A conflict raged.

Bright and dark orange clashed.

They rose to heights of immensity and crashed onto each other with such force, that Nar’s very soul quaked and quivered from the reverberations.

The dark and the bright swirled and mixed, and made a thousand different shades and hues of orange in between them, but they never stayed joined for long. Always they separated, always they rose, ready to once again clash.

Everywhere he looked, he saw the orange at war.

The heat and the weight of it was such that it should have erased him from being.

But when he looked down at his own body, he saw that he was cloaked in a swirling hazy mist of gray light.

It was the only other color in existence.

None other existed across the endless expanse of orange.

And Something took notice of him.

Something gazed up at him, from within that raging conflict.

It looked upon him with such an intensity that it set his whole being to tremor.

Pitiful.

*********

Pitiful.

The word stayed with him as he woke.

What had that orange been? Pressure?

Was the very Pressure barring his way now insulting him in his dreams as well? And if it was, was it not right in doing so?

The world around him was filled with a much more subdued orange light. Rather than the violent clash and confrontation he had witnessed, here, the light simply swirled in a harmonious blend of oranges.

However, a dark bulk blocked the beautiful display.

Gad stared down at him, her powerful arms folded over her chest.

He wanted to flinch. To look away from those unyielding eyes. From that strength and character. From the righteousness and care with which they looked down upon him…

But he could not look away from such eyes. They wanted nothing but the best for him, and would go to the very end to make it so. No matter how harsh they had to be, to both him, or their owner.

“I’m sorry,” Nar whispered. “I should have told you.”

His voice tasted rough and of fresh blood.

“You should have told us all,” Gad said. “We said we needed to end all the secrets between us, so they wouldn’t be used against us again.”

Her eyes held him in place. Locked. Trapped. They would allow no respite now, until the truth was out.

“Why did you do it?” she asked.

“Why do you think?” he replied.

“We would have found a solution together,” she said.

“At first, we would've tried. But then, when everything failed, you would have stopped me,” he whispered. “And I couldn’t bear that. Not anymore. Things are different now.”

She didn't say anything to that.

Nar scoffed. “We’ve been together for how long now, Gad? Five months? Six? What about all of my life before now? What about who I am? Is that just gone? I was never someone to be carried, or a burden to anyone else! My dad was our leader, and for better or worse, I shared in that responsibility. I looked out for everyone as much as I could. I sacrificed. I gave. Just like my dad did…”

He almost spilled everything then. But he held onto to it. Barely.

“So yes, I have told you many things. But do you know me, Gad? Do I know you? All the things we did and lived, long before we even knew what years were? Or months, or days or hours or anything at all? Are we supposed to just be these new people? These Climbers, and forget everything that makes us, us?”

“Nothing is gone, Nar,” Gad said. “If anything, I believe that this journey has only served to bring out our true selves, in a way that the cubeplant could never do. And it did, for better or worse. The difference is that now the weight is meant to be shared. Carried by everyone equally.”

The lights above him swam.

“Just like that?” he whispered. “We throw our burdens, our futures, our needs and hopes, to each other?”

“And in return we pick up each other’s burdens too. We hold our futures and hopes and everything... Together. That’s all there really is to a functioning party. We’re sentient, after all. We’re not perfect, but we have each other, and that makes the whole better. Makes us stronger. Able to fix and endure things we can't alone.”

“And what if something can’t be fixed?” Nar asked.

“We find a way,” she said.

“What if it can’t!”

“We find a way.”

“You know nothing of what I went through. None of you do,” Nar said, the words finally escaping his lips.

Gad nodded, and the sadness in her eyes cut him.

“No, I don’t. But no matter how bad it was, you cannot fall into self-pity," Gad said. "It’s a hard place to climb back out of.”

“As if you’d know…”

“I’m here, aren’t I? Climbing, just like you?”

Nar closed his eyes.

It was easy to forget that he was not the only one with reasons to leave. What could have possibly pushed her hard enough to risk her life on this Climb? What hopes and dreams did she carry, that held her strong through the darkness and the horrors of the B-Nex?

“You are what you do, and I am scared,” Nar whispered.

Gad shook her head.

“It says, you are what you do, not what you feel. Not what you think,” she said. “Crystal! If it was like that, my path would've broken to pieces already! And even so, you’ve done nothing that would endanger your path.”

“You don’t know that,” Nar said. “I hid my [Aura]! I’ve run from it! It hurts too much, and it's not the magic I want. That I need!”

“From what I’ve seen, you were right to run from it,” Gad said. “Had I known the truth, I… Yes, I would've never allowed you to use it.”

The anger in her words was as heavy as the Pressure. However, it was also soothing, to know that she cared for him such.

“None of us will leave you behind,” she said. No. She vowed.

“At some point I thought about doing it. I thought about it a lot! Of leaving you guys behind!” Nar shouted. “I just needed you to Climb!”

Gad chuckled. And it was a dark, and low chuckle. Heavy.

“And do you think you were the only one?” she asked him.

Nar stared blankly at her.

“Oh, Crystal… You did!”

She placed one of her heavy, strong hands over his chest. He could feel it's warmth against his heartbeat.

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“You are what you do, indeed,” she whispered.

“W-What do you mean?”

“It’s not for me to say, but for you to find out,” she said, shaking her head. “But Nar, I thought about abandoning you before. Crystal, at some point I even hated you,” she said, grimacing at the words coming out of her mouth. “Well, hate might be a strong word. I felt like you were trying to usurp my place. What tank needs a secondary tank? You were showing me I was slow and incapable. All the things that made me Climb to prove to myself and others that I wasn’t. And on my darkest days, and knowing who you were. What you were...”

She shook her head and pressed her eyes shut. "The thoughts that came to me then. The feelings... I will carry that shame forever."

“Gad, I…”

She raised a hand to stop him, gently.

“But it's not just me. Take Jul,” she said, and pointed to a place next to him with her chin.

Nar had known the rogue was there, from the moment he had woken up. He had even hoped for it.

“She ran from an abusive home. From pain and tears and things we cannot understand. To her, we were just a means to escape her parents, and she also lied to us. Did that make her a coward, or wrong? She hid her daggers and lied to us, yes, but only because she believed she was a coward. She let fear blind her and guide her needs,” Gad said. “But you helped her see that she wasn’t. That she was strong, and capable, and mighty. That she could stand up to her fears, with her own two feet and four hands. That her parents were not strong enough to define her, or her path or her life. And slowly, we became more than just tools for her escape.”

She turned her head and looked towards their party.

“What would make Kur, a manager brat of all things, Climb with us lowly workers? We don’t know yet, but whatever it was, death was a better alternative to him… We know about Mul and Cen, and enough has been said about it. But we don’t know yet about Viy, but we will, in time. She’ll need more time and patience than all of us put together, as she is the one most badly broken,” Gad said. “And then there’s Rel. And yes, we all heard her the other night. She wanted us too, and she waited for you to ask the question for weeks… So that she could have the relief of not having it be a secret anymore. To be understood by us. Supported by us. Accepted. Just like you.”

She smiled and shook her head.

“Even Tuk. Funny, laughing, jokes cracking Tuk. What do you think pushed him out?” she asked him. “Because something had to. No one chooses to Climb. Climbing is just the only option left to us Climbers, when there’s nothing else for us to hold on to. And that day, when we gathered to look for our parties and eventually came together... We were not friends, Nar. We were strangers, looking for useful people to Climb up with. And by the Crystal, never again think that you were the only one thinking about abandoning the others in those early days. In the worst of it, I'm sure that even Tuk thought of it.”

Nar blinked away the grit in his eyes. He wasn't sure of what to say.

Gad shook her head, reading the confusion in his silence.

“What I’m trying to say is that you need to stop being so hard on yourself. On what you think or didn't think. Felt or did," she said. "You have done well, Nar. You've done amazing things. Things that took courage and sacrifice, and I can’t stand to see you like this, punishing yourself for not being perfect, whatever it is that drives you so. For your path, for your [Aura], for your need for magic and whatever dreams you hope for, or nightmares that you carry. Even for your very thoughts, you are too hard on yourself, Nar. Like you told Jul, we’re not in the cubeplant anymore. You’re not an Unclean anymore. You can take a break! You can stop when you’re tired and when you’re hurt! You can tell us when you have problems, or when it hurts. No! You must tell us! Otherwise, we won’t know! Being Unclean taught you to hide everything too well! It took months for your true self to start peaking through! And when you lie bleeding and broken on the floor, because we asked you to do something that would hurt you, how do you think that makes us feel, uh? Mul hasn't said a word since. Hasn’t even eaten! I know he looks like a grumpy old shit, but he’s not. How do you think he’s feeling right now, knowing that he accused you of not wanting to use your [Aura] for selfish reasons, and now seeing the results of it?”

Nar clenched his jaw, feeling his heart being squeezed inside his chest.

“I’m sorry…” he whispered.

“You should be. To us, yes, but much more importantly, to yourself. And I’ve had enough of this. Of seeing people suffering when they should have been relying on me. On all of us. And I’m tired of waiting for people to come forward. I’ve realized that it’s wrong of me to do so,” she said, her tone softening. “So, now, I’m going to ask you questions, and you will answer. Do you understand?”

Nar nodded with as much strength as he could muster.

“Good. Let's start from the beginning, then. Why did you choose a hybrid class?”

With his throat as tight as it was, it was hard even to push out the words. But the time had come, and if there was anyone who could and deserved the full truth and story out of him, that person was Gad.

“My dad has the Wasting sickness. Only the cough, and only the one blue spot for now. I want to save him, like he saved me when I was little. You can laugh at it, but I thought the only way to do it was to be strong enough to be able to fight it all by myself. To Climb back down, to break through those Doors if I have to… I don't know how I’ll do it, or even if it’s possible. I don't know how I’ll find him again. But I will get the strength to do it, and as a tank/DPS hybrid, I will be able to take all the damage and deal all the damage that is needed. I will Climb back down and I will get to him. And I don't care what stands in my way, or what I have to do to get it done. Do you understand?”

Gad sighed and buried her face in one of her massive hands.

“Is that why you need magic, too?”

“Yes. I need real power,” Nar whispered. “And I’ve had enough of [Aura]. When I left, my dad told me to forget about it and find happiness. But I never will, unless he's up there with me. Safe and healed.”

“And here you are, forced to use it...”

“And it hurts. Gad, it hurts so much,” he whispered. “I know pain, Gad! This isn’t it! I can’t breathe. I feel like I'm dying. Like I'm being cut and crushed to shreds from the inside! But there’s no other way. The System wants me to use it, and soon enough, I’ll lose my second modifier to it, and my path will be broken. I will be stuck with something I can’t even use, and I’ll never be able to save my dad!”

“Don't lose hope! We'll find a way!" she said. "But do you have any ideas as to why it hurts you so much more than us?”

Nar licked his dry, cracked lips and swallowed with difficulty. “I think it’s because I’m Unclean. They sent me straight to the machines. I was only five. You’re not supposed to work with your [Aura] until you are at least ten, right? That’s when they test you, to see if you have the aptitude for it… But they wanted to get rid of us, Gad, and so they gave us a choice. Exile, or work to their terms. And they worked us to death! Every day, for double shifts. You could puke blood. You could pass out… It didn’t matter. Once you woke up, you had to get right back to it or get beat up. We didn't even work for the quota of the cubeplant, but for our own quota, so that we could eat. And Gad, they starved us! Starved us every time they felt like doing it! To make sure the Crystal was watching, and see how loyal and devout they were. Against us Unclean.”

“Crystal have mercy,” Gad whispered. “I-I’d heard. I... I tried not to see, but…”

Tears ran down the sides of Nar’s face again, and he stared blankly beyond Gad, not at the swirling orange above their heads, but at his own memories.

“We were punching bags for boredom and a quick laugh. And many went through worse… A lot worse. And we weren’t even allowed to fight back. Or stop any of it...” he whispered. “Crystal… You have no idea what I had to overcome just to stop hating you guys. Let alone trust you with my life…”

He sighed. “All of us who could Climb, did so. No... We were forced to do it. There was no future for us in the cubeplant. No hope in a place that wanted us dead. We worked too hard and from too young… Not many of us kids actually made it. Those machines were hungry. And of course, none of the adults wanted us to stay. Because if you’re already dead anyway, then the Climb becomes a hope. A way out… The only way out. But it doesn’t matter. In the end, it’s too late. I’m broken. I started too soon, and that machine destroyed me. I cannot use my [Aura] anymore. It was fine when it was weak in the cubeplant, but now, it’s too strong for me to handle. I can’t take it…”

Gad waited in silence after he was done. Then she got up, and stood with her back towards him.

A long moment passed.

“How does it feel, to have told me all of that?” she asked, still not facing him.

He exhaled shakily.

“It feels good, actually. It feels really good,” he said. "And how did it feel to hear it?"

"It makes my insides boil," she whispered. "And my heart break."

Nar clenched his fists to control the surge of emotion. "Thanks. And Gad, I'm happy you got it out of me."

Gad turned to face him, and he saw, in the orange light, that two brilliant streaks fell from her own eyes.

“I won’t laugh, Nar,” she vowed. “I will never laugh of your dream. And I swear to you, when the time comes, if you still want to save your dad, I will come back down with you. I won’t let you return to this darkness and face all of this by yourself.”

Nar stared at her in shock. “But... You-You’d be up there, Gad! Free, with your own dreams and life to live! I couldn’t ask you that. I won't. It would be too much!”

Gad knelt next to him. She brought her face down to his, so that their noses were almost touching.

“You won't have to ask me,” she said. “I once thought about leaving you behind. Even kicking you out of this party, and I will carry that shame with me always and forever… But that’s not how I feel anymore. You’re my family, and I love you like a brother. And yes, it’s only been half a year, but I don’t care. You’re all my family now, and we will stick together! Through this Climb, and even after it!”

Nar stared wide eyed at her. “I can’t… You can’t!”

“It will be my decision to make. Not yours. Now rest. Sleep and heal. I will speak with the others, and we will find a way.”

“But Gad…”

“We will find a way.”

“But…”

“Nar, just say thank you and shut up.”

“... thank you.”

“There we go,” she said. “Now try to go back to sleep.”

She got up, but as she was leaving, she looked at him again. “I will be very upset, betrayed even, if there is more you haven’t told me, or if in the future this happens again. It will mean that you still don’t trust me. That I’m still just a Clean to you. A means to an end, after all that we’ve been through together. And that is… Upsetting.”

Nar gave her a pale imitation of a smile.

“I’ve told you everything,” he whispered. "There's nothing else."

“Good… Good. Rest, then.”

With that, her footsteps receded into the distance.

Nar was left alone with Jul’s soft breathing.

Jul, whom he loved like a sister. A little sister that was somehow older than him.

He had known that he cared for her.

But he had been scared to admit it. Afraid it would betray his plan and his dad. That he would care too much for her, and for the others, and that he would do something to put his plan in jeopardy. That we would choose them over his dad.

But maybe it was time to stop letting his fears control him. His fear of his emotions, of his [Aura], of betraying his dad, of the future, of embracing his party…

Maybe he really was just being too hard on himself.

I’m too tired. I’m not going to think about it… For now, I’m just going to lie here, and look at the pretty lights.

And by the Crystal, the light was brighter and more detailed than he had previously noticed, the slow lines of lightning crossing the vast ceiling with a beauty that stole his breath away.

It was truly breathtaking.

When the tears came again, he did not fight them, or swallow them.

It was not pitiful, nor was it pathetic.

And as sleep came to claim him back into the healing nurture of his HP, the last thing he felt was the soft touch of a hand taking his, and of fingers interlocking with his own.