Metropolis of Ashes

(62) - Calling into the void - [V]

With his big, dark eyes glaring at me as if I was some sort of a miracle, he breathed loudly into his gloved hands, wearing a dark, blue outfit of a common soldier. Shaking as I was, this crude image made me question this world. What the... hell...

Paul... Is he...

I threw myself at the place he was, clenching his body and shaking it violently. I yelled for him to wake up, but his ever-pale face was calm and unmoved by my voice. He... He wasn't cold... Was he breathing?! Who did...

My widely opened eyes immediately went towards the crumbled officer. He didn't move an inch. His eyes were still pinned at me.

"...You."

Before him, a black, shiny item lied. So calmly, an object of life destruction. A medium-sized gun, with its back part in red blood. He probably hit Paul with... This.

I couldn't hesitate. Throwing myself at the lying weapon, I snapped it away before he could realize my intents.

With the gun pointing at his forehead, the heavy weapon weighed my shivering arms down. My hands were shaking profusely, as the pointer made a chaotic patterns on his sweated skin.

He... Didn't kill Paul. He... Didn't kill me either... He didn't direct any harm at me. Why? Why is he staring so lunaticly at me like that? Is his shotgun empty of bullets?

But as I reloaded it, I could reject the last option. The face of the man became even paler than it was.

His face. The terror in his dark-gray eyes. My reflection in it... Wasn't it... Familiar?

"Why didn't you kill me?" — I asked him.

The dark eyes of his widened suddenly.

"I... Can't understand... Why aren't you answering?!" — Yelling at him, my throat hurt so much.

But it all was like a dream.

It all has happened before.

"Because I was ordered to." — His swallowed face didn't show any emotions. In his lifeless, dark eyes, I felt a moment of similarity.

"I've... Met you... Before."

And then, a face visualized before my sight. A slim one, of a young man. He wore a darker outfit than the usual officers. The cold feeling of the gun lifted up to my head. In the basement of my home, an archive of the past.

"You're... The one who wanted to kill me!?" — The tone of my voice couldn't be controlled, as I jumped away from that man.

Despite him having no weapon, and being defenseless, the fear still grew inside of me. I remembered all.

"You..." — There was still no answer from him.

But then, a sudden thought came to my mind.

Didn't Aura... Shoot him in his back?

Didn't he drop before me, with me seeing his last breath?

"Why... Are you still alive?!"

"...I don't know it myself." — He repeated it like a mantra.

"W-What are you doing here?! Why... You..." — The despair squeezing my heart, the pulsing pain drowning my brain in confusion. — "Tell me anything! Please!"

It's so strange.

Why have I met two of the ones I never even thought of meeting again? Why here?

"Ever since that day... I've started to wonder. Why is it that... The order on that day was different?" — He muttered out slowly, as if he couldn't breathe.