Looking at Luna’s back, quickly shrinking in size as she made her way back into the depths of Cthulhu’s lair, I couldn’t help but smile a little.
“She really is a sweet child.” Hannah commented, looking at exactly the same I did.
“She surely is …” I said and finally leaned back into the sun lounge. The sun shine directly on my skin which somehow didn’t even feel that bad, even though I should be quite aversive to sun like Tom was.
“She might be a little bit too trusting though … and she clearly puts you on a pedestal.” Yeah, I knew that much. But so far, I couldn’t find a way to change that.
“At least I got her to see me primarily as a friend.” She still valued me highly, but at least she looked into my eyes and didn’t see some saintly being, far out of her reach.
“Well, that’s true. Say … you remember that you and your class put searching for marine life on every day we don’t have a trip which takes too long?” Hannah asked and made me flinch a little. Surely, I hadn’t forgotten that.
“Please don’t mention it ever again.” I growled a bit angrily.
“Hmm … why did you do that? You could have talked them out if it … telling them that it wouldn’t work for example would be quite easy.“ She asked and put me into a corner. I didn’t want to lie to her, that was for sure, but explaining the real reason was … embarrassing.
“At least two of them might need to protect this world in the future by fighting constantly. It’s only logical to make them realise what they are fighting for to motivate them a bit.” I told her, which wasn’t a lie to be honest.
“I’m not buying that.” She still said and left me no further option but to tell her the truth.
“Okay, Luna wanted to go as often as possible. Satisfied?” I said and looked away from her.
“Jup … I’m thinking of enjoying the water for a bit myself. Do you want to come with me?” She said and chuckles happily as I didn’t reply, but rather stared at her angrily.
And she truly left me afterwards, went a few metres into the water until her knees were completely under water and then returned to my side.
“Wow, that’s it? How old are you again?” There was only a single person as far as I could see who didn’t go in further … and that was a grandma.
“Old enough to buy alcohol in this area. Cheers.” She said, took her drink and took a sip of it. Truly … staying at the beach was shit, but the alcohol would make it better. Sadly, drinking a lot of it wasn’t exactly feasible there, so I kind of had to be satisfied with a little bit.
In the end, I laid there for a few hours, bathing in the sun and enjoying my free time without these brats around.
Thus, I didn’t even realise as a dripping wet Luna stood by my side again and poked my shoulder.
“Hey, there is a beach-volleyball field over there.” She said and pointed into the distance.
“Do you have … a ball?” I couldn’t remember anyone taking one along earlier, but someone may have taken a deflated one with them.
“You can rent one at a nearby shop.” She said and placed both her palms against each other pleadingly. Naturally, she didn’t take any money with her.
“Alright …” I said and started to search through my mantle, only to realise I made the same mistake.
“Here you go.” Hannah said and handed me a few coins over. “Take care of yourself.”
Yeah, I would certainly do that. Together with Luna, we went across the beach while she told me how much fun they had in the water … however that was possible. But shooting at water bubbles with air bursts was apparently quite funny for teenagers. Well, I didn’t understand much of humour in the first place and so I laughed whenever others would do.
A few minutes later, we arrived at the field with a volleyball in my hands and was directly greeted by a few teasing boys.
“Where have you been, Lucy? Were you scared of marine life?” No, I wasn’t scared of any monster and their teasing made me a little angry. But I was already prepared for that after not going with them.
“I heard there are some demons capable of destroying whole ships within an instant.” I said and threw the ball into the air, only to catch it afterwards.
“But not here?” I simply shrugged, threw the ball into the air and tried to fling the ball over the net, but failed miserably as I hadn’t played that game before.
“Well, do we want to play, or do you want to make fun of me? I can’t concentrate on both.” I said and put my tongue out of my mouth, quickly putting a stop to the teasing in the process.
And thus we played beach-volleyball for a little while until a few other from our class came by to tell us we needed to go back. As nice as I was, I bought the ball back to its owner and quickly caught up to the rest of the group.
After a little while of making sure everyone was there and nobody drowned which would have been hilarious, we got back to the hotel and ate dinner as a class while another one got back from a museum tour. During our mealtime, we girls also agreed to take a bath together which was apparently possible thanks to there being one large common bathroom for each gender.
As soon as I stepped into the bath with only a single towel around my body, I knew I should have begged the headmaster to give us the hotel which was crappier, but at least didn’t have a large bath. Because, unsurprisingly, it was more of a little swimming pool with hot water than anything else … and that was truly too much for me to take. Once more, I sat by as the others had fun in the steaming hot tub and merely cleaned myself with a cloth. At least they didn’t try anything funny which could have turned rather serious as I slowly felt my vampiric powers reawaken from their daily slumber.
And finally I could call it a day afterwards. There was nothing else on our agenda for the day, especially nothing with the much hated water. I could finally rest in peace in my bed, with Luna right by my side as we wrapped us into a shared blanket which was way too small for both of us. But a little bit of cuddling made everything possible.
“Lucy … is everything alright?” No, this was the worst possible school trip out oft the three possible ones.
“Yes?” I still said as I didn’t want to worry Luna at all.
“We had managed to catch a fish with magic …” Luna revealed a bit sleepy.
“Oh?” I asked, not that interested in her story and conscious that she would drift off into sleep rather quickly anyway.
“It had yellow stripes, but was otherwise completely black …” Which probably meant it was dangerous in some way or another … luckily they didn’t have to touch it.
“I see.” I said soothingly.
“Shouldn’t you write that down? You are responsible for collecting our findings after all…” I chuckled a and rested my head near her shoulder.
“I’ll do that tomorrow.” I said and listened to her low breathing for a little while until I got bored eventually. In the middle of the night, I stood up in my nightgown, opened the window quietly and stepped onto the windowsill. Closing the window shut from the outside once more proved to be quite a difficult task though, but after some time, I managed to do so. Grabbing the gutter, I pulled myself onto the angled roof and whistled a bit surprised as I saw Hannah who I really didn’t expect there.
“Shouldn’t you sleep?” I asked and walked up towards her carefully until I could sit down on the very top of the roof and look at the full moon.
“I should ask you the same … as your teacher.” She said and snipped against my shoulder playfully.
“So, what’s the plan?” She asked and kind of expected me to pull something out of my sleeve right away.
“There is no plan.” I said and closed my eyes a little. The colder air caressed my skin a little which felt rather nice after the whole day of continuous sunshine.
“That’s a bummer. And I really had hoped you would propose the demon infested mine as a destination for a nightly trip for us two.”
“It’s probably flooded with water at this point.” I concluded unhappily.
“True … but the possibility for carnage still exists.” Maybe … but the probability was rather low.
“Nah…” I muttered.
“Is it because of all the water you don’t want to?” Of all the water? Did she mean the swimming, the bath and possibly the mine as well?
“… yes.” I said quietly.
“I see.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t think water and I will get along anytime soon.” I admitted and already felt the emotions coming I usually connected with water.
“No, don’t worry about that. If there is anything with water, just let me do it instead. You don’t have to … to face dying over and over again.” That was nice of her … but water was only part of my many problems.
“It’s not that … at least not anymore. It’s more about feeling completely helpless these days. It still feel these deaths whenever I get close to water and it’s gripping my heart … I felt this crushing helplessness each and every death … and that hasn’t vanished in the slightest. If anything, it got even worse as soon as I got back. Suddenly, I need to fight against Aska to stop him from encroaching me once more … and I feel so helpless. Whenever I imagine him coming to this world for contingency plans, my heart clenches and I … I …” Suddenly a wave of sadness rushed over me, crushed me beneath it and gripped my heart just as I told Hannah before. I hated this feeling. I hated this helplessness. But it kept coming back because I had no clear idea how I should work towards my goals.
And for the first time, it pushed tears into my eyes.
“Hey, hey …” Hannah wrapped her arm around me and patted my shoulder carefully. “You don’t need to face that storm on your own. I’ll be with you, no matter what.” I knew that much. I knew she would stick to me till the bitter end, but then what?
“I … you can’t. Nobody can. I’m the only one who can do anything against a god with a suitable weapon. But I don’t have such a thing. If any god gets here, it’s over. And if it’s Aska, I will see you die in front of my eyes, and I will see him murder everyone I hold dear. That’s what’s at stake … and nobody can help me with that. Because nobody knows how he can get here and what’s stopping him in the first place. Nobody … not even I.” No matter how hard I fought against Aska, he would always come back. And I knew that he would win eventually, if not during our first fight all together.
“Lucinda, I’ll be with you no matter what.” Again, I knew that much. But what could she realistically do?
“It’s not helping! He would kill you, and I can’t have that. I am who I am because someone was always holding me back. Someone like the old Mary, Sofie, Luna and you. But once you all are gone … I would fall into a spiral of death. I would become the very existence I hate so much. And I don’t want to be like him … we already have way too much in common.” I cried out and weeped into my hands. I knew from the very get go that stopping him from coming here eventually was hard. But I still had hoped to have found something in the archives of the academy until this date. But I found nothing.
All I had was some foolish reincarnators, an underground organisation, a faith and a kingdom. But in the face of a god? That all amounted to nothing.
Even when someone would use these tools to fight myself at this point, I would score an overwhelming victory.
“I’m so pathetic … four hundred years of training … and I’m still a plaything of someone else.” I continued to weep uncontrollably while Hannah took me in her arms.
“It’s going to be fine. You hear me?” She said, but it didn’t help much to cheer me up.
“Why? Why should it?” I asked and barely kept back from shouting at her.
“Because I believe in you. I believe you can do this.” She said which helped to calm down somewhat. But not much.
“Do you? Do you truly believe I can win against the gods?” I asked, still incredibly overwhelmed by this crushing feeling of helplessness that just wouldn’t go away.
“Yeah …” She admitted and without even looking into her eyes, I knew for sure she wasn’t lying.
“You are foolish.” I muttered in between my sobbing.
“Maybe. But that’s what I believe. And I won’t let anyone take that away from me, nor even you.” She said which didn’t help to get rid of the crushing sadness at all, but at least let me get a grip on myself.
“I can’t have you believe I am incapable … can we?” I had shown her a pathetic display, which was something I absolutely despised myself for.
“Oh no? Tom would directly try his best to stab you from behind once I turn my back on you, the church would drop you faster than you could even blink and your whole life would be ruined. And I know how much you hate being betrayed, so give your best and credit yourself a little more, will you?” She said and patted my back while I kept rubbing my eyes to clear them of any tears.
“Alright … thanks.” I said, my heart still gripped in pain, but I somehow had it under control.
“You feeling better now?” She asked concerned. For her, it probably looked as if I was alright, even though it couldn’t be further from the truth. This feeling wouldn’t go away for a little while longer, I knew that much from the past two months.
“Somewhat … let’s go to the mines tomorrow night.” I said and smiled wryly.
“That’s the spirit.” Hannah said and patted my back one last time. “Shall I help you with getting back into your room?”
“That would be nice.” I explained and told up to stumble over to the edge of the roof, only to look back and her and wave a little. Making one step backwards, I fell downwards until my hands gripped onto the gutter and wind pushed me into the already open window. My landing was lighter than a feather and while still wiping away those reappearing tears, I closed the window and snuck under the blanket a second time. This time, I hugged Luna and rested my cheek on her shoulder.
Somehow this helped to fight back against the tears a little and with two very different feelings in my heart, I dozed off into sleep.
Looking at Luna’s back, quickly shrinking in size as she made her way back into the depths of Cthulhu’s lair, I couldn’t help but smile a little.
“She really is a sweet child.” Hannah commented, looking at exactly the same I did.
“She surely is …” I said and finally leaned back into the sun lounge. The sun shine directly on my skin which somehow didn’t even feel that bad, even though I should be quite aversive to sun like Tom was.
“She might be a little bit too trusting though … and she clearly puts you on a pedestal.” Yeah, I knew that much. But so far, I couldn’t find a way to change that.
“At least I got her to see me primarily as a friend.” She still valued me highly, but at least she looked into my eyes and didn’t see some saintly being, far out of her reach.
“Well, that’s true. Say … you remember that you and your class put searching for marine life on every day we don’t have a trip which takes too long?” Hannah asked and made me flinch a little. Surely, I hadn’t forgotten that.
“Please don’t mention it ever again.” I growled a bit angrily.
“Hmm … why did you do that? You could have talked them out if it … telling them that it wouldn’t work for example would be quite easy.“ She asked and put me into a corner. I didn’t want to lie to her, that was for sure, but explaining the real reason was … embarrassing.
“At least two of them might need to protect this world in the future by fighting constantly. It’s only logical to make them realise what they are fighting for to motivate them a bit.” I told her, which wasn’t a lie to be honest.
“I’m not buying that.” She still said and left me no further option but to tell her the truth.
“Okay, Luna wanted to go as often as possible. Satisfied?” I said and looked away from her.
“Jup … I’m thinking of enjoying the water for a bit myself. Do you want to come with me?” She said and chuckles happily as I didn’t reply, but rather stared at her angrily.
And she truly left me afterwards, went a few metres into the water until her knees were completely under water and then returned to my side.
“Wow, that’s it? How old are you again?” There was only a single person as far as I could see who didn’t go in further … and that was a grandma.
“Old enough to buy alcohol in this area. Cheers.” She said, took her drink and took a sip of it. Truly … staying at the beach was shit, but the alcohol would make it better. Sadly, drinking a lot of it wasn’t exactly feasible there, so I kind of had to be satisfied with a little bit.
In the end, I laid there for a few hours, bathing in the sun and enjoying my free time without these brats around.
Thus, I didn’t even realise as a dripping wet Luna stood by my side again and poked my shoulder.
“Hey, there is a beach-volleyball field over there.” She said and pointed into the distance.
“Do you have … a ball?” I couldn’t remember anyone taking one along earlier, but someone may have taken a deflated one with them.
“You can rent one at a nearby shop.” She said and placed both her palms against each other pleadingly. Naturally, she didn’t take any money with her.
“Alright …” I said and started to search through my mantle, only to realise I made the same mistake.
“Here you go.” Hannah said and handed me a few coins over. “Take care of yourself.”
Yeah, I would certainly do that. Together with Luna, we went across the beach while she told me how much fun they had in the water … however that was possible. But shooting at water bubbles with air bursts was apparently quite funny for teenagers. Well, I didn’t understand much of humour in the first place and so I laughed whenever others would do.
A few minutes later, we arrived at the field with a volleyball in my hands and was directly greeted by a few teasing boys.
“Where have you been, Lucy? Were you scared of marine life?” No, I wasn’t scared of any monster and their teasing made me a little angry. But I was already prepared for that after not going with them.
“I heard there are some demons capable of destroying whole ships within an instant.” I said and threw the ball into the air, only to catch it afterwards.
“But not here?” I simply shrugged, threw the ball into the air and tried to fling the ball over the net, but failed miserably as I hadn’t played that game before.
“Well, do we want to play, or do you want to make fun of me? I can’t concentrate on both.” I said and put my tongue out of my mouth, quickly putting a stop to the teasing in the process.
And thus we played beach-volleyball for a little while until a few other from our class came by to tell us we needed to go back. As nice as I was, I bought the ball back to its owner and quickly caught up to the rest of the group.
After a little while of making sure everyone was there and nobody drowned which would have been hilarious, we got back to the hotel and ate dinner as a class while another one got back from a museum tour. During our mealtime, we girls also agreed to take a bath together which was apparently possible thanks to there being one large common bathroom for each gender.
As soon as I stepped into the bath with only a single towel around my body, I knew I should have begged the headmaster to give us the hotel which was crappier, but at least didn’t have a large bath. Because, unsurprisingly, it was more of a little swimming pool with hot water than anything else … and that was truly too much for me to take. Once more, I sat by as the others had fun in the steaming hot tub and merely cleaned myself with a cloth. At least they didn’t try anything funny which could have turned rather serious as I slowly felt my vampiric powers reawaken from their daily slumber.
And finally I could call it a day afterwards. There was nothing else on our agenda for the day, especially nothing with the much hated water. I could finally rest in peace in my bed, with Luna right by my side as we wrapped us into a shared blanket which was way too small for both of us. But a little bit of cuddling made everything possible.
“Lucy … is everything alright?” No, this was the worst possible school trip out oft the three possible ones.
“Yes?” I still said as I didn’t want to worry Luna at all.
“We had managed to catch a fish with magic …” Luna revealed a bit sleepy.
“Oh?” I asked, not that interested in her story and conscious that she would drift off into sleep rather quickly anyway.
“It had yellow stripes, but was otherwise completely black …” Which probably meant it was dangerous in some way or another … luckily they didn’t have to touch it.
“I see.” I said soothingly.
“Shouldn’t you write that down? You are responsible for collecting our findings after all…” I chuckled a and rested my head near her shoulder.
“I’ll do that tomorrow.” I said and listened to her low breathing for a little while until I got bored eventually. In the middle of the night, I stood up in my nightgown, opened the window quietly and stepped onto the windowsill. Closing the window shut from the outside once more proved to be quite a difficult task though, but after some time, I managed to do so. Grabbing the gutter, I pulled myself onto the angled roof and whistled a bit surprised as I saw Hannah who I really didn’t expect there.
“Shouldn’t you sleep?” I asked and walked up towards her carefully until I could sit down on the very top of the roof and look at the full moon.
“I should ask you the same … as your teacher.” She said and snipped against my shoulder playfully.
“So, what’s the plan?” She asked and kind of expected me to pull something out of my sleeve right away.
“There is no plan.” I said and closed my eyes a little. The colder air caressed my skin a little which felt rather nice after the whole day of continuous sunshine.
“That’s a bummer. And I really had hoped you would propose the demon infested mine as a destination for a nightly trip for us two.”
“It’s probably flooded with water at this point.” I concluded unhappily.
“True … but the possibility for carnage still exists.” Maybe … but the probability was rather low.
“Nah…” I muttered.
“Is it because of all the water you don’t want to?” Of all the water? Did she mean the swimming, the bath and possibly the mine as well?
“… yes.” I said quietly.
“I see.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t think water and I will get along anytime soon.” I admitted and already felt the emotions coming I usually connected with water.
“No, don’t worry about that. If there is anything with water, just let me do it instead. You don’t have to … to face dying over and over again.” That was nice of her … but water was only part of my many problems.
“It’s not that … at least not anymore. It’s more about feeling completely helpless these days. It still feel these deaths whenever I get close to water and it’s gripping my heart … I felt this crushing helplessness each and every death … and that hasn’t vanished in the slightest. If anything, it got even worse as soon as I got back. Suddenly, I need to fight against Aska to stop him from encroaching me once more … and I feel so helpless. Whenever I imagine him coming to this world for contingency plans, my heart clenches and I … I …” Suddenly a wave of sadness rushed over me, crushed me beneath it and gripped my heart just as I told Hannah before. I hated this feeling. I hated this helplessness. But it kept coming back because I had no clear idea how I should work towards my goals.
And for the first time, it pushed tears into my eyes.
“Hey, hey …” Hannah wrapped her arm around me and patted my shoulder carefully. “You don’t need to face that storm on your own. I’ll be with you, no matter what.” I knew that much. I knew she would stick to me till the bitter end, but then what?
“I … you can’t. Nobody can. I’m the only one who can do anything against a god with a suitable weapon. But I don’t have such a thing. If any god gets here, it’s over. And if it’s Aska, I will see you die in front of my eyes, and I will see him murder everyone I hold dear. That’s what’s at stake … and nobody can help me with that. Because nobody knows how he can get here and what’s stopping him in the first place. Nobody … not even I.” No matter how hard I fought against Aska, he would always come back. And I knew that he would win eventually, if not during our first fight all together.
“Lucinda, I’ll be with you no matter what.” Again, I knew that much. But what could she realistically do?
“It’s not helping! He would kill you, and I can’t have that. I am who I am because someone was always holding me back. Someone like the old Mary, Sofie, Luna and you. But once you all are gone … I would fall into a spiral of death. I would become the very existence I hate so much. And I don’t want to be like him … we already have way too much in common.” I cried out and weeped into my hands. I knew from the very get go that stopping him from coming here eventually was hard. But I still had hoped to have found something in the archives of the academy until this date. But I found nothing.
All I had was some foolish reincarnators, an underground organisation, a faith and a kingdom. But in the face of a god? That all amounted to nothing.
Even when someone would use these tools to fight myself at this point, I would score an overwhelming victory.
“I’m so pathetic … four hundred years of training … and I’m still a plaything of someone else.” I continued to weep uncontrollably while Hannah took me in her arms.
“It’s going to be fine. You hear me?” She said, but it didn’t help much to cheer me up.
“Why? Why should it?” I asked and barely kept back from shouting at her.
“Because I believe in you. I believe you can do this.” She said which helped to calm down somewhat. But not much.
“Do you? Do you truly believe I can win against the gods?” I asked, still incredibly overwhelmed by this crushing feeling of helplessness that just wouldn’t go away.
“Yeah …” She admitted and without even looking into her eyes, I knew for sure she wasn’t lying.
“You are foolish.” I muttered in between my sobbing.
“Maybe. But that’s what I believe. And I won’t let anyone take that away from me, nor even you.” She said which didn’t help to get rid of the crushing sadness at all, but at least let me get a grip on myself.
“I can’t have you believe I am incapable … can we?” I had shown her a pathetic display, which was something I absolutely despised myself for.
“Oh no? Tom would directly try his best to stab you from behind once I turn my back on you, the church would drop you faster than you could even blink and your whole life would be ruined. And I know how much you hate being betrayed, so give your best and credit yourself a little more, will you?” She said and patted my back while I kept rubbing my eyes to clear them of any tears.
“Alright … thanks.” I said, my heart still gripped in pain, but I somehow had it under control.
“You feeling better now?” She asked concerned. For her, it probably looked as if I was alright, even though it couldn’t be further from the truth. This feeling wouldn’t go away for a little while longer, I knew that much from the past two months.
“Somewhat … let’s go to the mines tomorrow night.” I said and smiled wryly.
“That’s the spirit.” Hannah said and patted my back one last time. “Shall I help you with getting back into your room?”
“That would be nice.” I explained and told up to stumble over to the edge of the roof, only to look back and her and wave a little. Making one step backwards, I fell downwards until my hands gripped onto the gutter and wind pushed me into the already open window. My landing was lighter than a feather and while still wiping away those reappearing tears, I closed the window and snuck under the blanket a second time. This time, I hugged Luna and rested my cheek on her shoulder.
Somehow this helped to fight back against the tears a little and with two very different feelings in my heart, I dozed off into sleep.
