There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)

The last time Zein went to a funeral, it was for his already deceased parents, who he knew were already dead since he was born. If anything, it was a memorial service rather than a funeral. Thus, the sadness he felt was momentary, and the relief of finally putting his parents in the same resting place took a bigger place than the sadness.

There were a lot of dead comrades during his Borderland Unit enlistment, but most of them had no body to be buried, since no one had enough extra life to retreat from the Deathzone while carrying a dead weight. With how easily it happened anyway, they became numb to death and after twenty minutes of memorial service in the courtyard, they had to go back to their own duty.

And so, the last time Zein had a sorrowful funeral was seven years ago, if it even could be called that. A mass cremation that would not allow him to recognize the remnants of the twins’s bones. It was abrupt, short, and he had no time to digest it properly until four years later.

Compared to that, this funeral was less personal for him. While he was close to the guides and Anzus, he was rarely involved with other espers since he specialized in guiding high-ranking espers. He knew both of the espers whose funerals he attended, but he never interacted with them, unlike Bassena.

Looking at it like that, he shouldn’t get too affected by the funeral. If anything, he was there to support Bassena.

But he was wrong. Dead wrong.

The fact that it wasn’t personal made his mind wander instead of focusing on the deceased. And for Zein, a wandering mind was dangerous.

Everything started well; he was worried that Erika’s family would lash out at Bassena as the commander, but they didn’t do such a thing. Instead, they thanked the esper for coming to the funeral and told him to hang on. It seemed that Radia’s personal visit and the clip of the battlefield that had been circulating that day from the conference post contributed to that treatment.

Thanks to that, the funeral went on peacefully. It was autumn, and the cemetery was surrounded by a sea of red foliage. The same color of red as that accursed twilight where Zein lost the twins. The leaves swirling in the air and scattering on the ground looked like the bloody road he had to walk on as he carried his brother’s lifeless body.

Zein thought he had overcome it already, but it seemed that the scar ran deep. The twins’ death, for him, was harder than facing the truth about his parents. He held himself well during the first funeral, but on the second one, which was held by the guild, his chest felt heavy with the weight of his necklace.

Perhaps it was the way he knew everyone who was attending. It was quiet, with everyone thinking back to the battlefield; the solemnity of the quiet sorrow reminded him even more of that red day.