Pain, suffering, death.
Words that no child should know but because of special circumstances I am more than well acquainted with. Bloodstains are forever carved in both soul and memory and the painful stains are invisible to others but all so clear to me in my hands because of the horrors that I have committed, but in between it all there is still a hope. A small glimmer that refuses to die no matter how hard I have tried to squash ruthlessly from my mind and how much this world has proven me otherwise it is still present within me. A hope that I can protect my loved ones. Normally your first childhood memory would be of being held by your parents, a happy memory, that will help you through the hard times that lie ahead.
Not everybody is that lucky.
There are some of us that know the hardships of this world. There is no good or evil. There is a shade of gray in this world, there is survival, desperation, and despair. Those unlucky ones are not blinded by the world. The secrets that are carefully hidden to the public and the nativity they posses is astounding. I am happy for them. They will never know the pain that I have experienced and that is something that I am willing to protect, so that their unsoiled hands can stay that way and those of us that are damaged beyond repair can protect them.
My first memory is of my father's death. For the first time in my life I understood loss. The burning in the back of my throat as I tried to stop the bile from coming out and the sting in my eyes as I fought back the tears. My mother running away with me, trying to protect me from my father's mistakes. Later, the madness that consumed her because of my own stupidity and the astounding guilt that flooded me every time I would lay my eyes on her. My poor fragile, delicate, precious mother that I tried to protect till the very end but was useless all the same.
"YOU'RE NO CHILD OF MINE GET OUT!"
Quickly I left before she could do any more damage. Closing the door softly behind me I slid down the door and kept my misty eyes from shedding a single tear. It had been years since I had cried, the last time being when my father was murdered before my eyes at the age of five, and now at the age of ten my heart has been hardened beyond repair.
I winced and looking down I saw that my side was bleeding, probably from the lamp that she threw at me, and I was more than positive that both my arms and face were matted with bruises. Sighing I began the painfully stand up while gathering support from the door handle.
Hearing footsteps I looked up to the kind face of the maid. With beautiful long hair that reached her waist and porcelain features, she looked like a beautiful doll. She was also the person I considered my best friend and confidant.
"Mai why do you keep going in there? You know she does this every time you go in there! Let the staff take care of her, she only gets violent with you, I care too much about you to see you like this every day."
"I'm sorry Keiko but she's my mother and she's like this because of me. S-she's all I have left."
"Mai all I'm say-"
BANG!
Keiko's eyes widened in fear and slowly she turned towards me and yelled, "Run! Get out of here, they found us!"
Heart beating in my throat I yanked the door open and slammed it shut behind me, barricading both my mother and I from the rest of the house. Fighting to control my breathing I tried to focus my thoughts.
Grab mom.
Get out.
Run.
Find somewhere safe.
Turning around I spotted her curled up in the couch where I had left her paying no mind to the screams that could be clearly be heard from outside the closed and locked doors.
"Mom get up we need to go!"
Looking at me blankly for a second she resumed staring at the wall paying me no mind. Frustrated and gritting my teeth I tried to even out my breathing. Patronizing her or saying the wrong thing could get us both killed, myself at her hands or both of us by those monsters outside.
Think, Mai, how can we both survive this?
BANG!
Too late just grab her and run!
Escape, flee, anything! Heart beating on my throat I ran towards my mother and hauled her up from the couch dragging her towards the fireplace. Fingers moving frantically around the fireplace I finally found what I was looking for. Pushing the brick that gave away to a hallway I tried to push her towards the entrance but I was met with resistance.
"Mom we don't have time for this! Just get in there!"
"They're here."
The single sentence had me whirling around to face her in shock. She hadn't spoken a word to me since the accident and this was the first time I had heard her voice in three years.
"The ones who did this to me. The ones who took him away! They're trying to hurt my Mai too!"
With clear eyes she turned to look at me and smiled sadly while saying sadly "I love you Mai. Don't ever forget that take care of yourself I'm sorry for being selfish but I am going with your daddy. Stay safe honey and don't look back."
Suddenly I felt myself being flung into the fireplace at the same time that the doors were violently flung open. Whirling around I stepped from behind my mother and pushed her behind me and towards the fireplace, secluding her behind me and away from danger, there was absolutely no way that she would sacrifice herself for me once again. I refuse! Looking up I saw them; the people who had killed my father in cold blood and in extension were here to tie all loose ends.
They were all dressed in deceivingly normal clothes for the killers that they were. They surrounded the room two on each side and one in the middle facing me directly. The man in the middle was wearing a red shirt almost as a mocking reminder of the bloodshed that usually followed him along with black jeans and shoes, but the most distinctive feature about him were his eyes. Dark black eyes that seem to be an endless reminder of murder, unhappiness, and most hauntingly, death. Hardened features surrounded the soulless eyes and an exact shade of black as his eyes was imitated in his hair.
The most important thing to all of this was that they were all armed with guns and they were pointed directly at us.
"Yoshido," I said directly at the middle, with as much venom in my voice as I could muster.
"You know, it took much longer than we thought to locate you and let me tell you that with our resources that's an accomplishment I am willing to give to you Mai, because lets be honest, your mother is nothing but a shell of her old self," he chucked and continued, "Now when we killed your father we thought to just kill the whole family but then imagine our surprise when we found your fathers notes on what he did to you."
No, my mind screamed, now they know everything and they will never leave you alone!
"You my little Mai are a mine of gold! What we been trying to accomplish all these years, failure after failure and I had almost given up!"
"You should have, you sick bastard!"
Laughing cruelly at me he continued, "We can make this world a better place Mai. If only you help us reach this greatness Mai, we can leave your mother be but only if you choose to cooperate."
Mind whirling I thought about the proposal. We could stop running and hiding all the time. Keiko would finally be…..Keiko!
"Where is Keiko?!"
"Oh the servant girl that follows you around everywhere, she's still alive."
"Prove it!"
Sighing and looking at me like an adult indulging a child he turned to one of the men to his right and nodded once. He immediately left the room and a painful groan could be herd from the other side of the door along with the sound of something, or someone, being dragged from the floor. The doors reopened and what I saw broke my heart, she was being dragged by her arms and Keiko's once beautiful and clean features were now marred with blood with her head bowed down and breathing harshly.
"You sick monster!" a shout was heard from behind me.
Until this moment I had completely forgotten that my mother was behind me. Grabbing me from my upper arm she flung me to the floor while at the same time a gunshot was heard. After that everything seemed to pass in a blur. Scrambling towards my mother I completely ignored the men behind me I was somehow able to reach her. She was laying face down and with a push I flipped her over. Blood was slowly dripping from her mouth she winced in pain and her eyes, so similar to mine, focused on me and gave me a weak smile. Patting her frantically I found the wound; it was located right at her heart. It was obvious from the amount of blood gushing out of the wound that she wasn't going to make it.
My eyes stung with tears of frustration. Once again she was suffering and it was my fault.
"You shouldn't blame yourself for this Mai I did this because I love you and no mother should see her daughter die before her."
Without another word she slowly closed her eyes and just simply died. There was no shudder no cry to indicate her passing and no obvious revelation that she was gone after our five years of hiding. Head pounding I looked up, rage building up within me, wanting nothing else but to hurt these bastards. No, not only hurt, but to kill! A emotion that I was not accustomed to and I embraced it fully not wanting to deny the giant monster screaming for revenge within me.
Before I could even think of doing anything at all I felt an arm wrap securely around my waist and the last thing I felt as I succumbed to darkness was a cloth being pushed to my face and smelling a strange scent.
Breathing harshly I scrambled out of bed sweaty and cursing profusely at the alarm clock I took a moment to gather myself and breathe normally. I hadn't dreamt of the past in a while and it gave me a dark sense of foreboding deep within me and the pessimistic side of me whispered in my ear, its because you deserve to remember, remember that all of your family is dead and its ALL because of you, how does it feel like to be a murderer?
In. Out. In. Out. Breath Mai that's in the past and there is nothing you can do to change it. You can only move forward from now on.
I had a family now that I had begrudgingly let into my heart, not counting my happy exterior. In truth I was as weary of them as anyone else I had ever met.
Smiling grimly, the image of them all standing together popped into my mind. Naru with his ever-present blank expression firmly in place, Lin with a nonchalant stance along with Ayako hitting Monk with her purse and him with an annoyed expression and John trying to calm them down while Yasu and Masako just ignored them all.
They were the family that I protected now without reservations and of course there was no way they would ever learn just how far I had gone to protect them. Even Naru that jerk. Especially after my failed love confession even though it was the last thing that I had wanted to do.
Unwillingly the memory resurfaces bringing me back painfully three years ago in the airport.
"Naru you can't get on that plane!"
"Oh," he said raising an eyebrow condescendingly at me "why shouldn't I? I have what I came here for."
My heart constricting and throat closed up was preventing me from revealing the truth I blurted what came to mind.
"Because I love you!"
Eyes widening I looked at him in disbelief. I couldn't say what was the real problem but I also couldn't lie. That meant…..no! I can't fall in love! This is the worst thing to happen to me!
"Do you love me, or gene?" and without another word he whirled around and walked away like what I had said didn't mean anything to him.
That bastard! He didn't know but it was all the same. Didn't he know that by me saying that I loved him was making my world crash down?
Breathing heavily I felt a hand clamp painfully on my shoulder.
"So you love him? Interesting Mai, I might just blow up the plane for fun now, I didn't even think you could be possible of love of all things."
"We had a deal Yoshido, you leave them alone all of them, and you get your toy back."
"But this would be soo much more interesting don't you think? Oh well I guess I just have to settle down with making you suffer for a long time since a deal is a deal."
I had given up the freedom that I had fought for so many years to obtain but one threat to them and it had all gone to hell.
I couldn't risk them getting hurt because of me.
It didn't matter because I had escaped once again and keeping under the radar for about a year now and, at 19, I was free from them completely.
Squinting at the alarm clock that had woken me up so rudely I looked at the blurry red numbers and squinted a bit so I could make sense of the time: 8:30. Shit! I'm thirty minutes late; Naru is going to kill me! So without further thought to my dreams, dark thoughts, and lost and regained freedom I picked myself off the bed and went about my hectic routine of getting ready.