End of the Hunt

Eita watched over Sammy as Gadot and Chazz worked to free Sara from her agonizing restraints. Azalea, for some reason, went straight to Munkar's lost blade, and after some bit of work that Eita didn't quite see, approached alongside Yua.

“Is she...”

“Fine, I think,” Eita said.

Azalea checked Sammy's pulse, then put a hand on her forehead.

“She exhausted her body and spirit alike,” Azalea said, “but you're right, she'll be fine. Penny would know better...”

“We'll pick her up on the way out,” Gadot said, “She'll live, but she won't be walking very far.”

“What about the other one?” Azalea asked quietly, looking pointedly at where Cassiel hovered awkwardly over the scene, “that's Cassiel, isn't it?”

Eita explained what had happened as well as he could, and Azalea seemed to accept that the new fallen angel quietly remaining nearby wouldn't be a problem. At the same time, Sara was freed, and though she groaned and muttered some protests, Gadot slung her over his shoulder like a firefighter performing a rescue.

“Think you can handle our fearless leader, Ikami-kun?” Gadot asked.

Eita nodded, but decided to not emulate Gadot. Instead, carefully, he slid one arm under Sammy's knees and the other behind her back. She was surprisingly light, despite Eita's weariness, and so the departure from the convention center began. Idly, Eita wondered how the damage would be handled, and the evidence of the battle that had occurred. But, he trusted his friends and that things would work out. After all, there was nothing too bad.

Or so Eita thought. When they picked up Penny (quite literally, with Azalea giving the beleaguered girl a piggyback ride out of the building), that scuffle had done more than put a weird chip in the floor or leave unrecognizable degree. Overhearing other talk also suggested there would be a wrecked motorcycle somewhere. Someone was sure to notice. Would they all really be fine?

Most of the Fallen seemed to think so, and the mood in the air as they retraced their steps was as though a dark cloud had passed, a quiet and weary triumph.

Just out of the shadow of the convention center, Sammy stirred. She opened her eyes, looked up at Eita.

“We... made it, right?” she whispered, “I'm not... um... dreaming?”

“We did,” Eita said, “And we're all going home safe. Even Cassiel, though I don't know how Yua's folks are going to take that.”

Sammy reached up and put a hand on Eita's cheek.

“Eita...”

“What is it?”

Sammy hesitated, and looked away.

“I'm glad I didn't scare you off.” she said.

“Well,” Eita said, “I'm glad I don't scare easily.”

He looked up himself. He was at the back of the pack, and it seemed like most of the others hadn't really noted anything. Penny, however, was looking over her shoulder from Azalea's back and grinning like the Cheshire Cat. The very sight of that sent a chill down Eita's spine.

“Don't mind me.” Penny said, “I'm just anticipating some free entertainment.”

Eita didn't want to know what she thought was entertainment to come.

But, with that mystery left deliberately unsolved, a day passed. Then a week came and went. The “vandals” at the convention center were little noted in the news and not long remembered, as though everything that had been done that night was swept away with the debris of broken windows and smashed vending machines. Evidently, there was no security to rat them out.

Another week came and went. Arrangements were made for the students displaced by the attack on the school, and classes resumed where and when they could.

Eventually, the days and weeks brought the beginning of summer, with no new terrors emerging on pearl wings to hunt the Fallen. By then, it almost felt as though those strange days were a strange dream, and the friends that Eita and Yua had made were nothing more than the transfer students they played at being.

Yet for all that, even sitting on a shaded bench at Yua's side on the first day of summer, the way they had done pretty much ever since grade school, Eita couldn't entirely forget, and didn't want to forget.

Not that he'd be allowed to forget. Though the Fallen were elsewhere just then, Cassiel had been sounding the call for a “training camp”. Even if the hunters had given up the chase, as long as the Weaver was out there, there was a frightening world behind the everyday curtains.

“About the whole training camp thing,” Yua said, voicing what had been on both their minds.

“What about it?” Eita asked

“Are you looking forward to it?” Yua asked.

“In some ways,” Eita said, “I guess.”

Yua frowned, and looked carefully at Eita, as though trying to solve a difficult puzzle.

“Is Sammy that great a kisser?”

“W-what?” Eita stammered.

“Well?” Yua pressed, “who's better? Her, or me?”

“Yua,” Eita pleaded, feeling himself starting to blush, “That's not fair.”

The first and last time he'd kissed Yua was in a school play when they were eight.

“If you can't make up your mind,” Yua said, blushing furiously, “let me help you.”

Yua leaned in and kissed Eita on the lips. A cool breeze blew, and some part of Eita realized as he responded, holding her, that as complicated as their lives had already gotten, no end was really in sight.