Ding!
We'd arrived at the fourth floor. There was an eerie quietness to it when we stepped off the elevator, as if all noise had subsided the moment we'd shown up.mBefore any of us could take as much as a glance around, the consecutive noises of four cameras breaking came through.
"I'm quicker this time," Celeste said, with his palms four glass shards lighter. Now that the eyes to the floor were shut, we could explore freely without worry. But still, I remained worried. Something about the absence of what was expected made me feel anxious.
"Isn't it awfully quiet?" I said.
"Whadd'ya mean?" Sav replied.
"I mean… J's fighting the tenants just a floor above us, right? Shouldn't we be able to hear that?"
Kyra looked up. "You're right. When we were up there earlier, we were able to hear the rumble of tenants rushing up from the lower floors. So we should be able to hear their stomps if they're just above us."
"Must mean J's finished all of 'em off," Sav said. He smirked at the thought. "Guess A.X.A. was right after all, J was more than enough—!"
The ceiling above us suddenly caved-in.
Rumble! Crash—!!!
We dove out of the way, just barely avoiding the debris that'd fallen over where we previously stood.
"What the hell!?"
The dust quickly settled, revealing a handful of tenants with their glares set on us. They began a dash towards us.
"Run!" Kyra yelled.
We all turned foot and sprinted for the other end of the hall. As we did, I could hear the rumble of the tenants' footsteps in our pursuit. Soon we approached a dead-end, and once we did, we turned around to confront the ones who ambushed us.
"I thought J took all of 'em out!" Sav said.
"You spoke too fucking soon!" I told him.
With our backs against the wall, there was only one direction we could go: forward.
"On me!" Kyra called out. She activated Panorama and unsheathed her knife. I saw that we had no choice but to follow her lead. I took my knife out and Celeste readied his remaining glass shards, while Sav situated himself at the back. As the tenants came flying forward one-by-one, Kyra dodged their attacks accordingly and struck their vital points.
"Back me up Klyson!"
"O-Okay!" I replied. In that moment, as Kyra swayed aside to avoid the attack of a tenant, another one incoming grabbed hold of her arm. The force knocked her knife to the ground.
I seized the moment.
With no time to hesitate, and with no room to falter, I immediately dashed forward with my knife raised in the air and swung downwards. The slash cleanly sliced the tenant's arm in half, releasing the tension that grasped Kyra's wrist. But I hadn't taken into account the other tenant waiting for me, just right there. I was in a vulnerable position.
"Duck!" Celeste yelled from the back.
I dropped to the floor the quickest I could, and as I did, I heard the sound of a glass shard slicing through the air above me, nearly trimming my hair. In an instant, a number of tenants in front of us grabbed their suddenly bleeding throats and fell to the ground. Celeste had thrown a flurry of his shards their way. Now only a few remained.
"You okay, Kyra?" I tried helping her up. She didn't need it though, as she'd already started pushing herself off the ground.
"I'm good. Let's do this."
I watched as the remaining tenants roared our way.
"Like New Zina?" I asked.
She looked at me and smiled.
"Like New Zina."
We both charged forwards in unison, our knives gripped tightly in opposite hands. With what I could count, there were only five tenants left. As I came into contact with the first one, Kyra swiped by and attacked the second. We both overwhelmed our enemies with a combination of hits, followed by a finishing stabbing blow. Soon, there was only one tenant left.
"I got her!" Kyra said. She leapt towards the tenant, and with her swift flexible movements, the attack on the tenant was with ease. Kyra gracefully splattered the final remaining tenant's blood on the walls.
"Wow..."
Although the scene was violent, I couldn't help but feel captivated by what I saw. The woman was beautiful, and a badass too.
"Shit, you're amazing!" I joined her by her side.
She brushed it off with a smirk. "You gave me the confidence to fight this way."
We stared at each other for a moment again.
Bang—!
In front of us, the door from the stairwell suddenly burst open, and through came dozens of tenants running up from downstairs. As if in synchronization, more tenants began to fall through the hole in the ceiling from the fifth floor. Me and Kyra were suddenly in a position where we were covered from both ends: tenants coming from the door on the left, and tenants coming from the hole in the ceiling on the right. We'd been completely blocked off from contact with Sav and Celeste.
"More tenants?!?" I couldn't fathom it. They were rushing us from both ends and would soon surround us completely. "This seems like way more than I remember there being!"
I looked over to Kyra, and she had no reply. Her mouth hung open with shock as she looked back between the tenants and me. Her breathing had become shallow.
"This isn't good... I thought J had taken the majority of them out!"
"I thought so too!" I readied my knife, but my hand trembled. As hard as I tried to grip the handle steadily, it was too loose to even strike properly with. I'd never found myself in such a vulnerable position before, but finally being confronted with it, I was scared.
"I'll take the front, you take the rear!" Kyra activated Panorama and prepared for the ambush on her end. I tried, once again, to hold my knife properly, but it was slipping past my palm. I was nervous. I wasn't prepared.
I was scared beyond measure.
Up until this very moment, I'd been carried past hardships in my life as a Fractless. Although I was different, I was treated with extra care. I rode that privilege all the way towards my future, until now, where the hardships I should have faced were finally catching up to me.
I didn't know what to do.
All these thoughts and emotions swirled inside my head like a whirlpool. Time seemed to slow down while the tenants rushed towards me with mindless agitated expressions on their faces. I was dumbfounded by the amount of responsibility I'd been faced with in this singular moment, and for the first time ever, I wished not to be grouped alongside the ones with Fractals.
This is what people with power must confront with their strength?
Understanding that to the fullest extent now that I was bearing witness to it upfront, I suddenly realized I wasn't ready.
I was never ready for something like this.
As a Fractless, it was never my responsibility to put up with an event that required so much strength. I had nothing to offer in a moment like this, just like how I had nothing to offer during the war with Invidian, or how I couldn't even offer help to Garren in time before he fell victim to his own body.
I'd never been able to do anything for anyone.
I've just been a burden.
Shank!
A knife reached past me, stabbing the tenant in front who'd nearly struck my face.
"Klyson! What are you doing?!" It was Kyra. In the moment I faltered, drowned too deep in my own self-conscious thoughts, the woman I looked up to had to defend me for my own mistakes. I was ashamed.
"Get yourself together!" She yelled, as the tenants closed-in on our circle. If I didn't pull my weight in the next few seconds, we'd both be overwhelmed.
Still, I succumbed to the weight of the overflowing pressure.
On the other end, attempting to defend herself and my paralyzed state, Kyra was moving from corner to corner, fending off as many tenants as she could at once. Her breathing was heavy, and it was shallowing by the minute.
"This isn't good! This isn't good!!!" Her eyes were straining with the prolonged use of Panorama, and her arms were aching by the constant swinging of her knife. I could see, from my perspective as the bystander, that she tried her absolute hardest to keep us afloat in the sea of chaos.
"I can't let you get hurt too Klyson!" I heard her whimper. Her breathing had transitioned into a wheeze, as her lungs were working past its limits to keep me untouched from the countless tenants that threw themselves at us. I tried to move and do something to help, but it were as if my body chose not to. As much as my mind screamed and screamed, my muscles had stiffened, and my feet were glued in place. My knife had dropped to the floor by now due to the constant trembling.
"Agh—!" I tried to reach for it, but I shuddered with hesitation. My fear of death was at its peak. And if it were to come to that, I couldn't blame anyone but myself.
Can I really blame myself though?
My mind began to counter the guilt that built within me.
You're a Fractless. You were never expected to perform at that level in a situation like this. It is the responsibility of those with Fractals that should excel in these kinds of moments, not you. Your actions right now are justified.
I was trying to convince myself that what I did was okay, that standing-by while the ones who actually had powers did the dirty work for me.
A Fractless had no place in doing what those with Fractals did.
"Shit! SHIT!" In the panic of the chaos, Kyra stumbled her footing. We now both found ourselves in positions susceptible to the tenants aggression.
"KLYSON—!" She reached her hand out for me, but the tenants quickly overshadowed us.
My eyes widened with shock as I was about to face the repercussions of my mistakes. Kyra had done as much as she could to fend the tenants off, but now they were upon us. The flood of their savage motion was about to eat us whole.
It would all be over soon.
It should have been over in an instant.
"AGHH—!!!"
Out of nowhere, Kyra screamed an ear-piercing screech from within the pile of attacking tenants. Unbeknownst to me at the time, her eyes had just shot red with an instantaneous burst of pain. Blood leaked from the corners of her eyes, as her pupils dilated beyond a measure she'd never surpassed before.
As hell broke loose among and over top our bodies, Kyra, underneath it all, realized one new prominent thing.
She could see everything.