Chapter 75 Kidan #2
Slen’s accusatory eyes sliced right through Kidan. Tear-slicked and raging with pain.
“No…” Kidan shook her head. “I didn’t know.”
“I know.” Yusef smiled weakly. “I wanted to do this myself. For once. My dad will be free during this chaos. All I had to do was cause a big enough distraction in Uxlay, and keep the Sicions split. But the explosion was supposed to go off after I left. You two were never supposed to be here. Neither was… I.”
Kidan’s voice became wretched with terror. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“I told you… I’m done being a burden. I can handle things on my own, without risking the two of you. I guess I failed on that part.” He coughed and black blood poured down his chin.
Slen’s whole face shook, wiping the blood from his chin. “You absolute idiot.”
“I wanted to free you too. He’ll be gone, Slen. He’ll never touch you again. Koril will be killed in the riot. I made sure.” Yusef grabbed Slen’s gloved hand and pressed it to his cheek. “I should have done it back then. The first time he hurt you, and I found you.”
Silent tears flowed down Slen’s scratched cheeks. “Stop.”
Kidan dug her nails into her palms and stood again. She shoved against the column again and again, roaring in both grief and pain when it would creak a little and return to where it had been.
“Come on, Slen,” she shouted, straining down to the base of her spine. “We need to move this!”
Slen remained where she was. “We can’t.”
“Slen!”
Grand Andromeda Hall was crumbling around them. The charcoal drawings fell like raven feathers. Yusef’s strained face couldn’t keep his smile anymore. His breathing grew shallow.
“Fuck!” Kidan screamed until her throat was raw. She tried to find the window again, but all that remained was gray. It had been blocked by a collapsed pillar. She coughed into her arm to clear the dust collecting on her tongue.
Weakly, Yusef reached to caress Slen’s cheek, fingers peeking from his glove. “I wanted to bury my feelings for you here. Set us both free. Stupid, huh? As if it would be that easy to be rid of you.”
Slen was so still, her lashes were a dark line around her eyes, wet.
He coughed again, waves of pain moving across his face. “Tell me it’ll be okay, Slen. Even if you lie, I’ll believe you.”
Kidan could no longer see from behind the blur of tears. But the outline of Slen’s head bowed low, brushing a kiss over his forehead, her words softer than they’d ever been.
“It’ll be okay. You will be fine, Yusef.
The dranaics will heal you and you will see your father.
He will be free and you will both live far away from here.
You will go to the Semain Mountains and scream from the top of the world.
You will travel and draw and you will be happy because that is what you deserve. ”
Yusef’s eyes faded into a cool brown, but he managed to ask, “One more lie.”
Slen turned her face aside, her lip trembled, dark eyes red. She seemed to search for strength and it took her a while to face him again.
She sniffed. “Someday, I will love you as you love me and regret not telling you.”
A relieved sigh left Yusef, and with that, his final breath.
The curve of his lip was still arched, in the process of a smile.
Slen choked back a cry, but the second one ripped out from her throat, unable to be restrained.
Kidan felt herself wither. Another tremor built within the walls.
Urgent, not giving them another second to think.
Slen and Kidan threw themselves over Yusef’s body, their eyes met in the carnage.
This is how we will die.
A scream built inside Kidan but there was no space to let it out.
Her entire body rocked like a bell with the third crash, but she clung to her friends.
Even through the ringing, and the end of the world, she didn’t let go.
Slen’s hand squeezed hers back. When the piercing sound faded, the dust cleared slowly, and a shaft of sunlight streamed through.
Landing on Yusef’s fading eyes.
Sunlight…
One of the windows was accessible again.
“Go!” Slen shouted, her whole face covered in ash.
Kidan stumbled to her feet. She tore her palms on sharp pieces of broken stone and climbed up to the small uneven opening and crawled through. It was a couple feet up from the ground and she jumped, headfirst, rolling onto the grass, facing south.
“Help!” Kidan screamed but there was no one on this side of campus. She ran toward the front of Grand Andromeda Hall, glimpsing the gathering crowd and the Sicions pushing students backward, away from the carnage.
“There are people inside!” she roared, making every head turn toward her. “Hurry!”
One Sicion reached her quickly, face dark. “Are you all right?”
“Inside! People are alive inside!”
“We need to get you aid,” he said, pulling her away.
“I’m fine!” she shouted. “What are you doing? There are people inside!”
Another Sicion lifted her up and pushed her into the crowd, not listening. She kicked violently.
“Why aren’t you—”
An earsplitting explosion swallowed her words.
Her knees were on the ground although she didn’t recall falling.
Students buried their heads in their hands, screaming too.
Kidan stumbled to her feet, her balance wavering to one side before she crashed backward.
There was a furious tornado before her, threatening to suck her in, and it took a long time to settle.
Grand Andromeda Hall came into view in a hazy dust storm.
And what was left of it was in…
Ruins.
Not one lion statue remained.
“No.” The broken word was the only thing left inside her. “No.”
A devastated gray world remained, the dome entirely collapsed, held up by one remaining pillar, which crumbled with a sudden violent snap.
The crowd screamed again.
Kidan pushed forward, half dragging the onlookers, half using them to give her support because her legs were too weak. She fell again, now at front of the crowd, staring up at the ruins.
Her voice was unrecognizable, tattered like her clothes, but it was hers, because only she knew who was trapped inside. “Did she get out?”
Faces zoomed close to hers, shrugging her off with terrified looks. She wanted to see one familiar face, anyone.
Yos.
Where was he?
GK.
I need you both. I need you!
Sacro was there instead, laying a hand on her back. “Kidan?”
“Did she get out? Please, did she get out?” Kidan demanded, tears making everything blur.
He stilled. “Where?”
The agony on her face made him shoot to his feet. “At the back of the building. Slen—”
He disappeared into air. Kidan ran after him, ignoring the protests of her bones. It didn’t matter if she was bleeding. She needed to get to them.
Please, be alive.
When she got there, Sacro was standing still.
“What are you doing?” Kidan yelled, pushing him aside to find the window.
But it was gone.
Completely sealed off.
Her hands searched the gray disaster, willing it back to existence. “It was here. Right here.”
Sacro wouldn’t meet her eyes, head bowed.
Kidan swayed on her feet. “They’re… they’re both…”
Sacro righted her before she fell. Turning him to her. “I’m very sorry.”
Kidan could hear nothing.
Feel nothing.
A part of her was still in there with them, crushed beyond recognition. She began to slide to the ground, let herself wither completely when something caught her eye.
Behind Sacro’s shoulder, a weak figure slumped by a single tree. The figure’s face was ash white, scratched beyond belief, and they were clutching their limp, distended arm.
A black jacket hung from their small shoulders.
Slen.
Before she knew it, Kidan was running through bruised bones. Tears flying everywhere, she embraced her tightly. Both weak, they dropped to the ground. Slen’s chin rested on Kidan’s shoulder, her eyes trained on the collapse.
“I left him,” Slen whispered in a haunted tone. “I left… him.”
Kidan only hugged her tighter.