"It's uncle Wu!" Lloyd said with a gasping, scared voice.
"He's missing!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," I soothed down the line to Lloyd quietly, turning to the wall away from Violet. "Calm down. What do you mean Wu's missing?"
"What do you mean what do you mean Wu's missing?" Lloyd exclaimed in a slurred babble. "What's there to not understand?!"
"Lloyd," I snapped. He quietened. "Tell me what happened."
I could hear Lloyd audibly gulp as he gathered his scrambled thoughts. With a heavy, weighty sigh, he began to explain everything.
"You know those twins - Acronix and Krux?" Lloyd asked. I nodded, ducking out of my dorm room and strolling down the hallway to the stairs.
"Yeah," I replied. "The, uh, the time twins, or whatever, right? They messed around with time."
The others had told me not to worry about it, that they'd sort it out. I didn't want to leave for Uni during the middle of the mission, but Lloyd convinced me that everything would be fine. I suppose it didn't end up being fine after all. Ya think?
"They- they hit Wu with a time blade."
My eyes widened.
"Today?"
"No... more like a week ago."
I paused in the middle of the hallway.
"And you didn't tell me?!" I hissed. Yes, I had noticed that Wu was a lot more lethargic, but I just assumed that he was sick, or his old age was finally getting to him. I was too focused and freaking out about university and getting everything ready for it to worry much about anything else. But now I felt terrible about my obliviousness to what was literally happening just down the hallway.
"I didn't want to worry you even more!"
"When somebody is hit by a time blade you say something." I groaned, rubbing my forehead. "Doesn't matter. What happened?"
"Well, erm, big battle stuff - you know the gist. Oh! And we found Kai and Nya's parents. Turns out they aren't dead!"
"Yay."
"A- anyway, the time blade was reversed but then- I- everything happened so fast but... long story short, Wu's lost in time and I'm really freaking out about it."
Lloyd sighed.
"I'm just... really worried. He's my uncle, but he also looked out for me when my mother didn't and when my father couldn't. I..."
"It's okay," I murmured, exiting the frat house and taking a seat on a bench. "I get it, you don't have to explain. Do you want me to come back?"
"No! No, no," Lloyd quickly said. "No. You do your smarty-pants University stuff. We'll find a way... we always do."
I curled my knees to my chest, resting my chin on the top of them. I folded my free arm between my torso and thighs.
"I miss you," I mumbled. "I'm sorry."
A short silence passed as we weighed the situation. It was heavy in my chest, empathetic for the emotional trouble that it put Lloyd through, partnered with my own sorrow for the cryptic, wise old man.
A snore flew out of the speaker. My eyebrows dropped.
"You're kidding me," I muttered, shaking my head. I suppose it was late, it was probably nearing one in the morning. I dropped my head back and gazed at the stars but they didn't glimmer as vibrantly tonight. They were melancholy.
"Goodnight, Lloyd," I said quietly, even though I was sure he was too out cold for him to hear me. I shouldn't be surprised. He usually did randomly collapse into sleep after a big mission. "You narcoleptic fool."
🍃💚🍀
"You look like shit."
"Thanks, Violet," I grumbled as I collapsed onto one of the cafe seats. She pushed a coffee towards me, which I grabbed and cupped it as if it was the only thing precious in this cold, depressing world. Don't be depresso. Have some espresso.
"I sent you photos of my notes," Violet continued, swirling a spoon around a mug of something that smelt incredibly bitter. "I can't believe you wagged forensics."
