Seized Heart

“Miss Phoibe?!” Yumi shouted from the chair with panic starting to set into her mind. She wasn’t certain what was happening anymore or even if what she was seeing was real or fake. Within her mind, she wanted to believe it was fake, but it appeared so real. The woman before her suddenly locked eyes with Yumi drawing attention towards her. “What’s going on?”

A surprising amount of hesitation surfaced within Phoibe's voice as she replied, “An external force is trying to take over the system. I can’t lock down the source…” Her fingers rapidly tapped through the control panels trying to wrestle with the unknown intruder. However, the system was never designed to do such a thing. Phoibe reactively altered her powers to adapt to the attack and change the machine, yet even that didn’t seem to be slowing it down. “…damn… It’s faster than I can block it off.”

Left without any recourse, she turned away from the chair and rushed to the wall panel. Her finger slammed into the large raised button acting as the cut off switch for the whole system. In moments, everything came to a grinding halt devoid of any light.

Emergency lights flickered on seconds later returning the room to some semblance of safety. Though the bright white lights left unease in the air that couldn’t be dispelled so easily.

Yumi sank into the chair as much as she could with some relief. The pounding in her heart finally started to slow down a bit. Once she felt recovered enough, she turned around to look back at Phoibe. “What was that?”

“I’m not entirely sure myself. It happened shortly after I started mapping your mind.” Materializing a semi-transparent slab, it began to light up with data. She ran her fingers over the surface examining the readings of her machines. “If I was to take a guess, it was your mental defense. Given how you’ve all changed I didn’t take into account the vastly different scale at which you sit. The strange aspect is that if I’m theorizing accurately, your mind was trying to take control of the system. The materialization of that woman seemed to be the first step.”

She jumped out of the chair out of caution, it might have been shut down, but she still had no clear understanding of how her powers functioned. The fact that it did whatever it wanted without her command was frightening. She wasn’t going to risk it doing something even with it powered off. “So it’s a dead end…” Yumi tried not to sound so disheartened after she had hoped to control her powers, but she was out of options now.

Phoibe shook her head. “I’m just going to need a little more time to tweak the system. The benefit of this machine is that it easily adapts to my power. So I just have to make it more powerful and account for the needed security to keep your mental defenses from entering.” She tapped on the wall exposing the walls and floor to the vast machine that she constructed.

Yumi only had a narrow path out of the room. The sight before her made her realize why this was more than needed for her business. It was a complicated network twisted and spun around in ways that she could never hope to understand. She questioned if even the Atlantean could understand the mess. ‘…she sounds confident…is there still a chance?’

“In the meantime, you can return to your friends. I’ll summon you all once I’m ready. The company of your friends should also help to find a stable and safe environment for you.”

Chapter 385 – Seized Heart

Back up on the third floor, Yumi’s return came with the explanation. Once she finished, everyone stood still taking it all in before Seiji interjected. “So we’ve still got a chance!” He appeared to be ignoring the potentially negative aspects that came along with it.

Saki wanted to hit him for his blind optimism, but she noticed what he was doing. All she had was a pessimistic view of the situation comparatively. “Do you still want to go through with it, Yumi?”

“I think so. We can shut the power off again if it doesn’t work out. The benefits outweigh the risks in my mind.”

Yuki placed a reassuring hand on Yumi’s shoulder. “Miss Phoibe knows what she’s doing. You’ll be fine.” He then looked over to the beds where Yori rested. “We might have a harder time convincing him of that though, given what happened.”

“Then we won’t tell him.”

“Yumi?!” Saki and Yuki said in unison with equal amounts of shock. Neither of them could believe that she would suggest lying to her own brother. They stared over the table at each other trying to silently discuss things between them.

However, Yumi stood up interrupting them before they tried to find something to sway her from the course. “This is my power and body. My life, not his. If I want to risk this then it’s not for him to tell me I can’t.”

“Well…yes, it’s your decision, but are you really wanting to leave your brother in the dark on this?”

“I’ve made the decision. Speak about none of this to him. All he needs to know is that this will give me the chance to finally control my powers. It’s not like I’m going to be risking my life doing this. He doesn’t need this holding him back.”

Stepping away from the table, Seiji isolated himself from the group. His arms came up crossed against his chest. “I don’t like it, but I understand how you’re feeling…” He became a little distant as something recalled to him.

Yuki ran his hand through his hair roughing it up a little as he seemed to be struggling with it. A sigh eventually came from his lips with a resolution. “Fine…you’re right it’s not a huge risk since we can just turn off the power.” He turned to face the door already in motion. “I’m going to see if she needs some assistance. Plus, I doubt he’s going to be thrilled to hear this plan coming from me.”

Sensing something was a little off with the way Yuki moved, she turned to go after him. “Won’t your powers cancel out Miss Phoibe due to your strength?”

“Miss Phoibe is quite skilled. As long as I don’t go full power it’ll be fine.”

He seemed set on helping out Phoibe. There wasn’t going to be anything that she could do to convince him away from it. ‘I’d go with him if it actually meant something, but I’d just be in the way…’ She would have to let him go on his own. “Just make sure to stay on the path,” she warned, remembering what Phoibe told her about the underground.

He gave her a confused nod before he disappeared from the room. They were left waiting for both Yori and Phoibe. None of them had a clue how long it would take for Phoibe to finish even if Yuki helped. Their powers could make anything happen. So it could be fast. Which meant that they were mostly waiting for Yori to wake.

Awaiting Yori left things fairly empty. Hiroshi paid a visit which ran smoothly thanks to the absence of Yuki to mount the tension. Saki and him discussed matters in private before he left once more. Yumi hadn’t really been brought up to speed on everything happening as she realized from watching them. Something was clearly going on between them that she missed from being out. She only picked up that they had to be making plans of some sort.

However, bad ideas came up while waiting and bored. Bad ideas that were ignorant and stumbled upon. Yumi looked over at Saki in all of the things that she still didn’t know about. In all the personal dilemmas she had forgotten something very important. “Saki, this might not be a good time to ask, but what happened to Katsumi and Kaede?” She was so caught up in her own things that she couldn’t believe she forgot about her friends. They were so important to her and yet she just forgot about them.

Unexpectedly to Yumi, the room suddenly chilled rapidly. The subject that they knew would be coming up eventually had finally been presented. They had no good answers for her. Not saying anything to her wasn’t the same thing as lying, that was what they convinced themselves. Yet, they couldn’t ignore it any longer.

Saki slowly stood up in silence. She wasn’t about to be able to tell her. Even when she looked around at Seiji and Nerine they turned away. They had no more answers for her than she did. It was about what she expected. No one wanted the undesirable task. When she finally managed to say something, Saki remained terse. “Follow me.”

‘So they’re alive!’ It was an awkward reply, one that Yumi looked to be ignoring. She just wanted to see her friends once more and free from Takako’s control now. ‘I wonder if they remember the fight. Have they not come to see me because they feel bad about attacking me?’

The real reason unfortunately was far worse than Yumi could have dreamed up in any countless number of scenarios. She could only cry streams of tears unable to react in any other way upon seeing her best friend in such pain. Kaede held on to Yumi in a feeble effort to provide empty comfort that she couldn’t offer. Her friend was hollowed by the whole experience together; they seemed to be sharing the futility of their lives. She just didn’t have the courage or strength to do what she felt was the right choice.

“We should probably go Yumi…” offered Saki as an out. She could tell it wasn’t something that Yumi could deal with now. It was why they hesitated telling her immediately. This wasn’t the sort of thing that could be easily shown in any situation, but Yumi was still emotionally weakened by everything. But they decided to leave it up to Yumi to ask them and they would just face the consequences. It wasn’t the sort of lie that could hold or should be.

Yumi couldn’t even react to Saki. She didn’t even hear what she said to her. Her mind barely acknowledged that something was said. Beyond that, there was nothing inside Yumi. She couldn’t think or feel. It had all just poured out of her. No further reaction could come out.

Time held no meaning for her with such a state. She didn’t even know what happened to her after a while. It wasn’t until she snapped back to reality suddenly that she understood how much time had passed. ‘I’m back in the room…’ Yumi could hear voices nearby her. They still had a slightly distant sound to them that slowly came into clarity.

The reason for the noise was because Yori had woken up. She lifted herself out of the bed to look over at her brother, who stared off in an absent direction with no sense of space. It immediately called to her what he had given up just to rescue her from her mind. Those that took her from everyone demanded a terrible price. Even in her trauma-filled fear that rested just below the surface of what she fought, it couldn’t hold anything over her guilt for what she did to him.

Seiji noticed Yumi awake off the side and poked his head up announcing it to the room. “Hey you’re back, Yumi!”

“..yes…”

“Back? What’s going on?” Yori asked immediately, picking out the difference in tone that Seiji used. His defenses immediately went up.

Everyone struggled to say anything about what happened out of fear of putting Yumi into a relapse. They didn’t want to remind her of what she saw. She only just recovered. Yet Yumi stepped forward to do it herself. “I saw Katsumi…”

“…I’m sorry…”

“It’s not your fault…”

Suddenly snapping the atmosphere in half, Yuki burst through the door shouting to everyone. “It’s finished! We’re ready to try again!” He couldn’t see the mood with it being disguised in part around them gathered around Yori. “Oh hey, you’re awake! We’ve got a new plan ready to help Yumi.”

“Help Yumi? What’s wrong with her?”

Yuki paused for a moment recognizing that defensive tone coming out of his voice. He was hardly surprised by it. “You didn’t tell him?” An eye darted over to Yumi, who stared at him to keep the secret. He swallowed roughly, not really looking forward to when this lie blew up in their faces, as he expected it would at some point even if it wasn’t today. “It’s nothing to worry about. Seiji, help him to his feet. We’ll fill you in as we make it downstairs.”

Turning away the help, Yori walked away from the bed initially looking like he could see. “I can walk myself.” However, that only lasted as far as him tripping into the table. His sight hadn’t returned after the rest. Seiji quickly caught up behind him and directed him out of the room despite his pride in wanting to do it alone.

“Hell! This is insane!” shouted Seiji while everyone else had trouble even getting a sound of their mouths.

Smiling and nodding to him, Yuki agreed wholeheartedly with Seiji. “Isn’t it?!”

Saki turned her head around to take the whole thing in before spotting Yuki's pride-filled face. She could tell that he was happy about the whole thing and none of it mattered to him if he made it or not. She would never know how much he helped, but she recognized the look in his eyes. The look that says he was living out a dream. “A little overkill?”

Only Yumi had seen it before the change could really react on how different it appeared. The room had ballooned in size, no longer being a small and cozy space that suited one or two people. It was now nearly bigger than the entire building that Miss Phoibe owned above ground. No longer in the center, she moved the chair to the wall and multiple more joined them, enough to account for all of them. Even beyond that, the twists and turns of the machine that packed the walls crawled on in the distance until there was too much in the way. It felt like it went on forever. ‘Just how much extra did she have to build to account for my change?’

“This is the place that will help Yumi control her power?” Yori asked, unable to see anything and only feel out the sense of the room from everyone else’s reactions. He hung nearby to the door, the only confirmed surface he had to map the room so far.

Phoibe stepped forward with slate in hand to control the device. “That’s right. I’ve made significant upgrades to it to handle not just Yumi’s potential, but everyone involved. Since this is going to be a virtual space it’s going to need to project everyone’s minds into the realm and I had to make changes to adapt to that difference. The intent is to project Yumi’s mindscape in virtual space so that you can understand the personalities. Though everything that you will see is digital and fake, it will feel real. I can’t answer what you’ll find inside, but you will be Yumi’s anchor to remain in control while she is confronting the other personalities buried inside. Remember your roles.”

“I’m ready!” Yori declared with no regard to the fact that he just woke up and probably could do with some more rest. But everyone else was not going to stop him and they followed suit with him.

“Very well then, take your places in the chairs. Once you’re ready I’ll start the simulation.” Phoibe began running the final checks on the chairs awaiting the activation. All systems held green and she looked over at Yuki in silent agreement. “Simulation start! Good luck!”