***
A sullen blackness was surrounding the two passengers as they felt themselves leaving the human world at the speed of light and sound.
Akira felt his lungs being pressured by his entourage, as if the shadows melted in this water-like atmosphere were drowning him.
"Stay strong!" cried the silver-haired Shin through the heavy amount of darkness.
The young boy didn't hear, or rather couldn't; his mind was entirely focused on the pain that his body was enduring, as if he was burning from inside.
Slowly, he turned his head to try to see Sawaki: it was as if he had lost his sight.
Nothing could be seen, or heard.
Only this pain, so harsh, was perceived, coming from the tip of his fingers and flowing into the depths of his organs.
Suddenly he realized that his body wasn't hurting for nothing: it was emitting a sinister but yet pure glow of light,
as if his corpse was reflecting the light of dawn.
"What is happening to me?" thought the boy.
The boy tried once again to breathe, to move his arm; no success.
The glow shining through his bones suddenly became brighter as he saw a little light resembling to an exit of a tunnel.
"We almost arrived, hang in there!"
This time the adolescent could hear something like a small fainting voice.
Nevertheless, reassured by those words, Akira collapsed to escape to the pain and suffer that his mind and soul were enduring.
"..."
"...Ryuuko..."
"Ryuuko, wake up… You cannot die here… You cannot sleep here..."
« Who… Who are you ? » thought Akira.
"Shirogane and I are waiting for you... Hurry up..."
"Akira…" said another deep, familiar voice.
"Shi… Shirogane?"
« Akira, dear, please listen to me. I don't have much time…"
"Shirogane, you're alive! I thought you were gone…"
"Well, not yet. Listen. You'll have to wake up soon. Follow Sawaki, I effectively ordered him to lead you to me. However, be careful of those who pretend to be from the world of light. They might want to harm you."
"Why? Why would someone harm me? And where are you now?"
The voice sighed softly. "Follow Sawaki. That's all I can say to you for now…"
"Shirogane! Wait!"
"Wake up.."
"Ryuuko-sama! Wake up!"
The young man abruptly opened his eyes, and saw the Shin lowering his face towards his.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!"
The boy suddenly relieved his head: they bumped into each other's head with force and both fell on the hard floor.
"Ouch! What was that for?"
"Sorry, you just startled me… I thought you were going to attack me."
"No problem, but don't ever do that again!"
"Ok…" said the boy, exasperated. "Where is this? This doesn't seem to be the Shadow World. It's pretty lightened and blank…
The remarks of the young Rei were not totally absurd. The two of them were standing in a white place, where there was nothing besides three sculpted magnificent
mirrors. The first one was three times taller than Akira, and around the glass-door there was a refined outline of white gold and shining sliver, interlaced and melted
together to form a splendid crown of pure gold at the top of the mirror, in which center a blood-coloured ruby was incrusted in. The second mirror was simpler than
the first one, having only for ornament a sculpted human on the top, made of wood and steel; however, it was as impressive and imposing as the previous one.
Finally, the third mirror was entirely black, and on which contour we could see agonizing shadows sculpted forms, mixed to laces of shining gold and Nature
reflecting pieces of emeralds, incrusted in the waves of the sculpture representing once again a black crown on the top of the darkening mirror.
"Those are quite impressive, but where are we?" asked persistently Akira.
"The mirrors you can see there are the Guardians of the Three Dimensions. This one – said the Shin by designating the simple mirror- leads to the Human World, where we were an instant earlier."
"So then you mean we're still not into the World of Darkness?" asked the auburn-haired teen.
"Well, no, but…" The Shin stopped when he saw that the boy was not listening to him anymore. He seemed to be hypnotized by the three doors, which were emitting
a pure but yet dark aura melted with an undescriptible uneasiness.
The young Rei approached the second mirror, fascinated: he looked at his reflect who made a wink at him.
"It winked at me!" said Akira, surprised.
"Well, this is your human form after all. You are not really human, remember? This is the reflection of your inner conscience as a human."
Akira glanced one more time at his reflect which was now looking bored and sleeping on the floor like nothing could ever disturb him.
"Hey, I'm not like that at all!" protested the boy. "Oh well, I pretty don't care. Which mirror or door or whatever leads us to the true Shadow World?"
"The black door you're seeing there is leading to the Shadow World…"began the Shin. " Hey, you're not listening to me again! No! Don't go there! "
The young boy was, this time, approaching instinctively the majestical white door. As expected, he found himself into his Rei form: tall, long raven hair floating around
a long black and white outfit. His face, calmly composed, was graced by a pair of pure red-coloured ruby eyes. Akira felt his heart pounding at this vision of himself,
which he had never seen before.
At this moment, everything came out of his mind: Shirogane, Sawaki, Homurabi, the human world, the shadow world; all that counted for him at this
precise instant was this holy-seeming like door, and his true and only one reflect which seemed to call him through the mirror glass.
As the teen tried to touch this image of his, he felt that he was attracted by a pure unknown force that was pulling him inside.
A spiral of light formed around the young Rei: he was being sucked into the Light World, as if this one was praying to him to come into the true world he belonged to.
"Stop right now you fool!!! You can't go now! It's too soon!" cried Sawaki.
Seeing that it was no use of screaming, the Shin grabbed the remaining arm of the alarmed boy who was almost engulfed by the mirror,
and pulled him back into the blank space. Both of them fell once again on the floor.
BAM!
"This is the second time! Fuck!" cried Akira, who was sitting on the chest of the Shin.
"I should be the one saying this! I thought I warned you well enough about this door!"
"No you didn't! And this is my own world after all. Why can't I go in there?"
"HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN ABOUT SHIROGANE OR WHAT?" said the angry Shin with a fearful voice.
Somehow, the scary sound of Sawaki's tone calmed down the boy, along with the mention of Shirogane.
The boy came slightly back to his senses.
"Ah, yes…. That's right. Well then it is this one right?" said Akira by designating the black mirror.
Sawaki didn't reply. The Shin was looking at the boy with big widen eyes filled with surprise.
"You…"
"What again? When will we the hell go?" asked angrily Akira, taking a step forwards the Shadow World's Palace's door.
"Well, you… No, that's nothing. Let's keep going."
"What the hell…? Well, it shouldn't be something important. He's pissing me off for taking so long!" thought the young Rei.
"Should we go then?" asked Akira.
At his surprise, the Shin had already disappeared into the black mirror, which was forming circle waves in the glass, proof that someone had passed through.
"This damn Shin!" thought the teen, annoyed.
Before following the Shin through the dark passage, Akira felt a tiny bit of bad pressentiment, that was forbidding him
to go in there. The young boy chased this feeling of uneasiness, and followed the Shin through the massive amount of darkness.
At the same time, in the palace of the Shadow World, a red-haired Shin, sitting on a black throne, made a terrific smile of satisfaction.
"You finally came… Ryuuko. My dear, dearest boy…"
***