The Celestial Way

Chapter 8.6 - Haven by the Way

The next day, he patiently waited for the shuttle to arrive. Despite its apparent size, Dragon Retreat turned out to be a rather small settlement, easily walkable from one end to the other within an hour. Airo spend his time wandering aimlessly along the elevated walkways and grounded thoroughfares. The locals gave him a wide berth, intimidated by his armor and dark expression. He paused in his walk from time to time to appreciate the bitter irony. Of all places on this planet, he was stuck in a shrine-town dedicated to dragonkind. Statues of the hateful winged reptiles gazed at him from every corner, as if mocking him and taunting him to take them down with his sword. He was half-tempted to do it, and to the void with this forsaken place.

Night fell, and no shuttle came to pick him up.

On the next day, he asked Kiana to contact the Consortium again. She was mulish and refused at first, yet she consented angrily once she couldn't endure his coercion anymore. He presented himself to the command staff at Kryoon again, with no better results than before. Yes, they would sent a shuttle. No, it couldn't be done ASAP, he was in a hot zone. No, they didn't know why the previous request was ignored. Yes, in a couple of days at most; he had Omega-level clearance, after all.

Airo spent the second day indoors. He took an ordinary datapad, and browsed the shrine-town's database for something to read. When he became bored, he practiced martial arts on the small landing before his room. The hours dragged by. The third day he tried climbing some of the canyon walls; it was an activity he enjoyed in his youth, alongside parkour and swimming. He scaled the smooth vertical surfaces recklessly, clinging to the smallest ledges and handholds in the crystal inlays, heedless of danger, knowing the power armor would prevent any falling incident.

Again there was no shuttle.

On the fifth day, with one very pissed off and furious Kiana, he made one last attempt to contact Kryoon City. By sheer will he refrained from throwing threats at the desk-bound commanders on the other side of the line, knowing the futility and foolishness of such actions. After long arguments and lots of bureaucratic maneuvering, he realized he had been written off. Nobody was willing to send valuable military assets deep into the paraworld's wastelands to recover a single person, even if they would've been a living Ancient. His clearance meant only he couldn't be refused outright. He was promised an extraction again, but this time they didn't even bother giving him an ETA.

Days passed. Airo alternated between staying in his room, and wandering outside, growing increasingly restless and angry. He didn't notice when he swapped the reading datapad for a bottle. He contemplated taking one of the town's ATVs or landcruisers and just get out on his own, but groundside travel was useless on Terra Para without the Beacon Highway; he could become trapped in a spatial maze again, or caught in the open by a warpstorm. He instructed Yeoman Cloud to begin fabrication of an aerial vehicle, anything that could reach the high stratosphere and the nearest Consortium base, even if it took months to build, even if there was a one-in-five chance of a catastrophic design flaw showing up mid-flight.

Kiana and Zuckeroff completely abandoned him, and acted like they were on a vacation: they socialized with the locals, explored the shrine-town, and behaved in a generally care-free way. Airo grew more and more isolated, quietly ostracized by Dragon Retreat's inhabitants. He stopped returning to his room, and instead began to spend his nights in the few bars the shrine-town had, taunting the patrons into fighting him, and flinging curses at them when they ignored him.

And, of course, there was that stupid dragon. Airo thought he had gotten rid of her; yet she came by every evening, asking incessant questions, poking her damned snout in his efforts to distract himself, and being an utter nuisance. He tolerated her, barely, clinging to the thought the moment he left this cursed town, she would stay behind, one way or another.