What Could have Been

This is an idea that was canned for obvious story reasons, as the story took a different direction. I have a few others that I might want to flesh out eventually. But for now, this will remain a bit of Patreon-exclusive content for my readers.

- - ----====| | |====---- - -

“Oh, am I interrupting something?”

The words jolted Emerald, as she was preparing to fight Tukson. They had come from behind her, from the direction of the book store’s entrance. She spun around, coming face to face with the newcomer. There at the entrance stood a girl a few years younger than herself, clad in red and black with a weapon of some kind clipped to the belt at her back. Was she a huntress? Her silver eyes glanced to the right to Mercury, who stepped back in surprise at her sudden appearance. Emerald then realized that she hadn’t even heard the door open.

“Well, apologies if I am,” the girl continued, looking to Tukson behind the counter. “An acquaintance recommended this place to me, as I am in dire need of research material regarding Remnant’s past. If this is important, I do hope that this can wait a moment.”

“Go home brat,” Mercury spat. “The store’s closed.”

“Oh?” She looked back over to Mercury. “While the lights are dark, the sign out front says otherwise.”

“Do what he said twerp,” Emerald hissed. “Get lost or get hurt.”

The red girl spared a moment longer to look at him. Then she turned and dismissed him, next looking at Emerald and then to Tukson behind the counter. “I take it that this is some sort of robbery I have stumbled upon?”

Tukson looked to the other two in the room. “No, no It’s not.”

“Ah, it is a murder attempt then.” She glanced at the others before returning her gaze to the shopkeeper. “Well, do you care if I lend a you a hand with these-”

Mercury took a step, one of his legs sweeping to roundhouse kick the girl in the head and strike her down. His leg never even got close. One moment he was mid kick, and the next he was gone. The store’s right wall suddenly had a crater in it, with Mercury in the center.

The red girl had never even moved.

“Mercury!” Emerald heard herself scream as she brought her own two weapons out, ready to fight the intruder. She never managed to even bring them to bear as they were abruptly ripped from her hands, the weapons flying through the air to bury themselves to the hilt in the doorframe of the entrance. The shock of the abrupt loss of her Respites caused her to stumble forward, toward the girl-

Her world shifted, and suddenly she felt… different. The red girl was there, much closer and looking down at her, Emerald’s head in her hands. What?

Then she understood. She saw, off to the side, her own headless body falling to the ground. Gouts of arterial blood - her blood - painted the stacks of books crimson red as it fell. Emerald tried to say something, but she couldn’t as her lungs were suddenly very far away. All she could do was look up at her killer, whose yes were now a shade of angry yellow and whose grin had far, far too many teeth to be normal-

The girl brought her hands together, and Emerald knew no more.

- - ----====| | |====---- - -

“-Or get... hurt…” Emerald stammered, mid-speech. What in the gods was that? Emerald looked around, focusing on the red girl, still standing there and looking at her. She looked over to Mercury, who suddenly looked equally disoriented. “What?”

“I was about to ask if this was a robbery?” The red girl asked. “Because if it is, I may have to… cut loose.”

A bolt of fear coursed through Emerald at her words, chilling her to the bone. Whoever, whatever the girl standing in front of her was… Emerald suddenly wanted no part of this.

“Now, unless you have failed to grasp that message, I need to speak with the shopkeeper here,” The girl-shaped monster said with a cute smile on her face. She glanced over to Mercury, standing ramrod still. “Can you afford us a measure of privacy?”

“Y- Yeah, of course,” Mercury muttered.

“And you?” She looked to Emerald, her silver eyes ever so glinting with hints of yellow.

Emerald had no words, only nodding. She walked forward, toward the exit, stumbling toward the door and past the red girl who stepped aside to let her out.

“And please,” the red girl spoke, her eyes glinting, “Would you kindly lock the door on the way out?”

“I’ll lock the door on the way out,” Emerald heard herself speak and watched herself do, turning the lock on the door and closing it behind her. She followed Mercury, her gaze locked forward toward the back of his head as they walked for what felt like an eternity.

But in reality, it was less than a city block. She was starting to panic when suddenly she felt her free will return to her all at once. Emerald stumbled and fell, skinning a knee as she collapsed. Mercury would have done the same had he not locked the joints on his legs. She laid there on the hard pavement for a moment, struggling to not hyperventilate.

“What… What in the hell was that!?” Mercury stammered, half-shouting. “What- Who was that!?”

“I… I don’t know Merc,” Emerald said, pulling herself up to a sitting position, drawing her legs to her chest. “What… did you see?”

“What?”

“What did you see!?” she said, louder.

“Oh.” A beat, before he continued. I saw you, getting… Getting decapitated. She- she just stepped forward and ripped your head off. And that was after she broke everything in my body. I felt… I felt everything break. And then I was standing there, and your head was back on…” He sank to his knees, falling forward to land on his hands.

A long moment passed in silence. “She showed us.”

“Emerald?”

“What she would do if we fought her,” Emerald explained. “She’d… she’d kill us both easily.”

“Was that some kind of Semblance?”

“I don’t know.” She didn’t know for sure, but there were plenty of Semblances that could screw with people’s heads. Like her own.

Mercury said nothing at that for a while. “We need to get our stories straight,” he eventually said. “Boss is going to be mad we didn’t kill him.”

“We- we couldn’t.”

“Do you think she will accept that?”

A beat passed in silence. “What do we say?”

“I don’t know,” Mercury said. “He was gone, out for lunch, something.”

“Yeah.” Emerald climbed to her feet, once more following Mercury as they took the fastest path away from Tukson’s bookstore they could. And all the while, Emerald kept thinking about her.

Yellow eyes, filled with anger. A mouth full of teeth, too sharp to be human.

She never wanted to meet that… that thing, ever again.

- - ----====| | |====---- - -