Chapter 42 - Shatter

Iris

+--

"...It's here."
They'd entered a large room deep in the compound, the exact dimensions impossible to tell with the tall rows of bookshelves that ran in neat orderly lines along either side of the entrance. The cases faded into darkness, the black floor littered with loose papers, yellowed and crinkled and moth-eaten.
Further on, glimpsed in slices from between the bookcases, were a row of computers, fat and square.
Valkyre began to make his way towards the machines in the back, but stopped once he realized that Raguel wasn't following. The angel glanced back at the other, frowning.
"...What is it?"
The half-breed's eyes flickered over the room, nervously, even as he took a step forward, in the same motion glancing behind, back along the hallway. Raguel shook his head, stepping forward again, but slowly, cautiously.
"...It's nothing. But we should hurry. I have a bad feeling about this place..."
The angel gave a sharp, curt nod. This, at the very least, they could agree on. He let his aura sweep around the area, but couldn't detect anything else. Still, it did nothing to settle his nerves.
There was actually quite an area of open space between the bookshelves and the row of computers, and again the angel found himself staring down the dark ends of the room, trying to find an end. The lights above were broken, the shattered glass crunching noisily beneath his booted feet.
Valkyre began picking up scattered papers from the tables, flipping through the sheets, staring at data logs and long strands of sequences that meant absolutely nothing to him, filled with sciences and diagrams of things that should've long since been banished and forgotten.
He glanced up once, startled to find his own reflection in front of him, until he realized that what was behind the tables of computers was not actually a black wall, but instead a thick sheet of glass. He paused, studying it, but could not see through the glass, which had a silvery tinge, as if indeed a mirror. The angel eventually turned back to the papers sprawled out before him.
Raguel, on the other hand, had begun to investigate some of the computers. Most were broken, but a few still held promise, once swept clean of the rubble around them and the thin film of dust.
Valkyre watched the half-breed work for a while, then turned back to the pointless information on the sheaf of papers in front of him. The angel dropped the packet in exasperation, then glanced around. Leaning against some of the bookshelves' sides were some metal drawers, and on closer inspection, they contained rows of neatly organized files, clean of dust and grime. Valkyre pulled one of the drawers open, flipped through the folders inside, but found them most of them to be just logs and dates.
He switched to another drawer, and another, until the labels changed from dates to a series of digits and alphabetical numerals, all still incomprehensible... The angel sat back on his heels, reflecting. Raguel... he'd had a label on the back of his neck. So had Corryn.
Yet Iris had not... proof indeed that he'd never been formed in the labs, yet then again, neither had Raguel nor Corryn been born there... Why hadn't they done anything to Iris?
Why didn't he have a label, an identity...?
Valkyre pulled out a random file, flipping open the manila folder. More information. Specifics on blood type, weight, weight change over a period of time, lung capacity, an excruciatingly precise and detailed bank of information.
No name. Just a specimen number.
And after that, just more pages of meaningless data. Bodily reactions to tests. Chemicals.
...And on the last page... an expiration date.
The angel dropped the folder, slamming the drawer shut. Worthless.
Iris, standing next to him, stirred, bending down to pick up the papers. Valkyre stared, blinking, watching the boy fingering the crisp white pages, eyes blank. It occured to the angel then that Iris probably didn't even know how to read.
"Valkyre."
He turned around, looking for Raguel, whom he spotted further back, lit by a weak electric glow from a monitor screen. One of the computers had worked.
Valkyre quickly rose, touching the boy on the shoulder and glad when the small hand grasped his, the manila folder forgotten.
"...What is it?" he asked as he approached, almost tripping over the debris as he made his way over. "Have you found something?"
Raguel shrugged. "It's a database. I'll see if the information is here..."
Valkyre frowned, watching the other's pale fingers nimbly work on a stiff keyboard, eyes scanning rows and rows of files and data.
"...Raguel..." the other didn't reply, but the angel continued, knowing he was still heard. "This place... it isn't quite... right. The way it's all..."
The half-breed paused, looking up. "...What do you mean?"
Valkyre glanced around at the dark uneasily, at the shattered glass and the overturned chairs, littered paper...
"It doesn't seem like somewhere just abandoned," he said. "This place looks like someone attempted to completely destroy it..."
Raguel shook his head, fixing his gaze back on the flickering computer screen.
"The state wanted the labs all shut down," he replied, fingers beginning to move over the keyboard again. "The... people... here, they tried to keep it running anyways. I'm not sure on the details, but disputes and arguments started breaking out.
"When the labs still continued to work, the state decided that they had to be shut down manually."
The angel frowned, contemplative. "...By what methods?"
Raguel paused, then looked up with a smile.
"They put down the place by force. There was little real danger to the... staff, as most of the members had simply heard of the ploy earlier and escaped. So there were few... ...human casualties." He paused, blinked brieftly, then continued.
"A prime force the state saw fit for taking care of this nuisance was to take advantage of the abilities of magic-users."
The half-breed looked away then, glancing down at his own pale hands.
"In particular... angels."
Valkyre paused, then glanced around the room. Indeed, the room looked like it had perhaps been sacked, but the breaking of the glass was obviously something that hinted at magical-use rather than physical action. After all, he'd found almost no bullet shells or blood about the place. Still..
"As well... I remember they had a few demons."
The angel looked back sharply. "Demons? ...The state sends out bounties on demons all the time, and if not, they... are often targeted by the black market." Valkyre almost swallowed back the last few words, watching Raguel carefully for a response, though no obvious show of emotion broke through the other's expression.
"...They came here for a special purpose. They had to have been."
The angel let out his breath slowly, crossing his arms over his chest. "...What do you mean?"
Raguel looked up at him, and smiled.
"This is mostly hypothesis, but I believe they were searching for something. Something that the labs had, that the state wanted..."
Valkyre paused, then let the information slowly soak in.
"...Iris."
Raguel nodded shortly, then turned back to the computer. Valkyre pressed his knuckles against his lips, thinking. The state, wanting Iris long before the actual bounty came out... Then, when Iris himself escaped, they set out the bounty on him... of course. It made sense, and it gave a logical reasoning for the disintegration of the labs.
And yet... in the end... why did they want him...?
"...Here."
Raguel straightened his shoulders, clicking on something on the screen, then scrolling down along a file.
Valkyre peered over the other's shoulders, eyes hurt by the sharp contrast and the small font, trying to make sense of the letterings. He personally didn't know many of the words, but then again... he remembered nothing before Camael had found him. And as for a knowledge of reading... he'd only learned the basics, and gathered up a weak vocabulary and rough understanding of most words as he'd gone along.
"What is it?" he asked, hand instinctively running out, finding Iris', firmly gripping the small, thin fingers that curled around his palm in response.
"...His file. His information, and what they recorded should all be..."
Raguel stopped, blinking. There was a gleam of sweat on his brow, his eyes frozen.
Valkyre glanced over at the screen again, then frowned. The neat rows of information and words had turned to a garbled mess, utterly incomprehensible and broken with letterings and symbols.
The half-breed suddenly scrolled down, the little letters flying up, and then ran into row after row of broken lines and dots, nothing more than fragments...
"...It's... not here."
The angel stared at the senseless black and white, blinking.
"...What do you mean, not here...??"
Raguel was shaking his head, teeth gritted. "The data's... gone. They erased it. The... the state! They"-
Iris gasped sharply, suddenly. Valkyre whirled around, reaching out, grabbing the boy by the shoulder, body tensed, immediately alert. He glanced around the room, along the row after row of bookcases, casting deep shadows over them. No. They couldn't see anything. Something...
The darkness was consuming around them. Utterly silent, but it felt like... there were flickerings.
Indeed, he felt it... brush of auras, so faint against his own, but undoubtedly there, and nearby...
Valkyre trembled, suddenly realizing just how close the other presenses were... somehow, they'd snuck up on them, caught them completely unaware... So close... In fact, they very well could be... right in the room.
The angel glanced to his side. Raguel's eyes were equally alert, the half-breed having turned his back to the computers, his entire body tensed and ready on instant's notice.
The silence deepened, enclosing around them. Valkyre breathed shallowly through his mouth, eyes darting around, hand running down to the dagger tucked to his belt.
And then, he heard it, so faintly at first that he thought it had to be only his imagination, his stressed mind playing tricks on him.
It started out as a soft hum, a lilting, tuneless melody that rose steadily in volume, defining itself as one from a feminine throat, continually rising in pitch, becoming something high and piercing so it made the angel wince, recoiling slightly.
The note broke in a sharp shriek, followed by broken, bone-chilling yet eerily feminine laughter.
A blur of white, and then something dropped from from a bookshelf top down before them, swaying to its feet.
Eire.
She smiled at them, silky white hair falling over her eyes, unreflective black eyes contrasting the white of her face, her lips.
"We found you again, Iris."
Valkyre grabbed the boy by the shoulder, pushing Iris behind himself. His hand rose instinctively to his seal, feeling the familiar, reassuring cold stone threaded with gold. His eyes were glancing around, constantly searching... Rheis. He had to be somewhere nearby as well...
Valkyre paused, then stopped, staring at Eire.
She was dressed in black again, the same outfit. She was like a photograph taken in monotone; silvery-white hair, lifeless black eyes, a black long-sleeved shirt that made her pale white hands look as if detached, tight black pants that hid her ankles...
Eire smiled. "Iris, come home." She held out her hand, tipped in milky-white fingernails. "You remember home, don't you?"
The angel blinked, staring at her.
The cable.
There was no cable.
Valkyre started, glanced around, nerves grinding, on edge. Where was Rheis?? There wasn't a cable between them... that... that meant... that he could be anywhere...
"Raguel!" Valkyre shouted, but his call was muted by the sudden, thunderous smash of glass from right behind them, exploding shards flying everywhere, tinkling on the ground.
Rheis' black blur of a body caught Raguel off-guard, knocking him to the ground as both tumbled to the floor.
The angel had no time to mind though, as at the same instant, Eire shot forward, hands outstretched, neon-bright swirls of angelic energy flowing from her palms.
Valkyre snapped off his seal, immediately flaring his wings and darting ahead as well to meet the blow. The angel's right wing blocked Eire's first blow, spanning out in front of her with a muffled rush of feathers, momentarily blinding her, able to see nothing but the whirling mass of wing.
Valkyre crouched down and slammed forward, hitting Eire heavily in the stomach just as she tore the wing away, snarling. The light-blooded female was sent flying back, saved only from smashing into the nearby bookcase by flaring her large, luminous white wings, then dropping from midair into a crouch as Valkyre launched himself towards her, his own magic gathered in his palms, clenched in his fists.
Eire lept forward suddenly straight towards the other, stretching out her own hand, palm open, glowing white. Valkyre's fist connected straight with the center of the other's hand, but then a sudden blast of bright light lit from the palm, sending out a huge pulse of pure angel magic that sent Valkyre hurtling backwards, crashing into a jumble of tables and chairs.
The angel gasped in pain, flashes of red momentarily blotting his vision. He stumbled to his feet though, gritting his teeth, feeling something sticky travel down the back of his neck and knowing it was his own blood. His fist throbbed in pain, leaking blood as well, and his arm felt as if fire were coursing along it.
There was a heavy thud to his side, and Valkyre glanced over to see Raguel stumbling to rise, leaning against the side of the bookshelf he'd just been thrown against, loose books and papers dropping to the ground from the impact.
Rheis darted forward, trying to strike another blow, the half-breed only able to counter it weakly, stumbling backwards and being pressed against the wooden shelf, struggling to hold the other back.
Valkyre hissed under his breath, teeth clenched, then darted forward. His wing swept out, aiming for the dark-blooded male's shoulder, but Rheis detected his movement and jumped back deftly, stopping the blow with both his hands, his black hair flying over his eyes, a grin on his face.
Rheis' fingers dug into the angel's wing, then he suddenly twisted and turned, dragging Valkyre off his feet, whirling him around and slamming him into the wall of glass that Rheis had just broken through himself, the angel thudding heavily to the ground in an opposite room amidst a raining shower of glass.
Valkyre groaned, fingers scrabbling in dust and crumbled plaster, skin slit with the tiny shards of glass littered everywhere. His entire arm hurt now, the knuckles of the hand that he'd used on Eire torn and bloody.
Everything... hurt. Eire's sudden counter had been surprising, showing more power than he'd imagined the female capable of since their last encounter. He couldn't understand it though, the broken cable... He thought they'd needed it. Now, suddenly disconnected, they seemed like perhaps they were even stronger... Was it? Or had things somehow changed...? Rheis hadn't even spanned his wings this time, though Eire had...
There was a sudden heavy thud, and the angel looked up in time to see Rheis snarling as he pushed himself off a splintered table, engaged with the black blur of Raguel.
Valkyre let out a pained breath, glad that the dark-blooded male would now be engaged, at least for a while. It would give him a chance-
Someone screamed, and the angel's violet eyes widened in shock and, then, realization. He dragged himself to his feet, teeth ground together against the pain, and somehow still managed to stumble forwards, dragging behind his wings, one of which felt like it'd been pulled from its socket, muscles all stretched until they broke. But, of course, that didn't matter now.
Iris.
Valkyre managed to grab the edges of the broken window, vaulting himself back into the room. His wings slid back into nothingness, as they were going to be nothing more than a burden to him now.
A dim brightness, glowing. Eire.
She was tangled with Iris, hands grabbing at something the young boy was trying to pull away, her milky-whire wings curled around them both, flared and fluttering slightly with her movements.
Something snapped, and the white-winged angel stumbled backwards, triumphant. Valkyre realized then that she'd just torn away the tearstone, the broken links of the chain scattering to the ground.
Iris had fallen to the ground, letting out a small cry. There were fingernail-shaped crescents on his arm where the other's grip had dug into his skin.
The boy's weary gray eyes blinked open, widening as they saw Valkyre, the soft loose hair drifting over the boy's face. The angel realized what a mess he must seem to be, dripping blood everywhere and covered in glass, a licking of his lips reminding himself that there was probably a bruise on his cheek as well, and a cut in the corner of his mouth.
Something dropped to the ground right beside the boy's face then, bouncing once on the hard black floor. The tearstone.
Iris' eyes widened, the boy trying to rise, hand reaching out...
Eire's heel came down hard on the small, clear stone, and it shattered in a sharp crackling, like of glass, the threads of gold snapped and bent, the silver chain skidding about along the floor like a writhing snake, then stilling.
Eire smiled, drawing her leg back. Nothing was left but chipped bits of stone, scattered on the floor.

+--

AN: Fufufufufu. Super-crunchy-action! Much randomness! Much beating and violence! Much excessive details and descriptions!
Uhm, I probably cut off this chapter at a bad place, but truth is, I wanted to give you guys some interesting action, as all it's been so far for a long time now were endless descriptions and rambling.
Also, as some of you have noticed, I've gotten around to giving each chapter a one-word title. Why one-word? Because it's quick and simple, so it's like a summarization of the chapter. It's a little too... less, at times, but it's a good, quick snapshot of a chapter.
Mostly just so I can track what happened in which, for all the frequent times I go back to re-check a detail. ^^; Oops.
So, there. Might be a bit confusing at first, but it sure as hell should be less stale than just dull numbering, so here ya go.
Well! I've finally got myself back into the groove of Iris, so expect some more chapters! I promise to try and keep it up! [Though, school wants me back... ;o; It starts... thursday! ::wails::]
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! ;o;

You are not authorized to comment here. Your must be registered and logged in to comment