District 42-Chapter 104: Preparations
Casper left the storage room in which he was with Amelia and Olaf. The last followed him as expected, and the head nurse stayed there, seemingly to be both excited and disturbed with the sudden start of something as big as what the White warrior had in mind.
The soldier walked through the infirmary and settled in a random room, picking the master key in the pocket of the lab coat and activating it quickly. Olaf looked flabbergasted to him, hardly believing in what his eyes were seeing.
"H-hey, how could you take this thing back? Does Anton ran away successfully in the battle we had at that corridor in front of the Lab’s entrance?"
Casper stared back at him, who never averted his eyes from the white cube.
"I don’t know why it’s related with Anton, to be honest... And, take it back? It has been a while since I took it back from him." He assured, making the man even more confused.
"But..." Olaf pondered about what Casper said to him, versus what Anton told. He didn’t know why the middle-aged man had to lie to them about the master key, or how he could get one.
"Maybe he didn’t want us to know that he has the power to acquire one? Or is it something else? What’s up with that old man?" After he got pensive and stopped to talk, Casper just brushed it off and focused on what he needed to do for now.
The soldier remained operating the keyboard again for some while, but it wasn’t so long as the previous times. He was just adjusting some details. Other than it, reviewing to make everything happen perfectly.
"Ok, it’s ready. With just one click, our plan will start. Can you tell Alfar that we are getting ready?" Olaf nodded, not paying much attention to what he asked to him, but getting the message somehow.
When the trio was gathered into one of the individual rooms, Casper explained to them what he would need.
"These things here are capsules with some kind of drug that will be crucial to help the prisoners to break the mask’s restrictions. I will need that you two pass through each block and use this in the corridors." Casper took the capsules that he received while still in the laboratory. They seemed to be enough to each block of Halden. If they were unlucky, maybe just one block or two would be missing.
Alfar heard attentively to the first part and had some worries about it.
"The way you spoke about it makes it seem easier than it is, actually. I mean, me and Olaf aren’t the best people to do this type of thing. It’s not like we are the athletic or skillfully type after all."
Olaf was also pondering about that matter and, incredibly, looked way more optimistic about it than Alfar. Since he heard the word escape, his eyes lit up, and that naive and insecure man had partially disappeared.
"We can do this if we prepare a good plan..." Both of his partners looked intently at him, which made him went a bit shy. "Eh... W-well, what I am saying is that we don’t need to think in this plan in a way that outrightly disqualifies us because of our limitations. We can take a path that uses our advantages..."
Interested, Alfar motivated him to talk more, and so did Casper.
"Instead of run through each Block, let them take us to our cells. If they do this, we will be already there, you know? And, if we can take our entire blocks to react, we can use them to help us to conquer the others, one by one. We don’t need to do this alone."
"Yeah! That’s great. Good job, Olaf." Casper complimented, patting him on the shoulder. Alfar nodded in the most energetic way he could (which wasn’t much, by the way), agreeing with him. The Dark elf was satisfied with the plan. Use people to fill the gaps he had in his skills was what he did until now to survive in Halden.
"Ok, that’s great for me as well. But it will not work when we are talking about you, Olaf." Casper was dumbfounded as to why Alfar would say something like this but realized that Olaf was even nodding with his head for him.
"You probably noticed, Casper, that Olaf has this problem in his arm and leg. He is a Guinea pig of low value. If the Ridires kill him, they will not pay a huge bill. But, talking about me, it’s a different thing... So I think it’s better if I go alone to surrender because, at least, I will be sure that they wouldn’t kill me."
Casper found it to be a reasonable plan and agreed with them.
"Then, we have the first step. Now, for the others, we will just need me to operate this master key here. Just do what I said with the capsules, and the rest will be very intuitive."
Alfar and Olaf didn’t seem too much pleased to still be unaware of the actual plan, but they did not open their mouths to complain about it. They understood a long time ago that that was how Casper worked with people.
"Ok, if we already set everything, let’s go now?" Both said ’yes’ at the same time, and they left the room.
...
About half an hour had passed since their meet in that room at the infirmary. Alfar was pretty confident that nothing would happen with him, but, still, it was his life put at stake there.
He didn’t know exactly how bold and rebel the Ridires could be. He learned with time that nobody can underestimate a human’s selfishness and craziness. After all that he, Olaf, and Casper did inside the prison in the last hours, it was uncertain what would be their intentions.
He raised his head slightly, glancing at the Ridire that was in front of him. His eyes passed for each one of the warriors that his vision could catch. He was being surrounded, and all of them were pointing their rifles towards him.
"Don’t be scared. Everything will be ok. And you will not need to kill anybody." He tried to calm down himself, not just because of his negative thoughts, but also because, in times like that, Deamhan, his second personality, started to talk in his mind. He would keep persuading Alfar to lose control, to give up in his despair, to don’t trust them. The Dark elf was always trying to take control, and Alfar needed to be focused all the time to not let him do so.
The Ridire in front advanced some steps, walking calmly towards him. He put his hand in Alfar’s head and then forced him to lower it completely.
"We said to you to kneel and look to the floor, didn’t we? Be obedient, you monster."
The Dark elf didn’t respond, letting his head as much lowered as he could and giving up on being stubborn.
"Hey, Sir Rolvur? Yeah, we caught one of them. It’s Alfar... Yeah, we didn’t have the chance to catch Casper. This guy and another one that seems to be a failure got out running from inside the infirmary. We didn’t get the second one as well. Yeah. Roger." The same Ridire who was holding Alfar’s head was talking on the phone with someone. When Alfar heard the name of that dirty guy, he almost snapped. The Dark elf was still there, hoping for more negative emotions and motivations, and Alfar’s thoughts were a full meal to him.
"Ok, he said to not kill him, anyway. He is a good guinea pig and is taking part in an important project, so we can’t even scratch him. Besides, although he has this peaceful personality, he is still very inclined to be dangerous, so be careful dealing with him."
He handcuffed Alfar, then raised him from the ground, making him look inside his eyes for a moment. The warrior’s eyes were filled with anger and disgust.
"A lot of people died because of your friend. I hope you keep this in mind until we get back to interrogate you, otherwise you will be just another murderer, got it?" The Dark elf looked back to him, without any fear, clenching his fists and biting his lips in frustration at those words.
The warrior gave up in intimidating or try to put him in the line and just dragged him through the corridors until his cell.
"Remember to keep searching for the others. Be clever, and stay alive. If we lose more personnel for that man with white hair, I will start to get furious and do something stupid!" Those warriors responded to him in unison, seemingly spirited.
The Ridire walked with Alfar for some while, without saying a single word. He let him into his cell and then left after closing the gate completely.
Alfar gave a faint smile, walking more inside of his place and getting nostalgic.
"Good... half of the first step is done... And now" he took out from his clothes the capsules of gaseous Berserker. "Let’s see what you have prepared for us, White warrior!"
