This being his first night back in years, Heliodor couldn’t be too careful. After all, he had no idea who still roamed these streets and rooftops at night anymore. All he could do was assume it was as populated as he remembered it being.
Rolling his neck he glanced upwards. A few fire escapes made the ascent to the rooftops easy enough and Helio quickly found himself looking at the all too familiar skyrise once again. The area he had chosen for his hunting was not a usual location for him. Often he chose more poorer communities as many there wouldn’t be missed by others, but that exact reason was why many chose such communities. So, Helio opted to stay somewhat close to his apartment which put him in a community that was solidly middle class. At 8pm at night, he should have luck finding people still roaming the streets despite the winter cold.
So, feeling confident in his choice, the corrupt slipped across the closely situated rooftops with ease. The night breeze nipped at his exposed flesh, but he paid it little mind. The sooner he found his prey the sooner he could get back to the warmth of his apartment. A nice cup of hot coffee would be his reward for a good night’s job. Oh how he looked forward to that.
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It wasn't that Niter was avoiding his usual haunts. He knew that there was an increased police presence – his sister told him about that one – due to mounting incidents where people fainted and woke up robbed. Niter suspected that was the work of another Negaverse agent or senshi, but didn't know many to begin with, and didn't feel that it was up to him to discover who it was. It would seem, then, that he left to give them the space to get caught by the police, and spare himself, but really…
Niter wandered off from his usual locations because he was too absorbed in his Switch to pay attention to where he was going. Slippered feet simply kept on, stepping over drainage pipes and gabled roofs, skirted around satellite dishes and guerrilla garden setups. He hadn't noticed when the world around him became unfamiliar; he couldn't guess how far he'd gone.
The Kingdom Hearts release had been interesting enough to retain his focus, but his run got botched when a stumble over a rock caused him to be hit by a meteor. It cost him his most recent level 1 Sephiroth challenge, and he sighed at the sky for all his pain and suffering.
His hands felt stiff, and jittery from the adrenaline. He was soaked in sweat, despite the frigid weather. And now he was down however long that last attempt took him. He kicked the rock off the side of the building.
This was how Niter culled energy. If he won during his challenge mode exploits, he would go home and eat the rest of his sweet rice balls, have a glass of iced coffee, and take a nap. If he lost, he'd vent his frustrations by doing his job for the Negaverse and collecting energy as quickly and efficiently as he could.
Niter looked for a way down, but froze when he felt an oncoming energy signature. An ally above him in rank, but he couldn't tell much more than that. But even knowing they were an ally roused a level of fear in him; he stayed put, and hunkered down behind a few rows of potted plants on a makeshift bench, and hoped they would go the other direction.
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Even with the ambient glow from the street lamps below, Heliodor felt like a wraith as he slipped from roof to roof. A brief pause to assess his surroundings below was all that stilted his forward motion. Silently he cursed his luck thus far. All he needed was one person. More would be ideal but just one would, hopefully, tide him over.
Jumping down onto a shorter building, Helio slid to a stop as an aura blossomed in his awareness. His tongue flicked over dry, cold lips as he assessed his situation. It was chaotic and a rank lower than himself so a friend in theory, but friends were not what he left behind. The odds though that this was anyone he had met before were incredibly slim. All of them should have ascended their ranks at this point and the ones he was most worried about had surpassed him well before Heliodor came into their lives.
Another roll of the dice. Each roll feeling more and more risky.
Abruptly, the corrupt changed directions. The target wasn’t far; it was the benefit of stumbling across someone of lower rank. And within a few buildings Heliodor came upon the location of his new quarry. His wooden geta’s announced his arrival as he slowly walked across the rooftop patio. The hollow sound of wood on the rooftop was a rather unmistakable sound to anyone who may have heard it before. At his point, Heliodor didn’t even notice how his cadence was subtly announced.
A wonder though. Was he being hidden from? A smile broke an otherwise wary expression.
“You know hiding at this point is pointless, right? Even an attempt at an ambush would be be idiotic considering I know you’re there.” He stopped his approach giving whoever it was space to feel as if they weren’t being directly threatened.
“I honestly just want to chat if that’s alright with you.”
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Worst case scenario confirmed.
Not only was Niter busted (this guy didn't have the courtesy to pretend he didn't feel Niter), but he was invited to do the exact thing he was hoping to avoid. An ambush would've been easier. So would getting drained, or told to do whatever, or sent off to fetch this person's quota for them (as long as it meant they weren't sticking around to talk to him).
Once Niter finished sighing his soul out of his body, he stood up from his crouch behind the plants and turned around to face the person hailing him. He blinked; he hadn't expected to see attire like that on a senshi, but he hadn't actually met enough senshi to develop an expectation either. Most of them had weird outfits, though, with nothing to tie them to any one culture on Earth. Which must've been the point – Jet had explained to him that senshi weren't from Earth.
(Which meant neither was he, and he was very sure his parents didn't go up to Nycticorax just to say he'd been born there, which was confusing, but he kept his mouth shut and nodded his way through that briefing, and hadn't wanted to ask about it since.)
"Sorry, uh, didn't feel you." He rubbed the back of his head. What would he want, anyway?
"My name's Niter. What did you want to talk about?"
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The corrupt that emerged could almost be mistaken to have bloomed right from the plants he slipped out from, if one was dense enough to believe such poorly constructed items were indeed plants. There was little doubt in Heliodor’s mind what sort of sphere this senshi was based from, but he wasn’t idiotic enough to cast assumptions about powers. Heliodor learned long ago that assuming anything could very easily get you hurt or worse.
“Didn’t feel me, hm?” He remarked with arms crossed, a brow raised.
“Heliodor. Nice to meet you Niter.” Grabbing a nearby chair, it’s wrought iron detail and heft spoke of better quality than the floral decor, and sat down in its half frozen cushion after brushing off a few lingering signs of snow. Something about this Niter felt…sheepish. Like a little lamb afraid to have come across a big bad wolf. A good turn out for Heliodor if it proved true.
“Nothing too crazy or, hopefully, time consuming. I’ve been away from the city for a while and am curious how the war has been going here.” Leaning forward the senshi dislodged a weft of hair that he had somehow managed to sit on before crossing ankle on knee leisurely. “Who is in charge these days, are there any specific names I should be aware of on either side?”
He rested his head against a fist, arm propped on the cold iron of his chosen chair. “Mainly what I need is a thorough understanding of the situation I’ve stepped into.”
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This was.
The worst.
Situation.
Of his life.
Niter felt his shoulders wilt under the strain of having to give someone an entire debriefing about what had been going on in the city since they'd been gone for a while. Niter couldn't figure out how to do that given that he didn't fully understand what was going on in the short time that he'd been awakened to this behind-the-scenes war, and he certainly didn't understand what was going on in the Negaverse past whatever Jet told him.
He wasn't even sure where he gave off the idea that he knew anything at all. Niter thought, from looking at himself in the mirror, that he didn't look like he knew much of anything. Which was true, unless Heliodor was looking for strats on how to speedrun Bloodborne.
But that wasn't what this was about.
Niter reminded himself to exhale the breath that he'd been holding, and maybe start by speaking. He'd been holding onto one of the terracotta pots while he listened to Heliodor, and only now felt it crack beneath his grip. His hands quickly slipped off of it and knotted behind his own back.
"... I think you'll get a better understanding of the situation from my General, Jet. He's in Information. As much as I'd like to help, he'd be a more thorough source. I can call him if you like?" Pleasesayyespleasesayyespleasesayyes –
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One would have thought that the request Helio had made was utterly demoralizing with how the other corrupt practically wilted downward like a sickly fern. A finger from the hand his head rested in tapped against the side of his cheek. Perhaps it was a tall order. A bit broad in fact. Some people needed a bit more direction, and honestly, a lot could feasibly happen in two years time.
Yes it was a tall order.
The last thing he needed though was a higher up to come charging into the scene. “No.” He spoke firmly. “Don’t call him.” Sighing he shifted in the chair, the cold biting through his fuku. Eventually he stood and stepped back and around the furniture before turning to Niter. “Sorry, but I’ll find him later if I need him.”
Heliodor needed to ask the right questions right now if he was going to get anything useful from Niter. Something broad but niche. Easy enough to answer without, hopefully, feeling overwhelming for someone to actually answer. After all, as a basic, Niter likely didn’t know much of anything important.
K.I.S.S. Right.
“But, can you tell me of any other Generals that you know about? This way I can have a few people I can bother with questions so you don’t need to answer them all for me.”
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More Generals. Okay, so he was going to ask them instead. That was a good sign. Niter was off the hook, then.
"Other Generals…" He echoed as he crossed his arms. It was cold out, and Niter was starting to feel the chill. "There's Aquamarine, he works with Jet a lot. And there were a few Generals at the orientation earlier. There was, uh…" He stared at one of the plants.
"There was Prehnite and Sylvite. I think they work in Information? And there's Ashanite, but I don't know what branch he's in." The rest of the speakers, he was reasonably sure, were Captains. There might've been other Generals there, too, but they weren't speakers, so they weren't introduced in the beginning. And Niter didn't spend much time dawdling; he was busy getting the hell out of there as soon as he could.
"Oh… Right." Niter tapped his fingers against his bicep. "It was coordinated by General Faustite. He didn't speak much, though. That's all the Generals I know about right now.
"That are. Doing stuff." He was sure there was a whole list of Generals, but not all of them were in town. Or doing their jobs.
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It was obvious with the way Niter fumbled for names that he was still quite new to the whole negaverse operation. Considering the intensity of the stare directed at the artificial foliage, It felt safe to assume the corrupt was rather new to the whole negaverse operation. Helio couldn’t really blame Niter. After all, he had been just as bad if not worse when he was first recruited. Times had changed though, and information was precious.
Prehnite and Sylvite were not familiar names, but if they were in the information branch they could be useful to contact at some point. He’d lock those names away for another time. Along it’s Ashanite as a possible curiosity.
Helio was careful not to move for fear of breaking Niters concentration. But, the mention of Faustite, General Faustite caused a shift in stance as a brow rose. When Helio left Faustite had disappeared. It was that moment that Aeolus had decided to venture out and see what else he could do before he had been officially reassigned. To think that Faustite had returned and moved up the ranks to General was, well…both surprising and not. It felt like Faustite had the same multitude of lives as a cat.
“Well, four official names is certainly a good start. Better than I had when I first got to Destiny City.” Offering a crooked smile, Helio dropped his arms. “Good enough that I’ll let you off the hook.” As promised. Of course, the night wasn’t getting any younger and if Helio had any chance of satiating his energy requirements he wasn’t going to do it standing around interrogating someone who knew so little.
Turning on wooden heel Heliodor shifted his focus back to the original quarry of the evening. He glanced over a shoulder back to Niter and offered a wave in goodbye before dropping down from the rooftop.
Strickenized