Ravens of Eternity

47 Coming Together, Pt After much organization and planning and scheduling, Eva, Miko, and Mack reconvened a couple of cycles later. They were joined by Eva’s grandparents, who were positively ecstatic to hear that Eva was still alive.

The two of them looked like your typical caucasian grandparents – they were in their 60s and had completely grey hair. They were both thin and frail, but their eyes were full of life.

All three of them cried when they saw each other – the strain of their loss was difficult to bear. They thought she had died, and she thought she was never going to see them again.

“Grandpa! Grandma!” Eva cried.

“Eva darling!” replied her grandma. “It’s so good to see you again! We were so fraught when you disappeared... But now everything is right again! You’re alive!”

Even though they were separated into two completely different universes, Eva felt their warmth envelop her. It was as though they were right next to each other – the moment was that powerful for them.

“I’m glad you’re both alive as well. How are you two getting along?”

“Ah, our bones are old,” replied her grandpa. “It’s getting harder to get up in the mornings. Harder to get going. Easier to slow down. Easier to lay down.”

Eva frowned. Concern lined her face.

.....

“You’re still too young to say that,” she chided him.

“I’d say we’re just old enough to...”

Eva’s tears hadn’t stopped flowing since the call started, which surprised Miko and Mack both. This was a side of her that she had never shown anyone, ever. Except her grandparents, perhaps.

“How’s your savings doing? Is your insurance still holding strong?”

Grandpa started mumbling and cussing, so grandma answered for him. She said it plainly and calmly, but it was strained underneath.

“Oh, there was a bit of a vote recently,” she said. “The governor said it cost the state too much money, so-”

“So come next March,” intruded grandpa, “we’re gonna be pullin’ from our savings. Like he couldn’t kill us fast enough already!”

His voice was clearly agitated and irritated, and his face was furrowed in a deep scowl.

Grandma simply took her bony hands and rubbed at his shoulders, and attempted to comfort him.

“Mind your blood, dear,” she cood. “No need for it to boil, now.”

He began to calm down immediately.

That fucking asshole governor! thought Eva. The state’s outta cash ‘coz he’s got all of it!

Eva was furious about that. Half of the “leadership” in her country only used power to line their own pockets, or the pockets of their friends. They did so at the expense of everyone else. Worse, it was happening all over the world, and it hit everyone, everywhere hard.

The rich were literally eating the poor, wallet-first.

But she felt that she couldn’t do a thing about it. Not now, or in her old life. Greed was too formidable an opponent, and was one thing she couldn’t beat. Certainly not as a solo.

The only thing she could do was vent her frustrations on some hapless thugs.

“Why don’t you both move to another state?” she asked. “A place where they have more money and can take care of you?”

“Oh we’re too old to move around,” said grandma. “I don’t think we could handle that...”

“I wish I could send you my money,” said Eva.

If she had even the remotest possibility of sending her credits to them, she would have happily emptied her ledger. She would have done job after job and ground out the credits to send to them. But she couldn’t.

She had become powerful in her new life, and yet was still as powerless as she was before.

The contradiction ate away at her. Why couldn’t she do anything?

“It’s alright,” said grandpa. “We’re doing okay for now. Savings is still holding up.”

Eva wondered what they could have – no way was there enough for another year. They had never had much to begin with. The family were simple folk and never needed the frivolities of great wealth.

They had never found a use for it, and were content with what they had.

So they, like everyone else around them, were completely unprepared to have their already meagre wealth sucked out from under them by the powers-that-be.

Eva wanted to cry at the injustice of it all.

But then her resolve bubbled up from within her. She had done things in this new life that she never could have done in her old one. Who said that she was still powerless? Only herself! She was the only one in her own way. And that was a mode of thinking that she needed to shed.

So what if her opponent was completely unreachable? It didn’t mean she couldn’t do anything at all. She just wasn’t looking at the problem the right way.

She caught herself counting mecha on the battlefield, when she should have been looking for the shortest path to victory.

“We’ll figure out a way,” she said resolutely. “It doesn’t matter what problems we have in front of us, we’ll take care of it no matter what.”

Miko smiled widely. This was the Eva she knew.

Just as everyone basked in Eva’s radiance after her inspiring words, the sound of a phone ringing cut through the moment. Everyone’s faces flattened a little as it went on.

It was kind of a jingly little tune which caused Mack to shimmy a little bit, but he quickly realized that he needed to answer the call.

“Sorry,” he said. “Don’t go anywhere. Got a little surprise for everyone.”

He moved forward and tapped a few keys on his keyboard, then with a click of the mouse, a window appeared on the screen.

In the window was a middle-aged Japanese couple, their faces stoic yet warm. The two of them looked rather stiff and were dressed well, as though it was a special occasion.

In a way it was.

Miko immediately became ecstatic on seeing the pair.

“Tousan! Kaasan!” she said.

Eva realized that those two were her parents, so she backed away from the camera and let Miko take the spotlight. Mack had also increased the window, so they were larger on the screen.

Just like Eva and her grandparents, Miko and her parents burst into tears. Their previously formal and stiff bearing broke in an instant.

They were going to admonish her honorifics in how she greeted them, but simply found that they couldn’t. That simply held little value any longer. She was still alive – it didn’t matter what she called them.

What mattered was that they heard her.

All three spoke in a flurry of Japanese, and although everyone else didn’t know what they said, it was clear what was being spoken. They all missed each other greatly.

Eva noted how the normally stoic Miko had pretty much broken down at the very sight of her parents. For the first time since she met her, she actually behaved like a thirteen year old girl would, after having been separated from her parents for so long.

Miko was incredibly smart and capable, and was probably the most badass 13 year old in the galaxy. But in the end she was still just a little girl.

It tugged at her heart to see how vulnerable she had made herself in this moment.

Miko presented Eva with an upturned hand to her parents, and even said her name reverentially a number of times.

The two of them bowed to Eva, and exclaimed their thanks in english.

“Thank you for looking after our precious little Miko,” said Miko’s okaasan – her mother.

“Nn, thank you,” mirrored her otousan – her father.

Eva blushed at their thanks, and bowed a little in response. She got the sense that Miko had told her parents she was responsible for saving her. But that was truly only half the story.

“Miko is a great friend and trusted sister,” she said. “If it wasn’t for her, neither of us would be here today. She helped me and a dozen other people live through a vicious pirate attack. You should be very proud of her.”

She glanced over at Mack for just one moment before she turned her gaze back to Miko’s parents.

“She’s certainly more capable than most, despite her age,” Eva concluded.

With that, Miko’s parents’ already tear-soaked eyes burst forth even more. They were incredibly proud of her, and what she had achieved. Their only wish was that they could be with her as she grew even further, to heights neither of them could have ever reached themselves.

“Our pride for her is immeasurable,” said okaasan. “We only wish we could send you money, so we could see you better off.”

Her husband quickly leaned into her and whispered some Japanese into her ears, and they had a hushed conversation between the two of them. There was some concern laced in their tone.

Eva whispered to Miko as she was curious about what they were discussing. She had a feeling their discussion was about money.

“What’re they talking about?”

“They are discussing finances,” she replied. “Every time my mother brings it up, my father is unable to resist going into further detail. It is because he is an accountant. Classically trained.”

Miko then broke their discussion before it consumed them further. If she hadn’t, it might have escalated to more heated temperatures.

“Do not worry,” she told them, “we have plans to become very wealthy. However, we are both worried for all of you. Neither of our families have been materially wealthy, and we fear that your wallets have grown thin with time.”

Miko’s father nodded his head a few times. He replied with relatively broken english. He wasn’t as well-practiced with it as his wife was.

“We have trouble,” he said. “Your mother, laid off.”

Miko’s okaasan immediately berated her husband in rapid Japanese, but he took her hand and calmed her down with a soft and even voice.

“Eva also daughter,” he continued, “we must trust. Please?”

Miko’s mother understood what he was trying to say, and nodded her head. But her cheeks were slightly flushed from the embarrassment.

“I worked as a book translator for many years,” she said. “But the book companies have been losing money steadily, so they gave me less and less work. Eventually the contracts stopped coming.”

“That makes little sense to me,” said Miko. “There are always new books to translate. I do not understand why there are no contracts.”

Miko’s parents looked at each other briefly, then sighed. They weren’t sure how to explain something like nationalism to her. Its rise had caused their country to become more and more isolationist as the years went by.

.....

That resulted in less demand for anything that came from other countries and cultures, from books to movies to food. The companies who had imported those sorts of things watched as their margins shrunk. Less money, less work, less pay.

Many lost their jobs, and people like Miko’s mother suffered the consequences.

“The whole world is suffering, little Miko,” she replied. “Everywhere is becoming like this.”

“Is there anything the two of you can do? Are there other jobs?”

“Nn, there are. I am looking into them, but none can match my old salary.”

“We still strong,” otousan interjected. “For three-quarters year.”

Miko’s family had also suffered some financial losses. They might be strong now, but like Eva’s grandparents, their lives would become much harder in a year. She was about to say something when her grandpa interjected.

“Sorry for intruding,” he said. “But maybe we can help? We... we don’t have much, but we can try to scrounge up what we can.”

“Yes, we’d be happy to help,” grandma said in support.

Miko quickly replied, before either of her parents could.

“That is kind of you to offer, grandfather,” she said, “but we cannot accept. It is not a matter of saving face, but rather you are also in need. We cannot take from you, knowing you too have your own financial problems to bear.”

“If anything,” Eva added, “it’s the both of us that need to be providing for the four of you. Should be our duty, or somesuch. The universe we’re in is teeming with wealth. We just have to figure out how to get some of it to you. There’s gotta be a way.”

Both grandparents and parents were immediately filled with pride at Eva and Miko. They had taken filial responsibility, even though they couldn’t do so much as send each other a single cent.