Chapter 30: Heart To Heart

Did the Professor send her here to convince me?

The thought was incredibly uncharitable. Abigail had thought she'd gotten over the knee-jerk distrust but apparently wallowing in self pity brought out the worst in her.

“I figured you'd be here, you know,” Elaine said in that deep, husky voice.

“Am I that predictable?”

“Well, when something bothers you you're either singing in the mess hall or training down here. But you didn't really seem to be in the mood to sing, so...”

Abigail huffed. “So why are you here, then?”

“I thought maybe you needed someone to pull you out of your own head so I came to check on you.”

Abigail gave a weak smile and then let Elaine lead her to one of the walls of the training hall. They sat down side by side next to it and Abigail opened the bottle of apple juice, then took a swig. “This isn't a sales pitch, is it?”

“Fuck no,” Elaine said.

“Then why?”

“I get why you ran off. I get why you didn't want that. It hit too close to home, didn't it?”

Abigail's fists clenched. “Yeah.”

“Don't worry,” Elaine said. “If they try to pressure you into it I'll keep them off you. Promise.”

Abigail let out a rueful chuckle. “Thanks, but that's really not what bothers me.”

“Then what is?”

“When it was just about singing it was easy to tell them to fuck off. I did have success without accepting their offers. Maybe not as much, but I did. I could claw my way up on pure talent and effort without debasing myself. But this is different. There's no degrees of success here. We either win every battle or we're dead. Can I afford not to do this?”

Now it was Elaine's turn to chuckle. “You know I thought the exact same thing before I went through with it?”

“You did?”

“Yeah. Just because our circumstances are different doesn't mean I didn't struggle with the decision. It's not just about the act itself, it's about the chance of the whole thing fucking up and turning you into a monster. And it's about the fact that you'll stop aging.”

“Do you actually feel any different?”

“I do,” Elaine said. “It's not just that I'm a lot stronger, to the point where I have to be careful not to flex my strength too much, but my body is also going through changes. I'm aging backwards. It's like my body is twenty-one again.”

“Was that what had you worried?”

“No, it was just... being scared of what happens in a few decades. But then I realized that I didn't have the luxury to worry about the future if my hesitation cost me the future.”

“So you think I should go through with it.”

Elaine shook her head. “You need to find your own answer. The camp being under attack was the final push for me, the one that made me accept the offer.”

Abigail didn't say anything about that and finally Elaine asked:

“Wanna tell me what happened back there? I only know that your buff suddenly cut off.”

“I...” Abigail began, then took a deep breath. “The camp soldiers were affected by the red haze and started shooting at us.” Elaine sucked in a breath. “Their guns barely did anything to our armor but still. I used space magic to neutralize them, using gravity to keep them pressed to the ground. Even that didn't quite work. They were so mad they broke their own bones trying to fight against the gravity field. But still, I was doing it. I was keeping them from harming anyone and I was doing it without killing them.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “But then some of the cadets turned on me. They were the weakest of the bunch, all Level 5 or lower, but they attacked me. They were bearing down on me and I... I panicked. It was like being seventeen again.” Later she would kick herself for mentioning that but right now everything was flowing out of her. “I was about to use everything I had in a massive blast of fire. I knew it would kill them, that it would kill people who were brainwashed and hadn't done anything wrong but in my head it kept spinning on repeat that I didn't want to be a victim anymore. But before I could let loose Ophelia showed up and saved me.”

Elaine sagged in relief and reached out to stroke Abigail's hair. Abigail flinched back at the touch but then leaned into it a moment later. “I'm so sorry you had to go through that, Abigail.”

“If only I had been stronger...” Abigail whispered.

“Do you want me to be nice right now or do you want me to be honest?” Elaine asked, her voice soft but her tone serious.

“Honest,” Abigail muttered.

“If you'd been a Lacrima things would have gone worse.”

“Huh?”

“Think about it,” Elaine said. “If you'd had the same powers as me you would have been fighting on the front line, right next to me. You would have been so tough that keeping you in the back with the other supporters would have been a waste. And if you hadn't been there to stop the soldiers and draw the attention of the brainwashed cadets, who knows what would have happened before Ophelia arrived?”

Abigail opened her mouth to argue but nothing came out.

“Not only that but unless becoming a Lacrima gives you perfect prescience, you wouldn't have been able to see the attack coming any more than you did.”

“Well maybe unlocking more of Apollo's power would do that,” Abigail argued.

“Maybe, maybe not. Either way, things worked out because you were where you were.”

“So you want me to stay weak.”

“First of all, you're not weak,” Elaine said. “Second of all, it's still your decision. But becoming a Lacrima is a life-altering decision that you need to think about carefully. Don't rush into it but don't deny the idea outright, okay?”

Abigail heaved a sigh. “Okay.” She paused a moment, then added: “Elaine?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“Always,” Elaine said, getting up and then pulling Abigail up.

The two of them were about to head out of the training hall when Jeanne entered it.

“Welcome back,” the angel said in her French accent.

“Hey, Jeanne,” Elaine greeted and Abigail thought she noticed the faintest hint of a blush on her Awakener's face. “What brings you down here? Did you want to train or...”

Jeanne nodded. “I was hoping the two of you would be interested in sparring with me.”

“The two of us?” Abigail asked dubiously. “Don't you mean Elaine?”

“Non,” Jeanne said. “Normally celestials fight in pairs, you know? We haven't really been able to for lack of manpower, but it is the norm. And I think the two of you would work quite well together.”

“How so?” Abigail asked.

“Normally one fights in front and the other supports from the back. That lends itself to your fighting roles, non?”

Elaine turned to Abigail and said: “I'm willing but what about you?”

Abigail considered. If she was supposed to be a supporter then this would be a great test to see if her support was actually worth a damn. She'd felt the fathomless depth of Jeanne's power once before. It would be interesting to see if her support would be able to bridge that gap. There was just one thing that... “If celestials usually fight in pairs, why won't you find yourself a partner?”

“Because her best option will be too busy to make sure nobody dies,” a sultry voice said and a moment later Rachel entered the training hall.

“Indeed,” Jeanne said. “So?”

Abigail nodded. “Let's do it.”

**

Apparently Rachel or Jeanne must have sent a message among the cadets because in the time it had taken Abigail and Elaine to don their armor the training hall had filled up with people.

Oh good. If we lose, we get to embarrass ourselves in front of the entire base.

It was a pessimistic thought but the fact that Jeanne believed herself to be a match for both of them did not bode well. But Abigail had an advantage. She'd seen Jeanne fight before.

“This is not a test,” Jeanne said, addressing Elaine and Abigail but speaking loud enough that the entire crowd could hear her. Good lord but she had great projection. “I am not the Professor and I will not yield if you manage to land a single hit on me. Show me the power of the first Lacrima in decades and the best supporter in Project Divinity.

No pressure or anything, Abigail thought, her bow in her hands and Ophelia's Lampade Wand held by Evelyn's Deva Arms.

Elaine already had six crystal swords floating behind her back and Jeanne was carrying her Trumpet. Not the musical instrument but the ornate golden halberd named after it, the one originally designed as the weapon and symbol of office of the Trumpeters, the angels who would usher in the end of the world. The weapon was obscenely powerful. It could pierce the toughest armor and wasn't slowed by flesh nor bone. It also enhanced magic cast through it and acted as a battery for that magic, filling up a little with each spell cast through it and then capable of ejecting the stored power in a single, devastating attack.

When Abigail had seen Jeanne in action the angel had used that ability to form a blade of plasma and carve apart a Shoggoth, a building-sized Outsider created by feeding a Dark Young thousands of sacrifices.

It hadn't been the most powerful attack Abigail had ever seen, of course. That honor belonged to the achingly bright flash of light that had destroyed an army in the blink of an eye, Evelyn's Vasavi Shakti. But Jeanne's plasma blade had certainly been the most powerful attack delivered with a melee weapon Abigail had ever seen. If her or Elaine got hit by something like that, no amount of healing magic would save them. They'd be lucky to leave corpses behind.

Stop that. She's not going to pull something like this when sparring with allies.

**

Elaine had been itching for an opportunity like this. She'd beaten Prudence so handily at arm wrestling that she was desperate to see how her power stacked up against a Cherubim, and Prudence's direct superior at that. The fact that Jeanne had wanted Abigail to join to make it fair had her thinking that Jeanne was an order of magnitude stronger than Prudence and therefore completely out of her league but at the same time she struggled to think of anyone she'd rather have as support than Abigail.

Alexis was an amazing fighter, Ophelia a great healer and absolutely murderous with her new magic, Cassie could block hits others had to scramble to dodge, and Evelyn could hit harder than anyone else. But in this situation what Elaine really needed was someone who could stand back and support her with a variety of buffs and a bit of fire support. And that was precisely what Abigail could provide better than anyone else. It hadn't been flattery when Jeanne had called her the best supporter of Project Divinity. It had been simple truth.

“Everybody ready?” Rachel asked, apparently acting as both medic and referee.

“Ready,” Jeanne said, loud and clear.

“All set,” Abigail said from behind Elaine.

“Ready,” Elaine said.

“Then... begin!”