It was dark.
It was cold.
It was suffocating.
"Where am I?" I muttered. Clearly, I was the only one there, lost in a sea of black. My nose itched from the ice cold air. "Agatha?"
There was no answer.
I moved my feet a few steps forward and the shoes echoed throughout the room. At least I thought it was a room. The ground felt unusually solid as if I walked on a slate of black ice.
"Caesar?!"
His name echoed, growing distant after a few seconds.
"Where am I?!" I repeated.
"Anyone?!"
Silence. There was only silence.
Fear brushed over my heart and I gulped.
I realized I was alone there.
But I was always alone, no matter what. I hated being alone.
"There must be a way out," I said.
With that in mind, I searched the area with haste. I thought it was just a room but the place was larger than I expected. Too large, in fact. Even if my legs kept walking just at one side, there was no end.
The area kept growing bigger was what I concluded.
There was only pitch black darkness.
Like my heart.
"Eh?"
A chilly, frost feeling wrapped around my chest in conjunction. It heightened up my fear as it was.
My breath was shaky.
"Ava!"
I turned my head around and a face greeted me.
No, it was a mask. A blank, white mask in the shape of a mannequin's face, without any detailed features or quirks about it.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"Why, I am you." Another mask appeared next to the first replied with the same voice as me.
"Indeed, Ava," said the first mask, again, imitating my voice.
My small fingers strewed together, sharing its warmth. "What do you mean?"
"She's confused!" exclaimed the second.
"How sad. She doesn't even know who she is," said the first with a sad tone.
I frowned at them.
The second mask hovered to my side. "I mean, she lost her memories, remember? Of course, she doesn't know who she is."
"Ava, you're changing," said the first.
"I'm aware of that," I stated quickly.
"No, no, NO. I'm not talking about that change. You were once a beat-up little girl, at the mercy of your fake parents in order to analyze what your Aegis is capable of. You despised them, yet during the day, you're someone else entirely," said the second.
"I know that already. Why are you telling me this?" I admitted that the mask irritated me, rubbing salt over my old wound.
The masks looked at each other before turning their attention back towards me.
"Ava, how sad have you become," said the first.
"I pity you. You'll destroy yourself like this," said the second.
My eyes glared at them. "What do you mean?! I don't understand! I wanted to be like this so that I could kill those two with my own hands. I cannot waver. I cannot hesitate when I wanted to kill."
"You yourself are fake," blurted the first.
"What?"
The second mask rotated around my head and stopped in front of me. "You think you're doing this in the name of vengeance. But that was not it, Ava. You are empty inside after all that had happened. A large void that lusted for a purpose in life. You never wanted to be alive, Ava," it continued, "You acted like you loved that Hope guy as your parent, but it was just you being greedy. You wanted to love someone, and for that someone to love you back."
My hand swiped the mask away but it hovered near me again. "T-That's not true," I said. I was shaking.
It was not true at all. I loved Hope very much. It was not fake.
"You're unsure of what you are, Ava. In order to have a goal in your life, you deceived yourself into thinking that vengeance for the sake of Hope was the right thing to do," said the first mask, circling around me.
"N-No..."
"It is true, Ava. You're denying it. Deep inside, you know it's true. You're nothing but an imposter. Someone who desperately held on to a belief that she thought was correct. You cried for your own salvation. After your former parents left you, that conclusion was what you came up with," said the second mask.
"My salvation..." I mumbled nervously.
"But what does it mean to be saved, you ask? Perhaps killing a bunch of people to get to your parents was a small step to that. You pushed on in your life thinking that!" exclaimed the first mask.
"That's why we pity you, Ava. You are FAKE. Admit it. You're just a leftover specimen for your parents' experimentation. Knowing they discarded you, there was nothing for you to live on. You latched yourself onto the feeling of hatred just to assure yourself that you have something to live for," said the second.
"I am... Fake?"
I did not know anymore. I denied what they said but somewhere inside me, the words they spat at my face resonated. And I hated it.
"What do you plan to do now, Ava? Continue to be a faker, as you always had?" said the first mask.
"Or you plan to be a genuine person? Like someone who ACTUALLY has a goal in life?" said the second.
"I'm not... Fake. I did it all this for Papa!" I shouted.
"NO!" Both of them shouted simultaneously.
"You're deluding yourself. You never loved him," said the second mask.
"You just want to satisfy your greed. You are EMPTY, Ava. Don't you get it? You searched for your parents way back in Mansel Island just to comfort yourself. You never loved reading books. You hated reading. You never loved talking to your friends. You despised how they looked at you condescendingly. You never liked potatoes, to begin with. You forced that food inside your mouth, despite how in the back of your mind, you hated it," said the first mask.
"You love your Aegis. You never disliked it. That power allows you to make anyone beg for mercy. And you loved that," said the second.
"Fake, FAKE, fake. All of that you had done, it was all FAKE!" shouted both of them.
"NO! I'M NOT!" I yelled.
Their voices that resembled me grated in my head, pounding on it endlessly.
That was a nightmare.
It had to be.
"Please, wake up!" I closed my eyes, hoping the masks disappeared.
After what seemed to be hours upon hours, a blinding light warmed me from above.
"Help... Save me!"
I tried to reach it as my body was slowly engulfed by the evanescent embrace.
. . .
The first thing I felt after I woke up was a sensation of smooth fabric and sleek metal over my front. I noticed instantly that someone was carrying me on her back. It was the woman from before, with two other running on each side. There were gunshots and distant explosions somewhere.
My eyes heavily swept over my surroundings.
We were barely outside of the capital city of Chad seemingly. I remembered the scenery of sand and a vast open field in my mind.
Grains of sands passed my head and I sneezed.
The woman carrying me, Arc, shot her eyes sideways. "She's awake!"
Kat who was at her right drew her eyebrows together at me. "Who cares? Let's get her over to the Teria airship quick."
"Over there, idiots," snorted Bee.
Their steps slowly came to a halt.
I strained my eyes since there was nothing.
"It's invisible, Ava," said Aegis in my head. "I can't help you right now. That short blade you formed was the only thing I could do. Anything beyond would strain you. Greatly. And you can't even move your body."
Indeed, I could not feel anything. I tried to move a finger but it did not respond.
I was in a bad shape.
There was a feeling of electricity in the air, slowly but surely increased in intensity. The warm, stuffy air blew at us in a whirlwind.
"General! We're back! Please don't kill us!" shouted the trio.
Moments after that, a large, black aircraft appeared in front of us. Its charcoal metal gleamed under the sunlight, with the Great Corporate United's logo plastered at its side. The logo's background was dark blue where a picture of a woman in gold stood in the middle, in the act of what seemed to be a form of a modest bow.
The aircraft was very sleek compared to any I had seen before. Its entire body was almost flat, with two small wings on each side. Two wheels shoulder the aircraft's weight off the ground about twenty meters. And there was no cockpit sort of. Given that the head of the aircraft did not have windows for pilots.
At least that was what a normal plane supposed to look like. Not that I have seen much except in picture books.
The side of the aircraft split into two halves like an elevator's and proceeded to roll uniformly towards the sand, forming a large, blank plate. The inside of the aircraft can be seen clearly when what looked like a blue light washed over the black plate, and a man walked from it.
"General!" said Bee. "She's the girl, right?"
My jaw dropped.
The man on top of the plate was Derrick Jones if I remembered correctly.
'He's a general now?' I thought.
He was in the standard dark blue military uniform and a golden chain hung loosely at his right arm. He wore a military hat with the C.U's logo.
"Why do you disobey my order?" asked Derrick directly.
The women stared at each other with sour expressions.
"Er, Sir. We thought it would be... wise to participate in the incursion. I mean, we got our objective in the end," said Arc who was carrying me. The other women gestured proudly at my figure like a prize that they had won.
"Did Sir Relly say anything?" asked Derrick.
"No, Sir..." said Bee.
"You're Vlasta's Maidens, that I personally request Sir Relly to join this operation. You're all close-combat type units and another squad I was entrusted to. In a rare case where Sir Relly and the others require reinforcement, only then you will be deployed. And yet you do THIS," said Derrick.
The trio was silent.
"What if, when the time you're all gone, he requests reinforcement, and you're not there..."
Arc raised her head. "We're sorry, General."
"I'll let the higher-ups know about this." Derrick pointed for them to enter the aircraft and they did so reluctantly.
Arc was still standing at her spot. "But Sir Relly was not there when we arrived. Bee, Kat..."
"Oh, don't be foolish, Arc. He's probably biding his time for the right moment. I mean, there's still that Gheele Folami everyone was talking about. Perhaps he's fighting him somewhere," said Bee exasperatedly. "Come on!"
Arc then shifted her feet over the plate covered with blue light. In an instant, she and the two others moved without doing anything, towards the inside of the aircraft.
I have read about an escalator, and that stair-like thing functioned a lot like it.
My head twitched when three yellow shards flew right by my head and mounted on the black plate.
"It's Caesar!" shouted Kat as she turned her body around.
Arc then turned to face him and I saw the man. His black robe swished along the warm current of air.
"Miss Ava!" yelled Caesar. He ran to us with a yellow spear in one of his hand.
"Get in! Now!" said Bee to Arc.
A shard managed to strike Bee at her back and she winced. A few more shards darted at us but Kat swiftly kicked them away.
"Miss Ava--"
Caesar's robe took a slash at his side and he stumbled to his knee. Behind him about a hundred meters away were Relly, Alicia, and Bart.
Lily was sprinting at Caesar exuberantly, her eyes wide. She was back to her normal form. "Caesar! I'm taking you back!"
"Sorry, miss Ava," apologized Caesar while looking at me. "I'll rescue you, I promise."
With that, he threw his spear upward and it split into millions of very thin tendrils. All of them were directed at Lily and she was skewered through and throughout by it.
Caesar formed a shield large enough to protect his entire body for it to whirl along with him as he ran back to the capital city.
Alicia's invisible crystal did not manage to reach Caesar while Lily's attempt of pursuit was interjected by Relly adamantly.
"But... Relly."
"Next time, Lily. He will come back to us. Trust me. He will," said Relly with a low tone.
"He's right there..." Lily looked on at Caesar's small figure on his way to the city.
"Lily, please."
"Alright..." Lily cast her gaze downwards.
Arc turned her back against them and moved inside the aircraft.
We were swallowed by blue light everywhere before it finally cleared up to expose what was inside the aircraft.
"Ava."
My eyes caught sight of a man beside Derrick. He seemed familiar. I tried to focus on the man and I gaped.
It could not be.
'But he was there,' I thought. But it was not possible. In no way, he was there.
And yet the man I once considered precious to me stood still, looking at me.
"Ava..." He repeated.
I teared up upon hearing that voice. His short, blond hair was messy with a plain, blue shirt and close-fitting black jeans.
"Papa..." I said.