January 26, 2006, 22:00
Beijing, China
Andy has learnt at some point in his childhood that the world is an unfair hell of a place, and that he was one of the unfortunate people that had to dirty their hands to get the bare minimum of anything in life, to survive day in day out.
"Are you done packing?" CuiFen asks him, her frown as deep as it always has been. She's towering over him, ready to throw hands at any moment of a misstep.
He's on the verge of crying, but he holds it together, because the last time he let his tears out, the woman beat the shit out of him, and that's not what he would like to think of as his last memory at the orphanage.
He hates CuiFen, with all she is. She's a siren, but surprisingly has one awful voice that he can't bare to hear, nevertheless when she screams at him for the dumbest reasons.
"Get going, bastard, I don't have all day for you."
He's getting kicked out of the orphanage, for simply being too much of a handful, according to CuiFen. He doesn't quite understand why him of all the kids, but he knows that CuiFen is never seeing the gates of heaven for how she treats them all. She has her favourites, but Andy was quite the opposite of that.
The entire system is a mess, and he's the victim of those who have failed to run those established systems.
The only person he'll be missing when he's gone is JingFei, a girl very dear to his heart and the only person that has ever smiled at his face and treated him equally as anyone else. She has always hugged him after he gets beaten up or scolded, she has always given him a shoulder to cry on.
He has been abandoned since the moment he was born, left on the street when he was a few weeks old, getting picked up by a stranger and beginning the saga of being dropped from one orphanage or foster home to another.
He often looks at the mirror and asks himself what is so godamn awful about him that makes people hate him so much. How bad was it for his parents to throw him away like a garbage bag without thinking twice about his future life, that if they ever thought he'd survive or just die from hunger.
Andy takes one last look at the crowded room of kids, all watching him as he leaves them for good, probably never seeing them again because he thinks he'll die on the streets as quick as a goat in a lion's cage.
He walks out with CuiFen to the front gates of the orphanage, his bag filled with ragged clothes and his favourite comic book. There's a car waiting for him outside, and he wonder for a second where the hell is her being delivered to this time.
CuiFen doesn't say anything, she just tosses him with a jerk to the back of his shoulders off outside and closes the door abruptly behind him.
He finally allows his tears to hail down his cheeks. He's so cold and hollow, he's in so much mental pain he doesn't even want to move or try to survive.
The driver screams at him to get in or he's gone, but Andy doesn't move a muscle. He just stands there, waiting for CuiFen to open the door and smile at him, takes him in her arms, treats his wounds due to the other kids picking on him, hugs him to sleep as she sings him a lullaby, tells him she loves him before she gives him a good night kiss.
But it all sounds so good to be true. Because reality is far from it, reality is harsh and scary, and he thinks he's way too young to deal with it on his own, he's only a twelve year old after all.
At some point, the driver does drive away, and Andy is glad, he doesn't need help, not from him, not from anyone. He has been let down way too much to need the hand of someone else.
And so he walks and walks and walks, he keeps walking. To where? He doesn't know. But he sure hopes whatever is there waiting for him is gentler than all his orphanage keepers and foster parents, he hopes he finds a home one day, the warm arms of someone who will accept him for who he is, someone that would love him with all his hideous flaws.
Andy wishes he could find someone that loves him unconditionally.
*
July 14, 2021, 2:01
Thomas's castle
"For starters, I'm very much aware of how terrified most of you are, even if you try your best to hide it. This might not be new to us, we might be tackling the same weight of crime day in day out with maniacs and psychopaths. I know most of you lived a good part of your lives here, the world still feels wrong, imbalanced, if you will. I know that much and feel that much." Evdokia says, hands clasped behind her back as she walks in circular motion, head low.
She has everyone's undivided attention in the room, and she suddenly remembers Rati's words.
"It's a lot worse than you might think. I just think I should put that out there." Thomas mumbles loud enough for everyone to hear, and their faces fall, "I'm not saying this to discourage you, but rather to prepare you."
Evdokia eyes Thomas, and something feels wrong, nothing she can quite pinpoint, but its her gut feeling. She pushes it aside.
"Anyways, the plan isn't exactly put yet, we need to storm every mind in this room to figure shit out. Our only advantage right now is having Thomas on our side." Evdokia says, and she hopes with all she is that she believes what her tounge is saying.
"Hmm. But there's so much I know, especially given that I was never allowed in political meetings our clan would organise." Thomas flicks his wrists.
"At least you know how bad it is for other nations, correct?" Valodya asks suspiciously.
"yes. Not much to be heard of, anyways. The vampire clans have most of the rest of small kingdoms under their ruling and their laws, while some larger kingdoms are still fighting, some have fallen, some haven't. "
"That much we know." Evdokia hums, " But we need to talk forces. Which nations and kingdoms still have their armies together and under their orders."
Thomas doesn't answer to that, instead he looks as lost as a fish out of the water with its fins. It can't use them to crawl or fly.
"I don't know." He settles on saying in the end. "but I do know that I can provide us with weaponry. Ira, he should be able to find the Atlantic empire soon by now. We can join forces and-"
"No." Jean says.
"excuse me?" Thomas asks.
"No. We're not dragging the Atlantic empire or king Dima into this." Jean elaborates.
"What? You expect we can end this by just the mere force of us?" Thomas scoffs.
"That was the plan wasn't it?" Robin raises an eyebrow at Thomas. "we agreed on only asking help from nations who are already in need for our help. We're good fighters, everyone in this room is. If it's a matter of the vampire's clans, we, only us, can take over the Edgar clan at the very least, plus the warriors you already have."
"How is that solving anything? My father has an entire army of vampires and fucking onis, we don't stand a chance." Thomas trues.
"Then what do you suggest?" Reema asks.
Thomas doesn't answer, instead he sighs heavily.
"I don't know. " he says at last, "I just...can we sleep on it and talk in the morning when my head is clearer?"
Even if everyone in the room didn't necessarily agree on that, they still go along with it because as a matter of fact, they do have to relay big time of Thomas.
Thomas leads everyone to their rooms and washrooms to find their comfort in the place. Before Evdokia goes to bed, she catches Thomas when he's by his room's door. She holds his upper arm tightly and whispers in his ears, "One lie. Just one lie, Thomas, and I'm crisping you alive in the sun light."
Thomas gulps, eyes wide, but he nods.
*
July 14, 2021, 07:19
Thomas's castle
Evdokia finds YuNing and another boy in the kitchen when she leaves her bed for a fresh breath of air.
The boy's name is Mosaab if her memory serves her well. He was one of her recruits at some point during a major case. They were quite a group of creatures who kidnapped humans and tortured them in rituals. They were a huge group, trading between each other their catches as they liked calling them. It disgusted Evdokia to her bones, and she knew her fire of rage wouldn't cool down unless they kill every last one of them.
At that time, Evdokia had asked the chiefs to be given a whole operation squad to cut them down to their end in one go, and it worked out. It was a bloody bath, but they managed to pull the roots of the venomous plant.
At that time, Mosaab was seventeen, he's now twenty.
"What are you doing, staying up this late?" she asks them casually as she pours herself a cup of ice cold water. She notices a book, or an album, in Mossab's hand. She raises a questioning eyebrow at it.
"Ah, I was showing him this album of pictures. I haven't shared it with someone before because my parents told me to never show it to anyone in the human world. But now that we are here, I guess I can share the beauty of those memories with someone." He smiles widely at her as he passes the album to her.
Its a screens album. She thinks that's probably an old piece of junk to people of this realm at this point, with how fast their technology was evolving until she left. Although, she has her doubts about much of evolving given the world's circumstances.
She flips through the thin pages of beautiful sceneries of their world. From the magical Atlantic empire and the rainforests to the dark valleys and mountains of fire and sand to the moonfolk's kingdom up in the sky.
"Have you been to all of those places?" she asks as she lets her eyes linger on that one image of the sky castle, standing tall above the ground, water falling off another cloud next to the castle, inviting the people living on the clouds to their source of life.
"No, it was my parents'. I haven't seen them since they gave me to a group that was immigrating to the human realm." His voice is sad, but not too much. He's a war elf, one of the first kingdoms that has fallen. If her maths is correct, he was probably a few months old when he was given away, meaning all he knew about his parents was through this album and possible written letters. "I hope they're still alive, I have a lot to ask, a lot to give to them."
It pains her, that nostalgia to your loved ones that have been snatched out of your grasps for no apparent reason isn't that far from what this boy is looking forward to.
She closes the album gently, handing it back to Mosaab.
"Would you like to see some of those locations in action?" she asks excitingly, grinning at both of them.
Mosaab looks baffled, but he nods, a spark of a young child that never got to be one, finally showing on his face.
If she remembers the routes well, she knows that the sky castle is near this castle. The only thing standing before her and seeing her home again is a bunch of enforcers scattered around the territories.
Thomas's map. She remembers Thomas mentioning stealing a map that shows where the enforcers are located. It belonged to his father.
She brushes her hand on YuNing's shoulder as she walks past him, murmuring wait for me here, as she climbs the stairs to Thomas's room. He's sleeping like a rock, just like he used to when they were kids.
She fumbles through the magical maps collection he has, until she finds the one she needs.
"bingo." Evdokia grabs the map and heads downstairs after putting on her shoes. On her way out of the room, she notices a bed empty in the room. She doesn't dwell on it and just leaves. Someone is probably in the bathroom.
"put on your coats, we should be able to go and come back before dawn." She's wearing a black hooded coat herself, black leggings and shirt with a pair of white shoes.
Evdokia grabs her gun and sword just in case, not wanting to take any chances.
They start by heading down the underground tunnel, taking a different opening than the one they came in from. She doesn't know where the tunnel heads to exactly, but she knows that's her way home.
Its a long walk and she feels her eyes stinging from the darkness, until she sees the end of the tunnel.
Evdokia's nose catches the smell of something so real and so godamn close to her heart.
Gardenia flowers.
Evdokia forgets about the fact that YuNing and Mosaab are with her, and she starts sprinting to the other end of the tunnel, the longing to seeing the tall walls and pillars of the sky castle digging deep through her saw and leaving her raw and scared. But what does the world has to offer her other than a broken heart and a burnt down wing.
The sky castle is nowhere in the sky. The clouds are empty. The clouds look so fucking empty. Evdokia's heart sinks down to hell and comes back up, her head lightening with every step she takes closer to the grounds under the clouds that once held what she calls home.
When her eyes are met with rubble and huge shards of broken marble she falls to her knees, just like how the sky castle has fallen.
The sky no longer holds the humongous castle it once did, the clouds are no longer pouring waterfalls. The entire kingdom of the moonfolk's has fallen, literally fallen from the sky to the ground.
Evdokia slaps a hand onto her face before screams started escaping her throat, broken and heart shattering whines and moans she didn't even let out the day her parents have died between her arms.
The moonfolk's kingdom is gone. Gone into the wind. Like a jenga tower that was toppled down because of one missing piece.
Evdokia loses the sense of time, and she's feeling numb all over. She thinks someone has their hand on her shoulder, but she's way too senseless to be sure of it. For all she knows, it could be one of her ghosts. She can see them too, standing right above the rubble of home where bushes and twigs have grown over the white marbel. Their reaction isn't as bad as Evdokia's. Something tells her it's because they're not real, that they only knew that much the day they died. But she likes to think differently about them.
Eventually, she stops crying. Her throat is soar and her cheeks are wet and stiff. She looks beside her to find the two boys beside her. YuNing's arm is flung over her body, while Mosaab's hand is squeezing hers.
She keeps on squeezing her eyes shut, opening them back up at the clouds, waiting for the illusion to be gone. But it never does.
The sky castle has fallen.
The moonfolks kingdom has fallen.
Evdokia gets up with the help of YuNing, she chuckles darkly.
"I guess destiny never wanted you guys to see the moonfolk's kingdom." She wipes her tears and grabs tissues from YuNing's backpack, blowing her nose off.
"I guess not." Mosaab murmurs. Suddenly he ducks his head and drags both Evdokia and YuNing behind a bush.
"Wha-?" YuNing is about to ask but his question is muffled by Evdokia's hand on his mouth.
It's Andy, with another vampire and what seems to be a whole squad of geared up creatures. Evdokia is a hundred percent sure the other vampire and the creatures aren't part of their group.
"Fuck, what is Andy doing here?" Evdokia whispers under her breathe, but she feels YuNing tugging at her sleeve, and she looks his direction, he looks mortified.
"That's Markian. That's the guy that kidnapped us." YuNing whispers, and his face is paler than a ghost.
"impossible, Reema's squad and Valodya killed them all." Evdokia breathes out.
"Apparently not." Mosaab grits his teeth.
Before Evdokia gets to react, she hears a gun being fired, and she doesn't realise that she's the one who got shot until she feels the blood soaking her clothes.
"Fuck! Get down!" Evdokia pulls Mosaab and YuNing downwards by their arms, and snatches her gun off and fires back at the figure, straight in the head.
She looks back at Markian and Andy to find them gone.
"we need to move, now." she could see more people coming from the sniper's spot, and she doesn't think she can take them all out alone, not while being shot.
She still hasn't felt pain, so sprinting away was not the issue stopping her, but rather Andy.
She knows how much the kid means to Reema and Robin, and she-
And it finally plays in her head.
The men who attacked them on their way to the safehouse after Evdokia sent the location to Reema.
The tracker.
Andy being the only one who didn't get injured in the fight.
She finally sees it.
"It's Andy." She whispers to herself, "Andy is the rat."
*