to realise he was very good at reading such things when she’d sparred him with Soul Sense. This time, he’d recovered himself. And the last time, too. But what of next time? She shook her head, unsure, watching the movements of his hands. For now, it didn’t seem there was much to be done except watch him carefully.

As she did watch, she again noted the smoothness, and practised ease of his movements as he sealed the hole in her sisters stomach. Now, back to normal, he just seemed… cool, calm, calculating. And, just a little, sort of, like he almost cared about them. At least he’s competent, she reflected. If he saved Jo now, then regardless of whatever was going on with him, she’d owe him one. For real.

But if he didn’t save Jo, if her sister died… Beth would turn the shotgun on him and keep shooting until he was a bloody smear on the ground, and Heaven’s Contract could then do the same to her for all she fucking cared.

###

Nicolai opened a pouch of wound-sealant, a kind of bio-friendly anti-bacterial glue that would also work to absorb the blood that had filled the cavity in her, and spread some inside the hole in Jo’s stomach.

Her bowels hadn’t been cut, which surprisingly wasn’t uncommon with stab wounds like this. They were slippery things, lined with mucus, and had a tendency to slide out of the way. But there had been a few arteries nicked and quite a bit of flesh damage. Fortunately, no organs had been hit. Next he began suturing her abdominal wall and skin back together, working fast before the sealant could glue things too much. His Soul Sense made the task easier than it would otherwise have been, as everything was drenched in her blood, slippery and hard to see, but the Soul Sense allowed him to sense where everything was.

After a few minutes he was done and he spread more sealant then some disinfectant over the red and raised flesh. He smiled at the neatness of his stitching, pleased with himself. Still got it. It was significantly easier to patch other people up than the self-surgery he’d had to become skilled at. Visiting hospitals had always been a tricky business for Nicolai, because that was usually only necessary after he’d been shooting people. Following such events police were usually smart enough to investigate nearby hospitals for recently admitted, bloodstained men.

‘How do you feel?’ he asked Jo.

‘Weird,’ she grunted, but as she raised her head and looked down at her stomach, she let out a heavy breath of relief, hands moving around the knitted flesh as though disbelieving at finding herself whole once more.

‘All done,’ he called to Beth who lunged into the room then abruptly slowed, sinking down beside her sister.

She reached out to touch the wound then stopped, glancing at him.

‘Leave it be, I just cleaned it,’ he told her.

‘Are you ok?’ she asked Jo.

Jo smiled. ‘I think so. I’ll be alright. Right?’ She looked to Nicolai.

‘You’ll be alright,’ he echoed, then dug out a nutrient bar from a pocket and handed it to her. ‘Eat up, you lost blood and need to give your body some fuel.’ So long as Jo didn’t move around too strenuously she should be fully recovered in a couple of weeks, and almost recovered in a few days.

The advanced flesh-and-cell regrowth sprays and substances he’d put into her wound were nothing to sniff at, the results of centuries of human development in medical technology. A wound like she’d suffered would’ve taken months or even a year to fully recover from, centuries ago.

He left the girls and turned to the dead archers, his eyes on their gauntleted hands. Beth was sobbing and Jo was comforting her and telling her it was all ok, in between bites of the nutrient bar. He did his best to stay quietly out the way from their personal moment as he settled down near the exit, so he could keep an ear and an eye out for undead or other humans, and started chopping at one of the gauntlets clasps.

###

Some time later Nicolai sat there crosslegged, and three shiny new Pegasi rings glittered on his fingers, joining his original one. He considered them significantly more valuable than both the bolt-action rifle he’d taken from the Chosen, and even his polearm retrieved at long last.

He lifted the polearm in question up, running his hands over it, glad to have it back even if, after the passing of such time, it was no longer quite the fantastic magical weapon it had once been to him. Even so, it was nice to have.

He had performed a few quick tests with the four rings, aiming to see exactly how useful it would be to have four of them. This had starkly revealed that having four was not quite as huge a difference as he might have expected. As he’d noted before when fleeing from the bird, a second ring had increased his speed by about fifty percent, and this theme continued as he tested the rest of them; each successively activated ring had its effect halved.

Threat Analysis had created a handy little chart for him, making the statistics plainly visible through his AR eye lenses.

Total Ring Effect

1 ring = 100%

2 rings = 150%

3 rings = 175%

4 rings = 187.5%

By the time he got to four rings, he wasn't even at double the original effect. This transpired to be exceedingly inefficient, as the cost in Oma moved in the opposite direction; it doubled with each ring.

Oma Cost Per Ring

1st ring = 100%

2nd ring = 200%

3rd ring = 400%

4th ring = 800%

This meant that when using two rings, he was using a total of three times the Oma he would use on one ring, as it was 100% + 200%. When using three, it cost seven times the Oma of one. When using all four it cost him a total of fifteen times the normal cost. This had led to his Node emptying in slightly under four seconds.

Nicolai was thinking that he was likely only going to use two of the rings, three at the maximum. Using a fourth was not at all worthwhile. It could be argued that it would still be best to keep all the rings for himself, just in case he got into a situation where that last ring might be difference between life and death. But Nicolai would rather do his best not to get into such a situation.

In the meantime, he could give the fourth ring to Beth, so that she might be of more help to him. Once Jo had completed her Seed, he was considering giving her the third. However, he didn’t intend to lend the second to anyone. Two rings were worthwhile; 300% cost for 150% speed was acceptable.

Jo was now standing, and she looked fine. That would be because of the anaesthetic numbing her pain, but he didn’t think a bit of walking and even running would do her any harm.

He took a moment to distribute his new things on himself, the rings onto a finger each, the polearm hanging from a loop, then gave Beth the rifle because he was weighed down enough.

‘We’ve got one more quick thing to do, then we can head back and rest. I don’t anticipate any more combat. Can you manage?’ he asked Jo.

‘I can,’ said Jo, tired but determined.

After a glance at her sister to see the reaction, Beth turned and gave a nod to Nicolai. ‘Let’s go, then.’

He was surprised and pleased to note that her attitude toward him seemed much improved. And Jo, too. Both of them were looking at him differently. Saving Jo’s life had had a positive effect; despite the fact he could be considered the reason she’d been injured in the first place, as anything that happened to them while following his orders was ultimately his responsibility. Neither of them seemed to have considered that and he saw no reason to remind them, simply nodding and heading out the room.

###

Nicolai led the others via the secret-tunnels as much as possible, and they managed to avoid all the undead patrols as they wound their way to the Gauntlet.

Upon arriving, Nicolai took his time at the entrance tunnel. Without his poncho he was forced to repeat the strategy the Chosen had applied when they pushed through here, using his MP5 to pick off the undead on the balconies one by one. He worked fast, killing them quickly before the big undead could get too close, dodging the weapons it flung at him.

Once it was closer, he tossed a fragmentation grenade into it and detonated it with his Link connection. He got it a good blow, the grenade right in its centre, and it crumbled apart.

As soon as it began to fall he darted forward, the Soul Trap in his hands and powered, and he chased around the blue wisps of soul that escaped out from it, catching at them with the Soul Trap. Some of the wisps got away, but he caught most of them and the helmet was filled with a shimmering blue liquid when he returned.

‘Here,’ he said, holding it out to Jo. ‘Put your Seed in, this’ll be food for it.’

She did as he’d asked, pulling her Seed out of her clothing.

The three of them watched as her Seed drank and chewed at the liquid within, consuming about half of it then pausing, and letting out little hungry squeaks.

Jo knew what to do, taking out Oma crystals and feeding them to the Seed, then it resumed drinking. She had to give it another four before it was done.

‘How close are you to one-hundred?’ he asked her, and she tapped her Mark to check.

‘I’m at twenty-three Soul and twenty Oma,’ she said, and Nicolai restrained a frown. She had quite a ways to go.

He mustered a smile. It was fine, anyway. He had a plan, one that would pay more dividends than simply seeing her Seed complete. ‘We’ll get you to a hundred soon,’ he told her. ‘Let’s go.’

###

Nicolai headed into the old safe-place warily, though the girls looked around with interest. He worried the Chosen might come back here. But up top they found nothing, just some trash left from the group before they’d all moved on, and Kleos’ jar of liquid.

He took out a number of scrunchable plastic water-bags purchased from the Trade Link and they spent some time working to drain the strange liquid from Kleos’ jar, filling the bags. By the time they were done almost all the bags were full, and it was quite a weight of liquid. He took two thirds, and Beth the last third, sparing Jo the trouble, then they set out once more to return through the castle.

This time, the journey went without trouble and in due time they were back at the new safe-place, Nicolai knocking on the door, glancing up at the camera staring down at him from the corner above it. He’d noticed an identical camera in the painting room, aimed to have vision on both the crack in the wall and the stairwell up, the sticky-wire trailing over the walls and through a crack in the doorframe. He was quite pleased with the locations of both. Perro and Azure had done well.

The door opened quick enough, revealing Perro, and the sound of quiet music, some synthesised, electronic track from Azure’s new speaker which was now in the centre of the room.

Bom, bom, bom. Nicolai’s head nodded to the beat.