"Huh?"
Cairo's face was lit well enough to show just how animated his face had become. One side of his mouth raised higher than the other to show his gums.
"You tweakin?"
Naren's golden eyes shook for a second. Of course it was useless. Who would believe him. Something as outlandish as "We died." Of course Cairo was just going to write him off as insane.
Naren's heart continued to beat out of control, the constant pulse nestling in his ear as more than the white noise it had once been.
Drip...Splash
That's right. Water. Reflection. He turned his gaze around to the edge of the cell as he drew closer. Cairo shifted in his seat before the wisps from his forehead began to glow a brighter orange.
"What you starin at now?"
Naren's eyes counted the seconds as the droplets fell. Drip...Drip...Drip...His bare feet touching down on the cold floor. It didn't even take a second before he began running through the dungeon.
"How you get free?!"
Cairo's words turned into a distant rumble as Naren's legs continued acting on its own. His breath heaving with each step, until a sudden divot on the floor trampled on his stride, sending him to a tumble.
Scraping his face, Naren got up to his feet, ignoring the familiar voice of a little boy in the cell next to him.
He couldn't do this anymore. No more. He didn't want to go through this over and over again. Dying. Suffering. Ending up in the same place over and over and over again.
It was like he was being slowly erased. Slowly written into one chapter, not given the liberty to go to the next.
His thoughts were in shambles as his a piercing pain dug through his skull. The splintered wood of the trap door leading to the town square in pieces as his head bled from the borderline insane escape method.
But this time there were no flames. No debris. No screams. Nothing. This time Lastlight was completely empty.
Not a soul was walking the streets of Lastlight. The streets that should have been bolstering a crowd of unfathomable life, or one that should've been fuel to an inferno of amber violence.
But Naren met neither of those.
His heartbeat continued to spike as his ears were muddled with a constant thump...
Then he heard a voice.
"So you weren't a fairy tale...Vera"
Naren's head instantly shot up and to the left. A single building that was carved directly into the farthest reach of the rocky dome that Lastlight was nestled in.
Giant window panes decorated the all white building. Columns propping up a overhang leading directly into the dome above. Two doors sat comfortably between it all in a perfect act of symmetry.
Tired golden eyes narrowed in on the window, a second later, bare feet sticking to them perpendicularly. Before gravity could do it's part Naren had already identified the next jump in his reflections.
Silverware fell to the ground as rough calloused feet crumpled up a completely white table cover.
Locks of crimson curls tangled and shuffled into a mess resembling a birds nest more than human hair, were barely out of reach from two golden balls staring Vera directly in the eye.
Naren's breathing as erratic as it had been had finally settled down.
He didn't have to go through all of this after all. He never had to do it to begin with. It was all just a means to an end. Just a way for him to become a shaman.
If Vera made him a shaman right now, then he could leave. He had the option to leave all of this behind and to do his own thing. After all, none of this had anything to do with him. Not Lastlight. Not Zeus's son or whatever. Not even the Tomb of Atlas.
The only thing that mattered to him was finding Cendrine. The only thing that gave his fleeting invisible presence something to lean on.
Naren opened his mouth to speak. He hadn't chosen the words exactly. He just knew what it would entail.
'Get out of here. Make me a shaman. I'm done with this.'
Something along those lines should work.
"Make me—"
"I beg your pardon...Who are you?"
His mouth hung open as his entire being gave out. Three words that pushed him further than any death could.
And suddenly, just like that the world stopped making noise. Not like before where Naren was dying. But because for the first time...Naren didn't want to hear his own heartbeat.
He didn't want to hear the only thing that proved he was alive.
A warm familiar feeling spilled across his stomach as his tired eyes squeezed shut. There was a lot of commotion in the hall. A lot of yelling. Some crying. Some fighting that ensued.
But Naren didn't hear any of that.
—————————
His eyes fluttered open expecting to see the same streak of darkness as before. But it wasn't. Instead, this time there wasn't an absence of light. Nor was there the cold stillness of the dungeon floor. Or the resounding stiffness in his shoulder.
Instead, he awoke to a ceiling cast in a bioluminescent blue glow and a sharp sting in his stomach. His hand instinctively shot to his abdomen, hoping to put back whatever guts had fallen.
But before they reached they were smacked away.
"Don't move."
Another sudden shot of pain branched through the left side of his abdomen, as a deep pressure pushed it down.
Naren grimaced, holding in his screams through gritted teeth. He slowly turned his gaze to his left.
A woman with dark blue almost black hair was looking down. Her pitch black eyes somehow seeming like there was an ounce of glint in it, betraying the deepness of it's monotone appearance.
Her hands were covered in some blue gloves as she pressed down with thick clothes. Switching them out periodically as if this was her average morning routine. A pile of blood-soaked predecessors giving a hint to how long she had been at this.
But the part that caught Naren's attention wasn't how meticulous or careful she was. It was her breathing and her heartbeat. Two completely contradicting pieces.
While her breathing was steady. Completely devoid of any foreign intervention. Her heart was beating rapidly. Almost as loud as his own.
"You're organs are reversed so nothing really hit...Aren't you a lucky boy."
Naren scowled. Every memory he had of her was her talking down to him. Like she was some mature leader while he was just a child foot soldier.
"How...old are..."
"Seventeen."
She had him beat by two years. Wait one year. He had turned sixteen so recently he had forgotten. Well that's besides the point. The fact she was older really soured his mood more than it was already.
"Your little friend's gone by the way...Theron and Dione took her."
So she was gone...Why should he care?
As his thoughts rummaged, a sharp point suddenly pricked his stomach.
Several times, a thin pulling pinch began to echo in his stomach. His eyes widened as he watched a thin wire being wound around his gaping wound several times. Pulling it ever so close each time.
The fact he was still conscious was a miracle. The only reason he could think of was the amount of times he'd died already. Each and every death was something just as torturous and painful as the last. It was no wonder that his pain tolerance steadily increased.
"Sit up."
Naren complied. His body sending waves of protest as he lurched off the ground, which was softer than he thought.
"Raise your hands."
As he raised them, his gaze wandered to the ground below. A soft layer of cloth over a bed of leaves. Not too shabby.
A sudden pat on the head took him out of his appreciation.
"Good boy."
Looking down the ghastly wound was gone now. Instead covered by a fresh layer of gauge wrapped cleanly around his waist, better than any crude job he'd be capable of.
Naren's gaze lingered on his newly patched up abdomen. Remember all the times he was stabbed. Just how many times had it been?
His golden eyes wandered up, finally locking onto the pitch black gaze of Yuna. A purple petal from the flower in her ears brushing against her lashes.
"...Do you know my name?"
"No."
His gaze lingered for a second before diving back onto the ground. What was he expecting. Vera forget, despite how long she was with him. Despite how much she was depending on him. He wouldn't be surprised if Alice had forgotten as well.
Or even...
His thoughts cut short by Yuna's soft words.
"Not that it matters...Number two."