Chapter 2
The Dream
Aside from the nightmares of the past, he always came back to this place.
It was a windswept plane that looked as though it had suffered through a raging inferno.
He could see the husks that had once been trees and shrubs. Though drenched in a torrential downpour, the area turned the ground to thick clay-like mud that sucked in his feet as he walked forward.
All around him, though, were weapons of various kinds, blades of all types, hammers, polearms and maces stood out of the ground like grave markers for fallen warriors, some of them familiar, but the majority were strange to him.
He felt like he should know them, but whenever he reached they slipped from his grasp bar a few.
They are carried off into the distance leading to a hill with a sole blade planted on top of it.
He began to walk slowly at first, then picked up the pace towards it, but he never drew closer to that blade no matter how far he went.
Like always, the mud slowed him down and drew him exhausting his efforts, while the storm-battered him though he kept pushing forward.
As always, he was no closer to the hill.
He looked up towards it and, as always, saw a cracked Victorian porcelain mask floating before his face with a visage he saw only once long ago.
The Present - Investigation Day 1
Ads eyes fluttered open, and he sat up and felt a surge of weariness. That dream was a constant companion since his near death when he was younger. Always a hill of swords that he could never seem to reach the Summit of.
Though the place had changed over the years, becoming more barren in the civil war and brighter when he had joined Babel. Its current form, though, had come about after everything had after Babels violent fall and only gotten worse with time.
Climbing out of the lumpy bed, he stretched needed to start the investigation today to see what stones he could turn over. The best place to start would be the areas that had been forgotten by the majority of the citizens, the unofficial infected ghetto's and the slums to see if he could turn over anything, as well as bars frequented by the Bratva types he'd have to be very careful though.
He knew how to walk their walk out of necessity when it came to going after them, but he wasn't one of them, and he would slit his own throat before even stooping to their level. All in all, covering that sort of ground would usually take time, but he couldn't help feeling he was working against a timetable that was already in motion.
He turned and looked out of the window forlornly, taking in the street below as the sun rose. This would be difficult; he would much rather cut out the rotting source at the heart of whatever Reunion was planning, but that could cause even more damage since nature abhors a vacuum. It would also lead to more blood being on his hands than there already was.
As he gazed out of the window seeing various people moving below him, he got the feeling this was going to be a long few days.
Investigation Day 7
Ad sat in a small bar through using that word was an abuse on a good word at first glance. The place was in the heart of one of the poorer neighbourhoods in the city; most of its furniture was repurposed from various places, mainly old factories. He could see the odd drum and wooden wire spool used as tables or chairs with what looked to be scavenged office furniture in other places.
The exterior when he entered was an old disused tool store which was covered for this place.
Still, they had some decent tunes playing, mainly some Emperor playing in the background with some DDD thrown in along with the occasional Urus artist. It also had a decent atmosphere, which helped though the drink did leave a lot to be desired; he knew he wouldn't go blind from drinking it.
He took another sip; the stuff was bitter as all hell and strong with a faint metallic after taste. The stuff he'd shared with the others in the Civil War had been better than this.
He rubbed his eyes, looking forlornly at a faded patriotic poster on the wall, thinking about his old team, all gone on ahead, leaving him alone.
He took another swig and pushed down on the memories going over what he'd found. His efforts had been mixed, to say the least, some of the infected had helped, but primarily it had led him on a wild goose chase. Still, some had given him some promising leads on several Reunion members he had failed and confirmed their affiliation when they met with others.
Their idle conversion, though, had to lead to some breakthroughs in that regard. Something was planned; some of them seemed excited, almost eager the way they talked about it.
He pulled out the little notebook he kept in it; he'd made some notes so far and flicked through to his notes. Some keywords he'd heard from them that had stood out were 'strike', 'uprising', 'homeland' and 'claiming what was theirs'.
That combined with their attitudes, along with a few other scattered sentences, was what he had picked up from them, as well as the tension he felt confirmed in his mind that what was going to happen would be happening soon.
He grimaced; the Bratva, on the other hand, had been harder to pin down in this city than they usually were, something about a series of raids by the Guards before he'd arrived. Though he had managed to locate a few of their members' lower ranking by catching sight of their telltale tattoos and signs, they didn't do much except shake down a few stores for protection.
He'd tailed them for a few days and had eventually gotten lucky when a captain had turned up to collect their earnings and led him all the way back to one of their safe houses, which gave him an opportunity he had also come across this small at the very least it also had this handy dive bar nearby too. He took another swig and noticed his glass had nothing else left in it, checking the time. Based on his observations over the last two days of watching them, there should be about four of their made members there right now with the Captain.
The basic plan was to infiltrate their little safe house, ransack it for any records they kept and 'ask' the Captain a few pointed questions about the goings-on in the city right now. He stood up, checking his cash, then cracked his knuckles to get to work.
----
A short while later, Ad carefully climbed up a rusted fire escape testing each step as he moved carefully up it. The last thing he needed right now was to fall into the alleyway and break his leg; he'd learned that early on when he started down his path, his arts couldn't protect against everything, and a nasty fall would be the last thing he needed.
As he neared the top, he stopped using his arts to sharpen his hearing and listened for anyone who would be up there. Straining, all he could hear was the quiet hum of an HVAC unit, the distant traffic from a nearby road, as well as the low murmur and sound of the mass of humanity but nothing from the rooftop.
He eased himself onto the roof, keeping as low as possible, and moved to the vantage point he'd used previously when he found their safehouse that they had set up in an abandoned store in a particularly rundown area of this industrial district.
He carefully scanned the area below and could see one visible guard watching the street from a painfully obvious hiding spot in a doorway that he'd seen during the previous few nights. There was the other in a more subtle one, hidden as a beggar on the street. That one was good, but he still gave away what he was. That meant the other two and the Captain inside, which made him smile slightly. It meant he had everyone where he wanted them.
Summoning his arts while taking a few steps back, he dashed forever and leapt from the roof, easily clearing the gap between the buildings. He broke his fall with a roll that softened the blow, killing his momentum as he came to a stop, straining his hearing listening for sounds of alarm.
He sighed in relief when he didn't hear any cries of alarm or the sound of anyone moving down below. He made his way along to the other fire escape on this side and glanced down at it, and grimaced. The whole thing was in an even worse state than the first one; he could see rust eaten flooring and where parts of the guard rails had fallen off or were hanging in there by scraps of metal. The whole thing looked like if he wasn't careful, it would shake itself to pieces as he went down it, and he didn't care to waste his arts strengthening it.
Sighing as he scanned down and located the window that he wanted to get into, the damn thing would be hard to get to, but he could make it though it would cut into his window more than he would like.
With one final look around, making sure there was no other way down, he began to plan his descent.
----
A short time later, along with much quiet cursing and painfully careful movements, he'd made it down to the window and had eased it open. He was Inside what looked to be an old disused workroom. It was filled with clutter, and all kinds of rubbish and a sniff of the air made him gag slightly and realise that this place was used for something else. He eased me over to the door and listened out again, starting to feel tension sing through the air as my sense's reached out. Everything was still silent, and he slowly opened the door and scanned the darkening corridor with a faint light at the end leading towards his target.
He moved like a ghost down the corridor and stopped drawing my black blade, and glanced around the corner seeing a yawning grey-haired Lupo. One of the guards here and a new one at that, judging by the fact the Lupo was fairly unscared and untattooed, which meant he was probably barely less experienced than the gang.
Glancing again, Ad saw his head turn to look the other way; like a lightning bolt, he shot out around the corner; before he could even react or make a sound, he'd put one hand covering his face and pulled him back onto his black blade sending it through the Lupo's heart killing the man. Ad felt the mobster's body and took his weight as he pulled the gangster back around the corner and lowered him to the ground in the shadows.
He quickly searched the Lupo's pockets and found a set of keys as well as a short sword at the guard's side. He took it out and examined it, the blade looked old, but it seemed as though it was well cared for. He grimaced though he could practically feel all the innocent blood that this blade had bathed in though for this Lupo to get this opportunity. He took the blade, and without a backwards glance, he headed to the door and opened it slowly.
Inside was the gaudiest office he had ever seen with a large Urse sprawled on a couch snoring like a busted chainsaw. The man in question worked for an acting agency and turned up on set for the role of a crime boss. He would be turned back with a scathing letter from the director about typecasting. Moving swiftly across the room, which causes the Boss to start to rise at the sudden sound before he could so much as reach for a weapon, Ad already had his blade pressed against his throat.
"Who the hell are you," the boss growled, going still as he felt the trickle of blood running down his neck.
"Doesn't matter," Ad said coldly, "I need information, and you're one of my best sources."
The big man laughed, "What," the Boss said, "makes you think I will tell you anything? When my Boyeviks get here, your a dead man."
He gave a smile like a snow-swept tundra that caused the laughter to die in the Bosses throat as Ad's lifeless eyes finally registered, "Why are you going to tell me anything?" Ad asked, "Nothing that you can do will hurt me. I'm a ghost, but I can and will burn your world to the ground in an evening if I wish."
Ad's face went blank, then said, "Now you can give me what I want, or I can take my time. What's your choice going to be?"
The Boss sweated like a pig but still had some courage to spit in his face.
"The hard way it is then," Ad said coldly.
----
Investigation Day 12
Ad sat in his room as he read the Chernobog Messenger talking about an investigation into the recent fire in an old store in industrial district 15A. According to the article, no leads have been found yet, but the police were closing in rapidly and would soon catch the dastardly perpetrator.
Ad snorted in disgust what was really happening was the Chernobog Police in that area didn't want to enter that part of the city along with the fact that the whole place was rundown and filled with infected and other undesirables all this was mixed in with a rich taste of corruption to most likely the Bratva giving 'donations' to the guards so they could get a crack at the person how destroyed their safe house. But given all the witnesses were dead and the evidence was burned to cinders, then they had limited information to go on.
He frowned as he opened up the notebook and flicked through to what he'd gotten from the documents and the boss. He wished he'd had longer to go through them. It indicated many new targets in the region he would hit after he was done here. He finally got to the page he needed, and his frown grew deeper as he read the numbers the Bratva had moved a terrifying amount of hardware into the city at the request of several individuals on top of their usual dealings. This would be enough to worry anyone at the best of the time; however, the names from their own files were traced back to Reunion leaders in the city. The Bratva didn't care as long as they were paid, but reading between the line, the various bosses were getting concerned, and some had been quietly making their way out of the city with their asserts.
From there, he'd followed the trails, and what he had seen had shocked him in scattered locations Reunion was building up stockpiles for a damned war! Worse, many innocent infected who they claimed to fight for and uninfected would get caught in the crossfire. He stood and looked out of the window, not really seeing the city but looking off to a far off-dry and barren place with small patches of green; there he smelt the smoke and heard the screams along with the clash of steel and the heat of Arts that came to him at times, the Civil War had left its own deep mark in all who were there especially those who had been on her side. He shook his head as he remembered the woman he'd sworn his blade to and came to respect and even in some ways love, along with the comrades, the friends, hells, the brothers and sisters he'd made.
But that all ended with the fall of the Tower, and he closed his eyes with a monumental effort forcing back the tide of dark memories. Seeing his teams die, holding Hawthorn the last one to go as he tried to staunch her bleeding.
After that, all he remembered was the flash of blades as he threw himself into battle and then just walking in ruins hunting them like the…
He snapped out of it and realised his blades were in his hands, and they were locked around them in a death grip. He put them on the table.
He sat on his bed feeling older than his years; he had an appointment with the General to keep today as well as that meeting he'd manage to track down.
He needed to be ready, he needed to be better.
