RIN – II
Red.
That's all I remember.
I saw it dance through the air like the petals of roses, bloody and beautiful and everywhere, swirling and twirling around me, painting my fingers scarlet. I looked at them and felt their warmth and laughed, laughed so loudly my throat burned and tears stung my eyes, but I didn't know whether they were caused from pain or from joy or some other emotion I couldn't understand.
I'm crazy.
I was outside.
I don't know how I got there.
A man cried out; then a sound like thunder, a fierce jolt of energy ripping through my arm, and his cry was cut off and for a while there was nothing but damn silence but then wailing replaced it and more thunder and more glorious red petals and I laughed and I screamed and I cried and I danced.
Kaai Yuki watched me with that stupid penguin doll hugged to her chest. Knuckles shinning white. Chocolate eyes dull and disapproving. Blood bubbling from the gaping hole in her head.
I'm crazy.
/
The men in blue came later.
Hovercrafts painted black and red rippled out of the darkness and the thick metals doors swung open and men came pouring out like black rain, only with legs and heads and eyes and swords that glinted cruelly in the red-tinted light, but I wasn't scared because I had a gun.I laughed and I fired without mercy and the first one's head exploded in a fountain of crimson.
I stared.
"There's rose petals coming out of his head," I said wonderingly.
Then the others were running at me and I forgot about him.
The big man lunged towards me and his sword cut through the air but I ducked to the side and it whistled right over my head. I could feel the wind it stirred, cold and fast. Then I was on the ground, perfectly balanced, and threw a vicious kick at his groin. His agony was expressed in a muffled grunt. He staggered slightly, and I took my chance and leapt up and crashed the barrel of my pistol against his forehead.
The last thing his squinty eyes saw was my wild grin.
The last thing I saw of him was an explosion of red.
Huh. More flowers.
A flash of navy and then I was fighting again.
Two men now, one tall and bony, the other small but fast and muscular. The smaller one thrust his dagger towards me while the taller one sliced at the air with his sword. It was good his strikes were clumsy or I might have been hit as I lurched to one side and twisted, lashing out and snatching Short's wrists. I swung myself forward with unnatural strength and flew over his back and my feet crashed against the Tall's chest. The momentum threw him backwards.
He slammed against the pavement and cracked his head.
Behind me, Short whirled around and slashed, but I was too quick for him.
I slammed my feet into the concrete and the impact sent pain shooting up my leg but I scarcely felt it. With my heels grinding against the cold earth, I lifted my arm, curled my finger around the trigger and grinned wickedly.
I fired and the bullet tore through his heart. He opened his mouth and his scream pierced in the air in the form of thick red liquid that gushed down his face and splattered against his chest and strangled gurgling sounds. He reached out with trembling fingers and tears pooled in his eyes and his expression morphed into something gruesome and tight with pain. Then he keeled over and died.
Giggling, I turned back to Tall.
His eyes were glazed over and blood pooled around his neck. It glistened wetly in the moonlight.
Oh.
I didn't even need to shoot him.
Annoying.
I stood over him, clicked my tongue and locked away. The hovercrafts were still there, humming softly, but the men were more hesitant now. They stood and stared with huge eyes and pasty faces, and one turned on heel and threw up with a pained roar. Fear leapt from soldier to solider, deadly as the plague, turning their insides to water and their legs to jelly, making them tremble and shake and fill with the primitive instinct to flee and survive.
I cackled like the lunatic I was.
"What's wrong?" I taunted. "Are you scared? You big strong men? Didn't you come to put me in my place? Meeeeeeee, little red rose~? Haha!"
They stared, all speechless, and I screeched with laughter...and then I raised my gun and I fired and another man crumbled, clutching at his abdomen. The string snapped, training kicked in and they surged forward. Two lingered behind and drew pistols from their hips. Fire burst from the end and a bullet soared towards me, but I side stepped and it whizzed past my ear with a ringing shriek. A blue man stabbed at me, shouting, and I bent over and I felt the pressure of the blade against my clothes, curving over my belly, but it was too high and didn't break through. My palms hit the earth and my legs snapped up and slapped the blade from his hands. He came at me, but I spun and swept his legs out from under him.
I shot. He died.
And yet more came, more and more and more but I killed them, every single one. I'm not sure how many came at me because in the end everything was red and I couldn't stop laughing or crying.
They're not going to stop me. I'll kill and kill and kill and they'll never stop me, me, the raven draped in red silk, the little dove, the red rose, me the red rose-
"Oi."
Silver screamed and I lurched to the left and the blade ripped through empty air. I scrambled away, spinning across the pavement, and sprung back onto my feet and lifted my gun...but he was already gone! I blinked in astonishment and when I opened my eyes his blade was coming down on me. I cursed and brought my gun up to meet it and metal clashed against metal in a shower of orange sparks.
For a split second, we stood frozen, and I examined my new skilled opponent.
His hair was the colour of molten gold and his eye was a strip of stolen blue sky, glowing with an eerie light of its own. His right eye was hidden beneath a wall of dark golden locks. Black straps – probably attached to some sort of eye patch – wrapped across his face, one arching above his eye brow, the other curving down his cheek and disappearing somewhere behind his neck. He wasn't overly large, but he wasn't scrawny either, with broad shoulders and a strong build. I could practically feel the muscles in his arms.
But it was the scar that I noticed most.
It followed the bridge of his nose, rising and then spearing down his left cheek. Pale brown tinged with red. Jagged around the edges; a vicious and violent slash.
An exact copy of my own.
"Hey, Rin..."
A voice, a boy's voice, echoing from somewhere far away.
"...what are the stars made of?"
I stared at the man and he stared at me.
I don't know if it was my imagination or what, but he seemed just as startled as me.
Then the everything exploded in fire and brimstone and I was flying.
I saw the sky and the hovercrafts, all black and red, phantoms detaching themselves from the shadows, then a streak of silver and white and then I crashed against the concrete and pain exploded in my side. It seared through me like fire and I tried to scream but the wind was knocked out of me and all I could do was lay there, agony digging through my flesh.
A shadow fell over me.
Wincing, I forced myself to look up.
A clone peered down at my with squinty eyes. He was impossibly huge, with a thick bulging neck and tree trunks for arms and overcooked sausages for fingers.
He reached down and wriggled through fat fingers beneath me. He bumped my shoulder and pain surged through me and I let out a little cry, but the clone didn't care and lifted me up off the ground.
My head dropped to one side and all I saw was fire.
Everything was burning – the houses, the pavement, the trees. All burning. The flames leapt from house to house, consuming everything in sight. Corpses boiled and popped and cooked before my eyes. Living men, too, screaming and running aimlessly, waving their arms around frantically, helplessly, as the flames ate away their skin and spilled down their throats and baked them from the inside out.
I couldn't see the blonde man.
The clone turned around and strode towards a silver hovercraft. It hummed gently. Inside, I saw some women clad in white clothing of neon and plastic thread that glowed bright and white at their necks and waists and wrists and ankles. Their hair was white, too, and they didn't dare meet my blood-stained gaze.
One grabbed my arm and wrenched it forward and the pain cut through me like a knife, and then a needle punctured my skin and the agony exploded and caved in my skull and ripped through my insides and gorged out my eye I couldn't see anything at all I was screaming and thrashing and crying and and and -
/
"Hey, Rin..."
I looked up and saw a boy. I couldn't see his eyes...the shadows cast by his golden locks were too thick, but I saw his smile. It was warm and sweet and made me smile in return.
"What are the stars made of?"
I giggled.
"Are you stupid?"
He pouted.
What the hell is this?
I punched his shoulder lightly.
Who are you, exactly?
"It's made of fireflies!"
Wake up. I want to wake up. Let me wake up.
My chest hurts.
No...
Everything hurts.
My insides are burning.
I don't want you in my head.
Just go away. All of you...Everything I've ever seen or heard or done or forgotten...just disappear.
Let me sleep.
He kissed my forehead.
His lips were soft and gentle, and when he put his hand on mine everything in the world was suddenly as it should be.
Let me sleep.
So yeah, crazy, murderous Rin. Isn't she cute? XD
This chapter is shorter then the other ones...mostly because I hate writing fighting scenes XD They're so annoying!
I apologize if this seemed to graphic for anyone. Tell me in a review or PM and I'll try to tone it down. I get a little carried away sometimes.
I really like this chapter, except for maybe the end. I started using 'pain' in every sentence, but apart from that I'm rather pleased.
Also, I spelt grammar wrong in the last chapter. While I was apologizing for mistakes. How ironic is that?
Anyway...
THANKS FOR THE REVIEWS :D They make me so happy~
[ EDIT ] Put 'argued' out my eye instead of 'gorged' out my eye...for some strange reason...Fixed.
- raven_by_night