(Start playing it before you read haha)
"Arthur!" An orange headed girl about 13 was standing at the school gates waving to an older boy who had just come out of the school building and was walking towards her with a slight jump in his gate, he looked flustered and slightly distressed. A frown decorated his usual beautiful and charismatic face.
The girl saw him see her and saw how his face turned into a mask of horror. In several strides at a run he was next to her. He was 17. Their Birthday's were tomorrow. He would be 18 and she would be 14. He took her face in his gentle hands. He looked deep into her eyes, stripping her of everything with that gaze.
"What are you doing here?" He said while taking her by the wrist and dragging the girl who had to jog to keep up with his strides. "Why did you have to come today of all days" He muttered under his breath.
The girl answered innocently. "I wanted to go and buy a cake for tomorrow, its our day" She said with a happy smile on her face.
"Lets go to the store you like with the cheesecake then" He slowed down slightly looking glancing over his shoulder quickly. He could feel someone was tailing him. Hunting him. All because he, Arthur Milton had beat him in a chess game in front of his goonies and made him loose all face in front of his pawns.
He looked down at his younger genius sister. He couldn't drag her into this.
He wouldn't drag her into this.
He quickened his pace and saw how his little Alice gave him that quizzical look, wanting to know what as wrong since she knew something was wrong. There was no point in denying it wit her. "I want to get to a store before it closes in 15 minutes" He explained "Its a surprise for tomorrow" He smiled placing a finger on his lips.
Alice believed every word he said. Every single one. She looked up to him. Admired him. After all, he was the only one she had ever lost to at anything. Her brother was her world. He didn't look at her strangely when she was able to answer problems in the most minimum time possible or questions that a university student would struggle with. He just found her even more difficult ones to solve.
She loved him dearly. As a brother.
She hadn't thought that that smile would be the last one she would ever see. Why would she? How could she have known? She couldn't have. It was impossible.
He had left her to walk into the cake shop to drool looking at the cakes from the outside of the glass; she had thought he would be back to pick her up and they could choose the cake together, even if she knew he would choose the cheesecake for her.
The clocks ticked. Eventually the soon in the sky started to fade. The colours moulding together to make a bloody orange. By 7 o'clock in the afternoon the cake shop shut. She walked out worried now.
Had something come up? Why wasn't he here? Had he left her?
She started walking down the street. In the opposite direction of where her home was. She didn't want to go home. Not without her brother. Not without Arthur. She didn't have a cell phone and there was no public phones in this area so she couldn't call him.
After walking for over half an hour in no particular direction it was now half-past seven and the sky was blood red. So was the pavement. Following the small river of blood with her eyes it lead into the wall of an alley. She didn't want to follow it. She didn't. She wanted Arthur. Yet she felt this attraction, as if something was forcibly pulling her by her shirt towards the source of the blood red that matched the sky.
There was the body of a man, sickly pale and dull eyes. The eyes flickered to hers, staring right at her yet they didn't see her. Until a slight flash of recognition crossed them and the blue sapphires that were his eyes sparked to life a tad more.
"Al.." The voice croaked. It didn't sound like her brother, he looked too defeated, too weak to be her brother. Her brother was a deity.
Her God.
Gods can't die.
They are immortal.
Arthur was going to die.
She walked over to him, seeing the knife wound and pulled it out. She shouldn't have pulled it out. If she hadn't that might have saved him still.
He smiled at her. "I'm sorry, I won't be here to celebrate your birthday.." His voice sounded strangely strong and healthy. Yet maybe that was her, changing the memory.
Manipulating it.
Maybe he hadn't even spoke. "Smile, no matter what, and don't, never cry for me, that will only make me sad since I am your God.. Right? You don't want to make your God sad right..?" All she could do was shake her head tears streaming down her face. She quickly wiped them away with the back of her sleeve. "Thats a good girl" He smiled and handed her a hand sized, rectangular box. "I got this for you.. yesterday.. It's full of our memories.. So you won't forget them.."
And like that Arthurs eyes became dull. He had died.
The whole scenery changed. Alice was no longer watching the girl from above, she knew that younger her would spend all of her night there and be found the next day by the cops. The next day she had started playing her MMORG's. She was a healer. Her name was [ ]. She had also enrolled at the medical school at an early age and was rumoured to be a prodigy. She smiled, laughed, sucked at sports. She curtsied when needed and shook hands when wanted to. Her mental state was stable. She wasn't traumatised. She hadn't entered any depressive state. She hadn't stopped taking care of herself. If anything she was even more strict with her lifestyle because that was what her brother; her God would have wanted from her.
Letting the memories finish flowing their course she looked around herself. She was in a large grand room, filled with giants sitting on golden chairs. There were as many males as females. All giants. All scary. Yet materialising before her was a young man, looking to in his early twenties.
"Ar-Arhthur!" She couldn't believe her eyes, he was there in front of her. Walking towards her. She ran towards him and flung herself in his arms, feeling secure and at home.”Happy, Happy Birthday” He simply smiled. You’re the best present I could have ever had” He smiled back at her. Alice was trying to contain her sniffles of happiness. She was so happy it seemed to good to be true. So happy her gut told her it wasn’t going to last. So happy she felt someone was going to snatch it all away from her.
She buried her head in his shoulder. "I've missed you so much, we, we can be together now, right..?" She broke away from him to look in his sapphire eyes.
She didn't like what she saw. He was sad.
Seeing the pain of his blue eyes reflected in her own he smiled and patted her head like he used to do when they were both younger.
"You still have one more job to do Al, okay? But don't rush it, after all, I've never seen a person so skilled in the art of medicine" He smiled sadly at her and started letting her go, loosening his hold around her shoulders.
"NO! It's not fair! I-I!" She broke of her sentence and started to cry into his shoulder anew. She didn't care what the onlookers thought.
"Sh.." he soother her while patting the back of her head for several minutes until her sobbing and trembling had been reduced quiet hiccups, teary eyes and red cheeks. "Good girl, that's my girl"
All Alice could do was meekly nod. "Will.. will you carry on watching over me..?" She asked slowly stepping away from her brother.
She could feel her legs start to disappear. Her body started vanishing from her toes up. She looked at her brother for an answer. He was just smiling there with a nostalgic, sad, yet happy smile painted like a masterpiece of art on his lips.
She saw him smiling and nodding, wiping away a tear from the corner of his right eye.
That was enough assurance for her. He wouldn’t abandon her.
“Happy birthday Al”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Slowly Alice's eyes opened. The dream all so vivid in her eyes and head. So vivid, so real she knew it wasn't a dream. She felt that her cheeks were wet. Lifting her hand up to touch it she saw it was bandaged yet didn't feel any pain. The bandage came away from her cheek wet, she had been crying while unconscious, yet for how long? |