The Guardians - The Collapsing of the Wall (Book 3)
Chapter 5: Longing

The pale light from the ceiling, the cold floor, a blanket lied on the table, and the hands crossed on the knees. The breathing is calm, the eyes wide opened and wet, the thoughts far away, and her gentle voice whispers a song known only by her. She’s alone again, and she is climbed up on the table where Isaac had put a blanket for her. She’s thinking about touches, about smells and the taste of wine. She bites her lip, while she suavely touches her legs. Lily had suffered too many changed feelings lately, and she was now waiting bored, but also excited for someone to walk in the room where she was isolated.

Brook had visited her a couple of hours ago and announced her that they started working on the New Unity. The children had been moved again in the basement area, where they were well guarded by the trained Guardians, and where the Magicians were creating food and energy for all of them.

A knock on the door makes her come back to reality from that dreaming state, and she remains surprised when she sees Addison coming in. Without saying anything, she sits next to Lily on the table, throwing her shoes on the floor.

“I’m surprised to see you here”, says Lily.

“I’m surprised to see you alive again”, says Addison.

Lily smiles.

“We made a pretty good team out there, before… you know…”

“My so-called death. Yes, we did. You surprised me for the second time, I admit that.”

“When was the first?”

“When you started shooting at the dragon that flew away with me.”

Addison had a different opinion of Lily now, she even admired her deep down, a thing that was bothering her somehow. Mixed feelings were trying her now, and she didn’t know for sure what she was doing in this room.

“What brings you here?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. Maybe I felt the need to talk to you the way I never did before. You aren’t exactly my favorite person, but you are usually right. And I am surprised by the fact that, even it’s difficult for me to admit it, you’re strong.”

“Thank you.”

“I don’t know why, but it seems that you always replace your way back. We are here together, we are Guardians, and it seems that even now we are growing numbers, there are times when we become fewer.”

“I know what you’re saying.”

“I really have no idea why I’m here.”

“Maybe that you will replace the answer. I admire you, you know. You say that I am strong, but you have a tough character. With all our differences, you are a good Guardian. The Base needs people like you.“Addison smiles back and jumps down from the table, puts her shoes on and walks out. She steps thoughtfully on the corridor that leads out of the library, and when she goes around the corner she bumps into Isaac.

“Are you going to see her?”

“Shh!”

“Sorry, but it’s no one around!”

“Yes, there’s where I am going.”

“I’ve been there.”

He looks at her tried by a feeling of surprise.

“I thought that you didn’t like each other.”

“Let’s say that things have changed.”

“I’m glad to hear that. It’s called maturity.”

“Don’t give me lessons, for I think you don’t want me to start too.”

Isaac lets go of a smile because he knows that, between the two of them, he is the one who acts fast, without thinking too much.

“I didn’t get the chance to thank you for what you did you there for me.”

“Then thank me”, he replies ironically.

“I have to give this more time to think.”

“Really?”

“I’m joking. I really appreciate what you did, especially when you could have left me there to die. You were running to get to Lily, and you still decided to turn around and save me.”

He replies with a look on the ground. He had no idea either what had happened there, but his instinct didn’t let him act differently.

“See you around”, says Addison in a dried way, trying to close the weird conversation that had started between them.

Their looks meet and they seem to live again a moment on the battlefield. Addison, with her tough character, seems to get soft in front of Isaac’s warm eyes, and she is crossed by a tremble which goes down her spine. She remembers that Alice has feelings for him for a long time, so she shakes her head and hide her red cheeks, and walks away elegantly, letting Isaac follow her with his eyes.

“Crap”, mumbles Addison when she gets out of the library.

The ones who knew about Gloria’s involvement in the problems from the Base had understood how everything had happened, but they were still throwing her ugly looks when she passed by them. As for the rest of the Guardians, they knew that Lily had died in the battle and that Tamara was again the leader. Of course, a leadership where Lily was behind, from the shadow, from the metallic room behind the library.

“Things are all good”, Isaac tells Lily when he brings her a box full of food.

“Sit here for a while”, she tells him tapping the blanket from the table with her hand.

He sits where Addison had stood a couple of minutes ago, and he feels her energy and her perfume. He is tired and confused, so he starts wiping his eyes. When Lily’s hand touches his back, he completely relaxes, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.

“I know that I’ve put you through a lot lately, so this is the reason I have waited for us to be alone to tell you what I feel.”

“Lily, there’s no need to start a conversation based on my troubled thoughts. It’s not good to scatter my thoughts…”

“I just want to tell you that I know what you’ve been through.”

“I don’t know if I can see you dying in front of me one more time. Every time is just more painful and terrifying.”

Lily looks on the ground. She feels bad for putting Isaac through so much, but she can’t control what happens around her.

“We’ve been through so much together, and I want you to know that I would do anything for you”, he suddenly says.

“I know. Me too.”

“When I say everything, I mean I wanted to kill Dean after what I saw back there. If he hadn’t disappeared on the horizon I would have done that, and probably you would have hated me now.”

She terrifies when she hears her brother’s words, but she understands them as well.

“Isaac, promise me you won’t hurt him.”

“I don’t want to promise you this. If he touches you again, I will kill him.”

“You know that he saved me, right? Even if he did it in his own way.”

“What kind of a way…”

“Please.”

He jumps from the table and starts walking across the room with small steps.

“Why do you keep going back to him after all that he is doing?”

“I’m not.”

“After how much he did to you, how he acted, he hurt you, physically, sentimentally, he fucking killed you, and you ask me not to touch him? I think it’s a problem somewhere because I really can’t understand.”

“I think that deep down you do.”

“But you gave up on him. You hate him. How can you change your feelings so quickly?”

“I had the chance to kill him then, but I couldn’t. Something didn’t let me.”

Isaac wanted to tell her that she was losing her mind, that she was going blindly after a plan only she thought Dean had or she hoped, but he was under the impression that Dean didn’t truly save Lily. He is tried by loud thoughts, but he blocks them to keep her away.

“If he will be a danger for you even for a second, I will confront him. I am sick of everyone getting away like that.”

“He won’t be, I promise. I know that I was angry and I hated him, but I can’t stop loving him, Isaac. I never really gave up on him, even if I showed you that. Now he has a plan, and I don’t want to ruin it. Please don’t ruin it. He is one of us.”

Isaac grabs her cheeks and kisses her on the forehead.

“You know that I love you, don’t you?”

“I know. And I love you too, and I trust that you won’t do anything stupid.”

“Just stop the emotional blackmail”, he says before he gets out.

Lily puts a hand on her face, and she waits patiently the visit of the next person, but who doesn’t come anytime soon.

“I wanted to hate her! I really tried! But I can’t, Addison! I really can’t! Regardless how badly she treated Isaac, and how much she did to him, I know that’s not fair, but I am friends with her for so long! I can’t continue to blame her! I will talk to her! I am decided! And I can’t blame you either, for you were right about her, but you can’t say that I wasn’t right as well!”

Addison seems to be looking through Alice while she speaks, a thing that she notices too, unpleased that her monolog is not listened to.

“Do you even hear me?”

But she doesn’t move.

“Addison!” shouts Alice pushing her forcefully.

“Oh, crap!”

“Welcome to this planet! What the hell is going on with you? Can’t you hear what I am saying here?”

“Sorry. I was thinking.”

“About?”

“About bullshit. About Isaac, who is the brother of the girl I used to hate, who I wanted dead, but who I admire now and I am glad she is alive. Isaac, who makes me look at him differently since he saved my life, the one you are in love with, who you are afraid to tell what you feel because you fear that he doesn’t feel the same, the one who has the eyes blue as the sky, which I saw only due to his sister…Crap. What the hell is wrong with me? I am sentimental and I’m turning into an idiot. I have to stop. I am not that selfish to lose a friend for a man.”

“About nothing”, she replies instead.

Brook doesn’t stay away too long for her friend and brings her news about what was going to be the New Unity.

“I miss…” Lily interrupts her.

“What?”

“I miss Dean.”

She looks at her carefully, with big eyes and the mouth opened.

“Go on.”

“What?”

“It’s the first time when you actually say what you think, but are you sure that Dean is still the one you spent your days with?”

“Brook, with every minute I spend closed in here I realize how much I miss him. I miss him like hell and I want everything to be over soon. I want a miracle, I want Leonor, Ray, the Guardians who don’t want the freedom to be gone and I want him here.”

“I don’t know why he did what he did, but believe me when I tell you that I thought he broke something inside you.”

“Me too. And I realized that I knew the truth from the beginning. Dean is not the type who walks away from us. How could I believe this for a second? I hated him. I hate him, damn it!”

“But you love him too. Maybe more.”

“Yes. What do I do now?”

“Now let’s hope that he really had a plan with that poison because if he didn’t, I don’t know where we are heading from here.”

“We’re going to war.”

“We’re preparing for that.”

“You know, someone once told me that when you start a war you better know what you’re fighting for.”

“Who?”

“Save this question for the end, please.”

“Fine. What did you answer?”

“That I was fighting for feelings.”

“And what are we fighting for now?”

“ Still for feelings, but there’s one more thing.”

“What?”

“Freedom. In its rightful meaning because now we know its taste for good.”

Brook finally feels that she’s talking to her lost Lily again, and she replaces herself smiling from the heart.

“Who?”

“Dean”, Lily sighs.

“I trust you. If you think and feel that he knows what he’s doing, then we will do this your way.”

“If only Isaac had your attitude…”

Their conversation continues a lot of hours from that night, and the morning catches the Guardians building the continuity of Base R. The Magicians were working hard to build more floors to the Base, and they rushed to finish it as soon as possible. The halls were crowded now, and the numbers of the training Guardians had increased visibly. The war was close, and they were ready. And there was will and determination in the air, and they seemed to know what they were fighting for.

But they had been forgotten their true purpose? While they were preparing to fight each other, the Wall’s Portal was unleashing purple sparks. Even though the pieces of portal where the demons and dragons had entered were gone, there were others forming in different places, and those places were next to the Base led by Leonor and Ray. During this time, the Wall’s Portal was becoming thinner, and beyond it were waiting hideous and ugly creatures ready to destroy every world they were going to pass through.

The legends said that if these creatures managed to kill half of the Guardians alive from that world, a portal to the other worlds will be opened, where they could enter and destroy everything. The curse was going to start, and that was why the Guardians weren’t supposed to forget their true purpose in that world.