Vae Victis - B2 Chapter 2 - End Times (Patreon)

End Times

I found a small grove in the middle of the forest and made camp quickly. Saia sheltered us with her field, and we quickly agreed on a few things to keep her presence a secret. The kid had a piece of flint in his bag, which made getting a fire going an easy task. There was plenty of wood for a fire around, so I had little issues getting one going.

I did go through his bag, looking for any clues as to why he was out there all alone, but I didn't find much. He had some junk food snacks as well as two small bottles of water and one of coke. He had a few lighters, a change of clothes, a small purse filled with markers and a big map of Colombia that was scribbled all over.

I didn't look at it for long, despite being very interested. I had invaded the kid's privacy, but I didn't want to step too far. I put everything back together and placed it next to the sleeping kid. The poor guy was obviously exhausted, and I could see signs of malnourishment.

From the way he breathed, I knew that he would be waking up soon, so I pulled out a can of beans and a wooden spoon from my pack and opened it. I pulled the mask of my mouth and put it around my neck as I ate a single scoop, just enough so that it looked like I had been eating.

His breathing changed and I heard him shuffling, then he went still. I didn't react, instead I kept my eyes on the can in my hands, swirling the spoon as I looked at the fire.

I heard the kid turn his head, looking around, and his heart beating faster. He was frightened, as well he should be. His hand crawled across the ground, searching, and finding his improvised spear. I had left it next to him, it wasn't like he would be much of a threat to me even with it, and I figured that it would prove him some comfort.

"Good morning," I said, making sure to keep my face turned away from him so that he couldn't see my mouth. The twitched, then froze again. "Or is it good evening?" I asked, it was still nighttime.

He didn't respond, and I pulled the mask back over my face as I turned around to look at him.

His eyes were wide and fearful, so I offered the canned food to him. "Hungry?" I asked.

That made him blink, and got him out of his shock. I heard his stomach growl, and I leaned over, placing the can next to him before turning back to look at the fire.

I heard him grab the can, and after a second of pause, start eating. I spread my hands in front of me like I was warming them on the fire. The night was cold, more so than what I remembered, but low temperatures didn't bother vampires that much.

I let him eat in peace, wondering when the last real meal he had was. By the sounds I was hearing it was probably a long time ago. Once he was finished, I glanced in his direction.

"Good?" I asked.

He raised his head to look at me, then quickly nodded. "Yes, yes, thank you," he answered hurriedly.

"De nada," you're welcome, I said.

"I remember you," he said slowly. "The bear, it was... you're the angel that saved me."

The side of my mouth raised behind the mask. "I'm not an angel," I said. "But yes, I saved you. What's your name?"

The kid looked at me uncertainly for a moment, but then answered. "I'm Felix," he said, then after a pause he continued. "I thought that bear was going to eat me, if you hadn't been there... Thank you," he said, then stood up.

I just waved my hand, slowly, trying to appear human.

"What were you doing in the woods alone? If I may ask?"

He gave me a guarded look, then raised his chin and answered. "I was out hunting."

I tilted my head at him, then glanced at the improvised weapon next to him. I didn't think that the wooden spear was good for much, and I knew that he didn't have any other weapon on him. Hunting with that would be difficult for even a grown man, let alone a child. I didn't say that, of course.

He kept his eyes on me, and I noticed a touch of defiance in them. Then he noticed something behind me, and his eyes slid to look around us. I saw him look at the faint blue sheen of the field around us, and his mouth opened up in awe.

"What is that?" He asked.

"A skill," I said.

His eyes lit up and he looked back at me. "You have a skill!" He exclaimed.

My gambit had payed off. The kid knew about skills, that meant that he had encountered someone who had gained one before. Everyone on Earth should have their Masks by now, but actually gaining investment in them was another story.

I turned to look at him from behind my glasses, then nodded.

"You leveled your class?" He said excitedly, and I tilted my head.

"Class?" I asked, then continued before he could answer. "You mean my Mask."

"Same thing," he said, his face turning eager now. "That's so cool! How'd you do it?"

It made sense that people would have made connections and used terms that were closely related to Earth culture. I knew more than they did, so I could see how people would be trying to use any knowledge they had to make sense of things.

"Do you have a Mask?" I asked instead of answering his question.

He frowned. "Of course, everyone does."

That was good, from what Shadow had said that was supposed to happen. But I couldn't be sure until I saw it by myself.

"And what's your Mask called?" I asked.

The kid rubbed the forearm of his right hand with his left, and fidgeted in place. I knew that I was taking advantage of his naivety, but I needed information.

"It's a Student Mask," the kid said, almost as if he was ashamed. "I haven't been able to level at all."

He was studying me, waiting for a response. I didn't say anything. A Student Mask or an Ornament were very good. I had gotten to choose because I was an Exemplar, people on Earth would get their first Mask based on what fit them the most. It made sense that a kid would get it, as most kids were required by law to attend school, education was important. I realized that Felix had turned his eyes to the ground, and from his body language I could tell that he didn't like his Mask.

I cleared my throat. "That is a good Mask," I said.

He raised his eyes, and stared at me in anger. "You don't need to lie to make me feel better! It's the worst!"

I raised an eyebrow. "Why do you say that?" I asked.

"Because! I haven't been able to level it at all! All the others have gotten at least one level in theirs. And I've gone on two hunts already!"

There was a lot there to unpack, but I had to be careful. I didn't want him to know that I was prying for information. It was better if I pretended like I knew a lot more than I did. True, in some ways I did know a lot about Masks and the Grand Spell, but I didn't know how Earth viewed these things. They've had a month to come up with a lot of their own theories.

"Okay Felix, how about we start at the beginning?" I said slowly. "You said that there were others? Were you separated from your group? Did you get lost?"

The kid shook his head, again looking defiant. "No, I know these woods!"

The kid obviously didn't like being looked down upon. He probably thought that he was grown up already. And perhaps in this world he would have to be.

"So you went out alone?" I asked.

That made him wince, and he started drawing a circle in the dirt with his leg. "Yeah," he whispered almost too low to hear, but not for me.

I almost told him how stupid that was, but I managed to stop myself. "And you did it in order to hunt? Try and get a carving, level?"

He nodded, then raised his eyes looking me over, obviously looking for any signs of judgment. I was wearing a mask and glasses so there wasn't much for a human child to see. He narrowed his eyes, almost as he saw me for real for the first time. He looked me over, then his eyes landed on the weapon next to me.

"Is that what you used to kill the bear?" He asked and took a step in my direction. "It's not rusted," he said, then paused, his eyes rose to look at me with something approaching fear. "Are you a raider?"

I tilted my head. "I don't know what that is," I said.

He narrowed his eyes. "Where did you get it?"

I did not like the kid turning this around and interrogating me. I was the one that was in the control of the conversation. But I also didn't want to spook him. "Why does it matter?"

He looked at me for a long time. "Where did you come from?" He took a step back, then glanced around, looking for a way out.

I spread my arms. "I'm not going to hurt you," I said slowly. "I wouldn't have saved you if I did, now wouldn't I?"

That made him pause and I continued.

"I don't know what a raider is, really. You could say that I've come from a far away. And... I haven't talked to another human since all of this started," I told the truth, technically. I haven't talked with another human before him, Shadow and Saia didn't count.

He blinked. "Really?"

I nodded. "I was in the mountains when the light came," the estate was surrounded by the forest, so again I said the truth, just not the whole of it.

"Oh," Felix said, now looking ashamed.

"How old are you Felix?" I asked, trying to get him to relax a bit.

"What does that matter?" He asked, immediately back to being defensive. I cursed myself, I should've remembered what I was like as a kid. Being dismissed because of age was one of those things that rubbed me the wrong way a lot back then.

"Well, we are getting to know each other," I told him.

He narrowed his eyes. "I'm thirteen! And you haven't even told me your name," he raised his chin at me.

I suppressed the desire to chuckle. The kid had spunk. "Of course, I apologize for my rudeness," I said, trying to keep my voice level. "My name is... Estrella," Star, it might not be a common name, but it was a real one. And it was also the truth, it was the first part of my new name.

It wasn't that I wanted to lie to the kid, but I didn't know if anyone from my old life was still alive. There was some cause to be careful.

"Now," I started, this time allowing some hardness to slip into my tone. "Why don't you tell me what you were really doing running around the wilderness all alone?"

I had to assert at least some sort of authority here. The kid had gone through a lot, but he I could already tell that he was used to not listening to others.

For a moment, Felix seemed like he was going to refuse, but then he glanced back down at my weapon, studying the blade for a few seconds. I haven't wiped off the bear's blood yet. I could see him remembering and realizing that he really was in a tough spot. I could sympathize, he was like how I was back when I first met Shadow. Unsure if I could trust him, but having little choice. It was a strange feeling, knowing that I was now playing the role on the other side.

Felix swallowed, then raised his eyes back to my face. "I was looking for something," he shuffled his feet.

I glared at him, though the effect was probably diminished with my eyes being behind the glasses. Still, my lack of a response seemed to get to him after almost a minute of silence, and he spoke again.

"I was looking for a dungeon," he said.

I blinked, then tilted my head. "A dungeon," I asked. But already I had a suspicion from the ways he had talked about things before. He had called Mask a class, and Carvings, levels. It wasn't that hard to make the connection. "That wouldn't be a light suspended in the air, like a rift in space?"

Felix nodded, and I grimaced behind my mask. So, those places were here too. Shadow didn't know if they would be, rifts were something new even for Kirios. I could only assume that they were like the one on Ish Vimza, that they dropped loot. I could see how that could be useful, especially if a lot of the stuff that Earth had was now useless. His interest in my weapon was now even more intriguing.

"And why were you looking for something like that?" I asked him.

Felix's lip quivered for a moment, and then he launched into a fast talking outburst. "Because I need to level! All the others already have, and I'm stuck. The Boss already said that he won't take me on any more hunts because.... Because I didn't level the last time. And I heard them say that my class was useless, and that they were just wasting food on me... And, and, I almost died, and they'll leave me behind if I don't level... So I'll die anyway... I need to... I..."

Oh God, he's crying. I froze, not really knowing what to do as tears streamed down the kid's cheeks. I stood up, too fast for a human. Shit, I forgot about keeping appearances in the moment, but the kid didn't seem to have noticed as he had a hand on his face, trying to wipe away the tears.

"Hey, hey," I said softly. "It's okay."

I knelt next to him, and realized that I was still taller than him.

How did I not notice how small he is? The kid said that he was thirteen, but I couldn't see it, not now. He was thin, he barely had any meat on him. I took in more details now, saw how his clothes were dirty and haggard, how his hair was unwashed. I had noticed all of these things before, but I didn't really think about what they all meant.

This kid had been in survival mode for a long time. And I saw as everything spilled out of him. He jumped forward, startling me as he put his hands around me, crying on my shoulder.

For a moment, I froze, I didn't know what to do with such expressions of emotion. And I didn't have many examples in my life to take inspiration from. My thoughts moved to the only people who had ever shown me any kindness. My sire had always been stoic, and held himself back. But before everything happened, he had always been... A reassuring presence. Even though in the end, when I had looked in his eyes, I saw none of that, it had helped me in the past. But that wouldn't work now. Next was Khalil, my old friend. He was a man of faith. He would've offered words of God as comfort. I had never believed as deeply as Khalil had, so I didn't think that that would work.

The last was Shadow. And in a short time, he had been a teacher and a mentor to me. He had helped me survive, as now I had to help this young kid survive. This was what I came back for, to help my people get through this hell.

Slowly, I put my hands around his shoulders, somewhat awkwardly, as I didn't know how to provide such comfort myself. Felix didn't seem to mind, he just cried, and I held him. Trying not to think of all the horrors that he had to have lived through in order to survive this long.

* * *

A while later, I sat next to the fire. Felix had fallen asleep, exhausted, and perhaps a little bit embarrassed at his outburst.

At least he would get a good night's sleep, with no threats able to get to him.

I had pieced together a few things from some of he had said while crying. Enough that I knew that his life had been hard of late. I was pretty sure that he was part of a group that managed to survive the initial arrival of the Grand Spell, and were now based in a church in a village nearby. Most of the others were kids, like him, if I understood right. They had been taken in by a priest and a few hunters that had also survived.

He had mentioned his parents, and though he didn't say much I knew that they were dead. Most of the other kids were orphans too. They were barely surviving, and they were trying to "level" in order to get the tools that would let them survive. That's what the hunts he mentioned were most probably all about. Hunting animals in order to gain investment. They didn't know how Masks worked yet, which was why they had no idea how Felix's Mask gained Carvings.

I made a mistake, I thought that most kids would get the Student Mask, but it seemed like that wasn't the case. Felix was the only one in his group that had. Perhaps he was just a better student, or others had different things that interested them more. It didn't matter in the end.

They thought that killing things was how you gained carvings, which was why Felix's never improved. Shadow had explained how the Student Mask worked to me, you had to have a teacher, and intent mattered. Even if Felix was learning something new on those hunts, if there was no real intent by others to teach him anything, it would net him a lot less investment. Thankfully, I had been in the right place at the right time, and I had the power to help him.

It'd hurt my heart to hear his story, but I knew that I would hear a lot more just like it in the future.

I settled in to wait and rest as I felt the dawn coming. There was a lot that I had to do, and I would need all the strength that I got to see it through.