Paradisus et Lacrimosa

The touch of cold, sobering waters woke Haruki. He floated in a seemingly bottomless puddle, but he didn’t fear drowning. It felt like the water itself was pushing him up out of its own will.

He opened his eyes to a sight of an orange sky, as if colored by a distant sunset. But last time he recalled, hadn’t the sun just risen? Was he asleep for that long? Out at sea? He should have been dead; Swallowed by some sea creature or lost buoyancy and drowned at this point.

Clouds, like a picturesque London fog, rolled endlessly around him. Reflexively, he pushed his palms against the surface behind to rise—and he rose, like he were on solid ground. Strange. He thought he was floating above water just now.

He got up on his feet, wobbling as he did, afraid the rippling water would make him slip. It didn’t. The surface of water was just like deep water, and the boundless below under a clear glass mirror.

“Where am I?” He walked forward, his boots splashing water like a playful child with every step.

“Haruki Kanno,” a woman’s voice called out, disembodied, but exuding a warm, motherly quality.

From the clouds, the figure of a woman emerged. When she cleared the haze, she revealed more of her features.

A woman, looking around her late fifties, olive skin and short, petite figure. A white, frilly dress reminiscent of a wedding gown covered her from neck to heel, and a veil flowed from her head up to her shoulders. Her smile was gentle, radiant, and each step she took, the water below her rippled in perfect symmetry like she commanded the pond to part for her.

The woman was familiar to Haruki. Very much so, though he’d never met her. Only seen her. It could only be her.

Josephine. Queen Josephine.

“You’re…”

“Yes. It is as you think. In a sense.”

“Ack!” Haruki flinched. “You can read my mind?”

“It is not that I can read your mind. It’s that I am in yours, at least for the time being,” Josephine said with a slight chuckle. “So what you think, I can hear. At least the idea of it, if not the exact words.”

“Okay.” Haruki breathed deep (in his mind?) and clasped his hands for warmth. “What are you… err, are we doing here? And is a place like this really in my head?”

“The Divine created this mental space for you and I to talk.”

“Why?”

Josephine approached, one dainty footstep at a time. “Because I wish to apologize. On behalf of the Divine.”

Haruki crossed his arms. “Really? Why doesn’t he-she-it just come down here and tell me themselves?”

“Because the Divine’s true form is incomprehensible, and Their form entering your mind might ruin it if you’re not prepared. Therefore I, a soul who has passed in this world, will serve as liaison.” Her voice then eased. “And there may be things I wish to say, myself.”

“That… makes sense.” Though Haruki took the chance to sate his own curiosity. “But first, a question from me.”

“Yes, please ask.”

“...Are you really Mr. Junk’s wife? If you can read my intent, you know exactly who I mean. If you are, how did you end up here?”

Josephine nodded. “I am. I was in a plane crash. Private jet for company business. But before impact, we were taken by the sky—raptured into it. I awoke alone on the shores of Ka-Ilyah, the plane nowhere in sight but a broken wing, floating in the sea until it sank.” Her voice shrunk, haunted by a faraway longing. “I wanted to go back. But as the years went on, I accepted there was none. Wherever I was must have been the afterlife. And so, I was found and married into the Ka-Ilyah royalty—but only to keep the king company. My body and soul belonged to Gerald, forevermore.”

Gerald. So that was Mr. Junk’s name. “I see.” He looked aside. “But I found a way home. And I closed the door.”

“That you did. But…” Josephine extended a hand, a ball of silver light within. “As an apology—and gratitude for saving this small world we live in, Paradisus—the Divine would like to offer you a way back home.”

“Paradisus?”

“The world in which its citizens called Eas; The world sleeping above our home world’s sky. Paradisus. The paradise of wishes.”

“So… this is the afterlife.”

“You could call it that, but as you see, I now reside in an afterlife within the afterlife. This is a place where humanity’s wishes come true, and where those caught in a vicious game between beings beyond our comprehension live alike.”

Haruki tilted his head. “I don’t understand.”

“Nor me,” Josephine said. “But I have been told, this was a place of peace. A fantasy come to life, like a repository for every human’s earnest wish. Until one day… the Inverted City—Lacrimosa, came to be. No one knows why, not even the Divine, but it served as a door between worlds distant and unknown. Its doors twisted every worlds’ wishes into curses, and thus the birth of what we all call the Sky Legion.”

“I’m getting the idea,” Haruki said with a nod. Though apprehension gnawed at him; He didn’t have any desire to be involved with some elaborate game involving gods and dimensions. Ah, Josephine must have heard that.

“Our home world is safe from such games.” Josephine smiled and nodded. “Because our world is the lifeblood of Paradisus now—our world’s wishes and curses alike.” She glanced at the silver light again, gesturing it at Haruki.

He stared at its warm glow. The light made his chest warm, and his rushing blood calm. Even his wounds became painless. “So if I go home, I don’t have to do any of this anymore? Won’t the sky take me again someday? Why did it in the first place?”

“...The Divine has never told me. Because I was probably drawn into Paradisus the same way you were. Perhaps it was for a higher purpose. Maybe, we were chosen at random. I can only wager a guess. But what is absolute is Their promise. A promise that you will be home, safe, and the sky will never take you again.”

Haruki raised a brow at Josephine. Her smile weakened, a certain wistfulness suddenly twisting it. “There’s something you want for me.”

Josephine managed a single chuckle. “I speak with Gerald in his dreams, you know? I tell him about this world, to the extent the Divine allows. I… I miss him so much. But for some reason, the Divine will not allow me to apologize, so…” She looked at Haruki, pleading. “When you arrive home, will you tell him that I’m sorry, and thank you for being my husband?”

Haruki sighed. Yes, he could go home. He would be safe from all this insanity, and go back to his life of safety, of certainty, absent of all this god-tier madness. He could build himself a better future, now that he knew what shapes his dreams could take.

The Divine’s promise was absolute.

But so was his.

Haruki sighed and shook his head. He laughed quietly.

He pushed her hand away slowly. “I’m sorry. I can’t take the offer.”

“Ah. But why?”

“Because I made a promise, too. When I did that, I already made a choice. I just didn’t know it at the time. But now I know,” he said. “I promised Ako I would return her daughters—not simply that they would return to her. Me being there, alive, is part of the deal.”

Josephine's face turned downcast. “But…”

“Everyone there… is chasing their own freedom. They understood something I didn’t. Everyone made their decisions, not just because they felt like it, but because they wanted to see things through, come what may. They chose the burdens they carry. So… I’m choosing mine.”

Josephine let out a breath. “I see. So that’s your choice.”

“It is.” Haruki bowed shortly, and rose to face Josephine eye-to-eye. “I’m sorry I can’t tell Mr. Junk all about it. I also promised to take a certain someone on a tour of our world so… I’ll find another way home, someday. For now though, there’s somewhere I need to be.”

“That you do. Just know that whatever happens next, you will have to manage. The road ahead may even be harder than what you’ve already passed.”

Haruki laughed, pride swelling in his chest. “I know what I’m going into, thanks to you. I chose it, so I’ll see it through.”

Josephine mirrored a laugh. “My husband would be so proud of you.” She closed her eyes, and when she did, the cloudy scenery behind her began to fade into light.

“Goodbye, Haruki. May the winds grant you fortune.”

####

Haruki slipped into consciousness, waking from a deep sleep somewhere in the recesses of his mind. Though he hadn’t opened his eyes. His senses returned one at a time.

A faint smell of lavender, and something sweet and unknown wafted at first. Then, fresh but dried blood came after. Probably his own and someone else’s. The scent of gunpowder followed.

Next, sensation returned. A pillow under his head. A pillow. No, of course not. The feeling was too familiar. Firm, squishy, but soft and supple enough to enjoy a lie down. He wasn’t in an infirmary nor a bed, but this was just as good as fluffy cloud heaven.

He twitched to life, the electricity of life running through every nerve of his body, even up to his fingertips and toes. The object below him twitched in kind.

“Haruki…?”

Hearing returned. He recognized the language, of course, but was certain it wasn’t the vernacular from Japan. It was this world’s.

“Haruki…!”

Haruki’s eyes flashed open. When his sight came to him, a deep, blue sky welcomed him back. His attention turned to the shadowed figure looming a mere spitting distance from his face.

“Haruki, you’re awake!”

Anemone, her voice young, mature, yet oh-so-delicate, but endearingly nasal. Her expression wore thick unease, tears welling at her eyes’ edges.

Her long, flowing golden hair drooped down to his cheeks, and tickled him fully awake. He laughed, then smiled and stroked her cheek with his hand. Dirt and grime smudged her cheeks. Oops. Shit.

But it didn’t faze her.

Anemone sunk her face into his chest and sobbed. She smacked his stomach lightly with a clenched fist. “I thought you wouldn’t wake up anymore! Stupid! Dumbface!”

“Hey now,” he chuckled. “Don’t call me that. Come on. You’re not Flare.”

“I don’t care. Let me have this.”

He sighed. “Okay.”

Several winds passed, and Anemone cried until there were more tears on his chest than there was blood and soot. When she finished, she sat down and rubbed her eyes, red as they were.

Haruki surveilled his surroundings and analyzed his place in the world. Water, all around. Daytime. Clouds high in the sky, none touching the water. The platform they were floating on, the fuselage of the Kenichi Modern. The tail was gone, and only half a wing stuck from the water. It was a miracle the fuselage hadn’t just sunk along with the rest of the plane.

He wanted to lament the loss of the Kenichi Modern, but he was just happy to be alive. Alive to see his choices through—alive to make new ones.

Instead, he offered a quiet salute to the Kenichi Modern: his first, and greatest creation.

Thank you, Mr. Junk. He looked up to the sky, to a distant afterlife he now knew existed. And thank you… great grandpa.

Anemone blinked, curiosity dancing on her face as if she hadn’t just cried an entire river earlier. “What now?”

“What now…?” He looked around, seeing nothing but water and the city of Bellfry far in the distance. “I don’t know. Can you use the wind to push us there?”

Anemone shook her head. “I’m really tired. And I don’t feel… as strong anymore? Perhaps with that last battle, every ounce of Divine power in my blood had left me.”

“So that means… you’re just a normal girl now?”

“Normal?” Anemone pouted. “I’m still a half-elf, princess of Ka-Ilyah. I’m still just as strong as Marina and Flare! Hmph!”

Haruki laughed, his smile wider than it has ever been since he arrived in this world. Second only to the first time he had flown the Kenichi Modern. He pat Anemone on the head. “I didn’t mean it that way. Come on.”

She continued to pout. “Hmph.”

Ah. Ever-so Anemone. Still that same princess. Still that same girl.

“But that’s a good question.” Haruki relaxed his shoulders, breathing deep the fresh cold of the morning sea. Smell of freshwater and fish alike. He took a sip, the sea cooling his parched throat. “I guess we just… wait. And enjoy this moment a little more.” He patted the metal part of the KM’s fuselage. “He served us well.”

“I suppose so.” Anemone crawled up to Haruki and rested her head on his shoulders. She closed her eyes, satisfied. Her breathing synched with his as they rested on a floating piece of history.

Several moments passed, in what seemed to be minutes turned into an hour. An hour? Maybe less so, maybe more. It didn’t matter. Now was good. They had their pick of fresh fish and potable water. He could probably use Flare’s power to cook them. Being planewrecked right now wasn’t so bad.

A foghorn blared in the direction opposite the harbor.

He and Anemone turned to face it.

Approaching them were the remnants of the Isolde sailing on the water like it were a normal boat.

On its bow waved Marina and Flare, the Redwings in a crowd behind them. Marina was so excited she stepped up the railing, almost losing balance, only for a now-unhidden Fianna to catch her from falling off the ship.

Haruki and Anemone shared a laugh.

Help was coming.

Friends were coming.

Unlikely friends they met, bonds they formed in this irresponsible journey they chose to take. Living today meant facing tomorrow’s challenges head on. But what was there to worry about?

Together, tomorrow was worth seeing.