Cold Nights Beneath the Southern Sky

Mikaela

The night felt colder than usual in this southern city. I sat in silence in the corner of the underground room—the only safe place left amid the ruins and debris of a once-shining city. In my hand, a broken communication device flickered weakly. I stared at it with empty eyes, as if waiting for a miracle to happen—as if hoping that one of its signals would come back to life.

But nothing ever did.

It had been days.

No signal from Yoona.No message from Jess.No sign of life from Mila.

The silence had long stopped being just around me. It had seeped in—through my skin, through my breath, into my very bones. I sat alone in the dark, head bowed low, teeth chattering. Not from cold. From the effort of holding it all in.

I hugged my knees to my chest, the thin, tattered jacket I wore barely holding my trembling body together. The fabric clung to me like a useless memory, a relic of a time when warmth was still a thing I understood.

But I knew.

I didn't need a transmission.I didn't need confirmation.I didn't need hope.

I knew what it meant.

They were gone.

M.I.A.Missing in Action.

Vanished.No bodies.No signals.No farewells.Just... absence.

"Damn it…"

The words cracked as they left my lips, no louder than a breath, no stronger than the grief lodged in my throat. They weren't a scream. They weren't a plea. Just something broken, empty.

Still, the tears came.

I didn't try to stop them.Didn't even try to pretend anymore.

My fist struck the cold concrete beneath me.Once.Twice.Again.

Not from anger. Not from rage. Just to remind myself I could still feel. But even pain was dull now—just another echo in a body that had lost its purpose. I failed them. I couldn't protect them. And so, I cried. Not the kind of crying that begged for comfort. Not the kind that ever truly ended.

It was the kind of crying that belonged to ruin.To graves without names.To promises I had no right to keep.

Not loudly—just a quiet, broken sound, stifled by the skin of my own wrist, clenched between my teeth in a desperate attempt to keep the sobs from escaping. But it was useless. The pain came anyway. The sounds slipped through, fragile echoes that dissolved into the cold walls of this room, swallowed by silence that didn't care.

And then, through the fog of everything—through the weight, the numbness, the guilt—her face returned to me.

Conny.

Her smile, too bright for the world we lived in. Her laugh, always too loud and full of life. Her strength, unwavering… the kind of strength I leaned on without ever thinking it would disappear.

I could still feel it—that final moment. The warmth of her body crashing into mine, forcing me out of the blast. The way her hands gripped my shoulders with the last of her power. The sharp scent of smoke and blood. The tremble of her breath against my ear.

And her voice.

"I've got you."

That was the last thing she said.

Right before she was gone.

"Mikaela! We can restore this world! If we destroy Omega Alpha, we can start over!"

"Don't give up! Get up! Make this world laugh again!"

I clenched tightly the small dragon-shaped pendant hanging around my neck.The one Conny had given me—a symbol of our promise.

I wiped my tears away harshly.My hands were trembling, but I forced myself to stand.

No.

I'm not done yet.

I stood amidst the ruins of a dying world.

The wind carried the stench of ash and iron, whispering through the skeletal remains of cities that once breathed with life. Everything I had known was gone—reduced to rubble, silence, and ghosts.

But something stirred within me.

A flicker.A breath of fire in the hollow of my chest.My eyes, dulled by grief for far too long, began to burn again.

I will destroy Omega Alpha.And from the wreckage, I will forge a new world.

Not this twisted wasteland soaked in blood.Not a world that devours the innocent and buries the brave.Not a future built upon the graves of those I failed to protect.

No.

The world I will create will not demand sacrifice—it will protect what remains.

I am Mikaela Filareine.And I swear this upon every scar and silence I carry.

I will seek out those who still remember what hope feels like.Even if it's faint. Even if it's dying.

I will find them.Gather them.Unite them.

For Yoona.For Jess.For Mila.

And for the future they never got to see.

And most of all—for you, Conny.

I clenched my fists, knuckles pale and bloodless, the skin split and raw. My breath shook as I raised my face toward the fractured ceiling above me. A single beam of moonlight pierced through the broken stone, casting a pale shimmer across my tear-streaked cheeks and the dust-covered floor.

The world had long since stopped speaking. The winds were hollow. The stars no longer sang. Yet in that quiet, I whispered.

"Wait for me, world…"

The words scratched against my throat, hoarse and nearly silent. But they carried weight—like ash, like memory.

"Wait for me... all of you. I will turn this around."

The silence answered with nothing but stillness. No voices called back. No divine hand reached down. The dead sky above offered no comfort.

But I didn't need it.

Not anymore.

Something had begun to stir within me—slow, trembling, fragile. Not hope. Not yet. But something close. Something like resolve, cracked and uneven, rising from the ruins of who I used to be.

I let the silence wrap around me, not as a prison, but as armor. Let the grief settle in my bones—not to weigh me down, but to remind me of who I had to become.

That night, beneath a sky long abandoned by stars, I buried the part of myself that had been waiting to be saved.

And in its place, I forged something new.

Not rage.Not vengeance.But purpose.

From the shattered pieces of my heart, I shaped a promise.

A promise that no matter how broken this world was—no matter how much it had taken from me—I would rise. Not for glory. Not for justice. But for them. For Yoona. For Jess. For Mila. And for Conny, whose laughter still echoed in the hollow of my chest.

The journey to change the world would not begin with fire or battle cries.It would begin here—in silence, in pain, in breath.

And I will not stop.I cannot stop.

Not until every word of my promise is fulfilled.Not until I rebuild what was lost.Not until the world remembers how to feel again.