Ch. 14 -Raison D'etre

The morning's first sunlight was obscured by a blanket of rain and stormclouds. This was an ordinary occurrence in Felarya, and a light downpour like this was hardly enough of a disturbance to keep any of the jungle's residents from going about their business as per usual. The rain's cold touch gently roused a sleeping blonde naga and brought her to let out a quick yawn and a stretch of her arms before donning her typical smile and proceeding to her morning rounds. After waking Anna, and receiving the usual resistance she gave at this daily ritual, Crisis doubled back to check on the second late-sleeper in her midst. Upon arriving at the tree whose hollow interior had become Nadiel's makeshift home, she leaned towards it's knothole entrance and drew in a breath in preparation to jolt him to life with a deafening wakeup call. "Get up, SLEEPYHEAD!" It was surprising that the occupant of the small space wasn't ejected from his shelter by this mighty blast, or that he didn't begin cursing at Crisis as he typically did when she put so much energy into her quest to break both his and Anna's habit of sleeping in. Curious at the lack of snide monologue, Crisis leaned even closer to the knothole, bringing her eye within inches of it to peer inside. Some lambent fungi gave off just enough glow to outline the confines of the hollow, and the apropos dummy left behind to act as a decoy for just this occasion. Unfortunately for Nadiel, he had not anticipated rain on this particular morning and the prerecorded rambling he had timed his mask to play began a minute too late to make a convincing impression of his presence there. Only when Crisis realized that it was just his cloak, boots, and equipment arranged to mimic his sleeping posture did Nadiel's mask begin to wail "Dammit, Crisis, five more minutes!", "Yes, mother...", "Humans weren't made for this, you know.", and his other usual sarcastic remarks. "Hehe" Crisis giggled amusedly, "He never gives up..."

The real Nadiel was only a stone's throw away, perched on top of a large boulder, barefooted, bare chested, rifle in hand, training in the rain. On occasion he had been known to shake the laziness from his system with repeated combat drills in the morning, but in this instance his training was different. However, when he heard Crisis' earsplitting call he immediately ceased his activity and allowed the glow of the angelic seal that he had been attempting to attach directly to his rifle to fade. "Damn," he scowled, "she's ahead of schedule." In attempt to cover up his activity he instead practiced an elaborate series of spinning kicks, which he performed repeatedly until Crisis finally caught up to him, just a moment too late to see the steam rising from the palms of Nadiel's hands, his back, and the length of his weapon. Even though he knew her arrival was all but inevitable, that he may have even heard her creeping up behind him, and that he may have even caught a glimpse of her in the corner of his eye, he was still startled when her arrival was marked with a loud and extended "HIII" that Crisis had been saving just to set things even for his escape. Having lost his balance from her surprise attack he slipped off the side of the boulder and tumbled into an embarrassing faceplant on the ground below, much to the delight of his attacker. "You know I hate it when you do that..." he mumbled angrily as he wiped the mud from his face. "Aww," Crisis fawned, "did the clumsy little human fall down again? Maybe if you ate more than once every two days you wouldn't have that problem." Nadiel shrugged. "I'm not in the mood to hunt right at this second, you can go ahead without me." Disappointed, Crisis retorted: "But that's what you said last time, and the time before. Even Anna's getting more hunting experience than you at this rate." "So take her, then." Nadiel answered, "I need to get cleaned up before I do anything else." At that moment, Crisis' all but eternal smile actually waned just a little, which was enough of a gesture to cause Nadiel to reconsider. As she headed off he let out a long sigh, "I suppose the rain will wash me off if I tag along." Her blissful facial expression and giggling restored, Crisis cheerfully turned and waited for him to catch up.

While in truth he was greatly interested to observe her techniques and was even willing to consider her company mildly pleasant, he wouldn't dare make any notions of this on the outside for fear of encouraging her to treat him even more as an honorary naga hatchling as she was beginning to do, especially after one occasion in which she bound his legs together to enhance the illusion. While Crisis would directly try to teach Anna how to stalk and capture humans, there really wasn't much for her to do with Nadiel, who could already evade their senses with ease, but wasn't large enough to eat them himself. She did find it entertaining to watch him creep up on common travelers, and often deftly stand right behind them, look over their shoulders, even sift through their rucksacks without being noticed. In this instance it was a trio of campers who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time and ended up being used as practice. Nadiel made the first pass at them, making mock assassination poses with his wristblade but stopping it just short of their necks and backs. Having proven how easily he could have eaten them if only he were 60 feet taller, he grabbed a couple handfuls of their food and nodded his head towards their camp, gesturing to Crisis that he was done and it was her turn to have at them. It was quite remarkable to see a creature of her size move just as quickly and quietly as he had done through the dense brush and make her strike on the still unsuspecting campers, who were still huddled around their fire. One of the three happened to be telling a ghost story to the other two, and for the sake of punctuality Crisis waited until the climax to introduce herself, scaring the three campers half to death. Try as they may to run, within a blink of an eye she collected the three of them in her hand and postured herself with the dark cloudy sky above and the fire below to give her face the most imposing silhouette possible. This was more showmanship than usual so Nadiel sat down on a nearby tree branch to enjoy the show while taking a bite of his recently stolen breakfast. Even Crisis' most innocent giggle seemed to her captors to be a menacing laugh, and they quivered and whimpered in her hand, begging for mercy. "Silly humans, afraid of ghosts. Let me show you something really scary..." She opened her mouth wide, putting her set of pearly white teeth and the cavernous entrance to her throat on full display, which wasn't at all beneficial to the campers' levels of courage. Amused at just how much of a reaction they gave, Crisis closed her mouth and giggled some more. Two had practically fainted from this psychological assault and the third was shaking uncontrollably. Because he appeared to be the most energetic, he was chosen as the first to be eaten. Crisis took her time with him, touching him against his face again and again to sample just how violently he was trembling with fear. Then she slowly introduced the poor soul to her mouth and pulled him in halfway to let him kick and thrash about a bit, which he did with every ounce of strength that he had, but to no avail. Crisis tilted her head back and allowed the camper to slide down her throat, forming a shallow bulge that followed the trail of her esophagus down into her chest. A minute or so later when the others came to, she deliberately displayed the quivering protrusion in her gut to them, making them suddenly very curious where the third had disappeared to. "See," Crisis said as she pointed to her stomach, "look how happy he is in there. But oh, he's probably so lonely.... Won't you two give him a little company?" The remaining two campers looked at eachother, then at her, but were frozen stiff with fear and didn't say a word. Crisis' smile grew until it practically reached from ear to ear. "I'll take that as a yes." She said as their faces turned ghastly blue with fright and she gave them a similar treatment to their companion. Nadiel let out a low whistle. "Well then, that was certainly... something." he said in awe of what had just transpired. Crisis rolled onto her back and yawned as she prepared to digest the squirming contents of her bloated belly. "See how much fun it is to be a predator?" she said in a subdued tone of voice while stroking and patting her midsection with her hand. Nadiel strained himself to come up with a witty answer. He did envy her for the sheer amount of pleasure that she could get from something as simple as the act of eating, but he'd sooner shoot himself in the foot than say that aloud. By the time he did come up with something clever to say she had already fallen asleep, so he grumpily turned around and took a relaxing stroll through the woods to relieve his frustration.

After walking alone for about ten minutes, Nadiel came across a shallow stream which flowed over an outcropping, forming a waterfall just tall enough for him to stand under. Still feeling in need of a shower, he had not put on his shirt, cloak, or boots, and now found an opportunity to set himself back in order. He put down the clothing he carried and disrobed from the few items that he had been wearing to briefly wash himself. When this task was complete and he returned to his full uniform the clouds finally subsided and a ray of sunshine pierced the canopy and allowed him to dry himself and his gear. The warmth was very soothing, and Nadiel basked in the sunlight for hours. While in this trance-like state he lost interest in his surroundings, and only when there were sounds of movement did he realize that he was surrounded. Without a second thought he dived behind the nearest piece of cover and armed his weapon. Peeking just the pointy tip of his mask to perform an optical scan, the immediate contact count was only 6, but when he saw the image of who had come for him he was absolutely shocked. They resembled humans, superficially, but were twice as tall as a man and clad in steel. Their curved, metallic faces bristled with various sensors and cameras and their bodies were mostly obscured by the gigantic metal body shields that they carried. Their movement was very organic, these strange, armored giants could articulate themselves with no less grace or dexterity as regular men. "So the shieldmaiden project has finally produced some results, has it?" Nadiel whispered to himself. He had heard of an attempt to artificially grow working muscles specifically to produce a suit of armor that would not sacrifice the stealth and mobility that his people so greatly cherished, but could not believe his eyes that this feat had actually been accomplished. These giants would not be easy to kill, but perhaps if he could bring just one to its knees the others may lose composure. If there are six of them, the odds are good that they're supporting an operation conducted by two infantry combat teams, and an unknown number of SpecOps that may be lurking in the shadows to cover them as well. This was bad, very bad. Nadiel may have been able to eliminate a significant number of his attackers, but even he could not kill all of them on his own. He knew this, and knew it well. But he had only a few options. He could rely on the assistance of a certain blonde to get him out of this mess, but the odds were strong that doing so would just get her killed beside him. If Ryoko intervened the result would likely be the same. His only other choice would be to draw them away from this place and then wear their numbers down until they finally overpower him, which would at least prevent them from causing harm to anyone else. Nadiel slipped from his cover and bolted towards the southeast, with the force behind him in pursuit. After drawing them a suitable distance away from the great tree Nadiel stopped to face the small army gathered behind him, with his weapon at the shoulder. In unison they began to chant a repeating hymn as they began to appear from the greenery. This practice had three purposes. To intimidate an enemy that can hear their approach, but cannot see it, and to call for a martial execution in the field, and a third reason that Nadiel could hardly remember, so sure was he that the first two were being put into full effect. The melody of the chant brought with it waves of nostalgia into Nadiel's mind. Even as he leveled his weapon and prepared to fight to the death he couldn't help but sing along and participate in the chant as well.

Brush moved in the distance behind Nadiel. After going to the trouble of leading his executioners away from the area, Crisis still managed to sense his that he had been gone for too long and that something was wrong. Her teal eye appeared from between two limbs of a tree as she seemed to prepare to leap out to stand between Nadiel and his attackers, but this only seemed to complicate Nadiel's troubles. He turned towards her, and removed his mask to show the fiery look in his eye. Undaunted, Crisis held her ground. As Nadiel's former compatriots began to form a line ahead of him Crisis even drew closer. In one decisive movement he fired his rifle, sending a round flying just ahead of the tip of her nose, and that he followed up with a slow shake of his head. Crisis understood his actions and stern facial expression, and did not come any closer. She refused abandon him entirely, so she remained in place as an uneasy witness to what was to come. Nadiel once again turned his rifle on the assembly of Ellisian warriors, and his anger manifested into coils of light that undulated around his weapon, which drew a shocked expression from the legion of onlookers. With the seal given another breath of life, Ellis' consciousness immediately stormed into Nadiel's own mind and demanded to know what he was doing. Nadiel figured that the answer should be plain as day, but his ancestor seemed to have plenty of reason for him to stay his hand. "Just what do you think they're doing here, boy? Do you really think your master would send one-tenth of his entire armed forces just to look for you?" "If he didn't send them, then who?" Nadiel questioned. "I DID." Ellis boomed. And with that every warrior in the clearing, even the mighty shieldmaidens, bowed their heads towards the glow and the voice. "The men and women here are the ones loyal to me, and thus they shall be loyal to you." he concluded and the light faded away. Not long afterwards a dark blur flew down from above and landed on the ground in front of Nadiel. It was his former SpecOps squad, with a thin woman wearing the commander's cloak. "Talya, is that you?" Nadiel inquired. Immediately the woman's head perked up, for she was the only one of his kind whom he referred to by a first name. She stood and removed her mask. "Yes, master. But you... you're alive! I can hardly believe it.." she exclaimed as she wrapped her arms around him. "We've missed you, brother." Nadiel looked down at the 63 kneeling subordinates he had been given. "Even after I've abandoned you, served only myself, and killed my own kind, you still treat me as your own flesh and blood?" Talya began a warm smile. "You've not changed a bit. You're just as much our brother as you always have been. So, commander, are you ready to lead us to victory?"

Nadiel could not see or hear use any other means to detect the presence of yet another witness to this event, but he knew that she was watching. Somehow his instincts told him that even at this moment, she was nodding in approval. A toothy grin took hold of his face. "So we're to go to war, are we? Well, its not as though I have anything else planned for today..."