Chapter 16 – The Ocean We Once Saw
Night settled softly over the city of Amaranth. The café had gone quiet, the laughter from earlier fading into the hum of the lanterns outside. Inside, only a few candles still burned, their flames trembling as if afraid of the silence.
Taro sat alone by the window, staring at the stars.
For once, he wasn't joking.
The others had gone to sleep upstairs, but his mind refused to rest. The reflection in the glass looked older somehow – a face still smiling on the outside, but hollow underneath.
He reached into his pocket and took out an old photograph. The edges were worn, the colours faded: a boy on a pier, his parents standing behind him, the sea stretching out forever.
The Past: "The Ocean We Once Saw
Taro's parents had been wanderers – explorers who crossed the world long before the Rifts tore it apart. His father, Renshiri, was a shipwright who dreamed if building vessels that could sail beyond the horizon. His mother, Kaela, was a navigator who believed the ocean itself was alive, guiding those who listened.
Every summer, they took Taro to the coast of Lysara. He remembered how the tide always seemed to chase his footsteps, how the sun burned gold against the waves, how his mother would hum the same song every evening:
"The sea remembers every soul it takes, but it gives them back in dreams."
They were poor, but they were free. Until the day the storms came.
A Rift opened far out at sea – a wound in the sky that bled fire and lighting. The ship his parents had built, The Dawn's Whisper, was caught in it. Taro, left onshore to gather supplies, watched the light consume the horizon. He waited all night for the sails to return.
They never did.
When the storm cleared, only fragments of the hull washed up. And a compass – his mother's. The glass cracked, the needle spinning endlessly.
He kept it ever since.
The Present: "Wounds that Still Sting"
Reika found him there hours later, the photo in his hand.
She didn't say anything at first. Just sat beside him.
"You never talk about them," she whispered finally.
Taro's voice was quiet. "Because if I do, I'll start to believe they're really gone."
Reika glanced at the photograph. "They'd be proud, you know. You kept moving forward." He laughed softly – a fragile sound. "Forward?" I spend half my time running into explosions."
Reika smiled faintly. "And still…you keep laughing. That's something."
He looked at her, eyes tired but alive. "You ever wonder if we're laughing just to hide the cracks?"
She hesitated. "Every day."
A silence fell between them, gentle but heavy – the kind that speaks louder than words. Outside, the stars shimmered. Somewhere in the distance, the ocean murmured against the cliffs.
Taro looked down at the compass in his hand. The needle, after years of chaos, had stopped spinning. It pointed toward the sea.
He smiled – really smiled this time. "Guess it's time I went home."
Reika squeezed his shoulder. "Then we're all go together."
From the stairwell, Kairo's voice drifted down, calm and warm: "You're not alone anymore, Taro."
Taro blinked, tears forming unbidden. For years, he had carried the laughter like armour, the jokes like shields. But now – now the armour cracked. And it was okay.
He looked at his friends – the family he'd found through fire and loss – and whispered, almost to himself,
"Mom…Dad…I made it this far. And I'm not scared anymore."
The candlelight flickered, and the photograph on the table glowed softly – as if the sea itself had heard him.
The next morning, when the sun rose, the cafe smelled of salt and sea breeze. And in the distance, waves crashed against the shore – as though calling toward the next chapter of their lives.