No More Crying Reprise

Everything hurt.

Breathing felt like inhaling daggers of ice.

Biting numbness gnawed at every digit and extremity.

Burning, sawing, strain pulsed in her teeth and eye sockets.

Sayane was absolutely spent.

Music had faded, and now she was simply crumpled into a dangling heap in Azag’s arms with a small stream of drool running from her dazed, parted lips.

The rest of the Silence soldiers were too shocked to repeat their former commander’s hail. Instead, they all merely fell to their knees as well. It had worked.

They were all healed. Millions had seemingly joined Sayane in singing, banishing the remaining Dissonance and giving the world a true glimpse of the healing that could be ahead. But it had all but broken her.

All she could do was try to find comfort in the touch of the one she had just feared she might lose forever. Waves of emotions stormed in her wrecked body as she felt the absolute versions of everything from joy, wonder, exhaustion, relief, trauma, pain, and hope all at once. Azag’s hands never released her as he softly brushed her hair from her bloodied face.

“You’re here,” Sayane weakly croaked through tears.

“I’m still here. Just like your song. I’m still here, too, Sayane. You did it. You can rest now,” he said in a deep, calming voice.

His strength was returning. His words were now sounding like his regular voice, and Sayane let their sound reinforce the vulnerable aspects of her mind as relief won the battle of emotional dominance.

She inhaled. Slow. Heavy. Labored. Yet calm.

Then she exhaled. Swift. Frail. Shaking. Not calm.

Inhale.

Shake.

Exhale.

Tremble.

Inhale.

Tremor.

Exhale.

Collapse.

Shakes began to rise in Sayane's body and mind.

Azag noticed, and his hand rubbed her chest.

“Good. Good. Breathe my love. You can breathe. I’m going to get you somewhere where you can rest. You can sleep for days, then I’ll find you a damn drink,” he said in an attempt at comfort.

Delirium began to set in, and images of everything that had come before fired through Sayane’s mind, pulling sensations and memories with them. Each vision struck her with more and more intensity until a whimper rose in her throat. Azag’s hand pressed to her chest again, and she felt a warming sensation coat her skin.

“Breathe. I need you to breathe, Sayane. I need you to rest. Saxum! Can-Mo!” Azag called.

Sayane’s hand raised, half-asleep, and touched Azag’s face.

“I want to go home. I want to go back to your tavern,” she cried.

“I miss home so much. I miss everything…” she cried as her eyes looked to the sky without seeing it.

More images flashed. Tokyo. Her old apartment. The scaffolding falling onto her. The other Great Harmony Shards. The vault where she’d arrived. The waterfall where she’d cried. Him. Always him.

Heavy steps beside her sent vibrations into her legs and feet as they slouched onto the earth.

“Can we go back to The Shattered Stone, please?” she asked as Azag’s spell coated her entire body with gentleness.

“Shhhh. Shhhhh. Of course, we can. We’ll go first thing tomorrow, okay?” Azag whispered.

Attis’s paw touched her hand in comfort, but new memories tore into her mind.

“Fuzzy. They’re going to take my song! Please don’t let them hurt me! Please, I'm so afraid. Please don’t die! You have to run! We have to run!” Sayane choked as the panic attack built.

“Sayane, you're okay. You’re not in the vault anymore. You’re safe. All of us are safe,” Attis sniffed as his hand trembled against hers.

“Azag?” Saxum asked as he and Can-Mo lowered themselves beside her.

Sayane's spiraling eyes settled on Echo's dead body, which had been gently laid nearby. Images of him ripping into their captors as the helmet drilled into his skull punched Sayane's memories.

"Echo!! Echo please!!! They're hurting Echo!!!" Sayane cried out.

“We need to get her from this place. She needs rest. We have taken too much from her. Please, carry her somewhere to rest!” Azag asked as his voice shook ever so slightly.

In his hands, Sayane was now flinching in hysteria.

“Red. Red everywhere…” she cried as she looked at her blood-coated hands.

It caused her to kick her legs in terror and violently wipe her palms on her stomach.

"It's always on me! The Dissonance is covering me and consuming me!! The red is always there!!!" she cried out as she tried to crawl away.

Azag’s hand returned, and he poured more comfort into her mind, but it still wasn’t enough. Anahita landed on Sayane’s chest and also began to rub.

“Sayane the red is gone. The Dissonance is broken. You destroyed it. It’s over,” Anahita said.

“What if the flowers never bloom again? What if I was too late? Oh no, I was too late…” Sayane groaned as she pressed her hands to her head in desperation.

All around them, sympathetic voices began to whisper in fearful inquisition.

“What is wrong with the songstress?”

“What is happening?”

“Is she hurt?”

“Is she dying?”

“She’s breaking…”

Azag looked around in concern. It had finally caught up to them. As incredible and powerful as she was, Sayane was still just a mortal creature, capable of being broken under severe, continued duress. And that had finally arrived. She had saved them all, but it came at too steep a price. He prayed to the nothingness that it would pass.

“You’re okay. You’re okay. You don’t have to cry anymore…”

He remembered the broken girl she was only six months ago when she arrived in their world. It had taken weeks for her to find some semblance of peace, then it took another few weeks for her to find her way. Then, there in that pool in the darkness of a long forgotten fissure, she had found her voice again.

She’d told herself no more crying, and those tears had stopped. But he had seen her cry and weep dozens of times since then.

Through it all, singing and music had always brought her comfort.

Ambient light bathed them in pearlescent white as the Violated Shard approached in humming silence. None of the instruments rose, and Azag knew that meant that Sayane’s mind and heart were truly not with them at that moment. It was her turn to be saved.

“Red everywhere. Covering everyone. Everything. Oh gods, consuming me…” Sayane wept as she curled into a fetal, broken bundle.

Desperation sparked in Azag’s mind. He had to try something. If his touch wasn’t enough, he was going to have to reach her in her own way. It wasn’t something he was looking forward to, and he didn’t know if it would work, but he had to try.

“Everyone, please look away. I really don’t want you to watch me when I do this…” he murmured.

“Azag?” Can-Mo asked.

He covered his eyes and sighed.

“Actually, cover your ears too…”

Anahita understood and smiled an encouraging, soft smile.

“You’ll do amazing,” she said as she flitted her wings and returned to Saxum’s shoulder.

“I doubt that. But thanks,” he replied.

The Violated Shard was close now. Its blinding radiance covered all of Sayane in angelic light, almost burning her out of perspective. Even Azag was barely visible, but he still turned his head to look at the Shard, which he was now unsure how to understand.

“You and I are as much to blame for this as anyone else…” he said with the faintest of loathing growls in his voice.

“We took too much from her. We knew she could do it, but she shouldn’t have had to. Not alone at least. And you drained her now, to heal me and the others. So now, I need you to help me fix her.”

Pulses of light and golden flecks drifted out.

“I’m not a songstress, but I do love THE SONGSTRESS. So you better help, or I will never forgive you, or myself…” he growled.

It felt as though the Violated Shard was quietly approving. Faint, soothing ambient hums purred out in deep, bassy cries.

“Please, I want to go home. Please take us home, away from all of this…” Sayane whispered as her eyes flickered, then rolled back.

“We are, Sayane. I’ll take you back to the tavern, okay. And you’re going to have a lovely bath in the waterfall’s pool, okay? Do you remember that pool?” Azag asked, hoping it would set her mind for what he was about to do.

Her lip trembled.

“I cried. I cried so hard… I was so afraid and sad…” she said as more tears returned.

“You did. But you sang too… You sang…”

Nerves caused his stomach to tremble, but he cleared his throat and pressed his hand to her chest. One final look between him and the Shard was all he needed. Then Azag parted his lips.

“You sang… nooooo moooooore crying…” he sang in a nervous, deep voice.

Sayane shook with sobs as his words settled on her like a blanket.

It was unrefined, uneven, and slightly off from roughened, exhausted vocal cords. But it didn’t matter. None dared to look, speak, or interrupt. Azag inhaled and continued.

“You sang… I don’t want to mourn anymore. Nooooooo more crying… I’m picking myself up off the floor…”

As he sang, the Shard hummed out in melodic beats to support him. It helped pull him closer to harmony and gave him the sound dampening he needed to allow his voice to rise a little more. Every note stitched itself to Sayane’s heart as his hand continued to send gentleness into her soul.

She remembered that night.

The water was cold. Her heart was shattered. Her old costume might still be there on that damp, mossy stone. Waiting. Remembering who she was and reminding her how far she’d come.

"No more crying. I'm stepping through the door."

More light coated them.

“Nooooo mooooooore crying… I’m… I’m…”

Azag stuttered when nerves and fear caused him to forget the lyrics. But then Attis was beside him, with one paw on his hand and the other on Sayane’s leg. If anyone else could sing with him, it was the other who had been there from the beginning and was there that night in the darkened cave when the idol finally truly died, and the songstress was born.

“Fuzzy…” Sayane sobbed.

“You sang… I’m tired of the pain and hoping for a world that will never be the same…”

His voice was beautifully strong, with a weighted, throaty pull at its bass. Azag could feel his small paw trembling, but he continued to sing. They'd been there to watch her rip herself down to nothingness in that water, then rebuilt herself every day until she became the awe-inspiring creature they were now cradling.

“Nooooo moooooore crying…” the two men sang to Sayane as the Shard enveloped them in pure white until no one else could see them.

With The Shard’s aid, both of them began to harmonize.

“Nooooo moooooooooore cryyyyying. I never found peace, but at least I found a way. Noooooo mooooore cryyyyyyyying. It’s a brand new day.”

Soothing softness moved through Sayane’s mind, and the images of terror started to fade. Her hand rose to find Azag’s face, and he leaned forward. When her touch found him, the Shard’s light began to shine with even more clarity. Without realizing it, Sayane’s lips parted, and she began to murmur the words with them.

“Noooooooo moooore crying… I’m picking myself up offfff the floooooor…”

Something strange began to occur. Sayane’s throat and hands began to glow purple once more. Small, flickering embers of light danced along her skin, but then they bent upwards and made their way to Azag’s and Attis’s throats as well. Azag felt Attis’s paw tense on his arm as the light touched them, and suddenly their voices harmonized into perfect pitch, and the Violated Shard’s light turned to brilliant cyan that matched Azag’s eyes.

“Noooooo more crying. Noooooo mooooore crying.”

Sayane was singing with them now. Subtle parts of her eyelids allowed her to see Azag there against her, caressing her face as his throat shone out and the Shard’s light consumed them with blue.

Large fingertips pressed down firmer onto her chest, and Sayane watched as blue warmth manifested from his fingers and saturated her skin. It sank beneath the surface and floated through her body fully, pushing the pain away and letting her finally breathe normally again.

This felt different than his usual abilities. It felt true. Pure and complete. It felt like something her own power would have created. Her eyes opened fully, and she smiled a weak smile as her palm rubbed along his jaw. It caused him to pause, but he sang one last line, with Attis joining in.

“Noooooo more crying…” they finished in a gentle, fading tone.

She mouthed along with them until they were done, then she reached out for Attis as well. He cautiously crawled into her lap, and Azag cupped them both in his enormous arms.

“My two boys… My beautiful boys. I love you both. So… So much,” she sighed as she pressed them both to her.