Turn Back Time

“Kiyomi!” Ezequiel roared.

Koharu looked up as the earth tremored beneath her, Ezequiel’s Golem charging towards them.

Koharu grit her teeth, her body glowing with blue-light. She shrieked as she blasted Kiyomi off her back with the light, scrambling to her feet.

Kiyomi hovered in the air, her blade in hand, red dress flowing in the breeze.

“Kiyomi,” Koharu breathed, keeping her blue-light activated. “What…”

Ezequiel grunted as he flung a boulder at her, but she just shifted backwards and dodged.

She turned back to Koharu. “Turn off the portals, Koharu. Or you all die.”

“Kiyomi what the hell is going on!” Koharu screamed, clutching the sides of her head.

Kiyomi rolled her eyes. “If you don’t want to comply.”

She raised a hand to Ezequiel, her tome appearing in it and flipping open. A giant red eye rose from the pages, opening wide and glaring at Ezequiel.

“Then suffer the consequences.”

“No!” Koharu shrieked, swinging her hand sideways.

A ray of blue-light burst from the portal nearest to them, arching and hitting Kiyomi’s tome.

She bared her teeth, the tome disintegrating into ash and flaking from her hand. “What’s the point in resisting, Kay?”

Ezequiel stepped in front of Koharu, his spined stone back scorched with blast marks, ice still patching his shoulder from the Jotunn.

“Koharu, get Ace and Beltran and get out of here!”

“I’m not leaving you!”

She glanced at the Sentinel as the monster lumbered forward, hoof barely missing the wagon. It crushed the six dead Pegasus that had been pulling it, their volcanic bodies crumbling. Her eyes flickered up to the battlement atop its head. The Warlock. It was gone.

She spun around as the clap of thunder shattered the air from behind her, her hands igniting.

A man stood behind her, his arms folded, a grey hood painted with the rolling pattern of a storm cloud drawn over his head.

“Koharu Hoshizora,” the man said, his voice hollow, distant. Like thunder. He lifted his chin, his face darkened but his eyes crackling and glowing with lightning. “Surrender in this moment, and you will stand trial.”

Koharu crossed her arms, her blue light flaring around her body. “We’re not afraid of you, Cypher Corp.”

His teeth glowed and crackled with lightning as he snarled. “Then you have chosen courage to be your executioner.”

“Slowly, Ignacio. Try again.”

Ignacio sighed, and slowly held out the carrot. The deer’s nose twitched as it reached forward. It turned its head to the side, and snatched the carrot from his hand, leaping away.

“There you go,” his mother said, her hazel-brown eyes wrinkling as she smiled down at him. Her moon-and-stars pendant hung around her neck on a thin golden chain, glittering as it twirled in the sunlight.

He leaned his arms back, legs outstretched. “When can I pat them?”

She chuckled. “When you do that every day for the next three months.”

“Three months!” Ignacio said, turning to his mother as she sat on the bench behind him, tapping something onto a holo-screen on her lap. “Aren’t there synthetic deer that are made friendly?”

She combed her curtain of thick black hair with her fingertips. “Not everything comes easy in life, Ignacio. Some things… some things are worth fighting for,” she narrowed her light brown eyes, poking him on the shoulder and pointing. “Look at that.”

She pointed at the deer, the animal’s snout already back in the grass. It had a pair of horns that looked kind of like ivory tree branches in winter.

“That’s one of the only species left to be enjoyed by common people like us,” she said. “Enjoy them while they last. By the time you’re my age, it’ll cost a fortune to play with a real deer.”

Ignacio sighed. “Synthetics are easier to deal with.”

She shook her head, glancing back at her holo-screen.

“Ignacio!” Celeste called.

He glanced up, smiling as Celeste came skipping towards them. Her hair bounced up and down, arms swinging.

“Would you rather she was a synthetic to stop her from being annoying?” his mother asked.

Ignacio snorted. “Sometimes, yeah.”

She placed a hand to her mouth as she laughed. “Always take care of her, Ignacio. Okay?”

Ignacio nodded, glancing back up at her. His smile faltered. That curtain of black hair was gone. Her eyes were sunk in and dark around the edges, neuro-pens sticking from her forearm. Her skin was ashen, lips dry and cracked as they parted. A thin tube ran under her nose, connecting to a small device that hung around her neck. Right where her pendant had once hung.

Ignacio glanced down, fingers reaching for the pendant as it hung down to his chest. The moon and the stars. A mother and her children.

“Take… care of her, Ignacio.”

Ignacio’s eyes peeled open, the grass at his nose blurring into focus. His body ached. It ached so badly he felt numb. Like every bone in his body had been broken.

Did you do it?

He lifted a shaking hand, pressing against the hard, dirt ground. He lifted his head, drool running from his lip, blood from his eyebrow. Both left dark patches on the sand. Neither wet his face as much as the tears covering his cheeks.

Where is she?

He glanced over his shoulder, his vision blurry. The Sentinel was advancing again, the Hallowed Titan beside it. He coughed, spluttering as he spotted his leg.

“Oh, man,” he gasped, his heart rate picking up.

The shin was snapped in half, bone sticking out of the skin, blood pooling around it. He lay back down, fresh tears warming his eyes. He pressed his forehead against the ground, gritting his teeth.

“Damn you, Ignacio, get up,” he muttered. “Get up.”

He tried pushing himself up again, shrieking in pain as he tried using his other arm. He glanced at it, his breaths turning shallow. The bone was broken there too. Just in two places instead of one. Snapped, sharp and jutting out the skin, piercing out the torn sleeve of his jacket.

He screamed into the air, pounding his good hand against the ground. “I did not come this far to lose like this!”

“Then… get… up.”

His eyes widened. That voice…

He lifted his head. And his blood froze. The deer-creature sat on its haunches, long black arms over its knees, its deer-skull staring at Ignacio.

A breeze swept by, turning his tears cold and billowing the creature's long black hair.

Ignacio lowered his head, cheeks puffing as he gasped through the pain.

“I’m… scared,” he growled. “I’m so scared.”

The deer-creature stared at him.

He lowered his head again, clawing a hand into the dirt. He screamed as he dragged himself forward, the pain searing through his entire body. Tears fell from his eyes, and he reached a hand towards the beast.

“Help…”

The deer-creature stood up. “Take… care of her, Ignacio,” it said, its voice rasping.

“I can’t,” Ignacio said, gritting his teeth. “Not like this.”

The deer-creature turned, its bones creaking as it staggered away.

He squeezed his eyes shut. “I’m scared of not being strong enough for her, mum.”

The deer-creature froze. It lifted its snout, the tips of its horns glinting. It turned, glaring at him sideways with an actual eye. And not just any eye. With one of her hazel-brown eyes.

“Then do what you must,” it said in her voice, “to become stronger.”

He lowered his head.

Did you do it?

He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. They’re not something to control. They’re something to be.

Something shuddered inside him. And it wasn’t just Beltran’s Aspect. He took another deep breath.

Take care of them, Ignacio.

He opened his eyes, grunting as he tried squirming upright with one hand. Something cold pressed against his chest. He reached for it, frowning as he pulled the chain from inside his bloodied shirt. And in his palm he found the moon pendant. Glittering with his blood, gleaming in the sunlight.

He clutched it tight, lifting his head. The deer-creature was gone, as if it was never there. The blades of grass along the dirt path swayed in the breeze, and Ignacio tucked the pendant back into his shirt.

Koharu had said it was a Fear. But it wasn't. It was a Remnant. His Remnant. 

“Thank you, mum,” he whispered. “Thank you for everything.”