Chapter 13 #3
“And yet the big, mighty, all-powerful one and two both spend lunch with me every single day.”
“Not by choice.” Both Seba and I said in unison.
“I think you’re both being too hard on the guy, anyway.
He’s literally a draftee. Half of the new recruits can barely carry a can down the road, and the other half couldn’t dodge an eighty-foot cross wing in a coliseum.
At least he keeps up in sparring.” Breaker shrugged, while he pushed his food absently around his tray.
“Why are you both so focused on him? He’s one of thousands. Why don’t you go pick on Barry or Dan?”
“Who the fuck are Barry and Dan?” I pinched the bridge of my nose in irritation. Whoever banned caffeine from being served in the cafeteria because it was a ‘drug’ was going to be the next person on my hit list.
“Barry is in your unit, and Dan is in Seba’s.” Breaker raised a brow in our general direction when Seba also shrugged in response. “You guys seriously don’t pay attention to anyone but yourselves, do you?”
“I’ll learn their names when they make rank.” I waved him off dismissively.
“Unless they’re Vann. Then you’ll learn his name and obsess over him every single day.” Breaker clasped his hands together wistfully, then he stabbed his protein like he was making a point. He was entirely too amused by this.
“Because the other recruits aren’t directly ruining my day.
” I was forcing myself to eat, the conversation and my exhaustion ruining my appetite.
“I can’t fucking escape him. He’s in my room, he’s in my classes, he’s constantly tripping right in front of me during Basics.
He’s nothing but a burden, and I just hope his rank drops far enough that I can petition to have him removed. War or not, this is ridiculous.”
“I wonder why.” Breaker said thoughtfully, glancing up at the ceiling of the cafeteria. “Even if you’re bunking together because there were no dorm rooms left, there’s no reason to have a new recruit taking advance classes, unless there’s a reason he’s where he is.”
“What are you implying?” Seba asked next, pausing from his own meal with unusual curiosity.
“Do you think there’s something special about him?
His family name carries no significance, from what I could find.
I couldn’t find anything about him at all, other than his enrollment and scholarship records for Medella University on Protectorate 005.
He was clearly never anyone significant enough to merit official profiling. ”
“Kind of like you, Breaker,” I added, just to give him a deserved jab.
“Says the son of… wait, who was your dad again? A janitor at the waste plant?” Breaker responded with a curt smile.
“A felon, actually. He stole tools and machine parts from the waste plant while moonlighting as a janitor.” If he was going to insult me, he could at least get it right. “And now he’s a dead janitor that no one misses.”
“If only we could all be so lucky.” Breaker smiled dreamily, and I rolled my eyes. All I knew about his dad was that Breaker didn’t like to talk about him. That was all I needed to know, though.
Seba glanced to the side, completely silent, likely not wanting to engage when he was the pride and joy of General Hideki Takeyama, the most decorated pilot, soldier, and diplomat in the Territories.
He didn’t know his biological father, but he’d had a consistent parent for the entirety of his memory.
Funny that such a thing would make him feel left out, when we both would have happily traded places with him.
Breaker stabbed another piece of his meal, never eating any of it.
“But just look at us now: a bunch of fucked up rejects in massive war machines, fighting for a cause and set to carry a nation. No reason Vann couldn’t also just be another nobody who had high marks on his Entrance Eval and got put on an accelerated program.
All of us are proof that Mictlan doesn’t care about lineage as much as results.
Even Seba isn’t actually a born Takeyama, but he’s top ranked because he’s top rank. ”
Seba nodded, acknowledging both the statement and the compliment. I hated to say that Breaker had a point, but he did.
“He confirmed as much when I asked him about where he came from last night.” I admitted. “As far as I can tell, he’s just a scared little mouse who’s in over his head.”
“Huh, then that’s all it is.” Breaker rested his cheek in his hand. “I haven’t seen him pilot a Shinka yet, so I’ll reserve judgment until I see how he fairs in the real test.”
“I doubt he’ll ever get that far.” I scoffed and returned to my meal.
The protein slab was good today. The flavor was light and almost nutty.
At least that was a positive. “Unless he manages to leverage other people to raise his rank, there’s no way he’ll ever breach the top 1000 on his own.
The last thing any of us need is for him to waste a perfectly good Shinka Suit, when they already can’t keep up with production. ”
Seba frowned. “I’m not entirely sure those units are even good enough to go toe-to-toe with the Ghuls as it is.
We have no idea what kind of numbers they already had built before they debuted these new weapons, either.
I took out ten of them on the station, but there could be tens or even hundreds of thousands for all we know, while we only have something like ten-thousand units across the entirety of the military in active use.
Not to mention that even if we had the numbers, only a fraction of the population can pilot and sync on an acceptable level.
” He paused to chew his food, then swallowed it down with a furrow to his brow.
“What’s frustrating is we don’t have time to wait for these recruits to figure out how to breathe through a mile run.
We need Pilots, and we need people who can sync, and the more time we waste waiting for escalation, the worse our chances of surviving this are.
” Sebastian bit his lower lip. It was unusual to see him so rattled, but he’d been a bit on edge since we got back from the Protectorates.
We’d all played in hundreds of simulations over the years, but that was the first instance of true, live Shinka combat either of us had ever engaged in.
I was glad he’d been able to handle it when he needed to, but I could tell from the small changes in his mannerism that he was more affected than he’d ever admit.
Despite being an orphan like the rest of us, Seba hadn’t lived a violent life, and it showed.
The eight units I’d had to take out hadn’t fazed me much, conversely.
If anything, it got my blood flowing. But cold blooded murder was just another Tuesday where I grew up. Seba was built differently.
“Gehenna never made an official statement one way or the other about their intentions. At this point, it could still be a third party agitator for all we know.” Breaker chimed in, his elbows on the lunch table, and his chin resting in his hands.
Though he always appeared nonchalant and casual, his words were very much not.
“They haven’t pulled us in yet, so presumably they’re not in dire straits, and the current active duty pilots are enough.
But I can’t help but assume something must be happening behind the scenes that none of us know about. ”
I glanced sidelong at Breaker, preferring this conversation topic to anything regarding fucking Vann Callan.
“Honestly, I was just thinking about that last night,” since I couldn’t sleep thanks to the fucking mouse you let into my room, “That we haven’t gotten an official war declaration, I mean.
The news updates are so limited, when it should be the only thing anyone is talking about. ”
“Just a theory.” Breaker shrugged.
“It’s not a sound one.” Seba shook his head.
“They won’t pull us in until they absolutely have to.
We’re too valuable here, readying new troops and refining our skills.
It would be foolish to risk losing us before they’ve fully assessed the risks and expectations.
But don’t forget that they attacked our most advanced hospital and our primary medical training facility.
Then they went for the entertainment station who broadcasts half our media.
Doesn’t all of that seem incredibly calculated?
Gehenna only lost the last war and agreed to the treaty because they’d not been prepared to take on the Shinkas.
To assume they’re not carefully planning every move would be foolish at best.” He finished the last of his protein, letting us all sit with that for a moment before he continued.
“Not only that, but the rebels have neither the resources nor the organization to pull off something this elaborate. The Ghuls all wore the Gehenna crest, and I have no reason to believe it wasn’t them, considering they’re not making statements to disown involvement and diffuse the conflict either.
If it was a third party, they would be making a circus out of it before accepting blame. ”
“As much as I agree, I wouldn’t underestimate anyone with a desire for power.
” Breaker spun his fork in his hand, having barely touched his meal.
He always made eating look like a burden, but I thought he was simply spoiled from living on Earth.
The rest of us had been eating this stuff our entire lives.
“But even if we rule out Axis Mundi, I still don’t feel particularly confident about our chances right now.
I wish there was something more we could do. ”
“Putting our best efforts into training our underclassmen is what we can do.” Seba, reiterated. “As disappointing as this new batch is, they could be the difference between survival or subjugation one day, and I prefer to have done everything in my power to ensure survival.”
I sighed, not wanting to acknowledge that would also mean giving Vann the time of day. There were too many troops and too few Shinkas to worry about saving the un-savable though. I didn’t want him standing next to me on the battlefield.
So instead, I suggested something a bit more tolerable. “Want to meet up in the repair bay and work on some propulsion upgrades later? Whatever happens with our band of rejects, we can at least keep our personal machines in top shape.”
“You know I’m always in.” Breaker nodded.
Seba simply tipped his chin.
We finished eating in silence, and I took a moment to ponder it all. I was letting this one, singular, insignificant person get too far under my skin. It was better that I focused on what I could control.
Even if sleep wasn’t among those things.