The Lesser One Arc 2 Version 2 Chapter 17: Situation

 

Situation

The knight plants his sword in the ground and leans on it. The crowd is going wild. I slump to the ground, holding my sword in both hands.

The knight rushes at me. “It’s not over yet!”

I roll backwards and recover my posture. I get an idea.

Sage. Conjure me a paralytic poison that I can coat my blade with.

Done.

I run my hand along the blade of my sword, coating it in a paralytic agent. Then I look at the knight. “You’re going down.”

We clash. Metal rings against metal. Sparks fly. I am clearly at a disadvantage here. My ability with a sword is minimal at best.

The knight scores a slash on my side. Blood runs down my armor. I stagger backwards, holding my injury.

The knight presses the attack.

Above the arena, a man with a saw is walking towards Esla.

“No, no no!” I grit my teeth and go in for another exchange of blows. The knight seems to have infinite stamina.

The knight slows, then shudders.

Sage: It seems you nicked him.

The poison is taking effect?

The knight collapses.
Sesnet raises his hand above his head. “Markus wins!”

A vampire butler enters the ring and holds my hand above my head. I am out of breath, my side bleeding, my arms shaking. When I return to the waiting room, I collapse to the ground.

Rack chuckles. “Ey, boy. You really pulled a cheap trick in there.”

“Is there something wrong with that?” I look up at him.

Rack laughs. “No, no. A win’s a win, friend.”

I turn to Sebastian and Tia. “That makes three wins.”

“Indeed.” A vampire butler has entered the room. “Markus and his attendees, Lord Sesnet wishes to talk with you.”

We follow the vampire butler out of the waiting room. I can’t get my mind off of Esla’s lost hand. I know I failed her.

We reach the grand throne room, which is protected by large oak doors with intricate engravings. Two skeleton warriors push the doors open for us as we pass.

The throne room is massive. Statues of ancient Greek origin line the walls, while tapestries hang from the ceiling. Sesnet is sitting on the throne, leaning his chin on his palm.

“You did it.”

“I did.” I clutch my side, which is sending me pings of pain.

Sesnet raises an eyebrow. “Maxamilian.”

The vampire butler bows.

Sesnet’s expression sours. “You didn’t give Markus enough time to heal his wounds.”

“I am sorry, sir.”

Sesnet waves his hand. “No matter. Leave us.” Sesnet snaps his fingers and a skeleton attendant walks up to me with a health potion on a silver platter. I take it, uncork it, and drink it. My wound starts to hurt less.

Sesnet stands up and walks down the stairs beneath the throne. “I didn’t expect you to win your third bout. Andreaus is one of my best fighters.”

“He was.” I grit my teeth. “Where’s Esla?”

“She’s being treated. Don’t worry, she isn’t dead and won’t die under our watch.” Sesnet appears quite smug. “Did you enjoy the extra bit of motivation during your last bout?”

“No. No I didn’t.”

Senset chuckles. “Honest. In any case, you have our vote for the purposes of becoming one of us. You fought well, you played dirty tricks, and you really gave me and the audience a good time.” Sesnet snaps. “Here is your physical reward.”

Another skeleton attendant brings me a covered silver platter. The skeleton lifts the top to reveal a device that looks like a handheld game console.”

“What’s this?”

Sesnet shrugs. “It’s a hypercomputer I discovered, well, where I discovered it doesn’t matter. It’s yours. I know you have a sentient construct attached to you. This will allow you to interact with it better.”

“You know about Sage?”

“Yes.” Sesnet walks up to me. “My boy, you are quite the fighter. If you ever want to earn some quick cash, you can contact me.” Sesnet hands me a business card.

“Um, thanks.”

“Bye.” Sesnet snaps his fingers and I am ripped through a wormhole. Two seconds of infinite screaming abyss later, I am standing in the middle of a parking lot in London. Tia and Sebastian spill out of the portal behind me.

Sebastian coughs. “He could have let us off somewhere closer to our base.”

Finally, Esla pops out of the portal. The portal closes behind her.

Esla staggers, appearing half delirious. I rush to her and support her by the shoulder.

“You really took us for a loop there.” I look at Esla’s missing left hand. “What the hell were you doing in London anyways?”

Esla coughs. “Thanks for saving me back there.”

“I didn’t save you. You lost your hand.”

Esla holds up her cauterized stump and then lets it fall. “I would have died if you hadn’t beaten that knight before you did.”

“Esla. What were you doing in London?”

“I was supposed to be watching you. Making sure you didn’t get into trouble. That’s all I’m allowed to say.”

“So you were spying on me.”

“No. Yes. I mean, maybe.” Esla coughs. “I would ask you to take me to a hospital, but they would probably ask too many questions.” She moves her right hand through the spot where her left hand used to be.

I think for a moment. Sage. Can I make her a functional prosthetic hand?

Using that device Sesnet gave you, I can.

It’s that powerful?

Yes.

I turn to Esla. “I’ll make you a new hand. Today. Come with me to my apartment.”

Sebastian makes a call. “Hi, Rephtan? Yes. Bring the vehicle to this location …” After giving out location he hangs up. “We’ll be here for about half an hour until our ride arrives.” He points up, at a sign for a fish and chips restaurant. “Do you want to get something to eat?”

I realize that I am famished. “Yes. Please. Anything would be good.”

We enter the fish and chips shop. The place is abandoned, besides the man behind the counter. He grins at us when we enter. “Heya, what will you be havin’ today?”

“Just the regular meal for all of us.” Sebastian pays in cash.

We go to sit down. Esla lifts up the stump of her hand and stares at it.

“Did it hurt?” I examine the cauterized wound.

“Still does. They didn’t give me any kind of painkiller.” Esla grimaces, as if reliving the moment. “You said you can give me a new hand?”

“Probably.” I take out the hypercomputer. “Sage. Can you speak through this?”

“Yes. Hello, Markus. Hello, Tia, hello, Aahlia. Hello, Esla.”

Sebastian and Tia don’t appear surprised. Esla, on the other hand, looks shocked. “What is this thing? Is it a fully functional AI?”

“That it is.”

Sage: “I am an offshoot of protocol two-one-B from Centarius L.”

Esla’s eyes are wide. “Wow. You really are an AI.”

I set the hypercomputer on the table. “You said you could build Esla a new hand.”

“That I can.” There is a small LCD screen on the computer, reminiscent of a PDA from the early nineties. Sage projects an emoji-like face on it. That face is winking. “Would you like a functional replacement, or something better than a new hand?”

“Um, I’ll take the cybernetic enhancements, please.” Esla actually appears to be having a bit of fun. She holds up her stump. “But I think all my nerves were burned off during the cauterization process.”

“I can help with that.” Tia looks at Esla. “I have access to growth magics. Trees are not the only things that we elves can grow.”

“Really?” Esla tilts her head. “By the way, Markus. Who are these people?”

“Oh right.” I turn to Sebastian. “This is Sebastian. He’s my butler.” I turn to Tia. “This is Tia. She’s kind of like my observer in a way. She makes sure I don’t get into any kind of trouble.” I glare at Esla. “Unlike you, who happened to be caught by a dangerous mob boss while sneaking around a place you weren’t supposed to be.”

“Ahaha …” Esla moves her stump as if to scratch her neck but then realizes that it’s gone. “Yeah, that wasn’t smart on my part.” She looks at me. “By the way, what in the hell are you up to in any case? You’re meeting with big mob bosses and fighting in an underground fight club. What happened?”

“I, ah, I’m trying to gain entrance into a special organization. That’s pretty much all that I can tell you at this point.” I do my best to smile.

Esla sighs. “Yeah. I know that much. Like, what kind of an organization is it?”

“If I tell you any more you’ll probably faint and wake up with a terrible headache in a few minutes with no memory of the event.”

The shop owner comes up to our table and slams four sets of fish and chips in front of us. “Eat up, lads.” He then returns to his post.

We start eating. Esla appears to be struggling with only one hand. I watch her for a minute. I know that, had I been a better fighter, she wouldn’t have lost her hand. But that’s behind us. There’s nothing I can do about what happened. The best I can make up for it is by making her a new hand.

We finish our fish and chips just in time for the limo to pull up next to the shop. We leave the restaurant and walk to the limousine. A devil whose face I do not recognize opens the door for us.

Esla stares at the limo. “How much money is Esmex paying you?”

“I can’t disclose that, but I can tell you that this is how I travel nowadays.” I step into the limo.

Esla frowns, and then climbs in next to me. I open the mini fridge. “You want a drink?”

Esla looks through the various drinks. “Um, just sparkling water.”

“Here you go.” I hand her a bottle of sparking water. Esla takes it in her remaining hand.

She looks at the bottle. “How am I supposed to open this?”

“Oh, right.” I open it for her. “Are you sure you’re okay? You lost your hand like a couple of hours ago. Does it hurt?”

“Terribly.” Esla’s smile is thin. “But I’m pushing through because it’s my fault that I was there in the first place. I got caught up trying to figure out what was going on and didn’t watch my step.”

I hand her the bottle of sparkling water. “Sure. You said Dr. Barrimore put you up to this?”

“Him, the school, your parents. Everyone wanted to know exactly what you were getting up to here in London. We’ve been hearing stuff about you being attacked by terrorists. We couldn’t just ignore that.”

“Yeah. About those terrorists. I think it would be best if you just went back to America. These people are very dangerous. I’ve seen them kill—well, not exactly people, but sort of?” I fold my hands. “Go back to America.”

“No.” Esla puts down the bottle. “I need to stay here and report back to Ixtham and your parents.”

“Tell them to contact me directly.”

“They can’t. There are a number of administrative pushes—well, it’s all very boring, but someone up high really cares about keeping what you’re doing secret. So I had to come here on my own and pretend that I was doing something else.”

I look at Sebastian. “Is this your doing?”

“Yes. We’ve been negotiating at the higher levels of the administration surrounding Ixtham and dungeon crawling back home.” Sebastian keeps his eyes on the road. “We need to protect you from some of the repercussions that could happen if information surrounding your situation was released to the public.”

“Okay. Thanks.” I turn to Esla. “I’ll fill you in, then.”