Ballistic Coefficient - Book 2, Chapter 31
2024.11.26 23:30 Obsequium_Minaris Ballistic Coefficient - Book 2, Chapter 31
First / Previous / Royal Road
XXX
Professor Marick led them up the side of the mountain, to a large opening encrusted with bright white crystals of some kind. Outside, the sun bore down on them without mercy; most of the students were dripping with sweat by the time they made it halfway up the road leading to an opening in its side. As they approached the entrance to the mountain, Pale couldn't help but look over the side; they'd ascended about two-hundred feet, ending up around its midsection.
Someone bumped into her, and she stumbled a bit, though she managed to catch herself after taking an involuntary step forwards. Gritting her teeth, Pale turned around, her gaze narrowing when she saw Sven walking away from her, Joel trailing just behind him.
"Watch your step," Joel said with a sneer. "We wouldn't want you to go over the edge."
Pale scowled, but said nothing, instead falling in behind the others as they entered the interior of the mountain.
As she stepped inside, Pale was immediately struck by just how ornate the interior was. Professor Marick had said the mountain had been raised as a tribute to the kingdom's fallen, and from the looks of things, he hadn't been lying – light-emitting gemstones were stuck into the wall and ceiling every few feet, and those same ornate broken chain carvings that adorned the Luminarium had been etched into the stone here, too. Moreover, the craftsmanship in general was simply master-class, from the carefully-erected pillars to the fact that the ground upon which they were walking was almost perfectly smooth and free of any kind of defect.
"Wow…" Pale muttered. "This place is…"
"Sobering, isn't it?" Professor Marick said, coming up alongside her. "To think that this is all that's left of a battle from so long ago… Professor Virux would have a field day if he were here."
"He hasn't visited this place yet?" Pale asked, surprised.
"Oh, no, he has," Professor Marick said, waving her off. "Many times, in fact. But he seems to come away with some new obsession whenever he visits this place. In his defense, though, it isn't hard to blame him; everything about this mountain was masterfully done."
Pale nodded along with his words. "Not bad for what was ultimately intended to be an insult to the Otrudians."
"If you're going to insult someone, then you might as well go all the way and really twist the knife a bit," Marick pointed out. He suddenly cleared his throat. "Students, gather around! We have a lot of ground to cover, so here's what we're going to do – half of you will be with Greymane, and the other half will be with me."
He motioned to Pale, Joel, and Valerie, along with two other students. "You five, go with Greymane. The rest of you, you're with me."
Pale had to bite back a curse. If she didn't know any better, she'd have said that Professor Marick had done that on purpose, but somehow, she doubted it. Still, that didn't change the fact that she was stuck with her three least favorite people in the world, plus two stragglers. Just her luck, she supposed, for as much as she believed in luck.
In any case, the students all split off into their assigned groups. Once they were properly organized, Professor Marick looked over to Sven and gave him a nod.
"You take your group to the upper floors to start," he said. "I'll have mine take the lower floors. We'll meet back here in two hours. Sound good?"
Sven nodded, then motioned for the students to follow him as he began walking deeper into the mountain. Pale hesitated for a moment, but followed after the others as they trailed behind him.
This was a bad idea, but it wasn't like she had any other options.
XXX
"Alright, so we're lost," Joel observed.
Pale had to admit, for as much as she disliked Joel, he wasn't wrong. They'd been traveling through the upper levels of the mountain for the better part of an hour now, and they still weren't at the top. To play Devil's advocate, however, the hallways deeper into the mountain had quickly turned downright labyrinthine; she'd heard the other two students and Valerie talking to each other in hushed voices, and from what little she was able to make out, the hallways had apparently been purposely designed to be confusing in order to deter would-be grave robbers. The idea wasn't without merit, she supposed; information on her data banks told her that the pyramids of Egypt back on Earth had been designed in a similar way for the same exact purpose.
Of course, that didn't change the fact that, ultimately, Joel was completely right, and they were completely, hopelessly lost.
Normally, Pale would have been able to spot small imperfections in the stone that would have allowed her to navigate them out, but the mountain had been designed so immaculately that everything looked almost completely uniform; there was very little for her to go off of when it came to retracing their steps, and even if there wasn't, Sven didn't seem too interested in hearing what any of them had to say.
"...booby traps?"
At that small whisper, Pale suddenly paused, her foot midway to the floor. Slowly, she took a step back and turned towards the student who'd said it, a young man who was conversing with Valerie in a hushed tone.
"Booby trap?" Pale asked. "You saw a booby trap?"
The young man turned to her, his eyes wide, while Valerie gave her a glare before turning away. Pale gave her a baleful look, but then turned back to the other student.
"Well?"
He shifted, suddenly uncomfortable under her gaze. It didn't take much for Pale to imagine why that was; no doubt Valerie had been telling everyone willing to listen about how Pale had put two rounds through her knees and nearly killed her during initiation. Pale breathed a sigh of resignation as that thought crossed her mind and went to turn away, only for the other student to finally let out an exhale.
"...Wait," he said. She turned back to him, and he bit his lip, seeming to almost wither under her gaze. "Just… read about it in a book, a while back. Apparently, this mountain was booby trapped at one point"
"It was," Sven confirmed from up front, without looking back. "But that was a while back. Unless some Zaniel bandits have moved in, then we shouldn't have to worry about anything like that."
He said nothing else. Pale rolled her eyes. "How reassuring…" she muttered, her voice dry.
Sven may have been confident, but that was no reason for it to rub off onto her. As far as Pale was concerned, there was now very good reason to be cautious as they moved through the mountain. It just made sense to her – for lack of a better term, there was a lot of bad blood between the Kingdom of Zaniel and the Otrudian Empire, and it was the kind of bad blood that wasn't about to fade any time soon, even with the war between the two having been over for quite some time now.
Honestly, it reminded her of humanity and the Caatex more than anything. Even when the war between them inevitably came to an end, assuming one side hadn't been wiped out by the other, then there were going to be a lot of consequences. Humanity had spent the better part of several decades on the backfoot, constantly losing entire worlds to the Caatex offensive; that kind of sin was not something that was easily forgotten, and moreover, it was the kind that could only ever be repaid with blood.
If humanity ever won their war, there would be hell to pay. That much was certain.
And she'd likely be a part of it.
Pale shook those thoughts from her mind, instead focusing on following along with Sven and the others as they continued to stumble through the mountain.
And yet, try as she might, she couldn't ignore the way her artificial heart had started hammering in her chest at the thought of being one of humanity's instruments of revenge.
She'd been made for war, that much was certain, but there was a difference between a war and recompense. And yet, part of her knew that if she was ordered to do it, then that was what she'd do. Ultimately, she was a weapon designed by her creators, and like any other weapon, it was her job to fire when told to fire, and not to question the reason why.
And yet, there was some part of her that felt uncomfortable with the idea of being used in such a manner. It didn't make sense, even to her; she'd killed hundreds of thousands of Caatex already, so this should have been no different. But even then, with all her experience obliterating Caatex battle groups and all the orders she'd been given by her superiors, Pale still knew there was a world of difference between killing someone who was trying to kill you and wiping an entire planet from existence.
A memory popped into her mind – it was of a singularity expanding through space, swallowing everything in its way before collapsing in on itself. And as she watched, a voice came with it.
"Test successful."
It had been decades ago by now, and yet she still remembered the event vividly. It had been necessary, of course, and yet… part of her knew it was wrong. She just wasn't sure why.
Her thoughts were suddenly interrupted by one of the students giving a yelp as he tripped over something nearby. Pale jumped a bit, turning to him in surprise.
She was stunned to see what appeared to be a broken piece of thin brown string, barely visible among the stone floors and walls, lying on the ground.
None of them had any time to question anything, as several porcelain cylinders suddenly came rolling out of a nearby alcove. They stared at them for a fraction of a second before Sven called out.
"Run, now!" he shouted.
None of them needed to be told twice. They all took off in a random direction, looking for cover. Pale could tell a few of them happened to be with her, but she wasn't focused on who; rather, she was focused on a doorway to the outside that had suddenly presented itself to them as they'd turned around a nearby corner.
Not a single one of them bothered to think further than that; they all double-timed it for the doorway, running as fast as their legs could take them.
Pale took her first step outside just as the porcelain cylinders behind them went off, shaking the entire floor with the force of the explosion. A huge wave of pressure suddenly enveloped them all, forcing them forwards, Pale was blown out of the doorway along with one of the other students, the two of them actually being lifted off their feet from the force of the explosion. There was no heat, rather it felt more like someone had just given her a very strong push. Somehow, it wasn't enough to kill her, Pale realized as she flew through the air.
But as she went over the edge of the mountain, something told her that she was going to wish it had.
Pale fell several feet before making impact with her first rocky outcropping. There was a loud crack, followed by pain blossoming across her right side, and yet she continued to roll down the mountain, grunts of pain escaping her with every impact. She continued to fall for several more seconds before the next rock came into view.
She had just a moment to realize how fast she was approaching it before it made impact with her head, instantly knocking her unconscious.
XXX
Special thanks to my good friend and co-writer, Ickbard for the help with writing this story.
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Captain Rex is, on the surface, depicted as being Anakin Skywalker's second-in-command of the Grand Army of the Republic's 501st Legion. While many including myself concluded that he specifically commanded Torrent Company, Star Wars mainstream media continues depicting him as the commander of the entire 501st, or at least continues to allow that misconception to exist. The whole deal with his promotion to the rank of Commander and the creation of the 332nd Division makes it even more difficult to figure out.
In the case of Phasma, she's clearly one of the top leaders of the First Order's stormtroopers and holds some direct command over Starkiller Base itself, but still bears the title of Captain.
Now obviously there's always the technicality that captain isn't always a rank (such as the position of 'Captain of the Guard', held by Captain Enoch aboard Grand Admiral Thrawn's Star Destroyer), but I don't remember coming across this being the meaning behind Phasma's title.
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Appreciate any help!
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