Are

The memories of Eve shakes Naomi to her core as her guilty, wandering mind returns to the moonlit sky. Her four paws stomp across the dew-stained grass as she makes quick over the field some few miles away from the K.N.I.G.H.T Clinic.

Faster and faster her legs carry her, running from the treachery of it all more so than the Clinic itself. She came to realize the love she harbored for Eve only to turn her back on it all. She was a coward who, given the moment to escape, took it all upon herself to hungrily, greedily, partake of the freedom she was offered, as is the nature of the beast.

Back in the past, The Maginot Line sat before her, and she pushed forward into the hall. As Plato, as Naomi. The dank, quietness of it all assaulted her ears before anything else. Never before, thought Naomi, had a guard so haphazardly forgotten to lock the cell behind them.

Of course, her first line of thought was to search for Eve. The hallway was as long as the sea is wide, as tall as any mountain, and as dark as the void of space. The echoes of her breathing alone confused her sense of direction, to say nothing of the direction Eve’s voice traveled from.

Above and in front of her pit, hangs a loudspeaker, likely to be used for broadcasts in the advent of emergencies. Behind her, ingrained into the walls, were rows of deep, dark pits. Inside the maws of desperation and disillusioned lies empty rooms. Rows and rows of rooms, with nary a trace of Eve. The tension of being in the open, the fear of those eyes spotting her causes her fight or flight instinct to activate with obstinate severity. It tugs at her, for she is a survivor.

It carries her legs against her will through the labyrinthine corridors and hallways and lobbies and more. She paces herself, checking every which way for some sign of life, some oni around a bend, some ghastly ghoul waiting just out of sight. Yet even Dorian Grey’s eyes remain shut to Naomi’s sudden, inexplicable success at scampering away.

Every step towards the exit brings bliss to Naomi. Every step condemns her to a lifetime of guilt and despair and sorrow. Every step makes her reconsider the faith she never had for such a fortuitous moment. With every step she takes she blasphemes against the world and at herself all at once.

The stairs were long and drawn out but she couldn’t chance using an elevator. She approached the door, the final door to the heavens that await. Hesitantly she places her hand on its knob, stricken with indecision. She could leave now and find a new life, a new love, a new home. In doing so, she gives up the quasi-life she had come to know, a love she wishes desperately to bring with her, and a home to reside beside her.

But what was she to do? She was no saint, no hero, no martyr or soldier. The cells contained no prisoners she could find. No lab she passed contained a scientist or doctor. They were lonely with unused devices of overabundant healing and hurting. No corridor hid a cowering Eve tucked away in a ball, waiting to be held. Empty, empty, empty, everything was empty. Why would this facility, with its god-like Dorian Grey be so, so empty? Perhaps this is his wrath stricken upon a world who could not claim a cure fast enough?

Another pang of sorrow and reticence takes over, causing tremors within Naomi. So many times now had she seen, or heard, or witnessed, or chanced a glance upon, the sick and the dying small ones. At times she would caution a glance at the same red-headed little boy stricken with fits of seizure. It would solemnly walk to and from, guided by the herders of adults. Then one day his fit fought its last and the boy never chance upon Naomi’s sight again.

Then there was the cute little girl with those rosy cheeks and the blondest hair you ever did see. She was all smiles any time Naomi witnessed her, even after, or perhaps especially after, a cough mixed with blood. That smile never did fade, even after her permanent absence from this life.

Those first few weeks after those children were the hardest for Naomi. Dorian Grey’s powers had diminished greatly on her after that day she defeated him. Yes, he was still strong, but the pull he had, and the chemicals that burned, all seemed as nothing in deference to them.

In staying here, Naomi’s hand falls off the doorknob, she could make a difference that, in the outside world, she never would, never could. Her hand wavers now in its own twilight state; with equal chances saint and sinner at the same time, Naomi is stuck existing between two realms. One realm, she stays and through her sacrifice, she brings some semblance of peace to the world.

The other realm, she pushes that door open and rushing into that infinite sky. She loses her Eve, but gains her life back. Slowly, oh so slowly, her hand drifts further from the knob. Her conscious mind persists in a tumultuous state even as her subconscious can’t seem to let Eve go.

It is then, perhaps in a jest from Dorian Grey himself, that Naomi catches Eve’s whispers on the wind, a wind that has no place and no way to exist within this steel confinement. “Run,” it tells her. “Run and never look back.”

And so the scales tipped and Schrodinger’s choice was made. She slams the door open, breathing in the taste of freedom.