Tsugi's vision slowly returned as she was gasping for air. Her lungs burned and her forehead stung, dripping blood down into her eye and off her chin to the desert floor in steady drops like that of a leaky faucet.
Drip, drip, drip.
Her legs were weak and shaking, barely supporting her own body weight. Her arms felt heavy and she glanced down to find the giant, bladed half of the scythe in her hands, covered with blood.
To her left was the shriveled cloaked body of the creature – unmoving.
The air around her so deathly silent and still.
To her front was Ruzo lying very still with Lugo crouched in front of him in a defensive position as though guarding him from – from her?
Lugo’s leg was twisted in a way a leg should not be, the white part of his tibia was protruding out of the side of his leg, slathered in the dark red that too pooled beneath it. He had one arm across his ribs and the other held onto his sword, trembling as though it had weighed a ton.
Even still he managed to raise the silver thing, pointing it at her in such caution it threw her for a loop.
“Tsugi?” He breathed, his eyes widening with trepidation
“What – what the hell happened? Are you okay? Can you see me?” Tsugi dropped the scythe on the ground and ran toward Lugo and Ruzo.
“Yes.” He breathed and lowered his sword in a way that he seemed – relieved. She held onto his face and examined his blood shot eyes. They would blacken in a few hours and soon swell to be unrecognizable.
“What happened? Is Ruzo okay?” She ran her hands along Ruzo’s fur, feeling nothing from him, not even a gentle breath. But his body was still warm.
She takes his muzzle into her hands, gazing into those eyes that seem to stare right into her soul.
He’s fine. His eyes are open and he’s looking at her so he must be fine – right?
“Ruzo?” She said softly and shook his muzzle. “Come on buddy, get up, let’s go home.” She smiled and waited, but the giant warwolf didn’t move – didn’t so much as blink.
She whips her head toward Lugo. “What’s wrong with him? Why won’t he get up?” Her eyes watered and she ran to place her ear against Ruzo’s chest. There was no sound of a heartbeat, nor the rise and fall of a gentle breath.
She felt a wet stickiness on her hands and face when she pulled away.
The sun had finally emerged from behind the moon and shone a light upon her hands. And there, painting her hands were a dark viscous red.
It’s just paint. It has to be. It’s only paint – it’s only paint.
Her gaze shifts unsteadily to his body where there was a huge gash on the side of his chest. Underneath him was a pool of blood that had soaked into the greedy thirsty sand.
“No.” Tsugi’s voice was but a whisper. “No. Come on big guy, you can’t leave me.” She rocked back and forth on her toes as if to soothe herself. “Not now, come on – you can’t leave me. Don’t leave me – don’t leave me.”
She ran back to his head and peered into those very light brown eyes. They almost seemed golden in the desert sun, but they didn’t even wince at the assaulting ray of light beaming down on them like a raging fire.
No. Those dark pupils remain dilated as though he were lost in nothing – but darkness.
“Come on big guy. I’m right here bud, look at me.” She sniffs, closing her eyes and pressing her forehead to his, willing him to whine, to move, to show her any sign of life within him. But he only laid there. Laid so damned still in that vast desert that seemed to go on forever to no end.
Her heart leaped into her throat and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t let a single ounce of air go pass her throat in which there had seemed to be a rock lodged in it – or perhaps it was her heart, wanting to follow him to wherever he had gone.
Her lips quivered uncontrollably and quiet sobs escaped her throat, turning into wailing cries of heart wrenching pain that echoed through the desert. Her sorrow was so immense, even the gods and death would join her in her river of tears.
“Come on my good boy – come back to me.” She cried, stroking his bloody muzzle, willing him to take a single breath and look at her. “I’ll trade my own life for yours.” She whispered.
Then it dawned on her – she could.
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With her resolve in place, she took a deep breath and placed her hands on Ruzo.
Lugo grabbed her hands with such ferocity that if she were a normal person her hands would’ve been ripped clean off. But she just looked at him, looked at a blurry version of him and watched him gently shake his head.
“I’m sorry Tsugi, but it’s too late.” He mumbled through his pained gaze as he tried his hardest not to cry.
“No.” She said. “He’s fine, you’ll see.” She shook off his hands and placed her hands back on Ruzo.
“You can’t Tsugi! Look around! There’s no life around here!”
“I don’t care! I will save him!” She cried, beginning to muster every ounce of energy she had left.
“You can’t, you’re barely alive right now! Even if you manage to heal him it’s too late! You will die for nothing!”
“No! I can do it!” She cried, pushing everything she had left into Ruzo.
But there was a sharp pain on the back of her neck and her world became drowned in darkness.
***
She opened her eyes but everything was fuzzy. Was she attacked? She whirled around and summoned her daggers, only to feel a tear overflow the rim of her eyes and roll down her cheek.
What the hell happened?
She reached a hand up and wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. She looked up to find herself surrounded by a bright lush green field as she sat under the wisteria tree. She was confused and lost, unsure if she had been dreaming – or if it was all real.
Perhaps a hallucination?
She glanced around but there wasn’t anyone in sight.
But, what was she doing under the wisteria tree?
Looking down, there stood the graves of Namiko and Miru, followed by Yamo, Volgan and Fay. And next to them was a fresh grave – Ruzo.
Tsugi’s knees buckled from underneath her as she fell to the ground. Her face filled with distraught and her heart in her throat. Tears welled into her eyes, streaming down her face.
There were so many tears, so much that she cried enough to fill the oceans ten times over. She clutched at the pain in her chest as her wailing echoed through the earth, crying for him to come back.
Her friend.
Oh her dear friend who had been there with her through everything. They laughed, played, fought and survived through hunger, pain and near death together. He will never be here with her anymore, to share the morsel of food with her, or to wake her from her dreams just as she does him.
There was a piece of her that had left with him, and she missed him dearly.
Words could never describe her pain that she felt that day as she cried till her tears turned into a river of blood. She sat by his grave and cried through her happy memories with him starting from the little pup who bit her that day to all those times they spent laughing and running through the field, swimming in the water, and all those days he spent by her side through all her bad times.
What will she do now that he’s gone? Who will bring her back from her nightmares? Who will remind her of reality? Who will ground her to earth when her mind enters the deepest darkest corners of her mind?
Who will she share her happiness with? Or will she ever find happiness again?
“Hey.” Lugo said softly, placing a hand on Tsugi’s back in an attempt to console her.
“Don’t touch me!” She barked. Her face screwed up, her eyes burned red, and her quivering lips refused to heed to her command.
“Tsugi?” Lugo said with much caution, showing her the palms of his hands. “It’s just me.”
“I know it’s you!” She yelled. “You’re the reason why Ruzo died!” And she began crying again and she couldn’t stop it. “If you didn’t stop me I could’ve saved him!”
“No you wouldn’t have. You were already so close to death, and even if you spent your life source to heal him, it wouldn’t have brought him back.”
“It doesn’t matter!” She clenched her eyes and her fists. Forcing herself not to say it, but it left her lips before she could stop it. “If it wasn’t for you, he would still be alive! You just had to get some stupid godforsaken thing from that deathly creature! If you hadn’t then he would still be with me! It’s YOUR fault he died!”
Her face red with fury and her trembling fists shook, not from wanting to punch him in the face, but to punch herself for even allowing it to happen. “Go away. I don’t want to see you anymore.”
-“How dare you yell at your best friend!” The voices were screaming at her again. “He’s your only friend! He protected you! He protected Ruzo! How dare you say such a painful thing to him?!”
Tears welled in Lugo’s eyes and his lip began to quiver. He swallowed hard to push past the rock lodged in his throat and quickly wiped away the tears in his eyes with his sleeve. With a deep breath he said so softly, “yes – yes, it was my fault. If it wasn’t for me, then none of this would have happened. I’m sorry.” He croaked.
He set down a crate by Tsugi. “Today’s the day of the dead. I figured you’d want these.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a necklace with a red stone inside of it, cut so perfectly and beautifully that it gleamed at her even from the distance in which he held it.
“I had meant to give this to you for a different circumstance, but it seemed, I caused the reason for this gift.” He mumbled, grabbing Tsugi’s hand.
“You killed him for this stupid thing, why the hell are you giving it to me? I don’t want it!” She fought to pull it away from him, but he held onto her hand as tight as he could and forced the necklace into her hand.
“I went to get it for you. I just didn’t expect for things to go the way they did. I really am sorry.” He whispered and quickly turned, leaving the hill. Leaving Tsugi to her sorrow.
She was still so angry at him, and she wanted to scream and yell at him again and again, but another part of her refused to.
-“It’s your fault Ruzo’s gone and now you’re going to push away your best friend too?” The voice scolded.
No! It’s not her fault! How is it her fault? If he hadn’t brought them there in the first place, none of this would’ve happened!
-“Tsk, tsk, tsk – you’re too quick to lash out. You didn’t stop him. You were there with him. You went with him. You insisted on bringing Ruzo. You were the one that went and got distracted and got hurt. If you hadn’t gotten distracted, everything would’ve been fine!” The voice was now screaming at her.
She cried and clenched the necklace in her grasp till it pierced her palm, drawing in a bit of blood.
She opened her hand to look at the necklace and watched as the red stone began to shimmer and something whirled deep inside of it as if answering her cries.