Aleyah’s Mind

The electricity faded, and the pain was gone. Aleyah stood up and looked at where the doors once were. In her mind, she was scared. Her aura continued to be depleted and she was trapped there with no way out. The thought of her dying in such a mysterious world frightened her, but in her heart, she knew she did the right thing.

There was no wind, yet the current was in motion. There was no light, yet she was still able to see a far distance. Even walking to the edge of the water, she could see her reflection stared back at her.

Silence overtook the setting. Aleyah was out of words and ideas. She sat on the sand and curled her knees to her chest. The water barely touched her feet. A burst of red light surrounded her, but only for a second. She was back in her uniform. Her blades and armor were gone.

Aleyah stared into the water. She tried to not shed a tear, but couldn’t stop it from happening. As the tear fell down her cheek, she wiped it off and looked at her hand. Another tear followed from the other eye and she used the other hand to wipe it. The next thing she knew, tears fell on her lap. Aleyah had no control. This was the first time she felt vulnerable in a long time. She hated the feeling.

“Stop it…” She told herself as she wiped the tears off her face.

They continued to fall.

“I said stop it…” Her nose was running, and tears poured out of her eyes. She felt disgusted.

“I said stop!” She screamed.

Aleyah smashed her hands on the sand, but it made no noise. Her eyes were closed so that sand wouldn’t get in. She opened them and saw what she looked like now. Aleyah has never seen what she looked like when she cried. Both Aleyos and Yuto have, but they felt nothing besides concern for her. Aleyah, at this very moment, felt shame.

Her tears stopped falling and she got up. As she did, something fell out of her pocket. It was the charm that Yuto’s grandfather gave them for being accepted into Sentinel. She picked it up from the ground and brushed it off. Before putting it away, Aleyah lifted it in front of her to see the gem that was inside. She saw Yuto and Aleyos in it, but of course, that was her imagination.

Aleyah smiled and took a chain from out of her uniform shirt. She hooked the charm to the chain and placed it back inside her shirt.

After she hid the charm, a gust of wind from the left pushed her to the side a bit. She held down her skirt and hair to stop them from moving to vigorously. When the wind calmed, she noticed her duplicate with the red hair was to the right of her. It was standing on the sand looking at the water.

“You…” Aleyah whispered.

The figure stood still without responding.

“Why are you here!” She shouted in distress.

Aleyah’s duplicate looked at her. She had no sign of emotion in her face. Aleyah began to get angry. She walked closer to her fake.

“Answer me!”

There was no answer. Aleyah rushed to the other and grabbed her by the collar. She tried to look threatening, but she was too weak to do so. She felt like she wanted to cry again, but her eyes were all watered out.

Aleyah released her grip. She fell to the ground and lowered her head, “Please…answer me…”

A few minutes passed, and the duplicate lifted her left arm and pointed to the sand that was covered by an oncoming wave. Aleyah looked where she was pointing. The wave went back into the ocean and words were engraved in the sand.

Who are you?

“Who am I?” She stared at the words with confusion. “What do you mean? You’re me aren’t you, you should know.”

Aleyah waited for the water to wash away the words and replace them with a new response. The ocean water reached the sand and covered the question, but when it pulled back, the same question stayed. She looked up at the duplicate and saw her looking at her.

She stared forward and got up from the ground.

“My name is Aleyah Angelourus. I am the leader of Team Trinity, a soul strike team a part of Stronghold Sentinel.”

The duplicate turned away from her and continued looking at the water. A new message appeared.

Does that define you?

“Does that define me? I guess so.”

You don’t sound so sure.

Aleyah placed her hands on her chest, “What do you want from me? That is who I am!”

Were you the same 10 years ago?

“What? No…I- I was better off 10 years ago.”

The duplicate looked at Aleyah. Her arm was still up, pointing at the sentences that would appear in the sand.

“I had a mother and a father…my brother and I had our parents. We had a family. There was no need to involve Yuto, we never met him at that time. Maybe…maybe his father and brother would still be alive if it wasn’t for-”

Aleyah stopped talking. New words appeared in the sand and it was hard for her to respond to.

Do you blame your parents’ death on your incapability to save them?

All she did was stare at the question, but a new one replaced it.

Do you regret not being strong enough?

“I…” She was still lost with words. Rapidly, her memories of the day she lost her parents came back to her. She saw them as she looked at the water.

Her mother bled out on the floor while her father was in the hands of another. The figure looked down at her and Aleyos with its bright red devilish eyes in the shape of an X. Her memories then took her to the time when her and her brother walked a lonely path. Eyes of inhuman people stared at them. Their mouths spoke with such distaste and pity.

Yuto and his family was next. They met him and his father first. Eventually they were taken in by his grandfather only to witness Yuto lose both his brother and father to the war. More people Aleyah considered family and got close to died.

As she watched her memories flash before her eyes, she started to realize how weak she really was. Even when they fought against Team Delta, it was Aleyos who changed the situation and it was she who almost costed them their place in any stronghold. After the battle against Shai Zou Len, Yuto saved them both at the end of it all as well.

Was she not the leader Aleyos and Yuto needed? All this talk about her avenging her parents, was it all just a façade? Maybe anger built up camouflaged as inspiration? She began understanding the questions a bit better now. Who are you? Does that define you?

If you cannot answer, why don’t you disappear? Wash away all your pain of being weak.

Aleyah nodded and started to walk into the ocean. The duplicate lowered her arm and watched. Water sunk into her shoes as she entered. This was the right choice she thought. Humanity had the key they needed for the fragment. There was no need for her. She heard about teams losing their leaders before and gaining new ones. Aleyah made peace with this as the water covered more than half of her body.

She could not see it, but the water, which was bright from the beach’s sand, grew darker and darker the further she walked. The water was up to her chest. Aleyah felt the current pull her in further, but she stopped. Her duplicate’s focus was now on her. Aleyah turned around and looked back at her.

“I do regret not being strong enough, but the me back then and the me now does not define who I am.” Aleyah said.

Aleyah turned her whole body and right in front of her, floating in the water, was the necklace with the charm she just made. For the first time, she got a reaction from the duplicate. The red-haired Aleyah looked puzzled.

“My name is Aleyah Angelourus and I am a sister to a brother who is far greater at shogi than anyone normally should be.” She laughed. The water stopped getting darker.

“I am best friends with a guy that cooks incredibly amazing, and yet he can still call everything he eats not made by him the greatest meal of his life.” She smiled. The light in the water expanded.

Aleyah started to walk out of the water.

“I am a member of one of the best strongholds there are with leaders so courageous and inspiring, that I set aside my own desire to avenge my parents so that no one will ever have to go through what my brother and I went through.”

Only her feet remained in the water and with the last few steps, she found herself in front of the other her.

“I am weak, I’m sure about that, but…If I was given the choice to change my past and have power or end up here again, I would choose here.”

“Why?” The duplicate asked. She sounded just like Aleyah.

“Isn’t it obvious?”

The duplicate’s eyes widened.

“It’s because I’m human.” Aleyah smiled with tears in her eyes.

The sun rose behind her and Aleyah turned around. She moved next to the other her and they both watched as the sky lit up.

“What would you do with power now?” She asked.

Aleyah looked at her. “Protect.”

The duplicate nodded and pointed to the sky. Aleyah looked and saw a figure falling from the clouds. Eventually, she noticed that she was looking up at her duplicate. Aleyah was falling backwards into the sand. She reached out but caught nothing.

Aleyah was that figure falling from the sky. Closer and closer, the water got and in an instant, Aleyah dived in. Expecting it to hurt, Aleyah closed her eyes, but she kept falling even after entering the water. When she opened her eyes, however, she didn’t see water.

What looked like cosmic energy was the barrier between the real world of Noah and the spirit world of Sanctum. She continued to dive down and in her line of sight, was another person going towards her. As she passed the figure, she took a good glimpse of him.

It was a guy that she has never seen before. He had silver hair and was a darker skin tone. He had red eyes and wore a red robe with a hood attached to it. He looked just as surprised as her. Around his neck was a necklace as well, but different from hers of course.

The boy passed her and eventually she reached the climax of her fall. A force slowed her down and turned her right-side up.

Sanctum Vault

Aleyah was in front of the gate again, but this time it was opened. She climbed up the steps and saw the key again. At first, she was confused. She thought she threw the key to Loki before the gate closed on her, but she paid her thoughts no mind.

She walked in the gate once more and grabbed the key.

A portal opened behind her and she heard everyone’s voice. She smiled and tightened her grip on the key. Aleyah was ready to return to her family, friends, and comrades, but before she could, she needed something from a certain someone.