No Tears This Time (Open)

[leapoffayth.livejournal.com]

Of all the duties of a summoner, the Sending was easily the hardest for Yuna to face. Every time she took up her staff and danced, it meant only one thing: more people had violently died, needlessly died, shouldn't have died, wouldn't have died had an outside source not torn them apart. Left alone to wander the universe with their anger at sudden death intact, their lost souls could coalesce into an even greater threat.

This time, she thought with a painful clench of her heart, she wasn't guiding the souls of a small army's soldiers or the scattered casualties of a ruined town. If their information was to be believed, with the possible exception of her guardians, all Spirans had perished in the Ohm's violent strike. Knowing that meant she was likely the last summoner still living---thus the responsibility for their souls fell to her.

Even as she picked up her staff and walked to the center of the observation deck, standing under the red sky as seen through the window, she had her doubts. Without a Farplane, where would they go? Could her prayers reach them this far away? Could one summoner handle so many souls? A total annihilation of her planet and countless others. It was a daunting task to be sure, but just a small pebble on the long journey awaiting this crew.

No matter what happened, she thought forcefully, she owed it to everyone to give it a try. With a strong enough prayer, they would have a chance at final peace.

Her mind made up, Yuna began her solemn dance. There were no hymns, water columns, or sparkling lights this time: just a girl left alone to mourn the deaths in her own way, the entire overwhelming situation putting her rhythm just slightly off.

When the last of her fervent prayers trailed from her mind past the tip of her staff, invisibly entering the universe, she let the rod clatter to the ground and dropped to her knees. Whispering into the humid air, she willed one last thing to be true.

"I'm sorry, everyone. If there's a way to stop this, even a way to right this wrong...I will. I promise you."

Comments

[leapoffayth.livejournal.com]

"How to send those who have died because of the Ohm," Yuna answered solemnly. "Everyone's so far away, but their anguished thoughts still linger out there. I'm meant to bring them peace---it was just a matter of extending my wish."

And that, Snow, was what she was doing. Not that it likely made any sense.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

It'd take him a minute, but it did make ... some sort of sense when he thought about it. "Sort of like a prayer? What does send mean?"

[leapoffayth.livejournal.com]

"To send means to guide the dead beyond this life. If their souls do not find rest, hatred of the living eventually warps them into fiends that then attack us. It's a horrifying fate---all the fiends my guardians and I had to fight past were once people, warped beyond recognition by the pain of death."

Yuna looked down guiltily. It was always something she'd tried not to think about. At least she was usually able to send them afterward.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

So then she was just ... Oh, man he thought. He didn't like to think of the idea himself, so if Yuna was doing something like this ... she must have let the thought of all of the people she'd ever seen and known, the countless people on her planet being gone really settle in.

"I'm sure it worked, to whoever needed it, but!" he added - he had to make sure to keep Yuna's spirits up. "I bet the number's not nearly as high as anyone might think. Not with all of those unopened pods down there."