\n Chapter Eight

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\n Tears

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\n Stahl surprised himself by how well he remembered the path back to the Koena ruins, and it wasn't a long swim around the island to the underwater cave that gave access to the elevator. By the time he dove under the surface towards the cavern, the sun had completely set, but the sky was lit a deep blue by the moon. The water was colder than he remembered. It felt frigid despite his fur, which served to make him quicken his pace.

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\n He was grateful as he came up on the cavern where Mea would be waiting. Scrambling out of the water, he wiped the wetness from his fur as he stood up, scanning the room for Mea. She was leaning with her back against the wall, just to the side of the elevator door. Her arms were crossed, and she was frowning in Stahl's direction.

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\n "You're late. How long ago did the sun set?" She asked, tapping her foot paw on the ground. Her fur was dry, so she had to have been waiting at least a little while.

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\n He took a few steps toward her, but found her gaze to be a bit unnerving, so he kept his distance. "Len kept me for longer than I thought he would. On the bright side, we finished my initiation. I'm his apprentice now." Stahl pointed at his left shoulder, showing off his new tattoo.

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\n "I fail to see what's bright about that." She turned the pressed the button for the elevator, and the light above the door lit up, signaling that it was on the bottom floor. "The elevator will be here soon. So now that you've given your life away, I guess you won't be able to go make a life out of treasure hunting."

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\n "I didn't give my life away. I'm going to become Shaman so that I can help other people. It's more useful than bringing back junk from the ocean floor." Stahl said, watching the lights above the elevator door flash words he didn't understand.

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\n "More useful to them, but how will you be happy if all you worry about is other people?" Mea pressed the elevator call button again, impatiently. "You can't just give up on your dreams because your friend almost died."

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\n "My friend almost dying is what made me realize what was important to me." A loud chime signaled that the elevator was there. Stahl recognized the foreign word above the door, even if he didn't know what it meant.

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\n As the doors slid open, Mea slipped between them, onto the elevator. She leaned against the back, just as she had on the wall outside. Stahl followed her in and pressed the button on the inside, which he knew by now made the elevator move down. "Can I ask you something, then, Mea?"

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\n "That's a useless question. It depends on what you're going to ask." Mea set her eyes on Stahl, waiting for the question.

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\n Stahl wrinkled his nose, his fur bristling at her attitude. "What's your problem with Shamans? You're so negative about them." There was a jarring shudder as the elevator began to move down the shaft, towards the deeply buried ruins, and Stahl nearly lost his balance. He leaned on the wall to keep from falling over.

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\n Mea was silent for awhile, staring at the floor. Then she started to speak slowly, her harsh attitude having melted to a somber sadness. "You already know that I grew up in the city, that's where I learned to take care of myself. In the city, you have to look out for yourself, or you'll end up broke or dead. If you watch someone else's back, you aren't watching your's well enough. There was a group, though, we were all treasure hunters. We had a sort of code, we would help each other when we could, and for awhile, it worked well."

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\n Stahl nodded as he listened. He still wasn't sure what this had to do with shamans, but he assumed it would get there eventually. "That's where you met Lakeland."

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\n Mea looked over and cocked a brow at the younger Lahu. "He told you to stay away from me, right?"

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\n "He did, but obviously I didn't listen to him," Stahl said, sweeping his tail absently against the wall behind him.
\n "He was part of the group. One of the many city born and bred. He had a knack for bringing back junk and turning it into a useful commodity in the city, and that made him useful. Ironic that I'd run into him out here, making a life for himself where I never could." Mea rubbed a paw against her face, but Stahl couldn't tell if she was scratching an itch or wiping away a tear.

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\n "What do you mean? You tried to live with a tribe?"

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\n "On one of my treasure hunts, I met him," she said, wrapping her paw around the necklace that hung close below her chin. "He was a shaman's apprentice in the Haku tribe, where I was born. He was a bit older than me, only a few years from becoming the tribe shaman. I was staying in the village during my hunt, and one thing led to another. Before I knew it, he was asking me to stay with him. He gave me this necklace, as a sort of engagement gift." The elevator jerked as it came to rest at the bottom floor. With another chime, the doors opened to the ruins. Mea walked out without hesitation.

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\n Stahl followed closely, letting Mea lead the way through the rooms, back out to the hallway that led to the intersection between the four wings of the building. "So what happened then?"

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\n Mea stopped, and held her paw out to block Stahl, as they approached the first door at the end of the white hallway. "There's a weapon on the other side of this door, remember?"

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\n "Yeah, the laser. How are we going to get past it then?" Stahl asked, sure that Mea had a plan of action already forming in her head.

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\n "I'm going to be the decoy, and you're going to blast it with your glove-thing. With any luck, that should disable it, and make it safe for us to pass."

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\n "How lucky are you, generally? I'm not very lucky, so you've got a lot of weight to carry." Stahl chuckled nervously, reaching for the glove hanging from the usual spot on his belt.

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\n "If I wasn't lucky," Mea said, as she approached the door, preparing to run, "I wouldn't be alive today. Ready?"
\n Stahl held up his gloved paw, and wiggled his fingers. "As I'll ever be. Sorry if you end up dead."

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\n "Oh, it's quite alright. Just don't leave me down here if I do. I'd hate for this to be my tomb." With that, Mea moved forward, and the door slid open for her.

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\n The rest happened fast, as Stahl raised his gloved paw and aimed it at the weapon hanging from the ceiling. It swiveled to follow Mea, who ran swiftly past it. Unfortunately, Stahl was standing too far away, and the door slid closed before he could get his shot off. The incredible force from the glove wrenched the door against its frame, mangling the metal viciously as Stahl was thrown backwards, down the hall, landing with a dull thud against the floor.

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\n He scrambled to his feet and ran towards the door, slamming his fist against it when it didn't open. "Mea?" he shouted, looking down at the bottom of the door. It was bent in such a way that there was about an inch of clearance on the bottom, and so he fell to the ground and slid his gloved paw underneath. He closed his eyes tightly and clenched his teeth as he fired the glove, the upward force pushing the door cleanly up into the ceiling above. The downward force pressed Stahl's paw into the ground, as if it was being crushed by a heavy boulder. The glove's lens shattered, and the wires sparked a few times. He gritted his teeth, trying to keep from screaming. As soon as he was able, he pulled his paw back and held it close against his chest, his other paw fumbling to to take off the glove. He threw it across the hall, holding his damaged paw against himself.

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\n Blinking the tears from his eyes, he glanced down the hall, looking for any sign of Mea. She stood safely in the middle of the threshold, looking down at him. "Are you okay?" she asked, kneeling next to him. She took his paw in hers and pulled it closer, despite his protests. "Well, nothing looks broken. You're fine."

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\n "Fine? Says you. My paw feels like the sun set on top of it." Stahl growled as he sat up, sharply pulling his paw back to himself.

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\n Mea laughed a bit as she stood. "Sun set on top of it? That's a new one. Don't be a pup, you've been through worse in the past week."

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\n Stahl flexed his paw, looking over at his glove laying on the floor across the hall. "Looks like my glove is done for, though. What happened?" He stood and walked over, inspecting the broken device before hanging it back on his belt. "There's no way I hit it through the door."

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\n Mea shrugged deliberately, walking through the threshold to the other half of the hallway. She bent and picked up the remains of the security weapon. "Either you hit it through the door or someone else came and beat us to the punch."

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\n Stahl approached wearily, glaring at the scraps that Mea was holding. "Neither of those make any sense."
\n "Is there any point in dwelling upon it? We can keep moving now." Mea tossed the scraps aside nonchalantly.
\n "It just makes me uneasy," Stahl said, looking back behind them as they started to head towards the center of the ruins. "So you were telling me why you hate shamans," he asked, rubbing his hurt paw with his free one.
\n "His name was Tayu. I told him I would stay, because I couldn't stand to say no to his face. I left that night, while he was still sleeping. I went back to the city, and I tried my best to forget about him. I just went back to my life. I ran away." Mea approached the second door, and held her paw out once again to stop Stahl. She gradually got closer and when it began to open, pressed her back against the wall. Once she saw that the far side was clear, she waved Stahl through.

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\n "That can't be where the story ends." Stahl said, as he moved ahead, back into the central intersection of the ruins. The four hallways must lead to the four wings, he mused to himself. "So any idea how we find the fifth wing?"
\n Mea followed, and walked up close behind Stahl, wrapping her arms around him with a grin as she reached her paw into the pocket on his shorts, pulling out the card key. Stahl's ears flushed and he stepped forward, away from her, after she removed the card from his shorts. "These keys are automatic. It seems the ancients had a penchant for laziness, so all you have to do is have the key near what you want to use it for, and you're set."
\n "So all we have to do is walk past whatever this key is for, and it'll let us use it. Lets hope it actually is a key, then. If not, we'll be walking around all night."

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\n "We won't be walking around all night," Mea said, smiling as she started to walk down the hall, "because I have a hunch." When she reached the middle of the intersection, she stopped and turned to the wall. With little effort, she removed a panel, revealing a glowing screen hidden underneath. "I found this awhile back."

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\n Stahl quickened his pace, interested by the hidden screen. "You knew that was there the whole time?"

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\n "Sort of. But I didn't have the key for it, so why would I bother bringing it up?" she asked as she held the key up to the screen. After a few seconds, the screen flashed, and more words that Stahl didn't recognize appeared. With a bit of manipulation, the floor at the middle of the intersection began to shift, and a hidden panel opened up to a ladder, leading down below the facility.

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\n Stahl's tail wagged and he smiled at Mea before turning to inspect the newly opened passage. The ladder led down into a black hole, and it seemed as if there was no illumination below. "Thats amazing. I walked right over top of it without knowing it was there."

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\n "Ladies first." Mea said, as she stood next to the ladder, waiting for Stahl to start climbing down.
\n "What?" Stahl asked, not familiar with her figure of speech, as he crouched and slid down into the passageway.
\n Mea sighed and shook her head, rolling her eyes. "Just climb."

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\n The ladder lasted forever, or at least that's what it seemed like to Stahl. As they climbed, Mea continued to tell her story. "Awhile after I left Tayu, I joined with Lakeland and a few others to look for the Tear. I didn't like it, I always preferred working alone. But working together proved to be more efficient, and it saved us so much time. We followed every lead there was, and we always kept the others in the loop. Of course, all of us were keeping the best bits of information to ourselves, myself included."

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\n She paused, chuckling under her breath. "That's why Lakeland has issues with me, I think. Anyway, my search eventually took me back to the Haku tribe. Who would've guessed back then that I was at the wrong Lahu tribe. Either way, I had to face Tayu again."

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\n Stahl looked up at Mea. "You aren't giving me any good reasons to trust you," he said jovially.

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\n "I saved your life, you owe me," she said, taking a step quickly to place her paw down on top of his injured one.
\n He hissed and pulled it away, shaking it. "Hey, you don't want me to fall, do you?"

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\n "Maybe. I guess you'll have to trust me." She grinned down at him, but in the darkness, all he could see were her fangs. "Anyway, Tayu couldn't have been happier to see me. He asked me to stay, again. He wanted to pick up where we left off. I refused, I said I was only there for work, but he wouldn't listen. One day, he followed me into the ruins I was investigating. It was the same day that my 'partner' decided he was close enough to the Tear that he didn't need my help anymore." Mea paused, her voice starting to weaken, sounding as if she was on the verge of tears.

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\n "He shot me. He shot me, and the only reason I'm alive is because Tayu found me. He used his inscriptions to heal me. The wounds were bad. I shouldn't have lived. It took most of Tayu's life just to keep me alive. Maybe I was dead already. It doesn't matter. All that matters is that I woke up, and Tayu didn't." Mea wiped another tear from her eye.
\n Stahl's paw finally hit solid ground, and he jumped from the ladder, stretching his arms happily. "Finally. It's dark down here," he said, looking around, unable to find any light sources. "I guess we'll have to feel our way around."
\n Mea jumped off the ladder, too. She pulled a metal cylinder from her bag and turned it on, illuminating the hallway. "Flashlight," she said, shining it in Stahl's eyes. He winced, covering them with his paws.

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\n "So my search for the Tear took on a new meaning. I needed to find it to bring Tayu back. I never should have left him. He never should have come for me," Mea said as she led the way down the dark, narrow passage.
\n Stahl placed his paw on Mea's shoulder as he followed. "I'm sorry. But Tayu saved you. He did exactly what he wanted to, with his life."

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\n "You don't know what you're talking about, kid. Life shouldn't be thrown away like that, not for anyone." She pushed Stahl's paw off her shoulder and continued forward. "Shamans pay too high of a price. He threw his away for me, but I never asked him to. He should have just lived his life for himself," Mea said, turning back to Stahl. "And now I've had to devote my life to giving it back to him."

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\n Stahl looked at the ground and held his paw back behind him. "Sorry." He followed the rest of the way down the hall in silence. He didn't have anything to say, because part of him agreed with her.

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\n Eventually, they came across another door. As it slid open, the bright lights on the other side blinded both of the Lahu. Mea switched off the flashlight and replaced it to her bag.

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\n The room on the other side was small, but a large glass wall overlooked a huge cavern on the outside. By the glass wall, there was a number of computer screens, each flashing words at an incredibly fast rate. Mea entered first and walked to the computer screens, trying to read what they were saying. Stahl, not able to understand the words, looked out over the vast cavern beyond. A set of stairs led from the chamber they were in to the floor of the cavern.

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\n "This isn't good," Mea said, scanning all of the screens. "Something is wrong with this machine, whatever it is."

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\n "No, you think?" Stahl said, pointing through the glass. On the other side, what look like lightning cracked and bolted through the air, speeding around the chamber. The lightning came in every different color, and altogether seemed to give the room a strange silver glow. Stahl flinched back when a bolt struck the glass, but it was reflected safely back towards the far wall.

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\n "This must be some sort of ancient machine. What does it do?" Mea looked around the room, searching for more information. There wasn't much to be found. At the end of the room, there was another door, locked not with a computerized mechanism but with a mechanical valve. From the looks of it, the door opened to the stairs that led down into the lower chamber.

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\n Stahl continued to examine the room on the other side of the glass. On the bottom of the cavern, he could see a large metal floor had been installed. On the floor, he saw familiar markings, etched into the metal itself. The markings, at the edges, were a perfect circle. Inside, they were nearly identical to the inscriptions of a shaman. Stahl pressed his paw to the glass and felt the energy on the other side of the glass. "They discovered magic." He whispered, trying to grasp what they had found.

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\n "The ancients didn't use magic, Stahl, they used machines," Mea said, stepping forward to one of the frantically flashing computer screens. She began to manipulate it, pulling up whatever information she could. "According to this, it's a power generator, fueled by the Heaven's Tear. They were draining the energy from the Tear, to siphon power off to the rest of their civilization. It must have reactivated when I turned on the ruins last week."

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\n Stahl took a step back from the glass, and looked over at Mea, eyes wide. "Mea, when exactly did you turn this machine on? What day did you activate the ruins?"

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\n Mea looked up at Stahl, trying to remember. "The day before I showed up in the village. I got caught by Alaka, snooping around, so I had to come visit through politically acceptable methods."

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\n Stahl turned back to look closer at the circular pattern etched into the bottom of the cavern. "Is it possible this machine is related to what wiped out the ancients?"

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\n "Anything is possible, but I don't think we have enough evidence here to conclude that." Mea waved a paw at him as she started sifting through information from the computer.

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\n "Mea, what if this machine is what is causing the dead spot, the make'loa? It showed up on the same day that you turned this on. What if this machine is broken, and isn't taking energy from the Tear anymore?"

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\n "Is that possible?" she asked, looking down into the cavern through the window.

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\n "If the Tear isn't here, or something is wrong, maybe the inscription there is causing this machine to take energy from whatever sources it can find. We use a similar inscription in our New Year ritual. Taking just a bit of energy from each one of us, and giving it to all. This is just the opposite."

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\n Mea shook her head, reading from the computer. "The Tear is still here, that's what the computer is telling me."

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\n "Forget the Tear, Mea. We have to shut this thing down! It might be creating the make'loa. The dead spot is almost at the village, if we don't stop it soon, we'll have to leave the Kahawai." Stahl moved next to Mea, trying to grab her attention away from the computer screen. She didn't seem to notice him.

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\n "Forget it, Stahl. I don't know how, and you're not likely to figure it out yourself. I'm not leaving without the Tear. Not after I've come this far." Mea said, turning to the door at the far end of the chamber. "It's down there. In that cavern." With a quick step, she made her way to the door and started to turn the valve.

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\n Stahl stared at Mea, unsure of what to do. He couldn't believe she was putting the Tear before everyone in the tribe. "I don't care about the Tear anymore. This thing is a danger to the tribe, and everyone on the Kahawai. We have to go tell Len. He might know how to disrupt the inscription."

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\n "Then do it by yourself," Mea shouted as she struggled to open the valve on the door.

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\n "You caused this, you have to help. You owe us that much!" Stahl moved behind Mea, trying to get her attention. When he placed his paw on her arm to get her attention, she pushed back violently, knocking him to the ground.
\n Mea glanced down at Stahl after she pushed him down, and then went back to the valve on the door. Stahl glared back up at her as he pushed himself up to a sitting position.

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\n He had learned a lot in the past week. Before everything he had been through, maybe he would have stayed with Mea. He would have cared about the Tear. Now, it didn't matter. All that mattered was getting back to Len.
\n Furious, Stahl stood and started to walk away. He slammed his paw against the computer as he passed by it. "Fine, I'll do it myself. Lakeland was right, I never should have bothered with you."

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\n The words stung Mea, but she didn't stop trying to open the door. She never even turned to see Stahl leave, but somehow, she still knew what he was gone. That sense kicked in, the one that told her she was alone. As usual. She gripped the sides of the valve tightly, and turned with all of her strength. Eventually, the metal began to turn, bit by bit, until she had completed a full revolution. With one more hard pull, the door shifted free of its frame. Mea quickly swung it aside and ducked through the threshold.

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\n On the other side was the top of the stairwell that led down into the lightning addled chamber. The wall of the stairwell was as white as the hallways above, despite the fact that the rest of the cavern had bare stone walls. She quickly started to descent the stairs, flinching downward every time a bolt of lightning struck close to her. She hunched her shoulders forward, covering her head with her arms as she flew off the bottom of the stairs and onto the metal floor, which caused her paws to tingle ever so slightly.

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\n Scanning the room, she spotted her treasure at the center of the circular inscription. It was floating at shoulder height, of its own volition, seemingly untouched by any of the lightning that was ravaging the room. The Heaven's Tear, a crystal of such fabled blue vibrancy that it couldn't be described through comparison. To Mea's dismay, it seemed to have faded instead to a still vibrant ocean blue. It gave off a faint glow, looking as if it were surrounded by a safe, protective halo.

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\n She approached cautiously, holding her paw out towards the stone as she got close. More than once, lightning struck the ground near her paw, and she had to jump to the side to avoid it. Just before she could put her paw on it, a strike to the back of her head took her by surprise. Searing hot at the side of her head, the blow shattered her concentration and knocked her to the ground. She felt the warm trickle of blood down the side of her face as she attempted to stand up. Another blow, to the top of her head. She collapsed down, onto her belly, crying out as the brutal blow cracked against her skull. She could feel the energy in the floor, seemingly seeping into her body as a frigid tendril, wrapping her in its grasp.

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\n The world was hazy, and she could hardly see between the disorientation and the blood in her eyes. She groaned and tried to stand, but couldn't manage to find the strength. There was a loud clatter as a metal pipe was dropped unceremoniously next to her. She grabbed at it, rested her paw on top of it, but couldn't grasp it. She could barely see the legs that walked in front of her. She certainly couldn't discern any identifying features. A voice spoke to her.
\n "Thank you for opening the way for me. I've been waiting so long for this one."

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\n Mea tried to respond, but found no words. Once again, she tried to focus all of her energy into standing, and almost made it into a sitting position. She fell short, and ended up on her side. Looking up, she could still only see a silhouette of her attacker.

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\n He moved towards Tear, her Tear, and held his paw up below it, almost cradling it, as if it were a pup.
\n "Don't try to stand, I don't feel like taking a life today."

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\n He walked over and bent down, looking into her eyes. She could only see enough to tell that he was looming over her.
\n "No, I don't see any reason to do that."

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\n She felt his paw on her shoulder, rolling her onto her back. To the side of her vision, she could see as he once again approached her treasure. Mea made a pathetic noise as she tried to yell at him to stay away from her treasure, from her Tear. He removed the gemstone from its place, and held it up in front of him.
\n "No, this wont do. This one is far too drained. Nothing left."

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\n He sighed, audibly. His voice was raspy, Mea didn't recognize it. Her heart jumped when he loosed the Tear from his grasp, and she watched it fall the the hard metal floor. On impact, the gem didn't bounce, but instead shattered as if it were glass, the shards scattering around. One piece tauntingly landed just next to Mea's face. She could see that the shard was no longer blue, and had no divine halo around it. It was clear, empty, only a husk of what once had been.
\n "I suppose next I'll look for the one to the East."

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\n He loomed over Mea again, but she didn't remember seeing him approach. The world was getting darker, filled with shadows. It was harder to focus.
\n "That's a hint, in case you're too simple to figure it out. My gift to you for helping me get this far."

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\n With that, the figure walked away, up the stairs and out of the room. Mea reached for him as he walked by, but couldn't get anything in her grip. She collapsed onto her back again, closing her eyes. Sleep pulled at her, and she gave herself willingly. The icy tendrils reached up into her, wrapping themselves around her, pulling at her. She didn't care. There was nothing to fight for anymore. The Tear was gone, and so was Tayu.

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\n "It's gone." She whispered to no one as a tear fell to the floor, and she lost herself to the darkness.
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