Chapter Text
According to the man sitting opposite of him it was 21st of December.
”It’s snowing outside.”
’I don’t care…’
“Christmas Eve is only three days away.”
Silence.
“Did you celebrate Christmas on Vers?”
The gentle knocks from a chess piece being moved on the board sounded in the room. The sound was surprisingly loud. It was probably due to the dense silence inside – what he liked to call it – the glass box, which made Slaine feel like a forgotten ornament inside one of those wintery snow globes he knew were being sold all over the world at this hour. The only things that were missing were the water to drown him and the plastic pieces to fall around him to fake a gentle snowfall. It was so gruesome he could actually find it appealing, and for a moment he wished he had a snow globe to shake and admire the lifeless state of the figurines inside it.
He noticed Orange move a chess piece from the corner of his eye and he wondered why his captor still insisted on visiting him like that. Why had the man not lost interest in him yet? The tyrant never spoke during Orange’s visits in the prison. He never spoke to anyone. Slaine even wondered if his voice had died during those long months he had spent in his silent prison, not using his vocal cords more than during his moments of madness when he screamed his heart out. The guards had already lost interest in him. The entire work force had lost interest in him and simply did what they had to in order for Slaine to stay alive. Other than that they left him alone in his prison cell – which Slaine preferred above anything else.
“I don’t celebrate it,” Orange said and moved another chess piece as he played against himself while Slaine sat silent and unmoving on his designated spot opposite of the little table between them.
‘Just leave,’ Slaine thought and kept his eyes locked on the chains between his cuffed hands, which lay limp in his lap.
“Is your cell cold?” he heard Orange continue and Slaine breathed a silent sigh.
‘Why are you so persistent? Just go! Leave me alone!’
“I’ve heard that you huddle up beneath the duvet a lot.”
‘Shut up!’
“If you want us to increase the heat, that can be arrang-“
Slaine could not take it anymore and he kicked the table leg to his right irritably, hard enough some of the chess pieces fell over on the board. Orange looked at him with that blank expression which irritated Slaine to no ends. The former tyrant glared back at the soldier who had captured him, with piercing eyes.
‘I hate you. Why won’t you understand that?’
Orange looked at him for a short moment, clearly thinking far more than he gave the appearance of, and then stood up from his chair in defeat. Slaine had won this time; Orange understood he could not gain anything from spending further minutes with the obstinately silent tyrant. This kind of win was far more gratifying than winning at chess – even if Slaine had never played it with his capturer. He had refused to touch the pieces and Orange had begun to play alone while talking away about useless little things Slaine had no interest in. All he waited for was the decision of executing him but he knew that would never come.
“I understand,” Orange said as he looked at Slaine when guards came to show Slaine back to his cell. “I will come back on Christmas Eve to wish you a merry Christmas.”
The man always said that; he would always let Slaine know when he would come back to make a new try of speaking to him. Wednesdays were the usual days Orange would visit him but to Slaine Wednesdays could have been whichever other day of the week since he had no sense of time anymore. He had been locked up for several months now that each day felt the same – like he stood still in time with nothing happening around him. Be it Wednesdays or Fridays, Mondays or Sundays – those were all the same for him.
Orange exited the room first while guards were holding Slaine beneath his cuffed arms. When Slaine had seen his captor disappear through a guarded steel door he was shown back to his cell, got his cuffs removed and was then left alone. He had thrown a glance toward the tiny barred window on his way to the cell and he had seen nothing. The snow must have fallen heavily since the entire window had been covered up with it; it had been pitch black.
Slaine curled up beneath the duvet and closed his eyes and nuzzled the pillow. His father’s talisman slipped out from beneath his heavenly blue t-shirt and he reached up toward it to hide it inside his hand.
‘Dad…’ he thought and frowned. He held tightly onto it to find some kind of stability in his predictable environment which was so foreseeable it slowly drove him mad. He breathed out a heavy and frustrated sigh, heard someone walk down the corridor and announce the evening’s dinner. Slaine did not answer – as usual – and heard that someone place the tray of food on the table, which was bolted to the floor, through the gap in the barred cell door. When Slaine refused the food, the prisoner was left alone again.
To make time slip by even if he had nothing to wait for, Slaine decided to sleep. He had no appetite at all after each of Orange’s visits and he did not know why, and so he fell asleep – forgetting about the food and entered the land of dreams.
***
“My lord… Wake up,” he heard a nostalgic voice say and Slaine slowly opened his eyes. “Wake up, my lord.”
That voice was so nostalgic despite the hollowness of it that Slaine was suddenly brusquely woken up by his curiosity to know who this unknown person was, and quickly he sat up in his bed and pulled the duvet off. He stared at a pale man who should have had dark hair, but even his hair and clothes had lost their saturation. The man wore a uniform of a Baron from Vers and had gruesome wounds across his torso and face. They looked like burn wounds and part of his uniform had been burnt away. His face had an open wound which did not bleed and the blood on his uniform was still glistening in the weak light from the corridor outside of the cell. Something that resembled smog emitted from him all around as his image slowly flickered, like he was a heatless flame floating in thin air – and yet he was covered in heavy but silent chains which swayed along with his slow flickering and floating motion.
The more Slaine looked at him the more he felt his skin crawl. He realized the man standing before him should have been dead several months ago.
And he was…
Slaine emitted a scream of horror as the being stared at him and Slaine hurriedly crawled up against the wall behind the bed’s headboard. He pushed his back against the cold stone wall as hard as possible, wishing he could fall through it in order to run from the dead man before him.
The being’s slightly concerned expression turned into panic and it flew up to him so fast Slaine had no time to react until the being’s face was right before his. There was no smell of rot or blood, nor the smell of burnt or the man’s nostalgic scent he had had while he had still been alive. Slaine went completely silent for a while, trying to understand what had happened as the familiar but horrifying face floated in front of him, and when he looked down toward the bed he saw the man’s body go right through the bed.
“Please, listen to me,” the being said with great worry and reached out a hand to touch Slaine’s shoulder, but Slaine shook his head in utter panic and screamed once again.
The former tyrant threw himself down from the bed and landed painfully on the floor. He hurried up from the floor and ran up to the bars to yank at them, scream for the guards to help him.
“SOMEONE!” he yelled. “PLEASE! OPEN THE DOOR!”
There was no reaction in the corridor outside.
“My lord! Please! It is me: Harklight! Calm down!” the ghost of Harklight said behind him with a hollow voice. Slaine heard the ghost’s voice get closer and he turned around quickly. “Please, listen to me. I have something important to announce.”
“Get away from me!” Slaine yelled frightened. The crawling on his skin intensified. “You’re dead! You’re supposed to be dead!”
“And I am, my lord,” the ghost of Harklight said urgently. “I am dead, but I am here to warn you.”
“Warn me?!” Slaine yelled and took steps to his left to get away from the floating being. “You’re not real! You can’t be real!”
“But my lord…” the ghost of Harklight said with a suddenly saddened expression, and it stopped hovering closer to Slaine. “I have not moved on since I can’t,” it then continued. “There is something I have to do before that.”
Slaine’s panic began to slowly weaken and his legs began to tremble underneath him. He stared at his former subordinate who had been a good friend and an excellent soldier. To see what had become of him was sickening; the man was dead because of Slaine. It was a reality he could not hide from – a reality he could not flee from – because now the result of Slaine’s crimes stood before him like an unpleasant revelation. It had been easier to forget when there had not been an image to haunt him, but now that image stood right before him. Slaine could not deny it.
“H-Harklight…?” Slaine said quietly with a trembling breath. “I’m sorry…”
The former tyrant watched the ghost of his subordinate shake its head with a slight smile on its pale lips.
“You owe me no apology, my lord,” the ghost said. “Please do understand I am dead because I chose to die in battle while fighting for what I believe in and not because you asked me to.”
Slaine frowned. He had to admit it felt like a relief to hear the ghost of Harklight say that, but even then the guilt continued to eat at him.
“Then why are you here?” Slaine asked confused. “Are you here to haunt me?”
The ghost of Harklight shook its head once again.
“No, my lord. I am here to warn you about visitors,” the ghost said and a sudden chill ran down Slaine’s spine. The former tyrant shivered and for a moment his teeth clattered. The face of the being turned into unease.
“V-visitors…?” Slaine asked and began to grow worried. “Is someone else haunting me for my crimes?”
He could not help but to ask. A sudden feeling of being watched struck him and fear shook him all the way to the core. Would those whose death Slaine was responsible for come back to demand and claim revenge? Would they be familiar or unfamiliar faces – or both? Who and how many would they be? What would they say and not say?
‘How angry will they be…?’ he thought and shivered again.
“Do not worry too much, my lord,” the ghost of Harklight said silently. “But I have to warn you that you have to change your ways, my lord. You have to stop waiting for death and not treat Kaizuka Inaho as your enemy, or else you will carry longer and heavier chains than me in the afterlife – pull and tug at them and feel them holding you back and exhaust you. You are an angry man, my lord, and that anger and bitterness will turn into heavy chains after you die if you stay like this.”
Slaine’s mind came to a halt and he could only stare at the ghost of his former subordinate. He watched the heavy chains around his body. They certainly looked heavy now that Slaine took a closer look at them.
“The afterlife is a beautiful place, my lord, but only for those who have lived humbly. You are a humble being, my lord. Deep down I know you are, and thus I want to ask you to change your ways.”
“Change my ways?” Slaine asked and lowered his eyes. “Do I even deserve a beautiful afterlife for what I have don-?“
“But you do, my lord!” Harklight interrupted him and yelled with urgency as if to stop Slaine from finishing a horrible line of words – words that should not be spoken. Slaine jumped from the ghost’s sudden yell and went silent. The ghost of Harklight looked at him with a painful longing. “Live through the punishment you have gotten and forgive and forget your rivalry with Kaizuka Inaho, and then seek the rightful afterlife you deserve.”
Slaine had to admit that deep down he wished his afterlife to be much more pleasant than the reality he had lived, and still lived in. Harklight’s ghost was telling him to change his ways in the life he had now in order to earn a comfortable afterlife. Did that mean Slaine still had a chance? Could he still right his wrongdoings by such a simple way as to accept his punishment and release his grudge toward the young man who had fought against him and captured him?
“I did not get the chance but I beg of you to take it, my lord,” Harklight’s ghost said quietly with a melancholy tone. “Three ghosts will be visiting you after me. The first one – Ghost of Christmas Past – will come at midnight tonight.”
“T-three ghost…?” Slaine asked and took a step back once again. “Ghost of Christmas Past?”
Harklight’s ghost nodded and looked concerned.
“The second – Ghost of Christmas Present – will come tomorrow evening. The third…” Harklight’s ghost went silent for a while. The former man pressed his lips into a thin line as if he was uncomfortable of continuing.
“And t-the third…?” Slaine asked slightly distressed and began trembling from the being’s troubled look.
‘Is the third ghost frightening…?’ he thought and held his breath, waiting for Harklight’s ghost to continue.
The ghost of Harklight hovered silently for a while. It seemed to pain him greatly to speak about the third ghost and Slaine grew more and more worried of what this third ghost would be.
“My lord…” Harklight’s ghost then finally said. “The third ghost – Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come – will arrive on the night to Christmas Eve. Let the ghosts show you and teach you; listen to their lessons. They all three have important things to give you and only you can find courage to accept their gifts that will help you change your ways.”
The floating image of his former subordinate began to fade. Suddenly fright grabbed a merciless hold of Slaine and prompted him to chase after the ghost. What would he do once the ghosts came to haunt him? How could he face them alone?
“Harklight!” Slaine yelled after the young man and reached out a hand toward the disappearing image. “Where will you go?”
The ghost of Harklight gave him that smile which Slaine remembered when the man had stood next to him, alive and ready to serve him with unconditional loyalty despite Slaine’s overbearing insanity; it was the smile which told Slaine the man had been his only friend and the only source of trust in the crazy turmoil they had lived in as the two worlds around them had burned in Slaine’s name.
“You will never see me again, my lord,” the ghost of Harklight told him with his voice echoing more and more along with the fading image. ‘But if you change your ways and wholeheartedly believe in the gifts the ghosts will give you, you will save me from these chains as well – but only if you wish to. That is for you to decide, my lord. It is soon midnight.”
“What gifts!?” Slaine asked in a hurry as the last hint of the ghost’s smile disappeared. “Harklight!”
The room echoed empty. The ghost was gone. Nothing of Harklight’s presence lingered and Slaine stared at the spot in the air where the wounded ghost had hovered. Tears gathered in Slaine’s eyes as he understood the man was gone forever – taken away by the gentle cradle of passing. Did he wait for Slaine to learn the lessons and accept the gifts the ghosts would present to him? Was the man hoping for Slaine to give him salvation from the heavy chains, brought onto him by his own crimes he had committed as the living man he had been?
‘This has to be a dream,’ Slaine thought and listened to the silence in the little cell and the area outside it. No one was there. It was completely devoid of life. Slaine’s heart was the only heart beating in the proximity and the silence made the heartbeats overpowering. The sound of his heart was the only thing accompanying him until he heard the gentle sound of a clock, and Slaine turned to look toward the clock on the wall opposite of the cell. The weak light further down the corridor lit up the hands of time just enough for Slaine to see the minute-hand was closing in on the midnight hour. The hour-hand waited patiently for its comrade to arrive to midnight alongside it, to step over to the witching hour when the ghost would arrive. They were in no hurry – moving slowly with all the time in the world at their hands. Tick tock the clock spoke softly. It was a bizarre communication between him and the hands of time now that Slaine thought about it and listened to them.
Not yet, the hands of time would tell him if they could speak. We’re not there yet. You have to wait. We decide when it’s time.
It was a cruel joke made up by a nightmare. It had to be. It was supposed to be Christmas – a holiday Slaine had not celebrated for years but a happy holiday nonetheless. This nightmare and the waiting for a ghost made it feel more like Halloween than Christmas and Slaine could not help but to laugh quietly. He leaned his back against the bars to his cell and covered his face with his hands. It was stupid. It was silly. Madness had finally caught up with him, induced by the uneventful days which were nothing but a gray mess where day and night was only distinguishable by the lights in the corridor being turned on and off.
‘What am I doing? I’m crazy, that’s all,’ he thought and sighed heavily in defeat and hung his head and searched for support from the cold iron bars behind him. He gripped them hard with his hands to make sure they were really there. If this was a nightmare, it was awfully vivid since he could feel the pain from his fingers tightly gripping the bars – enough to make them ache around the cold iron.
He stood up from his position against the bars and sighed with a loud sigh – releasing all the built up tension inside him from the frightened hallucination which had had the image of Harklight’s ghost. There were no such things as ghosts.
‘It’s just madness,’ he assure himself and took the first step toward the bed while he began to feel calmer.
First step.
Second step.
Third step…
As he reached the edge of the bed and raised the duvet to pull it around him, the clock on the wall outside the cell released a horrifyingly loud ring of a solid metal cast bell of unrealistic proportions. It pierced his ears and messed up his thoughts into a jumbling mess. It made his heart react with loud and fast beats as the sudden and unpleasant surprise of the bell had frightened him. Slaine turned quickly to look at the clock on the wall. It showed the witching hour had arrived. The hands of time stood at guard on their midnight position and the loud ringing of the invisible clock tower bell kept echoing around him – engulfing him like a tidal wave set to arrive at midnight.
The room suddenly went cold and the light from further down the corridor faded into darkness and the ringing of the bell stopped. There was nothing. Only blackness and silence. Slaine heard his breaths tremble and felt his body shake from fright. The air had become so cold it crawled inside his lungs and threatened to freeze him. He pushed up against the wall next to the bed and waited and listened. There were no steps from the guards and the ticks and tocks of the clock had disappeared. He was alone in the darkness.
“H-hello…?” he said quivering. “Is someone there…?”
Only silence was his answer and he swallowed hard and listened to his frightened breaths. This could not be a mere hallucination. It could not be this real. Or could it? He had never lost his mind like that – never experienced the true horrors of the human mind – but whether it was real or not, an unpleasant trick of his mind or genuine experience, it was frightening nonetheless.
A gentle breeze of warmness reached his ankles and he looked down in the darkness. He could not see anything in the blackness but he could sense a comforting breeze in the shivering cold. Something flickered in the corner of his eye and he turned his head to look at the source. The light further down the corridor had come back and was moving toward his cell. Slowly and gently it cast a light in the darkness while its intensity grew and a white figure hovered behind it. It came closer and Slaine kept his eyes fixed at it, feeling fearful of letting it go with his sight. It moved silently but with calm and did not seem hostile at all and once is stopped outside of Slaine’s cell to look at the prisoner, Slaine could see its form.
It was clad in white and carried a metal cap – much like a candle extinguisher – in its hand – whenever it had hands. Its form and shape shifted constantly, slowly but gently it suddenly was a being with one arm, then with only one leg, in the next moment it had twenty legs and then a pair of legs and arms without a head. It had no visible outline and was constantly in a state of dissolve in the dense light.
It was a gentle light; warm and comforting and somehow nostalgic.
“A-are you … the Ghost of Christmas Past?” Slaine asked quietly while he tried to recover from the shock and horror. The being seemed to nod. “So Harklight spoke the truth? You are the first of three to haunt me?”
The being nodded once again and reached out something that was supposed to be a hand through the bars, but with it billowing the way it did, it looked like dense smoke which danced in the warm breeze – which Slaine realized emitted from the ghost.
Slaine hesitated as he stared at the ghost’s hand. What would the ghost do with him? What would it show him and teach him? Since its presence was nothing but kind Slaine swallowed hard and took a deep breath, reached out his hand toward the ghost’s. As he was about to touch it he hesitated once again and hovered his hand above it as he debated in his mind if he should trust the ghost or not. Harklight had told him to let the ghosts show and teach him and give him a gift each that would help Slaine to save his afterlife once he had faced his demise. Harklight had never told him a lie and his smile had been as genuine as when he had been alive.
‘I have to trust him and the ghosts…’ Slaine thought and finally lowered his hand and touched the billowing ghost’s hand. It felt soft like cotton and once it had enveloped Slaine’s hand with the smoke warmth coursed through the former tyrant and the surrounding cell dissolved in a violent wind which shattered the bars and stone and concrete room and corridor. The light from the ghost blinded him and Slaine closed his eyes in a desperate attempt to protect them from the light and wind. His hair fluttered along with his clothing and the talisman around his neck bounced against his chest as it protested in its chain against the wind.
And then … calm.
“Daddy! Daddy! Look!” he heard an excited child’s voice say and Slaine opened his eyes. “Dad!”
In front of him Slaine saw a small boy who could not be older than ten or eleven years old. The boy was dressed in creamy white knitted sweater and wore soft brown pinstriped pants. He had a soft hue to his blond hair and had blue eyes which stared at a man who was immersed in a pile of papers and books on the desk next to which he sat. The small boy pulled at his father’s knitted sweater, begging for the man’s attention while the child wore a smile born from hope and assurance that this time the boy’s plan would work.
“Is that me?” Slaine asked the ghost next to him and looked at the billowing head of the being holding his hand. “I think I remember this, but it’s vague…”
The ghost nodded and they both turned to look at the child Slaine and his father.
“Dad, I drew a Christmas tree! It has all the angels and apples, and all the candles and even a star!” the boy said excitedly. “I made it just for you, daddy!”
“That’s pretty, Slaine,” the man answered absentmindedly, not even throwing as much as a glance toward the child’s picture.
“Dad…” the boy said quietly and the smile on the boy’s lips faded. “Daddy… I drew you a picture… Don’t you want to see it?”
“Not now, Slaine. I’m working. I almost got the formula I’m looking for. Don’t disturb daddy when he’s working,” the man answered this time with a hint of annoyance.
“I remember now…” Slaine said to the ghost as he watched the tears gather in his child self’s eyes. “My dad was just about to solve a mathematical problem concerning the power of Aldnoah and he had been immersed in trying to solve it for days. He even forgot that it was Christmas and…”
Slaine’s voice faded and it became hard to breathe. He reached up his hand to the talisman around his neck – the same talisman he could see hanging around his father’s neck as the man leaned over the papers on the desk in front of him – and tightened his grip around it. An ache awoke in his chest and he had to bite back his tears.
“… and I had to celebrate it alone,” he whispered. “I sat next to the Christmas tree which we had decorated two weeks earlier before dad got the flash of genius that would make him work through Christmas, and waited for dad to finish his work so we could open our Christmas presents together.” Slaine breathed in a deep sigh in a desperate attempt to release some of the ache in his chest. “He didn’t open his presents until two days later… Of course he knew what they contained as I had chosen the gifts for him and he had paid for them, but still…”
A tear rolled down his cheek and Slaine quickly dried it away. He had to be strong despite the loneliness weighing so much he felt like he crumbled beneath it. The reminder of how much he missed his father before he had become busy with the Aldnoah research, struck Slaine like a poisonous arrow which spread a heavy emotion inside him.
“But I drew you a picture…” he heard his younger self cry.
“I will look at it later, Slaine. Let daddy work,” his father scolded impatiently.
The last thing Slaine saw of his younger self before he had to close his eyes to protect them from the suddenly growing wind, was how his younger self walked over to the door to throw a last glance over his shoulder toward his father, before the boy left his father in the study. The image of the silently crying 10 year old Slaine shattered in a strong wind and the light blinded Slaine once again.
And then … calm.
“That sounds so much fun!” he heard a beautiful voice exclaim. “And then what do they do after they have danced around the Christmas tree?”
Slaine opened his eyes and saw a young golden haired girl and a boy who was clearly a younger Slaine. The boy was around 12 to 13 years old and wore a gentle blush on his cheeks and looked innocently curious about the girl’s excitement. A weak smile played on his lips while the girl had glittering eyes.
“Then they open the presents. Keep in mind different countries has different cultures and different families have different traditions on how to celebrate Christmas, but in my traditions you eat a tasty dinner, then open the Christmas presents, and then dance around the tree,’ the young Slaine explained to…
“Asseylum…” Slaine whispered and stared at the kindly smiling girl who was eager to listen to Slaine explaining how he celebrated Christmas. “I remember this as well,” Slaine said to the ghost and smiled. “I have forgotten how happy I was though.”
“Say, Slaine. Can we celebrate Christmas? We lack proper Christmas trees but I am sure we can do something to make it feel Christmassy!” the young Asseylum said happily and excitedly.
The young Slaine’s cheeks grew even more crimson and he looked excited as well.
“S-sure!” the younger Slaine said and looked ready to assist the princess with her idea.
“Let us ask my grandfather! I am sure he will give us permission!” the princess said and took a hold of the young Slaine’s hand to pull him along.
Slaine watched his younger self run after the princess with a warm heart. The memory was sweet and yet sorrowful. It was before his father had passed away but was not present in Slaine’s life. Asseylum had taken a liking to him after saving him from the terrifying crash after Slaine’s father had decided to move to Vers. Back then Slaine had been considered as a friend of the princess who was allowed to stay in the royal palace due to his father having such a good reputation as a scientist. While his father had been busy working Slaine had spent time with Asseylum, enjoying a somewhat carefree life.
“We celebrated an awkward Christmas that year, only Asseylum and me,” Slaine told the ghost. “My father was of course busy as always, but the kindhearted princess tried to make my loneliness less real by spending time with me. She was truly kind.”
“P-princess!” he heard his child self yell from the end of the corridor where the children had run off. “W-wait for me!”
“But then my father died…” Slaine said quietly. “… and I was taken away from her to be trained into a soldier…”
“Hurry up, Slaine!” he heard the laughing voice of Asseylum yell to Slaine’s younger self.
Oh how he missed the princess. The ache in his chest grew and a second tear rolled down his cheek. Again the loneliness struck him but this time in a different way. Asseylum had been there for him back then and she had been a great source of support and joy – but now she had not appeared before him even once. The words of hers – conveyed by Orange before summer had become autumn – echoed in Slaine’s mind, of how she had wished for Orange to save Slaine from his misery. It had been such a strong impact to hear her not hate him for what he had done that Slaine had been contented for a little while before the tedious and empty life in prison had begun to pull him into a thick mud of purposeless existence.
‘But she never visits me. She never sends me messages. She’s not there at all anymore,’ Slaine thought and the wind began to blow again along with the brightening light. He held his breath and felt the wind play with his hair and clothes. The hand enveloped by the billowing ghost’s gripped the cottony hand of the ghost’s and he wondered what the new vision would be. What other painful memories did he have to watch?
The wind seemed stronger this time and the light shone so brightly he had to cover his eyes with a hand to protect them. He gasped as the intense wind threatened to knock his breath away.
And then … calm.
He heard a sob in a room which whirred quietly from machinery. It was an awfully familiar noise which put so much ache in Slaine’s chest that he knew instantly what he would see once he opened his eyes. Carefully – ever so slowly – he opened his eyes and saw a dimly lit room. The light was of a fluorescent blue and revealed a lonely figure sitting on its knees in front of a glass wall. On the other side was liquid and a female body dressed in a skintight suit. The golden locks drifted in the weak currents inside the tank where Asseylum’s unconscious body floated while the machinery gave her life-support. On the floor, in front of the tank Slaine watched himself. The date was fresh in his mind.
“24th December, 2014…” Slaine mumbled and listened to his slightly younger self’s sobs.
“I’m sorry!” he heard himself cry. “Forgive me, princess… I tried to save you. I searched for you and when I found you I was so happy…! And this was the result of my uselessness!”
“This was closely after the battle on Saazbaum’s landing castle in Russia,” Slaine said to the ghost and took a step back as the memory became so vivid that his heart was about to burst. “I couldn’t save her… I was nothing but a useless boy pretending to be a hero…”
The Ghost of Christmas Past gripped Slaine’s hand tighter to prevent him from running away from the memory. It forced Slaine to watch himself cry for Asseylum and talk to her like the young boy had been struck by madness from grief.
“Right after this I lost myself,” Slaine said as he struggled to breathe from the strong emotions inside him. “I became apathetic… psychopathic… All my emotions died since all I could think about was her. No one else existed in my state of crisis and I lost my way completely for a while…”
Slaine tried to pull himself free from the ghost’s hand but it held him without giving way for his helpless sorrow and desperate attempts to flee. The grip around his hand tightened further until it hurt and the cries of his younger self echoed in his mind. His heart was sent into turmoil and it felt like he was in the same kind of crisis as his younger self. It pulled at his heartstrings, choked the air out of him as his breathing became harder, forced tears onto his cheeks and finally made him scream:
“No more! Please, show me no more!”
The Ghost of Christmas Past pulled him closer and loomed over him. The gentle air around the billowing being had disappeared and he heard an echoing voice say harshly:
“These are the shadows of things that have been. That they are what they are, do not blame me!”
The ghost was angry.
“I can’t take it anymore!” Slaine yelled and took a hold of the metal cap it carried with his free hand. He raised it and threw it back down over the ghost, which disappeared like a candle that he had snuffed out.
The wind picked up in strength again and angrily tore at his hair and clothes and he screamed and raised his hands to protect his face from the harshness of it. The wind got so strong it tore the vision of his younger self into shreds and Slaine lost his balance. He fell against a hard surface and once he opened his eyes he was back in his cell, lying on the floor. The weak light further down the corridor shone as it always did and lit up the tick tocking timepiece on the wall. The hands of time were leisurely wandering over the numbered dial, the minute-hand in a more eager pace than the hour-hand’s barely noticeable movements. It was only one minute after midnight and everything seemed to be back to normal.
Slaine’s heart beat inside his chest like he had been running from a monster and he slowly got up from the floor. The shocking experience had left a horrible feeling inside his soul – so horrible his entire body shook. He felt sweaty despite he had not felt warm, and his breathing was irregular and deep. He hurried to curl up beneath the duvet to hide and wondered what had truly happened. Had it been a nightmare or a play of his lost mind?
‘Was it real?’ he thought and put his arms around himself to hug himself tightly. An indescribable urge to sleep washed over him and he breathed in a deep breath. He told himself to relax – that it had simply been a nightmare and he had fallen off from the bed as he had been tussling and turning in his sleep. Slowly he began drifting away in the similar manner he did every time he was about to fall asleep. His mind and heart calmed, his emotions faded away and a comfortable unconsciousness washed over him, and he fell asleep.