[Can’t Opt Out]

Emilia tugged the hood of her cloak further over her head, keeping her eyes down and hair tucked back as she moved through the crowd. She had no idea where V had gone, the two of them having been forced apart by two members of the other group of visitors—of the family of visitors.

They’d been waiting for them at the cavern exit, which shouldn’t have been a surprise, except it was. It had been a surprise—one had left them wandering the city they had emerged into alone and injured. Her own arm had healed, although she could still feel the slash across her stomach sealing closed, her hands tugging her cloak across her body to keep the wound hidden.

Fortunately, it seemed to be the height of the workday. Aethervoices were echoing across the streets, rattling through Emilia’s senses as she slipped through the crowd of potential customers and workers. She didn’t completely disappear into the locals, but with her minimal height and locally sourced clothes, she fit in well enough.

Hopefully, it was well enough that she’d lost whoever had been chasing her. She couldn’t tell, though, the man’s own clothing and colouring had been that of a local, and had he not spoken to her and V, she might have assumed they were being attacked by an Enclave member, or undercover Risen Guard.

He had spoken, however, his voice cold and detached as he and the man with him had asked if they had killed their niece and nephew, because the psychotic family of visitors had even more members. That was why it had been such a surprise when the pair had suddenly slipped out of the locals, who had been shooting her and V questioning glances when they’d emerged from the cavern. Most of the locals had been quickly moving as far from V and Emilia as possible, whispers of ⸂More visitors?⸃ floating around them, because the family had only recently erupted out of the cavern as well.

Not these two. Unlike every other person on the street, the two men were silent as they stepped towards them, eyes hard and cold until that single question left them.

If they had been preparing for members of the family to step into their path when they emerged, they hadn’t been expecting for there to be more members, and that second of confusion had given the pair the chance they needed to split them up—to slice through them with blades and arrows.

In the distance, someone screamed, and the world erupted in fear. The aether shook, and Emilia shifted with the suddenly uneasy crowd.

⸂Someone’s bleeding!⸃ a voice yelled through aether, as though no one had ever told them that screaming in panic never ended well.

Just as suddenly as the uneasy energy had appeared, it shifted. People bolted, pushing and shoving their way past slower people in a hurricane of motion, everyone on the street—including Emilia—forced along with the stampede. More screams echoed through the street, children calling for their parents in broken sounds that rattled through Emilia’s bones and—

She swerved, hauling a pair of children up just moments before the feet of panicked adults slammed into the place they had just been laying. Blood surged through the air, more and more adding into the power of the moment, as people yelled and growled. Falling, shoving, knees sliding through the ground and adding more to the chaos as Emilia slammed her back into the wall of a nearby building, children tucked into her neck, their quiet sobs of fear vibrating her brain and body.

Chaos. So much chaos, and why? Because of blood? Because one of the other visitors had decided to attack them? Had they attacked a local? Driven the world into this madness simply because they could? Because they were trying to kill her and V in the mayhem? Or was this the result of V and one of the men fighting?

Was V the one bleeding out somewhere?

People rushed past them, pushing their way through the older and slower residents of the city as they raced for the closest door out of the city. Emilia could barely see it, but what she could see betrayed a door slowly closing.

Closing in the blood curse raging through the city.

Closing in any local who was unlucky enough to not make it there fast enough. Trapping them on this side.

There was no way that Emilia could make it, not holding two children, their weight dragging her body downwards even as she stood still.

⸂Mommy!⸃ another child called, their voice broken and far away, but dragging both her attention and that of one of the children in her arms towards it.

⸂Ally!⸃ the child in her arms yelled, fighting with Emilia’s grasp in an attempt to get down. ⸂Ally!⸃ they yelled again when she refused to let them go. If she let them go—let them run off into the veritable stampede happening around them—they’d almost certainly die.

Just like the others—like the child whose blood she could smell, whose little hands she could see through the trample of feet. Blood was dangerous, so dangerous locals were willing to spill more and more in their attempt to escape it.

Not that Emilia could blame them—not completely, anyways. She’d seen what blood could do, in small and large amounts, in injuries and both singular and multiple deaths. This wasn’t making that blood count better, this wasn’t fair to the people sprawling and dying across the ground, but she couldn’t begrudge the people for their actions.

A little body knocked into her side, arms attached to a mop of unruly black hair wrapping around her.

⸂Ally!⸃ the child in her arms yelled again, and this time when they tried to get down, Emilia let them go, arms offering to put the other child down as well. Their little red head didn’t seem to notice the offer, and she straightened back up, one hand resting on the back of the other child’s dirty brown hair as he hugged their new arrival.

⸂Where’s Mimi?⸃ he asked.

Ally shook their head into Emilia’s leg, mumbling that they didn’t know. They didn’t know where Mimi or their mother was.

⸂They’ll find you,⸃ the little boy assured Ally, his voice sounding so confident it would have been funny, if not for the fact that Emilia wasn’t sure they would find them. There was too much chaos as people rushed past them, too many bodies, their energy and blood quickly beginning to burn the aether.

It was going to rupture soon, and Emilia could see enough blood splattered across the ground to know that they would be in danger here. Her eyes shifted over the surrounding area, looking for somewhere safer. The closest doorways weren’t close at all, nor protected from the struggling locals. If they tried to push their way through, they’d die too, and—

“Emilia!”

Emilia’s eyes shot towards V, pushing his way through the crowd towards her—although, not nearly as violently as the locals pushing him. He was still several metres away when suddenly he went down, and she found herself screaming his name, body willing her to go to him—to throw the children off and draw her weapons and make people move for her.

If she’d been able to tell the kids to stay there, she might have. She couldn’t speak with them, though, and couldn’t leave them, knowing they might stupidly try to follow or race with the crowd and find themselves heartless trampled under blindly stepping feet.

Luckily, she was saved from having to wish she could abandon them when V popped up slightly closer to her, his own arms filled with more children. He emerged from the sea of frenzy, his body pressed against hers in the tight space of safety. The children between them all startled, before almost all of them, save the child still in her arms, began to yell and scream in excitement and relief—apparently they all knew each other.

“We have to get out of here,” V said, eyes searching the area just as hers had. The other visitor's gaze landed on the same storefronts she had scoped out, his expression tightening as he also realized how difficult they would be to get to, before his eyes flicked upwards. “You got anymore climbing in you?”

“If I have to,” she replied, already planning a route to the nearest window. It wasn’t too far, but they had a lot of kids to tout up and over the roof. The three she’d acquired, plus the two that V had—

Plus the other four who had suddenly appeared at their feet.

Emilia blinked down at the new arrivals, three younger children and one who appeared just on the cusp of becoming a moody teenager. The teenager stared back at her, black eyes glaring up into her own very unnatural silver ones.

⸂You’re visitors,⸃ she stated, not quite a hiss of anger but certainly not full of love for what they were either.

The rest of the children’s eyes shot up to her, before flicking to V’s face as well.

⸂Him too?⸃ one of the children the man had rescued asked the teenager, pale brown eyes wide and shocked as he looked between them.

At the very least, no one was running away in fear, and if anything, the shock that they’d been rescued by visitors was distracting them from the mayhem around them. Ah~ to be a child with such single-minded focus!

⸂Were you the ones who caused this?⸃ one of the younger children asked, more in awe than fear or sadness.

Emilia shook her head and looked to V, who thankfully also shook his head. Even more thankfully, unlike her, V wasn’t completely caught out by the children suddenly talking to him. He pointed, first to the teenager, and then up and to the window they had scoped out as hopefully being able to get into. He made a series of motions which clearly indicated they wanted to carry the children up there, and were it not for the seriousness of the situation, Emilia might have laughed at him doing so with such a stern expression.

Several of the children did laugh, although most were also eyeing up the climb with little enthusiasm.

⸂Can you really make it?⸃ the teenager asked, hands landing on her hips as she levelled a 100% teenage look at them.

It was rather amusing how ubiquitous the teenage experience seemed to be between countries and even entire worlds. Whenever she’d met people from the Free Colonies, some of the first questions she’d ask them was what their teenage years had been like. Inevitably, even the most strait-laced of people would admit to engaging in at least some teenage angst and attitude, as well a healthy dose of cringy and potentially deadly behaviour.

Both she and V nodded, Emilia giving a dramatic flex before she adjusted her hold on the child in her arms. Little red eyes peeked up at her, glittering with unshed tears. She gave the kid a reassuring smile before turning and lifting a foot. V’s hands seamlessly appeared under her foot, and one heave later, she was grabbing hold of the roof—not the eaves! She’d accidentally grabbed the eaves and fallen off a roof when it snapped, during her own badly behaved teenager stage, and fallen nearly 30 feet. The child in her arms hugged her slightly closer, but didn’t scream or struggle to get away as she settled them onto the roof.

“Pass me the hammer,” she called down, catching the {Blood Hammer} when V passed it to her. It was one of their new items, this one created by the death of Silverstrain Girl and Grumpy Man. They had a handful more split between them as well, swiped off their corpses.

⸂Is that a blood weapon?⸃ one of the children asked as Emilia made her way across the roof, feet stepping carefully over the dilapidated tiles.

They cracked and snapped under her feet, and each step seemed to be an accident waiting to happen. She didn’t have time to be as careful as she wanted, however. More and more, blood was rending its way through the world, snaps of red cracking through the aether and leaving holes across it. They didn’t have time to be careful, not when chances were they might not have time to get everyone inside safely at this rate.

The {Blood Hammer} collided with whatever material the windows of this world were made of. It shattered easily under the weight of the hammer, sparkling shards decorating the floor of the room inside. Emilia dragged the {Blood Hammer} over the edge of the frame, breaking away as much as she could before setting the child inside, as far from the potentially sharp shards as she could manage. Thankfully, despite the child’s disinterest in letting her go earlier, they seemed to understand that now they needed to, their little hands disappearing from her neck.

She glanced around the room, which appeared to be a bedroom. Internally cursing their inability to communicate, she made a series of gestures that she hoped the child would take to mean go hide behind the bed because maybe you’ll be a bit safer there, before turning and racing back to the edge of the house.

They had more children to get inside.

BlissfullyBroken

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