After they had lunch, Karabell suggested they went for a walk. It was a good opportunity to search for Arago's hiding place, too. They'd slept until noon, and, for some reason, his back was extremely sore. Well, Een and Kei were still sleeping. But it was probably for the best. Frederick had introduced Karabell and his teammates to some of Base Tau's teachers. Surprisingly enough, Base Tau didn't have a proper leader. Rather, everyone did their own thing, making sure not to disturb one another. It was a training base, so it somehow made sense. Their only goal was turning those apprentices into real soldiers.
"Feeling any better, Shono?" Karabell asked over his shoulder. He stretched his arms, basking in the sunlight.
"A little, yes. I'm sorry for making you all worry."
Lyra gazed at the abandoned buildings surrounding them. She was still having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that Base Miu, had been wiped off the face of the earth. All those people... They were all dead. And there was nothing she could do about it. At that rate, they were going to die too. That world was so unfair, giving them hope only to take it away within mere seconds. Karabell and Frederick... Did they really think they could win? For two thousand years, humanity had barely managed to avoid its extinction. Did they really think that, after all that time, they'd be the ones to end all that fighting? Lyra took a deep breath to slow the frantic beating of her heart. She wanted to believe it too. But after everything she'd witnessed...
They found Arago faster than they'd anticipated. Its face split into a large grin the moment it saw Karabell approaching. Shono offered his thanks for the previous day, awkwardly asking the beast it if it was hungry. The creature shook its head, puffing out its chest.
"Come to think of it, we don't really know if they can eat human food..." Alice whispered into Karabell's ear. For a moment, it looked like everyone had completely forgotten that the creature in front of them was a man eating beast. For some reason, though, Alice had a hard time picturing Arago attacking someone.
"Hey, Arago. You wouldn't happen to know when your boss'll get here, would you?" Karabell inquired. He could more or less guess the answer. "It's fine. Well, I'd rather it didn't get too close to Base Tau. We can just meet here," he suggested, inspecting the immense structure they'd found Arago in. It looked like some sort of abandoned factory. Maybe it was a hangar? No, it was too small.
*
Alice dashed down the stairs and through the hallway, before swinging the door open. After pestering him for an entire hour, she'd finally managed to persuade Karabell into sparring with her. She wanted to start training as soon as possible. Een and Kei had also managed to get out of bed... And, as always, they were making a lot of noise.
"I'm not giving you my axe, you could hurt yourself! Seriously, why're you so interested in weapons? It's not normal, for real..." Een yelled. They looked exactly like two sibling fighting over a toy. "Don't just watch, guys! Help me out, come on!"
Lyra and Shono burst into laughter, having experienced the same suffering. Ultimately, Shono agreed to let her borrow his mace instead, since it wasn't as dangerous as Een's axe. Leaving Shono behind to look after the girl, the other four headed for one of the sparring rooms. Unfortunately, they couldn't find one that wasn't occupied. Allegedly, there were more apprentices at Base Tau than they'd first thought. At Lyra's request, one of the instructors allowed them to spectate for a bit. Seeing the children practice like that, in an enclosed space, using training dummies and wooden weapons, Karabell couldn't help but feel envious. Back at the Agency's base in the Lower District, they'd had to go out and fight trees, pretending that they were real enemies. Not to mention they'd been forced to use real weapons right off the bat, since making replicas out of wood would've meant cutting down the very trees they were supposed to defeat in combat.
"Naturally, this is nothing like the real thing," the instructor groaned, leaning against one of the walls. "Name's Fen, by the way."
"Karabell Ress." The Captain shook the man's hand. "Yeah, but we all had to start somewhere... Speaking of which, I take it you were a fighter before?"
"Aye, you're right there. I even worked at Base Miu for a while. But after twelve long years, I finally decided it was time to call it quits. So I moved back here and became a teacher one year ago. I wasn't the strongest soldier, but I wasn't the weakest either. Still not sure I did the right thing. I think knowing that was what kept me sane, even after seeing my teammates die right in front of me again and again. If not even our captains had managed to save them, then what could I have ever hoped to accomplish?" Fen's eyes were fixed on the floor. "What about you, Captain?" he asked, stressing the word 'Captain'. "What do you think?"
"Sometimes, doing your best isn't enough. We know that better than anyone. That's why we all strive to become stronger. In order to protect the things we love and the ones we hold dear. Giving up isn't really an option," Een spoke, on behalf of the whole group. "So don't give up."
To think that all those kids were aiming to become soldiers... They seemed so fragile. But they'd been like that in the past too. Being a fighter was awful. They didn't get to choose how or when they died. No matter how much they fought, they couldn't win.
"Has anyone heard anything from Frederick?" Alice asked as Kar turned around, ready to leave.
"I called him earlier. Seems like he wanted to take a look at the base's archives." Karabell shook his hand dismissively. "Nothing useful."
"I figured as much... If he'd found something interesting, he would've started to brag about it already, don't you think?" Alice giggled. "Still, how'd we get dragged into this mess?"
The hard part wasn't figuring how they'd gotten into that mess. The hard part was figuring out a way to get out of it. Een cleared his throat.
"Totally unrelated, but don't you guys think we should do something about Kei? I mean, she's still a child and all, but she has an unhealthy obsession for weapons. Maybe we should teach her a few things. Who knows? It might come in handy," Een suggested half-joking, hoping to lighten the mood.