Chapter 3: Despair?
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What despair it is to feel something unbearable without being able to do anything about it.
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Village of Luttren...
01/32/3324
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"Aaahh!!.. ha... ha..." Liu woke up gasping and in panic after a nightmare replaying the horrible scenes she had witnessed.
She remained lying in bed, staring at the ceiling as she always did upon waking.
'Maybe it was just a bad dream after all. Grandpa Mo and Mimie will be in the dining room, waiting for me to wake up...' she told herself.
"Ha! Pathetic."
'I'm trying to run away from reality. If they were still alive, it would be Grandpa Mo's voice waking me up for breakfast, not a damn nightmare.' she thought.
She raised her only left arm as if to touch the ceiling.
'Aside from my arm, nothing has changed? There are just two new things I can't reach anymore? Because they're too far away?'
Liu began to sob while staring at her hand suspended between herself and the ceiling, 'The ceiling feels so out of reach today...'
'I'm lazy.'
'Am I really lazy?'
'Even at a time like this?'
'It makes me want to throw up.'
'Am I disgusting and despicable?'
'Being lazy? Does that mean their deaths don't affect me?'
'That's really pathetic. I want to kill myself.'
She turned her head toward the window, Luminosity's light shining through.
'If I dive headfirst out the window, will I die?'
"Hhaa." she sighed.
'I don't even have the courage to get up, might as well blame it all on laziness. I want to go back to sleep.' she closed her teary eyes.
But... she couldn't fall back asleep.
'Why? Why do I keep thinking about what happened? It's annoying, it pisses me off, it's so frustrating damn it!'
"Rraah!" she growled in sync with her thoughts.
She grabbed her head with both hands, curled up under her blanket, and sighed mentally, 'Hhaa, I want to rip my head off. If I remove my brain, I'll stop reliving all these images, all these sounds, all these sensations...'
'I can't stop.'
'Whywhywhywhywhywhy...'
'Rrraaah, it's so frustrating. I can't do anything even though it hurts so much, it feels so awful.'
'I'd rather die...'
'Please.'
'I don't want to stay like this.'
'Lumeno... can't it grant my wish? Can't it kill me?'
Liu started crying again, even harder than before.
"I want to see Grandpa and Mimie again..."
At that moment, the door opened and Pasha entered the room. She had brought Liu a meal, but seeing her crying, she set it down on the desk to the left of the door and went to comfort her.
Pasha hugged her, "It's okay, it's over, it's over..."
Liu flinched and lifted her head to see Pasha, "What are you doing here?" she said while wiping her tears with her left arm.
"I'm going to stay with you until you have a new family or until you feel better."
"Why?" Liu asked in a strange voice.
"To help you..."
'To help me...? I don't want that. But I'm too scared to be alone. What should I do?' Liu nodded.
"Are you hungry? I made you an omelet with the remaining champilums from storage."
Pasha brought the meal to Liu and sat beside her bed.
She looked at Liu for a few moments, then began speaking, "I'll help you with all the procedures and paperwork you'll have to sign, and I'll also help you find your path toward the future you want."
Liu stopped eating for a few seconds, hesitating, "I want my grandparents..."
Pasha sighed, "I know."
A heavy silence settled.
"Can you leave me alone, for a bit?" Liu asked.
Pasha nodded, "It's the seventh hour of the first day of the week. Tomorrow I'll go back to work for most of the day. Tell me if you'll go to school or not."
Then she left the room, leaving Liu alone with her thoughts and her meal, "I'll be in the dining room."
...
After several seconds of silence, Liu muttered, "I don't want a future without Mimie and Grandpa Mo." then continued eating her omelet.
'I have to think about my future? They've asked us that many times at school. But I don't want to make a decision. It's scary.'
'I have to make a decision? Without Mimie or Grandpa Mo? Is that what he meant by "making decisions on your own"? Is that what being an adult is?'
'It's scary.' Liu shivered alone in her room with her meal.
'Pasha is in the dining room. But I still feel alone. That's weird.'
'It's unpleasant, I don't want to feel alone... but it won't go away.'
She tried to convince herself she wasn't alone. Pasha was there, like a big sister. She also still had her best friend, whom she could see tomorrow at school.
But that feeling of loneliness refused to leave her no matter what she told herself.
She was afraid.
Liu started sobbing again.
Not because of her grandparents' deaths, but because of that feeling of loneliness.
It was the first time she had ever felt it, and it terrified her.
"Snif.."
'Why do I have to go through this? I didn't ask for anything. Normally, happiness and misfortune should be balanced, right? So why isn't my happiness as strong as my misery?'
'Why did my parents abandon me? Is it really because they love traveling? Was I really just an accident during one of their trips? Why did they leave me alone?' her thoughts began to turn chaotic after that feeling of loneliness appeared.
'Should I make finding them my goal in the future? Is that what people expect from me? Is that what Grandpa Mo and Mimie expect from me? No...'
'I don't know...'
'I'll never know.' she still tried to rationalize her thoughts.
'I can only imagine it, deduce it?'
'Should I resurrect Mimie and Grandpa Mo? It happened a few times in Chicken Joe's books, but would they even want to come back? Would they be happy to see me? Would they be happy with what I'll do with my life?'
'I don't know. Uncertainty?... it's scary.'
The feeling of loneliness within Liu only deepened.
She thought back to what had happened.
'I don't even know what really happened. Are they really dead?'
'They were absorbed by the vortex that the black Form came from. They were absorbed by the black Form? Maybe they're living inside it. Maybe they're still alive...' a faint hope began to form inside her.
'Should I find that black Form and open it to see what's inside? But how? Even Grandpa Mo couldn't react, so how could I do anything? Do I need to become stronger? But how? I only know how to condense energies and release a little of it. I might be able to beat normal adults like that, but...'
'What could I do? Wait to be adopted? If I end up in a noble family, maybe I'll get the chance to become stronger. Otherwise, should I join the Great Games? I don't even know if that would help. Grandpa Mo and Mimie never explained anything beyond absorbing, condensing, and releasing energy. The only thing I know is that nobles are expected to know how to do that.'
'But for that, I'd have to wait. Either to be adopted, or to reach the age to participate in the Great Games. So I'll have to keep doing what I'm told and follow what others say. But that idea disgusts me. I don't want that.'
She had always thought in her own logical way. But the difficult situation she was in made her far more pessimistic.
'Hhaaa, even if making decisions on my own is scary and makes me feel this horrible loneliness, it's still better than losing the freedom to make those decisions, right?'
'Ha, that's pathetic. I'm scared of becoming an adult if it means making my own decisions, but the moment I imagine losing that freedom, I'm even more terrified... I don't understand.'
'What's wrong with me? Can't I think properly anymore? I'm not even lazy anymore, so why is this happening? Damn it, I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do.'
Stress began to rise within her; the stress of not understanding her situation for the first time, the stress of not knowing what to do for the first time, the stress of these new emotions she was experiencing for the first time...
The stress of the unknown.
That stress and anxiety began to suffocate the motivation and hope she had created herself.
'I'll never achieve anything like this, there's too much uncertainty. This isn't how I'll be able to defeat the black Form or resurrect Grandpa Mo and Mimie. Even finding my parents feels impossible.'
Her long and painful reflection led to nothing. The accumulated stress and anxiety completely erased her patience, giving birth to a deep despair.
'Raa, why can't I do anything. Do I even want to save my grandparents and find my parents?'
...
"Hahaha..."
'Am I crazy or what?'
'Why did I even think that?'
'I should really kill myself, that would solve everything, right?'
"No?!" she shouted.
But no one answered.
...
'I need to stop thinking... I know, I'll read a Chicken Joe novel.'
She left her room and headed toward her grandparents' bedroom. She opened the door as usual, as if she had forgotten they were no longer there.
The first thing she saw was the desk in front of her, the one where she always placed Mimie's breakfast... she stood frozen in the doorway, speechless...
"What am I doing??!" she dropped to her knees.
"What am I doing." she curled up on the floor.
"Why? Why!!" she burst into tears.
...
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[Pov of Pasha]
Pasha found her crying, on her knees and curled into herself.
As always, she hugged her and reassured her, "Shh, it's okay, it's okay, I'm here."
'What should I do to truly comfort her?' Pasha wondered.
...
It took Liu a long time to calm down and stop crying.
"Do you feel better?" Pasha asked.
"I think so." Liu answered softly.
She stood up and walked further into the room, her face empty of expression.
Pasha looked at her with even more pity than before, 'What will become of her?'
"It's okay, everything will be fine, I'll stay with you until you truly feel better." Pasha tried.
"You know, you can tell me everything. It's hard to know what to do when you think about it alone, so I'm sure that with my help we can find a solution."
Pasha wanted to find a way for Liu to truly open up.
She genuinely saw Liu as a little sister. They had many things in common, and she had watched Liu grow up.
She had also received a lot of help from Liu's grandparents. And even though Liu had always been rather quiet, Pasha had managed several times to get her to open up.
'I really want to help you, but for that you have to trust me, please Liu.' she pleaded internally.
Liu turned to look at Pasha.
She had to raise her eyes slightly to meet hers. Her empty gaze looked like a silent plea to Pasha.
"I really want to help you. I'm sure we'll find a solution." Pasha repeated.
"We'll figure out what to do for your future. The two of us together, I'm sure we'll make the right decisions."
Liu's expression suddenly turned into a terrifying indifference that sent a chill down Pasha's spine, 'What's wrong with her?!'
Liu began raising her voice until it almost became a scream.
"Find a solution?!! Find what to do?!!! Make the right decisions?!?!!"
She spoke so fast she had to catch her breath.
Then she continued just as loudly, "You don't even believe my story!!! You don't know what you're talking about!!! Are you going to kill yourself with me?!! To make my problems lighter!!"
"Calm down!" Pasha tried, "We can take our time, we have—"
She was cut off.
"Calm down??!! You want me to calm down!" Liu shouted.
"You want us to figure out what to do, huh?!! But you know nothing! I know nothing!!! We don't know a damn thing."
Liu was exhausted after shouting so much.
"What do you want us to do?" she asked in a desperate voice as she fell to her knees.
She started crying again.
'What do I want us to do?' Pasha asked herself, rushing to hug Liu once more.
'I don't know.' she thought, crying along with Liu in her arms.
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What despair it is to feel something unbearable without being able to do anything about it?
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