Wilbur and Orville

"No one is coming to save you."

Her mother's words rung in the air.

With a blurred vision and a half open head, she stood erect on what remained of the hill. They were all dead. Valhalla was gone too. She stood alone.

 **************

"In the end, you didn't kill him", I walked up to Lady who was standing at a great distance from Valhalla.

She didn't say anything. But she probably regretted everything.

"Everyone died", I said, without really caring for anything.

I figured I'd be redoing everything once again. This time was much sooner than I had expected. I realized I needed to be much more firm if I wanted to create a better reality.

"You should have let them leave", she looked at me as if all of it was my fault.

"Please don't push it all on me, Lady. You've had this coming for a while now", I wasn't going to take the accusation sitting down, even if she was right.

She seemed like she didn't want to go on arguing about it. For one, everyone was dead but she wasn't turning around to look at them. I was kind of the same. Even though we stood with our backs turned to Valhalla, everyone was still behind us. The place was ruined and their corpses were lying around everywhere. Except Grim, who'd been buried after every organ of his spilled out and painted the ground pitch black.

"I meant to tell you that there's a place I need you to go to", she looked straight at me.

"What place?", I asked.

"In the east", her voice was shaking, "there's someone you should meet. When you meet him, give him this."

She handed me the pretty box that she kept on her table.

"Give who?", I asked.

"I'll give you his address. I'll show you on the map", she dug into the inner pockets of her heavy fur coat.

She then produced a map and opened it, laying it straight on the ground.

"Here", she pointed, "There's a tree. It's huge. And a garden. And a nice house. Small house, but nice. It might actually be quite big. You'll have to see."

"Hold on, have you seen this place or what? Or are you sending me on a fool's errand like Chopper?"

"Well, if I know him -and I do- then he'll have a place exactly like that. On second thoughts, it will be a small house", she answered.

"Who is this person I'm looking for? Do you have a name?", I asked.

"Name isn't important. I don't remember it", she paused, hesitating for a while, "He's the man I hate the most."

"And what about here?", I turned around to look at the mess.

"I'll take care of it", she said in a husky voice.

I should mention that I was by no means in top form. I was almost gravely injured. If not for Lubbock sacrificing his life for me, I'd have died. Well, to be precise, Lubbock, Sight, and Chopper, all had died trying, in some way, to shield me. Actually, I'm sure, at some point, when we realized the tides had turned, all everyone was trying to do was preserve my life somehow. Indirectly, they were just trying to get another chance to live. I was at that point now where I could understand their conviction and not feel sentimental about it.

In any case, I didn't think twice before setting off. I didn't take anything with me, naturally. I just knew I had to go east before I redid everything. I could care less about Lady and the other dead ones I was leaving behind.

I don't think its important to state here who the attacker was. We didn't see his face. We didn't hear his voice. Lady tried talking to him, he didn't say a word. He was cloaked, heavily cloaked. He brought down Valhalla the minute he arrived. June was the first to go out, since she was inside. I thought that would be enough to send Lady berserk but she was cool as a cucumber.

That person didn't give us a chance to understand anything. And the one go we got at him was prevented by Lady. Lady didn't fight. She even saved the attacker. It didn't matter really. For me, it just made clear that that's what Lady's stand about the attacker was. Lady wore a look of guilt on her face as if anything that man did to her was well-deserved.

I also understood that there was no getting through to the attacker. He had one reason coming here and he didn't leave until he'd seen Lady die. Although this time, she didn't quite literally die, but at least all that mattered to her was dead. It was synonymous to physical death. For some reason, I was spared, but the attacker probably had his own reason for not trying to kill me. Perhaps he had a clue as to what I was.

Or perhaps I denied the reality in which I could die by his hand. In any case, he left. And I drew two conclusions from this whole scenario; the attacker couldn't be reasoned with and Lady wouldn't fight him.

That meant in the next reality, I needed to prevent their encounter entirely. I didn't yet know how I was going to do it. Ideally, if the red sky didn't happen in the first place, the attacker would have no reason to appear. In the original reality, it was Grim who caused the red sky. In the reality I created after the destruction of that world, Grim wasn't the one that caused it. Or perhaps it was Grim. I didn't know, despite the fact that I created it all.

When I thought about where I'd begin, I didn't even know. I shook the thought away thinking I'll figure it out when it was time to turn that corner.

In all those wonderings, I travelled for three days before arriving at my location. I should mention that I had neither slept nor eaten properly in three days. And I didn't look any worse for it. I hadn't had time to think about it.

When I got there, I found the place quite easily. It was in a farmland, a small house in a nice garden, under a huge tree. Exactly as Lady described it. I'd have accused her of lying of never having seen it, had it not been for the owner of the house.

The door was answered after a single knock. It was quite a beautiful sunny morning.

"Yes, how may I help you?", the very pleasant faced, handsome youth asked.

Despite my ragged appearance, he didn't seem to be threatened. I could almost see divinity in his bright face. He could have been an angel in another life but not this one. In this one, he looked almost exactly like our Lady, had she been spared a little positivity by the world.

"Hello there", I said, realizing for the first time that I was dying for a drop of water.

The young man, who was probably a bit over my age, waited patiently for me to say more.

"I have something for you", I thought I'd just get away after being done with the delivery.

"Would you like to join us for breakfast? I couldn't help but notice you look rather weak, sir."

The young, very well-mannered man said. I could have just bowed right there and called him my god if I had just a little bit less of dignity left. But I took up his invitation silently.

It matters little to the story but I feel compelled to mention that the food was brilliant. I ate enough to last a week and when I was done eating, the younger boy asked me if I'd like to rest. I took up that offer too. After a nice bath, and receiving some nice clothes from the young man, I was rejuvenated. But instead of going to sleep, I joined them in the sitting room.

The young man lived with his younger brother. Both were such nice, angelic people. I'd have called Lady a monster for saying she hated him, if they didn't look exactly like her. The younger one bore even greater likeness to Lady than the older one. I figured it was the older one she hated.

I remember Lady telling me the man she hated was way too perfect. I suppose I could agree. The young man seemed to possess every quality you could ask for. For starters, he was hilarious. Secondly, he was good at work, in the kitchen and the farm. He was building a flying machine with his younger brother and he seemed to be a genius of mechanics.

I ended up staying two days with the two of them. The brothers were very close. It appeared to me that they had their perfect world made in that farmland and there really was no space for a third person.

"Have you ever had a sister, Wilbur?", my question at breakfast couldn't have been spookier.

"A sister? None that I can remember", the older brother, Wilbur answered.

"Interesting. I forgot about my sister too. Those poor things are always getting forgotten", I answered as plainly as I could.

Wilbur laughed.

"You're an interesting man, Seraph", he said, "Orville, bring the tea!"

"Where'd you live before?", I asked.

"I think we lived in a pretty run down place as kids. That was before the war. I moved away very young. And Orville joined me later."

"I remember our sister", Orville walked in with a pot of tea in his hand.

"You do?", Wilbur was shocked, "I don't quite remember her all that much."

"So you did have a sister?", I asked.

"I suppose if Orville remembers too. But I don't recall much beyond the simple fact that we might have had one."

I wonder how one could forget having a sister. Although, I was one to wonder such things.

"I know we had one sister", Orville seemed quite sure.

I didn't really care if they remembered or not. I could see it clear as day just by their faces.

"Did you fight in the war? You must have been old enough to do so", I asked, completely neutrally, of course.

"No, I didn't prefer it. I moved as far away as you could from war, see. We rarely had news in those parts", Wilbur answered.

I felt like I could throw my head back and laugh. But Wilbur and Orville were markedly the nicest people I had the chance to encounter in my entire life. I didn't want to start an interrogation so I left that conversation off.

"In fact, I came here to deliver this to you."

I realized they'd never asked me why I'd dropped by. And I never thought to mention it either.

I took out the pretty box, I'd been keeping with my scarce belongings and handed it over to Wilbur. It didn't look that pretty. It was half covered in blood, and had faced quite a shakedown when Valhalla fell.

"What's this?", Orville came over to see.

Wilbur examined it all the ways possible. He probably remembered it.

"Isn't it our mother's?", he asked Orville.

Surprisingly, he remembered his mother's jewelry box better than his sister. Now, do you see how hilarious he was?

"Where'd you find it, mister?", Orville asked me.

He couldn't have been over 16. And he called me mister.

"Oh, here and there", I said and got up, "Well, I'll be on my way now. You've taken care of me so well. I'm very grateful. I'm afraid I must hurry now though. I've imposed on you long enough.

"So suddenly? Hold on, about this box, Seraph-"

"Don't mention it, Wilbur. And I've had my breakfast, It was really quite lovely. As usual. Now then, you must excuse me", I waited for nothing after that.

I headed for the door and took straight to the road. I didn't look behind. After all, I had a reality to build.