Oceans

Ever since Torikou arrived in Cholidea and volunteered to become a rescuer, she continued her training even up to advanced training. After nine years, she had multiple assessments and demonstration exercises in emergency events. Rescuers were particularly taught acrobatic movements and obstacle courses while making sure to keep a human dummy—with human weight—strapped on their backs and kept safe. The Rescuers were pushed to increase their stamina, agility, flexibility, and speed. They were taught to wear their Rescuer gear. The Rescuer gear has hydraulics in joint areas of the leg to increase running speed and lessen the Rescuers’ effort to run quickly in difficult missions because rare times, they have to piggyback ride the rescuee when there is no vehicle available. It was a combination of human stamina and technological improvements. Being a Rescuer was difficult, but Torikou did her best to keep up—sometimes she kept up, and sometimes her best wasn’t enough. The master of her team was Cyrielle Kowalska, she was a lady in her late thirties and trained in martial arts and as a rescuer, since childhood, because it was her passion in life and it made her happy and fulfilled, so Cyrielle trained and guided them, making sure they became reliable people. Missions abide and abide, and she continued to serve. She gave her life to become a Rescuer. It was life-fulfilling, similar to climbing mountains. She got to help others and discover her own capabilities as a human. The Rescuers did their best efforts to live up to their plan of evacuating people in different areas and regions of Eorthe to bring them to safety—because nothing is safe anymore, Histeria can attack you anytime. The Rescuers aren’t perfect, most of the time they only rescue 46 percent of the people while the rest die. They don’t deserve blame made by some of the people they rescued because that’s all they could do—anyways, they will lead the people to an isolated island in the oceans called the Lost Gate of Illnoia, a mysterious place where no one knows the location—except Roland McArthur and his trusted assistants—for the sake of safety and not letting Histeria know this vital information.

… 

Meanwhile after all these years’ time, at around eight o’clock in the evening, Morris speaks with his fellow engineers. He looks out the window of the Great Tower and sees the majestic sight of The Grand Whale, the name for his spaceship. His spaceship is beginning to take its shape—taking inspiration and similarity to the great blue whale. It is filled with metals, screws, and nets around the workers. Cyborgs and robots help engineers build it because it is just so massive. Lots of metal pillars support the building of the spaceship. It’s late, and the workers never stop. The night is noisy and filled with light glares and sparks of hot metal. Meanwhile, John Loid stands in front of the Fauna Core’s captive jail. She hibernates and is strapped with tons of thick, metal chains. 

“Let’s do it.” John Loid’s sadistic psychiatrist said.

Robots open the lid of the jail and put on her a headset—the thick ones on the ears and a virtual reality so close to her eyes. They strapped it on, closed the lid, and woke her up.

“So well… Kanoe Ishiki,” they said. 

Kanoe opened her eyes and saw dead bodies of whales beached to the seashore. Choirs of screaming pigs, birds, and cows in pain as they were slaughtered rang in her soft brain cells. Baby birds were trampled by a bunch of chainsaws in their nests, and baby koalas were taken from their mothers’ pouches, and killed in front of them. Kanoe screamed, yelled, and resisted the agony with all her might. Blood and flesh of animals she always loved entered her mind, with a chorus of agony singing in burning flames. Her brain was burning and her heart was scratching, screeching, and stressed. She begged to die,

“Just kill me! Please! Help me! Help them! Huuu… AAAAAAAAA!! PLEASE I BEG YOU MAKE IT STOP!” 

Her whims and begs for mercy reach the mind of Aramis McKenzie (the Magma Core), who is on the verge of successfully reviving his weakened powers.

“Mr. Aramis, is there anything of the matter?” Elias asked. McKenzie is trembling in fear. His intuition senses deadliness. Over the years, McKenzie reached out to Elias for help, since he was his best friend of Peter. Elias gently guided his powers to work and helped him get back on track. He even gave some of his powers to him. When McKenzie couldn’t respond to him, Elias began to worry.

McKenzie screamed and went insane. 

“GYAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!”

He heard Kanoe’s torture. McKenzie’s powers went into disarray, heating up the headquarters with flames, throwing stones around the glass windows, and began creating high-magnitude earthquakes around the planet. 

That alarmed the Rescuers, and they detected the areas for rescuing. There are areas around the world that the Rescuers rushingly traveled to. Among them, is the Ocean Core in the land of Dandelion. Hideki, Torikou, Thomas, Hyonae, Aidan McKenzie, Alice McKenzie, and other rescuers, ride with their masters, Cyrielle Kowalska and Cynthia Agatha.

The place was a beach with a cloudy sky. It was filled with palm trees, wood houses, and watermelon stores. The sand was white, and the waves grew taller and smashed onto the sand. The sand went everywhere as the ground shook. House ceilings pour dust, and coconut trees throw coconuts on the sandy floor. It wasn’t long until the signature Rescuan airship arrived. It was flying in the sky. It had shiny sails and a thick-clothed balloon filled with hot gas. It had a propeller on the back of the ship. Soldiers and Rescuers come and stand together to bring people to safety. There was a volcano nearby and it erupted poisonous, white gasses, changing the color of the sky from blue to orange-yellow. It had a chemical reaction around the sky to illuminate panic. Children screamed loudly as the ground shook. Houses of the village got crippled and destroyed. Its foundation broke down into masses of broken wood. The ocean tide became so low, the far side of the sea started rising. The flying rescuer boats were filled with populous people, going up to the rescuer airship and going down again to pick more people up. It was messy chaos. The ground reeked of black gasses and the tsunami roared deep. The worst came to reality: explosions arose on the sandy ground. It scattered people and debris. Explosions arrived, one after another, and the whole place was on fire. Thankfully there were masses that were now safe, but there were unfortunately still many, many, loved ones and friends that died, drowned, crippled in fire and debris. 

Filled with business, Torikou breathed quickly and lightly—she was struggling. It was a terrible event and she worried about her teammates. She couldn’t stand what these people were going through, she couldn’t live if all those happened to her teammates who were practically now her family. Looking outside, she could see Alice bringing people up to safety. Alice was a rescuer specializing in the air region, color-coded orange. Aidan picked up people from the sea—he was a rescuer specializing in the water region, color-coded cyan blue. Hyonae was by Torikou’s side on the ground region, color-coded green. Hideki was also rescuing people in the same place, especially those who got stuck in debris. When Torikou looked for Thomas, worried for her brother’s safety, she saw him fighting something strange and gasped in horror- Histeria! Histeria is here! 

In a spark of explosive light, there was a dark figure standing in the bright flaming heat. Torikou remembered a sound in her childhood she would never ever forget, Ayaka’s gunshot. She realized it was the person who took away her most loved one. The girl in flames, Ayaka Histeria approached her. She was burning like hell but not dying. She continued to walk forward. Torikou felt scared in treacherous anxiety. Torikou suddenly got shot in the stomach and fell to the shaky ground. Ayaka stood before her and looked down at her. She said, 

“Isn’t this a beautiful sight? Well, it once was.” 

Ayaka knelt down and whispered, 

“I’m going to destroy this planet and trap all of you one by one. Beauty will be gone because none of you Earthlings deserve it.”

 Ayaka laughed menacingly in hysterical laughter. As the fires and magnitude grew, Histerian soldiers, wearing deep black metal armor and heavy rifles with them, walked alongside the deep red flames. Torikou’s mind fainted out of fear and blood loss. 

“Torikou!” Cyrielle yelled, caught Torikou at the last minute an explosion would arrive but was shot by a bullet in the arm, and flew back to the Rescuer airship. The airship strengthened its virtual shield and slowly flew away, hiding in the dark white smoke.

As the airship was retreating, a low-class rescuer got hit on the head and almost left behind. He was on the beach shore, hidden from Histeria by flocks of wooden and stone debris. Seeing the airship fly away, he thought to himself, I’m just a low-class rescuer, I thought I’d never reach the sky in my life… guess it was true. Then, after a few minutes, he saw someone come out of the water. It was a woman wearing a mandarin-fish-designed silk dress. She wore a coral reef on her forehead as her crown. She was soaked in seawater and black oil. The little rescuer went to her, and asked, may I help you? The woman hugged him and felt frail. The rescuer knew this was his chance to prove to himself he was a great rescuer after all. He carried the lady and bit the bullet—flew in the sky with his harpoons, dodged Histerian rifles, spears, bombs, and flames, and reached for the airship with rockets at his feet. He was able to enter and entrusted the ocean woman to the healers.

As the airship flew away, Ayaka jumped high and chased them in the sky. Elite Rescuan Soldiers had to hold Ayaka off to protect the people and escaped the ship and parried her attack. Cynthia, along with the other pilots, piloted one of the strongest Rescuan Soldier airships called the Shuttlecock. Cyrielle and the other soldier leaders wore their gears and bazookas and dragged her down with their best bullets. Ayaka takes damage but hits them with white poisoning flames coming from the Hellcat inside of her. The poison flames plague the Shuttlecocks and the Rescuean Soldier’s gear. The gears rust quickly and lose their ability to shoot harpoons and bullets, while the Shuttlecock’s metal armor melts and loses its fuel too quickly. Knowing the rest of his team are in the losing game, Roland McArthur chose to jump in the fight. He is the best fighter—that’s why he is the leader. McArthur swiftly wears his gear and jumps in the air, dodging all of Ayaka’s flame attacks.

“Leader! Leave this to us! You need to live!” one of the struggling soldiers yelled.

“Do not underestimate me,” McArthur replied.

McArthur dodged her every attack and went to her in a close-range fight. He knows Ayaka is all for long-range attacks because of all the weapons she uses: guns, bows, and Hellcat. McArthur used his knife to battle her and managed to wound Ayaka deeply in her forehead, damaging a part of her brain. Ayaka screams, 

“Ouch! That hurts so much!”

McArthur continued attacking and wounding her. To the disdain of her well-being, she cries,

“Why are you hurting me? I’m just a young girl, that’s bad of you! Why are you bullying me? Huu… Father! Help me, please! Help me now or else!”

Ayaka got very angry and pushed McArthur back before he could land another fatal blow. The blow to McArthur was strong, he hit himself on the Rescuer airship’s metal bottom and hurt himself. A soldier picks him up from falling and brings him back inside the ship. Cyrielle and her team with the help of Cynthia push whining Ayaka to the ground.

Ayaka falls back to the Dandelion village that was submerged in a tsunami wave. The fire was gone, but the ground exploded again. The chaos was suddenly blurring as the clouds covered the sight. Ayaka held on to a small patch of a tree, waiting to be rescued by an Histeria ship. Deep in that space, Ayaka looms, looking at the sky, looking with her white tiger eyes, seeking revenge, a revenge we’re still waiting for, and waiting to find out why.

As the airship traveled back to Cholidea, along the journey, everybody was exhausted. Cyrielle and Cynthia, and their teams and teammates, were wounded, while Roland McArthur struggled to bring back his heart pulse. 

“Leader, leader! Are you still there? Fight! Fight! Stay with us!” Cynthia cried, 

“I’m sorry we're not strong enough to fight her back…” Cynthia’s tears flowed from her eyes. She covered her face with her hands and sat down.

“Leader! We won’t give up on you! Don’t die on us!” another soldier yelled.

“Please live!” everybody yelled in tears.

Hideki stood in the corner, with his arms crossed looking down at the floor, frowning. Thomas stood beside him, looking at the pile of grieving people. Hyonae cried while everyone we’re desperately trying to make the leader live. Torikou couldn’t hold back and just sat down in a stance of loss—as she did at the treehouse ten years ago.

Cyrielle called the healers, and the healer gave him CPR, and another wrapped his wounds with bandages. 

“Save… save everyone…” McArthur whispered, struggling to talk. His view was blurry, he lost his eyesight as he had hit his head on the impact. A lot of people were surrounding him, yelling and tending to his injuries. Sounds were muffled—he felt too weak to wonder what was going on.

McArthur closed his eyes and stopped breathing.