Disclaimer: Darkstalkers, Street Fighter and all related trademarks © Capcom. References to Namco properties © Namco Bandai Games. References to SEGA properties © Sega Sammy Holdings.

Author's Note: The chain and collar mentioned in the prologue is a rarely seen bit of apocryphal canon, which involves a common Japanese view of Lilith, where she's shown in a lot of media wearing a collar, sometimes with a seemingly broken chain hanging from it. Within western media, the collar is usually effectively airbrushed out. This chain is indicative of, at least in this canon, the unbroken contract of slavery that makes Lilith's soul subservient to the ruler of Makai, namely Morrigan, and/or Jedah Dohma.

The disclaimers are due to the larger universe created by the Cross series (Namco X Capcom, Project X Zone), especially since Lilith's actions will cause ripples throughout more than just her own universe...

Vampire Savior: Mirror Of Her Soul

Prologue: The Mirror Crack'd

Visibly, it was nothing but a dog-eared piece of dyed red leather. However, Lilith had tried everything including a blessed knife 'borrowed' out of Anita's supply. Nothing could cause more than a few scratches in the edges, and the demon runes were unable to be even damaged. As a result, Lilith felt like she'd never be able to leave her eternal bondage or servitude. She could even recall when she'd got it, when she'd been summoned from near-oblivion by Jedah Dohma, to work as his dragon.

Her purpose was to work within the rag-tag group known as the Darkstalkers, a band of especially powerful daemons from Makai. Her main goal was to assist them in helping Jedah Dohma to create a new world with a demonic embryo, anything further remaining undisclosed. Her personal goal was to track down Morrigan, since she had, according to Jedah, had stolen a vast majority of her power, leaving her weak and underdeveloped, and would probably expire in only a short time if she wasn't able to recover what had been stolen from her.

What she'd not figured out until it was almost too late was that she was a sealed fragment OF Morrigan's power, excised from her due to her being deemed too powerful by her father. As a result, the collar now was effectively a sign of her fealty to Morrigan, as a 'sister soul', which she could do with as she wished. As it was, all she did was keep her in the castle and at arm's length when she was out of the castle, not trusting that Jedah might have planned for reclaiming Lilith, and through her, Morrigan's full power...

Lilith knew that the only reason she was alive at all was the fact the power that had be sealed away continued to grow, and that excess power was what Lilith was left with. Right now was part of her brief respite from Morrigan's constant requests, Morrigan herself being asleep. She walked down one of the corridors that her 'sister' walked down when she was having a meeting with Demitri, having wall to wall mirrors all the way down the corridor for several metres. For some unfathomable reason, he felt it was offensive. Morrigan found it hilarious.

She was roughly halfway down the corridor when she stopped, since her reflection had changed attire, and was now reading a book of all things, the 'reflection' snapping the book shut with a loud bang which startled Lilith.

She was dressed simply, for Lilith, in the leather jacket and short skirt which had come to be her standard casual attire, only that and the book she was holding making her stand out, Lilith's own form shifting to the same outfit to remove the more glaring inconsistency. She couldn't create the book.

"Hello… Me," Her reflection stated, "Umm, How do we put this?… First, I'm not some trick of 'Lord' Dohma. I'm from a potential future,"

"So, why are you here?" Lilith asked, confused, "Even if you do have a point. Jedah isn't subtle about his requests..."

"You could call me the natural Lilith, not the heavily bound and cursed one you are..." Her reflection stated, "No-one normally picks up two conflicting geas and a soul contract at your age..."

"Hey, What are you talking about?" Lilith asked, "And what do you mean by 'natural'?"

"Bet you wish you didn't have that bit of cursed leather round your neck… It's still anchored to Jedah, you know that?" Her reflection offered, "The guy isn't really fond of releasing those under contract to him, and you weren't even able to read the really fine print… He's one of the two geas, and, obviously, the soul contract..."

"So..." Lilith began.

"Yes, he's likely planning when to rip you out of Morrigan and claim her power for another of his power plays..." Her reflection sighed, "Look, You made a deal with the Anti-Christ, for crying out loud… He's also known as The Great Deceiver!… Jedah and his kind make a game out of waylaying innocent souls with their iron-clad contracts!"

"I'm no 'innocent soul'… I'm a lump of Morrigan's power, removed whe… You know all this, don't you?" Lilith stated, as she noticed her reflection had gone back to her book, earning a nod, "You're not really listening either..."

Her reflection shifted the T-shirt she was wearing as she slung her jacket over her shoulder to read, 'I got screwed over royally by the Anti-Christ and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt', before she snapped shut the book again.

"I know what we were… But the thing is this… Mana is mana. Yes, you went too near Morrigan, and your mana was close to hers in nature, so we ended up in this situation..." Her twin began, before she paused, and looked at her, "The operative word, howver, is 'Mostly'… If all you were is Morrigan's power, sealed away in a remote bit of Makai, how could we be able to meet, and why do you have to be kept restrained at all?"

Lilith found any response she could give to that challenge died on her lips. It didn't add up. She was genuinely caught in a white lie. Yes, she did get weaker when she strayed away from Morrigan's presence, yes, the chain of her collar did obey Morrigan's desires, for now, but then there were the inconsistencies. When she was away from Morrigan for long periods, she still had power, she still had a body, she didn't drop dead or fall unconscious, and she had some level of free agency. She'd assumed it was because she was using the 'free' mana left over from when it was left, but...

"You'd almost think that Jedah faked the connection..." Her reflection offered, Lilith swearing mentally as an all too worrying possibility reared it's ugly head. Why did she drop unconscious right when she defeated Morrigan, waking up a few days later as her shadow, often literally? Why, if she was part of Morrigan, did she look so different in so many ways? Why did Morrigan keep the collar in place? Her reflection then let her see her neck, where a broken collar still sat, the chain long gone, before she breathed in and out.

"I will admit, we needed to do what we did anyway..." Her reflection continued, "If we'd not encountered Morrigan, all that really icky dark-typed mana would still be in us, and that collar, the chain wouldn't even fracture in our lifetime..."

"And now?" Lilith asked.

"For me, I could snap it right now..." Her reflection offered, "I only kept what little remains of the thing for this day..."

She then tossed a clearly magically shrunk parcel at Lilith, who caught and pocketed it, wondering what her doppelgänger was getting at.

"Now, as for you, the items in there could break that chain, permanently, and with little chance of it coming back..." The reflection stated, "The collar however… That can't just be broken,"

"Why are you telling me this?" Lilith asked, "You clearly broke the contract..."

She shook her head.

"I weakened it, I found wiggle room in the blasted thing..." Her reflection offered, "However, what you need to do is deny it. Deny it with every fiber of your being… This is going to be loud..."

Lilith then watched as she reached up towards the collar, an echo of Jedah's words to her, telling her that she was the rightful owner of Morrigan's power, that she would recover it and be whole, ringing about the room, then words she barely heard, the words reducing to a shriek as the world shook.

"I declare the contract void, broken and false..." Her reflection intoned, "I declare myself unbound by any daemonic claims..."

The mirrors shook, Lilith unable to hear the words of Jedah's contract as they unravelled, Her reflection's appearance flickering, shifting. For a moment, it was the look she knew so well, then red and blue became pink and white, then red and blue again, then… The shriek reached a crescendo, the only thing Lilith able to hear was the sounds of mirrors breaking...

"Damn… Never actually worked out how much power Jedah put into that accursed thing..." Her twin stated, back in the outfit she started in, "Don't try that right now, If you don't snap the chain first, well, you'd have either Morrigan or Jedah on you like flies on a corpse..."

Lilith nodded. She'd fiddled with the collar a few times, to get a diatribe from Jedah about why she shouldn't mess with it. The fact that the contract was among the things she heard as her twin snapped hers told her how much it was still continuing his control over her, how it had control over her.

"Leaving that, what's in your body is, mainly, none of Morrigan's soul at all… The soul in there is a young soul, a… mostly untouched soul..." Her doppleganger offered, "You can be forgiven for what the collar's influence did to you, but… You have to break your own..."

As she paused, Lilith looked up and down the corridor, the walls cracked and buckled, the mirrors almost all broken, and she could see damage begin to affect the one that her doppleganger was stood in as well, as the piece of leather in her hands burst into flames.

"It's only your choices, right now, especially with what you do with my gift to you, that parcel's contents, which will decide if you can weaken the hold of that collar upon you..." Her twin stated, her image beginning to fracture, "I think you don't need… know not… do it where… care about… Sword… Evil…ne can…ly break... chain..."

The mirror then collapsed, and Lilith released a handful of her bats to spirit away the parcel, Morrigan arriving as they left the opposite way.

"I thought I felt a white-wing's power in this area a short time ago..." Morrigan stated, holding out her hand, the chain appearing between them, before releasing it, "I guess I was mistaken..."

Lilith, normally would have ignored the insinuation of the gesture, except for one thing. She knew what she'd seen as her doppelgänger snapped her collar, plus the fact she'd checked if Lilith's chain was broken. She wasn't completely checking for a random 'white-wing', a term she'd only heard today. She knew about Lilith's true disposition, and was keeping her restrained in her own way… And she had a feeling she knew what she REALLY looked like, since Morrigan's check for a white-wing had involved summoning the chain.

She'd seen her doppelgänger appearance when she was breaking the collar. She'd had a pink outfit and white wings. Morrigan had mistakenly solved the last part of the puzzle about what she'd seen. The other Lilith had said she was from a potential future, one where… Oh my. Lilith slipped away from Morrigan, who was cursing the fact she had lost her favourite taunting corridor due to someone doing something, repairing mirrors. She'd be busy for a good hour or so, long enough to do some things to do with what she'd just witnessed...

Once she was in her chambers, what there was of them, she looked through the parcel. The main bulk of it, once it was expanded, was the same outfit she'd seen her twin wearing, with a note suggesting to find somewhere for her bats to roost for a few weeks, as well as to reduce the use of her powers to less than baseline levels until she'd found a way to avoid falling into bad habits. She presumed that using her magic would attract the Darkstalkers, and send her right back to Morrigan or Jedah.

The other items were a can of something called 'Extra Strength Antiperspirant' and a heavy leather pouch with a compartment filled with green sheets of paper with people's faces on them, as well as a good amount of coins. Looking back at the pieces of paper, she noticed 'Ten Dollars' printed on them, and realised it was human money. The back of the note told her the antiperspirant would mask her allure heavily, so she'd not passively go round attracting men, and vampire hunters, like flies, as well as a piece of advice.

'Head for the Americas. Very few people there who would rat you out. There should be plenty of money in the wallet to get yourself a place to live and a good job. See if you can get into the Street Fighter circuit. Remember those people like Sakura?' The note read, 'They should give you plausible deniability for if you do decide to continue getting enjoyment out of a good fight. Never mind that they're also good people.'

Lilith smiled. Yes, she remembered Sakura. Never met her personally. Contemplated chatting her up once or twice. Didn't mainly since she had feelings for a man who could snap her like a twig. Still, What would new clothes, antiperspirant and several hundred dollars do which a blessed knife couldn't?