The world returned in fragments.
Pain first.
Then cold.
Then the heavy, suffocating weight of silence.
Elian opened his eyes slowly, vision swimming.
Above him, the cracked ceiling of the old gymnasium stared back — a jagged canvas of mold and decay.
His body ached in ways he couldn't name.
Each breath felt like pulling glass into his lungs.
He tried to sit up.
Failed.
Groaned.
Somewhere nearby, a door creaked open.
Soft footsteps approached.
He braced for another blow.
Instead, a soft, trembling voice whispered:
"Elian...?"
Mina.
---
She knelt beside him, pale and shaking.
Tears clung stubbornly to her lashes, but she blinked them away furiously.
Her tiny hands hovered uncertainly, afraid to touch him — afraid he might break.
"You stupid, stubborn idiot," she muttered.
But there was no anger in her voice.
Only fear.
Only worry.
Only something else — something warm and raw and terrifying.
Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around him.
Held him tight.
As if she could stitch him back together by sheer willpower alone.
And for the first time in what felt like centuries, Elian let himself collapse against someone else.
Let the walls inside him crack, just a little.
---
They didn't speak much after that.
Mina helped him to his feet — or what was left of them — and they staggered out into the night together.
The streets around Saint Eden were deserted.
The lamplight painted everything in sickly yellow strokes.
A world abandoned.
A city that had long since stopped caring.
But Elian was still breathing.
Still standing.
And so was she.
---
Mina led him to an alleyway behind the local library — a place where she sometimes slept when she couldn't bear going home.
She produced a dented thermos from her battered backpack and poured him lukewarm tea.
He drank gratefully, ignoring the sharp stabs of pain in his ribs.
They sat in silence for a long time.
Finally, Mina broke it.
"I sent a letter," she said softly.
He blinked at her, confused.
"A letter?"
She nodded, chewing her lip nervously.
"To the Head Office... of Saint Eden's Board of Governors."
Elian's heart stuttered.
"You... what?"
"I told them everything," she whispered.
"The Hunt.
The bullying.
The cover-ups.
Everything."
His stomach twisted into knots.
"Mina, they'll expel you—"
"I don't care."
Her voice was steel now.
"I won't let them destroy you."
Elian stared at her.
Really stared.
For so long, he had been alone — truly, brutally alone.
But here was Mina:
Tiny, fierce, broken — and burning brighter than anyone else in his ruined world.
---
He looked away, throat tight.
"You shouldn't have," he rasped.
"Maybe not," she said.
"But I did."
A beat of silence.
Then she smiled — a small, crooked thing that nearly broke him.
"You're not alone anymore, Elian," she whispered.
"Not if you don't want to be."
---
Above them, the first fragile rays of dawn bled into the sky.
A new day.
A new battle.
Elian didn't know what tomorrow would bring.
More pain, probably.
More war.
More loneliness.
But for now —
For this one sliver of stolen time —
He wasn't fighting alone.
And for the first time in a long time...
He dared to hope.
---