Where did he go?
That's the only thing that's on my mind as of right now. I'm so far away from the crowd that my family is probably looking for me. Or are they? I remember that day when they talked about how we were causing them trouble and all. Maybe they're happy that we're gone.
I've gone way too far; I should return to my family. Anra is probably there anyway, right? I didn't search enough. He was probably sleeping right next to me. I just failed to look down and thought he was actually missing.
___________________________
I hear voices, familiar voices. And they're coming from an opening to the inside of a mountain, a cave. The voices are very quiet, and therefore it's hard to understand what they're saying. I want to follow the voices, but do they really have anything to do with Anra? I think it's best if I just check it out, just in case Anra wandered into the cave.
The cave is much wider than it looked from far away, and on top of that, I can barely see anything in it. I take a step into it, and a chill goes down my spine. Every step I take, the lower my visibility gets. I turn my head back to get a glimpse of light and look back towards the inside of the cave.
___________________________
I was playing catch with Mera when a man with a cloth wrapped around his eyes walked towards us. He had a white beard that stretched to the end of his neck and had many wrinkles on his face. He had a long stick in his right hand and was swinging it near the ground.
He had hit Mera with the stick, which made Mera look behind him towards the old man.
"Hey, watch where you're going!"
The man paused, "Sorry, son, I didn't see you."
"Yeah, because of that cloth wrapped around your head."
"Kid, do you know why I'm wearing this cloth?" He asked politely.
"No." Mera replied.
"It's because I am blind."
___________________________
My foot hits something as I walk into the cave, but it's not a rock; it's a stick. Why is there a stick in a cave in the middle of the desert? Who knows!
I reach down to grab the stick and bring it up. It's a long stick, and I know what to use it for. Remembering that blind man I saw years ago, I begin swinging it around the floor to make sure I don't bump into anything.
Every time the stick hits something in front of me, I wave it to the right, and if it hits something to the right, then I go left. The voices got louder, and I can start making out what they said. I also don't seem to need the stick anymore because I can see light.
"How did they even know?"
"It's because you blew our cover!"
"Me? You're the one who went into that store earlier!"
I peek behind a stone wall to see two people. One of them is a man, and the other is a woman. The woman is holding a stick that's glowing. The same stick that was used to kill that helpless mother.
"Well, you were the one who asked the guy for directions!" The woman barks at the man.
After giving it some thought, I believe these were the people from earlier, only this time they're not wearing cloaks.
The girl has red hair and white skin; she has freckles all over her face and has brown eyes. The guy has brown hair and has darker skin. He has one hazel eye and a large scar going down his other eye.
"What matters is that we got what we wanted." The man replies to the girl.
"No? We still need the other one."
The man's eyes dangerously graze the area where I'm hiding. "Can't we just kill this one and then only get half the bounty?"
"No, Arl, that's not how it fu-" The girl gets cut off.
"Put down your damn weapons!"
Several guards pop out from the other side of the cave. How did they get there? Is there another opening to the cave?
The man runs right while the woman uses her stick to shoot the ground again. The man goes back to his original position, only this time he's holding someone. He's holding a kid who has brown hair. I got a single glimpse of the kid's face, which is all I need to figure out who it was. The kid was my little brother, Anra.
"Shoot, and I'll burn him to a crisp," The man screams as he pulls his sword near Anra. The soldiers take three short steps backwards as the one in front of them all gestures his arm. Just then, I can hear the mumbling of the child, and I can see him trying to struggle. But all it's doing is making the situation worse because the man begins to tighten his grip.
The woman turns her head slightly to the right. "Just do it, it's our job to kill him anyway!"
"It's a child, goddammit!" The soldier with the greatest number of badges yells. He has black hair, blue eyes, and a button nose.
"So, what if it's a child? I'll be paid 5,000 Keyroes for this!" The man yells back at the soldier.
The man pauses as the sound of a rock hitting something plays, and his eyes widen. His grip on Anra gets looser and looser until his hands eventually drop altogether. The man then falls onto his knees, and then he kisses the ground.
The woman looks back at the man's body, distracted. Taking advantage of the situation, the soldiers shoot the girl 3 times before she falls backwards, unlike the man, who fell on his face.
I stand there, holding a heavy rock in my hands, a rock covered in blood. I killed someone; I took away someone's life. I-I am a horrible person.
But it was to save a life, and these people were evil. I saved the life of someone good by eliminating someone evil. I saved Anra by killing this man. But does that really change anything? Murder is still murder in the end, right?
I loosened my grip on the rock and let it drop to the floor. The rock gets slightly chipped as a small piece of it breaks off when it hits the floor. I then drop both of my knees to the floor and wrap my arms around Anra.
Under my eyes, you can spot tears as I embrace Anra. Why am I crying? I didn't cry during the funeral of my parents, so why am I crying here? Is it all just crashing down at my heart at once instead of being separate, smaller attacks? Tears drop onto the ground, blending into it almost immediately.
Anra isn't crying, screaming, or just moving at all. He's frozen still, with both of his eyes open wide, along with his mouth being slightly open. After a second or two, his head falls back, and he loses his balance completely. His two eyes also close while the rest of his body seems to have lost all connection to the brain.
"Anra?" I shake my brother gently, no response from him. I try to loosen my grip, but that's making him fall back even more. "ANRA, THIS ISN'T FUNNY!" I scream at him in horror.
The soldiers stand in a circle around Anra and me as I place Anra onto the ground. One of them holds up his hand towards his forehead. I then bring up my right hand and slap his hand away from Anra.
"Don't touch him!"
"I'm not gonna hurt him!" the soldier claims.
I hear a scream from behind me; all the soldiers flinch from the sound. I turn around to look behind me, and I see two burnt corpses lying on the floor. Further away, I can see a woman running, the woman who I thought got shot. The woman holds her stick in one hand while clenching her shoulder while running.
I look back towards the soldiers, I can hear the hard clicking sound of reloading a gun, and afterwards the explosive noise of a gun, and the tapping noise of running.
"It's too dark, I can't get a good shot!" One of the soldiers whines.
The bullets fly into the walls and onto the ground, but not a single one even touches the woman.
"You two!" The soldier who tried to touch Anra earlier points at the two remaining soldiers. "Follow her and make sure she stays dead!"
The two soldiers react fast and sprint towards the entrance of the cave. I can hear the gunshots coming from their guns as they leave my vision.
I look back towards Anra, and I see the soldier with the button nose kneeling at the child, sweating and cursing. I don't need any further explanation; I can read that expression easily. That face doesn't look like worry turning into relief; it looks like worry turning into even more worry. He, too, is gone, isn't he? I didn't even notice the man doing anything harmful to him, but apparently, I'm just blind.
Why? Just why? Everyone, mom, dad, that one mother, those two soldiers who were behind me, and now Anra. Why does everyone around me have to f*cking die? Maybe it's just a curse; death revolves around me, death follows me. Perhaps I'm just dodging it every time by giving it to others. Every time someone dies, it's when I'm in a life-or-death situation as well, after all. Maybe I am cursed, maybe I am the problem.
As I look back towards Anra, I also see the corpse of the man that I killed, adding one more person to the death counter. Even if it was for self-defense, I still killed someone. I'm really no better than those bounty hunters, am I? I mean, after all, there has to be a reason for bounties to be put on people. But we didn't even do anything bad! Now I'm just confused. In the end, I am still a murderer; I still need to be brought to justice.
Suddenly, he feels as if the gun in his hand is being pulled by the barrel. His eyes follow, and he sees a boy holding the barrel to his own forehead; that boy is me.
"Pull it"[1]
[1] The reasoning for this is explained more in chapter 6