“Shit, what’s wrong with you?! Why are you doing this?!”
“… I’m not going with you.”
“What? Why not?”
Sakura stares down at Seymour in disgust before she spits into his wounded hand, making him yell out in pain. She wipes her mouth slowly, and exclaims seriously –
“… I know what you’re planning to do, Seymour.. I don’t want to help you destroy the world.. But I know… I know that it doesn’t really matter what I want, because you’ll just find some way to make me do what you want, and use me like you did before..”
“Sakura.. I-”
“No! Shut it! I’m tired of listening to you! My loyalties are with the eXo PRIME!
I want to be accepted back into their ranks, and have a fresh start! As far as I’m concerned, killing you will automatically get me back into the PRIME, and back into General Solari’s good books!”
She presses the pistol harder against Seymour’s forehead, but he remains calm, and asks curiously, his hair blowing about wildly from the helicopter’s wind –
“You really think that slaughtering me will get you a grand seat in the PRIME? Solari will kill you for killing me.”
“Y-yeah, but..”
“Do you really think you can kill me? I’m your mentor, your superior, and your Commander. I’ve known you for six years. Everything you know, even how to hold that gun properly, has all been because of me. But, if you have convinced yourself that what you are doing is right, and if you really think you can pull the trigger, then by all means, do so. I won’t stop you.”
Sakura’s hand trembles as she desperately tries to pull the pistol’s trigger. A livid tear slides down her face, and she lets her hand fall limply to her side. Cautiously, Seymour gets to his feet, and puts a hand on her shoulder. She angrily swipes it off, and turns her back to him.
“You don’t really need me, do you, Seymour? You just need these fucking things you forced into my flesh..”
“That’s not true..”
“Yes it is… I’m not nearly as strong as you, Seymour.. I could never gather enough courage or strength to try and stand up to you.. Try to stop you in what you’re doing.. If what you say about Solari is true, then there is no future for me.. I don’t want to destroy the world, but I can’t stand up to you… And even if I do, I’ll be killed. And if I simply decide to do nothing, then you’ll reenact your diffusion, and I will die along with everyone else. But if I do choose to continue along your path, then I will die anyway.. Every road I take will be a dead end!”
“Why are you saying all this?”
“… Because Trace was right. People never change; no matter how hard you try to change them, they will never change who they really are. My virtues, what I’ve clung to my entire life, have vanished, but I haven’t changed. Now that the war is over, there is no point in my existence anymore. No point that I can be proud of..”
Sakura takes a deep breath, her back still turned to Seymour, considers the pistol in her trembling hand for a moment, then says in a quiet, stony voice –
“By the way, Seymour.. You probably don’t know, but, Data told me that today is August 21st.”
“So?”
“August 21st, Seymour.”
A look of comprehension dawns on Seymour’s stark, sweaty face as he breathes disbelievingly –
“… August 21st.. So.. That means-”
“Yes, sir.. Today is your birthday.”
Sakura finally turns to face him, and with a painful grimace, rips the Magnetic Force Initiators straight out of her hands. Her blood dripping onto the concrete helipad, she drops the MFIs to the ground at Seymour’s feet, and approaches the edge of the rooftop, while Seymour looks on in horror and shock.
“Happy birthday.”
And on that note, Sakura takes another deep breath, places the pistol underneath her chin, and pulls the trigger, spraying the back of her head out over the edge of the rooftop. She falls slowly backwards, away from Seymour, and plummets through the cloud of pollution, disappearing from sight.
End of Part 3
~ Facing the Past ~
~Santuc TerraDome: Bercedam District~
Far away from the military headquarters, and now flying over the twisted, bombed-out ruins of the northeastern Bercedam District in their stolen PRIME helicopter, Seymour, Elena, Data and Trace head towards the unmanned aircraft tunnel, the Diverting Outerworld Gate, a transport tunnel for military aircraft situated high on the shell of the TerraDome, which has been firmly sealed against any aircraft trying to leave or enter Santuc. Seymour sits across from Elena in the passenger area, staring absently at the blood-stained MFI apparatuses in his hands, which are nearly fully mended by the Seraph Tears Elena found in the emergency box, while Trace whispers to Data up in the cockpit. Elena silently watches Seymour stare, feeling his guilt linger in the air like a noxious gas.
“… Seymour?”
Without looking away from the MFIs, he responds –
“… What?”
“Well, it’s… It’s not your fault what happened… to Sakura..”
Smirking self-deprecatingly, though is expression remains without a trace of humor, Seymour glances up at Elena’s soft, hopeful visage, and says flatly –
“Don’t say that. Of course it’s my fault. I was such a…”
“A.. what?”
“… Nevermind.. Self-pity won’t get me anywhere.. It’s just that..”
Breaking off mid-sentence, his words caught in his parched, guilt-choked throat, he struggles to articulate his thoughts, feeling the taut air in the confined copter pressing against his heart like a iron weight. He rubs his eye despondently with the back of his hand, avoiding Elena’s gaze, and exclaims in a low, solemn tone –
“She was a fucking child, you know? An orphan of the war, just like me.. and I used her like a tool.. I didn’t even give a shit how she felt… It wasn’t important, as long as she kept on doing what I told her to… Mm.. But I guess Solari was right, for once. It looks like nobody can stand me if they’re not being controlled by me.”
“Okay, just stop it with the self-pity for one sec, and listen to yourself, Seymour. You’re acting like this is the first time you’ve been responsible for someone’s death. So, she’s dead, alright? She left you the MFIs; let’s just go find someone else to replace her!”
Keeping silent for a moment while processing Elena’s declaration, Seymour watches her biting her nails nervously before he responds baldly –
“.. Are you just saying that because you think it’s what I want to hear?”
“Er.. N-no..”
Seymour closes his half-healed fingers over the MFIs, and in the morbid silence, Trace calls out from the cockpit in a mocking tone –
“Boy, if it gets any livelier in here, a funeral’s gonna break out..”
“Oh, shut up, Trace..”
Elena glares with condemnation at Trace’s head peeking out from his chair, tentatively crosses from her seat, sits down next to Seymour, and, checking to see if nobody is listening, leans in close, and whispers –
“You know, Seymour..In.. that place.. that city… I was there for so long, I was about to give up hope, when I met a man who reminded me a lot of you. You know what he said to me? He said, ‘You give others strength, yet you leave none for yourself. You have let this place and its people crush your spirit, but it isn’t lost. Don’t forget, and don’t ever abandon what gives you strength, and you’ll never be lost’. I didn’t, and here I am, alive and well, thanks to you, because you’re the one who gives me strength.”
Taken aback by Elena’s sudden exclamation, Seymour makes sure neither Trace nor Data is paying attention to them before uttering quietly –
“So.. You do remember..”
“I do. I was pretending before when I said I didn’t. I knew the others wouldn’t believe me if I spoke about it, so I kept quiet about it until I could get you alone.. But I think what he was talking about.. He wasn’t just talking
about me. He knew you, and I think he was really saying it so I would deliver the message to you.”
“Hm.. Seems like something he’d do..”
Softly running her fingers through Seymour’s hair in a goading sort of way, Elena asks anxiously –
“Well, you saved me from that place, so why can’t you do the same for her?”
“N-no… I can’t.. I’d never be able to do for her what I did for you.”
“Why not?”
Staring pensively at his own interlocked hands, Seymour runs through his entire horrid excursion in his head, and, under Elena’s watchful, curious eyes, he exclaims –
“I was really lucky in your case.. When I went to Paradox, I had no real plan. All I knew was that I had to try anything. But still… The whole thing felt… I dunno.. It almost felt like it was staged.. Like it’d all already been laid out for you and me.. Like that was only way it could’ve turned out, even though it really shouldn’t have…”
“What do you mean?
“I don’t know.. None of what happened there makes sense to me..
But.. Don’t you feel like the pieces all lined up a little too perfectly?”
“… I don’t really know what you mean.”
Seymour slumps back into his seat, his eyes closed, his mind flooded with questions, searching for something, anything to assuage his guilt. Glancing back at the pair sitting in a solemn miasma, Trace quietly slips from the cockpit, into the passenger area, and looks at the two with an expression torn between amusement and pity.
“You don’t do grief well, kid.”
“Yeah, I know. That’s just me, isn’t it? Always severe and serious.”
“Heheh, well, there ain’t no shame in bein’ serious, as long as you got me to clear the air, right?”
“Mm.. sure.”
“Well, anyways, kid, we’re nearing the gate.”
Seymour nods, eager to distract himself from his dismal thoughts, slides up into the cockpit, and sits down beside Data in Trace’s empty seat.
“You alright?”
“Yeah, I’m good. But can we get through the gate?”
“No, it was sealed off by the eXo PRIME about a year before the war ended, and left to rot. Too many hijacked aircraft with Aozora troops hidden inside coming through the gate..”
“Oh yeah.. So, how do we get through?”
“Allow me.”
Trace slides the helicopter’s passenger door open, digs through the rack of weapons in the very back of the copter, and pulls out a SPEAR-28 electromagnetic pulse launcher. He leans out the open door, the fierce winds blowing roughly into his wrinkled face, squints his eyes, and fires at the seal covering the gate. Five massive, bright blue orbs explode out of the barrel of the launcher, hit the seal, and implode the metal from within the impact zones, before exploding in an azure storm of streaking white lightning, revealing the lengthy tunnel within the thick metal of the TerraDome shell. Trace slides the door shut, replaces the launcher in the rack, and sits down next to Elena without a word, his wrinkled face frozen with elation.
“… Man, weapons have gotten badass.”
“Good job, Trace. So, we head for the shore, right?”
“Yeah. We go to the Atlantic Union, and find Adrian and Sam before they get to the other side.”
“Right..”
Flying straight through the opened gate, they enter a dark tunnel that reeks heavily of melted metal, and travel along the shadowy gateway for nearly a half hour before flying out into the bright white light of the world beyond the Dome.
~The Atlantic Union Bridge~
The helicopter soars above the abandoned ruins of what long ago used to be The United States, which stretch out far below like a scorched, decimated canvas. The remains of burnt, twisted metal, cracked, fractured concrete, and collapsed buildings are being pounded by harsh rains that fall from the mantle of thick grey clouds that swirl angrily in the sky above. After hours and hours of straight flying, just as the sky around them begins to darken, Seymour and the others finally reach the shore of former Georgia State, which has been transformed into a long sheet of strange, reddish glass with deep ripples carved into its surface from the fierce ocean waves that crash against it. Off the shoreline, the enormous Atlantic Union bridge stretches out into a mass of black clouds. Sitting in the cockpit next to Data, while Trace and Elena appraise the weapons in the racks in the cargo area, Seymour checks his tracer, but the screen is clouded with distortion.
“No signal out here, Data.”
“No wonder.. There’s a hell of a storm out there.. Probably interfering with the signal. But regardless, it doesn’t seem like a good idea to fly this thing into there.. We’ll probably get swept away..
“Well, what other choice do we have?”
“We could wait here for the night and see if the weather gets better?”
“There’s no time for that.. They’re probably still out on the bridge, and they won’t last long in this storm. We have to reach them before they make it to Morocco.”
Data stares out at the distant tempest distractedly, and says in a quiet voice barely audible above the pounding of the rain on the helicopter’s frame –
“… They aren’t going to Morocco.”
“Huh? How do you know?”
“… They’re heading for the Kunai Rebel stronghold at the end of the bridge with a friend of mine from the K-Rebels.”
“What? If you knew, why didn’t you just tell me that in the first place?!”
Seemingly struggling with his response, Data glances at Seymour nervously, and admits shyly –
“… I was still deciding where my loyalties lie. But I guess there’s no point in holding back now.”
“I see.. So, we just have to stop them from reaching the stronghold?”
“Yeah. They can’t have made it there yet.. Though, they should be close.”
“Then there’s no going back now. We need to move quickly.”
“I guess..”
Data hesitantly steers the helicopter along the bridge’s path, and flies it straight towards the violent storm looming on the horizon. After about an hour of flying along the bridge’s somewhat warped road, the helicopter becomes caught in the squall, being slammed with thick, icy sheets of rain, and pounded with brutal winds that blow it to and fro, so that it nearly collides with the bridge’s massive arch. Data wrenches the cyclic upwards, as the blades lightly clip the arch, and steers the helicopter away from the bridge.
“What are you doing?! Follow the road!”
“The winds are too high! We can’t go along the bridge without crashing!”
“Then pull up and fly alongside the bridge! Keep left!”
“We’re flying against the wind, Seymour! The craft can’t handle a hurricane!
We have to turn back!”
“NO! Keep going!”
In the passenger area, Trace and Elena watch with concern, rocked by the jerking motions of the craft, and Trace yells to Seymour over the gale –
“Think rationally, kid! We can’t keep going like this!”
“What should we do?!”
“Rrrgh… Fine! Find something to land on.. We’ll figure out what to do there..”
With relief, Data steers the copter away from the Atlantic Union, and flies over the wind-tossed ocean before finally setting it down carefully on the warped steel deck of a military ship run aground against a small island made of grayish rock, which is barely the size of a large house. As soon as the copter touches down on the ship’s slippery surface, Seymour slides open the door, agitatedly runs out into the gale, his long white hair blowing every which way, and stops only when he reaches the very edge of the melted prow, staring out at the distant silhouette of the Atlantic Union rising through the darkness of the storm. Looking apprehensively at the others, Elena hesitantly follows suit, walking out into the icy storm and cautiously comes up next to him, shielding her eyes from the tempest. She puts a hand on his shoulder, trying to catc
h his eye, and says tentatively –
“Don’t worry, Seymour. We’ll find them. We just need to wait until this storm dies down..”
Fury pulsing through his veins, Seymour slaps Elena’s hand off of his shoulder, and shouts vehemently –
“Die down?! Why should we wait?! I can’t believe you guys can’t take a little rain and wind!”
“A little rain and wind?! This is a fucking hurricane!”
“Yeah, and?”
“God, you can be so stubborn sometimes, Seymour!”
“Just go away, Elena! Leave me alone!”
“Fine!”
Elena furiously stomps back to the helicopter, slipping slightly on the wet, melted metal surface of the deck, wrenches the door open, climbs inside, and slams the door with rage, agitatedly shaking her wet hair out of her face. Trace hands her an ratty blanket from the box of emergency supplies stowed beside the rack of weapons, and asks concernedly –
“Whoa.. Calm down, blondie. What did he say?”
“He thinks that we’re wasting time waiting out this damn storm! Can you believe that?”
Paradox: The Last Day - Seymour's Story Page 25
