Chapter 3 – A Sinner

  A short conversation breaks out in the main room among the Sinners, where each of them is sitting around the coffee table. Everyone is here, except Damien. Avidia, who had just returned from a rendezvous with a member of Ihuy Association to discuss the payment for their work, arrived just in time for the discussion.

  Rita wondered, “Do you all think Damien should be part of that next mission?”

  Each member pondered for a moment, thinking of the correct answer.

  Avidia was the first to respond, “Assuming that the training procedure is without flaw, there is little reason to not allow him to participate.”

  “Just tucked the little guy in bed — in his pop's room!” Elmer exclaimed out loud.

  “That does not answer the question I posed, Elmer.”

  “Yeah, yeah. The training is going alright. We've been at it for three days in a row now, and that boy is built tough. Not only does he know how to use the Driftblade somewhat well, but he can also take a beating! Hah!”

  “Beating kids on company time, how lucky,” Sumi puffed.

  Rita added, “If you say so, Elmer. But... according to the contract, this Angel's Threat level is Eta-5, quite higher than an average Husk. Can we risk that?”

  The man pondered, “I mean... most of us can kill an Eta with no problem, right?”

  Everyone seemed to be in agreement, except Avidia, who was the least suited for fighting.

  Sumi interjected, “If you don't tell the pipsqueak that it's an Eta, he won't be fearing it.”

  “No, it's not about fear,” Rita said, “the real problem is if he can survive it. From what Elmer said, he can't regenerate much, and he only has a low-grade Driftblade — that one of you robbed of a corpse!”

  Sumi looked away dejectedly.

  Then, a powerful, augmented voice spoke, “Foolish.”

  Everyone looked to the source of the uttered insult. It was the armored sniper, Null, who said that word, getting everyone's attention.

  “The pupils always forget the intricacy of the years of practice that the teacher provides them with. You are all no exception.”

  Null's speaking was powerful but artistic. He made his point clear — the Sinners forgot the teachings of their leader, Soren.

  Avidia clarified his words, “Null appears to be criticizing our unwillingness to throw caution to the wind.”

  Elmer angrily spoke, “Of course the damn sniper says that! He gets to laze around and shoot things from afar — no danger to him!”

  The masked figure responded firmly, “I merely wish to see the fulfilled potential of Soren's chosen.”

  The room was silenced. Null spoke what everyone else was thinking. They thought about if Soren's words were true.

  'The next Sinner will be the one to lead you all to the fated goal.'

  When they first laid their eyes upon Damien, their belief in Soren's leadership wavered ever so slightly. They had their doubts that were yet to be shaken off.

  Elmer spoke first after the silence, “Hell, Soren gave us a week to turn him into a Sinner. I don't think babysitting him more would help, honestly.”

  Avidia followed, “It would be in our best interest to follow Soren's ways and have the subject learn from experience, rather than training sessions.”

  “Agreed,” Sumi nodded once, “at least he'll get to see how it really is.”

  Rita reluctantly agreed, too, “Well... as long as nothing horrible happens, he should be okay!”

  “Elmer, how would you grade Damien in combat prowess?” Avidia posed a straight question.

  The man recalled the training sessions with the boy. During the three days they trained, Damien improved in every single one. On the first day, he barely managed to scratch Elmer's shoulder. His movements were sporadic and infrequent. On the second, Damien put more thought into getting past Elmer's impenetrable guard. He would have surely fulfilled the objective of severing a limb back then if Elmer had not increased his own engagement, making it more difficult for Damien. And on the third and final day, he got very close to severing his leg from the thigh. The only thing that prevented him from achieving the hit was Elmer's unwillingness to walk around with one leg for two days. For a brief moment, Elmer put in more effort than he initially wanted, ending the fight. In theory, Damien won the battle, but he was never told that he did.

  “He can be deadly — that's for sure. He may have looked to you guys like a quiet guy, but I still remember when I told him on the first day to chop off one of my limbs as his first goal. Before I could focus, he was already a few moments from turning me into a cripple. I have seen those burning eyes of his only once before, and his were equally as soul-shaking as before.”

  Everyone patiently waited for Elmer to give his final verdict on Damien.

  “I would say that he can kill that Eta. No questions asked.”

  Meanwhile, in Soren's room aboard Hermes where Damien rested, the boy woke up to a strange sound he had never heard before.

  His eyes and body were still mostly asleep, but something was preventing him from returning to his dreams. It was not the stinging pain he endured during training nor the sore limbs he acquired from swinging around the Driftblade. It was a pleasant, tender voice of an animal. Damien looked around the room and was surprised to see a black cat right above his head. It had soft fur and a pair of luminous, white eyes. 'Meow!', the cat produced a sound, staring right at Damien.

  “Hello, who are you?” He talked to the cat.

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  The cat, unaware of human speech, only continued to meow at the boy, hoping that he would fulfill whatever request it had.

  Damien had never seen a cat before. He only heard from them from Soren when he spoke about his own. This must be that same cat, as the man spoke about 'Kali' the cat. The one in front of him had a tag saying 'Kali' on it. There was no doubt about it.

  “Hey, Kali. I've heard a lot about you.”

  Kali continued to meow and wave her tail in anticipation. Damien did not know the cat wanted something, as the only description he had ever received of one was quite redundant.

  'It is excellent at sleeping right on top of your work', Soren's voice echoed through the boy's mind.

  Somehow, the gentleness of the cat's meow reminded him of his training sessions in a strange way.

  “You know, I haven't been feeling like myself in a while. When I have a weapon in my hand, I feel like a different person — like someone violent.”

  The cat did not understand what Damien was saying, but it still stopped meowing to listen to him each time he spoke.

  “It's like something possesses me to fight better. I don't really get it. Something in my veins just... grows.”

  The strange feeling that Damien felt urged him to speak of it to an animal. As soon as he realized what he was doing, he felt a bit embarrassed even in his solitude, and pretended like it never happened. However, Kali did not forget, and he continued to meow at Damien, who was now getting annoyed.

  “Kitty, do you want something?”

  Kali made a feline gesture that hinted at the door to the room. Damien pieced two and two together, realizing what Kali wanted him to do.

  Damien put on his top and headed to open the door to his room. Kali the cat followed right beside him, carefully walking around his feet. He was about to open the door to the main room when someone else knocked.

  “Come in?” Damien said, somewhat perplexed at the situation.

  The door opened, and Rita entered in an amicable manner. Kali slipped out of the room before she noticed.

  “Good evening, hope I didn't wake you up!” She uttered, zealous as ever.

  “No, not at all. Something else woke me up,” Damien followed, scratching his head.

  “Oh, this is only going to take a minute.”

  “I'm listening.”

  Damien turned from a shy boy to an intrepid version of himself in less than half a week. As Rita looked at him, she no longer saw someone way below her. In fact, only then did she realize that Damien was actually older than her.

  “Tomorrow, you will be joining us on your first mission!” Rita informed him excitedly.

  “Oh, already? I thought I had more training to do,” he said glad, but also surprised.

  “Nuh-uh! You're coming with us!”

  The pair was smiling. Rita smiled with genuine glee, and Damien followed due to the infectiousness of her expression.

  “You know, there's a place aboard Hermes that I really wanted to show you,” the girl offered.

  “Right now?”

  “Right now.”

  Damien could not bring himself to say 'no', despite wanting to sleep. He followed Rita through the main room, carefully maneuvering around the sleeping Sinners. They ventured into the door on the opposite side of the training room elevator, entering a hallway with three more doors — two on the left and right side, and one more on the far end. Rita took the door right in front of them.

  As soon as they entered, Damien was caught by surprise by yet another room here. This one was even less a room than the training room, featuring but a balcony overlooking District 16. It resembled much of the sight from his home.

  No words needed to be exchanged. Both Rita and Damien remained captivated by the stars above, carefully examining them, and looking for constellations to pick apart. It was a serene sight after all of the training that the boy had to endure.

  Rita herself looked quite happy in her current state. She was a Sinner like any other, and to the boy, she seemed the easiest to talk to.

  “Rita, what's it like to be a Sinner?”

  She glanced over at Damien, “It's an interesting experience. It's not all easy, but you get to see the sights of New Order, pick up some knowledge, and the colleagues are fun to talk to!”

  “That's great. I always wanted to explore the world.”

  “Well, now's your chance! It isn't an everyday occurrence that you get to ride a spatial warping house like Hermes to get anywhere you need.”

  Damien thought to himself, 'I have seen so little of this world'. He had spent most of his life studying Soren's philosophy, and compared to others, was quite far behind in life experience.

  “How did you become a Sinner, Rita?”

  She gazed towards the stars yet again, “That's a long story.”

  “We have the time for it,” Damien urged her to continue.

  After contemplating, she spoke some more, “Well, to put it bluntly, Soren found me in time of need. That is about as much as I'm willing to go back to the past.”

  “I see. Do the other Sinners have a story like that?”

  “...We all have something that brought us to Soren — or rather, Soren to us.”

  Rita replied with a surprisingly simple sentence that made sense to Damien.

  She continued, “What was that moment for you? What occurrence brought Soren into your life?”

  Damien had looked upon the topic like this. He had always taken Soren for granted, forgetting the times before him. In truth, he did not remember much of his life before the Angel encounter.

  “Soren saved me from an Angel attack.”

  “Oh... that must've been a terrible experience!”

  “Actually, it was quite serene.”

  It was something about Soren that had the aura of serenity. Both Damien and the Sinners felt a sense of authority from him — something similar to a bird tending to its hatchlings. Even though the man is one of the few people Damien knew, he never got to know him personally. Not even once did Soren speak about himself in their conversations.

  “Our leader has that air about him. He makes things right, I say!” She stated.

  Damien asked her, "What made you follow him, though?”

  “He is a man with a plan.”

  Of course, the plan to save the world, as he always claimed. Damien heard that phrase so many times before, so much that it had lost its meaning upon him. It seemed so abstract now — to the point where even Soren said the words emptily.

  Damien admired his 'father', “He must be an excellent fighter, then — to gather such a strong group like you.”

  “Indeed! I got to taste that personally, ha-ha,” Rita laughed awkwardly.

  “You did?”

  “You can imagine how that went.”

  He thought for a moment about something that had been bothering him for a while. Rita never used Ichor in battle.

  “Yeah... I wanted to ask you — how come you fight with that spear, and not Ichor like Elmer and Sumi?”

  Rita jumped, “Ah! That's a bit of a touchy subject...”

  Damien looked at her, puzzled, “Uh, that's okay. Don't force yourself.”

  “No, I think you should know. It might come in handy to know this...”

  They looked at each other in anticipation.

  Rita rolled up one of her sleeves, revealing a red wound across her forearm.

  “I am a Redblood.”

  He was visibly taken aback. He had never seen nor heard anything about such a phenomenon. It was not Ichor, but red blood?

  “There are very few of us left alive. That's because we are much weaker than Ichor-bearers. We cannot regenerate as well, and our blood does not turn into tools for us to use.”

  “That is why you wield your Gas Spear...”

  “Yes — a weapon originating from the south of the city.”

  Being a Redblood in New Order is a challenging task. They are biologically disadvantaged from birth. Damien admired Rita for still becoming a Sinner despite her unfortunate upbringing.

  “The South... so, Districts 15 and 17?”

  “No, those districts were shattered a few years back.”

  “Shattered?”

  “Right! When a District loses control of itself or suffers something terrible, it is considered shattered and no longer functioning.”

  Damien looked slightly unnerved, “Two entire Districts — shattered?”

  “Yep! Things like that happen sometimes. Either way, when I say south of the city, I mean even further than those two Districts.”

  He was puzzled by this; the only thing beyond Districts 15 and 17 is the wall that protects the city from blistering sandstorms of the Boundary.

  “Oh well,” Rita steered the conversation in a different direction, “Where were we again?”

  Neither of them knew how they got to this point.

  Damien brought up a topic, “By the way, Avidia mentioned something before that cleanup mission. Something about a Threat level?”

  The boy heard this term in reference to the mission's Angels, although he did not understand what exactly it meant.

  “Oh! I think that you'll find out more tomorrow about that. It's going to be your first mission, are you excited?”

  “Actually, yeah! I hope that my arms won't be as sore as they are now when we get there,” the boy said, stretching his arms.

  “I'm happy to have you on board, Damien. Don't get yourself killed tomorrow!”

  With that, the night concluded, and the two went back to their spots. They exchanged a few more pleasantries on the way and then split apart in the main room.

  Tomorrow will be the day that Damien gets to use his battle prowess in practice. He went to sleep with that thought in mind, hoping to wake up well-rested and on time.