Sasha

---- Ninth entry -----

You noticed all those hopeful words, didn’t you? How I tried to end the previous entry with something that felt like strength, like love. Like maybe I was holding myself together.

I’m glad I’m doing this digitally. My handwriting would be illegible by now, the pages soaked with tears. At least this way, no one can see how much I cried over the keyboard. And I can edit the text again and again, framing it just right, showing you what I want you to see.

But you probably noticed—oh stars, I hope you noticed—also what I didn't say. I didn’t say anything about Mom, Dad, Ilya, Alex, or anyone else. I kept writing about the helicopter ride, the training, the magic. I wrote about anything except the people I love most.

Because I’m a fucking coward.

There’s a voice inside me, whispering that if I survived, you’ll read this. And when you do, I want you to like me. To think that the Sasha who wrote this was someone good, someone kind, someone brave. Someone you’d want to be.

But I am not brave or kind. I didn’t contact them. Not even once.

I wish I could blame the Coalition. But they didn’t stop me. On the contrary, they gave me my phone back almost immediately. Edgar said they’d bring anyone I wanted here, let me spend my last months with them. But I didn’t ask.

I couldn’t face them. Not my mom, not my dad, not Ilya or Alex. I opened my phone a thousand times and stared at the messages piling up. I couldn't even open them, fearing that people will see it, so they even brought in a tech guy who fiddled with my phone so I could read their messages without the dreaded two bold checkmarks appearing. The guy acted as if it was completely normal, to ask for this, but I knew it wasn't.

The messages were flooding:

“Hi, Sasha. Are you okay? We’re worried about you. Please call us.”

“Where are you? Are you alright? Please answer.”

“I love you, Sasha. Just tell me you’re safe.”

Every word felt like a knife. I wanted to answer so many times. But doing it? Hearing their voices, feeling their hope? That would’ve been unbearable.

What could I say? Lie to them? “Hi, Mom. Everything’s fine. I’m at a magic training facility. I’ll be home by the Flower Festival!”

And the truth?

“Mom, I’m going to face an eternity of torment beyond anything you can imagine. The only person who went through it says it’s worse than death. I’ll forget you. I’ll forget me. But it’s okay because if I don’t do this, everyone dies. So… how’s the garden?”

No. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t lie. And I couldn’t tell the truth. So I said nothing. Fucking coward.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Edgar told me it was okay. He said no one would blame me. He sat with me the first time I tried to record my farewell messages. I stared at the blinking red light until my vision blurred, and then I broke down. He poured me coffee, sat across from me, and said, “You’re already giving them everything, Sasha. You don’t owe them more than that. And you deserve every second of peace you can get.”

He meant it, I know; I could see it in his eyes. But I didn’t believe him.

Still, I recorded the messages.

For Mom and Dad, I talked about Sunday mornings in Rovalia, how Mom’s singing filled the house, how Dad’s tinkering with his clocks made everything feel steady. I told them how much I loved them. I cried. I joked.

For Ilya, I talked about our childhood and his dreams. I reminded him to tease Kostya for me, to tell him stories about his aunt Sasha.

For Alex, I said she was the sister I chose, my joy and hope and meaning in the whole world.

And for Stanis… I told him he missed his chance. That he should go and get it—build a life full of love. I tried to make it light. It hurt less than I expected. Maybe because I’ve already decided you won’t remember my feelings for him. And I made sure he would know it. Because if I didn't, just the fact that I was in love with him would chain him to me, to a memory of a girl he didn’t even choose, but who became a holy fucking Savior, forever. I can’t do that to him. Or to you.

The rest of the preparations weren’t any easier. Edgar started explaining them in bits and pieces, trying to ease me into it. But now, with only months left, the full weight of it has settled.

It’s not about saving me. The Door won’t let me die, no matter how much I’ll want to. It’s about saving you—future Sasha. It’s about giving you a chance to hold on.

“Memories are part of the soul,” Edgar said one night, his voice steady, though his exhaustion was palpable. He’d just returned from Perrilion, quelling a catastrophic eruption, shadows on his face deeper than usual. He didn’t seem to notice his own fatigue, though; he never did. “You can’t copy them. You can only transfer them. And that takes something from you.”

I nodded, the words sinking in. “And the Door needs a whole soul, right?”

“Exactly. That’s why we can’t preserve much. A dozen memories, maybe a few more. Any more than that, and the Door won’t accept you.”

A dozen memories. Out of everything I’ve ever been.

He didn’t say it, but I knew he was thinking of Alaric. The world calls him the Patron Saint of Romantic Love, framing his story as the ultimate tragic romance. How he preserved only memories of his wife, Martha, and returned to find her gone. How he chose to end it as soon as he recovered enough to understand what happened. For Edgar, it’s not a tale of devotion—it’s a failure.

“That won’t happen to you,” Edgar said firmly. “We’ve learned. You’ll choose several people. Several anchors. Two decades is a long time, Sasha.”

I nodded again, my chest tightening. I understood.

“And the fail-safes?” I asked.

He explained the spells I was learning to craft and how they would feed on my own power to create a loop that could delay my self-annihilation. A spell designed to buy time. Just moments.

“Seconds, a minute at best,” Edgar said. “That’s all we’ll have. But it's enough to reintroduce the memories. And those memories—they’ll give you a reason to stay.”

He paused, his gaze softening. “Think of these memories as lightning during a storm. They won’t light the whole sky, but they’ll show you there’s something beyond the darkness.”

It sounded beautiful. Poetic, even. But it wasn’t comforting.

"And what if it's not enough?" I asked. His face darkened, but his voice was calm: "It will be. It was for me. For Alaric. - he paused - at least for some time." Then he hesitated before adding quietly, “And these diaries—they’ll be a map. Not enough to bring who you were back, but something to hold on to.”

Now, as I sit here writing this, I think about the memories I’ll choose. A dozen moments to define a life. A dozen fragments of me to tether you to the world after an eternity of pain.

I don’t know if I’ll choose well. But I hope you’re reading this. I hope you’re here, alive. I pray - although I don't know to whom anymore - that these words—and the memories I will save for you—are enough. They have to be, for both of us.