“I see the entrance!!!” Amely yelled from the pilot seat, We had to take a helicopter to get to the point where the labyrinth formed, but something was odd about this one. 'Is… is it closing?” I asked as I pulled a pair of binoculars to see closer; now normally the laberinth of a Titan doesn’t close like this, it crumbles when the energy needed to sustain it vanished upon the deafeat of its Titan, leaveing the people that were inside and are still alive safetly on the other side, but this looks like its collapsing into itself, instead of speeting out the group the laberithy seems to be bending and contorting violently “What do we do? This has never happened before,” Bernar asked when he took the binoculars form my hands to inspect the situation, I turned him to look at me “you are the Orchestrator tell me we can help them” Bernard sighed disheartened “Lu, I`m going to be honest, the chances of this working are next to none it pains me to say it… It really does, but they-” Lulu stomped on the floor of the helicopter and grabbed Bernard by the collar of his shirt. “Bernard… I don’t care if the possibilities are less than one porcent, I AM NOT returning five caskets to their families” Lulu placed her hand over her stomach and looked at Bernard with determination “I would never be able to defend and fight for My children… so let me try to defende them” the man left the binoculars in its case and undid the bottons in his shirt cuffs, rolling the fabric back to his biceps.

  “Fine… I need an anchor, and it must come from outside of the labyrinth, as the entrance is closing only something small and…” he opened his eyes when Lulu showed him a sniper rifle case. “Why did you bring that?” Lulu walked as Amely opened the door of the helicopter, the wind blowing her long golden hair. “In case Otis or his friends were in the same zip code," the man slapped his face and then fixed his glasses. “Right, I`ll start casting, think you can make the shoot?” Lulu planted herself firmly tied down by the cord to her seat, pressing her eye to the scope. “If I could impale a fly to a tree by its wings without killing it with my bow, imagine what I can do with this.”

  The all too familiar sound of beeping machines and the fluorescent fulgor of lights woke me up, I sat up right in the hospital bed and made an imediat checkup, I blinked several times for my eyes to adjust confirming that I was able to see out of both of them with no promble I moved and rubbed my arms up and down, it appears I can move them with no concern or hurt I uncovered my legs and moved them on the bed I even wiggled each of my toes to confirm I could, I quickly opened the closed Jell-O pack that was on a food try and tasted the strawberry flavor lastly I looked at the heart monitor and breath in relief as it showed that my hearet was working with normality “are we… dead?” I heard Ozwald on the other bed and saw him connected by a translusid tube to a bag over his head “I don’t think so… but if we are, this has to be heaven” “How so?” he asked and sat himself up “well there’s an angel next to me” he rolled his eyes and blushed “really now? A lot of people keep calling me demon” I pouted “yeah and all of them are evil or Marten” I heard a grunt form my left and saw a blanket rising up, once it fell I saw a Marten with wild hair looking annoying at us “oh come on we killed a shark can you two be less sickly sweet?” he made a pained expression as Donna elbowed him “Babe come on you said almos the same line when I woke up” with a small don’t tell him that Marten turned over and closed his eyes again.

  We laughed for a moment, and then I looked around and saw a tuft of fluffy brown hair waking up, “Niko…” I pulled the niddle that was stooked to the back of my hand and leet the liquid fell to the ground “wow hig don’t take your IV like that it could-” but I ignored Donna`s medical knowledsh and walked to the bed where Niko was, he opened his eyes “Hey Hig what`s-” I placed my hands on his shoulders and looked to the ground “I`m sorry… you were eaten alive and got hurt by Able because I wavered and I-” Niko lifted my head and proceeded to flicker me in the forehead “You dumbass of course I would try to protect you, you are one of my best friends please don’t feel bad, you can put yourself in mortal danger for me next time” he took a handkershif with several patterns in gold and red and tied it to the hand where the IV tube were planted “there all better” I started to sob and nodded

  “Okay, now that we deal with that… who has the core?” Niko asked as he patted me on my head, we all looked at each other and try to get to our pockets but quickly found out that we were still in the hospital gowns “Hig overe there” Donna pointed to a chair where most of our things where as I was not bound by the curse of the IV I quickly checked my pants and the guys too but northing I did found the smoking pipe Able had when the door opened “… sigh I should have know you would pull the IV off your hand Higen, I`m lamenting not strapping you to the bed now” Dr. Cambell commented “Like something small like a lether strap would stop me… Sir, have you seen a calamity core of the Pride affinity?” The doctor nodded and checked on the vitals of the others halping the by removing the IVs of their hands “yes, when we pulled all of you from there the core was near all of you it`s currently been guarded at Tartaros HQ…” something was off, Dr. Cambell isn’t this stright forward, by now, he would have made a joke or a comment on how difficult was for him to pierce my skin with the needle, he was also looking more rugged than normal.

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  “am… Doctor, is there something wrong?” Ozwald asked, he responded by massaging the bridge of his eyes “it was just… a long day I used a lot of power to get you out of there and I also had to make sure you all were fine,” he said that last part a little louder then normal “… like I said a long day” Donna talked next “right… am we are ready to give a propper report on the situation we just need to get Mrs. Aster” “she is currently at my office im sure she would love the insight of this adventure but I need to talk to you all” that didn’t sound good I moved back to my bed as the doctor walked infront of us an breath deapply “you all were stupidly reckless and I can not believe you had the nerve of doing this” the room felt silent as nobody had a rebuttal even Marten that normally would counter with but we were sucssessful old man was silent as a mouse “Doctor I undesrstand your anger but-” the man threw his glasses to the floor, they shattered and bend from the impact “anger? Higen, I am more than angry, I am pissed off!!!”

  His voiced boomed bouncing around in the room “you all are brave but please think what would have happened if you didn’t return to your home?” he looked at the guys “and what would we had told your families if you two didn’t return either im not trying to discorage you with this just please don’t do this again call us… please” with different variatons of understood, right and sorry Cambell pulled the shackles form his coat and they were different, the cores were no longer the normal smooth sphires grafted onto the silver bangle, now they were carved into different shapes the colors too were brighter, “oh wow I like the new look, gatta say I was not a big orange ball girlie but I am a double helix kinda gal” Donna turned the new shackle on her hand looking at the carved core “okay I do like some fire and all but I didn’t have an issue with the original shape, however im not complaining this fire shape looks sick!” “I think mine got inspiration from the trip, this looks like one of those ammonites, right?” Dr. Campbell coughed to get everyone's attention. “Yeah… we didn’t do that.” Five sets of WHAT!!! Echoed in the room, “When we found you, your shackles were like this. We took them for examination, but we haven’t concluded why the sudden change. Be careful when summoning your weapons, so with nothing else to say, you are dismissed.”

  And just as sudden as the doctor arrived he left, the mood is a little better and the bottom line is that he is right I shouldn’t have to put them in this kind of danger; I looked to the side and noticed Ozwald pocking me, he did it again but this time closer to my shoulder and he try one more time but he was going to pock my left eye so I stopped him “Ozwald I love your antics and games but I need that eye” he retrieved his hand and squinted at me “so you can see?” I nodded, “I see a cute red-haired being adorable.” he walked to my right, “and can you hear me from this side?” “Yeah, clear and loud,” he squinted harder and walked behind me, “And you can feel this?” he started to tickle me in my sides, and he knows full well that’s my weakness “HAHAHA StOO—OZW HAHAHA I GiVE!!!” I hugged him to stop his tickling. I ended up panting hard from all the laughter. “Nothing was taken?” “I was going to tell thee, but thou decided to test me! Now Marten knows I'm ticklish!!!”

  Marten nodded pleased “you better believe I will use this information to mess with you later” I let go of Ozwald and pass everyones belonging to each other so we could give our report and plan form there “I`ll take the bathroom guys” she closed the door as we changed in the room and once we were ready we marched to Dr. Cambell`s office and found the door slightly opened “Mr. Lulu… we are here” and just like a villain in a book she turned her chair around, fingers interlocked and looked at us, and instead of yelling or reprimend us she calmly walked to Ozwald and I “why would you do something like that alone?” and pulled us into an iron thingt hug I felt a few popings in my back from the pressure “I was worried sick… still I`m proud of everyones work” this embrace, theres something nostalgic about it, for all the time I have been here Mrs. Lulu has nevere striked me for the emocional type, she is someone commanding and in control but feeling her arms trembling at the tought of Ozwald and mine demise put things in perspective “Mrs. Aster… sorry we didn’t tought it would be this hard” Ozwald answered she broke the hug and walked away “you should always expect the next fight to be the last so when you survive you can celebrate… also do this to me again and I will save your asses just so I can shoot you myself, Got it?” back to be her commanding self, we gave her the full report and after a little talk “listen the Holy Cross hinted at the fact that they cant create a calamity often or correctly Paolo is probably their first sucssess and even at that Luxura sounds far weaker than Able and the shark”

  “maybe it was becose unlike Able Paolo didn’t had a Titan” Donna commented “think about it, the main difference was that there was an actual Titan offering power and sustan to Able while Paolo`s body was treated only as a shell” “well first things first, we will try to use the Supervia Core to stablise the body of Paolo and see if we can use it as a replacement for the core Otis stold, so for now go home and rest I will think of an appropiet and ironic punishment for all of you later” and with that it seems like our little trip to the beach is over.