Faded Fire and White-Gold Carp

“I really hate how places look after Hemera.” Yawned Nitya. The street lights, flickering as though they didn’t know whether it was night or day, stood slanted over the streets. She couldn’t stomach processing anything else.

Kanami laughed, though it was distinctly the laugh of someone who really wanted to cry. “How come you hate Hemera so much anyway, huh?”

“How come you like Hemera so much?”

“Fair point. Got me there.” She let out a half-giggle, stretching her arms out and letting her palms face the sky. “It's a long story; kinda mushy. You up for it?”

Nitya looked around the smoldering remains of Fresa District and stared at a broken holoprojector still trying to play that same Hemera ad. “I expected as much, so yes.”

“I got engaged when I was about twenty, to a guy named Luca. We were a little young, but neither of us cared. His family immigrated here from Germany for some reason, and he was tall, for you, and really pretty, too. Breathtaking is more accurate, I think.”

“So you like pretty ones.”

“I just appreciate the beauty present in our world!”

“Ah, is that all?”

“Oh, shut up! You’re awful!” Kanami gave her shoulder a playful punch. “Weird, but anyway, he was the sweetest person I ever met. Luca always let me cry on him. We’d order bad takeout and drench it in whatever leftover sauce we had from the week before. We did almost everything together. Before I knew it, I was almost throwing up with laughter once after watching a really bad movie from the 2020s, and suddenly Luca brought out a ring and proposed. It has a genuine ruby-my birthstone!”

Nitya hummed, a lie on her lips. “I’ve never seen one.”

“I’ll show you when we get back to my apartment; I’m not surprised, since real stones aren’t easy to come by. I obviously said yes. Whatever happened in my life, wherever it took me, I wanted to be with him. Even Neo-Athens looked beautiful when he was around. I really, really loved him.”

“Something happened, though?”

“Yeah. Something did happen. The district, my home, burnt to a crisp one evening. I was coming home from school and my apartment was burning. Everything I had, everything I cared about, just burning. I just stood there. I listened to a shitty advertisement about who-knows-what and watched. I wasn't the only one out there, but I was the only one who went in. I knew Luca was still in there. I didn’t want him to die.”

“You went into a burning building alone?”

“I couldn’t deal with the idea of him burning alive while I was just waiting around.” Kanami snapped. Her shoulders sagged and she sighed, hugging herself. “But when I went in, there was…nothing. No bodies, no Luca, just nothing. I started moving things around. People came to drag me out, but I was just numb. I lost my arm trying to save a corpse and I had almost nothing to show for it. There was no trace of Luca. There wasn't anything to cremate.”

“I'm sorry, Kanami.” Said Nitya, and she really was.

“A few days later, Hemera contacted me. I knew he worked for them, but I had no idea he was so important to have that big of a life insurance plan so young! He wrote me into his will so I’d be okay if something happened to him…pretty lucky, huh? Hemera helped me get my shop despite Luca’s life insurance.”

“Yeah?”

“Nia and Toton helped me get back to myself,” Kanami laughed, her grin brightened by the lovely orange glow of dusk. “But Hemera helped me back on my feet.”

What…was a Toton?

“That's why you're so loyal to them?”

“Maybe not loyal, but I don't think they're anywhere as bad as you think they are. Why do you think they're so bad anyway, huh?”

“I have my reasons.”

“Really? You made me tell you my tragic past and you won't even answer that? Too cruel, Nitya. You're the worst.” Kanami bumped her shoulder.

Nitya laughed to herself. If only Kanami knew the full truth.

Turning away from that smile she couldn't bear to have directed at her, Nitya looked at the cracked and broken asphalt and half-melted buildings. “I want everyone to be free. Hemera is fundamentally opposed to that, because if everyone was free, where would they be? That's why I don't like them.”

“Hmm, that's too simple. You're lying, aren't you?” Kanami stopped and turned around, ducking low to see Nitya's face. She laughed as she stood up. “You are! You're a terrible liar, you know that? You have to get better at that, Nitya, or it'll come back to bite you~so what's the real reason? And if you won't answer that, then why is Hemera after you, huh?”

“Within the deepest part of Hemera’s internal database, there's rumors of something called the Hyperion Core. Supposedly, it's an extremely powerful engine capable of everything from superluminal travel to opening wormholes to traveling through black holes, and coincidentally enough, it's somewhere by Neo-Athens. I’m not supposed to know about it. No-one is, but even then, I don't think they'd do all this because I know about the Core.”

“So why?”

“Because I'm going to find it first.” Nitya winked. Kanami rolled her eyes.

“Sooo, the biggest company on the continent-in the world!-is after you because you might find something that isn’t real?”

“It is real.”

“And how do you know that, huh?”

“I just do. You can call it a ‘gut feeling,’ if you'd like.”

Kanami rolled her eyes and poked Nitya’s stomach. “You're letting this thing decide?”

“I do try to feed it more than Nutri-bars and ramen.”

“Hey! You leave my diet alone! I'm getting by just fine on nutri-bars and ramen, and it cuts down on grocery bills!” Laughed Kanami, putting her arms behind her head and stretching them out towards the summer sky. She looked at Nitya with a smile laced with something she couldn’t identify. “You really believe that Core is real? Enough to be okay with the destruction of Fresa for it? What are you even gonna do with it?”

The cold breeze against her ears made Nitya shiver, seemingly beckoning her towards a building with its roof partially collapsed, carrying the stench of melted rubber and the sound of flickering static. A motorcycle or two were parked next to a nearby building. A tattered flag, its emblem not clear in the wind, hung on the side of each. Nitya pulled Kanami close. “Inside. I'll tell you inside.”

“Nitya, there's barely an inside left-whoa!”

She was correct: the inside was a burnt mess of twisted metal. What remained of the speakers repeated a mix of the same advertisement over and over and the chorus of an incomprehensible pop song. The workbench sat in a pathetic heap next to a crushed amalgamation of wires, circuit boards, and spider-like limbs that once made up the parlor’s operating chair.

Kanami stepped ahead and thumbed it. “Hemera gave me this shop.”

“And it’s the reason you don’t have one anymore.”

And..the reason she had it in the first place.

Nitya allowed the taller woman to lead her upstairs and into her studio apartment. She could smell the faint scent of jasmine incense. From what she could see, it was sparsely decorated, though a poster from an anime she used to watch hung on a wall. Ah, she wondered where the series was now…

Kanami tapped her shoulder, holding a ring in one hand and shining her phone on it with the other. “Heyo, Nitya, check it out: my engagement ring! What do you think?”

A gold band inlaid with a pure-crimson ruby. A date and two initials were engraved on either side.

“It’s beautiful.” Said Nitya, and she really meant it.

“Yeah, isn’t it? Got scared to lose it at the shop or have it stolen while walking around, so I kept it here. Didn’t really help in the end, huh?” Kanami looped a chain through the ring before putting it over her neck and tucking it underneath her shirt. Holding a small backpack close to her chest, she slipped a picture frame and a small urn into it. She handed Nitya an odd-smelling sandwich with a smile. “C’mon, Nitya. There’s nothing else here.”

Nitya bit into the sandwich as she followed Kanami downstairs. She yawned, wiping her mouth with her sleeve, and tapped the side of her HUD. “Turn on the flashlight, will you?”

“Good evening, Reconnaissance. Initiating flashlight.”

The shop was even more pathetic with light illuminating each crevice, crushed automatons indistinguishable from cybernetic enhancements. Nitya kicked a piece of thin scrap metal out of her way and picked up a small screwdriver. “Need any of this?”

“Nope, everything I really need is in my arm, and everything else can be replaced.”

“It’s more than a prosthetic?”

Kanami laughed. “Yep~What, did you think I wouldn’t upgrade myself?”

“I’m just surprised, is all.”

Whatever Kanami said next, she didn’t hear it. She shifted through the rubble and kicked over bricks, hissing in pain as wires and glass scraped against her hands. She crouched, knocking over a brick to sit, and paused. An odd feeling spread across her fingers.

Nitya pulled the brick out of the way. Another cluster of bricks sat lopsided behind it. She straightened them out and pushed her way closer.

“Soooo, Nitya, what’re you looking for?” Kanami called from the other side of the parlor, spinning around lazily in her chair she’d found.

“How old is this building? Do you know?”

“Huh?”

“The building. How old is it?”

“Um…I think it was built sometime around 2100? Why?”

2100…about twenty seven years ago, and three years after the first mention of the Hyperion Core in Hemera’s internal files. Nitya hummed to herself.

“No reason. I was just curious.”

Hidden by bricks was a fully unharmed part of the wall, a slight shimmer to it as if it didn't fully belong there. Nitya scratched a crack between it and another brick. She cursed and kicked it when it didn't budge. The wall continued to shimmer.

Kanami crouched beside her. “What are you doing..?”

Nitya tapped on her temple a few times. Force wasn't working and she wasn't smart enough to figure out if there was a puzzle involved. It felt like playing a RPG she didn't understand but only bought because her friend liked it. She never did like that game, but at least it had made him smile.

“Gabriel Haeberli! Hyperion!” She began rattling off strings of words, repeating phrases within Hemera’s internal files, kicking at the wall again when none worked.

“So, Nitya, maybe stop kicking the wall? You're going to hurt yourself.”

Cursing under her breath, she glared at the shimmering wall. She felt Kanami’s fingers hovering over her back before rubbing light circles across her shoulder blades. A kind gesture that was wasted on someone who couldn't appreciate it.

“Now try.” Whispered Kanami. Nitya cursed again. Damn herself for finding this woman.

She rattled off the same phrases before resting her head against the wall. A brief flash of light blinded her and she sat up so quickly her head reeled.

“Only I who have found this place shall finally embark into the light.”

The bricks began to split apart, engulfing them in an almost poisonous golden light before dissipating and revealing a lengthy staircase. A cold warmth permeated from its stone chamber.

Kanami looked at the staircase and then Nitya from the corner of her eye. “How’d you know to do that, huh?”

“I don’t know. Let’s go.” Said Nitya, gesturing Kanami close and beginning their descent.

The stone walls were cool to the touch in some places but warm in others. The staircase, its roof so low Kanami had to lean down, was barely a person wide at first before expanding out to accommodate them both. Nitya shuddered as water splashed onto her ankles. They’d reached the end of the staircase.

Within the center of the shallow pool she stood in was a small stone platform. It was only high enough to avoid the water. A pair of beautiful golden carp swam around it, swimming out of the way Nitya and Kanami stepped further in. Nitya shuddered at the cold water soaking her tights. She stared at the pair for a while, mesmerized by their glittering scales, and leaned down to glide her fingers over them. Soft and soothing, as all fish are.

“Huh,” Kanami said, holding up a glossy sheet. “This is completely blank.”

Nitya slid closer. “Was there anything else?”

“Yep. Nothing else here. Why would you go through the effort to build this place for just a blank piece of paper?”

“It wasn’t meant for us. Let me see it.”

She smoothed out the paper’s corners. A glossy, pretty piece of paper that reflected the water below and yet held nothing. Nitya tapped her HUD, sliding it from its place on her neck to her head, and placed the paper next to its flashlight. Nothing changed. It was just a pretty, blank sheet.

“Whoever built this didn’t build it for nothing, but maybe, Nitya, that’s too obvious? That’s it!” Shouted Kanami. She rocked on her feet with excitement.

“What is?”

“That paper must be the reward for completing something else. But what else is there here…?”

Nitya looked at the fish. They swam closer to her, spinning around and in between her ankles. Her tail wagged, despite her best efforts, the water soaking it and her skirt when she crouched. Holding up the carp, she stared into their eyes.

“Hey, what’s the secret here? I’ll eat you if you don’t tell me.” Nitya asked. The fish wiggled in her hands, opening and closing their mouths rapidly.

“I don’t really think threatening the fish is going to work, Nitya…”

“If you threaten people, they talk. I don’t see why fish are any different.”

“Fish can’t talk.”

Nitya placed the fish down after staring into each one’s eye. “No, but they are afraid of dying.”

Picking up the glossy paper, she dipped a corner into the pool. It shimmered in the water for a moment. The paper began to break apart into small pieces and she submerged it fully. The carp devoured the pieces. They swam up the stone platform in unison, settling on its top before merging into a glossy, white paper fish with gold lettering acting as its scales from a distance.

Nitya picked up the paper fish and shook it. “So, Kanami, what do you think? Did threatening the fish do the trick?”