Chapter 8: Chapter 8 - Stephanie's Tale (Part 1)
The colorless curtains glowed with a tinge of bright orange, a crack of sunlight beaming through, it's glow smearing the wooden floorboards, forming a narrow bridge of light that trailed towards two legs laying motionless, stretched out, and beyond that, a torso belonging to that of a boy, sitting against a bed slightly dampened by tears. A phone in one hand, the other lazily sprawled out onto the floor. His eyes, puffy and swollen, still wet, an unfocused gaze out the window, on a face devoid of any sort of emotion. Empty... hollow as a shell.
Subaru sat unresponsive, blinking only occasionally. Unthinking, unfeeling. Within his barren mind, evoked a recollection of a time gravely identical to the conditions of his current state. An empty husk of himself, incapable of speech, of life. Like a machine that ceased its functioning, taken apart, with all of its components missing. It was a time he tried, only to fail... an endless loop of self-destruction. All his valiant, albeit, erratic efforts, amounting up to nothing.
Nothing. A word that best describes his expertise, excelling at a field lacking in any sort of use, benefiting no one, and most usually, hurting everyone, and this one fact alone, extinguished the already dying flame inside him, snuffing the toiling embers in its wake.
Even when a faint knocking was heard, he paid little heed to the sound, even less, when the creaking of a door stirred the sullenness air to life. The footsteps shortly after, were practically inaudible to the misty-eyed Subaru.
"There you are. I thought that was your messy hair hiding behind the bed."
A voice full of energy and life, imposed upon the gloominess that had lingered on for far too long. Soft, gentle and womanly.
"Just thought I'd make sure you didn't run out on us again."
Almost in a trance, Subaru slowly turned his head to the side, looking up. A sight of bright yellow met his heavy, lifeless eyes. A nightgown belonging to a body of a woman, smiling with eyes still drowsy. Clumps of hazel brown hair, scruffy and rumpled, running down the length of her body, stopping only at her hip.
"Stephanie..." He said, voice silent and gruff.
"Good morning to you too, Subaru." She greeted him with cheer.
Subaru stared at her, unblinking. Her figure was basked by the warm glitter of sunlight, almost like a personification of the sun itself. Her eyes, kind and bright, green as a four-leaf clover in a bountiful meadow. A complexion the shape of a heart, with a smile that could cheer even the worst days in life. It was as if he was staring at a sunflower, in a season of full bloom.
His transfixed stare did not go unnoticed by Stephanie, whose lively expression quickly changed to that of concern, catching sight of his reddened eyes.
"Hey... did something happen?" She inquired, bending low, hands on her knees.
He knew that look, having been subjected to it times aplenty, each always feeling like the first. It was the worried look of a mother, uneasy for her child. The softened yet tensed expression. Eyes, care and sympathy defined clearly within, with a tone of voice that urges you to spill your troubles, knowing full well that they will understand you, no matter the circumstances.
Just seeing that, even if it was just a short glance, was enough to pull at his heartstrings, and without even realizing it, tears were already beginning to stream down his still moistened cheeks.
"S-Subaru? What happened? What's wrong?"
His hand made a futile attempt to stifle his sobs ever growing, a chocking noise emerging from the depths of his throat. He shook his head rapidly, barren of reasons to do so, as his clogged nose made an attempt at an inhale. All the while, Stephanie's bewildered, concerned expression seen just barely over distorted vision.
"I'm sorry..." He choked, red in the face and looking away. "I just--I don't know, I'm just--I'm sorry..."
He managed a trembling exhale, an effort in vain at calming his impulsive breakdown.
The resemblance to his mother was uncanny, unsettling so, to the point where he didn't know what to do or what to say to her, all he wanted to do, eternally, was apologize, over and over again, without really knowing why. He wanted to hug her tightly, and never let go, begging for absolution for everything he has done.
It was at that exact moment he realized, he wasn't numb, or apathetic, or even empty, It was the exact opposite. Every emotion he thought gone, had surreptitiously been culminating inside of him, teeming with the pain, the suffering, all threatening to overflow.
Hearing her compassionate voice merely loosened the top that sealed these feelings within. It was gone now, emotions restraint no longer in a capped bottle, flowing in the form of bitter unyielding tears, expressing raw unbridled misery, howling the guilt, the longing.
"I didn't... mean to cry, I'm sorry... so sorry. God, I sound like-- such a chicken, don't I? I'm sorry..."
"Subaru, there's nothing to be sorry about. You haven't done anything wrong. Why? What's happened? Tell me, I'll listen to anything you have to say." She said with a tone so gentle and kind, as she crouched down beside him, a hand resting reassuringly on his thigh.
It was hard to convey to her the tremendous ache pounding in his chest, capable of mustering only small words through unsteady muttering, words that were direct and blunt.
"I miss my parents."
His sorrow, now uttered, rang in the air. Traces of languished pain screaming with little cries, the craving of a sheltered love endowed exclusively by a mother and father. And Subaru knew they sounded pathetic out loud.
It reminded him of his first day in preschool, bawling his eyes out in front of the other kids, yearning for his parents to come back. And they did... to promise him everything was going to be fine, to tell him never to be afraid, and to hold him tight and assuage him of all his fears, only ever letting go when he felt safe and calm in their arms.
The memory of it bolstered a twinge in his chest, forcing his eyes to water even more, a rising lump in his throat made it harder to speak, but continued on despite his wavering voice.
"I want--I want to tell them... I-I'm sorry. But I-I can't..."
"Why can't you?" Asked Stephanie softly.
"Because I don't know how to." He said through heavy wails. "They... They're too f-far away. I can't reach them t-there... from here. I don't know how to see them, but I want to go see them... I want to go so much."
Stephanie looked on at the sad state of Subaru, mouth slightly agape, looking lost and confused. Struggling to find the perfect way to console the crying boy with so little context relayed. Slowly, breaking the lament undisturbed, she spoke very gently.
"Subaru... Kris and I... we can help you look for your parents, I'll ask friends of mine to keep a look out as well. Tell me where they are, we'll find th-"
"YOU CAN'T HELP ME!" He bellowed suddenly, a vein throbbing in his flushed face. "YOU CAN'T.... you can't... you can't help me... It's impossible."
She flinched, jolted into hurt silence, watching as he try with best effort to subside his whimpers through deep gulps of air.
"I'm... sorry, I didn't mean to... yell." He said, wiping a runny nose with a sleeve. "I miss them... that's all."
He didn't stop, he continued on, voice shaking evermore.
"I just miss... playing with--with my dad, losing to him, winning again him... it was fun... sometimes... it would end in a tie, b-but it didn't matter... we had so much fun, we didn't care. So much... we would make so much noise... neighbors would complain to my mom and... and my mom... my mom..."
The back of his eyes burned with tears, leaking down the glistening line composed solely of residual droplets. Remembering with unquantifiable regret, the things she would do that he had foolishly taken for granted.
His laundry, that would sit on his bed, neatly folded and stacked into sorted piles. His room, always coming back to it after school in pristine condition, no matter how defiled it was the day before. And the lunch boxes, dutifully placed onto the table for his taking... All those chances he had, and he never once thanked her for everything she has done for him.
"... I miss her food... she would cook so much for me, too much to even... to even finish... But I would still finish it all... because... because it just tasted so... so good... It was so nice."
He fought back with extreme difficulty, the unrelenting pain that seared with anguish at every fleeting image of her. A barrage of memories, crashing with synced emotions on a face broken into ruins.
"T-Then she would sm-smile at me as I handed her the plate... and I would smile back at her and thank her... for making me such... such a delicious meal."
He drew a large quivering breath, feeling drained of all his energy, the capsule of emotions depleted, its contents spilling, dripping on extensive space, only they were tears on once dry floorboards.
"I miss them... I want to see them again... That's all I want."
It never occurred to him how much he actually was wishing for their love, not until it was too late... A year, maybe even more now... He has been gone... How long more until they finally get over the loss... How long, until the void in their lives were patched, healing and finally forgetting.
The weeping stopped. His unearthing of this brief thought derived from his state of despair taking hold of him.
Maybe... that would actually be for the best. Once their grieving was done, it will take time, but they will be happy once again.
"You'll see them... I'll make sure of that. Just tell me Subaru, where are they? I won't rest until I find them." Said Stephanie, but Subaru did not take heed of it.
For the suffering he put them through... How could he want? How could he wish? He was undeserving of their love, of their tears, of their worries. It'd be best if he'd just stay away from them... and stay here. Suffering is all he would do, inflicting them with more of it. Just like with Emilia, just like with Rem...
"Subaru it's alright... you can talk to me. You can rely on me, I promise."
He turned towards Stephanie, meeting her cautiously benevolent eyes, and wondered how long it would take until those same eyes would be staring back at him with affliction and grief. The very thought of it, battered the accursed mentality of solitude further into his skull. The final nail that sealed his thoughts of justified isolation within.
"Why..." He began slowly, his tears halting its flow. "do you want to help me?"
For once, it was Stephanie's turn to fall silent. Blinking with narrowed eyebrows at the question.
"Because I'm worried for you obviously." She said almost impatiently. "I come into your room and here you are crying your eyes out... You want to find your parents, I understand. In fact, that's all I can understand and that's enough for me. Believe me when I say, I will help you no matter what."
"But why?" He said despairingly. "I'm useless. All I do is ask, all I do is beg... I run when things don't go my way... I cry for help when I'm lost, like I am now! I can't do anything by myself! I'm useless! My parents... they're better off without me..."
"That isn't true, Subaru." Said Stephanie, her voice softening with solemnity.
"How do you know it isn't true?!" He hissed through gritted teeth, eyebrows twitching on a face wracked so much with pain. "It's been so long for them... days, months, years for all I know! They haven't seen me in so long... They'd have given up already anyway!"
Stephanie looked on with patience, giving a surrendering sigh, shaking her head.
"Alright... you asked for it."
She shifted her position, joining Subaru on the hard wooden floor, her legs also stretching out, right beside his. She flashed an amused smile towards him, seeing his confusion and closed her eyes briefly, deep in thought, before exposing them again to the rays of orange light.
"I don't know if Kris has told you yet. Actually, I don't think he'd even want to talk about it at all to be honest. But you see, if things had turn out alright in the past, Helen would have had an older sibling with her right here, and at the tender age of ten."
The effect her words had on Subaru, seemed to be within her expectations, giving a sorrowful smile, one Subaru conceived before to be of feigned warmth, now more prominent than ever, as her gaze turn to the window, and the rising sun within it.
"Kris and I... we grew, met and married in Lugunica, and to top it all off, we even settled in its outskirts. He was a knight and I was just your regular housewife, living in a beautiful village with the kindest people you'll find anywhere. It was bliss. The air, cool and fresh. Children chasing each other left and right, mothers gossiping away over a cup of tea and fathers... well, they do whatever guys do when they're together."
She stopped for a moment, relishing the memory in private, before resuming her story once again.
"I remember exactly when it happened. It was a very chilly morning, kinda like this one. I was feeling rather sick, everything I do was completely nauseating... couldn't even clean a thing, what a lousy wife, huh? Anyway, it didn't let up during the day, so I paid a visit to the capital to see a healer. I remember him looking at me, with a big grin on his face, and I remember being confused... I also remember those words he said to me afterwards that changed my life forever, 'You're pregnant, Stephanie. Congratulations!'
"I couldn't believe my ears... my heart felt like it was going to burst. When I went home that evening, I couldn't even sit still waiting for Kris and when he finally arrived that night... oh, you should have seen the look on his face when I told him. Absolutely hilarious.
"Well, you can guess what happened next. We were excited, we were over the moon, but probably most of all, we were frightened out of our wits. We had no idea how to raise a baby and we were only in our early twenties. We felt like kids, lost in the scary world of Adulthood. But the neighbors would always come by and give their support and I will always feel more confident afterwards. It was a lot of fun too, forever guessing it's gender. Kris thought it'd be a girl, but I was leaning more towards on having a boy. But either way, I knitted more than enough clothes for either of the two. Day by day, night by night, we waited in anticipation... Eventually we decided on the names, 'Harold' for a boy and 'Helen' for a girl."
As she went on and on, her tale captivating Subaru into soundless silence, the smile she had on gradually lessen with every passing word, until finally, it had completely been discarded, abandoning the story midway through, instead substituted for an expression that was best suited on a being of extreme forlorn.
"Days turn into months... and soon I started experiencing the painful things that comes with pregnancy. Kris would tell me to stay in bed, he wanted to take a whole month off to look after me, you see... But he didn't have to, that's what I told him... I told him a friend would be more than glad to watch over me. Eventually he agreed... very reluctantly though, I can tell you. And then he was off, a few weeks assignment to escort the king to the northern province. That was a mistake of mine, wasn't it?"
Though the question came with a quick smile, Subaru felt no urge to answer it, sensing the sudden shift of tone in her voice, tensed and unwilling.
"At first, it was all fine... all was still right in the world, but that all change by the end of the second week.. It happened in the middle of the night and it took just a second, one moment everything was so peaceful, the next... all I could hear were screams and roars. When I went to look out the window, I saw... people being eaten, my friends... people I got to know, being consumed alive right in front of my eyes... A wolgarm pack broke into the town somehow, and they were eating everything they could find. The wooden doors didn't stand a chance, all of them were broken down as if they were nothing... and all I could do was watch... from a window by the front door. It was stupid of me, I know.
"I don't know... every time I think about it, I think to myself of all the things I could have done different. I could have done this or that, but I didn't... All I did was run out the door when I had the chance, waited, until they were focused on somethi--somebody else... and that's what I did, running along the road towards the capital, pushing through the chaos of people and beasts, ignoring the shouts for help, the shrilling cries of children... screaming to be saved... I ran by so many of them... and they were all staring at me... begging... I could have easily grabbed one of them with me, but I didn't..."
Strain was heard in her voice, parting only at the end of the last sentence, with enormous effort to shroud the fact with a silence that attempted to regain what little composure was left, beginning again after a deep breath.
'I ran as fast as I could, with one hand over my belly, and hoping--though I regret doing it now--that the beasts would go after the other people running alongside me. But... at that time... I was already not feeling too good, everything ached, and eventually... the other survivors were all far ahead of me... I tried calling for them to come back and help me, but... under those circumstances... who would, right?"
There were no tears, but there was remorse. A great amount of it, showing on her face, suddenly gaunt and devoid of the cheerfulness she had arrived with. Subaru felt to blame for that, guilty to have her relive such traumatizing memories. He knew where it was going and he didn't want to hear anymore... wanting to interject, to interrupt, before she breaks, but found himself lost of his voice, seeing a sense of resolution hidden beneath the mask of regret, exerting a compelling want to be left undisturbed.
"That's when I fell forward... It happened so fast, I tried to turn myself away, fall to the side, but I was... slow and I paid the price... fell flat on my stomach... and I stayed in that position for so long... realizing what had just happened. But... that wasn't the final blow. There was growling right behind me... when I heard it, I got up as fast as I could, everything below my chest hurt so much while I ran and ran and ran begging to whoever was listening that my baby would be alright. But again... I was just so slow... one of them caught up to me, and it's teeth sunk into one of my legs... Right here, see?"
She pulled up her nightgown, baring her long slender legs, and Subaru saw, right above her right heel, a disfigured patch of scarred skin, faded yet still glaringly visible. His gaze stayed frozen on the spot, only tearing away once Stephanie pulled it back down to cover the blemish.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone