The Bonds Between Love and War: Part 1

Music rang through the hallways of the school as Aria crept out the back door. Her date was a no-show and, despite the best efforts of several other girls to cheer her up, she decided she was done for the night. What was the point of standing around in a pretty dress and her best makeup if none of the boys were going to ask her to dance?

“It’s not like I was expecting much, anyways,” she muttered, pushing through the steel gym doors.

She unfolded a large canvas bag she’d hidden in her purse, shifting the contents around as she tried to make room for everything: a tube of lipstick, bottle of hand sanitizer, a package of wet wipes, and even the strange journals she’d smuggled out of the library two years prior. The black polyester gleamed in the streetlights, their reflection like stars in the sky above her bead.

“I hate to fold it up but,” tears stung her eyes, “if I take anything with me, it should be the dress. Grandma worked hard on it, so it’ll be the one memento I take.”

The dress folded with ease as she placed the satin-like fabric inside the canvas tote. She’d packed a light cardigan crop-top, high-waisted shorts, and a pair of low-heeled sandals to change into once the dance was over or, God forbid, her date was a no-show. She couldn’t believe the irony; it wasn’t even ten o’ clock, and she was already leaving. She was surprised she didn’t leave sooner, her date being a no-show before the dance even started and all.

She couldn’t help but entertain the thought that maybe people really did think she was as useless as she felt sometimes. The car accident, while something she’d made progress towards accepting, hadn’t left her mind. In fact, she still blamed herself; she wanted to find a way to atone, and lessening the burden of her own self-pity on her grandmother seemed like a possible avenue. Still, it was difficult to explain what, exactly, she was feeling. The self-pity was there, for sure, but did she feel guilty because she blamed herself, or was it that she wanted to wither away, like a languishing flower?

“Whatever. It’s like anyone will care if I’m gone, anyways.”

Carefully, she stepped out of her heels, hanging onto a nearby light pole for balance. Fumbling around in the tote, she realized that, aside from the dress, her evening attire was all black. She let her mind wander as she fastened the straps on her sandals, white clashing against her black tights. If everything else was as dark as the sky, was she subconsciously mourning the death of her parents still, like some kind of perpetual funeral? Perhaps her mind was really trying to tell her that the future was as boundless as a starry sky, but… Was there a part of the universe that starlight would never reach? If she held out her hand, would she be able to scoop up even a morsel of the stellar luminescence? The way the light scattered when she squinted… Was she chasing a light she knew she would never reach, or was it, instead, that the light was trying to run from her? The way they hid in the streetlight, obscured by the artificiality… Her life felt just as artificial, something mass-produced and cheaply made. The more she thought about it, the less she wanted to compare her life to something as grand as a star; it didn’t feel right, comparing something so broken-down and decayed to something so full of life and energy.

“I guess it won’t matter in the end.” She picked her shoes up, the artificial leather causing them to stick to each other. “I never was a stilettos girl, and now the actual heels are going to end up poking me in the side.” She gave a long sigh. “Will another three, four inches bring me closer to some god, or will they break as I fall, tempted by the gates of some inescapable hell?” She paused for a moment. “What am I even saying? I should have just worn flats. Err… My mind isn’t exactly the kindest place right now, so I guess it wouldn’t have really mattered, to be honest.”

She returned her attention to the purse, still trying to move its contents around. Finally, after another minute, she managed to organize everything… at least, well enough so that her heels weren’t trying to stab her through the bag itself.

She blew a curl of hair out of her face with an exasperated huff. “Now then, I think it’s time I take a better peek at you,” she said, addressing the journals in her hand she’d pulled out of the purse. “I never looked further than the first and last few pages, but the phone number on the first page… If I really want to make something of this stupid life, maybe I should call it.” A quick flurry of pages later and she’d flipped to the final page:

“Author’s Note:

If you have managed to read this far, surely, you’re anxious to learn more about the words and meanings etched into these pages. I have poured countless years of research and study into these writings—exploring the most fundamental principles of this world, using only the most viable subjects.

I have been to the depths of the ocean’s floors, studied the connections between dark matter and dark energy, drilled into the ice at the poles, and even worked as a top scientist at one of the world’s particle collider research institutes; I have examined the intricacies of human consciousness and how personality fades during unconsciousness, helped solve some of the most intricate mathematical equations to plague human minds, and thus… I took all of that data, all of those years of research, and found a way to avoid the pesky “butterfly effect”.

Of course, this you already know if you’ve read the research that is contained within these pages, but that must also mean you are curious. Seek me out, if you dare to challenge the very laws that govern the universe. What you think you know is wrong.”

She bit her lip, drawing a small trickle of blood. Her tongue embellished the bitter taste, lapping at the red liquid until she had stained her lips with the makeshift lipstick. Anxiety drilled into her heart as she held her phone against the journal, finger poised, ready to be the catalyst for the start of her new life—but what would everyone say when she was gone? Her body trembled. She was afraid that the one thing she’d clung to would be nothing more than a sick, elaborate prank. The author’s note sounded good, almost too good.

She could care less about everyone else. After all, they were the reason she could never push the thought of ending her life from her mind; it had been there the moment her parents were declared deceased—the moment she realized she’d lived, and they hadn’t. What did everyone else care? They were all too worried about who would take notes for them when they skipped class or who would take over her club duties.

Maybe it was selfish of her to want to die, to want to get away from the insurmountable anxiety that kept food from her mouth because anything she ate just came right back up, to want to understand how everyone else could be so happy all the time while she drowned in a monochrome world, unable to escape the depression that weighed her down like their taunting laughs and pointing fingers.

“I want to say goodbye to this miserable life.” She hit the call button as the Caller ID scrolled “Unknown” across the top of the phone screen. “Maybe this will be good for me… and everyone else. I can be out of their lives, and they can be out of mine—for good.”

The phone rang once… twice… three times. She decided that, once the call hit thirty seconds with no answer, she would hang up, finger poised above the red button that would end both the phone call and her only shot at a new life, at something that could fix the relentless years of pain and suffering she’d had to endure. Just as she was about to end the call, to her surprise, a man’s voice answered the other line:

“There is no turning back once you’ve chosen this path.” His voice was a gravely mixture of caution, yet she could sense an elated undertone somewhere within it. “Are you certain this is what you want?”

A lump formed in her throat before she could choke the words out. “What I want is my old life back. Not a game of twenty questions.”

“I see,” the man said. “Very well then, Aria Miruna. Stay right where you are.”

The line died as a shiver crept down her back. How did he know her name? Was it the Caller ID? Was she having second thoughts? Some subconscious part of her did want to just carry on like normal, but another part of her clawed at the back of her mind like a caged animal, desperate for freedom, for something she knew she couldn’t have but selfishly envied anyways.

She shook her head. “No way. I’ve come this far to change my mind now, and like he said, there’s no turning back.”

But what did she really want? If there were two warring factions in her mind, which side would win out? Her unconscious, repressed memories of a boy she thought she once knew? She couldn’t even remember his face anymore—or if he was even real. There was something about an aquarium or some junked-up thrift store… But that couldn’t be right. The tags on her clothes had come from a local shop in the mall, but when did she buy them? And with whom? She almost felt sick; she pushed the thoughts from her mind.

Everything had become so distorted and twisted: the friends she thought she once had, the bedroom that was no more than a box of lingering negativity, and even someone she couldn’t remember—someone she wasn’t sure if she loved or hated. She’d spent the last two years trying to forget about life before the accident—she could just start over with a new life and act like nothing had ever happened… except she couldn’t forget. Her negative thoughts had already polluted the pristine waters of her sea, turning it from clear to murky and, instead of trying to purify it, she dove in head-first.

A rolling ache coursed through her body as she plunged into the icy depths. Words that once held no meaning now swirled around her, taunting: “useless”, “lazy”, “unapproachable”, “weird”, “unlovable”. She was shoulder-deep now— She didn’t know what had happened at school, after she finally returned, a month after the accident, but everyone’s attitudes had changed.

Waist-deep— The girls stared at her like she was talking to the guy they all liked because how dare she, but she didn’t even know their names, standing near the entrance to the classroom. Did they not understand what she was going through, with the death of her parents… the death of her life?

Chest-deep— She would try to sit with her “friends” at lunch, but they’d make up excuses about why they had to leave and couldn’t stay, forcing her to eat alone. She was forced to cower beneath the unrelenting stares of the lunchroom and hushed whispers of gluttonous voices, eating the gossip up like how a flood swallows the land.

Submerged— Hate notes littered the inside of her locker, calling her every name imaginable. She’d find her textbooks in the bathroom sinks, ruined by the running faucets. Some mornings, she would sit at her desk only to find the very edge of her seat as she landed on the floor, nursing a newly bruised tailbone. She wouldn’t cry—she couldn’t cry. There weren’t any tears left for her; they had all been used for her parents, for the friends she thought she had—for anything other than the hell she had been living in. Stifled giggles and snickering students had become the song she played at the funeral for the death of her life—her world.

A robust chill followed by waves of nausea pulled Aria from her repressive daze. Her teeth chattered from the unabating cold as her nerves swayed to the clattering rhythm. The nausea grew stronger as her arms and legs began to shake. She’d been carsick before, the kind of nausea that takes hours to fade, forcing her parents to pull over onto the side of the road so she could empty her stomach, but this was an entirely different kind of nausea, one that forced her to her knees as sweat left dark splotches on the pavement. All she could focus on was the hair that dangled in front of her eyes and sun-bleached parking lot.

“I should have warned you,” a harsh whisper came, “I tend to have a bit of an… overwhelming effect on some people. My apologies. You’ll get used to it.” It was the voice from the phone.

Aria rolled onto her back, wrists resting atop her forehead. She stared up at the sky, peering through the streetlight halos until the stars came into view. Why was she unable to see them earlier? They were beautiful, almost as if they were encouraging her to reach out for their sacred light—to protect the final glimmers of hope in her heart.

Life wasn’t something she enjoyed, even if she refused to admit to herself it was true, but she held on to the fading glimmer that someday she would enjoy life, and she’d be one of those generic families that posted their lives on social media. It was a ridiculous thought, but it underscored the hope she clung to that life did have a purpose and that there was meaning to hers, despite the bullies and the internal struggles she faced. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew things weren’t all bad, but even so. Why did everyone have to be so cruel? What did they gain by tormenting her?

Tears formed in her eyes, tears of anger and resentment. She hated the people who had turned her life into a living hell, especially those whom she had considered friends—the ones who found more pleasure stabbing her in the back rather than acting as a support pillar. Most of all though, she hated herself for being so gullible. She should have known that they only wanted her around because she made their lives easier. Tears weren’t her thing. She wanted to be strong, and the first step in achieving that strength was fixing her past mistakes—impossible second chances.

“God, I’m so sick of feeling this way!” She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, still nauseous. “I’ve made up my mind. I’m going. I’m leaving this pitiful excuse for a life behind and—” She turned her head… and rammed it straight into the base of the streetlight she was laying under. “I don’t remember that being… there,” she said, stunned and confused.

For a moment, she thought she’d managed to stumble to her feet, but everything was spinning; she couldn’t tell what was up and what was down until her head hit the pavement. She tried to keep her eyes open, remembering the time she hit her head on the windowsill as a little girl. Her mother had scrambled down the stairs to find Aria sitting on the living room floor with a bloodied head. She had been lying on the top of the couch, but she’d scooted it out, causing her to hit her head on the windowsill as she fell between the back of the couch and the window. “You knew better than that, Aria,” her mother had said. “When you hit your head like that, don’t ever fall asleep,” she scolded as she dragged her crying daughter into the car on the way to the Emergency Room.

Footsteps echoed off the concrete and out into the empty back lot of the school, the rhythmic pounding lulling Aria to sleep. She caught a fading glimpse of a man as he emerged from the shadows, into the dim streetlight: lanky, dark hair, clean-shaven, and dressed like he’d come from a formal business meeting, suit and all.

“It seems this is everything you’re taking to start this new life of yours.” He crouched down, collecting the items that had scattered from her purse. She must have dropped it when the nausea hit. “I would have preferred to pick your brain and learn more about you first, but I suppose you can rest—for now.”

The man slung Aria over his shoulder. He carried her purse with his free hand as he moseyed through the parking lot. A faint tune whistled from his lips before Aria and the strange man disappeared into the darkness of the night.

“There you have it.” Millee suddenly reappeared beside Brendan, noticing the troubled look on his face. “I see that didn’t make you feel any better, but that’s ok, I guess.”

He opened his mouth to speak but stopped. Millee had changed her entire outfit. Draped around her arms and lower body, an oversized white hoodie kept her warm in the chilly, early-spring evening. A light blue, off-shoulder shirt fluttered across her body when she moved, its wide neckline playfully exposing her collarbone. Between the hoodie and the shirt, she reminded him of a walking cloud. The pink bow perched in her hair almost seemed to clash with the other colors, yet it added a gentle, carefree touch to the outfit as well. Her white thigh-high socks were the perfect personality piece though, adorned with tiny bears—an endearing touch as they hid beneath her knee-length skirt, legs like clouds beneath the sky-colored pleats. She finished the ensemble off with a pair of black, polished Mary Jane pumps.

Brendan’s sour expression earned him a one-way ticket to Gut-Punch City. “Dammit, Millee! Take this seriously,” he said between breaths. “We’re not out here dressing to impress!”

“Yeah, I noticed. That loose, faded black button-up you have on doesn’t even match the shirt you have on underneath, and what’s with the shorts?” she scolded. “Both of your shirts are wrinkled, the button-up doesn’t match your blonde hair at all—never wear grey—your actual t-shirt is so faded I can’t even tell what it says anymore, and is it supposed to be white or off-white? The collar sags, your shorts have a hole in the back thigh and—”

“For f— Look. I appreciate the fashion advice, but you’re not helping your case. You keep dodging my questions and you’re not even explaining any of what just happened to me.”

“That’s the thing, Brendan. I’m the one showing you all of this. Take me seriously. Just because I want to look presentable doesn’t mean I’m neglecting my responsibilities.”

He rolled his eyes, hoping she wouldn’t see. “You look cute, really cute. But were the tiny bears for your socks really the most appropriate thing you could have picked out?”

“Socks…?” She looked down at her legs. “Oh, yeah. I mean, I just throw on whatever legwear I feel like that day. Today just so happened to be thigh-highs. Tomorrow could be leggings or a pair of shear pantyhose. Just depends.” She looked up, catching the final second of an eyeroll. “Don’t be like that, Brendan. Again, just because I want to be cute doesn’t mean I’m not taking this seriously.” She unwrapped a sucker and popped it into her mouth. “Want one? I only have cotton candy flavor on me right now, though.”

He sighed. “You have a hell of a fashion-sense, and, no, I don’t want any sweets at the moment. It’s just— There’s a couple things we need to talk about—about what just happened.”

“You want to know where that man—” She pulled the sucker from her mouth. “Correction: where Ahzef took Aria, right?” She placed her foot against the wall of the gym’s exterior and leaned back. The evening breeze was just enough to ruffle her skirt.

“Yes, but can you stop with the suggestive poses? You’re so unafraid of, uh, you know…” He noticed the forlorn look on her face. “Uhh, hello? Millee? You didn’t hear anything I just said, did you?” He averted his gaze as he stared into the parking lot. “Totally unafraid to flash your underwear at me.”

“It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it, but if you saw anything,” she threatened, “you will have something to worry about it.”

“Oh, yeah because that’s real fair when you’re the one who seems to lack modesty.”

She tilted her head towards the sky, ignoring him. “Anyways, Aria was taken to the very same ship she told you about. I was going to have you watch a few more important pieces of her past, but I think you understand the gist of things from here. What I really need you to see are these next few fragments.”

Without warning, she snatched what looked to be large shards of multi-colored, tinted glass from the air, filled with cracks. Within their frames were a series of moving images, almost like a silent movie. Each fragmented section seemed to tell its own part of the overall story even though they’d occasionally spill over into each other.

“This is a fragment of her memory. No— It would be better to say this is part of what Ahzef tried to erase but failed at. When Aria finally broke, so too did several important pieces of her memory that she threw away in an attempt to quell her subconscious. He promised her that he could do the impossible.” A melancholy look crossed Millee’s face.

“He promised he could bring her parents back, that he could give her what she wanted most—a new life. To do that, he would theoretically rewrite the whole world, but it was all a lie.” Brendan joined Millee against the wall, pressing his back against the cold concrete.

“I see you finally decided to join me,” she winked.

“Yeah, well— Just don’t punch me in the stomach again, and maybe I’ll stay.”

She almost looked sorry, wincing at the thought of punching him again. “I might have been a little harsh, punching you like I did. Sorry,” she apologized. “Getting back on track, Aria is perhaps the greatest weapon against the Reverse Royalty. I don’t claim to know everything, but what I do know is leverage. Why do you think Azael appeared before us in the library?”

“He knew we’d opened a link to the past and, with that, he saw an opportunity to correct the mistake Ahzef made in putting his trust in Aria. If he could prove that she was a threat to his plans, he’d receive Ahzef’s praise, but it could also be an opportunity for him to use Aria to his advantage.” He pondered on the thought for a moment. “It’s just a theory, but there’s the chance that, if Ahzef could rewrite the past, he’d keep her under a much tighter lock and key.”

“I’d give that theory probably an eight out of ten. When you decided you were going to fight Azael, you might have stood a stood a chance, but it would have been a grueling fight. You could have potentially taken him down, but we can’t chance a maybe.” She slid down the wall, stretching her legs out. “Unlike Lucifero, Azael cannot be revived. It’s kind of funny because Ahzef understands how strong he is. Therefore, he refuses to offer him any second chances. He's no fool and, in order to truly defeat the Reverse Royalty, we would have to defeat Ahzef first. He truly thought he had Aria under his thumb, but he didn’t plan on Omnis’ intervention.”

Brendan picked her brain. “Mana told me about several of her, let’s call them “visits”, with Omnis, but just who or what is Omnis?”

She struck a thoughtful pose. “I think it’s best you watch these final memory fragments before we get much deeper into this conversation. Remember, this is still about Aria.” Millee stood up as she paced forward a few steps. “These next fragments are some of Aria’s worst and will test you. Are you ready?”

“As avoidant as ever,” he smiled. “You still owe me answers to my questions, you know.”

She smiled. “Yes, I know. We’ll address that later. But for now, actually do take my hand this time.”

***

Aria struggled to open her eyes, caught somewhere between a hyper-realistic dream as her consciousness waded somewhere just beneath the surface. She felt like she’d been shot full of anesthesia, unable to discern reality from a medicated hallucination—that much she was acutely aware of. Bed sheets trapped her legs between the soft cotton as she tossed and turned before kicking them off in her sleep-wake struggle. Pillows were knocked from their position against the headboard, the only thing keeping her from ramming her head against the solid oak.

Her whole body shivered amidst a cold sweat. The air conditioning was unabating as it crawled across her soaked skin like death, no longer shielded by the comfort of her sheets that lay in a heap on the floor. What was meant as comfort seemed to have the opposite effect, the crumpled pile of sheets growing more and more wrinkled by the second.

“Brakes…” she mumbled through her stupor, “hit the brakes… Tree… Car…” Her face twisted in terror. “Car!”

She shot up in bed, forehead taking the brunt of the impact as she bit a sizeable gash into her lower lip. Blood poured down her chin, staining her mouth a bright crimson. For the first time, she consciously realized the chill in the air. Once the pain hit, she knew it would come all at once, lip already throbbing. Blood dripped onto the mattress topper, slow at first, before it gushed from the self-inflicted wound. She held her hands over her mouth, trying to stop the blood from staining the fabric but it seeped through her fingers, regardless.

She looked around the room for something to use to clean herself up with, but four grey walls and a small, round window above her head were the only things around. There was a sink and cabinets against the far wall, but they been locked behind a plexiglass case for whatever reason—it didn’t take a genius to know the door to the room was likely also locked. Between the strange room, torn lip, and a coming headache, she wasn’t sure what to do next, and her eyes wouldn’t stop watering from the pain.

“Is this really what I wanted? Am I making the right decision here?” she sniffled. “What the hell am I doing?”

“If one mistake was all it took before we gave up, what would we learn?”

Aria jumped. “The voice from the phone… W-when did you get in here?” She quickly wiped the tears from her eyes, now red and puffy.

“Unimportant. Tell me,” he said, eyeing her, “are you prepared to throw away your old life for good?”

Aria stared back. “Yes. I’m tired of this. I’m tired of being the girl everyone looks at and says, ‘But you have such a pretty face. How could you possibly know what it’s like to suffer?’”

The man closed his eyes and nodded. “Yes, that’s quite unfair. We all have our struggles, do we not?” He pulled a clipboard and paper from a plastic bin by the door. “Might I see a finger for a moment?” She looked at him, weary, before reluctantly holding out her hand. With a small prick, he drew fresh blood from her pinky finger. “Please sign your name here, initial here, and sign here,” the man said, tapping each dotted line as he skimmed the page.

“What is this supposed to be, and what am I supposed to write with if I sign it?”

He ignored her. “This contract ensures you agree to all the terms and conditions of the procedures outlined on this page. Liability is held only by the agreeing party.”

She felt like she’d been hit by a train and left to die on the tracks. “Assuming you’re some kind of doctor, whatever happened to explaining things to the patient? Can’t I read it first? Plus, I need a pen. I don’t have anything to write with.”

“You want to be rid of this old life, do you not?”

“I mean, yes, but—”

“Then please sign where I just indicated—in blood.”

“In blood,” she repeated.

“Yes.”

A dull, uncomfortable ache sprouted from midsection of her back as the man snatched the clipboard from her hands, signed and dotted in red. Did the growing ache in her back have something to do with the contract, or did she sleep wrong and she was just now beginning to feel the effects of weak muscles? The man seemed to know exactly what she was thinking.

“You can use the mirror on the wall if you’d like to see your new contract crest. When you’re ready and fully dressed, come see me in the hall.”

“Fully… dressed?” She flushed bright red. Her eyes shot forward, but the man was already gone. “A warning would have been nice… Who just forgets to tell someone they’re missing clothes?” She stumbled out of bed and walked over to the mirror, craning her head around to see the new crest.

A large diamond-like polygon had been etched into her back. It looked like a giant tattoo, just less required maintenance. It almost seemed to ripple when she twisted around, trying to get a better view in the mirror. If the crest weren’t so obvious, she’d probably forget it was even there. She turned to examine it from the other side.

“Mmm… Need more light.” Her feet pattered against the tile floor as she flicked the light switch on the wall before returning to her place in front of the mirror. “What does this thing even do or mean? I feel like I’m living some kind of weird fairy tale where the girl gets locked up and someone has to save her.” She shivered. “Ew. I hate the thought of that.”

She peered into the mirror again, examining the crest further. Several rows of smaller polygons spiraled around the larger, main polygon, growing in size with each new row. The first encircled the main shape, each row thereafter encircling the one before it, wider.

“The way the rows spiral around like they do kind of reminds me of a firework after it’s shot into the sky.” She twisted around to the other side again as the light illuminated four small cubes, one at each corner. “These almost make it feel confined, like some kind of seal.” She flexed the muscles in her back a little more, taking in every detail. A trio of numbers suddenly came into view, nestled inside the larger polygon: 005.

“Probably not a big deal, but why zero, zero, five? This is starting to feel more like some kind of creepy experiment than a bad fairy tale.” She shuddered. “Ok, clothes now because God knows where everything else went. Just my underwear and this itchy, thin medical gown are not an acceptable fashion statement.”