-Pruning the Roses, Part 8-

Come on, come on, come on!

I pleaded with Akari. My thoughts, my words, my arms, my eyes. Everything I had was sputtering, flailing, or begging for the barrier to be dropped.

"Dammit, it's already done," I cried, "Let me out! She should have to handle this alone, it's too much. You said it yourself, if it would've been overbearing for Airis, how awful do you think it is for that little girl out there?"

Hailey shrank back under my pressure, and I could feel Akari's emotions swirling as they became tangled with my own.

"Kill the barrier and cut the link, kiddo." I asked again, wiping tears from my eyes, "Being in my head any longer won't be helpful. Stay with Hails and let me go."

The ego collective was handling things worse than ever, and I feared their foolishness would bleed into Akari's mental link and cause further grief.

My consciousness typically shielded Airis from their turbulent emotions, but I didn't have such a luxury for myself. I went to punch my fist into the barrier in frustration once more but slipped forward as it had dissipated at nearly the exact time.

I couldn't bear to see Akari's wretched expression, so I fled.

Hikita was looming over two figures whose faces and shoulders were covered by her red officer's coat. She must have laid them down next to each other after she…

My steps came to a stop.

No matter how much I tried, my body just wouldn't listen to me; my legs felt numb.

A tiny spark had flickered back to life within me, and I felt a wave of grief that didn't belong to any of the egos or myself.

Tightness in my chest kept my mouth from speaking.

Piercing blue eyes met my frozen gaze, swollen and glistening in the low light.

Hikita appeared as a doll. Stiff movements and a blank face, devoid of any hints to what she might be thinking.

"We aren't finished." She said dryly.

Reason returned to me like a blow to the stomach.

I nodded, "Right."

Hikita and I headed to Julius and the others positioned under the void-altered Alaetüs.

Knight-Captain Flik and my knights were the first to greet us, and they all seemed remiss that they'd once more been unable to assist in a crisis.

Their concerns were unfounded, Hailey had sent the knights away to begin with, and they would've been shooed all the same.

"Is this everyone?" I asked, "The numbers seem off."

Flik answered quickly, "Commander Adaemus issued scouting orders for the passage that woman had come from. A sub-complex and stairwell were found. Those were retracted once things with the, uh, divine warrior, started changing."

Said 'divine warrior', the Alaetüs dyed-in-void, was no longer showing any signs of magicks or other movements.

"And what about Ikuye?" I looked around for the rambunctious girl but couldn't find a hint of bright-blue hair.

"Her party members retreated back to the tunnels. They were worried that she might be influenced in the same way as before, or worse, that whatever is afflicting this one could spread."

I suppressed a sigh and threw a thumb toward Julius and the rest of the raid members.

"Things got funky, and now it's fine. Ikuye is still down for the count. We handled things on the other end already. So what's with the commotion?"

None of my knights knew anything else, so we continued on to pester the source of excitement itself.

Julius was in the middle of completing a many-part plan between two of our mages and Tatsuko, one who specialized in elemental-type spells.

"—then we execute with that exact timing. Norrick will strike the left bindings, and Fenwave takes the right. Tatsuko handles a high pressure wind gust to lower the body to the ground."

The three mages split off and jumped into action.

Two beams of fire struck each of the metal chains on either side of Alaetüs, as her body shifted upwards slightly as a gale thick with aethermist rotated around her legs.

I stood next to Julius as he watched with a focused expression.

"Not worried that freeing her will cause a problem?"

"We already removed anything that seemed like it was involved in the rituals along with the children, but as we saw, something still happened." He said flatly.

"So, you think the monolith stone or carved magick circles are enough to set things off by their selves. Without risking collapsing the roof on us all, the only other option is to remove the Alaetüs."

He nodded, "It's a calculated risk."

"I hope you had someone better in math check those calculations."

Julius paused, blinking in confusion.

"What?" I asked innocently, "You were the one that brought up our time at the Academy the other day. Can't help it if I've been remembering certain things. Mr. 'Needs Improvement'."

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Julius coughed and seemed desperate to change the subject, "Scouts found something further in."

"So I heard. Stairs and some sort of complex?"

"Stairs to the surface, to be more exact. Straight to one of the exterior towers."

It was a bit of a surprise, but not outside our expectations. "Not quite an escape tunnel then? Aeko will be sad to lose that bet."

"Well, we haven't finished scoping out the rest." Julius seemed hesitant to conclude the absence of an escape tunnel.

Maybe he made his own bet with the troops.

"How big is the other section if it's still being scouted?" I asked.

"Big."

-✵-

The Alaetüs was safely lowered and subsequently quarantined by healers.

We decided to wait for Ikuye to recover before attempting anything else. According to Strea and Tomin, it wouldn't be too long before she would wake up and be back to normal.

Guess this has happened a few times since the war started in earnest.

I left Strea with a simple message for Ikuye, 'Ask one of your siblings for help if you can't handle it yourself.'

Scouting reported continued to pour in from the depths of the underground structure, and we all made guesses to what its purpose was.

From the furnishings and layout, it appeared to be a living space. A central common room led to a large bedroom, a study, and a full kitchen with ventilation that disappeared into the ceiling.

I was more interested in what secrets would be hidden away in a private study that was behind not just one, but two, false doors.

We'd only be able to figure it out if we went ourselves, so my knights and I ignored Julius' complaints and embarked on our own quest to unearth the truth.

Hailey opted to stay behind and watch over the injured Alaetüs, and she assigned her own attendants to watch over the casualties and prepare to move them back to the surface.

Akari and Hikita both decided to accompany me.

Hikita was resolute that, whatever else remained here, she would see it through to the end, no matter what it was. Akari, on the other hand, seemed unsure. I could tell she was feeling bad, and her brain was probably cycling through levels of guilt and stress that shouldn't have been hers to deal with.

Hails and I both were irresponsible adults. Airis had just about fought with Rias to convince her to stay at Command and not be involved with the front-lines. But we had made excuses and contradictory exceptions for Akari.

At least this new exploration seemed as far from a battlefield as we could get.

The reports did little to detail the extravagance of the rooms down here. The walls were finely carved wood paneling or even full-wall murals painted in rich and rare colors.

It was a temple of opulence—Or rather, a den of greed.

The study was the same. Marble bookshelves along the back wall were filled to the brim with expensively-bound books. An ornate wooden desk was centered on a semi-circular elevated platform with false windows behind it, looking out into a painted midnight sky.

Hikita was still acting stiff and stone-faced.

"It's… kinda tacky. Right?" I tried to lighten the mood, nudging her and pointing at desk placement.

"It… seems familiar."

"Huh?"

Hikita brushed her hand across the desk and stared at the stars on the wall.

"Not sure. Feels like I've been here before. A long time ago."

I was lost for words.

Knowing what I know now, it could be possible. I imagined a tiny Hikita sitting on Renault's lap at the desk. A doting father who had his office renovated with fake windows and a night sky to appease a child's silly wish.

Haaah. No way, right?

Aeko's voice cut away the mental scene, "What do you think this is?"

She was attempting to pry some metallic device up from the desk, but it wouldn't budge.

Viktor lightly smacked the back of her head.

"Quit touching things at random. What if the room is rigged with traps?

"Eh?" She pouted, "But Hawken said the room was clear."

Hikita's interest in the device had been drawn, and she awkwardly took Aeko's hand and pulled it away.

She pressed on the top and it came apart in two, revealing a series of concentric rings with different colored baubles attached at differing intervals. She placed the cover down and began to spin the rings.

CLICK.

Hikita positioned the first three rings in a way that the devices made a loud clicking sound. She continued to move the other rings without pause.

CLICK.

Another set of rings was arranged strangely, yet the device sounded like that was the correct position.

CLACK.

Hikita shook her head and recoiled her hand as all the rings spun on their own and reset.

"Was it like this?" She muttered.

CLICK.

CLICK.

CLICK.

She got the third set correct and stepped back from the device, pulling Aeko and Viktor back with her.

The raised platform rumbled, and then the whole thing, desk and flooring, parted down the center to reveal a staircase.

"I've definitely been here before." Hikita looked at me with a weird look.

"It would seem so."

I didn't know what else to say.

My vision was haunted by similar mental images from before, a young Hikita running around the study and skipping down the stairwell with a smile.

A woman's laughter startled me, and I turned to see a vibrant and happy Valerie Renaire holding a little blonde-haired baby.

And then I was filled with rage.

He was there, right behind her. The monster who ruined our lives.

Renault had a hand on Renaire's hip, looking down at me, smiling.

"Papa, Papa! Hehe! Up, take me up! Hehe!"

A little girl's voice giggled, and Renault reached out toward me. I flinched, trying to jump away, but he grabbed me and held me tight against his chest.

Dammit, you bastard, let me go!

"Would you like to see the shiny treasures, my curious little Kity-cat?"

"Yeah!" Hikita's young voice came from my mouth, and I slapped myself mentally.

I had never explained these psychometric episodes to Hikita, so in turn she wouldn't have known to keep her mental state on guard when her emotions went wild.

Well… shit.

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