The Lost Exile: Hiriya's Lost Memorial

Chapter 2.2 One person lost...

Hiriya slowly opened his eyes, everything around him was dark. As if he was encapsulated in some dimension, never to exit again. He tried to move his limbs, however they wouldn’t budge. A sudden bright light falsh in front of him and as it faded, he could see a girl running away… she kept on running… her long black hair waving in the wake of her movements… A long metal chain swung out of nowhere and latched onto her leg, the girl fell and started getting dragged backwards; a tall tower was looming above behind her, as she continued to be dragged towards the tower, she outstretched her hand, somehow trying to grab on to Hiriya, Hiriya tried to hold her hand, but it was just out of reach…

“ALICIA!!!”

Hiriya woke up abrutly. He was lying on the infirmary bed of the school. The sounds of beakers rattling could be heard; he turned to see a shocked Kyouki. As he tried to stand up, his head was still groggy from the dream, so he started to totter a bit… Kyouki saw this and quickly rushed over to him.

“You should lay down some more. You’re still quite injured.”

“How long was I out?”

“ 3 hours… Midori Sensei helped carried you here after I treated your wounds.”

Hiriya turned and looked out the window. The cafeteria was being repaired. At around this time, Alicia would have bursted out from the door and come to hug him, Hiriya suddenly felt like he was so lonely. The infirmary doors slid open and Ice walked in with Rita following him in suite. Ice looked and Hiriya and then Kyouki.

“Thanks for treating him, Kyouki.”

“It’s my job.”

Hiriya stared at Ice.

“Sorry, Alicia was…”

“I know. Kyouki came and told me about it. Don’t worry, it work out somehow. I’ll go gather some information and see if I can find where these mysterious people took her to.”

Ice walked out of the infirmary. Kyouki stood up, told Hiriya and Rita she was gonna get some more medicine and walked out as well, leaving Hiriya and Rita alone together.

The two did not speak. This had never happened before. Usually, Rita would be crying if Hiriya were injured. The two remained silent…

-Ice-

‘Why would they take her?’ Ice kept pondering.

 He had eavesdropped on Midori-Sensei’s report. Apparently someone had kidnapped Alicia and the school is tracking down on people with Darkness Element and Fire Element.

Ice was still in deep thoughts when Kyouki shouted out for him. He stopped and waited for Kyouki to catch up.

“Ice, don’t do anything dangerous by yourself anymore.”

“I’m fine. You don’t need to…”

“Your arm is bleeding!”

Ice looked at his right arm. She was right, the blood had been trickling all the time while he was walking.

“It’s fine. I just got a scratch…”

“Show me.”

Unwillingly, Ice lifted his arm sleeve; the blood had been trickling from a deep gash in his upper right arm. Kyouki immediately held her hands towards the injury, a white magic circle formed and Ice’s wound started to heal. Besides the warm feel of the magic used, Ice suddenly feel a drop of something cold on his arm, he looked at Kyouki. A tear had started to swell in Kyouki’s eyes. Ice frowned. He patted Kyouki on her head.

“I won’t die. You should know better than that.”

“That’s not it! Ice, you body is special. Its…”

“I know. You don’t need to tell me this.”

From the corner of his eyes, he saw Rita running pass. She was crying.

-End-

“Hiriya…” Rita mumbled.

The two had kept their silence for the past 15 minutes until Rita had spoke.

Hiriya started to get up again. Rita walked forward and forced him to sit back down.

“Move, Rita. I need to go save Alicia.”

“In your current state of health!? No, I won’t allow you.”

“Please, Rita.”

“…So she’s more important than me, huh?”

Hiriya felt a drip of water fall on his head. He looked up, Rita was crying. The same Rita who was always so cheerful and stubborn at times… was crying like a tiny girl. Rita tried to rub away her tears.

“Why… I’m the one who has been with you since we were kids and she’s only been with you for a few days and you care more about her than me?”

“I…I didn’t mean that…”

“LIAR!”

Rita slammed open the infirmary door and ran out. Hiriya just lay seated on the bed of the infirmary, all alone. A few minutes later, Ice walked in. He had a scowled face.

“Hiriya, let me hear what happened. Not just with Rita. The moment you woke up till now. I know you were hiding something.”

Surrendering all will to resist, Hiriya poured out everything he knew, the dream, Ice coming in with Rita, his argument with Rita and Ice walking in after. Ice pondered for a while and then he replied to Hiriya.

“Hiriya, I’ll give you the location of where Alicia was taken away to. However, I can also tell where Rita is running off towards, but here’s my condition.”

Ice paused for a moment.

“Hiriya, pick one.”

“Huh?”

“You should know better than me that Rita would only cry if it was something that happened to you, right? Honestly speaking, I can’t think of a fairer way than this. Either give up on Alicia now, or give up on Rita. The choice is yours.”

“What are you talking about, Ice. Alicia is missing and you now know where she is. Plus, Rita probably just went to the roof to cooldown any…”

“Hiriya. Would Rita cry if it was something as futile as trying to look for Alicia?”

Hiriya fell silent. He could find nothing to rebut Ice’s statement.

“So… what should I do then…”

Ice gave a sigh of relief. His scowl began a face of calmness.

“Rita is headed towards the place where Alicia is held. Pentra Tower. I’m pretty sure you and Rita would have gone there before.”

“Why would you…?”

“Rita told me that you two would go there often when you were down. And from the dream you described, Alicia is also held up there. ‘Exile Dream’ – A dream where Exiler and Exiled can sense if each other is in danger.”

“… Let’s go. We need to save the both of them.”

“Wait.”

Ice virtualized his EM armor. A white magic circle formed around Hiriya’s bed.

“We’re going somewhere first before we will go and save them.”

The bright light enveloped the room…