Sigma/Star

Chapter 134: Humming

"Normal."

"Good."

There was a long pause as everyone waited for Rex to catch up and remember what he had to say. They had been constantly working with him in an effort to get him to memorize the specific things he had to say before, during, and after operations, but he was a lost puppy at best. "Uhm...it works?"

"Close enough." Ardwen gripped his controls tightly and settled into his seat, releasing a large breath as he attempted to relax slightly. They had some travel time before they would reach the Breach, and so he knew his anxiety would only increase from here. They still did not know how they would be greeted, either by the Enian Federation they had fled, or the Artisan Confederate they had intercepted, and they knew already they weren't exceptionally welcomed by the Eastern United States. It could be a rough welcome that resulted in their instant evisceration. It wouldn't take much to order a few special squads and generals to turn and fire. "Then we move out."

* * * * *

Porter and the White Storm zipped along, covering ground in the blink of an eye. The teen could already feel the electrical buzz across his skin, the surge of chi coming out from within him, accelerated by the machine around him. He continued his humming, tapping his finger along as he travelled. Viewscreens shifted around him, projecting his time of arrival, calculating the best route, and identifying potential targets and areas to attack.

"You don't have to do all that you know," Porter chuckled. "Maps are fine and all, but best angles of approach? Ideal targets? I can fight you know."

"Consider it a brother's wariness," Sigma replied from the sky. "I'm just looking out."

Porter leaned his head back slightly in his seat. "The Goliath can calculate a lot of information I need, and I still think I'll be alright either way. The last person I had to train under would have whipped me senseless if I tried to rely on a machine to figure out how to fight."

"He seems to have done a lot of things to you in a very limited period of time. You're feeling very confident from the looks of things."

"I know you can read biometrics, Sigma. You and I both know that isn't true, but the last thing my friends need is to think that I'm terrified. If they believe that I'm ready to saunter into war, then they will follow behind me."

"You do think you're better than you were before though, do you not?" The screens within Porter's cockpit changed, moving away from battle reports into key communications between the many leaders at the upcoming battleground.

"Maybe." Porter inspected his hands, looking over them in detail. He followed the little lines along his skin, the tiny indentations that cross together into organized chaos, patterns that came and went depending on how he looked at them. His eyes flowed along to the individual hairs, to the veins he could see just under the skin, and to the nails at the tip of each finger, with the little cuts along them from his combat training. "I needed to be a better me. All this training I have ever received before was about ability and things beyond what a normal soldier could do. It was chi and mastery over the energy it could generate. It was about flow and control. But it was never about who I was as a fighter. Can I be better than others just because I can force myself to move faster?"

Porter paused for a while, and Sigma never cut in, letting the silence linger between them as Porter continued his inspection. The teen was well-aware that his brother could see the interior of the White Storm at all time, and would know that Porter was thinking. "I couldn't beat Sigmeund before, and he could not grasp chi beyond operating his machine. I wasn't able to avoid a Bahari strike, and Chase had to sacrifice himself to do that. No amount of meditation or control would ever bring me closer to winning those fights, would it?"

"I wouldn't know this. I can only tell you what the data would indicate and provide, but you are speaking out conditionals with a lot of different variables. No computer could ever calculate a what if statement so complicated. The past is the-"

"Bullshit, you can calculate that, I know you can."

"Would you let me give you some brotherly advice?" Sigma exclaimed, before the two burst out into laughter. "Just, don't get hung up on what you could have been. Just look forward to what you still can be with the life you have. Otherwise you end up like me, and your future is in someone else's hands."

"And yet, you're taking it back right now."

"No, I'm taking orders from some brat sibling of mine."

"Well, you can watch this brat sibling of yours then, and see if he is any better than he used to be. If breaking my body every day made me any better at fighting, it will be worth it now. So long as nobody else is dead on my watch, I will have achieved my goals."

"Along with destroying the government, pushing back the invasion of an entire race, and being able to ask Riya on a date."

"One step at a time," Porter replied, snorting at his brother's final point. "Besides..." Porter drifted off for a moment, his eyes wandering and staring past the viewscreens around him, taking in the environment around him as it flew by. "Who knows what will happen to the government. Destroying it all might not be the answer. People need some sort of rule to stay alive. But...I just want them to understand what it is that is ruling them. I want them to choose if that is right for them. But they will never have that opportunity if they are constantly being told tomorrow is another war. They will never think about what the government does in order to win those fights if they believe we are under threat. And they certainly won't discuss why we're even in the fight to begin with. That can only happen after everything is done and over with.

"But if a war goes on long enough, it becomes commonplace," Porter continued. "It is what you wake up to every day, it is what you fall asleep to every night. Once it becomes a mainstay, you no longer fear it, and then you can discuss it. That's why I sent out my message. That's why I will fight the Jahari next to the government today, and rally against these organizations tomorrow. And we will see what the people choose. If they are still afraid, we will come no closer. If they feel comfortable, maybe we will see a new horizon in the future. Perhaps a day when there will be no war."

"And a chance to ask out-"

"Stop it you. Let me have my grand moment of philosophical musing, without you pointing out all my flaws."

"But that's my job."

"You're taking this brother thing way too seriously already."

"Well why don't you just silence me with your awesome skill instead."

"Well maybe I will, and you can watch me single-handedly defeat the Jahari."

"I was talking about Riya."

"Shut up." A ping went off in the Goliath, ending the conversation. The approach was finalizing for Porter. The others would be some distance behind, nowhere near as fast as the White Storm. They would still be a while before they got into combat, and Porter wanted to make sure they were guaranteed a safe arrival. If that meant he would draw all the attention instead, so be it.

"Ready then?"

Porter flexed his fingers and wrapped them around his controls, shifting his weight in his seat as he settled in. "So very ready."