1 Day After the Vanguard Departed
After a long, tearful farewell with Leora, Lucia remains at the starting point, left behind with permission. She decides she will no longer be the obedient child. From now on, she will do as she pleases.
She first abandons her strict two-meals-a-day routine. Today, she feels like eating, so she has crackers three times.
The unfamiliar feeling of a full stomach brings a brief contentment, but it also convinces her to eat only once tomorrow.
Then, she mimics Leora and the others, standing before the complex instruments, nodding and shaking her head, pretending to review data, to flip through files and grasp what they mean.
Finally, before bed, she stands before everyone's doors and says:
...I've got it all figured out, you know.
You'll be so surprised when you come back.
...
Every door stays hushed, offering no reply.
...
A child's rebellion can only stretch so far.
2 Days After the Vanguard Departed
Lucia gets up early. She lingers for a few minutes, standing still and looking toward the direction the vanguard team took, until she finally accepts the truth: they won't be coming back today, either.
She gathers Froggie into her arms and begins another day of living alone.
Her first act is to water the dandelion three times. Then she breaks off a small morsel from her own rations, grinds it to powder, and lays it over the soil.
She hesitates briefly, but in the end she commits, fishing out one of her hoarded candies, the very one Leora gave her from a red box.
She dissolves the candy in water and feeds that, too, into the earth.
Put something nutritious into the earth, and it becomes fertilizer. Lucia knows this well; her mother taught her that much.
When she is done, she crouches beside the flower bed with quiet satisfaction, gently stroking the green leaves.
This way you'll bloom sooner.
3 Days After the Vanguard Departed
Morning comes. The alarm clock rings.
Lucia sprints at full speed toward the water purification unit. She scrambles up to the top of the tank and slots in the filter cartridges the adults prepared and left nearby.
With the "mission" complete, she races at her second-fastest speed toward the little flower bed in the hallway.
Patter, patter, patter. The sound of bare feet flying across the floor, then a sudden, screeching halt at the hallway corner.
...!
NOOOO!!
Lucia lets out that universal shriek, the one every child unleashes when something they love is torn away from them.
She stumbles around the corner, racing toward the flower bed, then gives in to her skid and slides all the way to the nearest dandelions.
Her hand trembles as she reaches out, aching to touch the yellowed, wilted leaves, yet terrified that even the lightest touch will be the end of them.
What did I do wrong...
She nearly lets a few salt-laden tears seep into the already "burned" soil, but stops herself just before they fall.
She has no choice but to attempt a rescue on the handful of dandelions that still cling to life. From the storage she retrieves the smallest entrenching shovel and gently scoops them from the flower bed, one by one, transplanting them into...
...into Leora's coffee cups.
Leora had many coffee cups. Before she left, she scrubbed each one spotless. There will be nothing inside them that could finish the dandelions off, far better than Chris' old liquor bottles. This knowledge eases Lucia's heart.
That afternoon, Lucia arranges the five surviving "dandelions in cups" back under the daylight lamp.
The lamplight filters through the leaves, illuminating the delicate blades until they seem almost transparent. Lucia curls herself up beside them, chin resting on her knees, and watches the yellowish-green veins in stillness.
But she cannot see life flowing through those veins, and so she has no way of telling whether they will live or die.
...
The warm, yellowing light wraps around her, pulling her toward sleep. A faint despondency and loss enfold her, giving her the strange sensation of sinking through something unreal.
Her thoughts begin to drift: how far have the grown-ups of the vanguard team traveled by now?
She turns it over and over until sleep nearly claims her, but no understanding comes. It's something far beyond what the alpha-beta materials ever taught her. She simply cannot grasp it.
Perhaps when she's older... when she's grown, the way the dandelions grow... then she'll understand.
She sinks into a deep sleep beside the ravaged flower bed, oblivious to the low, rasping roars that drift in from beyond the door.
7 Days After the Vanguard Departed
Early morning. The alarm hasn't rung yet. Lucia is jolted awake by a clamor of "footsteps."
It takes her only two seconds to go from dazed to certain: these footsteps do not belong to anyone from the vanguard team.
She springs up immediately, races to the console that controls the force field, and fixes her eyes on that crucial knob.
Is something wrong with the force field...? Did it run out of power already? But I didn't hear any alarm...
Should I turn the knob?
Lucia doesn't know that turning the dial means depleting the power reserves, that with every adjustment, her own chances of survival shrink right alongside them.
Still, she does it anyway. She turns the knob two clicks to the left.
She listens as the howling outside slowly subsides. Only then does she let herself breathe.
...That day, at the tips of the five remaining dandelions' stems, the first traces of yellow petals begin to show.
Lucia sees blooming as the arrival of happiness. In truth, it is a countdown to the plant's end.
But Lucia doesn't know that.
Unaware, she drifts slowly toward death, carried along by the passing days, by the quiet wait for the dandelions to bloom.
20 Days After the Vanguard Departed
The vanguard team has yet to return with news of victory, but the monsters born of the Chaos Contamination have clearly evolved. And they are closing in on humanity's last sanctuary.
Lucia goes back to the storage room, prying weapons off the racks with hands and feet both.
She remembers the knowledge Chris passed on to her, just in case. Activate, aim at the monster, and pull the trigger.
She killed an enemy for the first time.
But she also realized something for the first time. The enemies knew her name.
Who... are you...?
Fear of the unknown had never fazed her. She could simply label it as something wholly bad and eliminate it.
The creatures howl as they press closer to the door. But those shattered syllables assemble into words she knows by heart.
Like a mother calling for her daughter. Like Luna calling for her sister. Like Leora calling for little Alpha. Like Chris calling for his wife and child.
No... It can't be... Not you...
But now, a fear born of the familiar has seized her heart in a crushing grip. Beneath those tender calls, she can no longer tell whether the monsters are bad or not.
And so she no longer knows whether she should strike them down.
No... NO!
More monsters are scaling their way closer. Lucia does not shoot again. Instead, she flees, scrambling up the stairs, and wrenches the stairwell's fire door closed behind her, sealing it with a desperate turn of the lock.
She stuffs Froggie into her backpack and bolts toward the flower bed beneath the daylight lamp, gathering up the five of Leora's coffee cups—five dandelions on the verge of blooming—and clutching them to her chest.
She keeps running, nearly crashing through every vanguard member's door, grabbing anything that feels familiar and comforting, and packing it into her backpack.
She goes to Chris' room first, the room no one has entered since the day he died.
She bursts through the door, then falters, frozen in place. The familiar chaos she remembers has been erased, every surface tidied into meticulous order.
A note rests on the floor, addressed to no one but her.
"I cleaned the place up. Making a kid deal with my mess day after day is not right.
I'm sorry, Lucia. I'll pay more attention from now on."
It was written before her birthday party.
...
From Chris' room, she takes the note, along with a set of weapon components.
From Julian's, a communications terminal.
From Helga's medical station, a single syringe.
Nemo's room is no longer locked. She slips inside, and her eyes land instantly on the thermal blanket she had given him, laid out on the table.
It is now folded with care—folded her way—and placed there with quiet intention.
Atop the blanket rests a tiny transparent keychain, containing a wisp of soft, orange-white fur. The fur of a cat, perhaps.
Aside from this, Nemo's room holds almost nothing. He joined the vanguard empty-handed. Now he has left the same way.
Lucia shoves these "useless things" into her backpack in a frantic heap and bursts out again.
As she runs, carrying everyone's belongings on her back, she feels as though she is only just beginning to know these adults—adults who were so good at hiding pieces of themselves.
She glances down without thinking, and suddenly notices the dandelions in the coffee cups have bloomed.
A few small flowers. Bright, vivid yellow.
But the grown-ups still haven't come back.
Those grown-ups are so bad at lying.
And so, Lucia abandons the ground floor. It is no longer safe. She retreats to the second floor, carrying everyone's regrets with her.
She can hear them—the monsters she no longer dares to fight, the ones she could never hope to kill—piling against the door, straining to reach the only survivor inside.
She shoves every heavy thing she can move against the door, then presses her own back flat against the thick metal plate.
Tears well in her eyes, but she clutches the backpack and the coffee-cup dandelions to her chest and keeps them from falling.
Everyone's here with me. The flowers are still blooming... We haven't lost yet.
She grits her teeth and braces against the shuddering door, holding firm until the pounding stops. The monsters leave, at last, and retreat to prowl elsewhere.
30 Days After the Vanguard Departed
Lucia has been driven back, step by step, floor by floor, until she is cornered at the very top of the base. She sits curled up, arms wrapped around her knees, too weak to speak.
In her desperate scramble upward, she has lost every last supply she had. She can no longer remember the last time she ate anything.
Numbly, she grips a nearly exhausted red marker and begins to write, slowly, across the floor.
I want... to eat. I want water.
She licks her cracked lips and tastes a faint trace of blood.
The words before her, a plea for food, begin to blur. Then, impossibly, they wobble upright, sprout spindly legs, and go for a little stroll around her. They wave a brief farewell, then scamper off.
Where are you going...?
Even my wishes are leaving me behind...?
She staggers to her feet, stumbling after the fleeing words.
Beneath each unsteady, twitching step lies every wish she has written across the floor in all this time:
I want to see Mom and Dad again.
I want to see Luna again.
I want to be Mom and Dad's child again. I want to be Luna's sister again.
I want Froggie back.
I want Leora back.
I want Helga back. I want Julian back. I want Nemo back. I want Chris back.
I want...
The words begin to shift, no longer the simple wishes of a child. Something larger swells beneath them.
I want "success." I don't want "failure" anymore.
I want the research to go well. I want everyone to make it back.
...
Red writing sprawls across every wall and every floor, crammed together in a dense, desperate mass.
She walks the full length of her wishes, only to be stopped by a door on the top floor. The restless words slip through the crack beneath it, escaping her grasp.
...
She leans weakly against the door, her body slowly sliding down until she sinks to the floor.
But perhaps the fleeing words have drawn attention. From beyond the door comes a growing rustle, the sound of something creeping closer.
Something even reaches the door handle, pressing down on it, testing.
Don't open it...
She presses her weight against the door and whispers reassurances to herself.
It's gonna be okay. I'm not scared. I'm brave... Nothing can scare the brave little hero Alpha.
She keeps watch over the dandelions in the coffee cups, her eyes fixed on the five fluffy white puffs.
The flowers have long since bloomed and faded, withered away into these delicate, fragile seeds. So fragile that a single breath would scatter them.
The grown-ups probably aren't coming back.
Beyond the door, where her eyes cannot reach, the void is consuming everything. The rift of the Fog has spread across the entire world.
The steps in the stairwell crumble to dust, each one dissolving into the gray with a soft, rustling sigh.
The shrieking of the monsters fades into the distance. Or more precisely, it is devoured by something unseen.
Then, the hum of the F.O.S. laboratory instruments dies away. Even the sound of dust settling upon the floor falls silent.
The world before her blurs, stretching into streaks, bleeding away like runaway ink.
The world is turning into chaos. Into nothingness.
Even with a child's mind, she understands this: the world is collapsing.
And in all the world, only one small, ordinary little girl remains.
Knock, knock.
...?
Two rhythmic tremors pulse through the door. Sound and sight have both vanished. All that remains is the raw vibration against her back.
Like her mother gently knocking, rousing her from sleep.
She lifts her head sharply. Only now does the truth strike her: nothing is left in all the world but her and the door she leans against.
Like a tiny boat drifting alone through the Fog.
...
On this day, in this world, little Lucia picks herself up from the floor and, with great caution, opens the door.
<color=ff4e4eff>It is Lucia who opens the door.
Behind the door, there is nothing. Only the graveyard of civilization.
......
Far away, a faint glimmer flickers in the distance, like a path emerging through the ruins. The trail left by the vanguard team.
She shoulders her backpack and, with the utmost gentleness, cradles the coffee-cup dandelions in her arms. At first, she simply traces the tracks, feeling her way. Then, like a child learning to walk, she follows the scattered points of light.
She must be deliberate with every step, carefully commanding the muscles in her legs. The involuntary spasms have been growing more frequent lately.
I...
I... must...
There are no gods in this world. Lucia can only demand more of herself—just a little harder, a little further.
But even the muscles that shape her voice are faltering. Soon, she will barely manage a whisper.
I must... find the vanguard team... Ngh!
Her legs give out beneath her, and she falls.
The coffee cups shatter on impact. Dandelions tumble out with clumps of soil, and the white puffs scatter everywhere.
...No...
She stares at the scattered fluff, and in them she sees the five remaining vanguard members she once watched depart, now all fallen, all lost.
At last, she breaks down and weeps.
Don't go... Don't leave me... Not again.
It feels as though the wish she clung to for so long has been shattered—scattered to nothing, her fragile hope crushed in a single blow.
She pushes herself onto her hands and knees, reaching out to gather the scattered seeds...
But then a gust of wind, cruel and perfectly timed, sweeps through.
They all drift away.
......
The tiny white parachutes drift onward. Lucia scrambles to her feet, weeping, and chases after them. Just like those kindergarteners she once looked down on, the ones who cried on their first day, running after the adults they couldn't bear to lose.
Tears blur her vision, smearing sticky and warm across her face.
She keeps chasing forward.
The glowing footprints beneath her grow fainter, fewer, and as the last trace of an adult's step vanishes, she throws herself upward with the last of her strength, then crashes hard to the ground.
Sob... sob...
Still, she catches nothing. The dandelion seeds have all scattered on the wind, never to come back.
Beneath her palm, all she finds is something smooth and soft. A ribbon.
Her hand begins to tremble violently. Fresh blood, still wet, coats her palm.
She lifts the ribbon and holds it before her eyes, studying it.
Striped in blue and yellow, soaked in blood, it's Leora's soft hair ribbon.
It says, "I broke my promise."
No, no, no...
She keeps crawling forward. Soon enough, her hand finds a Construct, or more precisely, the wreckage of a female Construct.
Then a second body. A third... A fourth.
Lucia wants to gather up the remains of the vanguard members, to hold them close. But like the scattered dandelion seeds, they can never be gathered again.
............
The Fog's corruption has devoured her tears. She can cry no more.
She clutches Leora's ribbon and remains frozen in place for a long, hollow moment. Only then does she slowly lift her head and fix her gaze on Leora.
...I... heard what you said... I read the files too.
I know... you... the warriors turned into light... became Hero Ω, Hero Ψ, Hero Χ... You went... somewhere very, very far away.
She murmurs to the bodies, her voice fragmented, recounting the "story" Leora once told her.
You have to deliver... the "Sefirot".
And those "Sefirot"... they are in your frames, right?
The dead do not speak. Their silence answers her questions, offering no encouragement.
She takes it as consent.
...I told you. Hero α knows everything.
She lowers her head, her resolve hardening into something final.
And I also told you... Hero α can keep flying... just like you... until she lights up the whole universe.
She gazes out into the vast Fog and spots a "bridge" in the near distance. At its far end, a rift is slowly sealing shut.
She forces herself to move again, pushing the bodies forward, struggling to drag them onto this bridge that spans across dreams.
The bridge feels familiar to her, almost comforting, yet for reasons she cannot fathom, it repels her with violent force.
...Please don't push me away.
Lucia cannot hear the bridge's silent screaming. She pushes the bodies forward regardless.
If what you said is true... that sending the Sefirot to "other worlds" can save everything...
That everyone will come together, stand side by side, and beat the bad guys...
But you... you probably couldn't make it happen.
...I'm not doing so good either. I can't go find Luna anymore.
...
...Then let me help you finish your mission.
After she has pushed the last of the bodies down, she gathers the vanguard's belongings onto her back and crawls along the bridge toward the rift, steeling herself with quiet encouragement.
She will follow the dandelion fruits, wherever they have drifted.
...The little hero Alpha...
She spreads her arms wide.
...is heading out too!
She leaps.
<color=000000ff>"My turn to rise with all my might."
The void feels endless. She falls and falls, the bottom never arriving.
Lucia squints against the rushing dark, clutching tight to her memories and the keepsakes the adults left behind, but the Fog keeps trying to strip them away.
Nemo's cat-fur keychain is devoured first. Then Chris' note tears free and vanishes. Leora's hair ribbon snaps apart.
Soon, she will have nothing left to hold.
One moment, she glimpses that crimson world. The next, debris drifting through the Fog slashes her cheek and cuts into one eye. Her body is soon covered in wounds.
As her skin begins to peel away, she grits her teeth and casts everything she can no longer hold into the Fog.
Her hair is torn out, strand by strand. What little remains corrodes to ashen white. She has lost all her color.
Her flesh corrodes next. When her muscles and bones can grip nothing more, she clamps the remaining keepsakes between her teeth.
She can give up everything, even herself. All she wants now is to light up the stars with whatever is left of her, to carry forward the hope that every vanguard member, one after another, gave their lives to deliver.
She is about to plunge into the depths of the Fog—or perhaps into an entirely new world.
...
When a sliver of light, the cold glow of an operating table, finally reaches her eyes, the Fog has already consumed everything she was. Not even her precious memories remain.
She feels someone holding her, an embrace that gives her permission to cry out again.
And so she does. Her lungs expand, and she wails.
This is...
The story begun by Lucia.
Alpha
