(5) Repeat

Hinoka waved to us violently from across the way. She seemed the same happy she was when she met me. Tears looked ready to flow out, or maybe that was the glimmer of water. My life was on repeat. History was repeating itself. It made me happy, but I knew she was happy for the wrong reason. Takumi glanced at me, concerned. His honey eyes reflected the sun, but the sun quickly turned into clouds. My maroon eyes found Hinoka's instead, but her eyes had stopped smiling. She muttered something to Azura, but obviously, I couldn't hear. Azura seemed upset, yet, emotionless. She probably knew this was going to happen eventually, I did too. History couldn't help but repeat itself.

But, I didn't want that to happen.

"Hinoka!" I cried out. "I we need to talk."

Hinoka scoffed.

"Hinoka!" I repeated.

Slowly, more soldiers filed out of the woods. Pines were caught in their hair, covering them like sprinkles. Their armor was stained with blood, and you could tell they've come a long ways. They looked ready for anything, each having some sort of battle scar. The Hoshidians were clearly tougher than we thought, at least, tougher than I've thought…

Something brewed up in the brush behind us. It rattled, and made a few whining noises. I turned as Elise emerged.

And suddenly, my life was on repeat.

"Sister, we…" Elise trailed off as she dusted herself. A few tears were in her sleeves from getting caught on thorns and branches. Her eyes widened in surprise to the presence of Hoshidians.

Everyone seemed more confused by the second.

"Well…" Elise trailed off awkwardly, her eyes meeting with Hinoka. "Are you fighting her?" She muttered quiet enough so no one could hear but me.

I shook my head, then nodded when I saw the soldiers, then shook my head again. We weren't fighting Hinoka. I didn't want to fight Hinoka, honestly. Maybe if she listened we could go back to Hoshido. We could negotiate, and things would work out… then again, I wasn't quite sure if Hinoka was one to negotiate. Maybe since she thought we were returning, she'd bring us in. But what of-

Suddenly, Niles came running. He repeated Elise, he stopped in his tracks.

"Are we fighting these guys?" He repeated, watching me for orders.

"Well-"

"Darling! There you are, we were so worried!" Camilla beamed. "Oh no, were these Hoshidians picking on you?"

"Camilla, I-"

Hinoka's eyes widened as everyone came through, quickly looking furious. Her eyebrows furrowed. "You kidnapped Tamuki, didn't you?"

My heart raced. Soldiers started getting closer, like they were trapping us in a cage.

Hinoka grinded her teeth, saying to herself "I'm so stupid" or maybe it was "she's so stupid". She swept the red out of her face gracefully, just to fully expose her enraged eyebrows. She looked sad, and angry- I guess it ran in the family. I could've sworn she was ready to run across the water, but only Azura seemed to be able to do that; but Azura has disappeared into the heads of soldiers. You'd think finding bright blue hair like hers would be easy…

I flinched back into Camilla, who was whispering something under her breath. She sounded like she was making battle plans, but I couldn't be so sure. Clearly, we were out numbered, but I had faith in us if we had to fight. Camilla, Niles, and Elise were all strong. We could take on Hinoka, if it came to that… except for the fact…

"Leo?" I asked Camilla.

Camilla laughed, "He's still having quiet time. He's pretty pouty right now. We can't have a child on the field, after all."

I would laugh in return, but seeing as we were in battle, it seemed like an inappropriate thing to do.

"Takumi…" Hinoka called out in desperation. "Takumi!" She repeated, louder. Her voice echoing as it did before.

Takumi didn't even look twice at Hinoka. I glanced at him in the same way Hinoka had, but his mind seemed somewhere else. He looked lost in thought, like he was thinking hard about what to do next. He looked like he was trapped in a sort of black void. He must've been thinking hard, maybe he felt like he needed to choose. I knew how that felt, I just hoped he'd make the right choice.

I certainly didn't want to lose Takumi, especially after just getting him back. Though, in all honestly, I wanted him to make the right choice. Although, I didn't know what was the right choice anymore, I knew it wasn't this. It wasn't endless war that would just repeat over and over…

Hinoka and I waited in silence, waiting for Takumi to speak. But we couldn't expect him to choose, if anything, I didn't think it was likely he'd stick with us. But I was prepared for everything… Almost. But before could wait for Takumi's response, an arrow flew past my head. My eyes followed it as it stuck into a tree. Niles and Camilla eyebrows raised, nearly being pierced by the arrow. Lucky for Camilla, who was standing behind me, she didn't get her hair cut off. They both dodged it easily, which made me think I had a magnet inside me that attracted arrows.

Hinoka grunted loudly, making it clear that that wasn't the plan. I didn't blame her.

Everyone looked to me for orders. I didn't want to fight, but we clearly had to defend ourselves. Seeing as her soldiers were getting impatient, I'm sure talking would end badly. Though, how much I wanted to try, I knew the minority didn't. So, I just nodded slowly, seeing as the endless soldiers had no end.

I didn't doubt we couldn't take them on, I just doubted how smart we'd be. (Without Leo, it made things a bit harder on us). Along with that, Takumi didn't seem very hopeful in the moment. Honestly, they were both critical to the party. Without them, things felt less livley, and enemies felt less… dead.

Immediately after the arrow had hit the tree, I was in a wave of soldiers. Takumi's face faded into them, and I felt like I was being torn away from everyone. Camilla and Niles went to fight somewhere else, but I wasn't to concerned about them. They were tough, but I'm not sure how Takumi would do fighting against his true siblings… (which didn't include me that they called "traitor").

Right as Elise grabbed my arm, Takumi disappeared from my mind, but then he came back. Elise was on the brink of tears, biting her check. She wrapped her arms around her staff, as if hugging it. She clearly needed help, and she didn't want to be alone here; yet, I wanted to stay with Takumi to make sure he wouldn't be alone either.

I was afraid too.

Even so, I nodded, drawing my sword to protect Elise. She stayed close behind me, her back pressed against mine. The warmth of her back oddly felt like Takumi's hands. I looked at her through my peripheral vision, knowing I was acting ridiculous. I guess whenever I was on the battlefield I did act slightly ridiculous.

Elise grabbed my arm occasionally, each time I got a tiny scratch she'd heal it up right away. I didn't take that many hits, Elise helped me dodge several of them. I cleared most of the enemies hoarding me quickly, and moved on to the next ones rolling in. I made sure not to injure them to the point they were on the brink of death, but I made sure they didn't try to attack us again.

My ears started ringing due to the screaming of others. I couldn't make out if they came from any of ours, but it sure did hurt. Elise squeezed tighter once she heard it, and suddenly, everything went quiet. I though I went deaf, but really, I must've gone blind; not being able to see Ryoma approach me was troubling. He was almost too big to missed, yet, I didn't see him coming. Elise ran, probably crying, not that I could hear. She scattered frantically away from him. I tried to call after her, but that made my ears ring more. She probably expected me to follow, but stupidly, I didn't.

When I looked into Ryoma's eyes, I felt like I was repeating myself. The same eyes of longing I've seen before were glossed over. Care, sympathy, and compassion hid behind burning eyes. Ryoma looked almost as furious as Hinoka, maybe a little calmer. More or less, his grip didn't waver. He snatched my arm up, as firm as metal bars. He pulled me up aggressively, holding me up to his face. He seemed to lifted me feet off the ground, and I didn't realize until then how tall he was. He looked ready to bite my head off, and stab me with his sharp armor. But to my surprise, he didn't. He mercifully threw me to the ground, shouting something to the others in the distance. But, of course, I couldn't hear him.

My head hitting the trampled grass felt like a rock. I felt dizzy, and didn't realize when Ryoma pulled me up again. Except, it wasn't Ryoma, it was Takumi. I felt relieved, and happy. I smiled wide at him, feeling about ready to fall over. He had helped me off the ground, probably looking disgustedly at the mud that covered me. I wrapped my arms around him, but his arms didn't claps around me.

And then a dagger was thrusted into my shoulder, even worst than the last. My breathing felt the same, the ground felt the same as I hit it, even the sky looked the same when I looked up. The only thing different was the look on Takumi's face. And I blacked out.

In the end, I couldn't stop history from repeating.