This World Belongs to Us

23: Azarial

Azarial burst through the door to the bedroom. He was instantly confronted with the sight of Joseph's burnt body resting against the side of the bed. The feeling of shock and disgust at the sight of even more death managed to be quickly overshadowed by Azarial's sudden bewilderment.

There weren't any windows in this room. All of the upstairs rooms had windows. This didn't make any sense.

Azarial realized that Liara had not followed him into this room, so he went back into the hallway and immediately realized his surroundings were frightfully wrong. He saw the corridor repeated through the window at the end. He noticed the dark staircase leading down to where the first floor should be.

The singing had stopped. This was clearly the work of the angels. He swore loudly at them and smashed his fist against the wall. They had already killed two of his friends. What were they trying to do now? He didn't have time for this bullshit. He had to get to Sumita.

Azarial began to quickly explore this new setting. He climbed through the window and entered another hallway. He opened a door and walked through four repeating bedrooms before turning back. Joseph's body had vanished from the first room. He was starting to get very annoyed. This wasn't like a maze to solve. It felt like he was pointlessly walking in circles.

He eyed the staircase. It was angel technology. It had to be the same as the dark stairs in the basement. It had to eventually lead somewhere. He gritted his teeth, activated his Vi Athenemate, and began to climb down the spiral staircase.

The darkness seemed thicker than usual here. His light could barely illuminate the next curve of the staircase below him. But this didn't matter. All the steps were the same, and he descended at a fast pace. It became a dizzying experience very quickly, so he turned his focus purely on his feet and imagined that the stairs were not spiraling around into infinity. He just had to get out of here. There was no time to think about what had happened...

Fuck him.

Why did he have to be the one to open the door? He knew there was an angel in there. He should have thought more tactically! It wasn't a good time to be so fucking stupid!

But... none of that would have happened if they hadn't gone to the tent together. Look at how much good that little trip did. His reactions were probably slowed by the morphine. He couldn't react in time. And what good would all these bandages do now? Kivar was dead. They should have just stayed in the cabin. Why didn't anyone say that? Since when is splitting up ever a good decision?

Fuck Kivar. That self-centered, uncaring, unsympathetic, violent asshole.

He had always been the odd one out in the group. He was so hard to talk to. They had gotten in fights before, some that turned physical. It was never too serious, but still, the guy just didn't know how to act around others! He had never been a good person.

And yet... there were some times when he was fun to hang out with.

So, fuck him. Fuck everything.

"Fuck!!" Azarial screamed into the darkness. The sound didn't echo. It just vanished, as if the absence of light swallowed it whole. He glanced around. This wasn't a tunnel. It was a void.

He increased the light of his Vi Athenemate and tried to see if there was anything around him. Surprisingly, his light actually revealed something in the distance. He squinted his eyes and leaned forward to try and get a closer look at the object.