Chương 48: AS I LAY DYING

The rain was pouring, marking the city streets with white noise. Acelin walked in it, unconscious of the pelting of water on his shoulders and the wetting of his clothes. The rain bounced off his mask, so he felt none of it on his face. He was alone, trying to remember his mother's smile. There once was a time when he had a saving grace in the world. But like with all good things, that was forced to end. She abandoned him, leaving nothing but a broken heart and a broken home.

After that, Acelin was no longer allowed to play outside. Everyone started to call him everything but his name. They ignored him. They beat him up. They bullied him. And he was forced to accept it as how life was supposed to be. He was young, and he was small. And little people didn't have a say in anything. He became a beast to them. No different than a rabid pet left chained to a guard post. He started to think that he was never going to mean anything to anyone ever again.

But his mother's smile he had always seen in Ellie. Ms. Brazer. She could replicate the warmth of a winter morning's hot cocoa. He didn't fully remember his mother's smile. It had been so long. But he remembered that when he looked at Ellie, he thought that was what it was supposed to look like. It was his fault. It was all his fault. He was evil. He was a monster. A good-for-nothing. A waste of space. T'balt was right about him. But what did it matter? Someone had to be. Why not him?

It was the monsters of the world that had the power. They could save people if they wanted. They could also hurt people before they hurt them. What was so bad about it? If he could be that monster, then Ellie would be okay, and he wouldn't be a failure to his mother.

"Momma. I found him." Genya pointed at him in the rain, stopping Acelin in his walk. He looked at her, meek and small in that worn nightgown. But he could tell she was put off by his new get-up. The mask made her retract into the safety bubble around Ann. The older woman ran up to her, pushing an umbrella over the girl's head, to keep her safe from the rain.

"Don't run off on your own so much," she reprimanded.

"I can move better now, but that doesn't mean I can keep up with you."

"Why is she here?" Acelin murmured to himself. She had come to find him in all this rain, when he was going to go find her. It was like an invisible force had pushed the situation, but why did it have to get the little girl involved, too? It didn't matter. She wasn't his problem. Ann looked up at him, drenched by the rain, and he saw a flash of that smile. The warmth felt wicked.

"Are you okay?" she asked. Acelin said nothing. His head leaned down to block water from hitting his mask's eyes.

"We noticed you were gone, so we came to find you. Make sure you were okay." Acelin looked down at his hand, flexing it. The electricity flowed through his skin, but whenever it was released, the currents scattered under the rain. Anything he could muster was weak. Too weak and unfocused. He shook out the uncomfortable vibrations in his hand.

"I wanna go inside. I don't like the rain," he said. She looked around from under the comfort of her umbrella. Genya clung to her leg, hiding from his scary mask.

"Sorry. But we need to get back soon. Ellie doesn't have much time." He winced.

"We should get back before something happens. Here." She adjusted the umbrella, giving it enough space next to her for a third.

"If it helps, you can squeeze under the umbrella with us. We won't bite."

"No thanks," Acelin said, pulling his hood down.

"Are you sure? I wouldn't want you to get sick."

"I'm fine," he said abruptly. She was taken aback by it, but she concluded that these were just the machinations of young children. They weren't always meant to be understood. So she walked ahead, with Genya at her side and Acelin at her back.

"Either way, I'm dead," T'balt said to himself. Ellie still hadn't moved. Her breathing hadn't eased, and her face was just getting more pale, haunted by the shadow of death. He was twisting the chain on Chosa's choker. He had developed a nervous habit of fiddling with it that he relied on too much for his liking. But he couldn't help it. Everything was just driving him crazy. He wondered if Ann even knew the depths of what it would mean for him to kill her. What if it didn't work?

Then he'd be taking a life for no reason. Ellie still dies. Then he loses Ann, too. And he'd have to live with that. But couldn't he live with Ellie dying, either? It was his fault. Vikram was coming to attack him, and Ellie got caught in the crossfire trying to save him. It was his fault that she was dying. The easiest solution to that was the longest. He'd reset and relive the last week over again like he had already done many times. But he couldn't shake the foreboding feeling he got at Ann's message.

It was directly from God, if he was to believe that.

"Don't abuse the power? But what's the point of it if I can't use it to fix my mistakes?" That was what the Redeemer loot was. That magical fix to turn back time. It was what people back in the normal world would've wished for ten times over, and he actually had it. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. He'd grown to hate it over the last few iterations for all the pain it forced him to see.

He didn't deny that at times he wished he were dead for good. But if it weren't for Monan, it would be his most valued possession. Without it, he wouldn't have been able to survive one day after Zero Day. He would be dead at the hands of the Deer King, and he wouldn't know anything. And Ellie would be dead by now anyway, at the hands of Nrv. Even now, he knew he relied on it as a crutch. Because the truth was that it saved him from his fear of death. A fear of dying with nothing…

But now he wasn't supposed to use it? What kind of sick game is that?

"The door to victory... Is that the secret to beating Monan? Does that mean I can only beat him if I let you go? Is that the message?" He brushed her auburn hair with his hand. If that were the case, then he could end all this. He just had to kill Monan once. That was it. That fleeting hope was what he relied on to get him through this game. Then he could reset, save Ellie, and everything would be okay. But for that, he had to live without her, to live with his mistakes. He hardly knew Ann Patrick.

She had known him in a past life that he didn't remember, putting the shoe on the other foot for once. He was the one who didn't remember. But he knew he could live with her death more than Ellie's. She was older, and she had already died once, of natural causes. It seemed more justified to save the one who was killed by Redeemer interference. But it was a false justification. Ann was still innocent in this. But if she wanted to save Ellie, who was he to tell her no? T'balt punched the bed in frustration.

He didn't know what to do. Every angle had its warmth and sharp edges.

"If I had more time… I need more time." It was a funny statement. Time was the one thing he now had in infinite supply. It was everyone else who needed it. Ellie started to stir. Her breathing cooled for a moment, and she opened her eyes.

"Ellie." He could see the strain it took for her to look at him, fighting to make a movement.

"T'balt…" She grabbed his hand. And that very moment, he could've cried. That poor excuse for a smile she had on her face made him hate the world more than he already did.

"Why?" he said.

"Why do you people have to keep saving me? Don't you get it? It doesn't matter if something happens to me." She looked at her missing arm, remembering what had happened. Then she looked at her other, grasping T'balt with the last of her life.

"I don't want to hear you saying things like that." Her voice was hoarse, only able to rise to just above a whisper.

"You shouldn't take your life for granted. No matter how many times you die, it still means something to the people you've saved." Her eyes started to fade a bit. T'balt squeezed her hand tighter than she held his. It opened her eyes again, and she tried to laugh.

"Pull me back down." She searched the room.

"Where is Acelin?" T'balt shook his head.

"He ran away. That kid is just causing more and more trouble by the minute."

"He saved you, T'balt. Don't be angry at him."

"You don't understand. I never told you what happens to that kid if I let him be. He's not… He's a lost cause."

"He's a child. What could he possibly—""He kills us, Ellie. Me, you, everyone." Ellie's words caught in her throat, and there was a pained expression on her face, more than the pain of her missing limb.

"Despite what I thought, he doesn't change. It's just like with Chosa. I don't think I can keep saving him, knowing what he's capable of," T'balt said. She looked up at the ceiling. That thing where she searches for answers above her, until she's struck by the muses or by God.

"I told you that I quit my job as an EMT… Did I tell you why?"

"Because you said what you saw made you lose faith in people."

"But one of those things that I saw…" Acelin walked quietly behind Ann and Genya, hands tucked in the pockets of his hoodie. The meek rain had turned to a storm. Lightning flared through the clouds, and the sounds of thunder rumbled in the atmosphere. He watched the two of them frolic together, unbothered by the pouring rain. Genya saw the water coming from the sky as her personal playhouse. She would run from the cover of the umbrella and bounce in a puddle, getting her nightgown drenched and dirty.

Then she would run back and hug Ann's leg, getting her clothes drenched and dirty too. Ann would pretend to be upset.

"Now we're both wet. Why would you do something like that?" Genya could put on the brightest, toothiest cheese in all the world.

"Now we won't have to take a bath ever again." Ann smiled back, experiencing the fun of the childish logic.

"It isn't fair." Acelin thought. It was never fair for him. It was all fake. They were just pretending to give a crap about each other. Genya was an orphan. So she was only pretending not to be as lonely as he was. It made him sick. The rain slowly started to die. And Acelin's footsteps began to leave traces of an electric charge. Ann looked back at him as she would from time to time.

"You've been quiet ever since you arrived at our home… Genya told me about what happened when you first saw her. She wants you to know that she forgives you." The young girl continued to keep Ann as the buffer between them. But she still made an effort to peek at Acelin's reaction. There was nothing coming through the mask.

"I don't care about that," he said after a moment of silence.

"She forgives you anyway. I told her you probably only did it because you were scared." Acelin raised his head in anger.

"I'm not scared. If anything, you should be the one who's scared."

"Should I be?" she said nonchalantly.

"Of what?"

"Of dying…" he said. She kept walking forward, face turned to her destination, almost purposefully not looking at him. She thought for a moment.

"I am. I was sick for what felt like ages before I found Genya. Dying scared me to death, until I saw T'balt," she paused.

"I never knew what would happen when I died. The Looter God fills my head with all sorts of ideas, but I don't know which are true. All I know is that the world goes on, with or without me. And that's what scared me."

"Don't give me that crap!" Acelin snapped.

"Don't act like you weren't going to abandon her anyway by letting T'balt kill you." She stopped walking. The rain had cleared. Genya tugged at the leg of her jeans, wondering why she had stopped. Then she looked back behind her and saw the scary boy aiming at Ann's back, crackling with weaponized light. Genya gasped, "No. Don't hurt her!" Without looking back, Ann knelt to her.

"Genya." She petted the girl on the head.

"Head on back. Tell Mr. T'balt that I found Acelin, okay." Genya looked up at her, searching for meaning. There was no sadness in Ann's eyes. No warning or hint of doubt. So reluctantly, the girl did as she was told and turned to run back to the house. When she was gone, Ann turned to Acelin and stared into the frightening sight of vengeful light.