THE WAY TO WAR

It was dark. Wet. 
It was cold too. 
The wind was howling, shooting the rain sideways, seemingly straight through the material that made up Caylle Blaanch’s coat. Ambient city light threw reflections off the puddles on the narrow, cobbled sidewalk. It was silent as he cut through the shadows. Silent in the way stormy nights were silent with rain spattering against the cobblestones, wind throwing random fits and the air heavy with temper. No sane man would be caught dead in this storm… 
Caylle smiled grimly to himself.
The outer-city of Basal was sleeping. It was so late it could be termed early to those who liked mornings. In the same way Caylle didn’t like to be cold, he didn’t really like mornings. But here he was, experiencing both. 
Lovely… 
His thoughts spun around almost unconsciously as he ignored his superficial discomforts. His negative emotions were buried so deep he was barely aware of them. His focus was on returning to the second compound in the middle of Old Town, at the north corner of Way City. He was more aware of the silence of his surroundings, the weight of the nightstick on the left side of his belt and the pistol on the right. His boots made no sound on the wet cobbles, and if anyone had been awake, they wouldn’t have seen him.
But he was alone, so he didn’t need to worry about it. The type of things he did and what he was were more suited to the solitary darkness.
His surroundings became more familiar as he broke into the compound’s outer territory. The flicker of movement at the corner of his eye had him melting into a deeper shadow almost unconsciously. He reached automatically for his nightstick. There it was again, furtive and sneaking… The light from a working street lamp glinted off red hair. 
Laura?
He was moving before he thought about it, skirting around well-known paths and alleys to come out in front of the slinking figure. She froze, a flash of moonlight broke through the clouds, revealing her and the two little boys held tightly to her sides. The light reflected off their hair in damp, white halos. Hers remained a dull auburn color. 
“Laura… what are you doing out here? What are you doing with the twins?” 
He was truly confused, all three of them should have been deep in the underground lab beneath the second compound, sleeping—or working, since Laura was a morning person. Caylle knew this because Laura was his friend, his only friend. The two little silver-haired boys were the only concept of family that he recognized. They clung to her, staring at him from frightened golden eyes. 
Stared at him… 
With fear and without recognition.
“What have you done?” His voice came out flat and he couldn’t change it. 
“Caylle…” Water flattened Laura’s hair to her head, clinging to her face. She hadn’t bothered to brush it away. “Please understand! This was the only way.” Her voice was desperate, weak and shaking. 
There were no emotions in those young gold eyes, only confusion. Shell-shocked and empty.
Caylle felt part of his world crumble around his head. “You erased their memories.” Even his flat tone disappeared. His voice was nothing, he felt like nothing.
“Please, Caylle! They were going to use them to work that machine!” she pleaded, her head jerking to glance behind her fearfully. “Do you know what they would do if they could control that thing? I had to, to protect the boys, to protect everyone!” 
Caylle didn’t much care about everyone… He only cared about the fact the two eight year olds he had helped raise, that had helped raise him, were gone. And Laura, his friend, had done this. He felt a peculiar cold emptiness settle over him, the very epitome of the mindset that dominated most of his existence. He let it flow over him and take control. He hid behind it. 
“This is insubordination,” he said tonelessly, drawing his pistol with his right hand and aiming it directly between her eyes. “Turn around, or I’ll shoot you.” Laura’s evergreen gaze was black in the semi-darkness, there was fear there but there was pity too. Understanding. 
He didn’t want or need her pity. He didn’t want or need anything from her anymore. 
“Caylle… I know you’re angry. I know you don’t understand right now. But can’t you see? They will never survive here. They’ll become like you. Killers. Do you want that?” 
Despite the chill lack of emotion he had hidden behind, Caylle felt a stab of betrayal, of anger. 
“You’re not a weapon, Caylle, you’re a human.” She had said that once, now she told him this? 
“You’re just trying to get out of here alive,” he stated. “You just don’t want to die.” 
The smaller boy to the left sniffed suddenly and hiccuped as he tried not to cry. The other one had been crying the whole time. They were identical in everything but size and the shade of their eyes.  
“Don’t cry, Shuu,” Caylle said, unable to distance himself from them the way he wanted to. The way he just had with Laura, letting go of everything they shared in the past. He just couldn’t with the twins, even if they didn’t know him now. Maybe they would remember him when they were older. 
If Laura took them away, there would be an older…
“It’s okay, Kagaali.” 
Caylle dropped his eyes and let his arm fall to his side. Something rose up in him as he stepped back, yelling at him to stop her from spiriting away the two main subjects of Project Kashii, which was so much beyond the Hunter Project. To call in her disobedience, shoot her, anything to keep her from getting away. 
But he pushed it down. 
She stared at him as tears mixed with the rain on her cheeks. Her face always got splotchy when she cried, her fair complexion turning red and haggard. “We will meet each other again,” she promised him, her voice thick. 
“No. We won’t,” Caylle replied, putting a threat behind his words. He knew if he ever saw her again it would be through a scope. “Get out of here before I change my mind.” 
She didn’t thank him as she pulled the twins past him, fresh tears spilling down her face. He wouldn’t have heard her even if she had. He was too busy building mental walls to keep out the emotions that were trying to roll over him. Trying to break him down, break through his conditioning. He wouldn’t let them. He couldn’t. 
So he accepted the cold emptiness, the distance, and let Laura Wilson run away with the only two pieces that would classify as his heart.