Diamond Dust

Chapter 1: Unfounded doubts

A trembling hand retrieved the paper and the precious bracelet. "Dayo." A torrent of tears took possession of Luna. Memories, her memories, their memories. Marked in indelible ink, pieces of the past intruded on the young woman's memory.

Trying to regain control of her emotions, the paper in one hand and her bracelet in another, Luna gathered her last strength. "No one must know." The trembling, brittle voice continued. "Whoever you are. I've moved on."

With one hand Luna wiped the tears from her eyes and with the other trembling hand tore up the piece of paper. Perhaps it was her old friends who were out to get her again? No, Luna had changed, she was different, she was strong, courageous.

Climbing the stairs to her apartment, the young woman made the painful decision not to tell anyone about what was going on. She probably hoped that her tormentors would grow weary, as they had years before.

One last thought ran through Luna's mind as she pushed open the front door of her apartment. "How do they know I live here?"

It was a cold night. The day had been relatively warm, but the evening was in stark contrast to the day. Unovis was a huge, modern city.

Wishing to get as far away as possible from Lumin, her former home in southwestern Unovis, Luna had moved to another district. Luna had settled in the Prism District, the city's largest district to the east. At the gateway to the small town of Echelon, the building was in one of the quietest parts of Prism District.

Cara had also recently moved in, and her meeting with Luna had come naturally at the start of the school year. Both entering their fourth year of study, the two friends had chosen very different paths.

It was on this day, a few weeks ago when Luna was still living in Lumin, during the integration day organized by the university, that they got to know each other. It didn't take long for Cara to introduce her new friend to her friend Taho.

Taho was a charming young man of average height, and his kindness was matched only by his sincere love for Cara, which only Cara didn't seem to see.

The result was a shy group of three friends who gradually bonded together, giving Luna the sweet taste of what she knew for a time: friendship.

However, there was another variable to take into account: Emi. Emi had been Luna's friend for many years. A stranger to the conflict and Dayo's tragic death, Emi had followed what had happened to her friend from afar, without really being able to help or console her. Perhaps the brunette's greatest regret was that she had never been able to protect her friend.

In a surge of hope and a desire to find a united group as she had once known it, Luna had one day decided to introduce Emi to Cara.

"I'm not feeling it, Luna." Emi sighed later in the evening following the coffee the three of them had had together. I don't know," She said. "Isn't she... too perfect?"

"Is it a flaw now to be perfect?"

Emi sighed again, not wanting to get into a conflict with her friend, and ended up changing the subject. It was sometimes very difficult to change the mind of a Luna who was still full of hopes and desperately wanted to know again a friendship as precious as the one she had experienced with Dayo.

As Cara didn't seem to have any bad feelings for Emi, Luna decided that she would see each of her two friends separately. In any case, since Emi had also moved to Unovis, just on the north of Little Street, Luna no longer had any ties to Lumin.

Everyone had moved on, in their own way.

"It's been a while since I've seen her..." Luna sighed, trying to organize both her bag for class and her thoughts, which were far more tangled than her class notes. "Maybe I should send her a message?"