The Children of War

In the southwest of Astra, the city of Cain is slowly decaying under the weight of a multi generational war. Let's have a look at life at home...

Akashi Pacè’s earliest memories were of the city of Cain. He couldn’t have been older than two years old, sitting in a stroller, wide eyed with wonder looking up at the great metal skyscrapers. Their glossy windows reflected the beauty of the sun down onto the grated walkways that laced their way through the city. Most of Cain was made of metal alloys left unpainted in the hurry to erect them as fast as possible. The only thing Akashi could see in the sky that wasn’t metal were his parents pushing along his stroller. They chatted back and forth with concern furrowing their brows. His parents were amazing to him. Beautiful. In a man-made world, they just were and to simply be in a world that was forced into existence was glorious. Akashi never knew how to describe that feeling. Maybe he never would, but he felt it deep down anyways.

Before long, they were finished walking through the aluminum colored streets, and they passed through a beautiful white arch into the ancient garden of Cain. Cain’s garden was renowned for being a place of peace. Even as a child, Akashi knew it was a special place. It was a magical place where people met, spoke, loved, and laughed together and connected with what made them human. The garden was beautiful and vibrant, with music echoing through the trees, flowers, and bushes were all around the people. People came to the garden for everything, whether it was to meet with friends and family or worship their gods. The garden was a collective consciousness coming together to show that they still knew beauty outside of their reflections in the windows of skyscrapers and the flashing of neon lights in the night.

 The garden was indeed a wondrous place.

Akashi remembered coming back to the garden week after week, year after year. The concern on his parent’s faces would fade away as they passed through the arches and into the beautiful luscious greenery. They’d let him out of his stroller and he’d go see his best friend, Ollen. They’d frolic around laughing and playing. Sometimes they fought, but his dad always came and made things better.

But soon, his father was gone. His mother had a weary, tired gaze that never seemed to leave her face. She held his hand tight in hers and walked him down the street, guiding the young boy to the gardens just as before, but somehow different. When she passed through the arches, she wouldn’t smile. The weight didn’t leave her shoulders. She sat with concern and heartache weighing on her as she spoke with Akashi’s aunt. They’d sit at a table and chat while he ran around with Ollen.

Then his mother was gone too. He walked with his big sister who never liked going to the garden. She was irritated that she had to take him at all. She didn’t want to be there, she had better things to do. She was in a race for qualifying exams. “If I could just get in under the wire, before I turn 17 then maybe…” She never finished the thought to her brother. He assumed the rest: Maybe she could get into a good school in Euco or Dragon’s Heart or anywhere but here. He didn’t get it. Why get away? The garden was right here after all. Akashi passed through the arches alone. His sister stood outside, her eyes intent on a data pad in her hands.

Then, it was just his aunt. Auntie Gee, as he called her. The stern woman said little, acted little, and regardless of where she was, she had a face of stern impatience. No one spoke to her, no one spoke to him.

Except Ollen, of course. Auntie Gee would take a seat at an empty table alone. She rubbed a scar that ran up her entire forearm as she stared off into the middle distance. When she had enough, she stood up and walked to the arches. Akashi knew not to ask questions. He followed her out sheepishly and Ollen waved goodbye in silence.

One by one Akashi’s family left.

Except him and his auntie.

They were the only two left.

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.

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“Lady Lanoreth!” The voice of a reporter shouted outside the great white arches of the garden. Lady Lanoreth, one of the town’s councilors, had just stepped through the new heavy steel doors blocking entry into the garden. “Surely you can’t expect us to believe that you’re taking this heinous defacing of the gardens seriously!” The crowd outside the gardens had grown into a furious fervor. The gardens had been blocked off for days and tensions were rising higher by the moment.

“Ma’am, I can assure you with complete confidence that I’m taking this seriously. Investigations are underway to find out who’s been destroying the public property, and in the meantime the gardens will remain closed.” Lady Lanoreth replied with a quivering smile. She stepped onto a podium that hovered a few inches above the ground. The crowd roared in disapproval at her attempt to speak to them. “My good people of Cain! Please! Take a moment and consider who you’re directing your frustrations at! We are doing everything within our power to investigate this crime. Lord Vanor and I have the very best that Cain has to offer on the scene to investigate.”

“Ma’am, if I may?” A reporter pushed himself to the front of the angry mob. Lady Lanoreth nodded to him. “Anonymous sources claim you and the lord were sitting in the garden having tea during the investigation while the rest of us were forced to stay outside. Do you care to confirm or deny this rumor?” Lady Lanoreth paused. She opened her mouth to speak, then quickly closed it and sighed. She brought an open hand up,

“People of Cain, please take a moment to consider that maybe I was -”

“Forgive me Lady Lanoreth, but I feel this is a yes or no answer.” The reporter interrupted.

“Okay… Well yes. Yes I was, but -” The crowd erupted.

“People please!” Lord Vanor erupted out from behind the closed garden doors. He immediately covered his head as a stone caught the corner of his eye and another tore through the sleeve of his shirt, “Damn it!” He turned to an officer guarding the door, “Get this crowd to simmer down! Where is detective Panshin? She’s supposed to be dealing with this!” Lord Vanor cowered behind an officer’s riot shield as they closed in, protecting the councilors. 

“All we have to say at this time is that Detective Panshin Pacè is on the case and she is inside as we speak!” Lady Lanoreth shouted. The crowd quieted down at the statement. Murmurs of Panshin’s name reverberated across the crowd. The family was well known for their honor in battle as well as their commitment to civic duty. Panshin was the last remaining adult member of the Pacè family. The others had been lost to the Southern Calt. She was the only member to come back in the three generations that the war had consumed.

The officers dispersed the now quiet and satiated crowd. The metal walls outside the garden went quiet as the screaming echoes came to an end.

“Hey…” A voice whispered from an alleyway. Akashi was a teenage boy leaning against the facade of an old building near where the crowd had nearly lost control. He snapped his fingers and the music cut out from his headphones. He looked around, then hesitated. Nothing. He prepared to turn it back on when a voice cut through the silence again, “Ash Kash!” The voice called from the alley. Akashi stopped. He turned and glanced down the alley.

“Uh…” He responded, the sound echoing off the walls, “Ollen, is that you?” A swift wind hit his back and Akashi swung around. He jumped as he came face to face with his best friend.

“What are you doing out here?” She asked. Her curious dark eyes inspected his skinny disproportionate frame up and down. He was a tall scrawny boy with curly brown hair and dark down turned eyes. His skin was a light olive color and he had the perpetual look of someone up to no good. He stared back at her with a startled look on his face as he brushed his brown fringes out of his eyes. 

“Why are you sneaking up on me?”

“I’m not!” She smiled, “Why are you standing out here, huh?”

“I’m waiting for my auntie.” He glared at the ground.

“Auntie got ya on a leash again, huh, Kash?”

“Shut up!” Akashi stamped a foot and glared at her.

“I’m just saying, man… you’re back on the leash. Stuck waiting outside the garden… hanging around…” Her voice became a swirling song on the wind as she lurked around him prodding at his sides, “but… we both know where you should be… where we should be…” Ollen’s voice had a way of lolling him into listening. She made everything sound fun. Everything sounded enticing. Thoughtless excitement rolled from her tongue and a joyful smile gleamed upon her lips. She knew exactly how to convince him.

“Where should we be?” Akashi asked, a smile curling across his once sour pouting mouth.

“We should beeee…. In the garden, Ash Kash. Come on! We’re like detectives or something! Let's solve the case, huh?” The idea sparked something in his mind: He could be a detective. He could solve this mystery. Maybe even better than Auntie Gee ever could. Maybe he was a great detective just waiting to be given the chance. Maybe this was his chance. Then Akashi paused and laughed. What a ridiculous thought.

“Ollen, we can’t solve the mystery. It’s probably the gods or a cult… or both. Probably both. There. Mystery solved, let’s go chill in Burn Shack and call it a day.”

“Come on, Kash. Don’t act like you aren’t tired of Burnin’. You do more napping in the shack than burnin’.” Akashi shrugged,

“So? I barely sleep anymore because you keep me up messaging me all night! Gotta sleep some time.”

“So, come on…” Ollen grabbed his arm, “Come on come on come on! We’ll sleep when we’re old - or dead. Who knows which’ll happen first, right? Besides, I can’t solve the mystery of the garden vandals without my sidekick!” Akashi glared,

“Hey!” He ripped his arm away, “I ain’t your sidekick, and I ain’t going to get pulled around by you!”

“Fiiiinneeee…” Ollen shrugged, “I can’t solve the crime without my… partner.” She gave him a knowing wink, “Now come on! Let’s go break the law and solve some mysteries!” Akashi hesitated a moment longer. He checked his data pad for any new messages. Blank.

“What if my auntie comes out here and I’m gone?”

“What did you do last time she had you on the leash?”

“Told her I stopped a mugging…” Akashi felt the flare of embarrassment from admitting such a brazen lie.

“Did that work?” Ollen stifled a laugh,

“Well…” He tried to hedge, then immediately gave up, “…no. No luck with that one.” Akashi shared a weak smile, pretending to bask in his own embarrassment but he felt the shame of adolescence deep inside himself. Ollen slapped him on his shoulder,

“Well, think about something better as we go this time, huh? Maybe you fell into the sewer or - oh I don’t know - saw a pretty butterfly.” She called as she began jogging towards the garden wall.

“There aren’t butterflies in Cain outside the gardens!” He corrected. Ollen was already far ahead of him, jogging her way towards the garden walls. Akashi bolted after her. Ollen ran past the periphery of an officer guarding the entrance and vaulted over the wall. Akashi watched with wonder. How could he possibly do that? He couldn’t jump that high! How could she jump that high? He pounded a fist across his chest as he ran and let the feeling of not being outdone drive him forward. He jumped, his vision blurring as he grabbed the ledge of the wall and threw himself over top of it. His foot snagged on the wall and he felt himself falling forward. He screamed in fear as he fell down into the garden, his cheek smacking into the brick interior of the wall. His foot came loose from the top of the wall and he collapsed into a bush with a heavy “oof.”

“Oh, Kash.” Ollen said from somewhere. He wasn’t sure, but she sounded nervous. Upset maybe. Akashi laughed, hiding his pain,

“Not my best entrance…” He said in a daze.

“No. It wasn’t.” That wasn’t Ollen. Akashi felt his stomach curdle and his heart drop. His eyes fluttered about as he focused up at the sky, but the sun was blotted out by the slender features of his auntie Gee’s face.

“Auntie I -”

“Save it, Akashi.” She spoke with no malice or anger, but an objective impatience. She turned away and spoke to a nearby officer assisting her investigation,

“Take these two to their homes.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Ollen, do I need to speak with your father about this?” Ollen looked down and to the side, refusing to make eye contact with Panshin. A guard helped Akashi to his feet. He was dizzy and confused. He swiped branches out of his hair and shook himself back to focus. “And you…” his aunt glared daggers at him. He stared back in defiance, though the glazed look in his eyes gave away that he was more injured than he was letting on. Panshin sighed, “We’ll talk tonight.” Her face lost the sternness of the great detective and morphed into a concerned aunt, “Why do you insist on causing trouble when there’s so much to go around already?”

“We were going to solve the mystery, auntie…” His voice was disjointed and on a strange wavelength that even he couldn’t make sense of. Why was he talking?

“Now would be a really good time to shut your mouth, Kash.” Ollen mumbled as the guard holding her pushed her forward. Panshin shook her head,

“Get them out of here. I’m done with the nonsense of children.” She waved them off and turned away. Akashi’s rattled brain craned his neck around to stare at whatever she turned her attention to. It was a strange symbol written into the flowers. It was the most odd thing he had seen. Flowers organized to look like a symbol, but a symbol of what? He stared at the strange glyph. It reminded him of a scythe with a circle around it stamped into the ground by heavy footfall. It was a horrible symbol. The amount of offense this put upon the entire city was far from a laughing matter. Who would stamp on the garden flowers? Akashi felt a pang of horror followed by irritated apathy. The guard yanked his arm and his eyes shifted away, Ollen stared at Akashi and mouthed,

Did you see it? 

He nodded. As his body jerked around he saw the rest of the garden. The symbol was everywhere. Encroaching on other parts of the garden. Not just the flowers, but etched into the walls, painted on sidewalks, traced in the sands of the garden, and baked into the coals of the fireplaces in the lounging space. Akashi looked back at Ollen,

“Did you see all of it?” He asked louder than he should have. Ollen shook her head, choosing to ignore him.

.

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Akashi rummaged through the bookshelf on his aunt's office wall. He was looking for something that could be associated with the symbol he saw. Her office was a cluttered mess. Panshin was a detective who worked long hours and had to raise a young boy that was hardly her own. She didn’t have the time to clean. Akashi was pretty sure she wouldn’t even if she did have the time though. He threw the books he had no use for onto the synthetic wood floor. He grabbed a book and the cover out loud,

“Power, Balance, and Reason: The Ziforous Journey… What in the fiend’s is this?” He mumbled as he threw the book against the back wall. He snagged another book off the wall, “Gods above and symbol below. Maybe… maybe…” He pulled out his data pad and turned it on, holding it over the book. The door to the office flew open and his aunt stood on the other side.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Her voice was oddly calm for how aggressive her demeanor was. Akashi fumbled to throw his data pad back into his pocket.

“I - uh - well -” She snatched the book from his hands and jammed it into a cluttered space on the book shelf,

“I don’t care.” She responded. “Go to your room.”

“I’m trying to help, auntie!” Akashi pleaded.

“And I’m not trying to hear your nonsense. Not tonight, Akashi. Please… not tonight…” She sighed as she took off her utility belt and holster. Her kinetic pistol slammed into her paper-ridden desk. “Just go to your room. Rest your head. You might’ve sustained a concussion so don’t sleep yet, okay?”

“My head’s fine.”

“Have you tested your balance and reflexes?”

“I have and I -”

“Did you do it right?”

“Yes I did and I -”

“Are you sure?”

“Aunt Panshin, stop!” Akashi shouted.

“Boy.” She grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and lifted him to eye level with her. Fear crossed his eyes and worry flashed in hers. She dropped him gently and sighed, “You will not listen to me when I care for you. You will not listen to me when I don’t. You just won’t listen.” Akashi saw a single tear forming in her eye. She blinked and it was gone. She glared down at him, “Tell me what you want.”

“Would you even care if I told you?” Akashi’s lowered his eyes to the floor. The detective shook her head,

“You wouldn’t know what caring was if it landed in your lap.” Akashi opened his mouth then stopped and let out a sigh,

“You’re right. my head’s starting to hurt anyways. I’m going to my room.” Akashi trudged out of the office. He shut the door and shook away the pain he was feeling deep in his chest. It burned and it made him angry. It made him hurt. As he opened the door to his bedroom, a forced smile curled across his mouth, forcing the hurt down deeper. He pulled his data pad from his pocket and whispered, “Access scanner history.” A list of the books he went through appeared.

.

.

.

“Ollen! Hey, Ollen, when you get this… do me a favor and respond? I think I’m onto something.” Akashi whispered into his data pad. He pulled it away from his mouth and began glimpsing through the scanned pages. He smiled with excitement in the dark corner of his closet as he went through the pages. Maybe he could solve the mystery. 

The evening wore into the night, but Akashi couldn’t tell the difference. Ollen hadn’t gotten back to him and he felt his patience waning. He wasn’t sure how to handle that part of the problem. He wanted her there so they could do this together after all.

 From outside his closet, he heard his bedroom door crack open. The surprisingly soft voice of his aunt flooded into the room, “Akashi? Will you speak to me tonight?” He held his breath in silence. “Akashi… I know where you like to hide. Ever since you were a toddler.” The closet doorknob turned and he grabbed it, holding it shut. He felt her pull on the other end. There was a moment of tension as his entire body chained together to hold the door closed. He braced his feet against either side of the wall and held position. “Dammit, Akashi!” Panshin yelled, “You know I could break this door open and you with it!” He still said nothing. The room went silent. There was a deep centering sigh from the other side of the room, “Ah… my nephew…” She relaxed. An uncomfortable calm settled over her. Akashi hated it. He hated her. Why would he ever want to be a detective? Why would he want to be like her? Then he remembered: To be better than her.

“Akashi… when your father left… Your mother was tasked with keeping you and your sister safe. And when your mother - then - then your sister - look, we all made vows. And it was always for the love of the family. Of the youth. Of you. You aren’t a little boy anymore. You’re growing. And now… now I need you to do right by our family. I need you to act with the honor that our name carries. That your name carries. Your grandfather led some of the first attacks into the Southern Calt, you know that, don’t you? And before that, he defended Cain with his life. What have you done other than cause trouble?” He heard her footsteps recede to the bedroom door. The thoughtless way that she said those final words left him shattered. His hands fell away from the handle and he sunk into the pile of dirty clothes behind him. His data pad dropped to the ground between his thighs. Panshin’s voice spoke in an even tone from across the bedroom,

“I have work to do tonight. I won’t be home, but I expect you to behave. Do right by yourself and this family. Get to bed soon if your symptoms have subsided. I’ll check on you tomorrow.” The door shut.

Akashi deflated at the words and breathed out tears of frustration. Panshin never wanted kids. She never wanted a family. She just wanted her job. Now she was stuck with him, and she knew just as much as he did that he felt stuck with her too. Akashi cried. He cried until his head hurt and he couldn’t see straight and the darkness was filled with colors and streaks of the unknown as though the Fates danced before his very eyes. His heart fluttered down to his stomach and imploded like a bomb inside him. He felt himself whimper. He curled up on the floor of his cramped little closet surrounded by dirty clothes and wistful nothings. He had to do something. Something to make the hurt go away. Something to feel like he mattered. He needed to matter.

When he checked the time, it was the middle of the night. Nearly 1am. He had finally gotten the nerve to get up and act. He threw the closet door open, letting in the light of his bedroom. He never went out into Cain this late, it was foolish… but not if you had something to prove.

Or a case to solve.

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Hey friends, I hope you enjoyed this first installment into the life of Akashi and the wars of Cain. There’s quite a few parts to this story that I’m looking forward to serializing here. I can’t wait to share it all with you. I hope you enjoyed this first installment! Thank you for reading!