-Tessa POV-

 

“Good day to you, Alexander!” Tom said, plopping his lunch tray on the table next to ours before doing the same with his body and a chair.

His odd greetings and formal speech were always entertaining, though his use of our full name had me trying not to cringe.

I felt a familiar presence stirring awake in our mind, but I didn’t have the attention to spare on her right now.

Mentally apologizing, I smiled as best I could and responded in the same bright tone, “Likewise, Thomas! What have you been up to today?”

I hadn’t had time to talk to him today before lunch, so I figured this was as good a question as any to continue the conversation.

Despite his continued use of our full name, he was quite nice, and much more polite than the other boys in the grade. While the others either mocked or ignored us, Tom had seen us and decided that we would be his friend. His formal greetings combined with his stereotypical surfer dude appearance seemed to catch others off guard, but I found it kind of endearing.

Occasionally, though, he would get a far-off look in his eye and ask something completely unrelated to the subject at hand.

In fact, he had that same look in his eye right now. In order to give myself time to think about a response to whatever outlandish question he was going to ask now, I took a large swig of my water.

“Hey, Alexander, do you have a girlfriend?”

Ah. Okay. That was… not what I expected. Composing myself, I tried to decide how to respond.

Suddenly, I felt a presence glomp onto me, a mental version of a hug.

[I count as your girlfriend, right~?]

That message had me almost choking on my drink. Thomas quickly leaned over to pat us on the back, but I waved him off while recovering.

{Was that because I ignored you waking up?}

[Ehe~]

Forcing my attention back to the outer world, I managed to sort the water out of our lungs and the air back in.

“I’m okay,” I told Tom, prompting him to stop patting our back. “Just wasn’t expecting that.”

“That’s a no, then?”

“Yeah. I mean, no. I mean- ugh.”

Tom smiled at us.

“So what brought that question on?” I asked. His seemingly random questions always had explanations behind them, though often convoluted.

Tom then told a long story about how he overheard some boys talking about a rumor of a wishing well in the forest behind the school. They were talking about what they would wish for if they went, and they all claimed that they would wish for the same thing: a girlfriend. Tom was curious if this was something that other people wanted or had, so he decided to ask us.

“Erm, Tom,” I said. “Did these boys know you were listening to them?”

“Yes, probably.”

“They were probably just messing with you, then.”

“Ah. I see. My apologies for bringing it up, then.”

“Don’t worry about it, you didn’t know.”

The other boys were always playing tricks on Tom, and he always seemed to believe them. I suppose being trusting is a good thing, but it annoyed me to see others take advantage of his trust.

As we went back to eating our lunch, Maia interrupted.

[What if that rumor was real?]

{Why does this feel like one of your Bad Ideas?}

[We could go investigate. It would be fun!]

{Maia, no offense, but your ideas usually end in either flames or tears.}

She huffed in mock offense.

[Well, then, I guess we’ll just go home and do nothing, as usual.]

{Okay, fine. We can take maybe an hour after school to check it out.}

 

-Maia POV-

 

{Maybe we shouldn’t have come out here, after all.}

[Relax, even if we don’t find anything, it’ll be fun!]

Tessa, as usual, was against doing anything. I get that it can be disappointing to not find anything, but come on! The fresh air, the pretty trees! I usually go on a walk after school anyway, and the forest is a much better place than the usual concrete jungle we traverse.

As I trekked through the forest, following the faint dirt path through the trees, I gave control of our voice to Tessa, and she began to hum softly.

Neither of us really liked our voice, but it was nice to listen to her.

Coming to a clearing, I slowed to a stop and looked around.

{Wow…}

[What’d I say?]

{Okay, yes, it was worth it.}

The afternoon sunlight filtering through a gap in the trees cast the center of the clearing in a bright light. There seemed to be a wall of trees on all sides, seemingly forming a sanctuary. Oddly, I couldn’t hear the sounds of cars and construction that I expected to hear. In fact, it was completely silent, with not even the previously incessant noise of cicadas to annoy us.

In the center of the clearing was an ornate though mossy fountain, no longer flowing with water. As I approached, I saw that the fountain seemed to depict a collection of woodland animals. There was a moth, a fox, and a rabbit, among other animals.

Looking at the water in the fountain, I was surprised to see that it was not full of leaves and clouded with muck. Though still, the water was so clear as to be almost invisible. In fact, the fountain as a whole seemed to be very clean, albeit mossy and somewhat cracked.

At the bottom of the fountain, there was a single coin.

{Well, it’s not a wishing well, but close enough.}

[Let’s toss a coin in.]

I dug through my pocket to pull out a coin, before tossing it into the fountain.

[{Heads!}]

It landed tails up.

Stepping back, I noticed an engraving on the base of the fountain. I crouched down to read it.

"Fear is the bane of Life."

I paused to think about that. Fear was good, right? It keeps people safe, and prevents people from making mistakes. I scoffed at the plaque on the fountain. Fear had kept us safe many times, both physically and socially.

Tessa, evidently coming to the same conclusion, said, {Yeah, right.}

Turning around, I began the trek back towards the school. After all, the hour for our detour into the forest was just about up, and we needed to be getting home soon.

The clearing darkened before we could leave it. Looking up, I saw that the weather had suddenly turned overcast. Odd, it had been sunny just a few moments ago.

“Oh? You disagree with my motto?”

I whirled around, turning back toward the middle of the clearing. In place of the scene of animals on top of the fountain, there stood a girl that appeared around 16 years old, wearing a simple white dress.

Oddly, though, her hair was silvery white, and didn’t appear to be dyed. It reached almost all the way down to her ankles, and flowed as though blowing in a wind that I could not feel.

Moving my gaze to her eyes, they appeared opalescent, a shifting display of prismatic colors that hurt my head to see.

Wait. My?

Panicking, I mentally reached out for Tessa.

No response.

I couldn’t feel her presence at all. It wasn’t even as though she was asleep or had gone dormant; she was simply gone.

[Tessa!]

Nothing.

The girl’s expression slowly morphed into a grin as I was overcome with panic. I had never been without Tessa. Tessa had never been without me.

Forcing my eyes to focus on the girl in front of me, I asked in a trembling voice, “What did you do?”

“I merely want to talk. Privately.”

I could only stare at this girl - no, this inhuman thing - in front of me. She no longer appeared human in my eyes, though her outward appearance didn’t change. Her eyes, for all their colors, simply seemed to have nothing behind them.

“Why?” I croaked, nerves frayed and mind fracturing under the weight of her gaze.

“Oh, many reasons. I’ve had an eye on you two for a while. But what really caught my attention is what you did just now.

You know, I’ve been called many things before. Life, Fate, Reality, Chaos. But never, not once, has someone attempted to call me on my bullshit.”

The air grew tangibly colder around me. I shivered, though I wasn’t sure if it was from fear or the cold.

She spoke again.

“You two are interesting. So let’s shake things up a bit, shall we?”

With that question, all my strength left my body. The last thing I saw was the ground rushing up to meet me.

 

-Tessa POV-

 

“Oh? You disagree with my motto?”

I froze. There wasn’t supposed to be anyone for potentially miles around. And besides, the voice came from right behind me.

Wait.

I? Me?

I suddenly became extremely aware of the fact that I was in control again.

{Maia? What’s happening?}

…No response.

I mentally felt around for Maia. She wasn’t anywhere to be found. Not dormant, not asleep.

Just gone.

My blood ran cold.

Where did she go?

Was she taken?

Did she leave me?

We had always been together.

I thought we always would be.

And now she was gone.

I had never felt so alone.

Someone cleared their throat behind me.

Trembling, I slowly turned around.

Standing atop the fountain’s base was a beautiful girl. I almost mistook her for a statue from how still she stood, but her long hair blew in the wind.

Wind I couldn’t feel.

Forcing myself not to back away, I slowly approached her. Her eyes, swirling softly with innumerable colors, watched me inscrutably.

I could not bring myself to speak as I stood in front of her. For some unknown reason, the sight of her filled me with fear and apprehension.

“You two are quite interesting.”

I blinked. Did she make Maia disappear?

If that was the case, I…

I didn’t know what to do. I felt helpless.

“Why do you disagree with the inscription? Fear breeds inaction, hesitation, regret.”

I unsuccessfully tried to force my legs to stop shaking. They wouldn’t. It was all I could do to listen to what she was saying.

“Are there not actions you regret? Do you not seek to remedy your mistakes?”

My eyes widened. I couldn’t tell what she meant, but it didn’t sound good.

“Ah. You haven’t realized yet. Well, warrior princess, you will have your chance soon. A change awaits you.”

With those enigmatic words, I crumpled to the ground, suddenly unable to support my own weight. As I felt my consciousness slipping away, I couldn’t help but think, I hope Maia’s okay…