Greyashe chapter 330 is entitled 'What we found.'

 

Previous chapter 329: What you lost.

Next chapter 331: Universe of everything.

Summary page

 

-Short summary-

 

Taking a deep retrospective in the annals of himself, Van finds the reason to keep going has always been close to him.

 

-Long summary-

 

Cradling Van’s head in her lap, Roysé whispers to him ---acting as an ‘anchor’ to reality. At first she assures him that everything will be fine and that she’s here for him as is everyone else, but after a moment she leans in close to the farseer’s ear and tells him what her first love had said to her before he sacrificed his life.

 

‘If one cannot be happy, then make someone happy’.

 

Asking, almost pleading she says this to him in a whisper. ‘Don’t give up.’ She takes his hand and places it on her forehead, as she cannot use the remanence to keep him from freezing until he returns. Uncaring of their plight, the wind picks up and snow whirls around them. Roysé is unaffected, but she worries greatly about Van. If this keeps up, he won’t have a place to ‘return’ to.

 

Deep down in his own consciousness, Van is above a familiar city when he hears a disembodied voice fade in and out of his consciousness. He can barely hear it over what seems to be auditory interference, but he can feel it. The boy suddenly feels himself falling, but not by his own accord. It feels more like he’s being dragged into something by an unseen force. He resists it the best he can, but is soon dragged right out of the sky down through the city. As he falls he gets a good look at his surroundings and realizes that he’s still in Greyashe. Rather than moving to a new ‘where’ he has instead gone to a new ‘when’. This is Greyashe a year ago, when he was still a simple sweeping boy who was unaware of his own heritage. The sense of nostalgia almost causes the boy to forget that he’s being dragged unaware into an unknown place, but he quickly remembers this when he tries to stop and get a closer look at his surroundings. Where is he going? Where will he end up? Being unable to get a clear answer to these questions causes him no end of anxiety, though he’d be lying if he weren’t at least a little excited about the prospects. Essentially he’s in Greyashe and as far as he can tell he’s experiencing events from a different point of view. How many others could say they’d be able to experience this? Though that begs the question of how this is happening to begin with, but one thing at a time.

 

Suddenly he is brought to a stop and jolted upward like an elevator stopping without provocation before it’s proper destination and then slowing down until it is on the right floor. Van’s senses spin unfettered for a moment and he has to shake his head to gather himself. He then realizes he’s ‘solid’. Before he felt as if his essence had been melted into an entirely new substance unbound by rules of shape or form. Now however it’s like he has put on new clothing; a bit prickly but with a good fit. He clenches his hands once, twice, and sneezes as a snowflake rubs his nose. Ah, the Greyashe weather… although he won’t complain about experiencing the warmth of other continents, there’s something to be said about going back to what’s most familiar. Van then looks down at the shoes of the person he’s inhabiting, and marvels for a moment at how high off the ground he seems to be. He then realizes that he’s thinking some really odd things for someone who was a...substance for maybe only a few moments. He then notices a window of a shop nearby and wipes away the snow to get a look at who he might be.

 

Van Rayleigh stares back at him.

 

Van makes a disappointed face.

 

Though to be fair, it is the ‘him’ from before he left home. He’s shorter, his face more childlike and without the signs of fatigue and cynicism that he has now. Most of all he can’t stop looking into his own eyes. Knowing the significance of what they hold causes him to be overly attracted to their complex simplicities. They are eyes –simple eyes, but so much more.

 

The boy then wonders what happened to the ‘him’ of this period. Was that version replaced with this updated one? Or does it still exist somewhere?  Although it probably doesn’t matter much in the long run, he confesses to it bothering him on an existential level. Does he exist then when he’s existing now? Or is it the other way around?

 

Nick and Nancy stand behind the boy silently as he makes a case for digging into his own conundrum. Nick asks if windows are really that interesting? Nancy shoots him a look and he shrugs. Van’s been staring at that one for a while so he’s just curious. Van quickly turns around and apologizes. He didn’t mean to concern them or anything, he just felt a little odd but that’s passed now and he feels fine. Nancy looks concerned but doesn’t pursue the matter any further, instead asking if they’ve already visited the third district? Nick grins and asks if she’s really that hungry for Ms. Henning’s homemade muffins? She’d better watch out our she’ll get a muffin-belly. Nancy swings her broom at the boy and misses by mere centimeters. Van replies to the question with one of his own; have they been home again since leaving this morning? The two stop and after a moment’s thought say that they haven’t yet. It is about that time though since Mr. Sikes likes the trio to check in after a few hours of work despite it not really being the norm for their job.

 

Van quickly deduces that they’ll probably head back in a bit and that’s when he’d meet Claire –or the girl with no name and his journey would commence. So wait. What if he were to do things a little differently? Could he perhaps find out where Claire would be and meet her there first?

 

Does he even want to meet her again?

 

Unfortunately the inadvertent side effects of knowing everything that had happened to him until the present have presented themselves. He’s still fully aware of what he did to Hydon, and of his own weakness. Why would he want to meet her like this? What would they discuss? Then Kani’s parting words enter his consciousness and he feels a great deal worse. In turn Van begins to entertain thoughts of how his life might have been different or even better if they hadn’t met. Truth be told, if he had remained here in Greyashe he might have been happier. It is ignorant bliss, but still compared to the hell that he’s going through now, he’d take any bliss. The moment that Claire had revealed to him who he really is, he gained much and lost much more. In his eyes, happiness is something he seems to be in lacking supply of. What now then? What does he do now?

 

Van turns to his friends and asks if they’d like to take a stroll with him for a while? Nancy agrees but asks him why? Van offers his best smile despite his inner turmoil and states that he just doesn’t feel like going home yet. Nick offers a mischievous grin and asks his friend when he became the trouble making type? The boy responds that all he wants to do is have a walk around, not really cause trouble. Besides, they might find more work out there to do. Mr. Sikes would be proud of them taking the initiative wouldn’t he? The two agree and set out with Van who takes the lead despite not knowing where he wants to go or what he wants to do.

 

Which is uncomfortably similar to how he is now.

 

While the third ward is known for it’s down home feeling, the first and second are known for being busy centers of industrial activity. The buildings seem to touch the sky, and the sound of machines clattering fills the landscape.

 

Greyashe isn’t known for much other than it’s snow and since there aren’t fresh slopes to gallivant down, tourism tends to be low key which means the city has to rely on other means such as production of exports to sustain itself. Sweepers like Van rarely venture here unless they have no other choice or need to get to the third ward (Van and his friends live closer to the fourth, although they’re not quite out of the third.) So heading back is an oddity of itself, which is something Nick states as he and Nancy follow Van. The farseer boy doesn’t hear them as he’s caught up in his own thoughts and his frustration at being unable to decide on what’s important.

 

Was meeting Claire the precursor to his downfall?

 

What if it’s true? Then….

 

Is it detestable for him to even think this way?

 

Or is he right?

 

What does it matter if he is?

 

Or if he isn’t?

 

Did she steal his happiness?

 

Did he lose his own happiness?

 

Someone please just help…

 

Just…

 

The boy looks up at the sheltering sky for answers. It’s opaqueness is only surmount to the thick broth-like substance that his thought process had become. Why can’t he just make a decision and stick with it? To hate himself or her for his own predicament. If he doesn’t figure out something then he might just tear himself open from the inside out.

 

Then he sees it.

 

Only for a second. A moment so insignificant that he’s not sure it happened. He sees someone standing on one of the buildings and looking down at them. At him, but they run and hide before he can properly identify them.

 

And now the benefit of knowing what he knows now becomes clear.

 

A flash.

 

He knows this person all too well.

 

The boy realizes he has to make a decision. Whether he’s going to regret it or not he would have to decide.

‘

‘If one cannot be happy, then make someone happy’.

 

Van turns to his two friends and apologies for abandoning them in a place like this, and that if he acts like he doesn’t remember it later please forgive him. Nick stares at him confused and asks what he means? He’s not making any sense…..Nancy does at first too, but somehow, someway, realization seems to set in on her and she nods asking Van to come back home soon. Nick protests, as Van nods and runs into the building, and up the stairs.

 

If no matter how happy he is today he’ll be miserable at some point later…

 

If it’s never, never going to stop then…

 

The inside of the building is dilapidated, and water drips from the celling as Van steps in a puddle in his mad dash to the top. He leaps over missing sections of stairs, and without stopping runs to the top, and opens the door leading to the roof. He hears a rustling noise to his left and turns in that direction.

 

A girl with long black hair and golden eyes wearing nothing more than a shawl despite Greyashe’s incredibly cold weather looks back at him as she stands on the roof’s edge. She seems equal parts curious and wary. Van takes this sight in and heaves a heavy sigh of relief. From here perhaps, Claire would run into Mr. Sikes who would then introduce her to him and then..

 

History. Or the future.

 

He closes the door behind him and the two regard each other.

 

The boy strides over to his best friend and stands on the edge of the roof beside her. She bristles as if she’ll jump until Van says in an authoritative voice to wait. Surprised she does, as he takes her hand and shakes his head. He asks if she was scared coming to this strange world all alone? And then the Challengers captured her and modified her body so that they could use her to attack their enemies, the Goddess supporters. Even when she escaped she couldn’t find any peace as the Challengers hunt her down to kill her, and the Goddess supporters wanting to avenge their fallen comrades want her dead as well. There’s been nothing but fear, sadness and loneliness for her. Yet, for the sake of someone else she’s enduring it. For the sake of someone else’s happiness, she’s abandoning her own sense of safety, comfort and in some ways her future.

 

Most of all, her own sense of happiness.

 

Van feels it. A genuine feeling, a sense of warmth that that had long left him, a clarity that had been sleeping somewhere in the doldrums of self doubt. For once in recent memory…maybe even for the first time in his whole life he feels like someone who is actively participating in the direction of his life rather than watching as a mildly amused spectator.

 

Clearly he turns to the Claire that may be real, may be a figment of his own imagination and tells her that it reached him. The happiness she abandoned to come to their world, to Greyashe, it reached him. He is happy to have met her, that she made the choice to abandon her own happiness so they could meet. Now he will become someone, someday who can return that happiness to her.

 

Silently this ‘Claire’ returns his genuine smile and leaps from the building, landing safely below and disappearing into the distance so that their meeting would still happen. Watching her go, Van feels the weight of his words disappear as a wave of realization washes over him. He knows what he has to do now, and it won’t be easy. Still…

 

He reaches up to the sky, his arm becoming impossibly long and fishes around in the clouds until he feels his hand rub against a light switch. It’s time to turn out the lights on this memory and let it rest. He would need it again over and over again so that it can light the way into the future and keep him from ever becoming lost again. So it’s ill-advised to allow this light to burn out from overuse now. With his elongated arm, Van tugs the light once and the clouds dim. Once more, and the sky fades. One more time and he’s alone in the dark except for one small bulb sized light that contains a distorted image of the memory he observed. The boy examines it, and opens his winter jacket patting around until he finds a spot right above his chest where an outlet has appeared suddenly. He screws the light bulb in, and it flickers softly for a moment before settling down and going out, leaving him in complete darkness.

 

Roysé opens her eyes realizing she dozed off, and the weight on her lap has lightened. She stands and for a brief second frantically looks around for Van. She calms down for a moment upon feeling a soft ‘agape’ nearby, and finds herself drawn toward it. She stops right behind Van who stands observing the direction toward Greyashe, and asks her brother if he’s okay? He acknowledges that he’s fine and apologizes for not waking her up. She looked peaceful so he didn’t feel the need…

 

The angel is already standing before him and takes his face in her hands. She feels every crevice in his expression only stopping when she runs a finger over his lips. Opening her eyes despite not being able to see anything, Roysé warmly asks if he found what he’s looking for?

 

Van smiles wistfully, and replies in a whisper that he has.