Chapter 58
To Forget Part 3
Bairon, with that sharp gaze tensed between cold hatred and almost surgical concentration, kept the muscles of his face immobile, only a slight tremor in his eyelid betraying the internal pressure. His weapon—still vibrating with that rectangular green light— cut the air in small arcs as he watched the hallway saturated with viscous remains.
Then, a voice broke the tension like a dry snap.
—"Officer… Bairon!?"
The sound entered him without permission.
His eyebrows furrowed first, a minimal gesture, as if he wasn't sure he'd heard it.
Then his eyes turned toward the call, slow at first, measuring each centimeter, like someone afraid of finding another threat instead of an ally.
His face, still hardened by the fight, froze for a fraction of a second when he recognized the figure in the empty frame of the destroyed door.
Surprise loosened his expression slightly, relaxing his jaw; his breathing, which had been a controlled, rough thread, loosened in a contained sigh.
It was as if an overly taut string had given just enough not to snap.
Relief didn't come all at once—it emerged.
First in his eyes, where hardness became a glint.
Then in the corners of his mouth, which stopped trembling.
His right shoulder lowered a couple of millimeters: almost imperceptible, but enough to show that his body had recognized that, for the first time in minutes, he wasn't surrounded only by enemies.
—"You're here…" — he exhaled, letting that minimal crack of breath mix with fatigue.
But the phrase didn't come from complete relaxation.
It was more the recognition that the fight wasn't over… though he wouldn't face it alone anymore.
But Bairon didn't manage to take another step.
A wet crunch, fast, like a soaked rag being wrung out, burst from his side.
Another fish monster—this one with four elongated limbs and an almost simian twist— lunged at him from the ceiling, falling with a descending slash aimed straight at his collarbone.
The officer reacted the instant the shadow fell upon him.
His right foot pivoted, his hip followed, and the "spear" of green rectangles traced an upward sweep to the left.
The blow cut the air first, then the monster's wet skin, and finally its entire torso with a rough, broken sound.
The creature split diagonally, as if an invisible line had decided to split it from hip to armpit.
Black fragments splattered the floor.
Bairon didn't stop.
He used the same momentum to launch himself into the room, a short leap, almost a controlled dive, while the dismembered corpse fell behind him hitting the floor with a dull splash.
He landed on knees and hands, sliding his body forward.
The friction of the floor dragged him several meters, and he stretched the spear to one side, driving it in to stop the slide.
The blade—if you could call that black claw fused with green energy a blade— scraped against the floor leaving a glowing groove, splitting it into fine dust.
His body stopped dead, a gasp escaping him from the impact.
—"Officer, you're alive! And the others?" — blurted the soldier in the blue coat, approaching without taking his eyes off the hallway, his breathing ragged, relief barely managing to hold itself over the fear.
Bairon clenched his teeth as he rose, still leaning on the green spear, the rectangular glow trembling as if vibrating with the weapon's pulse and his own.
The echo of the collision still burned in his arms.
—"I want to know the same thing" — responded Bairon, without raising his voice but letting the edge of impatience seep into each word. —"It's just you. What about the others?"
As he spoke, he fully straightened up.
His legs trembled slightly, not from fear, but from the accumulated tension of the recent cut and the controlled fall.
He raised the spear and shook it with a sharp flick of his forearm, trying to dislodge the excess of that thick, black blood clinging to the dark claw.
The substance splattered out in thick droplets.
Some fell straight to the floor; others traced oblique lines on the wall; one in particular lingered in the air longer than natural before splattering against the broken door frame.
The soldier in the blue coat retreated half a step, not from fear of the officer, but from the unpredictable movement of the still-warm monster fluids.
—"No, sir" — he responded firmly, though the tremor in his fingers showed adrenaline still coursing through his body. —"The rest just went up."
He turned partially to the left and pointed at the hole in the ceiling, the splintered edge still with dust falling in fine threads. From above came footsteps, cut-off murmurs, and the occasional light metallic clatter, like someone adjusting a weapon.
—"We're about twelve…" — he corrected instantly, counting in his head. —"Eight people, sir."
He made a brief, tense gesture.
—"Counting Major Körper, nine."
The mention of the major fell in the air with its own weight, like a block marking the next inevitable concern.
And for a second, just one second, the silence between them seemed to fill with the echo of those missing… and those he might never see again.
Bairon fell silent.
The number—eight, nine with Körper— settled in his mind like a piece that didn't quite fit.
He processed it without moving a muscle, only letting his breathing loosen slightly while the tension from the previous fights returned in slow waves through his chest.
He started walking toward the hole in the ceiling, but before taking the first step a strong odor hit him.
A thick, sweetish, burnt stench.
A smell that stuck in the throat, like burnt oil mixed with damp mold.
It rasped his nose first, then spread to his tongue, leaving a bitter aftertaste.
He turned his head, slowly.
And there it was.
A large corpse.
Larger than the four-limbed fish monsters he had faced on the other side of the door, who were still devouring each other.
Not as massive as the six-limbed one that had pursued him down another hallway, when he was with Laios and Hanz… but it was similar.
Enough that its shadow, even dead, seemed to occupy more space than it should.
It was charred in small zones on various parts. One part of the body had a huge scar where an arm should be, open, and the other he couldn't see due to the body's position.
One leg was cut into several segments, and was also terribly twisted, while the other had an unclosed hole with scarred tissue around it.
The torso, wider than the small ones', showed an irregular pattern of holes and scars, as if the creature had been stabbed repeatedly.
Bairon observed it for just a few seconds, analyzing proportions, marks, bone structure, trying to associate it with something he'd seen before.
—"A midpoint…" — he murmured, without raising his voice.
His eyes swept the entire creature, from the incomplete jaw to the shattered legs.
Something about its size, about the body structure that seemed to belong to something that would have two arms and not four, seemed to confirm his impression. It was a category between two extremes, between the 4-limbed "beasts" and a 6-limbed "demon."
The soldier in the blue coat swallowed behind him, following his gaze with a disquiet he preferred not to show.
Crak.
Crak.
The unpleasant sound began to sound more like bones breaking under other bones.
Both—Bairon and the soldier— turned at the same time, almost reflexively.
In the shattered frame of the entrance, several four-limbed monsters were piling up, trying to get through.
But they didn't enter.
They couldn't.
The creatures pushed, bit, tore at each other with a ferocity that had no direction, as if their only real obstacle wasn't the door… but the three others equally desperate to cross it.
One sank its teeth into the neck of the one in front and ripped it backward, causing a jet of dark blood that spattered the floor.
Another used the gap to try to advance, but two more jumped on its back, sinking claws and pulling it down.
The result was a pile of bodies fighting to enter without success, forming a living plug that only generated more noise and violence among themselves.
The creature at the front managed to stretch an arm inside.
Its long, membranous fingers flailed, tearing the air, not reaching the room's floor.
Before it could advance further, another monster pushed it sideways and bit its forearm, breaking it with a soft, viscous sound.
The soldier took a step back, measuring how much longer that improvised flesh barricade would hold.
—"Officer, let's go with the rest" — he blurted, tensing his voice, but without losing control.
He didn't wait for confirmation.
He ran toward the hole in the ceiling, took momentum with a foot on a broken table, and leaped upward.
His fingers hooked onto a splintered edge; his feet struck the wall to adjust his position; a second push catapulted him to the upper level.
He disappeared in a sharp motion.
Bairon didn't waste time.
The officer took three short steps, the green spear accompanying diagonally like a firm extension of his arm.
He jumped just below the hole, braced a free hand on the wall, and pushed off hard, his body stretching in a taut arc.
His boots grazed the edge, enough to brace, push, and haul himself up in one pull.
As he stood up above, the sound of the monsters below broke again into a new crak, each time closer to breaking through their own chaos.
***
[Upper Deck]
The silence above wasn't real silence: it was that tense space between breaths, careful footsteps, and the faint echo of monsters fighting below.
Eilor, shirtless, sat on the edge of a broken chair that creaked every time he moved his torso.
He had fine cuts and dark bruises all over his back and sides. His skin, still damp from sweat and dried blood, stretched over muscles contracted by adrenaline.
He stared fixedly at the hole in the hall ceiling, whose size was easily twice as large compared to the hole in the floor through which he and the others had climbed up a little over a minute ago.
—"Did he go up?" — he asked, brow furrowed, voice hoarse, drawn out, as if he'd just spat dust and blood.
Behind him, Eli stood.
She held Eilor's head with one firm hand on his forehead and the other at the base of his skull, forcing him to lean forward.
But what she was doing wasn't in her hands: it was the invisible, firm, meticulous pressure of her telekinesis moving in small vectors within the young man's muscles and skin.
Fine splinters—some white, others stained with monster's black blood— slowly emerged from the flesh of his back.
They didn't all come out at once: sometimes one vibrated first, just a whisper of movement; then it slid out as if something were extracting it with invisible tweezers.
Each one that came out left behind a red line that half-closed.
Eilor growled low, teeth clenched, not taking his eyes off the hole.
—"Yes" — Eli finally responded. —"Teo threw the monster to the deck above after tearing out its tongue and then followed it."
As she spoke, her telekinesis pulled out a larger splinter, one buried near the shoulder blade.
The wood came out with a tug that made Eilor's body tense like a bow.
He let out a rough snort, almost a pained laugh.
—"How kind of him…" — he muttered, without lifting the head that Eli still held.
The other group members checked the state of used weapons, listened to the brief account of Teo's fight, or simply breathed heavily, trying not to think about the noises rising from below.
Tap.
A dry sound—soft, restrained— but enough for the six people in the group to react as if an invisible cord had been yanked from their necks.
They all turned in unison toward the hole through which Eilor, the fire soldier, and the air soldier had climbed up minutes before.
First they saw a head.
Then a boot bracing on the splintered edge.
Then the rest of the body emerged, with a fluid but burdened motion.
And then they recognized him.
The soldier in the blue coat appeared over the edge and climbed up fully, followed almost immediately by Officer Bairon, who straightened up behind him.
For an instant—just an instant— their faces lit up with the same synchronized surprise.
The return of an officer in such a situation meant something more than relief… and the happiest was Eilor, whose eyes shone a little.
But the surprise evaporated as soon as they saw his state.
Their expressions changed quickly, as if struck by an icy gust.
Brows that furrowed, jaws that tightened, eyes that widened with that silent recognition of real danger.
Bairon was wrecked.
His shirt and pants were torn in multiple lines as if claws had tried to pierce him from side to side.
Diagonal cuts, incomplete bites, hanging fibers.
Parts of the fabric were burnt in some areas, charred in others.
What drew the most attention was the color.
The white of his shirt was stained in deep blacks, some dry and scattered like ink stains, others wet and gleaming.
It looked like the trail of multiple creatures that had exploded, bled, or died on him.
The black ran in irregular streaks down his forearms, chest, even part of his neck.
And it wasn't just the uniform.
It was his posture.
Bairon entered upright, but his body betrayed him with small tremors of tension: micro-twitches in his fingers, breathing just slightly deeper than normal, an adjustment of the translucent green spear as if his muscles still expected another immediate attack.
The entire group—all six— saw him like that, processing the obvious.
He had come from below despite having left from the same level they were on now hours ago.
He had been down there fighting alone, perhaps for all the hours they had been waiting since yesterday.
Coming back alive bordered on improbable.
Besides, he returned alone.
One murmured softly.
—"…Seriously?"
Another, further back, swallowed and lowered his gaze, understanding that if Bairon returned in that state… whatever left him like that might still be out there.
The soldier in the blue coat yanked off his coat to move better, panting, but said nothing. He knew the officer would speak first… if he had the chance.
The air tensed.
Gazes remained fixed on Bairon, waiting for words, orders… or an explanation that wasn't worse than what they imagined.
Then, Eilor's head—which until that moment Eli had been holding tilted with both hands and the subtle force of her telekinesis— moved slightly.
First it was a minimal gesture: a muscle in his neck tensing, an attempt to lift his chin.
Eli felt the movement before seeing it; the balance of her telekinetic force vibrated between her fingers.
Then, without warning, Eilor pushed upward with enough firmness to break the posture she was forcing him to maintain.
His body straightened a bit in the chair.
His back, still with reddish marks where splinters had been removed, arched as his shoulders made a short, rigid movement, like someone snapping back to consciousness.
Eli let go of his hands immediately, instinctively.
Her fingers separated from Eilor's hair and neck with a slight startle.
Her expression twisted into a mix of concern and an awkward grimace.
—"Kaep…" — she tried to say, but he was no longer listening.
The young man fully lifted his head.
His eyes, still somewhat glassy from pain and concentration, focused on the figure that had just climbed through the hole.
His face didn't soften.
His voice came out rough, still affected by the effort and the pull of the splinters left inside.
—"…Bairon…"
—"…"
Bairon turned his head slightly toward him, the green spear still in hand, his breathing not entirely steady, his uniform wrecked and splattered with black.
The ambient sound—the others murmuring, the tense footsteps, the distant echo of monsters fighting below— seemed to retreat a couple of meters, leaving only that exchange of gazes.
Eli took a step to the side, keeping her fingers ready in case Eilor collapsed or the wound reopened.
But Eilor kept looking at the officer, not breaking eye contact for a second, as if he needed to confirm something.
Bairon looked at his eyes first. Then he lowered his gaze, scanning Eilor from chest to legs, as if searching for some trace that would give him another excuse, something to delay the inevitable.
—"I already know what you'll ask, Kaep… and—" he began.
But his voice caught.
Eilor said nothing. He simply looked at him. There was no desperation or rage in his features; only fixed attention, like someone waiting for the other to finish at once because anything else would be cruel.
That silence fell upon Bairon like a weight. He pressed his lips together, trying to breathe, though there wasn't enough air in that destroyed room to keep postponing what he had to say.
—"I'm sorry" — he managed to let out, barely. —"I couldn't do anything."
Bairon opened his hands for an instant, an awkward gesture, as if he wanted to show Eilor the empty fingers, the dirty palms, the entire helplessness.
—"Your uncle… is dead."