ROD - Chapter 103

Chapter One-Hundred-Three – World Hunters Association – Part Three

Bottling is an effective method of dealing with negative emotions.

-Former UWO Command Sergeant Major Jakel-

The guards are talking quietly amongst themselves, moving us toward the glass elevator.

“Tran needs to use the bathroom,” Barlow says suddenly, he looks… pissed.

“Nah, I’m fine,” Tran says.

Barlow grabs his shoulder tightly, so tight that Tran winces, “You need to use the bathroom.”

“Do I?”

“Yes,” Barlow growls.

“Well, I guess I need to use the fucking bathroom, since my bladder is the size of a…” Tran pauses, “Uh, the size of… a goldfish, yeah a goldfish.”

“Fucking hell,” Clayton mumbles.

Barlow pulls Tran by the collar into the closest restroom, pushing him through the door roughly. There’s three people in the restroom already, Barlow waits for two to wash their hands and leave.

“Hurry up,” Barlow says to the last guy who’s taking his sweet ass time.

The guy flinches and moves to leave, but Tran groans, “Wash your damn hands.”

The guy looks at Barlow who nods, “With soap.”

Clayton suppresses a laugh as he holds the door closed to stop more people from coming in. He opens it for the last guy who leaves flustered, muttering curses under his breath. I check all the stalls before saying, “All clear.”

“Why the fuck would you do that?” Barlow huffs at Tran, a vein on his temple is throbbing, “Why are you always fucking things up?”

Tran rolls his eyes and splashes water in his own face before he answers, “You done? I’m sick and tired of your shitty attitude lately, bro.”

Barlow looks like he’s going to snap, but he doesn’t. He pulls the anger demon off his shoulder and tries to calm himself before he says, “You jeopardized all of our safety by being a dumbass.”

Tran picks at his teeth in the mirror, “Did I?”

“Yes, you fuckwit.”

Tran’s eyes slowly turn to look at Barlow, “You need to pull whatever fucking stick is up your ass out, I’m so tired of seeing you mope every fucking day.”

“Make me, bitch,” Barlow challenges.

“Guys…” I try, but neither one wants to listen at this point. They’ve both been itching for a fight. They’ve been at odds for a while now. Ever since I got back. I don’t know why, but they just haven’t been communicating like they should.

“Jimmy, you have mana right?” Tran asks, cracking his neck.

I sigh, “Yeah, I’ll heal you guys.”

“Money’s on Barlow,” Clayton says, folding his arms.

“I’ll take that bet,” Tran grins.

“Rules?” Barlow growls.

“No skills, no eyes, and no groin, everything else goes.”

“Agreed,” Barlow grins.

The tension is palpable. They haven’t fought like this in a couple years, and last time it was during combatives training.

“Give us a countdown, Novak,” Tran says, cracking his knuckles and smiling a toothy grin at Barlow.

“Just get on with it,” I sigh.

The air rushes as they both launch at each other. Tran manages to open one of the stall doors, causing Barlow to collide with it, cracking it off its hinges. He keeps pushing, Barlow is definitely stronger than Tran, but Tran is faster. Three punches to the side make Barlow wince, a haymaker from Barlow sends one of Tran’s teeth flying.

They exchange another series of blows, then another, until nearly all the stalls are broken. We don’t intervene and they don’t stop.

“You’re always fucking up!” Barlow roars, punching Tran square in the jaw.

“And you’re always brooding like a big baby bitch!” Tran shouts back, sweeping Barlow’s legs and smacking his knee twice with a toilet seat.  

He’s about to smack Barlow over the head with it, but he stops, changing the angle and hitting his arm. Barlow seems to be holding back his punches now too. I don’t think either of their hearts are really in the fight, but they started it, I guess neither is willing to give up.

“Alright, that’s enough, I’m calling it,” I say.

“Who won?” Barlow asks, wiping blood off his mouth.

“A draw.”

They look at Clayton, then he looks at me before sighing and agreeing.

“You guys feel better?”

“No,” they say in unison, limping toward me.

“Hash it out before I heal you.”

They both groan and glare at each other. There’s silence in the room, besides the leaking pipe they dented.

“Are we clear in this room?” Tran asks Clayton.

“All clear, I checked twice.”

Tran nods before slumping against the wall, nursing his hand.

“You asked why I said that…” Tran begins, stretching his shoulder, “It should have been obvious. Olivers will try to kill us, I wanted whoever is watching to know that he’s gunning for us, so that maybe, just maybe they can fucking deal with it before we’re praying that Jimmy can somehow fuck a resurrection out of his goddess.”

The room is silent again as we parse what he said. Tran breaks the silence as he wipes the blood from his split eyebrow.

“Look, I know I fuck up sometimes, and the last mission is something that I just have to live with. But I won’t apologize for doing what needs to be done. You keep talking about what Jimmy needs, yet you’re not listening to what he says.”

“He didn’t say kill a whole…”

“Stop reminding me!” Tran yells slamming his hand so hard against the cubicle that the last door falls off, “I know I… I fucking ruined them… I don’t need the constant reminder.”

Barlow squints at him.

“You think I’m proud… but I’m not… I’m ashamed, and I can barely sleep and… and I don’t even know what to do except move forward.” Tran lets out a long winded sigh, “There, I fucking said it, now you talk, what the hell is eating you lately?”

Barlow slumps across from Tran, his outfit is torn in four places and his eye is swelling, “I just… we’re fucking weak. Me and you, we don’t belong here, we’re grunts, we didn’t slay a god, we didn’t get chosen. I’m barely level ten, thanks to your shit… literally.”

“So? People get stronger,” Tran says, pulling his leg up, his ankle looks sprained, “Besides, Jimmy got us those tomes, you heard Clayton, we’re going to be badasses.”

“Are we though?” Barlow says, looking down at his bloody hands, “Most days I’m barely keeping up, just trying to be useful around this team is difficult. Everyone has a purpose, a point for being here. Dorliac’s an amazing healer and a great leader…”

“When she wants to be,” Tran says with an eye roll.

“Fair…” Barlow agrees, then continues, “Tenny is a fucking genius, Greymore and all of his team are basically heroes. Even you…” he grits his teeth without looking at Tran, “Even you change the tide sometimes with your crazy ideas. But me? I’m just Gregory Barlow, there’s nothing special about me. Hell… I couldn’t even stop the suits from taking Jimmy. Not even special suits, just the regular kind. I’m fucking weak… too fucking weak to be on the dream team… I’m holding everyone back, I can feel it every day… like I’m an oxygen thief stealing their air. I don’t belong here… and… and I don’t know what to do about it, because I want to watch you and Jimmy’s back. I want to prop you guys up, I just… don’t know how.”

My eyes lower as he wipes his, I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t know he felt like this. How long has he been bottling all this up? This is partly my fault, a good leader makes sure their team feels valued. I need to work on that. Barlow probably isn’t the only one feeling like this.

Clayton speaks, breaking his silence, “Godslayer gave us one clear directive. We need to win, whatever it takes, you saw Starman, do you think he would have stepped through that black gate to fight a god?”

Barlow grits his teeth but shakes his head, “He’s more likely to ask Jennifer to fill his schedule so he can avoid it.” Barlow breathes out slowly, it looks like he’s calming down.

“I know that you would step through the gate,” Clayton says, nodding to Barlow, “You might be shit compared to my team right now, but I feel greatness in you, even in Tran. Greymore isn’t in the business of being a soldier, he’s in the business of making monsters. In a few years, you’ll be fucking monsters. Mark my words, I don’t say them lightly.”

“I know the feeling,” I say looking down, “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve felt like a useless piece of shit in the face of overwhelming odds. That doesn’t help though, what helps is getting better every day, finding your weakness and making it your strength. Carving every weak thought from your skull until all that remains is a sharp blade willing to cut anything to win.”

They all stare at me, even Clayton. Tran finally speaks again after a time.

“If we want to win, we need to play smart, use everything to our advantage, that’s what Jimmy keeps saying. The WHA think I’m a moron because whatever file they stole from the UWO probably says I am, so I’ll act like one and make sure they know one of their chairs is trying to kill us. Two birds one fucking stone.”

Clayton folds his arms and nods, “It was a good idea, but communication is key to unit cohesion. Loop us in next time.”

“Everyone on the team deserves to be here,” I say, looking at each of them in turn, “Now, let me heal you and let’s get on with this. I’m tired and I want a shower.”

***

Ten minutes later we leave the bathroom much worse than we found it. I managed to reattach Tran’s tooth and we sort of fixed the leak in the pipe, by sort of, I mean that we bent the pipe closed. It is what it is.

“Ahem,” Jennifer says as we exit, “Shall I fetch you some fresh clothes?”

“Nah,” Tran says, then looks around, “Where’s Starman?”

“He… grew bored and left.”

“Oh, okay,” Tran shrugs, “Lead on, my beautiful lady.”

Jennifer blinks at him, and I swear, for a moment it seemed like she blushed. She leads us to the glass elevators, there’s a small crowd of costumed WHA people that are pointing at us.

“They came here with Starman, now their covered in blood, what do you think happened?” I hear one whisper loudly, like he never quite mastered a soft tone.

So much for a low profile. At least there is a lot of people tracking we are here if we go missing, not that it would matter. Clayton has another grim expression as he looks at his System interface, he’s slowly typing a reply.

“Fucking politics,” he murmurs, “I fucking hate politics.”

“We good?” I ask as the elevator dings on the top floor.

“I’ll let you know if we aren’t,” he says, giving me the worst fake grin he’s ever done.

Something is definitely bothering him. What kind of something though? Is it Alveria? Her boss? Another unknown force at play? The more I think about it, the more I agree with his sentiment, fuck politics.

We reach some kind of board room, the glass is tinted, but I can make out a large mahogany table with high backed chairs, more than twenty of them. A woman with emerald colored eyes wearing a black pinstriped suit steps forward, her black hair is in a bun that’s so tight it could rival Fisban’s. Clayton pauses for a moment, before stepping forward and muttering a curse under his breath.

“Welcome, Leeroy Tran, we’re very excited to get started, if you’d please follow me.”

“What about us?” Clayton asks.

“You can wait right outside,” she smiles.

“That doesn’t work for me.”

“You’re a grumpy one, aren’t you?”

“Hardly, this is me being cheery.”

She smiles deeper, “I’d love to see you angry then.”

Clayton’s head tilts a bit, a strange grin on his mouth, “It’s been a while, Jamie.”

“Hmm, has it? I feel like it was just yesterday you left me alone in my hotel room waiting.”

“I see you’ve moved up from recruiting, how are your knees?”

She smirks, “Looks like you’ve stayed the same, I heard you still haven’t gotten a promotion. Not too late to accept my generous offer. The WHA would love to have you and, what was her name again? Angry little archer…”

“Zero.”

“Ahh, well she’s welcome as well, we’ve been looking for more sanitation workers.”

Clayton’s eyebrow jerks and his hand clenches the dagger hilt.

“She seems fun,” Tran says, then looking to the boardroom, “You going to piss on my guard’s boots or are we going to discuss business?”

She straightens and gives Tran a smile, “I will make accommodations for your friends. They will have to sit with the aides though, only Chairs and Heroes may sit at the table.”

“Whatever,” Tran shrugs, “Just make sure you fetch me some food, I’m famished.”

She winces at the word fetch. Clayton stifles a laugh.

This is going to be interesting…