Hey, everyone! This is my very first RM fic, so don't be too hard about it. I don't own anything except my OC in the story. Well, it's a oneshot. What else can I say? Enjoy reading!

Poison de la rose

There, just one more touch… Suigintou slowly picked her lacy bonnet from the top of the chest of drawers and fastened it in her hair. The candle standing beside her in an antique candlestick (for he scorned electricity) was lighting up the reflection of her pale face in the large dim mirror in a once gilded frame. She was so unwonted to seeing herself in that black glass… The gothic corset and long skirt, which had been given to her by Thorn, were lying negligently on a chair aloof: she wouldn't need them that day. That day she wouldn't have to disguise herself as an ordinary human, though let it be a goth… There, just a couple of seconds more and she would be dressed in her old familiar outfit again, the one that had been made for her by father. After adjusting a satin rose on her chest, Suigintou looked around the room for the last time; one valedictory glance in the dim looking-glass and she started to ascent the shabby ladder that led to the roof of the house. She had to do what she had to.

The night happened to be surprisingly cool and clear for that time of year, the wind was searching though not too strong, even the stars looked sort of special: myriads of tiny icy fragments were glimmering with their cold mineral-like light on the black abyss of the sky. Suigintou had been perfectly calm, but the sight of those stars aroused some kind of incomprehensible agitation in her: why did she feel so close to them that night exactly? Truly, she wasn't going to do anything very special; where was that uneasy feeling coming from, then? Or did that decision really contradict the nature of hers?

The goth had been sitting on the roof all this time, with his legs crossed, wrapped in a long black coat. When the girl emerged from the opening in the attic and stood beside him, he cast just one passing glance at her and then turned away again, as if he didn't care about her the least bit. He was sitting there, staring in nowhere, as usual, was pensive, as usual, was smoking, as usual. The gaze of his lackluster grey eyes occasionally followed the thin stream of smoke from his cigarette; his pierced brow with a small metal ring was slightly twitching; from beneath his Victorian-styled top hat showed locks of black hair which adhered to his neck. On his finger among others was gleaming a golden rose-ring. Thorn, her new medium… Suigintou caught herself at the thought that it was a very unusual feeling to look down at him.

"You're leaving?" the goth posed an indifferent question without even looking in the girl's direction.

"Yes," she replied, "you know what to do. You'll need a lot of energy… And now, make me a doll once again!"

Thorn tore himself away from his cigarette, turned to Suigintou and, practically with no alteration in his pose, outstretched his hand with the rose-ring. She did the same. Their rings touched, radiating luminescence and waves of bright violet light encompassed the figure of the former doll. She had no idea what had happened with other sisters, but after having become a human she didn't lose the ability to alter her shape for a while with the help of her medium's powers. With each cell of her entire being Suigintou felt how the black wings of a raven were growing out of her back again, how porcelain dolljoints were taking place of her joints of bones and flesh and how her whole body was getting smaller and shrinking like a piece of clothing after laundering. A repugnant sensation – the doll's body was as if alien to her now, but, on the other hand, she could fly again.

The transformation was over in just a second, and now Suigintou found Thorn's eyes not somewhere below, but on the level with hers. "So, I'm gone. Remember about our contract", she said before soaring up into the sky, as if in hope to hear something in reply from the youth, but he remained silent and again stared far into the distance. Perhaps, Thorn had always been in the habit of being in such a melancholic and alienated state of mind, and although Suigintou gave him a hard time with her freaks since the moment of her appearance in his life, in that respect he remained the same.

Suigintou spread her wings and took wing from the top of the roof. A feeling of contradiction about the decision she had made was still striving within her breast. Was what she was going to do right, and did she need it at all? And what if she wanted to do so not only for her sake?.. Thorn took the cigarette into his mouth again and followed Suigintou with his eyes till she completely blended with other icy dots in the sky…

The window of Megu's ward was incessantly kept open, even in spite of the cool of the night wind, which was fluttering soundlessly the white hospital curtains. Suigintou knew for whom that window was never closed even at the coldest night. Without haste, as if still considering her intention, she landed on the windowsill and peeped into the room – her wandering glance immediately found a narrow bed on which the ill girl was lying. Megu was connected to some kind of an apparatus; an oxygen mask was on her face. Now she looked much weaker and thinner than in the moment of her first meeting with the first Rozen's doll. Her dark hair was spread over the pillow; her pale, nearly ghostly face had grown pinched, her cheeks were sunken. She was sleeping, but that was a sickly and restless slumber; the tips of her eyelashes were shivering nervously and she could be woken by the quietest rustle. Her thin, transparent hand was lying on the cover, the rose-ring on her finger.

Flashback

"How's she?" the young nurse asked an elderly woman who had just left the ill girl's ward, with anxiety in her voice.

"You mean Megu?" the kind woman closed her eyes and shook her head sorrowfully. "This girl is too weak… It seems as if she has given away all her powers to somebody. She doesn't even hope to get better, thinks about death all the time. I fear she won't make it…"

The young nurse dropped her eyes and sighed lamentably…

End flashback

Suigintou didn't hear that conversation but still was aware that Megu had no chances. In the sheer atmosphere of the hospital room there was something distressing, and over the girl's head ill fate seemed to be impending. If Suigintou didn't do that why she came there, the prophecy of the nurse would come true…

Megu heard the rustling of Suigintou's wings in her dream and opened her eyes immediately. First she saw a veil of black feathers before her and then the black silhouette of the doll sitting on the window. "Tenshi-san, you came to see me!" she pronounced in hardly audible whisper and smiled feebly.

Without saying a word, Suigintou jumped off the windowsill and made a few steps towards the girl's bed. While she was walking (a thick shadow was still lying on her face and Megu could only make out the dark shape of hers), her figure was transforming and stretching up and eventually it took the shape of a human body. "Suigintou, are you a human now?" the astonished Megu tried to sit up in bed, but she had power enough only to raise herself a little, leaning her back against the back of the bed.

"Yes, Megu, hush…" the second girl replied in a hollow voice and took a sit on the edge of the bed, looking intensely into the eyes of her medium. Now a beam of moonlight was falling across her face and Megu could descry it well. In this tall girl she recognized her old doll: all the same, after having turned into a human, Suigintou didn't change much, although her face undoubtedly obtained a few new features. It was her gaze that was in some way different: those blazing, piercing purple eyes, always so full of hatred and contempt, thirst for revenge and sad unrequited love for father, were now concealing something new.

"Say nothing", the former doll repeated and outstretched her hand towards Megu's face. All of a sudden, she tore the oxygen mask off the girl's face, and the apparatus, with its wires now hanging down to the floor lifelessly, peeped steadily and a straight green line came crawling along the monitor. Megu, after being deprived of this support so suddenly, impotently dropped her head on Suigintou's breast and grabbed her arm in order not to fall.

Rozen's daughter pressed the girl's fragile body to her bosom and touched her forehead with her cold lips. That was nothing like Suigintou – Megu couldn't perceive what was going on, but, refusing to seek and explanation, just closed her eyes and smiled silently. She felt good: at that precious moment she felt the warmth and care she had never received from anybody before. She was junk, useless, lonely, and now she suddenly was given such support – yes, it truly did feel good!

During the long kiss Suigintou groped for Megu's fingers with her free hand and put together their rings. The former doll's rose-ring slowly started to become red-hot and obtain the fiery hue, she herself was as if radiating inner glow, and the energy was gradually passing through her body into the body of the ill girl, filling it with life-giving force. Yes, she had ultimately decided… Suigintou wanted to satiate her ex-medium with power before breaking the contract. Now, being a human, she needed far more energy for the Alice Game than Megu could provide; for that girl giving her last bits of powers to the doll meant death, and Suigintou just couldn't let it happen. That was the reason why she was consent to let a contract with Thorn, though it was less advantageous. Thorn and Megu were similar in some way, but still he would never give her as much as Megu was ready to offer. Megu was a perfect medium: she thought Suigintou was her dark angel and felt nearly slavish devotion, she was ready to give away to her all her powers without rest and ask nothing in return. But Suigintou gave up all that profit… What for? Suigintou asked herself that question over and over again and often scorned herself for that weakness. What roused her to such an action? Simple gratitude for all and warm human feelings? Or perhaps it was understanding, for herself and Megu were very much alike: while passing the energy to Megu Suigintou recalled herself, pitiful, miserable, broken, lying on the very bottom of an abyss, and from above there was coming the dazzling light of the Rosa Mistica presented to her by father. She was a human now and there was no trace of her belly defect, but at that moment Megu was the one in the same position and she had nobody to save her but Suigintou. No, that girl simply had to believe in herself, to pull through, to go on living…

Thorn was still sitting on the roof and staring somewhere into the distance. He had just smoked the fourth cigarette. The ring on his finger turned hotter and hotter and by increasing burning pain and slight indisposition he knew that Suigintou was passing his energy to that girl, her ex-medium. He was ready to endure the pain – there was a contract between them. All was fair: he got from her what he wanted; she got from him what she needed. And still he couldn't understand her… Suigintou was ready to destroy her sisters cruelly, win the Alice Game at any cost but was now breaking the contract with her medium in order to save her. Perhaps, she would forever remain that strange, mysterious, contradictory, darker and more enigmatic than the soul of a goth. The ring was now red-hot up to the limit and was burning the finger all the way to the bone. Thorn shut his eyes tight and gritted his teeth in order to repress the cry of unendurable pain. She was saving that girl… He could never imagine what she could be like: she lived at his house; in the daytime, leaving her familiar dollish outfit behind, she pretended to be a gothess; was learning to exist in a human body and a human world; was waiting for a sign for the beginning of the new stage of the Alice Game… He didn't feel like admitting it, but it seemed that they were meant for each other: both had no friends, both were loners, both were strange to the entire world, living their own lives. The difference was only that he was perfectly indifferent towards outer world and she hated the most of it. She was one of the Rozen Maiden dolls and he would never find the clue to her riddle. And still there was something in her, in that Suigintou…

Finally Suigintou broke the long kiss and carefully, letting Megu go, rose from the bed and made for the open window. Megu followed her with a meek but inquisitive gaze. Being left without support, she didn't fall down from the bed but, in utter astonishment, discovered fresh powers, powers to sit up all by herself and make a deep breath without fearing anything, as if in those few seconds she had gone a long way towards recovery. But she didn't care even about this at that moment. The girl pressed her hand to her forehead: she still could feel the trace of Suigintou's kiss, both burning and icy-cold. Why had she done that all of a sudden? In all vast world only question was tormenting Megu and that question was "why?", but she didn't have enough courage to the former doll about it, fearing to do something wrong, so she remained sitting in shy silence.

A minute passed in dead silence. Megu's eyes were tensely fixed on the figure of the other girl, who was standing with her back to her in a spot of moonlight. Suigintou was also silent, staring out of the window – she had fulfilled her duty for her ex- (now Megu really was an ex-) medium but for some reason she felt the desire to stay there a little longer.

Finally Megu's quiet voice broke the silence. "You know, Suigintou", she began meekly, "the doctor examined me yesterday. He said nothing, but in his eyes I read hopelessness: now I know that for sure, I have but very little time left in this world… I don't regret anything. Nobody needs me here. I regret only one thing… I will no more be able to help you with the Alice Game, tenshi-san. Now, when you're a real girl, you must be in want of plenty of power from your medium, and my powers won't last long…"

Suigintou suddenly turned around, fire burning in her eyes; she swiftly strode to the bed and lifted Megu's chin with her fingers. "How can that be that you haven't understood anything? You don't need to provide energy for me anymore. I've just broken our contract; you are no longer my medium".

The dark-haired girl gasped and immediately looked at her finger: truly, there was no ring on it. She really had noticed nothing. "So, that is why you kissed me on the forehead?" she dared to ask.

"You thought I did it for the hell of it?"

"By how will you get by, without a medium, I mean?" Megu could hardly hold back tears though she had no reason for crying.

"You needn't worry about me" Suigintou lowered her gaze to look at her rose-ring. "I already have a new one, and it was his power that I've just given you. Don't look so surprised and don't say a word! I just couldn't take away you powers, you must keep living! You must, you just have to!" the girl kept speaking with more and more passion and her voice trembled with excitement. "You are not junk! You have no right to give up your life! I've risen up in order to win the Alice Game and you must rise up as well! No more of that nonsense of yours; I'm not your angel of death and I'll never be one because you'll get through! You know have enough power to recover and you'll do it! You have a choice: you either will believe that the world needs you or you'll deceive me forever. I sacrificed our contract, you just try to die now!" Suigintou was practically shouting and from an outsider's viewpoint it looked as if she was endlessly raging at Megu, but the latter clearly saw real friendly support in that sort of behaviour. None of the two of them had expected such an act from the former doll, perhaps it meant that she was turned into a human not without purpose?

Suigintou ended her speech abruptly and strode towards the window. "Farewell, I have nothing more to do here. And you just try to give up now!"

"Suigintou!" Megu suddenly cried out and the former doll stopped and cast a glance at the girl over her shoulder. Such grateful eyes, wet from tears, she had never seen before!

"I know nothing about your sisters and have very little knowledge about the Alice Game" she pronounced quietly, "but I know one thing for sure: that's you who rightfully deserves to become Alice! Come what may, for me you're already Alice. Today you proved that you really deserve it…"

As Suigintou heard those words, her human heart trembled and a secret, almost unseen smile appeared on her lips. "Thanks, Megu", she nearly whispered and, turning back to the window, hastily kissed the rose-ring. She didn't look back even once before turning back into a doll and flying out of the window, but even that way she couldn't help feeling the intent look of those grateful wet eyes that firmly believed in that in what Suigintou herself believed. Silently she soared up to the stars: thoughts were crowding in her head and obscure feelings were striving within her bosom. Ahead there was a long was home…

The damned ladder was squeaking in a disgusting manner while the girl was descending into the room. That was an odious sound, but he adored it… It was late, Thorn was fast asleep. His strong white body was brightly contrasting with the black sheets he was lying on. Strands of messy hair were falling across his forehead, his arm was adorned with some sort of mystical gothic tattoos. Do all the goths sleep without a short on, she wondered?.. The rose-ring on his finger was gleaming in the dark of the room.

Suigintou sat down on the bed beside him and slightly moved the ring – under it on his finger there was a big burn covered with gore. That could only mean that he had met his commitment in full…

Because of Suigintou's touch Thorn reluctantly woke up and looked in the utmost indifferent manner at the gothess who was sitting beside him. "You're back?" he asked mechanically, as if he couldn't see it himself.

"Yes".

"You did everything as you intended?"

"Yes, exactly".

"It's ok then…", Thorn was aware that such kind of conversation was absolutely meaningless, so he got down straight to business and moved a little on the bed. "Are you going to sleep now?"

For some reason or other Suigintou stared at the opposite wall. "No, I don't want to today. I guess I'll be on the roof".

Thorn burrowed his face into the pillow and said nothing in response, he didn't even see Suigintou leaving – well, he had no particular care about that.

The girl sat on the roof, nursing her knees, and looked up at those cold mineral stars. The wind was searching as before. She felt a strong desire to follow Thorn's habit and smoke. That night she had a lot to think about…

That's it. I really want to know your honest opinion about it, so please, don't hesitate to leave a review! Tolerant criticism is as well accepted. Hope you like it)