"We were a group, strangers all of us…on a… trip."
"We had been travelling, when it happened. We were stuck with no one to help us, trapped as desperation began to rise."
Kale spoke down into his hands, staring at his own two feet, unable to look up, not wanting to see how people were staring at him.
Fearful of their looks.
"Go on, finish your story. We're not here to judge."
Lillian prodded and guided Kale to speak, wanting him to open up further.
With a deep breath that caused his body to shudder Kale continued.
"We split up as people argued, we had no food or water to speak of, everyone just wanted to escape, to live. Blood was spilt as people fought, I was scared, I didn't know what to do as I watched."
Hushed silence followed the end of Kale's words, everyone was listening, feeling his pain as it resonated with their own.
"I was left in a small group, we walked for hours without safety or shelter, no one wanted to continue but we had to escape and survive somehow."
Tears fell from Chloe's eyes as she listened, she had heard a story like Kale's in the news, it was about survivors who were stranded in subterranean transport tunnels with no food or water. Thousands turned up dead as tunnels collapsed from the vehicle collisions as the debris and dust killed many more, she couldn't believe that Kale had managed to survive something like that.
Leaning forward Chloe listened to more of Kale's tale.
"We separated. Me and another were on our own as we continued, barely able to keep on going but we didn't want to die, to stop. We could have ended up like the others…"
"Do not feel guilty for witnessing the death of others. We are only human beings, despite how much we claim to be greater we are not miracle workers, that is why we must always try to do our best, to keep on moving forward. Those that don't are the ones that get stuck."
Crouching down at Kale's level Lillian spoke as she lifted his head up, looking into Kale's eyes, happy to see that the vacant look of his was clearing slightly as he spoke, but more guilt still remained, it wasn't so easy to remove.
"I was saved because they sacrificed themselves for me. They had more than me but chose to die for me, so that I could live. They suffered so that I…"
Tears fell from Kale's eyes as the scene of Captain Hyun struggling against death and still provoking the goblin leader played through his mind. And Brom as he was covered in a tide of goblins but laughed fiercely and smiled as he ripped through them, scattering them with nothing but his hands.
He wasn't worthy when compared to any part of them, but they sacrificed themselves for him. Kale just couldn't understand why.
It wasn't right that he survived.
"I was the only survivor. No one else was left."
Silence fell after the last of Kale's words, everyone around the room was quiet. It started off with Chloe applauding but soon it spread as more joined in and applauded Kale, as Lillian said 'the hardest step is always the first step. To open up to strangers and let them in, to let someone help you'.
"Listen to me. Everyone listen to me."
Raising her voice over the applaud everyone stopped to look up at Lillian, Kale included.
"Young man, what you are feeling is normal, survivors of extreme accidents feel the exact same way, this is the guilt of being the survivor."
"What you have to understand is that you have done nothing wrong. To survive doesn't make you evil or guilty of anything, if people have lain down their lives to save you then you owe it to them to move on and live for them, to remember them and make sure that their actions don't go forgotten. What I am saying is easy to listen too but hard to practice. When you go home I want you to think not about what has happened but about what they did, their words and actions as they helped you survive."
"Focus on how they lived their final moments to help someone else rather than to die and drag others down with them, they are worthy of respect. Would they want you to feel this way?"
Cheers and clapping erupted from around the room at Lillian's heartfelt words, she had touched all of them as they felt a small light or spark of hope within them, a new perspective grew that over shadowed the mire of defeat they had dwelled in.
"This is the end of today's meeting. Please feel free to join when we convene again, it will be every evening, Monday to Friday at 7.30pm."
'Would they want him to feel this way?' Kale wasn't sure, but they had willingly chosen to save him, even Brom with his surly attitude had whole heartedly devoted himself and suffered under goblin hand to buy as much time as possible. Would he have done if it was him that had been chosen to be sacrificed and not someone else?
Kale left the meeting as soon as it ended, he was wrapped up in his thoughts as he disappeared, not hearing the words of others as they spoke to each other or tried to talk to him. On the lookout Chloe never spotted Kale as she dashed around and offered drinks to everyone, even Lillian had been unable to spot him leave, he was like a memory that just slipped away, a passing whisper on the wind.
"You did well to bring him in Chloe, I hope we see him again."
"So do I."
Clenching her hands nervously Chloe could only agree with her mum, the image of when she had first seen Kale in the supermarket was transfixed in her mind, the pure devastation and sorrow reflected in his eyes was heartbreaking. He hadn't spoken much but Chloe wondered just what horrors could induce someone to look like that, what did you have to see for that to happen.
Lillian herself had only seen reactions like Kale's from survivors of the war who had PTSD or had miraculously survived as entire squadrons were reduced to nothing but paste on the ground. She really wanted to help the young man, he was too young for that kind of weight, there was something more their, but she just couldn't see it.
For days Kale returned to the clinic, choosing not to speak but to listen, to understand other peoples view points. To understand their guilt. He started to realise that he had beaten himself up and let guilt slowly wear away at him, destroying him.
He had to be better than that.
Kale slowly began to realise that he had to do something to honour the ghosts of Captain Hyun and Brom inside of him, to live on for them. Kale didn't know if he was going to be summoned again, he had one lead to look at, that he had thoroughly ignored.
The words appeared in his mind every time he held his eyes shut, the same message repeating itself over and over.
[You have survived]
[Test Scenario 08 - Complete]
[Achievements earned - 3]
Kale had seen these messages countless times but refused to look further, he hadn't wanted to know, it was just a constant reminder of that brutal planet. But with Lillian's help and by listening to the experiences of others Kale was determined to at least try stepping forward, he had to do what Captain Hyun and Brom asked of him, he had to survive.
Sat once more on the edge of his bed, Kale summoned up the courage to open the messages in his mind, to face the consequences of surviving the first summoning.
[Achievements earned - 3]
Kale didn't know what the achievements were or what they did, but he was about to find out.
[Achievement 1 - Sole Survivor]
[Achievement granted for being the only survivor of your expedition team]
[Achievement 2 - Last of the First]
[Achievement granted for being the Last Member of the First Fleet]
[Achievement 3 - Touched by a God]
[Achievement granted for escaping the grasp of a God. You are he who escaped]
[Target amount not met. Five Achievements required for enhancements]
Kale was well and truly confused, looking at the achievements had raised more questions rather than answering the ones that he had. The achievements themselves were a mystery but Kale read the titles and understood why he had them, but the way they were worded revealed a few key facts he didn't want to think of.
The expedition team, First fleet…..God. It was all aimed at a much larger stage, one that Kale didn't even have the right to know about.
The only thing that Kale definitely knew was that he needed to somehow become stronger to increase his chances of surviving, already he had seen the news and watched as they buried those who died in the first summoning.
Their bodies were laid in the earth, empty of vessel and soul, never to return.
He didn't want to be one of them.
But the new message didn't give him a choice, it was the date of the next event.