Rising Shards

We were outside now; I had to catch Kalei as she was midstep before it happened and nearly fell over. Oka was a bit older and was training with the man that picked up baby Oka at the start. She was holding back tears as she blocked attacks from his twin swords.

“Mikkel, slow down!” Oka said.

The man glared down at her, barking instructions as to what stances she needed to take next as he slashed at her.

“The first class of Tesata ended in agony and pain due to their foolishness.” Mikkel said. “Will you continue their legacy or forge a new one?”

“I’m eight years old.” Oka said. “How can an eight-year-old forge anything?”

Another strike.

“By being strong. And you are strong. You have a gift few in the world possess. If you start now, you can change everything.”

Mikkel sounded like Jeans there. I looked to Kalei, and she looked similarly troubled.

“That’s enough for today, Oka.” Mikkel said. “Follow.”

But Oka and Mikkel continued to train in front of us, speeding up as time passed in front of us. Oka grew taller, and her attacks more precise, now including blasts of conjured plants.

“Where is your strength?” Mikkel said, swiftly striking her as time lurched back to normal. “The fire I know so well?”

“It’s cold. Snow stops fire.”

“I had recently turned thirteen,” Void Oka echoed around us. “And with my age brought new responsibilities, namely working with Mikkel for longer periods of time with less breaks. Also, puberty. So much fun.”

“I’m sorry I have to resort to this, Oka.” Mikkel said, pulling a slip of paper out of his pocket.

“What is that?” Oka asked.

“This is a letter from Caelum,” Mikkel said.

Oka instantly jumped at it, but he held it farther than I could reach.

“Prove to me that you still want to learn,” Mikkel said. “That your rebellious spirit only fuels you more.”

Oka punched him in the stomach, but he didn’t even flinch.

“Not strong enough.” Mikkel said, burning the letter.

“No!” Oka screamed, jumping at the pieces that fell before her.

“I’ve been saying for years to let go of your past,” Mikkel said. “And now it looks like you have no choice.”

Oka tried to get up, but she slipped and fell on her face. Mikkel didn’t offer a hand to help her up.

“I think I wanna be done with this,” Kalei said. “How was this allowed?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

As if in response to Kalei, a steel door appeared before us.

“Just one?” I asked. I was kind of hoping it was the Kilander one, but reading the door confirmed it was the door Oka didn’t want opened.

“There isn’t much to say about the Kilanders, really,” Void Oka said. “They found me because they needed someone like me to find. Berin adopted me, and he’s kind of taken care of me. I am apparently rich now. It doesn’t make sense to me. But it doesn’t really make me feel conflicted, just awkward.”

The rest of the world around us faded again. Only the steel door in front of us was there, like a spotlight in the darkness of the void. “Who’s Caelum, then?” I asked.

“I...don't know," Void Oka said. “Mikkel always told me about him, that he was someone I knew when I was much younger. I thought he'd be someone that'd take me away from here. Mikkel always said his letters would be a ticket out of here. He probably just made the whole thing up. It's something for later, I guess. All that remains is this door.”

“Can we skip it?” I asked. “Oka, if you can hear me, I don’t care about what’s behind this door. If you never want to tell us, I really don’t mind.”

“Hey, wait,” Kalei said. “Do you hear that?”

I tried to listen. There was a faint sound near us.

“It sounds like something moving,” I said.

“It’s…the ocean,” Kalei said. “It’s this way.”

Kalei and I walked into the darkness beside the door, holding each other to make sure we didn’t get separated. It felt like my eyes were clamped shut, until we found her.

Oka sat on the edge of a rock formation that touched the ocean. Waves splashed up against her legs, which dangled into the water.

“Oh,” Oka said. “Hi, guys.”

“Are you real Oka or Void Oka?” Kalei asked.

“Real Oka,” she said.

We copied her and took our shoes and socks off and let them soak in the ocean for a bit. I watched the ripples that formed from our legs kicking, making sure not to splash on our emerald Rising Shards skirts.

“I’m sorry I’m being so weird,” Oka said. “It’s really hard to be back here.”

“It’s alright,” I said.

“These things really suck,” Kalei said. “I kinda wish we were told how much these would suck beforehand. Can we be done?”

“I think we just have to get that last door,” Oka said.

“Can we skip it if it’s that bad?”

Oka bit her lip.

“I really want to talk about it,” Oka said as she sniffed. “I’m just scared.”

“Scared of what?” I asked.

Another waved splashed near us. Oka wiped her cheeks, and I couldn’t tell if it was tears or the seawater she washed away.

“That you’ll hate me,” Oka said so softly I could barely hear.

“We won’t hate you.” Kalei said.

“She’s right,” I said.

Oka looked to Kalei, then turned to me and met my eyes again, and I could see they were red from her tears.

“Promise?” Oka said.

Kalei and I nodded.

“Please, for me, just say it,” Oka said. “I know it’s stupid and weird but—"

“I promise,” I said. “I promise I could never hate you.”

Oka took a few deep breaths. “Alright, I have an idea," She said. "I kind of want to explain everything else first. In my words, not this place’s. Then maybe...maybe it won't...”

“Just take your time and tell us whatever you gotta say." I said.

“When I was really little, they could tell my fangs would come in early.” Oka said. “So they sent me here. But Tesata’s nothing like Rising Shards. You saw it.”

Oka gripped the rocks by her sides.

“But they didn’t send me here to train my gifts,” Oka said. “They put us here to protect people from us.”

“What do you mean?” Kalei asked.

“When I said Tesata was closed off, I meant it,” Oka said. “You know I didn’t get to learn about anything fun like the stuff you two show me. All we did was train. All day, every day, we’d push ourselves past our breaking point to train our powers, then even further to supress them. It was relentless. You saw it, Mikkel didn’t teach as much as he just…yelled. They treated us like monsters.”

“That’s horrible,” I said.

“The only escapes I had was that one Raina book and musical tapes.” Oka said. “But they only had really old ones.”

“At least you had that,” I said. “I know they helped me a lot.”

“It did,” Oka said. “Which was good because I needed some place to escape to, because Mikkel pushed me more than the others.”

A big wave hit near us, like a natural soundtrack to Oka’s story continuing to darken.

“Anything good this place could have made, he ruined,” Oka said. “He made me hate being a Cani, hate being here in such a beautiful place. Every day he’d tell me I was worthless, and that I wouldn’t amount to anything, that I was dangerous, that I was a monster.”

Oka tried to hold back her shivering.

“And I believed him,” Oka said. “I tried to find a way to get out of here. I’d try to run to the train and sneak on. Or build a boat. They always caught me. I didn’t know what to do.”

I wanted to reach out and hold her, but something told me she’d push me away right then. We let her talk, waiting for her as she stopped to wipe her tears away.

“So I started to lash out,” Oka said. “I learned to be stronger than my power blocker. Just so I could feel like I was something, maybe even to try and win the other teachers over, I don’t know, I became the monster they thought I was. There was a student here who made me mad, and I lashed out at him. I hurt him really badly.”

Oka unwrapped her wrist cloth. The skin under it looked like it had rope burn.

“I made a vine and whipped him across the face,” Oka said. “And it burned my wrist. The energy from conjuring it was filled with so much anger, it made it almost burn like fire.”

“Oka…I had no idea…” I said.

Oka wiped her eyes.

“It’s alright,” Oka said. “I realized as soon as I did it how awful it was. I kept this cloth to remember what I’m capable of. And to try and be better than it.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said. I felt at a loss. What could I even say to all this? "That's why you didn't want to see all this, right?"

"I didn't want to see anything from here again," Oka said. "I’ve tried to change from who I was here. But I don’t know if I ever can. As crappy as the Kilanders are, at least they took me from here.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I’m sorry they put you through all that.”

Oka didn’t look up at me. She still blamed herself.

“One mistake doesn’t define you,” I said. “Especially one in a place like this.”

“They basically tortured you,” Kalei said. “It’s not your fault you blew up in a place like this. That’s probably what they wanted you to do.”

Oka’s lip quivered.

“You’re the farthest thing from a monster,” I said. “I know you, and I know you wouldn’t do something like that unless you were basically tormented into doing it. That school was cruel, and you’re kind.”

“Zeta…”

Kalei and I hugged Oka. She didn’t push us away like I was worried about.

"So is that what's in that last door?" I asked. If I went through something like that, I'd try to avoid going back to that memory too. 

Oka didn't answer me, though. Another wave hit us, knocking us back. When we turned around, the last door still waited for us.