Innocence:Lost

Their childhood home was severed in two. A shard the size of a small apartment complex had cut through the center, killing dozens when it arrived on The Night That Everything Changed. Holes in the ceiling let nature’s cold permeate the space and cover every surface with crystal dust.

Now, the two former children had returned, and they may as well have been ghosts in the place they once lived.

Fever chills were shaking Miu’s body as she tried to calm herself. She had never wanted to return here. She had never wanted to be here to begin with. This place represented the first mark of her life where things went drastically wrong without her consideration. It set her down this path that led her to the beast she was now.

But it had also brought her Yuki. He was the only good thing that had ever happened to her, and now she was back where they met with him. Or, some form of him. Looking at the cold polished metal of the twitching body that contained Yuki’s mind left her bewildered and unsettled. But most of all it left her heartbroken. Yuki may have hated his body, but it was his. This was a prison. Still, a sign that Yuki was truly in there was that he had yet to complain.

After setting Miu down, Yuki began to silently observe the broken space. Miu muttered words to herself, and a blue fire arrived, hovering in the air before them, giving them warmth. Yuki watched it with his expressionless sensors.

“So, you really can do magic? You’re… The Acolyte?...” he asked in a somber voice.

She nodded.

“That’s what they call me. Because I lived with the Arcans for a year and learned from them.”

“Miu?!” Yuki gasped.

"And the Arcans are working with the militaries and scientists. They weren't invaders. We brought them here..."

It took Yuki a moment to process all of this. Seeing the hardened, cold soul before him, he could only imagine every pain Miu had endured. And he hadn't been there for her. 

“What happened to us?” Miu cried as she held her hands to the fire.

“All of this. Every second. It was all so wrong. And this place! This place was the start of it!” Miu growled in shaking gasps.

Blue light shone from her eye and she shook as her knees started to buckle.

“Miu?” Yuki asked as he stepped forward with his hand extended.

To his shocked understanding, she flinched and pulled away. Yuki looked at his metal, foreign hand and knew that it was a lot for her to process. It was still a lot for him.

“Please don’t touch me,” Miu whispered.

“U-understood,” Yuki replied in soft acceptance.

“But…” Miu started as she wiped her eyes.

Yuki turned to her.

“Can you lay beside me until I fall asleep?” she asked as her tears returned.

Yuki nodded. He was grateful just to be near her, and though he didn’t know many of the details of what had happened since his death, he fully understood her lack of trust that he was actually who he said he was. So, this was more than enough.

“Want me to find a mattress or futon while you sit?” Yuki asked.

“Yes, please.”

With that, Yuki set off through the building. Habit drove him to choose their old wing. Neglected wood creaked beneath his feet as he walked. It made sense that Miu would not wish to sleep in an actual room. Those rooms were too full of bad memories and nightmares. She had told him of the ghost whispering secrets of loneliness that would drift from the closets. So tonight, they would sleep in an open space. She would be safe.

Yuki turned down a hall, and memories rushed back. It was their hall. A passing barrier beam drifted by outside the window, casting haunting pale light into the corridor. There were their doors. Hers was the second on the left. His was the sixth on the right. The ceiling had caved over hers, with a beam crushing the doorframe. Yuki’s door was open. To his surprise, he found himself wanting to enter.

When he reached the opening, nothing jolted him away like what he had felt when he was near the crater in Sapporo. In his soul, this place was still good. No matter how much abuse, humiliation, and loneliness he had felt in this building, it had led him to Miu. And in this room, she was always just a few doors away. He had felt safe within those simple beige walls. This would be the bed he retrieved.

Minutes later, he returned to the common room to see that Miu had created more small barriers to shield them from the elements and was now curled up on the floor. A small pool of blood was by her left cheek, telling him she had not stopped crying.

“It never goooooot better? Your eye?” he asked.

“Nothing got better. I may have gotten stronger, but everything got worse,” she replied without looking at him.

He watched her fingers run along her shoulder for comfort. Only now could he fully see the knots in her hair and the strange crystalline coating on her right arm.

“Here,” Yuki said as he lowered the mattress, blanket and pillow.

Only one pillow. Only one blanket. Miu glanced at them and understood.

“Do… do you sleep?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve never survived more than a few hours…”

Miu grimaced in shame. Yuki reflected once again on how little he knew about his current situation. In truth, he was afraid of sleep. If he did have to power down, he feared that he’d awake in a new body, away from her, or patched with his memories finally caged for good.

“What happens if you die tonight? Or shut down?”

“I’ll find you again, I s-swear. No matter how long it takes. I’ll come back.”

Miu sobbed and crawled to the bed without a word. She paused long enough to raise her hand over its dusty edges.

Yuki watched as she whispered and pulled years of neglect from the fabric. Particles of dust and crystal drifted out like a demon being exorcised, and the bedding was nearly new. Miu waved the remnants away, and they vanished in a soft glow. Though it was simple and small for Miu, Yuki could not help but marvel. Then Miu was in bed, turning her back to him.

Yet she still left space for him to lie beside her. Without a word, Yuki lowered onto the mattress. Miu felt the weight of the large being shifting beside her. Soft whirs of gears churning and pistons shifting told her he was moving. Then he settled. His leg accidentally touched hers and she felt the cold, smooth metal. Memories of his atrophied, loathed legs resting limp beside hers danced in her mind, and Miu finally came undone.

Sobs returned in full force as she gasped out in hate at all of this.

“Oh gods. Oh gods, Yuki. I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry,” she cried.

Cries became gulps that became gasps as seizures turned her despair into convulsions. Through it all, Yuki lay motionless. Inside, he was sobbing as well, but in a final cruelty for his new body, he had no way to weep. All he could do was feel the broiling sorrow ripping through his conduits and processes.

Then her hand found his.

His head turned slightly and he saw that she was on her back now like him. She would not look at him, but her small, rough, glowing right hand was clasped over his three cylindrical fingers.

“I miss you so much. I missed you so much…” she said as she clinched her eyes and prayed for sleep to remove her from this reality.

“So did I. I’ll make sure your ghost doesn’t come,” Yuki replied.

Her fingers tensed around his.

“It’s too late for that,” was all she replied.

In time, she fell into a heavy slumber. The blue fire stayed alive beside them, keeping her warm. Yuki never felt a need to rest or shut down. After a few hours of lying there, he finally decided to rise and walk.

Something was pulling him outside. Crushing weights of grief were colliding inside of him, and he had no way of releasing them. Being back with Miu had brought him great relief, but it also unleashed an insurmountable mass of confused hate as he finally had a moment to reflect on everything. Seeing her so utterly changed did not help.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

But it was.

With that rage sending twitches through his frame, Yuki exited the building and limped out into the cold. He moved without thinking, dragging his rebellious limbs through the glowing powder until he reached the space he didn’t know was his destination. Out before him was the former guard station.

“This w-was it…” he realized.

This was where they were when the Shards arrived. Dread still hung in the air. Yuki paused and remembered the ominous sensation in the air the night they tried to run. He remembered the terror of the explosions as the Shards ripped into their reality. Then he saw his Shard. The one that had severed his spinal cord. It was over five meters tall, flat at its top and wide at its base.

That shard had stopped them from fleeing. It had permanently broken his body. It had caused Miu to turn and try to help him, which led to her being branded by that invasive chunk. This one silent obelisk had done so much damage just by existing.

“Y-you! It’s you! All of this is your god-d-d-damn fault!!!” Yuki roared as he rushed his jerking body to the towering stone.

“AAAAAARRRRRGGGGH!!!!!” he screamed as he charged his fist and threw it full force into the crystal.

Metal struck geode with a thunderous snap, but nothing happened. The Shard was unharmed. But Yuki felt better. Something about inflicting any form of violence on this wretched stone gave him some for of release. So he screamed and screamed as he punched again and again.

All the while, the Shard stayed motionless and unfazed.

“Die you stupid s-son of a bitch!! Die! Die!! DIE!!!” Yuki screamed as barrages of powered punches struck to no avail.

“I FUCKING HATE YOU!!!” Yuki cried as he finally gave up.

The blue light of his Manu-Crystal observation sensors flickered. That was as close to crying as he would get. He slumped to his knees before the massive crystal in defeated calmness. Dents lined his reinforced knuckles, creating friction in his hand. But he didn’t care. It felt good to let hate win for a moment.

Then the crystal began to glow black. Yuki glanced up to see the fire within its core slowly be consumed by a dark, oozing void. Cracks appeared on the exterior of the Shard, and it began to break. There was a shatter, and the crystal broke into a thousand pieces that all began to be devoured by glitching black and blue until all of it was gone.

His Shard had been obliterated.

Yuki looked up to see Miu was nearby, silent, with her hand raised.

“I… I learned how to destroy them…” Miu whispered.

“I’m so-rrrrrrr-r-ry, Miu. I’m s-s-sorry for everything. I don’t know w-what I am. But I neveeeer wanted this.”

Miu shook her head.

“Neither did I.”

As Miu watched the being shake, she felt a strange pull of sympathy. If this was Yuki, it was a horrifyingly cruel fate, made even worse by his lack of understanding as to how he got there.

“You truly don’t know what you are?” Miu asked.

“No… But I want to find out. There are these voices i-in my h-head, like code teasing s-secretsssss. And there was an-another G.A.K.I. unit that said he waaaas a homeless person in Osaka.”

Dread returned to Miu. For all the cruelty she had seen, she didn’t put anything past the powers that be. If these metal soldiers were actually people, then she wanted to help them. Especially if one of those people was Yuki. She was weakened and needed to recover after months of destruction. Yuki needed help. Something about these G.A.K.I. soldiers terrified her, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was all connected.

For so long, she had been inflicting wrath on whatever target she deemed worthy for its part it had played in their hardship. But now, she felt that she needed to help this being.

Yuki steadied his mind and stood. He didn’t want to part from Miu. After all this time, they were finally back together. But it was a mutilated, fake form that could be shut down or go offline at any moment. He couldn’t sit idly and wait to die again, potentially for good. In whatever way he could, he wanted to find out what he was and how it happened. The code in his protocols seemed vulnerable and he knew enough to start testing there. Maybe, with Miu’s help from her understanding of the Arcans and their magic, they might find answers.

“Miuuuu, I-I have to find out what happened to meeeee. But, I need yourrrr help. I waaant your help. Even if you don’t trust me yet, I need you. I’m sorry for a-all of this.”

Miu wiped her eyes and exhaled at the familiar tone.

“Yuki always did apologize like that. Maybe you are him. I’ll help you find out. Then, we will kill everyone who played a part in making you like this.”

“Deal.”