King of Swords

A man sits in front of a recent grave, a white candle slowly burning down to nothingness, as he merely watches under the overcast night sky. He isn't wearing anything protective or secretive today, merely a coat for the weather atop his standard flannels, letting his long graying ginger hair fall to the side as his head looks down.

As he sits on the stump he turned into a makeshift bench, an older woman dressed in mourning clothes spots him, and walks up, folded umbrella in hand.

"Were they a friend?"

"Could've been." He did not look up from his position. "I didn't get the chance to know. We were in the same field, though."

The woman looked down, reading 'Jacob Bellamy' on the headstone.

"I've had many friends I've had to see buried." He added on.

"Are you a soldier?" She asks.

"No? Not exactly, anyways."

"Hmm. A firefighter, then?"

He chuckles. "In another life. How'd you tell?" He actually looked up at the woman now, seeing a soft smile amid sharp features, purely silver hair in a tight bun.

"Your back has the weight of many lives, but you don't carry yourself with the same arrogance or defeat that a police officer would. You also have a more practiced and steeled gaze than a mere unfortunate civilian. So, soldier or firefighter, then. Although, now that I think about it, you don't have the regret of a soldier." She listed off, her soft smile turning into a neutral position.

"You sound like someone with experience. Government?"

"To borrow the phrase, in another life. I saw dozens, hundreds even, of people who had all suffered greatly. Who had tragedy in their blood and lives on their back. People who were uniquely exposed to the tragedy of the world." Her specific phrasing caught the man's ear.

"...You aren't just a social widow, are you?" He asked, his inquisitive glance turning sharp.

"I've been widowed far too long to still hold the title. My name is Minerva Waller, former Director of Project FIRSTLIGHT - Washington Branch. And you," she extends a hand forward. "Are the King of Swords."

He stands of his own volition, slowly and calmly, dwarfing the woman by a solid foot, at least. "Is that going to be a problem?"

"If I was the current Director, maybe. But I'm not here to fret about jurisdiction and procedure." She withdraws her hand. "I'm here to get your help."

"What could I possibly do that you are not already capable of? Even a former director such as yourself must have some credibility with the project."

"That's what you'd think, but FIRSTLIGHT has been all but castrated in Washington. Our presence in Olympia, in Lewis-McChord, naval bases, anywhere. Ever since last winter, the sparse hold we had has been immensely reduced. I'd wager there's maybe a dozen real FIRSTLIGHT agents in those bases at all."

"A sorry state to be in, but why do you want to get my help? The Swords aren't amateurs, but we are a citizens militia."

"Because your organization is one of, if not the, most organized force in the region that actually knows what we're dealing with. There's still a city full of inhuman monsters out there that needs to be taken care of. I don't know why I was taken out of the picture, or why our forces are being diminished, but it has to be their influence." She spoke with conviction, but was just barely holding back fire and bile.

Fire that the King caught onto, and wasn't sure if it was a righteous torch, or mere destruction. "May I tell you a little about the people here?"

Minerva seems a bit confused, but nods.

"The latest one, Jacob Bellamy. He was a bit rough around the edges, but had his heart in the right place. He left behind his poor sister, and died only because he had no idea what could've awaited him." He begins, pointing down to the headstone.

"Asuka Izumi, fought an animalistic vampire until the sun rose, but didn't last longer herself. Samuel Terry detonated a grenade in his own hand as a last-ditch effort so that the rest of his team would survive. Lilibet Chaplin didn't get the chance to go on a mission before an over-eager vampire overheard her. Roxana Minami was a dutiful mole within a vampire-run business, but was caught after sending us key files. Cary Hahn fought off two physically empowered vampires until reinforcements could arrive." He continued to go down, pointing to each gravestone, some being many years old.

"All of them and more have given their lives to fighting vampires and their kind." He stressed, although Minerva didn't seem to catch it. "I have been proud to fight alongside them, and ashamed to see their lives snuffed out. You say the Swords are the most organized force in the region, and they are who we organize for. So none of us die meaninglessly or alone." He turns back to face the former director.

"Tell me, do you think they deserved to die?" He asked in a disturbingly calm, matter-of-factly manner.

"Deserved? Perhaps not. But sacrifices are made in the fight against inhuman creatures, and they made the tough sacrifices. They performed their duty to humanity."

"You don't think the cost was too high?"

"What cost is too high, in the face of our species' existence?"

There is a silence of consideration, as the wind rustles the trees near the graveyard. "We have much to discuss, Madam Director. Shall we go somewhere more private?"

An impromptu furnace fire within a safehouse rages, as the lifeless body of the director is charred inside. 

"Make sure there wasn't any tracking or tapping done." The King says over a secure phone call while wiping off his sharpened axe.

"Roger." A sardonic voice replied. "Do you have to be so dramatic every time?"

"Come now, Queen. You understand the level of extremity that FIRSTLIGHT holds. They don't see the monsters, only the different. They'd even view people like me and you as threats, for the gifts that-"

"You don't have to explain that part to me. It's just always a mess." The queen replied, rolling their eyes.

"The bigger mess would be if they saw fit to use us as pieces in their game. They'd run us down to the last man in the face of their grand results."

"Oh? Like how you did with the Bellamy kids?"

"That is not comparable. We gave them the information we had. It is a tragedy that Jacob is not here with us now."

"The information we had, huh? Because I remember you advising the scouts to wear ventilation gear ahead of time."

"...A trial is needed to gain the gifts we have, you know this."

"Powers are worth more than lives, gotcha! Look, I get the score. Just let me know when my turn on the chopping block is ahead of time. I got bills to worry about, man."

"I'd nev-" There is a key moment of silence, where the King had no proper words to say.

"You're clean. No signals detected and no movement in your area." The queen continued, knowing their victory.

"Thank you, Queen. See you back at base."

The drive back to the base was a quiet one for the King. No one could truly understand the necessary precision of sacrifice. Idealists, and those like Queen who didn't consider such things, saw any sacrifice of life as abhorrent. Pragmatists and obsessives, like FIRSTLIGHT, saw any sacrifice as necessary for the sake of their own bigger picture.

Either end more often than not had only self-preservation in mind. The idealists wouldn't sacrifice themselves and thus would not want others to be sacrificed, while pragmatists merely didn't want to lose their power or wealth.

Ethan, however, saw the score. No war is won without sacrifice, especially one as violent as the war against vampires. But, sacrifice needed to be precise, it needed to be intended. It needed to work. Otherwise, it's no different than murder.

"Jacob, Samuel, Asuka, Roxana, Lilibet, Cary, Ida, Monique, Tanit, Kiera, Bronwyn...all of you, and," He fishes for his wallet, pulling out an aged polaroid from a house party in California, his eyes moving from he flamboyant subjects in the foreground to the awkward and slightly blurred scruffy visage in the background. "Arthur, brother. Are you all watching me? Do you see what I'm doing?" Ethan's eyes water slightly, remembering the brief visage of his elder brother, with this photo being the only other time he has had the chance to see it.

"No. Of course not. You don't have the chance to see it, because of our enemy. You are all the reason why I must do what I am doing."

In the tarot suit the organization took its theming from, the King of Swords is a card that, simply put, advises you to make the logical decision without engaging with emotion. It's a card of sense and of authoritative decision-making. That is how Ethan Wilde viewed himself, a man who must put his emotions outside of the decisions he makes, in order to win the war, to be the King his people needed.

It is a fight he will continue to wage, no matter how long it takes him. "I'll make it all worth it. And then," his eyes wander to the photo once more, before folding it back up into his wallet once more. "I will join you all with a smile on my face."