15 ~ Verðandi

M - No...

Mary-Esther had just climbed the steps of that outside terrace, under a blinding fiery sky. It felt as if the sun had come closer to burn the world for a moment. The wind against her was fierce as well.

But that memory was worse than the world’s end.

M - No. I’m not...

Blue was pulling her ahead, making her walk a few steps against the strong wind from the landscape ahead.

The bird was pulled toward this sky, as the fire was vanishing from the sky.

The more it pulled on her arm, the faster the flames disappeared. It turned into a radiant sky in moments, scaring her as Blue was trying to escape.

The train was slowing down loudly. Freedom might be at hand, but now she was terrified. She held back Blue as it was trying to fly away.

Its talons suddenly grew to become something bigger. The bird’s body abruptly transforming and growing beyond logic, its feathers becoming a green dress not unlike hers.

The talons turned into hands, still holding onto her arms as well, as Blue was being pulled away into the sky.

So violently, all the blue colour had vanished from her. She looked into her now human eyes with obvious fright and surprise.

She discovered the same face as hers, and they harboured a similar mixture of fear and stupor.

B - Esther...

Esther felt painful shivers running along her spine and shoulders. Blue’s body was still flying and her weight pulled away from her. Blue’s hands were still squeezing Esther’s arm tight, holding herself from falling away upward.

Blue could see a terror worse than her own in Esther’s eyes. They looked like the reflection from a mirror to each other, but held their arms together. A boundary between dream and reality had fallen before her.

The train was still burning all along and behind Esther. Blue was being pulled in the opposite direction, away from it all. She could see for that moment the fires, the smoke, the chaos and the monsters... She was seeing everything that Esther went through, only to bring her there and free her...

Blue couldn’t release her grasp yet however. She couldn’t leave Esther behind like that now... After what she just accomplished for her, Blue couldn’t abandon her.

Esther was shaking, looking like she was about to cry from pain and shock. Her left arm was hurting her, as Blue was still clinging onto it desperately.

Esther felt lost entirely, refusing to understand what was happening to her.

Her blue rose... That was just it. Esther looked shyly back into Blue’s green eyes.

M - Blue... No, Mary... I did it all for you...

B - Esther... Thank you.

Esther felt her sleeve being ripped, Blue pulling her away with all the strength she could offer to still hold onto her.

Blue lost her grasp and disappeared almost instantly into thin air above her.

Esther called her name a last time in vain. Blue had called Esther too, but she was already far gone, where her voice couldn’t reach Esther anymore.

Shivering, Esther fell down on her knees. She was alone.

She looked at her left arm. Under the now ripped clothes, and under the cut of her skin, there was no flesh nor blood. There was only cloth stuffing filling her body, along with ashes inside...

As she got her right hand off from the inside of her left arm, she saw the dust and smoke held inside flying off. Her fingers were now stained only with grey.

She touched her chest to feel her heart beating inside. She bit her tongue and pulled away more of her stuffing from her arm, but nothing changed, she was only herself.

The landscape kept passing by, calmer all around her. The train was maybe slowing down in this landscape, but she knew she was now lost. The train would collapse along with that nightmarish world.

Esther cried.

~

M - I thought I wanted to leave... I wanted to live... Did I only wanted Blue to leave? My blue rose... I was only hers...

Esther stood up, facing the wind. She wanted to live too...

Not only for Blue, but for herself also.

She had always dreamt of living outside...

But the sky began to crumble. Large pieces of a gigantic roof were decomposing in different fire. The hills, the trees, the sky, everything was breaking apart.

S - The only living dreamer is gone now. Maybe it’s logical that it ends here.

Esther turned around to find a tired Scarlett standing there with burnt marks on her skin and clothes, but mostly looking sadly at her. Elise also appeared, shutting the door behind her.

S - So, Esther... That is what you chose to live for? Or what you chose to die for?

M - For the blue rose... Nothing was more important. So yes. That is what I was here for!

To save Blue from death before falling too far, in a place nothing else could reach...

Esther took all the ingredients out of her pocket and smiled at it. It looked so vain now.

She had walked, being the wish come true all this time. She had come to help Blue along...

M - Scarlett... The reason why you still look like a child to me... Maybe it’s because that’s what you looked like the last time you played with me... I belonged to Blue since...

S - That would imply we are more in your dream than in hers though. Who knows?

M - Did you see Blue around here before I arrived?

Scarlett wasn’t happy, feeling again confused and uncertain. Even though it was becoming pointless to argue about a dream reaching its end, they all had tried to puzzle its logic tale together.

S - When you appeared... We saw a lot of her in you, and not just because of your look... And now I think that she also spoke sometimes through you.

Esther lowered her head, feeling some sorrowful shame.

M - I thought I was her...

S - You were among the thoughts of too many people Esther... It got you lost and confused us all. It’s all over now anyway...

Scarlett looking at the collapsing world still had a nostalgic smile.

~

M - Still... I’m glad...

E - Glad? Why? Because you were able to make even dead people suffer?

M - No... I didn’t care about you two... I cared only for Blue. And now I think I succeeded in helping her leave this place. So I’m glad that my life began this way here, because it allowed me to help the one I loved to live...

The sisters looked at each other with wonder. Behind them the world was falling into darker nothingness.

E - Esther... The blue rose wasn’t about your love.

S - I think she’s unable to remember much from her previous owners. I mean, look at us.

Esther felt that sorrow rising again. The one she missed. The loved one she couldn’t recall, but for whom she had had overwhelming feelings prior. She’s been given from one to another, and now she could recall that deep pink colour and all it had meant for her. That immense melancholy associated with the flowers.

M - Rose...

E - I guess now is better than never to remember... Yes. Rose certainly loves Blue more than you ever did. And the blue rose we made was for them.

S - It’s time it seems. Farewell...

Elise and Scarlett disappeared in the void. The train was now falling into nil along with the leftovers of its scenery.

The last flames stretching along the remnants of the train disappeared as well. She found herself falling.

She was left alone in the dark again.

She wished she could have lived. That was her regret.

Having finally understood what her existence had been about, she still smiled. Because of her memory constructs, it had been hard and strange, but she was glad she had prevailed. It was a sad victory for her, but hopefully bright for the one she had cared for, succeeding in bringing Blue back from the dead.

M - Blue and Rose... May you live happily...

Ever after she thought, closing her eyes. She disappeared entirely.

The world sank, the last wagons of the train followed in the void.

Soon this world was gone.

~