Imperial Capital of Giad

June 22nd, Stellar Year 2141

It had been a little over a year since Shin was taken in by Vance and Tori. Winter and spring had come and gone, and now the summer shone warm again, and the fighting in between had never been bloodier. He was to blame for that, of course. Perhaps not entirely; for every rifle used to fight the war, there were equally as many cameras and notepads. Shin was far from the only spy at the Empire's disposal.

But he was the most effective.

Through him, the war had gone from a foregone conclusion just months away to a brutal down-and-out slog, lives lost by the hundreds with every passing day. The Empire had not magically manifested new soldiers. Their forces were still as diminished as they'd been last summer, but now they had the ability to predict the movements of rebel troops with an uncanny accuracy.

Rumors of spies had come, and now they'd gone. The Empire's interceptions had all occurred without the presence of any outbound radio or electrical transmissions. Nor were messengers ever seen leaving the affected bases, or any communications of any kind. To the rebels, it disproved the presence of espionage as they understood it. The Para-RAID Shin used was Imperial technology after all, and a closely-guarded secret at that.

Some now insisted that a powerful Esper had come under the crown's employ, one with the ability to sense the locations of threats to within a kilometer - a feat even the most powerful of Heliodor clairvoyants would have been hard-pressed to match.

Shin lay on a bed by the window, staring at the ceiling. It was the seventh bed he'd called his own in as many months. The seventh base as well. Beams of afternoon sun fell hot through the glass and kissed his skin, and Shin raised his hand above his head. He splayed out his fingers. A languid ceiling fan pushed warm air down over him. He counted each slow rotation of the blades.

Tori died a few days ago.

Nobody had come to deliver the news, at least not to the children, but Shin knew it all the same. The Alba twins were practically joined at the hip, but when Vance had returned from his latest mission, his sister was nowhere to be seen. This, the day after Shin had broadcast another set of coordinates to his masters.

He reached up toward the ceiling fan, and he imaged what it would be like if its wooden blades were sharpened steel instead. If it could spin faster, much faster, and if he could put his hand through it, and how much it would hurt if his arm were chopped off at the wrist. How quickly the blood would spill out of him. In thick red ropes across the sheets. How slowly he would die. How much better everyone would be if he did.

He closed his eyes. He thought of Nii-san.

Shin did this anytime he started to doubt. Whether it was doubt for himself, his masters, or his actions, he always thought of Nii-san, and every time he did it pushed his doubts away. He saw his brother's face as he'd seen it in the industrial district after dark, on the night Shin got lost in the city and found himself surrounded by the cold steel walls of warehouses, full of malice and hunger for the little boy who'd been bad.

He remembered the kindness of his face when Shourei found him. The love and the joy, and the relief to find Shin safe, and the way he swept Shin up in his arms and spun him around and promised that he would always protect him. And Shin had promised in turn to always be good.

Whenever he thought of his brother, he saw his face as he remembered it that night.

And he saw the rest of him hanging over a ledge, saw a chasm far below him made of pure, ink-black shadows. He saw his two small hands clutching his brother's wrist. He saw that he was the only thing that could keep his brother from falling. Everything his masters asked of him, all the bases that had been destroyed because of him, the rebel soldiers found and killed by Imperial headhunters - it was all to his keep his brother safe. Nii-san would fall into that chasm if not for Shin.

This thought, more than all the others, would push his doubts back for at least another day.

But today it didn't.

Today he saw another face below his brother's. The pale, smiling face of an Alba woman with shoulder-length hair swept back, her hand closed around Nii-san's ankle, dangling from his leg. Her silver eyes were wide and hurt. She was pleading. She was begging.

"Don't let me fall. Please, don't let me fall."

And Nii-san swung his other foot and kicked her, broke her nose. A shock of red splattered across her pretty face. It ran in two red streams down into her mouth, dripped off her chin, droplets falling into inky blackness. She kept holding on.

"Please!" she cried, but she wasn't looking at his brother.

She was looking at Shin. She was begging him to save her.

Nii-san kicked her again and smashed one of her eyes into bloody paste. And when she didn't let go, he kicked her again and again, breaking all her teeth, splitting her lips into quadrants, mashing her pretty, pale features until they were red and wet and nothing else.

And finally, Tori let go. She fell into the chasm. She did not scream, silent the whole way down.

And the weight pulling down Shin's arms became that much lighter. He gripped his brother's wrist with renewed effort and hauled him up over the ledge. Up into safety. And Nii-san gave Shin a look every bit as kind and loving as the one he'd given him on that night when Shin was five years old and lost. But this time Shin was the savior. That at least, despite everything else, he could feel proud of.

Until Shin felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned to see the face of Tori's twin. Vance in a black jacket, eyes glaring down at him, white-hot with fury.

"You killed my sister, Shin," he said.

"No," Shin moaned, his voice a trembling leaf. "It was my brother, he-"

But when he looked back at Nii-san, Nii-san wasn't there. Shin sat alone with his back to the ledge, hands clutched around nothing. He spread his palms. There was blood splattered all the way to his fingertips, and when he looked down at his feet, he saw that they too were coated in red.

"Your brother? There's no one there, Shin. Only you."

"No, I swear, he was right there!"

"You killed her. We gave you everything. We gave you a home. We gave you friends."

Vance's face twisted in a rictus of agony.

"And you killed her."

Vance lunged. Shin tried to back away, but the ledge was the only thing behind him. Vance wrapped two hands around Shin's neck and slammed his head against the ground, straddled his waist and crushed him against the floor. He pressed his thumbs into Shin's throat. Something cracked in the hard gristle there. Veins tore in his neck with wet pops one after one, and the air turned to fire in his lungs, and he tried to scream but only choked gargling came out.

"YOU KILLED HER."

Blackness devoured the edges of his sight. Vance's face grew blurry, distorting at the jawline and temple, then lips and forehead, until finally all he could see of him were his silver eyes, burning incandescent with rage.

"YOU KILLED MY SISTER."

The capillaries in his eyes burst and Shin's sight drowned in a wash of red. Vance's face melted into shades of crimson, and Shin saw nothing but a blood-drenched specter pushing him down, eyes like white-hot coals, and he wanted to move, to jump, to do anything to make this stop, but his arms were heavy and numb, useless at his sides.

"DIE."

He wanted to say-

Two rough hands on his arms shook him back and forth. Shin's eyes snapped open and he saw Vance standing over him, silver eyes and pale skin, black jacket and a rifle slung over his back. Shin screamed.

"I'm sorry!" he cried, jumping up, shuffling until his back was to the window, hot glass pressing on his skin through his shirt. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm-"

"Shit, are you alright?" Vance asked, crouching to bring himself closer. Shin tried to inch away, but there was no room to run.

And an instant later he felt the familiar weight of a small body pressed against his own, two arms circling around his back to pull him in, pushing his head into the crook between shoulder and neck.

"It's okay, Shin!" Kette cried. "He gets nightmares sometimes," she said to Vance without looking back. "But he's okay - you're okay, Shin."

Shin found himself hugging her back as hard as he could, arms wrapped around her, cinching tight, and distantly through the thumping of his heartbeat in his ears, he heard her give a groan of pain, but she made no effort to stop him. Seconds passed and he let up, just a little, and she laid her hand on the back of his head, rubbing in slow circles. Kette had rough fingertips, and the way they brushed through his scalp felt indescribably comfortable.

"Shit, shit," Vance said. "Okay. Uh. We don't have much time, I'm sorry Shin, but we have to move now - the base is under attack."

That brought him back to attention. He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, everything was alright. His heart was starting to slow. He let go of Kette and she followed suit a moment after, giving him one last look, green eyes wide with worry before pulling back.

"But don't worry," Vance said. "You're gonna be fine. You're all gonna be fine."

Shin looked back over Vance and Kette's shoulders and saw a small scattering of other kids standing in the hallway. But it was less than half of everyone who'd come with him from the orphanage.

"Where's everyone else?"

"Safe," Vance said so quickly and smoothly Shin wouldn't have caught the lie at all if he didn't know the man so well. He always glanced slightly to the left whenever he lied. "Some other soldiers found them and got them on a transport cab. They're probably way ahead of us by now."

He also over-explained.

But there was no need for Shin to express his knowledge of that, and very much a need to get moving. He pushed himself out of bed and stood on two shaky legs, grateful to find Kette's hand taking his own. He thought he might be too unsteady to walk on his own power. She squeezed his palm in reassurance, and he squeezed back, and it was all he needed.

"C'mon. Let's go," Vance said.

Ferril's Legacy was a rebel base built atop a network of subway tunnels and sewers, walls broken down and pathways carved until they had all joined together in a single labyrinthine maze. The base itself could only be reached through those tunnels, and the routes were closed off, rearranged, and re-built every week. It was a mystery how the Empire could have managed to launch an attack at all.

A mystery to all but one.

Vance led them underground, moving at a brisk pace through the narrow corridors. The echo of his footsteps was drowned out by the hiss of steam from cracked pipes and condensation dripping onto concrete far back and far ahead. At every corner and turn he stopped, held up an open palm in a gesture for them to wait, peered ahead to make sure it was safe before carrying on.

The clap of gunfire down the corridor made them all jump. But not Vance.

"Don't be scared," the Alba said without looking back at any of them. It was the first time anyone had spoken in over twenty minutes. "Your uncle Vance is gonna keep you safe. He's gonna bring you someplace nice, and we'll have ice cream to celebrate."

"You promise?" one of the younger kids piped up. A little girl with hair the color of straw and wide, hopeful blue eyes. "Super duper promise?"

"Do you one better," Vance said, turning to face them all. He dropped to a crouch, carrying his rifle by the spine in one hand, holding out the other. "I'll pinky promise it."

And he did. And when they came to the next turn in the tunnel, Vance took it.

And at the next T-intersection, sterile white lights painted the concrete from down the intersecting hall. Vance stopped at the corner, turned with finger held to lips in a command for silence. There hadn't been much noise before then, but after it every kid held their breath, and every noise in the hallway seemed to crystallize, crisper than ever. The high whine of electrical cables. The rasp of air from vent covers.

Footfalls around the bend, heavy with the weight of weapons.

"Stay, right, here," Vance whispered, enunciating each word so it couldn't be missed. "Don't follow. Don't speak. Don't scream. Plug your ears - I mean it, right now." He waited until they did, then nodded. "Good. I'm proud of all of you."

He shouldered his rifle. Took one breath in, one breath out, and spun around the corner.

Shin found that even with his fingers in his ears, the crash of gunfire was more than just a sound. It was a force, pressure on his skin, pushing on his eyes and making them pulse inside their sockets. And of course, it was loud.

Three shots, muzzle flash lighting up the concrete in shades of orange and white. A lull, then three more. Then a thunderstorm, Vance whipping back around the T on the other side, separated from them by the intersecting corridor. Sparks flung off the opposite wall as bullets shredded concrete and rebar.

Vance's face was a mask of concentration. He breathed in again, deep and strong, chest swelling. He noticed Shin staring at him from the corner of his eye. He winked.

'It's rude to stare, Shin,' he mouthed, and spun back around.

"GET FUCKED!" he roared so loudly Shin could hear it even with his ears plugged and the shatter of gunfire all around. "I'LL KILL ALL OF YOU. I'LL KILL EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU FUCKERS!"

Shin closed his eyes and remembered his nightmare. He shivered, and Kette squeezed his hand a little harder. He looked back at her. She gave him a nod. He returned it.

It was over in seconds. At one moment the din was apocalyptic. Devastation consuming all. And then it ended, and the silence that followed was so vast it seemed to yawn. Time dragged after that. They waited, all of them, fingers still in their ears, looking anxiously at the corner their guardian had left around, no one willing to move without being given the order. Shin looked back at the gathered children. Most were crying, but crying silently. Obedient even now.

Shin pulled his fingers from his ears, slowly. Kette followed him with her eyes, gaze lingering on his hand as he unlaced their fingers. He went to the smallest of them, the girl with straw-blond hair and wide blue eyes. Maybe four years old. Young enough for Shin to have to bend to be at eye level with her.

"It's okay," he whispered, and hoped it didn't sound as much like a lie to her as it did to him. "Don't worry. You'll be alright-"

Without a word the girl stumbled into him and locked him in a tight, desperate hug, sobbing desperately without a sound. Shin rubbed her back in small circles, and then the other kids joined in too, crowding him, little hands and arms encircling him from all sides. Another weight piled on as Kette gave a wide hug around the great mass of them.

"I hope y'all aren't crying over me," a gruff voice said.

Shin whipped his head around to see Vance standing in the intersection, one hand on the corner. He swayed on his feet. There was a dark, wet spot swelling on the thigh of his cargo pants, spilling down and soaking out ever wider. Shin was sure the spot would have shown red in a better light. But in the darkness, only his sharpened eyes could see it, and they made out no color. For the others, there was only relief.

"Vance!" Kette cried. She broke from the circle, and the other kids followed, crowding around the soldier.

"Easy, easy!" he said. "Come on, there's no time for this. We're still not safe. Follow me - and look straight ahead, okay? Don't turn your heads. Not even a little bit."

He stood at the mouth of the intersection, blocking sight and entrance with his body. He ushered them past. No one dared to look. Shin saw one splash of liquid in his peripheral vision, a length that could have been an arm or leg splayed out, and turned his head sharply to the other side, swallowing breathlessly.

Once they were past, Vance hurried back to the front of the line. He led them on through the tunnels, navigating each turn and twist seamlessly. Only Shin seemed to notice the soldier's limp, how with every passing second he began to sway more and more shakily.

The corridor reached a ragged, man-sized hole punched through the wall, widening into a carved-out tunnel that eventually branched into one of the larger subways, two rails running side-by-side. Vance looked both ways before letting them step out.

They ran past the wrecks of old subway cars ripped off their rails and shunted aside, past piles of debris, concrete rubble and ruined metal. The Empire had flooded most of these tunnels at the start of the war and bombed out whichever ones survived in an attempt to keep the rebels from using them. Obviously the attempt had failed.

The crash of gunfire echoed all around, ahead and behind, from the mouths of tunnels to right and left. Occasionally a scream would ring out, and those lingered longest, carried down the subway's long length.

"Vance, look!" cried the little blond girl, tugging at the sleeve of his pants. "Lights. Look!"

"Yeah." He faced forward, toward the further end of the tunnel. And there was indeed light there. Just faintly, such that even Shin's eyes could only barely make it out. "We're almost there."

"No, not there. Behind us. Lights!" She tugged harder.

Vance turned around. Shin did too, and saw the bright beams of flashlights in the distance. Several of them. A dozen at least. Probably more. Vance's expression hardened. He re-settled his rifle within his grip. The rebels of Ferril's Legacy didn't use flashlights of any kind. It would defeat the purpose of their tunnel network; instead they had trained to navigate in the dark. Which meant those could only be Imperial soldiers following their trail.

He patted the little girl's head. He looked over the group of children, settling last on Shin.

"Shin, come here."

Shin did. Vance pulled the pistol from his holster and held it by the barrel, proffering it for him to take. Shin did that too. The gun felt heavy in his hands, a large 9mm with wooden grips and a scratched slide.

"Your clan taught you how to use these, didn't they?"

Shin nodded.

"Good. I have to go now. You're the oldest boy in this group, and that means it's your job to protect everyone. You understand? Keep them safe, Shin. Protect them."

He nodded again. Vance smiled.

"If you keep following the tunnel, you'll get to the evac trains. They'll get you and everyone else someplace safe. Use that gun if you have to - but only if you have to. Understand?"

Again, he nodded.

Vance's smile deepened. The silver of his eyes grew warped behind a layer of sudden moisture, and his smile trembled, twisting at the corners into something sad.

"I'm so sorry Shin. When we met, I promised things would be different for you. And I meant it. I really did. No more fighting. No more running. No more being called a monster or an outcast, and no more being made to do things you don't want to do. That's the promise I made to you." He glanced down at the gun he'd put in his hands. "I'm sorry I broke it."

Tears spilled down his cheeks, tracing a path through the stubble that had grown in since his sister's death.

Shin did not cry. He felt the heat prick his eyes and fought it, fought it hard, froze his face solid, showing no expression whatsoever. Vance needed him to protect everyone. To protect everyone he had to be strong. And the strong didn't cry. Crying meant weakness.

Vance put a hand on Shin's head and ran it through his hair, ruffling it one last time.

"I'm proud of you, Shin," he said. "You're a good kid."

His honesty was like a nail through the heart. To the very end, Vance never doubted him, and Shin would remember that last look on his face for years and years. He could never forget it. The smile across his stubble, the crinkle of his eyes, the single lock of silver hair spilling over them. How they shone in the dark.

How the Alba soldier had loved him like a little brother, never once realizing that Shin had ruined everything he fought for.

And yet Shin still didn't cry. He managed that, at least. Vance stood and turned around. The soldier settled his rifle in the crook of his shoulder and walked past the gathered children, back the way he came. Toward the approaching lights.

"Go," he said without looking back. "Hurry!"

Shin ushered the kids into motion before taking off himself, pushing to the front of the group. Kette held the rear to keep the youngest from falling behind, and they ran and ran, ran until their legs ached and their lungs burned.

"ADVANCE!" Vance roared. "FOR FREEDOM!"

And when the peals of gunfire erupted behind them, they kept on running.

"FOR THE FEDERACY!"

Even when single shots in staccato pulses gave way to a full-auto fusillade, click and drop of an empty magazine, metal punch of another locking into place.

"FOR VICTORY!"

More gunfire. It seemed never to end - until it did. Until it was replaced by a silence so vast it took on a weight of its own.

But they kept on running.

More light greeted them ahead, not the sterile white of harness-mounted tac-lights, but the soft orange glow of kerosene lamps. A squad of rebel soldiers on a station platform worked in a frenzy to pack creates of supplies onto a subway train car. One raised the alarm as they saw the pack of children running toward them, raised his rifle at what must have shadows in the dark to his eyes. Another pushed the gunbarrel sharply down.

"Those are kids!"

That second one dropped down from the platform onto the rail-line and jogged toward them. Shin was first to reach him, still holding Vance's pistol in his hands.

"Hey, are you guys alright? How'd you get here? Who brought you-"

"Sir!" Shin said sharply. "Behind us, there's Imperials soldiers coming. Lots! Dozens! And our escort, Vance… um…" he struggled to remember his last name. Couldn't, and moved on. "He stayed behind to fight them! You have to save him!"

The rebel swallowed. He shook his head. "We can't. It's just us four, we're all that's left. We can't beat that many."

"But he'll die!"

"I'm sorry," he said tightly. He turned back to his squadmates. "Get these kids onto the train, fuckin' pronto! We've got over a dozen Imps closing in!"

"We can't!" another shouted back. "We're out of space, we just packed the last car-"

"Then fucking unpack it! We're not letting kids die over a few extra rifles. Quickly!"

The rebel on the platform snapped off a salute, face set firm, and grabbed his cargo dolly and shuttled it to the car.

"Now come on. Let's go, quickly, you're almost there."

The rebel soldier led Shin and the children to the platform's edge, boosting them up onto the station one by one. Shin waited for the others to go first, and when Kette caught up, she waited with him too. By the time Shin clambered onto the platform, there were white lights reflecting off the distant walls of the bend in the tunnel.

"Sir! I can't get this crate moved, it's wedged in there!"

The rebel clenched his jaw. He looked between the train car and the shining lights, then turned sharply toward the latter.

"Then I'll stay behind. That should free up some space." He turned to the children. "Go! Get going!" he shouted. Then took off at a run further down the tunnel.

The other rebels watched him go, then one by one, each shook their heads or steadied their guns, or muttered curses beneath their breath, or all three at once, before following after him.

And yet more good men went off to die for a traitor's sake.

—

Shin remembered a crashing sound. A flash of white light, heat and pressure like a hot hand all across his skin, pushing him down. The piercing cry of shattered metal. And then his memory went black.

He awoke to find himself laid out on his back, the metal floor digging grooves into his skin. He stared up at the wall of the train car above him. The wall, not the ceiling. Windows gave glimpses of a wide blue sky above. The train had been overturned onto its side. There was a shattered, burnt-black hole at the other end of the cab. He felt heat baking into him, a layer of sweat slick across his skin.

He sat up and pain lanced his side. He glanced down and saw a length of sharp metal jutting from his abdomen. He looked at it curiously for a moment. Poked it with his finger. It wiggled, and something ripped inside him and he groaned, and tasted blood all over his tongue.

He looked around.

And all around him were bodies scattered. A small arm severed, laying sprawled below the seat of a jutting chair, little fingers curled in over a pale and sallow palm. A little corpse at the opposite end of the cab where everything was burnt soot-black, curled fetal. It could have once been a boy or girl, but now was neither. Just a lump of charred crisp. The four year old blond girl sat five feet away from him, slumped against the cab's ceiling, her head twisted at an uncanny angle, glazed blue eyes staring at him in accusation.

Shin's stomach twisted.

Then a name shot across his mind.

Kette.

Shin forced himself to stand. Something ripped inside him again. Blood dribbled from his wound, curdling around the metal pierced through his gut and running in hot rills down his pants. He looked around, slowly at first, and then with desperation when he couldn't find her.

"Kette," he groaned. He wanted to shout, but could not. "Kette, where are you?"

He took a step, but stumbled, and hit his knee on the ground hard enough to lance pain all the way up his spine. He hissed. He planted his hands on the floor to push himself back up. That's when he saw Vance's pistol. It had slid under one of the jutting seats, lying on the grass in the center of a broken window, surrounded by shards. Shin grabbed it, unmindful of the cuts scoring through his skin. Held it in shaky hands and stood back to his feet.

"Kette!" he called. More blood spilled out around the metal shard. Down off his hand.

"Shin?"

Her voice was small. So very small, and so unlike her. But Shin heard it. Even without his sharpened Onyx ears he would have heard that voice. It was hers, after all.

"Shin, I'm here, under this… this metal thing. I can't feel my legs, Shin. I-"

Shin went to her. There was a sheet of roofing fallen over her, a huge solid piece he should not have been able to budge, let alone move, not injured and small and young like he was. But he did. Something in his blood came awake and he laid hands on the debris, tensed his muscles and pulled. The torn flesh of his abdomen screamed in protest. Blood flowed hot and freely from him. But he moved it.

And she was there, everything below her waist crushed up between a chair and a fallen support beam. Shin grabbed the beam. He pushed against it, and with a creak of fatigued metal, it gave way. Kette watched him. She said nothing, though she had opened her mouth and her lips were moving. He guessed she had no strength left for words, but that was okay. For now, Shin had enough for them both.

Shin let the beam go and fell to his knees in front of her. He took her hands in his and held them tight, looking down at her as she looked up. His eyes stung with the salt of tears. Wet lines of heat carved paths through the soot streaked across his cheeks.

"Shin." She tried to sit up, but couldn't. "Shin, please don't cry."

"I'm not," he protested. "I'm, I, you-"

The crash of metal being shoved harshly aside. Footfalls clanging on corrugated steel. Shin stood and whipped around to face the glare of flashlights. Two of them. He raised Vance's pistol against them, though the light was blinding and he could make out no human shapes.

"Stay back!" he growled. "Stay! Back!"

Shin heard the small metal clatter of a rifle being raised. Only one. From behind the other light came a high, reedy treble of a voice.

"Huh. Wouldja look at that. Kids. Ain't they cute?"

"He's got a gun, Han."

"So? We've got body armor. Put it down, kid, promise I'll make it quicker if you do."

Shin gripped the gun so tightly the contours of the wooden grips dug into his palms.

"I won't let you hurt her."

The beam of light wavered slightly in response, as if its wearer were shaking his head. "Looks like she's hurt enough as it is, kid. Killing her would be a mercy at this point. Same for you. Don't it hurt, having that metal in you?"

Shin trained the gun from one light to the other, finger shaking on the trigger. Should he pull it? Would it save her if he did? Or would it just make things worse? Would they hurt her for the trouble?

"Tch. Brat's got some steel, gotta give him that. I'll kill him slow."

"Hang on, Han. Look at him - look at his hair."

"What about it? One black mop's the same as any other."

"It's Onyx black," he stressed. "And his eyes: Pyrope red. What if he's part of the royal family?"

"Yeah, a crown royal on a rebel transport train, 'cause that makes perfect fucking sense. He's probably just some mixed-breed mutt."

Kette whimpered behind him and Shin whipped his head back to her, before re-settling his aim. The sights kept trembling out of place. His hands wouldn't stop shaking.

"No, he's definitely Onyx. I can tell."

"Really now?"

The flashlights came off. When the sunspots in his vision melted away, Shin was met with the black hair and eyes of two Nouzen soldiers, one standing tall, the other a head shorter. The first had lowered his rifle, and the second had never raised it to begin with.

"You know," the shorter one said. "I heard rumors there was some half-breed running around the rebel bases, leaking intel for us." He fixed Shin with a deeply bemused expression. "That you?"

Shin swallowed. He glanced back at Kette, but her only reaction was confusion.

"Does your little girlfriend know you've been a dirty fucking rat this entire time? Huh? You still wanna protect her?" He looked past Shin's shoulder at her isntead. "Do you still want him to protect you?" he taunted, a sick grin split across his face.

The taller one jostled him with an elbow. "That's unnecessary, Han," he chided.

Han clicked his tongue.

"Whatever. Thanks kid. Was a lotta fun putting this place to the torch. Couldn't have done it without you." He laughed. "We'll be going now. If the God of the battlefield likes you, maybe you'll live to help me again sometime." He laughed again, louder and crueler, before turning to leave.

The taller one regarded Shin coolly for a moment, looking between his face, the gun in his hands and the metal jutting from his stomach. He turned to follow.

And when they were gone, Shin was left alone with her. Alone with his truth stripped bare for his last, closest friend to see.

"Shin," she whispered after what felt like an eternity of noiseless minutes. "Is… is that true? He wasn't lying?"

Shin just stared. At the corpses of the other children, at the burnt-black rubble, the scorched corona where a rocket must have struck the train. He looked at anything but her.

"Yes," he said in a shuddering exhale. The word left his lungs with such force it all but tore itself out of him.

"It's true. All of it."

He spoke in a whisper. Pain stirred his chest like a hand had closed around his heart, squeezing the shivering muscle of it. He felt like if he spoke any louder the hand would clench, and he would die.

Kette said nothing. Shin wondered what expression she wore, but did not dare to look back. That too, he was sure would kill him.

Maybe that would be better.

"I've been lying to you… lying to everyone since the start. My masters sent me out to get information on the rebels. To help the war. To help the Empire. And I…"

His voice trailed. He breathed in, but felt breathless. He breathed out, and had to fight to keep from choking. His throat thickened. He pushed each word out with a heave of air.

"Sometimes they tell me how many rebel soldiers they've killed because of me. It's thousands, Kette. Thousands. And every base we had to leave, because of the artillery strikes… they only knew where to fire because I told them."

He swallowed down nothing at all, and it left his throat no less clogged.

"Tori died because I told them where to find her. I killed her, Kette."

And he might as well have killed Vance too. If his sister had been by his side, Shin was sure he'd have found a way to survive. For her sake, if nothing else.

"Shin," she said, in a small, stunned voice. "Can you look at me? Please?"

Shin said nothing. Did nothing.

"Come on. I'm asking you."

He regarded the pistol in his hands before dropping his arms slack at his sides, and the gun with them. It clattered on the floor, spinning before it settled at his feet.

"Look, Shin," Kette said, now sounding annoyed. "I still can't feel my stupid legs, so it would be a lot easier if you could just turn around and look me in the eye, 'cause otherwise I'm gonna have to crawl around on my elbows to do it, and it's gonna hurt really bad, and it'll make me look super dumb too."

She was joking. After everything that had been said, at this time and in this place, surrounded by char and blood, she was joking.

Somehow that was just like her.

On numb feet, Shin turned to face her. He sat down - fell down - on his knees to be closer to her, and with an effort that looked painful, she shuffled on her arms until she'd managed to sit upright, one hand propped behind her back.

"I believe in you."

She said it flatly. Like it was a fact to her. Her green eyes did not waver, set staunchly on his red. It could easily have been a line stolen from A Rose Blooms, just like before, and yet it sounded so natural coming from her. And so wrong to him. He didn't deserve that kind of faith.

"You have to know that. You have to know that," she repeated. Her face twisted in pain as she flexed the muscle in her arms, pushed herself, swaying nervelessly forward until she managed to catch one of his hands and hold it, anchoring herself by it.

"Before he went to war, my daddy taught me that the Vargus word for love is a little different from what it means in Common. He said love is the bond that ties forever. He said I should never use that word if I didn't mean it exactly like that.

He glanced away from the pressure of her stare. When he looked back, she was still holding her gaze with the exact same weight.

"You're still my friend, and I still love you."

Shin's ears twitched at the gravelly rumble of a truck engine, the cut of its wheels through the grass, then the drop as it slowed, stopped, and idled. He heard heavy boots dropping onto soft soil. Voices. Movement toward the derailed train. Rebel soldiers, most likely. The Imperials would have left with those last two.

Kette must have heard them too, but she didn't break eye contact.

"When we're better, and you're ready, tell me everything Shin. Everything. And remember that I'll believe in you no matter what."

Shin wished he could have doubted her. That her voice could have held less conviction, that she could have acted her age and been unsure. That later she could have forgotten what she'd said, or doubled back on it.

If she had, it would have her last year so much easier.

SORRY I'M LATE!

I was in... some other state yesterday, on the highway. Possibly Ohio. I didn't have any internet. But anyway, better late than never, yeah? My roadtrip was great. Incredible experience. I wasn't able to hit the west coast - as it happens, America is actually pretty big, and seven days to get across it and back is... possibly over-ambitious. But I did get as far as Colorado. Denver was amazing. Chicago was fun too. I feel like I hit a different city almost every night. My car is now 5000 miles older, but honestly, it was well worth it. Experience of a lifetime, honestly.

Have a great day, everyone!

- Verbosity