by David Tyne
31 | I Never
"Who's ready to get waaaasted?!" Tomás stuck his tongue out as he popped open another bottle of tequila, completely ignoring the two barmaids he'd stolen it from seconds ago.
"Jeez, how much has he had? Quit spilling that stuff everywhere, will ya?!" Millie barked after the drunkard. Harry joined me in giving a raised eyebrow as a handful of guests slotted themselves into one of the booths, the joining table stacked to the brim with shot glasses.
Sitting down with my slightly-depressed friend, I realised that we were pretty much all in the same room, except for Jamie. Even Grumpy and two of the rescued girls were joining us.
Tomás crawled over everyone's knees with his large bottle, trying to get the window seat as he finally slumped down and explained what we were all doing.
"Okay, so the game is 'I Never' — we go around the table, and whoever's turn it is, they say something that they've never done. If you've done it, then you gotta drink. Best way to get to know each other! Let's do this, perras!!"
I don't know how he'd done it, but everyone was totally pumped to play Tomás' game. It was probably down to his damn guitar — you'd think he was a real-life rock star, what with the way these strangers hung on his every word.
The popular musician cocked his head to the table with a cheeky glint in his eye. "Me first — I've never shared a shower with a chica!"
Everyone choked into surprised laughter, and my eyes darted towards the innocent Beth on the other side of the room. I didn’t want her to hear anything rude... Thankfully, she’d fallen asleep along with the old lady, resting on each other's shoulders.
The two women who'd followed Tomás and his guitar all night downed their shot glasses, giggling as they rubbed against each other.
"Relax, she’s my girlfriend! We’re allowed to!" All of the boys gawked at the two intimate women, while Serah and Millie glanced around the ceiling nervously.
After refilling the glasses, Millie brushed her shiny-brown hair backwards. "M-Moving on! Daniel, you go!"
I couldn't really think of one at first, but after Tomás' turn, I started to gauge what kind of admissions they were looking for. "Let's see, um... I've never... I've never been arrested before!"
It seemed as though no one would take a hit, until Harry pounded his shot to a round of gasps and snickers. He just smirked them off. "...What, you guys are surprised? I used to roll with a rough crowd!"
Millie leaned in forward, somehow not buying it. "Really, babe? What was the charge?"
He must have not been expecting us to ask, as he tried to squeeze himself backwards, away from Millie's inquisitive face. Being weak to her brand of peer pressure, he eventually gave it up. "...Hrm... blic urnnnatn."
Tomás analysed the mumble with incredible accuracy, and at the top of his lungs shouted "Public urination?!"
As Harry buried his face into his hands along with his girlfriend, we all hooted and chuckled loudly at his expense. Tomás patted the poor lad forcefully on the shoulder, trying to catch his breath back. "Haah, next turn! What's-his-face!"
Everyone turned to face Grumpy, who clearly didn't think that we’d all acknowledge his presence tonight. Regardless, every eye in the room was now trained on him.
"...What, me? Alright then, let's see. I've never... been naked... outside?" My eyes skimmed over him and his strange confession, until I heard a gulp from the other side of the table... Tomás slammed his drink down, licking his lips without any shame.
"Wha— really?! How the hell does that happen?!" Millie yelled at the grinning boy. He snickered as he tilted himself backwards, trying to look 'fly'.
"It's elementary, mi querido — step one, get out of the shower without a towel on. Step two, accidentally call your fiancé fat."
Everyone stared back with a hint of scepticism, until he nodded to confirm.
"Spent that whole freezing night banging on the door, giving my neighbours a five-star view of the goods. Never again, bros. Never. Again."
While Serah and Millie shuddered the image from their minds, I found myself awkwardly consoling him as he relived the 'traumatic' experience. When things were ready to kick off again, it was Millie's turn.
She seemed to be conferring with Serah about something private, until she caught my eye and glanced away. "...Okay, got one. I've, um... I've never slow-danced with someone, who I really liked."
I nearly toppled over my drink along with Grumpy's — that question clearly came from Serah. I thought back to the night in that ballroom, when it felt like Serah and I were the only two people in the world.
Millie smiled at me with a nod, as her new best buddy took a swig from her glass and moved her eyes to meet mine with an obvious blush.
So, girls really do talk…?
As Tomás and his two adoring fans got a refill, I raised my glass subtly and downed my drink with a merry wink. It was nice to hear that she hadn't completely forgotten about me.
I noticed Harry was starting to wobble, despite barely drinking any at all — still a lightweight as ever. Serah was startled when Tomás declared it was suddenly her turn, as she'd already influenced Millie's round.
"M-Me? Umm, gosh, I don't know. I've... I mean, I've never... kissed a boy... before."
Her face burned bright-red as Millie and the two girls raised their glasses, in admittance that they'd done the deed. Tomás threw his hands up in the air, as though there had been a foul in the game.
"Aw, c'mon! That question can only be answered by girls—" He stopped in his tracks, as Harry lowered his already-empty glass.
The entire table went silent, almost dead as Tomás desperately tried to retract his statement, coating it with apologies.
"Whoops. Sorry, bro. Didn't think you were... I mean, it's totally chill—" It didn't do much to save the mood, as Millie pushed her way out of the booth. She had to slide past Serah and the sniggering drunk girls, the latter of whom loudly whispered something crude behind her back.
Shooting Harry a pathetic look, her voice was low and bitter. "...Jesus fucking Christ. If you want to be a queer so badly, don’t let me stop you." No one had the courage to say anything as Millie left the booth in a freezing-cold state, never looking back.
----
After a frigid Harry stormed off as well, the game had somehow miraculously recovered its momentum. The rest of them stayed to continue — I was torn between who to check up on first, and decided to speak with the instigating Millie.
I found her up on the higher tanning area, glaring into the sea with specks of tears in her eyes. Before I’d even reached the top step, I heard her preface my entry with "I know. I didn't mean it, I'm sorry."
While that was good to know, the damage had already been done. "Mils, that was bang out of order... and you've gotta stop storming out on our drinking games. It's becoming a bad habit."
She barely acknowledged my presence, listening to the vibrating wind as it began to pick up. Somehow, I still got the feeling that she would appreciate an outsider’s opinion. Anything that would help to validate her own insecurities.
This was confirmed when she voiced her concerns from earlier, when I watched her during Harry's welcoming speech. "He's... I mean— He'll never love me... like he loves him, you know?"
Oh, I thought. I might have guessed that this had something to do with Ian, but it would've been far too inconsiderate to bring it up. She tousled one of Jamie's half-empty beer bottles in her hands, taking a long sip from it carelessly.
“I thought you two were keeping it casual,” I tried to shrug, stepping a little closer. “Now you’re talking about love, after two days together? Mils, what the hell are you doing to him?”
"...I don't know. It's not just that he might be gay, even though that does royally fuck us over even more. He gave up everything to infiltrate the O-Saints, because that’s what Ian would’ve wanted. That's not something you'd do for just anyone."
She seemed more hung up on the fact that Ian was a guy, rather than the further stage of t
hat relationship compared to theirs. All Millie ever wanted was to share her intimacy, but now that she’d found a partner, she hadn’t considered the jealousy that came with it.
"Mils, you've got to let go of the past. It's the only way you and him can move on. Who cares if he likes boys or girls? He might even like both, but labels like that will only confuse everyone. I've seen the way he looks at you, y'know."
My childhood friend half-turned, curious about what I was referring to. “He… looks at me?
"When he thinks you’re not looking, yeah. It's the way I look at Serah now, the same way I used to... used to look at you. Like he’s scared, of what might happen. He really does care about you, Millie."
The girl with the silky-brown hair moved to face me, her eyes glowing dull-red and all puffy. She tried to force a smile for my benefit, only to crack with tear-filled emotion.
"Hah... This is such a fucking mess, Danny. How did we even get here? We could all be dead, by this time tomorrow. I'll never really know, if there's anything between us..." I wrapped my arms around her, letting her cry into my shoulder. I never asked who she was referring to, Harry or myself.
"It's okay. It's not too late to turn back, if you're having regrets." She shook me off as I said it, shocked that I was the one bringing up something so negative.
"W-What's that supposed to mean?! Do you think we're making a mistake, by doing this?"
I stumbled backwards, taken by surprise at the sudden turnaround. I thought about defending my point, but she snapped straight back at me with a frighteningly-clear resolve.
"Daniel, let me just make this clear. Everyone, our friends from school, our entire street, my parents, probably yours by now... Everyone's dead. We know who killed them, and they aren't even stopping. If we don't force Telos to shut down, no one else will. My ‘regret’ isn't that I'd die too early, or without a cause... It's that I’d be letting scum like them finish me off."
----
After a spirited hour-long talk about what we were going to do tomorrow, I thanked Millie for her little set-up with Serah back in the bar. With a low giggle followed by a salute, she returned downstairs in a seemingly-better mood to go to sleep.
I laid myself back on the sun lounger, staring up at the black sky only to realise that the stars had been covered up during my talk with Millie. A massively-dark cloud hung ominously in the air above us.
A single drop of water landed on my cheek, making me groan. Rain. As I forced myself to the staircase overlooking the bow of the ship, my eyes caught onto some movement down below, turning my feet to stone. Someone else is still up?
I could just barely hear Tomás fadingly play his guitar in the lounge, but I assumed that the vast majority of our crew would be resting for tomorrow.
Squinting my eyes through the darkness, the outdoor lights had gone out for the night nearly twenty minutes ago. There were two figures standing on the deck — one of them was rather large, bulky in appearance — Harry.
The other seemed vaguely familiar. He was one of the students we'd saved from the hideout, looking to be in his early-twenties with golden-brown matted hair.
They both seemed to be having a good time, and it made me happy that Harry was finally socialising, especially after what went down in the drinking game. I moved further down the steps, glad that everything had been resolved until I stopped in my tracks once more.
The waves had started to churn up, rocking the boat more and more vigorously. The foul weather perfectly encapsulated the drama of what I was currently seeing.
The student grazed Harry's cheek with his fingers, locking both hands around his neck. He pressed his lips against Millie's boyfriend, who bucked his face forward into the cheating kiss.
With their hands all over each other, the rain came crashing down onto the deck, along with the last shred of respect I had for my friend.
32 | Delirium
I didn't care that I was intruding on an ‘intimate’ moment; the rage that controlled me was too much to suppress. Harry had lost Ian, moved onto my old crush, and then this random bloke? I wasn't going to sit back and let him play with Millie’s heart like that.
Barrelling down the stairs, I jumped the banister and charged towards the embracing couple, thrusting the student away from Harry. "Back off!" I bawled, causing the stranger to stare back wildly.
"W-What’s your problem? We can do whatever we want!" The student slung his arm around Harry, convinced that I was just a random bigot.
"It's... not that... Harry, get your shit together!!" I continued berating him. The other boy was about to leave for us to talk it out, when Harry snatched his arm with a dominant grip.
The look in his eyes was distant, yet filled with an uneasy amount of anxiety. "No, wait! Ian, you don’t have to go!!"
As the strengthening wind carried his raised voice throughout the yacht, the gravity of what he'd just said crept up inside of me. The student shrugged him away and stormed off towards to the bar, pissed that he couldn't even remember his name.
Harry didn't even realise he'd said it, his face frozen as the rain pattered against it. I attempted to keep my balance as the boat swayed even faster. "...Did you just say 'Ian'?! Is that some kind of sick joke to you?!"
He still hadn't said anything, and the barren silence was starting to grow incredibly uncomfortable.
"Harry, you'd better tell me whatever the hell it is you're thinking right now. I don’t even recognise you anymore, and it’s scaring me, dude..."
His eyes just stared down towards the chopping water, his chalk-white expression unreadable as the endless abyss looked back into him. After a minute of avoiding my gaze, he shook his head a little and turned towards me.
"...Hey, where'd Ian go?"
I stepped into it as I bunched my fist together, smacking him across the face. From inches away, I could only see his silhouette through the buckets of water falling from the sky. Even if he was visible, there still probably wouldn’t be any cognitive reaction.
"Cut the crap!! What is the matter with you?! How do you think Millie would feel, if she saw what I've just seen?!" Harry took a moment to register what I'd said, touching his blue cheek as the icy-cold water ran down his skin.
The only reading I could get from him was confusion. "Millie? She already hates my guts. I heard her whispering about it, like everyone else. Blaming me for the bridge, for Daniel and Serah hooking up, as if I was supposed to know. But now that Ian’s back—"
I threw another punch his way, almost certain that he didn't know why I was doing it. Violence was the only language he understood, though.
"Ian's dead! You're with Millie!! Just... start making sense, for Christ's sake!" I felt the need to go in for another hit, but before I could, I felt Harry’s large hand surrounding my neck. With tremendous force, he threw my body against the far wall and started squeezing even tighter.
He’s seriously trying to choke me.
"H...H...rry... Sto... Wh..." I pulled against his forearm, swinging my legs to kick him in the stomach, but he wouldn't let up. He had me pinned while cutting off my air supply; the rain was starting to dance in spirals around us both, the dizziness more suffocating than the pressure itself.
“You think that I wanted all of this to happen?” Harry’s voice cracked, teeth chattering into my ear. “Come on… Tell me I’m fucking sick. That’s what you’re all thinking, right?!”
Something changed again within his eyes, and he dropped me without warning to the ground. Coughing and wheezing, I stared up in horror as he hooked my attention with an eerie grin.
All of a sudden, he burst out laughing as though it was all one big joke to him. Holding his sides, the thug could barely contain himself after narrowly strangling me.
"Har... Harry... Just talk to me," I panted, concerned not only for his safety, but for everyone on-board this ship. He replied with the most worrying answer I could think of, and worst of all, he said it through a chuckle.
"...Harry? Hah! W
ho's Harry?! Me... Am I Harry? Are you Harry? Fuck knows, bwahah!! Harry, Harry, Harry, freak, psycho, Harry!!"
He almost danced as he sung his name, now completely soaked in the rain. It looked as though he'd completely lost it, throwing away his identity so that he’d never have to make another difficult decision — like the one that resulted in the genocide of the O-Saints.
Millie's very-public rejection of his past must’ve pushed him over the edge. I tried to ignore his childish cries, and spoke to him as a damaged person rather than a total loon.
"...Okay? Listen, why don't we go inside the cabin, and warm up? It's freezing out here, you're gonna catch a cold. Just... come inside, is that alright?" He stopped moving, and froze for a brief second.
After a moment of contemplation, I was startled to see him turn directly towards me, with a worried look that almost rivalled mine. I got the impression that he'd only just now identified who I was.
"...Daniel...? I... I don't..." Harry tucked his arms under his shirt like a petrified toddler, shivering as though he'd finally noticed where he'd been standing this whole time.
His glazed-over eyes reflected something similar to sanity, although it was quickly overtaken with a horrified, shell-shocked contortion. Even now, he struggled to make sense of how he got to this point.
"I don't... I don't know where I am!!"
----
I sat atop the tanning section of the ship, the dawn’s sun drying up all evidence of the previous rainy night. Serah joined me, handing over a tin of preserved fruit for breakfast as she took the seat next to mine.
I had to tell her everything, after she found me dragging Harry's collapsed body past her bedroom door, offering to help lift him back to his quarters. I didn’t dare tell Millie, though — not until we'd sorted out whatever the problem was. I listened to Serah numbly as she tried to draw sense from my flustered description of his current state.
"D-Delirium?" I repeated. It didn't sound familiar, but the clinical tone she used was enough to cause anyone to be unsettled.
"It's really not my area," Serah tried to utter in a detached way, but even she was deeply disturbed about Harry's mental condition. "One of the people in my Med School course presented a case study on it. It sounds very similar, the way you said he couldn't remember events properly, his disassociation and that random... violence.”
