The remembrance of the exact moment he lost his grip on her returned too vividly.
A sudden, uncomfortable tug of anxiety pulled across his chest.
In response, his arms reacted before he could think.
They rose, settling around her shoulders, pushing her away just slightly, disguised as an attempt to meet her eyes.
"I'm here," he said. The words felt clumsy in his mouth.
They were too small for what she had just gone through, and for what she must still be processing. Yet they were all he could manage.
Her fingers placed near his chest dug deep into his thin, translucent, fog-like clothes.
"I thought…" her voice cracked. "I thought I lost you."
She looked up at him, angst eating her from the inside.
'You did…'The thought surfaced before he could stop it, leaving a bitter, saddening aftertaste.
He remembered the black swallowing them. The cold closing in like curtains shutting on a finished play.
He remembered their hands struggling to hold onto dear life for each other, eventually slipping.
And the way her beautiful silhouette and pale blond hair, dyed by her blood, her flower-like elegance defiled by the ocean's current, drifted away. Her eyes losing all sign of life as she sank further into the dark.
His heart that did not exist constricted, tightening on his soul.
His grip tightened, then immediately loosened, understanding the necessity of managing his emotions.
The pressure of her hold on the fabric pressed into the part of his chest that had watched her die.
And what filled his chest wasn't relief, but a hollow suffocation.
Though it wasn't from her.
It was from himself.
From the knowledge that even when he tried with everything he had, he still failed.
A soft exhale left his mouth as he slowly pulled back once more.
It wasn't harsh in any way.
Just a step, enough to create a small space between them as his arms fell to his side.
She looked up, startled by the sudden distance.
Her hands slid down his shirt, down to his sleeves, still holding on but lower now, gripping his arms instead of his whole body.
He forced his eyes away from her face.
"...Can you see it?" he asked quietly.
"The colors."
Her brows knit, confused for a second, then she followed his gaze.
The lights around them responded, as if aware of being noticed.
They brightened.
Thin ribbons of color became more solid, floating in the air like slow-moving rivers. They shifted around his shoulders, brushed against her hair, coiled lazily between their interlocked shadows on the ground.
Serene's grip softened a little.
"I… thought it was my imagination," she admitted.
Her free hand lifted as she reached out, palm open, toward one of the drifting threads.
It reacted.
The strand bent, drawn to her touch, wrapping itself gently around her fingers like soft silk. Her expression flickered from fear to a brief, childish wonder.
"So you see it too," Iskael said.
The air around them trembled.
The president's voice boomed again, much closer this time.
"Class 10D, report."
Serene flinched.
Her head turned automatically toward the sound, eyes narrowing as if she could pierce the darkness with will alone.
Her fingers still circled his sleeve.
Iskael felt the way they tightened again at the call for their class.
This time, instead of pulling her away, he simply let her hold him.
He could feel the guilt crawling up his spine, but he pushed it down, layer by layer, into the same quiet corner where he shoved things he was not ready to face.
"We should answer," he said.
"Right."
She inhaled shakily, then straightened.
Her shoulders settled.
The class leader of 10D returned in her stance, even if her hands still shook.
"I am here," she called out, voice projecting far more steadily than her emotions. "Serene Weiss, class leader of 10D."
The echo carried her words.
Iskael watched the lights react.
They gathered around her throat and chest, pulsing slightly with each syllable, then spread outward.
'Interesting… they reacted to her differently.'
He couldn't help but make an observation.
In the distance, several faint silhouettes turned in their direction.
The president's voice responded.
"Good. Guide your classmates by voice. Have them gather around you. We will form lines by class."
"Understood," she replied.
Her grip on Iskael's sleeve did not disappear. But he did not mention it, nor did he let himself focus on it.
As they answered, something shifted in the void.
The colored threads that had been wandering aimlessly began to converge around certain figures.
There, in the distance, a tall outline surrounded by a thick vortex of color.
The president.
Compared to everyone else, he looked almost solid. The lines of his body were sharp. And the cascading light around him made it appear as if he were wrapped in a mantle woven out of living aurora.
Some students stumbled toward his voice, hands outstretched, bumping into each other, calling class names.
Others reached blindly, unable to see anything at all.
From the way some turned unerringly toward the brightest clusters of light, Iskael guessed that not everyone was equally blind.
He took note of the ones who could see it more clearly.
He glanced at Serene.
She followed his gaze again, eyes narrowing as she tracked the flow of light.
"Is it clearer for you too?" he asked.
"Yea, it's better now," she answered.
"When I first woke up, it felt hazy. I couldn't tell if it was a dream or something."
Her voice softened.
Her fingers around his sleeve tightened, then loosened.
"Iska," she added very quietly, almost too soft to hear,
"I am glad you're okay."
The words pressed against that suffocating spot inside him again.
He forced a small smile.
"Mn."
That was all he gave her. Anything more felt dangerous.
He did not trust himself not to cling if he gave in.
"Everyone from 10D, respond when I call your names," Serene raised her voice, switching to her leader tone again. "If you can see light, move toward it. If you cannot see anything, follow my voice."
One by one, familiar names answered. And with each response, the scattered students steadied, gathering themselves as Iskael and Serene quietly guided those nearest to them. The void shifted with that growing order, slowly rearranging itself as faint lines began to form.
Iskael, of course, ended up exactly where he always did, at the front of 10D's group, slightly behind and to the side of Serene.
The place where a supposed loyal dog would stand.
He did not comment on the familiarity.
In front of them, the president called out more names, lining up the other classes. Each time he spoke, a pressure rippled outward.
Iskael paid close attention, noticing how the colored strands around the president tightened whenever he spoke, then relaxed when others answered.
That strange energy he imposed, a supernatural pressure, sparked a deep curiosity in Iskael.
He simply wanted to try it, like a child discovering a new toy.
Iskael wanted to test it, to see how it moved when pushed, and how it shaped reality.
He shifted his attention inward toward his own lights and the ones circling around him. He tried to recreate what the president seemed to be doing, but on a smaller scale.
He focused on a cluster near his right hand, attempting to gather it toward his palm using his will, a desire to compress it into an artificial shape.
The colors twitched and trembled. For a second, they clumped together, forming a slightly brighter knot.
But then they drifted apart again, the knot untying itself effortlessly.
His brow creased.
"..."
"Iska?" Serene whispered, noticing the change in his expression.
"What are you doing?"
He hesitated, though he immediately acknowledged there was no real reason to hide it from her.
"I am trying to copy him," he answered simply.
She followed his gaze toward the president, then down to the faintly glowing threads at their feet.
"Copy what?" she asked.
"Haven't you noticed the pressure? The way it is influenced by these aurora-like lights, aiding the president in his speech?" he said.
He thought back to the way the president's first "Silence" had felt, the invisible weight pressing their souls into place.
"It is not just from his voice," he added. "The lights are pushing from him and filling this space."
Serene stared at the drifting colors more intently.
"What… he sounds like some wizard…" she murmured.
"You are making me more nervous. Does this mean he can hurt us whenever he wants to!!"
Her exaggerated shock earned no reaction from Iskael.
Her attempt at a joke landed awkwardly, but the faint curve at her lips was real.
He exhaled, the corner of his mouth tilting just slightly.
"Watch," he said.
He reached out again, this time to a thread near her hand. As he imagined it contracting, he changed his intent, pulling instead of pushing.
The light thinned.
It resisted for a moment, then slid a fraction closer, bending toward his palm.
"It reacts," he said softly.
Her eyes widened.
She focused on the same strand.
"Like this?" she asked.
Her fingers unfurled.
She did not reach for it physically this time. She simply extended her hand, palm open, and thought of drawing it in.
The light shivered and immediately obeyed.
It curved around her palm as if it had been waiting for her call, settling into a thin ring that circled her hand once before sinking into her translucent skin.
A deep, comforting warmth bloomed from her palm.
She flinched.
"…Ah."
"Huh… Where did it go? Why is it inside you?" he asked.
"I just… pulled," she said, staring at her hand as if it had betrayed her.
"It just melted into me, and it felt really good for some reason…"
He stared at the now quieter space around her hand.
"Hmm."
His tone flattened.
She looked up, eyes narrowing slightly.
"Do not say 'hmm' like that," she said.
"You sound upset."
He paused.
"Well, I think I have a right to be upset. I think it is unfair," he replied."
You somehow managed it properly the first time you tried."
Her lips parted. A smug smile she did not dare fully reveal pushed into her expression before she forced it into a small, cheeky curve.
"What can I say," she whispered. "I'm just a talented girl."
He looked at her for a long second.
The atmosphere softened. Then it splintered as the memory of her drowning flashed behind his eyes again. Her hand slipping from his, her blood in the water replaying over and over.
The image twisted his expression in a way he could not quite hide.
She saw it.
The moment his gaze clouded.
Her smile faltered.
"...Iska," she said quietly.
He looked away first.
But before the subject could tilt back toward the ocean and the way they died, before she could apologize for something that was not her fault, he turned his attention sharply to the front.
The colored lights that had been drifting calmly jolted all at once, shuddering as if plucked by an invisible hand. They bent in the same direction, pulled toward a point far beyond the president's line.
Then, a sudden deliberate clapping sound cut through the space.
Each clap landed heavy, echoing too long, as if the emptiness itself were applauding.
"Splendid," a voice said.
And it came from far ahead.
Further than anyone else.
But also right beside their ears...