Chapter Text
“Say it!” She yelled. “Say that I’m a Monster!” Shifting to distort her frame eyes glowing, Nimona froze at the shink of metal as Ballister reached for his sword. They locked eyes.
“I-”
“No. No! I don’t know why I thought you’d be any different. You’re just like all the others.” Ballister couldn’t tell if she was more hurt or angry, he couldn’t tell if he was more afraid or confused. Nothing about this made any sense. He pulled the sword out all the way, not missing Nimona’s flinch and the way she bared her teeth he looked away, ashamed of himself. She wasn’t angry, she was scared. He was scaring her. He threw the sword to the ground. He heard a sharp intake of breath at the clatter.
“You’re right, Nimona I-” Ballister took a deep breath and looked back up at her. She was on edge that much was clear, teeth sharper than normal, but she looked younger than usual too. “I don’t understand. This scroll- it looks like you it looks like Gloreth’s- It looks like you.” He gave her a helpless look. “Nothing makes sense anymore and I don’t know what to trust.” She didn’t say anything for a while, and the tension hummed in the air, making the hairs on the back of his neck rise like an unseen current, before she looked away, looking even smaller.
“She was my friend too.” She said, she didn’t seem inclined to offer anything more. Ballister took a hesitant step towards her.
“OK.” He said hands outstretched. “Ok, I believe you.” She looked back eyes shining in a way that might have been tears or might have been a residual glow. “Will you tell me about her?” He had never had any real conflict intervention training. One of many things he was realizing was wrong with how he was trained, but Nimona was right, and she deserved to be heard out at least. For Gloreths sake he heard out the man who chopped his arm off hadn’t he? And who was to say the director wasn’t still manipulating things? Scrolls could probably be faked, what did he know about old documents after all
“I don’t- she was my first friend.” Nimona said quietly. The vulnerability didn’t suit her, and Ballister didn’t know how to comfort her with his own mind still whirling with doubts. “Her village didn’t approve- they, they tried to kill me and I- I was just a kid! I didn’t- I wasn’t- I’m not-”
“Ok.” He said cutting her off as she grew more adjusted, her form fluctuating. “Ok, lets, lets sit down, I think we have a lot to discuss. I- I’m sorry for reacting so strongly. You didn’t deserve that.” She looked at him with suspicion and hope waring in her eyes, and Ballister felt that down to his bones. Suspicion and hope. What a pair they made. Ballister very slowly made his was to the couch, telegraphing his moves, and making sure not to go anywhere near where he had tossed his sword.
“I’ll go first.” He said after they were both seated. “Ambrosius asked to meet me him, he was the one who gave me the scroll.” He held up a hand to stop her inevitable comments on the reliability of a man who had chopped his arm off. “I know, he’s from the institute, and, and you’ve been right about them so far, about everything really. So, I’m sorry.”
Nimona looked at him like he had somehow manifested the ability to shapeshift and had grown three heads. He bit his tongue trying to give her the space she seemed to need to find her next words.
“I’m not a monster.” She finally said.
“I know.” He said with a sigh he reached up to rub his eyes with his organic hand.
“The institute sucks.” She said crossing her arms and folding in on herself. Ballister let out a started laugh.
“Yeah, yeah it does. Come to think of it, its mighty suspicious that this secret document containing an actual picture of the ‘monster’ we were meant to fight only surfaces now.” He tapped his lips grabbing the scroll and standing up, moving towards their murder wall. Mind racing. “Very suspicious in fact. We were never trained for anything to do with shapeshifting. If we had been it might be harder for the other knights to fight you- which begs the question, what were we really trained for?” He turned back to her and she gave him a long look, before turning into a bird and flitting over to the wall with him. Landing in human form.
“You’re right, if the institute had this the whole time, and they knew about me…”
Ballister turned back to the murder wall, pinning the scroll under the picture of the director.
“Something is going on and it’s a lot deeper than the director.” He said, letting the silence hang in the air a moment.
“What about the noble thing?” Nimona piped up breaking it.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, it doesn’t make any sense. If you actually wanted to fight monsters, you would want the best of the best right? Not just the best of a small group of people with money and power.” Ballister frowned.
“We were always told that the nobles were born to protect us.” He said, though it dripped with doubt.
“But that only makes sense if being noble somehow gave you special abilities or something right? But when we were fighting them you were so much better than all of them- even Goldengroin-”
“Goldenloin.” He corrected absentmindedly. “I think we need a better look at the archives. How do you feel about a heist?” He asked turning to her. He watched the grin spread across her face, teeth looking just that much pointier.
“Metal.”
***
“Now if we are going to do this we can’t let them know we are there. Nimona- look at me. We have to be subtle. If they know we were in the archives they might make moves to cover up anything we can find before we can get the word out.”
“Aw come on boss that no fun!” She moaned shifting into an octopus so she could have more arms to cross.
“I know, I know- which is why you, will be no where near the archives.”
“What!? No fair you’re just gonna dangle a heist in front of me and not let me break stuff??”
“No, Ballister said patiently, you will be across town making a distraction.” Her maniacal smile returned.
“Now that’s more like it!” She began rapidly shifting between whatever threatening creatures piped into her head. “What do you want me to do, blow up a city building? Ohh destroy a train? Kill a noble?” She got more and more excited as she listed things. Ballister waited until she seemed finished. He was learning that violence was an inherit part of her and if he was going to make this work, he needed to help her channel it, not stifle it.
“No, you’re going to rob a bank. As both of us.” She gave him a questioning look. “Both of us?”
“Yes.” He pulled out what he had spent the night working on and set it on the table. It was a hot pink mechanical rat. He passed her a palm sized remote. “You’ll turn into me, to give me an alibi, and then make sure the rat can be seen with you on the security cameras so they will see both of us there. Together.” He paused to make sure she was actually listening. “Then you’re going to blow the whole thing sky high.” She grinned.
***
Ballister carefully pulled the control panel from the wall and got to work rewiring it. He had built a miniature laser solder into his index finger of the prosthetic last night so he made quick work of it, neatly slotting it back into place as the formerly secured door swung open.
He slipped inside as quietly as anyone could while wearing armour. It wasn’t his armour of course, the black was far to recognizable. Nimona had stolen a spare set of the standard white armour from someone- he hadn’t asked who. It was slightly too big but nothing else would have fit over his prosthetic arm.
He had never been allowed to wear the white armour before. Neither had Ambrosius; though for very different reasons. Ambrosius as a descendent of Gloreth needed something to mark him as special to the public- and Ballister, well he assumed it was the queens love of metaphors taken a bit too far with the whole “black sheep” thing. He had often wondered if maybe he might have been more accepted by the other knights if he at least had the option to look like one of them. Still, he supposed it didn’t matter now, he adjusted the poorly fitted helmet and strode forward. He wasn’t sure exactly what he was looking for, but he doubted it would be in the paper archives.
He knew from exploring as a child that there was a secured area down here, one that no one but the director and the queen were allowed into, it was kept guarded at all times by two guards and Ballister was willing to bet what he was looking for would be behind that door. He stopped right before turning the corner that would put him in the path of the guards. He pulled out a tablet and sent a signal scrambler. Causing the guards radios to jump frequencies to the general one all the on duty knights used. And counted. 5, 4, 3, 2-
“All knights to midtown bank! I repeat all knights to midtown back. Ballister Boldheart is robbing the bank- we need back up now!”
The two guards looked at each other, their post and back at the radio, the message repeated.
“Do you think that means us too-” one began, but the radios crackled to life again, this time with Todd on the speaker.
“That means all of you get your lazy asses down here!” The guards took off running. Ballister smiled. Good old Todd, that asshole could always be relied upon to give garbage orders.
The secured door was a bit more tricky to hack, but he was familiar enough with institute security that he still had the panel replaced and back in the wall in only a few minutes. Inside there was a large screen and computer type set up, he moved quickly plugging in an encryption breaker key and began downloading everything he could. He mentally counted down five minutes, which he figured was probably pushing it in terms of time as it was.
The second he finished the could he slipped the drive into his pocket and made his way out as quickly as he could. Joining a patrol of knights as he saw them running past, only to peel off the second they came close enough to the door.
As he made his way back to the lair; not bothering to remove the white armour- it was amazing how invisible he was with his face and body completely covered. He could hear sirens and explosions in the distance. He bit back a sigh. Hopefully Nimona hadn’t caused too much damage.