The door creaked loudly as Leon started prying the door open. It gets stuck as if something is holding it closed.
There is a burst of childish laughter that comes from inside as Leon finally gets the door to open. Amora looks at Andrew in fear and asked, "Did you hear that just now?"
Andrew stares worryingly and asks, "Hear what? The door?"
Amora sighs and replies with: "nevermind."
Leon motioned for Amora and Andrew to come inside. Reyon followed after and once inside, Leon begins opening the fireplace, inside is a strange dark stain on the floor. Leon looks around and they go into the dark area of the basement.
***
Amora used her fire and shivered as it activated. She realizes that she is more excited to use her element than she first thought.
"I can't believe it took this long." She thought until Leon waved his hand in front of her.
"Carly, come on." Leon started walking away quickly, but Amora knew what she had to say.
"Leon... Reyon... I need to say something to you guys." Amora made sure Andrew wasn't around and quickly mentioned: "My name... isn't Carly."
She looks at the floor, not wanting to see them disappointed or confused.
"What's your real name then?" Reyon asked, calmly, seeming concerned.
"It's... well... my name is Amora. Amora Kuroki" Amora looked behind her as if to check for Andrew again.
This and she turns to see Reyon looking at Leon. Leon looks at Reyon and shakes his head.
He whispers into her ear, "Don't get your hopes up, we never named her that, don't you remember what we had planned to name her?"
Reyon whispered back saying, "Yes... Akima... I know, but that doesn't matter. She could be. I'm always right and you know that."
Leon whispered back, "Darkness must have found her, just stop, before we get our hopes up. We don't know her."
Amora walked away since she can hear them and is right there as they talked about her.
She goes down a dark hallway in the basement and finds Andrew on a phone.
He says something and Amora leans closer in the doorway to hear. She hears him clearly say, "I don't know how much longer now. Just stop calling and I can deal with the situation." The person on the other end seems to keep talking. "Yeah, yeah. I understand." He continued.
Amora squinted her eyes and whispered to herself "I thought his phone had been broken." With that, she stepped away right as he turned his head, giving a glare to that direction.
***
"Leon, where did she go?" Reyon asked while looking around wildly.
"I-I thought she was still here?!" Leon said almost shrinking.
"Yeah. You haven't been able to see much since the fight with Supernova last year." Reyon said smirking.
"Well, it's been slowly healing." He said as he rubbed the back of his neck.
"I'm sure they will be fine. I mean you know how different limbs and parts heal slower or faster than others." Reyon mentions as they start walking. Suddenly there is a footstep from behind them and they turn around.
"Hey." Leon says before asking, "You heard that too, right?"
Reyon nods and says "It's just the place settling." They walk upstairs and continue searching.
***
"It was... maybe he found one? No... who is he talking to?" Amora steps behind cover and suddenly hears whispering behind her.
She turns and sees another hallway she hadn't noticed before. She continues down the hall and sees a stairway leading back up. On the ground are a shriveled up creature and a decomposed leg.
"Geez, oh god." Amora walks away fast and starts gagging at the smell. While continuing to wonder what had happened there.
After calming herself and sitting around, She notices a poster on the older-looking wall.
The wall was covered in rust and was a different material than the rest. She looked at the poster and felt it. She pulled it down and looked at it and still couldn't see what it said. She looked back up to see a button, dimly glowing.
She pressed it lightly and the wall shifted and opened. She entered, stepping on some kind of plating, making the door slam shut behind her.
***
Leon and Reyon make their way upstairs and look at the nice furnishings. Reyon then says, "Remember when Supernova came on the TV, spouting his nonsense?"
Leon smiled and chirped back "Yeah, that's when we were a group of three."
"Yeah, Tavan, You and Me, the unbeatable squad," Reyon said smiling.
Leon's smile faded as he swiped some dust off of a desk and said "Yeah, I wonder where he went anyway. After finding that girl he left and never tried to contact us. After saving us, he left again and we haven't seen him since." Reyon smiled as she grabbed a blanket and aired out the couch and opened an old window to let the dust outside. "Yeah, I suppose he may have wanted to be alone, but it doesn't make much sense why he just avoids us, maybe trouble follows us."
"You think so?" Leon asked smirking.
"Yeah, I do." Reyon declared bravely.
"Maybe he really did leave for the reason he said," Leon said looking around more.
"He said he didn't want his child to be taken too. That was cruel of him to do. We promised to forget him. We haven't talked to him for years." Reyon said seemingly getting angry as she starts cleaning and instantly calms down.
"I know. I know. He needed to calm down and listen to us. It wasn't right of him to blame us." Leon said after walking over and helping Reyon air out the rug.
"I guess so. Do you think he had more children than Shirley? Maybe another girl or something?" Reyon asked as she turned her attention back to Leon.
"Actually, I believe he had a son. He brought him along to save us I think. I can't remember." Leon said as he continued cleaning.
***
Silence filled the room for what seemed like minutes.
The smell of dust was no longer. Instead, there was a smell of fresh air and sweat.
Reyon and Leon were laying down on the couch. Their eyes closed yet they were very awake.
They lie there for minutes only standing up to go to the old computer that was plugged into the wall for a very long time.
"Do you think it still works?" Leon asked as he stood up and slowly made his way toward it.
"Yeah I hope so, we could search the recent news." Reyon smiles as she stands up and stands near the window.
Leon manages to turn on the computer and he laughs out loud and declares, "I did it! Reyon it works!" Once the screen starts up, it shows the updates screen, the update finished fast and it showed the desktop with a few software.
A program was labeled as security cameras. Leon's smile faded as he opened the program to see only one file.
***
He clicked on the file and it opened up an old video. It showed Leon, Tavan, and Reyon walking in the building and Leon getting attacked and getting his leg cut off.
Leon shudders and says "Looks like while we were down there, someone was up here."
Reyon walked over with a confused look and saw the video. She gasps and Leon continues searching and sees a button labeled "Current Feed."
He clicked the button and suddenly the screen flashed with different cameras, one at a time. It showed Andrew walking slowly down one hallway and another showed Amora walking into a now open hall.
Leon ecstatically says, "Found her!"
He then fell silent as the door closed behind her. Reyon realized the situation and turned and ran to the stairs.
Leon was frozen for a second until the situation dawned on him, and he too ran downstairs. Once at the bottom, he could see Reyon looking around.
"Where was that?" Leon asked intensely.
"I don't know! We have to search the basement. Find a wall with a button!" Reyon replied while running down the basement stairs.
***
Amora sighed as the door closed behind her, she turned at the loud crashing sound and gasped.
"Oh no. Oh no. Oh no." She repeated as she tried activating her element.
She finally managed to get a small flame and walked back to the wall.
After failing to open the door, she turned and started walking in the opposite direction of the long hallway.
She continued walking until her energy ran out.
She felt her heart skip a few beats as her fire got smothered out.
She soon realized it was from her energy, (or lack thereof) and she stood still in the deep dark.
Suddenly there were footsteps from where she came from. Amora screamed and began in the direction she came from before until she suddenly noticed the end of the hallway and falls off a sharp edge.
She fell until suddenly hitting the water and panicking. In the dark, she managed to grab a ledge and pull herself up.
She pressed herself against the ground and started coughing up the water she had just swallowed. She reached around the floor and noticed that the ground was made of stone and was covered in water, to which she couldn't tell if it was because of her, or because of the water splashing up on the surface. She reached for a wall and once finding it, she lay against it, abruptly her eyes grew heavy until suddenly everything became dark.
***
Reyon suddenly screams for Leon, and he runs to her.
She shows him the button and after pressing it, the door opened slowly.
Leon used air to snap the hinges off of the door, so they don't close on them as well.
Reyon used a lot of fire in her palm to see. Once inside, they see a rail on the wall and a mannequin, once they got further in they see a button on the ground, it had been pushed and went back up.
Reyon pressed it and suddenly the mannequin started walking using the rail it was connected to, to make it sound like someone is coming.
They continued and got to the edge. They slowly let themselves down and got to the steep side of the water.
They made their way forward until Leon spotted Amora and managed to get to her.
They grab onto her, being careful and checking her pulse as they ran.
Once near the door, water starts rushing towards them in a huge wave.
Leon passes Amora to Reyon and Reyon runs ahead as Leon raises his hand and the wave stops right in front of him. The wave continues moving but in place. Leon thrusts his hand to the side and the water goes down another path. Leon chases after Reyon and once there helps her climb up with Amora.
Leon then jumps up and they make their way into the 1st floor, not even noticing that the mannequin is gone.
They put Amora on the couch and put a blanket over her.
They sat and Reyon started being a little questioning, "Isn't it suspicious how Andrew is always on his own?"
Leon seemingly also concerned says, "It's fine. I'll go find him."
They share a moment of silence and then suddenly a huge shrieking sound fills the room from another hall.
Leon ran into the basement and turns the corner.
Reyon stares at Amora for some time before whispering to herself.
"I'm hoping it's true. If you are our daughter..." suddenly she stops and smiles.
"I can only hope. We have so much proof! I know it... we both have fire... it looks the same!" Reyon stops and watches as Amora shivers and then smiles. "Good dreams huh?" Reyon whispers out loud. "Rest as long as you need to. I promise you will be fine."
"I promise. I promise I WILL protect you."