Chapter Text
Being awoken to the sight of bland stone brick walls surrounding her, Gura groaned at the pain her body felt at the slightest move. The shark had to somewhat shield her eyes from the amount of light that was coming from nearby. It would normally be bearable, but she still felt exhausted as if she hadn’t slept very long. Maybe she didn’t. Gura didn’t know how long she was out, but figured the bright light woke her up.
That’s when she began to hear the erratic clanking coming from somewhere nearby. Realizing that the sound was what awoke her, she attempted to get up, quickly finding out that her limbs felt completely stiff. Sleeping in an uncomfortable position in addition to still wearing her armor had not been kind to her body.
Everything had fallen apart, they had lost their home, their stockpiles, their food, all of their progress. Gone.
Her exhaustion led to the shark tightly gripping her helmet, removing it before aggressively throwing it against the wall. She had never felt anger like this, but quickly took it out on her beaten armor, giving the other pieces similar treatment as they were thrown against the wall.
Gura slumped back down against the wall, trying to calm herself through her shaking hands. She didn’t even know where she was, in the stone brick corridor that she had awoken in.
She felt like something was missing, but as she tried to think of what that was, she found her thoughts being broken by the repeated clanking from nearby.
Letting out a frustrated growl, the shark clenched her fists as she headed around the corner to investigate the clanking, her anger at the moment tempting her to tear apart whatever she would find causing the noise.
Turning a corner to the hallway where the sound was coming from, the shark did not immediately find what the source of the sound was, instead she found what she had been missing; Amelia.
Stepping around a mound of seemingly random logs and towards the unconscious detective, the shark gave her a strong kick as she huffed, “get up.”
Amelia began to stir, but another clank brought the shark’s gaze aside, past a wall of iron bars to see their recent stalker trapped behind the bars. The zombie was tapping its sword against the metal, making the horrendous noise.
The bars were fully intact, the monster hadn’t been doing any damage to them. It seemed like it was doing it on purpose, trying to get attention.
“I bet you think you’re really funny, don’t you?” The shark grumbled.
In retaliation, Gura pounded on the bars, the action doing more damage to her fist that it made in sound. The shark yelped in pain as she brought her fist against her body to cushion it.
Behind the bars, the monster seemed to enjoy seeing the shark hurt herself, which Gura quickly noticed and snarled at the creature, “you better watch yourself, you’re small enough to make a good lunch.”
A groan and shifting metal let the shark know that Amelia had gotten up, to which the detective tiredly said, “you seem angry.”
“Yeah, I am.”
“You usually aren’t like that, something up?”
“Well, this little shit is sitting in there all smug after making all this noise. I couldn’t get any sleep with that horrible ruckus and-“
“It’s messing with us.” Amelia said, looking over at the monster. Something changed in her expression and tone, suddenly harsher than it was before.
Gura watched as Amelia took a few steps towards the bars, noticing a limp in her left leg. The detective stood in front as she reached for her helmet. She slowly began to remove it when she suddenly snapped it forward, making a loud clang against one of the top bars, as well as a little crack.
The detective glared at the monster when it didn’t even flinch at the sound.
As Amelia looked over at Gura, the shark huffed “looks like you aren’t in the best mood either.”
“No shit Sherlock, just looking at that little asshole makes me want to strangle it.”
“Let’s go somewhere else, I can’t stand looking at it anymore without being able to get rid of it.” Gura groaned.
Along the way, Amelia began to remove her armor, dropping it in the middle of the hall as they walked. It was then that Gura noticed slight burn marks on part of the detective’s clothing.
“Ame, what happened to your clothing?”
Amelia grumbled, “Let’s just say that I found out what makes that little demon’s sword glow.”
They continued walking until Amelia spoke up again, “we left my coat back at the house, didn’t we?”
It hadn’t registered for the shark that she was only wearing her underclothing. Gura mumbled something under her breath as she looked down at her exposed abdomen, causing Amelia to stop and ask, “what?”
“You were right.”
“Right about what?” Amelia gave the shark a confused look.
“Right about this place being a death trap. That we won’t make it out.”
“Are you serious? You were the one encouraging me yesterday about needing to keep going.” Amelia’s tone was suddenly much harsher.
“Well you were right, and now I look like an idiot!” Gura snapped.
Annoyedly, Amelia spoke, “Gura that doesn’t-“
“It does!” Gura cut the detective off, “you were right. Right that after everything seems to be going well, things go wrong. Some sort of raid? Really? Why did it need to happen then? What even causes a raid?”
Amelia raised her eyebrow as she began to think, “From what I remember, you need to be dumb enough to kill one of those weird villagers with crossbows, like the ones from yesterday. It has some sort of flag on-“ Amelia paused, pinching the bridge of her nose, “Gura did you kill one that was carrying a flag?”
“I don’t know! I just attacked the ones that were in front of me. I didn’t get a good enough look at which ones they were, I was just trying to run.” Gura began to raise her voice.
Amelia let out a heavy sigh, followed by a groan.
“It’s not my fault! I didn’t know that I needed to avoid that one specifically!”
Amelia growled, “you don’t have to be so aggressive!”
“I’m sorry! I’m exhausted, I’m hungry, and everything that I felt gave me safety is now gone!” Gura snapped.
“Everything? What about me?” The detective retorted.
“You? You were ready to just give up yesterday! Are you even willing to go on?”
“Yes.”
Gura’s look of rage turned into one of confusion, “how? We are going to have to start from scratch! What is getting you to go on?”
Amelia’s gaze softened as she looked at Gura, multiple emotions appearing on her face as she stared in silence.
Gura was about to ask again when the detective spoke, “the one thing I still need to do.”
“That? How can-“ Gura stopped and softened her tone. “What… what is it that you need to do once we get out?”
The detective finally broke eye contact, “I can’t say, now is not a good time.”
“Not a good time? Really? Ame I asking you because I need some hope as well.” Gura snapped, back to expressing her anger.
“I’ll tell you later, you’re not… yourself right now.”
“Not myself? Ame I am myself, I’m just finally being realistic, like you were yesterday!”
“But you’re also tired and hungry, just like you said, you just need to recover and you’ll be back.”
“Ame there’s no going back! The odds of this are completely against us!” Gura took a deep breath in, “can you not tell me what it is that you need to do because I need to help you with it? What is it? Knowing you, you’re probably going to ask me to do something perverted for you.”
“Gura that isn’t-“
“Then what is it? What is so important to you?”
“I can’t say-“
“Something you have to do? Do you have to save someone with your time travel? No? What, do you need to tell someone that you love them?”
Amelia’s expression changed slightly upon the last suggestion, and Gura was barely able to pick up on it. The shark had said it as a joke, maybe deep down she hoped the answer would be yes, but she wasn’t ready for that possibility to come true.
“Ame… is there someone you love?” Gura said, her angry tone was now completely serious.
“Gura that not it, I’m not-“ Amelia seemed to freeze, like something was caught in her throat. The shark waited until Amelia spoke again, “y-yes.”
“And you want my help for it? Ame, whoever it is would probably feel the same way, anyone would want you.” Gura’s throat tightened as she asked, “It’s Ina… isn’t it?”
“N-No, it’s not Ina I-“ Amelia frowned, “I promise, I’ll tell you later, it’s just now isn’t a good time, ok?”
Rather than wanting to keep pressing the question, Gura felt relieved, as she looked at the detective who was refusing to make eye contact with her, “okay.”
Finally looking back up, Amelia gave the shark a thankful expression.
Neither said anything as a minute or two a complete silence passed, both standing in place. The quiet was broken by the nearby clanking starting up again.
It was then that Gura sighed, “I’m… going to go explore around this place for a bit and see where exactly we are. I need to think for a bit… on my own. I’ll… come back in a little bit.”
Amelia nodded as she watched the shark head out into an unexplored portion of the hallways. She slouched down and tried to calm herself from the conversion, not expecting for Gura to be so questioning like that. She didn’t know if she would ever be ready to tell the shark the truth.