While the bond between Prince and Irene was beginning to form in laughter, shoves and punches, Elian was not doing well. NOT AT ALL.
Three days had passed on the run—or so it felt to him—running as if they were chasing him; he wasn't sure whether they actually were; sometimes the mind builds suspicions the world doesn't confirm. During that time, the voices inside his head gave him no respite: they argued, mocked, and planned.
"Human!" the angel exclaimed. "If you keep this up you're wasting valuable energy. Running and running: we've been at it three days now." The angel kept Elian in a state of perpetual vigor while meditating on the mental plane; it suppressed hunger, sleep, and fatigue, forcing the body to stay at peak performance.
"HA HA HA HA," the demon mocked. "Don't you get tired of fleeing, you piece of shit? You bore me. Falling, getting up, breaking your foot over and over… it's comical."
Elian gasped as he vaulted over fallen logs, dodged rocks, and forded terrain that smelled of dead wood. His skin was scratched; he broke his nose when he stumbled, and yet he got up.
"Shut up," he ordered through his teeth, clinging to a primitive rage. "I won't let them capture me, never, ever."
He paused for a moment, looked at the sky, and said, like a curse cast into the wind: "I hope you died in that fire, S."
He kept running until the fourth night when he came upon a paved road. He followed it for about thirty kilometers. At the end of the road he emerged before the gates of a city whose billboards still boasted lofty phrases: "Welcome to Caerum Central, where the limit is the sky." The phrase would have sounded beautiful if the sign hadn't been crooked and the city hadn't been a crown of ruins: families on the streets, beggars who had domesticated hunger, kids in tattered clothing sizing up everyone to decide whom to rob.
"What the hell…?" Elian muttered, easing from a trot into a walk as if his lungs were finally remembering their size.
Then the Divine Sight activated without warning: an explosion of emotions visible like currents of color in the air. Sadness, anger, despair, death… and, confusingly, flashes of hope. For the first time since everything inside him had shattered, he didn't tremble at the faces or the buildings. He could look at them without collapsing.
"You finally stopped running," his angel growled on the mental plane, standing there with that discomfort he always had when he helped—after all, he had been laboring for days to keep the body from tiring.
The angel's enhancement ceased and Elian's body reclaimed the basics: hunger, sleep and the exhaustion of four days.
"What—what the hell?" he said, staggering just before he collapsed, when an old man reached out and grabbed him, preventing him from falling, though Elian still fell limp from exhaustion.
"Boy, boy… Boy!" the man shouted, gripping him by the arm, then peered at Elian's body, smiled, and, adjusting his hold, hoisted him up as if to carry him home.
Meanwhile, in Elian's mental plane, his entities taunted him even as he slept. "Heh heh… Come on, child… wake up," the demon sang, kicking Elian while he lay in a deep sleep.
"Tch," the angel clicked his tongue at how Elian wouldn't stir despite the demon's kicks. "Leave him," the angel said to the demon. "No matter how much you hit him… That useless thing won't wake. I worked myself to the bone keeping this stupid body from getting tired!" he exclaimed, clearly annoyed at having maintained the body at optimal condition for four days.
"So what?" the demon replied before delivering one last kick to Elian's head; still, Elian didn't wake. "Why are you telling me this? Do you think I care if you're mad? HAHAHAHA," the demon said to the angel with a mocking smile. "Calm down, snowflake… Let's worry about who picked him up… I only glimpsed a tall figure—hopefully that smiling bastard S HA HA HA," he added, grinning madly.
Both entities in Elian's head stared for a moment, each wearing their characteristic expression—the angel with a scowl, the demon grinning—and an awkward silence settled.
"Everything was better when we didn't speak," the demon said, turning his head aside with a weary expression yet keeping his mocking grin.
"I agree…" the angel also turned away to avoid looking at the demon. The silence dominated Elian's mind for a good while, until he finally woke.
Elian slept an entire day. When he opened his eyes he saw a ceiling of old planks and sheets.
Half-asleep, Elian pushed himself up and saw a figure by the fire: tall, back turned, wrapped in shadow. He shut his eyes and clenched his fists, ready to strike if necessary.
"I told you he was still alive! I WON!" the demon shouted inside his head, shattering the silence.
"Damn it," the angel huffed, clearly irritated.
"What the hell are you doing?" Elian whispered to himself, still half-asleep so the figure near the fire wouldn't notice he was awake.
"WE WERE BETTING!" the demon said in a very cheerful voice.
"Betting on what?" Elian replied, confused.
"If you were dead or not…" his entities chorused. "Time," they added, each with their respective emotions.
"Time?" Elian asked.
"Yup. Time using your body. If the angel won, he couldn't use your body except in life-or-death situations… But if I won," the demon explained in a sadistic, mocking tone, "the little angel would have to use his 'healing' to help me boost endurance and resistance when I take the wheel… and then I'd start wrecking things."
"What the hell are you—" Elian started to protest, but before he could respond the figure by the fire turned and saw he was awake. He nearly fainted from fear. The figure stood up; Elian guessed it was an adult from the height.
"Hey, kid… you okay?" a deep, hoarse voice asked as he approached.
"Y-yes," Elian answered cautiously. "Who are you?"
"My name is Salvart Rukan," the man said with a smile that tried to be warm. He placed a hand on Elian's head and patted him. "What's your name, little buddy?"
The demon in his mind shrieked: "Kill him!" while the angel leaned toward judgment by force. Distrustful, Elian lied reflexively.
"My name is S," he stammered.
Salvart arched an eyebrow, puzzled by the abbreviation.
"S?" he repeated. "Short for—"
"Never mind," Elian cut him off, returning to the practical question. "Why did you bring me here?"
"Don't worry about that," Salvart answered with a wide grin. "I saw you about to fall and brought you to my place so you could recover. What's bad about helping?"
"R-right?" Elian asked incredulously.
"Of course not, he's lying!" his entities shouted in unison inside his head, but Elian simply ignored them.
"Sure!" Salvart said with an even broader smile. "By the way, kid, you're cute… must break hearts," he added, staring at Elian.
"What?" Elian replied, flummoxed. "W-what do you mean, Mr. Rukan?"
"Ha ha… Call me Salvart… S, I want to be your friend," Salvart offered, then handed him a can of freshly cooked beans.
Elian hesitated but accepted the can anyway. The food tasted like a miracle—different from the rancid bread and dirty water he'd eaten for so long in the fortress. Salvart watched him with a mix of tenderness and curiosity—the look of survivors when they see a child alive.
"Heh, you're a real glutton, kid," Salvart said affectionately as Elian ate quickly. "You know… here in Caerum everything's wrong. Lirium abandoned us a long time ago… The city was destroyed nine months ago. There's little food and many kids like you die from lack of food and water. So… how about you stay with me? You won't lack anything; I'll give you whatever you want," Salvart said, studying every expression on Elian's face.
"R-really?!" Elian, ten years old, felt a sting of hope for the first time.
"Yes!" Salvart replied, looking over Elian's whole body, then went to a solar-powered lamp and turned it on; the place lit up; it was filthy, with empty cans scattered on the floor.
At that moment Elian could finally see the man: a thick beard, unkempt brown hair—whether from filth or natural color, he couldn't tell—dirty but not smelling bad.
"Then… from today on you're mine," Salvart said in a strangely eerie voice, lunging at Elian and beginning to smell him.
The demon in Elian's head growled with pleasure: "Told you, kill him." The angel raged, but neither could act.
"Sal-Salvart?" Elian asked, confused by Salvart's clinginess; the man wouldn't release him and even licked his face.
"E-Elian… I can't take it anymore," Salvart said between pants. "You don't know how I love kids like you… Seeing their faces light up and then fear when I kill them," he said, ecstatic, beginning to touch Elian's abdomen.
The Divine Sight activated; Elian saw the emotions of that place: anguish, despair, hatred, fear, sorrow, but also desire—a desire Elian didn't understand. Then he looked at Salvart and saw hundreds of dead children on his back crying… all children.
"NO. DON'T. TOUCH. ME." the entities shouted at the actions of Salvart, forcing Elian to shove him hard. Elian himself was confused; initially Salvart had treated him kindly, then began touching and licking him—he didn't understand why.
"Elian," Salvart said as he stood and ran toward him to embrace him with wild eyes.
But then Elian's survival instinct—the same one honed during his time in the fortress—kicked in. With a clean movement and thanks to the Divine Sight that let him anticipate Salvart's motions, he took him down and started pounding him with blows—strength not normal for a ten-year-old—while staring at the man with disgust.
"W-w-wait—" Salvart stammered as Elian pummeled his face. "I-I surrender… s-stop… p-please," he gasped, but Elian did not stop. He only ceased when he felt Salvart had fainted.
Elian came out of his trance, agitated: it was the first time he faced an adult—not a slightly older kid or a member of S's Legion, but another person. He battered him with all his might to kill him, yet he didn't; he wasn't capable of doing that, and a small part of him still remembered his mother's words about avoiding fighting.
"Forgive me, mom. But with him I had no choice," he muttered before leaving the place. He looked at his trembling hands—shaking from both fear and the force of the beating he'd just given the man—but he didn't want to dwell on it.
Outside, the scene was the same as before: a ruined city with many homeless people. "Damn… but at least this is better than staying with that crazy bastard or that degenerate," he muttered, somewhat arrogant. "Why the hell didn't anyone warn me?" he shouted aloud to his entities.
"WE DID TELL YOU!" both answered, angry at Elian.
"Okay, okay, sorry," Elian replied as he walked away from the man's ruined shelter.
Caerum Central remained a city of hollows and secrets. Elian stayed for a while: he learned where to sleep, what foods could be stored for a week, what streets to avoid. He lived a year in that broken city, trying to keep his humanity while arguing with his entities over who would control his body or what they would eat that day. He learned to be invisible and, at the same time, listened to rumors that clung like mud.
They spoke of how the last mayors sold Caerum to demons disguised as politicians; of pacts with vultures promising order in exchange for flesh. Above all, a name circulated in whispers: a girl whose voice compelled obedience, whose mere presence turned people into puppets. She wore black and purple; people avoided her like a plague. It was a blessing that this "plague" would meet him soon enough.