Mania and the Executioner (40 page)

“Hey!
I was hoping you would be awake. I brought breakfast!” Natasha says.

“Thanks!
” I say while grabbing a cheese Danish from the platter. “So what’s the plan for today?”

“I’m not too sure, but it probably isn’t the best idea to stay around here because Jorgen is probably gunning for you.” Natasha says.

“Hmm…want to come with me to test out some explosives?” I ask.

“HELL YEAH!”
Natasha shouts.

“Great…do
you know…a spot…that would be…good for that?” I ask while eating my Danish.

“Anywhere in the cent
er of Greenland should work nicely. The ice is thicker there so you shouldn’t have to worry about the ice cracking or anything like that.” Natasha suggests.

“Sounds perfect!
I’ll just look up a picture and then we can get going. Oh, and bring the food with us.” I say as I pull out my phone.

“Al
right let’s get going! Bye Kita, we will be back later.” I say.

Kita gives me this sad look, then nods and trudges over to the bed where she curls into a ball
. I port us to the picture and see tundra stretched out before us in all directions. I open my ring and slice into my left palm. I take out one of my Diamond swords to grind a small hole into the ice. Once finished, I transmute the colorless crystal explosive that is used in C-4 called RDX by using the same components of my blood that I used to make the nitroglycerine. I wedge the crystal into the hole and drip some of my blood onto the crystal. I look back and see that Natasha is about fifteen feet away. I take a few steps back and then I transmute my blood into nitrogen triiodide.

‘
I probably should have taken a few more steps back,’ I think as I lay on my back with my ears ringing while I see a puff of red smoke rising from the hole. That puff of smoke gives me an awesome idea for a smoke bomb. I see Natasha standing over me and saying something, but I cannot hear her.

(That is because you have two perforated eardrums)

“Airi says I have two perforated eardrums.” I say…or possibly shout. Natasha says something.

“Slow down! If you speak slowly I may be able to read your lips!” I say/shout.

(She is saying ‘we need to get you to Pinga’)

“Airi, how much time until my eardrums are healed?”

(Three hours in the current situation; ears are difficult to heal. Requesting the assistance of the goddess is not a bad idea)

“Alright, I’m porting us b
ack to your room!” I say/shout.

Natasha grabs my hand and I port us to her room. Kita perks up the second we come back and looks at me like she’s concerned. Natasha drags me out of her room and Kita follows us. I get dragged down a series of corridors and into a large ice chamber where Pinga and Cheza are making things out of the ice. Cheza sees me and starts talk
ing in a very animated fashion while looking quite excited before her expression changes to one of concern. I assume Natasha explained the situation because Pinga walks over and places both of her hands over my ears. Pinga’s hands are cold until they suddenly start radiating warmth, my vision blurs, and the ringing in my ears intensifies as my hearing returns.

“Are you
back with us Cole?” Pinga asks.

“Yeah, my hearing
is as good as new. Thanks!” I say.

“
Good, so what have we learned?” Pinga inquires.

“Don’t detonate the chemical they use to make C-4 when you are only two feet from it?” I ask.

“Good boy, no more explosives for today.” Pinga replies.

“Hey Cole!
Using my powers is so much easier here! Look what I can do!” Cheza exclaims as she touches the ground and pulls out a three foot long icicle. “I’m an icebender!”
18

“Haha!
That’s pretty awesome Cheza!” I tell her.

“It’s actually somewhat amazing that her abilities were able to manifest at all in places as warm as Hawaii and Arizona. She shouldn’t have much of a problem learning to control her powers here.” Pinga says.

“That’s great Cheza! Well, since I won’t be playing with anymore explosives today, why don’t you show me around Natasha?” I suggest.

“Alr
ight; we’ll see you guys later!” Natasha says and leads me out of the large chamber.

Kita scampers up my back and lies across my shoulders. Natasha shows me around the gigantic underground snow elf compound.

“Wait, so this entire place was built by snow elves with power like Cheza?” I ask.

“Yeah,
any pure blood snow elf has at least some control over snow and ice. Those that are half Inuit, half snow elf have about a fifty percent chance at developing abilities. Those that are like me…well, Chezarei is the only one I know of that has developed abilities.” Natasha explains, sounding a little downtrodden.

“Natasha, I could help you with that. If I were to give you some of my blood, it might be able unlock your latent ability.” I suggest.

“Thanks, but no thanks Cole. I’d rather not be connected to you like that. Even though Chezarei was fine with sharing you for the wedding and for sex, I doubt she would approve of sharing you that intimately.” Natasha says.

“
I hadn’t even thought about that…she would probably be pretty pissed.” I reply.

I nearly fall over when ice
suddenly wraps around my feet and shins. Two elves drop from the ceiling and grab both my arms while Kita jumps from my shoulders and runs off.

“WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING!?” Natasha screams.

“I’m getting my revenge for last night!” Alex says while stepping out from an alcove; I notice that his arm is in a sling.

“STOP BEING SUCH AN ASSHOLE!” Natasha shouts.

“SHUT UP YOU STUPID HALFBREED BITCH!” Alex screams as he backhands Natasha to the ground; now I’m angry.

“You may have caught me off guard last night, but not today!” Alex says.

Using his unbroken arm, Alex unzips my jacket. I could easily break the hold of the two guys holding me, but I'm curious to see what he does. Alex doesn't seem to be armed so at least I don't have to worry about getting shot. He puts his hand on my chest and I immediately feel my skin cooling down through my t-shirt.

"What are you doing!?
Ahhhh!" I shout in mock panic that is so poorly done that I don't even believe it. His burn feels like an ice cube compared to what Cheza can do. A smug smile starts across Alex's face as I continue my mock screaming. I'm just waiting until the burn cracks my skin open to give him a surprise.

(Objective met)

"Ahhh—hahaha! Is that really the best you've got? Now it's my turn." I say with a smile.

“What the hell is this supposed to be?” Alex asks as he looks at the small sphere in his hand that happens to be made of RDX that contains my blood inside of it.

My helmet wraps around my head and I transmute my blood into nitrogen triiodide while snapping my fingers for effect. The ball explodes in a large puff of red smoke and Alex starts screaming. The distraction is enough for me to break from the grasps of the two elves holding me, cut my way out of the ice, scoop Natasha up, and port us to where Cheza and Pinga are.

“Cole! Are you alright?” Cheza asks concerned.

“That was totally awesome Cole!” Natasha exclaims as I set her down.

“Thanks, I got the idea when I saw the giant puff of smoke that the nitrogen triiodide made earlier and I was thinking last night how it would be useful to have smoke bombs. Yes, I’m fine Cheza and sorry about disobeyin
g your ‘no more explosives’ order, Pinga.” I say.

“What happened?” Pinga asks as she walks over to Natasha and puts her hands over Natasha’s bleeding lip and swollen cheek.

“Alex felt it necessary to try and get revenge for last night so he had two elves restrain me while he tried to freeze me. I waited until he burned through my skin and then I formed a ball of C-4 in his hand. Inside of the ball was nitrogen triiodide which creates a sizeable cloud of red smoke so I essentially made a smoke bomb; oh, and his hand is probably a mess…or it’s just gone.” I explain.

“Eh, don’t worry about it; he deserved it anyway. You two should probably go back to Natasha
’s room and take Kita with you. She scampered in barking about ten seconds before you arrived.” Pinga says as Kita slinks out from behind her; Kita’s ears are flat and she looks ashamed overall.

“It’s
okay; I know that you did the best you could.” I tell Kita as I pick her up. She licks my face once in response, but still looks slightly ashamed.

I port Natasha, Kita, and myself back to Natasha’s room where we just hangout and watch TV for a few hours. Natasha announces that she is hungry
and leaves to go get some food. Cheza comes back while she is gone and we make small talk until Natasha comes back with a cart that carries three, covered plates. We all eat dinner, watch TV for a while, and go to bed.

…

[June 5th]

That night, I
had another dream about the fox-girl. I wake up the next morning to find Kita asleep on my chest. I gently move her off of me and go to the bathroom. I shower, get dressed, and exit the bathroom to find Natasha eating on the couch. I sit down next to her and eat as well.

“So I need to run some more explosive experiments today, are you in?” I ask
while finishing my omelet.

“Sure, but let’s keep the ear perforation to a minimum today.” Natasha says with a smile.

“Haha definitely! I just need to port home quickly to grab a notebook, pencil, tape measure, and…I think that’s it.” I say.

“Well, if that’s all, I can just fetch that stuff for you.” Natasha says and walks over to her desk, digs through the drawers, and pulls out the things I need.
“Ready to go?”

I nod and port us to the field from yesterday. Natasha moves back about thirty feet and I engage my helmet. I start the day’s experiments by making the same smoke ball that I did yesterday. I measure the ball, finding that it is 2.5 centimeters in diameter; I throw the ball at the ground and I disappear within a cloud of smoke. When the smoke dissipates, I measure the resulting crater from the explosion: 15 centimeters.

“Airi, how much blood did it take to make that?”

(0.1 Liters)

I decrease the size of the next ball to 1 centimeter, which results in a 6 centimeter crater.

(0.04 Liters)

So it appears that the smoke balls have a resulting crater that is six times their size and use up one tenth of a liter per ball. I record all of this information in the notebook and then I move on to experiments using solid RDX.

I’m able to determine that at least five milliliters of nitrogen triiodide per ce
ntimeter of spherical crystal RDX is needed to detonate it, the crater ratio is 1:20, and 0.1 liters per centimeter is needed to make RDX.

“Alright, I’m starting to feel my blood loss now so let’s call it a day.” I tell Natasha. We port back to her room where we watch a movie.

“Let’s go get something to eat!” Natasha exclaims when the movie is over. I look at the clock and see that it is dinner time anyway.

“Sure.” I sa
y while shrugging my shoulders.

I follow Natasha to the dining hall that must be exclusively for the head family because I’ve never been so instantaneously despised upon entering a room before. I just keep my head down and follow Natasha over to a servant who already has cart waiting, and we wheel the cart out of the hall.

“It looks like this will be over soon!” I hear someone say as we are heading down a corridor and away from the dining hall.

“Hey Airi, does my blood make me resistant to poisons?”

(Yes it does; any damage a poison will do to your stomach will be repaired and the poison will be consumed by your blood after it automatically forms a chemical compound to break down the poison)

Natasha and I get back to the room
to find Cheza waiting.

“YAY!
Food!” Cheza says as we come in.

“Sorry Cheza, but I’ll be eating all of this. Where do you guys want me to get food from?” I ask.

“What? Why?” Natasha asks.

“Oh, I’m pretty sure that all of the plates are poisoned.” I say blatantly.

“How do you know that?” Natasha asks.

“I uh, heard some guy say ‘it looks like this will be over soon’.” I inform them.

“Then why are you eating it!?” Cheza asks.

“To throw them off; T
hey will see that we are still alive after eating dinner, probably try poisoning breakfast or dinner tomorrow, and when we are still alive after all of their attempts, they will stop trying...or that’s the plan at least. Airi tells me that I’m resistant to poison so I’ll be completely unharmed! So is where shall I fetch my Mistresses’ dinner from?” I ask.

…

Chapter 36: Good Times with Explosives

[June 6th]

I had another fox-girl dream last night. I taste test the food that Natasha brings for breakfast and Airi tells me that it isn’t poisoned. I run more explosives experiments but today’s experiments are on ONC: Crater ratio is 1:30, 0.15 liters per centimeter, and five milliliters of nitrogen triiodide per centimeter is necessary to detonate it. Natasha and I head back and proceed to lounge around for a few hours until Cheza gets back. All three of us go to get the dinner cart when Cheza returns. I taste test the food and Airi tells me that the amount of poison has quadrupled from last night. After dinner, the girls make wedding plans while I go to bed.