The Sphere of Time

by TIME, S. O.

  “I need you guys to go find Hitori,” Kou says to me, Try, Andrew, and Cortez, snapping me back to reality.

  “What? No. We’re fighting with you,” Try says, but Kou shakes his head.

  “You guys are the strongest here. You’re also the only ones with experience working together. Go get Hitori and come find me.”

  Cortez shakes her head. “Man, we can’t just—”

  “Trust me. I have a plan. Just head down the left walkway to the memorial building, get her out, and you’ll be back in the fray in no time.”

  We all look at each other before Try shrugs his shoulders and walks to Kou’s left. “You better not die on us,” Cortez says as she joins Try. Andrew says nothing but pats Kou on the shoulder as he walks to the others. Kou turns back to the rest of the group.

  “Once we exit the tunnel, half of you will head down the right walkway. Groups should spread out along the walkway, and then enter the field for sting attacks. Once you pull their attention, the rest of us will launch a second wave from the walkway down here and attack those focused on the initial group, catching them off guard. If there are nymians on the field, avoid them as much as possible—leave them to Isao’s troops and use them as a distraction.”

  We all nod, and head out of the gate. Outside, we find ourselves under a covered brick walkway, just as Cortez described. Large arches leave the walkway open to the garden itself, but the overcast sky helps to deepen the shadow. The majority of the group turns down the right walkway, following Kou, while Try, Cortez, Andrew, and I head left. Through the arches we can see a massive garden, larger even than the one outside the Kurosawa mansion. Large statues and placards memorialize various fallen heroes and important battles of the first war, surrounded by flowers and winding walkways lined with fruit trees. I imagine the space was remarkably beautiful—before the addition of dead nymians and sections of blasted earth.

  As we hurry through the walkway, Andrew activates his green crystal, throwing a mirage of shadow over our group. If a guard looked too closely through the archways, they would notice strange movement, but it shields us effectively from a casual scan.

  After barely a minute of hurried sneaking, we hear shouts of alarm from across the garden, soon followed by bursts of red light. I resist the urge to stop and survey the beginning battle; the other side of the garden is too far to see anyway. As if called by the violence, the unmistakable sound of a nymian shriek joins the growing thunder of combat. The first shriek is soon joined by several more, and I can’t resist a glance. Even from this distance I immediately see the unmistakable swirl of a corrupted Tear open right above the most concentrated bursts of red light. As if it knew.

  By the time we reach the left side of the museum, we can tell the plan has started to work. There are only a few troops remaining on the second-floor balcony that wraps around the entire building, and their eyes are toward the battle. With the partial cover of the walkway and Andrew’s mirage, we successfully sneak below the balcony and up to a maintenance door. Coretz holds up her holo to the security scan, and with a cheerful ‘beep!’ the door opens. We’re in.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  T he bottom floor is open, set up with various displays and exhibits meant to memorialize and educate. Once indoors I pulse for Hitori’s energy. I find it—on the same floor as the boiling, overcharged mass of Isao’s energy.

  “Hitori is upstairs. It looks like she’s with Isao,” I call out to the others.

  “Of course she is,” Try responds, and we turn to the nearest staircase.

  We head for the top floor without much incident. At one point a couple of troops come running by, but we hear their footsteps and Andrew uses his green crystal to hide us behind a mirage wall.

  We reach an office where I can feel Hitori’s energy. Isao’s is nearby, but I think it is out on one of the balconies. I give the others a nod and we slip inside.

  The room Hitori is in is simple, with no decorations and only a few pieces of furniture. There are stacks of paperwork and a few desks with large screens on them. There’s a window in the far wall, but the blinds are pulled.

  Hitori is sitting on an office chair, staring blankly at the uneaten rations on the desk in front of her.

  Hitori looks up as we close the door behind us and instantly jumps to her feet. “What are you doing here?” she whispers angrily.

  “We’re here to help you escape,” Try says.

  “Don’t you get it? He’s never going to stop looking for me. He’s never going to stop coming after me. There’s no one on this planet that can challenge him. Every time I try to leave someone gets hurt.”

  I scowl. “But this isn’t your fault! It isn’t fair that—”

  “Of course it isn’t fair, Eiji! Life’s not fair! But I made my choice. I’m not going to be responsible for more deaths. I am a healer—and right now the best way for me to save lives is to keep my father from hurting more people because I want to escape.”

  Before I can answer, the door slams open and Isao appears.

  “Oh no you don’t,” he snarls, running straight toward us. Try and Cortez move to activate their crystals, but panic makes me faster. I lunge for the far window, yank away the blinds and make a Tear that sends Isao from our room onto the battlefield, as far from the building as I can manage. Even amidst the general thunder of battle, we can hear him roar in frustration.

  “It will only slow him down. That’s all you can ever do,” Hitori says, her gaze flat.

  “He’s not invincible, Hitori. And we have to stop him,” I say. Her expression doesn’t change, and she shakes her head.

  “It didn’t work,” Try says suddenly, and we both turn to him. “You came here to stop the violence. It was a decent play—your father’s always been overprotective, and maybe having you here with him could have stopped things, or slowed them down. But it. Didn’t. Work. You say he hurts people everytime you leave—well now you’re here. And he’s still hurting people.”

  Hitori swallows, the first hint of doubt in her eyes.

  “Time to change tactics,” Cortez says quietly. “We healers on that field.”

  Hitori bites her lip, and I try one more time.

  “Please, come with us. Let me take you to Kou. He needs you.”

  Her gaze snaps up. For a moment it looks like she’s going to lash out at me, but then her shoulders drop. With a tired sigh she stands and gives a short nod. The four of us all let out a breath and Try opens his holo.

  “Kou, we have her,” Try reports. “We’re at the memorial building.”

  “Isao’s heading back that way, get out of there!” Kou replies over the holo, his breath short.

  We sprint for the stairs without a word. Back on the first floor, Cortez opens the same door we entered through and the muffled sounds of battle change to a roar. The noise is much closer now, and I can see burning trees and collapsed statues from here. When I pulse out toward the battlefield, I immediately feel Isao’s rage, a brilliant star of fury that pierces through the tangle of anger and fear emanating from the other combatants. I can also feel a great deal more bestial rage and pain—the Tear has continued to spout nymians. I hold back a shudder as adrenaline shoots through me.

  “We have to head in. You two get to the farther perimeter with the other healers. Eiji, use your portals to send threats back to the field,” Try says to Hitori and me. My first instinct is to insist that we stay together, but I force back the urge. This is the plan, and we have to stick to it.

  “Good luck,” I manage as Try gives me an encouraging smile. Cortez and Hitori hug briefly and then the three of them charge toward the main fight.

  “Let’s go,” Hitori says, wasting no time as she breaks into a jog. We stay off the side, no longer bothering to hide under the walkway but still avoiding the main violence. I speed us up with a few quick travel Tears, and soon we are back at the gate that leads to the tunnels.

  Or, what’s left of the gate. It sits in a mangled heap, surrounded
by the rubble that was once the sheltered walkway. We stumble over bricks, trying to head to the right side of the field where other healers are stationed, when we’re stopped by the sudden appearance of Kou, who sprints in from the left, one hand clutching his side.

  Without hesitation he moves to Hitori, and they are soon wrapped in a tight embrace, as if holding onto each other for dear life.

  “Coming here is probably the stupidest thing you’ve ever done,” she says, but her tone isn’t scolding.

  “You should’ve known better than anyone that I wouldn’t leave you. There should never have been any doubt.” Their lips meet for a brief moment and then they press their foreheads together, relaxing slightly. I smile, caught up in their joy and relief. I’m about to turn back to stand guard when a sudden, tight pain squeezes my chest. My head begins to throb and I abruptly slump against a damaged wall, weakness surging through my limbs.

  “Please don’t ever leave me like that again,” Kou says.

  Those words echo in my head in my own voice, as if I were saying them myself. The pain spreads outward from my chest and I feel as though I’m going to melt into the ground and disappear. I open my mouth to call for help, but no sound comes out, and they are too focused on each other to notice my quiet distress.

  “I’ll never leave you behind again, I promise.” Hitori says.

  The words are a blade. The pain becomes impossibly sharp, my vision goes white—

  And then I’m fine. My breath heaves in and out of my chest, and sweat dampens every inch of my skin. But I’m fine—no pain, no weakness. I wearily force myself up to stand, one hand still on the wall.

  Hitori activates her crystal and sends a quick healing pulse to Kou. His breathing calms a bit and his energy becomes more controlled.

  “Come back alive.”

  Kou nods and turns to me. I quickly remove my hand from the wall, fighting back a brief dizziness. “This isn’t a goodbye. We’ll see each other again at the end of this,” he says.

  He extends his hand, and I shake it, trying my best to act normal.

  “Thank you for saving my life all those months ago,” he says.

  “Thank you for giving me a home—and a family. Thank you for giving me a place to belong,” I say in return.

  Kou grips my shoulder briefly and then rushes out to the fight.

  Hitori and I hurry to the right side of the garden. It quickly becomes clear we’re sorely needed; all but one of the healers are down. Hitori manages to save two of them, but one is too damaged to continue healing. As I glance over the field, a dull dread begins to spread through me. The sight of dead nymians and troops are evidence that our strategy worked—at first. But now the sheer strength of the nymians and experience of Isao’s troops are routing our forces. Isao himself has clearly made it back to the memorial building. Lances of brilliant red light shoot from the roof, cleaving through nymian and human bodies alike and leaving only smoking remains behind.

  Hitori’s assessment of our situation clearly matches mine. “Get back to the gate,” she tells the three surviving healers. “I’ll be sending others your way. If they can walk, send them back into the tunnels and tell them to head for the Kurosawa mansion.” They nod and head out, the two who can walk on their own supporting the third between them.

  “We need to go out there and get more. They’re not going to make it back to us on their own.”

  I nod, mouth dry at the thought of going out onto the bloody field. I spot a couple of civilians near the memorial building, one desperately trying to drag their injured companion from the fight.

  “Okay. I see two over there. I’ll open a Tear, we grab them, and then pull them back here,” I say before my nerve can fail me. Hitori nods and I make the Tear. We jump through and immediately reach out to the startled civilians.

  Before Hitori and I can snag them, three bright red lights illuminate the battlefield, accompanied by inhuman roars and a wave of blistering heat. Apparently not everyone had used up their serum. The ground shakes, and it’s all we can do to shove the two civilians through the open Tear. Before Hitori and I can follow, a nearby red blast knocks us off our feet and I lose my focus on the Tear. Ears ringing and vision blurry, I watch with strange detachment as the serum-enhanced troops set about annihilating the nymians. The beasts fall, slaughtered with shocking efficiency as the air crackles with heat and power. In less than a minute, they reduce the nymians to little more than a handful. As sound and sight return, I feel a brief moment of relief as I see a number of civilians and peace officers begin hurrying away, no longer pinned down by roaming nymians.

  But the relief doesn’t last. It’s then that the collective fighting begins to falter and now the troops that had taken the serum begin firing energy beams at whoever is nearest, their faces twisted into masks of mindless rage. Sometimes they blast the remaining nymians, but soon civilians and Isao’s remaining forces become targets as well. Everyone scatters, looking for places to hide as Isao watches unflinchingly from the balcony.

  In the end, two of the serum users cross paths. As blinding flashes of vicious red light pulse from their fists, they tear through each other without hesitation. In a shockingly short time, both have fallen, limbs hideously torn and scattered. The third serum user stands in the center of the battlefield and sends random smaller energy beams flying in all directions to try and hit as many people as possible. Several of the beams hit the ground, creating a dust cloud that blankets the area. Suddenly, one precise, massive beam shoots through the haze.

  When the dust settles we see Kou standing on the ground in front of Isao’s balcony. Kou is outlined in a controlled red aura—and the serum user has a charred hole in the middle of his chest. The body collapses with a sickening thud as everyone watches in silence. Kou and Isao stare at each other as darkness looms over us.

  “Kou…” Hitori whispers.

  Kou tries to leap up to a portion of the building that’s been blasted in, but Isao sends an energy strike right below where Kou would land, sending Kou back to the ground. Kou attempts once more, but this time Isao launches an energy blast directly at him. Kou barely manages to launch his own energy blast at it to cancel them out, but the resulting explosion sends Kou flying back away from the building.

  I take a step, preparing to run to him, but I drop to the ground instead. My vision blurs and my muscles refuse to respond. I look down and realize I’m slumped in a puddle of blood. A dim signal tells me to look at my chest and when I do I find redness and burning. One of the stray blasts had found their mark.

  I know immediately that the wound is fatal. That information doesn’t stir a panic, oddly—just a vague sense of dismay. The world swims around me as a torrent of thoughts, regrets, and wishes flow through my mind, but I don’t feel any of it directly. I watch these hopes and dreams and questions rush by as if I were standing on the edge of a massive waterfall, passively observing the water that crashes away into oblivion. I turn to look at Hitori but her attention is glued to the battlefield. Something about seeing her sharpens my focus and I try to call out to her, but no words come. Cold and darkness wash over me as I sense the presence of Death approaching.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  I wake up standing beside a damaged stone fountain in the middle of a burning garden, unable to move. After a few seconds of disorientation, I recognize that I am standing in the memorial garden, a few dozen meters from the museum. I try to move, but my body doesn’t react to any of my commands. Why can’t I—

  I have to stop him. It’s the only way. I hear Kou’s voice ringing inside my head—no, not just his voice. His anger, his panic, his determination, his very self. My head turns left, toward the fountain spilling water onto the charred ground. I see Kou’s face reflected in the water. He closes his eyes and I’m brought back to the Victory Dinner, to a memory of Kou dancing with Hitori on the balcony. This time, however, I experience the moment from Kou’s perspective. A perspective that would’ve been impossible for me to see.


  “I vow to always protect you,” Kou whispers into Hitori’s ear as they—no—we dance in each other’s arms. She exhales pleasantly,

  “You mean I’ll keep saving you.”

  “I mean it. I’ll fight for you ‘til the day I die,” Kou says.

  I feel Hitori’s arms press around me—him. Us? My perspective jitters like a shaky video as my mind tries to reconcile my experience of the moment from two different angles, two different memories.

  “It won’t get to that. We’ll leave before it ever has to.”

  “I promise.”

  The memory fades, and its warmth goes with it. I’m back in Kou’s body by the fountain. He presses his hand against a boulder that was once part of a nearby statue. I can feel everything he does, but I’m not in control of anything. His anxiety. His fear. His uneasiness is almost identical to what I felt at the beginning of all of this. I can’t escape his head.

  I will free Hitori. I’ll end things here. The thoughts echo through me, more conviction than words. He takes a deep breath and walks out. Isao is still standing at the top floor balcony, watching us. His gaze is sharp and unforgiving.

  “You should have run away. I gave you a way out!” Isao yells.

  “You left me no choice!” Kou shouts back. “Look around! This madness must end!”

  Isao steps onto the balcony guardrail. “That’s exactly what I’m doing,” he snaps before jumping off.

  He lands hard but without apparent effort as the ground cracks under his feet.

  “I’m ending this.”

  Isao’s fiery red energy envelops his body as a wave of force roils outward from his scarlet form. Kou swallows hard, taking an involuntary step back. Power pulses from Isao’s crystal, stronger than I’ve ever felt before. I feel a crippling trepidation run through me, and I know it originates from Kou. I remember this feeling from the first time I saw him. This is what he felt as he stood by the river as a child, waiting for Hitori.