Countdown from Three

~Chapter 6~ Where I'd rather be

Arcthorn stumbled, and fell. He knew he was out of Azure's sight now, had she looked at him from the window when he left, all his vulnerability would be visible to him alone. In the quiet night, he was here, on his own. He laughed at his own stupidity. What made him think Azure would look at him at all? She wouldn't care the least; she had said that much. Why would she care if she had hurt him?

Her words had cut him, more than the sharpest blade in the whole of Empyrean and Clandestine ever would. Simple words she said; they depleted all the strength inside him.

To keep talking was a challenge. To stand up was a challenge. To walk was a challenge. To put on a façade in front of her as if he wasn't so terribly hurt was the most challenging of all. He had surprised himself by accomplishing all of them after she spoke the words that shook him to the core, and kept his façade on all the way until here. Here it collapsed and shattered. He couldn't hold it any longer.

It was night.

Rain drizzled. Rain from his hometown, Empyrean. It seemed like heaven now.

The coldness lapped against his hair, sliding to the tip, and dripped on his shirt. He watched with cold detachment, vaguely aware that the light rain was turning into a downpour.

Lightning tore the tranquil sky apart with transient luminosity; thunder cracked furiously. Arcthorn's hand curled into a tight fist, pressing it on his chest so hard that he was sure it would bruise. But why, then, does his heart still felt as if being pierced by a thousand arrows? Why did it feel like the world's weight was crashing down onto him? And why was there no pain when he saw blood on his clenched fist, escaping between the gaps of his fingers? His chest was constricted; he leaned forward gasping for breath, hands on the ground in front of him, supporting his weight.

More rain, endless rain, poured down on him mercilessly, soaking him from head to toe. Staring at the blackened sky, Arcthorn struggled to remember when there was ever a sun up there, when it was bright, when there were clouds against the celeste blue, when sunlight was cast down from there that lit up the world. He tried to imagine the sun rising tomorrow, clearing the gloom of night.

He couldn't. He couldn't remember when he had last seen sunlight; he couldn't remember what it felt like to have its warmth showering him. Was it bright? Was it comforting?

Had his world always been so dark, so cold, a world where sunlight didn't belong?

Even in Empyrean, it rained every night. Even in Empyrean, the sun would set, darkness would fall. What about on earth?

He shut his eyes. A strand of his jet black hair pasted on his cheek; rain slid along its length, travelling all the way to the corner of his mouth. His lips were pressed into a thin line, tasting rain water. It was salty, and bitter, like a drop of water in the vast ocean; like a single tear.

This isn't him. He was never melancholic, never dramatic. Where is that confident strategist gone? "The pride of Empyrean," was the repeated compliments he used to respond to politely - but now so desperately holding onto for the sake of discovering that boy again. Infinitely frustrated at his own lack of self control, Arcthorn threw himself back lying flat on the ground, exposed to the rage of the storm entirely.

Hadn't he planned out everything? Hadn't he spent months preparing for this trip, putting everything on the line? There's everything to lose, but there's nothing to lose.

If he didn't stand up now, the clock will tick down to the second Doomsday. Only this time, there would not be a redemption. He would allow the age of humans to end in fear and horror, all of mankind eradicated in deadly cold or heat, or the onslaught of meteroids. What would be left? Nothing. Not his father and mentor, not his beloved mother, nor friends, nor acquaintances... Not the books he cherished, nor the history and memories of anything he'd ever adored. Lost forever would be the irreplaceable home, for him and millions of others in Empyrean and Clandestine.