He sat there for a while, and looking at the things, the masterpieces he sculpted to remember them by, the impeccable and impossible detail, his eyes began to flood. His heart began skipping a few too many beats as it sunk and a churning found itself into his gut. He’d find himself whimpering as he rocked on those cold floors, remembering all the time they spent together. It was human, and so, it was wrong, he felt, wrong.

“I…” His breath was shortened by his cries. “I thought my emotions were gone… I thought all of it… was gone…? Why…? Why do I feel this way…? It was supposed to be easy…! I did this… made this…! Because I thought it’d be easy to forget them… to accept that they were gone… So why…? Why do I feel this way…!? Why…!?”

He asked the only one that could know, and perhaps she was feeling charitable, because she answered.

“I took all that you were—… I took your humanity, but now we are one in the same, everything you are, I am, and everything I am, you are… so everything you lost… you ‘technically’ still have… if I allow it… naturally…” Maybe no answer was better.

“What’s that supposed to mean…?” He’d regain some composure in his confusion.

“I want to be human… to feel it all… to know it all, pain, hate, envy, love… and you’ll give it to me… all of it… but when I don’t want to feel… when I don’t want to know… we won’t… because these are no longer your emotions… no longer your feelings… your borrowing them, form me…” Her words spoke with apathy.

The man took a while to register all that he had done to get where he was, and if his choice was truly the best one, if it was worth what he had payed.

“I… I hate you so much… but you know that… because this hate is yours… but I don’t hate you this much… so… you hate you too…? Huh…? At least we have that in common…?” August sought common ground.

Her voice echoed no longer as August became the empty husk he expected to be, and looking at the statues was like looking at a brick wall, nothing.

“You can toy with them all you want… my emotions… it won’t fix how much of self-loathing mess you are… nothing will.”

He’d stand, or try to at least, the grief resurfaced like a long due eruption, and he lost all feeling in his body as he fell, weeping for those that had conceived him. He’d rock, flat on his sides, weak.

“I hate you… I hate you…! I hate you! I hate you!” He’d shout it to the clouds, because though she heard, she was sure to cover her ears.

The door behind him would fall, and there they were, May and Cali, scared pale. He’d quickly collect himself, wiping his bloody tears, attempting to stand, though he could not. They’d make an approach, though only May got close enough to touch him, and she hugged him, confused, but eyes teary none the less.

“What’s wrong…?! Are you okay…?!” She held him by the face, looking into his eyes for a sign of sickness.

“I’m fine…” He’d remove her hands, barely mustering enough strength to do so.

“What happened… after the beach…? It’s all a blur… Where did you go…?” She attempted to recall, but all she drew were blanks.

“I went for their bodies… buried them too… isn’t it beautiful…? Aren’t they beautiful…?” The very words made him weaker, and he was forced to lean on his sister for support.

“Wha—… what are you—…” Her eyes would wander and land on the things, the memorials, the graves.

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They’d both collapse under their weight, both too weak to oppose.

“You know I love you right… and everything I do… I do for you…?” He mustered strength to stand, leaning on the one he hated.

“What’s that supposed to mean!? Yes…?” She clung to him, standing herself.

“All of it… I’ll make you make you forget all of it… what happened to me… what happened to them… it’ll be like it never happened… a bad dream… if that…” An inhuman and human proposal all at the same time.

The reason, if his grief was hers, even partly, he couldn’t live to see all he had left suffer, not even a little bit.

“Huh!? N-No…!? I… I refuse…! I refuse! You’ll… alone…! you’d have to go through this alone…! What kind of person would I be— what kind of sister would I be if I allowed that…!” An objection useless, but the gesture was nice.

“I’m not asking… I can’t watch this…” His eyes still bled.

“So I’ll just never know… what happened to them… my parents! What happened to you! Think this through for a minute… please…!” It was useless still.

“I’m doing it…”

“No… no… no… please… no…” May lost all her strength, and so she found herself sat on the ground, tears her only language.

“You’ll remember eventually… in fact… I’ll tell you myself, even what you didn’t know… what you couldn’t have known… so trust me… please… Trust… me…!” He lowered himself, and he was the one holding her face, looking in her eyes for forgiveness.

“I trust you… but this… no… I can’t accept this… Is there no other option…?” A last plea.

“No… none that I was okay with…” He’d wipe her tears.

He would then rest his forehead against his sister’s, and all of it, all she had seen, heard, lamented and cried through, would be gone, like morning dew. It would seem that yet again she would fall unconscious, in and to his hands. It was bad, but worse still, was the idea that he had to go through all of it himself.

He was forced to live her life, and he had to, there was so much to change, and so much to lie about, there was no room for error. That was only one problem still. As, not only did he have to deal with the pain of taking so much away from his sister, he had to know exactly how much it meant to her, and her love was strong, stronger than his at times.

Then, even worse still, was the fact that he’d have to see every time he had hurt her, and feel the pain himself, knowing he had caused it. So, with all of that known, there was no wonder as to why he sat there for a while, bloody tears still fresh as he stared at the floors. He wouldn’t be left to his self-loathing though, as there was much to do.

It was a good thing that Caliandra was there as she would take May from him, to lay the girl down somewhere better. She didn’t seem particularly pleased either as she refused look at August, though she did keep her gripes to herself, for the most part.

“You disapprove….?” He’d take hold of Cali’s cloak as she walked away.

“You must have things to do…? I suggest you get them done.” She’d pull away from him.

Thus, he was left to himself, and his thoughts, but there was much to do still, especially having eyes for the future. He’d stand, and upon looking up, he was stood in the chaotic and destroyed streets, looking at that pitch black cube above the city.

It was there, that place, stuck between dimensions by pagan technology that he’d crash into, the hiding place of those revered few. A hum would arise from the very ground, and even the buildings surrounding August.

Though, that was only the beginning, the city began to shake, and at first, only rubble was disturbed, but the more he focused on pulling the thing from its perch, the worse the tremors got.

In time, seconds, minutes, hours maybe—the continuity of space-time had long become spirals, all the meddling taking place—buildings began rattling like sticks, to their cores, even those built of those impossible materials.

The glass, even the glass would feel the consequences of those actions, fractures running through them as natural as clouds in the sky. Thus, the damage would be piled atop itself, buildings already in disrepair would crack and tumble, fractured ground would unfurl like blooming flowers, and glass played symphonies as it fell.

“You’d take lives…? Snuff them out, based on a faulty future…? And I’m cruel…? Interesting…” She’d put a weight on his conscience as she spoke.

“When factors approach infinity, any one not accounted for is a legitimate threat… and you know this. So, of all these broken visages you have created… ‘warped’… ‘diverged’ from that singular point of grief… how many times has the impossible happened?”

He might have lacked her power in its entirety, but all her knowledge was his, and so, what was the purpose of talking down to one’s self, to one’s own intellect. There was none, and thus her voice sounded no more, even as she slacked her weight, dragging it across his conscience. The feelings she forced would be useless in preventing tragedy still, as all he had endured was more than the lives of dictators.