“How many times do I have to tell you?! JAMES IS DEAD!”

Those words continued in my mind. Looping, time after time. No matter how much time passed, no matter how much I tried to fill my mind with other things. That same string of words just kept on going. All I had done up until now, seemed to have all been for nothing. I lost everything that day. The hopes of James coming back, now that he had his soul back. I lost Power Overdrive, my only way of going against Anima. And I lost all my will to keep on going.

I sat there, in the hospital wing bed. Looking around, as that phrase kept on looping inside of my head. I then, turned my head towards my right wrist, to that bracelet. That was the thing that caused all of this to happen. If it weren’t for that stupid bracelet, I would’ve never lost James again. I quickly used them to create a knife, to what I wanted to be the last time I had to use it, to then try to cut my wrist off, right at the point where the bracelet started. As soon as the knife got close to it, Martel quickly appeared behind me and caught the hand with the knife, quickly throwing it away

“What were you thinking?!” Martel quickly shouted this, as she held my hand with great strength.

“I cannot take this anymore. I’ve already lost everything. Please, just let me take this off and go home” These words came without any energy from me. It all just seemed hopeless.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Martel grunted a bit after this, as she let go of my arm. slowly sitting down on the bed next to mine“Goddammit, what do I do?”

“Please… just let me go… let me go back to my family… at least I still have them… “ Tears slowly began to form on my eyes as my left hand went over to the bracelet, trying to rip it off

“Could you PLEASE stop doing that?! It’s not gonna come off” Martel shouted this as she put her hands on her face.

“Why do you want to leave? Your brother’s still out there”

“Don’t even mention him… he told me time and time again that I cannot bring him back… all it took was losing his last part out of me to realize that it’s true…” I clenched my left fist, where the Demon’s Soul came into my body, where the mark now stood, as a nervous smile popped on my face. “ There’s nothing I can do to bring him back”

Martel sat there, listening to what I said, her expression slowly turning darker and darker “So, you’re giving up, just like that?”

“Yes…” I said that with a heavy tone on my voice, slowly starting to cry… not even when I heard the bracelet pop on the ground did I stop crying.

“Fine, you’re free to go.” Martel said this, standing up and leaving a crystal by my side “Here… use this to get home… I also attached the gauntlets on it, if you were to ever need them” She disappeared quickly after saying that, with no time to ask her anything.

I just sat there for a few minutes, letting everything out… I had lost my reason to stay… I had lost all my hope…

I took the crystal and put it right on my chest, which activated it. Before I knew it, the teleporting light had already surrounded my body, making me appear right in front of my house. I slowly got up, and started walking towards the main door, before a scream was heard behind me… it was my mother. I quickly turned around to greet her, only making her sudden hug that much more effective.

“Oh my god, I cannot believe you’re back already.” My mother said this with happy tears forming on her eyes as she hugged me. Her grocery bags were now on the ground where she was standing before, not sprawling, but sitting upright.

“Heh, yeah, I’m back” I said this, trying to contain my sadness… which didn’t hold for long

“Where’s your brother? If you’re here, that means you got him back, right?” My mom still had hopeful eyes as she said this. Her smile was still beaming. The same hope I used to have was there…

“He’s not coming back… I lost him…” These words came out without energy… dead… they were words of a dead man

“W-what do you mean?” My mother said this laughing, thinking it was a joke “You, you said you’d come back when you found him”

“And I did find him. But, he’s not himself anymore… the James we used to know is dead” I said this once again with the dead voice.

My mother continued to laugh, but her tone showed some worry “Come on, don’t joke like that. Is he already inside?”

“Mom… please… just listen to me… he’s not coming back” I tried to break off the hug, but it just got stronger. She didn’t want to accept it

“Please Colin, stop it, just tell me where he is?” My mom had lost her smile. She already knew what she was gonna say, but she still had hope, which got her nowhere

“He’s destroying society. Causing mass destruction… and I cannot stop him” I finally broke off, but not by force… she just stopped holding on

“What happened to you? This is not how you were when you left” My mom was starting to worry, tears forming on her eyes.

I just lifted up my left hand, showing the demon’s mark to her, with my back facing her “Because, I’m not the same as I was before” I tried to hold back my tears, as I heard a loud gasp coming from my mother. She was sad. I could hear her starting to cry. I got close to the door, having it open automatically. During my visit before my first week in SoulCrash, we configured it so that it opened to only our family. I just went up to my room. My father wasn’t home yet, so I didn’t have to deal with him. I didn’t want to disappoint another family member. I just went directly to my room, ignoring all the sounds behind me… ignoring the voice in my head telling me to stop. That voice no longer meant anything to me.

Seconds turned to minutes, minutes turned to hours, hours turned to days, days turned to weeks. I was broken. I never left my room, other than to go to the bathroom, which was connected to my room, so I didn’t have to interact with anyone. My food was brought up to my room. Sometimes, my parents would try to interact with me, but nothing ever happened. It wasn’t until the start of the third week that my father finally managed to get into my room. He sat in one of the corners, taking one of the chairs there was with him.

“So, when will you start telling us what happened?” Even though he did sound a bit angry, he didn’t say this in a condescending tone. He was worried about me, he just wanted to help.

“It was spot on”

“What?” That was the only response my dad made before I continued

“In the SoulCrash base, we all had separate rooms. They were based on our rooms back in our own homes. It made it seem like we hadn’t left our own homes… and I think that just helped make the situation worse”

“I’ve been stuck in this mindset for a while, thinking I would be able to bring James back. That everything could go back to the way it was once I found him. That he’d just be how he was before he disappeared. And after I talked with him again, I had that hope. But, it just can’t happen. Things cannot go back to how they were. Time’s arrow neither stands still nor goes back, it merely marches forward. I’ve been stuck in this cycle of hope and despair for so long, that I didn’t notice that everything else was changing. And now, that changed caught up to me, and I’m not ready to go with it”

I wanted to cry. I wanted to show weakness. But, I couldn’t. My dad was there, and I promised myself not to show him weakness anymore. Sure, I was basically saying how I’m giving up, but crying would’ve been going too far.

“So, is that it? You’re giving up?” My dad just said that after a few seconds of me saying it, expecting me to say more

“I don’t know… I thought being in here for a month would be enough to show it…” I just stayed in my bed, I didn’t even want him to see me.

“Huh… I guess it must’ve hurt a lot to have that happen…”

He said this before standing up. I thought he was going to leave, but instead, he just sat on my bed. He was looking away from me, and sighed. But, despite what I did, he was smiling.

“Hey kid, remember the stories I told you when you were younger?”

“The hunts that caused you to meet my mother?”

My dad laughed slightly. “No, not that. I’m talking about the Chaos Soldiers”

Chaos Soldiers… that’s something I hadn’t heard in a while, outside of the whole thing of me going to SoulCrash. The Chaos Soldiers were the frontlines during the Sylph-Hunter war so long ago. They were called in if the fight was going haywire, they were said to have never lost a fight, only losing against “The Savior”, which was the reason the war stopped.

“The Chaos Soldiers. Yeah, I remember them. You never stopped telling stories about them”

“The Chaos Soldiers were inspiring to those who heard the tales of the war, along with the ones that actually participated in it, because you knew that if things got to heavy, you would be able to get backup in the end and fix the problem, it showed us that losing hope was impossible” He continued talking, still smiling “I know that shit happened with your brother. I don’t know what happened, I still don’t fully understand the Sylph’s body, but I know that it took something important from you” As he finished saying this, he turned his head to see me, still smiling “I know you think that your brother can never come back… but, I also know that that’s not what you truly believe”

He then slowly extended his arm towards my head, shaking my hair a bit “The choice is up to you, I won’t stop you… but, you can at least get out of your room if you are gonna stay here” He smiled as he said this, to then stand up and walk towards my door “Think about it, take your time” After saying this, he left my room. Once again, I was surrounded by silence, and it stayed like that for a few more days, but as the time passed, I could see that he was right. Staying here was doing nothing other than fuck me up emotionally. I didn’t have to go through this, I was choosing to do it. I’m back here with my parents, I can spend time with them.

And, that’s exactly what I did. For a month more, I spent all the time possible with both of them. I helped around the house with cleaning and cooking, I went out with dad to help on his job, I learned how to sew from my mom. It was honestly a great time… and I would’ve liked that to be the end of it.

But then we wouldn’t be here now, would we? You wouldn’t be hearing this if it continued like this.

END OF CHAPTER 21