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Adaine’s heartbeat thumped through her head as she rocked. Tears dropped onto her shirt and bed, and she gasped for air in between sobs. She was alone. Alone. Alone. No one would find her no one could help her. They were all gone, gone, gone.. she was helpless again, unable to do anything and they’d come and take her away from her friends and her dad and she couldn’t do anything and fuck fuck fuck FUCK! She smashed her hand onto the ground, barely missing her crystal. Crystal. Call. Call someone, call someone. Adaine grabbed her crystal, thumb missing the button as she called her friend.
It only rang for a beat before a familiar voice picked up.
“Hey Adds! What’s up?”
Adaine tried to breathe, but her breaths came out in strangled sobs.
“Fig.. I..“
“Ok, that’s ok. Don’t worry Adaine. I’m gonna help you.”
A couple more sounds came from Fig’s end, the sound of her talking to someone, and footsteps.
“I’m gonna come over there, can you talk right now?”
“Uh.. a little.. yeah..”
“That’s good, well done. Are you at Mordrid right now?”
“Y-yeah.”
“Ok, I’ll get a cab. Can you take some breaths for me? Four seconds in, three hold, four out.”
Adaine tried to breathe, her breaths still coming out strange and loud.
“Can you summon Boggy or anything?”
“No.. ‘m out of spell slots..”
“Ok, that’s fine. Do you have a plushie or something?”
“..yeah, I have Alf.. the dog one..”
“That’s great, can you hold him for me?”
Adaine squeezed the toy, putting all of her frustration and sadness and worry into it. The small dog you just looked back up at her with its black bead eyes.
“Can you tell me some things you can see Adaine? Just five things.”
“O-ok.. the wall.. my bed.. Alf.. my books.. and the door…”
“That’s great, can you tell me four things you can hear?”
“The fan, the crickets outside.. the cars… and you.”
“That’s really good, well done. What are three things you can feel?”
“Uh.. I can feel Alf.. the bed I’m sitting on.. and my clothes..”
“You’re doing great Adaine. Is there anything you can taste or smell?”
“I can taste.. salt.. from my tears.. and uh.. my room.. smells like vanilla.”
The call went quiet for a moment while Fig got into the cab and told the driver where she needed to go.
“Do you know what happened or did it just happen?”
“I.. I’m home alone because Jawbone and Sandra-Lynn went out and Kristen and Tracker have a religious thing and I don’t know, I guess I started stressing about how they won’t come back and they’ll all leave and someone will take me away because I’m too much.”
“Ok, do you want me to talk you through any of those thoughts and help you show why they wouldn’t happen?”
“Ok.. uh.. what if Jawbone and Sandra-Lynn just don’t come back and leave me here..?”
“All of their stuff is here, and they pay for the house and a lot of the things in it. They wouldn’t just leave, because that would be like throwing away a bunch of their life.”
“Yeah.. that makes sense..”
“What about the second thing? About people leaving?”
“Yeah.. like, what if people decide that they don’t like me and that they should find new friends and that I’m not worth it?”
“Who are the people in this?”
“I guess.. you, Gorgug, Riz, Fabian, and Kristen and Ayda? And Raug and Zayn and Zelda and all the rest of the Seven?”
“Look at it this way, all of these people have individually decided to become friends with you. Why would they decide now that you aren’t enough?”
“..yeah.. that.. yeah. There’s also, what if Aelwyn decides to stop talking to me?”
“Why would she do that?”
“Maybe I remind her too much of our parents, maybe I bring back old trauma? Maybe she just doesn’t like me. I don’t know?”
“Would you ever stop talking to her?”
“No! Never!”
“Even after everything? Everything she did, everything that family did?”
“I wouldn’t be able to leave her.”
“Then what makes you think she would?”
“I don’t know..”
She paused for a second, thinking it though. All the reasons made sense. Jawbone wouldn’t just leave, he was her legal guardian, he would go to jail for child neglect. And if they didn’t like her, Adaine’s friends would’ve left previously instead of waiting all these years. And Aelwyn wouldn’t have taken the time to try get better and stay in contact with her if it was worse for her.
“Would you be ok to just.. stay on the call? Until you get here? Just so I.. know you’re there.”
“Of course Adaine. Love you.”
“Love you too Fig.”
A knock sounded on Adaine’s door around 7 minutes later. She jumped up, opening the door and flinging herself onto Fig, who stumbled slightly as the other girl wrapped herself around her.
The two sat on the ground, Adaine curled up, laying over Fig’s legs.
“How’re you doing? Out of ten, right now.” Asked Fig, running her hands through the other girl’s hair.
Adaine thought before answering, “six. I’m still.. you know… but it’s better because you’re here and I’m not alone and it’s been a bit.”
“Yeah..”
The two took a minute, thinking about what to say.
“I love you Adaine. Genuinely. I worry for you so much because you’re one of my closest friends, and I couldn’t bare to lose you. I know it’s what we do, as adventurers, but every time we go into battle, every scary situation.. I get so worried that I could loose you and the others. It’s something I find it hard to say.. I don’t exactly keep my heart on my sleeve y’know,” Adaine smiled to herself at that, and Fig kept talking, “and I know ‘I love you’ gets thrown around a lot but I mean it. There’s no other word. You are like a part of me. I genuinely love you guys so much, I can’t even explain it.”
“I love you too Fig. Really, I mean it. More than anything else.”
Because that’s how it always ends up. However it is, it always ends with them. In every universe, every version of themselves, every life that has been and will be, it always ends with them.