(Ophelia)
***
[A/N: Content warning for some violence today.]
***
I woke up with a literal hit to the gut.
It wasn't even a playful or fun smack like I might have gotten from Koharu. It genuinely hurt like hell—like a stomachache intensified by the thousands. I raised myself instantly, and I shouted loudly as tingles of pain seared in my abdomen.
Another attack came before I processed anything I saw.
"Stop! Please!" I screamed, moving my arms up to cover my head.
My eyes watered, but I spotted the blurred outline of a man in front of me.
*Never thought I'd see murder by rake, but there's no way that thing won't kill me!*
"Get up!" He waved the tool around like a madman. "I'll hit you again with the butt end of this if you stay here any longer! You slobs aren't supposed to be here! You'll make the stores look unsafe."
I tried standing up, but the pain across my stomach was so excruciating that I immediately fell back down. Bumping my head against the window lightly, the subsequent crash of wood against my body was far less pleasant.
"Get up!" he yelled again with his bulging veins and bloodshot eyes.
His gaze rendered me frozen, and I was struck into a state of fear and panic.
*Not again…*
"What's wrong with you?" Koharu shouted at him, standing up. "She can't even stand to get up now! What do you think you accomplished, you piece of shit?"
Though she appeared forward and confident, I noticed her fists shook aggressively, so I couldn't help but wonder how much more terrified she was than me when she looked like someone dropped her in a tundra.
Silently, I cheered her on, hoping she telepathically got the message.
"Move aside, or I'll hit you, too!" he seethed.
Behind him, a metal tray housed his larger machines. Barbed, iron edges of blades and gigantic vats of chemicals frightened me much more than his current weapon of choice.
"Koharu… stop," I spoke softly, afraid a heavy breath would hurt me too much between the hurried, shallow ones I took. "Help me get up. Let's just leave here."
"No! You don't deserve this at all!"
She turned to the man, the skin on her neck pulled taut from her swollen blood vessels.
*Are you asking to get sliced and diced? You sound frightened!*
*Huh…?*
I knew Koharu could be hot-headed to the point of insanity sometimes, but I didn't expect she'd be crazy enough to sweep the man's legs from under him while he had something so sharp in his hands.
"Try standing up," she instructed me, and by that point, I cried subtly.
The man looked fazed enough by the resonant crash and subsequent fall, so I gathered what little strength I had to get on my feet. Every breath I took was short and nearly motionless, though each caused an ounce of pain. My heart raced, and my nerves made me shaky as I moved.
Koharu stood in front of me and partially threw me over her back once I wasn't touching any part of the bench. She, too, trembled with much deeper exhales as she struggled to support me while I dashed alongside her. My tears dripped onto her shirt, hydrating the dirt collected between its threads.
She ran past the domino-like buildings, sliding between their thin spaces to hide in their shadows. When we were far enough away to escape the man's angry screams, she sat me down so that we were slightly out of view.
"Ophelia, oh my gosh. Are you okay?" she said when she placed me as gently as she could on the ground, my back against the brick wall of a store.
Of course, with my weight, the attempt was a little clumsy, so my torso hit the structure roughly. Her breath hitched at the sight as she panicked and placed a hand on my shoulder.
*Shit. This isn't good.*
"I'm… not sure," I muttered, wincing. "It really hurts."
I crossed my arms over my body and slouched, too weak to hold my posture upright. A tense expression covered my face after the tears quelled. It still felt as if a knife continually slashed and dug into the gash to widen and worsen it, though red stains hadn't peeked their way through to the visible side of the fabric.
"Let me see it."
In affirmation, I nodded slightly. She lifted my shirt enough to see my abdomen, and she gaped at the grotesque sight while tensing her fingers to the point the hem cinched around my waist.
"Crap, there's a bruise all across here." As she touched it lightly, I made a pained noise.
*What is with people and poking bruises? Those things hurt like a bitch!*
Hissing, I muttered, "Don't."
She got the memo with a single word and retracted her hand, that look of surprise lingering.
"Sorry." She averted her eyes. "I didn't know how sensitive it was. At least there's no blood. I don't know what I'd do if that was the case."
"Me neither," I croaked.
Deeply troubled, she examined it for a minute more under the muted morning light.
"The sun's barely even out. Let's rest here a while."
Unable to speak in complete sentences, I nodded, and she placed herself beside me with a few inches between us. Placed stiffly, she appeared uncomfortable, but she adapted to the sharp angle between the alley's ground and barrier. We drifted off to sleep without much commotion.
*You don't know how much I thank you right now, but my tongue feels petrified like all my nerves were bashed.*
***
"Hey."
Koharu prodded at me when the sun seemed to be about thirty degrees from us.
While I was static, the pain subsided, but as soon as I shifted, my stomach ached sharply where it experienced trauma.
"Ugh." I placed my arm over the wound, cradling it like a cramp.
*Isn't sleep supposed to fix this?*
She frowned. "Should we stay here for the day? You still can't even move," she stated with a frantic voice that hardly soothed me.
I pushed through the pain and got onto my feet, still crouched over. My face contorted, and I kept my arm static, though I doubted it did much to mitigate anything.
"We… need to keep going. And I… made that promise to you."
I had to pause as I spoke. With much effort, I finally stood myself up, and Koharu looked at me with wide eyes.
"Ophelia," she commanded as I was about to fall over, back to her serious tone. She braced my back with her arm. "Don't push yourself. That was insane earlier. I don't know how you're not more hurt than this. Don't worry about that stupid promise we made while I was playing around."
I nodded, no quick words pieced together to respond to her.
*I didn't think I was so weak, but I'll have to make do.*
"Sit down a bit longer," she begged. "Please. That rake did a number on your stomach."
"No," I declared with wet eyes. "Let's just keep going."
Dead serious, Koharu glared at me. "Ophelia, I can't force you down in the state you're in, so I'm going to tell you again: Sit down. I don't want to see you in pain trying to walk five feet. It'll take five minutes now when it'll take five seconds later."
I didn't have the strength to push her off me.
"Koharu, I'll be fine. Let's leave this alley."
"Why are you so stubborn?" she asked a lot more calmly than she must have wanted to insinuate. "You're acting worse than all the servants at the castle combined."
CRASH!
By sheer accident and the tangling of limbs, Koharu hit the ground when I stepped forward. I turned back to glance at her, wanting to give her sympathy, but I was unable to help her in my damaged state.
"You're stubborn as well. I may be an advisor, but you don't have the same relationship with me as those fools."
*Stop pushing her away.*
"You're right." She dusted off her clothes.
*It's not her fault.*
*It's not mine.*
"At least—as your girlfriend—I care about you. At least I'm not going to push you to your last breath by ordering you around. I ask one thing of you for your own good, and you choose to ignore me. There's nothing else I can do."
"You're damn right."
Keeling over, I pondered what to do while struggling to inhale the pungent air.
*Why am I so hurt beyond the surface? Was I assured by the promise of a safe haven that does not exist or comforted by the nuance of luck in the times before when apathy was crowned king?*
I looked down at the girl who clasped my legs. Her gaze beseeched me to stop as I paraded behind a front of anger.
*Once too much care is put in by someone, I shatter and avoid anyone who wants to help me. I push away with little pull.*
*But that's no excuse to act out in defiance…*
I told Koharu, "Let go. Trust me."
"If you're going to storm away like in the forest,"—she clicked her tongue—"I don't think I will."
I sighed. "I'm not."
Peering into my soul, she let go while muttering, "You're lucky I'll do most things you say."
*It's really a two-way road with us.*
I plopped onto the ground, ungraceful like a penguin flapping its useless wings.
She grinned slightly. "I knew you'd give in eventually."
"I'd have given it a second thought if I wasn't hurt so bad."
"Well, your stomach—"
"That's not entirely it."
"What else could you mean then?"
She was clueless about the way my mind worked.
*How am I supposed to put it?*
I swallowed, cringing when my abdomen shifted.
"Maybe I come off as fearless in wanting to continue forward, but I'm deathly terrified of being out on the streets."
She tilted her head, and I proceeded to explain further.
"I've been—I guess subconsciously—worried this entire time about something like this happening. I never lived completely in the castle."
"Right."
"I saw how brutal it could be outside it plenty of times, even when I was in school. Actually, school's both a playground and hellhole in comparison. I know that very well. I ought to tell you about it sometime."
*Fun conversation right there.*
She chuckled quietly to not cover up my confession.
"So I was scared something could happen to us—something could happen to you. People still have their stupid power complexes, it seems. For all the physical differences in this place, they're really just cosmetic."
It hurt like hell to get that all out as I held back a cough.
Koharu was silent for a moment, deciding what to say. "It's the mantra, 'history repeats itself', you know? There are always some idiots who don't learn."
She leaned her head back against the cold stones. "I can understand where you're coming from, and I appreciate you told me. I was getting worried about how you were acting—rejecting small gestures and jabs from me. You never did that before, so I thought it was my fault."
*Could I get any more fortunate than knowing you?*
I nodded solemnly and grinned as much as I could.
"Yeah… I'm thankful you get it. I didn't want you to think I was embarrassed by you or something. I'm just scared. There's no world where I'm not except for the one we've created on our own inside the castle. That's… part of the reason I want to try so hard to get back. It's my safe haven."
She smiled gently, and she looked so adorable that I tried reaching my hand out to caress her soft hair that slowly became ragged and oily, shining slightly under the morning sunlight like grass doused in a thin layer of dew.
"Damn!" I yelled, retracting my arm.
My abdomen felt as if it was struck by a cannonball. I knew from then my condition worsened, but how could I hurt so badly without any visible signs like skin or organs bursting?
"Oh my gosh!" Koharu grabbed my hand hurriedly before standing up. "I'm going to find you a medic. Stay here, please?" she implored with worried, sparkling eyes.
I gave her a slight nod, for I couldn't even move to protest her orders in that state.
Overcome by searing pain, I bent over. Without any dexterity, I tried unbuttoning the lower rungs of my silk top to examine my wound. I heard Koharu scream as her voice receded into the distance.
"Someone! A doctor! Help!" she shouted in desperation as she ran along the sidewalk.
She repeated such statements as loudly as the king did when he stood atop the castle's front balcony.
Finally, I removed part of my shirt, revealing hideous streaks that resembled the crude lines of fencing. They varied between the gentle red of a hibiscus and the color of a blood ruby, deep and menacing like dark pits. Yet they did not leak in the slightest and simply appeared as blood blisters—volcanoes that would explode with the slightest touch. I thought it was wise to avoid aggravating any of those vile spots, so I instead ran my hand over the lighter areas.
My head lolled back in pain as I made a hissing noise.
*Fuck. No wonder why it hurts so badly.*
It was another one of those moments when time seemed to drag on. A lack of soreness made someone take each unaffected second for granted, even on a scale as small as a headache. The worse the pain, the lengthier each minute felt, and seconds soon resembled epochs as I helplessly sprawled on the ground.
I took difficult breaths. My lungs had likely not been harmed, but the motion in itself intensified my suffering.
*When the hell is Koharu going to get back? She's taking forever!*
I felt a little bad for almost cursing at her, but such situations always brought the worst out of their victims. I figured I'd get more than enough sympathy (even with a nasty attitude) so long as I was compliant.