Haru [https://shadowsprey.com/wp-content/uploads/story-images/01_28_Haru-S5.png]

ATARRABI

Haru jerked awake, his screams in the Neither echoing in his ears. He clenched his fists, felt the vacancy in his hands where she should be, but his fingers tangled in empty sheets on a soft bed.

The room came into focus around him as the last of the Neither slipped away. It was dark, the semi-sheer curtains drawn in front of the windows. A warm breeze moved in, causing the hem of the fabric to sway.

There was enough ambient light that he could make out Osawa and Vahn sleeping on the floor. Vahn faced the door, his back to Haru. Osawa slept at Vahn’s back, closest to Haru. He had one arm on his chest, his glasses resting beneath his hand there.

Haru shifted his weight, careful of the foreign mattress, and swung his legs over the side of the bed. The wood of the frame let out a quiet creak when it released his weight.

He took a moment to straighten the athletic pants on his hips and reorient himself into his body. He assumed the clothes were Osawa’s work from the feel of fresh cotton on his skin. His feet were bare, and his jacket was on a hook near the room’s door.

Moving was like wading through mud. His body was aching and heavy, both unused and worn out. His body screamed at him to rest, to be still, but he refused. He crept past his sleeping companions, easing the door of the room open just enough to slide through. It clicked shut behind him, ringing bright and clear in the vacant hall.

He found his way to a stairwell at the back of the hall and followed it up, seeking an aerial view. The wood creaked beneath his bare feet with each step he took. At the top of the stairs he found a service entrance. It stuck at first, but he leaned his shoulder into it and shoved it open.

The night air greeted him with its faded warmth. A subdued hum carried over the city, as if it purred in sleep.

At the edge of the roof he stopped and leaned his elbows on the thick guard wall. The buildings around him butted up against each other, the flat roofs staggered at different heights. Narrow lines connected them, silhouetted against the safety lights. A smog nestled around him, blocking out a more distant view.

“You’re back.”

He looked over his shoulder to Osawa. Osawa was dressed similarly to Haru, with matching grey pants, but Osawa had a loose white cotton shirt.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” Haru said, turning back to gauge the cityscape.

The loose stones on the roof skittered under Osawa’s boots as he approached. “Vahn woke me. We both know he doesn’t sleep. Not really.”

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“Neither did Kanna.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Osawa. Osawa approached the guard wall then turned back to the building, leaning back against it. He rested his hands on the lip of the wall.

“We made it to Atarrabi,” Haru said. He turned and leaned next to Osawa, but shoved his hands into his pockets.

Osawa nodded. “Vahn found us transportation,” he said. “We can leave from here in the morning, and it should be a short trip to Gegenes.”

“Do I want to know how the two of you managed to get me across the plains?”

A small smile snuck onto Osawa’s lips. “Some things are probably better left unsaid.”

Haru straightened and stretched, wincing with the movement. “I’m assuming the somewhat bruised ribs are Vahn’s work.”

Osawa’s smile dropped. “He did his best, considering.”

Haru turned to Osawa. “Considering what?”

Osawa’s expression turned to confusion, his eyes narrowing on Haru, before he looked away. He cleared his throat. “Not everyone mourns the same, Haroun.”

Haru tilted his head back. The smog above the city made a mess of the sky, though the stars still managed to valiantly shine through. But it was the dark that was beautiful to him. Here he could see hints of the violet and indigo twisting in the inky black, even if the breadth of it was lost.

Osawa pushed himself away from the wall, his boots crackling against the uneven roof. He put his hands in his pockets and made to leave but stopped short. “I know you don’t want to tell me about what happened,” he said, “but I’m glad you’re back with the living.” He glanced over his shoulder at Haru, checking on him one last time. “Try to stay here this time.”

Osawa disappeared into the open doorway at the head of the stairs, the white glow of his uniform fading into the black.

Haru sighed heavily, leaning back onto the roof wall. He wished he could tell the others what had happened, but it wasn’t something he could fit into words.

The Neither was a place that wasn’t a place, somewhere between here and everything else. And, somehow, Kanna was there.

Parts of her, at least.

Despite the visions in the Neither, he still didn’t know what happened the day she disappeared. The Neither could twist things, make them more or less than they actually were.

Kanna had died that day. But only for a moment.

A breeze picked up, carrying the scent of the grasslands through the smell of the city industry. He breathed deep, remembering another roof, another time.

Kanna had spoken about her brother once, and only once. She told Haru about the death mask that her mother kept hidden in the upper floors of their estate. As a child, it would call to her. She hid it under the bed in a guest room, the same bed that sat atop the rug with the bloodstain from Salim’s fall down the stairs.

When she felt alone, she’d said, she would hide beneath the bed and stare at the mask. Resting on the ghost of his blood, she would try and figure out what her brother was trying to say.

For Kanna, death had never been something to run from, but something to dare.

She told Haru she always wondered what had happened to Salim, that she thought he would be able to tell her the truth, somehow. She believed that when death was a surprise, the soul must linger for a moment. Just a moment, to wonder what had happened.

That moment was all they needed.