In a narrow room, with a yellow light, almost neon that illuminated the room, there were several people standing, some outside the door due to the limited space, others near the bed, attentive to their companion's condition.
He breathed heavily, his chest rose and fell rapidly, his coloration was pale, paler than normal, and his temperature was very high, almost 42°C.
"If he was like that, why did he push himself in training?, he's supposed to have said that no one should be a burden to the other"
With bitterness, Ethan said those words while looking at the man lying in bed who moved with difficulty and was bathed in sweat.
They were supposed to be fine by the time they were in Florencia, 2 days wouldn't be enough for him to recover.
"…His body was at its limit, first the time he spent with us, during that time he was only tortured, he didn't eat for a week, he only drank when they drowned him in the bathtub. Then he faced us and Peter, after organizing us, he went for the bags of money, he said we would need them later; then he fought against the district boys, it must have put him in a high stress state"
Lucius mentioned to the others while holding a wet cloth that dripped in a bucket and placed it on Heiss's head. He continued counting after leaving it.
"The wounds he received were more than critical, although he told us that the guy from the district was on our side, I didn't think they would have to carry out the act at such a level for it to be credible, look at being cut on the neck and pierced with an iron bar through your back, near the spine is for maniacs. He died and came back to life thanks to the medicines he took, stopping his heart and preventing him from bleeding out more than expected. We couldn't transfuse him blood, only overload his body so his metabolism would increase and heal those wounds with the syringes. He still feigned normalcy the following days, resting a little and preparing for this, all very meticulous if you ask me; but I agree with Ethan, why reach such a degree of demand?"
The gazes fixed on the boy, they were cold expressions, a minuscule part was guilt, as if he were the one carrying a weight that they couldn't see.
"..You better tell them, Cloe"
Each one heard those words, everyone turned to see who had said them, it was none other than Rudolf, who stared at Heiss, as if wishing that at least the suffering he had would stop. It was hypocritical, yes, he was the one who tortured him the most, with the desire to finish that job and search for his son, yet they were mere excuses compared to what he truly felt towards Heiss, it was respect, his actions made it clear that he cared about them, and he simply couldn't understand his actions, which made his frustration keep increasing.
His strength not to be bent before torture was something that also made him gain his recognition, compared to how cowardly he was, 'I should have fought more for my son', was what he thought upon seeing what it was to fight seriously, and yet he also didn't understand what Heiss wanted.
"...", Cloe said nothing to those words, she just turned and contemplated Heiss's face.
They both felt the same, they knew nothing about that person, they didn't understand his motives, and yet they felt that they should be very alarmed by the words he said when they were on the deck.
"It's fine, but I want your cooperation, according to what Rudolf and I believe, it's that Heiss wants us to take an option, one that will define our actions in the future, and I think it has to do with the districts"
"….", The silence was palpable in the room, you could hear crickets and other insects in the night, the ship moving gently, creating a characteristic sound of a boat.
"I think we owe it to him", was what Jesús said upon noticing the tension in the air.
Each one knows that they couldn't have gotten out without his help and guidance.
"I agree", said Lucius, who affirmed with Marcus.
Caleb's group was in a not very pleasant position, they knew that if they got involved in something complicated they could involve lady Kalika in it, on the other hand, what they learned could serve them to take precautions, plus if they felt indebted to Heiss.
"If it's about supporting him, I think we can keep it in mind", said Caleb, without committing too much to the team, but showing that they weren't going to say no.
Later each one agreed and Cloe decided to tell them what had happened on the deck.
***
His strength not to be bent before torture was something that also made him gain his recognition, compared to how cowardly he was, 'I should have fought more for my son', was what he thought upon seeing what it was to fight seriously, and yet he also didn't understand what Heiss wanted.
"...", Cloe said nothing to those words, she just turned and contemplated Heiss's face.
They both felt the same, they knew nothing about that person, they didn't understand his motives, and yet they felt that they should be very alarmed by the words he said when they were on the deck.
"It's fine, but I want your cooperation, according to what Rudolf and I believe, it's that Heiss wants us to take an option, one that will define our actions in the future, and I think it has to do with the districts"
"….", The silence was palpable in the room, you could hear crickets and other insects in the night, the ship moving gently, creating a characteristic sound of a boat.
"I think we owe it to him", was what Jesús said upon noticing the tension in the air.
Each one knows that they couldn't have gotten out without his help and guidance.
"I agree", said Lucius who affirmed with Marcus.
Caleb's group was in a not very pleasant position, they knew that if they got involved in something complicated they could involve lady Kalika in it, on the other hand, what they learned could serve them to take precautions, plus if they felt indebted to Heiss.
"If it's about supporting him, I think we can keep it in mind", said Caleb, without committing too much to the team, but showing that they weren't going to say no.
Later each one agreed and Cloe decided to tell them what had happened on the deck.
Medellín, at the time of what's happening on the boat.
"Miss, are you sure about canceling the investment for the agricultural group AgroNexa?"
It was a spacious office, with large windows that showed the beauty of the city's lights, it was well furnished and lit, giving a warm welcome with its immaculate white colors with cultural art from the region.
"I am, with the information that Caleb gathered about the possible….no, about the inevitable coup d'état, it's a waste to invest something in this country when in a few months its economy will go to hell. Food will become scarce and prices will rise, what I want is to take everything possible at very affordable prices, without that advantage those companies are useless to me"
"Alright, the next on the list is the meeting you'll have with the young heiress of Constructoras de Sementó S.A.S, let me tell you that I didn't think she would accept seeing you after the bombing incident"
"Once I mentioned Heiss she didn't say anything else and accepted, they must be very close"
Kalika decided to approach in person and dissuade her from having a conversation, at first she refused, but when she heard it had to do with Heiss she changed her attitude. She thought it would take her more time or other approaches, to her surprise she accepted without putting up a fight.
"The meeting is covered, the only thing left is to sort out the issue with your sister"
A few days ago, Kalika's sister visited her in person, traveling from Japan with only the intention of speaking face to face with her. The issue was the inheritance succession that would take place in the middle of next year.
As much as it seemed, Kalika was not alone with the Tanaka family issue, of the 9 siblings she has, 2 of them support her completely, they even know of her decision to bring down the family and make a revolution. Between the 3 of them a coup against their family was being developed, everyone did their part, some more specific than others; Kalika is in charge of foreign relations and the country, her sister is an expert in data analysis and large-scale arms trafficking, her brother has a lower profile, seemingly just another company worker like her other two sisters, but he has 2 primary abilities, one is his handling of accounting and the other is his handling of computer systems, in simple words, he's someone with the ability to hack and manage financial systems as if it were breathing.
For the coup against this family, the vision of necessary change was required, and his siblings had that.
It may be that weapons didn't seem to have much impact in the war for control in a corporate administrative environment, but nothing could be further from the truth, this is a war for control of the most powerful family in all of Japan.
Each of the members had vans with heavily armed men, 24-hour escorts and as if that wasn't enough, densely tangled connections with politicians and people of high influence in and outside Japan.
No one messed with them because the consequences could be disastrous, from being incriminated in a crime you didn't commit, to disappearance.
"I believed his visit was unnecessary, it's already a risk that two heirs meet, I didn't think they would already start moving on their side"
"Miss, do you think they will also call her to take sides with some heir?"
With a pen in her hand, she started spinning it while staring at her butler.
"I don't think so, not for now, they know that I'm the last to take sides with someone, they will only call me when things are tight between them, even though they had the audacity to call my two brothers because they're also adopted, it doesn't mean they run to ask for help, they know very well that they would look desperate if they come to me for my vote"
Both Kalika and her two siblings were adopted by the family elder, although they were heirs by title, each one knew they had no opportunity for the position of succession, this due to the main branch of the family and the secondary ones, which exercised power to monopolize the position, on the part of the elder he only said they could do as they pleased.
"Your two older siblings are the ones with the greatest probability of inheriting the position, the third never paid attention to succession events"
"Yes…. And yet he is the most dangerous of all"
"What makes you think that?"
She looked at him out of the corner of her eye, turned to the window and looked at the crowded streets, it was calm, the air was hot.
"Haa..", she let out a sigh into the air.
"His eyes….they are a sign that you shouldn't play with him, maybe he shows disinterest in almost everything that has to do with politics or orders of power, his studies are normal, without standing out, although he doesn't fail anything either, he doesn't try and comes out with decent results for most, a disaster of course for the family. And yet….it's as if he did it on purpose. In the trainings he never gave his all, the only time we had to face each other he said he didn't want to fight with me, that it would be a bother, with the others he didn't care. Despite his disinterested behavior, with me he was always more cautious than with the rest. I'm not saying that the two older ones aren't strong, of course they are, we all had a masterful education, but among all, I feel that the third one is more aware, his eyes are very fine to my mind, and unlike the others, I don't have a single standard for him, I don't know how strong he really is, because he does everything to go unnoticed or just to participate"
"Should I send someone to observe him, miss?"
"No, for now he has no interest in the position, or anything in particular, he also has no connections, so he's not a problem, if he had some ambition I could bring him to my side, but I have nothing to offer"
"Then why did he decide to join the older brother?"
"….", his silence said more than anything, that's because she didn't really know why she had made that decision, maybe he offered to let the family leave him alone or some comfort without being bothered in the future, who knows and that was the only thing she still couldn't understand. To join Kalika requires doing a lot of work, that's why she knew he wouldn't accept being on her side, besides being risky because he was a legitimate son of the secondary branch.
"Let's leave the topic here, bring the girl in. She is something that deserves more of my attention, even more after learning that he accepted seeing me after saving my people"
The person speaking was about Heiss, Caleb's report left her surprised, not only because the districts were involved in this matter. It seemed that Heiss was a skilled master at combat, he seemed to be stronger than her team, she still didn't know how Heiss had wiped the floor with her team, so she only made an estimate of his strength.
'Maybe he's close to the strength of the first-order inquisitor', she thought after reasoning about his strength, she wanted to have a strength that she could control, not one that was an unpredictable variable.
For her plan, she needed someone with the potential to be completely empty, she could do it without him, but it might not be exempt from dangerous losses for her. It was more feasible to make him enter the family in a way that wouldn't be suspected for not having a past, be uninteresting for his own empty personality and finally be able to exert control through him, he was a sacrificial pawn, if he survived she thought she would reward him much more than she intended to offer him.
"Clanck"
At that moment Nile left to tell the girl she could come in, at that moment a thin girl with blonde hair stood up from her seat and approached the door, she didn't appear to be more than 16 years old, she was accompanied by what seemed to be her bodyguard.
Kalika stared intently at the door, and in a small murmur, something was heard last that was not perceptible to Nile.
"….And for all of this to work there's only one way"
***
In the small room, an uncomfortable silence reigned. No one dared say a word after hearing Cloe tell them what Heiss had said, it was hard to think that someone could change so much because of others, however, they were unaware of the problems that the codices must have gone through to get out alive from those tests, therefore, they decided to focus on the topic of the "selection" that Heiss mentioned.
Everyone had doubts about the meaning of those words.
"It sounds like if the district is going to do something big, the way he says when he discards us the rest makes it seem like we're not welcome in that plan, or at least we're not being taken into account", Caleb gave his perspective
"What if it's a genocide?", Jesús mentioned in a whisper.
"It could be, but there are still gaps, like for example his motives", said Ethan analyzing what they could be wanting, it was the question that gnawed at him during all the time he was hunted in Kazakhstan.
"What motives would a terrorist organization have?, all they did in Paris was a massacre, no one survived the flames and even worse they had the audacity to say publicly that it was them", mentioned Emily upset by remembering the tragedy from 2 years ago.
"But there must be a purpose, we shouldn't be ignorant, if they were capable of that disaster two years ago, we won't know to what extent they can go, a human race extermination could be inevitable!"
A heated discussion took place in the small room, they had conflicting opinions about what position they should take in light of this information, if there was really a genocide in progress they should do something to prevent it, the question was what can we do against them?
"We must report to the UN and different organizations, we must go directly with CRITON, they should be able to do something about this possible threat"
One by one they affirmed or proposed another idea, it was a debate about what to do, what each one should do, what position they would take and if they should report it.
In the end they all concluded that the best thing would be to report it, it would be a problem for not having evidence, but the mere warning could alert them, no one wanted to get directly involved, therefore, it was better for the experts to take care of it and CRITON was the specialist. Founded a month after the Paris bombing "Le Vide Rouge", it was the indicator to the world that a new group had appeared, a threat that they knew nothing about.
They called it CRITON after Socrates' dialogue, a way of saying that the sentence will have execution, an allusion that escape or flight won't arrive since the judgment is inevitable, a bit different from the work, but emphasizing that the trial against the districts for humanity is inevitable.
"Are we all in agreement?, we should present the case once we meet with lady Kalika and report it through a means that they can feel veracity"
Each one nodded, and finally they could breathe a bit about this topic, that is until a voice spoke.
"So that's your answer, leave everything to the others?"
Everyone was startled and took a step back, the person was none other than Heiss.
He had only one eye open and breathed with difficulty, looked at them with an expression of disappointment while looking at each one with difficulty.
"Truly such narrow minds"