The Price For Immortality

This Is Personal

Everything seems to be settled. Everyone that Lui hurt is fine. Zac is out of prison, and the police have no clue what to do about anything, but that's their problem. Luinor is broken, Zeutron is broken, and Xcalius is broken. It seems like the end of the road.

Everyone fell asleep, and they slept until dinner. Now, they're sitting at the table, all of them groggy and tired. They could barely sit upright, let alone hold a conversation.

"Should we all go home, now?" Daigo asks between yawns.

"Probably," Rantaro answers mid-yawn.

Lui is staring down at the table. He doesn't want to go home. He doesn't want to leave his new friends at all. He looks up and stares at Valt. He gets that warm, friendly feeling again. For once he likes someone, for once he actually has feelings toward someone. He doesn't want that feeling or that connection to go away.

Shu walks in, holding a dish of food. He serves it to everyone, and they all dig in. He serves Lui last, and with a glare instead of a smile. Lui doesn't pay attention to him. He simply starts eating like everyone else.

Valt looks over at Shu. "Hey, we haven't broke Spryzen yet."

Shu looks back at him. "What if I don't want to break Spryzen?"

Everyone stares. "What?" Rantaro asks, his mouth full of food.

Shu looks around at all of them. "Spryzen took my childhood, sure, but that doesn't mean it didn't give back more than it took. I have a bond with Spryzen. It's like Valt and Valtryek. Spryzen isn't evil. At least, in my mind it isn't."

Everyone keeps staring silently. Lui stands up and leans forward on the table. "I've gotta go," he says.

Valt points down the hallway. "The bathroom's up-"

"Not that kind of 'go'!" Lui gives Valt a glare, then immediately softens his expression. "I meant go as in leave. I have to talk to Gabe."

"You do that," Daigo tells him.

Lui looks at Shu, for who knows what reason. Shu glares back at him with an expression that one could only describe as cold. Just out of spite, Shu pushes back his hair, reminding Lui of what he's done. Lui turns away, and runs out the door.

Daigo stares at Shu, and watches as he lets his hair fall in front of his scar again. "You don't have to be so cold," he says.

Shu stares down at him.

"I know Lui hurt you, but you don't have to be so cold towards him."

"He was always cold towards us." Shu looks at everyone. "Why are you all so against me giving Lui what he deserves?"

"'Cuz we already did that, buddy," Rantaro says.

"We didn't punish him." Shu glares at them all. "If anything, we helped him. We saved him. When we really shouldn't have. Remember why we started hunting Lui in the first place!? Remember what our intention was!?"

Everyone falls silent. There's a knock on the door, and Hoji opens it. "Zac! You're back!" he says, trying to sound cheerful.

Everyone else is dead silent. Zac comes into the room, smiling. He leans on a pair of crutches. "My foot's broken!" he says brightly. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a pen. "Who wants to sign my cast?"

"Not now, Zac," Valt says, looking up at Shu. "I know we wanted to kill him, Shu, but after we found out about the whole Bey power thing we decided not to do that. There wasn't a point in killing Lui if we could fix him."

Shu clenches his fists, and his jaw. "No, Valt. There was a point in killing him. The point was that he hurt everyone we love. The point is that he was cold, heartless, and tormented us with a smile. That was the point of hurting him! That was the point of killing him!"