Wish upon the Stars chapter 75

The banner hanging over us had the symbol of the Heartripper Society  in sharp relief on a circle of white against a black background. I  swallowed hard and looked around, but I didn't notice anyone paying  attention. I...wasn't sure what the hell was going on. These people were  supposed to be sleepers. Having a giant meeting place like this seemed  off, was there another group using the same symbol? That seemed  unlikely. I wasn't going to figure any of this out here, we needed to  fucking go.

I turned to my friends, my body language  clearly telling them something was wrong. Callie stepped in close and I  gestured up to the banner. Her face paled as she turned to the others,  planning to lead them out with me on her tail, but when we turned I  realized there was a problem. The man following Cark was standing in out  way. More specifically, he was in plain sight, with no stealth skill  active. His eyes were wide and unblinking and fixed on me.

I  could tell from the Impact I sensed that he was G rank, though I  couldn't tell much else. I'd been told that Heartripper sleepers were  usually pretty weak overall. However, that revelation came from someone I  was pretty sure could blow up this planet without much trouble, so it  was pretty up in the air what "weak" meant in this case. Zeke's  standards for judging G ranks could be so absurd as to be unrecognizable  to me.

Regardless I was about to find out exactly what he  meant, because the sleeper's eyes were fixed on me. He clearly  recognized me, or at least my mask. It made me think there might be some  way for the handler to communicate with the sleepers over a distance  when they were in the trance, which frankly wasn't ideal, but was good  information to have. It meant anything one learned the others might  learn, so we would need to be careful how much of our hands to show when  we fought him.

The question was,  were we going to fight him? He was in the way, but this place was  crowded, and even if the other Heartrippers were inactive or too busy to  be surrounding us right now, fighting him here WOULD tip them off, and  then we would be fucked. I cleared my throat, hoping maybe he had  directions to not reveal his purpose. Maybe I could bluff since we were  so public. "Excuse me man, can I get through? We were just on our way  out and you're kind of blocking the hall."

His  blank eyes never left their position pointed forward. When he spoke,  his voice was flat, empty, and cold. An endless frozen tundra, with no  real sign of life. "Heretic." He was dressed in civilian clothes, which  was odd for down here, and his lack of presence lent itself to stealth  well, but he clearly wasn't afraid to stand his ground. In fact I got  the feeling he didn't really do fear in this condition. "You will  remain."

That  was interesting. There were a bunch of scenarios here, but I could only  think of three categories they fit into. Either he'd been following  Cark for unrelated reasons, noticed me, and been diverted from his  mission. He'd been following Cark because he had met with me and was  using him to find my group, or he hadn't been following Cark at all, but  had been following us, and the fog had broken line of sight and he'd  picked up the trail because he couldn't find us.

The  last one could basically be discounted. I would have noticed us being  followed with Seek Hidden like I'd noticed Cark being trailed. Not to  mention the coincidence of him losing us and picking up Cark, who we  knew, and happening to wind up here was absurd. No, he had been trailing  Cark beforehand. The reason being related to us seemed unlikely too  given who apparently ran this place. Unrelated then probably, which  meant that this little meet up was unintentional and I could still get  out of it. Maybe.

I  played relaxed as I responded. "Still not sure what that means or why  I'm heretical but whatever. Am I talking to the handler or the puppet?"  No response. "Well I'm going to assume the former for now. If I'm  talking to the person in charge then I should point out where we are.  You guys go out of your way to keep this place secret, Cark had to  actually look to find it, Makes me think you don't want it revealed and  scrutinized by the general public. If we fight here all these people  might get upset about being stuck. They seem like the violent sort.  Might turn into a riot, and then your secret is out."

The  puppet just stared, his creepy eyes managing to take in all of me  without actually looking at any one spot. "You will remain." The silence  dragged on after that, like he was being relayed a message, and he  finally spoke. "You have a suggestion." It wasn't a question, there was  no inflection or uptick at the end, just a statement relayed through a  mouthpiece.

He  was right though, I did. "This is a fight club. You don't want us to  leave, and we don't want to stay, but neither of us want's to get  trampled by a stampede of rioting fight club spectators." I paused.  "Well I don't want that and you don't want the attention it would bring.  I'm not totally sure if you have a sense of self preservation. So why  don't we just play to the spirit of the place. Everyone loves a part. We  have a straight fight down there in the arena. Whoever wins walks away.  But I want my weaker teammates to be able to leave. Cark can go with  them, and Nightstrike and I stay."

I  turned to Benny, who looked upset but had a gleam of understanding in  his eyes. We'd played Doom Sovereign together enough to have some codes  for certain situations. Everyone loves a party was a code we used to use  in game for when we were outmatched. It meant the other person should  go get help while the speaker kept the bad guys busy. Jessie looked  upset and was about to interrupt what Callie cut in. "I agree, let our  two friends pass and we'll fight for you in your little fighting pit.  It'll be a hell of a show too."

The  blank sleeper just stood there for a minute, clearly having orders  relayed. "Your terms are accepted. A battle will be fought." He snapped  his fingers and about six other people stepped up to surround us. "The  weak are unnecessary. The heretic and his companion will stay." The  sleeper stepped aside to let the two of them pass. Neither of them  looked enthused about going, but Cark looked even more upset to leave.  His cover was almost definitely blown already, considering he was being  followed, and he might not get back in.

He  whirled on the man standing to one side of the exit. "What is this  place? What is the symbol, what do you have to do with the missing kids?  Why do some of them end up here?" I knew he couldn't give up the chance  for information. It seemed like his problem and ours might be related,  and I was ready to help him when things here were over, but he was  clearly afraid he was going to miss out on his only possible lead.

As  usual, the sleeper didn't react, eyes trained forward, but he did  answer. "Those who come here are failures. The ones who break."  That...was bad. If I was understanding then I knew where Cark's sister  had gone. I also knew what had happened to all the other missing kids,  bar the ones who ended up here. It even made sense. Ascendants started  as mortals, and mortals would have no reason to check if their kid had  been implanted with sleeper programming when they were taken.

It  also explained why this wasn't a bigger deal historically. They got  returned mostly, and after a few years it became just a scary story they  barely remembered. It even made sense from an infiltration standpoint.  Trying to work people into the population would be harder than just  using people who already were. No one would ask "hey, did you get  kidnapped for a few weeks as a small child?" They would just ask where  that person was from. Cark's problem and ours were intertwined in a way I  hadn't expected.

It  also meant that we weren't just running down a sleeper cell we could  wipe out, we were looking for missing children too, and that changed a  bit about how we had to go about this. I stepped up and put a hand on  Cark's shoulder as he started to retort. I leaned in close. "We can help  you later, but for now I need you to get my friends out of here safely.  We have the same problem and we know it now, so we're on your side.  Please." His jaw clenched, but he looked at Jessie and Benny.

He  didn't know them well, but he had drinks with them, and they were H  rankers caught up in a G ranked mess. Someone so invested in helping his  sister wasn't going to let a pair of newbies get killed because he was  impatient. He growled but nodded, gesturing for the two to follow him.  Jessie was upset, but she stayed quiet, following the lead Callie and I  set. She and Benny were rookies and they knew it. So was I for that  matter, but I had a bit of a knack for this. She swallowed hard as she  passed me, giving me a shaky smile before the three of them vanished  down the hall.

I  wasn't worried about them getting hurt with Cark here. The guy was kind  of a badass from what I could tell, but more importantly, all the  combat ready sleepers would be staying here to style on us in the arena.  They were definitely going to be coming at us together, but I the  battle was the least of my concerns. Callie and I knew each other's  tricks well and we'd fought often enough to be able to work together a  bit. These low level clowns weren't an issue, especially not for the two  of us.

Once  they were gone we made our way down to the edge of the pit surrounded by  the cement steps. We waited for the current fight to be over (a fire  user who expelled flames for propulsion and a teleporter) and then  hopped down to take our positions as the announcer came over speakers we  couldn't see. "We have a special treat for you tonight ladies and  gentlemen! All the way from the vaunted Ascendant Academy, we have a  pair of fighters trained by the Unity themselves!"

The  other sleepers dropped in after us, at least I assumed so from the  numbers what with them having stopped to put on a bunch blank black pull  over masks. The crowd went wild, clearly recognizing them. "For the  home team we have the Silent! You all know them, the secret force  fielded by the Bleakest Depths themselves." They seemed unconcerned by  the seven to two odds, but I hadn't really expected them to be anyway,  this was a fight club, and they would get to see a fight, that was  enough for them.

The  cheers died down and the announcer completed his introduction. "From  the Academy we have Solomon and Nightstrike! A pair of powerful fighters  that should prove a challenge to even our own ringers!" I didn't know  if he had any clue how strong we were, but he clearly didn't care much  either way. I doubted any of their fighters were that tough, otherwise  they probably wouldn't be here. Either way though, I wouldn't  underestimate them. I was going to give my all to this fight, I wanted  to see what the Heartrippers were capable of.