Chapter 10 Eliza

My body was now laying down on a bunch of soft throw pillows near the bookshelves while being guarded by Nex. He had comfortably positioned himself right next to me. I would've said that he was too close for my liking but I was too tired to do anything about it. Today was complete chaos. Worst part is that for some reason I couldn't go to sleep. Was my body too tired to fall asleep? Or maybe my head was just wrapping about the millions of situations to wonder why Terra defected. Nex had fed me my pellet for the cycle because I was unable to move my hands. Now I just needed to rest. That fight was one of the biggest I've ever faced. The entire time I wasn't even sure if I was going to be able to rely on Nex. The destruction we caused definitely slowed down Talos. However, that wasn't the point of that skirmish. It was to flush out Terra on why she defected. Frustratingly, we couldn't find a proper reason. Nitra on the other hand was still missing. We've only found one of the two girls. Talos was quiet as the hours passed. There were no tremors ever now and then probably because of the missing construction golems. During this time, Eliza had instructed Able to set up new surveillance ports in deeper areas of Talos. She even went into her kitchen to make me some of their version of soup. She was quite concerned for my well being despite being a stranger that she just met. All I could do now was look up to the dimly lit ceiling to pass the time. Every part of my physical body was aching to the high cosmos. I wonder if Plaux could feel what was happening down here? Or perhaps the Tortoise plates? This place is quite deep underground. As I was about to sleep, Nex was poking me sides. Each poke he took I made a count of. This way the next time I use training, I would be sure to hit him that many times. There was no way of knowing that each time he would poke my body that it stung like how a Yelgir would attack its prey from below the ground. My face was quite relaxed so even I couldn't make an expression.

Nex: Hey… Hey… Hey… Arc… Are you still awake?

Arc: I can't sleep… How about you? Are you okay?

Nex: You never were the type to sleep anyway. But I'm okay, just a bit distraught. I guess you could even say that I'm a bit heartbroken.

Arc: What does it mean to be heartbroken?

Nex: It's an expression from books. It means that you feel sad about something so much that it hurts your chest.

Arc: Are you sure that isn't a heart condition?

Nex: No… I'm sure.

Arc: I could only give my guesses why you feel that way.

Nex: It's a bit obvious why after all. I never thought Terra would lay a hand on you. More like, I wanted to believe that she was just kidding or brainwashed. But the more you two fought each other. I just knew there was an attempt to kill. It was painful to watch despite not being the one fighting.

Arc: Nex… you know how we're supposed to keep these kinds of things under control.

Nex: I know…

Being so close to Nex, I could feel that his heart was beating faster and faster. He was afraid. Afraid that things were never going to be the same. But more importantly, I was afraid. I was afraid that someday I might have to make a hard decision. A decision that I never thought I would have to make. It was like time standing still when I saw those eyes of hers. When she threw those powerful hooks at me. It was like some kind of weird message that things were over. After so many rotations, why now?

Nex: Say, tell me your honest opinion. Is it wrong to have these kinds of feelings?

Arc: What kind?

Nex: To feel pain when your teammates fight each other. I know that we can be replaced one way or another. But even still, knowing that everyone can just go missing in a flash. It still hurts. Even all of it. Is it so wrong?

Arc: It's wrong for our line of work… Though I wish I could protect everyone. That's my honest feelings.

Nex: I'm scared that I'll forget everything.

Arc: I feel like this is something you should know Nex. I feel like this is the perfect time to tell you actually. You told me this a long time ago. Though I'm not sure if you remember.

Nex: What is it?

Arc: This isn't actually our first conversation we talked about this…

Nex: Huh?!

Arc: I think it was time you knew something.

I wasn't joking when I said that. Nex got up from the ground to look me straight in the face. His expression said it all. I just spent most of my energy smiling. There were various points in time when our memories would be wiped to help us cope. How the scientists in the platform do it is still a mystery, but they would erase our memories. Personally, I'd remove some memories that I wouldn't want to remember. Memories of physical pain so I wouldn't hesitate to do things. Or maybe remove some of memories that involved a specific fear from an event. Depending if it's beneficial to the person, the cognitive magicians will remove it. However, doing this has it's many consequences. Sometimes it can rearrange memories or remove them entirely especially those who aren't resistant to it. The platform still finds it beneficial anyway because then they'll always have willing teams to go on classes. I've always had a strong resistance to memory magic. This meant that I could remember all of the memories of our classes. Every conversation, quirks, traumas, and tiny happy moments. I've been cold to most of my classmates not for the reason that not only that I might lose them but because they'll never remember. They might not even remember me. I do care about them because I've always known a lot about them. I guess I can say that I'm a bit bitter that they could never remember something about me. But how could I blame them? Though there were some stronger memories that I think I've wanted to wipe. They must've been so strong that I would want to erase them. However, my resistance to memory magic still occasionally made me remember some things.

Arc: We've had this conversation before. Different planets, different times, but it always comes down to this. Seems like no matter what, you're always bound to talk about this.

Nex: How could I possibly forget these kinds of things! I'm sure that I wouldn't want to get those removed!

Arc: It's just part of the side effects of memory magic. If you aren't resistant to it, sometimes it takes more than you think. The major things remain while others drift off.

Nex: There's no way I could forget!

Arc: Hahaha, this is the 6th time we've had it. It always ends the same way.

Nex: The same way?

Arc: You forget in the end…

Nex: Then what about the time I told you about me? The real me?

Arc: That one was new. I can guarantee that.

Nex: Then why do you remember and we can't?

Arc: Sorry but that's a secret. If I tell it then it might be dire.

Nex: You're joking!

Arc: I'm sorry but that's how it is… I really wish i could say more. Maybe I'm just too tired to act cold right now.

Nex: No! That's not fair! I want to remember. I want to know the things I've already told you!

Arc: It's honestly alright. I think at some point I've stopped caring. The hardest parts of every rotation is knowing that everyone was just going to forget about the good things. Maybe that's why I was so surprised that Terra defected. But I did promise one thing specifically for you.

Nex: What?

Arc: That each time we reached this conversation. I'd tell you and I've done it without fail. We'd become friends all over again and again. Over and over…

I could see that Nex was saying something but I was already starting to drift into my sleep. My eyes were already starting to shut by themselves. The pain in my body was already starting to disappear, making my body relax. This was probably one of those sleeps where it was going to hurt the next morning. I disliked that whenever I slept my memories started to flood back to those days. Times when everyone would remember the small moments. Nobody said it was easy but someone had to remember it all. A part of me does value these memories more than my own life. Though I wouldn't want to question a command from the platform. That's why as much as possible I want to keep this a secret. Call this me being selfish but this is what I want to keep special. Nothing around me will stay. Living on the platform has taught me that everyone needs to push forward. Everyone wants to survive. What's the point in holding material possession when I'm always going on dangerous classes. It might get destroyed along the way if I do. That's why I want this to be my selfish request from the universe. Help me keep these memories alive. I don't care what happens to this body, just make sure that I can remember the happy moments. Terra's first taste of Junjo seeds, Nex's first time at the beach of Likon, and that person. I might not remember but I just know he/she was important. Important memories are the ones that fight off the memory magic the most. Memories that are worth protecting. To me, Memories that are more valuable than stars themselves.

I woke up to the sounds of tremors again. The work must've been starting for quite sometime but I just hadn't noticed. My body was still aching from the sores of the fight. There were still some throbbing pains on my back and legs especially. However, I still wanted to move around. It didn't feel right laying around for too long. That was enough rest for now. Nex was still sleeping right next to, he looked like he was in some deep sleep. I made sure that when I started to move out that I wouldn't wake him up. It's been a while since some of us slept soundly. Usually it would be pretty rare because those would only happen when we're at the platform. There wasn't anyone else in the room. This made me naturally curious where Eliza would be. Moving out of the office, I followed a different path of bookshelves. This time the crime section of the maze. It led me to a different door. Compared to the other doors in the area so far, this one was just a normal door. A door that was simply made out of wood. As I opened the door, Eliza was on the other side of the room cooking. My eyes had finally adjusted to the setting and it revealed to be the kitchen! The place was made out of stone bricks like some kind of cozy house. There were ancient gas burners on the left side of the room followed by an average blue plastic kitchen top. A steel door that looked like it led to the storage that seemed to be left open. Eliza was by the massive two door steel fridge taking out some kinds of items out of it. She saw with a bit of a surprised look while holding her ingredients. She then hurriedly placed it on the table right in front along with the other things on it. Her hair seemed to be a mess along with the clothes she was wearing. I moved closer to her till we both sat by the table.

Eliza: Greetings! You're finally up. Quite the mess we've stirred up huh. To think that we just met too.

Arc: I'm sorry if we caused some trouble for you.

Eliza: It's quite alright. It was only bound to happen to be honest. It was either you came along and did what you did or Peter was going to come here to probably kill me.

Arc: Still, we could've handled things a lot differently.

Eliza: It's alright kid. I mean what were you going to do? Let your friend kill you? I wouldn't put it past you if you blew up the entire Talos city. Do what it takes to survive. I guess even your humans knew that too.

Arc: Thanks. I appreciate it.

Eliza: No problem. So are you feeling better?

Arc: No, my body definitely wants to rest more but I don't like sleeping.

Eliza: Sounds like a case of ptsd.

Arc: ptsd?

Eliza: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. It's something to do with your brain. It basically means you feel haunted by your past. With the power you guys have, I'm sure y'all seen some strange stuff.

Arc: Maybe then. We have memory magic to help us forget things we don't need. Especially since our humans don't have the luxury of just sitting around.

Eliza: Quite the sad thing huh.

Arc: I think it's much better than the alternative of killing yourself or being useless.

Eliza: I can't even imagine what life must've been for y'all.

Arc: It's something you get used to.

Eliza: Are you sure you don't want to rest more? Able examined your body as you started to crash. He reported that your arms and legs were on the verge of being completely broken.

Arc: I guess that's all thanks to Terra. She was the girl that I fought.

Eliza: Definitely quite the powerful woman.

Arc: With the power to manipulate vibrations. It's definitely the most destructive magic I've seen.

Eliza: It would be a lot more dangerous if she actually knew how to use it. I've seen what vibrations can do to a person. From what I've seen, she doesn't even know the true potential it has.

Arc: That's just the perks of learning to fight Terra. Vibrational manipulation is still relatively new to us.

Eliza: Strange how your humans can be so limited to things.

Arc: It's probably because we rely on magic to fill the gaps. How about you? You clearly look worse than me.

Eliza: I was having a good sleep before these tremors. Though personally, I'm just stressed about various recent things. When I was sent here a long time ago, my mission was to make this planet viable for humans. I still plan to do that but right now. I'm being pulled into something I feel like is greater than I think. Magic? Talos? Two different humanities? I'm just a scientist who was sent here to create a new home world for humans. Sure Earth is great but we're slowly getting trouble there. That's why we chose this planet, to help expand our human kind.

Arc: I'm sorry. We didn't think it would burden you so much…

Eliza: It's alright. I just haven't been given time to process things correctly. Maybe that's why I'm so hungry right now! Stress eating!

Arc: Isn't it unhealthy to do that?

Eliza: Don't judge me. You eat pellets!

Arc: A little less hostility please.

Eliza: Sorry, just stressed. Oh Peter what have you gotten yourself into now…

Arc: Can you tell me more about this Peter person?

Eliza: Sure, I guess. It's better to vent out all of this stress or it'll ruin my complexion. Well my relationship with Peter is complicated right now. But back then it wasn't. Things were much simpler even with all the secrets of the universe.

Arc: Tell me, what's it like?

Eliza: My sandwich?

Arc: No, I mean living in a home world.

Eliza: Well, before I tell you I want you to know about Earth. Earth isn't some kind of paradise I'm scared you're picturing of.

Her expression changed from tired into a much more serious one. The tone in her voice shifted too, making things between us eerily pressuring. She pushed her food away from her then tipped up her glasses. Being in plenty of classes myself, I don't picture any planet to be some sort of paradise. There's always something much darker in the background. Sometimes it can be the locals while others the terrain or wildlife. To me, even if Earth was going to be something terrible I still wanted to know. I nodded my head to Eliza.

Eliza: Okay… But don't say I warned you. Though I wouldn't put it against you if you didn't want to come back with me. Well where do I even start?

Arc: Children! How are children made?

Eliza: Woah! Okay! Big questions! Did no one really tell you about that? It's a bit embarrassing to answer that!

Arc: Why what's wrong? I don't think anyone on the platform knows how to have children. This goes especially true for academy students. Only the elders know. Once it is time they just extract DNA from us. We're born from the birthing centers, only knowing that we belong to a specific family right after we finally realize we can create memories.

Eliza: You're test tube babies… I never knew. So your human race decided that normal birthing wasn't enough. I guess that makes sense if you're having trouble trying to increase your population. But to resort to that… the situation must've been dire.

Arc: For us, birthing centers are normal. Some even being from the same birthing center.

Eliza: So none of you how they're made?

Arc: No, the information partianing it is locked away from academy members like me. Though I wouldn't know how the process works in the birth centers. I've peeked a couple times when I've returned but all I could see were vats of humans. The process is still unknown.

Eliza: That is quite dire. Well, I guess you're quite pure then. It's quite the dirty process to create a natural human baby. Those methods you've said were describing artificial means.

Arc: Would you tell me about it?

Eliza: Personally, it's not something I'd like to explain. It's a bit sexual in nature.

Arc: What's sexual?

Eliza: Now you're making me feel guilty for teaching you these words. This is just the stuff that your parents tell you.

Arc: I don't know much about my parents. We're complicated.

Eliza: Oh… I see my mistake for just assuming things. Forgive me.

Arc: I don't see a reason for you to apologize.

Eliza: Well, you do look like you're at that age where you'd be curious to know. Have you noticed something strange in your body whenever you see a female? Something that feels oddly embarrassing?

Arc: No.

Eliza: Eh?

Arc: Nope.

Eliza: Oh I see, then how about this. Don't you feel curious sometimes about the other gender's body? For females, at some point we feel curious too.

Arc: Maybe it's because I've lived on the platform I don't see that many females. For most of my life, I've been with the same people. Those would be my teammates.

Eliza: That's so strange. What the hell is this kind of place anyway? This feels like some kind of dystopian novel. Are you even happy on the platform?

Arc: We do what our platform commander tells us to do. For the sake of humanity, Adam be with us.

Eliza: Woah. Is that some kind of cult signal or something?

Arc: What's a cult?

Eliza: Explaining Earth things is going to be the hard huh. Well it's not like I'm busy anyway.

Arc: If you're curious about it. Adam is our hero. The saviour of our humanity. The first magician to stand up against the odds. The reason why we're alive.

Eliza: Hey, that's actually quite interesting. What's this Adam person like? Do you have historical records or something?

Arc: Um, no. He's a folk legend of sorts. Though he doesn't have records because we were sent to space. It's widely believed that he existed from the stories past down from our elders.

Eliza: So he's just a story huh…

Arc: But he did exist. If he hadn't then we would've been stuck on Eden.

Eliza: I'm sorry for not sounding respectful. It's just that I'm a person that thinks of the scientific approach. No proof then there might've been a different reason why y'all survived.

Arc: I guess it's hard to understand when you're not from the platform itself.

Eliza: We discovered our existence because we figured that we evolved from a single cell organism. Maybe it was similar to your home or that place called Eden.

Arc: Perhaps It's just this is the believed reason to why we survived the fall of Eden.

Eliza: What is Eden anyway?

Arc: It was said to be our first home planet. A planet that was filled with luscious food, majestic terrains, and incredible creatures. Though at the price of not being able to use magic. If it weren't for Adam, we would've been kept as pets.

Eliza: Pets? By some other alien life?

Arc: Maybe he was some kind of extra terrestrial but there was a being that created us. That being created us using his magic. That's why some of us were born with the very same ability.

Eliza: This sounds eerily like the bible.

Arc: Bible? Is it some kind of book?

Eliza: Yes, it's a book. Though it's not like any other book out there on Earth. It's widely accepted by millions of people on our planet that the stories are real. The name of the settings and even the name of Adam himself. It does bear the same similarities.

Arc: Strange. Do you have a copy of this book in your library?

Eliza: Sorry. We didn't bring one. I wasn't the religious type to care about those kinds of things. Though Peter was. It's almost uncanny actually. Could it be that Eden in the stories of the bible wasn't just a place but a planet? A planet that… No, I'm just thinking too much about it.

Arc: If you say so. So tell me about these things…

She explained the whole process to how humans were born from females. To be frank, the details she used were something a bit hard to understand. Some of it felt wrong to listen to because of how disgusting it is. I made a couple of faces to show my clear disinterest but that didn't stop her. However, Eliza surely knew a lot of things about their humans and planet. Truly a lot compared to how little they tell us at the platform. Things started to get a bit strange and awkward too when she started to talk about adolescence. She explained things about my body that felt too accurate for a stranger to know. Part of me felt a bit vulnerable there especially when I started talking about the changes of the female body. My face would start to heat up from listening to the things she would say. These were the strangest conversations I've had in a long time! I could feel that my so much awkwardness started to develop as she continued on.

Eliza: And that's how babies are born. As you can tell, I'm not pregnant or anything. So my breasts aren't going to lactate or grow anymore. They are quite the size now actually, though it does get annoying when they're big.

Arc: Wait! Stop! That didn't sound like something I should've known. I could feel my face burning up!

Eliza: Hahaha, I guess once you reach a certain age. You stop caring about what embarrasses you when you're with children.

Arc: I don't feel like a child. I've killed people.

Eliza: Arc… You are a child. Just one that had their childhood harshly stripped away from them. You should've experienced the joys of youth, going to fun things, taking care of family, and maybe even falling in love. Instead, you were sent into a gritty world where the only people that were with you were your teammates. Your mind might not be a child anymore but that doesn't mean that you can't be one from time to time. An unjust world that treats everyone the same. You guys never deserved any of that. Or at least not until a certain age. You deserve to have your own life

Arc: I see…. Thanks for telling me that… It really does make me think a lot. Not just that but everything you've said made me think a lot especially things I want to figure out. Thanks a lot, even if we just met.

Eliza: I guess it was just my way of doing something selfish of mine.

Arc: What would that be?

Eliza: Being a mother again...