As with all good celebrity scandals, Lazula was the focus of talk shows and tabloids for three whole days. Some supported her– calling her brave for the way she told the whole world at once. But for each of them were ten insults. Ten telling her to drop out of the Nikos Tournament, and pay back all the prize money she'd won while she was at it. Those were just the ones that believed her. Others thought she'd lost her mind. Or had taken one too many shots to the head during 'actual combat.'
She was all at once a hero, a villain, and a joke.
Moka ignored Lazula's face on the news as she made her way through the hospital lobby. She hadn't stayed long after the hospital's first call. She wanted to be there to comfort her mother when she woke up. She wanted to hold her as she did. But there was no way past the horde of doctors, nor through the network of wires puncturing paper skin. The faint rhythm of the heart rate monitor felt like a countdown. She feared her mother's sunken eyes would never open.
She left before an hour passed, hoping it wouldn't be the last time she ever saw her a day later, she did wake up. She looked faint, as if just being awake took great effort.
"Moka…" a croaking voice greeted. Mrs. Chino's eyes were pink and glazed, turning feebly toward her on dark, wrinkled bags. Moka couldn't meet them. She looked instead to the chair she pulled to her mother's bedside.
"Hi, mom. I wanted to be there when you woke up, but I… I couldn't. I'm sorry."
"It's okay, Moka. You're here now." Despite everything, she managed to smile. "And I hear you've entered a tournament for me. I probably won't be able to go, but I'll be watching you from here."
Moka took the fragile hand that extended from the hospital bed. "Thanks, mom. I'm gonna win it for you. I promise." If her mom could still smile, she could too. She tried her hardest. "I've been training. Oh, and I passed all my classes, so I'm staying at Sentinel! It's hard. But I'm doing it. Cas is helping me a ton."
Mrs. Chino took a few seconds to catch her breath. "Good. I'm so glad you're doing well," she said. "I know this can't be easy on you. Not for Latei or your dad, either. But I know how hard you've been working, all for me." her bony fingers worked the edge of her sheet. "I'm sorry you have to."
Moka clutched her mom's hand tighter to brace herself against the quivering of her lip, the welling up in her eyes. "Don't you dare apologize."
"I don't know what else to do," Mrs. Chino admitted. "I took care of you and Latei for so long. He was a little rascal when he was young, you remember." A resigned, weak breath of laughter escaped. "But I'm not used to being the one taken care of. I don't like being such a burden."
"You're not a burden. You're my mother," Moka maintained. "When I was first starting school, and you fought so hard to convince Mrs. Regen I wasn't some 'problem child,' was I a burden then? Or when I was with Jay, and I thought I loved him, but you knew what kind of guy he was? How many times did we fight about him? And you were right. Always." She took a second to compose herself. She let the second go with a measured breath. "You were taking care of me then. Was I a burden to you?"
"No." Mrs. Chino's lips quivered, and she raised her free hand to pad tears from her cheek. "The doctors told me yesterday, they can't promise me another year. It's possible. And a full recovery is possible, even if remotely. They just don't know. What I do know is that I love you. I love you, and I'm going to make sure you know that."
"I love you too, mom."
They sat with each other, in silence, until Moka's tears broke too.
Caspian was surprised when Moka told him she was still coming to Sparring Team practice. Even more surprised when he found her waiting for him in the lobby of Madrona Hall. She never was very good with time. She was holding up about as well as he expected, though, after hearing her mother's cancer had progressed. Stony clouds hung low over their walk to the SFC. Conversation tended to last from the moment they met, to the moment they went off to separate locker rooms to change.
Today, they were silent.
At practice, Caspian fielded most of the usual chat between the two of them, Cole, Ashe, and Aspen. On a stroke of luck, Midas was uncharacteristically punctual that day. Practice started in earnest before anyone could ask Moka why she wasn't the socialite they'd come to expect.
"So last week we discussed combinations, finding that next strike before you finish the last to help make your movements more fluid. And today we're going to pick back up where we left off," Midas announced. He smiled wide, and for a second Caspian thought he was about to remind the team for the fifth time he was the 'master of fluidity.' Mercifully, Caspian was wrong. "But! Before we get back into it, I think we have time for a challenge day today." He held his hands out to the crowd with a grin. "Anyone? Hmm? Moka? No?"
A powerful arm raised above the front of the group; shoulder protected by bluish-grey steel, wrist and hand by fingerless gloves.
Midas looked uncertain at first. His black eyes flicked all over the modest audience. He swallowed and decided his smile would return. "Lazula! Alright. Getting ready for a big win at the Nikos Tournament, huh?"
Next to Caspian, Moka's sharp breath cut above excited murmur. She looked mortified, as if a Beowolf burst through the door and began tearing into one of the students just inside. "Wait, she's–?" she mumbled. Her head sunk, and she swore under her breath.
"So, who will it be?" Midas addressed the rest of the team with outstretched hands. "Remember, as always, you do have the right to decline. No judgment."
"I want to challenge Caspian."
Caspian didn't know how quickly a cold sweat could drench his forehead. He tried his best to ignore the eyes and excited smiles flashing his way, and choked on his first couple words. He managed to force out one. "Me?"
"Yeah. You've been getting better. I want to see how much."
Midas's smirk bore into him from across the room. "Caspian. Do you accept?"
He took a deep breath.
"Yes."
All the confidence he thought he'd built up toward combat, all the pride in improvement, washed away as Lazula stood twenty paces in front of him. Her hand rested on Impetus's hilt, and the golden spokes of her shield caught the light. The Sparring Team watched on with a buzz Caspian thought might be excitement, or apprehension.
The pounding of boots on ground drowned out the countdown's gentle tone. He didn't know how Lazula moved so quickly with one hand still around her hilt at opposite hip, the other holding a shield that must have been thirty pounds. But within a second she was upon him, Impetus bearing down on his neck.
He raised his armguard, and hard-light plates flashed to life just before impact. It held even one of her strikes, but his arm couldn't. The weight behind her blow crashed his shield into his head, leaving him staggering and open to Impetus's gleaming blade. Across his chestplate and gut, into his left arm, and down his right shoulder. They hurt. Not only because of the blade tearing across clothing and skin, but the force of a Beringel's fist in every strike. She readied her blade for a fourth, but her shout shook Caspian from his wide-eyed stupor.
"COME ON!"
She called his shield up to meet her blade. It must've come of instinct, as he couldn't remember seeing Impetus approach, or widening his stance and bracing his arm for impact. Regardless, it did little. He adjusted his arm to drop her blade aside, just like her demonstration a couple of weeks earlier. But striking twice at Aegis's face felt like trying to bring down a concrete wall with a stick.
Lazula swatted away a third attempt, hoisted up her knee, and drove her boot into the opening she created between his sword and shield. As she buried her boot in his gut, waves of cobalt washed over her. For a second she felt as though she had plunged foot-first into frigid brine.
She forgot the feeling as quickly as it washed over her. She stepped in toward him, ready to end the fight with a sweeping slash down his side as he stumbled.
He held his shield to her strike, and felt something odd stir within himself. A rush of force. Energy born from the clash of steel that traveled into his core, swirled and swelled until he dispelled it all through Undertow's blade.
Lazula raised Aegis. But the force of impact caught her off guard. She flung away and onto her back, flipped over her shoulders and ended on hands and knees. She grinned. Nearly laughed, and her hair spilled from the bun behind her neck.
"What was that?" she questioned.
"I-I don't know," Caspian answered. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to, I just–"
Lazula stood. He stopped apologizing, because she still had about three times his aura remaining and a smile on her face.
"No. I know what that was," Lazula corrected. "That was my semblance. How did you do that?"
"I… I don't know. Really," Caspian maintained. He rubbed the mark her blade left on his arm. "I guess Moka did try unlocking it…"
"Hey, Moka," Lazula called.
The faunus went stiff. She did little to acknowledge Lazula beside a flick of the tail and sidelong glance.
"Thanks for helping him out."
She responded with half a nod and turned away. If she did reply, it was inaudible above the rest of the Sparring Team.
Just about every member managed to congratulate him by the end of practice, even the ones he'd said little more than a hello to in the past. It was a big moment. For a huntsman-in-training to unlock their semblance was as big an accomplishment as a non-huntsman learning to drive, or graduating. Yet he didn't quite know how to respond. "Thank you," of course. But he didn't feel the sense of achievement he expected. Or that he wanted. And it wasn't until he and Moka walked back from the SFC did he explain why.
"So, I guess you did unlock my semblance," Caspian figured. "It's weird, because I didn't feel anything at the time. But you definitely did." She didn't acknowledge his half smile. "Thanks."
"Yeah, 'course."
"I know I should be excited, but… I'm not," Caspian admitted. "I've waited so long for this, but I just have my sister's semblance." He ran his fingers along the edge of his sleeve, turning over his wrist. "I guess it makes sense since we're twins, but still."
"Well, it sure is a strong semblance."
"Not quite as strong considering I only have one soul to power it," Caspian replied. His self-deprecating chuckle was short-lived. "...I guess I just wanted something a little more unique, you know?"
"I get that."
He swallowed back any other complaint he might have. His problems could wait. Moka wasn't herself, he knew that, and wanted to kick himself for carrying on like she didn't just find out her mother might be dying. Gently, he asked a question he already knew the answer to.
"How are you?"
Her answer came with little resistance beyond a sigh. "I'm… not great," she said. "I'm starting to wonder if anything I do actually matters. If any of it will make a difference." Her jaw clenched, and with apparent difficulty she swallowed. He heard the strain in her voice. "Sometimes I wonder if my mom is dying. And I'm just in denial, thinking there's anything I can do to help."
Caspian nodded. Slowly, absently, as all his energy was directed toward producing an answer for something so heavy. "Because of you," he began, with unusual calm. "I've been learning not to listen to my fears. Or rather to listen, hear what they tell me, but don't let them control me. Your mom is getting sicker. That's true. But she's alive. Fronline's still taking care of her. And you're taking care of her too. By being around her, by fighting in the Nikos Tournament, and getting your name out there for sponsors, or donors, or whoever else. You're taking care of her."
Another sigh. "I'm glad I've helped you, Cas. Really. And I do appreciate what you're trying to say. But the tournament is giving out fifty thousand lien in prize money. I thought it would help, but the emergency treatment they just gave her was more than double that." Agitated fingers pulled at each other. "I checked yesterday. My family has eighty-two lien in savings. I'm just coming to terms with the fact that there's no way we're going to make that kind of money for her."
Her sudden flash of animation made him flinch. She went from despondent, withdrawn, to a desperation that verged on anger.
"And I won't even win! There's no chance, now Lazula's competing."
"Then let me pay for it."
"Cas, I can't– I can't ask that much of you."
"My family has an absurd amount of money," Caspian insisted. "A hundred thousand lien is less to us than you imagine. I could give you a few times that, and hardly even remember doing it the next day. If it'll save your mom's life, take it. Please."
Moka looked as though she began to speak twice, and both times Caspian thought she would accept. But she bit her reply back, and shook her head before her third try. "I came to Sentinel because I wanted to get strong enough to win prize money from tournaments. And pick up sponsorships. But so far I've done nothing. I can't just sit back and let you take care of this for me." Her head dropped into hands that rubbed her eyes. "I just want to feel like what I do matters."
Caspian wanted to debate her, tell her she hadn't done 'nothing,' considering she was favored to win the Nikos Tournament before Lazula's entry. But he knew it would do little to sway her. "At least let me pay for the most recent treatment," he proposed. "It's unfair that Frontline expects you to pay that much out of pocket." He smiled, hoped it wasn't out of place. "And you can put the prize money you win toward your mom's treatment."
"But I w–"
"You can try. Lazula's lost before. Once– and yes it was because he caught her off guard and blocked her semblance. But it happened once, and it can happen again."