The sun had barely embraced Atarkan with its red hue as Mirai walked the frozen street with a priest beside her. She had once before walked down this very street, toward the very house just around the next corner. Then, it had been a summer night, the sun still setting as if it cared not for the shadow of night and the awaiting moon and the stars. Back then, they had both been so very drunk. Though one of them more than the other, for what other reason would Mirai ever have to half-carry a man to his own house?
Torin had kept smiling then, something he'd seldom do, even if drunk, but that night he was different from how he usually was... She could almost hear his voice echoing against the cobblestones and the buildings.
"Mirai, Mirai, Mirai!" he had repeated her name, and almost brought them both down as he misstepped.
"Careful!" Mirai took a better grip of the man and made sure that he would not fall face down to meet the cobblestones and whatever there might be beneath their feet.
Torin grinned. "You know... the world changes, it changes!"
"You just..." He forced them to a stop and stared at Mirai, his eyes clear and so earnest. "We must love. I realize it now. We must love!"
Mirai scoffed. "What does that have to do with anything?"
He suddenly patted her on the head. "I know what goes on in that head of yours..."
Mirai frowned.
"... You're lonely, and for what reason?"
"I'm not..."
"Yes, yes, you are! I can see it! Stop being lonely! Instead, pick someone, anyone, and love them..." His gaze drifted past her. "You must love as well... if you don't, then what is the point?"
Mirai stepped around the corner and halted. Her gaze landed on the stone structure, right where Torin had emptied his stomach after his grand sermon. The priest stepped past her, but came to a stop soon after. She stared at Mirai, observing her, and said nothing. She just stood and awaited.
Priests were strange like that. Mirai had come across so many of them. They were somewhat similar, in some sense, emotionally barren, perhaps, but... whenever Mirai found herself in the midst of her own sadness, for one reason or another, priests became people who could offer her some levity.
Just spend a moment and think about it. Meet the gaze of a priest... There is so much torment hidden behind those eyes. They are fragile things; they know not of happiness, of lust, of pleasure; they know nothing of such things, yet they observe it, and they try to mimic it... and what they do know of is torment. They know of pain; they know of suffering. They know of eternal heartbreak. Or so it felt.
It is oddly comforting to be around someone, another human, even if they barely qualify as such, who knows what it feels to be hurt, who knows what it means to mourn.
Mirai furrowed her brows and took a deep breath. Just around this corner, four doors down on the right, there'd be a house, and in that house there'd be a woman. Someone who has been waiting for her lover to return since the moment he left too long ago.
She felt sick. Her stomach churned, and her throat was filled with a burning sensation. She wasn't ready to do something like this. She hadn't done something like this. She hadn't ever had to deal with something like this. It had never been her job; it had never been her duty. It had always been his, Sergeant Torin Veld's duty.
Surely, she could still turn around and run away. And the priest who had come with her would not blame her. Mirai supposed that priests could only ever blame themselves.
She took a deep breath and met the priest's gaze. Her name was Saran. Her hair was blonde, and long white streaks ran through it. She must have done something like this a thousand or more times. Her eyes were so gentle, even with the torment that lay behind those green eyes of hers.
Mirai forced a step, then another, then a third, then as many as it took to reach Saran and to take one and the next past her. And all the while, the priest's gaze followed her. Not a thing had they said to one another during this long walk, and only a short introduction at the City Guard's Headquarters. Yet... it felt like she knew and understood everything that there was about Mirai.
Soon, she stepped beside Mirai again, as they made their way toward the fourth door on the right. They walked slowly, and because Mirai couldn't bring herself to go any faster, every step that she did manage to take felt heavy. It was as though her legs did not wish to move a single inch, as if the soles of her boots did not wish to depart the surface of the street for even a moment.
And even then, even when her mind so solemnly fought against every step she took, Mirai found herself at the fourth door, and when she did, her mind told her to run, to keep walking down the street, past this house and what had become her sorry duty. But when she took one step past, she felt a hand on her sleeve. Mirai looked at it and saw the priest's gentle hold. She lifted her gaze and met Saran's eyes.
Not a word needed to be said. Mirai could read what that gaze meant.
'It must be done.'
Yes.
It must.
After all, it is only right. Is it not?
Against every instinct, Mirai approached the door. She raised her hand, but her knuckles hovered inches from the wood. A simple knock had grown so monumental. This one action would change the life of another; it would change it so fundamentally. It would change it and never allow for it to be the same as it had been.
The two had loved each other. Mirai had seen. Back then, when she brought the drunk Torin to this very door that one summer's night. It had been her who opened the door; it had been him who reached for his lover and kissed, saying that he had missed her so.
Mirai sighed. She could not do it. Her hand fell down, and she was about to turn her head away, perhaps in shame, perhaps in need of the priest's grace to give her the right to walk away, or to have her knock on the door in Mirai's stead.
But the door opened on its own. And soon, a woman stood on the threshold. Her hair blonde and braided, her eyes blue and so clear; freckles around her nose, and then an expression of surprise that soon turned into a smile as she recognized Mirai. She held an empty basket in her hands, hiding away a slightly swollen belly.
Mirai saw it all, and her heart sank further. It felt like it had suddenly stopped beating altogether. And the woman saw her expression; the uniform she wore, the eyes filled with fear and sadness. Her smile had already faded.
"Did something happen? Did something happen to my Torin?" she asked, panic in her voice.
In that moment, everything that had happened flashed before Mirai. She saw Torin alive, as if it were the moment of his death. She saw him, standing in front of Kanrel. She saw him. Then he was gone. In the blink of an eye.
Her posture slightly collapsed, but she forced her spine straight. "Miss Jelen... I am Corporal Mirai Vareth, and I have been asked to inform you that your fiancé was confirmed dead approximately a week ago. Sergeant Torin died while performing his duties, saving civilians during these dire times; he perished while having saved others."
"On behalf of the Ranger Corps, the city of Atarkan and her people, and Captain Vareth, I extend to you and your family our deepest sympathy in your great loss." Before Mirai could even finish her speech, Jelen's basket fell to the ground, and she collapsed against the doorway. The priest stepped forth and helped her stand, all the while Mirai finished her speech; all the while, the woman in the priest's arms wept.
Mirai saluted, her hand slightly shaking. "He was a great man; a great leader. His death will be mourned by all who knew him." She managed to keep her voice from shaking; her tears would not fall, not yet.
Saran nodded slightly to her and soon helped Jelen back inside, closing the door behind them, leaving Mirai on the outside, still saluting, even when the doors had already closed on her. Mirai could yet hear the howling of a woman who had lost her beloved.
Mirai's hand fell down, and for a moment, she closed her eyes. Slowly, her expression hardened, and her grief faded away. And when she opened her eyes, she began her walk back toward the command, so as to report back. But as she reached the corner, she turned to a small alleyway; she walked deeper and deeper until she found its darkest corner, and against the wall, she collapsed and buried her face into her hands. Loudly weeping against them, muffling her own cries so as not to attract any attention.