Amidst the dim glow of the bonfire, Nocten sat hunched forward with his hands clasped together. Night expelled all life and gave life to the crimson moon above him, staring down at him with its judgmental glow. Nocten had finished gathering the last of the firewood, hauling individual shucked bits back towards the wide open plains where he had determined camp. He was exhausted, shown with sweat beaming down the sides of his temples with some salty droplets leaking off of the tip of his nose. Even the cool air couldn't keep him calm, as his frightened and persistent demeanor kept him impetuously awakened.
After carving the tip of a stick to make it smooth-edged, Nocten dug its tip against the center of a shucked piece of wood, drilling it through to light it aflame with his bare hands. After several failed attempts, he exhaled an outcry of frustration and flung the smooth stick against the grass below. He turned away as a cold breeze escaped towards his moist forehead, gaining a transient moment of relief before he assaulted the hardwood once more.
All the while he had done so, delusions sprung towards his visions. He pinpointed toward the carelessness of his actions in close quarters combat, blaming himself for Lucy's disappearance. His mouth murmured silent insults, attacking his own character for how tragically unprepared he had been. The existential downgrading of his pride, along with his own identity as a refugee of Sancta only shredded the deepest crevices of his heart further. There was no purpose, no motive, and no way home. But what even was home at this point? The question echoed inside Nocten's still heart, finding meager purpose in even the creation of his flame. There was no flame. Even if he had ignited it, what then? It did not matter. The crimson moon still judged him the more he glanced at it, to remind himself of the long procession of days, weeks, or even months of his demise. As he clung to his own periodic admittance of defeat, regret poured into his eyes as he slumped backward in his own bubble, clasping the incentive of tears away with his dirtied palms.
The shifting of grass entered his ears, but he paid no heed to it. It would only get louder and invasive if he paid attention at all. He ran his fingers against the hairs of his eyebrows, still covering what little faith he had in his eyes. Just moments after doing so, a tickle against the small hairs of his fingertips forced his eyes open. Graceful fireflies luminescent of an emerald green radiated his surroundings, surrounding him in the light that he had sought to replicate for the past five minutes. Either it was the arrival of nature itself or the forgetful act of the Rot's existence that calmed Nocten's anger down for a standstill. A firefly landed on his nose and crept toward his glistening forehead, reminding him that there was such a beauty that contrasted with the darkness of the world he lived within.
"Fire's gonna attract them," Scarlet's voice broke the night's silence. Her eyes trailed through the influx of fireflies surrounding their perimeter. "Good thing fireflies still exist. It's the one thing that won't let us down tonight."
Nocten remained silent. It was evidence that he still harbored an everlasting grudge against her for her attempt at stopping him from locating Lucy. But little could be said about how he truly felt about the situation with careful consideration.
"Waiting until morning's not going to do you any good. You said it yourself, right? We're going back once the sun hits. You might as well sleep. You'll need energy."
Nocten pursed his lips together and tried to escape the conversation. He shifted his body to the side against the grass. The firefly on his forehead dusted away and drifted into the rest of the pack. "Not tired," he uttered.
A brief sigh put Scarlet back on her toes, approaching the tall autumn-leaved tree rooted beside Nocten. Her impatience began to grow dull as she leaned her back against the center of it. "Seriously, if you keep this up, I'll have to drag you back to the hideout myself," she droned. "You won't have enough stamina for the walk back."
"Then go to sleep. No one said you had to stay awake. I'll go find Lucy myself."
"Alone? Out in the dark?" she jested. Crossing her arms, disappointment of his decision enraged her further. "Probably the worst combination out there, if I do say so myself. Just don't come whining to me once you're in a body bag after the Rot's done with you."
She kicked herself off of the tree and made way for the center of the pile of wood that Nocten had gathered, intending to use one as an uncomfortable seating arrangement. Just as she had done so, Nocten flared up with his face in utter aghast at her. He watched as she made her seat, bolting upright with his previous animosity returning to strike.
"Is this all a joke to you!?" His voice raised toward her to break the droning of fireflies beside them.
"What?" Scarlet appeared unaffected by his rage. "You think I'm not worried? Not scared? You don't think I'd rather be anywhere else than stuck with you?"
"No one said you had to come along. That was your choice. You could have let me go."
"Mmmm, maybe," she said. She crossed her legs together. "Or maybe I was getting tired of staying at the hideout. Maybe I'm interested in your story, and why you came here in the first place. Maybe I happen to care about you, or maybe you're just too in over your head to realize that."
"Ugh," Nocten's voice escaped his mouth. He pressed his hands over the top of his scalp, clutching it as if he was out to rip it out himself. He paced around the fireflies surrounding Scarlet in the center of it, dismissed by the lingering stress encompassing his aura. "Just forget it."
"Look, I know you're scared. I was once too. But sometimes we live without acceptance of our current state, all to the point where we lose ourselves, and-"
"To hell with that!" Nocten shouted. "I know she's alive and out there. She was trained for this. We were all trained, and for… for what?" A clear diversion was made to the topic at hand, venting to the point of no return. Scarlet noticed it. It almost forced a laugh upon seeing it in action. "Just so that they could use us and sell us to Curse? What even was the point of our lives? To be used as some fodder or currency to a bunch of criminals?" He glanced at the moon once more. "All while the world just burns and worsens every day. Just… ten years, all just an utter waste."
"Sounds like it sucks," said Scarlet.
His eyes beamed toward the center of her forehead as he watched her casually recline herself to the full extent of the hardwood, using it as a makeshift bench. He lost his patience through the shifting of his voice to attack. "And you… you lay there and you tell me that I'm in over my head? It really is just a joke to you."
There was a pause. He turned away and shuddered as his breath began to hitch, losing control of his temper. He felt squeamish after his distress got to him, only for it to rupture as an untimely comment made him turn around once more.
"You remind me of this guy I used to like," said Scarlet.
"What?" Nocten's voice was in disbelief at the shift in their uneventful conversation.
Scarlet's eyes darted toward the red stars instead of the moon beaming down upon her eyes. With one arm braced behind her head as she stared upright, she breathed deeply to reminisce of the relaxing nature of her past once more. "His name was Brendan," she said. "We used to ride horses together back at our hometown. It was always uphill, downhill, races, in nature... everything. I remember how riding horses always made him so tan. I couldn't ever get to his level, but… everywhere he went, people always were attracted to him, and he never had to work very hard to be the center of attention. Even my sisters were all over them, and he never knew."
The sound of fireflies and their heartbeats cascaded the silence. Nocten stood like a statue watching over the heavens.
"One morning, he was handling something important for a construction project. Something super complex. It looked like he took a month to make it. He was showing it to me in the town. I was on my horse... and it took a literal shit on it. An actual brown turd, all over the cracks and crevices inside. You could even see the little bits of undigested foods and fats inside from last night. It was impossible to clean."
He watched as Scarlet gave off a light chuckle, placing the back of her left palm against her eyes to cover her expression of content.
"He was so angry at me for it. I watched him closely trying to salvage what he had," Scarlet said, laughter brimming on the rise. She ejected herself upward and sat peacefully towards Nocten, eyes locked against his. "He always got angry whenever he saw me. So I taught him a neat little trick. I said, hold your breath and count to ten, and it'll make the pixies in your head float away back to their den. So he tried it, and his face turned red near the fifth second."
The story had left Nocten shell-shocked for a brief moment. There was a kind and resolute presence that Scarlet gave off with her story that was barely indescribable. Something within her that he lacked at the time. Humanity. And that channeled a bit of life within the husk of his heart.
"He looked so cute doing it. We'd argue a couple of times, here and there, and whenever he did, I'd always call him names and laugh at his face," said Scarlet. Her face suddenly soured as she dug her head down to her lap. Her voice grew soft and dark. "Then he traveled all the way to the eastern woods, and never returned."
Nocten stared confused at her. He tried to answer back, but couldn't utter a single word.
"Sometimes I think about the last thing he said to me. He poked my forehead and told me that we'd ride together again. And I'd always think of those sunny hills we'd go to every week, and that smile on his face, and I'd say to myself, I'll see you again." Scarlet finished.
It was something that Nocten wished he could have said to Lucy if he had known she would vanish amidst their battle together. The fallout of what memory had remained of happier times returned to him. Lucy was nothing but a bystander in his childhood. Where he would be jesting with folks his age, the same bully type demeanor that everyone loathed, she would be watching from the sidelines, completely unaware that their paths would intertwine. But what Scarlet's story had done was more than emotional. She had revived all the little memories that he remembered of Lucy and his time of serenity when they wouldn't have a single care about the Rot and its spread. One of the earliest memories that she had brought to his attention involved a time when he had rescued one of her closest friends at the time from a torrent of flame at a self-serving market. He remembered inhaling the stale deadly inferno as his nostrils tinged and nearly vacuumed the smoke into his lungs. He would rescue the girl from the kindness of his own heart because he was taught to; it had only seemed right. Lucy's presence remained even then. He didn't care what she had thought of him at the time, but he realized that his act alone might have contributed to her overall disappointment of what he had become.
More of her words began to make sense. He wasn't taken for a coward at first glance, but a boy who would actually practice what he preached. And for that, he realized that he owed her more than what she had criticized him for. He even owned Scarlet as well, for everything she had said to open up the memory of his legacy.
Without another word, he approached Scarlet and said beside her, eyeing his knees with his palms flat on the wood beside his hips. He flicked his head toward her and watched as she stared confusingly into his eyes. He looked up at her.
"What was it again?" He began. "Hold your breath and count to ten, and what?"
Scarlet chuckled. "Make the pixies in your head float away back to their den." she said.
They stared at each other as if they mutually exchanged a silent exchange of a truce that was partially incomplete. Something was missing. Nocten remembered her words and the happier days of his past when he felt like a hero that mattered to their homes. Instead of rambling towards the same story he had just relived in his mind, he took a deep breath through his nose and held it for five seconds until his face began to turn red.
"Are you… are you serious, right now?"
Nocten released his breath at second seven. He heard Scarlet laughing uncontrollably before he spoke to break apart the purpose. "That's terrible advice," he said. "It doesn't work. You're going to kill someone with that."
"No, but now I know both of you are as gullible as I thought you'd be. I knew it. You're just like him," She paused. "I'm just thinking too much about it. I swear, I'm gonna lose it if I remind myself of him and my sisters, and everything else."
The fireflies swirled around the two of them and dazzled them with their bejeweled emerald light. The two of them looked away before Scarlet took the first initiative. She lifted her left hand up at him, intending to apologize, only for Nocten to follow immediately after, mirroring the same intention.
"There's no need," he said. "Not for me or anything else."
Scarlet gently placed her palm back on her knee.
"I'm sorry for everything. I was being so hostile… and… I know you were trying to help me clear my mind away from Lucy. I understand that stopping Curse is the utmost priority in your group. But I... I just... I owe Lucy my whole life. She saved me when the Rot attacked us when we were young... and I ran away like a coward while I left the others to die. I never thanked her for what she did. I still think about what I could have done. I could have saved other people's lives. Maybe Lucy's face staring down at me wouldn't seem so terrifying anymore. Nothing scares me more at this point than disappointing people. And I was all blind to it, thinking I could make a difference with Sancta. It's all just… too much. In the end, I'm just all alone, back to where I started. Sold out with nothing to live for, and nothing to show for it."
"Well, you don't seem blind anymore. Seems like you've opened your third eye. You're the one telling me all this right now, after all."
Nocten did not seem content with Scarlet's answer. He swayed away, lingering in misery before she added to it. Her eyes drew toward the side of his cheek, realizing he had been purposefully hiding it away.
"You… You know, I learned something special from Brendan before he died. He told me that as long as there's someone worth fighting for, that's enough purpose it takes to live. One life alone. And it's never too late to fight for that purpose. The only time it's too late is when you're dead and buried. So… Lucy's still out there, and she's probably waiting for us. Right?"
Silence.
"You're the only one here," said Nocten.
"Is… that enough for you?"
"Yeah. I guess so."
"So, what's the plan now?"
Nocten's mind wandered away from Lucy for a brief moment. He felt a fighting chance to build something new, but he had no idea how to. He hoped the answer would have come to him, but his serenity was broken up entirely by the sound of roaring vehicles storming through the shattered pathway around the tree.
"Get down!" hissed Scarlet.
"What's-" Nocten's voice cut off as Scarlet dragged the back of his collar down behind their makeshift bench.
Peeking outward from beneath the darkness, they took shelter in the highrise of the grass. Scarlet observed the unknown occasion. Two armor plated vehicles arranged in a tight convoy rolled through the shattered pathway, each equipped with a cone of light atop the roofs of their chassis. She took tremendous care to remain undetected as the light circled around. As they stopped along the pathway, Scarlet unveiled several Curse guards and personnel exit the vehicle to remain idle on standby for unknown reasons.
"What do you see?" Nocten whispered.
"Shut up."
Several seconds later, another burst of cone-shaped lights flashed from the road ahead of their armored convoy. A similar line of armored vehicles had stopped directly in front of Curse's convoy, and as their occupants disembarked, the insignia of the House of Sancta became visible among their chests and armored vests. Those who mingled in the House of Sancta were considered an elite member of their collective. While members of the opposing factions spoke and exchanged indistinct words, Scarlet watched as the rear compartments of the armored vehicles opened in orderly succession, revealing their cargo.
"Looks like friends of yours are dealing with some of the ones from Curse," whispered Scarlet.
Nocten remained silent, reminiscing the same betrayal he had the dawn he was sold out to Curse.
"Clever bastards, dealing in the midst of night. And they've got the Rot on their reins."
The term didn't quite strike Nocten as heavy as of an impact yet until he realized what Scarlet had meant by it. He remembered the inhumane reputation Curse had for training the creatures of the Rot for their own purposes, with the most noteworthy being their own pack of wolves ready to slaughter whatever came upon their doorstep. They were infamously known for the capture and harboring of the Rot to deliver the most tremendously torturous methods of their stragglers and captives. Nothing could stand up to the Rot's unpredictable nature. Shackled to the point where none of their mottled hands could strike or devour their Curse captors, even they could break free in moments of negligent use in the hands of foolish amateurs.
The question of their sudden taming and arrival had no discernable origin point, but it was rumored to have started from Balen Ramsey's treacherous rule among the city of their inhabitants:
"Interdictum…" Scarlet spoke the name of their grand hideaway.
The name "Interdictum", a faraway city that harbors the secrets of the Savior of Curse, as well as the home of regulated and normalized Rot presence. Ramsey was rumored to have come from a wealthy aristocracy that gradually sheltered him the moment the Rot's presence increased before and after the fabled huntress had fallen. It was not long until he began to make a grand entrance as a commandeering general and inventor that innovated the usage of Rot as sustenance instead of a threat. Rumors of a synthesized sedative began to make the rounds around Sancta with the power to neutralize the threat of the Rot's unsatiated appetite. Ramsey's reputation skyrocketed as a result of its creation, pushing him to the fabled Lord of Curse. The utmost promising title, he would raze all enemies with Rot as their omega weapon until the lands bled dry of all color and life.
In the present, Scarlet witnessed the Rot being pushed out of the cargo bay with an influx of sedative pushed within spines of the mottled Rot. Placed on tightened iron chains and cuffs around their parasitic necks, arms, and legs, the House of Sancta escorted them carefully toward the Curse guards. A silent exchange of mutual glances sought the House of Sancta out in their armored vehicles, escaping into the darkness without another word. Yet the Curse remained, sheltering in a makeshift camp. The Rot were loaded up into their armored vehicles, shut and sealed tight to prevent any unnecessary escape.
"That's fucking insane. Curse was supplying the Rot from Sancta this whole time." Scarlet whispered.
The sudden news astounded Nocten and made him furious. "But how?! We never noticed any sign of Rot anywhere!"
"Quiet down, or else they'll hear us," she reminded. "I have a plan. We take them out quietly and leave one of them alive for information on Ramsey's whereabouts. We steal their guard attire and we drive the vehicle down to Interdictum. We find the Savior of Curse… and find out what exactly they're hiding."
"What, so they can catch us in the act?"
"You forget so easily," said Scarlet. She procured the gate pass she looted from the commanding officer that separated the two and flayed it around like a piece of candy to a toddler. "We can walk straight inside as long as we play the part. Willingly, of course. Unless you're scared."
"I can handle myself just fine, as you saw before."
"Fine by me," said Scarlet. She eyed the convoy as she prepared to enact her stealthy plan. "I think if we-"
The midnight sky gave a terrifying groan as a distant detonation collapsed the forest miles away from them. A thunderous clap of unknown force sent waves of unbridled wind that surged across miles of the land. It was a sound so overbearing that both Nocten and Scarlet froze for nearly a minute, sheltering behind the wooden cover and what little sustenance it had to protect them. Shrieks of hollow wood and wind torrents blasted past them. Even the Curse guards had sheltered behind their armored vehicles, hidden from plain sight to avoid the demise of the forest.
Then, in the corner of his eye, Nocten spotted a splitting sight in the sky; a detonation of white and red aether expanded near the moon and struck the clouds above, erupting in a fiery sea of dazzling bewilderment. The deafening roar eventually dialed down as miniature sparkles began twinkling downward, showering all below it with an unknown substance.
"What the…" Nocten muttered, unable to believe what he had witnessed.
"Come on, let's move!" said Scarlet before dragging Nocten out from cover. They assaulted the distracted convoy with only seconds to spare, knowing full well that it was now or never.