The Knights of Grimm - Act 4 - Whispers of Arkhonex

Chapter 9 - The Pathogen

Kassius

He paces back and forth down the Isomacium bars of their cell, like a dog waiting to pounce the moment finds a way out of this compartment. His amber eyes are narrowed constantly as he moves up and down the cell walls, whilst Cardin just throws his bouncy ball against the wall constantly. Repeatedly catching it in his hand when it rebounds back to him. Whereas the Huntsman named Locke finds himself constantly on edge, waiting for them to get dragged out or something. Always ready to start a fight or something like that.

Cardin glances over to Kassius with merely his eyes as he catches the ball in his large hand. He sighs, sitting up from his bed as Kassius slows down, gripping the bars with both his hands. "Are you gonna be pacing around all night?" Cardin curiously inquires Kassius, as he looks out to the window which reveals the falling sun and the rising Fractured Moon. Kassius looks back at him, his metal hand still holding onto the Isomacium forged bar.

"There's gotta be a weakness." Kassius says, pulling the bar with his hand, but even the concrete does not crack or move.

"Trust me pal – that shit doesn't break. I have thrown myself at it countless times and it has not moved an inch. Hate to say it buddy, but we are stuck here." Cardin informs with a heavy sigh.

"Quit being such a defeatist – we're getting out of this godforsaken hell hole." Kassius states, Cardin looks down to the floor with sunken eyes.

"Maybe some people should stay in cells." He sighs.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Kassius questions, looking back to the Winchester Huntsman on his bed who bounces the ball up and down against the floor as he sits there, one leg hanging over the edge slightly. Cardin stares back at him with grief very clear in his eyes.

"It means I deserve this...what I did to my own team...even to the Headmaster and that Pyromancer. I should be dead – but I guess rotting away in a cell is a more deserving punishment for a piece of shit like myself." Cardin mournfully tells Kassius, so much grief and depression bursting from his voice and heart.

"Quit moping then. You're not the only piece of shit that failed their team, you know." Kassius informs as he looks over his shoulder at Cardin, which gets his attention. "Do you see me giving up?"

"What happened? What went wrong?" Cardin inquires, and Kassius sighs as he lowers his head. He has not had to tell this story in quite a long time, yet the memories feel so fresh even now. He may have accepted what happened but it does not mean he has forgotten – he has just found another place for it. A place he has gone back digging to so then he can fill Cardin in on his own past.

"Gods...what didn't go wrong?" Kassius sighs, turning away from the Isomacium bars and he sits down on his own bed, pressing his hands against his legs. "My team – Team K.R.D.V, Cordovan. Kassius, Rajah, Draven...and Vetra." He describes, even though he has moved on from her death and is fully committed to Yang – it does not mean that he does not stammer at the mere mention of her name.

Cardin quickly catches onto that. "Did you and um...Vetra...have a thing? Before you met Yang?" Cardin inquires, clearly unaware of their long and pretty complicated history together.

"No...I knew Yang long before Vetra, we did start...kinda dating...I dunno it was a silly fling at first. We only kissed back then, never got far till I moved to Mistral." Kassius informs, the whole past between the two of them is beyond awkward. But it was real just as it is now, realer than what he had with Vetra, but that does not make that fake either.

Love is a complicated thing, can either bring happiness or can bring destruction.

"Damn dude – crazy shit huh?" Cardin chuckles, making Kassius chuckle too.