Takes place shortly after: The Price of War
and The Cost of Living


The jump always seemed to leave a faint ringing in his ears, like a string on an instrument that was vibrating. One breath he was on Earth, the next he was stepping out into the warm summer air of Ganymede, into the solemn looming of his Wonder’s cathedral.

Reims let out a slow breath.

He never knew what he would find when he went there. Every visit felt like he was returning to a place that remembered him more than he remembered himself. That day, the light was soft, and gold filtered softly through drifting clouds. The flowers, still lingering from spring, scattered pinks and white along the long pathway leading towards the grand wooden carved doors of the cathedral. The scent was faint, but familiar. Comforting in a way he didn’t realize he’d come to look forward to.

Ahead, the great silhouette of Reims Cathedral rose from the landscape. Gothic spires climbed toward the twilight-blue sky. The stained glass windows glowed faintly, as though lit by an unknown source. Stone statues perched along the parapets. He’d only realized some of them were stone, winged lions the last time he’d visited. Perhaps because they were more repaired then than they had been before.

Reims (the Knight, although he felt too small to share the name) walked forward, hands sliding into his jacket pockets. He still didn’t know how this place worked. Why pieces that had been shattered for centuries slowly pieced themselves back together as if wanting to be whole again. Why it kept changing for him — for them. Because he knew it wasn’t just him. It was Yvoire too. It was any Knight or Senshi who spent time at the place whose name they shared.

He didn’t remember enough about this place to earn that kind of devotion.

Maybe he never would.

He paused to glance over towards Yvoire’s castle, and the bridge that was no longer crumbling like when they’d first discovered it. The arches holding the road up were solid now. Strong and elegant. Rising over the river that split the boundary between Wonders.

Yvoire’s castle stood in the distance across the water. The bridge connected them cleanly now — two ancient places, two old histories tied together once more.

He wondered what the bridge meant. He wondered how many things he wasn’t actually seeing. Either through ignorance or because he hadn’t earned the right.

A quiet, familiar ache stirred in his chest.

He’d talked to Yvoire earlier. Not about anything deep, but enough. Enough to know Yvoire was hurting too. Enough to know he was trying to be strong in all the ways he didn’t need to be. And Reims had told him… what? That he could come by, if he wanted. That he was going to be there.

It felt stupid now. Too soft and awkward. He didn’t know if Yvoire would actually show up. Or maybe he just arrived too early. He found himself turning slightly, his gaze drawn back to the far side of the river. Watching the wild flowers sway in the breeze. Waiting. Listening.

Sometimes, here, he could sense Yvoire before he appeared. Like a pressure in his chest, a moment before a heartbeat.

He stood still and waited for that feeling.

Waited longer than he meant to.

But nothing shifted. No change in the air. No aura brushing against his own.

Just quiet.

Reims exhaled slowly, both in relief and disappointment. “I guess it’s just me for now,” he breathed. Not upset, just… accepting. Yvoire had his own Wonder. His own grief. His own shadows to face.

Reims couldn’t expect him to follow every time he came here. Still… he looked once more across the water, as if wanting to give Yvoire one last change to surprise him.

Nothing.

He nodded to himself, as if acknowledging a truth he’d already known, then turned back toward the cathedral.

Wind brushed through his hair, and he lifted a hand to the side of his neck without thinking, his fingertips ghosting over the thin scar that was left on it. A reminder he couldn’t ignore. His ribs ached faintly, still tender even though they’d healed.

He wasn’t sure if he deserved to have healed so quickly.

The images from Northpoint returned easily. Yvoire being cut nearly through, the color draining from his lips. Amarynthos with blood pouring from his abdomen, holding himself up with only his staff and stubbornness. His friends — the people he’d come to cherish dearly — bleeding while he watched, while he failed, while something inside him screamed that Knights were supposed to protect others.

He had a sword. He had strength from his magic. He had a winged lion — magnificent and powerful, with stained-glass wings that caught the light like living windows — who’d fought for him, for them.

And none of it had been enough.

Reims swallowed hard, his throat tight.

The cathedral’s massive doors were already open by the time he reached them, arches climbing like giant ribs toward impossible heights. Multicolored light spilled from the windows, casting soft mosaics across the marble floor and wooden pews.

He’d cleaned this nave so many times — swept dust from the corners, polished the wood, touched the cracked stone with his bare hands in apology for letting it fall into ruin. Each time, something new had repaired itself. Statues stood where fragments once rested. Glass reset itself into patterns he didn’t fully recognize.

How many lives had he lived here? Just the one before?

How many secrets had he kept? Forbidden enough that not even Ganymede knew the answer.

He tried not to think about the role of his past self, or about anything else his past self had been. But the shadows of the truth followed him, carved into memory if he let his eyes close long enough to see.

He walked down the center aisle, steps slow. His thoughts had been loud for days, ever since Northpoint, ever since being harassed by the General and his youma.

He needed training. He needed to be stronger. Devyn, maybe. He’d promised he would train him after Reims had almost died before. Or Zac. Zac was frighteningly skilled — he could tell by just watching him, even if he didn’t have time to see much. Evan could help, too. Evan always helped, always cared, always showed up even when he shouldn’t have to.

But if the youma were tracking them somehow…

If something was following their energy signatures…

Then what happened if he drew those people into it? What if, in asking for help, he put them in the crosshairs?

He didn’t know if he could live with that.

His jaw tightened, hands curled around nothing. The cathedral, seeming to sense something in him, answered with a shift in the light — colors trembling faintly across the stone as though the Wonder itself was holding its breath.

Reims didn’t. He stood very still, knuckles turning white at his sides. The echo of not enough still clung to him like smoke, impossible to swallow back down.

A soft sound — too heavy to be wind, but too deliberate to be settling stone — broke through the quiet.

Reims flinched.

He wasn’t proud of it, but his body tightened instinctively, turning before he could think.

From behind one of the tall pillars, a shape stepped into the fractured rainbow light.

Massive paws. A mane as black as ink. Wings that shimmered with panes of stained glass, casting colored shards across the floor with every slow movement.

His lion.

The creature held himself lower than usual, his posture soft — almost hesitant. As if unsure whether he was allowed to approach. As if he were the one who had failed.

Reims’ breath caught, his chest tight in a different way now.

“...Hey,” he said quietly, although it came out a little broken.

The lion blinked slowly, as though with something like an apology. Then he stepped closer, careful, careful, lowering his head until his muzzle hovered near Reim’s arm without quite touching.

A question. An offer. A quiet are you alright?

Reims’ felt his throat tighten. He lifted a hand, hesitating for just a moment before resting it gently against the lion’s jaw. The fur there was softer than it looked — warm and alive and real in a way that helped ground him instantly.

“I’m okay,” he said, even though it wasn’t the whole truth. “I just… I should’ve protected them better. I should’ve known something would happen.”

The lion’s ears flicked back in a pained, admonishing way, as if he was rejecting the words. He pushed a little closer, pressing his forehead lightly into Reims’s side. It was for comfort, but also penance. A shared guilt neither of them needed to carry alone.

“You did what you could,” Reims murmured, fingers curling in the thick mane. “I know you did.”

The lion’s wings shifted, a quiet rustle of glass feathers catching the dim light. He pulled back a fraction, amber eyes searching Reims’s face with a quiet intensity that made it hard to breathe.

Then — slow and deliberate — he turned his head.

Toward the organ. Toward the glowing orb set into its center.

The lion stared at it, unmoving.

Reims blinked, pulled from his spiral. “...You think I should go to it?”

The lion glanced back at him — gentle and insistent.

Reims let out a breath. He smoothed his hand along the lion’s cheek one more time, a gesture heavy with gratitude.

“Alright,” he nodded. “Okay, let’s see what it wants to tell us.”

They moved together — Reims walking, the lion padding quietly by his side — toward the waiting glow of the Code.