Why Is It Okay?

--Sky's Perspective--

A familiar flash of light shone over my eyes, stunning me in the soft bed I laid in. I slowly pushed my weakened body up, gripping my stomach in pain.

I opened my left eye, and it was actually there! I almost put my fingers in it out of surprise and happiness... but decided not to, and just to enjoy the full vision I was experiencing once more.

"Ah, you're awake finally!" I lifted my right arm into my vision, being unbothered by the voice I was hearing.

"Am I dead?" I opened and closed my fingers repeatedly, looking down towards my feet and doing the same thing with my toes.

"No, you're still here. I'm Tavian, do you remember me?" A man named Tavian asked me. I shook my head, leaning up in my bed.

"Wait, Dani?! Where's Dani?! Where's Red?!" I asked him. I tried to get up on my feet, but the man named Tavian pushed me back into my bed.

"Hey, what was the last thing you remember?" I stared at the wall in defeat. "I walked over on an ice sheet… the rest is blurry. What happened to everybody?" I explained to him. Tavian began to explain everything.

"Your friend Red fell under the ice thanks to one of the White Stones, or so I hear. Dani fell into the water too, but she's okay. It seems like you have parts of your memory, but they're super inconsistent. Listen, Sky, I'm sorry your friend Red died but… there's a lot more going on that we should be worried about." He said.

I zoned out, only thinking about the vague memories I have of Red, and the last thing I remembered hearing her say:

Se-Se-Li-A

Those noises were reproduced thousands of times in my head, and I couldn't stop them from happening.

"Sky, it's to my understanding that there's something about Ellie you don't know." He started again. My face turned sour, but Tavian soon defused it by telling me about her twin.

"Ellen is Ellie's twin sister, and she was the one in your base with Raven. I'm highly impressed you took him out… Raven used to be in the higher ranks with me." He explained.

I pushed myself out of the bed. "What do you mean, with you?" I asked him again, with the sour look coming back. Tavian sighed and looked out of the window to the right of the bed.

"That's what I'm going to explain to you now, so try to keep an open mind. I'll start back as far as I can think would be useful to you, as of right now, and this information might overwhelm you, so stop me if needed…"

…

…

…

-August 11, 2443-

-The Isle-

--Tavian's Perspective--

"You ready, Tavian?" Raven slapped me on the back and my drink spilled on my lap. It was hot, so I scrambled to blow off the heat.

"You do that again and I'm going to slap you with my sword. I'm as ready as I could expect to be." I told Raven. That asshole.

Raven ran to the front with the empty carriage and carts led by several mammoths walking south of home base. Orion's castle had just finished development and he wanted us to take care of this village down south, as their waste was polluting the river, or so he said.

Something I picked up from Orion after being here for a year was that he's a very greedy man, constantly wanting more and more. I don't know how he isn't satisfied with what he had, but I sensed this mission was to destroy this village in order to boost the number of slaves he had.

Conquering, and conquering, and more conquering, that's all this man was about. Most small villages located anywhere near his castle have been wiped off the face of this land, and this one would be no exception.

We were getting within sight when Raven stopped the mammoths, patting them to let them know we weren't going anywhere. He handed me binoculars and stared out to the village. From here, I could see what we were working with.

No signs of barracks, the houses were made of mud, clay, and wood, with some stone ones that people very obviously used to store food and other important resources. I could see children playing in a field, but the group I had personally focused on were the two sitting on the balcony of a house and coloring in a book.

White hair and green eyes, and brown hair and blue eyes. The girl with the brown hair had the tips dyed red, but only on one side of her head. Her look was the most unique of everybody, including the white-haired girl next to her.

"I think I'll take that white-haired bitch next to the one you're looking at. You wouldn't mind, would you?" Raven asked me. I held back the disgusting taste his words left in my mouth and put down the binoculars.

"So, the plan is to just take all these people and turn them into slaves?" I asked, but Raven didn't put down his binoculars.

"Well, yeah, that's what we do." Raven clarified while looking to my right. The girl in training next to me, who went by Noboki, had put her hands on her hips.

"Let's get this over with. I don't want to think of this ever again." She commented quietly.

Noboki had bleached hair that fell to her eyes and dull, blue eyes. The way she carried herself reeked of too much confidence, but that was better than none.

"Alright you pansies, let's hurry this up then." He said. Raven slapped the back of the mammoth and jumped to the lower ground, inviting the mammoths to follow him.

We walked with no care about how loud we were being, as it wouldn't matter soon. The closer we approached, the quieter and quieter the village got, up until we stood at their doorway, and it was silent inside.

"Look, we know you're in there! Why don't you open up and make this easy!" Raven started to pound on the gate, while Noboki stood by my side, shifting her legs back and forth.

"What is it?" I asked her, but she stood silent for a little longer.

"I don't feel good about this… how do you do stuff like this?" She asked. I shrugged, I couldn't find a way to honestly answer that, so I didn't. Raven signaled for the mammoth to kick down the gates and without hesitation, the big, wooly monster shot the gate down with little to no effort.

Raven walked inside with his band of soldiers, and they started to just destroy everything. The housing with sledgehammers, other things with explosives, it didn't matter, they were just leveling the field until somebody came out.

With similar features to the girl, I saw on the balcony, the brown-haired woman stood bravely at her front door.

"What is it you want?!" She asked.

Raven didn't answer, he only hopped over to her with a ton of enthusiasm and his hands stuck in his pockets. He got closer to her, looking at her body all over, before turning back to everybody else.

"Observe. She isn't a good pick because of her posture. She doesn't stand straight, which means she'd have problems coming with us. Do you know how we treat these people?" Raven asked with a wicked smile. Noboki grabbed my sleeve and hid behind my shoulder, cowering from Raven. I would've too.

"Like this!" Raven smiled and slid his sword into the back of her neck, pushing until the blade pointed out of the innocent lady's mouth. The mouth stuck open because of her shock and neatly fit the blade between both edges of her teeth before Raven pulled up and split her skull down the middle in the back. Small chunks of her brain splattered against the floor and blood started to trickle down the walkway leading up to her house.