Don't Stop Dancing
Sorceress Myst's Alnel Challenge: A fic where Nel is a vampire.
Disclaimer: I do not own Star Ocean.
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"At times life is wicked and I just can't see the light.
A silver lining sometimes isn't enough
To make some seem right
Whatever life brings
I've been through everything
And know I'm on my knees again.
But I know I must go on."
-Creed 'Don't Stop Dancing'
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She watched the palace from afar. Ever since she had found out her predicament, her sickness beyond all sicknesses, a curse from the gods, a play on her soul, she didn't participate anymore into the myriad activities that she had once done as a protector of the entire planet.
The truth of her sickness was that she was stuck in time, never moving forward, never dying, never aging, never being able to be what she once had been.
She was sick, cursed with an affliction from Apris's anger and her own madness. The pivotal moment always replayed, refreshed, and reviewed itself so that it was a never ending reminder of her life's curse.
She had angered the gods so much that they had sent a plague upon her. So many had been killed by her that a few of them had conceded into turning a gift of hers into a curse. Eternity. She had that long now instead of the matter of months she used to have.
Taking another gracing look upon the Palace brightening like the stars from her perch on one of the many towers, she saw someone slip off towards the graveyard, not much caring that others were seeing the person leave. Watching, transfixed, Nel felt a sudden alarm sweep through her body.
He was going towards her family mausoleum.
She had to go. Strangely, she wondered if her penchant hunger might also be appeased by this stranger near her family mausoleum. Simply falling from her view off the tower, she seemed to be weightless, nothing more than air itself, until she landed with no sound, the shadows the only company she was keeping as she went through them, seeping into the darkness like poison seeped into blood, mixing and almost all together not mixing, strengthening and yet still weak as shadow herself.
When she got to the poor soul near her family's home, she was shocked to see that it was not a person seeking any thing but a simple one-sided conversation. His words were sharpened by her hearing, making it seem as if he was beside her and yelling his words to the world.
His conversation halted with the grave when he began noticing the obvious seal was broken and that there was evidence of a fragrance she alone had seemed to wear. He closed his eyes in a mixture of bliss and disbelief.
Not sure what to do, Nel began moving away to only bump into tree and gasp as a small pain of thorns poked her side. The awful tree was a prickly thing from hell that her great-great-great grandmother had planted in her youth for her father's burial.
That was when the being turned around to seize his eyes upon a sight of darkest hopes.
She was alive!
Nel stared at him like a deer in the headlights, startled out of her shock by a pair of strong arms, one mechanical, the other flesh, wrap around her body. Drawing back as he stared at her with crimson eyes a browner shade than her own. Darker than her own blood she realized as she watched the surprised pair of eyes realize that she wasn't truly living anymore.
The first thing he had registered after holding her, missing her like no other he had before him, was that her skin was unbearably cold to his skin, like the coldest winter in Airyglyph. It was paler than the snow he had seen traveling here.
It was then that he looked into her eyes. A power entranced him as he stood there, her will pouring out to his blood, singing a hymn of incredible intensity and joy as he watched unabashed. Those eyes were blood, the life stain of the gods.
There was no description for the obvious thing to him. He was courting his death here with her.
"What are you?" It was a question of concern as his eyebrows knitted in a focused confusion at the appearance of a woman he had lain eyes upon two years ago at her own funeral. Her gown had been the darkest red and black that he had ever seen that she seemed to be swathed in the royal gown much like she was now, almost blending into the shadows.
"Nothing of your concern, Nox." She reminded him of blood that he spilled on the funeral casket, his own blood fell down, coating the garnet flowers he had brought from a claw scratch on his skin. He had watched them put her into her tomb and now he was watching her, not breathing, just being an object that couldn't respond to him like a human.
"You are my concern, woman." She was his every desire and she knew it too. Damned she was and he knew it was cruel for her. She stared towards him, her silent admission to him nothing more than a curiousity. She was pretty much uncaring, calloused to the situation since she knew that she could not hope to love as she was not human anymore than she was dead. She was everything that couldn't be.
A silence enveloped them, her chest and heart beating as if it were alive still though it knew that it wasn't. Eventually they moved, him following her to her a small alcove near the waterfall, a place she often came to in the night as it was no longer a sight she could see in the day.
He watched as she sifted through the shadows, her body the same except for the cold touch and the fact that everything was not moving. She was a possessive thing, her body knowing it unlike her mind. When she sat down, she stared at him, making sure she did not make eye contact for she knew the pull of his blood to her lengthening fangs. She wanted him and his blood desperately but she wasn't bringing him here to die like a victim. She wanted to talk. She hadn't been able to talk to anyone for two years since she died.
She saw everyone but they never saw her for she would escape into the shadows, phasing in and out of the walls and the darkness that she was, ashamed of herself.
"What in all Apris are you?" Once he sat down, leaning against the wall of the alcove, staring at her hands, hardly believing those fingers were indeed not alive, flexing as they were to the sides of her arms, crossing them across her breasts with no meaning to emphasize them.
"I'm a vampire." It was simple. She used the terms she remembered about the particular monsters that she had never had to vanquish due to the war. She seemed as if she was not happy about the predicament, her mind somewhere else yet still there. She was given a lot of benefits though she did have a few drawbacks already.
"A bloodsucker? Who would have thought that of you?" His question wasn't meant to offend and she knew it. She could tell by the sweet and manly smell he had that he was not lying nor trying to offend her. It was strange that she was attracted to his smell as he was one of the few people she tended to visit as often as twice a week, the only competitor being Claire.
"Apris." She could remember the feeling that she had gotten when she was denied her heaven from her god. He was angry, so furious with her that he had decreed she would not pass. She could not pass.
"I see." Another silence followed before she asked a question that had bothered her. She was uncertain what he was hoping to do at her grave. No one had visited it in over a year, not even those that had been closest to her in life. Her queen had forgotten her while Claire and Adray only came on the anniversary of her death. Claire's husband had opted to stay with their child.
"Albel, what were you doing there?" She didn't understand why he would visit her. She never saw her funeral as it was that she were dead during the raining afternoon in the Aquios sacred gardens and cemetery where her family's grave was. She knew as she woke up the night afterwards, feeding on nothing, that she was the last Zelpher to be born.
"Swearing an oath." He stared into the endless night. For some reason he loved the night time. He hated sleeping in such a time but his body had always demanded it so he had. The night time was a time of solace and patience in the darkness. It was the night that had called to him when he was much younger, falling away into the shadows, perturbing his young mind.
"What oath would you swear at my grave?" She could remember when she was younger, the voices calling out to her in the dead of the night when she was supposed to be asleep. They did appear and she never ran away. For a young girl, she had been numb, first with the death of her mother and then her father only a year or so later when she was only nine springs. They hadn't scared her as they formed thousands of red eyes or shown teeth so sharp that could snap her little neck in two. She simply walked amongst those shadows as a mere friend, taking comfort of the darkness from her fears.
"………….I do not wish to discuss it with you, Nel." His face flushed as Nel watched his visage become hindered from her view by his shaggy bangs. She had always thought that Albel would be the more cursed one out the two, but it appeared that she was. She had stayed in the mausoleum for at least a month, desperately curbing her bloodlust.
It all ended when she heard some children playing in the graveyard late on night. They had been nothing compared to the arrogant strength she had wielded against their frail bodies. Afterwards, she had taken the children's corpses to the grave digger's cottage, writing a note to say she was sorry and that the true blessings of Apris be upon them. Later in her new earth home, she cried tears of blood till she felt the annoying hunger come again.
"Albel….." Using a strong hand, she turned his head towards hers, his eyes magnifying as he was caught into her crimson, the strongest red he had ever seen, oculars, dealing with her will coming through. Putting his arms up and forcefully taking his face out of her grasp, barely surprising the woman, Albel turned away once more, angry now.
"Fine! I was swearing upon your grave." Nel felt a funny feeling in her stomach as she realized that was one of the sweetest and yet also the rarest thing that she had ever heard. Was her grave really worth that much? What use would Albel have with an old enemy's grave?
"On what?" Her curiousity was now piqued. Why would an enemy do that? Albel hated her or so she thought. She knew that she didn't have to beat around the bush to try and find out the reason but she did not like the thought of reading someone's mind against their own will. She felt like it was a rape of some sort like her gods had done to her.
She could remember the meeting of her diety, his pious gaze upon her with anger on his brow. She could only stare as he told her that she was a nothing. Her worth was nothing and then he had gone through her memories, replaying all those horrible memories. She could feel the ghost pains send shivers up and down her spine. That was when his voice broke through her mind to awaken her back to his presence.
"Answer a question for me, woman and I will answer yours." His eyes reflected the light of a living being, a shine she regretted not having anymore. She was no longer of his time, and no matter how many times she wished for a companion, no human would willingly become what she was for her sake. Clair had easily been frightened of her when Nel had approached her in the night. Clair had taken it to be a nightmare of Nel as the woman watched her best friend writhe at the sight of her.
What question could Albel ask that would offend her? She already offended the living by killing and feeding from them much like a black widow to her prey.
"What is it?" She leaned forward towards him, her nose twitching at his scent. He smelled strangely, not a bad smell but it was a smell, an emotion he was trying hard to hide, that she could not pinpoint well at all.
"What is it like?" His face returned to hers, trying to prove that he could overcome her mesmerizing scarlet orbs, as if he wasn't what he was. She could only blink before she looked away, trying her hardest to hide her growing fangs on her reddened lips. She could hear his blood sing and it was a tempting song to taste.
"What's like?" She struggled to calm her bloodlust by repeating a mantra of calmness she had learned in Aquios as a spy. Calmed enough, she returned her gaze to the man in front of her, his eyes seeming to be beacons as he stared at her throat, watching a rune that she had tattooed move as she nearly forgot to move her mouth for an answer.
"Drinking blood." She blinked. Was that all? Did all humans really think that now? Wait, had she thought of that when she wondered about vampires? No, in all reality, she barely realized they existed. There were some special forces groups that dealt with the more mythical monsters and left the humans to her.
"I can't really describe it. It's the only time I ever become alive, I suppose. You kind of have to be a vampire to understand." He waited as she answered, her mouth moved trying to hide the sharpened canine that gleamed a near holy white peaking between her lips like a treasure.
She had no way to really describe how much euphoria one got from drinking of blood. It was like getting tipsy except so aware that no one could beat oneself. It was amazing and invigorating.
"I see." That killed their conversation to a lull of silence and tension. He seemed to be hiding his eyes as he waited for her to swallow her pride and ask him.
"So what was it?" Growling with a small bit of annoyance at his pride, something she did appreciate in him if only a little, Nel watched him with the utmost caution and awareness. There was something that seemed so off about him swearing on her grave.
"Bah. I will be true to you forever." Standing up, he turned his entire body to face the waterfall, the night sky seemed to accentuate his figure into the darkness as if it was foreshadowing the truth of what he wanted. The darkness overtook his form as the stars shined brighter than the moon on his back.
Nel realized what Albel was saying and she felt so touch that she wanted to cry with normal human tears but she couldn't. She had no choice but to wonder if he was really joking! She would hate it if he was only joking, much like Cliff would.
"Really, Albel?" He noticed her voice was wavering, unsure, needing his confidence when she had none of her own. She had no life anymore and no friends. He knew she was lonely and had been for the last few years.
"Why else would I swear it? Apris above, you're as thick as that maggot is." He reached over to her cold skin, not flinching as she had expected him to do. She was surprised that he willingly touched her skin when it was not worthy of his warmth. The vampire only let herself fall into his steady and warm embrace. His heartbeat was the only constant reminder of time between them.
"I see……." He rested his head ontop of hers, holding onto the dead beast with nothing more than love in his heart. If she wanted, he'd give her his life blood, he'd give her the world if she wanted it, because he knew that he was lonely without her to pester or to love in his own way.
"I want to be with you, Nel. I realized that too late. Perhaps, I can stay with you in your time." She had been the only person he was really comfortable enough with before her death. She never seemed to do what one would think. His Nel was an unpredictable whirlwind of daggers and a heart that knew it no longer could beat.
"My time is slowed drastically. I'm stuck in time while everyone moves ahead of me. It's going to be a lonely experience. I wouldn't mind the company though." She looked up at him, her eyes shining as a tear of red liquid fell down her cheek. She was happy. She really was happy and for once in her undead life was she able to thank the gods for this chance.
"Good. Because now, I'm not letting you go back into oblivion while I rot like the rest of these maggots. Just one thing." He pulled possessively on her body, embracing her frame within his, holding her with his mere human strength, a strength she could easily surpass. Raising her head up, placing a small peck of her lips on his, Nel tilted her head to side as she blinked again.
"What is it?" Was there something wrong with her now that he knew her completely? She seemed to feel his hands caressing her skin, warming it with his own warmth, yet still holding it within its skin.
"Do you really have to sleep in a coffin?"
"………Do you really want an answer to that?" And with that he knew, he would and could only love her, an equal, his death, his life, and his annoyance. She was death, desire, and life incarnate. She was lonely and he was lonely.
Passing through time with her seemed a dream and to him the humans were nothing but dancers upon a court of frivolity.
"Don't stop dancing." Those were the last words she had spoken to the humans. Those were the last words he ever heard and saw from her lips as she was taken by the fire of the morning sun.
Turning to the dead all around him, tears falling away into nothing, he turned his eyes to his vampire woman then to the only being he left alive in the mob, a simple child with red hair and green eyes. His last words would echo with his laughter as he held onto a pile of ashes and a pair of daggers.
"Don't stop dancing."
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WHOOT! I finally finished this! I wanted to get to the point, but it kinda took forever. Anyway, I hope you love it! This was in response to a Sorceress Myst challenge! GO SORCERESS MYST! You are my favorite, yo'z! lol, You're just super duper nerdy cool.