The Fusionist Book 2 -- Chapter 60

Chapter 60

Penelope rushed up the stairs and nearly tripped on the top step, her attention distracted because all that had happened over the last week. It had been a whirlwind of training and revelations of the incredible power this Mage possessed, but now the Skirmish was nearly about to begin. Starting the next morning, the first quartet of teams would begin to fight for the flags of the others, and with all of the advantages they now possessed, there was no way they could lose.

At first, when Head Drill Instructor Bleeker had corralled her into the ridiculous plan of participating in the Skirmish and inviting a first-year Mage to be part of the team, she thought he was crazy. First, she didn’t have a team and wasn’t likely to have one since all of the teams had already been assembled near the start of the year. Second, having even one team member that couldn’t hold their own during the Skirmish was tantamount to suicide in the arena, because the matches were typically tight and relied on precise tactics and strategies to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. She knew this because she’d seen every single match since she’d arrived at Fort Pinevalley and had immediately been envious of those that were able to compete.

But no one would want a Jaroupa on their team, because her people were considered to be too unpredictable and couldn’t be trusted to follow orders for some reason – though she wasn’t like that. Like, at all.

It was that reason, as well as the fact that the Nobles from the Kingdom of Androthe weren’t a very inclusive bunch when they got together, that she never thought she’d be able to participate. She thought the idea Bleeker proposed was a joke at first, but he was dead serious.

Which brought her to the third reason she thought he was crazy: She had absolutely no experience leading a team through a Skirmish. Yes, she knew the tactics that had worked in past Skirmishes and had studied them, even devising her own in the wishful thinking that she might one day participate, but teaching them to others and leading her own team?

As for the first reason she thought the Head Drill Instructor had been crazy, it was revealed that a team had dropped out at the last moment, for reasons no one was aware. It seemed very convenient, but as it allowed her to start her own team at the permission of Bleeker, she didn’t question it too much. Finding willing participants wasn’t that difficult, though Bleeker ordered Barty to join the team, which the Head Drill Instructor said was only fair since she had put him down for weeks after nearly killing him. Vivienne was also an easy choice because she was the best ranged Martial trainee that didn’t already belong to a team. Kimble jumped at the chance as soon as she looked into recruiting, which only left the main reason Bleeker wanted her to form a team in the first place.

Larek.

Stymied in all of her attempts at gaining more information about him, it seemed as though the Head Drill Instructor was turning to another tactic. Penelope was to gather what information she could on him and pass it on to him, including the existence of any “special” Fusions. She remembered overhearing him mumbling about a healing-type Fusion when she met with him in his office, so she suspected that was what he meant. Initially, this seemed like an impossibility based on what she knew about Fusions – which wasn’t much, if she was being honest with herself – but she had gone ahead with the plan, well, because she was going to participate in a Skirmish!

Oh, how wrong she was about Larek and his miraculous Fusions.

But even with the spectacular air shield thingy he had created, which prevented nearly all attacks from reaching the one protected by it, as well as the stat boosts he placed on her weapon – which were incredible! – she hadn’t seen any sign of a healing Fusion. That he might have created or used one at some point wasn’t hard to believe, but she’d seen nothing throughout all the training done in the sparring room over the last week.

In an effort to see if it was true that he had a healing Fusion, she even deliberately hurt herself once, not badly, but enough that she needed a healing spell to fix her up rather than wait for her Body Regeneration do it over the next few hours. Both Nedira and Kimble offered to help with the minor healing spell because their official healer was busy with making Fusions and couldn’t be bothered, and she couldn’t find it in herself to bother him.

Because, as much as she had been instructed to find out information on Larek and his healing Fusion, she would much rather win the Skirmish. After learning what he could do, she knew that without his effort on their behalf, they would have no chance. Not because Penelope didn’t think she had a good team, but she had a fairly good idea of what they were up against.  Compared to the teams of all fifth and some sixth-year trainees and students, the team members they had that would participate were about average; without their sixth team member contributing next-to-nothing during the actual match, that dropped the quality of their team to the very bottom.

But with the Fusions he created, she put them firmly right up near the top. She would like to say that they were unstoppable, but there were some unique teams out there that could give them some trouble.

Now she was heading up to the Head Drill Instructor’s office once again, there to report on what she had learned…

…which was where her distracted attention was causing her to nearly fall on the stairs. She was unsure of what she should even say, because she was worried if she revealed too little, he might pull her as team leader and put someone else in charge because she wasn’t getting results. If she revealed too much, on the other hand, it was possible that they would see Larek as too valuable of a resource and not allow him to participate, pulling him – and his Fusions – from the Skirmish.  It was even possible that they might believe his powerful shield Fusion was a form of cheating, because while it had counters, one had to know how they worked to take advantage of them – and it was doubtful that anyone would be able to counter the things without insider information.

When she thought more about it, Penelope being pulled from the team was probably a worry she shouldn’t be concerned over at this point, because she was fully entrenched in her position at the moment; nevertheless, she really didn’t want to lose this opportunity to participate in the Skirmish – because she might never get a chance like this again. But having Larek and his Fusions pulled from the matches would be just as devastating, because while she could participate, they were almost guaranteed to lose almost immediately.

She still hadn’t completely decided by the time she knocked on the Head Drill Instructor’s office door.

“Come in.”

Taking a deep breath, Penelope opened the door and then shut it behind her after she entered. Standing in front of the desk inside, she waited for Bleeker to speak.

“Ah, Penelope. I trust that you have some information for me?”

The tone of his voice was eager, perhaps too eager, but to Penelope it was perfectly understandable based on what he wanted to know.  But she also detected a hint of greed underneath his words; it was at that moment that she made her decision on what she wanted to share.

“I do,” she replied, nodding as she did so. “The Mage student Larek is quite talented in his ability to make Fusions, which are much more powerful than anything I’ve seen before.”

“Oh, really? Such as?” he prompted.

With a mental breath, she brought her Skirmish sword around from where it had been attached to her back, feeling the rush of a massive boost to her stats accompany it as she gripped its handle. She did her best to hide her reluctance in presenting it to the Head Drill Instructor. “Take a look at your Status after holding this.”

Standing up from where he had been sitting, Bleeker took the steel handle of the large sword in his hands. Penelope immediately felt the drain throughout her body as her stats were reduced back to their normal levels, something that she still wasn’t used to feeling. After Larek had added the Fusion to her weapon, she had taken to holding it whenever she could.

The Head Drill Instructor’s skeptical face disappeared as he dropped back into his chair with shock clearly written over his face, and a temporary twitching overcame his entire body. It disappeared after a few seconds, and he was left looking at the weapon in incomprehension.

“What? How? This— My Strength and Agility have doubled?!” He was whisper-shouting by the end, as if he was afraid to say what was obvious on his Status.

“Yes, sir. That was my reaction, as well. Larek created this kind of Fusion for allof his teammates, not just for me.”

“How is this even possible?”

She shrugged. “You’re asking the wrong person; I have no idea.”

“But—”  He stopped what he was about to say as he looked away from the wooden and steel weapon in his hand and stared hard at Penelope. “What else can he do? Are there any other unique Fusions that you’ve seen?”

She didn’t hesitate in her response. “Not that I’ve seen,” she lied smoothly. “He did mention that he might have something special for us for the Skirmish, but I’m not aware of what it could be.”

Bleeker continued to stare at her as if he was trying to test the truth of her words, before he nodded.  Mumbling to himself as his eyes turned back to the weapon, causing Penelope to relax slightly in relief as his penetrating gaze left her, she caught only part of his words. “…even if it was just this… but what else… still try and… no matter.” None of it really made sense to her, but she was just glad that his attention was off of her for the moment.

Handing it back to her a minute later, she saw his visible reluctance to let the weapon go and she commiserated with him; it was hard to casually give up that kind of power once you felt it. “Very well. I’m looking forward to seeing how you and your team perform tomorrow. Afterwards, please let me know what you can about whatever this ‘special’ Fusion is that he has for you tomorrow. You’re dismissed.”

Attaching the sword to her back once again via its special leather holder, she nodded and turned around, heading for the door. She wasn’t stopped as she opened it and left, and she hurried away from the Head Drill Instructor’s office as quickly as possible.

While she’d lied to Bleeker, there was a bit of truth to it that she didn’t think he’d discover it until it didn’t matter anymore. The “special” Fusion was something he – and everyone else – would see tomorrow, and pleading ignorance of it was enough to hopefully get her free of any suspicion of knowing about it beforehand. It was a decision that she didn’t regret in the least, because she knew that she had to protect their secret weapon as much as possible.

That “secret weapon” being Larek, not the shield-thingy he had created – though that was equally important. The more she thought about how she was being used to reveal the Mage student’s abilities, the more she regretted ever being sucked into it. At first, she had felt so horrible after what she had accidentally done to Barty that she was willing to do anything to redeem herself; investigating his savior seemed inconsequential at that point. But as she learned more about how kind and unselfish he was, she felt… protective of him, in a way she hadn’t felt before. Like he was a treasure that needed to be safeguarded from the world and those that would seek to take advantage of him.

Those like Head Drill Instructor Bleeker.

It wasn’t until she heard the underlying greed in his tone of voice, even if it was a greed for a Fusion that could help Martials in general, that she was fully converted to becoming Larek’s protector. Unfortunately, the revelation of his abilities when it came to the stat boosts on her sword were necessary. Without at least some proof of what the first-year Mage student could do, she figured Bleeker would grow suspicious that she was lying to him about everything; it would be obvious on the morrow, anyway. She nearly thought about telling her team that they shouldn’t even use the shield Fusion during the Skirmish, because it would just make Larek more of a target, but there was still the desire to do well in the arena that dwelled in the back of her mind.

The two desires – to protect Larek and to win every match in the Skirmish – warred with each other, but in the end she didn’t think it would matter whatever she chose. His abilities would already been scrutinized after the Skirmish, as a result of the stat boosts alone, so what was one more overpowered Fusion compared to that? Regardless, she would do everything in her power to protect him from being abused by those in charge, because his genius didn’t deserve to be trapped in a room somewhere where he would be forced to pump out Fusion after Fusion for the benefit of others. She didn’t know if this was what they might have planned for him once the wider world discovered his abilities, but even after she had discovered it, the thought of using him for her own benefit had been at the forefront of her mind.

Now, after seeing what he could do and watching him work with such care and generosity, she immediately felt ashamed. Unfortunately, she could easily see others not caring about him like the way she was beginning to, only seeing him as something that could be exploited. Granted, the exploitation would likely benefit hundreds or thousands of SIC members throughout the Kingdom, but at what cost? Just seeing him create a brand-new Fusion from some half-baked ideas and have it work was revolutionary, as far as what she knew about Fusions went.

What could he create when he’s had time to learn more and grow?

Given that he was only a first-year Mage student, she couldn’t help but think about what he might be like as a fifth-year or even after he graduated.

He could literally change the world.

Unbeknownst to her, as she made her way down to the barracks to get as much sleep as she could for the upcoming excitement the next day, the resolve to safeguard Larek solidified in her chest without her awareness, forging a bond she couldn’t feel or even detect in any way. But it was there, an undeniable connection that she would do everything in her power to maintain.

Including her own life.

Book 2 Chapter 61: https://www.patreon.com/posts/fusionist-book-2-84630523