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Not a single entity could fathom their surroundings any longer. The sky — though futile — crushed and gnawed its way down, threatening to crush the girl in white. She, a pale beauty, stomped her heels into the quaking earth, drawing glass shards towards the girl in black, who deflected them with equal determination.
The shards from the girl in white, Hikari, were imbued with memories from her journey through the blooming and iridescent labyrinth. They were almost alight with a pink flame — a flame of motivation and desire, a desire to kill Tairitsu, the tempest summoned from the labyrinth of decay and death. However, their battle came to a halt. Hikari leaned over, bringing her prismatic defence down, and let out a sigh. "You... don't have to do this," she muttered. Yes, she was speaking to Tairitsu, but with a tone that suggested she was also telling herself to stop, to give up and accept defeat.
Much to Hikari's dismay, that did not seem to be Tairitsu's plan. "You're right. I don't have to... for you." She allowed a smile to curve the side of her lips before dropping it effortlessly. Moving toward the girl in white, she lifted a finger to Hikari's chin, then cupped her cheek. Tairitsu studied the face of the girl in her hand, frowning and squinting. She saw the pink flames within Hikari beginning to wither — a sign that all the method to her madness was succeeding in wearing down her opponent. "I don't have to do this for you," she finished, raising her free hand to summon her swarm of dark glass.
Hikari's eyes widened. She knew she couldn’t die yet; she couldn’t leave this world without knowing what else lay beyond this... this...
Right, this — where was she now? The sky had broken, descending into this wasteland, errors and glass fracturing her surroundings. This was no longer the cathedral below; this was a place where she would truly settle the score against the damned Tempest who had sent them here.
And with that, the testimony began. The fuchsia fire, representing the girl in white’s will, flared once more. Once a bellowing echo of pastel flames, had now become a roaring ember of wisps among the memories and anomalies Hikari carried. She let the newly formed pink bow in her hair settle, the swords gravitating behind her taking their places. The girl in white once again encased herself in a glass shell before attacking.
Tairitsu ground her teeth, a 'tch' escaping her lips before she fired back. She had no plan, only a motive: to destroy the girl in front of her. The Tempest had created her storm, but Fatalis' will did not waver. As if the memories could speak to her, they began to form anew. Hikari furrowed her brow, concerned. The memories had sentience? Their own motives? Since when?
These questions, however, did not matter, for the sentient memories had now reformed into a sword. A dagger, shining silver, bound together by a jasper of bloody red. Now placed in Fatalis' hand, she prepared to lunge once the storm of death and destruction simmered, becoming more of a comatose time lapse than a vicious memory.
Letting down the pragmatism she had once surrounded herself with for safety, Hikari — the called Fatalis, sealer of fate — lunged forward. It felt more forceful than she had calculated, as though her movements were no longer as fluid as before the sword had claimed her hand. However, she did not resist. She continued towards the girl in black, her eyes clenched shut until she hit a bump in the road... that bump being Tairitsu.
With a gasp and a hand on Hikari's cheek, the Tempest’s panicked breaths filled the air as the sword drove itself into Tairitsu's chest and continued through to the other side of her body. Hikari’s pupils shrunk as she whimpered now, tears falling while placing one hand over Tairitsu’s and shakily removed the other from the sword. Nobody spoke, nor did anyone dare utter a word. Only the final breaths of the Tempest and Fatalis filled the dark universe.
Tairitsu’s hand slipped from Hikari's cheek, and she allowed it, crying over the now lifeless girl in her lap. This was how Fatalis had to testify — and the red jasper sealed upon the sword was now far more discoloured than she remembered, a symbol of her poorly chosen path.
There was no justice, after all, for either of them.