Cross Conviction

"I almost feel bad for you," Whirlwind hollered above the loud drone of his right propeller, "Out of all the knights you could have run into... you ran into me, first."

In a flash, Whirlwind was on top of his opponent. Sparks flew as his spinning blade ground against the enemy's metal rod, briefly illuminating the dark hallway with each high-velocity contact. The intruder responded with equal aggression, attempting to land a flat-footed boot against Whirlwind just as he had done to Sturm before. However, Whirlwind avoided the attack by forcing a gust of wind through his propeller downward against the ground, launching him up and over the adversary's head. For a split second, the white-haired candidate seemed suspended upside down in mid-air as he brought his inactive left gauntlet down on the intruder's steel-clad head. The brutal sound of a metal-on-metal clash rang through the hallway while Whirlwind flipped backward, righting himself before landing on his feet.

I've never seen a fighting style like that, Sturm thought to himself. How can such power be hidden behind such weightless movement? 

Apparently stunned by the crushing headshot, the shrouded enemy did not turn to meet Whirlwind head-on. This mattered little to the red-eyed warrior, who promptly swept his opponent's legs out from under him and delivered a powerful punch- energized by the forward momentum generated by his propeller- directly into the enemy's lower back. While Whirlwind's steel-plated knuckles impacted against hidden armor plating, the upward force was enough to send the intruder rocketing into the ceiling as the boy's propellers shredded the long black mantle flowing over the fiend's back. After slamming into the ceiling, the armored opponent fell back to the floor, accompanied by the crash of metal tossed into a heap. There the intruder remained- a black mound barely visible against the tile of the dark hallway.

Slowly, Whirlwind approached the shadowed mass of the man's collapsed form. "Now to remove that helmet and see who has earned the honor of becoming my first kill," the candidate growled as he repositioned the beam of his flashlight over the enemy's position.

"Hey, wait!" shouted Sturm, stepping toward his vengeful peer, "Not yet. We don't know who or what these people are. We might be able to get information out of-"

"I didn't ask for your opinion," snapped Whirlwind, cutting Sturm off. "Besides, do you even know the first thing about interrogation?"

Sturm shook his head. "No, but the instructors do. If we bring this guy out to the meeting point-"

"What instructors?!" Whirlwind cut the swordsman off yet again. "Do you see anyone? If they were here, wouldn't they be coming to rescue their students? We're on our own, you damned fool."

Throughout this ordeal, Sturm has never considered the possibility that the candidates were entirely alone. To him, it was a given that Scharf and the others would be waiting at the rally point in the training field. Certainly, the instructors wouldn't abandon their teams under such horrific circumstances. However, Whirlwind did make a fair argument. Though Sturm remained convinced that his captain wouldn't leave the Third Hunter Team's survival to chance, internally, he was forced to admit that the absence of any instructor or academy staff member was troubling.

Sturm took a deep breath in an attempt to manage his mounting stress and clenched his fist tight around his bayonet. "Well, if that's the case, that's all the more reason to get out of here."

"By all means, get the hell out of here..." Whirlwind replied, turning his focus away from the crumpled mass of the intruder and toward Sturm, "I told you I didn't need your help right from the start."

"I promised Emmy that I'd-"

"Fuck Emmy!" Whirlwind raged behind his steel mask, "Her and the other two... they're worthless. They put me on the Recovery Team to babysit a group of dead-end rejects while they hose down blood and scrape splattered bitch off the wall! You don't know a damned thing! I'm going to earn my kills today..."

Finally, Sturm had enough. He wouldn't stand for Whirlwind's rantings any longer. "Do you hear yourself? You're rambling like you have something wrong with you. What, are you only here to kill people? Is that what you think being a knight is?"

"What would you know about being a knight?" Whirlwind growled, "Do you think you can preach to me because of who your father is? I heard you almost died sparring against that rat you picked up off the street. You're an embarrassment."

In the midst of their argument, Whirlwind had callously shifted his flashlight's focus away from the intruder lying on the floor. Though Sturm could barely make out the dark mound of the man's silhouette over Whirlwind's shoulder, he was too enraged by his classmate's words to spare any caution. Recollection of Magnolia's scorn after his self-proclaimed rival's original attempt at intimidation only angered Sturm further.

"Listen..." said Sturm, stepping up under the taller boy's nose, "Don't talk about my family. If you want a fight so bad, I'll give it to you. But right now, we have more important things to worry about."

Whirlwind gave an insincere chuckle, muffled by the steel plate covering his mouth. "I can't wait to see the look on your friends' faces when I humiliate you."

"At least I'd still have frien-" Sturm's heart dropped mid-sentence as he realized that the shadowed mass on the ground behind Whirlwind was no longer present.

"What was that?" replied Whirlwind, glaring down at him.

Sturm frantically shook his head in a panic. "Shit, he's gone! Look out, Whirlwind!"

Red eyes growing wide with shock, the boy turned around just in time to be met with a vicious strike to his face. The enemy's metal rod had been drawn across Whirlwind's mask with such force that it shattered his goggles and cracked away the left side of his lower face shield. Leaping into action, Sturm charged past his reeling classmate and drove his bayonet through the air toward the intruder. However, before the blade made contact, the mysterious adversary ran his hand over his sharpened rod, immediately melting it into liquid form. The shimmering, mercury-like substance rushed across the front of the man's person, enveloping Sturm's weapon and right arm.

What the hell is this? Sturm thought to himself, attempting to tug his captured arm free.

The metallic liquid crept up Sturm's arm toward his shoulder as the young swordsman put all of his might into a desperate attempt at freeing himself. Upon attempting to step back, the boy found that his feet were also being anchored to the ground by the same glistening substance. He tried to ascertain Whirlwind's condition but couldn't turn far enough to locate him. Suddenly, a stinging pain erupted all across the areas of his body in contact with the liquid metal. His feet, hand, and arm were overcome with the sensation of a thousand tiny pins being driven through his skin as he felt the bayonet being wrenched out of his hand within the amorphous metal wall. Just when it seemed the situation couldn't be more dire, the enemy passed his armor-plated hand through the liquid barrier and materialized a long stiletto from the same substance in the palm of his hand. Unable to move, Sturm looked on with gritted teeth as he awaited an almost certain death blow.

Suddenly, to the swordsman's surprise, Whirlwind dashed around the edge of the liquid wall and propelled his right first forward at incredible speed. Met with a priority threat, the intruder was forced to divert much of the liquified metal restraining Sturm to protect himself from Whirlwind's assault. When the speeding propeller blades made contact with the shimmering substance, they effortlessly sliced through the mass, splattering many metallic globs across the floor, walls, and ceiling. Seizing the opportunity, Sturm tore himself away from the diminished barrier and leaped back to put distance between it and himself. Sturm then looked down at his arm and was able to make out dozens of tiny blood spots in the low light- evidence that his skin had been pierced by the viscous metal liquid.

"Playing dead, were you?" said Whirlwind, now facing down the intruder amidst a mess of metal liquid all around. "Coward."

Blood ran from Whirlwind's mouth, staining his jacket's collar a brownish red. The damaged section of his mask gave way to a sinister snarl, starkly contrasting the wide grin of the shark's mouth decorating its still intact right side. As Whirlwind spaced his feet apart, the propeller blades began to spin on his left gauntlet, as well. He carefully angled his arms away from his other to avoid a potential propeller collision and anchored himself firmly to the ground as the blades spun faster. Looking on, Sturm couldn't help but wonder if the defensive zone secured by the pair of whirling propellers would be worth the inevitable loss of arm mobility incurred by their potential for dangerous overlap.

He already took this guy down once, Sturm thought to himself. For Whirlwind to risk such a reckless strategy, he must be worried about something.

As abruptly as they had gone out, the lights returned to life, revealing the extent of the damage Whirlwind had suffered thus far. In addition to his split lip, he had been wounded in the lower left abdomen at some point during the struggle. Blood had soaked into his woolen tunic, radiating out from a round puncture. While this was cause for alarm, Sturm was helpless to intervene. With both of Whirlwind's propellers running at full speed, the slightest misstep could be deadly. 

"Listen up..." huffed Whirlwind as he flipped up two small, protective hatches on the insides of his gauntlet braces with his thumbs, "Whatever the hell you are, I'm going to teach you something new today."

For the first time, the intruder seemed to give some reaction. He tilted his head but a few centimeters to the side, perhaps conveying some level of intrigue.

"These propellers are powered by radial combustion engines," the boy explained, running his thumbs over two freshly revealed, bright red buttons, "Now, hooked up to those engines are nitrous oxide injectors. Do you know what happens when you introduce nitrous oxide into a combustion engine?"

The fiend was entirely unresponsive. 

Whirlwind scoffed. "That's right... I didn't think so."

As soon as he pressed the conspicuous switches, Whirlwind's gauntlets roared with mechanical fury. The drone of his propellers shifted pitch to an ear-splitting screech and the nearby windows rattled against their frames.

Voice raised to a scream to compete with the deafening howl of his weapons, Whirlwind ranted on triumphantly. "That's right! Forty percent more power output!"

Sturm took a step back, unsettled by the violent thundering of engines pushed far beyond their limit. It was as if, at any moment, the propeller blades would be ejected from the apparatus, if the entire gauntlet didn't burst sooner.

 "But I'm not done just yet!" Whirlwind again hollered aloud, "Do you know what happens when you introduce nitrous oxide to the human body?!"

Suddenly, a small panel on Whirlwind's left gauntlet opened and launched a small silver canister above the boy's head. He quickly snatched it out of the air, careful not to cross his propellers. Then, holding the canister above his head, he crushed it with a loud pop. Though the depressurization of the small contained caused metal shards to shred the flesh on Whirlwind's left hand, he didn't even blink. Freezing vapors mingled with fresh blood and rolled off of his palm down into the exposed left side of his mouth. Soon after inhaling the chemical, a wicked grin overtook Whirlwind's mouth, matching the bestial smile painted across his mask.

"It suppresses pain, and tears any reservations you might have straight out of your body!"

Whirlwind's armored opponent leaned forward in preparation- an anxious tell that the boy was quick to pick up on.

"What's that?!" the white-haired warrior cried out, "What do you feel right now?! Is it fear?! Reservation?!

With a wave of his hand, the dark intruder recalled his amorphous shield, surrounding himself with the liquid metal.

"Come on, tell me!" Whirlwind rambled on with uncharacteristic vibrancy, "Because I don't feel a God damned thing!"