With my rather messy defeat of the Grimm the simulation ended. The mutilated corpse of the Beowulf and the blood that covered me vanished. I suddenly became aware of my armor speaking to me, the mirth of battle subsiding.
"Damage sustained. Damage sustained," the Coffin said.
"Display."
On my screen appeared a schematic version of my suit, areas along the left side of my torso were yellow contrasting the green of the rest of my armor.
"Armor damage minimal. Suit functions sustainable. Unable to unlock armor. Unable to detach," basically saying that I was stuck inside for the time being.
"Emergency eject status?"
"Inoperable."
"Great. Just freaking great," I grumbled, disengaging the helmet from my head.
The Coffin continued though, "Occupant vital signs abnormal. Neural connection down to 84%. Heart rate and breathing elevated, approaching red levels. Correction, heart rate and breathing decreasing to acceptable level."
I forced myself to calm down. The after effects of my flashback combined with the fight had put my body through hell. Mentally it was debilitating but physically it always made me weak. The stress of both though had pushed me much farther than before and the Coffin was reading it. I'd need to work on calming myself or have Basher and Spira always near.
There was a pinching sensation in my neck and a hiss as an auto-infuser injected me with a relaxant. My exoskeleton was fitted with a rudimentary medical system. It couldn't fix me but it could keep me fighting when I couldn't anymore and would also stem off death for a precious time while help was called. In this case, the drug made sure my heart didn't explode.
With a numbing sense of drug induced calm, I picked up my weapons and stalked off to the exit.
The teachers were waiting there along with Ms. Goodwitch.
"Are you hurt?" one asked worriedly.
"No," I replied annoyingly. "I'm fine. My armor is a bit damaged from the fight, nothing major though."
"Ah okay. Our sensors couldn't register your body's status. I believe your armor was blocking all of our sensors," she explained, tapping on her scroll.
"Yeah, I guess it would do that," I mumbled, disappointment beginning to swell within me.
This was the final test and I had botched it up. Now I doubted whether I'd make it into Beacon. I was planning to plow through all of these exams to make up for my written tests but with this last test it was all up in the air. I kept cursing myself and my stupid flashbacks.
"Ms. Miriage," said Ms. Goodwitch, stopping me before I could leave.
A cold shiver crept up my spine. "Y-yes?"
"That was a rather brutal match, a win, but very violent," she hummed with thought, her eyes like a hawk's. "You had a stumble in the beginning, could you tell me what happened?"
"I uhm…" I paused, not knowing what to say. I didn't want anyone to know about my flashbacks, my nightmares, my other… disability. There was only one person who knew and I wanted it to stay that way. She kept my secret as I had kept hers. So I ended up telling up another half-truth.
"I had a malfunction."
"I see. Well it was still an excellent match. Would you like to know your score?"
"Yes, please," I told her.
She turned her scroll around and I saw myself in the top five of all the applicants who had finished their exams. My eyes widened and I shivered with glee. Despite my mistake my scored were still top notch. Better yet there was a score gap between the top five and the rest of the applicants, giving me a safety net. I sighed in relief, hopefully with this it would even out my poorer tests.
"What now?" I asked her.
"Well, you've completed all the exams for today. Go check out where you first entered and you are free to leave. Remember to pick up your belonging from the locker room," she said.
Giving her my thanks I hurried off. I had no intention of staying to watch and I needed to get out, of Beacon and of my armor. Plus I could use the last hours in the day and try and make some money because who knew when I would finally get the results. Until then I was back to my normal grind of making money and scraping a living. After I gathered my things and checked out I stomped out onto the road. Despite whatever I could try I couldn't get the Coffin to release me. It would take tools that I didn't bring plus the help of the two idiots to release me from my walking prison. And so I was cursed to walk out of Beacon and down the sidewalk… in full gear. The heavy falls of my feet shook nearby windows of glass and disturbed neatly stacked newspapers. That was the least of my problems. People would stare at me without even trying to hide their stares, making me ever more self-conscious of myself.
"Just stop staring at me," I muttered to myself as I heard someone ask if I was a new sentry model. I kept my helmet off just so people could see that I was human and not all robot.
"Gods damnit. If I didn't have my stupid flashback I would've been fine. I could've even made the top spot. Now I'm fucking stuck in this damn thing. Coffin was a great nickname Skye. Oh just wonderful. Just perfect. Stupid, smartass Skye," I said to myself. "And you," I said to my picture of Andy, "stay the fuck out of my head."
It was a long walk back to the hotel I was staying at and I was in no rush, plus it was difficult to navigate on the now miniscule sidewalk. Adding on the extra girth of armor took up a lot of room. I had the irritating thought that this is how Basher must feel every day of his life.
A flash and alarm from my armor was the only warning I had, instinctively engaging the helmet that formed over my face. I caught a glimpse of red highlighted areas before the front of a nearby store exploded outward.
"Civilians in danger," the Coffin yelled at me.
I turned and grabbed as many of the pedestrians as I could and tucked them under me, shielding them from the heat and flying debris. It was a few moments before everything dissipated and it was calm again. A women inside my arms was screaming, I could also hear the cries of a baby or child.
"Are you all okay?" I asked to the half dozen or so people I had grabbed. There was a murmur of words as everyone responded and I turned to see the damage.
I froze for a second in horror, reliving that day at Lily's Café. There were a few charred bodies around me, the ones I had failed to save. The people who were nearest to the building that was targeted were either vaporized or now in too many gory pieces to be identified. Some had been thrown into the middle of the street, twitching or groaning with the remnants of life. The opposite side of the road, which I was on, was luckier but still everyone was sprawled on the ground with severe burns or impaled with debris.
My stomach clenched and I felt the food inside clawing its way up my throat. The world I saw began to jump from reality to nightmare and I fought it for control. I held onto my anger, using it as an anchor to the world. It barely kept me here. A shrill caw from above sent a cold, reassuring flush through my body and I saw Spira diving down. In her talons she had Basher by his armor plates, his paws pressed over his eyes due to his fear of heights.
"Hey guys," I chuckled as Spira deposited the frightened Bash onto the ground while she took her post on my shoulder. Bash ran up and head-butted my armor like usual, wrapping himself around my leg for safety from the sky. Spira hummed her greeting and continued to sing softly, knowing the turbulence of my mind.
"Shall we go hunting?" I was met with two steely gazes. "Good."
I ran over to the now ruined building, Spira taking to the skies while Bash climbed up onto my back.
"Full sensor sweep," I told the Coffin.
The image flared as my sensors swept over it, switching different colors and revealing what my naked eye couldn't. There was explosive residue and signs from a large, most likely homemade device. Inside, highlight with red outlines, were the charred remains of the people inside. I cursed, whoever had done this had targeted a dust store. It was smart, their explosive only had to be large enough to combust the dust already present and the exploded forms of dust would conceal whatever traces their device left behind. Still the Coffin was able to highlight a piece of its trigger system and it tagged it as being radio detonated.
I whistled frantically and Spira dove down and landed on my outstretched forearm. Quickly I relayed to her what I needed her to do and she took off once again while Basher hoped off my back and began to sniff around the area. The device had a radio detonator which meant that whoever had set it off had to have a line of sight to it and had to be close by. It meant there were still in the area. By myself I couldn't even begin to cover all the area, the surrounding buildings and back alleys would soak up my sensors leaving me nearsighted. My Grimm however were experts at tracking down others and their Grimm senses were more sensitive than anything that I had.
While they combed the area I began to deal with the people. I took the wounded and laid them all gently in a relatively clear area across the street, tending to what injuries I could. My semblance held too high a cost and I couldn't heal everyone injured. The sirens alerted me to the police and paramedics that had arrived and I went over to inform them of the situation. They mistook me for a robotic sentry at first before I peeled back my visor to show them I was human. Luckily some of them noticed me from the frequent visits to the police station and quickly went to aid the wounded.
Just as I finished relating to them the situation I heard Spira's caw and knew that she had found something. Basher, through some sort of communication with Spira unknown to me, suddenly found a scent and direction. He led me quickly away from the scene of the explosion. Following the two of them they winded through the alleys and streets to a building not too far away. It was five stories high, the tallest building nearby and it looked like a prime spot to spy on the target building. I went to the backside opposite the explosion and climbed up its wall stealthily. I almost fell off when a damn window opened but was able to keep my grip.
As I reached the top I peeked over the edge and saw three men. They were dressed in fairly nice clothes and had their full attention on the emergency crews tending to the explosion site. One had his eye glued to gigantic binoculars while the other two took notes of fiddled with what looked like a detonator. These were the men who bombed that building and murdered all those innocent bystanders. I wasn't going to let them escape.
The Coffin screamed as I pulled myself into the air, landing on the roof with a crash. These men were something else for they didn't freeze although they flinched. They drew guns from inside their clothing and immediately began to fire. Alarms blared in my ears as whatever they were using damaged the exterior of my armor. I fired back in rage but they had already dodged to the side, my shot obliterating their observation and electronic gear. Their gunfire stopped abruptly though due to having to evade my shot and left two on the right and one on the left of the roof.
Now I had the advantage. The building was large but with three of them and my exoskeleton on its roof there was hardly any room to move around. The waist high walls might as well be a hundred feet tall because there was nowhere from these killers to run.
I charged at the pair of men on my right, attempting to finish them before they could recover. My encased foot kicked the man who was on all fours, sending him into a bone-crushing smack with the side wall. That gave time for the other man to get to his feet who tried to shove the muzzle of his machine gun into a crack between the plates of my armor. He didn't expect the speed of my suit, twisting so fast that I broke his arm. His cries of pain were silenced as soon my fist slammed into the side of his face. That only left…
"Fuck!" I screamed, electricity crashed through my suit.
I hadn't expected the other man to recover so fast. He had shot me with some sort of electricity dust and it was playing hell with my systems. The shot must've hit a joint and even then it was lucky that it penetrated the under layers of armor. There was a thud as something jumped onto my back. I keyed a rear camera and saw the last man hanging onto me and stabbing a knife into the back of my neck.
"Shit! Shit! Shit!" I yelled. The back of my neck was one of the spots with the least amount of armor since I needed to move my head around. The high shoulder actuators and armor usually would protect it but with someone on my back I was vulnerable.
My visor flashed red as the thin armor began to weaken, a few more strikes and he would stab through into my spine. Bash and Spira attacked ferociously, trying to tear the man away but he was resilient and single-mindedly focus on killing me. A quick shiver of fear washed over me as a sense of defeat and helplessness clawed at me.
"Emergency purge!" I bellowed.
On my command, the Coffin popped the external armor plates on their hinges and steam erupted from every open port on my exoskeleton. It was a gamble, giving him many areas to easily stab through but as a strangled and piercing scream erupted from behind me I knew it had worked. The scalding hot steam from the cooling system could melt skin and cook muscle easily.
I turned around to see my Grimm easily pulling him to the ground, not at all harmed by the burning heat. The last man on the other hand was clawing at his face and skin, only making his wounds worse. All the steam that had been purged from my suit had melted any exposed skin and had burned his clothes into his flesh. It was a gruesome sight but I didn't feel an ounce of guilt.
"Maybe," I growled, "you now know what it was like… what it was fucking like for everyone down there! For all those who didn't get the mercy of a quick death! You know their fucking pain! Burn you piece of scum!"
"AHHHHHHHHH! FUCK! FUCK! HELP! HELP ME! MY SKIN! IT FUCKING BURNS! AHHHH!" he continued to scream.
I aimed my shotgun at him, my finger teasing the trigger. I wanted to kill him. I wanted him to pay with his life. Maybe that way there could be some amount of fairness to everyone innocent who had died. But the blood… the screams… it was real… C-ydna… No!
Klaka fired, blowing a crater next to the bellowing man's head.
"Fuck!" I screamed, clutching my head. "No, no… you get to live."
Grabbing him by the collar I slung him over my shoulder, him screaming with every movement. Spira and Bash took care of the other two after I checked that they were still alive.
"I'm not a killer. No," I corrected myself with a wave of guilt, "I am a killer but… I was. It was another time. I'm different. I'm not there."
With that I leapt off the roof and landed on the ground, shattering the concrete ground beneath me. It only took me a short while to find my way back to the site of the explosion. My arrival startled many of the new crews there who began to treat me as a threat but it was quickly quelled when a few of the people in charge explained who I was. I threw the man I carried hard onto the ground where Spira and Bash laid the other two.
"These are the men responsible for the bombing," I said coldly, keeping my helmet and visor down. Inside my Coffin tears streamed down my face, finally bursting through my battle-high. They were tears for everyone who had died and was hurt, tears for Lily and her café all those months ago, and tears for my doomed murderous soul.
I was gazing at the efforts to investigate the bombing and the paramedics carting away broken bodies. I cursed myself for my stupid semblance, being too weak to save all those people. Many of them would die and though I could save one of them I couldn't do a damn thing about the rest.
"Skye," gasped one of the officers who knew me and was processing the bombers, "are you certain these were the men who detonated the bomb."
"Yeah," I growled looking back at them. "Here," I tossed what was left of their gear that I had policed up, "there's the remains of their detonators, radio, and binoculars."
"Skye," he said still aghast, "these are wanted terrorists, extremely dangerous wanted terrorist. They're on the top ten for bombings all around the city including the one at Lily's Café."
With that piece of knowledge the Coffin whined as it brought every weapon in my arsenal online, it recognizing my intent through its neural link. I took a step towards them unconsciously with closed fists.
"We haven't been able to catch them and they've been running loose for years," he continued, reading things off a scroll. "We could never identify enough about their bombs because of the way they destroyed themselves in their explosions. We knew that they were radio detonated but the few times we could trace the signal they had already escaped. This is… this is…" he mumbled at a loss for words. His eyes widened as he reached the bottom of their files in his scroll and I froze. Even reversed I could still read the large flashing letters that spelt out 'REWARD'.
"And they have a monetary reward for their capture," he told me.
"How… much?" I said feeling instantly giddy.
"It doesn't say. We'll have to take them back to the station to find out but it would be all yours I think. Here, sign this," he said and I frantically scribbled out my name on his scroll. "Come with me to the station and we'll see."
Half an hour later I was standing in the middle of the lobby of the police station. Again everyone was staring at me, this time for more than just my armor. Word had got around like wildfire about my capture of the terrorists. When curious eyes looked to see who the person responsible was they saw a six foot tall, blood splattered, dented, soot covered, and scratched exoskeleton crowding the waiting room. I didn't care, I was happy that I could finally get justice for Lily and everyone else who was killed.
While I was waiting a woman walked into the room, taking a quick glance before recognizing me. She was the same woman who I had protected, the one who had cradled her baby.
"Excuse me," she said cautiously as she walked up to me. "Uhm… they tell me you're the one who caught the terrorists responsible for the… the…"
I turned and nodded, my visor and helmet covering my head and face.
"Oh… uhm… Mister uh, are you a robot?" she raised her voice.
Letting the helmet disassemble itself and tuck away behind me and I faced the woman and took a knee so that I was eye level with her. I scowled, I was tired and exhausted from the fighting, flashbacks, and emotions that had torn me apart inside.
"Oh my word I'm sorry. I thought you were a robot, or at the very least a man. Uh, I'm Margaret, you saved me back in the street," she said introducing herself. Margaret extended a hand but retracted it, glancing at my armored fingers.
"No, I'm just a girl," I told her.
"What is your name?"
"Skye."
"Skye, that's a beautiful name. This is Emily," she said, motioning to the baby she still carried.
Emily was sleeping now, her chubby round face at peace. It warmed my heart seeing the little life I had saved.
"Well, I just wanted to say thank you. You saved us in the street. Without you I don't… I don't… I don't…" she stuttered and began to sob quietly.
Her display of emotion overwhelmed me. I had never been thanked before by someone I had saved. Hell I'd never met someone I had saved before. I didn't know how to act or even respond. Instead I lifted my hand and gently caressed Emily's face with a single, large finger. I was as gentle as I could be, not wanting to harm her with my exoskeleton. It stopped Margaret's sobs in an instant as she watched me carefully touch her baby.
"She's… a cute one," I said softly. "I am glad you're safe and unharmed. At least, you two are," I said grimly reminded of the dozens who I hadn't saved.
I stood back up so that I towered over Margaret and Emily, suddenly feeling guilty and taciturn. I couldn't stare down at these two lives without thinking of the ones that couldn't be here, the ones that would surely curse me down for not saving them.
"You two should… go."
"Oh… I uhm… Yes…" she bowed her head slightly then scurried to the door, taking one last worrying glance at me.
Her pity infuriated me. "Fuck you," I muttered, "I don't need you to fucking look down on me."
"Skye!" the officer working the desk finally called.
"Finally!" I sighed explosively as I stepped up.
Due to the difference in height the old officer was force to crane his neck to look up at me.
"Good job today, you apprehended some dangerous terrorists. Vale is safe from further bombings from them now because of you," he congratulated me.
"How much were they worth?" I said acidly. My mood had soured and I now had no intent to linger around her. I hated everyone in the room. I wanted them to stop staring at me with their admiring eyes. I wanted them to stop pitying me. I wanted them to stop gods damn noticing me.
"Oh," he stammered by my sudden bluntness, "well altogether their arrest total to 20,000 Lien."
20,000?! I thought with glee. With that kind of money I could live in comfort for a year!
"But," he continued, "I can only give you 1,500 of that."
"What?!" I shouted explosively. All heads turned and the room fell silent.
"W-well," he stuttered, pushing away from the desk a bit, "you're not a licensed bounty hunter. So the rest of that reward goes to the government."
I was deathly silent, trying to think of a reason that I could get the full reward. Nothing came to mind because all I could imagine was me tearing apart the police station and bloodying up everyone present. With forced calm I thumped my hand onto the desk, open handed and palm up. He quickly got my meaning and counted the bills and placed them in my outstretched gauntlet with shaky hands. I took the bills and stormed out of the police station, not caring what I crushed, hit, or pushed out of my way.
A couple blocks away I was still fuming with rage, my Grimm trailing behind me. I think they smelt the madness of my mind, knowing it all too well from instinct. They treated me less like a human and more like a Grimm. I thought about how I would blow all my cash on some alcohol to drown out my sorrows. Fuck my streak, I was going to get drunk. As if hearing my thoughts, Spira landed on my right shoulder and slapped me with her wing, forcing my head towards the storefronts besides me.
"Spira you useless, flying piece of-," I froze, staring at what she had forced me to see.
There on my left was the jewelry shop that I had been mesmerized by the night before. I stared at the rows of rings unmoved from their spots, unconsciously finding that cheap and simple ring I had found before. Some part of me deep down pinged with relief to see that it was still there.
"1,000 Lien," I murmured, staring back down at my fist that still clutched the crumpled wad of bills.
"1,000 Lien…"
"So who's the lucky man?" the lady who was working at the store asked.
"Uh, l-lady," I mumbled rather embarrassed. I still didn't know what the hell I was doing in that store. The money would've been better spent towards fixing my suit and buying money and food too… but instead here I was about to purchase this thing.
"Oh, that's wonderful. It's great that two people can be so happy together don't you think?" she said unlocking the back window to the display and picking out the small ring. "You want this one right?"
My face burned as I took the ring in my rough hands and held it close to my face. It was strange now that there wasn't a glass window between me and it. Looking at the ring through it made it seem unreal, like a faraway thing that I could see but never have. Now that it was there in my hands I felt like it would disappear or that I would wake up from a dream.
"Mmmhmm," I hummed, totally absorbed in the simplistic beauty of the ring.
"So when are you planning to pop the question?" she asked casually, finding an appropriate box and bag to put the ring in.
"Never," I told her solemnly.
She froze, a box in one hand and a gift bag in the other suddenly.
"Never?" she said each syllable like her tongue was numb.
I sighed debating whether or not I should tell her anything. It would be easy to take the ring, pay and leave but it wasn't right. It wasn't likely that we'd ever meet again so I might as well. I was in a slightly nostalgic mood and she had been nice to the two idiots.
"I had an… unusual childhood," I started.
"Most do," she chuckled, resting her elbows on the countertop.
"Yeah I suppose. But when I was young… younger I mean my town was attacked by a Grimm. In the process I lost the ability to walk and feel anything below my waist," I said making her gasp but then her face contorted into one of confusion. "Hehe, yeah I know what you're thinking. I'm standing just fine right now. So I went to… a place and they made me leg braces that gave me all the feeling and ability of my legs back to me. I spent many years there, many long and painful years to regain the use of my legs but I wasn't alone. There was another girl there. She was like me, uh, there to be well… experimented on. We quickly became friends and then, roommates, then support after the long and painful days of tests, and then girlfriends… and then…" I paused reminiscing on all the secret and special times that I had spent with Andy. Thinking about it made my eyes water and I had to put a hand on the counter for support, Basher and Spira nudging me encouragingly. "Then we became lovers."
I looked up and saw a sparkle in the woman's eyes. It looked like she was in a dream or maybe my words and story had lulled her into a nice fantasy, my fantasy.
"It sounds so… perfect," she hummed softly.
"Yeah," I chuckled, "now that I think back to it, after all that I've been through, after all this time, it really was perfect. I mean there was so much pain from our day to day tests and experiments and then there was of course our arguments and the strife of just being in a relationship. We, at first, weren't without our own secrets but soon nothing was hidden from each other. We knew practically everything there was about each other. But then…"
I trailed off feeling the onset of an attack. My hands began to shake and grip the counter, my knuckles white with the strain. The sides of my vision darkened and the strength began to leave my legs. Spira picked up Bash and placed him on the counter where he cuddled my hand. She landed beside him and stared at me and began to sing her lullaby.
"Are you okay?" the woman asked worriedly.
Ignoring her I pulled Andy's photo from my pocket out of habit. I stared long and hard at her picture, calming myself until my breathing slowed and I felt that I had a firm grip on reality.
"Is that her?" she asked.
I nodded, reluctantly handing her the photo.
"She's beautiful, oh, and a faunus too. Are those… cat ears?"
"Fox," I chuckled, imaging how livid Andy would be if someone mistook her ears for something else.
"What's her name, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Andy. Her name is Andy," I said softly. "She was… everything to me, everything that I held dear, everything that I loved, she was my world."
The woman returned my photo to me and I held it tenderly within my fingers, staring longingly at the frozen face.
"So, what happened?"
I took a breath as I relived the memory, the blood, the screaming, C-ydna, Andy's father, and the scientists.
"There was an… incident," I said, leaving it at that. "I decided to leave, forcefully, and escape from all of the pain that was our lives. I asked her to come with me. She said no."
"Oh my Gods… I'm so sorry. That's so sad. Have you had any contact with her since then?"
"No. I've been on my own ever since I left. But…" I grinned as a tear fell down my cheek, "to me, in my heart… nothing has changed. I still feel the same about her. My feelings are as strong if not stronger than they were back then. I still love her… with all… with all…" I couldn't finish my sentence as I broke down in tears.
This was the first time that I had told my story to anyone else besides my Grimm. It hurt, it hurt so much to hear myself say the words aloud. They etched in stone what was usually just a nightmare of a distant memory but here and now they were real, too real. Spira's lullaby turned somber as the woman scurried of and returned with a box of tissues. I must've looked like a wreck, crying uncontrollable at her counter. It was all just too much to bear. All I wanted was to be with her again, to be able to see and talk to Andy. I'd give my life, all my money, everything I had just to see her again. The despicable truth was that none of it was possible, I had ran away and followed my path. There were miles upon miles between us and in the time that I was gone she could've disappeared into places I would never be able to find her in.
"I'm sorry," I said as I regained my composure, wiping the final tears from my face. "It's so stupid and you had to listen to me rant on and on about something that so dumb."
"No, no," she said softly. "It's not dumb, it's love. You love her. You don't know how much your story means to me."
"What do you mean?"
She chuckled, resting her elbows on the counter and holding her chin in her hands. "I had a love just like you once. It was a long, long time ago. We were going to get married but he was an adventurer and a soldier. The Grimm attacked and he went off to protect all of us and me. He had done it so many times before but that time he never returned. I waited and waited but he never came back. The only word I got was a letter informing me that he had been killed in the service. Some part of me is still waiting for him to return."
"Oh, I'm so sorry," I muttered, now feeling so insignificant. Her story was so much more tragic than mine. At least I had some hope of Andy being alive but her, she knew that her love would never return.
"No it's okay, I came to terms with it long ago. But you see, I work here at a jewelry store. We sell necklaces and diamonds and bracelets and all manner of things. Yet the ones that I always pay attention to are the rings. I see couples come and go, filled with love. They are old, young, poor and rich and they all were chasing after that dream of happiness with their loves. Some live happily, others come back to return the rings after things didn't work out but you," she paused, placing her hand over mine.
Basher took the moment to flop onto our hands and lick hers, making her chuckle.
"You are in love, still in love, with someone you don't even have the slightest clue where she might be. I guess you remind me of myself but your love is so strong that you haven't given up hope. That… that tells me that your love is true, genuine, and so much stronger than anyone else's love. You love almost without hope. It makes me feel… bewildered at your strength," she said, petting Bash with her free hand.
Her words struck me deep, tickling the core of my being. I had never thought of it that way. Loving without hope sounded desperate, sad, like I had forgone myself to a future of hardship with no reward. Yet it was like she said, the strength of my love kept me going.
"True love is so hard to find and harder even to realize," she continued, staring into my eyes, "but I know for a fact that you have found it in her, in Andy."
"I… Guess," I mumbled, thinking on the aching burn of my heart.
Without another word she slid her hand from mine and went to the other counter. She quickly boxed, wrapped, and bagged the ring I wanted and brought it over to me. Placing the bag on the counter she slid it over to me with a smile.
"Oh," I said, fumbling to get out my wallet. "That's 1,000 Lien right?"
"No," she said gently, stopping my hands from pulling out the crumpled bills. "I want you to have this."
"What? For free? No, no I can't possibly do that. It cost too much!" I exclaimed.
"For the true love it cost nothing. I would only ask you to promise me one thing."
I hesitated for a moment but then said, "What is it?"
"Promise me, that no matter what, you'll never let go of your love for her, for your Andy."
I dropped my wallet and stared at her in disbelief. My eyes wandered to Bash and Spira who were looking at me with piercing gazes, then to Andy's photo that laid on the counter. Andy… The tears began to roll down my face again and I struggled to steady my voice.
"I promise."