Chapter Text
Enjin, still breathing hard, his mouth dry and sweat running down his back after finishing off a Trash Beast, watched from several meters away as Rudo tore one of those creatures’ legs clean off, one that was particularly large, using a silver hairpin, now transformed -thanks to 3R- into a kind of double-tipped electric javelin. The strike was precise, fast, brutal. A metallic crack rang out like contained thunder, followed by the hiss of severed cables and the heavy crash of the lifeless limb against the scrap.
Impressive, if you asked Enjin. He’d have to congratulate Zanka on his fine work as a mentor; he could clearly recognize the unmistakable blend of styles in the attack: polished technique, steady and calculated rhythm, fused with Rudo’s wild, erratic inexperience.
He slid Umbreaker back under his coat, satisfied with a job well done, and began walking toward the boy, determined not to interfere. So far, Rudo was handling things well on his own, and challenges were always exciting. The air, while not as clean as near the town that had hired them, wasn’t dangerous enough to worry about the masks destroyed during the fight. It smelled of dry earth, ozone, and ash, with an almost viscous density that clung to the skin, but otherwise posed no real health risk… hopefully.
Halfway there, he ran into Tomme, who was brushing the worst of the grime from her jacket and pants. Her face carried the calm expression of someone who had just survived something extremely dangerous, but given how constant that scenario was in this line of work, she looked utterly unfazed and almost radiant.
“The others are dealing with the last two Beasts,” she told him, falling into step beside him with a crooked smile. “Although, based on the details Gris gave about the situation, they look more like a pair of hyperactive pups playing cat and mouse with Zanka and Riyo.”
Enjin let out a short snort of laughter as he stepped around a chunk of protruding concrete.
“This mission has been particularly interesting,” Tomme commented, pulling her notebook from her pants pocket, its edges warped from moisture and use. “I think this is the first time I’ve seen Beasts organizing into a pack.”
“Don’t most Beasts do that?” Enjin asked, glancing absently toward a spot where electrically charged gusts of air were kicking up lazy spirals of dirt close to the ground.
“No, no.” Tomme shook her head, animated, slipping into that more academic tone Gris always mocked. “It’s one thing for them to group together by place of origin, you know, specific contamination zones give rise to Beasts with shared traits that tend to attack in groups. But it’s something entirely different for there to be a concept of hierarchy within those groups.”
She gestured for him to focus on Rudo. The boy was still fighting -and doing well- surrounded by a rain of crackling white sparks.
“Look,” she continued, pointing. “That Beast, along with the second one you roasted a while ago, were huge but slow. You could say they were the leaders. And they only became truly defensive once Riyo and Zanka went after the smaller ones.”
“The pups?” Enjin clarified, his deep voice thoughtful.
“Exactly.” Tomme flipped a page in her notebook, revealing a small pencil sketch: circles connected by lines, brief notes scribbled in the margins. “Two leaders, five juveniles, and two pups. Both the leaders and the juveniles did everything they could to keep us away from the pups. And look at the result, if Rudo is able to handle that Beast, it’s probably because it believes the pups are safe.”
She carefully put the notebook away and then added, more as a murmur than a direct comment:
“It’s a shame they try to kill us the moment they see a human… In a way, Trash Beasts are fascinating animals.”
Enjin nodded, though not because he truly agreed. It was difficult, almost impossible, to find fascination in something that tried to tear your head off every time you crossed its path. Maybe that was why he liked Tomme. To him, Trash Beasts were just that: a nuisance, yet another threat in the shitty world they’d been born into and learned to survive in. Creatures born from excess, bad feelings, and human negligence. An ugly reminder of the absolute degradation of an entire species, and the punishment dealt for the cold-blooded murder of the planet that had conceived them…
“Who killed the planet?” Glob had once asked one afternoon, half-jokingly, years ago.
Enjin took a slow drag from his cigarette, letting the smoke linger in his lungs a second longer than necessary before exhaling through his nose. He shot Glob a sidelong look, unimpressed, tired even.
“And why do you think I should know something like that?” he shot back, more aggressively than he’d intended.
Glob froze for just a moment, long enough to catch the edge in the response. Then he clicked his tongue, as if deciding not to take it too seriously. He shook a can of purple paint with a firm metallic rattle and signed the lower right corner of the graffiti he’d just finished with a quick, confident motion.
“Man, no need to get like that,” Glob said, shrugging. “It’s just something my grandma used to say… Forget it, it’s stupid.”
He waved a hand vaguely, as if he could brush the comment out of the air and make it disappear. But Enjin already knew he’d fucked up. He bit the inside of his cheek, annoyed with himself. Glob adored his grandmother. It was one of the few things he always defended without irony, without sarcasm, without that layer of distance he used for almost everything else.
Enjin took a step back to take in his friend’s finished work, searching for a silent way to make amends. The paint, still fresh, ran down the wall in places, forming small, uneven rivers where lines met and overlapped. The graffiti depicted a humanoid figure painted entirely in a bone-white hue, almost organic, standing out violently against a deep, dark blue background speckled with hundreds of tiny yellow dots that evoked a sky possible only in children’s stories.
All of the figure’s discernible features were defined by delicate strokes in a slightly different white, almost imperceptible. It wore a kind of long tunic that fell in soft folds, and its head was distorted in an unsettling way: seven elongated points emerged from it like a crown. It had no mouth or nose, but its blue eyes -intense and unnaturally alive- seemed to follow Enjin as he observed it. The figure held a lush bouquet of forget-me-nots, the same small flowers that decorated the inside of the tunic, repeated over and over like an obsessive motif.
“Wow,” Enjin murmured, almost without realizing it.
He shook his head, pushing the memory and everything it implied aside. Both he and Tomme paused to watch Rudo’s movements more closely. Though he’d improved tremendously since officially joining the Cleaners, he still had much to learn. Each strike was accompanied by white flashes of electricity shedding from his javelin; he used the momentum to slide nimbly, narrowly avoiding disembowelment, and the same weapon served as a lever to keep his balance. It was a good jinki. A shame it would crumble into gray dust, turned into nothing, once it was done being used.
“He’s exaggerating,” Enjin complained, crossing his arms.
“Dramatic… almost theatrical,” she agreed, smiling with something close to affection, a patient calm. “Though… I admit it wouldn’t hurt him to start pacing himself. He’ll be exhausted by the time we get back.”
“Exhausted is an understatement. He’ll be bleeding from the nose-”
A particularly loud metallic sound cut Enjin off, putting them both on alert. Rudo, leaning on the javelin to stay upright, spun on himself to build momentum and drove the weapon, gripped with both hands, straight into the precise center of the Beast’s chest. The creature let out a distorted, agonized roar, a titan mourning its defeat with a deep, vibrating howl that made the ground tremble beneath the humans’ feet.
Rudo released the javelin and slowly stepped back, allowing the weapon to discharge electricity freely, seemingly indifferent to the Beast’s uproar.
Enjin grimaced. Tomme covered her ears.
With one last spasm, atrocious, cruel, the creature collapsed, completely impaled.
But… things never -damn it, never- were that easy for the Cleaners.
The satisfied smile beginning to form on Enjin’s face quickly twisted into a worried grimace when he saw a dense red cloud, carmine, dark as poorly fermented pomegranate wine, pouring from the Beast’s tubes, which must have formed some kind of mechanical respiratory system, a grotesque parody of organic structures. The cloud enveloped the creature and everything around it, Rudo included.
“What is that?” Tomme wondered aloud, her tone suddenly tense. “I’ve never seen a Beast-”
Enjin felt something in his stomach tighten, like a rabid dog gnawing at his ribs, splintering them down to the marrow.
“Rudo,” he murmured, and he was already running before he was even aware of what he was doing or the danger he was putting himself in.
His mind raced at a sickening speed, fabricating scenarios, each more terrifying than the last: the red smoke eating away at Rudo’s skin like corrosive acid, melting flesh and dermis; the red smoke raising massive blisters that filled his insides, oozing white and yellow fluid; or maybe the red smoke was a fast-acting poison, coursing through his veins, setting his nerves on fire and-
a corpse.
Enjin would find a lifeless body because he had been negligent as a team leader.
It was his decisions that had led a child to die.
A child who still had baby fat on his face.
A child who still lit up at praise.
A child who hadn’t even tasted beer yet.
No.
No.
NO.
No, damn it.
He wouldn’t let panic take over.
Enjin clenched his teeth and forced himself to imagine a near future where everyone returned to base safe and sound, all limbs still attached, took a shower, enjoyed a good restorative nap, and stuffed themselves with delicious food. There would be time to scold himself for his recklessness later.
The battlefield greeted him with the strange smell of melted plastic, old blood, and… burnt candy? thick in the air. The ground, soaked with the creature’s oily fluids, had turned slick. Every step was a struggle not to get stuck, accompanied by a sticky, wet sound that seemed to pull him down. And though most of the red smoke had already been carried off by the wind, slithering away in delicate spirals until it vanished, the burning in his eyes and the itching in his nose nearly brought tears to them.
All right. Message received: never underestimate danger, and always carry a spare mask.
The Beast’s remains, a tangle of hundreds of twisted pipes, kilometers of stripped cables, large warped stamped plates, and putrefying dead vegetation, lay scattered and inert. They still released small, spasmodic sparks, metal contracting in a postmortem, cadaverous reflex, as if the monster refused to die completely even after its core had been destroyed.
The javelin had already crumbled into dust during Enjin’s run.
“Rudo!” he shouted, his voice reverberating through the wreckage. “This isn’t funny, brat!”
The lack of response made the hair on his neck stand on end.
Enjin moved forward, scanning in every direction, awkwardly dodging fragments of pipe and sheet metal buried in the mud, remnants that must have belonged to some ancient structure.
“Come on… answer me,” he muttered, unsure whether the irritation was directed at Rudo or himself.
He turned a full one hundred and eighty degrees, passing a shattered concave pane of glass that must once have been one of the creature’s eyes. He doubled back. His distorted reflection mocked him, silent. Damn it. He kicked the glass until it shattered completely. Enjin rubbed the bridge of his nose, sighed, tired of this whole bad joke, and then…
He saw it out of the corner of his eye: a white, small, disheveled shape. Unmistakable.
For a moment, as he ran toward where Rudo lay unconscious, Enjin felt a sharp relief pierce his heart. A brief, absurd jolt, as if simply seeing him there, motionless but whole, were enough to convince his body that it was over, that the worst had already passed.
…that feeling didn’t last long.
The one lying unconscious at his feet was not a young man with a permanent scowl, bruised-black circles under his eyes, and that constant look of a cornered animal, always on the verge of going for someone’s throat.
No.
What Enjin saw was a small child.
Too small.
A slight body curled in on itself, protecting itself even in sleep, breathing with deceptive calm while resting peacefully against the dirty, cracked ground.
The child… no, Rudo. It had to be Rudo. He was still wearing the Cleaners’ uniform, but it hung off him, far too big, as if he’d stolen it or inherited it from someone much older. August would tear his skin off if he knew one of his creations no longer fit the person it had been made for. The sleeves nearly swallowed his arms, the collar of the jacket brushed his chin. The gloves, once snug around his hands, now dangled loose and misshapen, exposing the bandages beneath. They were a mess: stiff with dried blood, dark and rusted, as if they hadn’t been changed in days.
Enjin feels as though the rabid dog from before has torn his organs out, leaving him hollow. An inexorable emptiness pressing down on his soul.
And maybe, Enjin thinks in desperation, the situation wouldn’t be that bad… horrible, insane, impossible… hell, Rudo has just turned into a child… if it weren’t for the fact that he suddenly realizes something else. The realization comes with a wave of nausea climbing up his esophagus, burning his tongue.
Beneath the grime and dirt coating the exposed skin of his face and neck, there are marks. Not random stains or recent wounds. They’re irregular. Brutal. Cruel.
Injuries that have absolutely nothing to do with the fight from a few minutes ago. Enjin would give anything if they did, simple wounds caused by an irrational, instinct-driven monster protecting its pups.
Bruises on the forehead and temples, dark and diffuse. Thin cuts across the cheeks and the bridge of the nose, far too precise to be accidental. Scrapes along the chin. A split lower lip. And around the neck -Enjin swallows- clear finger marks, imprinted with a symmetry that churns his stomach even more. Everything is old. Two, maybe three days, judging by the purplish hues already turning yellow, by the uneven, neglected healing, no care, no rest.
Someone is burning trash inside Enjin’s lungs.
Air goes in and out, but every breath feels dirty, insufficient, as if the oxygen can’t quite reach him. He crouches carefully, slowly, making sure not to touch him yet. His shadow falls over half the small body, warping against the ground. He can hear his own heart pounding in his ears, a dull, constant thud, as if nails were being hammered into his eardrums from the inside.
“Rudo…” he repeats.
He reaches out clumsily, fingers stiff, and hesitates for an endless second before brushing aside the clumped strands of hair stuck to Rudo’s forehead with sweat. At the touch, the skin is cold. Damp. Fragile as abused paper, ready to tear under the slightest pressure. The contrast sends a violent shiver down Enjin’s spine, tensing his shoulders. And yet, Rudo’s face remains calm. Too calm. As if the body had decided to disconnect from everything it could no longer process.
Tomme’s footsteps cut sharply through Enjin’s spiraling thoughts. A dull thud, followed by a muffled curse. He doesn’t need to turn to know she’s tripped over one of the half-melted pipes scattered across the ground, he himself had nearly done the same on his way in. The steps stop a few meters away, and the rough sound of her breathing fills the air as she struggles to catch it.
“You run fast,” Tomme complains between gasps, in a tone meant to sound light, and failing. “I’m glad you found him… ugh. Is Rudo okay?”
She approaches slowly, carefully watching her footing, avoiding metal debris and the sticky filth coating the ground. Enjin remains silent, eyes never leaving the motionless child. A new, irrational fear blooms in the back of his mind: if he looks away, if he allows himself to focus on anything other than that small chest, the rise and fall will simply stop. Ridiculous, he tells himself. Still, he doesn’t move.
His jaw tightens before he answers, and when he does, his voice comes out low and rough, as if dragging rust along with it.
“He’s not dead, but…”
“But what?” Tomme presses, stopping beside him. “Oh.”
Yes. Oh.
Tomme crouches down as well.
Enjin immediately notices her hands trembling. A brief, involuntary gasp escapes her lips. Her expression changes within seconds: first it hardens, features tightening into a mask of professional rationality; then, almost imperceptibly, something softens behind her eyes.
Then she says, quietly, exactly what Enjin has been repeating to himself for several minutes now.
“This is really fucked up.”
The words hang in the air, dense, insufficient. Neither of them adds anything. The wind, Rudo’s uneven breathing, and the distant creak of cooling scrap metal are the only sounds.
“This is impossible… Beasts don’t… and he’s so small,” Tomme begins, bringing a hand toward Rudo’s neck, then stopping a few centimeters away, afraid of hurting him more. “Who could do this to a child so-?”
Her voice breaks irreparably, swallowing the rest of the sentence. Enjin brings his free hand to her shoulder, resting it there in a clumsy but sincere gesture. A long sigh escapes him, heavy, laden with exhaustion and rage.
He needs a cigarette. He needs one desperately, even though he knows it won’t help at all.
“We need to get Rudo back to headquarters as soon as possible so Eishia can examine him,” he finally says, forcing firmness into his voice. “Tell the others to finish up and get back to the car. The kid already looks fragile, and I don’t want to risk his condition getting worse.”
Tomme nods silently. Her face remains pale, tense, as if she still hasn’t fully processed what’s in front of her. She hums a brief sound of agreement, barely audible, and then, moving with the automatic efficiency of someone who needs something concrete to focus on in order not to fall apart, she stands.
She activates the communicator on her choker and, careful not to let anything slip into her voice, informs the rest of the team that Enjin, Rudo and she, will be waiting at the car; that Rudo is injured and, for that reason, they shouldn’t take long. Nothing more. No details. She ignores Gris’s questions. The idea of an injured teammate alone is worrying enough, but adding the absurd fact that he’s turned into a little child is something no one would believe at first glance.
The necessary explanations would come later.
Meanwhile, Enjin bends over the small, motionless body. He carefully slides his arms beneath Rudo’s back and knees and lifts him slowly. Another unpleasant surprise hits him immediately, followed by horror. Rudo had already been light as a teenager; being a child only made it worse. The uniform, though designed to withstand the harsh punishment of the job, was useless when worn so poorly fitted. It crumpled in Enjin’s hands like wet wool, offering no resistance at all. Maybe it was just his imagination playing tricks on him, but Enjin would have sworn he could feel small bones, too prominent, pressing against the fabric.
Rudo’s head lolls against his shoulder, and the child shifts faintly. A rag doll without joints, letting himself be moved and unmade. A soft whimper slips from his parted lips, so faint it nearly goes unnoticed. Enjin freezes for a second, his heart leaping in his chest.
“Shhh… it’s okay. You’re safe,” he whispers, not realizing he’s begun to rock him gently.
The sway of his arms is more reflex than conscious action. An instinctive movement, as if his body knows exactly what to do even when his mind can’t begin to understand what’s happening.
Enjin is grateful that Tomme walks a few steps ahead, carrying Umbreaker with both hands. He doesn’t think he could handle anyone else’s anguish right now, besides his own.
When they finally reach the car, she quickly opens the rear door. Her movement is efficient, automatic, though a shadow of discomfort crosses her face as she looks at them.
“I’m sorry, but I think it’d be best if you sit in the back with him,” she says quietly. “I doubt Rudo would want to be separated from you.”
Indeed, when Enjin, just to test it, tries to move him even a few centimeters away, the still-sleeping child lets out a hoarse, broken whine. A small, helpless sound that pierces both adults straight through the chest. Enjin stops instantly, as if struck.
He sighs, resigned, a weight of exhaustion settling into his shoulders. He sits in the back seat with Rudo in his lap, adjusting him carefully and wrapping him in his own coat, which Tomme helps him remove without saying a word. The garment covers him almost completely; only the white hair peeks out, faintly reflecting the dim glow of dusk. A grayish sky, sickly green, filters through the eternal clouds above.
Tomme sets Umbreaker against the seat to Enjin’s right and closes the door softly.
Enjin swallows.
He can’t, and doesn’t want to, think yet about the implications of all this. His mind, usually sharp and practical, feels dulled, incapable of forming a coherent explanation. Every thought is a stone sinking into mud before reaching anywhere. So he spares himself the headache by not thinking at all. Not yet.
He simply feels the faint warmth of the body in his arms. The minimal weight against his chest. The fragile, uneven heartbeat, confirming -again and again- that Rudo is alive.