Chapter 37: Off-Alexis
"Thank you for joining us, Ash," Azure said, dropping him off at his dorm room.
"Yeah, thanks for healing me. I feel better than I have in a long time," Ash admitted.
Azure got so close that her soiled sleeves brushed against Ash. "That’s all I want to hear. Stay safe."
She turned around and left. Ash glanced down at his sleeves to see leftover Hollow residue had been transferred onto them.
"Might as well do laundry. Hopefully the Block C machines are still functional." Ash changed out of his clothes and into a spare set and departed.
Three corridors in, it hit him.
Food.
He walked another block, trying to think of the recent extraction he just did.
Starving.
He was just outside the Block C area.
Feed me.
He couldn’t contain it. His hunger thrashed, unable to contain itself anymore. It had been silent for a while, but now, it didn’t just want a new Shade. It demanded it. And the worst part was that a piece of him was starting to agree.
Ash stumbled into the washing machine room, trying not to drop any of his clothes on the floor.
"Huh. What are you doing here?" a familiar voice said.
"Phoebe?" Ash responded. His vision was blurry, but he could just make out her figure and voice.
"You look terrible in a different way than usual." Phoebe helped him onto a bench against the wall, while she took control of his laundry.
Ash took a deep breath. "Azure and Vivian dragged me out to see them take care of a Gate."
Phoebe raised her eyebrows. "How did you go from how I left you, to how you look now?"
"Azure healed me. I don’t know the full method, but she took me somewhere, and I came out feeling... rejuvenated? Energized?" Ash struggled to find the right word.
"That still doesn’t explain this," she said, shaking the soiled clothes in front of him. Phoebe glanced around to make sure no one else was lurking in the corners. "And why, excuse my language, you look like shit if you say you were rejuvenated."
"Some of the Hollow’s fluid got on Azure, which then got on me." He took another deep breath, trying to control his hunger by any means necessary. "How Azure fought the Hollows was unlike anything I saw before. She didn’t mean any harm to any of them; it was like she was treating them as a friend you hadn’t seen in a while."
Ash’s vision finally sharpened. He blinked at Phoebe, caught off guard. She wasn’t in her usual polo shirt. Instead, she wore the academy’s formal dress: a tailored navy military jacket hugging her frame, its gold buttons and trim catching the light of the room. A wide brown belt cinched her waist, and she’d returned to the regulation knee-high socks.
"...What happened to you?" he asked. "Why are you wearing that?"
She took a spot next to him and crossed one leg over the other. "I didn’t have anything else to wear while I did my laundry... Besides, I didn’t take you for a Block C type of guy."
"They’re the only ones that no one uses," Ash admitted. "Even if they’re usually broken more often than they’re working."
"Right?" Phoebe said.
The hunger thrashed again, causing Ash to wince and grab his head.
"Hey, do you need any help? Should I call Daro again?"
"No, it’s just..." Ash tried to think of an excuse. "There’s a student’s Shade that’s been bothering me since I returned to the academy with Azure and Vivian. I’m not sure if you’ve felt it or not."
"Hmm..." Phoebe thought aloud. "Now that you say it, I do feel one that is not quite right. Like the Shade is slightly off-axis and detached from the person."
Ash used his Shade senses and located the same student with little trouble. "Come on, let’s—"
"No." Phoebe stopped him entirely.
"What? Phoebe, that student is in danger. If we—"
"No," she said again. "Last time you entered someone’s Shade to calm it down, you came out bleeding from wounds you shouldn’t have had and couldn’t move a limb."
"I’m feeling better now. Besides, that was a one-time thing."
"And Sora? Was he a one-time thing? I don’t know how you managed to come out of it yourself against Willis. I don’t expect you to tell me either. But I do want to keep you away from danger."
The machine washing her clothes stopped and beeped. She got up from the bench, straightened her jacket, and placed her clothes in the dryer.
"Ash," Phoebe said, returning to his side. "You have an incredible power, but you’re still a Null rank. There’s a reason there are systems in place."
Ash turned to look at her. "Just one more. I need to know I can do this if it happens to someone I care about."
"I really don’t—"
"Phoebe. I want to do this."
The only noise that followed was the sound of the machines cleaning their clothes.
"Fine. But this is the last time." She turned to look at his face, her auburn hair blurring the edges of his vision. "Tell me now, if you get hurt, this is the last time you do this."
"This is the last time I’ll do this," Ash repeated.
Phoebe got up and checked on the machines. "There’s forty-three minutes on yours and another hour for mine. That’s your timer to help this person."
She didn’t put an "In Use" sign on theirs, and extended a hand to help Ash to his feet.
"Where do you feel it the strongest?" Phoebe asked.
There.
"There," Ash said.
Phoebe blinked. "Okay..."
Ash was already walking before he heard Phoebe’s response. Through Block C, they took a shortcut into Block E, where the Shade’s presence was increasing in strength.
"I think we’re about to see them," Ash said.
Phoebe didn’t sound convinced, but they were too deep into the academy now.
"Stop." A voice came from a corridor.
"Lucia? What are you doing here?" Ash asked.
Her violet eyes locked onto him, before glancing over at Phoebe for just a second.
"I was taking a late-night walk. That’s all." She hadn’t moved from her spot. "Phoebe, that boring outfit doesn’t really suit you well."
"We were doing laundry. That’s why I’m in this," Phoebe responded.
"We?" Lucia’s eyes didn’t leave Ash.
He raised a hand to tell Phoebe to stop talking.
"I’m sure you feel it too, don’t you?" Ash began.
She gave a knowing smile. "Of course. And that’s why I expected the newest member of the Crimson Workshop to find their way here." Lucia finally began moving, stopping between them.
Lucia first turned to Phoebe. "We’re still having our nails done next week, right?" she asked.
Phoebe nodded.
Then she turned to Ash. "Enjoy finishing your laundry together."
"When did you join those freaks?" Phoebe asked.
"I didn’t. She dragged me into it because she said they knew about..." Ash swallowed the words.
"So it was about a human," Phoebe said, her voice slightly louder than usual.
"It was always about what came through that Gate that day and nothing more."
"Oh that’s—"
She didn’t finish her sentence, instead pulling strands of her hair that had fallen over her left shoulder.
"Phoebe, what I saw wasn’t in any textbook or lecture. You would know that better than me. If Lucia has answers to them, and our goals intersect I’m not turning the opportunity away."
"But you’re still a Null rank. Aren’t you?" Her blue eyes looked like they were holding something else behind her glasses.
"I don’t know what I am," Ash said, his vision beginning to distort again, "But I know what I don’t want to be."
"What’s that?"
"Alone."
Ash slumped down on the hallway like he was finally able to let off straps of weight that were bolted on. Phoebe didn’t sit down next to him, only offering a hand when he was ready to take it again.
"You’re impossible to manage," Phoebe finally said when Ash took her hand.
Ash took a step, then another reorienting himself, walking in what his vision was telling him was a straight line. Instead, it looked like he was only propelling himself in one direction.
Where the off-axis Shade was waiting for him.
"Thou which hast disturbed my work. Answer for thyself." A voice came from the source of the Shade.
"Wait, I know this person," Phoebe said, entering the room. She made a gesture to Ash to stay behind for now. "Alexis, what are you doing?"
"Oh uhm... I... I wanted to sound intimidating."
Phoebe sighed and pinched her temple. "Alright, Ash, come out."
Can’t... wait...
Ash walked through the door, but not before tripping on an extension cord. He reached his hand out, just barely making contact with the ankle of Alexis.
The hunger didn’t just reach for her Shade; it forcefully gripped it away, unable to contain itself anymore.
Finally.
And the Shade realm opened up for Ash.
