The evacuation of the inn had gone relatively smoothly. Well at least for Michael and Lucia. Their escapes were fairly uneventful aside from just falling in line according to the orders of Isaac and Jean. Their way out had been cleared mostly by his squadmate or Lucia. Resistance from the dying and desperate Imperials were significant and quite deadly, but it was nowhere as dangerous as that officer who almost managed to take Michael's mask. He quickly exited the inn and rendezvous with everyone outside. Heeding to Jean's order Michael followed without any doubts or hesitation.
But before he left the scene, the neutral haven of mankind now contaminated with the new way people think of to choke people. In war, even the basic of kindness was a liability. He wondered how people could even tolerate the sight of this. Oh yeah, he knew why. Those who made the decision, almost everyone, had never had to pick up a gun before in their entire life. Had never seen the horribly mangled corpse, the blown off limbs, the tears on the dead bodies of your best friends you've made. The reinforcement of hatred and disdain had never been as strong as this one scene before his eyes: the sign in front of the door, labelled White Hart, blurred in the yellow fog of chlorine.
Michael gently made a cross with his hand while looking distantly at the inn. Then he turned around and marched away.
He never came back to White Hart again...
Two weeks later.
Michael was sitting at a table, chilling out with his deck of card, trying to construct his monumental construction of millenia before being destroyed by a bump on the table, when the man in charge of letters pass him an envelope. A slightly pink, significantly marred by the dirt and wetness of the container yet still recognizable, envelope, encased with the elegant red hue of glue. A smile immediately formed on his face. Pink envelope. Who could be so majestic and rich to use it? Who else? Her elegance and gentliness was indistinguishable.
He quickly opened the letter and read.
My dearest son, Michael.
I have finally received your letter. My heart is finally at ease with my mind when I read your lovely words. But at the same time they ache at the hearing that you are not doing well. I know honey. War is never good for the mind and body alike, and anyone educated enough will know that. But it is your only way forward. The Federation requires your service. You can't really get away with all of this. Just keep on going honey. I know you can. I hope these words manage to reach you, but don't worry, I have full confidence in you that you will live through this hellfire. After all, you and your father are one of the same.
Do you remember the time he tells you about his study trip oversea to Vinland? He was only twenty at the time. Scared like a puppy. Grandfather was pretty strict on him, making him fend for himself all by himself. His first few months were pretty terrible. I took pity on him back then, and that's how we met. You wouldn't believe how much he had changed from when we first met until you were born. I know it would be disingenuous to compare his trip of knowledge and wisdom to you having to swim for yourself in the tide of blood of humanity, but the parallels are there. He left the comfort of his own home, scared and daunted, he came back a wise, intelligent and proactive professor, a wonderful and faithful husband, and a brilliant father who gave both of us a great treasure: You
God knows it. You're my darling, your father's half. You inherit his intelligence and his resilience. You may be weak now, but as long as you don't die, you will come back when you demand it. And before you or anyone even know it, you will not be cracked so easily any longer. And the enemies would then cower before your ability to not give in, to just hold on and fight for a second longer than them. You will show those officers who think little of human lives your infragility. And you will come back just like your father: a courageous, dauntless fighter who fought for the sake of his country apolitically, no matter what their purposes are.
I know this letter may be a little bit short, and a little waste of our only opportunity to talk, but we all know each other. There isn't much happening at home that's worth the mention. But if this makes your day a little better, whenever this letter arrives, then I'm glad.
Stay strong my darling and may God be with you
Elizabeth
It did make his day a little better. A little bit. For a little while. Before it was immediately ruined. By the very definition of disgrace of human beings.
The scream suddenly pierced his consciousness, pulling him back to Earth with the letter on his hand. Not the scream of excitement that Michael thought would come from Lucia - it happened all the time now - but anger. A knife in his back, the sensation suddenly slit through his chest. The ground felt no more than the distant fog as he turned around. Alexander-John Middleton. The man he dreaded. The man whose grip on his loved Lucia was still as tight as a cracker, now in front of him in a fury of anger that could burn an entire house down. And all of that fury, obviously noticably, was directed towards him. What the hell is going on?
Swallowing a gulp of saliva, Michael slowly and hesitantly approached the man. He slowly swung his gun from his shoulder, holding it by his two hands in front of him. His breathe almost disappeared as he faced the angry rage of a person, amplified by the fact that the man before him is way older and a superior in ranks. The man who could kill Michael any seconds.
To his surprise, and further scaredness, Middleton did not take the gun. He slapped it out of his hand before grabbing Michael by his collar. His combined strength of his veterancy was enough to lift the five foot sapper off the ground, his face right on par with the level of his. His eyes were like a predator, like a hurt predator hunting the hunter that shot it.
"YOU..." Middleton had prepared all the way what he would say to Michael, what to intimidate and crush with both his might and his status as Lucia's protector and guardian. But when the fiend that was threatening Lucia's existence was before him, his blind anger and rage had blurred all his preparation, as the only word he could utter out was just a culmination of reckless and hot-headed contempt.
For poor Michael, he was confused shitless. He was soft-spoken up until being pulled up. What the hell did he do? The entire week he did nothing of against orders. His squad did indeed fail to accomplish their designated task before every other squad does, and came back alive with their asses clean, but if he was to get upset at that, then Jean or Isaac would have been the target. Why a scared nobody private like Michael? Then was it something else?
'You will show those officers who think little of human lives your infragility.''At least you seem to be self-aware. Of yourself and the things surrounding you. That, I can respect."During Middleton's fierce fury, Elizabeth's words, in her beautiful handwritten font, cherished on the smooth silky white piece of paper, came back to Michael subconsciously. Heinz's too. It was unexplanably correct of what his frail but strong mother had said. Before he even realized it, his fear began to drop like the release the pressure out of a helium tank. His illogical mind began to subside, way better than Middleton could. His eyes soon turned solid cold like freezing water. And Middleton could sense the sudden change in aura around the fiend he wanted to destroy and flatten into his place. Had the captain approached the man a few weeks before, he would have gotten what he wanted: a mentally crushed, scared and shaking Michael. But no. Poor Michael was no longer poor.
He had become not so easy to crack.
"Yes sir?" His voice suddenly became irritatingly neutral. No fear, nor mocking him. Middleton wanted to pounce on the private for trying to make him look stupid, but he could not. There was no reason to beat him up for asking a natural question. And everyone was watching, they all heard what he said. It was like a machine in a human's body, with a logical mind at its arsenal.
POTENTIAL UNLOCKED: Dialogue as weapons
It was more aggravating than beating or mentally intimidating him into submission, simply because he was using things that Middleton did not have. And it was his greatest fear that if his Lucia ever managed to get a hold of. His hand gripped even tighter, but to no avail. Eventually, he was forced to calm down, a little bit. Being enraged at this upper-classed soldier wouldn't bring any good. He was no longer flinched by intimidation. Michael knew what that something else he did that angered Middleton.
Lucia
That rat of a guardian. When Michael's fear subsided, and his powerful rationale settled in, connecting the dots became a job of counting from one to five. He remembered before Amone even began, his direct order to keep her safe. Or on the train when he called her over to his cabin. He had always found that suspicious. And now the rat had finally come out of the cage. He wasn't sure what degeneracy he was doing to Lucia, but the nature was coming to light. Michael didn't do anything wrong to her. And so far Middleton is the one doing just that. It was unbelievable to think that one would do such things to an innocent sixteen years old out of love. The definition of love had never strayed that far from God's word in the book. It had to be an extrinsic abomination.
After Middleton had stopped burning all his hair into crisp, he decided to put the sapper down on the ground, but not letting go of his collar. He still burned hot though
"How dare you lay a finger on Lucia? I told you not to!" Venom flew from his mouth, as he stared straight at Michael's. This time, the sapper, instead of flinching in terror like he would have at the beginning of the war, stared back unblinking.
"With all due respect sir, I don't recall such an order." He replied.
"I told you those who harm her will taste my bullet. I said that clear enough and yet you did not heed my order." Middleton continued his barrage.
"I did heed your order. You may call the testimony from the rest of the squad that I shielded her from the vehicle." To which Michael was not at all intimidated. This was his domain. His tone was especially annoying to the angry Middleton, as it continued to be neutral. He kept finding the opportunity to put the sapper in his place, but he could not. Beating him up would make him the aggressor to everyone watching, as he was not saying anything wrong or provoking in an objective nature.
Soon Middleton realized he was falling right into this ignorant and arrogant upper-class's little mind game. He was fighting logic with anger. And he knew he would never win. He had to calm down. Why the hell must he be so deep in fury and anger? He's his superior. He had the authority to make the call, and the guy would have no choice but to obey, otherwise he'd receive the firing squad. Why would he have to play this stupid game?
"Hmph." Middleton's tone also dropped, as his anger began to subside.
"I don't believe you know her entire life purpose when I brought her under my wing. This is not a place for your childish romance-drama play.""As I was not informed. I'm apparently the ignorant one here. But it is possible for ignorance to be educated." Michael's tone continued on its path. As neutral as a machine
This guy...
"So if you have the time, please inform me of what her purpose is. If I'm hindering it in any way reasonable, then I will stop."If Middleton was still hallucinating in his fury, he would have lost this game right here. Like a father teaching a baby how to walk, Michael led Middleton right into the part where he was faced with a trilemma: Either just spit it out in front of everyone, ruining it all, beat him into submission - which again made him the unreasonable party, or just leave it and lose this game. All bad outcomes. This Daunte guy is indeed much better than he is. His past would agree definitely, but there was no more of that. He didn't care one bit if he is worse or not. All he cared about is Lucia and his plans.
"Don't think you can lead me with your wordplay. It doesn't work, nor does your explanation, Orders are simple. Do not tempt Lucia for she is undergoing something beyond your very existence, to be raised and protected by me, for everyone else." There, he let Michael go at last. He wondered if that got to him. But his response was his stone cold face, and then suddenly a look of contempt and judgement.
"As I expected."If it was the old Middleton, that line would immediately cut right through his conscience like a knife, slicing it to pieces with all the implications up and down, of how far he had gone to become this person that was simply under one's expectation to act badly. But the old Middleton is dead. The present Middleton wouldn't care one single bit. He wouldn't care if he was looked upon as the bad guy, as long as it fulfilled his goals. He immediately left the scene, dragging Staff Sergeant Baker behind him.
But what Middleton accomplished for himself was nothing...
"I hope your day is just as pleasant as you are to me." He whispered after Middleton was gone.
Just like Michael's wordplay went into deaf ears to Middleton, his words also went into Michael's deaf ears. It did not deter him. Like how harsh punishment did not stop crime. Or how matters do not disappear regardless. It just morph into something. The only thing he managed to accomplish was to plant more seeds of intent on Michael to oppose and dismantle that rat's legacy. And it would last beyond anyone's expectation...
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