AKIHIRO ATLAS
As I continued walking down the corridor, my footsteps echoed off the metal floor, but what I heard wasn't really those sounds. Sometimes one becomes so deeply immersed in one's own thoughts that the outside world becomes nothing but a distant hum. This is exactly what I was experiencing right now. The white lights on the ceiling were passing in front of my eyes one by one, the shadows on the walls were moving, the mechanical vibrations of the ventilation systems were circulating in the corridor, but all this could not reach my mind. Because my brain was reliving the same few seconds over and over again. The moment Mizu fell silent. The moment he looked away. That heavy silence where Aiga said nothing. And the worst part... everyone falling silent at the same time.
Sometimes people sense bad news before the words are spoken.
Perhaps that's why fear is such a heavy emotion. Because fear doesn't always start with reality. Sometimes it starts with intuition alone. With the change in atmosphere in the room. With that little glint in people's eyes when they look at you. With a sentence left unfinished. And then the mind begins to fill in the remaining gaps with its own hands.
My mind was doing exactly that right now.
And I couldn't stop it.
Kuren.
Kazami.
Their names seemed to echo in my mind.
Suddenly, absurd details began to come to my mind. Kuren constantly shouting at people in the training hall. Kazami annoying everyone by putting his feet up on the table during his duty rotations. During a task, the two of them get into a fight and then eat dinner together five minutes later. The human mind was truly cruel; when it felt something bad, it showed you the warmest memories. As if it were a way to make the approaching emptiness feel heavier.
My chest tightened.
I haven't felt this way in years.
I've seen death in the Sacred Domains. I saw destruction. I saw people falling apart. Sometimes I had to fight for days without sleeping. Sometimes I couldn't do anything but look at the fear in the eyes of people who were dying in front of me. But despite all this, I had learned to control my mind. Because if a general drowned in his fear, everyone around him would die.
But right now...
What I felt right now wasn't fear of war.
It was more personal.
It was more human.
And perhaps that's why it was more difficult. The feeling began to arise that I had betrayed the responsibilities I had assumed as a general. It was increasing even more.
I felt like it was going to get even worse.
Because one can prepare oneself to lose the rest of the world, but one can never prepare for a bad outcome regarding one's own home.
I tried to take a deep breath, but it was as if my lungs weren't getting enough air. When I lightly squeezed my fingers, I noticed thin lightning bolts circling around them. I was getting close to losing control, and this was making me even more angry. Because I didn't want to be like this on the first day I returned.
I wanted to appear strong.
I wanted to remain calm.
I wanted to act like a general returning to his team.
But right now I felt... lost.
And you know what's the worst part?
I couldn't even think about Jared.
This realization stopped me in the middle of the corridor for a few seconds.
I lowered my head slightly.
Jared…
He was one of the people I carried in my mind for three years. Perhaps it was one of the most important. He was one of the faces I planned to see when I returned. Finally, I learned something terrible about him and came here feeling certain that I needed to talk to him. But now, even though I was walking towards him, my mind couldn't even focus on him.
Because fear makes people selfish.
The mind was creating a priority sequence when trying to survive. And right now my brain was only locked on one thing:
Something had happened. Something that shook everyone.
Something definitely had happened. Something everyone was too afraid to even tell me about.
And everyone knew this. Something big enough for everyone to learn.
Only I didn't know. Something that is the reason why everyone is hiding it from me.
As this thought grew within me, the past three years suddenly began to look different. What happened here while I was trying to save people in the Sacred Domains? What did my own team go through while I was watching other worlds collapse in lightning bolts? How many missions had there been? How many funerals? How many failures? How many nights?
Mizu's previous sentence echoed again in my mind.
"BECAUSE I DON'T WANT YOU TO WEAR THAT EXPRESSION RIGHT NOW!"
He was right in his own way; he must have not wanted me to be upset...
But I hated it.
Because for the first time... I truly felt left behind.
Sometimes one thinks they have sacrificed everything for the sake of duty. Your loneliness, your time, your life... but what he doesn't realize is this: Time doesn't just change you. It also changes the people who stay away from you. And when you return one day, you realize that what awaits you where you left off is not the same.
Perhaps this was the scariest thing.
I had returned home.
But the house… continued to live without me.
This thought settled right in the center of my chest.
As I continued walking down the corridor, the lights on the ceiling were shining into my eyes, but I no longer really saw where I was. My mind was stuck between the past and the present. Dec. Part of me was still thinking about the old version of the team. Noisy dinners. Pre-mission discussions. Kuren's shouts. Kazami's indifferent grin.
The other part of me...
He was thinking about the worst-case scenarios.
And the human mind doesn't act rationally when it's afraid. It conjures up the worst-case scenarios. It turns silences into cemeteries. It turns facial expressions into farewells. It can never imagine a good outcome.
That's exactly what I was doing right now.
Because I had seen what was in Mizu's eyes.
The pain, the fear, the hurt, and the disappointment.
And my brother wasn't someone who got hurt easily.
That's why I was afraid.
I was really afraid.
Perhaps for the first time in a long time... I was afraid not like a general, but merely like a human being. Because I didn't just see them as my comrades-in-arms. They were like my brothers.
When I reached the end of the corridor, my steps slowed down involuntarily. The section where Jared's room was located was quieter compared to other parts of the team building. The lights here were a bit dimmer; the white lamps on the ceiling cast pale reflections on the metal walls. The low hum coming from the ventilation systems spread throughout the empty corridor, creating an atmosphere that made one feel even more alone. And for some reason... at this very moment, the uneasiness inside me grew even stronger.
Because the moment I started thinking about Jared, my mind became strangely clouded.
This was so ridiculous.
I wanted to see him.
I really wanted to. Even though I knew I would cry my eyes out as a result, I still wanted to see him.
Jared… One of the noisiest, most tiring, and most energetic people on the team. The kind of person who changes the atmosphere the moment they walk into a room. One couldn't remain silent around him for long because Jared didn't view silence as a natural state. They were always talking, always doing something, always bothering people. And now...
Now, when I was going to his room, what I felt was more fear than longing.
This thought choked me.
I stood in front of the door for a few seconds.
I looked at the small metal plate with his name on it.
"Jared Kimura."
Kimura…
Kimura…
Kimura…
No way. No way. No way.
Despite the pain that shot through my heart, I managed to bring my hand to the door and slowly moved it closer to the door sensor. I had permission to enter Jared's room.
The door opened to the side with a mechanical sound.
And the moment I entered...
For a moment, I really stopped breathing.
Because the room… smelled completely like Jared.
No one else could have come up with this ridiculous definition anyway, but there was no other explanation. Sometimes when a person enters a room, they immediately sense the character of the person who lives there. And this room was like Jared's mind transformed into physical form.
The room was messy. Everywhere I looked, I could find a multitude of items that might interest a completely different person.
But this wasn't just lifeless clutter.
It was a living mess.
Most of the walls were covered with posters. Some belonged to old action movies, some were full of game characters, and some were completely meaningless. On one of them, it said in huge letters, "SLEEPING IS FOR THE POWERLESS" but right below the poster were half-empty energy drink cans. On another wall hung posters of old music bands; some of the corners had been reattached with tapes, most likely because they had fallen several times.
There was a large screen on the right side. Beneath it, multiple game consoles were stacked on top of each other. The cables were tangled together. There were half-left play handles on the floor. There was still a crack on one of them.
I involuntarily smiled slightly.
Because I knew why this was happening.
"He got angry and broke it when he lost..." I muttered to myself.
Suddenly, memories began to flood my mind.
Jared playing games until the morning and keeping everyone awake. Leonard constantly complaining. Kai going crazy every time he loses to Jared. Sia coming silently and unplugging them all.
My chest ached slightly. As I remembered the past, those feelings that filled my eyes gradually began to affect my body.
There were scattered drawings on the table. Some of them were mission plans, but most of them were completely ridiculous. Cartoons. Funny drawings of team members. I even had one that was drawn in an exaggeratedly serious style. He wrote the following in capital letters below it:
"BROTHER 2 — SHOWS HIS EMOTIONS 2% OF THE TIME."
Involuntarily, a light breath came out of my nose. Then I started giggling.
But that little smile disappeared after a few seconds.
Because as I moved around the room, I began to notice something else.
Time seemed to stand still here. It was as if everything had come to a standstill a few years ago and then ended without continuing.
It was as if Jared had left a few hours ago and was going to come back. There was a jacket left unfinished on the chair. There were snack packages lying open on the corner of the table. But even those biscuits were dry now, no one had eaten them for a very long time. On the small shelf next to the bed were books, magazines, and game boxes arranged haphazardly.
But amidst all this chaos...
There was a strange silence.
And that silence felt wrong.
My gaze slowly shifted to the bed. I could see someone there. I could also tell very well who it was.
The quilt had been pulled all the way up to his head.
At first, the tension inside me eased slightly.
Because this was truly something Jared would do.
He could sleep without leaving his room for days after missions. He ignores people especially, then says, "I was meditating.He would make ridiculous statements like that.
I parted my lips slightly.
"Jared."
Silence.
As the door closed behind me, the mechanical hum in the room became more distinct.
I took a few more steps. Maybe he hadn't heard me. Or maybe he was sleeping.
"Hey." I raised my voice a little more. "It's me."
There was no answer again.
My eyebrows furrowed slightly. My eyes involuntarily trembled. I was about to cry.
"Jared."
He still wasn't moving. He wasn't even reacting.
The restlessness inside me began to return.
But my mind was trying to normalize it.
It's probably asleep. He's wearing headphones. Maybe he's really too stupid to hear.
Or maybe he's being stubborn because of what Magnus did.
Because Jared was really like a child sometimes. Because he was still a child. He's too young to handle such things. A younger child… a little child.
He's too young to experience these things...
Maybe if I could have been there with him. Maybe if I had never gone on that mission...
Why...?
As I moved a little closer to the bed, I spoke more clearly.
"Akihiro, it's me… Jared, please answer me."
The silence continued.
"I returned from duty."
There was no reaction.
There wasn't even the slightest movement under the duvet.
My chest started to tighten.
"Jared..." I said in a slower voice this time.
There was no answer.
I took another step.
Then another one.
My footsteps were echoing throughout the room now.
And with each step, the bad feeling inside me was growing.
No.
No, don't be ridiculous.
But my body wasn't listening to me.
As I reached the bedside, my eye caught sight of a small metal object.
ID card.
It was sitting on the small coffee table by the bed.
My hand reached out involuntarily.
I took the card.
The plastic between my fingers was trembling slightly.
My eyes fell on the writing on the card.
"Jared Kimura."
And for some reason...
At that moment, the bad feeling inside me turned into genuine fear for the first time. I saw it again... Kimura. Kimura. Kimura. I hated it. I hated myself. I hated Cistern and how they blamed all this on a little kid.
I hated Magnus the most. More than anything else, I hated him. You are responsible for all of this. Magnus, if we meet again... I promise, I will never trust you again. I hate you, forever.
At that moment, everything I held within my body shattered.
Sometimes one cannot understand exactly at what exact moment an emotion spirals out of control. The pain gradually grows, becomes heavy in your chest, disrupts your breathing, clouds your thoughts... yet you still remain standing. Because your brain tries to protect you. Because even when the human mind is on the verge of breaking, it continues to tell itself the lie that "I'm fine."
But there are moments...
All the walls a person has built inside themselves collapse in a single second.
That was the moment for me.
As I was looking at the ID card between my fingers, my breathing began to Decelerate. My chest felt like it was being squeezed from the inside. My throat was burning. And my eyes involuntarily drifted to the bed.
The quilt was still lying in the same position.
As if it were about to move soon.
As if it were about to stick its head out and say, "Please, stop being dramatic. I can't stand such things!" as if he were going to say. It looked like he was going to make a Jared move.
But he wasn't moving. I was waiting, but he wasn't making any move.
And me...
I was starting to feel the truth now. No, not feeling it. I was starting to accept it.
The strength in my knees gradually faded.
First, my breath trembled.
Then my shoulders.
And then...
My tears began to flow, and I felt like I couldn't control my body. I felt like I didn't even have the strength to try to stop the hot water droplets running down my cheeks.
They suddenly accelerated; my eyes must have turned red already.
Uncontrollably…
I tried to stop it for a few seconds when hot tears started pouring out of my eyes. I clenched my teeth. I tried to regulate my breathing. Because I was someone who didn't like crying. I was someone who carried the pain inside. I hated breaking down in front of people.
But there was no one here right now except Jared. He wasn't used to seeing me like this, but... I was the only person who could make him feel like he was at home right now.
And me...
I couldn't stay strong anymore. That's why I could even let him see my weakness.
My knees buckled hard to the ground.
The metal floor echoed with the impact, but I didn't care. My hands clung to the edge of the bed. My head slowly rested against Jared's bed.
And then...
I really started crying.
Not silent.
Not controlled.
Everything I kept inside me felt like it was falling apart.
My shoulders were shaking. My breathing was becoming labored. My tears were constantly falling onto the bedspread. And the worst part… I couldn't stop them.
Because my mind had finally become fixated on the same thought:
I wasn't here.
I wasn't here.
There was only Jared here. He was ignoring the whole outside world now. Because they must have felt like they had lost everyone they could count on.
And if a person isn't there for the people they love when they need them most... then what was the point of all their strength?
My fingers tightened the coverlet of the bed harder.
"I'm sorry..." I whispered in a trembling voice.
My voice sounded broken.
"I'm sorry, Jared…"
My throat tightened.
Because the moment I started thinking about his face, the guilt in me folded. That stupid smile of yours. His constant talking. His attempts to lift people's spirits. And amidst all this, that stupid admiration he had for me.
I was his general.
Perhaps I was one of the most important people in his life. Perhaps I was one of the two most important people.
And me...
I wasn't with you in that war.
I leaned my head harder against the bed.
Breathing was hurting me now.
"I couldn't protect you…" I said while crying. "I promised you…"
My tears were flowing non-stop.
"I told you I would protect everyone..."
The moment this sentence left my lips, my own words echoed in my mind. What I said to Urizen. The vows I made to save people. The promises I made to protect my home.
How funny.
Sometimes, while one wants to save the entire universe, one cannot even protect a single person in one's own home.
This thought completely shattered me.
My hiccups started to get uncontrollable. My shoulders were shaking. My hands clung weakly to the edge of the bed, as if they needed something to hold on to to prevent me from falling.
And then...
The real thought came to me.
That terrible thought that lies deep within me.
I lifted my head slightly. My tears continued to flow down my face.
And I began speaking in a trembling voice.
"I'm sorry…" I said again. "Because it's me…"
The moment I said this sentence, something inside my chest collapsed completely.
Because I was really starting to believe it.
The people around me were being harmed.
Because of me.
Tasks. Battles. Losses.
Because people were connecting with me.
And I couldn't protect them.
"I wish…" I said, breathless. "I wish I hadn't been such an important person in your life…"
My voice broke.
"I wish it weren't me…"
I closed my eyes tightly.
Because even thinking about Jared's face was breaking my heart now.
"I wish..." I said as I cried again. "If I hadn't been one of the people who connected you to this world..."
My shoulders shook again.
"Because when people come close to me... in the end, they only suffer..."
As this thought echoed in my mind, I felt as if I couldn't breathe properly.
What Magnus said.
The fragility of people.
Losing, suffering...
All of a sudden, they all got mixed up.
And for the first time...
I'm starting to fear myself.
What if the problem really is me?
What if what's really ruining the lives of the people around me is my own existence?
This thought drew me deeper into it.
I leaned my head back on the pillow.
I squeezed the quilt between my fingers.
And I continued to cry like a child.
"I'm sorry, Jared…" I said over and over again. "I'm sorry… I'm sorry…"
As if saying the same sentence enough times would change the past.
As if suffering enough would bring it back.
But nothing was changing.
The room was still silent.
And this silence...
It was heavier inside me than anything I had ever felt before.
I didn't know how long I had been crying like that.
The concept of time had completely disappeared. Sometimes when a person stays in pain for too long, he starts not even feeling his body. Only the heaviness in your chest remains. Only that pressure burning your lungs when you breathe. And that's exactly where I was right now. My head was still resting on Jared's bed. My fingers kept squeezing the quilt as if I were about to tear it to pieces if I let go.
My shoulders were still shaking slightly.
My tears had slowed down, but they hadn't stopped.
And the silence inside the room...
It was the kind that eats away at one's mind.
This room used to be a noisy place.
No place Jared lived in would be quiet.
But now here, only my breathing was heard.
And this silence felt like the heaviest thing in the world to me.
Just as I was trying to start talking again...
A muffled, tired and almost completely exhausted voice came from under the duvet.
"Please get out of my room."
That was all.
A single sentence.
There was no anger in it. No shouting. No hatred. I couldn't feel anything.
This... made everything worse.
Because what was in his voice was just fatigue.
And when I heard that voice, my body froze.
I really forgot to breathe for a few seconds.
My eyes involuntarily shifted to the bed. The duvet was still completely covering Jared's face. He wasn't even moving. It was as if he had used all his energy just to say that single sentence.
As for me...
I didn't know what to do.
I slowly stood up, but my knees were still shaking. One of my hands involuntarily remained on the edge of the bed because I felt like I was losing my balance. I wiped my face with my hands, trying to stop the tears. My fingers were shaking. I tried to improve my breathing, but it wasn't happening. My chest still felt like it was falling apart.
Because this is the moment…
It was nothing like anything I had imagined.
For three years I had been thinking about the day I would return.
The moment I'll see my team again.
Maybe I thought Jared would jump on me screaming stupidly. They would ask me a thousand questions about the tasks. They would talk non-stop. Additionally, as the first task, I would take them to get their favorite drinks.
But now...
He wanted me to leave.
And he was right.
This thought pierced right into the center of my heart.
Because at that moment, for the first time, I realized this:
I was late to his pain.
When you missed the moments a person needed most, when you returned, you couldn't have the same place anymore.
I bowed my head slightly.
I tried to speak, but my voice wouldn't come out at first.
Because my mind was divided in two.
Part of me wanted to stay here. To sit next to him. To be by his side, even silently. I thought leaving would mean leaving him completely alone.
The other part of me...
I couldn't forget the tiredness in his voice.
"Please get out of my room."
This wasn't so much a request as it was... like exhaustion.
And I couldn't push him any further.
But accepting this...
It hurt me incredibly.
Because for the first time, I truly felt like a stranger in Jared's eyes.
I slowly lifted my head and looked around the room again. Posters. Console tables. Unfinished drawings. Messy desk. Small details that show a person is still trying to live.
And someone hiding themselves from the world under the bed.
My throat tightened again.
I took a step back.
Then another one.
But I couldn't take my eyes off the bed.
Because I didn't want to go.
I really didn't want to.
Sometimes people experience moments when leaving someone they love alone feels like betrayal. And that's exactly how I felt right now. It's as if I'd lose my place in Jared's life completely the moment I walked out this door.
But if I stay...
I would have ignored his request.
And I no longer had the right to harm him further.
I clenched my teeth.
Then I closed my eyes and tried to take a deep breath.
I needed to pull myself together.
Like a general.
Like a human being.
And for Jared, like what I truly was but no longer am...
One... whatever I am... I'm sorry... Like that bond that means nothing to anyone anymore.
I couldn't do any of this anyway right now.
I was just falling apart.
I took a few steps toward the door. Each step was heavy. It was as if my body didn't want to move forward. I stopped as soon as I brought my hand close to the door sensor.
Because I felt there was something I needed to say before I left.
I slowly turned my head toward the bed.
My voice was still hoarse, but this time I spoke while trying not to cry.
"Jared..." I said quietly. "No matter how late it gets after this... no matter how hard it is... no matter how much you hate..."
My throat tightened again.
But I continued.
"How much for yourself... when you feel alone despite the passage of time, how to be broken and to get away from people so you can try... I'll still be here, Jared. Because I don't want to abandon you not only when you're doing well, but also during your worst moments. Even if one day everyone leaves... I want you to still be able to see me next to you when you look back."
My eyes began to fill with tears again.
"This time I won't miss it." I clenched my fingers into a fist. "I won't be late for you."
My breath trembled.
And then, I whispered one of the harshest words I've ever said in my life.
"I will always be here for you from now on... I promise."
The room fell silent.
Jared didn't answer.
And with this silence, another part of me broke.
As the door slowly opened, I looked at that bed one last time.
Then...
I left the room silently.
When he closed the door behind me, I leaned my back against it and slowly slid down, pressing against the door, until I sat on the floor.
I pulled my legs to my chest, placed my arms on my knees, and rested my eyes on my arms.
I continued to cry, repeating what I had been saying for a while.
"I'm sorry, for being so important to you... for being such a useless person."
END OF CHAPTER