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Chapter one, Part Two:

Dreams come true, but nightmares do too

(Ten)

Cautious as I would be when a symphony starts from every corner. Only my feet were steadily tapping at the beat. They would pound like thunder, shaking every side within me; I stood ready. It has to be to the left, I thought when the sonorous cacophony perked my right ear. No, not the right; the left. So as my sudden instincts would show, my feet dug deep in the flaky soil and drove left. Had that silver bullet nearly hit me, only the tear of my fragile shirt would show of it. "Why won't they give up?" I growled, scowling to my left; my posture to my right. Within every attempting beat of the surviving heart, yet another vibration crackles through the air. This time, the only way forward was up. Slightest of the wind that had bristled my hair, told me, guided me to where I should survive. Their all around, I conveyed to the wind. To the left, I look, a couple of fires were lit and men chatter with their silent tongues. No, not there. To the right, it was yet the same. Twigs crackled from either sides and from every side the chill goads my fear. I don't want to move. Where's sis? Hot water gathered around my eyes and my face began to burn and swell. "I've come too far," my claws assume the form of ten crescent talons, curved, thick, and slightly jerking for the battle, "They just want what have." And what I had was a question to myself. Again, the callow, dirt-clogged feet grinded against Eve's soil. My legs arched, my arms raised and postured for such belligerency. They were coming, closer, louder, and more silently aggressive than before. All ready, I was planning out what to do them. Knack their heads together…swing anything I have at them. And on the rushing side of my mind, escaping was my number one alternative. Hurry up and run for it! Would I have run like a cowardly cat or stand brave and tall like a lion? Two choices but one was bleeding through my mind…Run. Forever, nevertheless, what I thought was the gravity pulling me up; it was none but the freedom of my legs that rushed me up the weeping willow. The orb in the dotted sky hung beyond me, far, far out of my reach. And there below me, there were the other Zoanthropes. All of which were running from tree to tree just like I was. Such melodies that surround every corner, every second of my time, I glide fluently across the cool breeze. Their cries were ever so distant and still it sent plenty of cold water down my spine. Some Zoanthropes were driven into the ocean where their bodies sink deeper into its hold and just submerge within the grip of the foaming waters. What sorrow can't I not bare to perceive? It repeated to me over and over and over again. How I'd wish my ears were silent to the caterwaul but, no. Even with that, just seeing them helplessly stand there, raising both hands from mercy, was too much.

(Nine)

Somewhere in a long forgotten mind, I find a place I should have been years ago. But that was not where my destination would end. There were more places where I had to search; my heart was too reckless to start at. If I were me, would my shadow tell me what is wrong with my emotions? If I were my shadow, would "me" let out all my emotions? It continues in one's head to think of something long forgotten which comes from the heart. Somewhere in the deepest of such a soul, withering as the chill stole whatever warmth I had, I daresay there was something provoking to come free. A desirable wish, perhaps?

(Eight)

"Bring her down the warpath! Let it loose!" was the last of what I was to hear before my ribs were pierced coldly by the whizzing silver that put me to the edge of its sword. Neither was I sure nor relieved to hear the air crackle straight across my gentle ears; I rather pleasure it to only be the thunder that struck me twice. Beyond the plenty of blood that dribbled from me, my reflection, as hollow as the breathing air, ploughed the waves of the whispering wind. Across its glowering white nightgown, a number was the only darkened space to spill through the ghost's hue. Its over-the-window cry carried further across the valley than any other Zoanthrope that could bare the pain. It wailed and as I declined for only the given seconds that I had to dead-silently mouth what words that would only choke inside my throat, I murmured unblinking with tears, "Where art thou Ura…Uranus?"

"I'm here." It says before I fade.

(Seven)

Before me, my eyes see the usual:

People, places, and pity…

Three "Ps" and all but one made sense to me: pity. Though I find laughter and cherishing from all who falls down the line of humanity, there is one line broken through. A place where someone could plan any detrimental matter and no one would know about it until it was too late. That's where I come in. When at first my heart and mind would stop for life or death, I reborn my features all at once. My eyes would glitter from the sky even if the sky had slept before me; the trees in my hair would only sprout oranges and black tiger stripes when really the color was suppose to paint on my cheeks; a dove's wings would follow behind my steps and not an inch apart from my pace. I feel my dearest friend, one who whispers refreshingly as the wind, caress my fur and whisper a lilting melody in my ear. I answered with rhythm in my whispered voice, "When time reclines before your eyes, your pity will be taken and freedoms arise." We soon smile to each other and advance to what we do best on Eve's soil. I know he is watching us but I pay no mind to father of Gods. I was the first to lead the way into the rush of the wind.

(Six)

They brought me somewhere. White walls were lined everywhere around me, blinding me almost into insanity. I squirmed from what ever it was that grasped me ever so tightly. But doing so reaped my breath. Aside the lucidity, an onyx panoramic windowpane glared back to me. Unable to see through it, I was to see myself. But it couldn't have been me, that half-divested girl whose over-sized belts was the only thing to protect her virginity. With but a glimpse to my side, I find what kept me at my place: chains, very thick were they, to be only thick enough to suck the life out of me when trying to break free from it; one on each my arms and legs, waist and neck, including a, somewhat, small mask that hid my mouth and nose. I see a man, very up-tight and well-groomed like an entrepreneur or such. He must have had something to do with this. I hear him say beyond the thick, black glass, "Has she any viruses? Advantages?" And the old man beside him differed in opinion. Latches upon latches from one side of me clicked each at its turn as the businessman follows through a door in which I have not seen. When he approached through, along with two shelled guards, the latches locked itself. As he drew around and surveyed me, my lungs twisted inside me, sinking deeper as our space was but an inch apart.

"What a beautiful specimen…gorgeous. None I have seen with so much tenacity." He said slyly with a rather French accent.

"What do you want?" I heaved at him through a small mask.

"And you know our language." Enthusiasm, now, took over his tone. He began to smile. I'd like to have whipped it off his face if I could but the struggle was no use.

"What I want, Uranus," he said, drawing closer to me, "Is for you to show me who you really are. What is inside all that…anger?" He was surely enough precise of my emotions for my claws were only prone to strike at any chance I had.

"It's Uriko not Uranus." I corrected him of my name. He just stood there and smiled. The level of my patience were locked away somewhere deep inside me. "Yes, of course. But mind yourself that I was not talking to you." Before I was able to ask of his comment, he swayed one hand over his shoulder for a sign. My body began to feel heavy to the bone. The chains in which were tightly locked onto me had slithered from my body and away into the ceiling like puppet strings. My arms and legs laid on all fours; my knees buckled at the instant I was loose.

(Five)

Beating the bare feet on the dirt, I race with her quicker that I thought. One would usually estimate any velocity passing nearer toward the face when such speed can only be measured by feet. To me, velocity was careless of me. It mistaken me as itself; a laugh, indeed. Such humor that I laugh to myself in a way one would not think of it as none other than a snicker. I matter it boredom. First, the rush excites me until it ends with a sober from the clouds. The wind had had enough of me; and so I thought the same. We depart our laughter to silence and she would clamor our ears in a ring tone unheard. A ring tone of roaring thunder.

(Four)

"Set up the ceiling. I think we're going to find what we've been looking for." His echo remorse the reliant blush around my ribs where the bullet had once been. What was I to see but the cold, hard cement? Alighting my figure, the darkness glimmer upon me.

"Go ahead. Look up, Uranus," his childish goading resembled a grimace on his face somewhere, "What harm can a little beast change do?" Plenty, I thought solemnly. All I wanted to do was disappoint him; make sure his grin was clean off his face. I'll give him what he wants. But he's not going to like it. My bones wobbled as I used my arms to life me off my front. The higher I rose, the harder and heavier it was to stand on both my feet. And as I progressed, more and more of the man I saw. The moonlit orb bathed upon me. I was washed by its luminosity, and now broken into two parts: sour love and sweet revenge. I quaver, here, on all fours, lengthening whatever I had when it was time to call forth all raven of demise. "Tell me what you feel, Uranus," says the man. His grin had to be pleasurably passing a mile by now.

"Let I say it to you once," my growl heaved moist puffs under my breath, "And not another time more. I am Uriko Nonomura. It will not change by any who can not over-rule me. Ya got that!" Already was I on my feet by the second, I was able to see his scowled face now. "Guards!" I hear him cry. Right where I want them.

(Three)

That's where places come forth from hiding. It finds its way pass the blindfold and tells me to squint for more vision. And so I did, but it can be fooled by my appearance that places will think of me as a traveler wanting home. Indeed, a traveler was I but ever was I homeless. Around me, Earth was my home. All of whom I have never seen before greets me with waves and smiles. People…that of which I am but I do not act as, a person, I am, to those who think of me as themselves or someone they think they know. And now I pass them all. I dare not glance back nor glimpse forward for I come forth to the city and out into the moonflower meadows. My mind races and I am out of breath. Anxious, was I, ready to be broken from this cell. The clock strikes nine and I am just an inch away from the home singing angels. I rest my sins upon that place. It watches me hereafter and even months ago. This is where I belong.

(Two)

He began to laugh eccentrically. His hair was a mess and his clothes were askew. He wasn't a businessman anymore; he was a coward. Inching cautiously by his side, only two of his shelled guards crept toward me. They thought of me to be the explosive a building: uncontainable and a second away from zero. "Oh, how rude of my appearance. Let I answer you my name." says the entrepreneur as he bowed with manner, "I am Colonial Alan Gado, the leader of the army force. I only come to capture those who are not fitted in this world; bring peace when all zoanthropes are in pieces." He treads on the heels of self-glorification and presumption, feeling pretty on what he was to say to me. "Feeling lucky, now, Uranus?" he uttered in high spirit and began to spurt more satirical questions across my face, "You want to say something to me? You want to do something to me? Are you mad? You look mad. Want to hit me? I'll let you hit me. Here, take a shot." He grazed an arm over the belt strap on my chest, testing me, persuading me. But I didn't move. "What are you? Afraid? Scared? A cow—." Deliberately, without warning, his chin was struck with the ball of my foot. They could say: "I couldn't help it." But, really, I only gave him my formal and simple enthusiasm, "No." From aside my posture, where both my arms gently trembled from those who held me, I found the shelled guards agreeing to my actions; seeing that they have not come forth to my stance and forced me to the ground. I, too, began to hint a snicker, feeling petty good about myself. "She really hit me! That lifeless little excuse for a pesticide!" I heard him growl.

"Let her have it." Giggled Gado and the two men aside me took turns knocking me to my knees and beating the crap out of me. One of them had the courage to pull me by the hair and let my eyes face the air directly. I've had worse beating than this; but pulling my hair? Uh-uh. "Make sure she stares at that God forsaken moon until her eyes bleed!" Are you kidding me? That's like asking a baby to maneuver a button bomb. Two more were to come behind, the window of their helmets glowering red. Rushing across either of my fronts and back, only two were to already tame me. Guess not… What was the use of any other struggle if what was to be aimed for, was like walking a thousand miles with a boulder clinging to my back?

"Over there." He pointed somewhere behind me, somewhere I ventured upon not to look. My arched back was to drag across the ground and solidly glance off the cardioid's pivot. "What ridicule," said I in a hushed voice, "Obeying like leashed dogs. I pity those who act in action and not think why they do such things." To this, I was to see the amber flame ignite within Gado's eyes. How could he resist wanting me to be his dog of obedience? He compressed my jaws with just one hand, making sure I could not veer my face loose. His thumb, anxious to press further in, hooked the jaw line to the point one could not prickle a gulp. Lettering his French words and clicks, none of such spells were to penetrate the numb sensibility of me ever to heed or fathom. It was just my pulse. Whatever was he to say it was to my inferior cost for when my chin struck the air, my prying thirst for knowledge consumes, through cold blood, as a thing apart. The Stars, as I was to see it without prompting the memories to the surface of my sanguinary eyes, reeled across a moonflower valley, somewhat, like auroras waxing and waning from pearly sapphire to a polychromatic murkiness. I find it to only be the milky moon waxing on me, waning away ever delinquent amber skin that bare the bruises and blood spills.

An empty, black vortex in my mind withheld a tantalizing mockery of excellence. It throbbed until that depleted mind flew forth from the surface to my inert actions, aiming for whatever it was that caught my pupil less eyes. The lifeless haze had coursed my veins, awarding me a, somewhat, mirth-provoking feeling across my skin. Everything I was to see danced horridly. Beyond the blur, the halo moon ruptured into its bloody color. That and everything that was to meet my eyes. My petite fingers, with lovelorn talons, writhed in greed. My spine yanked spruces of fur throughout my back, dispatching hundreds of pulsating overcasts luring me into its place.

"She's seen too much! Bring her down!" Such a cry tickled me ever so lovingly when what I felt tighten my gossamer arms were nothing more than slight squeezes. Pulses…heart-throbbing anxiety…everywhere! I allowed one of my arms to freely lift from my side and swerve to the point my claws were to grip a neck. In the thick of the fray, a pellet whistled just an inch from my ear but squarely on the victim within my grasp. Only ounces of his rosy serum stippled my cold cheeks. I released of its useless body and shimmered across the shadows in which coats me with pulsing steps. And within every eluding bullet, what tenderness of revolting shrills come from each armed man as I stealthily worked my way through rows of them until there was but one left? And from that "one", Gado still stands, scared enough to wet his pants. Awww…Like a puppy. I thought referring to Gado and last shelled guard standing. Unhesitant, lashing my arm around the guard's neck in a headlock and hearing it fall to pieces at the moment; I wrung him to the ground, and dug deep into the flesh and bone of his back to make sure the corpse couldn't move another limb. Now it was just me and the entrepreneur. But, unlike others I have come against, he approached in the midst of his awe.

"S-such beauty, shape, purpose." He crawled wryly on all fours, breaking humid sweats and stumbling over countless carcasses. It must have been his sense of art that had made him do such involuntary things. And so, as I approached him, I made my getaway into the window above me where I now stood beyond the…sea?

(One)

I have searched and now I regret my action, my purpose. Prices are to be paid when the sacrifice, itself, can not gain what it needs. So, for my price when sacrificing to search for the deepest function upon my heart's purpose, I depart from the real world I use to live in. My mind begins to regain and what is before me was part of my sacrifice: glowering moonflowers and the crashing oceans. There is this spot somewhere that I know, somewhere I wish was never there before I knew what it was. They say comfort and kindness is what makes it bigger but that is not true. I've had that before but that "thing" hasn't gotten bigger at all. It just shrunk, decline, deteriorate, and FAIL to exist in any way. I feel this spot burn, not with love, but burst and sink away. If dies but keeps coming back more irritable than before. Seeing how it can't leave, I live with it. But across from where it should, across the seven seas, it is already my new beginning.

(Happy New Year…)

But wait! Isn't this just a dream?