By: Datenma
Barbelo-san suggested a prequel to Dark Love and I thought it was a smashing idea so here is the first chapter of the prequel. The main couple will, of course, be Garcia/Picard but that comes later. I use the Japanese names for the characters, keep that in mind.
Dedicated to: Barbelo! Because if you had not suggested it, this story would not even be!
Disclaimer: I do not own Golden Sun.
Warning: Shounen-ai later. Blood and lots of it, this is a vampire story after all.
Read and review please. Flames and flamers will be shot on sight by…Magnum! ::points at Gackt's crotch:: Not! Only good little girls and boys get that! ::evil laugh::
Chapter 1: Never enough
I stare at the man with tears in my eyes as he digs into my mother's skin, tearing her chest open and then feasting on the crimson blood spurting from her chest. I back away, eyes wide as my back hits the wall and I slide to my knees, my body shaking all over from fear. My father's body lay a few feet from the man who was now killing my mother, he was already dead, his eyes wide and glassy, staring straight at me, almost blaming me for all of this. The man drops my mother's body to the floor now, licking his lips as he turns to me, grinning with a sadistic gleam in his eyes.
I turn my gaze away from my mother's dead body, back to the man, my heart rate speeding up fast, and the adrenaline was rushing through my veins. This man was not human, I knew that already. I had seen his fangs and there was a lust for blood in him that no human should have. This man was a monster. He had killed other people, not just my parents and he was going to kill again. He was going to kill me. He was not finished. He wanted more blood and he would have it. What could I do? I am only a frightened child, sitting on the floor. I watched him kill both of my parents. I am only glad that my sister is at a friend's house right now or this man would have killed her as well.
What can I do? There is nothing I can do but stare at the man who killed my parents, the people responsible for me being here now. I am a disgrace. I deserve to die. I lower my head and begin to sob, soaking the knees of my pants with salty tears. The floorboard creeks under his weight as he approaches me, his footsteps heavy on the wooden floor. The smell of fresh blood in the air is strong; reminding me of the time I flew off my bike and skinned my knee on the concrete outside of our house a year ago. It is petty to think of times like that but that was one of the few times I have ever experienced physical pain before, I have to make myself ready for what this man is going to do to me. "The least you could do, boy," His voice is close now, as he pauses inches from me, his voice sounding like the breath of death, "Is look your killer in the eye like your father did, like your mother. They gave their life to protect you. You should have ran when they told you to run. Maybe then you would have lived just a bit longer than this. Oh well, how you die is none of my business. I am just here to make sure that you die. Your kind make me sick and I do not need you growing up."
I look up to see that his grin is still there, but this time it is wider, more wicked, one of his sharp fangs sliding out from the edge of his mouth the glinting in the bloody light from the setting sun that is drifting in front the nearby window. He reaches out from me and grabs my neck in one hand, lifting me off the ground with ease. I grab onto his wrist, trying to pry his hand away from my neck but it is no use, his grip is far too strong and I can no longer draw breath into my lungs. The room and the man begin to swirl wildly before my eyes as I feel my body weaken, my lungs tightening painfully, blood trickling down my nose and from the edge of my mouth. "That is a good boy." I feel the back of my head slam against the wall and a warm wetness oozes from the back of my head and down my neck, tickling the fine hairs along my body. I shiver, fighting to keep my eyes open but growing weaker and weaker by the moment. Just before I lose all control over my actions, I hear a door slam open in the distance and familiar voices calling out front the front door, carrying through the house quickly as three pairs of feet run into the house, echoing through the empty house.
"Big brother!" I hear my sister yell from the doorway, the door sliding open quickly as three people run into the room. I turn in the man's hand, smile weakly, and my younger sister as she stares up at me with frightened crimson eyes.
"Jasmine…you came…" The two people who entered the room with Jasmine now run up to the man, one of them slamming hard into his body and knocking him away from me. As I fall to the ground, the other person catches me and holds me to their chest, the smell of gardenias reaching my nose in spite of all of the blood that is still filling the air.
"You killed my baby brother, you bastard!" yells the woman who slammed into the man who had been holding onto my neck in an iron tight grip only seconds before. As my vision begins to focus and I can think clearly again, I realize that my uncle is holding me in his arms, checking my body for any wounds and Jasmine is still standing in the doorway, staring at the motionless bodies of our parents lying on the ground, their blood staining the cream carpet. The look in her eyes frightens me, she is watching mother's face now, her bottom lip quivering as she falls to her knees and drops her face into her hands, forceful shivers causing tremors to pass through her small body.
I hear the sound of metal and turn my head to see my aunt unsheathing a small dagger with strange black markings on the blade. She has the man pinned under her knees, a vicious look in her taupe eyes as she brings the dagger down into the man's head, blood splatter on the window and the front of her white blouse. Her breathing is rapid, her chest rising and falling quickly as she climbs to her feet and brushes her bangs out of her eyes and turns around to face me slowly, trying to give me a reassuring smile but only managing to offer me a mixture of a weak smile and a grimace of pain. She turns away from me and looks at the two bodies lying on the floor, papers thrown haphazardly around the room, the coffee table in the middle of the room turned over and thrown into the wall, creating a large hole there, the plaster cracking and falling to the ground. "If only we could have come sooner." She whispers dropping onto her knees and lifting the hand of my father to her cheek and sobbing painfully, her tears mingling with the blood on his dead, cold hand.
If I had been stronger, I could have prevented this from happening. The thought crosses my mind bitterly, perhaps too bitterly for a boy of my age but I know deep down that no matter how bitter it may have sounded, it was true. If I had been brave enough to stick up to that man, whatever he was, I could have saved this from happening to my parents but I was too scared, I was too weak to do anything. Nothing I do is ever going to be enough to take this pain away now. I want to become stronger. I want to do what my aunt did, I want to have the power to protect the people that I love, the people that mean the most to me. But will I ever be strong enough?
I feel small, cold hands grasp mine and I turn to see that Jasmine is at my side, her eyes filled with tears but a smile on her face. Her auburn bangs are matted on her forehead from pushing the tears up onto her face but she still looks pretty, just like our mother. "Big brother, we have to look after each other now that Mommy and Daddy are gone. You are going to protect me, right?" I reach out for her weakly with my right arm and slip it around her shoulders, pulling her to me.
"Of course, I am always going to be there for you, Jasmine." This is all I can do now. It was what my parents would have wanted me to do, look after Jasmine is anything ever happened to them.
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We moved into a mansion called the academy where our aunt and uncle lived. It was founded by a man who was mine and Jasmine's great-great-grandfather, or something like that. The academy trained people with special powers, powers like that of Jasmine and me, powers that could be used against people like that man to make sure that no more innocent people died because of them. Many people around our age lived there too and they were really nice to us, many of them had lost their parents to people like the man that killed our parents.
My aunt and uncle lead me into a large room that they call the 'common room' while they send Jasmine off with a girl the same age as her, with strange blue hair. I sit down on the couch with my aunt and uncle on either side of me, both of them taking my hands into their own. "There are some things that you are going to have to learn, Garcia. Your mother and father were vampire hunters; they were two of the best hunters in the world. However, they gave up the life of a hunter when you and Jasmine were born. They did not want to put either of you in danger from the vampires. Alas, the man who broke into your house tonight was a vampire. He must have heard about where your parents lived from one of the older, stronger vampires and went to kill you to make a name for himself among his kind. Your parents renounced their powers when they gave up the life of a hunter so they could only do so much to fend themselves from the vampire that attacked." I take a deep breath, trying to make sense of everything that she has just told me, knowing that it is not over yet, that there was going to be more for her to tell me. I wanted to know all of it and I wanted to know all of it now.
"I know this may be a lot for you to handle, Garcia, I mean with your parents and all," My uncle places his hand on my shoulder and I find the motion comforting in some sense, at least he was trying, "We could do this later, if you want to try to get some sleep." I shake my head and look up at him.
"I want to know everything now. I do not think I could sleep even if I did go to bed now." It comes out as a whisper but I know they heard me; they are sitting so close, their attention solely on me. The silence is thick in the air before my aunt takes a breath and turns away, releasing my hand as she stands up and paces around the room, tapping her chin with one hand.
"We are hunters, Garcia. You knew that, of course, at least you know now that we are hunters and that we go after vampires. Your uncle and I run this academy and teach other people with the same powers that you and your sister have. We protect people from the vampires as best we can, our kind, the hunters have done this since the first vampire walked the earth and we will continue to do so until the end of time perhaps but we will do it for as long as we have to." She pauses and leans back against the wall, turning her head to look out the door and into the corridor just past the room. "Your mother and father asked us to take you into the academy if anything bad ever happened to them, and they said that if either of you asked to become hunters, we were to train you and make sure that you knew all there was to know about being a hunter. It is in your blood, Garcia, all you have to do is say the word and you can become one of us. However, if you do not want it, we will have to seal your powers so that they do not draw unwanted attention from vampires."
"Please, this is too fast for him." Whispers my uncle. She turns to him and narrows her eyes slightly.
"Too fast? Teos, come now. I understand that he just witnessed his parents being mutilated but I have lost people too, you know. The point is that he must decide now before it is too late. The vampire could not have found my brother's family on his own; he had help from a powerful vampire. It could be Alex." I should have remembered that name but my mind was so jumbled with difficult thoughts that I must have blocked it out of my mind or at least suppressed the memory of ever hearing the name being uttered. "The fact of the matter is, we cannot let anyone know that they are dead. It would cause a panic even if people do not know that it was a vampire that killed them and not some freak on the lose with a chainsaw. This is a lot, I know, I understand it but I have had to do this before. I cannot allow my personal emotions to get into the way of this. I am merely trying to protect Garcia as well as Jasmine."
"I want to become a hunter." We all freeze and turn to the doorway to see Jasmine standing there in her nightgown, holding her stuffed bear our dad had gotten her for her fourth birthday. Her eyes were read and puffy, indicating she had been crying in bed but there was a determined fire burning in her eyes and her hands were balled into fists. "I want to become a hunter and protect people like my Mommy and Daddy did. I want to protect my big brother. I do not want to let anyone else die because of the mean people. I do not want anyone else to be hurt because of them. No one has the right to take another person away."
I turn away from the doorway and look down at my hands, watching as they shake before I bring them up to my face and cover my eyes. This is all I can do. "I want to become a hunter as well. It is all that I can do for my parents. This is what I want as well. I want what Jasmine wants. She is right, no one deserves to the life of another person. I want to make sure that this never happens again. At least, I can try to prevent it from happening."
"This was your decision to make. I believe that you have made the right choice. The training is hard but I believe that you will be able to do this." That was how this all started. That was how I met him, my one and only true love. The only person that I could ever have feelings for as long as I live and breathe.
-TBC-
Yes, that is right. The people you thought were Jasmine and Garcia's parents in Dark Love are really his aunt and uncle. And was Alex the one who ordered Garcia and Jasmine's parents dead? You will have to wait to find that out in Heaven's Light, the sequel to My Angel. Yes, I have it plotted out so that there is now a sequel to My Angel but it is only going to be put up once I finish My Angel. We meet Picard in the next chapter so be ready for that! Read and review please or else I will not know whether to continue this or not! Sorry for the typos, I type fast and I don't look over my work, plus, I'm singing along to J-pop while I do this so it makes it twice as hard to catch the errors while I type. I'll go back over it if this gets any reviews.