Xander took a second to look at the blocky houses, each styled in a different colour. His memories came flooding back of just…existing here as a child. Before everything involving Chelic happened. He suddenly felt free. In that moment, he wanted nothing more than to just lay down under the setting sun and let the remaining warmth wash over him, before it retreats and he gtt dinner and a rest in his comfy bed. He looked around to see the surrounding housing ships, wondering if he could recognize his old one from the distance. But before he could sink fully into the pool of nostalgia, Julian knocked him over by rushing past, carrying Cassandra's cold body in his arms.
The layout of the streets was eerily familiar to Julian. He had only stopped here a couple of times with the Battlestorms, but that was only odd jobs with missing person cases in either the capital city or a small housing ship, and probably not the one he grew up in. But winding through the narrow streets was all too familiar to him, from the days of him and Xander playing tag and hide and seek. Memories he never really put much stock in, but the comfort was the closest distraction from what was currently going on. He was able to get to the main city. Past the main street shops was what looked like the red cross of a hospital sign.
He ran to it and opened the door. The mood was gloomy, even by hospital standards. But that didn't matter. He ran up the reception, slamming the small bell to notify the staff.
"Yes, hello?! I got a dying girl here who needs medical attention, right now!"
The receptionist barely moved before Julian was screaming at her to hurry up. Cassandra was eventually put on a stretcher and carried to another room. The room was almost impossible to Julian to get into, due to whatever was happening one door to the left that required dozens of people to wait outside the door, some with camera equipment for some reason. Maybe some celebrity got drunk and punched above his weight level before paying the price, it didn't really matter.
Julian stood by as some nurses watched over Cassandra.
"What happened leading up to this, sir?" A nurse asked after taking him aside and trying his best to avert Julian's gaze from Cassandra.
"Well, she was pumped full of blood to help her fight off threats better, but we might have overdone it, and now I don't know what's going on with her!"
A doctor approached Julian just as he was about to burst into tears.
"Sir? Sir? Your friend is fine."
"What?" Julian asked.
"She just seems unconscious from a mild shock. I'm assuming some wielder messed with her blood levels before they stabilised. We'll let her sleep and run a test on her tomorrow morning, and we'll let her go if nothing's up."
"So we're all good?" A young looking nurse asked, smiling at Cassandra's body. "At least something good came out of today."
As the other three ran through the hallway to Cassandra's room, they scooted past some cameras, before instantly being shoved back and directed to Cassandra. Once all the stress built up in Roxanne's body left in the form of the longest sigh she had ever pulled off, her phone rang, and she retreated around the corner until the sound died down to answer it.
The call was from Willow, her voice piercing through the hallways as soon as the phone was answered.
"Roxanne? This you?"
"Yeah?"
"Are you at the Roperia medical centre?"
"Think so?"
"Is Nuria dead?"
"Is Nuria what?!" Roxanne asked. She stood waiting for Willow to clarify the statement she misheard. She surely misheard that.
"Dead!" She repeated, more aggressively. "Look, you're on the floor, just push past them until they kick you out!"
Roxanne closed her phone, running in the direction of the crowd, sneaking past the camera man and shoving past the people at the door, coming face to face with Nuria's body.
What was left of her face lay in one last agonized expression. Her previously tanned skin was replaced by the whites of her skull peering out over it. And above that was a perfect small circle for a hole, right above her head where the attack landed. Roxanne was pulled out of the room by a guard as she opened up her phone.
"How is it?" Willow asked.
"There's…there's a hole in her skull, Willow. She's dead."
A suppressed moan was heard from the other end.
"Willow, I'm not sure if you noticed, but I was off the ships yesterday. Did I miss anything?"
There was a pause.
"Wait, shit! The news was reporting you dead!" She yelled out after a brief second. "How'd you get back?"
"We used the person inside the shield. Look, I'll explain it the next time we meet up, what'd I miss?"
"Well…Zach died."
"Wait, Zach…how?"
Roxanne stood in place trying to wrap her head around all this. Nothing about it felt real to her. Two leaders were dead and she was only gone a day.
"Look, Javier's here on the phone. you're in charge until he gets back tomorrow. Let him speak to the media people."
"Roxanne, was it?" Said the voice. It sounded like Javier, only the voice was heavier, trying it's best not to waver.
"It's me." Roxanne whispered back.
"Cool. Can you show me the media people?"
Roxanne moved to the room holding Nuria.
"We're here." Roxanne whispered.
"Hello?" Javier asked. "Am I clear?"
The media people stopped crowding the door and moved on to Roxanne. A few eyes were focused on her, enough to make her uncomfortable, but most eyes were unblinkingly staring at her phone.
"Prince Javier?" A woman with a microphone asked, unflinchingly staring into the flip phone. "How do you feel about your mother's death?"
There was a brief silence.
"Take a fucking guess!" He eventually screamed over the line. "Look, I know this is a major event, but can you have an ounce of fucking respect for her?"
Microphone lady turned her nose up at Javier, going back to the door. But in front of it was Julian, Xander, and Cecilia."
"You heard the ruler." Xander said. "Get lost."
Microphone lady tried pushing past him, but Cecilia delivered one open palm strike to the gut, leaving her on the floor. She scowled at them, but left the room. All the other news stations followed.
"Did I go too far?" Cecilia asked, turning her head to Julian with an expression of second hand pain.
"Eh, I reckon you hit it just right." Julian replied with a casual hand wave.
"Now then, are the doctors still with you? Because I'd like to speak to them."
"Yeah, They're here." Roxanne nodded, handing the phone to the doctor in the room.
"Look." Javier sighed. "I know I'm asking a lot, but please let my friends stay in your hospital if you have a spare room. After what I've heard they've gone through, I'm sure they can be spared at least that."
"I'm sure we have more rooms." The doctor nodded, glancing around the room to check.
"Excellent. And also…thanks for preserving my mother. I'll be back tomorrow."
The phone hung up, and the others were directed to their rooms. Roxanne and Julian stayed with Cassandra while Xander and Cecilia got their own rooms.
Night time.
Xander lay awake in his hospital room. He somehow couldn't sleep. He wandered through the hallways staffed by nobody but a few nurses, none of which tried stopping him. He stepped outside, watching the night time streets. Nobody knew who he was. At this moment, nobody was expecting him to do anything. If he felt like it he could take advantage of the current situation and just run somewhere. Anywhere. Get a job in some cybersecurity business and go from there.
"Nice place you got here." He whispered to himself.
"It really is." Cecilia replied.
Xander jumped slightly at her voice.
"Honestly, as much as I wanna hate this place, it looks pretty." She continued, looking up at a streetlight. It was pretty. Metal with some fancy spirals covering the circular bulb. "So, what's keeping you up?"
"Just thinking too hard. You?"
"Probably the same." She nodded. "What you thinking about?"
"I guess…helping the rulers."
"Ah. Still not used to heroism, I take it?"
"Blocking a door isn't the most heroic thing ever, but sure, we'll go with that. It's also just…I was told what happened to Nuria."
"Well, you probably know who did it to her, right?"
"I can guess. Legion number three, guy named Levin. Never seen him in person. From what I know he just kind of appears and leaves whenever he feels like it. Don't know the guys exact powers, but they always leave the victims with a perfect hole on their bodies."
"So are you gonna release this information?" She asked.
"How am I meant to do that?" He asked with a pained expression overcoming him. "What would that even be like!? 'Hey, I have real important information on the highest ranking Legion members. Please don't question how I got any of it' Like what am I meant to do?"
He looks towards an unimpressed Cecilia.
"Do you not remember our conversation on the ground?"
"About my redemption?" Xander asked.
"Correct. If you have anything to say, anything at all. You need to tell them."
"Okay, but-"
Cecilia put a finger to Xander's lips with her left hand, and snapped her fingers with her right.
"No buts. Tell me, why are you doing this?"
"To kill Chelic." Xander replied.
"Is that it?"
"Look, all I wanted was to get out of there and live a good life with my girlfriend and my teammate. My girlfriends dead, my teammate is probably dying as we speak, and all I want is to kill the bastard who did it."
"So you don't care about your brother?"
"I mean, I'd prefer him alive, clearly. But he still doesn't feel like my brother in much besides names. Not like we had the time to do much brotherly stuff anyway. So if I have to let him die to kill Chelic, I'm fine with that."
"Hey, I get it. Did I mention I had a brother?"
"Nope."
"Well, I did. He was the one who killed me. Don't recall a moment of hesitation as he slashed my head off. But he's probably dead now, so I'm not really worrying about it."
"I see."
"But anyway, I appreciate the honesty. Too many people would say some drivel about the greater good or honour, but you? I can respect you. So if you don't mind me asking, I would like your permission to pursue vengeance."
"Okay? Why?"
"I imagine the heroes can do their honourable thing while we get to kill those responsible. We got a deal?"
"Sure lady. We got a deal."