Darkness...the indiscriminate enemy.

I leave you to read.

~MS

Chapter 3

Yuri's Shadows

I can already see the sympathetic eyes that you're about to give me. But don't' bother. I've seen them before, and yet look at me now, where I am, where I stand. Those eyes...those eyes can look into the soul, and the eyes that cannot see beyond the skin on my face...both accomplish the exact same thing. That ship has come and gone. And all that's left on the dock for me to use are the tools of vengeance.

I wasn't sure anyone could relate to me first. After all, I'm the leader of this front, I've heard every story and every hardship my teammates...my friends have gone through. So no, they can't really relate to my early life.

It was perfect, after all. I don't' expect them to. And they don't either.

Rich parents, large house, siblings that were kind, and never fought...you could honestly say I had the good life. I never really considered myself greedy or selfish; my siblings came first for everything. I was the oldest, so that was natural; I had to protect them and help them. If there was one great hardship during those early years, it was the fact that my parents weren't home much. Being rich had its price, after all, as most of their time was spent out in the field, doing expensive research for some expensive company. What mattered was they weren't home a lot, and that did hurt.

Honestly though, I was fine with that. I was never alone after all, my siblings were my charge, as well as my company. I was happy then, and happy when my parents were home. Nothing to worry about, right?

Some say the punishment comes first to the perfect. I only wish I heard this saying before my life went straight to hell.

The clear blue skies, the everlasting sunrise

shining in the urban greens

cannot dispel the shadows made

to linger, the darkness of reality

covered by the topical beauty

of the nature we so love.

I suppose you could say our family was religious. We weren't devout, but there were always the little things: giving our thanks for the meals on our plates, occasional prayers at our bedside, bathed in the moonlight, and occasional church visits when our parents weren't out in the field. God was in our lives, but did not control them. I was fine with that, what else could I have thought at such a young age? I didn't want anybody I couldn't see controlling what I did. It was tough enough having my parents control my life, one more person didn't sound that appealing.

Of course, I was met with correcting words whenever I voiced this in the open. Nothing to get me in trouble, mind you, but there was always the constant reminder that God is watching. The observer of all, the omniscient, the omnipotent. He could hear, he could see, he could offer advice through his texts. That's what I learned.

It is only now that I realize that those traits are useless at stopping tragedy.

Me? I think he could have stopped it. He goes on about how all-powerful he is, after all. For whatever the reason, however, he did not.

God wasn't there to tell the bad men to leave. God wasn't there to convince those robbers to put their guns down, to see the error of their ways and repent. God definitely didn't help me find where my parent's valuables were, so I could save my family. And he surely didn't mind watching as my siblings were murdered in cold blood.

So what did we do wrong, God? Was there too much happiness in our little family? Were we sheltered too much, shoved into the back corner of reality, unable to see what lay in front of us? By no means were we unfaithful, but by no means did we deserve what happened!

You showed us reality. And now they'll never get to see it. Now all I see is the darkened sky. That ray of hope, that one piece of optimism that kept me going? Gone. All thanks to you.

Square one, God. Square one.

The light, the guiding path

covered in moss and gravel

obscured to the blind, the weak

who follow the rails of safety.

You think that was bad? Well, you're right. Nothing much tops being one of the reasons your innocent siblings are dead, with gaping holes in their heads. The images of blood, soaking the refined carpet floor, their faces still wide with terror, frozen from their last moments, staring across the room into the nothingness that awaited them, unawares of the bullets about to ruin their lives for good. They never knew the sound of the gunshot, they never knew the reason of the invasion...all they knew was to stay put, to wait for the big sister to fix this.

And I failed.

The weeks after the incident I spent confined within my room, silent as the statues atop our grand church. I can't even tell you how many plates of food were left to deteriorate outside my bedroom door. What did it matter? No matter what I ate, or when I chose to do it, it left me all too quickly, one way or another. My room was no solace, the food unimportant. All that could be seen was that that would never be in front of me again.

Counseling? If that were a joke, I'd be laughing right now. Tell you what, God. Give me a counselor that can bring my siblings back. Give me some damn religious confessions that doesn't only serve to relive those painful memories once more, leaving you screaming for mercy, mercy from a God that did nothing to prevent.

Remember Eve, God? Remember the supposed sin she committed, aided by the serpentine malice that resided in your utopic garden? Remember her innocence in the matter? Strange, that the snake, the catalyst of realistic atrocities, still slithers about in your utopic paradise, preying on those who may place the slightest of trust in his words. Is it wrong to trust others, God? What if they force themselves upon you? Thrust their way in, insisting their way is right, forcing their ideals, their methodologies onto us, without a say from the people that are being afflicted? Do they matter at all?

Of course not. For it wasn't the snake in the grass that was banished, but the catalyst of innocent trust.

Were we Eve? Were we the symbolism of perfection, destined for an atrocity brought about by the overly trusting methodologies we were raised upon? Love thy neighbor...love thy neighbor to death.

Perhaps you meant that literally.

And who do I kill

with the broad end of my blade?

the man in the cage

or the beast that never became?

Five days. Six hours. Twenty seven minutes, thirty-four seconds. Yes, time moves at a snails pace when all but the tears on your face stop. The days and nights melded together into a cacophony of light and noise, the cars passing by invisible to the eyes that can no longer see outward.

They say time is a human concept, created to understand and discern the passing days. Of course, anything made by humans is open to interpretation, and as such, time does not pass the same for those around me. And here I am, not gauging the passing of human time by the minutes on the bedroom clock, but the coming and passing of the suns rays, blending together into a countless, messy conglomeration of days and weeks.

Who knows how much time has passed? The passing of the suns is as frequent as the knocks at my door, the meals left untouched within the bedroom hallway. And as time passed, the meals rotted, and the sun accomplished its westward journey again and again, my eyes stayed their course, standing alone in the mirrors of pastime, the haunting visions of my family's lifeblood staining the window to the future.

And yet here I am. Unseeing, unmoving, unwilling to go forward. Still living, still breathing. Somehow.

Darkness surrounds me once again; I've lost count as to how many times it's happened. But this time, something was wrong. The nights were always slow to approach, with the sun slowly sinking across the western horizon, teasing us with its final rays of light before plunging the world into total darkness. The guardian, leaving its pupils to fend for themselves in the cold.

No, this was no taunting sunset. The blackness approached all too quickly, a pressuring void that sucked my very breath and vision away from me. My unseeing eyes were blinded, breath taken from my soulless body, and all I could hear was frantic sobbing as my head was thrashed up and down.

'So, this is what it's like to die.'

the pressure was released, but only for a moment, and my eyes broke free from their spiritual cage to see the teary eyed corpse of my mother, an overstuffed pillow for a coffee promotion held in her trembling hands.

'Or is this just the final step in the process?'

My vision was obstructed once more, and after several minutes, the instinctual, bodily will to survive finally gave way to everlasting darkness.

To sleep, to wake

a given world for the unlucky' sake

given the choice, to live or to vanish

to be the setting sun, lower once, be banished.

I'm alive.

It's like waking up from a dream. The feeling of independence, the rush of normalcy, all too much to take, at first. Of course, I didn't know this was the Afterworld. It felt like reality, the world that should have been here once I woke up from the terrible nightmare.

Of course, that bloodstained window was never cleaned. Dreams may haunt the mind, but none can chill the very soul to its core in this such way. It was these past memories that spurred me to move forward.

But to what? I knew nothing of this world, and those around me knew just as much. It was a school, I was a student. That was all. Nothing more, nothing less. Ask them how they got here, and you'd hear everything from scholarships to parental funding. The stories were normal, but the circumstances surreal.

The thought of suicide never occurred to me, but in the early days of the Afterworld, I certainly tried it. The tallest of gym buildings were easy to access, and the subsequent drop completely unnoticed by the students milling about. Apparently it was normal to them for a teenage girl to hurl herself off of a building to her...second death.

Four times, I've tried. Four deaths, four visions of blissful darkness And each time I was greeted by the calming void with open arms, only to be forced awake by some 'divine' magic, back into the confines of my body. Freedom from self mutilation was out of the question.

And so 'life' went on. Around me these unfamiliar students went to classes and did their homework. I quickly became accommodated with what seemed like the sole vacant room on the premises; the principles office. Where was he? For all the time spent here, there was never a mention of him.

His office was large, furnished, and quiet, making it a fine place to get away from the confusion and awkward conversations with non-humans. Without so much as a peep of protest this office turned into my home. And as the weeks went by, it turned into the headquarters we grew to love.

It was strange, creating the brigade. There came a time when more and more people came through, their emotions and thoughts flowing like the river rapids, from confusion to anger to the purest intentions of vengeance. Some were more angry than others, some said no words. In the end, we were all the same; lost and without a purpose, trapped in a dead world with students who never experienced life.

One thing was agreed upon, however. Of all the hatred, of all the desires for vengeance, there was none stronger than mine. And that was why they saw me as their leader. I was the one with the most experience, I was the one that knew this strange world the most, and I was the one that wanted to put my foot into God's ass the most.

There were doubts, of course. Was I ready to lead? Was I even capable of leading this ragtag group of misfits, not ready for the rebirth into a world that never accepted us in the first place? These thoughts plagued my sleep for the passing weeks, filled with uncertainty and thoughts of failure.

But those thoughts never came to reality. Those that looked up to me stayed loyal, and I was left leading the group of misfits caught in this purgatory world. But as time passed, and the days grew shorter and shorter with the passing of every sunrise, they became less and less of what I could call comrades with a purpose. Their safety, their well being, were less and less of my chore, and more of my responsibility.

It was foreign, at first. This feeling of...of what? Selflessness? That feeling you get, to protect everyone dear to you?

...Dear to me. That was it. They were no longer comrades, because they were my friends. They were the family I lost.

They were people I loved.

And now I could protect them.

The shadow, so large

but tis' not his body

the gun rests on its back

waiting to cue it's masters bidding.

Things are not as they seem. They never are.

God's emissary, the Angel that caused us so much trouble, was nothing more than a human, just like us. The fear of vanishing that the brigade held so dear was nothing more than an escape from this cursed world.

But the worst was yet to come. From nowhere, a new foe assailed us, and threatened to take away the meager peace that we managed to develop in the new world. It took the 'death' of a comrade, Takamatsu, for us to realize the true threat that this presented.

He was like me. He was like all of us. And now, he was nothing like us at all. Sitting at his desk, acting like all of the other miserable drones here, going about their daily 'lives' without a care in the world. His memories of the revolution, the brigade, and his friends, now all but a distant memory.

What was I to say, to comfort the rest of the brigade? To help them deal with this new threat? My job is to protect them, to keep them safe from this new danger. But what brought this on? Why must we now be under assault from what seemed yet another of God's creations? Darkness, shadows, devouring memories and souls, turning us to mindless husks.

Is that not truly death?

My questions led me underground, into the heart of what was once an allied stronghold. Deep within the aging rocks and the time-whethered sands, a simple building stood. It was clearly not built by human hands, the metalwork merging itself seamlessly with the rocky outcroppings in the cavern. A sign sat atop the gleaming metal door: Second Computer Lab.

Silently opening the door, the sights of my submachine gun were quickly locked to my eyes, aimed outward at a single man, sitting at a computer table. His glasses reflected the light from the hundreds-no, thousands of monitors that lined the walls. For a while, I stood there, and he sat there, and we did nothing but stare; he with an indifferent smile, me with a pertinent scowl.

And then he spoke. It was calm, collected speech, but to me it was rushed and chaotic, a torrent of puzzle pieces that scattered around the table, all fitting themselves in perfectly to the carefully placed pieces we had acquired during our time here. Stories of God's will and benevolence, the origins of the world, the true place of the NPC's that dotted the landscapes. Each word that left his lips was a blow to my side, and soon I held up a hand, halting him mid-sentence.

"Ah." He mused, stroking his chin. "You wonder about this 'love', yes? The very emotion that is disallowed in this world?"

Love, disallowed? To deny love is to deny human emotion at its base!

"Not so." The figure continued. Dammit, he was reading my mind? "What, Yuri, is love to you? There are many ways to find this world. Regret and unhappiness, remorse, or perhaps hatred; all may lead to this 'normal' world."

He smirked. "Some are drawn by love, this is true. There are those in your group that were drawn here for this very reason."

I frowned, in thought. Nobody in the brigade ever spoke of a love. Could he be referring to Kanade? She and Otanashi were close...

"There are many kinds of love in this world" the man continued, breaking me from my train of thought. "Love for a field, a building, perhaps. Love for the gardens in the meadow, or perhaps a particular subject in class."

He chuckled, an action that seemed too human for this...thing. "But gardens and subjects can be found anywhere and everywhere, in this world and the realm of the living. There is no shortage of rolling fields and places of study for us to indulge that 'love.'

His eyes grew dark, obscured by the bangs of his black hair. "But there are kinds of love that can be found only in once place, at one time. These kinds of love are brought about by the simple rule of chance, drawn by the forces of fate, or perhaps circumstance."

What is he talking about? I'm half tempted just to put a bullet in his head and-

"Remember Takamatsu?"

I froze. How could he know about that?

"It's a shame, what happened."He said, placing no emphasis on sarcasm nor remorse; I couldn't tell what he was implying. "Shame he had to...die, so soon. But the shadows found him an easy target: a warning, you might say. His loss may be forgotten with the passing of time, but I'm sure you felt the responsibility for his passing?"

I nodded slowly, my gun hand shaking. What was he...?

"You loved him, did you not?"

I froze. What? Me and Takamatsu? There was no way that...!

"Ah, you misunderstand. That is normal, I must say." He looked around, and suddenly, the monitors around me changed colors. Instantly, images of every single brigade member, past and present, appeared on the screens lining the room. The images were never taken by photograph, and yet here they were: Iwasawa with her guitar in the practice room, Yui with a peace sign and a water bucket balanced on her head outside of class, Otanashi, canned coffee in hand, staring out from the Gymnasium rooftop. They were all there: Hinata, Shiina, Takamatsu. All of them.

"Tell me, Yuri. What would you give for your friends? What would you do to ensure their safety?"

That was easy. Anything. Anything at all. That's why I was here!

Sensing my thoughts, the figure smiled. "I see. Their freedom. Freedom from an unforgiving God, in an unforgiving world. Simple, yet...difficult to reach."

The monitors changed again, and my face paled. Every member of the brigade was now in the official school uniform, the original Brigade's uniform having completely vanished. The smiles on their faces, their eyes that were full of energy were now nothing but soulless husks. Their locations were noticeably different as well; every one of them was stationed in a classroom, diligently reading or jotting down God knows what.

They were gone. I dropped to my knees, shocked by the sudden change.

"This will happen." the figure said, smiling all the while. "In the end, one by one, they will succumb to the shadows. So long as you and your new found 'love' is here, this will continue to happen."

I looked at him in confusion.

"That's right, Yuri. This love I refer to is not that material love of gardens and classrooms that I spoke of before. This is a fated love, and yet it is a love that is never meant to happen. This place...this very world, would be an eternal paradise. Eden, you would call it in the living world. We cannot allow such things to come to pass. Reality awaits everyone; nobody is exempt."

"Then why force us out?" I shouted, feeling my emotions begin to crack. "Why take the happiness we were supposed to find and crumble it into dust?"

"Truly, if a life cannot find happiness in the months spent in perfection, is that life truly worth living?" The man countered. "You must find your own happiness. And if such happiness cannot be found, or perhaps, doesn't exist, then there is no point in continuing...is there not?"

"Then why deny love? Why deny human emotion?"

"Vanishing is only the first step, child. To find love is to never want to leave. Love creates the paradise, does it not? These shadows-" he motioned around the room- "Are the cure to the disease of love. Perhaps in the world of the living it has its place, but there is no place for such emotions here."

The being closed his eyes, seemingly deep in though, and I couldn't help but feel that my mind was being invaded by...something. Him, most likely.

"Ah..." the being relaxed. "You do agree, it seems. After all, was your life not the definition of perfection until that...incident?"

Memories immediately flooded back to me; my family, my friends, and most importantly, my siblings. Suddenly, everything we did up to that point did seem like perfection, The large house, the acres of rolling fields, the time spent together...was that not love? Was that not...Utopia?"

"Then..." I mumbled. "This...this is the same thing."

"What is?" the being asked, cocking his head to the side.

For a moment, I didn't answer. Here he was, the mystery figure that seemed to be behind the shadows, behind...everything, telling me to get everyone out before their fate is decided for them, in true death. What was I to believe? The morals we followed since we came here, or the words of someone I just met, not ten minutes beforehand?

The man spoke up again. "Tell me, Yuri, can you find their freedom? Can you find what you deem most valuable, and bring it to them...before they die?"

On the outside, my gun hand was still shaking, and our eyes were still locked. Inside my mind, however, I was far from seeing the man in front of me. Gone was the almost serene expression of a seemingly young man, and replacing his features was a burly man, his hair obscuring his face. One hand held a 9mm pistol, the other a bloodstained lock of hair. Even through the blood, I could tell who's hair it was.

Mine.

Just as I snapped my gun's iron sights to my face, the illusion vanished, leaving the man from before, his expression completely unchanged.

It was as if I could see him in a new light. He, the seeming-God of this world, was holding the gun to my friends. The shadows- the many guns that lined the walls and floors and ceilings of the school, swarming for living flesh- held at the heads of my family. And here he was, giving me the choice; find what is valuable and live, or watch my friends die, one by one.

The burly man appeared once more, and suddenly, I understood.

The shaking in my hand stopped, and without hesitation I snapped the gun up to my eyes, fighting the urge to laugh at the simplicity of it all. Releasing the safety, I aimed directly at the man, who merely cocked his head in curiosity.

"You...you're God. Aren't you."

"What do you mean?" The man asked, chuckling. "I am no God. I hold no infinite power, nor omnipotence."

"But you hold the power to this world." I countered. "You put lives under your boot, send the shadows after us. Perhaps you hold no sway anywhere else, but here..." I released the bolt, feeling a single bullet slide into the chamber- "Here, you are truly God."

"Am I? And what power would I hold, Yuri? Power over shadows? Power over the very fabric of this world? You know as well as I do that I, me, myself...hold no such power."

"But you're the cause of all this!"

"The cause? Here and now, perhaps." The man replied. "But causes can be 'caused' by anyone. You, me, Otanashi...anyone and everyone has the power to 'cause' something. But a God doesn't 'cause'. Tell me, Yuri, what does a God do?"

That threw me off guard. God was the reason, the cause, the purpose of everything we did!

Seemingly sensing my thoughts once more, the man interrupted me. "And where did such ideals get you, Yuri? Who was your opponent throughout your little campaign?"

"Ange-" I almost shouted, but caught myself. After a moment's resignation, I whispered: "Kanade."

"Ah...a name." The man replied, smiling. "Do Angels have names? Do they feel emotion?"

Before I could answer, he held up a hand. "You should know, Yuri. You should know...that none of us know."

"Then who is God?" I asked, returning to the original question at hand. His roundabout way of 'answering' questions was getting on my nerves. "You claim power, but claim no godhood. Which one is it?"

"You are right, I claim no godhood. But I claim the means to use that godhood. I possess the means of utilizing omnipotence and power to my advantage. Does that make me God?"

"Of course not. You may have the means to control this world, but you lack the power to manipulate the living world, or any theoretical world that may come to pass."

"And what does that change about my standing in this world?" The man shifted his position, leaning back in his chair farther. He seemed very amused by our conversation. "In any other place I may be but a mere human, but here, I am God."

"You...are the God, of only this world?"

"You expected god to have unlimited potential?" The man asked, laughing. "I only possess the means of power here. As such, I am only God here. The logic fits, no?"

I found myself reluctantly agreeing. "Then...God relies on tools as well?" I gestured at the computers lining the walls for emphasis.

"Perhaps. Perhaps not. Truly, what is a tool without it's owner? Is it the formidable powerhouse that we acclaim it to be, or just a sack of paperweights, waiting for a use?" He gestured toward the gun in my hands. "Take your gun, for example. A fantastic tool, a great source of strength and power. Imagine the many things you ca do, what you have done with this fantastic weapon!" He was beginning to sound more like a preacher, less like the calm, collected person I just met.

"Take away the gun, and all we have is the girl with a dream and mission, without the means to carry it out save her words and her desires, which holds no sway in this utopic world. And then-" he gestured towards my gun once more- "we have your gun; the means to your success, the tool that has gotten you past the shadows, past what should have brought you down. But without you, what would this gun be? Where would it be, Yuri? Within the piles of dirt lining the walls of your...Old Guild, perhaps?"

"Yin and Yang..." I muttered. Slowly, the pieces were beginning to fall into place. "Then you...you only possess the means of power, and the methods to control it. Take one away, and the other cannot work."

"Exactly." The man stated, his calm voice having returned. "Your human concept of religion covers the very same principles. An imperfect race creating a perfect being. But in the end, your God is not perfect or benevolent because the God you created is not the ideal being envisioned within your holy scriptures, but a different being entirely."

The pieces, scattered and slowly forming, seemed to click all at once. No, there was no perfect being. There was no 'one god' to rule them all. There were only those with the desire for power, and the means to attain it.

As if it were without my permission, my memories brought me back to that fateful day that turned my world upside down. But instead of the burly, heavily tattooed man, all I saw was the boy from the computer room.

"The means of power...the desire to attain it...in this situation, am I not the God you so despise?"

"You!"

Without warning, I lunged at him, the reminder that this was a memory all but forgotten. As soon as my fist made contact with is body, however, the image vanished, and I was suddenly back in the computer room.

Silence reigned for several seconds before the man began to slowly applaud, a broad smile now adorning his features. "Well done...as I am God now, there have been Gods before me. Those who wrote these programs, these fail-safes, those who tried to abuse them, and those who tried to shut them down."

The man looked directly in my eyes. "You know the secret now. You now know how to be God."

He gestured around the room. "Now, what will you do with this power?"

The laugh that threatened to escape my throat before came rearing back tenfold, and my quiet chuckling soon turned into full-blown, maniacal cackling. Were anyone else watching, they perhaps would have thought I had gone insane.

Not so. It was just so simple now.

Shifting my submachine gun to one hand, I drew my final pistol, knowing it would take a lot of bullets to get what I wanted to done.

"And what is your choice, Yuri?" the man repeated. "What will you do with your power?"

I looked him dead in the eye, feeling the mild connection I had with him vanishing with every passing second. Without a second glance, I raised both arms, aiming the guns at the monitors that lined the wall. God's machines. God's will.

God itself? No. But perhaps a part of him.

"I'm doing what I always meant to do."

The man merely smiled. "And that is?"

It made so much sense now. Cutting off only the head of the snake kills the whole snake, after all.

"Simple." I chuckled, settling into a firing position. "I'm killing God."

The pain, the darkness

trapped in one's heart, unmoving

flees to the singe motes

of light; a new hope.

Was I...in the right?

God is dead. God no longer exists in this world; he no longer has the power to do so. His machines, his very source of power is nothing but a distant memory.

But it came at a price. For lost in that distant memory are the friends and family I once had. Their sacrifice gave us the answers needed to take him down. I can only hope that what Otanashi said was true. That they were now truly at peace, alive, living their new lives, free from the oppression that brought them here in the first place.

Perhaps...perhaps its time I joined them. After all, my purpose is done, for this world, at least. Am I fulfilled? Hardly. My family is still dead, the memories of their bloodstained bodies is still fresh in my mind.

And yet...that no longer bothers me. Perhaps it's because I can't do anything about it. Or perhaps its because now I know what to do about it.

That mans' words still linger in my mind. About how anyone can be God, with the right tools, being in the right place at the right time. Perhaps it is that I must strive against; those that wish to become God. After all, it was not god that killed my family, just a god.

Perhaps that was all that mattered.

Enough talk. My family is without their leader.

Chapter End.

Yeesh, this was a tough one.