Lost Mind

Chapter 10: Wails of Grief Can Cut Through the Strongest Hearts Like Blades

!Stong swear warning!

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Mellohi stared at her brother, her best friend, in his limp, twisted position on the ground. No amount of words strung together could possibly convey the emotion she felt. That was her sword in Tommy's chest; it was by her hand that he was slain.

She scrambled to her feet and stumbled backward, her bloody hands covering her horror-stricken mouth. Never in all her years of living would she ever imagine killing her best friend. Her Enderwalks were out of control, and she needed to do something about it.

There was only one thing she could do.

Static rang in her ears as she sprinted toward L'Manburg, leaving the mangled corpse behind—at least he was resting in a peaceful place. Mellohi charged onward, past the colorful buildings and her confused friends; past the place she used to call home. It was no safe place now. All it had to offer to her was torment and suffering.

A few people called out to her as she skidded down the stairs, but she didn't stop. Not until she reached the ruins. She slowed to a snail's pace as she crept down the bridge, to the little covered area in the middle.

Mellohi leaned against the fence, gasping for breath. Her eyes and nose were runny, and her lungs screamed for air. The water down under the bridge looked so painful, yet it offered the sweet release of death. With a deep breath, the Enderman hefted herself onto the fence. She wobbled dangerously, and flailed her arms to steady herself. If she was going to jump, it would be on her own terms.

The wind whipped at her hair, stinging her eyes. She took her blindfold out of her pocket and watched as it fluttered like a bloodstained flag. Numbly, she let go, and the ragged cloth floated down into the water like a landing bird. How Mellohi longed to be a bird, so she could just fly away and forget this whole mess.

Mellohi's feet tingled as she psyched herself up to leap from the fence, into the churning water below, but something stopped her. No. Someone.

"What are you doing?"

"Wha—Phil?" She whipped around to see her winged father, dressed in his typical black-and-green kimono and green-and-white bucket hat. The Enderman chuckled nervously and turned back to the chasm. "I was just . . . admiring the ruins?"

"Uh-huh," he breathed, raising an eyebrow. "Why can't you admire the ruins from this side the fence?"

"Because the view is better up here?" Mellohi shrugged, not confident in her answers at all.

"Ranboo told us what happened," he remarked.

"Oh, did he?" she asked bitterly. "And what do you and Techno think of it?"

Phil contemplated this. His mouth formed a sentence, but he changed it last minute. "We still love you," he said.

"You're a father. You're supposed to say that." She sighed. "What do you really think about me?"

"I think that you are struggling through a bad time right now."

"Way to sugarcoat it," Mellohi said sarcastically.

"Mel, that wasn't an insult," he murmured. "Wilbur was in the same position as you at one point."

"And it got him killed."

"Yes—well." He cleared his throat. "My point is that you aren't alone."

"Not alone?" she inquired angrily. "Not. Alone? Phil, there is no one out there who is like me. No one who knows my suffering!"