Tales of the Tides

Disclaimer: Nope nope nope.

Summary: When Yuri falls, everyone else is left to carry on without him. This is the story of hope, of grief, and learning the lesson of how to move on in the face of despair. This is the strength of Brave Vesperia. GEN.

AN: This is a collaboration between myself and my good friend Celirian! We've worked super hard on this and if you enjoy it, please go check out the rest of her work~ Anyway, this story ties in with the canon we've created in Tales of Free Falling and Tales of the Campfire so if you've read those, you're on the right track! If you haven't yet, please go and read them; you'll probably like them! This story acts as a prequel to the other two, and tells the story of that blank space of about a week in between the destruction of Zaude and Yuri and Estelle's reunion in Zaphias.

That said, please read on and I hope you enjoy!

Chapter One

The sound the massive apatheia made as it crashed to the ground was louder than any bomb blast or magic explosion that Raven had ever heard. Instinctively he reached out and pulled the closest person to him and turned his back to the massive stone, shielding Karol against the shards of razor sharp blastia that flew through the air in every direction. But even above the cracking of stone and cement, the rush of the shockwave through the air, and a few surprised shouts from the girls, Raven could still hear Alexei's laugh, his deep self-loathing and utterly hollow laugh; the laugh of a man who had lost everything that made him human a long time ago. The laugh of a crazy man.

The crazy man who had held Raven's life in his hands for the last ten years. The crazy man who had dictated Raven's every name, mission, move, and breath since the Great War. The crazy man who was now…dead.

Raven never expected this day to come.

Yuri might have claimed ownership to him now but Raven knew he would never fully be rid of Alexei's power over him; not while he was alive, at least. Alexei could have shut his blastia off at any point in time and Raven was half expecting the commandant to do so the second he laid eyes on him.

Raven was half hoping he would do so.

But here he was, suddenly free of his captor (well…one of them, at least) and it was a strange feeling. Was he done doing the dirtiest of dirty deeds? Yuri would probably never use him as a spy but the idea of being a partially free man was something Raven couldn't quite wrap his head around. It was also something he shouldn't be trying to grasp at the moment.

After the noise there was silence and it was even more deafening than the sound of falling apatheia. No one spoke or moved or hardly breathed and Raven wasn't sure whether it was the silence or the stillness that was making his skin crawl with something unsettling, like something just wasn't quite right. Aside from the obvious at least; destroyed shrines and giant monsters in the sky aside, something else was hinky and wrong in the air.

Despite the tingling in the back of his mind, a familiar calm settled inside Raven, a calm that could only come from years of seeing mayhem and destruction and knowing what it was like to be in the middle of it. First there was chaos, then there was silence, and after the silence came panic and that was what Raven needed to be one step ahead of. He glanced around to lookfor the others, still holding Karol against him. Five heads including himself and the dog. Last he saw of Yuri was the young man running to the other side of the platform to avoid the apatheia.

That would not go over well with the princess or Karol.

Karol who then moved under his arms and backed up a couple of steps, coughing on the dust in the air. His wide brown eyes peered around at the wreckage from the Adephagos in the sky to the broken gem and settled on something as his face paled.

Raven turned to see that a giant piece of the Apatheia had fallen not two meters from where he was standing and it was easily large enough to have crushed the both of them. Putting a hand to his neck, he cocked his head to the side and glanced at Karol, letting out a short whistle. "Wow, that's a little too close for comfort, huh?"

Karol shook his head in reply. "R-Raven…" He pointed and Raven followed the boy's finger line past the boulder sized piece of gem right next to him and to the main body of the Apatheia. It was cracked in a million places and a million pieces were scattered everywhere, but something else caught the older man's eye. Underneath one of the largest pieces of the blastia there was a pool of liquid, red and thick and in that pool sticking out from under green crystal was-

Oh boy…

Quickly, Raven walked in front of Karol's line of sight of the mangled arm (at least he thought it was an arm, but really, aside from being obviously human it was too disfigured to tell where it came from…or who it came from). Raven put a hand on the kid's shoulder and lightly pushed him towards Judy, Estelle, and Rita who were only just snapping out of their shock from all the action. "Why don't ya go make sure the girls are alright? That's what we men gotta do when somethin' like this happens." With an extra shooing motion Raven nodded at him. "Go on, ol' Raven will be right over."

Karol gave Raven a skeptical frown before turning and walking towards the girls. He had already seen it: the appendage sticking out from under the apatheia. It wasn't like he hadn't ever seen a dead body before or his fair share of blood and gore, but it was more of a shock than anything else. Alexei hadn't even bothered to move from under the falling blastia. He stood under it and watched its shadow grow larger and larger as it fell out of the sky with his arms spread wide as if he was waiting for an embrace.

He hadn't met the commandant personally, really only in passing, and he seemed like he had had things together, but Karol was pretty sure now that Alexei had been crazy for quite a long time. How else could you explain that guy's actions? No one was that plain evil without having a few screws missing. All the people they've been up against so far were similar. Ragou got his kicks from feeding people to monsters and Cumore used civilians like tissues: something to be used, abused and then discarded. Yeager was only out for the business end of things and Zagi- well where would you even start with him?

Alexei was no different from them… so why was he so scared right now? They had defeated their other enemies and while he was scared before those fights, during those fights… afterwards, he found courage in his actions. Courage and peace that they were doing the right thing, but right now? Karol just wanted to fling himself off the tower and sink to the bottom of the ocean and hide. His body was shaking and his mind was fuzzy and he wanted to be anywhere but up there with a broken mess of an apatheia and a very dead commandant.

Maybe it was because he had just seen a man who hundreds, no— thousands, of people revered and trusted fall so far. So far and so fast. Even Raven had mentioned that Alexei was once a great man who had real ideals and aspirations; a person just like him or Yuri or even the Don. All his life he had strived to be a great person like them, to be strong and brave and powerful. But Alexei fell and he'd seen Yuri start to tread on that side of the line already…

Power was a scary thing and now that he was the leader of a guild, Karol also had power. Power over people's lives just like Alexei did, and Alexei's decisions with that power affected more than just his soldiers but the whole world; so would Karol's actions from here on out. He had worked so hard to be where he was now, but now he was beginning to wonder if he was even ready to have that kind of power.

"Are you guys okay?" Karol asked as he came to a halt next to Judy.

The Krityan smiled down at him calmly with a small nod. "I think we're all okay here. How about you?"

Karol looked back at Raven who was doing spirits knows what for a brief second and nodded. "Yeah, I'm-"

"Where's Yuri?"

Estelle's eyes locked onto Karol who started and looked around. He hadn't even noticed Yuri wasn't on their side of the roof. "I...I don't know. I didn't see where he went once the blastia started to fall."

Raven turned back to the devastation as Karol walked off towards the rest of their shaken group and took in the full extent of everything. Zaude was in ruins; the apatheia crashing down had tilted the roof they were standing on to one side and it was cracked in at least fifty different places. He couldn't even imagine what the inside looked like but he could only hope that the soldiers that had been down there were safe. Alexei was deader than dead and a little more than messy (best not let the kiddies see that) and there was no way they were getting off of the shrine the same way they got up.

They had a slight problem on their hands.

Yuri momentarily forgotten, Raven started listing everything that needed to be done in his head; from different ways they could get down from the shrine top to what they would do if they had to spend a night or two up there before help could come. Ba'ul was still recovering so he wasn't an option and there probably wasn't a rope anywhere in the world long enough to get up to them…

Safety, control panic, make a plan, implement said plan, and then crowd control. That was Raven's duty right now. That was how he was trained and that was all he could think to do. He wasn't used to doing anything outside of orders…

First things first; he had to make sure everyone was okay and then they could move on to figuring out the rest.

Mind racing a mile a minute, Raven joined Karol and the girls just in time to hear Estelle's question.

She looked flustered, if not a little panicked and Raven would not blame her for it. All hell had broken loose and the sky had practically fallen down on top of them; not to mention there were tentacles in the sky (really gross looking purple tentacles).

"Well, Yuri was taking on Alexei alone when that thing started to fall." Raven said as confidently as he could because as tenacious as Yuri could be, Raven's mind had a habit of jumping to the worst case scenario immediately. Yuri wasn't with them and there was a rather large rock that had just fallen from the sky that the young man had just been standing under along with the commandant. "His fastest escape route woulda been forward which was ta the other side of that." He nodded at the apatheia. "Now, is everyone okay?"

Estelle got to her feet from where she had been kneeling on the ground, healing a burn on Rita's arm that already was beginning to go red and shiny. "I'm fine…" she said absently, the buzz in her head of Yuri, where's Yuri, he's not here drowning out everything else that might have made sense. She swiped a hand across her forehead, taking the sheen of sweat with it. The buzz got louder and she blinked to try and clear it. They needed to find Yuri, right now. He could be hurt, he could be bleeding, he could be—no, no, she wouldn't dare think of that.

There was no reason to be worried.

He was fine, he was fine, definitely fine, just on the other side of that apatheia.

Estelle forced her breathing to steady. She wouldn't worry, not yet.

"I'm okay too," Rita answered too, eying the apatheia with scrutiny. She itched –literally itched- to step forward to examine it but at the same time, something held her back. Maybe it the part of her that, more and more now that she'd been traveling with these clowns, told her to stop, to wait. She turned and looked over her friends; Estelle pale and showing the whites of her eyes, Karol nervous and twitchy, Judith insufferably calm and Raven even more so in a way that made her angry for a reason she couldn't name.

She definitely wanted to take a look at that massive apatheia but this was one of those times to stop, to wait, and instead of taking that step she cocked her head at Estelle.

"Hey, Estelle?" she asked tentatively, "You want to sit down for a second? You look a little funny."

"No," she answered eventually and forced a smile. "No, I'm alright."

And then there was Judy, who reached out and deliberately pressed warm fingertips to scuffed and dusty skin through a rip in her sleeve.

"Judith?"

The older girl didn't say anything for a moment, just leveled a mild violet stare on her and held firm, silent until Estelle shifted with discomfort.

"Really, I'm fine. Let's just find Yuri, okay?" Estelle made to go towards the massive, broken apatheia and the press of fingers became a palm wrapping around her arm to hold her back.

"Hold up a second," Judith said, "You can't just go running off like that; it could be really dangerous over there. We need a plan." Estelle stilled and Judith gazed over her head to look Raven in the eye, raising a single eyebrow. "Any ideas?" She asked calmly, like this was a walk in the park.

Raven caught Judy's eye and gave a barely perceptible nod. At least someone else was keeping a cool head at the moment. It was going to be up to them to keep the others from panicking too much and in their current situation Raven was very glad he didn't have to do that alone. He was used to being the one in charge; the one that's supposed to make all the decisions, but that was for his knights, for people who respected him. These kids didn't listen to anything he said- not seriously at least (which was entirely his own fault considering what he did to Estelle, and the rest of them, just a short while ago), but he wasn't going to have any authority over them. Judy would, at least, have more push in that department.

Which might be the most annoying part of it all right now. He knew what needed to be done and he knew how to handle the situation because he'd been there before, but unlike previous times he didn't have a troop of loyal servants. He had a handful of children that didn't have one iota of trust in him and probably wouldn't believe anything he said even though, under these circumstances, he was going to be more honest than he had ever previously been with them.

Because this time he was playing from the other side of the field; he was on their team. He would just have to somehow convince them of that.

Without really thinking about it, Raven held out his bow toward Karol, a silent demand for him to hold it. "I'll go take a look and make sure things are safe. Wouldn't want any of you young folks to put yourselves in danger."

Karol took the bow and frowned up at him. "But Judy's right, the floor might be unsafe over there."

"Ah, don't worry. I'm light on my feet." To accentuate his statement Raven did a quick backflip and landed as neatly as he always did. "You kids wait here." As he emphasized his last words Raven gave Judy a knowing glance. Currently worried princesses, easily angered mages, and young kids shouldn't have to see the mess up close if they didn't have to.

The Krityan gave him a small smile and put a firm hand on both Estelle's and Karol's shoulders. "We'll be here when you get back. Be careful."

Raven nodded and strode off no hesitation in his step and Judy turned back to the group, dropping her hands from Karol and Estelle. "Perhaps we should take a look around here to make sure things are safe when Raven gets back."

The three glanced at each other and finally nodded slowly. Judy knew it would be best to keep busy while Raven was checking out the rest of the disaster area. She was a doer, not a stand-around-and-thinker. She had noticed when Yuri ran forwards under the apatheia as it started to fall and she couldn't help but worry that maybe he hadn't made it all the way to the other side. The blastia was the biggest she had ever seen and it had come down fast and hard.

But she was learning to keep an open mind about things now, especially about Yuri because he had a way of being persistent and doing exactly what you least expected.

"Right," Estelle replied and straightened up. "That's a good idea." The whole area was a wreck, with chunks of blastia, rubble, and debris littering the ground that should not be so huge to be up so high. She made a point of not staring at how far away the ocean was, circling the shrine at all sides for miles and miles. Spirits, but it was huge.

It didn't matter how far away she was from the edge, Estelle wasn't sure that the feeling of being about to fall would fade for a while. At least if she thought about that, then she wouldn't be thinking about the icy puddle of fear making a home in her stomach.

"Let's leave the dirty work to the old man; better him than one of us," Rita spoke up with her usual edge, steadfastly not looking at Raven and instead staring in the direction they'd come from even as Estelle sent her a slightly reproachful look and Karol opened his mouth, though neither of them said anything, "This place is massive, I can't believe that it's been hidden all this time…"

"I'll, uh, check out that spot," Karol said and rocked on his feet, gesturing to an area near the shafts, a good distance away from the apatheia, "It's not so close to the damage so it should be pretty sturdy."

"We can cover more area if we spread out," Judy commented, "If it looks shaky, don't push it. Just remember where it is for later."

Rita answered with an absent wave as she walked away towards a cluster of blastia chunks and Estelle shifted on her feet, clearly debating whether she wanted to go with her, before making up her mind and walking in the opposite direction, closer to where Karol was checking instead.

Judith paused for a moment, watching the lurid purple of Raven's back disappear behind the massive apatheia, didn't move until he was completely out of sight before turning away to convince herself that she wasn't waiting.

Time to get to work, she thought, and started an investigation of her own.

The ground felt solid under his feet as Raven made his way carefully around the rubble towards the opposite side of the shrine's roof. He was well aware that Repede was only a couple of steps behind him sniffing the ground as he went. If there was one thing to be said about the ancient Garaios civilization it was that they knew how to build things and build them well. Most of the ruins scattered around the world were in pretty good condition considering how many hundreds of years have passed since any of them had been tended to. Zaude itself was spectacular and it was a shame that it had to be broken like that on Alexei's behalf.

Though, perhaps Alexei's death was a fitting punishment for destroying such a relic. Raven paused as he reached the largest remaining chunk of the apatheia and looked down. He came to halt just in front the blood pool that was filtering out from underneath the giant stone around the limb he had seen earlier. Raven couldn't help but swallow heavily as his stomach gave a sickening churn. He had seen pretty much everything there was to see in terms of human gore and he had only ever passed out once (and that wasn't even at the site of another body, but his own), but he was still human (in some terms) and it still made him feel ill when the insides of a person were suddenly on their outsides.

Ten years he had been a slave to him. Ten years he watched Alexei slowly lose everything that had made him a great person; everything that made him human. Ten years he had been a walking dead man and suddenly ten years felt like a millennium.

Raven shook his head and tore his gaze away from the carnage and glanced up at the apatheia. It was even bigger down near him than it looked while hanging up in the sky above all creation. He wouldn't forget that the blastia had been created at the cost of hundreds of lives and that the cracked, broken mess all around him was now all that was left of those young heartbeats.

A sharp bark forced Raven back into the moment and he turned as Repede dashed off to the right and disappeared around another large broken chunk of blastia. Following, Raven heard a low growl and his hand instinctively went to his dagger as he made his way around-

And nearly ran into red and armor.

"Lieutenant?" Raven backpedaled as Sodia skidded to a halt to keep from crashing into him.

"C-Captain Schwann!" Sodia stared up at him, violet eyes wide and scared. Very scared and panicked and a million other emotions Raven could only start guessing. "W-what are you doing here?"

For a moment all Raven could do was stare at the girl. Despite the complexity of the answer he could give to her, really he should be the one asking her that question. When had she followed them up to the roof? Had she seen Yuri? Did she watch their fight with Alexei? If she had, why didn't she help?

She looked really pale.

Raven straightened. "Just makin' sure thing are safe for you kids." He said nonchalantly and Sodia just stared at him like he was a ghost. "I could ask you the same thing…?"

"I…uh…I followed…" Sodia fumbled with her words as her hands started fiddling with the fabric of her uniform. She wouldn't look him in the eye. Eventually she stopped trying to answer the question and stepped around the older man and stalked towards the edge of the apatheia trying to sound at least a fraction less panicked than she looked. "W…we shouldn't be over here; the flooring is—"

Raven flinched as he heard Sodia retch. He knew he should have grabbed her the moment she started heading towards the commandant's body, but he was distracted. Sodia was acting…strange. He'd known her for a long time and had watched her in the knights; she was a headstrong, sturdy girl who didn't have any issues taking command of something. She was well organized and put together and almost always was a step ahead of everyone else.

Right now she was anything but…

Letting out a small sigh, Raven retraced his steps and pulled the young girl away from the remnants of Alexei; all too aware that she was shaking like a scared puppy. She stumbled a few steps while still heaving deep, shaky breaths and allowing him to lead her by an arm. He had to give her the benefit of the doubt; she had probably followed them up the lift only to arrive just in time to see Alexei's final moments. She had served under the commandant just as Raven had and he could empathize with what she must be feeling. It's not easy seeing someone you revere become the villain you have to stop. It wasn't easy seeing someone you revered die like that.

Pausing, Raven waited until Sodia straightened a little and got her breathing back under control before setting a hand on her shoulder. "There are some things in this world I wish you kids didn't have to see." He said softly. "Now why don't you leave the icky job to me and go make sure the princess is okay."

Sodia didn't say anything back but ripped her shoulder from his grasp roughly. She began to walk away but froze as Repede barked again and hunched down at her. Raven put himself between the dog and the soldier eyeing the canine. "Easy, boy."

Repede barked again.

Sodia turned and looked down at the dog with wide eyes and for a moment Raven thought she was going to be sick again because she went white. Whiter than Estelle's dress white. Raven's chest tightened in the way that it always did when he could feel a change in the weather. Something was really wrong.

Raven pursed his lips. He was suspicious now. "We're missing one of our party and we thought they might have run in this direction. You haven't seen anyone have you?"

"No." Short. Crisp. Finite. Sodia's head snapped up and her eyes caught his for a brief second before dropping to the floor. "No, I have not seen him."

Raven knew a lie when he heard one. He told enough of them in his life time (more than any one person should) and he could pick them of a conversation out as easily as finding a tomato in a carrot basket. Sodia was a really, really bad liar, but he knew that this wasn't the time to be nitpicking the details. Not after everything that had just happened.

Still… Raven hadn't said whether he was talking about a boy or a girl. How did Sodia know it was a boy missing?

"I see." Raven said with a small nod. No point in pushing the matter at the moment. He would have time later to figure out what was really wrong. "You join up with the others, I'm gonna check things out here."

Sodia looked almost too relieved to turn on her heel and practically run away from him. Raven watched with a frown as Repede finally relaxed from his defensive stance and turned to walk off his nose to the ground.

A ways away, Estelle wasn't so much scoping out the area as she was trying to calm her still-racing heartbeat. There were some places that had been wobbly and she'd stayed away from them, refusing all the while to look and see just how far up in the air they were. It was disorienting, a bit, and she focused on that instead of the niggle in the back of her mind that demanded she follow right after Raven and look for herself.

No, that wouldn't do any good, though.

He had it under control, surely. What could she do that he couldn't, that he probably wasn't already doing right now? She'd just be a bother. She dragged her lip between her teeth and eyed the area in front of her, littered with cracks and still settling dust. It looked safe enough, but that didn't mean anything.

Still, there was a pretty big stretch of crag up ahead and it was worth a survey at the very least.

If she had to look where she was going, watch what she was doing, she couldn't think about what she didn't know. She didn't have all the variables, as Rita would have said. Estelle glanced to the other side of the shrine and caught sight of Rita's back; the other girl was examining one of the shafts near the elevator, up to her elbows in panels and circuitry.

Estelle shook her head and stepped forward, only to realize too late that she'd made a mistake.

The floor shook underneath her foot and Estelle scuttled backwards with a yelp as the cracks spread out further from where she stepped, deep and sprawling like tiny, jagged canyons. For a moment, she couldn't do anything but stare because if she'd been only a second later, she might be tumbling down like the stones she'd dislodged.

"Are you okay?" A voice sounded behind her and Estelle turned to see Karol standing there, his hand outstretched slightly as if preparing to grab her.

She breathed.

"Yes," she replied, "Thank you. Just a little…" she trailed off to eye the cracks again, "I wasn't thinking." Well, that was kind of a lie. She'd possibly been thinking too much, and that was why she'd klutzed it.

"I already checked the area thataway," Karol offered and took a step closer just as Estelle took a step back, away from the shaky spot, "Want to look together until they come back? Unless you, uh, want to hang out by yourself instead. That's fine too."

Estelle did not want to hang out by herself and said so with a smile more honest than her first and together, she and Karol began to examine the nearby area. It wasn't much different than what they'd been doing before but separately, and they didn't talk much outside of 'don't step there's and 'watch out for that spot's and 'this is fine's, but it was better than the solitude.

"It's…" Karol began after a good silence, "It's been a while, hasn't it? I wonder what's taking so long." He shifted uncomfortably and she realized, for the first time, that maybe he was dealing with his nerves the same way she was.

"It's going to be okay," Estelle insisted in response with her head down like she was focused on what she was doing instead of what she was thinking, "Yuri's just fine." She wasn't quite sure who she was trying to convince with that one. She didn't think it was working very well.

Just then, there was a clatter and they all looked up just in time to see Sodia stagger out from behind the massive broken apatheia, looking pale and shaken, and didn't stop until she was a good ways away from it. On instinct, Estelle approached her and extended a hand to touch her shoulder, squeezing and feeling the minute shakes running through her.

"Are you alright?" she asked, and the other girl recoiled from the contact. "What happened?"

"Did you see Yuri over there?" Karol followed up from her left, and movement on her right said that Judy and Rita had discarded what they were doing to investigate too.

Sodia shook her head violently, to the point where she was afraid she might keel to the side. "I'm fine. Nothing. No." she answered the three questions quickly as she backed away from Estelle's outstretched hand and Karol's curious eyes.

Damn it to hell. How did she think this was going to go? Easily?

Sodia instinctively wiped at her mouth even though she knew that any evidence of her weakness a minute ago was gone. She didn't know what to do with her words, her hands, her feet, her eyes. The two of them were staring at her and she couldn't tell if they were being suspicious or worried. She knew she was acting weird and she knew she had to straighten her act up or she would look overly suspicious, but the shaking in her body just wouldn't stop.

She had just killed a man.

To have run into Captain Schwann of all people first didn't make that fact any easier to settle with. Even the princess would have been easier…or so she thought. Sodia thought that, at least, Lady Estellise would have been easy to lie to. But now that the princess was standing right here in front of her Sodia thought she might be sick again. She knew how much Princess Estellise cared about Yuri; it was so obvious. The little guild leader as well; he might be young, but from what Sodia knew he wasn't stupid. He might have had more worldly experience than everyone up on the roof put together, Raven excluded.

Karol would be hard to fool; harder than the princess and here she was with both of them staring at her and it made her feel as transparent as glass.

Oh spirits, they know.

Except there was no way they could possibly know because they didn't see her and they obviously didn't know Yuri wasn't on the roof anymore. She had to distract them; get their minds onto other things.

She had to get her own mind onto other things…

Clearing her throat, Sodia took a look around at the cracks all around them. "It doesn't look safe over here. We should move further to the edge, it will be more stable where the floor has the support of the outer wall."

And where was this coming from? Sodia heard her voice and it was calm and collected and authoritative and everything she didn't feel at that moment. Maybe she was a better liar than she thought? That in itself was scary, she shouldn't sound like that. She shouldn't be so good at covering it up… but she was and that was because she knew she had done the right thing. Right?

No, no regrets; she did the right thing. She did her duty as a knight to bring a criminal to justice. She did the right thing for Flynn; for her captain and best friend.

Yuri Lowell had to die.

She just had to keep telling herself that. Remind herself of that pained look Flynn got whenever he argued with Yuri. How Yuri was a murder, liar, and a menace to society. How it was her duty to protect the people, the princess, and her commander from people like him and that now with him gone, Flynn wouldn't have to be conflicted with right and wrong anymore.

Karol looked up at her and frowned. "You didn't see anyone?" He obviously wasn't going to let the subject drop so easily.

"I saw Captain Sch- Raven." Sodia said taking a step forward. Maybe if she started moving the other two would follow. "He said he was going to look around on that side of the platform."

A hand caught her and Sodia looked down to see a glove holding fast to her shoulder plate. "It's dangerous that way," Lady Estellise said softly. It was obvious she wanted to press the subject and it was taking everything she had to not keep questioning her. "Karol and I were heading over that way."

Sodia followed where Estellise was pointing and nodded. Distract them. Distract herself. Just…don't think about him.

Across the way Raven was following Repede, stepping over and around debris all while keeping his eyes and ears peeled for any sign of Yuri. Clothing, weapon, hair, a snarky comment. Anything.

Repede seemed to be trying to cover every inch of roof possible; zig zagging back and forth between broken apatheia, pausing here and there, and sometimes retracing his steps only to pause in the same spots he had earlier.

Now Raven was starting to get a knot in his stomach. He knew he was always something of a pessimist, but usually his speculations were exaggerated. This time, he was beginning to fear he was right.

Except there was no more blood seeping out from under any blastia and there weren't any holes in the floors large enough to swallow a person whole, even though Yuri was skinny enough for the wind to blow him off the roof.

Off the…?

Repede whined at his side and suddenly took off straight towards the edge of the shrine. His nose was no longer pointed to the ground and his didn't waver one bit from his straight path. Raven grabbed a hold of his dagger and jogged after him, to hell with unsteady footing.

That was when he saw it laying on the ground not a foot from the edge. Something long and something shiny enough reflect the sun into his eyes for a brief second.

Repede gave a high pitched bark and stopped to sit down in front the knife laying on the ground and nudged its hilt before sniffing the end and whining again. Kneeling down on one knee Raven could only stare as his pulse began to race. In front of him was a dagger he had seen before. A dagger he had used himself; a standard issue knight dagger with its tip soaked a good four inches deep in blood.

Raven's heart sank; he didn't need Repede's nose to tell him that it was Yuri's blood.

Repede pushed the dagger towards him with his nose and looked up at Raven before he turned and sat directly on the edge of the roof. The dog stared out at the horizon line and then down, all the way down, to the ocean below and the waves crashing up against the shrine.

His breathing sped up as Raven suddenly felt an emotion he didn't usually find in himself. Anger. Pure unfathomable anger. His vision tilted to the side and white hazed the corners of his eyes as he put the pieces together; everything sliding perfectly together like a sword fitting into its sheath.

Sodia.

The knight had lied. She had done more than just lie.

Scrambling to the edge on his hands and knees Raven ignored the vertigo he got as he stared down at the crashing white caps somehow thinking that maybe he would see Yuri bobbing around in the water. That Yuri would look up and see him peering over and yell for making him wait so long in the cold salty water.

That distance was too far for words to carry. If Yuri was lucky enough to survive the stab wound (or unlucky enough) the fall would have…

Raven turned, shaking his head, and quickly snatched up the dagger and wiped the blood off on his black pants. No one would be able to see the stain, no one would ask questions about blood. He stuck the knife in his belt under his jacket; deep enough that no one would be able to see it- this was not going to help their situation at all. They might kill him for it later, but right now Raven didn't care. He had a job to do -keeping chaos to a minimum- and that order just got a lot taller.

Yuri, you damn fool.

Kneeling back down next to Repede, Raven laid a hand on top of blue fur between twitching ears. "C'mon boy. The others are going to need us."

Repede let out a small whine as he stood up and followed sticking closer to Raven than the older man could ever remember him being before. They walked slowly so Raven could think about what he was going to say to the others and so he could get his own rushing blood to calm down.

This was the first time in a long time Raven could remember being this mad. He just didn't get angry anymore; annoyed, sure, but mostly he just went through the motions of the day resigned to his situation. He had almost forgotten what it was like to hear your heartbeat in your ears.

Raven paused at the base of the large apatheia where Alexei was still the deadest man in all of Terca Lumereis, he braced himself against the green smooth surface of the stone with one hand and took a couple of deep breaths. Without thinking he drew his hand back and brought his fist forward with every ounce of emotion he had behind it and ignored the shock of pain the shot up his arm and through his shoulder as his knuckles connected with the blastia.

There he stood frozen for a solid minute before Repede bumped his leg. Raven let his arm drop to his side; not even caring that his fingers were already starting to turn black and blue and looked down at the dog and nodded. "I'm sorry, Repede."

When Estelle saw Raven and Repede finally come around the other side again, her heart sank down into her feet. They were alone.

Those prayers weren't answered and it was the same two people to come back that started.

Judith's hand on her shoulder –when had that happened?- clenched just the littlest bit, the only evidence of nerves in her that Estelle could find, and Estelle… Estelle felt something inside her freeze and frost over.

They were alone. Spirits, they were alone. Raven's hand was a bruised, bloody mess but she was distracted momentarily by the look on his face, as dark and dangerous as a thunderhead. Repede walked next to him, his own head hanging low and dejected.

There was only one reason why they'd be coming back alone, why they'd look like that—no! No, she wouldn't think like that, couldn't. There had to be something else, another explanation, something that Raven couldn't take care of on his own, something… something that couldn't be what she was so suddenly terrified of, the something that she couldn't make herself think.

It took Estelle too long to realize that she wasn't breathing, took her until her body forced the shallow gasp that filled her lungs, that made her jerk and straighten, that made her blink.

She made to take a step forward but that hand tightened and held her back.

"Estelle," Judy said with just the slightest edge of warning in her voice, but she may as well have not said anything for all the good it did.

"Where's Yuri?" she asked tightly from where she stood as Raven approached them, his steps silent and slow, her voice pitching higher and more frightened the closer he came. "Where is he?" A demand, this time, because this had to be some kind of horrible joke. Because there was no way that he was coming back alone, not without Yuri. Because this wasn't how this was supposed to go.

If it was a joke, no one was laughing. Not even the comedians.

Next to her, Karol looked about as frozen as she did, going milk pale. He didn't say a thing, even when Judith pressed down harder on the both of them and Rita crossed her arms over her chest, something so obviously like fear making her curl in on herself where she stood.

Estelle still didn't feel like she was breathing even with air passing her lips.

Raven always had to do all of the icky jobs (though he never said he didn't deserve the icky jobs): spy, liar, traitor, messenger. Most of the time the latter was the worst job of them all because he never had any good news to deliver. This was going to be one of those times. And for some reason; this time he had a knot in his stomach, which was weird because Raven liked to think he'd become desensitized to giving bad news to people. This time, he really didn't want to be the messenger. He couldn't deny it; how invested he had become in this group of kids. He should have realized it sooner; back when the idea of betraying them left a bad taste in his mouth.

He approached the group slowly and tried his best to keep his face as neutral as he could (which was probably a giant failure because when you're good at not feeling it's difficult to cover up something you do feel); there was no point in breaking hearts without actually saying anything. Repede walked close to him, only a pace slower with his head to the ground and Raven dipped down to give him a quick pat on the head before stopping in front of the group.

Judy's hand on Estelle's shoulder tightened and Raven prayed that the Krityan had a good hold on the princess because he knew first hand that the girl could hit pretty hard when she had a reason.

"Good news is that this ceiling is pretty sturdy under our feet, so no worries about that." Raven started out quickly. He wasn't beating around the bush, but he had learned different ways to give bad news and just coming out with it never seemed to be as effective as people liked to think.

Words were an important thing. It took Raven a long time to realize that throughout his life. How you used them, how you said them, the words you chose to speak all had an effect on the people around you. There were times being blunt worked and there were times when you could throw in a little humor. There were times you had to be careful with what you said and there were times where you could throw all caution to the wind and just scream.

Raven chose his words carefully. Not to blunt, but not glossing over the question. "Bad news is I couldn't find our fearless leader. I'm 'fraid to say that he's…not up here anymore."

"What's that supposed to mean!" It was Karol that responded first, to everyone's surprise. "How can he not be up here? There's nowhere else to be except…" Brown eyes drifted to the apatheia and Raven shook his head.

"Don't get any wrong ideas, the commandant is the only one that's dead here. I made sure to double-check that." Raven crossed his arms and waited. There was nothing else he could say; changing the subject would be moot and giving any more details would make the situation even more hazardous than it was already going to become.

And it was going to become a shit storm if his own hand was any indication.

The only thing he could do from here on was to remind them, and himself, that he didn't find Yuri. He didn't find him at all. No body, no blood and that meant there was a string of hope they could grasp at; Raven just had to make sure he kept that string illuminated for the others.

Even if he was having trouble finding it himself.

Estelle felt the world drop out from underneath her feet and suddenly, it felt like Judy's hand on her shoulder was the only thing keeping her standing.

Her vision blurred and her head swam and for a moment everyone's voice became a hum inside her head, the only thing clear being the drumbeats she could feel from her heart to her fingertips.

This wasn't right. This wasn't right. This couldn't possibly be right.

Everything was wrong.

She stood stock-still and silent as the tower as it felt like the world fell apart and the air exploded with questions like firecrackers, of what happened?s and are you sure?s and Estelle didn't realize that her hands were clenching white-knuckled in her skirts, trembling with something she couldn't name.

They couldn't find him?

The hold on her relaxed and it was like the blaring of the starting horn, and Estelle moved, ducking underneath Judy's arm to run full blast towards Raven.

He flinched back just the tiniest bit but running into him (or hitting him) wasn't her intention; she barreled around him and dodged his hands that meant to hold her back to throw herself around the apatheia…

And there she stopped right where she stood.

Right over there, there was…what remained of Commandant Alexei, and Estelle felt everything she'd eaten threaten to come up as she threw a shaking hand over her mouth. No, no, not throwing up today. She'd seen—well, not worse, actually, but she'd seen plenty as the healer in a group of people who routinely seemed to nearly lose their limbs. This wasn't that different, just—more. A lot more. And in more pieces than she was necessarily used to. That was what she told herself to keep from heaving and it didn't work particularly well, but well enough.

The rest of the area was deserted except for the scattered rubble, of pieces of broken blastia and dust.

There wasn't a sign of Yuri and she found herself staring at what had once been the strong, respected commandant just as Judith caught up to her, grabbing her by the arms and swinging her around to face her.

"Estelle, Estelle," the older girl demanded, and Estelle couldn't meet her eyes because there was Alexei and she couldn't see Yuri anywhere and he was gone and there wasn't a single sign of where he could be. He was going to be hurt, bleeding, and he couldn't heal himself as well as he'd need to, and he was all alone—"Estelle, stop looking at that, look at me!"

She couldn't and a hand forced its way underneath her chin to drag her head up.

"Don't look at it, Estelle."

"Yuri's gone," she heard herself whisper, "We have to find him. Right now. We have to find him. We have to…we have to—"

Judy forcibly dragged her away from the gore and the wreckage, tugging her around so that all she could see was the grey of wreckage instead of the cresting waves on too-sharp rocks and the horizon line that went on forever and not a speck of land outside of this tower, nowhere to land, nowhere to rest.

"We have to find him," she insisted, "Judith…"

"I know," Judy replied, her visage of calm slipping away for just a second, "I know. We're going to find him. But you need to be calm and you need to think. You don't have time to panic, understand? Come on, come with me. Come on. Come away from here for now."

"We need—"

Judy gripped her tightly by the shoulders and shook her once, twice, three times.

"I know, just for now. We need to make a plan, right? You can't help Yuri without a plan."

Right. Right, plans were important. Plans were what she was bad at and what Judith was good at. Better than her at the very least, which didn't mean much. Estelle forced herself to breathe, air coming harshly through her nose and she didn't protest when she found herself being manhandled around the apatheia, away from the mess, away from the carnage, away from where Yuri wasn't.

First Karol reached out for Estelle and missed when she went headlong towards Raven and then Raven reached out for the princess and missed as she zipped to the side and out of sight around the apatheia. Raven cringed outwardly; he would have preferred it if she had hit him.

Rita made to follow after Judy took off in a blur of blue, but Raven didn't miss her. Catching hold of her arm, he spun around to make sure the mage faced the opposite way she was trying to run. "Bad idea."

"Let go of me!" Tugging hard, Rita tried to pry herself away, but he had a firm hold. "What are you doing? I said let go! Estelle-"

"Not gonna happen." Raven didn't even look at Rita as she struggled but kept his eyes on Karol who, thankfully, didn't look like he was going to take off at the moment. He did, however, look like he had forgotten how to breathe. Time for a distraction. Again.

Or anything that can come close enough to one. "What we need to do right now is figure out a way down from here."

Karol looked up at him, eyes distant as if he heard him, but didn't understand what he was saying and Raven knew that look all too well. He'd worn it himself many, many times. A look of abandonment, confusion, disbelief and almost every other emotion related to losing something…someone… a person could have all at once.

"We can't take the lift?" Rita stilled in his hand and looked up at him quirking an eyebrow up.

Raven shook his head. "It's jammed. The apatheia fell pretty much right on top of it." Rita frowned to herself, but started pulling again and Raven turned to see Judy leading a very pale Estelle back around the giant stone. Rita pulled one more time and Raven let her go this time causing the mage to stumble a couple paces before she ran out to meet up with the healer.

Karol frowned and took a few quick sharp breaths. He shook his head as he finally focused his eyes on Raven. "But if we have to get down from here to find Yuri! If he's not up here then he's down there and Flynn won't know to look for him!"

"My captain has better things to do than waste time looking for a murderer."

Raven flinched as Sodia spoke up from the distance she had been keeping herself from the group. She seemed to have gained some of her composure back, but still looked shaken. He heaved a sigh as all heads turned towards her and he dropped his voice low. It took everything he had to keep his settled anger from spiking again. "That probably wasn't a very good idea, Lieutenant."

"If you knew Flynn at all," Estelle spoke up from where she stood close to Judith as if she could borrow strength from her, body tense and voice steely. Rita was hovering close by, an aggravated frown twisting her lips from Sodia's words. "You'd know exactly where his priorities will be. Are you a knight or not?"

"He's a—"

"He's a civilian," Estelle interrupted, "You are a knight, and I am the Imperial Princess. Do your job." Estelle forced herself into silence after the words had been bitten out; the anxiety and fear gnawed on her rarely-seen temper until the edges began to fray and she made a note to at least try to keep her mouth shut, at least until she could better control what came out of it.

From there it was nothing but an absolute, dead silence. Sodia looked as if someone had force-fed her a frog and Estelle leaned just slightly to the side, brushing shoulders with Judith just enough to get her attention. In another situation she might have apologized for her words but not now.

Judy straightened and stepped forward, as calm and composed as if nothing unusual had happened whatsoever.

"Look, fact is, we need to get out of here and the fact is, Captain Flynn is down there either waiting for us or trying to get up. Now, I suggest that we make life a little easier for him and try and find a way down."

"I saw a place for some stairs down the spire shafts," Rita spoke up, "I didn't get a good look but it only makes sense. Elevators always break when you'd need them, and there had to be a way to get up there to fix them or to even build them in the first place." She pointed in the opposite direction where the battle had smashed parts of the shaft to rubble to reveal a hollowed entrance. "Over there looks like a good place to start."

"Right," Judith said, "I like that idea. Certainly a better one than trying to jury-rig the elevator back up to speed." Rita muttered a little under her breath, something unflattering about Krityans always underestimating pure genius. "Speed, which happens to be something we need." She shot a pointed look in Rita's direction; the mage at least had the grace to look slightly mollified if still rather offended. "Shall we?" She directed the question to Raven over Sodia's head completely, studiously ignoring the other girl with impressive practice.

Raven grinned wide, the corners of his mouth twitching because that was definitely the last thing he wanted to be doing at the moment. "Be my pleasure, Judith, darlin'." Reaching down he plucked the bow that Karol was still holding for him and put a hand on the boy's shoulder and gave him a little push. "There's two arches holding this thing up; you and Repede come with me and Judy can take the girls to the other side."

Karol was more than a little happy to oblige. His feet were practically hurting from restraint. All he wanted to do was run around the edge of platform and yell for Yuri, but Raven wouldn't lie about that. He had lied about many things and Karol still wasn't sure whether he'd ever be able to trust the old man again, but Raven wouldn't lie about Yuri.

At least that was what he had to believe at the moment to keep from completely freaking out.

How Raven and Judy were keeping so calm was beyond him, Then again, freaking out always seemed like it was his most constant state of being. He wasn't brave like Yuri or experienced like Raven and he didn't have the ability to keep things under wraps like Judy; he was just trying to keep his head from spinning in circles like his mind was.

First Raven betrayed them, then Raven wasn't Raven, but Captain Schwann. Then they brought down Heracles and after that Alexei almost killed all of them and injured Ba'ul. So they had to tromp through ice and snow and he almost died trying to fight off some flying fish monster. Then they rescued Estelle only to come to Zaude where they killed Yeager before they fought the commandant… and now they're here stuck on top of some ancient shrine after Alexei released a giant purple monster that was going to destroy the world and Yuri was missing and he probably fell and he might have been injured and...

And Raven was doing backflips and Judy was being her cryptic self and Estelle was freaking out too and Sodia was there (why was Sodia there?) and Yuri was down there and they were up here, so Rita's suggestion to actually move and put his mind to something was (at least for the moment) the best thing Karol had heard anyone say in the past three weeks.

Though, clearly it wasn't helping with his thought circles. As he followed Raven, next to Repede, he reached out and scratched the dog behind the ears. "Don't worry Repede, we'll get down from here soon and then we'll find Yuri. It'll be okay. It…has to be okay."

Raven didn't make any indication of hearing him and kept walking as Karol looked up at him. Karol knew what was going on in his own head (well what wasn't going on in his head), he knew what was most likely going on in Estelle's head and maybe even Rita's, but Judy and Raven? Not so much. He thought the older man had looked angry earlier, just as he was coming back from the other side of the platform, but Karol had been too focused on the lack of Yuri to really notice.

Did he even care that Yuri was gone? He seemed to be taking everything as if this was just another day on the road, but it wasn't. They fought and killed the commandant, they lost Yuri, and even after everything they'd done the world still needed saving.

As much as he hated to admit it Karol might understand if Raven didn't care, but that doesn't mean he wouldn't be a little more than miffed if that was true.

Once they reached the pillar Raven turned to Karol and put his hands behind his head. "Usually I don't condone breaking ancient relics, but I bet that hammer of yours can come in handy here." Whipping a foot out Raven kicked at the fractured cement. A hollow clang resounded from inside and one blue eye winked. "I think we're onto somethin'."

Karol nodded as he placed his bag down and hefted his oversized hammer over his head. "Stay back."

And hammer Karol did; for what felt like an hour. The pillar had been cracked, but it was still sturdier than the shell of a rocktortoise. He pounded away until giant chunks began to fall at his feet and his arms ached and he was covered in sweat. Karol wound up for another swing, but Raven motioned for him to stop and stepped forward to poke his head into the hole. Karol gratefully put his hammer down to watch as he tried to catch his breath.

This had to be it. This had to be the way down; if it wasn't he might go crazy. He couldn't just sit up there and do nothing while his best friend, his best friend, was most likely in a world of trouble (typical Yuri). He didn't save Yuri in that cold tundra just to die from some stupid free fall off a tower.

Raven pulled back scratching his head. "It's kinda dark in there."

"Tell me about it," A grouchy voice echoed from inside the dwelling.

"Flynn!" Karol couldn't help but smile a little because there in the hollow stood Flynn, scruffy and panting and with a hastily tied layer of bandage wrapped around his shoulder that he might have been bleeding through.

"Flynn?!" Estelle's voiced pealed across the rooftop as she raced along the edge Rita, Judy, and Sodia at her heels.

"Hey," he said, eyeing the group of bedraggled adventurers and his own shaken lieutenant, "Is everyone alright?"

There was a weird silence that made something twist in his gut and Flynn hadn't seen that kind of look on Estelle in…well, he hadn't seen that kind of look on her ever. He did a brief head count and froze, shifting his stare from Lady Estellise to the nervous little guild leader to Captain Schwa—to Raven. To Raven, who looked him straight in the eye and shook his head quickly. Just a fast, stilted movement that said more than words could.

Hell.

Hell, hell, hell.

Flynn hissed a breath in through his teeth and let it out.

Focus, Scifo, focus. He had to be a captain right now. Had to be a captain for just a few more minutes instead of the friend he wanted to be, because he still had a job to do.

"There's a clear path back down to the boat," he said, scrambling out of his hole and making to shuffle the group of people back down into the darkness from whence he'd come, "It's kind of a wreck too, so just watch out and try not to trip. Shouldn't be anything too major, though."

Before stepping back down again, he stopped short.

"…the Commandant?" So much was loaded up into those two little words and he had to ask, even though he knew the outcome solely in the fact that they were still alive. Still alive. Flynn forced back his flinch and Estelle went suspiciously green around the gills without saying a word.

Raven bit back a groan as Flynn turned and eyed the rest of the platform. He was hoping the young captain would get sidetracked just enough not to ask about Alexei. Still, he wasn't known as the Tightwad Captain for nothing.

Taking a small step forward, Raven ignored Karol pointedly staring at him and Judy trying to usher Estelle through to the stairs. "I'll be takin' care of that. Why don't you go back down with the others?"

Ice blue eyes narrowed at him and Raven couldn't force any kind of grin or smile or quirk of the mouth as he nodded and motioned for Flynn to follow him with a small wave of his hand. Repede followed, this time sticking close to the blond and the older man suddenly found himself realizing just what was falling over everyone.

Flynn was the only active captain in the imperial knights; the young man was about to become a commandant at an earlier age than Alexei had. Raven's stomach dropped at the thought; that was more than just one person should be doing. That was way more and he wasn't going to have any help. Raven would ask if he could help, but he already knew that the answer was going to be no.

Good luck, kid…

Flynn was silent as he followed Raven and stared over the remains of what used to be Commandant Alexei, white-faced and tight like an overwound spring. He didn't slouch an inch, didn't flinch or throw up or turn away. He didn't say a word. The only indication that he felt anything was the way his left hand clutched his sword at his side and the other came down to bury shaking fingers in the fur at Repede's ears, and the way it was like a wall came down over his face.

It was heavy, he thought distantly.

The magnitude of what had just happened was sitting steady on Flynn's shoulders.

The commandant was dead.

He was the only active captain in the knights. It wasn't that he was the best option; it was that he was the only option.

Flynn turned his head to look from the wreckage to the group of people hovering by the stairs. Waiting for him. Lieutenant Sodia hadn't looked away from him the whole while, he knew, and he appreciated her loyalty and concern. He felt unbalanced without Yuri, and just thinking the name made his heart race up into his throat and demand action. But he couldn't, not right now.

Flynn Scifo had to be steady, even though all he wanted to do was hit something, even though all he wanted to do was push everything else aside and scramble down those stairs to look for his best friend.

That wasn't even touching how he felt about the man standing next to him. That was something that he wasn't prepared to deal with, and Flynn was pretty sure that if he tried to, he might just end up punching Raven off the edge of that tower. He regretted the thought as soon as he had it and his stomach lurched in retaliation.

Flynn swallowed bile and gave Repede one more pat on the head, straightened even more.

"I don't need to see any more," he said quietly and didn't wait for Raven to reply before turning away from him and walking stiffly back to the stairway from which he'd come.

The walk back down was dead silent and Flynn pushed all thoughts of the Commandant and his own short-lived captaincy and Raven, and forced himself to methodically plan out a course of action for what he'd need to do instead of looking too closely at anyone else. It was easy to see the lines and boundaries between his companions, tall and Krityan Judith slightly behind Estelle and Karol with her hands out, like she was herding them, Rita taking in every scrap of information from their surroundings as she could in case she could use it later. Repede had looked from Raven to Flynn for several seconds before making up his mind to follow after Flynn, and hadn't left his side since.

And then there was Sodia, hovering slightly behind them all, set apart.

There was little room left in him for the guilt at leaving Raven to his task. He didn't have the room.

AN2: Thank you so much for reading! Chapter two will be up soon so please leave a review if you have anything at all to tell us; we welcome any and all feedback!