Here's the prologue guys. I hope you all enjoy it and give me lots of feedback so I can make this little story of mine even better. Thanks guys! ^-^
Prologue
Kazumi shivered as an icy north wind blew past and sighed. It seemed that the new coat she'd bought for the long winter was doing nothing to defend her from cold. She looked from the crowd of people in the street, to the clock tower in the centre of the square and smiled a little. As the nervous girl decided with Shana the previous day, she was awaiting the arrival of a boy called Yuji Sakai at the South entrance of the illumination festival, while Shana waited at the north entrance for him at the time of 19:00. This bold action taken by the two girls was to make the boy chose between them. The girl who wasn't chosen was to "Back-off" so to speak, and to leave the couple alone. She hadn't thought about that part much, except that it would be unbearable for either of them to watch someone they loved be with somebody else. Watch sadly, from a distance, as they talked, as they grew closer, as they kissed...
With the images of them being together as a couple coming to mind, the girl shook her head violently to get those terrible, painful, doubts out of her head.
"No, that isn't going to happen, I know it because Yuji will choose me..." the girl named Kazumi thought to herself.
"But..."
"What if I'm wrong...?"
"How would I live with it...?"
She knew that she, Yuji and Shana went to the same high-school, and they shared the same classes and even the same friends. She knew that if Yuji chose Shana over herself, she wouldn't be able to stand the feeling of rejection. Ever since a young age, Kazumi knew that she wasn't able to deal with powerful emotions very well, especially anger, sadness or love. She knew it would be nigh impossible for her be around her friends or classmates if either Yuji or Shana were part of the group. She knew what the result of this ordeal was going to be, if it turned out unfavourable to her... Isolation. She felt her heart writhe in pain just for the thought of it. The thought of being alone, just like in Junior High...
The girl took a grip of her jacket and squeezed it in attempt to relive some tension.
She shook her head again and looked to the time on the clock at the clock tower.
8:37, the clock read.
(Authors note: After the Bal Masque had hijacked Shana & Kazumi's plan, they ( I ) changed the time to 9:00 for Yuji to make his decision )
Time seemed to be in slow-motion while Kazumi stared at the massive ticking clock on the tower once more. She could feel her heart pound harder with each passing minute. As the time passed she found that she kept repeating the same negative questions over in her head, subconsciously.
8:40... What if he chooses her?
8:42... What will I do if he chooses her?
8:46... How would I react to that?
8:48... How would cope?
Kazumi Swallowed hard. She could feel the dread welling up inside her.
8:50... What am I going to do?
8:52... What am I going to do?
8:55... What am I going to..
"Kazumi..." said a familiar voice from behind her.
The girl turned around to face the young man, both shocked and delighted. All of her previous feelings of sadness and defeat vanishing in a second.
"Hi, Yuji." The shy girl smiled. The boy had once told her that her smile was like a flower caught in a ray of sunlight. The recall of this memory made her feel warm & tingly feeling on the inside on that cold winter night.
"Hi." replied the boy blushing a little as he returned a warm smile.
"Is he as nervous as me?" She wondered
"Umm... Uh..." Kazumi mumbled as she shifted nervously.
"Kazumi?" asked the boy.
"Yes?" Yelled the girl without meaning to, causing her blush to deepen to a darker shade of red.
"Um, do you want to go some-place else?" the boy asked without dropping his neither smile nor eye contact.
"Sure!" replied the girl, closing her eyes, smiling, with a cute cherry blush on her face.
The teens said little as they walked side by side. A few glances, a couple of words. But, through it was all slightly awkward, Kazumi saw that Yuji was smiling.
"...And his smile's good enough for me." The shy girl thought to herself.
When they finally found a place to sit down, Kazumi gasped at the view. It was a beautiful. One of Misaki's public gardens had been transformed into a winter utopia. Also, considering that nearly all of Misaki had turned up in their thousands for Christmas-Eve, the area was rather isolated. The snow over the past previous nights had covered the gardens with a blanket of white fluffy snow. The scene was like a Fairy-Tale. A thin layer of snow covered the large fir-trees, icicles hung from an archway leading up to a large water fountain. The girl couldn't imagine this place to be anymore beautiful. The garden district was always stunning around this time of year.
As the two sat on a nearby bench, Kazumi could hear a faint trickle of water from the fountain. Unfortunately, the relaxing sound of rushing water wasn't enough to calm Kazumi's nerves this time. She could feel her heart pounding so hard that she was sure that it was audible to anyone nearby. This triggered a cliché Shojo-manga line.
But Yuji is the only one here. So, does that mean, he can hear my-
"Kazumi," said the boy said suddenly interrupting her train of thought, causing her to jump.
"Yes!" Kazumi yelled unintentionally, causing her blush to turn crimson.
The girl's eyes went from Yuji's, to the light in his chest, to the snowy ground at her feet.
Idiot! Why did you do that! Kazumi internally wailed.
Suddenly she felt her heart skip a beat, as the Mystes took her hand in his own.
"Kazumi..." the boy said softly.
The shy girl looked back up at the person she cared about most in this world and felt her nerves begin to calm a little. Her head however, was still going in circles. She couldn't get her thoughts in her head straight
He's s holding my hand... Yuji's holding my hand... Is this for real? Is this really happening...? Yes... I think it is, no, I'm SURE this is happening. But...
"But..." Kazumi swallowed hard and looked to the snow at her feet, before asking in a quieter voice; "But what about Shana-Chan?" Internally, the nervous teen was screaming at herself for asking that question but she knew she had to, or she would never get it off her conscious. Her feelings were torn in two. She felt overwhelmed with joy that Yuji had chosen her between her and Shana. But also, she felt a sharp pang of sympathy for the young Flame-Haze, love-rival and friend that the girl Shana was to her. Even though she felt should be completely happy, there was always some small part of her that felt still guilty about the result of the whole ordeal. Kazumi hated that part of herself.
"Kazumi," Yuji began, "I chose you over Shana because I decided to follow my heart." The timid girl gasped incredulously and shot her eyes straight back up to meet his face. "It didn't have anything to do with Shana being a Flame-Haze, me being a Torch, a Mystes, or about this whole war for Power of Existence. All that really matters is that I can be with the person I care about most in this world."
The Mystes blushed a little, but continued speaking.
"Kazumi, ever since last spring when I first saw you, I knew there was something special about you." He lifted his head skyward. He seemed to be choosing his words very carefully, making the moment that little bit more special. "I used to lie awake in my bed at night wondering why I just couldn't get you out of my head. But..." Yuji looked down from the stars and into the girl's glistening eyes. "But lately, I think I've finally come to terms about how I feel about you."
Tears of happiness began to form around the girl's eyes. A single tear escaped an ran down her left cheek, which the Mystes wiped away with a brush of his hand.
"I'm sorry. I don't know... why I'm crying... it's strange, I feel so happy and yet..." Kazumi cried, sobbing in the middle of her sentences.
Tears began to stream freely down her delicate face.
"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." she continued, "I just can't stop myself from-"
Just then, she felt something warm underneath her chin, pushing her head up to look at the dark-haired Mystes. The girl felt her heart stop beating for a split second, as she gazed into Yuji's deep oceanic eyes. The Mystes' hand left her chin and rested on the left side of her face.
"Kazumi," Yuji said with that smile Kazumi loved so much, "You look much more beautiful when your smiling." The girl felt as if she had frozen to the spot. "So please, smile more often from now on."
The girl felt her mouth and lips go dry. Really dry. She felt her heart thudding so hard against her chest that it hurt. Her nervousness hit a fever-pitch; she could feel her mind's conciseness slowly begin to lose control, letting instinct take the reins of the adolescent, emotion-filled teen.
What happened next, to Kazumi, seemed like a blur. She instinctively licked her lips in preparation for what was about to happen next. She squeezed Yuji's hand a little; the boy squeezed her hand in response. The girl closed her eyes, lips parted slightly. She then leaned forward. She stayed like that for a while. Still, silent and unyielding. She could feel her heart crying out to his, in a voiceless plea for the young man to return the same affection and love that she gave to him.
How long had she had her eyes closed? Five seconds? Five minutes? An Hour? The girl couldn't tell. She waited and waited. She stayed like that, frozen like a living statue. Her breathing soft, rhythmic and slow. She continued to be like this for a while longer but soon enough, fear penetrated her heart.
A fear that this was just another repetition.
Immediately, as if on impulse, she disregarded this thought. Naïvely returning to believe that she was inches from her 'to-be' lover's face, despite her better judgement. The waiting grew longer, the soft breaths she once became sharper. The pit in her stomach grew deeper, the rhythm of her heart grew to a, dread-filled, Thump - - Thump. The cold, heavy thudding of blood rushing through her head was intense. She felt claustrophobic, caged in by her own fear. She could feel a different kind of tear begin to fall down her left cheek, tears quite the opposite of the warm, happy, joyful ones prior. Her tears were cold and sorrowful. She clenched her fists and took a gulp of air.
Kazumi opened her eyes.
She found, to her distress, that she was not in a romantic, frozen winter paradise, nor was she about to obtain her first kiss from the boy of her dreams. Tears began to slowly trickle down her soft delicate cheeks and into the already dampened pillow. She was about three miles from the clock tower; in a fair-sized house, in her bed, wrapped up in several thick blankets. Alone.
Yes, her hopes that her lover would return her affections had ended that fateful Christmas-Eve. Tomorrow was the start of a new school year and a new chapter in her life. As she sobbed slowly back to sleep, she wondered to herself; how the hell would she be able to continue to live normally as before, when something like this was going to turn her world upside down. By the time she had fallen asleep again, she still hadn't found an answer.
"A god shall rise and a god shall fall,
In this hour of demons time shall stall,
When all the fragments of Yukyu meet once again,
The worlds shall collide, when the clock strikes at ten"
"The Goddess will scream for her sweet lovers' call,
And she will cradle him until the curtains fall,
Tis the end of a life and beginning of anew,
Her cries unanswered, the blade strikes true,"
"The power unlocked, the world aflame, The darkness takes the reigns,
The murderer in cold blood shall be met with one-thousand years of fury.
And a couple married in bond shall be shattered By the Flame."
"The Nightmare will be for but a single hour,
But it'll enough, to christen the flower."
...
