CHAPTER 51: WHEN THE WALLS BEGAN TO DARKEN

A crashing sound erupted as five of the bird-like creatures cried out and dived downward at high speed, their claws stretched on both their legs and the tip of their feathers. Wind gashed out, following them like gas exiting pipes and jolting shaky edges of windows from their sockets into the air.

Beside the bus that was parked just right at the gate of Babel City, a man dressed in a full black outfit stood there, his eyes glowing black like darkness itself as he screeched his fingers against the metal side of the bus, cutting it open.

When all five creatures reached him and lowered their claws toward his head, he grinned and vanished, letting the creatures slam themselves at where he stood. A moment after all the creatures raised themselves and shook their heads, he reappeared, floating above them.

And when the creatures turned their gaze toward him in the air and cried out, he raised his right hand, spread his fingers, and with great speed, he devoured the creatures within a second as he moved and struck his fingers at them like lightning, leaving only tiny pieces of their feathers floating before landing on the slightly dried land.

Slowly, he lowered himself, landing softly on the ground and placing both hands at his back, walking calmly toward one of the tall buildings with light shimmering at its top floors, whistling.

...

"Why did you cry out and become worried when you saw the man die under the boy’s hands?" Gray said, walking closer to Wang, who sat in one of the foamy chairs placed at the front of the hospital fixed inside the barracks.

For minutes, Wang didn’t utter a word or have a change in his expression, and when he tilted his head, about to speak, he saw one of the nurses in charge of the hospital, who had been assigned specifically to Kai, walking toward them with a sad expression.

Seeing how the nurse headed toward them, both Gray and Wang stood up with mixed expressions and welcomed her.

"Lilian, how is the boy doing?" Gray said, clutching his fingers and staring deep into the nurse’s eyes, and when the nurse shook her head slightly, he unwrapped his hands, threw his right hand on his face, and moved it upward, brushing it through his hair.

Though Kai wasn’t his child, nor was he a family member to him, since the day he kept an eye on him, Kai had become more than family to him, and he wasn’t ready to let anything happen to him—not even a single scratch, nevertheless to hear him dead.

Wang turned toward Gray, placed a hand on his shoulder, and walked him toward the corridor, helping him to calm down before leaving him and walking toward the building where the soldiers were walking beside each other, gossiping about the return of Kai and five others.

’Why didn’t I even reject when they gave me the notification of adding him to the list of those going on the secret operation at Babel City?’ Gray thought, tilting his gaze to the sky and tightening his grip on the metal pillar placed on top of the pentagon hardwood-patterned fragile wall he leaned on.

...

On the fourth day of sleeping in the hospital bed without showing any sign of life in his movement, Kai remained wrapped in a blue sick cloth and injected with an intravenous cannula (IV) all around his arms and chest, being fed with nutritional supplements and antibiotics to help save him from any infections.

While he remained still even on the fourth day, Jinx, Kinji, Jane, and the other two were released and sent to rest in the restrooms of the hospital, but when all five reached the room where Kai was, Kinji, Jane, and Jinx stopped at the window, stared at him for a while before joining the other two.

Yet their minds weren’t fully detached from Kai as they kept thinking about him even as they reached the restroom and into the bathroom as they washed themselves clean.

On the outside, where the cars had been parked, countless soldiers stood at attention, their hands hardened on their foreheads as they saluted the car from which a casket was being pulled, with a cloth with crossed swords weaved on it placed at its center.

Oin, Max, and four others tightened their knuckles as they moved the casket out of the truck completely, carried it on their shoulders, and carried it from the entrance of the hospital and back to the truck, then boarded the truck.

A few other soldiers started the engines of other vehicles parked there and followed the truck until they stopped at the gate of the cemetery, got down from the truck, tightened their fists on the casket, and carried it to the hole dug in the ground.

At that moment, a few other citizens of the city of Bion walked toward the cemetery dressed in black and joined the already gathered group of people standing there, crying heavily. Gray and the other soldiers stood there with stiff faces, hoping to stop the tears from coming, but as the other soldiers clashed their swords together and shouted, drops of tears began falling from everyone’s eyes, including Gray and an old woman who nearly jumped on top of Mike’s casket.

As they began moving from the cemetery one after another, Gray walked to the truck the casket was placed in, picked up two groups of roses, lilies, carnations, and chrysanthemums wrapped with a red band, walked toward Mike’s grave now covered, placed them on it, and walked toward an already covered grave with the name Joe written boldly on it and placed the other flowers on it, then walked back to the truck.

Leaves spun in the air before landing on the graves as the cars drove out of the cemetery, moving systematically and speeding up when they moved out of the cemetery grounds.

Colored birds followed the cars until they all vanished beneath the tall trees, then jolted up in the air, flapping their wings and humming sweetly as they dived toward the canopies of the trees.

...

On the fifth month of the year, countless nurses came to Kai, checked his vitals, and made sure his Glasgow Coma Scale remained constant, and when it wasn’t constant, they did everything in their power to change it back to how it was.

In that same month, Kinji, Max, and Oin were sent to the same city of Babel, but this time with a set of fifty group men, who later returned with a series of remains of the creatures they had slaughtered into the barracks.

And when they were tasked a third time, the same three men walked inside Kai’s room, and on Kai’s bed, held his hands, and laughed for a couple of times as if he were conscious, then walked out of the room.

The ninth month came in a flash, and on that day, streams of laughter echoed inside the barracks, outside the barracks, and throughout the city as they celebrated eight months of peace and harmony, not burying any member either from the city or from the barracks.

While everyone drank lots and lots of drinks and engaged in all sorts of entertainment, the hospital walls began to darken as strange light danced on the walls, stretching from the entrance of the hospital to the door leading to the room Kai was placed inside.