3 - Portal Travel’s Closed

“They didn’t just alter his memories.” Ausra said, shocked at the lack of response. ”They completely neutered him. Can he even use his own soul expression?”

“Let’s check that.” Jian said. “Dima, are you aware of your own soul prowess? Do you know what it is?”

“I mean, kinda? Yeah, I-I know what it is.” Dima replied, his voice a little shaky, drops of sweat slowly streaming down his neck. It wasn’t even that hot.

“Are there any specific abilities that you feel drawn to? Or anything you feel like you can do?”

“No, nothing really...look, I think you’re confusing me with someone else.” Dima said, taking a step back. “I think you’re all either confused or taking the piss out of me, in which case, fuck you, it’s not funny anymore.”

“You have the nerve to call this a joke?” Sakuto said, taking a step forward. “You could be a ticking bomb for all I care.”

“D-dude, what’s your problem?” Dima asked. “Hey, come on, Oskar, tell ‘em something! Ausra, Ichika, Oskar, you guys know me, right? Tell ‘em something!”

“What do you propose, Sakuto?” Oskar asked.

“You’re not gonna like it anyways.” Sakuto said. “You’ll get upset at me while knowing that I’m making the right call.”

“...”

“I suggest we chop his head off.” Sakuto said.

“Yeah right.” Oskar sighed. “Fuck off. You’re not doing that to my friend.”

“Is that even your friend anymore?” Sakuto asked. “Just look at how much he changed. It’s not ‘Dima’ anymore, it’s just a body with half its memories deleted. It doesn’t even recognize the fact that it changed! We’d be doing him a damn favor.”

“You’re not touching him.” Oskar said. “The same goes for anyone here. None of you are laying a finger on him as long as I’m here.”

“You know how much stronger I am than you, right?” Sakuto said, sounding much more aggressive.

“Okay dude.” Oskar said, not even wanting to believe that he’s saying such things. “Is that supposed to be a threat?”

“You’re not seeing things right.” Sakuto said. By that time, most of the crowd had fallen silent, letting the two rock the stage. “He’s dangerous. There is a chance there are instructions implanted in his head.”

“You’re making this call only because you don’t like him.” Oskar said.

“And you’re making this call because you do!” Sakuto lashed out. “I don’t want anything to happen to you because of some amnesiac prick that you think is your friend. So what if he’s a friend? What has he done for you?”

“Just...shut up.” Oskar said.

“Hayk died, and what did he do? He switched sides, leaving everyone to just rot away and solve all the issues by ourselves. What if one of us died because we didn’t have enough muscle?” Sakuto said. “He bailed on everyone, and if I didn’t make it clear yet, he bailed on you!”

“He had his reasons!”

“Right, getting pussy. That was his sole reason.” Sakuto said. “There’s this one thing called loyalty, Oskar. If you don’t care that he threw you away like a used condom, at least care about the fact that he did that to us.”

“What the fuck are you even talking about?” Dima raised his voice. “What’s up with all these allegations?”

“You shut your mouth!” Sakuto yelled, and quickly, a shadow tentacle smacked him in the stomach, causing great enough pain to make Dima kneel down, holding the area of impact and growling in discomfort. Thankfully it didn’t have enough force behind it to cut his body in half.

“What the hell is wrong with you?!” Oskar said, quickly rushing over to Dima and helping him stand back up. Sakuto would’ve usually come up with a witty and self-downplaying response when confronted with such a statement, but now he just looked in silence. As if he almost began to realize that perhaps there could’ve been a different, less violent course of action. He felt a palm touch his shoulder, it was Ichika, in her attempt to prevent further escalation.

The wind blew past them.

“I don’t want anything to happen to you.” Sakuto said, now sounding quieter, and even a little scared.

“You’re just deranged.” Oskar said, expressing himself in a way that conveyed his intention to close the meeting and walk off. “Either you’re hating the guy for no reason, or you just can’t process the fact that I have friends other than you.”

“Before you leave...” Ichigo said, stepping forward a little. ”I apologize for interrupting, but there’s been a request from Victoria and Matilda Thomas. We need to decide on who is going to Warsaw, and who is staying here. This...was going to be the main reason for this meeting.”

“I’ll go there.” Oskar said. “And I’ll take Dima with me.”

“I’ll go with him.” Ausra said. Both Oskar and Ichika were surprised at that decision.

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“Ausra?”

“He shouldn’t be there alone.” Ausra replied to Ichika.

“He wasn’t going to.” Jian said. “Considering the request was written with quite a lot of visible concern, I’ll head there as well, accompanied by Yuuka Hoshikawa.”

“Yay! More traveling! :D” Yuuka cheered.

“If there aren’t any further details to go over, we can consider this meeting concluded.” Jian said. After a deafening silence, she gave a small nod to the ‘audience’ and everyone went their ways. Sakuto, however, stood still. He locked eyes with Oskar for a few seconds.

Oskar shook his head in slight disapproval, while Sakuto still looked angered, as if he wanted to get something off of his chest, but the chance to do so had already flown away into the endless sky.

“I’m sorry if now is not the time to break any news, but Mr. Kamiki asked me to inform you that your comrade, Rin, will be joining you in Krakow.” Ichigo said, approaching Sakuto.

“Thanks for letting me know.” Sakuto replied, without even realizing who was talking to him.

And they parted ways...

[WARSAW]

“The hotel should be somewhere around here. It’s probably the taller building up ahead.” Oskar said, walking towards their new home. Dima was right next to him, and Ausra was falling behind a little.

“You.”

Oskar quickly summoned his weapon and turned towards the direction of the deep female voice that called for him. His presence flared up, but would soon go down as he saw that it was a figure he was supposed to meet at some point. More specifically, it was the person that demanded he be stationed in Warsaw.

“Perhaps you should have arrived earlier.” Matilda said, exiting the narrow alleyway she hid in. Victoria followed her, albeit a little more hesitantly. “It is too late to conduct business now.”

“Huh?”

“Where is Captain Jian Fang?” Matilda asked. “And most importantly, what business is a dormant soul doing here?”

“A dormant soul?” Oskar asked. “What do you-” He fell silent as the realization struck him like a sledgehammer to the forehead.

“His presence is that weak?” He asked himself, looking at Dima before facing Matilda again.

“The dormant soulful is with me.” Oskar said. “And I don’t know where the captain is. Why are you here? Aren’t you supposed to be in a base somewhere? That’s where we were gonna meet up.”

“This one’s got an attitude.” Matilda sighed. “The base was attacked and overtaken by the opposition. Originally you were meant to arrive here and help us defend it, but now, it seems like the task is to retake it.”

“So that’s what we gotta do? Retake a base?” Oskar asked. “Sounds doable.”

“Hey uhh, you sure you can pull it off though?” Dima asked. “We’ll probably need some heavy artillery. I mean, it depends on what kind of base we’re talking about, but...”

“Your friend doesn’t seem so well-versed.” Matilda said. “Should I be concerned?”

“He’s my friend.” Oskar said. “And if you’re also gonna threaten to kill him, I won’t cooperate.”

“What an inspiring relationship you two have.” Matilda chuckled.

“Please, we need your assistance in retaking the base.” Victoria pleaded. “We can’t let her get here.”

“We don’t need their assistance. We need the assistance of one specific person.” Matilda said. “Where is Sakuto Hitori? We requested that he be here specifically.”

“Oh, that guy again...” Dima grunted.

“What’s up with Sakuto?” Oskar asked. “Why him?”

“Because we know for a fact that he is strong enough to keep up with the devils that infest this stronghold.” Matilda smirked. “He was quite the fellow when I met him. No offense, but just by your presence alone, I doubt you can do the type of work he can.”

“What type of enemy are you fighting?” Ausra suddenly barged into the conversation.

“A powerful mech-like opponent, believed to be remotely controlled.” Victoria said. “Katya Petrovna’s creation. It’s about four times the size of a human.”

“And guess who destroyed a mech that was taller than most buildings here.” Ausra said. “It wasn’t Sakuto Hitori, it was Ichika. She used her divine acclamation to, quote, destroy it in one shot.”

“What are you implying?” Matilda asked.

“I’m saying that we can carry this out very efficiently.” Ausra said. “I have a divine acclamation, and it's capable of delivering an immense destructive force to blow up anything in its path.”

“How intriguing.” Matilda’s smirk grew even wider. “What a nice selection of soldiers Kaito has.”

“He’s keeping Sakuto busy was something else, isn’t he? Is he that scared of leaving his back open to her advances?”

“We have the captain here too. She’ll support us.” Oskar said.

“Whatever.” Matilda sighed, turning around. “Whatever works. What a bummer that Sakuto Hitori is too busy amusing Kaito...”

“Sakuto this, Sakuto that, everything’s about that fucking guy...” Oskar mumbled.

“Oskar?” Ausra asked, as if she just heard something unforgivable.

“I’m tired, alright?” Oskar said. “I don’t wanna be reminded of whatever the hell happened earlier during the meeting either.”

“So what’s wrong?” Ausra asked, settling a little closer to him. She was surprised to see Oskar sharply step away.

“It’s okay.” Oskar said, frowning a little. “I just need some time to think about some stuff.”

“Looks like you have some problems with that Sakuto guy.” Dima said.

“I just need to think some stuff over.” Oskar said. “I’d prefer if I was alone when I did that.”

“Right, but uhh...I gotta tell you something though.” Dima said. “I need your help with something specific.”

“What?”

“I want to propose to Anna.” Dima said.

“Propose...?”

“I feel like the world is getting crazier by the day. I wanna at least experience getting married before everything goes haywire, you know what I mean?” Dima explained. “I already booked a restaurant, I want you to be there with me.”

“Why me?” Oskar asked. “You’re the one who wants to get married, apparently...”

“Because I want you to be there, man. I want you to hype me up in case I start getting doubts, you know what I mean?” Dima said. “Just don’t tell anyone anything about this, it’s gonna be a total surprise.”

“Ugh...I’ll think about it.”

“Come on, man. Please.” Dima smiled. “You’re the only guy I can trust.”

“...”