In the end, it turned out I did have to split this final chapter into two. I'll have that second half along with the final interlude out soon, I hope, but in the meantime, please enjoy this!
Haze didn't know why the roof had suddenly broken apart beneath his feet, but only one thing mattered and that was the fact that his shadow didn't know either. When his shadow stumbled, Haze charged forward with a yell, leaping and pushing the shadow with both hands as hard as he could. The wind played with his hair and ruffled with his clothes and for a moment he felt as if he was flying but the horror on the face that mirrored his told him the truth, as did the sounds of screams rising like smoke.
He was falling.
He was falling and there was nothing to cushion him. This was it, the end, but it would be worth it if they were safe. If these actions were enough to save them, the three he loved more than anybody else in this world. So as he hurtled down, he called for them.
=A, Ezra, Theo? Can you hear me?=
He called for them over and over as loud as he could without actually screaming the words aloud, but there was nothing. =Answer me, answer me, please. I….= It couldn't end like this, it just couldn't. Haze kept calling their names in his mind, over and over as their descent continued, his eyes on the shadow, trying not to flinch at the fact that the shadow's eyes were his eyes too. He didn't know what he'd do if the shadow tried to dissipate and reform, because hurtling through the air he was powerless, and he'd dropped his screwdriver at some point and though he'd only sustained cuts and bruises they were many and everywhere and they hurt. They hurt and he didn't know where his friends were. He had to know. They had to be safe.
=Theo? Ezra? Ada, our A? Are you there? Can you hear me?=
He gasped as his shadow started to fade away. Scrambling, he tried to grab at it, whip it away but then the shape of it became smaller and more compact. Skinny arms and legs, pale skin and bruises. Hair black and tousled and the eyes…the eyes were his again but bigger in his head. Younger, fear in them. Fear all over his face, the face of the angry, angry child he had once been. But that anger had been fear all along really, hadn't it? Fear like the feeling that was building deep in his stomach now and clambering its way to his throat, his eyes. All along, that's what it had been.
I wonder, if I had met them all earlier, would I have been a better person sooner? I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. He reached out to his child-self, surprised at how warm and solid the shadow formation felt. It was as if this really was him as a child, scared and unsure and only ever able to express it as anger. The world had failed this child, he had failed this child, the child he had once been, but at least now he could hold them. So he pulled his child-self to him and cradled them close, protecting them the way he'd imagined he'd have wanted to protect a child he'd have in the future. I wish you had met them, he silently told his child-self. That we had met them. If we had known them earlier, we would have been the better for it. We could have been happier for longer. As he closed his eyes and pressed his face against his child-self's feather-soft hair he called out to them again.
=You can't hear me anymore, can you? You can't hear me. Please, please hear me. A, Theo, Ezra, please hear me. =
They kept on falling, him and his child self, lost in the finality of the moment and still he kept calling, hoping to hear their voices in his head just one more time. But he did not hear them and so he knew. He knew that one way or another it was over for them. All he could do was hold on and let himself fall. All he could do was hope that if he was not returned to them somewhere on the Other Side, that he would be returned to the earth.
I'm sorry, he thought. I'm so sorry. I love you all. Theo, Ezra. Ada, our A. I love you, and I'm sorry.
I love you.
Goodbye.
…
Kay screamed as she saw Haze tumbling through the air and rushed forward, paying little heed to the buildings crumbling all around her even as she swerved and dodged chunks of stone and wood and fragments of glass. Weirdly, in her mind, she couldn't picture that day that she and Rena and Ariadne had seen Abel jump off the roof but nonetheless it was there in her mind, the knowledge of that time. She didn't know how she could do anything, how she could stop it but nonetheless, she ran.
"HAZE!" she yelled. "HAZE!"
But he couldn't hear her, whether that was because of the crashing and the shattering and screaming around her or the shadows falling with him she didn't know. But he couldn't hear her, and he had to hear her, somehow otherwise he'd hit the ground and then…
Unbidden, finally, an image of the day with Abel unfurled across her mind-the unnatural angles, the blood, the glassy stare- and she skidded to a halt, her chest suddenly tight and her gaze fixed on Haze. The entire world seemed to stretch out, Haze's descent smoothing out into slow motion and she couldn't breathe, she couldn't-
Abruptly, the tension in her chest was expelled with a scream as she was suddenly pushed to the side, sprawling across the ground. Grass tickled her nose and she spluttered as she scrambled up to see Howl glowering down at her.
"What are you playing at? We need to get to the gardens, they're the safest place at the moment."
"I…I…." Kay didn't know how to think, let alone what to think. "You're talking?"
Howl rolled his eyes and she tried to get up, but all of a sudden her legs felt wobbly. Haze, oh no, Haze. He was someone on the outside of her new friend circle but suddenly the thought that he would be broken and battered and dead filled her with the same wailing anguish that Ariadne's loss produced in her. She blinked up at Howl and tried to form the words as she attempted to get up again but the next thing she knew Howl had picked her up, carrying her under his arm as if she was a roll of paper or something. She wanted to squawk in protest-I'm a person, thanks a bunch-but she couldn't summon up the indignation and so she allowed herself to be carried along silently, the journey bumpy as Howl ran towards the school gardens. Around her she saw others running, some of them carrying other students-though they were being carried in a more reasonable way at least.
And then she saw A, looking over her shoulder in horror as she faded away in a cloud of little golden shards of light.
"Di-did you see that?" she asked breathlessly.
"See what?" Howl asked.
"A…she just…she's fading. Disappearing. Do you think Haze is disappearing too? That'd mean he didn't hit the ground, right?"
Howl didn't immediately respond, just kept on running, but gradually they reached the gardens, where lots of students were gathering. Howl stopped by a cluster of bushes and finally let her down, and she sat there in a sloppy sort of heap, gathering herself for a moment before sitting up straighter to see Howl had dashed back to presumably go and help others. Oh well, she sighed, I suppose I can ask later. When she tried to stand up this time, she was able to manage it and she wove through the crowds until she found some of her friends, ripping pieces of cloth and taking out things from first aid kits to help those with injuries.
"Kay," Wendy exclaimed, looking up. "Are you hurt?"
"Ah, I'm a bit bruised-Howl pushed me, probably outta the way of something-but I'm not really hurt but…ooof, oh no, you guys."
Kay winced at the cuts and scrapes all over Kura, Mikelz and Char in particular, the way Angela's arm hung limp as a student she didn't know made a makeshift sling for her, and Rena's twisted leg. She sat down and just stared at them for a moment.
"Um….Kay, you alright there?" Kura asked.
"Yeah, no, I…." Kay pulled a face. "Um…hey, Wendy, want help? I'm probably no good at the nurse-y thing but I can hold stuff for you."
Wendy's face lit up as she gave a gentle, cautious smile.
"Yeah, sure."
Kay got up again and went over to do just that, as more and more people streamed out and the school buildings kept crumbling. What's happening, she wondered. Why is this….wasn't what we did meant to make sure that nothing else happened? As the surge of people arriving started to slow down she gradually drifted away from her friends, going over to the group that were watching the building's destruction.
"Do you know why this is happening?" she asked.
Quiet turned away from where he was talking to Sado and Howl, and looked at her.
"In truth, I'm not so sure."
"It might be the pact thing," Ruby called over from where she was huddled with her group. "Remember, they re-routed the power of their pact directly into the building."
"But that's….you're saying that it was literal?"
Ruby nodded.
"It's logical, isn't it? They tied themselves to the building and now they're gone, so the building has to go, too."
"But that's…."
There was a hysterical note in Lily's voice and Kay, Quiet and Ruby turned to look at her as she gestured wildly at the building.
"Will's still in there, and Starri and Liddy….they…."
Lily trailed off, simply gesturing more before her hands fell back to her side and she sighed, before spotting a group of people heading up towards the garden and sprinting towards them. Hiraga and Lucy followed, as did some others and Kay watched as they went back and forth to try and help them. Seeing more people with injuries, including Lidia with an alarming amount of blood streaming down one side of her face and staining her hair red, Kay went back to her friends and kept herself busy with trying to help manage injuries, while others attempted to get help.
Not everybody had their phones with them, but those that did reported that the Silencer spell still seemed to be in effect, though now calls were going through for a moment before then cutting out. Sera tried to go to the far end of the gardens, where part of the containment barrier ran through, and when she came back she reported that it now didn't shock, and felt 'squishy' but that she couldn't get through.
"In that case," Sado said decisively. "We're going to have to do the rescues ourselves, until we can get help."
"But it's still…will it be safe to go back there?" Lucy asked.
"Some of us can fly over, and others can transform and burrow through the small gaps the rubble's caused, we can find people that way." Ani suggested.
When everyone who was near enough to hear her gawped at her she sighed irritably and ran her hand through her hair, tangling it before she sighed.
"There's no other safe way to scout out what's happening though, is there?" she sighed. "Besides…I can manage that much."
"I think I can, too." Aki said with a decisive nod. "And if some of you guys who have smaller forms transform then we can carry more of you over. "
Almost immediately, a number of the group did indeed transform into their reptilian forms, leaving Ruby, Aerin and Samu as the only ones who didn't, and immediately Aki and Ani exchanged looks and huffed laughter before also transforming. Ruby and Aerin helped their transformed friends climb onto Ani and Aki's backs and then Ruby climbed onto Aki's back. Aerin went to Ani but then paused, staring at Samu intently. Kay fully expected her to insist that he stayed on the ground, just as she'd insisted before. But instead she leaned forward, ruffled his hair and then gestured for him to go first. Once he was safely on, then Aerin clambered on and looked towards them all.
"Alright. What do you all think? Is it safe?"
"I…it's quietened, certainly," Quiet said after a moment. "I can't hear anything else collapsing and…well, we would hear it?"
"Survey from as high up as you can get, first," Sado advised. "Then go in."
"Yeah, yeah, we know that," Ruby rolled her eyes. "Alright, are all of you ready?"
When a chorus of yeses chimed in, Ruby nodded and then immediately, Ani set off, Aki following quickly. The beat of their wings caused a gust that had most of them stumbling back, and Kay spluttered for a few moments as her hair whipped around her face and got into her mouth. It took her more than a few seconds to be able to get it out of the way, and once she had the first thing she did was look up to see where they were, only to be distracted by the sky.
No longer was it pure white, and no longer were the clouds black. Instead, the sky was grey, the type of grey that came only from clouds almost completely covering it, with the teeniest, tiniest hints of blue poking out here and there.
"It's…it's normal."
"What was that?"
Kay jumped and turned around.
"Sera! When did you turn up?!"
"Just wondering where you were, what's happening?"
"Oh, Ruby-sempai's lot are trying to determine if it's safe to go back in there to rescue people. You know, until we can actually get help. Also, the sky's normal again."
"Oh, right…."
Sera blinked up at the sky, and then drily said:
"Yes, it is."
They didn't say anything more than that as they continued to watch Ani and Aki circling around and around above the buildings, possibly looking to land somewhere between them. Kay watched the dragons circling on-from this far, she couldn't see what anyone on board was doing-but it didn't matter because after a few moments they clearly determined that they could go down because they suddenly dove down sharply.
Then, as they passed part of the North Wing, a block dropped off.
Immediately, the block dropped to the ground but not before crashing into Ani, sending her flying backwards, wings flailing as she crashed into Aki and they both went pinwheeling across the sky before also dropping down, down, down.
Kay's screams were drowned out by everybody else's, and all of theirs were drowned out by the sound of the entire wall the block had come from crumbling to the ground. Pink dust rose up briefly from the ground and then settled and the resulting silence was far, far too hollow.
It was too hollow, and she didn't see how it could ever be filled in again.
…
The world went dark.
The world went dark, and there was nothing there apart from the loudness of her own thoughts, and for a moment Sasi thought that this was it, that this was the end. But her back crashed into the ground, pain burst all across her body, settling heavy on her legs and pinning her to the ground. Groaning, she blinked once, twice and managed to sit up despite the heaviness and the pain that only flared brighter with every slight movement. Her first instinct was to create an orb of light quickly, not just to help her see but to make sure she herself wasn't seen as dark but then she stopped.
It was a lie, wasn't it? All a lie.
The spurt of rage this bought on was enough to momentarily numb her and as she sat straighter, leaning against a pile of shattered stone to steady herself she simply looked around her, concentrating and waiting. There was nothing particular she did, yet after a moment she noticed chinks of pale light in between the gaps above her, and these were enough for her eyes to start to be able to pick out shapes all around her. Even in the shadows, her eyes managed to find the lines and shapes, and she was soon able to see that the reason she couldn't move her legs was because there was a huge plank straight across them, with more debris piled on top of that, weighted against her left leg in particular. Her rage ebbed away as the leg throbbed, as if to tell her to not look away or forget it again. She gritted her teeth and took a deep breath, wondering what to do. Down here, it was like a cave, but not like the beautiful glow-worm cave where she had been so happy, but one that was so deep down there was no hope of finding it. If it wasn't for the little gaps that let the sky filter through, she'd have wondered if they had somehow ended underground from the force of the collapse.
Hearing groans made her turn her head away from the state her legs were in and look around. She remembered that moments before she'd been buried she'd looked up and seen two dragons circling, only another section of the building to fall, crashing into them and sending them all flailing. Now she was thinking about it, she could have sworn that the impact of one of them falling had been what had knocked her into the path of the collapsing section and sure enough, a little distance from her she saw a frail arm from underneath a larger pile of debris. Blood pooled out around it, and instinctively she knew that whoever it was had no hope whatsoever.
But the person crawling towards her did.
She tensed and immediately reached for her sword, relieved when she discovered that not only did she still have it but she could still pull it out. She quickly realised it had been chipped, the tip bent slightly too- but it was the best she could do. Her ankle knives were no doubt completely crushed, perhaps even making whatever damage was already inflicted on her legs even worse. Her hands trembled, and it took her a few seconds longer than she would have liked to get a grip on the sword, but as she managed to lift it up and point the blade in the direction of the shuffling and groaning, the person in question made an orb of blue light form from their hand, releasing it so it hovered between them.
"Why the hell are you pointing a sword at me during an earthquake?" Cain asked.
Despite the vehemence in the question, the only emotion his face betrayed was a raised eyebrow as he looked at her, but when he shuffled forward and tried to sit up he hissed in pain, wincing as he held his arm towards him.
"Come here," Sasi ordered briskly, lowering her sword. "I can't move."
"Yes, I can see that."
Cain had no reaction to this, instead concentrating on pulling himself up to her. She reached over, and studied his arm. She was no medical professional, not even vaguely, but her life as it had been was more than enough for her to be able to tell that at the very least he had broken it. She didn't know how badly it had been broken, but she could at least fashion a makeshift sling. But there, too, was a problem. She had an obvious way of making a sling, but she couldn't bring herself to tear the cloak she was wearing. A part of her, the part that was still the angry girl who barely believed she was human, sneered at the rest of her for the attachment but she gritted her teeth against that, too and instead unbuttoned the cloak, shrugged it off and ripped at the edge of her tunic instead. Struggling to tear the material, she managed to pull out a smaller knife from her belt and used that to cut through until she had a couple of large strips of material. She beckoned Cain over and then quickly tied his arm up in the sling before putting the cloak back on.
"I didn't think you would know how to do this sort of thing." Cain mused as he looked down at the sling.
Sasi just snorted-there was nothing much she could say to that. Cain regarded her for a moment, and then sighed.
"Do you think this is it, Sasi?"
She blinked at him, and then shook her head.
"No, it's not."
"And you know this how?"
"Because they'll be looking for me. They'll know that I need to be found, and they'll look for me."
Cain continued to stare at her, and she found herself remembering another time, another place.
"Sasi?"
"What?" she asked, looking over her shoulder.
"I'd look for you, too."
Sasi turned around properly, and gawped. Tricker stood there, his hands in his pockets and his face…gentler, somehow, though his eyes still pierced.
"Huh?"
"If anything happened. Your friends wouldn't be the only ones looking."
She shook her head decisively and glared.
"If you want to believe you'll die, then fine. But I'm going to live, one way or another."
"For him?"
Sasi gave him a sharp look, but had to admit that there was no reason he shouldn't assume that. She wondered what someone like him thought of her, if he'd struggled to reconcile the image that he would have had of her (and her friends) with what he'd found when he'd returned. There was a part of her that suspected that he was interested in her, but he hadn't tried to flirt the way she had expected based on what the non-magical freshmen had said about him. As long as he didn't try, she was glad to have a new…well, not a friend, but a new someone in her life. The girl she'd once been, the angry one that believed all the lies about her, the one that sneered at her devastated shattered heart-she wasn't going to be that person anymore.
One way or another, she was going to live.
"Yes, for him," she answered with all of this in mind. "But for myself, too. Are you living for anyone?"
Cain averted his eyes, but then whispered:
"I have no idea."
Sasi got the sense that he was not talking about having a particular precious person, but something more than that, simply because there was a part of her that felt the same. She remembered that day, that day that had ended so beautifully in the glow-worm caves, how before that she and her friends had sat in the Headmaster and Headmistress's office waiting for the hammer to come down only to be met with hope instead.
"It's a failing of ours that the six of you look so surprised at that, I suppose."
"You've never said anything." Sasi murmured, low and angry.
"The superstition of mirror sisters and what they are supposed to cause has existed since the Forgotten Goddess was first sealed away by Goddess Akari," Headmaster Cher explained. "Three hundred years is but a blink in comparison to that, certainly not enough strength to unseat something that ingrained across a whole land. You are not the first known mirror sisters that we have had in this school, and it is more than likely that out of all the female students we've had who've been adopted, quite a number of them were probably mirror sisters who had been 'purified' by their adoption.
"Nonetheless, this is the first time we've had a whole group of you in the same grade let alone in the same cohort. And while discretion has worked well with those previous students clearly something has failed here. Now, you've got no choice but to have your background known and…well. This world we live in, it's not going to be easy. But we will not condone any mistreatment towards you."
Had any of that really been truth? If Headmaster Cher had been the Goddess Akari all of this time, surely he had known exactly what his lies had done. Whatever the reason for them (and she still, after all this, could not grasp the reason for them), he must have known. Certainly, he must have realised it from as early as the Great War. And with that realisation and the power that he'd had with it, surely he could have done something that would have changed their lives further down the line? That was what it meant to be a God or a Goddess, to be the core of the world. That amount of power and yet back in that office they'd both sounded so helpless.
That helplessness had to have been a lie, a lie to keep up the fantasy no matter how much they regretted it. It should have been enough to make her disbelieve everything they had said and yet…
"But nonetheless, it seems that overall this cohort is quite special, and that goes for the six of you too. The things you've been told before…that does not have to be what you become. Listen to our voices, listen to the voices of those who will speak up for you. I know it won't be easy to believe them all but you need to remember that you are not tainted, or cursed, or guaranteed to bring darkness. It is not birth-right that determines wrongdoing or worth but actions. Listen to us, listen to the people who want to be your friends or your lovers or your allies. Make amends with those amongst those people who you've hurt, because you cannot deny that you have done that, whatever your reasons. We will help pave the way as much as we can while you are here, but the rest now is down to you and what you choose to listen to. Now you know that there are different beliefs, there's no excuse."
"But…but what of after? You said that all you can do is change things here?" Asuka asked.
Once again, the headmaster and headmistress had an odd silent conversation before Headmaster Cher chose to answer.
"As I said, you and your cohort are special. Such a deep-seated superstition…I think it will take almost as long as it has existed for any true unseating to take place. However…maybe, just maybe, it will start now. So..what do you say?"
In the end, even if coming from them all those words had been meaningless lies, in the end they'd still managed to describe a truth. Tricker's death had been meaningless, unnecessary. But his life. Now that, that had been meaningful. Her heart had been ripped out, she was broken. There was no way to get past that, and she'd never get the vengeance that she'd wanted, not really. She'd expected that she'd get that from holding Shi-shoku as it fired the arrows she herself had made, but she hadn't. Inside, she was still hollow, the wind still screamed in all those empty spaces.
But once there had been peace and acceptance and happiness, quiet and tucked away corners, a glow-worm cave. And the memories, both in her mind and in her body. All those memories and the hope they offered. Even though they lined up with lies too, they were still true.
And so she would hold onto them for the rest of her life. She would hold on, and one day, she'd reach the end of her life and go to the Other Side and when she got there she'd be able to ask him: Did you see? I managed to live-are you proud?
She'd almost forgotten that Cain was there when she heard a little exhalation of breath and she glanced towards him.
"Does something else hurt?"
"It…it's not anything that you can do anything about."
"Right. We will be rescued, I'm sure of it."
"That's…surprising optimism coming from you."
"I suppose I should say that your pessimism surprises me, but it doesn't. Mostly because I didn't expect anything of you in particular."
Cain laughed at that, heavy and hearty before he winced, pressing his unhurt hand to his chest and taking a deep breath. When he calmed, he looked at her long and hard, something thoughtful smoothing out what would have otherwise been quite a piercing expression. She couldn't quite read it, but it didn't matter. There was enough understanding between them, the two of them broken creatures both. She nodded once and then looked away into the darkness and all the shapes she could see in it.
As she watched the shadows shift and change both because of Cain's light and the way the snippets of sky changed above, her thoughts drifted to her friends. Romantically minded Yuu and stylish Michii and steady Sainty and silly Niwa and Asuka, their determined and brave Asuka. She hoped that they were alright, that Niwa in particular had awoken and that she'd be able to get out, that Asuka and the rest would find Niwa first and then they'd all band together to come here and rescue her. You're the first, always, and I love you. I'm sorry that I haven't been able to be the friend I was all this time but…I'm alive. I'm going to continue to be alive and together we'll have a good life, be more than what the world told us we'd be and…and…. and…
And I will make sure to say all of this to you once we're out of here.
I promise.
…
It turned out that not all of Abel's fox senses had left him when he had turned human again, for when they finally decided that after multiple attempts at making phone calls, sending messages and breaking the containment barrier that they had to risk it to rescue people. He had no idea how long it had been, but he had spent ages sniffing out any traces of a person beneath the rubble. It was hard, to detect the essence of a person underneath all the spilled blood, but he could. He was also able to hear them-laboured breathing, desperate weeping, moans of pain-no matter how deeply buried those sounds were.
And so he had wandered from area to area, helping to point out where there might still be lives waiting to be saved, or lives that could no longer be saved to those who could use their strength to push away the debris. Some with Plant and Earth magic, or those who knew such spells anyway, used those skills to grow vines right through large blocks to crumble them. He had been picking up and putting aside those pieces that weren't so big, helping the uninjured crawling out and when he had noted that some of the other students who he knew from the group who had planned the death of the teachers were picking up blankets, clothes, and any other miscellaneous supplies that could be of use he had done the same, and directed other uninjured survivors to do the same.
He didn't know whether to be glad he could help, or to lament at the fact he'd never truly shake off everything that had happened to him. Every time he directed someone to a pile of rubble and a dead student was pulled out he found himself back in that casino, screwing his eyes shut and waiting for the moment it would snap back to the start, even while knowing that this was the real world. Here, in the real world, death meant death. There was no going back.
But we knew that already, didn't we? When we made that plan. We knew it already.
He wanted to be sick at the thought of it, but just as thinking of Ariadne and her sacrifice had enabled him to keep pushing on ever since returning, he made a point of picturing her face every time he felt the bile rise up in his throat, the shakes take over his limbs. And that way, somehow, he was able to keep going. There were also the new friends he had made, even if he wasn't sure if new friends was quite right for what they were. Starri and her group had been so very kind to him, more than he really deserved, and he knew that some of them were still here. If he didn't find them, he didn't know how he would carry on either way.
I'm looking for you, I promise. I'll repay that kindness by finding you. I swear, I will.
Suddenly, he came to another large pile of debris and saw a hand poking out from it. Slowing down, he listened closely and heard faint breathing coming from the pile, just as he saw the hand wriggle its fingers weakly.
"Hello?" he called, coming closer. "Can you hear me?"
"D-don't leave us! Please…." A wavery voice replied.
"I won't, it's alright, I'm going to find someone who can get you out…"
Abel looked around for anybody nearby, but all of them were either busy trying to reach others or too far away. He sighed and stared at the pile, and then shook his head and reached out to grab a fragment of stone, realising they had crumbled into pieces that, though still large and heavy, were smaller than he'd realised. Painstakingly, he lifted them off one at a time as fast as he could, putting them down on the side until he had made a large enough hole to see the two boys sprawled underneath.
"Can you sit up?" he asked.
"Uh…um, I can…."
This came from the boy on top, who then tried, ending up sitting on top of the other boy and apologising over and over for it before holding his hands out to Abel, who was then able to pull him up and over. As the boy scrambled to his feet, dusting himself down he then helped the other boy out. This boy seemed to have been cut in a number of places but as he stumbled to the ground, gasping and breathing, he seemed oblivious as he turned and pointed with a hand that tightly gripped a pair of glasses.
"They, he….he pushed me out of the way and they're…they're still in there!"
"Who is?"
"I…." the boy swallowed and gulped. "It's….it's…"
"Don't worry," Abel said quickly. "Go down to the gardens, they're sorting out injuries there. Maybe you should put your glasses back on, though?"
"Huh? Oh, these aren't mine."
The boy holding the glasses gave them back to the other one before stumbling off. This other boy stayed, blinking rapidly as he put them back on. Abel looked at him and realised he too was a member of their group, part of the Gardening Club though not one of the main six. Abel couldn't remember what his name was though, only that it was vaguely related to the Lesser Gods in some way.
"I…the ones down there…it's Will-sempai, and Starri-sempai. They're under…I heard her, but not him."
Don't. Don't buckle. Abel swallowed and managed to ask:
"I…you can…the vines?"
When the boy just stared at him, Abel tried harder to remember the words:
"Some of your club members and others, they're growing vines to break the stones and anything else. Then, whatever else can't be crumbled we can try to lift."
The boy nodded firmly at this, and then said.
"Oh, by the way, I'm Mars. Sorry, you looked like you were trying to remember."
"Abel." He returned, grateful for the information.
Mars gave another firm nod, and then turned his attention to the debris and concentrated, holding out his hands. They glowed green at the fingertips and then slowly, despite the barren winter-cold ground, slowly a thick green vine unfurled from the ground. Abel watched, his fear and horror not quite eclipsing his wonder at how effectively a plant could destroy stone and wood, keeping an eye out for them. Gradually, the pile became shorter and shorter, revealing large planks and bits of window, which he reached out to pull away. The two of them kept working this way until he started to see two pairs of legs and hear a soft sobbing.
"Starri, Will? Can you two hear me?"
One of the pairs of legs twitched, making the others on top jerk slightly. But they themselves did not, and just as Abel noticed how limp those other legs were the smell of blood assaulted him.
"A-Abel?" a voice came up, thick with tears.
"Starri! Are you…are you two hurt?"
"I'm not hurt but... I…he tried to pu-pu-push me out of the way and….then he…he….."
Starri's breathing became ragged, thick, and she gulped rapidly multiple times.
"It's alright, we're getting you out." He said, trying to sound reassuring but knowing he was failing at it. "We're getting you out."
He and Mars continued to pull away bits of rubble from the pile, working towards the same section that Abel had freed Mars and the other boy from when he realised that was where the sobbing was loudest, and sure enough he soon saw Starri's face, terrified and pale. Blood pooled on her face, but as more drops rained down, it was clear that this wasn't hers. That, and the broken shoulder that she peered over to stare up at Abel told him everything he needed to know, and the knowledge made him heavy.
"Starri, I need to ask…are you hurt, anywhere?"
"N-no…I'm not but Will, he….he…."
"Abel-sempai, I'll crumble these pieces too. I don't think that we'll…."
Abel turned to Mars, then looked at the scene before him before swallowing.
"Go on, then." He said before looking over at Starri. "It's okay, we'll get you out soon."
Then, he turned away swiftly, knowing that he could not bear seeing the outcome of this. Just as he did though, he spotted Sado's distinctive bulk, followed by two other figures and he waved his arms about, calling out and pointing until they noticed him and started to run. But his satisfaction at being able to at least get help was dampened when he realised that one of the people was Hiraga.
As they got closer, he heard both Mars and Starri cough before there was a wet sound and a piercing scream. Hiraga's eyes immediately widened and he realised what was happening and he scrambled over, dropping to his knees and calling Will's and Starri's names over and over as he pushed away fragments of vine and smaller rock, coughing as the remaining clouds of dust rose. Sado pushed away the remaining larger fragments and then reached down to pick Will up. Hiraga lunged, as if to claim him back but then found himself ambushed swamped by Starri, whose sobbing rose and broke into a full, relentless wail as she threw her arms around him and clung on as if she had been drowning all of this time. Hiraga's face contorted but then crumpled as he pressed his face into her hair and hugged her back, rocking slightly.
Abel stared at them for a moment and then stepped back, turning to see Sado glance down at Will's shattered form in his arms. Abel couldn't even begin to process the state of him. The word body hardly seemed the right word to describe what was left, but what other word was there? The only inch of him left that still had any peace left was his face, even despite the tremendous pain he must have faced.
The world under my feet feels right, he thought. No longer did his skin prickle, did he feel vaguely off-kilter. It was the surest sense that they had succeeded. But still…how can the world be right? How can it be, when I'm watching this happen?
"That's…."
Abel looked in surprise at Maria, who had been the third person to join them. She lifted a hand to her face and rubbed her eyes and then gritted her teeth, making a point of looking away. Sado sighed and stared straight at them, eyes pained despite his otherwise implacable expression:
"Well, we'll need to…you know. He has to be the worst of all of them, so far."
Abel could only nod at first, but then realised that he had to say something, do something. He'd failed them and nothing would make up for that but he had to try. He swallowed a few times, and then managed to say:
"I….I can take him to Robyn-kouhai."
At his offer, Hiraga almost immediately looked up, eyes wild. Absently, Abel noticed that something was missing about him, but he couldn't tell what. Then again, he supposed the answer was already there, such a broken and battered and tragic answer.
"Where…what are you going to do?"
"Robyn-kouhai," Maria said before Abel could answer. "She'll….she'll take care of him now. You know that. And you need to take care of the ones you have left."
Hiraga's eyes flashed, but then he looked down at Starri briefly and nodded.
"The others…Tate and Kureha and Mica…?" he asked hoarsely.
"I'm going to go there." Maria promised.
Hiraga nodded at this, and then returned his attention to Starri.
"I think we should leave them for now," Abel murmured. "There isn't anything else left here to fall."
"No, there isn't" Sado said, as he quickly scanned the area. "Well, in that case, I'm going to take him to Robyn."
With that, he quickly strode away, leaving Abel with Maria, standing there awkwardly, trying not to stare at the two sitting on the ground.
"Are you really going to check the infirmary?" he asked.
"I am. I don't think anybody's been to check and if there's a chance at least then I don't want to write them all off as being dead. I was going to anyway but now I think it's more important. Are you going to help me?"
You'd…you'd ask that? Even despite everything? Especially that first time. More than the casino, the smell of blood made him remember the taste of it, coating his teeth and tongue, slick and metallic and strong. He hated it. He hated it still. He would never forget that the blood had been hers. But it was because he'd never forget that he had to say yes, wasn't it? He had to help. It was how he was being human again, even in the midst of such horror, worse than what horror he'd been in.
"I…yeah, sure."
Something flickered over Maria's face and then she turned away. She started to walk swiftly, the purposefulness of her gaze telling him that she would not wait for him. He did not need her to wait though. All he had to do was follow, and so he did.
…
Yew's mind had been blank for so long that when memory and thought started to creep in again it almost paralysed her. She didn't understand what, or why, but something was telling her wake up, wake up, forcing her eyelids to flutter and her body to push itself upwards. Gradually, though, she became aware of a weariness in those eyelids, something clumsy about the way her limbs moved, the dryness of her throat as she managed to sit up and she opened her eyes.
She looked around her at the rows of beds, most shielded by light green curtains, and physically felt her thoughts line up and click into place, giving her a name for the place: infirmary. Directly across from her, one of the beds didn't have the curtain pulled around it and she could see a girl also stretching and waking up, her orange-and-black hair messy, yawning and grumbling:
"Uggh….what the….why am I so tired and…what's happened?"
The girl's eyes snapped open and she stood up, swearing when her gait was unsteady.
"Um, how long have we…have we been here?" Yew asked timidly, startled at how rusty her voice sounded.
"How would I know?" the girl snapped, her voice just as hoarse.
The girl glowered and Yew shrunk back, wondering how best to respond when suddenly, she heard something drop onto the floor in front of her. Confused, she bent down to pick it up to see that it was a poultice of some sort. She picked it up slowly and sniffed, vaguely aware of stirrings coming from other beds. She recognised some of the smells as being from plants that had medicinal properties, but she couldn't tell which ones they were. Although she liked to use magnolia blossoms and branches as a base for her own magic, she was not someone who used plants in general.
"Hey, Yew-sempai? What's the last thing you remember?"
Yew looked up to see another girl looking at her, this one skinny and long-legged with big brown eyes and short, soft white hair. She sat cross-legged in her own bed, dressed in a pink nightgown with a collar and flower-shaped buttons. There was a letter 'K' stitched on the collar and this sparked the memory that this young freshman was called Katherine, though Yew couldn't remember how she knew this in the first place. Certainly, she'd lost all interest in the possibility of looking after freshmen after Lunar had disappeared.
And even more so after I found her…
Yew pushed down the memory as hard as she could and she looked down at herself to see that she was wearing a night-dress too, though hers was longer and pale yellow gingham. She wondered who had changed her and when, and who'd gone through her things and chosen this night-dress of all the ones she owned. But, remembering that she had been asked a question, she looked back at the girl.
"What I remember?" she asked.
"Yeah. Rael said she remembers the thing that happened in the cafeteria, and then walking to class later and…that's it."
Rael was apparently the girl with orange and black hair who had snapped at her, and was now watching her with a scowl whose intensity was only matched by that of Niwa, who clung to a plushy with furious intensity as she stood by her bed, bouncing on her feet. Yew swallowed, again realising she had been distracted and flicked back through the memories filling her head.
"I…I also remember what happened in the canteen…the people who were saying…saying things about your friends-" Yew gestured weakly to Niwa. "And then Ruby-sempai and her lot…I don't remember what I did afterwards, though. Probably class."
Niwa's scowl only deepened, and Yew was relieved when another voice quickly spoke up:
"Yeah, we were on our way to class too."
This came from a bed on her row, and Yew twisted around to see that Gin and Getsu were awake, though neither were in bed or standing by their bed. Instead, Gin (who had spoken) was beside Mica's while Getsu was beside Kureha-both of whom were still sleeping.
"So something must have happened and now we've woken up…"
"It's been two months!"
Everyone turned to look at Rael, who had apparently gotten up and moved across the room, standing by the desk and holding a desk calendar. She held it up, and Yew's heart almost missed a beat when she saw the wintery image on it and the letters loudly proclaiming 'COLD MOON' across it.
"That's…we've been here two months?" Tate stuttered. "That can't be…is there anything in the log book thing that's there? About us…about Wren? Wren's not waking up either."
Yew glanced at Wren, who looked as bird-like as their name, the way Yew remembered but more fragile. And still, too. Far too still.
"If it's been two months, no wonder I'm hungry!" Niwa bit out. "Isn't there any food in here? Or water? I'm thirsty too! And where's all the adults anyway? And those other two, the students who do the work experience thingy?"
"If you keep talking, you'll just get thirstier." Getsu pointed out.
"Yeah, and? I'm already thirsty!" Niwa snapped.
"I'll get something from the office!"
Yew realised as she put her feet on the ground that she actually had no idea if she'd even be able to walk, but to her surprise despite a slight wobble initially her legs felt steady as she pushed into a standing position, and that despite the fact the flooring was freezing beneath her feet they did not hurt. One foot in front of the other, she soon was able to walk easily and normally as if she hadn't been asleep for two whole months (Two months! How had that happened?). She was vaguely aware of the others who were awake talking and arguing (definitely more arguing in the case of Niwa and Rael), just as she was aware that there were others who were still not awake the way Wren. Mica and Kureha were also not awake. But she pushed it away as she concentrated on getting to the office door and opening it.
New memories drifted back in, of the day staff and Professor Rynacel, seeing a glimpse of a small kitchen on the three occasions she had had cause to be in the infirmary. The third time, after her former roommate's body had been discovered on the grounds, a pretty and gentle-natured freshman had served her tea in here in an effort to calm her after other students had asked her questions about what she had seen. Lining up what she saw now to the pictures in her mind, she studiously ignored the row of dolls on the shelves (many of which had toppled over or fallen off since she'd last been here) and carefully searched around until she found a tin of biscuits and some water bottles and gathered them up, deciding that would be enough for the time being when something made her look up to the rest of the room.
Except, the rest of the room wasn't there.
A scream rose in her throat and then stopped there as she struggled to take in the scene before her. It seemed as if part of the ceiling had fallen in, and most of the wall. Now she looked down, the ground was scattered with glass and bits of stone, and she stumbled back, not wanting to step on them. The office entrance that led into the corridor had completely disappeared, parts of the door strewn across the floor, but she couldn't see the corridor, so blocked with debris it was. Is this what woke me up? She wondered. But I don't remember hearing anything, nothing at all-
"Yo, what's taking you so long?"
This time, Yew shrieked and she spun around to see Rael frowning at her. Yew spluttered a few times, realised she didn't have a coherent response to give and instead gestured wildly behind her using the tin of biscuits in her hand. Rael frowned, but then peered around her and then swore. Turning right back around she marched back through the infirmary to the main entrance and tugged at the door. Yew followed and then stopped in the middle of the room, watching as Rael tugged at the door handle, attempted to push at it and then kicked a few times before giving up.
"Dammit!" Rael raged. "What the hell is happening?"
Yew tried to stutter out some sort of response, but was distracted by Niwa charging towards her. Hastily, she shoved a bottle of water and the entire tin of biscuits at the smaller girl and then stepped forward.
"There must have been an earthquake or something," Yew said. "I mean, if the entire back is collapsed."
"It is?" Katherine asked, wide-eyed and tremulous. "That's…how are we going to get out?"
"We need to wake them up first, though!" Tate burst out. "They're…they're not waking up."
He gestured to Wren, Mica and Kureha and looked at them all pleadingly before repeating himself, in a whisper this time:
"They're….they're not waking up."
Gin and Getsu also stood close to him, looking equally worried. But Getsu pointed to some of the other beds.
"They aren't, either."
Yew knew that some of those still sleeping were seniors, but the final sleeping person was Reo, who had been her roommate after Lunar had disappeared, until the end of their freshman year. Putting down the water bottles on the nearest bedside table, she then went over to Reo's bed and leaned over, listening carefully. She could see the same stillness that she had noticed in Wren moments ago, and she knew what that stillness meant, she'd seen that stillness before, somewhere…
A memory floated unbidden into her mind. The wind, a walk, the outskirts of the forest Aeternum and…and…Yew took a deep breath and listened, hearing only silence. She then put her fingers to the side of Reo's neck and waited, but there was nothing. Only coldness, just like the coldness she had felt that day when she had stumbled across Lunar's body. The memory started up its re-playing and she stood there for a moment, paralysed by it. There had been differences, and surely the situation was different too but it was the same. The stillness, the coldness, the silence. It was the same.
She didn't know how she managed it, but she straightened and looked directly at Tate, Gin and Getsu. She knew that saying it aloud would utterly destroy them, but what else could she do? They'd realise it soon enough, wouldn't they?
"They've…they've gone." She cleared her throat. "That is…I don't think they're alive anymore."
"It can't be." Gin responded immediately.
"I think so. She's not breathing, there's no heartbeat."
Gin's face darkened for a moment, but he then broke away from his brother and Tate to check over Kureha. When he looked up again, his expression had completely changed. He didn't say a word but that was enough for Getsu and Tate to understand. Slowly, they all walked over to join Gin and huddled together. A wordless cry of anguish rose from the huddle, but it was impossible to tell who it was, and all Yew, Katherine and Rael could do was sit there and watch. Even Niwa, who had been making her way through the tin of biscuits with a scary intensity had paused and looked up, mouth slightly open.
Watching them hold onto each other, Yew started to remember other things, such as how those three and their group of friends had become well-known in their year group fairly quickly. It was not just because of the bar they had discovered in the West Wing and started running, but their extraordinary kindness and openness as a group, how easily they made you feel included and valued. Even though they themselves were a small tight group that nobody could penetrate, they had still managed to be open to everyone. Their popularity had only been rivalled by the group of reptile-magic students who were in their year, since they'd quickly become part of Ruby Reiko's group. Then, Yew thought, glancing over at Niwa again, there were those lot, who'd become well known for completely different reasons. And there had been…who had there been? Memories had been flooding in thick and fast since she'd woken up but now, all of a sudden, it ground to a halt.
She could tell there was something there, something she knew that had been true but whatever it was, it had been blanked out and no matter how much she thought, she couldn't get around the blankness.
But then a window smashed, and it didn't matter.
For a moment, Yew thought that the room they were all in was going to collapse too but when she turned to the window that had been broken, which was right by a set of cupboards, she saw a stick-no, wait, that's a sword-reach out and continue to smash the window until there was a large hole. Then, the sword was thrown through and a person climbed in. A girl with short hair, wearing a black-and-gold outfit that looked vaguely military to Yew's eyes. She was followed by another boy whose outfit had the same scheme, a thin boy with milky-white hair and huge gold eyes that made him look younger than his actual age. Both the girl and boy were covered in dust and dirt, and parts of their clothes were stained with blood, though as far as Yew could tell none of it had come from any injuries of their own.
"You….you're them. You're Ariadne-kouhai's black and gold people."
The boy's eyes widened and he looked towards Tate. Although his expression was now curious and calmer, his eyes were rimmed with red as he gawped at the boy, clearly having realised something. Ariadne-kouhai…isn't that one of the non-magical freshmen? What's she got to do with them? No memory that Yew could think of explained that at all.
"Yes, we are. I'm Abel and she's Maria. How do you know about that?" The boy asked slowly. "You fainted the day she left to look for us, right?"
Tate frowned.
"What do you mean? I just-"
"We'll explain later," Maria said. "There's a lot to explain but we'll explain it all later. For now, we need to get you out of here. The entire school's collapsed, and even though this wing is in better shape than everywhere else it hasn't escaped unscathed."
"Yeah, we noticed." Rael said drily.
"Wait, what do you mean, the entire school's collapsed? What about my friends? Where are they?"
Niwa abandoned her biscuits and came bounding up to Maria and Abel, squaring up to them despite the fact she barely came up to their waists.
"Where are they? Are they hurt? Dead? Is anyone helping them?"
"Yes, what about our friends?" Getsu demanded. "The rest of them who aren't here."
"That's…"
Yew watched nervously as Abel and Maria exchanged loaded looks with each other. Abel then glanced back at them, biting his lip.
"Oh, I don't like that look." Rael said. "That's not a good look. I should be worried about my buddies too, shouldn't I?"
"It's….it's complicated." Maria said. "But I promise, we'll explain. First we need to get you out of here, and perhaps also take some supplies from here while we still can…Abel, can you do that? Get any bags or boxes you can find, or just knot up some blankets and just shove as much as you can in here. Already-made medicines, the herbs, food, drink, bandages, whatever."
"Ah, um, I can help with that!" Yew offered.
"Are you…are you sure?" Abel asked uncertainly.
"Yes. I'm not…Even though I've been asleep for two months, I don't feel that weak."
Abel considered her for a moment, those huge eyes oddly watchful as expressions flitted across his face, multiple emotions in quick succession. They made a ball of fear knot deep in Yew's stomach but she swallowed it down when Abel nodded, and together the two of them quickly gathered things the way Maria requested. Meanwhile, Maria herself directed the others to get their shoes (apparently left in the bedside cupboards of each bed) and then led them to the window, where apparently Julka, Mist and someone called Judas were waiting to help get them down. Tate, Gin and Getsu all argued fiercely about the dead, but Maria promised them that once they were outside, then the dead would be carried through too. So as one by one, students were lowered out using knotted lengths of cloth, Yew helped Abel send down bags and bundles of supplies pulled almost haphazardly from drawers and boxes, before she herself was then lowered down.
Clinging to the rope for dear life, she closed her eyes tightly until she felt her now slippered feet hit the ground. She stumbled slightly, and then felt a pair of steadying hands on her shoulders. Opening her eyes, she met the familiar, worried gaze of Julka. She, too, was dust covered, her hair freed from its plait and tangled up, the sleeves of her tunic ripped to shreds. Underneath them, parts of her arm had been bandaged.
"Yew," she said warmly. "I'm so glad that you're awake. That you're alright."
"I…yes, I am. Not everyone else is, though…"
Not yet feeling able to take in everything else going on around her, she looked back towards the window she had come out of, seeing Maria lowering down a body. It had been wrapped in a blanket, but a lock of green hair tinted with light blue at the ends flopped out and Julka gasped, clapping her hands to her mouth.
"Not…not Reo." She whispered.
"Yes, I…do you know why? Why they didn't wake up, when we did?"
"We didn't even know what made any of you faint in the first place," Julka murmured, watching as Mist untied the cloth rope and then sent it back up. "I mean, it's probably because of what we found out was an imbalance in the magic of the land, but I don't think we'll ever know why it occurred like this, specifically."
"There's a lot we've missed then, isn't there?" Yew murmured, understanding almost none of what Julka had just said.
Julka looked at her, and she gave a wry smile as if showing that she understood the confusion all too well.
"Yeah, there is. I'm not sure that even I understand it myself."
"Mmmm."
Yew sighed, and then forced herself to look around at the destroyed scenery around her. It looked like it was the end of the world, something out of a movie or a book where horrible things just kept happening. But even despite the horror of it, she soon noticed one notable thing-that all the people she saw were students. Not a single adult appeared, not even as a broken body pulled from the chaos.
"I…where are the teachers? The…you know, the faculty staff?"
Yew was startled to see that Julka immediately went pale, gulping visibly. She did not immediately answer, and when she did her voice was small and oddly monotone, as if she was restraining her emotions.
"The day staff left a long time ago. But the teachers and faculty are dead."
Yew wanted to know, but despite that she didn't want to ask, either. She waited a few moments to see if Julka would explain anymore, but she didn't, instead wrapping her arms around herself and then turning when Maria called her name.
"What is it?" she called out, sounding much more normal now.
"Could you assist Mist in escorting them to where we're keeping the injured, and take the supplies with you? Abel, Judas and I will be taking the dead to Robyn-kouhai."
"I want to do that," Tate objected immediately. "One of us at least should do that."
Maria frowned at this for a moment, but it was Abel who asked:
"How do you feel, health-wise?"
"Thirsty, hungry, really confused. I'm surprised I remember how to stand and walk, but I can, so. Let me. Please."
"But-"Maria started.
"Then in that case, it's alright. The two areas are not so far from each other anyway."
Yew watched as Abel, Maria and Tate started to carry the bodies. Judas called over to some other students nearby whom Yew vaguely recognised as freshmen, and when they all started to walk away with the dead she turned away, focusing only on following Julka, Mist and the other infirmary survivors with their supplies. Rael, Niwa and the twin brothers immediately demanded answers and explanations, and Julka and Mist did their best to explain, but even as Yew tried to listen and understand, it all washed over her head. None of it made sense to her, and she just couldn't see how it would ever make any sense.
Still, she was awake and alive, and that was all that mattered. Wasn't it?