Christine had been lucky. She’d sensed the rushing water and reacted quickly, erecting a strong wall of ice that curved around her and Lindsay like a half-dome. Even so, the sound of water slamming into the barrier raged in their ears, and they could still see the water from the other side as it rushed past their position.
They also saw several very unusual sights play out.
“Christine,” Lindsay muttered as she pointed, “is that a man in a kayak?”
Indeed, moving through the waters was a man in a kayak. He looked like one of those extreme daredevils that pulled reckless stunts for fun. He soon swept past them, his kayak carried by the ravaging waters.
“Yes,” she muttered, dazed by the sight. “Yes, it is.”
“Okay,” Lindsay said, nodding as if everything was normal.
The next sight that crossed their field of vision was two people on a surfboard. One was a man, the other a woman. They were both butt-naked, save for the whip-cream covering key parts of their bodies.
“Christine?”
“Yes?”
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
Christine took one look at the naked couple, and promptly turned green.
“Me too.”
Several more unusual people flowed past them, including a pink-haired man riding a shark, a mini-sub with a window that had a strange man wearing large spectacles looking out of it, and a pair of children fishing as they sat in a washtub. Christine tried to ignore the stupidity of what she was seeing and focused on her friend instead.
“Are you okay, Lindsay?”
“Yeah… I’m fine.” Lindsay gave her a smile that didn’t fool Christine for a second. “I’m more worried about our friends.”
Christine was also worried about the others. They’d been down by the beach. She squeezed her eyes shut as she imagined the wave crushing her friends. She was even worried about Iris, that annoying vixen who did such a good job of pissing her off. Christine hoped they were okay.
“They have Kotohime and Kirihime with them. I… I’m sure they’re all right,” she said, though part of her remained unconvinced.
“Yes… I’m sure they’re just fine.” Lindsay’s smile said that she didn’t believe what they were saying any more than Christine did, but she wanted to remain hopeful. Because sometimes, hope was all a person had.
During the time they spent waiting, Christine thought about this strange occurrence. While it was impossible to know what had caused the tidal wave, that did not mean that she had no hunches. Whatever had caused this improbable situation was not natural. It couldn’t be. And if it wasn’t a natural occurrence, then that meant it could have only been caused by one thing.
A yōkai, or several, had created this perilous phenomenon.
The thought sickened her. How could a yōkai, how could anyone, do something like this? Christine had no doubts that, even if Kevin and the others had survived, none of the normal humans had. They would have been crushed beneath the massive tidal wave, their bodies broken. What sort of monster could unleash a technique like this with innocent people around? She didn’t know, and a part of her hoped that she would never have to find out.
“Christine,” Lindsay grabbed her attention. “The water stopped.”
Christine looked around to realize that her friend was right. Some water still remained in their area, but the water level was rapidly decreasing. Still, she waited for a few more seconds before letting the half-dome protecting them melt.
The levels had decreased to the point where only their feet got wet. However, the devastating after-effects of the raging waters remained. Signs were bent and twisted, their poles nothing more than lumps of metal that reminded her of half-formed pretzels. Park rides were destroyed, some were gone entirely, swept away by the water, while others had simply collapsed.
It wasn’t just rides that had suffered. Many people looked to have been injured as well. A middle-aged man lay motionless on the ground, while a little girl—his daughter, she presumed—was shaking his shoulders as if trying to wake him up. Blood ran from a wound on the father’s forehead, and the girl was crying incessantly, asking him why he wasn’t waking up.
Those two weren’t the only people who had suffered either. Everywhere she looked, someone was injured. Bodies of all shapes, sizes, ages, and genders lay strewn across the ground. Some were moaning in pain, while others were completely motionless.
“Oh…” Lindsay whispered, holding a hand to mouth, looking sick. “This… this is so horrible.”
Christine agreed, but she didn’t say anything. Nothing she said could make this situation better. Instead, she grabbed her friend’s hand and led her down to the beach.
The wave had receded long before they arrived. The beach was mercifully clean of corpses, which Christine had expected to see in abundance. She could only assume that they had been washed out to sea. However, the contrast between now and several hours ago was startling. To think that this place, which had once been so lively mere minutes before, was now a graveyard—unsettling didn’t even begin to describe it.
Luck finally seemed to be on their side as they located their friends. It was hard to miss them, since they were the only people left on the beach. They stood in a circle, crowded together. Kotohime and Kirihime looked exhausted, their bodies slouched as if they’d spent weeks awake without rest and were then forced to do strenuous labor. Alex, Andrew, and Justin seemed somewhat disoriented, but other than that, everyone else appeared to be fine.
“Guys! Hey, guys!” Lindsay waved at her friends as she and Christine ran over to the group. “I’m so glad you’re all okay!”
However, while Lindsay smiled and cried tears of relief, and even Christine showed how happy she was to see them alive, the group they ran to remained surprisingly somber.
“Guys…?” Lindsay’s voice trailed off. No one spoke. No one said a word. Not an, “I’m glad you two are safe,” nor a, “I’m so relieved to see that you’re alright.” Nothing. What was going on?
That’s when they both noticed it. Two people were missing.
“Guys…” Lindsay’s lower lip trembled. “Where are Kevin and Lilian?”
Kotohime opened her mouth, but no words came out. That’s when Christine noticed that the maid was crying, and she wasn’t the only one. Kirihime shed silent tears as she held Camellia to her chest while the five-tailed kitsune looked confused.
“Kirikiri, what was that wave? Do you know? What happened? Where are Kevin-kyun and Lilian?”
Her words made Kirihime stifle a sob. Kiara clenched her hands until her knuckles turned white. Even Iris, normally unrepentant in everything she did, had sunk to her knees, buried her face in her hands, and wept bitterly.
“No,” Lindsay whispered, her voice wrenching with agonized shock. As she gazed at the faces of those around her, the blond tomboy stumbled backwards as if she’d been physically slapped.
Christine held a hand to her chest, sinking to the ground as a sharp pain stabbed her heart. It felt like a hole had appeared in her chest, a gap in her heart where something had once existed. Images of Kevin flashed through her mind and the hole grew wider.
On that day, Christine lost the most important person in her life. Oddly enough, she couldn’t seem to shed a single tear.
***
The trip back to the resort was a quiet one. Even Eric was silent, lost within his own mind, not even looking at the many beautiful females in bikinis that surrounded him. Camellia sat sniffling in a corner, tears still running down her cheeks from having learned the reason Kevin and Lilian weren’t with them. Kirihime had done her best to comfort the woman, but it was hard when she herself was so distraught. Christine and Lindsay leaned on each other for support. Lindsay’s eyes were red from crying, while Christine’s were blank and dull and lifeless, like a doll’s. Even the cat, which had stayed by the bus as they enjoyed the beach, had an aura of despondency surrounding her.
The only one who did not appear completely br
oken was Kiara. She remained stoic, a bastion of strength in a turbulent sea of crestfallen emotions. Sitting beside her, Kotohime remained dead to the world, eyes glassy and dull as her mind replayed her failure over and over again. If only she had been just a bit faster, she could have saved them. She had failed to protect someone important to her again. Was this her destiny? Doomed to be incapable of protecting the people who mattered most?
While Kotohime’s heartache was powerful, it did not compare to the devastation that Iris felt. Lilian. Her dearest, most beloved sister was gone, and what had she, Iris, done to help her? Nothing. The only person that she had ever loved was dead, and she hadn’t been able to save her.
She sat against a wall, knees drawn up to her chest, arms wrapped around her legs, and her face buried into her knees. She didn’t cry. She had already run out of tears. Her eyes, red and swollen, remained shut. Her mind, wracked with guilt, became a receptacle for something sinister.
“It is the way of things.”
The voices returned. Dozens of wretched voices, beings from beyond dimensions whispering a cacophony of sickening words that made her want to hurl.
“What has a beginning has an end. Everything that lives must eventually perish.”
“Be quiet…”
They offered no platitudes. They didn’t care. Nothing mattered to them but bringing this world to its final demise.
“All will eventually become one with the void. There is no way to stop oblivion from spreading.”
“Stop it…”
Within the darkness of her own mind, Iris struggled against the incomprehensible whispers of creatures that defied time, space, and dimension. She pressed her face harder against her knees and tried to block out the voices to no avail.
“… Shut up…”
Iris never noticed the inky blackness coating her nails.
***
It was a desolate group that arrived back at Sobre el Natural. The difference between how they were that morning and how they were now was like night and day. Where before, everyone was laughing and having fun, now they were silent and despondent, their faces filled with grief and their hearts with despair.
They walked into the resort, ignoring the many people passing by, just as they, too, were ignored. These people didn’t care about them, about their heartaches and their troubles. Like two strangers passing in a room. You might be curious about that person and their circumstances, but really, it wasn’t any of your business, and so you just moved along.
The group split up after reaching the hotel. Iris entered the girls’ bedroom and buried her face in her pillow. No one else went in. They left the young vixen alone to her grief.
Kotohime went off somewhere with Kiara. No one knew where they went, but they didn’t try to find her. The traditional Japanese beauty had been about as distraught as Iris. They would let Kiara deal with her. Kirihime had also escorted Camellia to their room, where the woman’s loud bawling started up again.
“Come on, Apprentice.” Heather placed an arm around her student’s shoulders. “It’s not good to keep all those feelings bottled up.”
She drew Eric to her chest, holding him close and letting him rest his head on her bosoms. For once, Eric didn’t think about how amazing her breasts felt against his cheek. For once, he didn’t think about the fact that he was resting his head against a woman’s breasts. For once, that didn’t matter.
He wrapped his arms around Heather’s waist and cried. Christine would have been shocked, but she supposed that even a pervert like Eric had more on his mind than perverted stuff.
She left the hallway, seeking comfort in solitude. She walked along one of the many paths that ran through the resort. Her already weak legs eventually lost the strength to support her, and she found a bench to sit on.
She stared out at the surrounding view, a panorama of greenery and natural beauty mixed with Mediterranean architecture. During any other occasion, Christine might have admired the beauty. That day, she saw none of it.
Unlike the others, who were all distraught, Christine felt nothing. She was empty, like a chalice that was once full, but the contents had been poured out. Kevin was gone. She hadn’t been there to see it, but the evidence was undeniable. He was gone. How was she supposed to feel about that?
Kevin, the young man whom she’d confessed her feelings to and been subsequently rejected by. She still loved him despite his rejection. That was the curse of being who she was—no, of being what she was. It was unlikely that she’d ever find somebody else who could be to her what Kevin was. Even if he never loved her, Christine would never be able to love anyone else. It was only now, after he was gone, that this fact truly sunk in.
I’m so stupid. I know that I said we’d still be friends, but I… I should have tried harder to make him fall in love with me.
I’m sorry, the voice of her alter-ego said. I knyow how much he meant to nyou. Thanks to nyour genetics, it will be impossible to find someone else who can—
Shut up! Christine sniffled as she wiped at her eyes. Just stop talking! It’s not about that! I don’t care about our genes! I just…
I knyow. just want Kevin to love nyou the way nyou love him.
Christine remained silent. There was nothing she could say to that.
“I was wondering where you’d gone off to,” a voice said next to her.
Christine looked up to see Lindsay looking down at her. The blonde looked about as good as Christine felt, which obviously meant she looked like shit.
“You look like shit.”
Christine had no issues telling her this either.
“So do you,” Lindsay fired back.
The blonde tomboy sat next to Christine, who watched her for several seconds before returning to gazing at nothing. Silence eclipsed them. Unable to scrounge up the desire to speak, Christine was loathe to break it.
“It’s hard, isn’t it,” Lindsay said, her voice so soft that Christine almost missed it. “Knowing that someone you love is… that they’re not… not here anymore… I… it’s weird. I feel like there’s this gaping hole in my chest.” As if to emphasize her point, Lindsay placed a hand over her heart and clutched at her shirt. “It hurts so much, like someone shoved a hand through my chest and tore my heart out.”
Christine still said nothing, but her hands began to tremble. Lindsay turned to her.
“I don’t know if that’s what you’re feeling, but I want you to know that I understand how much it hurts. I also know that you shouldn’t keep these feelings bottled up.”
“I’m not bottling anything up,” Christine whispered, but the quaver in her voice betrayed her thoughts.
“You are.” Lindsay’s smile and bloodshot eyes were filled with equal amounts of sorrow and compassion. “I know you are. Throughout the entire trip here, you didn’t cry. Not even once. You love Kevin even more than I do, and now he’s gone. That has to hurt, but you don’t have to keep that bottled up inside of you.” Christine became stunned when Lindsay pulled her into a hug. “Let me shoulder some of this pain with you.”
Christine’s eyes blurred with tears. She tried to keep them in, but it was impossible. A sob wracked her body, shaking her frame. Pain unlike anything she’d ever felt filled her chest. She wanted to tear her own heart out, if only to stop herself from feeling this way.
She didn’t know how long she cried. Her mind wasn’t capable of telling time. She eventually became aware of a hand that had, at one point or another, began stroking her head. It was comforting. It helped soothe her frayed nerves. Cries turned into sniffles and sniffles soon stopped altogether. All that was left was a dull ache in her chest.
“Do you feel better?” Lindsay asked.
“A little bit,” Christine confessed.
She pulled away to thank her friend, but appreciation turned into shock when she realized that Lindsay’s entire front was covered in a thick layer of ice. The girl’s light skin had also turned a startling, ghostly pale.
Becau
se their bodies ran so cold, yuki-onna could not produce tears like humans did. Instead, they shed ice—even their sweat came out as sleet. While Christine was only half yuki-onna, that half of her was the dominant side.
Christine’s eyes widened. “I-I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s okay.” Lindsay smiled and shrugged, even as she shivered. “I know you have trouble controlling your powers when you get emotional.”
Christine blushed. She wanted to deny those words, but really, how could she deny something when the evidence was staring her in the face?
“Thanks,” she mumbled.
“You don’t need to thank me.” Lindsay shook her head. “Whenever you need a shoulder to cry on, I’ll always be here for you.”
Christine wished she could have smiled. She was grateful to her friend, truly. Yet, even though she felt better, all she could think about was how her one chance at happiness was gone forever.
Her life would never be the same again, no matter how hard her friend tried to cheer her up.
***
Kotohime and Kiara walked down one of Los Angeles’ many streets. The sidewalks were crowded with people who pushed, bumped, and shouted, all of them trying to arrive at their destination without delay. No one seemed to care for the two non-human women walking amongst them, though the one dressed in a kimono and carrying a katana did generate some stares.
“… And in other news, a most unusual occurrence happened this afternoon in Long Beach, California.” Kotohime stopped in front of a small shop. A TV sat in a glass display, and the female news anchor on it was giving the latest news. “A large tidal wave crashed into the beach in what scientists are calling an anomalous and unprecedented disturbance in the ocean’s tides. It is believed that the cause could possibly be related to global warming, however, no evidence has been given yet to suggest that this is indeed the case.”
Snorting, Kotohime ignored the rest of the reporter’s words and started walking again. That woman knew nothing.
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