“So… what happened?”
“He got hit, I guess. The Destroyer Cyclone tore him apart- vaporized what was left and scattered it to the wind.”
Eduard and Emmy joined Sturm in the courtyard, sitting around a wooden picnic bench beside the koi pond as they listened intently to his story. While most were familiar with the basic outline of Fiesel’s betrayal and subsequent destruction, the wealth of details provided by Major General Dietrich had allowed Sturm to fill in many of the blanks.
“I don’t know…” sighed Eduard, “That just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Why wouldn’t Fiesel make any effort to avoid it?”
Shrugging, Sturm replied, “Maybe he was trying to prove a point.”
“What do you think, Emmy?” Eduard inquired, turning to his teammate.
The girl, bandaged from her fingertips to her elbows, had previously been invested, but now seemed to have lost her focus. Staring blankly at the fish swirling just beneath the water, it took a prod from Eduard to recapture her attention.
“Sorry, what?” she asked, perking back up somewhat.
Eduard gave her a suspicious look before clarifying his question. “The general’s story seems a bit… embellished, doesn’t it? Crushing coal into diamond with a punch is ridiculous. The Hurricane brushing that same punch off as if it were nothing? No disrespect to Sturm- his father is amazing, but that seems completely implausible.”
“Maybe…” Emmy answered softly, glancing back toward the koi pond. “Did Captain Scharf have anything to say about it?”
Looking troubled, Sturm shifted his jaw and crossed his arms. “I haven’t seen him in a while. Not since the night he left us at the restaurant and got into that bar fight.”
“Speaking of which…” Eduard pivoted, quick to change the subject, “How has your assignment with Miss Pauritsch gone?”
Truthfully, Sturm couldn’t deny that Pauritsch was a more capable teacher. In the short time since the Third Hunter Team had been placed under her temporary command, they had made significant headway in the development of their abilities. Unlike Scharf, she made effective use of library time, often guiding her students directly in their studies. The team had yet to deploy on a field mission alongside the mud witch, but if all went according to plan, that would soon be subject to change.
“Great so far,” Sturm replied eagerly, “We’ve only been training so far, but she’s fairly certain they’re going to send us out within the next two days.”
“Really? How come?” pressed Eduard.
“We’ve been on alert for a week now. Major Luna thwarted a bombing at the post office last Saturday and Krieger has had us on standby since. The intelligence office thinks our targets are responsible.”
Eduard placed his arms up on the table and leaned in curiously. “That team of Red Front terrorists, you mean? Rumor has it that one might be the murderer targeting the girls.”
Rumor? Sturm thought to himself.
It was far more likely that Max had been loose with his divulging of classified information. While other knight teams were generally cleared to receive such details, Sturm hoped that his friend wasn’t being too relaxed in his open discussions on the matter.
“It’s possible,” said Sturm, straightening up in his seat. “We won’t know for sure until we take them down or come across more solid evidence, though.
“Fair enough,” Eduard replied. “Just don’t let your guard down. Like in your story, psychopaths are unpredictable. They don’t think like you and I.”
Sturm returned a nod of assurance. “I’ll keep that in mind. So what about you guys? Have you found any sign of Dominic?”
“None,” answered Eduard. “It wasn’t a major cause for concern initially since Krieger said Dominic planned on resigning from the academy with an exemption- all we needed was his signature.”
“Initially? So you are concerned, now?”
“Somewhat,” Eduard elaborated. “We’ve been to his house, talked with his parents, and even tracked down a few of his cousins. It’s like he disappeared into thin air.”
The look on Emmy’s face, as her teammate spoke, made it clear that she found the subject particularly uncomfortable. Sturm now realized that this was likely what had kept the girl lost in thought.
“What about his friends?”
Eduard glanced at Emmy and back to Sturm across the wooden table. “Didn’t have any, as far as I can tell. Seems like he was a shut-in.”
Considering this, Sturm understood Emmy’s apparent discomfort. After all, if Dominic truly was a loner who lacked outside connections, it served to reason that the only place he’d have to return to was his parents’ home. The fact that it hadn’t was a significant red flag.
“Sturm…” Emmy spoke up in a choked, quiet voice. “You don’t believe the killer could have gotten to him, do you?”
Admittedly, the thought had never crossed the young swordsman's mind. While nothing was completely out of the question, this would mark a significant departure from the murderer’s pre-establish patterns.
“I doubt that,” Sturm replied, shifting his focus to the girl. “So far, the killer has only targeted women. After the captain’s investigation, the academy’s psychologist put together a profile. According to his suspicions, there’s a specific reason he murders women.”
Desperate for reassurance, Emmy sought further clarification. “What do you mean by that, Sturm? Couldn’t it be that he prefers victims whom he perceives as easy to dispatch?”
“Maybe,” answered Sturm, “but some of the women he murdered were very capable of defending themselves. No offense to Gustavo, but he’s not much more durable or mobile than a regular person, and he’s able to walk around at night without a problem. A few of the victims were likely more dangerous than any of us.”
“Why women, then?” asked Eduard.
“Some sort of trauma from his past, maybe,” said Sturm, leaning back anxiously. “It’s also possible that he does it for some sort of… thrill.”
Eduard folded his hands and returned a sickened glare. “A thrill? You mean…?”
“Yeah.”
Shaking his head, Eduard attempted to dislodge the vile thought from his mind. “In any case, if I were you, I would make sure he doesn’t get captured alive.”
Taking the villain prisoner had never been of any consideration to Sturm, as it was his automatic assumption that such a depraved lunatic would have to be killed in combat. Were the murderer to attempt surrender, he’d have absolutely no idea how to respond.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” said Sturm, his voice lacking clear conviction.
“Well,” started Eduard, rising to his feet, “It’s getting late. We have to check in on Whirlwind in the infirmary and they’ll probably want to make sure Emmy’s burns are healing up, as well.”
After parting ways with the Recovery Team, Sturm made his way out of the cool evening air of the courtyard and back into the building. After rounding the corner to the dormitory wing, the swordsman found himself face to face with Max, who had a large brown paper bag tucked under each arm.
With a wide grin, Max greeted, “Heya, what’s loose, man?”
Sturm eyed the bags and tilted his head. “Nothing really, I was just talking to Eduard and Emmy out by the pond. It was getting chilly and they had somewhere to be, though.”
Hearing this, Max’s eyes lit up. “Emmy? Did she mention me?”
“Why would she mention you?” Sturm inquired, raising an eyebrow.
Max seemed at a loss for words as his cheeks flushed bright blue. “I… Uh… W-what? I mean, we’re friends, right? Why wouldn’t she?”
“We weren’t talking about you,” said Sturm, “we were talking about what happened to Captain Scharf.”
“At the bar?”
“No, I mean during the Great War,” Sturm clarified. “I told them the rest of the story I heard from Major General Dietrich.”
“Oh, um, right,” Max replied, anxious to change the topic, “So what did they think? Badass, right?”
“Eduard thinks that Dietrich might have been stretching the truth a bit.”
Hugging his bags tightly Max leaned forward, appearing to take some offense. “Why’s Ed gotta take the fun out of everything? Sure, that Dietrich guy is a weirdo, but how could anybody doubt the Hurricane?
“For what it’s worth, the Major General is a big fan of my dad. I guess it’s not completely out of the question that he might add a few extra details here and there to make for a better story.”
“Come on, man! How can you doubt your old man like that?! The diamond thing?! That’s totally like him!”
The forces required to create a diamond were immense. Concentrations of carbon would need to be exposed to millions, if not billions of years of intense heat and pressure before finally transforming into the precious stone. To cause that transition nigh-instantaneously was an astronomical feat, and to resist a power capable of such a thing was even more unbelievable.
“I definitely want to believe it, Max,” said Sturm with a sigh. “It just seems like more of a legend is all. You know what I mean?”
“Aw, whatever, man,” Max scoffed dismissively. “But you’re never going to be able to do that kinda stuff if you don’t even believe in it. You better ask your dad when he gets back!”
“Sure, Max. Whatever you say. So what’s in those bags, anyway?”
Max glanced down under each arm as if suddenly reminded that he was carrying them. “Oh, these? No clue. Miss Pauritsch asked me to take these to the commandant’s office. She said not to open em.”
“So why are you going this way, then?” Sturm inquired, crossing his arms.
“Cause I didn’t get to see what’s inside yet, obviously!’
With a disapproving look, Sturm shook his head and continued past his friend. As it was nearly time to retire, the young swordsman was more concerned with having a hot shower than arguing with his irresponsible teammate.
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