Rising Shards

Eventually, Oka did finish packing up and moving her stuff over. It took a few trips, and each trip was harder than the last. I felt hollow by the fifth goodbye.

“She’s really gone…” I said.

“Gone to like two rooms over.” Kalei said.

“Gone to like…two rooms over.” I confirmed, seconds away from sobbing, suddenly feeling less hollow.

“Alright, later,” Kalei said, forcefully rubbing my back. “Please be wrapped up in an hour. Or at least done with the most annoying cry style.”

Kalei left as I started the really loud crying that eventually became that like silent heave crying. About an hour later once I was cooled off, she came back. After a bout of awkward silence, we found ourselves both staring at Oka’s empty bed, with me on my bed and Kalei sitting at the desk.

“It’s really weird.” Kalei said. “It’s only been a few months, but I did get really used to having someone bunking under me.”

“Yeah…” I said. “I got really used to having her next to me.”

I realized I couldn’t tell Kalei about what we’d heard about 09 and Aira’s mission without asking Caya for permission, which meant I couldn’t tell her what Nikki was maybe up to if she was involved in that big trip Aira mentioned. I knew I’d have to ask Caya for permission soon if she took too long telling Kalei like she promised, because Kalei hated me keeping anything from her, and could tell immediately when I was.

“How are you doing?” I asked, hoping she couldn’t already tell I had heard something. “You kinda took off at lunch today.”

“I dunno,” Kalei said. “I had to go walk it out, you know?”

“It’s pretty dreary out.” I said, looking at the rainy window past our desk. I hoped that if Lillia found her, she had more luck than Oka and I had with 09 and Amara.

“Well, it’s pretty dreary inside, too,” Kalei said. “But my mom always says, er. What was it. Something like how the rain stops. Eventually. And that’s good.”

“Huh,” I said. “So you’re feeling better, then?”

Kalei looked over to her phone and smiled a bit. “I’m doing better, I think, yeah.”

Interrupting our quiet processing of all the changes that had come with our return to school, Dr. Diast stopped by with a trademark bag of random Cani medical stuff for us.

“Hey gang,” Diast said. “I bring…” She held up her bag, but stopped mid motion as she looked at the empty bed. “Where the hell’s Oka?”

“Caya made her leave already.” I said.

“That son of a…” Diast muttered. “Can’t just like wait a day or two so I can get everything ready? Not even gonna let me talk about the school rules a bit in a less emotionless way? No, eeeeverything has to be done instantly.” She sighed. “I’m just checking on how you guys are doing since you guys obviously went through a lot, and specifically because you were exposed to a lot of Elka.”

“We’re…doing alright? I guess?” I said. Since returning to school, I tried not to think about the big Elka bath all of us had taken when Jeans blasted us with the dark substance. My teachers described Elka as negative emotions, thoughts, stuff like that given a physical form in the void. Taking a dip in it felt like swimming in oil that was fizzy. It tingled against my skin in a way that felt like it would burn if I stayed in it any longer than I had.

“It shouldn’t make you physically ill; well, asterisk on that.” Diast said, immediately making me start to give too much thought to the big Elka bath I’d taken.

“Are we gonna be sick from this stuff?” Kalei asked. “Can I get another week off?”

“Well, part of the week off was for Elka recovery, but sometimes you can’t put a hard time stamp on when things will be better.” Diast said. “And since that whole thing was potentially traumatic on its own, and you guys are teenagers with hormones messing up your growing brains on top of that, you guys may be going through a lot the next couple weeks.”

“Like what?” I asked. “The Elka’s not gonna like make my veins explode or something?”

“No, not like that.” Diast said. “More like internal.”

“Our veins are internal, Dr. Diast.” I said.

“Yeah, aren’t you supposed to be a doctor?” Kalei asked. “That’s pretty basic stuff.”

“I mean internal as in mental, emotional, spiritual, what have you.” Diast said. “It could be a wide variety of things. It’s hard to say too since Elka exposure side effects can be similar to all the stuff caused by the things I mentioned before like mood disorders, trauma processing, that sort of thing.”

Diast gave each of us a pill bottle, clear blue with small, round white pills inside.

"Alright, um," I started. It was kind of embarrassing to bring this up in front of Kalei, but I had to ask this first. "These won't mess with my pills, right?"

"Nope, they will not interact whatsoever." Diast said.

"And you're sure?" I asked.

"I'm very sure." Diast said. 

“Should I tell my mom you’re giving us drugs?” Kalei asked.

“I already contacted families about this, so sorry to beat you to the punch there.” Diast said. “These pills are to help you through any side effects you may be feeling from the Elka.”

“What do these pills do?” I asked.

“They nullify Elka and Elkaic leftovers. And lower your blood pressure a bit, so if you feel floozy after taking them let me know. Or really if anything feels bad after taking them.”

“OK…” I said, feeling nervous at the thought. I felt better not thinking about what effect the Elka had on me, and the trip in general, but the pills would be a reminder of that. I also didn’t like to think of there still being Elka in me. Diast gave us some paperwork to go with the medications that had info on them, from instructions to taking them to potential side effects.

“Take the medications every morning,” Diast said. “And make sure to get enough sleep each night, and don’t push yourselves. Part of the reason you’re all so drained power wise is because of the big Elka exposure you all received, and it takes time to recover. And that’s on top of the Wildfire Hearts students who you had to fight, the recreant students leaving, and everything wrapped up in that.”

Kalei rattled her pills around. Her expression was blank, but I could tell she was holding back a lot there.

“So things are just gonna be sore all around for a while, as I’m sure you can already tell,” Diast said. “So seriously, go very easy on yourselves. If you’re feeling real crap emotionally, call me or one of the counselors. We legit have one of the best counseling teams I’ve seen, so maybe call them first.”

Kalei opened her bottle and retched after smelling the pills. “These reek like egg farts, Diast.”

“Yeah, sorry. I’m not in charge of the pill odor.” Diast said. “Now before I go find wherever Caya shunted poor Oka off to—”

“She’s in Lillia’s room now.” I said.

“Right, thank you, before I head over there to get them their meds, do you guys have any questions about any of all that I threw at you there? Anything else about the pills I can help with?”

I couldn’t think of anything. Kalei made a joke about suppositories which forced me to learn what suppositories are, so Diast decided we were set but told us again to tell her if anything felt weird with the pills, the Elka reaction, anything. I was glad she was my advisor and not Caya, the difference between Caya’s coldness in splitting Oka and I up to Diast’s better bedside manner was pretty vast.

Oka and I texted a bit that night. But outside of that, things still felt raw even if it wasn’t anything we did to each other. It felt like too many things were changing at once, out of our control. I tried to keep it quiet for Kalei’s sake, but I definitely quietly cried a lot that night.