Thank you, Klyson. I'm so sorry if I was burdensome to you today.
The words Soho told me as we parted ways after the mission yesterday echoed inside my head. My eye then opened—the ringing thoughts in my mind waking me from my slumber.
[ 10:07 ]
It was morning time.
I got out of my bed and switched on my light, noticing a white envelope on the floor by the door in its usual spot. I picked it up and opened it, not at all expecting to read what was written in the letter.
{ You will not be receiving the $25,000 commission for Dante Hade, because you failed to execute Dante Hade— }
My eyes widened upon reading this.
W-What—? I 'failed' to execute Dante? But I watched him burning to death myself!
I continued to read.
{ —If you look at the news, you'll find the words "Man with Fire Fractal Burns Down Orphanage and 52 Children With It" written everywhere.
Do you understand what you've done, Klyson?
Dante's Fractal was Infrared Heat Emission. But now it has been revealed that not only is he still alive, even if imprisoned, but that Dante achieved a Fractal Activation. Whatever you did to attempt killing him must have suited the conditions for a Fractal Activation, because his Fractal never involved fire before.
His Fractal has evolved.
Do you remember what I told you was Heathen's purpose? It was to prevent things exactly like this from happening. Yet, you ruthlessly, carelessly, allowed this to happen. Your accomplice has confirmed it with me herself. You ran away with her rather than staying to finish the job. With over 70 perfect executions, I least expected to see you falter with a target at all, if ever. So tell me now, Klyson Rainer.
Whose fault was it? Yours, or Soho's?
If your accomplice is causing you to make mistakes like this, then I will simply remove her from the picture.
I expect to have results made up to me in your next target, which I will assign tomorrow. Don't disappoint me now. }
I placed the letter on my desk slowly, trembling ever so slightly. As alarming as all the information revealed in the letter was, only one thing stood out to me.
'I will simply remove her from the picture.'
Coming from Ian, I understood exactly what that meant. I knew that he looked at his proxies as disposable, whether Absolute or Inspired, and Soho was no exception. Ian looked only at what could be done to further his ambitions for Heathen, even if it costed millions of lives along the way.
He was threatening to get rid of Soho, all because I made a mistake with one target.
Fuck. Shit.
I thought about all the work I'd done in the last three months, eradicating one target after the other. But there wasn't a single moment in all those times that I don't remember Soho aiding me somehow. From the start, until now, Soho had guided me on my journey in Heathen. She gave me a place of belonging at the Waving Kitty with Draz. She assisted me in any way she could with her Fractal whether I needed it or not. I'd never properly taken the moment to stop and recognize how Soho had made my transition into this rough life smoother than it should have felt.
She even saved my life that one day.
Soho, you're amazing.
I couldn't help but get caught up in my feelings. I understood that I saw her as more than an accomplice by now, even if I denied it. Doing what I did in prioritizing her back at the orphanage only confirmed that. If I was still the cold and calculated person I was before meeting her, I wouldn't have cared about tending to her feelings at that moment. I would have finished the job.
Fuck.
I'd suddenly struck a nerve. Something, unwillingly, was resurfacing within me. Something I'd turned away from for the sake of conserving my mentality, and sanity. Something, a memory, I'd let die along with the old me. But subconsciously, that old me had been restoring itself little by little, all as I realized how much I cared about Soho, how much I relied on her Fractal for help during my missions, and how much I depended on her for moral support through the thick and thin of this life in Heathen. I realized I'd unknowingly followed the footsteps of someone's values I'd chosen to shun long ago, all because it resulted in an outcome that changed me.
Kyra.
It was just a few months ago that I witnessed my world collapse in front of me, as Kyra met her demise because of one faulty mistake. As Darius had put it bluntly, Kyra was too caught up in the ideal of trusting and relying on the people around her, that she doubted the possibility of it attributing to her downfall.
Yet, that was exactly what'd happened.
All because she let those beliefs—that trust in friends—get the best of her, she died an awfully unexpected death. It was in that moment, and in the event that followed afterwards, that I established my stray from Kyra's path of beliefs. I'd told myself that day that I had no choice but to confide only in myself, because confiding in others put myself at risk, the same way Kyra had.
How hypocritical of me.
I laughed at myself with the realization that I'd unknowingly followed through with Kyra's beliefs anyways. Even though I killed my persona and my beliefs the day I awakened my Fractless potential, it couldn't take away from the values I so closely coincided with Kyra.
The old me, Klyson Rainer, had never died after all. It was always there all along, simply suppressed beneath trauma.
'I will simply remove her from the picture.'
But Ian's words taunted me. They reminded me why I tried to stray from that path in the first place. Not just because it would put myself at risk, but even others. And right now, Ian was making a perfect example out of that.
Soho, the one closest to me right now, was at risk of being a casualty in my name.
No, I can't let that happen. I can't let anything happen to her.
Soho had always been a great deal of help to me in my missions, but the way I saw it now, her life was not worth risking.
Why, Klyson, why? You told yourself you wouldn't let something like what happened to Kyra happen again, yet here you are in the middle of it all once more. Why are you putting other people's lives at risk for your own mistakes!?
First, it was my fear and inability to do anything as a Fractless that resulted in Kyra's death. If I had been stronger, smarter, and overall more reliable at the time, she could have still been alive today. Now, it was my blindness, and attentiveness to Soho that was putting her at risk for one of Ian's casualties. If I hadn't let the kind, emotional side of me take Soho's feelings into consideration, and instead went through with my logic reasoning—to finish the job and eliminate Dante while he was set aflame—then Soho's life wouldn't be on the line right now. I was making yet another mistake, and putting another person I cared about in danger again.
This can't be happening again. I won't let it happen again.
Before, I was bested for my inability to do anything. But now, I had the ability to do something about it. I was not going to let down this time, even if it meant turning Soho away.
I'm sorry, Soho. But I need to do this, for your own sake.
I'd chosen, in my mind, to proceed on this journey alone. Soho had done enough for me up until this point, and I cared for her a lot because of it. But it was for that very reason, for that fragile care I had in her, that I could not let her continue with me.
I will not let myself lose those close to me, ever again.
I'd made up my mind.