I sucked in a deep breath as I faced what was certainly the last battle of my life. My thoughts raced a million miles an hour, but no way out of this situation presented itself. Never had I been so completely overwhelmed in strength by an enemy, so shut off from hope.
Suddenly, the cockroach backed up a bit, its massive face pulling away from the window a few meters. Knowing what was to come, I quickly pushed Ren – who was still standing right beside me – as hard as I could, before jumping back the other way. I landed with a thud on the ground and rolled. And not a second later, the massive bug came sailing through the window. Or, it would be more accurate to say sailing through the entire floor.
The size of the face did not give justice to the body, which must have been easily three meters tall. The hard shell of the insect made the concrete yield like a dry cookie crumbling. The upper floor was ripped in two, the force behind the bug carrying it through the other side. An ominous groaning sounded from under me, cutting through the thundering crash.
Rooted to the ground, I lay clutching the carpet under me as concrete rained down all around me. The ground just past my feet had disappeared as a giant crack ran through the entire floor. Bricks and splintered wood tumbled around in the chaos, thudding where they hit the floor.
As I lay in the center of the storm of falling stone and debris, a stray chunk of concrete suddenly smashed into my head, muffling the world around me as my vision blurred and my ears rang. I brought my hands up to cover my head and felt something wet.
With a jarring movement, the ground under me suddenly tilted. Looking up in confusion, I realized in abject horror that the slab of concrete I lay on currently hung on to the rest of the floor with just a few iron rebars, bars that were currently bending and groaning under the weight. I put my head down, nestling into the lush carpet, unable to watch as more of the bars snapped.
It wasn’t even a fight, huh, I thought to myself in frustration. I’d often thought of how I would die. I’d imagined grand fights, gang wars on the scale of countries or maybe even continents. I’d imagined being backstabbed by a trusted lieutenant, or simply being overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies I’d made, fighting to the last breath with good friends at my back. But never had I thought it would be so disgraceful as being crushed to death in a crumbling building, all because of an animal that considered me not even worthy of being its food.
With another jolt, the slab tilted even more, almost at a ninety-degree angle now. I hung on just barely, my aching fingers gripping the carpet fibres so tight it whitened my knuckles.
“Ruby!” came a voice from behind me. It took my dazed mind a second, but I soon matched it to Ren’s. “Hold on a second, I’ll pull you up!” he yelled.
His voice disappeared into the chaotic sounds of destruction for a minute. Then, after an excruciatingly long moment, a thump sounded out above me. I looked up to find Ren, having jumped across the gap, crouching and offering me his hand as concern colored his face.
With what little strength I had left, I loosened my grip with one hand and reached out. However, my one arm did not have the grip nor the strength to keep me up, even for a second, and I immediately began to slip down into the deadly abyss behind me.
A hand clamped onto my wrist almost instantly, its vice-like grip the only thing keeping me from certain death. With a grunt, Ren began to haul me up, the weight shaking the feeble foundation he stood on. It was a miracle that the building hadn’t already collapsed yet, but I was sure that it wouldn’t be long.
Still, the floor stayed stable long enough for Ren to pull me up all the way and drop back down onto his backside, breathing hard. “Y’know, you’re a lot heavier than you look.” His voice had the familiar tinge of teasing I had gotten to know so well.
A small smile bloomed on my face, despite the pounding pain that hurt so bad I had to shut my eyes. Now that I wasn’t holding on for dear life, the pain on my scalp had come in full force.
“Or maybe,” I responded, my voice labored, “you’re just not as strong as you think you are.”
Ren instantly sensed the pain in my voice and snapped his gaze back to me, his glossy eyes open and filled with worry. “Are you hurt?” he asked.
I laughed, before wincing as the pain flared up in response. “Yup. Pretty bad, I think. Can’t see it though.” I couldn’t see much of anything, in fact. My eyes had been kept closed since light made the pain much worse. And when they were open, all I could manage were vague, blurry shapes.
“Oh no,” Ren said as he came up to me, gently removing my hands from my head and replacing them with his own. “What happened?”
I winced as his finger brushed the wound, and he instantly pulled his hands away. “Some rubble fell on it, I think,” I answered him.
“Oh no,” Ren repeated, his voice hollow.
“That bad, huh?” I said with a smile.
“Ruby, listen to me,” Ren said, turning to me. I’d never heard his voice sound so serious. “You need to Revive now. Like right now, Ruby. With an injury like that, you won’t last long unless you Revive. But it's gonna be painful, Ruby. Very painful. Worse than any pain you’ve ever felt before. But if you want to survive this, you need to do it.”
“So it is that bad.” Despite his tone, I found myself unable to take the information seriously.
Ren ignored me. “Here, take this.” His words were followed by the sound of cloth ripping. “Bite on this, Ruby,” he said, holding the cloth near my mouth.
Weakly, I opened my mouth and let the cloth in. It tasted bitter and salty, and very dusty. I bit down on it as hard as I could.
“Listen to me now. Take a deep breath and think of something happy. A memory that you know so well you could get lost in it. A person, a place, anything.” I did as he said, though I could feel his voice fading slightly, as if he was getting further and further as he spoke.
Or perhaps, it was I who was drifting away.
“Now, focus on that memory, and relax your body. Let all your muscles loose, like you’re laying on a bed, about to go to sleep.” I smiled at that. Sleep sounds real nice right now, I thought to myself.
But it was a trap. A horrible, agonizing trap. The sweet lure of sleep transformed into a monster. The second I breathed out all the tension in me, relaxing every muscle in my body, a terrible, burning pain invaded me.
I screamed, a deep, guttural scream of pain and fear as the burning hot Flux poured into me. It was hot, too hot. Magma poured into me, all around me. It was like I was bathing in it, my skin burning with fire. My insides felt scorched, the pain unlike anything I was expecting. The cloth between my teeth kept my screams quiet, but my throat was still ripped raw.
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The pain was all-consuming, taking over my body and mind. Ocean’s image was long forgotten, drowned in the flood of fire that had invaded me.
In the midst of the torture, I noticed a strange phenomenon. Through my eyelids, I noticed a flickering orange, cutting through the darkness that had descended over me. The blur seemed to be rising off of my own body, and the chaotic way in which it danced and swayed was captivating. So captivating that I found the strength to open my eyes and investigate, despite the added agony it caused.
Arguably the strangest sight of today – a feat in and of itself as not one of the contenders was easy to topple – greeted my eyes. The blur was fire, and it burned on my skin. The entirety of my body – save for my head – was truly, physically on fire. It burned on the surface of my clothes, somehow not affecting them at all. Ren had backed up already, staring at me with widened eyes. I turned to him, taking in his expression of shock, and laughed.
“Today just does not stop, huh,” I croaked out, fighting through the intense pain, my lips curled into a sardonic smile. When the weighted darkness of unconsciousness finally settled over me, after everything that had happened today, it found me still laughing.
-
Ocean stood before me, her long, hazel hair flowing in the wind. She wore a simple but elegant white gown, so long it pooled at her feet. Her face was the same as the last time I’d seen it, but healthier. The sunken, pale cheeks and the dark rings around her eyes were gone, replaced by a lively glow. She was vibrant, and the tender happiness that radiated from her expression filled a hole in me I had thought would never be filled again.
“Hello Ruby,” she said, her voice quiet.
Rivers ran down my dusty cheeks as I heard her voice, a profound cocktail of emotions swirling in me. Grief, joy, bitterness. Nostalgia, confusion, pain. I had so much to say, yet my throat would let no words pass. “Ocean,” was all I could manage, my voice shaky.
“I missed you too, sister,” she said, suddenly appearing right in front of me and throwing her arms around me. In her embrace, the dam finally broke. Seven long years of bottling up my sadness and pain, seven years worth of tears broke loose, carrying the pain within me as they poured out.
Her hand patted my back gently as I sobbed into her shoulder. “You’ve struggled hard since I left, Ruby. I’m so proud.” Her voice was choked with emotion.
Centuries passed in the minutes I spent crying, but eventually, as my sobs settled into sniffling, Ocean pulled herself away from me, her hands on my shoulder as she looked me in the eye. “I’m sorry, Ruby, but we don’t have much time. You’re passed out right now, but if you don’t return soon, it’ll all be over. And it can’t be over now, not after all this. You still have so much to do, Ruby.”
“What…What are you talking about?” I asked in confusion, the tears stopping at long last.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t have the time to explain right now. I’m sure you’ll figure it all out one day, once you’ve learnt enough. But for now, I need you to listen to me, okay?”
I nodded, although none of what she was saying was making any sense to me.
“Your parents, Ruby. You need to find them. They can help you, but more importantly, they need your help.”
I looked at her in confusion. “But my parents are dead. I’m an orphan.”
Ocean shook her head. “I can’t explain how, but I need you to trust me, Ruby. They aren’t dead, and they need your help, because no one else will help them. But before you do, you need to get stronger, far stronger than you are right now.” Ocean paused for a second, tenderness returning to her eyes. “I know life has been so hard on you, and you’ve already fought so much. It kills me to ask you to fight more, to fight longer. But there is no other choice for us, Ruby. They need your help.” She took my hand. “I need your help.”
“But…I don’t understand. I thought you were dead, Ocean. I saw you die, Ocean.”
Ocean looked at me with a face brimming with an emotion I could not decipher. “I know that none of this makes any sense, Ruby, but I can’t talk to you for very long, so I have to tell you everything important right now. You will figure out everything else in time, sister, I know you will. You were always the-”
Suddenly, in the middle of her sentence, Ocean doubled over, clutching her gut.
“Ocean!” I yelped out in worry.
“It’s okay, Ruby. I’m fine. But I don’t have much more time to talk, I’m sorry. I have one more thing I must tell you before I go,” Ocean said, looking back up at me. Her face was pale now, sickly, like she was in a lot of pain. A face that was far more familiar to me than her healthy look.
“You’re gonna leave, again?” I asked. “But…But you...” I stammered, at a loss for words. Despite the confusing circumstances, this was the first time I had felt whole, felt complete in seven long years. To lose this again, to lose her again, would be a blow I would not accept. One I could not accept.
Ocean said nothing, only giving me a complicated, overwhelmingly sad look. Suddenly, she shook her head, as if clearing it. “I’m sorry Ruby," she began, "for telling you this, for robbing you of another happy memory, but you must know this.” She took in a deep breath.
“Daphine lied, Ruby. She’s not who we thought she was. She was in on it, Ruby. The whole time. She was one of them.” Ocean’s face was grim as she spoke, devoid of the kindness I’d always seen her show. There was another emotion present too, boiling in her eyes. It was an emotion so foreign to her that it took me a second to name it.
Hatred.
“I…I still don’t understand,” I stammered out.
“She’s still alive, Ruby. I know that she is not dead, but I don’t know where she is. But she has nothing to do with you anymore, and I would like it to stay that way. All I ask of you, Ruby, is to no longer honor her in your memory. She is a monster, not the person you know her to be.” Ocean paused again. “I would have let you live your life without knowing that, but I know you. You’d want me to tell you this, but nonetheless, Ruby, I hope you forgive me for ruining her memory.”
I was silent, my mind utterly unable to comprehend the information. It was as if so much had happened that my mind had given up on it all. Her words drifted through my mind aimlessly, with no effect on me. I heard the words but entirely failed to register them as anything other than interesting sounds.
Ocean seemed to understand that I had reached my limit then, as she went quiet again for a moment, instead studying me with her face a picture of motherly pride. “You’ve done so well, Ruby. I’m sorry that you were cursed to live this life. I wish I could save you from the pain your future has in store for you, and it’s torture being so helpless about it. But no matter what, Ruby, no matter how far you go or where you stop. No matter where or when or how you die, whether you achieve everything you set out to or none of it. Whether you become the hero you’ve always wanted to be or not, know that I will always be proud of you, that I have seen all your battles and have bore witness to how hard you have fought. No matter what anyone or everyone thinks, there will always be at least one person who will forever be on your side.”
I stared at Ocean dumbly, a carefree smile on my face as I studied the strange girl in front of me, making odd sounds with her mouth.
Ocean laughed as she saw my expression, a gentle, teasing tone to it. “Oh, by the way. Keep that Ren boy close, k? He’s the kind to always have your back, and you’re gonna need that. Just make sure you always have his, too.”
As she spoke, she winced again, the pain of before resurfacing a little. Only this time, I completely missed it.
Cupping my face with both her hands, Ocean leaned forward and touched her forehead to mine. “I’m sorry, but that’s all the time I can get us. I have to go now, k? But I’ll always be right beside you, even if you can’t see it. We’ll talk again, sometime, ok? I don’t know when, but I know we will.” The strange girl’s voice was getting frantic, like she was trying to cram in every last word she could get. Still, her words were not making any sense to me, so I simply nodded and smiled.
Slowly, the girl’s body began to disintegrate, tiny glowing pieces of her floating up into the darkness that surrounded us. The void greedily swallowed everything, and as I watched the strange girl, whose name I could no longer remember, slowly get eaten, some small part of me screamed out in agony, desperately begging the rest of me to stop it, to save the girl from the darkness, to keep her with me. Or else to follow her into it – anything to stay with her.
But I didn’t, for there was nothing I could do. The girl was quickly disappearing now, her hands still on my cheeks, her forehead still against mine. My body was stuck, frozen. My arms lead, my body immovable. And so I simply watched, and watched, until the strange girl broke completely into scattered particles of glowing white, before being swallowed completely by the void.
And in her place, came flooding back the horrible, burning, scorching hot pain.