No More

Chapter 112: Damage Control

Lukas groaned before opening his blue eyes as they adjusted to the darkness. After falling off the bed he slept on, he used it as a support to help him stand. His thoughts were a blur, mentally asking over and over, but can never have a clear answer. "Where am I...?" He then looked at the black trench coat covering the darker clothing on his person. "Why am I wearing so much black?"

"I think it looks cute on you," A female voice said in the corner of the room, her left eye green and her right a chaotic red. "Better than your Ocelot jacket."

Lukas turned to face the girl, her body burned and marked with symbols of witchery. "Jess?" He took a step closer, looking at her body. "You look..." He didn't know what to say, considering her volatile personality.

She couldn't help but notice he didn't have an ounce of hostility when he called her name, only concern. "Burned? Cooked? Scarred?" She suggested humorously, although it held no weight in joy. "A lot has happened, Lukas."

"What happened to you?" He asked before looking at her new eye she acquired from Veritas. "Where am I – what is this place?"

"Somewhere safe." Jess said, walking over to him. "How much do you remember?"

"I..." Lukas opened his mouth, but then gripped his head in pain as the memories flooded in fragments in the resembling nature of glass; sharp.

"Easy now..." Jess helped him sit down on the bed, before taking a seat next to him. "Your mind is in a very delicate state. You'll start to remember in time, just not now."

"I remember..." Lukas began, looking at Jess with a mixture of embarrassment and anger. "...You hitting me on top of the ur-ghast's tower in the Twilight Forest!"

"That's what you remember?" Jess asked in disbelief before she had a playful smile on her face. "To be fair, you did try to kiss me~."

Lukas' face flushed red. "I-It felt like the appropriate time..."

"We were fighting a monster that can control the weather and summon mini, suicide-bombing versions of itself!" Jess let out a small laugh. "Even after it died, its guts and blood started raining down - how was that an appropriate time?"

"It just felt right! Even after that we..." He said as his face had a look of struggling confusion. "I can't remember what happened after..."

"...Is that all you remember?" Jess asked, a hint of sadness in her voice.

"Is there something I'm supposed to remember?" Lukas asked before he felt a pang of pain in his blonde head. "I... just remember a crazy lady and her goons who did some freaky blood magic."

"Do you remember how those blood mages caught us off-guard?" Jess asked. "Do you remember her?"

"Her?" Lukas is confused. "The lady with the blood magic?"

"...I guess not." Jess wasn't referring to the commander of the Clockwork Fortress. "We found a little girl abandoned in the Twilight Forest after we were done fighting the monsters."

"We did?" Lukas asked.

"Poor girl was blind, and wet from the rain." Jess nodded sadly. "When we were trying to comfort her, you were captured by those blood mages and..." Jess recalled what happened when she went back to her mountain base before the explosion. "I escaped with her, but Ellegaard stole her from me... she took a lot of things from me..."

"She stole her from you?" Lukas had a hard time processing all of the information; Ellegaard is a hero in his eyes. "How could anyone get the jump on you? You're usually so aware and defensive."