To Ashes And Blood

Who Sold Me Out

Damien froze.

Behind him, a familiar packet of chips crunched once.

"......Little pig."

For a while, neither of them moved. Then Cole stepped closer, the echoes of his boots drifting softly throughout the archive.

He shifted his gaze from Damien to the terminal, then back to Damien.

He threw another chip into his mouth.

“You do know,” he said between bites, “that breaking into military archives is technically illegal, little pig.”

Damien, still struck to the heart with fear, remained silent, almost visibly shaken.

Cole sighed.

"Arghhhh... well, I guess it's a good thing I hate paperwork."

The tension in Damien's shoulders loosened slightly.

Cole walked beside him and lazily stared at the screen.

His smug expression remained the same as he glanced through the open tabs.

Research Logs.

Experiment Records.

Personnel.

Surveillance.

Recovered Subjects.

Then his eyes landed on one name.

Oma Edwards.

The bag of chips stopped halfway to his mouth.

His expression suddenly changed.

Damien didn't let it slip by.

“You know her?”

Cole didn't answer.

For a long while, he just kept staring at the screen.

Then he reached forward, closed the folder, and turned off the terminal.

"We're getting out of here."

Damien frowned.

"Cinder..."

"I said we're leaving."

He dragged Damien by the collar.

His tone wasn't loud, yet it carried enough weight to bring silence down upon the entire archive.

After they had snuck out, skimming past the cameras, they walked through the empty corridors.

Damien finally spoke.

"Who is she?"

Cole shoved another chip into his mouth.

"Someone who should've stayed where she was."

"That doesn't tell me anything."

"Make do with it."

"You've heard the name before, and I feel you've even seen her, Cinder."

"I cannot say I haven't."

"Then what is Blackwater?"

Cole didn't react.

Which was enough of an answer for Damien.

Damien lowered his voice.

"Your girlfriend sealed every file connected to her."

"Classic bruja," Cole muttered under his breath.

"Why?"

Cole looked ahead.

"I've worked with Shannon for years, and I've only seen three expressions on her face. There's annoyed," he said mid-bite, "super annoyed, and lastly, disappointed."

A small smile appeared on his face.

"But when you started talking about intelligent Hollows..."

"It was the first time in a long time I'd ever seen her scared... the last time was when we were recruits."

Silence followed.

Then Cole reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device.

A map appeared between them, with a blinking red dot in the middle.

"Last registered movement."

Damien stared at it.

"The movement logs from the terminal."

Cole nodded.

"I memorized and registered them while you were having your little identity crisis."

"You read all that?"

"Do you think I just woke up one day and became a Cinder?"

"You were eating chips."

"You'd learn to multitask if you're ever going to be like me."

“I don't want to be anything like you.”

Despite everything, Damien almost laughed.

Then he noticed where the marker was located.

Corridor Nine.

Inside the abandoned industrial district of the Eastern Sector.

His expression hardened.

"In the original timeline..."

Cole glanced sideways.

"You're doing it again."

"What?"

"You started talking like you've lived another life."

Damien looked away.

“I thought you believed me.”

.........................................

The abandoned district had long since been reclaimed by dust and debris.

Collapsed buildings leaned against one another.

Broken roads stretched between rusted transport rails.

The eerie silence that filled the place was enough to tell anyone that no normal person would be living there.

Cole crouched beside a cracked concrete wall.

"There are no footprints."

Damien pointed toward the ground.

"There."

A tiny vibration had scattered fine dust into circular patterns.

Cole raised an eyebrow.

"You can see that?"

Damien ignored the question.

“Someone's been here recently.”

They continued forward and came across a discarded food container that was still warm.

A sleeping bag tucked behind a broken machine led into another room.

Several old speakers connected by wires stretched across the room.

Cole picked one up.

"It still has power."

Damien slowly scanned the area but found nothing tangible to follow.

Yet every instinct in his body screamed that someone was watching.

Then he noticed it.

A thread tied between two broken pipes, connected to dozens of tiny metal plates.

“An alarm...” he whispered.

“Are you just seeing that?” Cole asked as he moved forward. “You need to do better with your spatial awareness training.”

Damien's eyes narrowed.

"She's close."

Cole quietly shoved another chip into his mouth.

Crunch.

The sound echoed.

And then—

"Take one more step... I dare you."

The voice came from everywhere.

Walls.

Ceiling.

Behind them.

Above them.

Every speaker vibrated at once.

Even the air itself seemed distorted.

Cole slowly raised both hands.

"Easy now, lad."

Damien turned.

Standing atop a collapsed support beam was a girl wearing a blue mask.

Her blonde hair drifted in the wind.

A long blade rested loosely in her hand.

The weapon hummed softly.

Like glass singing.

Damien's breathing stopped.

"Oma."

The girl froze as she shifted her gaze toward Damien, lowering her blade slightly.

Several seconds passed.

Then she spoke, her voice tired.

"Who sold me out this time?"

Damien stared at her for a while.

"I'm not here to capture you."

She laughed.

"I'm here to help."

Her laughter continued.

When it finally stopped, she looked directly into his eyes.

"Help?... You're six months too late."

Damien felt something sink inside his chest.

"What?"

"The resistance already found me."

Cole's expression darkened.

Damien looked at him in confusion before turning back to Oma.

Oma slowly stepped backward.

"They took everything from me."

"My home."

"My family."

"My name."

"The only thing they couldn't take..."

She raised the blade.

"...was this."

The weapon released a clear, crystalline note.

The air around it bent.

Space itself seemed to vibrate.

Damien's pupils contracted.

“No. No. No. That can't be possible.”

His eyes locked onto the familiar shape.

The white edge.

The fractured guard.

The resonance veins running through the metal.

He had seen that sword before.

At the end of the world.

When the Eastern Sector fell.

When Oma Edwards stood alone against thousands of Hollows.

That blade wasn't supposed to exist for another two years.

Damien stared without blinking.

The wind passed silently between the ruined buildings.

His fingers slowly curled into a fist.

His memories weren't wrong.

The timeline wasn't simply changing.

Someone...

had already lived this future.