Gale joins me in one of my sessions, though he primarily sits in the corner, and we thusly manage to get nothing done. All I can hear is the swishing of his tail, and Lotus and Natrina don't come back to me, nor does the Auspicia. All I can see is the shadow in the corner of my vision, where Gale stands in real life, but even as Ignis casts me a doubtful look, I find that I don't want him to leave, so we go through promising scents, snuffing out potential memories before they can rise to my mind, and--

"I think I'm going to need to try this on another day." I murmur.

"You're going to need to try it alone, is what you're going to need to do." Ignis's ash-stained eyes narrow into a leer.
"It helped me," Gale says. "I get one free day, this is a good way to spend it. These are... nice candles. Good variety."

"This isn't about you." Ignis says. "But if that's what you want, Rena, feel free to go for a quick break. Just remember that every day we waste has consequences."

"Thanks," Gale calls back. "Just remember that you're holding one of our most powerful Defenders under here so you can put candles under her nose while everyone else risks their lives."

Ignis glowers at him as he closes the door, and her snarl is the last thing we see as she disappears from view, the scents reaching out with her, beckoning me back in with the past. I look at Gale ruefully. "You know, you were being distracting."

"Or maybe it's a lot of garbage." He's impossibly snide, though his fur bristles as if he was being verbally attacked. "Do you really believe what it shows you?"

"Yes," I gape at him. "I'm not making this up. This is magic, pure and simple."

"Whatever you say." Gale's ears perk. "Hear that?"

"Are you going to duck out of the conversation like that?" I ask, unsure if the scoff in my voice is mocking or desperately sincere.

"No, no." Gale's ears perk. "There's definitely... something." he walks past me and up to a door, flicking one of his long ears against the wood. From within comes the soft, muted sound of someone sobbing, and I think I might know who. He gives me something akin to a grin, lowering his head as if to offer that the both of us could go in, and I shake my head. "Rena." he hisses.

"Gale." I snarl back.

The door swings open. Glaze peeks out, sees us, and her wide eyes squint into a smile. "Oh. You don't need to be shy. I've been going through things."

"Things?" I ask. "Is this your room... or something? I didn't know the Defenders had individual items."

Glaze nods direly. "Of course, of course. You've never been back here because you don't have any... personal items, but Gale's been back here before-- Nina takes you back here, doesn't she?" The look she casts him is similar to the smug one I've only become accustomed to on his face, and I glare at him as if he'll spit up the meaning if I press far enough.

He only raises his jowls slightly. "Once or twice."

"There's far too much shredded fur for that--" Glaze says.

"Shredded fur?" I ask, wings bolting open, and one of them hits a picture frame, which swings back and forth. A frame falls onto the ground, and I swing it up into the light, all my interest immediately dropped. Glaze sits with a thickly pink furred Sentient, almost her exact twin. "Who's that?"

Glaze smiles sadly, her jowls twitching upwards as if it is painful to hold them there. "It's just an image of my brother."

Gale's ears slide back as he watches, moving briskly around the piled sentimental items that fill the room.

"Was he..." I lower my voice.

"He was a civilian death three years ago." she finishes.

"You guys look like you were close." I say, examining the picture. Their fur blends together when they touch. Both of them are smiling.

"No, not really! Maybe close for siblings, but not for friends. We fought all the time. I used to tease him about his fur color, since his markings were so bright... he hated that." Quietly, she adds, "I loved his fur. I was always jealous of him... and now he'll never know."

"Oh," I whisper.

Glaze's eyes rise. "It's alright, you don't need to pretend to be sad on my behalf. I know you wouldn't understand."

"I might," I object.

"She's right, Rena. We wouldn't understand anything." Gale... isn't growling. With a smooth flick of his tail, he says, "Sorry for bothering you."

"What was that about shredded fur?" I yell after him. He lowers his ears and keeps walking, more quickly this time. I bolt after him down the hall, looking back towards Glaze once, just as her eyes catch mine in the doorframe. "I... I'm sorry."

"Everyone loses something," Glaze responds, brushing it off. "Hang onto him by the tail, won't you?"

I run around the corner and hit Fyera in the side. Gale is just around her, looking increasingly more fidgety by the second, his face a mess of twitching muscles and hardly suppressed annoyance.

"Have you two seen Blossom?" asks Fyera. "We've been looking for her since midday, but it looks like she's left the premises--"

Gale rolls his eyes. "You and Ignis are the leaders. You can handle it."
"Avery's the leader, and I don't think she'd appreciate your nonchalance about your team members. I know we're all disposable to you, Gale, seeing as you had no problems slicing Auma open, but..."
Gale bites his tongue. With an angry, bloody grumble, he says, "Fine, fine, I'll get a patrol out. Where's Nina?"

"I'll come with you." I offer.

"Where's Nina?" Gale asks again.

My eyes widen. "What? Come on, you can't just decide to shut me out..."

"I'm not. I'm asking where Nina is." he says. "Or set me up with... who's still around? Kairu? He's alright. Kairu's good."
"You were just with me. What changed there?" I call.

"Nothing changed. Stop being weird, Rena." Gale keeps walking. "And please let me go."

"Shredded fur..." I look to Fyera. "What do he and Nina get up to?"
"Uh, sometimes I'm pretty sure they spar? She's not taking your male, if that's what you're worried about. She just gets very physically... aggressive. I don't know why he'd be so weird about it either, but I'm also not sure what you see in him." Fyera says. She shakes her head. "That's not important right now, Rena. Can you come with me?"
I nod, following Fyera back upstairs, but something still stirs in my chest, and I hate it.

The room is a calamity at the present, with the Defenders assembling as if for a Call Four or something equally perilous. It dawns on me that we might be, if not now, in the long term. The numbers are down, their faces ashen, and when Avery paces, she keeps her wings so close to her they go through the passive position and are rubbing against her neck. "I don't want to believe she wandered off for rigor mortis. Did we run medical checks on everyone?" Avery asks.

Glaze shakes her head.

"And why not?" Avery snaps.
Fyera steps in at Glaze's side while the pink Canira trembles terribly. "We were all reeling from the shock."

"This is basic procedure. We're trained for shock. We're trained for everything!" exclaims Avery, angrily flaring her tail feathers. "This shouldn't be happening!"

"It's my fault." Glaze says. "I'm s-s-sorry, I know I'm a bad medic, I'm trying my best but I..."

"We're all barely adults." Gale steps up the stairs and enters the room, Nina by his side. The shadows fold down the wall at his side. Gruffly, he adds, "They've sent out pups to fight a war that every grown-up on this planet couldn't handle. We're doing our best, but Avery, you have to know that's not going to be enough."

"I know," Avery whispers. "I had only hoped..."
"That's your problem," Arazel enters from the other direction. "It's the hoping. Now, philosophy's not going to do us any good. Can all of you come with me? We should be able to find her before she does any damage, rigor mortis, Plague, or both."

"We should split up." Gale argues.

"Ay, but don't go any smaller than three, and keep someone with you who can send up some kind of elemental flare if you're attacked or you find her." Arazel says. "I'll take the Auspicia and... Kairu. Flare, you're with Gale and Nina. Indy, take Fyera and Glaze. Who are we missing?"

"Only the strategists." Axel says. "We won't be much help this late."

"Right. You three and Avery hold the fort." Arazel gestures the rest of us forwards with one of her gleaming mechanical wings. "We only have so much night, the lot of you. Let's go."

The team disperses into the night, the darkness taking all of us by the neck. Arazel's fur and mechanical parts gleam in the moon as we walk, keeping her pace the best we can. The city with its ample lighting and white buildings, like so many teeth, fall back behind us, and I sense ghosts amongst us tonight, adrift on the cold winds. The frigid air batters my fur, and a presence enters me, my vision overlapping that of many parallel pasts. The Auspicia knows when a death is encroaching.

So many, so fast...

Arazel's quizzical eyes turn back to Kairu and I, who both flank her in silence. "So you still haven't figured it out, have you?"

"The knife? My powers?" I ask.

"Both," she says. "They're interlinked."

"No," I watch one of the two moons. Sirius gleams overhead, its pale face a speckled comfort. At least someone is far and away from all of this chaos.

"Mmm." She mumbles, displeased. "This will keep happening until you work things out."

"It's not-- it's not my fault." I begin.

Kairu is silent.

"It might not be your fault directly, but I assure you, this is going to keep happening until you stop messing around and figure out how to activate the knife and find the killer." Her metal wings flash. "Do I need to spell it out for you?"

"No, I only... I don't..." I stop again. "Do you hear--"

Kairu dashes forwards, leaving us in the dark. Arazel watches him, craning her neck forwards, and then she nonchalantly begins moving again, striding through the thick mist of shadow onto a moonlit hill by the kaanin pens. A lapnin holds herself against one of the stakes, and besides her sits Kairu.

"We're so close to the end of everything." Blossom whispers. Her eyes are full of stars. "I wanted this to be the last thing I see."

"Did they get you?" asks Kairu.

Blossom makes an affirmative gesture.

"Plague." I whisper.

"We figured." Arazel says.
"They're falling off," Blossom says, her voice dying in her throat. She looks straight up towards the stars. "Everything is falling off."

"You're a lapnin. Be logical about this." Arazel stands over her, obscuring Sirius from her view. "Tell us what you see. What you feel. It's the only way we're going to be able to help you."
"My viscera hurt here and here," Blossom taps several points in her stomach area. "Heart is pulsing erratically. Most notable symptoms are behind my eyes... in my eyes... I can see all these speckled patterns, like stars, but it's more like the afterglare of a dozen suns. They're making it hard to see at present. I can feel something congealing inside of my skull."

"Can you--" I begin.

"No. I can't fight it." Blossom says. "I didn't want to end up like Twitch," she sniffs, "But I didn't want anyone to kill me, like Auma, so I thought I could come out here and just... blink out of existence. Like the stars when the morning starts." She leans forwards. "It's no big deal. My life's so short."

Kairu begins, "Blossom?"
"It's so short. Just a thread. You clip it and it's over. That's it. Then what? I've got two more parts of me, but they'll never be mine again. That's terrifying. Where does the mind go? There's all this about an afterlife, but no one actually knows. Some of the Canii show our souls ascending to Verhamera, but the prey species evolved on their own. Why would there be an afterlife when we're just a mistake of magical cycling? Why would a god who never intended for us to exist take pity on us? Why would any god let her own creation come to this? Can she see us anymore?" Blossom strains against herself. "I shouldn't have come. I couldn't help anyone. I'm not a good fighter. I wanted to be a strategist, really, I did--"

"Calm down," say Kairu and Arazel at once.

"I hope she'll take me. I want to belong to the stars." Blossom whispers, hoarsely.

"You belonged here. You did a good job." Kairu says, wiping away a single tear from Blossom's muzzle with his snout. "I've got you."
"Okay." Blossom whispers. "Okay."

Arazel drops down, and just as quickly, a shining red cut emerges across Blossom's neck. Her face splits into something resembling an insidious grin, and then, her eyes roll up towards Kairu and out of her head. Arazel moves back, shocked, and the other patrols come in as Blossom's breath stills.

Kairu steps back, letting the body fall, as the blood begins to run down her white chest, dyed from scarlet to an almost maroon color by sickness. It gurgles in her throat, and her body curls, as if she's going to sleep. Gale and Fyera step forwards, and Gale sniffs the body.

Nina stands by his side, two tails wrapped around his back leg as if to bind them both together.

"We can bury her tonight." Arazel says. She looks at me as she passes, levitating the body onto her back. The blood spills out, but she does not blink... Arazel, are you unafraid of the Plague? Her glare focuses on me, that accusing, awful frown still across her face, and I want to yell at her, but instead, I stiffen up, sniffing slightly as the procession passes.

The grasses at the edge of the town whisper horrible things.

Give out.

---

I don't go to the funeral. The door cracks around midnight, which I only know because I can see both moons ascending the sky in my mind, and he finds me surrounded by a half ring of fire, scents so potent and memories so overwhelming that I'm blowing out my nose, my eyes, and my memory. Two long, silver ears perk in, and a long face nudges the door the rest of the way open.

"Making progress?"
"I was." say ten voices. I withdraw myself from a battlefield on another world, surrounded by the shadows of colossuses and their bones. It all runs together after a while, but I dare not tell him that. "Why are you back here? If you don't want to talk, that's fine. If you do want to talk, that's fine... but please, please, please make up your mind."

"I do want to talk to you!" He knocks over several candles, tilting a row that goes all the way up to my first lit wick and rests there, leaning precariously on the burning wax. "I just can't."

"Is this about Nina?" I ask. "What does she do to you?"

"This has nothing to do with her. Nothing does." Gale insists, head held aloft. "You're too sensitive."
He's closing off on me again. The nerve-- "Don't make this about me. They're falling around us. The end is so close... look, believe magic, believe the ramblings of a dying Sentient, believe anything you want, but I know this deeper than my bones." I have somehow, across the course of this conversation, become so close that the two of us have met in the center, exchanging breath. "I want to know there's someone I can trust in all this, and up until now, that's always been you. Can you please tell me what's wrong, Gale?"

"We've been through this." Gale says. "I was just apologizing."

"That was not what you were doing." I snap back. "You have to tell me right now exactly what's wrong with you, or I swear, I will finish this without you."

"How are you so dense?" Gale cries, mocking sneer and pitiful desperation.

"I don't know, why are you so cagey all of the time?"

Gale closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. "I was bitten."

That doesn't fix or solve anything. That doesn't solve anything. "Oh."

"There you go again! Is that your default response for everything, Rena?"

"I'm just taking it in," I say, defensively, "It takes me a while to process things, okay? I'm working with half a mind here and it's not even a good half and Gale, how could you not tell me about this?"

"I don't have that long left, so it doesn't matter if anyone likes me. I just have to fight as hard as I can until everything's over." Gale states. "I'm not going to burn everything down, or run for it, or... whatever stupid thing the others do as soon as they contract the Plague. Everyone just gives up as soon as they get it. Doesn't that make you angry?"

I nod.

"And I know they bit you too." he says. "I saw that bite wound. I can see the energy emanating from around it, and the funny thing is? I don't think anyone else can. It's just you and I, isn't it? I know you don't get hungry. I don't get hungry. Rena, we might have been dead our whole lives. You and I." he says. "Maybe that's why I followed you. I already knew you were sick."

"You've never given me a good explanation for why you followed me," I whisper.

"Well, consider this as close as you're going to get." he says. "Can you feel it?"

"I can feel everything." I close my eyes. "It's not as strong as she is. She'll protect me for as long as she can."
Gale leans in close to my neck. "She's poisonous too. She wants to hollow you out."

"But she'll save everyone."

"She can't save you."

"That doesn't matter."
"It matters more than everything." he insists, so close we're going to touch, and then, his tail hits my chest as he turns around. As if he has to.

"Did you think you were protecting me by distancing yourself?" I ask.

Gale just walks out the door.

I practice through the night, turn on and off candles with sparks of light, until everything is just brightness and noise and memory and the future is a dark tunnel ahead of me, and there he is, in the corners of the room, sinking in and out of vision.

We were born sick.

The room smells like Twitch's fire. There is no way out of it. I sleep with the candles on and my paws over my head, close to the ground, because I don't remember how to get the doors to open.