Fifty-Three

"Halt," one of the still blurry Squires whispered. Their muffled voice was hardly audible but Kon and Diur both slowed to a near stop as their party became cautious. Ahead of them Knight Bosch had come to a standstill and was slowly sweeping her head back and forth. Kon tried to see what it was that she was noticing.

The forest had grown sparse here, with thick, red clay-like dirt becoming more and more common as they moved. Power suffused the air, pushing down on him in the familiar way that a rift did. Kon could almost tell what grade the rift was with how the energy swirled around him. Not quite there, not yet, but close.

"D-Grade. Mid to Upper, hard to tell," Diur whispered to him. Kon nodded, the pressure of the area was intimidating, but not what it had been on the plateau. He idly wondered how strong he was now, what Grade he'd roughly be in. Without a full rune to fill his first web, he wasn't a true threat. The handful of nodes inside of him were mostly for background strengthening, not projecting force. He wanted a fire fragment or something like that.

"Quiet," the same Squire hissed as they all went to a knee. Kon and Diur followed a moment later. Without a spoken word the intermingled squads of of Squires broke apart and began to move. Each of the new Knights, Willis and McGuire, led a squad in slow sweeping motions that would eventually envelop whatever it was they were looking up at through the tree line. Kon and Diur kept a knee, just waiting.

Bosch came back a moment later, her heavy armor not making a sound as she stood before them. So close to her, Kon could feel energy stirring around the armor. It was similar to being around a treasure.

"She has something active in her armor that's silencing the sound of her movement."

"We have a problem. There's a rift up ahead. Mid D-Grade, but that's not the problem. The issue is that everything is already dead. Your monster tore through it and ate everything," Bosch said calmly.

"Oh, no," Diur said, eyes widening in realization. Kon stared at the two of them, waiting patiently for them to get around to explaining to him instead of being cryptic. Diur noticed his look a second and hurriedly explained.

"It was at the peak of D-Grade. Monsters do not need revelations to enter the next realm, grade, whatever you call it. They just need energy to begin their evolution."

"Alright. So it ate this rift to get the energy it needed to push into C-Grade?" Kon asked.

"This wouldn't be enough to push it over. The treasure is still there keeping the rift open, so it just ate whatever monsters had come out," Bosch said. Kon wanted to roll his eyes.

"Why can't they just say what it is we're supposed to be worried about?"

"It's running then?" Kon asked, hoping for clarification.

"Yes. Knight Willis and Mcguire continue the hunt. Now that they have the trail they can pursue it."

"What are we going to do?" Kon asked after Bosch fell into silence again.

"We? Nothing. You are going to stay here with the Squires while I clear the rift and capture the treasure," Bosch said. She looked over at the rest of her team and they started to break up into pairs and moved to cover the cardinal points around the rift. Kon suddenly felt exposed, the sudden burst of humanity that had arrived had departed nearly as fast.

"Mathis will guard you. I shall return shortly," Bosch said out loud as she turned and walked back out of the tree line and disappeared toward the rift. An uncomfortable silence stretched between the duo of Squires guarding them, and Kon and Diur.

"So. How's it been?" Kon finally stammered. Mathis's shimmering armor stopped its cloaking function and he appeared standing there with his large rifle cradled in his arms, pointed back the way they came.

"How the hell are you so strong?" Mathis demanded, his voice low but filled with anger. If Kon could see through the reflective full face helmet the Squire wore, he had no doubt that the man would look furious.

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"What you mean?"

"You are a cadet. The Dragon's Maw wasn't that big. I saw you around in training cadet gear. So, how is it that a month later, you are nearly approaching Knight levels of energy?"

"Oh. That. Yeah, it's classified. Knight Commander Alice Roose, uhmmm, classified it. Special training." Kon tried to keep his face as blank as possible as he met the gaze of the masked Squire.

"Hard to win a staring contest when you can't see the guys' eyes."

"That'll pass for now, but once rescue comes and we evac off planet, that's not going to fly. If I were you I'd get your story straight before an Inquisitor shows up."

"Inquisitor?" Kon asked. He was feeling frustrated, constantly behind on what was obviously common knowledge. Part of the problem growing up on a colony world cut off from mainstream humanity.

"Yeah. The guys who make sure we're all following the Code of Chivalry and Security. They're from the World Ships themselves. Don't belong to any Chapterhouse or Order or even from the noble houses. Scary bastards, all of them." Mathis shivered thematically as he kept scanning the area.

Kon sat on that for a moment, truly processing what it was that Mathis had just informed him. Then he slowly turned to meet Diur's wide, frightened eyes. Alice's words about orbital bombardment and genocide came back to both of them at the same time.

"Oh, those guys."

"Yeah. Those guys. Knight Bosch likes everything to be…uncomplicated. She won't push. But back at camp, she's not in charge. Lieutenant Freymis is, and he's much more interested in complicated. So, keep that in mind," Mathis said.

"Who's Freymis?"

"He was the X.O of the Dragon's Maw. Second in command," Mathis said when Kon continued to look at him blankly.

"Freymis led the evacuation as the Captain went down with his ship. He's been in charge since we've hit the ground at camp. Knight Bosch is the senior most Knight left, she's in charge of field operations."

"She was saying there's a fallback? Alpha?" Kon asked. He didn't want to think too much about returning to the camp and the questions waiting there.

"One of the operations camps we've set up. We've got a few of them to use as resupply sites for our patrols and hunting parties. Alpha is the closest, it's that way," Mathis pointed to the southwest.

"Not quite sure how far. Without satellite relays our GPS is shit. Local band only goes about a hundred kilometers. One of the reasons we have the base camps is to boost our signal out further."

Kon was warming up to Mathis. At first the older man had seemed the surly and distant type, but the more they talked, the more he opened up and seemed happy to gossip. Diur had sat with her back to the base of the tree, silently meditating.

"What's it been like for you guys? Down here?" Kon asked. Mathis turned to look at his partner who had so far remained silent. Some type of signal passed between them since that one's camouflage came down. It was the woman who had been talking to him earlier.

"This is Grace. She's steady, but careful who you talk about camp with. There's…something going on. It's between the Knights and the Naval guys, but it's trickling down to us. Nasty shit." Mathis shook his head.

"Want to explain to the new guy?" Kon asked. Both of them Squires took knees, keeping their eyesight downrange, but relaxing as they started to really get in the groove of gossip.

"Navy and Knights don't get along. Knights earn the coin and ships, but it's the Navy who pilots them. Washout Squires become internal security for ships, officers are from noble houses or from their own academies on the World Ships. Knights come from anywhere and we take anyone if they can make the cut. So, a bit of social stratification. Freymis is from some shit noble house and was pissed he had a Knight Captain above him."

"What's the difference? Between a Knight and a Knight Captain?" Kon asked.

"Knight Captain is both a Naval Captain and a Knight. There's an academy they go through to learn space combat. A man like Freymis rankled under the command of a Knight. We land after the Captain dies with the ship and suddenly he tries to take command. The Knights don't respect him though since he doesn't have any ground experience and refused to follow his command out of the camp."

Mathis stopped and looked around himself. Kon followed his gaze toward where he was looking and couldn't make out the other Squires in the woods. In this distance the Squires camo made it nearly impossible to see them.

"Issue is that with the Chapterhouse possibly being under attack, some of the other Squires are thinking about what happens after," Mathis whispered.

"What happens?" Kon asked. He didn't know what would come of it.

"Liquidation. The Chapterhouse sells their assets. Which would include Squire and cadet contracts."

"They can do that?" Kon asked, surprised.

"Yes. Noble houses can support Squires and elevate them to Knights. Noble houses like Freymis's. Even a few of the younger Knights have begun to fray, discipline is slipping as they try to get into Freymis's good books. Someone like you arriving in the middle of the camp, when it's primed as it is, could lead to…problems."

"Great."

"Don't worry about it. You'll get your training to be a Knight. Just, might not be with this Chapterhouse," Mathis said with a shrug.

"It happens somewhat frequently," Grace cut in, her voice heavily modulated by her mask. Kon grunted and went to sit next to Diur and leaned against her tree as he looked over the forest. He closed his eyes and just waited for Bosch to return.

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