#bookofdarkness

Decimator of Light: Book of Darkness Chapter 6: His New Title

             “Please, enter!” the Sovereign’s voice chimed from inside the room, and Frio gently pushed Cin past the steel door. The teen looked back to her, easily preferring her over the old man, but she merely gave an enthusiastic wave and shut the door with a heavy slam. Cin heard her footsteps in the hallway, moving further and further away, and with every step, he could feel more dread welling up in his stomach. When he could no longer hear her at all, Cin swallowed nervously and looked back to the brown-haired man sitting at a polished black desk in front of him and quickly realized that he was in some sort of office.

             The room wasn’t nearly as bare as the corridor had been. There were paintings and what appeared to be framed poems or lines of prose covering almost every wall. The paintings were beautiful, done in bright colors, some realistic, some the most abstract Cin had ever seen, all in differently-sized frames. Every inch of the walls were covered in some sort of framed masterpiece. Right above the Sovereign’s head was a painting of the entire Zero Squadron saluting, although Frio was missing, and instead, there was a stocky man missing his left ear, and next to that portrait, there were portraits of other Squadrons standing in formation with different numbers on their headbands. There were seven other Squadrons according to the paintings, not including the one that had had kidnapped Cin.

             The boy could only gape as he stared at the pictures, mentally debating whether they were actually paintings or simply photographs. But he could make out the changes in thickness all along the piece caused by the layering of paint and found himself even more impressed than before. His eyes just began drifting towards a poem sitting on the edge of the Sovereign’s beautifully designed desk when the man spoke again, unconsciously crumpling the paper up as he did so.

             “Please, please, Decimator, sit down! I would never expect you to have to stand before me like a common soldier!” He chuckled at this comment, but Cin didn’t see what was so funny. Nevertheless, he sat down in the elaborate chair before him, heart already racing, his throat drier than it had been the entire day. For some reason, this man gave him a horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he attempted to figure out why as the long-haired man continued to speak.

             “Now, I am sure you have countless questions for us. And your assumptions are likely correct, Decimator,” the glee with which he used that last word caused chills to run down Cin’s spine. “I am the Sovereign of Darkness, humble guide to the beings here and should-be protector of the nothingness that we are losing so rapidly. Now, I think you know we would not have Extracted you if it had not been of utmost importance. And as you likely have guessed, The Others have found out about your situation and your power, so we had no choice but to--”

             “I don’t have a single clue what you’re talking about,” Cin finally interrupted him. He couldn’t take sitting and listening to this strange speech anymore. As soon as the Sovereign had begun explaining, Cin had once again become completely lost. He spoke to Cin as though the teenager was supposed to already have a clue as to what was going on, as though this had all had been some great plan finally coming into play, as though Cin had been waiting for this the entire time. He hadn’t. “Look, sir, Sovereign or whatever you are, I think you have the wrong person.”

             “I beg your pardon?” the Sovereign looked at him expectantly, as though awaiting the ending to a very silly joke. When he received no punch-line, he furrowed his brows in concern, studying Cin’s face intently. After a moment, his smile completely vanished and his eyes filled with concern. “You...You do, of course, know who you are, what you are to us, do you not, Decimator?”

             That word again. It was like some sort of title, like ‘Sovereign’ was. Cin felt a twinge of annoyance towards it and felt it best to make it clear that the strange title was not his.

             “Vincint Luna. Or just Cin. That’s my name. Not ‘Decimator’ or anything else fancy like that. Look, I think you accidentally grabbed the wrong guy.”

             The Sovereign stared at Cin with a blank expression, as though unable to completely understand what he had just been told. Finally, sudden understanding flashed across his face, and the Sovereign covered his mouth to hide his gasp of horror and disappointment.

             “Oh...Oh, dear...Oh, goodness...” he frowned, shaking his head. “It must be...It seems as though you were considerably more locked off than we first thought. That we could have possibly imagined. You must be so confused...”

             “Locked off?” Cin furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. “Hey, I’m not locked off from anything, I’m not deprived of anything, I’m not abused in any way! Seriously, I think you just have the wrong guy--”

             “Oh, my dear boy. A thousand apologies -- but that is impossible,” the old man said, shaking his head. He looked to Cin, his dark eyes filling with pity. “I am afraid...Vincint Luna...that it is you who has the wrong idea -- concerning who you truly are.”

             Cin stared for a minute, trying to register what he’d just been told.

             Not know who he was? That was a good one. He knew himself -- his physical limits, his thought patterns, his strengths, his weaknesses, his secrets -- better than anyone. He knew his family, he knew his friends, and only he knew his plans for the future and his actions in the past. He was Vincint Luna, the lazy, underachieving, high school senior painter who was quickly starting to hate the guy in front of him. No one could change that or even debate otherwise.

             “What the heck, man?” Cin couldn’t suppress an awkward laugh due to the sheer silliness of the situation. A lot of crazy things had happened that day, but that couldn’t suddenly, magically change who he was, no matter what the man seemed to think. “You’re kidding, right?”

             The Sovereign’s frown deepened, and he leaned forward, clasping his hands together so tightly they turned white. He must have been trying to hide his panic and was doing a decent job keeping his tone steady and gentle as possible.

             “Vincint...Goodness, how can I even begin?” The Sovereign took a deep breath to steady himself, mentally searching for the right words before speaking, “Well...Have you not noticed how you are not like the others in the Gray World? How you seemed to avoid harm, had ideas appear without prompting, understood things with little systematic work to be able to do so? How the light always hurt your eyes? How your eyes are identical to all those in your dreams?”

             The last comment sent a powerful jolt through his entire body. Cin swallowed slowly, trying to shake the statement off. True, he was luckier than most, and he did have sensitive eyes. But the dream remark was wrong. Well, half-wrong. Half the people in his dreams, ones like Enatha, had pure-black eyes, yes. But the other half, the people like Alanore, had no blackness in their eyes to speak of, only pure color. But how? How had that man known anything about Cin’s dreams in the first place? The teen had stopped trying to tell anyone about them when he was six. The only time he even mentioned them anymore was when someone had asked him what he was drawing, and even then, Cin had always only responded with, ‘It’s from a dream’. His conversation with Kazuko and Mark about them had been the most he’d said about his dreams in years.

             Nevertheless, Cin had never considered himself to be one of the people from his dreams. He had seen small similarities, yes, but he was a normal teenager, and there was no such thing as a pure-black eye. His eyes were brown -- just very dark brown. He wasn’t like the people in his dreams. It was impossible.

             “My eyes are brown. That’s a really common eye color,” he finally said.

             The Sovereign winced with disappointment at that answer. “No, my boy. Your eyes have no color. Your eyes are the same as every other citizen here -- your eyes are pure Darkness. Perfect nothingness. You know this. You only lie and pretend your eyes have color to be like others around you in the Gray World. But you are not like them.”

             “Why do you keep calling my home the ‘Gray World’!?” Cin snapped, glaring now, angry that he was being lectured on what he was supposed to know about himself. Who was this man to tell him what his own eye color was? His family had brown eyes; he had brown eyes as well. His were just darker.

             “It is not your home, Vincint,” the man said, his voice slightly strained with the effort of keeping calm. “It is that entire world. The dimension in which you once lived. That is what we, the Darkness, call it. The Gray World.”

             Cin stared blankly again. “My...My what? ‘Dimension’?” Cin snorted at the mere thought, unable to express a small grin. This old man was sounding crazier by the second. Part of him was in disbelief at the nonsense, but the other part was getting more and more annoyed at being lectured like he was the one who didn’t know anything.

             “You are surprised?” the Sovereign asked, seemingly surprised himself by Cin’s comment. “You cannot possibly ignore the differences between the two dimensions. How light is unneeded to see here. How the states of matter are different from the solid, liquid, gas, and plasma you would be used to. How there is a fourth dimension here, allowing us to make use of the Darkness when we so need it -- the extra level that the Gray World’s dimension lacks. They have but three dimensions. We have a fourth, here. We...are Darkness,” the Sovereign opened his arms to motion to the area around him, clearly beyond proud of this final comment.

             Suddenly, Cin couldn’t breathe, he was laughing so hard. As terrifying as the idea was that he had been kidnapped by some insane cult, the fact that they believed such nonsense was simply too funny. He continued to laugh, beginning to think that he was on some sort of show or in the middle of some very terrible joke.

             But slowly, very slowly, his laughter began to die, as the Sovereign continued to look at him with an unmoving expression, not surprised, not even disappointed in his reaction. Cin’s smile turned into a frown as, slowly, reluctantly, he began to consider what had been said to him.

It was insane. Everything that man had said was utterly insane and something only some sort of sci-fi obsessed dork could have thought up. But the problem was, he had seen utterly insane, unexplainable, borderline science-fiction things happen in the past few hours. His wounds had vanished because some hands had hovered over them. He had seen ice turn more solid than he had ever thought possible. He had been hit with splinters from trees that had exploded because a woman had pointed at them. He had seen the man now sitting before him vanish in the blink of an eye. He saw everything around him clearer than he ever had before in his life, and yet everything was in perfect darkness. He could practically feel the emotions of those around him, his senses were so heightened.              Even if this old man was crazy – how could he possibly explain everything that had happened to him? To think there was a normal, logical explanation for it...Maybe Cin was the crazy one. As much as he truly wanted it to be, this man’s ideas wasn’t nearly as impossible as Cin had first thought. That thought suddenly made Cin feel incredibly heavy -- sick, even -- for considering such a possibility.

             “If I may infer – it appears you are beginning to see the truth of this predicament,” the Sovereign said with some relief in his tone. “But, I also believe that you need much, much more explained to you. I cannot possibly imagine what could be going through your mind at this moment, but I assure you, I will do my best to inform you of this situation, and I shall be telling you only the truth.”

             Suddenly, the Sovereign was gone.

             Cin jumped as he felt a hand touch his shoulder and whirled around, heart racing. He was only slightly relieved to see that the old man was there, patting him sympathetically.

             “How...how do you do that?” Cin stammered, not trusting the man enough to think he would get the whole truth, but too desperate for answers not to listen. His heart was racing, but he still felt a slight chill from the man’s touch.

             “Oh?” The Sovereign blinked in confusion at him, suddenly appearing in his chair again. When he saw that Cin jumped a bit when that happened, he finally understood what had been asked. “Oh, dear, of course. You mean my Ability.”

             “Excuse me?” Cin didn’t see how it answered his question at all.

             “It is the term we use in the Darkness. You see, while the Gray World has three dimensions, ours has a fourth, as I have explained. Where there is Darkness – where nothingness exists, that is. No space, no time, nothing that usually exists in the “emptiness” you have in the Gray World. Our people, everyone who was birthed from nothing, can manipulate this aspect of our world. We each are Able to pull things into this Darkness, at least temporarily, and this is known as their Ability. Some very, very talented individuals can even pull something from nothingness, but let us not get ahead of ourselves for the time being. For the average being, there tend to be several different classes of Abilities, depending on what sort of matter or force they are able to pull into the darkness. For instance, I believe you recall the Zero Squadron – the individuals who Extracted you?”

             “Er, yeah,” Cin was trying to keep up with everything that was being said, but at the very least he remembered the people who kidnapped him. It was all so difficult to believe, and yet, he had no choice but to trust the man after everything that had happened. All he could do was memorize as much as he could to try and test out the information later.

             “Well, their leader, Captain Veder, can nullify the pull that gravity has upon him. He pulls that force of gravity that should be effecting him into the Darkness, temporarily. He does this by will, and thus can be weightless whenever he so wishes, and because this is his native-born Ability, a natural capability of his body, his body suffers no physical damage for it. This Ability is called Floating, and he is what we call a Floater. But this is but one Ability. Another example: the man with the impressive amount of muscle, Sterk, has the ability to remove mass from inside of him and temporarily store it in the Darkness. This allows him to run at impossible speeds and to strike quicker and to kick faster than most. He only has to carry half the mass one usually would, though he begins with the same amount of energy of someone with a heavier mass, and that excess energy goes into increased speed. Like the Captain, this effect on his own body causes him no harm, as it is what he was born to be capable of, and we call him and those with the Ability Hollowers. Then we have the woman who escorted you to me -- Frio is her name -- that sweet girl can momentarily pause the motion of all the electrons in a small area. She stores the energy needed to spin the electrons in the Darkness. Usually, this causes the atoms in the substance to form an ideal orientation and take the most powerful solid form it can. When her power fades, the electrons continue normally, as though the energy had never been removed. Unfortunately, energy cannot ever be permanently removed -- merely suppressed momentarily in nothingness. Beings that have the same Ability as Frio are called ‘Welders’. And Abilities like these are fairly common, but very vital to our Squadrons.”

             Cin blinked, unable to do anything else. Cancel gravity? Reduce mass? Stop electrons? The last one made even less sense to him because he’d almost slept through all chemistry. All he knew was that atoms had electrons and they spun, but he was pretty sure them just stopping was something that made no sense at all. It was like he was in a comic book where the impossible occurred left and right because physics just didn’t apply or maybe because the creator was too lazy to get the information right. But he could not argue. It all fit; Veder floated around like a feather, Sterk was unnaturally fast for someone his size, Frio had caused the snow to take a solid shape he had never seen before. So far, everything was consistent.

             “Now, Pila!” the Sovereign continued, his voice filled with pride. “She is very vital, and her power is very rare. She is what we call a Pauser. She is able to temporarily stop the flow within any circuit. Water, air, and most importantly – electricity. I think you can see how vital this is in the Gray World, where electricity flowing through wires helps humans attain light and mechanical energy and even conversation and facts from far away. There is a Pauser on every Squadron, and the Pauser helps on every mission to make sure that the Gray World stays peacefully unaware of our small excursions. The humans merely assume it is a power outage or that their devices have ceased to function.              “Oh, and the most recent individual you had seen. She is known as a Reverser -- just as vital as a Pauser, but so much rarer that we do not allow them to go on missions or technically become members of Squadrons. They actually remove the effects of time from a certain area, causing everything to go back into the order it had once been in. It is one of the very, very few Abilities that permanently remove something into the Darkness. If continued long enough, this Ability can cause matter to go back to when the atoms within it first formed, though I don’t believe anyone has had the sheer power to be able to do such a thing in generations. Usually, Reversers are used in the same manner as...what are they called...as doctors, in the Gray World. They bring our bodies back to their original states in cases of injury. They are some of our most respected beings in the Darkness; saying anything rude to them is not permissible.”

             The Sovereign paused just long enough for Cin to realize he was waiting for some sort of reaction. So Cin nodded awkwardly.

             “Of course, there are several other different categories for Abilities, outside of those within the Squadron. I, for one, am a Porter. I temporarily bring space into the Darkness. I use my Ability to thus travel and to reach different places without movement. This was one of the original, innate uses for Darkness, really, to travel -- but different ones came to be, and now the Ability I have is usually used to deliver messages or packages. Everyone can use the Darkness to travel to the lower dimension, to the Gray World, but only those that can instantly traverse a distance within a dimension are called Porters.”

             “O...okay,” was all Cin said, leaning back a bit against the chair, looking down at his hands, and pausing for a moment to try and let everything sink in.

             He was numb. That was the only way he could describe it. Everything he had once known, everything he had believed possible, had suddenly been flipped on its head. It was as though even his hands, things always so close to him, were now foreign.

             Another dimension? And it was possible to reach it? And he, of all people, had somehow been pulled into it? He was no longer on his home planet, he was no longer even in the same universe that he had been raised in. But what bothered him most was that he felt that this was...right. That this was all true. That this was how it things were supposed to be.

             The viscosity of the air, the lack of light, the ability to feel everything around him -- this felt right. It was like Cin’s body had been struggling and straining his entire life, and had finally returned to where it felt most natural. And he didn’t like it. He didn’t like the sudden feeling of strange, unwelcome, never-before-felt belonging. No, he didn’t get along with all people back home, yes there had been bullies of all sorts as he’d grown up. But he had a home, he had a family, he had friends that made him feel welcome. He’d never thought for a minute that in his own home, in the place where he was loved and accepted most, he somehow didn’t belong. And suddenly knowing that he had been foreign to the world that he had grown up in made him sick inside. He shouldn’t have liked this new place more than his home; he had no friends, no family, no reason to prefer this darkness over earth. But his body told him otherwise.

             The unfairness of the situation started to cause a rage to boil in his gut. If this place was where he belonged, why would he have grown up in the so-called Gray World, then? Why would he have been given a life there if it hadn’t been where he belonged? Why had this old man expected him to know all this beforehand? Did he miss some sort of memo? Was he kidnapped and left on earth? And why was this place called the Darkness? Why would he belong in a place named after the source of nightmares, malice, and all evil?

             Cin slowly lifted his face up to look directly at the Sovereign, not entirely sure what he was feeling. He knew part of it was anger. Anger at the Squadron for bringing him there, anger at the man in front of him for telling him that everything he had ever known was wrong, anger at being taken away from his friends and family. But another part was relief, which he felt due to the strange sense of belonging, relief that he wasn’t so much different from others at home by sheer coincidence, that he wasn’t simply a freak. But this relief made him feel sick, as though all the happiness he had ever known in his life was suddenly somehow tainted. More than anything, though, he was worried. Worried about what was going to happen now. Would he ever see his mother, his father, his little brother, or his best friends ever again?

             “What do you want from me?” Was the question that left Cin’s mouth.

             “Hmm,” the Sovereign folded his hands on his desk, thinking deeply on the question. After a long pause, he decided to start from the very beginning. “Well, when this dimension was created -- the cause of which is still heavily debated about to this day -- The Others were created, as well. We lived separately, and thus we lived peacefully, and no problems existed within either realm. There was no pain, no suffering, no hatred. But our worlds met, and everything you know within the Gray World was created as a result of our realms interacting.”

             The Sovereign had hatred in his voice, though Cin wasn’t entirely sure for whom that was.

             “This new, lower dimension connected with ours and the realm of The Others, and each life form on the Gray World connected to one Other and one being of Darkness. With our help, life in the Gray World grew, differentiated, and evolved, became stronger, became what it is today. To this day, The Others, the Darkness, and the Gray World are all connected to one another, and as a result, all interdependent. But with the creation of life in the Gray World, the problems began between the Darkness and The Others.

             “As it turned out, for The Others to use their disgusting powers to manipulate the Gray World to their liking, they must leech off of the Darkness. And the easiest way for them to accomplish this is to steal it directly from the beings of Darkness, the life force of our own innocent people! The Others do nothing but create, they do nothing but increase and enhance -- The Others suck in all nothingness, all potential from my people to create their so-called ‘life’. The more of this ‘life’ that is created, the more Darkness that is used up, and the more our people suffer because of it. After decades of this abuse, we now fear that there is no hope left; that soon, the Darkness will all be turned into one, large, used-up canvas, not a single space left for anything else to be added. And the worst part is that our people are utterly helpless to do anything to stop this disgusting violation of our realm.”

             The man’s hatred grew with every word until his face was red and a vein was bulging in his forehead. Cin was afraid his teeth would crack from how tightly he was clenching them.

             The story was interesting, and he felt sorry for the people, but Cin didn’t really see what any of it had to do with him specifically.

             “So I somehow ended up on Earth? And you took me back because you need more soldiers?” Cin asked after a moment. It was the only thing he could assume from that story. There was some unstoppable enemy, and so they took back one of ‘their people’ from earth? Had be just been some sort of back-up his whole life?

             “No, my dear boy, no,” the Sovereign said, a smile finally reappearing on his lips. “You, you are no mere soldier. You are no mere being of Darkness. You are what our legends have been speaking of since the first being of Darkness made contact with the first Other. It has been told that when we are at our weakest and on the Darkness is on the bring of being used up entirely, a being shall appear with the capability far greater than any other -- the power to create nothingness. The Ability to create Darkness, itself, and save our entirely realm.”

             Cin shrank away as this was said, the sick feeling in his stomach suddenly doubling. There was a hunger in the man’s voice as he spoke, a desperation that Cin didn’t want to have any part of. But the man’s dark eyes remained locked onto Cin’s face as though the teenager was the one secret weapon that could destroy his enemy in a war.

Decimator of Light: Book of Darkness Chapter 5: In the Darkness

             She sighed gently, looking at the pile of work on her desk. There was so much paperwork to do – she had to review articles, read her students’ progress, look at the new suggestions from the committee, as well as catch up on the newest published research to make sure she didn’t fall behind. Honestly, the last part was the only work involving papers she was genuinely looking forward to doing – seeing what sort of new discoveries have been made always gave her a tingle of excitement. One never knew what tiny piece of information would be the thing to cause all the other facts in one’s head to click together, and suddenly, a whole new hypothesis was born.

           She looked at the forms and other paperwork she wasn’t as excited to do and quietly pursed her lips for a moment in thought. She looked around the room and, seeing no one else there in her personal office, just as there shouldn’t have been, she quietly put her forearm down on the table and gently nudged all the paperwork over to the edge, one inch, then two, and finally enough so that the center of her desk was free. Then with her other hand, just as guiltily, she nudged her beautiful teapot over until it, instead, was sitting in the middle of her desk, and only then, did she sit down and pour herself a nice, hot cup, picking up the nearest research article with findings only discovered two days ago, as though the other paperwork was not there whatsoever.

            She smiled quietly to herself, almost like she thought herself so very clever for putting off her responsibilities, as she started to sip quietly on her tea as she read the abstract for the article. Something about it had instantly caught her eye, though she wasn’t sure what. It seemed like any other article, testing the capabilities of citizens. Over a thousand subjects, all testing the exact same parameters they always seemed to be. All the data fit with everything shown previously – all except for one area. Where the subjects suddenly felt ill, and so, they were unable to collect any viable data. A small footnote in their main figure.

            And there it was. The small piece that clicked together everything, and a new hypothesis began forming in her mind before she even finished her first cup...              Cin was sprawled face-down. He could hear something that may have been voices but couldn’t manage to open his eyes quite yet. The pleasant feelings from the dream were instantly gone and reality was only slowly coming into focus. Something felt wrong -- his entire body felt different; not heavier, not lighter, but still different, somehow. The air he was breathing in felt strange to him. It wasn’t a smell; it was the air itself. It was thicker, stickier, almost like inhaling water, but Cin had no trouble breathing it in, for some reason.

             He brushed his fingertips along whatever he was laying on. Cin had been placed on top of some kind of strange material; it shifted with every one of his movements like some sort of form-fitting gel, but it was the wrong texture. It felt like cloth, not like memory-foam, but it shifted beneath him like it was actually a sort of liquid, readjusting smoothly with every touch. It was surprisingly comfortable, almost like a cloud shaped just for his body.

             “So you stole it on our last mission? Pila, the laws.”

             “I didn’t think anyone would notice, since so much stuff was smashed anyway! And it turned out to be exactly what we needed. We couldn’t just rely on Frio; she doesn’t have the experience, but the Captain was letting her just go crazy. I mean, there are laws against doing what she did, too.”

             Cin’s head was swimming. He heard the words being said around him, but he couldn’t register any meaning to them. Where was he? Who were those people? He just wanted to sit up. But to do that, he had to pull his arms in, and the moment the he attempted to lift his elbow, pain shot up his arm like he’d stuffed it into an electrical socket. He gritted his teeth violently rather than making any sound. Where did that pain come from?

             Then Cin remembered. He had been attacked by five people. He had run his hardest but still gotten caught when he’d made the genius decision to head towards trees. Trees that one of those people chasing him could blow up. After taking some splinters to his arms, one of them had knocked him out with some kind of soaked rag. And now, he quickly realized, he was lying wherever it was they had taken him.

             He took in a deep breath as slowly as possible, doing his best to keep it steady so that the people in the room would think he was still asleep. Then, very carefully and very slowly, he cracked his eyes open, just enough to see what was going on.

             The room was pitch black. No electric lights, no moonlight, no faint glow of any sort anywhere. But nevertheless, Cin could see absolutely everything around him. No, he could see better than he ever had in his life. What disturbed him most, though, was that he wasn’t sure he was even looking with his eyes; it was more like he could feel everything around him, as though he sensed every little change in the in the air, making him impossibly conscious of those in the room -- their every breath, their every twitch, their every heartbeat -- and those subtle movements was creating the image he saw. It made him feel extremely uncomfortable, like he was breathing down their necks even though they were several yards away. He tried to focus on the inanimate objects to get past that feeling.

             Cin was on a strange, golden cot in a small room that reminded him of a doctor’s office. Tools were scattered across a polished counter, many of which looked foreign and very dangerous to him. There were several other cots in the room on either side of him, all with curtains that could have been pulled around the beds for privacy, but all were pulled back at the moment, including Cin’s. Strange, oval mirrors completely covered one wall to his left, none of which seemed to reflect what was actually going on in the room, and instead remained clear and semi-transparent, almost like the surface of a calm lake. Those seemed oddly familiar to him, but he could no longer ignore the people nearby.

             There were three people in the room with him, two sitting side-by-side on a nearby cot and the last leaning on the wall next to the exit. Cin recognized all three of them. The first one on the cot was the giant man with the deep voice who had run far too fast for his size. He was still just as large, bulky and intimidating as he had been earlier, but Cin could make out this man’s features more distinctly now than he ever had in Kazuko’s office. The man’s nose and chin were both broad, and he had very dark, thick eyebrows with a vertical scar running down through the right one. He had more scars speckled down his shoulder and arm on the same side, and Cin was willing to bet that they continued down his arms and across his chest as well, but his armor hid that from view. Despite this appearance, when the man smiled, which he did now, he seemed a lot less threatening.

             The girl beside this man, the one he had been speaking to, was not the Frio woman who had been chasing Cin so closely, but he did recognize her from the office. She was second-shortest on the team and had a round face and soft features, but she had full lips and carefully-shaped white-blonde eyebrows. Despite the lack of hair, she was still surprisingly attractive. She wore an odd keychain on her headband that Cin had not been able to clearly make out in Kazuko’s home; it was shaped like two electric eels twisted into a double-helix. At that moment, the woman was pouting and looking rather ashamed of herself, as though she had just been trying to justify something she had done wrong.

             “Yeah, but we had orders, Pila. You can’t just shrug them off like that, you’ll get disciplined again,” the large man, persisted. However, he couldn’t resist grinning as the woman crossed her arms over her chest and her face darkened from embarrassment.

             “Well, so what? This isn’t a normal mission, we can’t treat him like anyone else from the Gray World! Our Abilities work differently there, anyway, maybe it works different on humans all together. We don’t know enough about him, in the first place, to assume Abilities would work the same on him as humans. So, Sterk, I think I did the only responsible thing given the situation,” Pila, the woman, nodded to herself, clearly approving of her own justification.

             “You’re panicking,” The large man, Sterk, pointed out. “So, you really do think Captain Veder’s gonna punish you for stealing from humans?” The large man softened momentarily with concern, and Pila’s face tensed with shame and hurt.

             “I wouldn’t be surprised,” she admitted after a pause, her voice losing some of its fire. “He made me sit here on guard duty with you, right? What use does a Pauser have here? I couldn’t do anything but stare if anyone came in. I’m no use in a fight like you or Tishina.”

             At the second name mentioned, the man by the wall, the last person in the room, lifted his head, as though expecting something.

             This last figure Cin recognized right away. He was the man who had looked Cin directly in the eyes in the office. He looked just as small as Cin remembered him, at least a head shorter than Cin, but not nearly as weak as the teenager had first thought. The man was thin, but lean muscle clearly showed through the tightness of the shirt. Now, Cin could make out a tattoo on his bald head -- it was perfectly black against his dark skin, and looked almost like a fiery meteor crashing towards his right ear. He had a square jaw but a small nose, and wore small necklace with a silver symbol that looked somewhat like a water droplet. The necklace fascinated Cin for a moment, mostly because he was sure he’d seen that shape somewhere before.

             “No, nothing,” Pila quickly said, waving her hand at the man to dismiss the thought. “Sorry, Tishina.”

             The man smiled, and he turned so that he was leaning with his back against the doorway again. Almost instantly, his eyes bore an unreadable expression in a half-closed, almost bored state, and he was smiling at nothing in particular. He seemed to be captivated by the blank wall in front of him, like he was having a pleasant conversation with it. Cin almost wanted to turn his head and follow that gaze to find out what was so interesting, but managed to resist the urge. For just a moment, Cin could have sworn that the eyes of the man in the doorway, Tishina, had turned flicked in his direction, but he convinced himself he’d imagined it.

             “So what if you can’t fight?” Sterk asked, his attention going back to Pila. “Can you imagine those Saturated hospital workers had managed to drive after him? If he’d managed to call the police? You know they Saturated the 911 dispatchers, too. You were vital to this all working out.”

             “I’m only vital for the beginning!” Pila cried, obviously louder since she had intended, because she gasped and put a hand over her lips, quickly turning her head in Cin’s direction. Cin kept his eyes closed, refusing to move, and the girl relaxed enough to look infuriated again. But now she whispered. “Once the power is out, once the phones are unusable, what good am I? I’m restricted from using my Ability on anything organic-”

             “Because it would destroy anything organic. You know that, you’ve seen the effects. They show everyone at the Academy-”

             “So does Frio’s! But she gets to use it on ANY inorganic matter, and today, it was suddenly okay to risk-”

             Both suddenly went silent, and Cin knew why. Someone was approaching. Sterk and Pila got to their feet, but Tishina remained leaning against the wall as their Captain entered, followed by the tall woman who had almost killed him, Frio, and someone Cin did not recognize.

             Frio walked over and stood beside her two teammates. She had large, worried eyes, but a very kind face. She was very slender and tall, at least three inch taller than the Captain and second only to Sterk, and like him, had many scars on what little visible skin she had. The deepest scar was a cross-shaped mark on the left side of her forehead that looked particularly painful. Now that she wasn’t chasing him down like a turkey on Thanksgiving, she seemed a lot less unpleasant.

              Captain Veder looked exactly the same as Cin remembered him -- two piercings in his left eyebrow, a not too skinny, not too muscular physique, and a stern expression with an air of deep-seeded duty about him. His hands were firmly locked behind his back as he motioned for the man beside him to step into the room, causing all four of his soldiers to lower their bald heads down with respect.

             The man that entered was particularly pale, especially when compared to the other people in the room, but then again, he didn’t look like he did any sort of work that involved blending in with the shadows. He wore a long robe with an intricate beaded design running down his arms. A long sash wrapped several time around his mid-section and was encrusted with dark jewels and gems. Beneath the robe, some metal-encrusted boots showed themselves along with a pair of pants that had silver embroidery all along the edges. He wore a crown on his head, made out of the same silver metal as the head bands the soldiers were wearing, with just as intricate a design in the metalwork. This man’s hair was long and rich brown, even though Cin would have expected it to be pure white at his age, and his hair was neatly tied back into a braid. His matching, braided beard reached down to his sash in the front. His face was warm, wrinkled from so many years of being bent in smiles, but as his black eyes fell onto Cin, the boy felt chills run down his entire body. The smile on his face didn’t quite reach those eyes.

             “So, I see you have retrieved him, then!” the man said with an impressed chuckle. His voice was a low, calming rumble, and the approval in his tone caused four of the soldiers in the room to smile. Tishina, however, tensed his eyebrows slightly, but made sure to keep the same air-headed smile plastered on his face that he’d had on the entire time.

“Frio and Sterk did most of the work, my Sovereign,” Veder said, his voice brimming with pride as he motioned to his two tallest soldiers. “And we managed to keep him relatively unharmed with the preparations done by our Pauser, Pila.”

             Pila’s eyes widened with shock, and her face burned as the old man turned to smile at her.

             “Your Captain has told me of your ingenious idea to use a Gray chemical to subdue your target. I am very impressed. Harming him any more than necessary would likely have ended badly for his trust in us. Your ability to think ahead is truly a value to your Squadron.”

             “Th-thank you, Sovereign-!” She stuttered out before giving a deep bow. Pila’s eyes were still wide and utterly bewildered by the reaction; she clearly hadn’t been expecting this. Her other teammates beamed, glad that she had been acknowledged and not punished.

             “Now, I understand that he did still have some amount of damage done onto him, yes?” The pale man turned, this time, towards Tishina, who was suddenly standing upright with both hands respectfully behind his back. He was smiling, but his eyes were tightly closed. With the smile, it seemed like his eyes were closed in pleasure, but Cin was sure that wasn’t the case.

“Yes, our Sovereign,” Tishina answered respectfully. His voice was raspy, like he wasn’t used to speaking often. “Upon inspection, our minor attacks have left abrasions and one particularly deep laceration to his right forearm, though more damage had occurred prior to our interference. With the connection broken for a day, The Others managed to manipulate the environment and Saturate enough humans to cause a deep wound to the trapezius muscle above the left scapula, as well as many contusions upon the forearms and abdomen. No nerve damage seems to have been sustained.”

             “A Reverser has already been called, sir,” Captain Veder assured the slightly-worried Sovereign, causing the smile to return to the old man’s face. “And all balance has been restored to the Gray World; the humans will have all the needed information given to them. A Seed has already been planted into those involved in the aftermath of the Extraction, and all the humans’ Darknesses are making sure to continue planting them as long as necessary.”

“I must say, I am quite impressed!” the Sovereign laughed heartily. “But I act as though I could have expected less from my Zero Squadron. You are all nothing short of heroes, I hope you understand. And your heroic efforts will be remembered for as long as Darkness remains.”

             The Squadron smiled, puffing their chests out with pride. Tishina did this as well, though almost reluctantly, and only when the Sovereign’s head turned in his direction.

             “Now, once the Reverser’s work has been completed, I must ask one of you to bring him to speak with me right away. There is much that he must be informed of: the current state of affairs, the dire need our people have, what The Others have been doing to us,” he practically spat out the phrase ‘The Others’, like he absolutely loathed those words. But then quickly got back to his cheerful tone again, asking, “Would it not be too much of a bother for someone here to escort him?”

             “I-I will!” Frio instantly volunteered. Her eyes darted towards her Captain the moment the words left her lips, full of guilt, and Cin realized she probably needed his permission to be able to volunteer for something like that. Tishina had opened his mouth as well, but closed it with a slight frown when he realized that he had not been quick enough.

“I shall be awaiting you both, then,” the Sovereign said with a small nod of gratitude, not seeing any issues with her enthusiast. “Please, make sure that the Decimator feels welcome; I do not wish for him to think we are his enemies, especially after how we were forced to bring him. Now, Captain, I think it would be best if you took the rest of your Squadron out to celebrate. I dare say, not only do they deserve it, and the rest of the Darkness will wish to express their gratitude, as well.”

             “Of course, our Sovereign,” Veder said with a final deep bow. “I completely agree!”

              The moment he said this, the Sovereign was gone. No flash, no twist, no puff of smoke, nothing. He was simply gone before the Captain had even risen his head back up from the bow. And Cin was the only one who found this out of the ordinary.

             “You heard our Sovereign!” Veder said looking to his soldiers, his chest swelling like he could hardly contain his pride. “We will go celebrate! Frio, after you are done with your duty, I look forward to seeing you join us.”

             “Y-yes, of course,” Frio stuttered and bowed, doing so mostly to hide the small, reddish tint beginning to take over her face. She had problems looking Captain Veder in the eye, but the Captain took no notice.

The squadron left, all laughing and excitedly talking to each other about what the Sovereign had said. The last one to exit was Tishina, his eyes still closed. At the doorway, he stopped and turned back to look at Cin. His eyes opened, and he gave Cin a look brimming with pity. It was less than reassuring, and Cin began feeling fear well up in his gut once again as Tishina turned away and left the room, leaving Cin alone with Frio -- the woman who had caused most of his wounds. Somehow, he forced his breath to remain steady to keep up his sleeping act.

             What the heck was going on? So many odd terms had been used, so much weird and official-sounding language. A squadron? He had to be taken in by, what was apparently, the best squadron? Away from the “Gray World”? His world was considerably less gray than the one he was currently in, why would it be Gray? And who were “The Others”? How had they caused the waitress to trip or the truck to just miss him? And what was with that last name? “The Decimator”. Something about it made Cin’s stomach twist uncomfortably, the way that name had been uttered, with an odd sort of hungry longing behind it. If that was what Cin was being called, he didn’t like it.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and jerked violently. Cin instantly regretted that action because now Frio definitely knew that he was awake.

             “Aa-a thousand pa-pardons, Decimator!” Frio said, pulling her hand back so that it was behind her back. Her face was full of guilt and panic. “I-I know my actions have been inexcusable, but you d-did not give us an opportunity t-to explain! Had you n-not ran, we would not have resorted to what we h-had done, th-though I know that does not excuse what I had d-done, and I apologize so d-deeply for it. W-we had planned to h-have a discussion w-with you, bu-but once you l-left, the chances of you being o-overtaken by a S-saturated human rose considerably, s-so we had to retrieve you as qu-quickly as possible. But I apologize f-for my part, I tr-truly do,” She shut her eyes tightly and bowed her head deeply in apology. “But pl-please -- the Reverser is here. P-please accept the treatment, I deeply im-implore you.”

Cin stared at her like she grew a second head. He had not expected an apology, especially not such a heart-felt one. Frio was practically crying with shame.

             “I...Er...yeah, sure,” Cin suddenly stuttered out, continuing to stare at her as though she was somehow mentally unstable, but she bowed and let out a deep breath of relief. After she straightened back up, Frio hurriedly left the room before Cin could remember how to formulate questions with his mouth. Frio returned only a moment later with another person following behind her.

             As soon as Cin caught sight of this person, his stomach leaped in excitement, and he had no idea why. For a second, it was as though Cin’s mind was convinced that he knew this person very well, but as he tried to find memories of her, he realized he’d never seen her before in his life. The emotions confused him into silence, and he was stuck looking her over again and again, as though hoping for something to spark a memory that he logically knew wasn’t there.

             The person tailing behind Frio had no case filled with medical supplies, no signs of anything for sanitation, nothing that suggested that this person was any sort of physician or nurse or first responder. This person was young, somewhere around Cin’s age. She was small, almost the same size as Tishina, maybe even a little shorter, with olive skin. Her hair was dark violet, shoulder long, with some of it up in two, short, spiky ponytails on either side of her head. What she wore was nothing like a doctor’s uniform; it was a very long black dress with sleeves that reached to her wrists, a high collar, and a sash that tied once around her hips, twice up her stomach, and then swirled down her arms until it connected to black rings on the middle fingers of either hand. She had a full face, a small nose, and large eyes, giving her the appearance of someone relatively harmless, but not someone authoritative enough to be any sort of medical professional. The only things that made her seem special compared to the squadron members were the six earrings she wore in her right ear that were connected together by a chain. A small spherical shape hung down at the end, like a sort of strange ear-keychain.

             Though Cin was a little dismayed that this person was supposed to do something to his wounds, he found himself relaxing slightly when he saw that the same odd necklace that Tishina wore was also around this girl’s neck. It had that same strangely-familiar, tear-like shape.

             “Welder Frio Zero, please, may I ask for some privacy?” the girl asked the squadron member politely but firmly. It was clearly more of a command than genuine request.

             “Hm? Oh, yes, of course!” Frio said, giving a bow to the girl who must have been ten years younger than her. She then left the room to stand at the doorway, keeping vigilant watch on the empty corridor with her arms behind her back.

             Cin opened his mouth to say something, but the girl didn’t seem very interested. Her eyes danced across his forehead, his arms, obviously making a mental list of all his wounds while somehow managing to also avoid all eye contact. The way she managed to ignore him while eyeing him closely made Cin instinctively close his mouth, suddenly unsure if it was acceptable to speak with her. She made him feel like an annoying object.

             “May I request that you remove your clothing?”

             “W-what?” Cin stuttered out, shocked not only by her boldness, but the authoritative tone she took. She wasn’t wearing gloves, she wasn’t even going over to get any medical supplies. She just stared at his wounds as though asking him to strip was perfectly acceptable.

             “Please, the top layers of upper and lower apparel at the very least. Whatever is under may remain,” she elaborated, her expression unnaturally focused on his scratches.

             For a second, Cin wanted to argue. But as he felt the pain in his forehead when he tried to lower his eyebrows in disapproval, he thought maybe it was best to at least try whatever it was this ‘Reverser’ could do for his wounds. So quietly, utterly embarrassed, he removed his shorts and shirt and then sat on the cot in front of this girl he’d never met before, wearing nothing but his boxers.

             The girl calmly reached forward and began to peel the bandages off his shoulder without hesitation. It was an unpleasant feeling -- Cin had never needed so much as a Band-Aid, so this was new to him. The blood had turned dry and crusty, and it had caked over in a translucent layer of yellow-white pus and medicine that the paramedics had applied. The girl removed the bandages quickly, not caring that it tried to stick to Cin’s skin, that she had to yank to get it off, or how Cin flinched while she did so. But the way she did it very methodically and without any hesitation helped ease Cin’s worries about her experience, though only slightly.

             He felt the fresh air hit the wound on his shoulder blade, and turned his head to look at it. It didn’t look better at all, deeper than he’d imagined it. Cin pushed back the urge to touch it, with how it was already throbbing without the bandages and the salve that this Reverser used said bandages to wipe off, and instead turned away, trying to focus on what the girl would do about it.

             The Reverser reached over and formed a triangle with her fingers and thumb, holding it over the mostly-scarred flesh, as though trying to figure out at what angle to approach a painting from. Cin was about to laugh out loud, until he felt the oddest sensation he had ever felt in his life.

             He could feel everything in his shoulder suddenly turning numb, and then slowly, ever so slowly, moving. He could feel the salve the paramedics had applied slipping out of his blood stream, see them forming the original blob that they had squeezed from a tube before slipping away from his skin. As soon as the goop was outside the Reverser’s hand-triangle, the salve slipped away, plopping quietly to the ground. Next followed by the salty crumbs that had caused him so much pain, which had been on the knife when it had penetrated his skin. As they left his blood stream, and then dropped to the ground like the salve, Cin could feel his skin pinching closed. First the muscle, the inner layer near his shoulder blade, and then the layer closer to the skin, and finally, his skin itself, pinching together. His wound closed perfectly, no scar, no anything.

            Cin could only stare in shock, knowing that his wound was no longer there. He wanted to flood the girl with questions. He even opened his mouth to do so, but no words were coming out, and all he ended up doing was gaping like an idiot at his own shoulder. The Reverser ignored his expression and moved her arms down his body, using the same hand formation to force splinter after splinter out from his skin. One at a time, the small pieces of wood simply fell to the floor, forgotten, as the holes they exited from closed right up. He felt the blood in his bruises pump normally again, as though he had never thrown himself over his own car, and he felt the last of his scratches erase themselves. Within ten minutes, he was just as good as he had been two days ago, if not better.

            Cin continued to gape in disbelief, not sure what to do or what to say. His eyes moved between the vanished wounds and this girl’s face, and he closed and opened his mouth several times, but never actually managed to form words. The girl didn’t seem to even notice. As soon as she finished, the Reverser turned to leave without giving Cin so much as a second glance.

             “I am done,” the Reverser said in a monotone to Frio. “I suggest you bring him to the Sovereign, now.”

             “Yes,” Frio said turned back towards the room, bowing deeply in thanks to the girl. “Thank you, Reverser Rakastaa!”

             “It is my duty,” she responded, walking off down the hall and out of sight. Cin watched her figure vanish still with utterly no idea of what had just happened or how.

             “Decimator!” Frio said, turning back to Cin who turned merely turned weakly to stare at her instead. But something about her excited expression snapped Cin out of it, and quickly reminded him that he was still in his boxers.

             He snapped his mouth closed and instantly began pulling his shorts back on, turning to his side to try and hide as much as himself as possible. He blushed furiously, yanking his shirt over his head, all while the woman didn’t seem to notice his embarrassment nor mind him being momentarily shirtless. “I understand that this is r-rude because you were only just R-reversed, but I must request you come with me. The S-sovereign awaits!”

             “W-wait, hold up-” Before Cin could properly argue, his wrist was grabbed and he was being pulled across a long, dark corridor. Frio was surprisingly strong; all he could do was stumble awkwardly after her, trying to adjust his shirt to properly cover his stomach with his free hand.

             The walls of the corridor were bare, save for a few doors, all of which were closed and seemingly led to a different type of room every time. Or at least, Cin guessed so from the different markings on every one. The entire place looked very official: under a different, abstract image on each door, there were symbols in an unreadable language, followed by recognizable numbers. It seemed to be in some sort of office or embassy, though one with no historical facts or paintings to cover the walls.

             Cin’s mind continued to race, but gave him nothing but unanswerable questions. He was still trying to recover from watching splinters magically moving out of his skin. Frio did not hold onto his wrist very tightly, but at the same time, not loosely enough for him to be able to break away without problems. She was excited, obviously looking forward to celebrating with her team. And as much as Cin wanted to run away, he simply couldn’t bring himself to ruin her good mood, especially when he had nowhere to run to. He could feel that, despite the attacks, the woman meant him no harm. And after watching what must have been magic done to his body, Cin could use a nice, long talk with someone who could answer at least a fraction of his questions.

             After about a minute of walking, a giant, steel door came into view, signaling the end of the corridor. It had an intricate border around it, the most artistic thing Cin had seen the entire time, and only sign of anything being in any way special within the building.

Decimator of Light: Book of Darkness Chapter 1: The Luck Fades Away

             Time seemed to have come to a screeching halt as the students saw a sudden look of realization dawn on their teacher’s face. They held their breath, all eyes covertly darting toward the figure napping at his desk. The teacher, who was normally oblivious to this well-known fact, had finally noticed that the student was dead asleep, rather than simply paying attention with his head resting on his arms. The sunglasses had hidden his closed eyes for a good half-hour, but the half-snore-half-whimper he had given off a moment ago had finally given him away.

             “Luna,” the professor said in an irritated tone.

             “Nngh.” The teenager’s only response, as he turned away from his teacher’s voice, was to try and continue napping.

             “Mr. Luna!” he repeated, this time with less patience.

“Susurry...” was his sleeping response.

             “Mr. Luna, wake up this instant!” the teacher finally shouted.

             The student’s head finally shot up and he slammed his hands on the table for emphasis. “I-I’m awake! I love Chemistry!” he declared. Half the students in the room quickly cupped their hands over their mouths to stifle their laughter.

             “That’s very nice,” growled the teacher, holding his pointer so tightly that his knuckles began turning white, “but you’ve fallen asleep in my Economics class!”

             “Oh,” the student said, pushing his sunglasses back up the brim of his nose. “Sorry.”

             After some unpleasantly loud shouting, the class was let out, and Vincint Luna left the room, grumbling and squinting harshly. His teacher had confiscated his sunglasses as punishment for falling asleep, and without them, the teen’s unnaturally dark eyes had trouble allowing him to see. Otherwise, he had been released with nothing but a mere (albeit very loud) warning. Luckily, the teacher had never caught him sleeping in his class before -- which was amazing, considering that Cin did so almost every day. But honestly, being caught wasn’t bothering him nearly as much as the dream. It had left him with a real sense of dread he was having difficulty shrugging off this time.

             “Hey...Cin!” called a tall, pale teenaged boy, snapping Cin out of his train of thought. The boy quickly jogged over to his squinting friend, a smile plastered to his thin face. “I just heard what happened. I can’t believe someone finally caught you! You sleep through basically every class, don’t you?”

             “Yeah, I know,” Cin chuckled lightly, scratching the back of his head. It really was a bit on the odd side; no teacher had ever noticed his constant naps, especially since he tended to receive relatively high grades. Not the highest, but high enough for the teachers to assume that he paid attention most of the time. Truth was, he was just very good with multiple choice exams, and he made a point to try and pick teachers who heavily relied on that testing format.

             “Luck finally failing you, Luna?” came another voice, followed by the appearance of a short girl with a long, black braid. She was wearing her usual baggy outfit, as in her opinion, the extra 10 or so pounds her short frame was carrying was an unacceptable offense that had to be hidden at all cost.

             Cin only chuckled a bit at her comment as his blonde friend took the opportunity to gently and affectionately pat the girl on the head.

             “Aw, c’mon, Kazuko!” He ruffled her hair, causing one of the many pins she used to keep her bangs out of her eyes to fall to the ground. “Don’t be jealous just ‘cause he doesn’t snore like a buzz-saw. You should get that checked out, by the way.”

             “Hey, Mark?” she chirped in a very sweet, excited tone, looking up at the taller teenager with her dark eyes opened wide. “Go to hell,” she finished, dropping the sweet act as she bent down to pick up her hairpin and then clean it against Mark’s shirt.

             “Isn’t she adorable?” Mark sighed lovingly, completely ignoring the fact that Kazuko was using his shirt as a napkin, and causing Cin to snort with laughter. Mark said things like that often, and Kazuko simply refused to acknowledge that the poor boy meant every word of it.

             “Jerk,” Kazuko muttered as she fixed her bangs again. Then with a sigh, she looked over at Cin, her expression fading from agitated to mildly concerned. “It’s kind of weird, though, isn’t it?”

             “Hm? Being caught?” Cin asked, lifting an eyebrow in her general direction, still squinting due to the light. “I mean, it was only a matter of time, right?”

             “Well, logically, yeah,” Mark snickered, stopping suddenly and yanking his friend back before he could take an extra step. They had already reached Cin’s locker, but the blinded teen had attempted to keep walking. “But you’re insanely lucky! Every time a teacher’s even come close to noticing you were asleep, you’d always wake up, or he’d suddenly realize that he forgot to write something on the board, or he’d be called to the principal’s office, or he’d trip and end up having to go to the hospital, or something.”

             “I don’t think it’s been that dramatic,” Cin pointed out. “Besides, I can’t always be lucky, though, right?” he chuckled before proceeding to struggle with his lock combination. He knew the numbers by heart, having had that same lock since middle school, but he simply couldn’t make out a single number on it without his sunglasses.

             “Oh, for the love of-!” Kazuko pushed Cin away and opened his lock with three quick flicks of her wrist.

             “You know my combo?” Cin asked, only a little surprised. He was doing his best to ignore the fact that her shove had sent him tumbling into a locker beside him, sending waves of discomfort up his spine. He usually wasn’t one that stumbled so easily. Weird.

             “Of course I know your combo; my eyes are AT your lock’s level. I know the combos for at least a third of the locks in this damn school! Now either pull out a pair of sunglasses, or a dog and cane.”

             “Yes, ma’am,” Cin obeyed, pulling out a pair from a corner in his locker. He always had an extra pair in there, as well as a pile in his room at home and three pairs in his car’s glove compartment. He wasn’t particularly fond of sunlight, and he knew where he could buy perfectly usable sunglasses for only a dollar each.

             “Do you know my combo, too?” Mark asked their friend, only to have her snort loudly.

             “Why would I need yours? In case I want some crappy poem or something?” She rolled her eyes.

             “They’re there for you, y’know,” he continued smiling, though he sounded slightly hurt. “Almost all of them are about you.”

             Kazuko merely snorted again, causing Mark’s smile to fade for a second. With a frown, Cin shot Mark an apologetic look before pushing the protective lenses up to his eyes. Mark nodded in acknowledgment and then turned away and rubbed his arm awkwardly, doing his best not to show Kazuko how hurt he really was.

             “But, anyway, like I was saying,” Kazuko suddenly began, completely unaware of the moment the boys had just shared above her head, “it’s a little weird, isn’t it? I mean, you’ve always gotten away with everything. You would’ve died a million times by now if it hadn’t been for your weird, magical ability to dodge trouble.”

             “I wouldn’t say a million...”

             “She’s kind of right, though,” Mark pointed out. “Just last week? When you fell asleep in your car? Waking up right before a van showed up in front of you? You must have some awesome guardian angel-”

             “-Or some sadistic demon following you,” Kazuko interjected. “I mean, seriously, Luna -- you fall asleep at the worst times, you end up in terrible neighborhoods, buildings you were just walking around in set on fire-”

             “Once!” Cin cried in his own defense. He was sick of people bringing that up. “That happened once! How was I supposed to know that that place had a gas leak?”

             “Yeah, how were you?” Mark smirked in amusement, enjoying how bothered his friend was. “You just happened to take the kid outside to play, and happened to make that restaurant owner think you were kidnapping him. And then you happened to cause a scene that got everyone outside and saved their lives!”

             “Yeah. Weird, I guess...” Cin muttered, pulling his keys out of his pocket before closing his locker and turning towards the exit. Something about the incident had always sat oddly with him, but he didn’t like thinking about it. For some reason, he wanted to think about it even less right now, with the dream lingering in the back of his mind. “So, who am I giving a ride to today?”

             “Do you even LISTEN to yourself!?” Kazuko snapped. “Weird stuff happens to you!”

             “Both of us, please,” Mark answered Cin’s question, ignoring Kazuko’s words, “I don’t have practice today, and I don’t really wanna take the bus.”

             “You’re just gonna let him get away with that?!” Kazuko stared skeptically at the blonde.

             “What’s that? Do I hear a short-stack saying she doesn’t want a ride home?” Cin asked the air around him, cupping a hand over his ear. Kazuko growled darkly, but turned red and dropped the subject. She despised public transportation.  

             With that, the three friends walked outside into the snow, Mark not so much as shivering despite wearing only a sleeveless shirt. The school grounds were motionless, aside from a couple of students walking to their after-school programs; not many students had their own cars in the area, and most others had already left to their bus stops.

Usually, it was only Cin driving Kazuko home, but today, the three had the rare opportunity to head home, all three of them. The track coach had suddenly gotten ill enough to end up in the hospital, although all Mark had heard was that he had no practice, and thus looked forward to going home and helping his mother take care of his seven siblings.

             “God, I hate your car,” Kazuko sighed as the black machine came into view. She said that every single day, so neither boy did more than snicker as she opened the door, which responded with a loud creak, and climbed into the back, quickly followed by Mark. Cin climbed into the driver’s seat after wiping some of the frost off his windows with his sleeve, put his seat belt on, shoved the key into the ignition, and pulled out of his parking space.

             “So,” Cin murmured, tapping his steering wheel lightly. The silence was rather awkward, mostly because Mark was staring at the girl next to him like a lovesick puppy, rather than telling one of his usual stories. This seemed to snap the blonde out of his stupor, and he quickly searched his mind for something to properly break the silence with.

             “I got nothing,” Mark finally said, leaning back slightly. “Only interesting thing that happened recently is you getting caught sleep-”

             “I got accepted to MIT,” Kazuko blurted out.

             Mark almost choked on his own spit, and Cin had to keep himself from suddenly slamming on the breaks. The shocked silence made Kazuko’s face burn awkwardly.

             “You...You what?” Cin found his voice first.

             “I got the letter today. I applied for early action, and I got in,” Kazuko explained, looking out the window with a forced nonchalant expression.

             “Whoah!” Cin laughed, his reaction quickly converting to happiness. “Congrats! You always wanted to go there, right? I mean, I knew you had good grades and everything, but with early action, too? Wow.”

             “Mm,” Kazuko grunted, apparently fascinated by something passing by her window. There was an odd silence, and Cin quickly stole a glance at his rear-view mirror to see Mark’s face losing what little color it once had.

             “That... that’s great,” the blonde finally managed to say, forcing his words past a lump in his throat. “You... really deserve it. You’ve tried so hard, I mean... and they have the best engineering programs there, right?”

             “That’s all you have to say?” Kazuko asked, her voice slightly colder than the inside of the car. “That it’s ‘great’?”

             Mark swallowed again, and with a quick breath, forced a large smile onto his face.

             “Sorry, sorry! It’s... it’s amazing! You’re going to do so great there. Not like anyone can be SURPRISED or anything, I mean, you’ve been in those robot battles things, you’ve never gotten anything lower than an A on anything, your test scores are great, and you probably did awesome with that interview and everything!” He looked at the roof of the car, shaking his head slowly. “Oh, man, Massachusetts...”

             As he laughed in disbelief at the idea, Cin noticed Kazuko’s expression drop.

             “Yeah. Massachusetts...” she muttered to herself.

             “And the best part?” Mark leaned towards her with a smirk, as though he was telling her a secret. “There’s no way I can get in! You did it! You finally escaped me! You always said you’d sell an arm just to get at least a state away from me, and you did it,” He laughed at the thought, while Kazuko stayed perfectly silent.

             “We’re here,” Cin cut in, slowing to a stop. They were in front of a small house with a large yard littered with toys -- toys Mark’s siblings never bothered to pick up, and that his mother was too tired to pick up. Cin turned off the engine and opened the door, taking his friend’s slightly panicked expression to mean that he’d want to talk to him before entering his home.

             “Well, see you, Kazuko!” the blonde said, flashing a final smile towards the back of the girl’s head before climbing out of the car. His happy mask fell the moment he was out of her line of sight.

             “Thanks,” Mark muttered quietly to Cin. His green eyes peeked over to the car one more time, only to see the uncaring back of Kazuko’s head. He sighed, his eyes turning hopelessly to his feet, instead.

             “You can get in,” Cin blurted out instinctively, placing a hand on his taller friend’s shoulder. “You still have the interview-”

             “Cin, I’m a guy with low test scores and nothing too impressive extra-curricular-wise-”

             “You’re the star of the track team! MIT has track -- probably! Everyone has track! It has to be enough. I mean, you have a huge family to help take care of! There’s no way anyone could hold that against you-”

             “It’s me or someone like Kazuko-”

             “You practically wrote her essay for her. That’s a huge factor, and she got in.”

             “She could’ve written it herself-”

             “No. If she got in with your writing skills, so can you. Just be yourself during the interview, and you’ll be following her there, okay? Hell, I might even put some effort into getting into a community college there so I can stay near you guys,” Cin patted Mark’s arm firmly with reassurance, letting him know the subject was closed.

             “Maybe,” Mark sighed, looking back at the black car for a moment. He then turned to knock his forehead lightly against Cin’s -- a tradition the two had developed as a goodbye -- and walked to his front door. “See you.” With a weak smile, Mark stepped inside, the sound of laughing and shrieking siblings emanating from the doorway for the few seconds it remained opened.

             Cin shook his head. That poor guy. But there was only so much Cin could do. It was always such a problem when friends had feelings for each other and refused to discuss it directly.

             Cin walked back to his car and sat down in the driver’s seat, Kazuko already sitting shot-gun beside him. Her expression was a mixture of disappointment, anger, and pain. Cin knew to expect this, so all he did was smile sympathetically and start the engine.

             “So, want to get something to eat and talk about it?” he offered.

             “Yes,” she reluctantly admitted, choking back tears by biting down on her lower lip.

               Thirty minutes later, the two friends were sitting as a table at a pancake house with a plate of chocolate chip pancakes in front of Kazuko, while nothing but a cup of coffee sat in front of Cin. The place was warm and cozy, so both had shed their jackets. Families littered the tables around them, excitedly chatting with their kids about their plans for the winter break. Within minutes, half of the pancakes in front of Kazuko were gone, and her hurt expression had been replaced by a purely angry one as she continued her rant.

             “And I mean, what is he thinking, anyway? ‘You finally escaped me’? He basically wrote my whole frikkin essay for me! He should be able to get in, too! But he’s just trying to find an excuse to get as far away from me as possible! I mean, what, is he just going to ditch the interview, too? The guy interviewing him’s only a few houses away, he could WALK-”

             “So, you still break into his locker?” Cin asked curiously, taking a calm sip of his coffee. There was no way for her to know the interviewer’s address unless she had broken into Mark’s locker to find it. Mark had a rule about talking about his applications and anything involving them, and that rule was to never talk about them, period.

             “Of course I still break into his locker!” she growled, though she lowered her voice as she did so. “I have to check to see if he wrote a new poem or not.”

             “You know, you might want to tell him that you love them?” Cin suggested. “Just a thought.”

             “I’m not an idiot,” she glared at him. “The second I tell him I even give the slightest damn-”

             “You can stop acting so defensive all the time and get married to him after college or something. I’ll be the best man, and probably your maid of honor, too, since I think I’m the girliest friend you have-”

             “Ha-frikkin-HA, Luna,” she glared at him, but his last comment had earned him a smirk. It faded quickly, however. “But seriously, you know he’s just kidding about all that stuff. He hits on girls all the time-”

             “No, he doesn’t,” Cin instantly defended his best friend. “Girls hit on HIM all the time. He’s the fastest runner on track, he writes poetry, and he’s not exactly bad looking, Kazuko. And yet, he doesn’t have a girlfriend. You know why? He only wants ONE girl, and he has since we were in the third grade.”

             Kazuko turned slightly red at this comment. Mark was open to constantly telling her how he felt, and he allowed Cin to remind her whenever the opportunity came up, too. Kazuko, however, never wanted to believe a word of it from either of them.

             “There’s just no reason for him to be serious,” she muttered, her tone finally shifting to disappointment. Cin sighed, glad that she was past her ‘anger’ phase and finally beginning to speak truthfully. “I mean, he could do better. I’m loud, I’m always so sarcastic, and I’m so fat...”

             “You’re not fat,” Cin rolled his eyes. “Especially not since you started running around every morning. Honestly, at some point, all that exercise’s got to be bad for you.”

             “Well, excuse me if for some of us, sleep just doesn’t seem to cut it,” she glared enviously in his direction before poking the remainder of her pancakes with a fork. “And you lift weights, you hypocrite! But seriously...why was he so happy when he heard? I kind of hoped he’d tell me not to go, that only preppy kids with loads of cash go there, or something.”

             “Maybe because you’ve been set on going there since you were...what, twelve?” Cin snickered a bit. “He IS glad that you’re going, he’s not going to lie about that. He wants you to be happy. What he’s disappointed about -- and he is disappointed -- is that he doesn’t know if he can get in, too.”

             “...He was disappointed?” despite her best efforts, the happiness in Kazuko’s tone shone through as she peeked up at Cin.

             “Oh yeah,” Cin was a little surprised she hadn’t noticed. “He went all pale. Sure, it’d be easier to tell with someone like me, but he turned white, the poor guy was so horrified. I mean, you’re going to MIT whether or not he gets in, right?” He looked at her, waiting for her to agree.

             The blush spreading further up her face was his answer.

             “Kazuko!” he stared skeptically at her, almost dropping his cup of coffee onto the table. “You can’t pass this up when you’ve spent your life getting the grades to get in there! It’s impossible to get in, much less for an engineering, and you did! Don’t you dare pass that up!”

             “But-”

             “Mark wouldn’t forgive you, either!”

             “But...” She weakened considerably at his last comment, but did her best to defend her logic. “I can keep track of him while I’m here! I can see which girls are talking to him and scare some off! But, but if we go to different colleges...” Her brown eyes locked onto the fork in her hand, but Cin knew from her expression that she was imagining Mark laughing his head off with some pretty girl that was thanking him for a poem he had written for her.

             “Kazuko,” Cin felt her jump a bit as he touched her hand, snapping her out of her stupor. She wasn’t the most touchy-feely person, but he decided to risk it. “That boy will jump through fire or ice for you. You’ll be able to see each other during breaks, and he’ll gladly wait for you.” He smiled at her. But after a moment’s thought, he added, “Well...” and he pulled his hand away. Kazuko’s eyes followed him, looking to his face as though her life depended on what he said next. “That is, if you tell him how you feel. And soon.”

             Kazuko looked back to her hand as though it hurt her to even consider such a possibility. Cin shook his head, watching her. She was so scared of showing any form of weakness, of letting anyone have the power to hurt her, and yet, she was just as terrified of letting anyone but herself have their hands on Mark.

             During their conversation, neither one of them noticed the waitress walking by, pausing every few moments to shake her head slightly, trying to keep her thoughts straight. Several people were already watching her, worried she was going to faint.

             Suddenly, there was a loud crash, and before Cin could even turn his head toward the source of the sound, he was pushed face-first into the table, just barely missing his coffee cup with his forehead. He felt a sharp, agonizing pain spreading throughout his back, originating in his left shoulder. His hand shot up to instinctively touch his shoulder, and within seconds, he started to feel a warm liquid dripping over his fingers as the air began to smell metallic.

             The waitress who had tripped started to scramble back to her feet beside their table, apologizing profusely, but ended up giving a loud shriek as she saw the tip of a knife embedded in Cin’s shoulder. She’d picked the knife up from the table behind them as she had been clearing it but had lost her footing due to another dizzy spell. Everyone in the diner froze, gaping in horror at the scene. There were several loud clanks as people dropped their cutlery, quickly followed by several hushed screams and the sound of smartphone cameras going off.

             “O...Ow...!” Cin grunted, awkwardly reaching behind himself and wrapping his fingers around the handle of the knife to yank it out, giving a loud hiss as it exited his body. The wound seemed to be relatively shallow, but blood was quickly gushing down the left side of his body, ruining his shirt and staining the chair.

             “H-Holy crap-! That could have pierced your lung-!” Kazuko cried, her voice barely audible with shock and fear constricting her throat.

“Yes, ow, I noticed,” Cin muttered through gritted teeth, trying to press his hand against the cut to slow the bleeding. “Kazuko, will you please ask the nice waitress if there’s a first aid kit or anything around here?” His eyes were shut tightly due to the pain, but he heard Kazuko’s chair move away and her run off despite the hysterical sobs from the waitress. Even if he bothered to open his eyes, his sunglasses had fallen off and his eyes were stringing with tears.

             What bothered Cin more than the pain and temporary blindness was the sheer fact that this had even happened in the first place, that he had been stabbed for the first time in his life, and by accident, no less. Sure, these things happened, probably, somewhere, to other people. But here? To him, of all people? And today?

             As much as he’d been trying to ignore his feelings, Cin was definitely beginning to panic, now. This whole day had been strange and wrong, not just this current moment. He had woken up, only to step on a mirror by his bed; he couldn’t even remember how it had gotten into his room, much less onto his floor. He had lost track of the time and ended up late for school for the first time in his entire life. He had forgotten his homework, gotten caught sleeping in class, was pushed into a locker, and now he had almost been killed by a tripping waitress. Normal people would have called this a bad day, probably, but for Cin, this was different. This was wrong.

             Cin was lucky. He had always, as long as he had lived, been lucky. Even as a child, he had never so much as scraped a knee, gotten a paper cut, or been hit by a ball. He had never forgotten homework -- it had always been in his backpack if he went to look for it when it was time to hand it in. He had always woken up from his daydreams at just the right moment to get anywhere on time. He had always ended up right outside of the area if something bad were to happen. This day was wrong, and getting stabbed was the final shred of proof he needed to stop all this denial.