"This is most peculiar," the man with the flippy hair remarked. "I've never seen an anti-akuma weapon in the form of a human being, if that's what you indeed are. You're an external weapon, but you're not, at the same time…"

He then proceeded to examine Magureatari from top to bottom, and I mean that as literally as possible. I tried to stifle several laughs, very nearly unsuccessfully. Magu looked at me, his face the epitome of contempt. The strange man attempted to look under Magu's extravagant clothing. Magu leapt backward with a "Yelp!" and flew to my side.

"Rixie! Tell him to stop!" he cried. I laughed, this time out loud.

"Fascinating! He has all—as far as I could see—the characteristics of an authentic homo sapien! …Let's have Hevlaska take a look at you!"

"What?! What is 'Hevlaska?!' Rixie, don't let him take me!" Magu yelled, ducking behind me.

"Are you kidding? I want to watch this!" I replied, turning to grab him by the elbow.

"Won't hurt a bit, promise!" the odd man reassured with an evil glint in his eye.

Following the man—whom I presumed to be Head Officer Komui—'s lead we rounded several corners and finally halted on a platform suspended over about 30 feet of nothing, a hard-looking tile floor below.

"Hevlaska!" Komui called, his voice ringing in the nothing. An odd, white glow began to collect at the floor and gradually migrated toward us. To Magureatari's horror, Hevlaska turned out to be a giant collection of what seemed like some sort of ghostly ectoplasm substance.

"You called?" Hevlaska asked in a low, airy voice that sounded ancient.

"Hevlaska!" Komui exclaimed, striking an elaborate pose. "Examine these two, please!"

"What?! Me too?!" I cried as Hevlaska wrapped a tentacle-like arm around Magu and me. Both of us went perfectly still when the mass of white mist began to speak.

"This puzzles me," it practically whispered. "They share a single piece of innocence. Each of them harbors half of it." I had been told what innocence was and why it existed, and now I was thoroughly confused. Komui was fingering his non-existent facial hair.

"Then that means…" He stopped mid-sentence. I wanted to scream at him, but Hevlaska's cool touch kept me silent for some reason. "You can let them down now, Hevlaska," Komui said, still lost in thought. Gradually, Magu and I were lowered and gently set back on the suspended platform. Magu glided to my side, latching onto my arm and leaning his head on my shoulder. Aside from the difference in genders, Magu and I were very physically alike. Same height, roughly same weight, same eyes—although my hair didn't in the least resemble a peacock.

"Tell me how you two came together, along with your lives' stories before you came to the order," Komui demanded. An…interesting inquiry.

"Well—" I began, but he cut me off.

"FIRST! Let's go somewhere more comfortable!" And the off we were again, twisting and turning through a labyrinth that was, at the time, unsolvable. We stopped in front of a large wooden door adorned with brass knockers in the form of gargoyles.

"The family room!" Komui announced. The door swung open to reveal a humongous room covered in gigantic sofas and colossal overstuffed armchairs, with massive, abhorrent gargoyle statues in each corner. "Ah, how homey!" the Head Officer sighed. I was beginning to wonder if this man knew the meaning of the word "sanity."

Komui grabbed Magu by the elbow and hauled him over to one of the enormous couches. I followed them, watching Magu struggle against Komui's grip, saying things like "I can walk myself" and "You're pulling off my arm." We selected a particularly squishy-looking sofa. Magu laid horizontally, his head on my lap and his knees crooked, his feet dangling over the arm.

"NOW! Tell me your lives' stories, please! And if you need to cry, my shoulder is super-absorbent!" Komui exclaimed, patting his clothing. I only hoped I wouldn't have to take him up on that offer.

~*~

When I was young, I lived in a huge house. My parents were wealthy, but not stuck up about it; they gave every extra cent to local charities. I remember them well: their faces, the way they moved, they way they spoke. My mother was an elegant woman—not in they way she looked or spoke, but the way she could gain control without having to speak. The only time I saw her without a smile on her face was when my grandmother died. But then again, I didn't see her for very long after that.

My father was the ideal characterization of the word "gentleman." He was always courteous to everyone, and again always smiling. He always called me Rixie. He never got mad; he never yelled. Not in anger, at least.

That day, there were clouds in the sky that were simply aching to let their heavy burdens fall. Mother, Father, and I were in the living room listening to James, our new butler, play the piano and sing. There was a loud knock on the front door, but the person on the other side didn't wait for James to rise from the piano bench—instead he proceeded to kick the door off its hinges, sending it crashing through the wall opposite it. Mother and Father leapt up from their positions on the couch and stood in front of me. The man who came around the corner wore my uncle's face, but it was wrong. It was twisted into a demonic grin, and it was staring straight at me.

"Corbin?" my mother's timid voice was looking for a trace of her brother in that stranger. The man with my uncle's face began to laugh, and his body started shifting—into a giant rock-like structure hovering just above the ground. I didn't know it at the time, but this was the spirit of my deceased grandmother. My uncle had used the Millennium Earl's power to call her soul back, and she had taken his body and put on his face. She was what the Black Order calls and akuma.

Before I knew it, my parents had been reduced to piles of ash on the floor in front of me. The monster turned to face me, readying its gargantuan guns for their next victim. Before it could shoot, a flash of green flew to my side. It looked like another person, at first, but then it changed into a peacock-colored tiger-like beast and leapt and the demon. There was a huge "BOOM," and when I looked up there was no trace of the monster or the tiger-animal. In their place was a boy with clouded blue eyes and peacock-colored hair.