Steam hissed, gears rumbled, springs and cogs whirred and churned. Caged bulbs, strung along the cracked concrete walls, cast a dim flicker over the capsule-like machines that crowded the room, stained with rust and ancient oil. Thick, clear tubes tendriled along the floor like bubbling, faintly glowing roots, each fastened securely to the undersides of the humming capsules. Somewhere deeper in the corridors, a scream of pain was cut short.

The light, the steam, and the pulse of the tubes all churned to the same mechanical rhythm.

A small, sandy-haired man in a tattered white lab coat shuffled into the capsule room, ticking notes on a clipboard that was soon deposited onto a bent nail on the wall. After an adjustment to his goggles, he pushed open a capsule's cover and, grunting, dragged out of it a lifeless mass of yellowish skin and half-formed bones. He slung the human-ish corpse over his shoulder, tossed it into a wide metal chute and closed the rusty door after it. The furnace below roared agreeably. With a handkerchief he wiped down the inside of the vacated pod, then shut the fogged-glass cover with a satisfying clack.

"Now then!" Doctor Kelodie chirped cheerfully to himself, turning a few knobs on each of the empty pods. He clicked a switch on his goggles. "Let's try again, shall we?"

The glow of the tendriled tubes filled the whirring capsules; the ambient light of the room was quickly overcome by a blinding blue radiance.

When the light had faded and the capsules had calmed to their consistent low hum, Kelodie carefully opened each of the covers in turn and peered in at the healthy, well-formed shapes within.

"Excellent. Excellent." He muttered under his breath with a smile, and pushed open the eyelids of each of the new subjects -- Echoes of once-living people -- to shine a light into each of their freshly recreated eyes. "Sight and consciousness. Brilliant!"

He grabbed the clipboard with a flourish and scribbled his observations.

Around them, the mechanical rhythm churned and hissed.

It felt like a moment to the fallen actor. Aster had walked across his final stage. He’d stood up in front of the greatest audience he had as they jeered and booed at the way he denied society.

Then Aster was executed. All the spotlight started to fade, and he was sure that there would be no light at the end of the tunnel. But then, his eyes pressed open. He rubbed the heel of his hands into them and stretched out his body as the sound of ticking gears and steam screeched around him.

“Ugh… I thought… I performed my finale already…” He thought as he cracked his neck and slowly started sitting up. He felt… good. His hand reached for his neck and saw there was no bruising, then it went for his hair, and it was in the same mess that it always was. As Aster started to move, his brain acknowledged that he wasn’t wearing any clothing, but Aster was anything but shy. In fact, he was more surprised by the sheer… perfection of his skin. It felt exactly the same. It felt like he hadn’t even died at all.

He heard another voice in the chamber, and his bright eyes snapped to the source. With an audience around, he couldn’t help but grin as his hands gripped the side of the table and he back-flipped onto his bed-thing in a standing position.
Yes, he was still naked. And no, he didn’t really care about that.

“Well well well!” He announced. His voice boomed through the chamber, “It’s a rare occasion in an Actor’s life when they obtain the opportunity for an encore! But here it is!”

His hands spread out above his head in an arch gesture, “I see it now! Aster Rolan: Alive Again!”

There were many thoughts in his head at that moment, but in reality, he thought there was only one proper response to all of this:

Joy. A chance to perform on his stage once again. But was it the same stage? And how much time had passed.

“Excuse me, sir,” he called to the doctor, “I’m assuming that you’re the one responsible for this, so, thank you, but do you think you could offer me the current date?”

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

The tail end of a memory was swimming through Dr. Howell’s mind like an important piece of information he was about to lose and never recover, again, except as it slowly disappeared down the stream, it’s importance seemed to become less and less interesting and valuable. His need for the memory turned into a want and then it turned into nothing more than a misunderstanding that shouldn’t have warranted his attention in the first place. As the thought vanished, his eyelids were pried open by covered flesh that felt all too familiar like the movements of human fingers. The chase of that distant memory had now completely vanished in the wake of a blinding light.

Fluorescent brightness riddled through his dazed pupils while his eyes tried desperately to focus and unfocus at the same time. Remnants of confusion fostered questionably in his unbearably scattered mind. He could feel his eyebrows knitting together as his face tensed in a failing attempt to ease the pain of bright exposure puncturing his sight as several words were spoken to him--something of appraisal or pleasant satisfaction coming from a masculine voice that seemingly hovered over him. Right as the voice silenced itself, the light clicked off, and Dr. Quinn’s mind visually fell into the remembrance of a dark cave located inside the barrel of a gun staring at him straight in the face before a valve and a clicking sound administered some sort of shocking yet cliché-like fatal blow to his head.

Dancing blind spots pressed against his vision, which kept him from over reacting physically to the disturbingly exciting jolt of recollection playing out in his mind. Death. Yes, death. He was supposed to be dead, a lifeless corpse. His mouth opened; body reacting to some cheerfully spoken command as his mind began grasping for the tail end of that escaped memory he had just rendered useless and trivial before having his eyes forcefully opened. The feeling of a depressor touched gently down on his tongue before his mouth closed itself to the sound of another spoken command by the same voice. His fingers wiggled, slight stiffness unfolding oddly and continuing into the nerves moving the muscles in his toes. He had just died. That elusive memory, it was death wasn’t it?

Or was it?

The dark patches in his vision faded into the churning sounds of valves muttering steam and gurgling machinery hissing. His dark eyes tightly shut, again, scraping back the sensitivity that had just been invaded. His right hand found its palm pressed against his face, feeling the facial features that tightened from the perplexity and a mechanical need to answer the voice’s question. There were already too many of his own questions flooding his thoughts and trying to push inquiries, loud judgements, and hypothetical answers to stabilize the disarray of confusion overwhelming him. If only he could recapture that memory…

“Ah? Qu—Doctor Howell,” his hand drew away from his face and relaxed next to his nude body, still yet to be fully understood as completely exposed, “Doctor Quinn Howell,” the deepness of his voice sounded so distant to his memory as if he hadn’t heard himself speak in some time. Had he survived the gunshot by some rare chance and fallen into a coma? It seemed like the most plausible explanation as imperfect of a solution to his problem to understand the current situation as it was.

His eyes reopened, and vision registered the face above him. Gadgeted goggles stared down at him. They were not too foreign looking but very much futuristic in their own right. The machinery webbed above him and the man standing over him had its own age, rust, and the lingering stench of burning metal, copper maybe. Curiosity turned his head away from the pleased face and stared from the glass container around him. There were other pods—all identical in build and stature—assumed to be like the thing holding his own body. Several seconds of thoughts to alleviate the escalating pulse fluttering in his chest past through him before his attention came back to the sand haired man, “W-where are we?”

In all his years of practicing, this set up was much too abnormal to be a hospital, unless his predictions of the future had escalated incorrectly during his coma. A heavy sinking feeling rested against his chest, imagining his family, friends, patients, time lost. How long had he been out? He couldn't have been out for too long; his motor skills, reasoning, and response times were far too advanced and nimble for a prolonged state of anything worse than a minimally conscious state. Unless, of course, technology had taken a giant leap, which was disturbingly frustrating instead of intriguing in his flustered mind.

---

The light was sudden and blinding, gone as soon as it had appeared. Next came the noise, loud at first but then dying to a low rumble as his senses adjusted to the room around him, distinguishing voices from machinery. The room was brightly lit, though not as difficult to deal with as the light the 'doctor' had just exposed him to.

Sora looked around quietly as he took in the situation, and then himself. He was naked, which didn't bother him nearly as much as what else was missing. His scars, his tattoo... his skin was flawless as a newborn's, but he felt anything but reborn. His hands reached up to probe his face, the familiar shape re-cementing itself in his mind as he noted that this too was free of scars or markings of any kind, even the piercing-holes in his ears were gone. His eyes darted around the room as he pushed himself out of his pod and stood just a couple steps away from it. He tested his own mobility as he stood there, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and carefully moving each of his extremities in his analysis, and watched the others in the room as well. Where he himself, and a couple others as well, seemed to be in almost perfect physical condition, the room was a sharp contrast of rusted machinery and strange liquids carried in tubing along the floor.

The first emotion he could identify to himself was anger, red-hot and persistent. This was wrong. Him, and the others in the room like him, should not be here. "What kind of dark sorcery or science is this? How- how dare you..." He had to trail off as he searched for the right words, though only one question could voice itself at a time. "Why? Why am I here?"

“Excuse me, sir, I’m assuming that you’re the one responsible for this, so, thank you, but do you think you could offer me the current date?”

“W-where are we?”

"Why? Why am I here?"

The brilliance of Aster Rolan's center-stage announcement shocked the morbid room into a confused, ticking silence. The fluid balance of Sora's moving limbs juxtaposed the low churn of machinery. Doctor Howell's deep-voiced questions arose gently from the third pod, adding a sense of thoughtful humanity to the sudden chaos.

Doctor Kelodie took a few shuffling steps back and pushed the goggles up to his forehead; he blinked furiously, and his eyes adjusted to the light and to the unmistakable shapes of three living, speaking bodies. No, this wasn't another hallucination. He smiled sheepishly and waved his palms up and down in a calming gesture.

"Ah, ha-ha! Yes, well, good morning to all of you, and welcome back! When, where and why, all excellent and very prudent questions that I hope I can answer to your satisfaction, if you will please sit down and take a few deep breaths. I don't doubt you've been through quite a lot."

He looked each of them in the eyes for a brief moment -- and when he was certain that none of them held any murderous or lunatic intent (a great advancement from previous would-be successes) he turned his back on them and knelt to open the lid of a heavy wooden chest. "I have to apologize first and foremost for the exposed state you've found yourselves in." He stood, and with a kind smile and an encouraging gesture he distributed a folded robe to each of the three men. The robes were simple and red-brown, threaded with a thin rope around the waist, and smelled strongly of cedar wood.

"This, ah, facility is an old monastery; these happen to be convenient and one-size-fits-all. How are you feeling? Any headaches or nausea?" With a curious smile he looked to each of them in turn, hoping they might have calmed and adjusted themselves enough to hear the answers to their questions. He dropped his hands into the deep pockets of his white coat. The three newly-awakened might find that the doctor was a bit shorter than the shortest of them, seemed to favor his left leg, and had an amused sparkle in his dark eyes. He cleared his throat.

"Now then, your questions. Today is November sixth, 1903." He said this gently, and he maintained friendly attention on the three faces to note their reactions. No doubt it would be a shock to some. "We're in the lower chambers of Copperwall Abbey, just above the King's Road through Elder Marsh. You're here now because these machines," he gestured to the churning and hissing metalwork around them, "have the unique purpose of returning perished souls to the land of the living." He waited a moment to let this sink in, and he gave them a small smile. "Welcome back."

"1903? Alas, I missed the turn of the century..." Aster sighed, his hand already coursing through is messy hair as he leaped from his pod-thing and landed directly in front of the stout professor.

The man reminded Aster of a good friend from his troupe, an excellent actor and a lover of the "mad scientist" archetype. Aster glanced at his goggled-eyes and grabbed the robe and flung it over his shoulders as he tied the rope loosely around his waste. It was likely the robes of a monk, assuming that this place remained in practice after all of these curious contraptions were implemented everywhere.

Aster wasn't that astute when it came to technology. His father's ships and all the boats from his town were powered by a mix of steam and clockwork, but beyond that he wasn't even sure if his father knew how the boats ran. He always left special effects to the ones who were good at it.

That being said, his eyes meandered around the expansive room as pod upon pod lay in a line, either used already or still containing a for that was potentially like himself: grey, unconscious, waiting.

"I'm not experiencing any headaches of the like, good doctor!" he announced, "Whatever process you executed has succeeded with flying colours! Why, I don't believe I've ever felt this good!"

His mind was reeling! He couldn't wait to start planning his next show, to find the tribe of actors with whom he could perform to his heart's content.

Though his heart slowed down as one question came to his mind. He was already making a few steps towards where he thought the door may be hiding, but this one thought caught him on his heel as he pivoted back to face the good doctor and the other people who've woken up that he'd clearly forgotten about entirely.

"Say, good sir... what is the state of Sink? When I... passed away, the political climate was rather hostile, so to speak. Has it changed? Has the state improved? And more importantly... why are we back?"

Matthew Souza

A few years ago...

Looks like a new moon tonight. Good. I'll need every bit of stealth I can get. Matt pulled his head back inside the window of his poky little room and cast around it, looking for anything else that he could take with him, the faint light coming in from outside illuminating his spartan surroundings. The SLF had "reclaimed" a cheap hotel a while back, and now used it as their base, though their rooms were far from luxurious. The bed barely even qualified as one, so Matt ignored it (though he did check underneath it, just in case). There was a lamp, which was currently switched off, and rested on a desk. Matt rummaged through it, but found only old papers, receipts, and a small rubber bouncy ball. He considered the bouncy ball for a bit, then pocketed it. Seeing as there was nothing else in the room, Matt was satisfied that he had inspected the room thoroughly. He turned towards the door to check if anyone were coming, and found himself face to face with a very surprised guard.

Matt wasted no time in bullrushing the man, shoving him to the ground and running out the open door before he could get out much more than an aborted cry of "Escapee!" Matt stumbled over the guard's body, but found his footing and kept running, aiming for the stairwell at the end of the hallway his room was in. People opened their doors behind him, groggy and annoyed, to see what all the noise was, only to see Matt Souza, who had been part of the SLF almost since its inception, sprinting away down the hall. The cry of "Escapee!" went up all around the hotel, and just as Matt reached the stairwell, a pack of armed guards came up from the bottom of the staircase, searching for Matt. He turned around to see if he could escape that way, only to spy another set of guards rushing towards him with menacing expressions. Looks like there's only one way to go, then. Matt started sprinting up the stairs, taking them three at a time, externally calm and internally freaking out.

When he reached the top, Matt knew he was stuck. The hotel was the shortest building in the area by a wide margin, which made it nigh-impossible to jump to any of the neighboring roofs. He looked over the side of the building, only to see even more guards waiting for him there. He gave them a cocky smirk and a mocking salute, but quickly moved away from the edge once they started aiming their guns at him.

The story was the same on any of the other three sides of the building. With even more guards coming up the staircase after him, Matthew Souza was well and truly trapped. As he heard the guards clumping up the stairway, Matt remembered the bouncy ball he had grabbed. Meh, whatever. I'm dead anyway. He took it out of his pocket and prepared to huck it at the first person to come out of that stairwell.

The door suddenly flew open, and just as the person in front came out, Matt threw the bouncy ball at them with all his strength. He was rewarded with an "Agh!" of pain, but immediately afterwards, his blood turned to ice. He knew that voice.

The Supreme Leader of the Sink Liberation Front, Alexander de Bourgh, stared at Matt with undisguised hatred. "Guards," he said, voice quivering with rage, "get him."



The execution took place immediately. Alexander had his guards grab Matt and bring him (a tad too rough for Matt's taste) to the center courtyard that all the rooms looked onto. There he knelt, hands bound behind him and a gun to his head, as Alexander's guards went around and woke everyone up; they were required to watch every execution, so that everyone knew what would happen if they betrayed the SLF.

Ordinarily, Matt knew, he'd be incredibly nervous, what with all the people watching him and the impending death and all. But now he felt a calm steal over him; he had accepted his fate, and made his peace with it. Having all eyes on him no longer bothered him; after all, what did it matter? He was a dead man.

Soon enough, everyone was outside on the balcony-cum-walkway that ran around the inside of the central courtyard, looking down at the pair below. Alexander had calmed down somewhat, though his gray eyes still twitched every so often, as he remembered the humiliation Matt had put him through. Once everyone was outside and the guards had returned, he began speaking to the SLF's members, taking the gun away from Matt's face and gesturing grandly to the crowd. "People of the Sink Liberation Front!" he shouted. "Here kneels before you Matthew Souza, one of our oldest members, and a traitor to the cause!" He waited for the boos and shocked gasps to die down. "He has been charged with attempting to escape, theft of SLF property, and treason! For these crimes, he is to be summarily executed! By yours truly, Alexander de Bourgh!" Alexander took a deep bow, to the cheers of the crowd. Matt could see some of the guards going around and prodding people who weren't cheering loud enough.

"Now!" With one word, Alexander cut off the cheering, leaving only silence before he spoke again. "Does the accused have any last words?" he said mockingly, jamming the gun against Matt's forehead again.

Matt felt a surge of excitement, and he allowed himself to smile slightly in spite of himself. This was it. "I do. To start with, you're a liar and you know it, Supreme Leader. We both know that the SLF is just an excuse to have your own little pet terrorist group, filled with people who do nothing but what you say. You're an asshole, a sociopath, and someone who should be put down for the good of the world, same as you're doing to me."

Alexander looked at him disdainfully. "Yes, yes, I've heard all of that before. Anything else, or are you done?"

Matt looked up, directly into his eyes, his smile now a fully-fledged grin. "I hope you choke on a rubber bouncy ball, you dictatorial fuckwad."

All the color left Alexander's face, only to be replaced with bright red. He tried to say something, but all that came out was furious spittle and incoherent noises. Matt's grin grew even wider. "Aww. Did I break the widdle Supreme Leader?"

"SHUT UP!" The gun barked once, twice, thrice, and again and again until Matt's body was riddled full of holes, all leaking a bright red. He was dead after the first shot, but his face was frozen eternally into a rictus grin, mocking Alexander for all time.

Said "dictatorial fuckwad" was panting in exertion, face bright red and dripping with sweat. He turned back to the crowd, pointing accusingly at Matt's corpse. "See what happens to traitors?! They die!"

But this traitor, as it turns out, still had a bit of life left in him...

---

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

As the spritely voice answered his subtle inquisition, Dr. Howell tensed the muscles in his arms, abdomen, and thighs, and pushed his frame upward into a sitting position as his visuals were made aware of more people who had been seemingly awakened out of something similar to his own state of affairs (unless he was jumping to unruly and falsely thought of answers). It was during the explanation that the severe oddity of the disposition of which he had now found himself that he came to the embarrassing realization that he was nude. As a conservative man, the pod’s lap beneath his bare bum was unwarrantly distracting as his mind raced through theories for the extent of research and teeth that had been pulled to make this possible.

There were doubts, though. His fingers were rubbing his forehead, now—noticing miraculously to the extent of which the memory of his death and perhaps even his entire life before the fatal blow could have been a false one. There was no scar, no bullet hole… He remembered being a man of some sort of intelligence, yet grasping the entirety of how his current positioning had befallen him was quite puzzling and a flag for questioning the truthfulness of the statements being given to him by a man he knew nothing of made all too much sense by everything he had been conceivably taught. And yet, the tale end of his brother’s presence, as if maybe he had been part of the memory, which had eluded him so vigorously upon his push to consciousness, was keeping him relatively calm as his mind continued scrambling to make sense of the science and technology being thrown at him much harder than the soft robe which had fallen into his pod. It all seemed so believable despite the absurdity.

But, had the memory of his brother even been real?

Of course, he had been. Dr. Howell’s mind wasn’t ready to dismiss his brother’s life as something fabricated. He doubted it ever would, which coincidentally lead him to believe the man’s answers.

And, so, if the man was telling the truth—Dr. Howell’s eyes scanned the ceiling, the physiques of the other captives or patients, rather, as he mustered up enough hollow trust to endure the man as an honest one as opposed to the paranoid idea that something preposterous or unethical had sabotaged him, bestowed faux love for an imaginary family—then he was genuinely fascinated, giddy in the way a child would be if handed a lucrative amount of money to buy whatever candy he possible could carry out of the candy shop by himself. However, his eagerness was somewhat healthier than the desire of a child’s uncontrolled persistence to consume ungodly amounts of sugar and other such waxy preservative he generally avoided.

More than the death of his younger brother that had helped elevate his lust for knowledge, his own death and revival was coursing question after question after question of pure interest through his veins and awakening nerves. But first, Dr. Howell tucked his arms into the robe. The scent pressed through his nose as a token for a second chance of exploration and procedure experiments…

A stark grin more stoic than normal, as piece by piece the moments, before his death, connected each other in a suspenseful playback of how his pride to live undoubtedly killed a man, suddenly caused the inquiring questions on the subject he had just been exposed to drift away from him. Was he getting a second chance because he had been a good man? No, no, he had murdered a man. He knew the operation would fail, but he still did it…

Dr. Howell might have been lost for another half hour reviewing the past revelation of his first death if it were not for the jovially concerned tanned man, standing tall, confidently, going right to business, and questioning the affairs of Sink. The doctor’s dark eyes focused on the man, younger than him by facial features and bone structure, but he apparently was gliding through this transition of scientific necromancy much better than he himself was—and showing more awareness of the state of affairs the kingdom had been under than his own naïve self had been prior to whatever it was that was happening.

“I was dead for five years,” he spoke to no one in particular, astonished that this technology existed so amazingly. His excitement, again by the thought of his brother, subdued. The heaviness he had been feeling earlier was still present but shifting in tone at the unfortunateness of not having held onto the elusive memory because it occurred to him that he had possibly been comfortable being dead--in the same place with his brother, again. Nevertheless, Dr. Howell generally was not someone who lived primarily for himself—except in those last minutes, which he now had the opportunity to correct (assuming the answers being given were all true, and judging by the younger, more assertive male, the truth was more than likely given).

The rope around his robe was tightened into a knot; fabric shifted over his body before he pulled himself out of the pod and let the bottom of his feet touch the cool ground beneath the soles of his feet. His vision scanned the area once more from a standing point of view, observing the machinery, the workings. His heart was thumping quickly, despite his calm face. He wanted answers, but first, realizing the important ones and categorizing them was necessary. It was a fascinating situation; very fascinating.

"I'm not experiencing any headaches of the like, good doctor!" he announced, "Whatever process you executed has succeeded with flying colours! Why, I don't believe I've ever felt this good!"

“I was dead for five years,” he spoke to no one in particular, astonished that this technology existed so amazingly.

"Say, good sir... what is the state of Sink? When I... passed away, the political climate was rather hostile, so to speak. Has it changed? Has the state improved? And more importantly... why are we back?"

Doctor Kelodie grinned immensely, nodding to every reverberating word of praise from Aster's practiced voice -- though somehow he felt even more pride as Doctor Howell formed smaller words of astonishment.

"Good, good!" He scribbled on his clipboard and hurried to check on the other pods -- there appeared to be at least two more who might yet wake, according to the readouts on the mechanical panels. Excellent, excellent! He flipped more pages on his clipboard and scribbled down a few numbers, then flipped a few switches on these promising pods to ensure they would alarm if and when there was movement within. Sometimes they needed a bit of extra time.

He laughed at his clipboard in response to Aster's quick inquiries. It was as if the actor were not surprised in the least that his personality had been too big for Death to contain. "Those are loaded questions," Kelodie said, and he looked up to point with his pen at the door beside Aster. "I can confidently say that there is no more political strife to speak of -- but the reasons for political peace are not at all good. It's much easier to show you. Out that door and to the right is the stairwell up to the monastery's main hall. Pick up a pair of sandals on your way out -- we haven't exactly been keeping up with maintenance, I'm sorry to say."

Just outside the door, the hallway stretched left and right. To the left was mostly darkness, with the occasional flash of bluish light; more machines churning, thick liquids bubbling, and the faint sound of people murmuring and sobbing echoed from a room down the left corridor.

To the right was a dimly lit hall lined with soft sandals, many of which had been removed already; at the end of the hall, a stone stairwell was lit from above by a cloudy gray morning. It led up into a wide old hall littered with dust, scattered with ancient blankets and pillows, and pocked by weeds and roots. A bronze statue presided over it all: a great lion with three heads, three wings and wild painted eyes. The path between the stairwell and the open double doors had been cleared and scraped by repeated drag-marks. At each corner of the room was a blue-glowing device that whirred and spun: the points of an invisible barrier meant to keep something out.

Through the main open doors, the sounds of the forest and of shouting people echoed into the hall. A caravan was stuck in the muddy road not far from the monastery, and the traders were at this moment in the process of digging their cartwheels out of the muck.

The road, and the monastery, and the dilapidated buildings that were lined up beyond the trees, the clock tower at the far side whose painted face was poked through with branches and bramble -- all of it might seem very familiar to the newly-awakened. This was Remus, the capital city of Sink, and they were standing in the Monastery of Tula-Sing, an ancient landmark and pilgrimage site for followers of the old religion. Or, rather . . . it was.

Though they had only been dead for a handful of years, the city appeared to have been ruined centuries ago.

Aster raised an eyebrow. The doctor’s words… the information he was delivering appeared to be a mix of positive and negative ideas, though his whole body seemed to suggest some level of optimistic concern. Whatever, it wasn’t truly an issue, Aster supposed. The spry man did another stretch as he approached the door to the next room, trapped in his own little bubble as he spun together new tales in his head.

Part of him wondered what there would be to act about if there were no more political issues to speak of, but he also knew there was always another story. Perhaps that of the performer who refused to let even Death knock him from his stage. His neck cracked as he tilted his head and pulled through to the next space. His feet found a pair of sandals that were perhaps a size too large, but he didn’t mind all that much as eyes wandered through the monastery. The whole place seemed to resonate with an air of mystery and the whirring machines were like harp strings to his alive-again ears. He began to hum a cheerful tune under his breath as he wandered down the wide-arch hallways. While it was true that the place didn’t seem to invest much in upkeep, it almost added a new level of character. It felt like he was wandering through an ancient civilization – forced to abandon everything at the last moment…

Odd. With that one thought came a realm of melancholy deep within himself that he swore he buried long before his death. When he wandered into the great hall and noticed the heavy, foreboding metal beasts that grappled the place, it created a level of dissonance from the great Golden lion statue that rattled his brain.

”What have I missed?” he asked the room, eyes glued to the golden statue that made his skin feel like rough paper against himself, “Does the cycle continue? Have we discarded one tragedy only to be greeted with another? For once could Life not imitate the art that we create?”

The door stood as sentry. The last shield, and probably the last dream that needed to be shattered before he faced reality once more, but with one final step Aster greeted this future with confusion he’d never felt before.

Then he wandered back into that great hall, and his knees crumpled beneath him.

“It’s… gone. The grand stage, the audience, all of it… Have I truly been dead only a few years? Or has it been centuries…?”

---

It was unnatural how, normal Sora felt as he performed maneuver after maneuver perfectly. He may have died but it didn’t seem like he’d lost any of his muscle memory from his years of practice with the moves he’d spent so long perfecting. He stopped as the Doctor handed him a robe, which he put on quickly after mumbling a thank-you to the strange man.

It was surprising to know they were currently in an old monastery. What reasons would compel a person to resurrect the dead in a place of holy worship? "I feel… reborn. I’ve not decided if that is good or bad yet." He answered the Doctor’s question carefully, he still didn’t know what was going on here, and as it always had been, it probably was still best not to let too many of his thoughts show.

The others asked questions, while he wondered when this Doctor would explain what they’d been brought back to life for. He would have asked again, with more clarity than his last attempt at asking why, until he heard what the doctor was telling them. "1903…? This is, unnerving." Sora glanced at the machines as the Doctor explained that these were the contraptions he’d used to undo nature, unsure what to do now. If Kelodie was telling them the truth.... Sora had been dead for a little over 17 years.

The other two seemed to be cooperating with the Doctor, posing their questions to him easily. How much younger could these two be that they seem so unfazed by the inherent wrongness in this? The dead should stay dead, so why tamper with this?

He cared nothing of politics, they hadn’t been all that bad from what he could remember of them 17 years ago, but then again, he wasn’t ever really affected by who was in power or not. One freedom gained for someone who gave up so many others, like sleeping soundly at night, or sleeping at all.

”Out that door and to the right is the stairwell up to the monastery's main hall. Pick up a pair of sandals on your way out -- we haven't exactly been keeping up with maintenance, I'm sorry to say."

As soon as Kelodie told them how to get out of here, Sora took the chance. He found a pair of sandals that fit him fairly well, and as he climbed the stairs he was glad to find that the monk’s robe he was wearing had a hood, which he pulled up just as he reached the room at the top. It didn’t hide his face as well as he would have liked, but it did cast a shadow that obscured his expression slightly. He wondered for a moment if after all this time his Brotherhood still existed, but looking at the state of the monastery around him he quickly dismissed this thought. If Monks had allowed their place of worship to fall into such disarray, he could safely assume that the Brotherhood’s quarters had collapsed in on itself tenfold.

He saw Aster leave, the man having come up the stairs shortly after him, and for lack of anything better to do, he followed the seemingly affable man on his way to what must have once been a grand place. As they got there however, it looked like time had taken a great toll there. Sora couldn’t even begin to guess how old the place must be, but by Aster’s reaction he thought he must be wrong in his assumption that the place was old. After all, he didn’t remember this place, it may have been built in the time between his demise so long ago and his revival today.

“It’s… gone. The grand stage, the audience, all of it… Have I truly been dead only a few years? Or has it been centuries…?”

He couldn’t answer the man’s question, so why he felt compelled to approach him was beyond Sora’s understanding. He sat beside Aster, who had fallen to his knees in the rubble and dust. "This, feels like it can’t be the same world we left, though I must say I know much less than you of what’s going on in it now. While you say you are only a handful of years removed from your time, I am almost 17 years displaced. This is all very unfamiliar to me, and I feel there’s something very wrong here." He sighed and stood, offering a hand to help Aster to his feet as well.

”I believe we both should go back to Kelodie, and ask him what’s truly going on here. He never really answered my question earlier, why we’re even alive right now.”

As if on cue, the forest outside filled with screams.

The mud-stuck caravan -- huddled at the center square of the overgrown city -- was under attack. Mothers hugged their frightened children, men and women aimed rifles at empty space in the woods, sweeping the barrels back and forth, blind to what was happening. Shots rang out and hit nothing. All they saw was the rip and shred of their wagon canopies, ransacked by invisible claws. Glass shattered, cans and boxes tumbled out onto the ground and tossed in all directions. Leaves rustled in the wake of moving things they couldn't see. Caravaners yelped and roared and fired their pistols, but the breath and claws at their back were nothing at all. Those shots instead came close to striking their fellows, which caused an uproar of a very different kind. Their horses screeched and fought against their harnesses; wheels and wagons cracked.

To the newly revived, this was a very different scene.

A swarm of dog-sized things was attacking the caravan with hungry ferocity. They were shaped like spindly children with big round heads and frightful teeth -- almost cute, if their long thin fingers weren't curved in such frightening points. They sprang and leaped and flitted and hissed, descending upon the caravan's supply cart in alarming numbers. They shred the wagon canopy to ribbons, broke open canisters, spilled food and destroyed supplies. While the caravaners shot and swung their weapons in ridiculous directions, screaming and staring at empty space, the creatures skittered around their legs and ransacked everything they needed to survive.

"Can you see them?" Kelodie called from the stairwell door. He tossed a small burlap bag across the room to them; it hit the floor with a glassy tinkle. The bag was filled with shiny, palm-sized stones of widely varying shape and color. Gemstones?

"You're the only ones who can. You asked why you're here." He gestured toward the confusion outside the door. "That's why."

A child's screech rang out; one of the creatures had snatched up a little girl and run off with her through the treetops. Her blue dress flashed brightly as she was whisked away along the boughs. Most of the caravaners took off running after the child, who to them appeared to be floating as if by magic.

"Those things can be captured with the stones, but only the once-deceased can do it. I don't know how they work, I haven't died just yet, but the others seemed to figure it out quick enough." Kelodie was just as cheerful as ever in the face of the terror outside.

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

Time felt wasted as his mind was lost in a methodical order of how such events should play out for himself in the next several minutes. A silly thing to have imagined—remembering his own death only to reawaken under the creative experiment (seemingly) conducted under the supervision of Dr. Kelodie—and then to believe he had such a choice of how to spend the next few pennies of his existence, tinkering in an academic study he had merely made-up himself. His mind was far from understanding the entire situation, as his brain weaved together loose ends and thin strands of information the best it may. A small curl of his toes, alleviating the coolness of the hard flooring as his mind registered unevenly at the noises protruding loudly from beyond the door that had just been opened, “By golly,” he whispered lowly as his fingers caressed his forehead gently, thumb pressing lightly into his cheek.

Perhaps it was his education getting in the way of his ability to fully grasp the situation with such ease and flexibility as the minds of the other two awakened souls, and for a lack of a better proposition to impose upon himself, he decided to follow the flow of social endeavors, with one foot placed in front of the other, until he, too, was wearing a pair of slippers and peering at the tremendously odd creatures lacing the outside world. Dr. Howell wanted the strange things to be what bothered him the most—extraordinary in their appearance, physique—the laws of which they moved seemed almost irrational, but if math served him some sort of rights, their abilities were presently logical, and yet, stretching his mind further in this dimension of thought was proving a repeat exercise and stress on the inner workings of the organ. However, with his eyes narrowing and gathering the brokenness of the world, it was the environmental change of what he once knew that bothered him the most.

Desperation had clouded the world in bouts of trash and in what only seemed fair to label as fear of these creatures rummaging and pillaging the kingdom. This was not the world he once knew. For all the jaded feelings he had compressed and visited in his memory of the day he had (first) died, the treacherous ruins that lay waste in the kingdom, now, was conjuring up a flustered emotion, hot to his cheeks. The embodiment of a man who knew of patients he could never save being granted the choice to do something about this was all too meaningful to him. His sole purpose in life had been dedicated towards helping people, saving people.

His body winced at the sound of the young girl screeching in innocent terror as one of the creatures carried her away. Reckless behavior would not save her; muscles stopping himself from reacting too severely. He turned his face away and drew his attention to the bag that had been tossed on the floor. His body motioned towards the bag with a large hand extending to grab hold of one of the gemstones. His fingers pulled a single gem from the bag and brought it close to his face for examination. The colors reflected inwardly of the dim light echoing through the monastic layer. His dark eyes squinted, again, studying the dimensions and natural cut of the stone. Much had happened in those five years, and Dr. Kelodie’s optimism—Dr. Howell summarized—must have been attributed towards the success of the experiments bringing forth the dead to life and of the ability of the resurrected to capture these things that were currently destroying the world.

“How many others of us are there, might I inquire?” Dr. Howell drew his hand away from his face and clenched the gemstone with his fist. His eyes shifted to look at Dr. Kelodie. Capturing mystical-type monsters had never been on his mind as a simple doctor. Once upon a time as a child he might have lured himself into a playful toy of his imagination, but to see a reality in which something so crazy did exist was a bit too far from his once one-tracked mind, “And how—how in such an earthly name did all of this come about? I cannot think the Kingdom has succumb to such turmoil in only half a decade’s time,” his eyebrows creased together expressing the frustration that was slightly lacking in his voice, “Should we be able to locate our friends and family prior to our deaths, now?” His intentions to explain to his dearest ones what had happened to him, the Duke, the corruption—it was all rather silly and unnecessary and probably just a reminiscing story of what the Kingdom used to be in better times than now, “No…” he trailed off, now openly speaking with himself, conflicted with matters.

His hand raised again and opened to reveal the gem. His eyes left Dr. Kelodie and focused on the stone resting silently against his rough skin. The lines on his palm distorted under the gem’s coloring. Priorities were priorities. And, if there was any cowardice in him, it was towards the idea these strange creatures—or monsters—may have already ridden the world of the ones he loved and knew. His eyebrows loosened, but his frown remained. He needn’t think like that, now, but the thought seemed all too probable.

The unfamiliar hum of machinery and distant voices seemed to be what stirred Kazuki to life first, as his eyes flickered under their lids, and his brain suddenly began to shoot electrically with random thoughts and memories. The boys consciousness slowly began to float towards the surface of his mind when the alarms finally began to sound.

To Kazuki, the alarm sounded like a loud but distant wale of some sort, long and even. It wasn't until one of the scientists began to poke and prod at the boy that he finally began fully aware of his awakened state, staring at his own limbs while the nurses looked him over. He was definitely in his own body, but, it was so unnaturally new that he almost didn't recognize it. Scars he'd received from angry shop keepers or street vendors, or from squabbles with other street urchins. He even remembers having a distinct burn on his left hand from a candle he'd received while still living in the church. All of it however, and against all of his own memories, they were gone. The skin that sat in their place seemed as unmarked and smooth as when he was only just a small kid. Not that he was much older now, he recalled.

After the nurses finished with their physical exam, they quickly pulled the child out of the tube and gave him an old, rusty colored robe, which he gratefully took and wrapped around his thin and still slightly damp form. He shivered a bit, and tried to wrap his head around what was happening for a moment, but was forced into a question session with another scientists, many of the questions seeming hard to answer at first, like his memories were covered in frost.

"My name is.. Kazuki. " he said confidently, having that one piece of information down in his own mind, as it was without a doubt his name. It was just something about the way it sounded on his own tongue.

“How many others of us are there, might I inquire? And how—how in such an earthly name did all of this come about? I cannot think the Kingdom has succumb to such turmoil in only half a decade’s time. Should we be able to locate our friends and family prior to our deaths, now? -- No…”

Doctor Kelodie watched, silent, while Doctor Howell slowly came to terms with what was happening -- as if the translucency of the stone somehow contained the truth of all things. Kelodie bit his lip and glanced repeatedly out at the caravan, nervous and impatient on behalf of the losing battle being waged in the mud, of the fading screams of the child, of the destruction that, to his living eyes, seemed impossible to comprehend -- but he gave the resurrected their space. Death should have been the end of them, as far as Nature was concerned. Now they were being asked to prevent others from sharing their fate.

He took a breath, and he chose to ignore the question about family and friends -- the answer seemed already clear on Howell's face. "A dozen have left here over the past six months, each with a bag of those stones." He nodded to the sack that lay open on the floor, its contents glimmering. "As of today, I can only account for the location of one. She's keeping watch over the crypt of the Third MODO -- due north of here, alongside the lake." He glanced outside again, tapping his foot. "Y'know," he huffed with a flash of a tight grin, speaking quickly, "I really do think and believe that these things are far easier to comprehend when you've seen and interacted with them first, or else the explanations and history will make no real sense with no context, right? So I must suggest --"

A hiss of steam issued from one of a network of thin pipes that crossed the ceiling; Kelodie glanced up, and prattled even faster than before: "I must go and check on the machines immediately. I've given you all I can -- please, take those stones, seek out Rirane to the north, she has a much better grasp on the situation than I do. I'm just the mechaniker." He flashed a grin and bowed low. "Good luck," he said just before he ducked into the stairwell and disappeared into the dark below.

"Help!" a young woman cried at the foot of the sanctuary steps. She was covered in mud, her hair all askew; a spindle-armed creature clung to her back. She couldn't see the horrid thing that hung from her shoulders, grinning with sharp teeth and big eyes. It was very nearly sinking its claws into her, and she had no idea it was there. "Hello! I see you in there! Please! My sister is taken, please help us! What kind of sanctuary is this, where you all stand and watch children get kidnapped? Please, I beg you!" She stared pleadingly into the dark beyond the open door of the temple, where she had seen the moving silhouettes of people inside.

Behind her, the caravaners attacked empty air with their shovels and shot at nothing with their muskets, hoping in vain to hit one of the invisible creatures. In reality, the creatures were retreating, returning in droves into the trees and taking off as fast as they could flee. A few of the spindly creatures remained, flitting back and forth between the wagons, gleefully dodging bullets and shovels.

Sqwaaak!

An ethereal screech rang in Howell's ears, and he would see a flash of bright orange and blue feathers, partially obscured by a tree. A long black beak snapped out suddenly, catching one of the foul little beasts by the leg. This new creature stepped out from behind the tree, flinging and snapping its prey like a heron swallows a fish. This new creature was shaped like a deer, but was covered in shimmering feathers and had the long neck and sharp beak of an exotic bird. Once it had swallowed the smaller creature, the bird-deer fluffed its feathers and squawked in threat at the others.

The people of the caravan hadn't seen or noticed anything at all. The bird-deer, too, was completely invisible to everyone but Howell. He was witnessing an entirely different plane of existence overlapped with his own.

---

"My name is.. Kazuki. "

After leaving Doctor Howell in the sanctuary, Doctor Kelodie sprinted through the dim stone hall and skidded, out of breath, into the pod room -- where he immediately found a child, out of his pod and wrapped in a robe.

Doctor Kelodie stood uncertain and mystified by the child's appearance. The man who stood before Kazuki now was rather short in stature, with sandy hair and thick, multi-lensed goggles atop his forehead. He wore weathered white coat, noting his profession as a doctor, and he stared in confusion down at Kazuki.

"Hello there." He flashed a small grin and squatted down closer to the child's level. "I'm Doctor Kelodie, welcome to my lab, may I ask how you got out of your pod?"

Kelodie was very confident that he was the only person here -- he maintained and managed the lab all on his own -- but unless one of the other awakened had been helping this child, it was strange that he had so quickly got out and found himself clothes.

To Kazuki's eyes, however, he really could see the nurses and doctors that moved around the room. Some of those nurses passed through machinery as if it wasn't there, and others flickered as they walked -- all of them, of course, had been dead a long time. In a room full of people, only Doctor Kelodie appeared vibrant and whole and alive.

Kelodie caught the child's eyes tracking movement that wasn't there, and thought he understood.

"Kazuki is your name, right?" He smiled gently. "You're seeing ghosts. But don't be afraid, it's your particular gift -- yours, it seems, is even stronger than most. You're seeing things the others didn't even notice." He laughed quietly, intrigued about this new heightened sensitivity in the child -- and maybe it was exactly because this was a child that the senses were so bright.

Doctor Kelodie stood and offered a hand to Kazuki. "Come with me. There are so many things I want to show you."

Kelodie led Kazuki down a darkened hall, then up a dim staircase into a wide old hall littered with dust, scattered with ancient blankets and pillows, and pocked by weeds and roots. A bronze statue presided over it all: a great lion with three heads, three wings and wild painted eyes. The path between the stairwell and the open double doors had been cleared and scraped by repeated drag-marks. At each corner of the room was a blue-glowing device that whirred and spun: the points of an invisible barrier meant to keep something out.

This was where he had left Howell, who may or may not still be present within the sanctuary. Outside the open doors there was a lot of shouting and screeching on the muddy road below.

Cree-eeak.

A big, bright blue toad hopped slowly across the dusty floor of the sanctuary. It was the size of a dinner plate, with warty dry skin that had swirls of purple and blue and spots of yellow. The toad had three dark eyes that each blinked independently. Every time its throat expanded, a fiery sort of glow shimmered within the thin membrane.

Doctor Kelodie could not see the toad; he had no idea it was there. Instead, he let go of the child's hand and offered Kazuki a finger-sized shard of translucent green stone. Deep within the stone were pinpricks of light, like a small galaxy swirled within. "You have a very special gift, Kazuki. You're what we call an Echo. People who are Echoes can use these stones to catch strange creatures that only you can see. Would you like that? To have some very special pets?"

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

"Good luck,”

Dr. Kelodie’s wish played itself on repeat like one of those broken, black gramophones. The elaborate and florally copper cylinder that used to rest on a small, ornately carved wooden stand in his family’s living room flashed before the comfort of Dr. Howell’s mind. It’s stereophonic device used to vibrate such nice and enchanting melodies through the rooms of the household. He so much wanted to selfishly embellish on this memory like a child does his favorite stuffed animal for amenity in trying situations, but no, he did not have time for this, despite the juvenile notions that were beginning to dissuade him. There was no reason for this sudden infantile fear. If anything, this fear — this cowardice, if that is what he should call it, was so similar to the thing that had lead to his accidental murder of the Duke.

A death of a patient was bound to happen sooner or later, but a distinction had been made between the Duke and his patients. It was not gray, it was black and white and —

His thoughts stopped swaying to the repetition of Dr. Kelodie’s wish. He had not been lost long in his contemplation, but how long was long when it was the sound of a woman’s voice desperately calling for help that was bringing him back to the present? Golly, she was right. He did not have time for anymore of his monotonous thoughts to be studied and reorganized and categorized. He was not here to fix or save himself. As not just a doctor but a humane person, he had a duty to uphold. His torso bent down quickly as his legs shifted, and with one swift movement, his hand had grabbed a small sack of stones in his other fist. Again, as before, when he followed the flow of things through the present time, one foot pressed in front of the other, except this time, it was at a much more rapid and needy pace. So needy that his conservative mind thought rather little of the loose garment tied around his frame.

The air outside was the only familiar thing about Sink he could truly understand, and that was merely the feeling of the air, not the scent. He had no time to ponder this. He was at the operating table, now, and had no time for something disheartened thinking, although a preparation would not hurt… No, again, no.

Sqwaaak!

Dr. Howell’s right arm was up and ready for pitching a rock at the creature clawing at the young woman. The tendons twitched his muscles briefly at the deafeningly high-pitched sound before he willed himself to carry-out the action. He had no real explanation for why he chose to throw the colorful stone aside from the small hint of instructions given to him by Dr. Kelodie. His arm was not the best for such things — as he was not practiced in tossing and throwing objects, but if his athleticism and close-distance served him right, hopefully, this action would do some good. The stone jetted from his open palm as Dr. Howell followed his body’s motions through the movement, and a little after the magical stone had made contact with the creature, he was able to pull the young woman towards him. Her muddied hair pressed to his robe as he grasped her tightly and looked around in solemn distraught prior to taking in several calming breaths for himself and looking down at the woman, “Are you hurt?” His voice sounded nurturing as if he were speaking to a child as opposed to an adult, and perhaps, it was not the time and place to be asking these questions. However, the words spilled out of him like an old habit that would not die, much like himself, apparently, and he found himself thinking that there had to be more he could do. Of course, there was. This was why he was brought back to life.


Indeed, if he wanted to do more, he would have to keep moving. Yes, but no, again, no. His mind was racing and trying to calm itself, to find a relaxing sequence of rational thoughts. The total chaos was frightening, and it made his lips tighten into a small, serious frown. Sink was in dire trouble; and much hard work was to be done; but first, he should acquire better garments for travel; at least, after finding out if this poor woman was alright.

The little orange shard of stone darted through the air, propelled by the good doctor's newly minted throwing-arm. It struck the ugly little scrabbling creature square between its wide alarmed eyes -- and the stone passed neatly through into the creature's skull.

The beasts sharp bitey mouth opened wide: "RrrryyyEEEEEEAAAAAAAAKKKK!" The screech sent all the other creatures scattering for the forest, though among the humans only Doctor Howell was able to hear it.

The creature dropped immediately off the woman's back. As it fell, its body became translucent, shimmering like a foggy vapor.

The orange shard of stone landed in the dirt at the woman's feet, bright with an orange glow that pulsed deep inside. The creature was gone.

After an alarmed glance at the stone she thought at first had been aimed at her, the woman peered up at the strange man who had thrown it, who now held her in an awkward and extremely inappropriate embrace. The moment her mind had caught up to what had just happened, she pounded a fist on his chest.

"Don't touch me, let go!" She ripped away from him, stumbled back, smoothed her hair out of her annoyed and uncertain face. The glow of the gemstone caught her attention; she kept an eye on Howell while she bent to pick it up, and she examined the warm glowing stone before she held it out to return it to him, her eyes daring him to step any closer.

"You can see them." It was a bold statement, but she knew it to be true as soon as she'd said it. His eyes had been tracking things that shouldn't exist -- not to mention he'd just stepped out of a temple that was rumored to be inhabited by Echoes. Her mouth formed a thin line. "I'm Rin. My sister Mia was taken by those things. You can help us find her, can't you?" she demanded, and refused to accept any answer she didn't want to hear.

Behind her, the chaos had abated. The caravan was in shambles, and the merchants had begun to clean up and right the spilled barrels and crates. In the forest, a small troupe of the merchants still called out Mia's name, searching the trees fruitlessly for signs of the taken child.

Rin moved back toward the caravan and gestured Howell to follow. "Please, take anything and everything you might need -- we have clothes and weapons, food if you're hungry. If you really can see and fight those things, if you can really get Mia back, everything we have is yours. Please hurry."

Kazuki stood among the many drifting figures of nurses and doctors, quietly watching them with dazed and curious eyes, which in truth, were only hiding how nervous the child felt. He couldn't recall anything about where he was, or who any of these people were. His last memories were filled with snow and felt so cold, but this situation just did not match. It was like he was missing memories, and that scared him. He didn't have time to act on his own feelings though when another person entered the room. It might seem odd that he would notice a single person in a room filled with so many other people, but for some reason, this person was different.. brighter, almost. It was as if he radiated a sort of vibrancy that the boy hadn't realized the others in the room had been missing. Kazuki felt so bewildered by the man that all he could do was stare while he approached and knelt down to speak.

"Hello there.. I'm Doctor Kelodie, welcome to my lab, may I ask how you got out of your pod?"

Kazuki finally felt himself come back to the present moment then, and his eyes finally began to follow the other figures in the room again, this time truly focusing on their movements.

"Kazuki is your name, right? You're seeing ghosts. But don't be afraid, it's your particular gift -- yours, it seems, is even stronger than most. You're seeing things the others didn't even notice."

The raven haired boy set his eyes back on Doctor Kelodie and seemed even more uneasy, thought once again, he attempted to hide it behind cold, curious dark eyes. His toes curled in with anxiety though, while he mulled over what the doctor had said. a gift? and ghosts?? What had he been gifted with? The boy stared at Kelodie a bit more honestly now, looking like he was having a difficult time deciding whether to trust the stranger. He seems honest and kind, but anyone can do that if they try.

"Come with me. There are so many things I want to show you."

Kazuki finally decided to just follow, too uneasy and still dazed to think of a better plan, and not willing to stay in a room that was apparently full of ghosts, however kind they might be. After walking for a few minutes, dark eyes carefully tracing the corridors of the massive structure. They entered a courtyard after a few more minutes, and then a room that contained an amazing machine that hummed and churned and swathed the room in a faint blue light. Immediately, the boy found himself enticed by the machines, curiosity momentarily overriding his unease. The sudden deep, scratchy croak of something suddenly pulled him from the object though, making him jump a bit and spin around to look for the source.

It was a frog.. maybe? The boy stared at the creature with the same engrossing curiosity, but also a good amount of apprehension, unsure whether what he was seeing as actually real or some sort of weird ghost thing? He looked to the doctor, hoping for some sort of similar reaction to the frog, but was disappointed when it seemed that the man wasn't aware of the creature at all. Before he could ask though, the man handed the child a stone, which swirled and shined like the night sky, and immediately caught the child's interest. He listened to the doctor speak while he traced his fingers over the stone.

"You have a very special gift, Kazuki. You're what we call an Echo. People who are Echoes can use these stones to catch strange creatures that only you can see. Would you like that? To have some very special pets?"

So that was his special gift? He could catch these ghost creatures with this stone? Was it magic then? Or... was he magic? The boy couldn't really understand how it worked, but the idea that it would, and that he was special for being able to, completely snagged the boys interest. As scary and odd as this situation was, he had never had anyone to look to but himself for life decisions, so it felt natural to simply go with his own gut and hope for the best.

"Yeah.." Kazuki finally said in a soft hum, smiling a bit at the stone. This entire situation was like something straight out of a story; it was any child's dream come true. But, how did it work? He wasn't exactly sure what he needed to do, and so, being a child, he simply did the first thing he thought might work. Approaching the frog, Kazuki curiously touched the stone to the frog's head, and waited. With little delay, the stone was suddenly sucked into the frog's skin, forcing the child to pull his hand back in alarm. He back peddled a few feet and watched the creature squeal in pain from the stone, quickly turning into a foggy image of itself, and suddenly fading into nothing but the stone, which by the end, sat on the stone floor.

"It worked!" he said in bewilderment, looking from the stone to Doctor Kalodie and then back to the stone in excitement. Feeling it safe now, Kazuki picked the stone back up, rolling it in his hand for a moment. It felt warm, and oddly, the colors had changed. It still looked like the night skies, but now with splotchy galaxies of bright blue, purple, and yellow. "What do I do now?" he suddenly turned to Kalodie, eyes bright with excitement.

Excellent. Excellent.

Lucas could hear all sorts of noises around him, though it was taxing to try and make out what exactly they were. The sounds of something mechanical; churning, clanking, and hissing around him, or… maybe some things…? Without warning, his eye was forced opened, light flooding into his sight around a dark silhouette. It was intense and painful, as if he had awoken from a prolonged slumber. That was hardly the case though… His eye shut, allowing a moment of relief from the stinging light…

Sight and consciousness. Brilliant!

Sight… consciousness… where exactly was he? Lucas struggled compose himself, regaining his sense of self from his dreamy, dazed state. Slowly, he forced himself to open his eyes, the light stinging to him once more, though this time Lucas could bare through it. It only took a moment for his eyes to adjust, the light becoming less and less intense until he could make out a dim light about him. Hardly what he expected, though he paid it no mind. After letting his eyes dart around for a moment, looking around in what he could only descried as some sort of pod, it was time that Lucas attempted movement.

Though easier said than done, he first hoisted his head up, placing his arms in position before finally forcing his upper half upward. It was hardly by much, but Lucas had positioned himself just enough to make out the surrounding area; a dimly lit room, rusty and oil stained, lined with all sorts off pods similar to his own.

“Where in the world…?” Lucas muttered, trying to make sense of how he could possibly end up in a place such as this.

At the very least though, it appeared that Lucas was not alone, making out other figures in the capsules around him, but more so his attention was drawn to the man lurking around the room and inspecting each and every pod. The sand hair man seemed to be taking notes of some sort, which was more than a little unsettling given the mystery behind Lucas’s whereabouts. For a moment, Lucas opened his mouth to speak, but something stopped him as he felt his throat close up. He could feel a sort of anxiety fill him, not necessarily from speaking to the man, but more so the answer he may give.

He was not sure he really wanted to know the answer.

---

Not even a second after he'd finished speaking, a chorus of screams rose up outside. Faster than Aster or anyone else watching would've thought possible of the young man, Sora was outside the theater and scanning the scene for the source of the uproar. It only took a second for him to realize the caravan across the way was under attack, though by what was a question he couldn't answer. He crossed the square, getting back to the monastery just in time to hear Kelodie's brief explanation of what was going on.

Sora took one of the stones from the bag just after Howell did, a bright blue gem which he held tightly, hidden perfectly in his closed fist as he stepped to the very edge of the shadows in the doorway, watching the scene outside for a moment as he thought. The girl's screams rang out louder than any noise he could remember, and he flinched at the sound. He felt the urge to go and help, or try to at least, but his conscience seemed slower to revive than the rest of him. Innocent people were never any of his concern before, why should they be now, when he really had nothing to gain from helping them?

He listened to Howell and Kelodie's conversation, until Kelodie ran off and Howell still stood there, lost in his own thoughts as the scene outside grew only more desperate. Sora saw one of the people from the caravan, a woman, starting to come over to the monastery. He left before she could get there, disappearing into the shadows as he reached the treeline, making his way over to the caravan. He wasn't sure why he was bothering to do this, he was right in thinking that he probably had nothing to gain from helping these people, but he also knew that he was not supposed to even be alive at all right now. If he was going to be an abomination, he might as well try to be a useful one, right?

A flash of colors caught his eye as he got to the caravan. A bird-like creature had appeared among the rest, and considering it was eating the little black things, it didn't seem all that friendly to them. He froze, taking cover behind a tree as the a few of the people's stray bullets came close to hitting him, before ducking out and tossing the strange little blue stone at the deer-shaped bird. It seemed to pass into the bird-thing's head, before the creature squawked one last time and dissipated into vapor, which then was sucked into the stone itself as it fell to the ground. He went to pick it up as a loud screech rang out from somewhere, causing all the other little beasts to run back into the forest.

Sora glanced through the trees at the retreating monsters before turning to face the remains of the caravan. People were no longer shooting blindly at the air now, though he could hear some who were deeper in the forest, calling out the name of the taken child. He took a second to think before stepping out into the sunlight to address the people of the caravan. What would he say? He walked up to one of the small groups of men standing nearby, bowing his head slightly in greeting before he spoke.

"Excuse me. I think, I may be able to help you get the girl back from those creatures. But, if I am to help you, could you help me first?" He gestured to himself, pulling the hood of his borrowed robe down as he did so the men could see his face. "I need a proper outfit, as well as some decent weapons since this," He held up the blue stone, which now pulsed with a mixed orange and blue light, "Seems to have only one use."