Riot's carriage rolled down Retly's main road. Inside was the group's iconic quartet: each of them reacting entirely differently. However, it went without saying that only one of these teenagers was reacting to their unbelievable surroundings.
June, still peeking out the carriage's window from behind, was in awe at the bypassing sights of the city streets and buildings. Her mouth was taped, yet she still gazed outside with sparkling green eyes.
"Why do we have to wear this stupid shit?" asked Katie.
"Are you asking me or are you just talking because you want to make conversation?" Kima dryly questioned without revealing her eye color.
Katie huffed out dramatically, "I regret speaking at all..." she uttered.
Kim finally opened her eyes after Katie's comment. Her purple pupils locked onto her lover's body. Ace, seated beside his younger cousin against the benches embedded into the carriage's behind, was abnormally trembling.
"You okay, babe?" She audibly worried.
The sound of his romantic nickname was familiar enough for his head to rise; looking at Kim and then Katie beside him quickly, his eyes once again directed toward the bottom as he endeavored to respond.
"Fine. Just worried about stuff, I guess," he explained.
"I understand the sentiment. This is kinda risky, y'know. If we get recognized, we could get killed by the Jester and his elite," Kim agreed.
"That's not it," Ace objected, "I'm worried about our future. This isn't a temporary thing. If the conflict escalates further, we'll be forced to make a decision and we actually will have to use the Tower. And if that happens, Retly won't be the only one caught in the crossfire. Everyone else in the world... would die. Men, women, children, animals, wildlife, everything. It would all end. And we'd be the only ones left standing. A bunch of mass murderers who destroyed the world just so we could ensure our home survives."
Ace's grimacing was then spontaneously stopped.
"ACE!"
Katie's scream jerked him back to reality. He searched around his surroundings and remembered where he was. Inside a carriage wheeling across Retly's streets, gradually sinking further into the city's depths--sinking deeper yet deeper into Retly's insides. After scratching his head and then groaning, Ace chuckled before softly apologizing.
"Sorry 'bout that. It's just a little disturbin', y'know?"
Kate nodded, removing her eyes from Ace's complexion. She interlocked her fingers and parted her lips following her eyes moving away.
"Honestly, I'm the same way."
"Whaddya mean?" Kim asked for clarification from Katie.
"It's scary, isn't it? I mean, Ace and I have both killed people before in our selfish ways but it's different now. Back then, we didn't want to do it but we accepted that we did it anyway. But then again, I guess a mass murder is inconsequential to unprecedented mass genocide. Not that those events are redeemable whether alone or combined," Katie noted.
"We came here for a reason, remember?"
Suddenly, Alex's voice rang throughout their heads. None of them flinched. Instead, they looked up as they listened to what their mentor telepathically communicated.
"To make a choice. If we have to sacrifice the world because we're unable to take any other path—"
"Is that the price to live?" June loudly interjected.
Everyone's eyes turned to her. She wasn't turned away this time. Whoever looked at her as if what she said would receive an elaboration—but while they waited, she'd stare them right in the eyes all the longer.
"Is that a choice we should make? You know, maybe… maybe Dad's right! We've all done terrible things for the sake of some self-righteous justice. But now we have a chance to make up for those past mistakes! We can be better than our past selves. We can… we can do the right thing," June proposed to her friends.
Yet they were silent. It was only at the reference to past sins did everyone finally look away. All of them had done such terrible things, they were entirely unforgivable. But despite that, they were still the last hope for Requiem Subjects everywhere; those who wished to continue living. Their saviors—devils wearing angels' faces. What they did was wrong, it was unmistakable. And even so… inside them reigned a single spiraling sensation neither of them could swat away. Regardless of their many sins, their wish was the same as Requiem Subjects' everywhere. The only one to say it, however, was her.
"I don't wish to change the past. I know I've taken innocent lives before, and I don't believe it was right for me to do so. Even so, I… I'd do it all over again. Our selfish desires thrown onto other civilians are inconsequential to the matter at hand regarding the whole Capital. If we don't move, the Capital's population will be decimated. Either by Retly or the world's powers once they realize how much of a threat we are," Katie finally responded.
"Remember what you said?" Ace placed his hand onto her shoulder. "We just need more time," he said.
"Yeah… and we're gonna use that time to explore as many options as we can before we have to resort to awakening the dormant Tower—"
The carriage they were riding in the back of had abruptly halted. Ace decided to poke his head out of the carriage's blinded windows, thoroughly scanning his whereabouts. To his surprise, Retly's citizens were completely uncaring. Either they walked past the vehicle, still conversing with their friends, or minding their business; just continually walking.
"These guys don't care about anythin', huh?"
"Looks like it. Anyway, I think it's time to leave and start exploring," Kim said, slowly standing up from her seat.
Ducking her head, her hand extended to June beside her. The two shared a quiet look into one another's eyes before Wilder finally grabbed Kima's hand. The two escorted one another out through the rear of the carriage; footwear's soles thudding against the dry ground upon landing against Retlyian soil. While they gazed from outside, Ace withdrew his head from the window and cleared his throat.
"Alright, Katie. Let's go," He said, standing up and extending his hand afterward.
The two cousins had the same moment. He didn't avert his eyes from gazing into her own. Instead, he flashed a familiar smile. A memory from the past dared to resurface, reminding her of who she stood beside. Ace Wilder. Her cousin. The one who saved her from the depths of despair and forever indebted to her ginger relative, she was ignorant enough to hope she knew him better than anyone.
Maybe she was blinded by ignorance—maybe she was right. Regardless of whichever was correct, she chased ever further into that belief, hoping to get enveloped in that ignorance forevermore until she sunk. But that desire wasn't foreign to him. There was a reason he specifically flashed only that smile and none others after. She finally melted into his eyesight, before her face fell and her eyes lowered in sync with her skull.
She grabbed onto his hand, his otherworldly strength yanking her into an upright posture. Their hands tightly held onto each other; veins spread across their limbs like an infection. In mere seconds and with one foot, they'd exited the carriage through the behind, now plunging their quartet of soles against the dry ground of Retly's sandy soil.
Everyone marveled at Retly's incredible mechanical scenery. That castle floating over the city was a sight akin to fantasies of yore. Yet for Katie, Retly's warm scenery was insignificant.
For within her, something reigned supreme. It was inescapable, inimitable. She was sure this voice was not her own—yet she succumbed, automatically listening to its commands. Perhaps that something belonged to the endless realm of time, cogs within that ever-moving machine orchestrating the events that would assuredly occur in the imminent path ahead.
She looked to her comrades. They were still in awe at Retly's structure. None of them could ever understand the weight upon her shoulders. Even if "that" was their plan from the start, what if she stood longer? So, she finally turned around, analyzing the sprawling architecture towering over her muscular build. This vast world that knew nothing of her in the past would memorize her name for all time. She would… make sure of it.
The next time Ace turned his head beside him, Katie Moon had vanished. Eternal Sight just caught her walking through a trash-riddled alleyway, disappearing into the shadows as if entirely engulfed by utter darkness.
On November 27th, 2023, Katie Moon entered the belly of Retly and wouldn't return for three years.
Next Chapter: Katie Moon.