Reborn

13: Tunnels

Breaks:

[L1,2 or 3] represents the beginning of a flashback to one of Elena's past lives. There is more than one past life, which is why I have put up the numbers. Though, these memories are usually told as she sleeps and Elena herself cannot remember them.

[/L1,2 or 3] represents the end of a flashback to one of Elena's past lives.

[P] represents the beginning of a retelling of a memory in Elena's current life.

[/P] represents the end of a retelling of a memory in Elena's current life.

~3~ is just a time skip

AN: Enjoy the story!

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I stumbled upon exiting my portal into one of the many root tunnels under the folded mountain. From beside me Yugo let out a gasp. With our hands still clasped and our bodies both exhausted I ended up bringing us both down.

I'd twisted on the way down, partly yanked to one side when Yugo had attempted to pull me up. Then I landed on my side painfully and ended up jerking Yugo over to his side too. We both groaned at the impact with the ground but didn't bother to do much else.

At my back was the entrance to the tunnel. Rain still poured outside, it's steady beat like a drum that echoed into the cave. The lightning that had been so incessant before had somewhat calmed. My guess- the worst of the storm had passed us by.

Exhausted, I simply let myself breathe as the pain in my side slowly faded away. Tiredly I watched how my shadow would be cast further down the tunnel behind Yugo with each flash of lightning that lit up the outside. The thunder that followed sounded like low rumbles which wasn't even felt in the tunnel.

"Are you okay?"

Blinking, my vision refocused from my shadow to Yugo in front of me. His brow was furrowed, breath just as deep as my own with his exhaustion. Azure eyes searched as he held my gaze.

All at once everything seemed to slam into me.

How the village had nearly been destroyed. How the Summit Tree is destroyed. How the travelers were all nearly killed. How I'd been threatened to a death by fire. How close I'd gotten to actually dying by fire. How Yugo had come to find me and worked together with me. How sore I was from it all.

The tears that gathered in my eyes burned. "N... not really..." I uttered to him as I started to hiccup. "Th- this is a- a bad d- da- ay."

Yugo's brows shot up. He blinked at me. Softly, "...just a bad day?" He sounded incredulous at that.

"...a r- real- ally bad d- day...!" I amended.

I'm not sure what I expected, but Yugo suddenly stifling a laugh was not it. Irritation and anger suddenly filled me, even as some part of me found the sound he made appealing.

"H- hey!" I tried to growl at him through my tears, "i- it's n- n- not- t funny!"

When he only tried to cover his mouth and didn't stop his laughing, I shoved his shoulder lightly and gave another growl. Yugo shook his head, laughing harder for some reason as the force of my push nearly rolled him onto his back. With a wet huff I turned over on my back and did my best to ignore him.

Staring up at the ceiling, my anger quickly dissipated. Only plain sadness was left. I pushed my mask up so it rested on my forehead and rubbed at my burning eyes. It hurt. Sniffles forced their way out of my system.