A World With/Out Home

Chapter 33: A pause. (Part 2)

When Kyle woke up he was met by a very recognisable ceiling. The medical bay personal to the Hero.

"Estile! Estile!" Riften leaned in front of him arms reached out but afraid to touch him.

"I'm fine no need to worry," Kyle rose and gently pushed his hands aside. "How long was I out?"

"Half a day," Riften sat down beside him. "I thought we'd lost you."

Kyle looked around, "Where's Lillia?"

Riften took a deep breath, "Lillia is... she's hurt, very hurt." He gestured to another section of the room and in a place Kyle had visited many times before was Lilia.

Before anyone could stop him Kyle stepped the entire length of the space and appeared beside the pod. Lillia remained inside unmoving, suspended in a pale purple liquid unconscious to the rest of the world. Though there were no visible injuries but Kyle could feel the thread of her life barely holding together.

He fell to his knees. "What have I done?"

"You did what you could Estile," Riften stood beside him. "When that explosion went off if it wasn't for you and Lillia it could have cleaved much more than the mountain top. You absorbed most the energy."

"But-," he grit his teeth only to widen his eyes. "The Captain!"

This time Riften's eyes clouded over and slowly he shook his head.

"Damn it!" a frustrated rage built within his body wanting to burst and only held in by the destruction it could cause.

The sound of a shuffle drew his attention. Bandaged and on a crutch was Reina. Beside her was Eloi and to his grateful heart Maila. As he saw the familiar and kind caretaker of the Garden tears began to drip from his eyes. Maila quickly stepped forward and wrapping him in her arms, enveloped him in a loving warmth.

"It's okay," she hushed and brushed his white hair.

As time passed and Kyle righted himself he wiped his tears away determined, "Where are they?"

Reina answered, "The sky fortress is moving North East as Valandus made it. Suspiciously however it shows no sign of stopping despite the fact they should have fixed the problem by now."

"Aren't they heading back to Lavise?"

Eloi shook her head, "No. They won't find refuge within Lavise any longer. You can thank your Captain for that."

"What do you mean?" Kyle looked at her perplexed.

"It was a secret plan formulated by 1st Officer Vontear and 1st Officer Lane. Using the holiday as cover we shifted large amounts of the Hero's Guard into Lavise and planned to strike them. However, we didn't expect them to move so boldly and attack first."

"You took Lavise?"

"Yes," Eloi nodded. "The city is under our control. The operation was easier than expected due to their negligence however overall we still came out the loser."

Reina replied grimly, "They took almost all of our secrets and have the sky fortress. We managed to steal some of theirs as well but not enough to make this worth it. The Captain-," she paused as for a moment her eyes began to water, "we can't let the Captain's death be in vain. We can still win this before a war breaks out."