"the moon and me are like this 🤞"
ᴍᴇʀᴍᴀɪᴅ ᴏᴄ
A tale of two impoverished sisters.
Luna and Marina were once nobles in an underwater kingdom formerly known as "Esdelle." That was until one day, humans came and wiped them out in what is now known as...
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⋆.ೃ࿔*:･₊ ⊹
Luna and Dazai were told to wait outside Yosano's office so she could attempt to give the girl an efficient treatment, though the doctor knew it would be to no avail as all previous patients had been.
Now the two were sitting across from each other on some plush benches on either side of the hall, the moonlight illuminating both of their faces. Luna had her elbows resting on her knees, her head hung low as some of her hair fell in front of her face, hiding it.
Her thoughts were all jumbled. She was supposed to be back home by now, deep in the water, away from it all. She was supposed to be telling Marina her plan. She was supposed to be using the wishbook to rid Hanako island of its curse. There were many things, but here she still was, up on the surface, waiting outside a doctor's office for a dying girl.
"Luna." Dazai said, watching the woman with hooded lids. He was trying to get her to look at him. Luna didn't raise her head, but she did respond, a certain thought about the incident looming in her mind.
"I thought you said the victims of the curse only start to move slowly at first before all the other stuff happens.."
"Yeah," Dazai began. "She's a kid though. The effects work twice as fast because her body's so small." His tone softened a bit, but his eyes were dark and dull.
"How did she even get here? It took us hours yesterday just to get to her village."
Dazai was silent for a moment. He'd had the same thought.
"Brigg has business down here on the weekends. So she must've been with him and then sought you out to return the necklace.. speaking of, why did she even have it?" Dazai asked as he studied her, something subtle now hidden in his deadened expression.
"I was showing it to her, and then I.. guess I never got it back." Luna answered, her eyes fixed on the turquoise pendant. She let the chain gently glide across her fingers. There was a brief period of silence between the two after that.
Luna lifted her head after a moment and looked straight at the brunette.
"But tell me this," she said with a stern voice. Dazai looked her straight in the eyes. "How are you immune too?"
His eyebrows raised slightly, but then his expression slightly softened.
"Right, that. I guess we never told you, did we?" He began, leaning forward a bit and clasping his hands together, the moonlight hitting his hair, making it a shade lighter.
"Among this island are those called 'Gifted.' Each of us in the King's guard have a specific special ability. We all have different strengths we use to work together, which is why we're regarded as one of the most powerful organizations.." He paused for a moment, looking off to the side.
"My Gift in particular allows me to nullify another's, and since I'm immune, we have reason to believe that the curse was placed by another Gifted."
Luna's eyes widened slightly as she looked back at the man, trying to process his words before he continued on.
"Although.. we don't know how true that is.. because Yosano's ability on the other hand, doesn't seem to work on patients who've been cursed."
"Yosano's ability?" Luna asked, images of the woman's office flashing in her mind. The bright light, the different equipment, the bottles and vials of medicine. The cleaver.
"Hers is called 'Thou Shalt Not Die.' She can heal any fatal wound." Dazai stated.
"It works in any other given scenario where the recipient's injured, but not on people who've been affected by the curse, almost as if they're bound by death.. So we think the nature of the curse is a bit more complex. And also because in normal circumstances, I'd be able to dissipate it just by touching the island, but since I can't.. it means we have to start by finding the source," He said, locking eyes with her. "We thought you might be able to help with that."
Luna thought his words over for a moment. Then she almost physically recoiled when she came to a certain thought.
So his ability cancels out the curse from killing him, so he's able to touch the water like me.. but then Yosano's ability doesn't work for some reason? Is this curse.. affecting me too somehow? Is that why I can't turn back? Before Luna could linger any longer on these thoughts, the door of Yosano's office opened. She poked her head out of the doorway, and Luna's heart slightly dropped. She could already tell by her expression what was about to be said.
"It's time to say goodbye.."
Dazai entered a few steps behind Luna. A chill ran down her spine when she saw the little girl's face. She immediately went to her side, sitting on the black, wheeled chair beside the bed.
There was a bit of dried blood and saliva at the corners of Delilah's mouth, her lips slightly parted. Her eyes were shut, and her body lay there motionless.
"I tried the usual procedures.. I was able to keep her heart beating for an extra five minutes, but I'm not sure there was even a point." The doctor said.
Dazai stood nearby, leaning up against the wall. He didn't look at any of the scene happening before him, just straight ahead at the night sky out the window. He'd already been through this before. Too many times.
Luna just squeezed her eyes shut. She could hardly stand the sight of the girl suffering like that.
Luna knew suffering. She'd met it a long time ago. Images of her mother and father flashed in her mind–images of random people, different voices screaming, images of blood rising and mixing in the water, but she wasn't sure whom it belonged to. There was so much. Those were the few bits and pieces of the battle she remembered.
In the darkness of her thoughts, her mind suddenly flashed back to the tavern.
'..truth is, cool pop had a son. Looked just like him..' Brigg said.
She tried to imagine another man who looked like Dazai. Two Dazais.
Cool pop looked so happy getting to dance with him like that. She was so sure something terrible was going to happen in that place, only to be met with that scene, followed by Brigg and Delilah's sudden presence.
She opened her eyes and gently grabbed the little girl's hand. She lowered her head and leaned forward slightly. This was the type of pain cool pop had to endure when his son was killed. All because of the curse.
All for a stupid necklace..
What's her father going to say when we have to tell him?..
"I'm sorry.." She whispered, squeezing her hand a bit.
This would have never happened if I had just stayed.. Her eyes widened. Was Marina right after all? Was Luna truly mistaken in her thinking? Could she ever really be fit to live amongst humans?
Something caught in the bottom of her eyes just then.
A faint, blue-ish green glow began to reflect from the necklace.
"Um-" Luna was about to sit up when Delilah suddenly broke into a coughing fit.
Luna simply froze, watching the once assumed dead girl start to sit up on the bed. She looked down at the pendant hanging from her neck, the blue-ish green light reaching its peak, swirling around in the air, then around the little girl before faintly dying back down.
A silence fell over the room. Nobody spoke for a very long moment.
