Chapter 27: Trauma

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Violet shook her head and continued to write down her thoughts. Mark, Vivian, and Roland had gone to the gym for a short workout the day before the final selection. Violet on the other hand had decided to stay back at their dorm, trying to determine what had caused her panic attack while fighting against Vivian the day prior.

‘I need to run back through what happened.’

Violet allowed herself to fall back into her memories, visualizing and recalling everything that had occurred during their battle. Her counter drew her attention the most, specifically, the point when the counter crossed 50%. A few moments after that she was suddenly stricken with overwhelming fear. It was like being trapped in the deepest part of the ocean, everything felt cold and heavy, there was no escape in sight, and death was inevitable.

‘It probably has to do with my counter hitting the 50% mark, but why did it increase suddenly and how did it cause a panic attack? I’ve never had one like that before.’

She crossed 50% soon after unleashing a massive explosion. But that couldn’t have been it, otherwise, the counter would have increased immediately following the explosion. But that isn’t what happened. Violet had been able to walk all the way to Vivian, who had been launched quite a distance back, with a limp. Violet even had enough time to allow minor healing and to observe any injuries Vivian had.

‘Injuries…’

Feeling a possible connection, Violet immediately began writing down the events that occurred between the explosion and her panic attack. Nothing was left out, even the amount of steps she took was considered. She focused especially on when she was observing Vivian since that was immediately before the counter increased. Vivian at the time had received numerous injuries and blood ran down all over her. But the most severe injury was her… arm.

‘I see.’ A sudden flash of realization appeared to Violet as she recalled how she had focused on Vivan’s arm. When she did focus on Vivan’s arm, Violet was reminded of the end of the second selection, where Vivan’s arms were broken by examiners. Subconsciously, Violet must have linked the two events, leading to her self-perception of being similar to the examiners. The slight mental dissonance of hating the examiners and perceiving herself as similar, coupled with the exhaustion of the fight, had caused her counter to increase to 50%.

‘But that still doesn’t explain why I had a panic attack.’

Violet had gone over the 50% counter numerous times in her life. Having had it since she was young, she was well aware of its function and the consequences of hitting 100%. Yet, across all of her years of living, she had never once experienced such a visceral and frightening terror. Something about this event was different than the previous times she had crossed over 50%.

After several minutes of thought, Violet came up with a hypothesis. Previously, she had never been in a fight when she crossed 50%. Whenever she was above 50% during a fight she felt anxiety and fear at the prospect of injury or loss. Violet suspected that her emotions, which had been suppressed while the counter was beneath 50%, overwhelmed her. Her mind was flooded with all the emotions she would have had if the counter wasn’t suppressing her. Without any time to adapt mentally, Violet was left helpless and terrified.

‘Shoot. This is a big problem.’

The final selection was a tournament between applicants. Each battle would be between members of the same letter rank, meaning that even the strongest applicant would have at least a decent struggle against the weakest remaining applicant. While Violet held an advantage over most of the other applicants, being a Mid B-Rank, that didn’t mean she would find any of the fights easy. If she crossed the 50% mark during any one of her fights, there was a high likelihood she would then lose. She still wasn’t ranked in the top 20 applicants, meaning if she lost early on she wouldn’t even be considered for acceptance to AGH.

‘I’ll have to keep my counter above 50% then.’

Violet sighed deeply. Keeping her counter above 50% massively increased the likelihood of hitting 100%. The tournament would likely have to take nearly the full day considering the amount of applicants that were left, meaning Violet would have no time to allow the counter to lower.

Knock, knock, knock

Violet slowly got up from her seat and walked robotically to the door. When she opened it she found Mark, Roland, and Vivian all exhausted from their workout. Sweat dripped down their faces and their breathing was heavy. Vivian in particular seemed especially tired and was leaning on Mark’s shoulder for support. Violet reached out to Vivian and helped support her, giving Mark’s shoulder some blissful rest.

“Thank you, Violet,” Mark said, wiping the sweat off of his forehead.

“No problem,” Violet responded, her voice as dead as could be. At the moment, with her counter beneath 50%, Violet felt nothing. Yet strangely, some part of her felt obligated to help her roommates.

“What did you do to make Vivian so tired though?” Violet asked Roland and Mark. Vivian and Violet were significantly weaker than Mark and Roland physically, but Violet still didn’t expect Vivian to end up so tired.

“Cardio,” Roland said. Coupled with his simple answer was a simple smile, a smile that Violet returned to him.

Roland and Mark then walked up to their rooms, arguing about who would be the first to use the shower. Along the way they playfully pushed each other, nearly causing Mark to fall down the stairs.

Violet assisted Vivian up the stairs herself, allowing Vivian to lean on her for support. Violet grabbed Vivian’s arm and wrapped it over her shoulder, despite Vivian’s embarrassed protest, Violet refused to let go. Together they began their ascent up the stairs to their room.

In her right hand, Violet held Vivian’s hand. As their hands rubbed together with each step Violet could feel the texture difference between the rest of her hand and the scar which now ran through. It felt, off, Violet couldn’t find a way to describe it. But the way the skin moved upon contact and how warmth was transferred was completely different.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

When they reached the top of the stairs Violet finally allowed Vivian to go free from her grasp. Vivian slowly walked into the bathroom and shut the door. Her body was hunched over the whole way and she was still panting.

As Violet heard the shower water turn on she began to observe her hand. The skin over her scar was a dull gray color mixed with her natural paler skin tone. The longer Violet looked at it, the more she felt something gnawing inside of her. It wasn’t an emotion, Violet’s counter was still too low, but a strange urge to do something, what that thing was Violet didn’t know. It was just there, biting at her heart and drilling into her head, a deep and moving calling to do something.

‘April…’

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Violet sighed and fell back onto her bed. Allowing her gaze to drift away from her hand seemed to allow the nagging feeling to dissipate. Yet Violet was still left with a strange sense of loss, a missing piece to a puzzle, something that was just barely within the realm of noticeable.

‘Why do I feel like this?’

After a few moments of thought, Violet came to her conclusion. Her brain was triggering an emotional response when Violet focused on her scar, but her counter suppressed those emotions. Yet these emotions were intense enough to push back against the counter somewhat, similar to how Violet’s fear of her father would overpower the counter's emotional suppression. What resulted was the strange feeling Violet was experiencing. The emotion remained undefined yet ever-present.

A few minutes later, Vivian exited the bathroom, her hair tied up in a towel. Violet could feel Vivian gazing at her, but it didn’t feel like a criticizing glance. Violet lifted herself into a sitting position and began to pat the side of the bed she was sitting next to.

“I have a feeling you wanted to ask me about something,” Violet said.

Vivian nodded, giving a soft smile, and sat down where Violet patted with her hand. For a moment the two of them sat in a peaceful silence. The smell of Vivian’s shampoo filled the air with a slightly noticeable and pleasant fragrance, AGH used rather high-quality and expensive hair products, something which Vivian took full advantage of.

“Violet,” Vivian said, adjusting the towel on her head simultaneously, “when did you get that scar on your hand?”

“What?” Violet reacted in surprise. She hadn’t thought that Vivian would have noticed it.

“The scar on your right hand, I felt it when we were going up. I have a scar on my shoulder so I know what the skin feels like.” Vivian then pulled down her shirt over her shoulder, revealing a scar a little smaller than the one on Violet’s hand. After allowing Violet a moment of observation, Vivian pulled her shirt back up and continued speaking.

“Scars only stay if you want them to stay, and you didn’t have that scar when we first met. Are you ok Violet?” Vivian asked, concern etched onto her face.

Violet turned her eyes towards her hand again, opening her palm to reveal the scar. The strange feeling began to arise in Violet once more. She sighed and sat in silence for a few more moments before responding.

“I don’t know. All of this feels insane to me, I’ve never felt like this before. I’ve never had to feel what I’m feeling right now.”

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Vivian nodded, allowing herself time to comprehend what Violet had said.

“I see,” Vivian said, “I think I can relate to that. This application I… I don’t know…”

Silence fell over the two of them again as they pondered the application process. Legally speaking, AGH was in the clear, the applicants had been warned in contracts about the possibility of trauma and extreme physical harm. Yet, not one of them could have ever expected something of such severity.

The brutality of the exam was unlike anything the applicants had ever seen, near death lurked around every corner, waiting for victims. The application didn’t just test applicants, it broke them, putting them in a situation where their willpower either collapsed or pulled through shattered. Regardless of whether or not an applicant completed the application, they were all victims of it, and the effects of it would be felt for long after the application ended.

Violet continued to look at her open palm. Slowly she could feel her counter being forced to move against its will and the nagging feeling grew more and more. There was no better representation, Violet thought, of the type of trauma that would come from this application. A nagging feeling that would never sleep, one that would never fade away. It was this feeling that AGH used to produce heroes, this feeling made the greatest heroes in the world.

‘I know this feeling…’

Violet was certain she knew the feeling that would arise if she looked at her hand with over 50%. She had felt it during the final obstacle of the second selection. She had felt it even more during the third obstacle. She could still feel the rain pouring down, her nails digging into her hand, the shockwaves from Mark’s fight. She could hear the running water from the parking garage and Vivian’s weeping, overlapping into a disturbing requiem of sorrow. She knew how she felt then, she knew she would feel it now.

“shit.”

Violet turned to find Vivian wiping some tears from her face. She sniffled as her nose turned runny. She began to cry, but she didn’t sob. A silent, restrained crying began to fill the room.

Inside of herself, Violet felt something begin to stir. With each teardrop from Vivian, Violet felt the empty feeling inside of her grow larger and larger. The drive to do something, anything, became a raging fire in Violet. In response, Violet wrapped her arms around Vivian and squeezed her closely.

Violet could feel the shuddering breaths, the tears dripping along her shirt. She could feel Vivian’s shaking body, moving with every breath, forcing Violet to tighten her grip. She wouldn’t let go, Violet wouldn’t let go, with every shudder she squeezed harder. With every cry out Violet allowed the empty desire for action to grow until it became an all-encompassing void in her.

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Violet squeezed tighter in surprise. Her counter had never risen at such a rate before unless she had received severe injuries.

‘What’s happening?’

Vivian began to cry harder now, releasing the built-up stress and held-back emotions from the previous days of the application. In response, Violet felt the void in her expand even more, beyond what she believed could have been possible. From the depths of her heart, Violet felt an emotion begin to show itself. Piercing through the counter which had operated with such perfection for so many years.

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‘I think I understand.’

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‘I think I know what it’s like.’

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‘To have someone you care for.’

Violet was overcome with emotion and she began to cry with Vivian. The two of them held each other closely as they were enveloped in fear, anxiety, regret, rage, and sorrow. Violet’s vision blurred as her eyes became a wellspring of neverending tears.

Vivian and Violet had distanced themselves from the second selection for as long as they could, distracting themselves with sparring matches and more. But something of such magnitude, something of such impactful trauma could not be held back for long.

All at once their emotions arose to the surface and the two girls embraced each other as though the either were a shield to block the horrendous feelings which now plagued them. They took delight in the small comfort provided by each other's warmth, it was a small comfort, but to them, there was nothing more valuable in the world.

It had been horrible. The second selection had been horrible beyond what either of them could have imagined. The pain they felt remained fresh in their minds. The nearly dead applicant, his burning body screaming in fear as death approached him. April, slowly losing the battle for life, was used cruelly as a test tool. The examiners, broke them down, pushing them further and further due to a grudge against a different examiner until Mark snapped.

And yet they knew. Both of them knew that this would only be a portion of what a hero could experience. An S-Rank would see this as nothing more than a fraction of what they had lost, of what they had experienced. An S-Rank would have seen true catastrophe, thousands dead in seconds, possibly because of their own hands, yet that was the best they could do. What Violet and Vivian had experienced here was nothing, nothing at all. The applicants had walked into the world of heroes naive and optimistic, but that was no longer the case.

…

Eventually, the two stopped crying. Violet wiped the tears from her face. She could feel exhaustion overwhelm her as the crying had sapped her of strength.

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Sniffling, Violet went into the bathroom and used the mirror to clean her face up. Her eyes and nose were red. Violet splashed water onto her face, feeling her poofy eyes begin to return to normal.

“Violet,” Vivian asked quietly.

“Yeah?” Violet responded, her voice still tinged with sadness.

“Do you still want to be a hero after all this?”

Violet nodded, “I do.” She didn’t even hesitate in her response to Vivian.

“Why?”

“Because after all that we’ve experienced, we’re still here. There’s nobody more prepared than us to become heroes. I don’t think anyone else would want to take the step forward if they knew what they were in for, so it has to be us.”

‘We have to do it,’ Violet said inwardly. ‘Or nobody else will.’

End of Chapter 27