Chapter 24
Rachel
As the sun slowly rose, we flew. I'm not sure what we were looking for, exactly. Somewhere to hide? The others? Or just fly around for a while and waste time? I don't think anyone knew. We just flew.
And then it happened. We stumbled across a bowl-shaped valley. It took me by surprise. From afar, all we could see was tall trees. But once we got over the valley, we saw it for what it really was.
A battle field.
My god in heaven… Cassie choked out softly.
The war the Ellimist spoke of? Shinji asked quietly.
We saw it once we flew over the rim of a mountain. A massacre. The area was burned and littered with dead bodies. The air, thick with blood. Smoke from crashed battle craft rose in an eerie spiraling pattern amongst the aftermath. For miles, scattered around fallen trees and piled on top of each other, the bodies of warriors.
Hork-Bajr. Taxxons. Megami.
Dead.
Everything was devastatingly quiet. Nothing moved. No one spoke. We merely glided silently over the gore. The battle seemed to have left no survivors.
I've fought before. After all, this is a war. But what I'd seen was nothing compared to the hundreds of bodies I saw that day on the planet Megami.
Cassie, what are you doing?! I asked.
She swooped down and landed, right smack dab in the middle of it all and began to demorph. Once she was done, I saw the tears.
Oh…Cassie, Shinji whispered and followed her. One by one we dropped from the sky, the living in the field of the dead.
Cassie stood over the body of a little Megami girl. Streaks of dried blood scarred her unmoving body. The green of the grass around her was stained an ugly brown, the smell of the sweet flowers that once grew there, overpowered by the stench of death.
But the horrific thing was that it was obvious how she'd died. Her own spear stuck out of her stomach, her little hands clutching the long wooden handle.
I stared at her. She'd taken her own life. Why did you do it, Little girl? I asked silently. Were you the last one standing? Was it too much for you in the end? Could you not bare your friends and family, laying dead at your feet? Was the blood on your hands too heavy on your heart?
"Coward," I spat. But my heart wasn't in it.
I saw too much of myself in her face.
Chapter 25
Nichirasu
Cassie seemed broken.
When I first met her, I knew what kind of person she was. Soft spoken, life preserving. A bit like our own Kai, in a way. Although Kai was much less serious. I wasn't sure Kai could ever be snapped, as Cassie had been. And I never wanted to see tears of a shattered dream stream down cute little Kai's face, like Cassie's were now.
"Don't you get it?!" She screamed, her voice cracking. She spread her arms out. "It's over! They're gone! We're too late!"
Rachel's face was cold and hard. Her face was wet with perspiration, not tears. "The Ellimist would not have brought us here to see the corpses of a dead race. It's not over, Cassie. This is just a preview." Her voice rose. "We just saw a group of living Megami in that cave. Living enough to knock us out, tie us up, and leave us to die."
I looked at Amara. She looked away so that I wouldn't see the pain on her face.
"No whole race is the same, Rachel. You should know that by now! And it doesn't change the fact that these Megami, these people, these Hork-Bajr, these Taxxons are dead! Dead!"
"Quiet!" Amara yelled suddenly. She looked from Cassie to Rachel. "We don't know what's going on here. We're all tired, and hungry, and lost and confused, but it doesn't mean we have to fight this way!" Violently tossing a piece of hair out of her face, she went on. "Let's get out of here. This isn't where we're supposed to be."
I could see Rachel tense up. I knew what she was about to say. What right do you have to boss us around? What right?! That's what she would say. But she was interrupted before she could lash out.
There was a flash of light, a painful flash of light. My mouth opened to cry out, but no noise came. We crashed to the ground, silently screaming in pain.
When the light finally ended, a group of male Megami came.
One, who was apparently their leader, began giving sharp, quick orders to the rest. They tied ropes to our feet and dragged us away.
Great, I said silently. Thank you, life. You just keep getting better and better.
