Ashes of Nyseros

"Hold my hand and don't let go, ok?"

"Okay." A young girl, around six years of age, grabbed her older brother's hands as screams of terror were rang out from beyond them. Soldiers, tanks, and other armored fighting vehicles rushed to reinforce whatever breach had occurred in the flickering planetary shielding as untold amounts of drop ships came in from orbit, unloading their cargo of unholy abominations. "Asta, they have people attached on those things."

"Don't look."

"Those are people on the pyramid things..."

"Don't look. See, the train station's just up ahead!" Asta squeezed his sister's hand and began to run faster as plasma energy blasts began to fire from the machines, overturning cars and rendering soldiers into molten goop. Crowds that had been standing still in one moment, cheering for the defenders, now turned and ran the other way, screaming. The boy looked into the crowded subway, and, pushing his way through, descended down the steps and into the station.

"Don't trip Sylbia, people will step on you."

"Okay!"

The pair ran through the corridor, weaving and bobbing past hordes of panicked people as they tried getting to the train. The ticket scanning area, normally a orderly place where the pair had seen many a people patiently lined up and queued, was now filled with a fast moving stream of panicked mass of people, the stoppers having been shut down to allow for easier access. The duo easily ran past the ticket scanner, the doors having been left open.

"Slow down Asta, my legs hurt!" Asta ignored Sylbia and squeezed her hand even tighter. A police officer was redirecting traffic around the area, trying to maintain what little order there was left in the herd of humans that now rumbled for the train. Sylbia spoke up again.

"Asta, I dropped my doll!"

The doll was a gift from Asta, a stuffed animal unicorn he had made for her years back.

"Forget it! It doesn't matter-"

"I need it!" Syblia ran backwards against the throng of stampeding people. 

"Sylbia!" Ignoring the danger of being trampled, the boy began to make his way over to his sister, grabbing her hand to drag her forward, when a tall man handed the doll to her.

"Here little one, make sure not to drop it again!" The man then looked at Asta. "And you take care of her!"

"Thank you!" Sylbia yelled out, but he was already gone, barrelling away from the pair and towards the platform.

"You happy?" Asta said, annoyed. Sylbia nodded. "Let's go then."

"Slow down and maintain space everyone! We don't want crowd crushes! Slow down please!" Several police officers stood in front of the stairs to the platform. Asta and Syblia slipped past them, heading down the stairs and onto the platform where the maglev trains were. People cramming into trains, way more than the train could reasonably hold. Sylbia nervously eyed the columns of people, hugging her stuffed unicorn doll.

"That's the one Sylbia, we have to get on that one! Come on, let's get on!" Asta wasn't sure if  they could squeeze in, but he wasn't going to let that stop him from trying. "Sylbia! Hold tight!" Asta and Sylbia shoved past a boy their age, trying to force their way into the train. Climbing over the back of some poor fellow who had collapsed onto the ground, Asta and Sylbia began to climb into the window of the train. From above, they could hear gunfire, and a police officer running past the people he was trying to protect, desperate to get on the train himself.

"Asta, help!" A woman had grabbed onto the hem of Syblia's dress, trying to claw her way onto the train as well.

"Let me on! I have a daughter too, she needs me!"

"Let...go!" Asta pried her hand off of Sylbia's dress. She fell backwards, dissolving into the crowd as Asta and Sylbia squeezed onto the train that was preparing to leave. As the doors closed, they heard the gunfire and the cries of despairing people who hadn't managed to get on.

Asta didn't want to think about what happened to them.

~~*~~

"Asta?" Sylbia tugged at Asta's shirt. Asta realized that he had fallen asleep, leaning against the edge of the train. People were stepping off onto the traintracks, despite being nowhere near a station. "Asta, we have to get off. The conductor said so."

Asta groaned, and began to make his way off the train with the rest of the crowd. Asta hesitated. It wasn't just him, looking around it seemed that many people were reluctant to head off of the well lit train and onto the deep, dark tunnel. But the lights were rapidly flickering, and soon, the flashlights of the people who had gone ahead into the tunnel began to shine brighter than the fading light of the train. At last, as the lights of their car began to flicker too, Asta made the decision to get onto the tracks alongside the people from the cars ahead, taking his sister along. Sylbia grabbed onto Asta, holding onto him as tightly as she did to her stuffed unicorn.

"Asta?" Sylbia said, softly.

"What?" Asta asked. "Don't let it be something silly, ok?"

"We'll be together forever, right?" So it was a silly question after all.

"Of course we will." Asta said, annoyed. "Just don't ask me that ever again, because I've promised to you before, and I don't want to repeat myself."

"I just need to know you're being honest with me. They say that boys will always lie to girls TV..."

It was a good thing he hadn't put her on social media. Good on him for being a responsible parent, in lieu of their actual ones!

"I don't lie, and I think it's stupid that you think I would." Asta crossed his arms.

"So we'll get married at a castle and have a pet unicorn when we're older, right?" Asta groaned. Not this nonsense again. Sylbia didn't understand marriage. Heck, she probably barely understood the bullshit they were going through. His patience was beginning to wear thin. She raised up her doll and shoved it into his face. "I remember your promise young knight!" She said in a funny voice. "You promised the princess you would marry her!"

Glad to know she wasn't scared anymore given she was acting like a brat again.

"No, no we're not. That's not how marrying works. And that's not important right now anyways." Asta sighed. "Just stay quiet until we get to the end, okay?"

"Okay, fine. I'll just talk to my unicorn." Sylbia pouted, turning away from Asta, but out of the corner of his eye, he could see her quivering. It didn't matter, finally he had peace. Or at the very least, he could be alone with his thoughts.

Asta wasn't sure how long they were walking. Even the adults seemed rather unsure about the distance. From the sides, he could hear murmurs of confusion. It appeared they were somewhere roughly underneath a mountain, hence the lack of stations, but it wasn't exactly clear why they had been sent to where they were being sent. A large abandoned train sat to the side, it's passengers presumably also having been sent forwards as the power had died.

Near the end of the tunnel, the people could hear voices. A station. The conductor yelled out.

"Everyone! We've reached the spaceport!" He excitedly ran ahead. "We have refugees, here! Down here! Open the screendoors!"

"Come on Sylbia, let's get a good seat on the ship out!" Asta and Sylbia began to run forward faster, moving forward with the rest of the crowd. They stopped at the station just as they had realized their mistake. The walls were painted red with blood, corpses piled up in heaps. Yirbenite soldiers now turned their rifles on the shocked crowd, radio chatter in a strange language coming in from their radios. They opened fire. Sylbia screamed.

"Oh god-" Asta didn't need to be told twice what was going on as several of the adults fell around them, their words cut off by a hail of bullets.

"Sylbia, we have to go!" Asta grabbed Sylbia, slipping past several others as they ran in the opposite direction. Asta didn't dare look back, and he assumed Sylbia wouldn't either. It didn't matter. All he needed was to get out of here safe. And then...and then...after that...then they would...

...they would do what, exactly? They knew the other end was blocked off too.

After what seemed like an eternity of running, Sylbia spoke up once more.

"Asta, wait." Syblia said, panting. "Asta, please. I dropped my unicorn again." Sylbia stopped.

"I don't give a damn!" Asta had recently begun to use swear words, but had always abstained around his sister. At this point, he didn't care. He turned around. "I don't care about your stupid, fucking -"

Asta looked at the wound his little sister had on her abdomen. Her face, formerly so full of life, was now pale and gaunt.

"Asta, I don't want to run anymore." She gave him a weak smile.

"Sylbia-"

"I'm sorry, Asta." Sylbia let go of Asta's hand and began to walk backwards, back to her doll which lie a few feet away. "Let's just sit down. I'm cold and sleepy."

"Sylbia!" Asta ran over to the girl, who was now sitting down. Some people ran past them. "Sylbia, please. We have to get out-" 

"It's ok, you tried your best. I just want to sleep with Mr. Unicorn here. You should go ahead."

"I'm not leaving you Sylbia. I'm not." Asta lifted Sylbia and hoisted her onto his back. His arms and legs screamed to stop, but he started running. "Come on." 

"Put me down Asta."

"No."

"Put me down, please." Asta stopped, putting his sister back down on the tracks. "Can we just hold hands? I'm really cold..." Asta set his sister down onto the cold tracks, her pale face now nearing white. "I'm sleepy..."

"Sylbia, please." Asta gripped Sylbia's hand tightly. "Please Sylbia..."

"Asta. Next time, you're going to help me find a unicorn, okay? We'll have lots of fun, okay?" Sylbia closed her eyes. "We'll find our parents, okay? And then we can be together in heaven, right?"

"Sylbia!" The girl did not move. 

Asta knelt next to his sister, who looked so peacefully asleep, until the soldiers approached him too.