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He failed.
He failed.
Couldn’t save Seira. Couldn’t fulfill his mission. Couldn’t bring Aries back.
Nothing changed. He was the same failure that left that cell all those months ago.
“You can change! Look at me. I’ve changed.”
Yunhua… Quitterie… he watched them grow, overcame their challenges, learned to love themselves and others but him? No, he can’t change. He still can’t do anything right. He’s not them. He can’t stop being a failure.
“There’s nothing I can do.”
He stares at the faces of his friends, the people he worked with, ate with, laughed and joked and experience the world together, all the ups and downs, all the serenity and near-deaths, their teary faces, their anguished faces, the sobs echoing through the cavern and that ever-present, ever-indomitable, cruel hesitancy that speaks to him, urges him to stop what he’s doing, throw away the remote, abandon his purpose in life, and just survive with the others, live with the others.
But he can’t. The King gave him a mission and the King’s orders are absolute.
Even so… You can’t kill them. Stop lying to yourself.
Ah, he really can’t change.
He reveals the second remote. Kanata screams for everybody to get back. He opens the wormhole. He hears the click of the gun as Ulgar raises it and Zack’s always reasonable voice saying it’s no use and Kanata’s correct follow-up. The wormhole isn’t for them. He’ll never hurt Aries, never again.
“I know, Charce. I know what you’re thinking. We’re companions after all.”
And so does he.
Charce hears Kanata’s boots scruffing the ground and of course Kanata is going to try to save him. Of course, Kanata’s going to risk his life for a traitor like him without hesitation. It makes him want to laugh. Only Kanata would do something like this.
It’s why he placed the sphere within arms distance.
It moves towards him, slowly, way too slow. He’s hesitating again, but Kanata’s scream spurs him to lift his left arm and he watches his fingers get sucked in, his wrist, his forearm. Above, a shadow catches his eyes and he sees Kanata’s in the air with his anti-gravity shoes activated.
It’s too late.
Kanata ought to have known that too, yet he still reaches out a hand towards him, face defiant, yelling his name, desperation in his voice, the others’ voices screaming too beyond the sphere. Charce’s heart tears. They truly care for someone like me, someone with no value, no reliability. They shouldn’t, but they do and he couldn’t help the single tear that rolls down his cheek.
He activates his helmet and smiles.
“I’m sorry, everyone. I really love you.”
His body passes through the wormhole, auto shutting off the moment the remote passed with him. He blinks. The cave is gone. There’s no gravity. He’s twirling in space and staring at the vast darkness that is space and the vast ice waste that is Earth. He could still see Kanata’s face brimming with anguish and horror (still too far away to stop him, of being sucked in, of being in danger), still hear his companions’ screams (begging for Kanata to save him, for him to stop, for him to live), bouncing around in his head.
How nostalgic. The screams. The sudden lack of gravity. Except back then none of them knew each other and their screams were laced with fear, not worry.
His eyes wander the empty expanse.
No luggage drifting in space with him. No bodies surrounding him, lost and confused and soon to be dead. No Ark ship waiting for him. No hope. No miracle.
This is what was supposed to happen months ago. They were supposed to die here, at their original home planet, far away from Astra. No adventure, no surviving, no exploring, no parties, no celebration, none of that was supposed to happen.
His eyes catch something orange and he couldn’t help but smile, using the limited supply in his thrusters to surge forward and catch the frozen tangerine in his hands.
How happy he is they didn’t end here.