Heroes of Dreamland Rewritten, Book 2: Stars in Far Places

Chapter 16

Captain | 大尉

My gloves clench the windowsill of the observation room the same way they have so many times for what feels like so many years now. Yuki is having monsters thrown at her once again, the same way she always has, but over time, the monsters have gotten bigger and badder, and more, now than ever before, of them are thrown at her all at the same time.

She already had a veritable platoon of smaller monsters thrown at her, which she magicked and tore her way through like they were nothing—though they did injure her plenty in the process, as always, she shows no sign of caring. Now, three gigantic monsters—a fire demon, a massive muted-green dragon, and a giant purple serpent—have been let into the room. All three are currently gazing around in confusion, obviously trying to decide which of them is the famed 'Project Starfall's Little Terror' they've been sent in to fight, obviously wondering why they've been provided a tiny white snack that's far too small to amount to any real taste of anything.

Yuki pauses and sizes them up, catching her breath as her chest rises and falls in heaves. Her paws clench into even-tighter fists than they already were, and she wipes some blood from her face—hers, for once, not that of one of the things she's just brutalized to death. Her eyes narrow as she takes in each monster she's just been faced with, looking them up and down, running all sorts of calculations in her tiny, cold, one-track mind.

I sigh anxiously, still scared after all this time that she'll let herself get careless and she'll wind up forced to realize that even Project Starfall can't fix everything, that even she isn't totally impervious, that even she can die. I don't know why I care anymore—or, really, why I ever cared to begin with—but even now, I can't stop caring about her. I can't stop worrying about her.

Even after Yuki forcibly kicked me out of her life almost four years ago, I've still come to watch her train. I've still kept an eye on her. I've never actually done anything for her in this time, though; never tried to reach out to her again. I don't know what I could do for her. I don't know if there is anything left to be done for her.

Well, that's a lie. I know one thing that could be done for her. I'm just too afraid—let's be honest, too cowardly—to actually try and do it.

Yuki suddenly bites down so hard that her fangs must be piercing her bottom gums, grimacing, and snaps her mouth back open, wide, in what looks like a shriek (though I cannot hear anything from the other side of the observation glass). Her paws snap in front of her, and she summons a beam of pure, concentrated dark energy, which she aims at the nearest monster, the dragon. She sends the thing sawing up and through the thing like a laser, and a moment later, the dragon is dead.

Her level of command of the dark energy in the air around her is insane. She is nearly all-powerful at this point, to an even further extent than ever before. I swallow once more, half-wondering, and not for the first time, why I'm standing here fearing for her life when it's the concept of her staying alive and getting out of here that should frighten me more at this point.

Obviously shocked, the fire demon and the serpent stare at the dragon's grisly corpse—these new monsters, made from the findings of Doctor Healmore's research and a seemingly-limitless supply of fresh subjects from who-knows-where, don't simply vanish into static like the monsters made directly by the Lord of Nightmares do—before turning to stare at Yuki instead. It's not a snack; it's Project Starfall, their gazes say.

I've seen that exact look so many times before. I've seen this all play out so many times before. I almost just want to leave rather than watching the same horror film over again, but like always, I can't move away. I can't look away.

If only she still thought playing with the Batamons was fun. Even that was so much better, at least in some ways, than this.

Yuki seems to pose some sort of a question to the two remaining monsters. The fire demon, unafraid, responds by making his flaming body so hot that it turns blue. The serpent, on the other hand, rushes into the corner of the room it entered from minutes ago, and cringes away from Yuki in obvious fear. It wasn't expecting whatever it encountered to be quite this powerful, it would appear.