Shakugan no Hybrids: Chapter 35

Chapter 35: When A Flame Has Become Ash

The world feels..cold.
A distant part of her mind compares it to floating in a liquid darkness, as if there is water all around her..cold and somehow bottomless. “No bottom beneath me and no surface above me” Shana concludes her mental exercise.Something is wrong. The world is less..intense. As if there is no world, but instead it is like a game, or a painting. It does not feel real. Still, somehow she can breathe normally even without Alastor’s flame, something that she would never be able to do if she truly was underwater in some way. “Where…am I…? What’s happening..?”
“Alastor…What…is going on..?” she asks confused. But there comes no answer.
Not a single trace of Alastor’s usual warmth.
Then reality hits her with the the impact and force of a sledgehammer: Alastor is gone! His flame is gone! His warmth…gone!
Even if not that long when looking at the amount of years, but when looking to all they have been through together, she cannot even remember how it feels like to not have Alastor at her side.
It is a terrible feeling, as if she has been stripped naked and left out in the cold.
“I feel…nothing..” her whispering voice sounds muffled.
“No warm fire inside of me…no strength..”
Her arms and legs do not respond to her will as she floats in the dark nothingness, unable to change anything.
Shana feels a sadness coming over..sadness, despair, and loneliness…so alone…
For the very first time she truly feels alone, abandoned.
“No..”she tells herself, hesitant at first, but with more determination as she repeats that simple word:” No…no..no. NO!”
“I have to wake up…there is no nothingness! Get up! W-wake up! Wake up! WAKE UP!”
Terribly slow, as if slabs of concrete keeps their lids down, the girl formerly known as the Blazing Eyed Hunter opens her eyes. The sudden burst of sunlight hurts as she smells the dirt near her nose. Dirt, mixed with the scent of snow, grass and blood.
“W-where…am I? What happened..?” she wonders, desperately trying to remember.
As she tries to move Shana feels a sharp pain in her side.
Alarmed she winces and tries to touch the pained spot.
It feels liquid and hot.
She raises her hand in front of her eyes to see what it is: blood.
“I am..bleeding?!”
Disbelief and concern take a hold of her. “When did I get hurt? And why hasn’t Alastor healed me yet?” she wonders.
Then the sensation from earlier hits her again with full force: “I cannot feel Alastor’s flame!”
The God’s presence, strengthening her and always warming her, is completely absent.
It is a terrifying difference, she feels so cold without her contractor it would not have surprised her if someone told her that she had died, in this was some form of afterlife.
“A-Alastor…? Alastor…”
Instinctively she tries to touch the ever-present necklace around her neck, but her fingers find nothing but bare skin. There is nothing there. Alastor is not there! With the growing pain comes an even faster growing panic. “Where is Alastor? Why am I hurt? Why do I feel so weak..?” The questions tumble through her mind as the former flamehaze feels tears burning behind her eyes.
“Alastor! Alastor!”
But the only answer she gets is the sound of rustling bushes and cracking treebranches, bending below the growing weight of the falling snow.
Without warning, the memories come back in full force and Shana groans, out of both anger and helplessness.
He! The hybrid..Malachite!
“He.. has stabbed me!” she remembers vividly. “He stabbed me without warning with that weird Hougu of his and then took off! What if its true what he said..about severing bonds and contracts..what if it wasn’t a bluff? What if…that treasuretool did somehow extract Alastor from inside of me? Is that even possible? And it that really happened..where is Alastor now?!”
Once again, desperation, followed by the signs of a brewing panic attack start to manifest themselves in the little girl.
“Oh no.. no! He can’t be gone, he can’t be gone, HE CANNOT BE GONE!” she mumbles over and over. “If he is gone…then where to? Guze? And..what about me? Am I no longer a flamehaze? If I am no longer the flame-haired red-hot-eyed hunter then who am I…then I am nothing anymore..nothing at all… Oh no…No! Not that, not that, not that! I have lived all my life for this, this is my life..please  no..”
She tries to stand up and struggles holding her balance. Never before did she realise how much she relied on Alastor, not just for guidance or wisdom, but for strength as well.
“No..if..if Alastor is gone…what am I going to do?!”
Her weak legs give up and she falls to the ground, weakened and lost in a mixture of worry and sorrow. In a snail-like pace she starts to crawl through the snow, deeper into the forest.
“Nietono no Shana…Alastor..Everything…Everything is gone! Everything that made me who I am is gone! Gone..” The last thing she remembers before falling unconscious appears in her head again: Malachite taking off into the forest with both Alastor and the Nietono no Shana. “Where has he taken them?!” she asks herself, followed by “Why has he taken them?” A stone hidden beneath the snow  punctures her already shredded uniform, hitting her wounded side. Shana can’t help but let out a high-pitched cry of pain as it feels like a lightning bolt zaps through her side. “How could I be so stupid!” She curses herself for being so weak..so full of trust. A fallen treebranch partially blocks the path in front of her. Desperately she grabs it and uses it to get herself on her feet again, using the branch as a walking stick. The wound in her side starts to drip blood again as the movement of her body rips it wide-open again, the steady stream of red washing away the recently formed clots of blood and dirt. The effort needed to simply stand straight causes sweat to start running down her forehead where it mixes with her tears. Finally, Shana gives up on holding her tears back as they merge with the sweat while she struggles to stand on her wobbled legs.
“Alastor..Come back! Please come back!” she tries to call him in a desperate attempt to reclaim her contractor and his flame. But once again her plea is only met with the sound of silence

The silence is eerie, as if life itself has withdrawn. The sun has been past its highest point for some time. Even if not knowing for how long exactly, Shana knows she has been out for quite a while. The shadows from the rocks and trees are slowly starting to lengthen already, and on her skin she feels the bittercold touch of snow slowly starting to fall more rapidly. Nothing around her indicates the direction of where Malachite could possibly have went. An icy wind suddenly blows past her, making her shiver and causing the tree branches to make a creaking noise, as if laughing at her hopelessness. The cave where she have slowly struggled to get out off now looks like a dark mouth mocking her very existance. It seems to taunt her. That this is the end, that there is no hope, that she should  just lay down in the snow and sleep...forever sleep..It would be so easy...No more struggles..no more pain..not being alone..and cold..the eternal darkness would not be something to struggle against. But instead would feel like an old friend...

Shana bites her lip in frustration, struggling to make her legs move, even if only for a little bit further.
“M-move! Move your legs! Walk!
I cannot give up!
That's not me! I cannot drop dead just yet! Whatever I was, was stolen from me, my identity was stolen, my dreams were stolen, my chances of survival were stolen, my companion was stolen, my weapon was stolen! I cannot sit down and await the end!”
But without a Crimson Lord to back her up, even the girl once known as the blazing eyed hunterhas limits. She realizes that her senses are numb, as  the cold inside her continues to build up.
Blood is still dripping bit by bit from her wound as she aimlessly holds her side with her hand.
The blood is still running thick.

“Move! Walk!...One leg...after the other...one foot...after the other...! Move! Move!”
But even that mentally repeated mantra is starting to lose its effect.
A human being is fragile, and exhaustion is never far away.
It is as if her legs cannot hold her anymore, as if they are made of water. Shana has to move slowly as her hand is resting against the tree branches in her way, lacking the strength to push them aside... Bit by bit she walks towards the forest... Bit by bit she feels her powers run out, or maybe it is all in her mind. Shana can no longer tell. Right now, all she wants is a chance…a chance for justice..revenge..a chance to live..

“A chance...! Just a chance to fight the one that betrayed me! That's all I want! If I am no longer a Flame Haze...! If there is nothing left of me to do...! I just want a chance...!”
Blood is dripping to the ground as she walks, leaving a long and visible trail.
“Power...”
It is a ravenous thought, once that scares her. It is the type of thought a hungry denizen would have.
She staggers, once again fighting to remain standing.
“Power...!”
For the last time she tries to ignore her inner cry. Then, at last, she gives up resisting.

Shana bites her lip harder and tears overflow in her eyes as her eyesight becomes blurred. She lifts her head towards the sky.
“SOMEONE! IF YOU CAN JUST HELP ME!!!”

When a desperate girl screams a cry for help into the wind, she expects many things.
What someone like that does not expect, is that the wind hears her plea..and responds.