Erm... hi. I guess this story isn't very popular, since not only does the first chapter only have 18 hits, but I'm writing this to the depressing tune of "no new reviews! Have a nice day." So... here's another chapter, in hopes that it will entice people to like it better. And if not... then I lose all faith in myself as a writer, haha. No, I'm kidding. I don't usually write for this fandom anyway, so...
Standard disclaimers apply. The storyline is actually property of my friend WoofBlackHayate, but she's given me permission to use it, so... just in case that wasn't clear and that was what drove everybody off. Although I have to think it's my crappy summary that did it, too. Anyway, for anyone around who bothered to read, thanks, and... enjoy.
To Fall
"It would break his heart if you died."
If Piers had in fact been able to hear Sheba's words, he might have turned back; he might have returned to ask the remainder of Felix's group and Isaac's party to come with him. As it was, however, she had not managed to reach him, and the Lemurian continued to plow forward blindly. He had to reach Felix before something happened to him—whatever Agatio wanted with him, it couldn't be good. Cutting down a monster straying into his path without a second thought, he prayed he wouldn't come too late.
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The first thing Felix noticed when he regained consciousness was the rope binding his wrists together in front of him. That would have been easy enough to undo, save for the fact that his sword was gone and he probably couldn't reach the knife he'd hidden in one of his boots without a certain amount of flexibility that he didn't have. The next thing that he realized was how cold the stone floor was, and then it hit him—he was alone.
It'd been a little too long since he'd last been by himself. Even when he'd leaped off the Venus Lighthouse, the waves washing himself and Sheba away, he hadn't been alone… Sheba had been with him, and his sister had found them eventually. Then there was Piers. The man would never say how old he was (though everyone thought that he was likely older than Kraden—the scholar himself was inclined to agree), but he was probably the only one who could possibly make Felix feel so... the Venus adept scowled as he realized he couldn't really put his finger on the feeling.
It wasn't anything that needed to be immediately addressed, anyway. The cell was dark, silent—dead. That darkness pressed in on him, fearful and suffocating, and idly Felix wondered if he was to die there. If only there was someone to break the silence, someone who would let him out before he died of this oppressive darkness! Somewhere in his memory, a voice whispered a warning. Be careful what you wish for.
"It appears that you're awake," came Agatio's voice. "Good. Karst is tired of waiting for you to wake up. Be thankful she didn't kill you while you slept." The cell door swung open, Felix gritting his teeth as the sudden onslaught of light shot needles of pain through his eyes.
"What do you want with me?" he asked.
"Well, at first I simply wanted to get rid of you for betraying Saturos and Menardi. But there's a much less bothersome, highly entertaining way to go about doing this then just killing you, like we originally planned. So we have a proposition for you." Agatio's smile bespoke false promises. "See, we have a friend who, although he is quite powerful, owes us his life. We'll let you go… on one condition."
"And that would be?" Felix growled, trying to loosen the rope around his wrists.
"Now, what kind of tone is that to take with your benevolent captor?" the male Mars adept asked, mockingly. "All we want you to do is fight him. He's been looking for a decent meal for a week now, I'm sure you'll do quite nicely. Of course, if you win, we'll let you walk away."
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Karst played with her scythe, her hand just itching to unsheathe it and do some damage. But the Venus adept was unarmed, and not only that but Agatio's thrice-damned game forbid her to do anything to him. She wanted revenge for Menardi, why wouldn't he let her take it? She had barely begun compiling a mental tirade before the stoic young man spoke.
"Fine. Give me back my weapon."
Oh. The look of barely contained amusement on Agatio's face told the other Mars adept everything. Smiling now, Karst ran a hand over the curve of the scythe's covered blade. She wouldn't need it, though… this would be entertaining enough on its own.
"You mean that sword of yours? I don't think so." Agatio couldn't help but laugh at the sudden, obvious change in the Venus adept's expression. Fear. He hadn't seen anything like it from the teenager before, not even when Felix had caught a glimpse of the Mars adept before he was knocked unconscious. This could be fun… "You've dealt with him—or at least those under him—before. Remember those monsters from last night?"
Sucking in a breath with a hiss, Felix wondered what sort of monstrous being could possibly control such fiends. "I…" What could he say? It would be cowardly of him to back out, so he felt, and yet he didn't stand a chance unarmed. Did he really have a choice?
"Well now, hurry up and tell us what you'll do. One-on-one combat, or will you simply submit to us and let us amuse ourselves with you for a while?" Felix's eyes widened as he thought over what that could possibly mean. "Why don't you decide out here in the hallway with us?" Karst's voice was full of mock-concern as she and Agatio strode into the cell, picking up the Venus adept and dragging him outside into the harshly lit corridor.
"Hurry up, boy. We're getting tired of waiting." The female Mars adept's hand strayed to the handle of her scythe.
"He won't be choosing. Unhand him, now." Piers' voice rang out into the corridor as he rounded the corner, depositing the body of a dispatched guard unceremoniously on the floor besides him. The blade of Excalibur ran red with blood—Felix shivered at the sight of the normally gentle Mercury adept in such a state. He seemed almost… possessed.
"You. I knew we should have killed you back there on the hill. I suppose we'll just have to fix that now, won't we?" A toothy, sadistic smile spread itself slowly over Karst's face, and her hand closed over her scythe's handle ever so slightly.
"I'll fight."
"You'll what?" Agatio wore an amused (although mildly perplexed) expression. "It took four adepts to defeat Saturos and Menardi, what makes you think you'll be able to defeat us on your own?"
Piers shook his head. "I will fight the one you wished Felix to challenge. If I win, you will let us walk away unharmed. If I lose… I will take his place." The bloodthirsty, vengeful aura from earlier was gone; in its place was a sort of fatalistic determination. Felix wanted to grab the Lemurian by the collar and ask him what the hell was going through his head. Why pick now of all times to try to be noble?
"Hmph. All right, then. This one's no fun anyway," Agatio muttered, pulling Felix to his feet and shoving him roughly towards Piers. The Mercury adept promptly dropped his sword to catch him, quickly setting about untying his bonds. Forgotten for the moment, the Mars adepts stepped back. "You've got five minutes. Use them wisely," the male Proxian called.
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"Are you all right? They didn't do anything to you, did they?" Piers asked worriedly, once Felix was properly unbound.
"Why?" came the Venus adept's horrified whisper.
"Pardon?"
"Why… why did you say that? You don't even know who you're fighting!" the teenager yelled, hardly caring that it wasn't like him to be so vocal.
The Mercury adept raised an eyebrow. "Should I be worried?" he asked.
"Those monsters we couldn't kill had a master."
"And I'm fighting him?" the Lemurian inquired, almost flippantly. "It should be a challenge then." He smiled, and it tore a hole in Felix's heart.
"You'll… you'll… you can't do this, Piers! You don't stand a chance!" Felix latched onto one of Piers' muscular arms with both of his hands, his grip almost bruising. The Mercury adept winced as he felt the younger man's hold tighten. "I don't want to see you die too…"
"Felix… Fe, if you would kindly let go of my arm…" Gently prying Felix's hands off of him, he laid a comforting hand on one of the Venus adept's shoulders. "Jenna and Sheba are alive, Isaac's party came in time to save them. And… I have a reason to fight. I'll be fine, trust me."
"But…"
"When I left Lemuria, all I had was my sword, my ship, and my psynergy. You… you and the others gave me something more. I had friends I could fight for, friends who would fight for me." He drew the young man close. "Here… a kiss for luck." Before the teenager could say anything Piers leaned down a little and kissed him on the forehead, lightly. "Thank you for everything, Felix."
And just as swiftly as the kiss had come and gone, the Mercury adept picked up his sword and went to face his impending doom. Karst led him like a red incarnation of Mercury himself, and somewhere in his conscious the Venus adept remembered something Kraden had once told him—something about how in a different realm, far from Weyard, Mercury was the herald who led souls to the realm of death. The thought sent a fearful chill down Felix's spine.
"Enjoyed your sappy moment?" Agatio's voice cut in, snapping the teenager out of his reverie. His tone was laden with sarcasm. The Proxian in question leaned against the wall behind Felix, arms crossed and an annoyed expression flitting across his features. "You'll probably need it. He really doesn't stand a chance."
"… I have faith in him," the Venus adept replied, not looking at his captor.
"Of course you do," Agatio shot back. "People always have faith. Feh, I drew the short straw this time. If only Karst didn't want to just kill you the minute she got you alone…"
The Venus adept said nothing, preferring to thumb through his memories of his little group's journey to light the beacons of the elemental lighthouses. He remembered how hesitant Piers had been at first to trust them, how eventually the Lemurian had become someone the party could not do without—and then there were all the battles. The Mercury adept was skilled with his blade, gracefully cutting down monster after monster. Such grace seemed a little incongruous to how powerfully built he was—but that, Felix supposed, was probably something he'd developed over the years from sailing on his own.
Lost in his thoughts, he didn't notice when Karst returned. It was only when she took a swipe at him with her scythe as a joke (and actually nicked him on the cheek) that he was jarred from his daze.
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"Well, they're at it. I wonder how long this one will last—I'll give him fifteen minutes, tops." The female Mars adept played with her scythe, seemingly bored.
"You know my bet, as usual." As usual? Felix's heart sank into his stomach at the words. They had subjected somebody else to this? Agatio's words weighed heavily on his mind as he took off at a run in the direction he'd seen Karst take Piers. Neither Mars adept paid him any mind.
"Five minutes? Eh, but he's not like the matchstick swordsmen we tossed in there before. He's actually got a decent set of muscles," he heard Karst remark, as he ran.
"Muscle doesn't mean anything if you can't move fast enough to avoid getting hit," was Agatio's reply, and then he wasn't in earshot any more. All he could think of was keeping Piers alive.
"Hn." Karst clamped her jaw shut and settled back against the corridor wall. "Well, the only way to settle this is to wait."
Almost there… It had to be just a little further this way, Felix thought. Faintly, he could hear the clashing of steel against steel, but one thing worried him—Piers wasn't using any djinn, wasn't summoning. What in Gaia's name was going on in that room?
Then an inhuman howl rattled the walls and made the Venus adept clap his hands over his ears in a futile attempt to block out the sound. An involuntary groan left his throat as the sound seemed to pierce his skull, leaving it throbbing and ringing and his ears temporarily nonfunctional. He couldn't hear Piers cry out as a blow he was too stunned to avoid hit full-force, smashing him into a wall where he slid to the floor like a discarded plush toy.
"Twenty minutes? Jeez, he's losing his touch." Agatio shook his head. "I'll go check on them, then. I'm sure Felix will want a few minutes to say his goodbyes..." His voice was suddenly thoughtful, not quite as malicious as he'd intended. It wasn't as if it really mattered. He walked slowly, purposefully towards the arena room. He wasn't in any real rush. If things went as planned, the Venus adept would still be there.
He couldn't hear swords clashing anymore. Did that mean… did that mean that Piers had won? Or… no. No! Felix sprinted blindly down the corridor, somehow finding the right room after what felt like an eternally lengthening hallway. By the time he got there, he was a little winded—and the sight that greeted him upon opening that door stole what remained of his breath from him.
The Lemurian had propped himself up against the wall, Excalibur still clutched in one hand. A sword-wielding creature (appearing to be half-man, half beast) advanced on him, raising its blade for a final strike, and just as it seemed that the end was in sight for sure Piers pushed himself to his feet and impaled the thing. Excalibur pierced its intended target, the man-beast's heart, with impossible speed; letting out an enraged bellow the creature retaliated by bringing a clawed hand down on the back of Piers' neck. Stunned, he fell without a sound, somehow managing to recover and roll out of the way fast enough to avoid the sword point that stabbed into the floor right next to his head.
It was then that Felix realized that Piers was injured—badly. Mia would call it a miracle to see the man fighting so hard when it seemed he'd lost far too much blood. It painted the floor, the walls, and the blade of his opponent's sword—which clipped the blue-haired man on the collarbone as the mixed entity (that was all one could really call it) gave an unholy scream mid-swing and finally expired. With the entity gone, the anti-djinn field it had projected dissipated, and suddenly the Venus adept realized why Piers hadn't used his djinn as he felt all of his own recover.
The Mercury adept paled a little further every step he took, and as he pulled Excalibur from the dead entity's chest he seemed to hang in the air for a moment—then the blade fell from his numb fingers, its master following it to the floor shortly afterwards. The sword knelled an ominous note as it struck the stone of the room's floor, and though Felix couldn't remember how he'd gotten there he knelt besides it, Piers cradled carefully in his arms.
"You did it, Piers. You beat him, just like you said you would."
"Mm… I did, didn't I?" Piers didn't seem to know who he was talking to, though. A solitary tear rolled slowly down Felix's face, and he rubbed it away with the back of a hand.
"Yeah—that means you can't leave me now! Who's going to show me where the others are?" the younger man asked, feeling dark fear slither up like a poisonous tendril within his core.
"Felix? Oh, Fe, you're safe… I'm glad we met," the Lemurian replied, somewhat thickly. His vision was dancing in and out of focus already…
The Venus adept blanched as he realized his shirt was becoming soaked with the man's blood. "No… no… don't talk like that! You'll live! You have to…" He didn't have anything with him—no! "Flower!" He called, invoking the little djinni. "Please… heal him!"
Even as the golden light of the little Venus djinni's power gathered around Piers' wounds, Felix began to lose hope—the large wounds, the dangerous ones, would not close. The little djinni shook its head and retreated to Felix's psyche, leaving a little pulse of energy that sounded like an apology in its wake. No… no!
Piers smiled a little, shaking his head. "I'm sorry, Felix. I was careless… all I could think of was how I couldn't let them hurt you." Seeing the younger man's stricken expression, he sighed. "Oh, Felix… don't cry. Come now… smile for me."
Forcing a smile, Felix felt the tears well up anyway. "That's a little better," he heard the Lemurian say, "but it looks… a little tense. Still… you're beautiful when you smile. I lo—" Piers never finished his sentence, the black creeping up on the edges of his vision whisking him away before the words could leave his mouth. The hand that cupped the Venus adept's face tenderly suddenly went slack, falling away.
There was no need to hold back now. The tears began streaming down the stoic young man's face, all of his emotional barriers shattered in that one instant. Hugging the Lemurian's still form to himself, Felix murmured, "You're still warm…"
Agatio found him kneeling by Piers' body. Clutching a hand that had only started to grow cold, the tears had slowed. The youth was silent as death, the only sound in the room being the nearly inaudible plip of his tears as they splashed one by one on the flagstones tiling the floor. He would not speak—not when the Mars adept needled him, insulted him, mocked his masculinity or his ability as a swordsman. It was like he could not even hear him… When the Proxian started on Piers, Felix merely tightened his grip on the fallen swordsman's hand. He had closed the Lemurian's eyes at least… somehow the idea of the man's sightless golden eyes staring emptily at the ceiling seemed a little unsettling to the Mars clansman.
Realizing that nothing he said was working, Agatio changed tactics. "Come here." His voice was a little kinder, and at last the Venus adept looked at him. Suppressing a shudder (Felix's eyes were glazed over… it looked almost as if he too had left the realm of the living), he held out his hand and tried to look understanding. Without a word, the youth laid Piers' hand by his side and stood, giving the Lemurian's body a final look… as if he was saying farewell. Then he walked stiffly over to the doorway where the Mars adept stood.
Taking the broken youth's hand, Agatio led him away.
