Because the airship was falling, Arcturus found it hard to maintain his balance; his bangle was sliding towards his direction, which he instinctively caught and shoved in his satchel. Nova, on the other hand, was still queasy from his motion sickness; he was wobbling and staggering and then fell back. Arcturus carefully held onto him as he thought of a way to escape.
There's not enough time to find a lifeboat. Ten minutes will fly by if we move at our current pace. What should we do? Escape? Where will we land if we jump from that hole? Wish to teleport? To where? The cave? That area is beaming with soldiers. The area where the old lifeboat is? It's been over a month. I don't remember what the area looked like due to the blizzard; I don't even know if the boat is still there; it could have drifted off for all I know. If we teleport there, soldiers could still find us too.
He realized that either escaping or staying would lead to his own death, so he became frustrated; wishing for something wasn't helpful either. Last time, he was guided by Kori to escape; he was only able to do so because he had trusted him. Realization came to him as he figured out the answer to his problems: he needed trust.
He looked at Nova; a sense of sadness came to him. Nova was extremely wounded from his ordeal with M541-WLF. Because he had used himself as bait, he was a bloodied mess. His sweater and pants were drenched in lavender blood, yet he was still breathing as if it was the norm for him. Was it wrong of him to ask this request?
No, it's not wrong. It shouldn't be wrong if we want to escape.
Arcturus had remembered what Nova said about how Souhait had three hundred and twelve abilities; if his words were true, flight should be one of them. "Nova, can you fly?"
"Excuse me?" Nova asked.
"Can you fly? We can escape the airship if we jump and fly to safety."
"You want us to jump off of this ship…?" Nova questioned with fear plastered on his face.
Arcturus's eyes widened. "Do you not like heights?"
"Souhait's actually not fond of them. We rarely use our power of flight because he's afraid of looking down when doing so."
"We need to get out of here, though." Arcturus looked up and cursed as he realized two minutes had passed. "We have eight minutes left before this entire vehicle explodes."
"We're afraid." Nova looked even more terrified.
Despite Nova's fears, Arcturus decided to scoop his other arm under Nova's knees and then stood up while carrying Nova bridal style. Nova became flustered. "What are you doing?"
"We're wasting time if we keep bantering back and forth. I'm going to jump off the ship with you. All you need to do is fly."
"We're afraid, though!" Nova held onto Arcturus tight while trembling.
Arcturus gripped him tightly. "Just trust me. We'll get out of here. We'll be in an unknown location, but we'll figure out where we are and where to go next together. Isn't that the purpose of why you wanted me to be your companion?"
Nova leaned back so that he was looking straight at Arcturus's gaze. The fearful look he had became a relaxed one as he held onto him tightly again. The trembling ceased. "We trust you. Let's go."
Arcturus nodded as he took a deep breath. He took a step forward, but lost his balance again. He gritted his teeth and did his best to not drop Nova. He took another step but staggered again.
If only there's a way to maintain my balance…
He felt Nova placing his right hand to his chest. His gesture helped him realize what it is he had to do: wish to never lose his balance, which he did. When he opened his eyes, Nova removed his hand and Arcturus took a step forward. He did not stagger. With newfound confidence, he dashed towards the hole and jumped out. They were now falling. Arcturus glanced over to see if Nova would start flying.
Nova leaned over towards his ear and whispered "Hold on tight," as he started glowing. His body elongated, just like how Arcturus remembered it back in Nova's cottage; his limbs shortened. His clothes slowly tore off from his body, and blew away with the wind. His skin gradually changed into lavender scales. His blond hair grew longer, changing into purple. His facial structure changed from the normal humanesque shape into a draconian shape with the long snout; golden horns grew out from his head. In a matter of seconds, Nova had become Souhait in reality.
Arcturus had latched onto him so tightly during the transformation that he realized he was upside down–under the body. He slowly climbed over so that he was sitting on Souhait's back. They were no longer falling, but floating in the air. The wind had felt nice, but he needed to assess their current location. They were near a large clear dome that was most definitely the rumored barrier of the isolated city of Sirius. From what he could see above, the city was too dark for him to look at fully. From above, it looked like a calm dark sea of twinkling starry specks. It was a beautiful sight, one he wanted to engrave into his memories forever.
"Beautiful…"
"It's only beautiful visually. The inside of the city is anything but." Nova sounded rather displeased.
"How do we get into Sirius?" Arcturus asked Nova.
Despite having the appearance of Souhait, Nova's voice remained. "We barge in." Arcturus realized this transformation was only Souhait in appearance as it was still Nova in control.
"How?"
"Like this!" Nova took a deep breath and then breathed out purple fire, melting a portion of the barrier.
As Nova kept melting the barrier so that the hole would be wide enough for him to fit through, the airship finally exploded. The pressure of the sound caused a portion of the barrier to crack, but also caused Arcturus to react poorly. He covered his ears but was also writhing in pain due to the pressure in his ears. His ears were ringing loudly and they also felt numb. He couldn't hear anything, not even if Nova was talking to him. He almost fell off of Nova, but he latched back on as a reaction. He gritted his teeth to withhold the pain.
While his hearing was out of commission, Arcturus had to rely on the other four senses. He could see that Nova was finished with melting a hole that he flew in; he latched onto Nova's soft and coarse mane tightly as he entered with him. The air inside of the city smelled similar to the oxygen outside; it tasted the same too.
He saw flashing lights approaching their way, to which Nova breathed fire in retaliation. The smell of the purple fire was rather intense compared to regular red fire; he even believed it smelled stronger than blue fire. The lights that were approaching them were enemy airships trying to shoot at them, but couldn't. Due to Nova's flames, airships were caught on fire as well as a few crashed onto skyscrapers and the interior of the barrier.
He felt Nova's movement becoming rather erratic; he accidentally bit the inside of his mouth, so he tasted a bit of metallic blood. He was rather worried about why Nova was behaving this way; he wondered if it was Souhait reacting poorly due to his acrophobia or Nova's motion sickness taking over. He did his best to latch on tightly.
He saw the draconic body glowing. His grip on Nova's mane loosened as Nova quickly reverted back to his normal self. Both Arcturus and Nova started falling. Surprised, he reacted by grabbing Nova's arm and pulled him towards him. He held onto him tightly, shielding his unconscious body as they both fell further down.
Arcturus was surprised to feel rather relaxed as he was falling to his imminent death. Was it because he already accomplished everything he wanted? Was he satisfied with the results?
He started remembering how he fell into a trap door. He started chuckling as he remembered everything he could remember about his life until now.
I guess this is how it ends.
He closed his eyes and smiled as he accepted the outcome.