A/N: If you're getting this update, hopefully all the formatting is fixed. It was brought to my attention that this chapter that I had published previously had formatting errors...what I didn't expect was how BAD those errors really were! It was a complete mess and I'm actually mortified that I published something so unacceptable and illegible! My sincerest apologies to anyone who saw it AND TO THOSE BRAVE SOULS who struggled through that thing and forced themselves to decipher that mess; you guys are the real heroes. Seriously.
Sorry again guys! Here is (hopefully) the completely improved version and I will NEVER copy my text over from Wattpad again!
Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ
№➍| ❝Laid to Rest❞
"Would you like to take up my place in this coffin, Miss Komori? Hmm?~"
She had always imagined that the white light would come for her slowly. That God would cradle her in His arms as she went and she would slip away peacefully on the bed of her sheets.
Never did she imagine to be in the arms of a fanged demon, resting in her place inside a coffin away from all the world, and that the bright light would jar her from life, taking all her breath away in an instant.
The "light" was no guide into heaven, but a flash so quick it was like she had merely glimpsed Elysium for one precious second and then it was gone and she was thrown into blackness.
The human feels the breath of a shiver begin down her neck, a rolling coldness. Can spirits really feel temperature? Perhaps only in hell where the flames burn eternally.
After all her devotion was she really bound for Hell? Perhaps He had decided that her time with the vampires had made her tainted, that she was sinful and irredeemable for trying to help them. Was this not condemnation?
I think I'm going to be sick…
"Kidding, I am just kidding~" A voice echoes through her perception, a familiar chill ghosts her nerves again. But oddly, she now feels swathed in warmth. "I have placed you back in your own bed in the brides' room. You might be feeling a bit nauseated, it is because I teleported. Human minds have difficulty adjusting to such quick displacement, you would perceive it as something of a flash or a pop. The feeling will fade, do not worry. There is no need to open your eyes."
The little human's senses feel like they've been detached from her body like simple limbs and her mind flounders and flails for purchase and understanding. Where am I? Who is this? Where did the lady I spoke to, go? Many thoughts run in perpendicular and confusing intersections within her mind-scape, but strangely enough she feels so relaxed. So uninhibited. The voice in her ear croons in a maternal tone...so soothing...so dreamy. And she's so awfully tired, what has she done to herself? She's just ready to rest with the angels up in the clouds of Nirvana and dreams…
"Mmmmm...ngh...nn~" the bride mutters and hums. Sing for me, angel!
"There is one thing I must do before we go, Yui-chan. I hope you don't mind. You are not really in traveling condition, anyway. You have lost some pints of blood and it will take some time to recover them, you will feel weak for a while longer. The brothers are going to check the casing soon, I feel it. I must be there when they do. They will not suspect your involvement; what with you so completely passed out you have the perfect alibi. And I will also fix things to deflect suspicion. But do not worry, I will be back for you once everything is settled and done. For now, sleep…"
And with that final thought the angels lure her to the clouds with their beautiful songs, and as she rests on her fluffy bed even Chouko cannot predict when she will come down and back to the earth again.
"Sleep~"
And shortly after the blonde's eyes shut, so do another pair. One body in the bed of countless dead brides, another in a casket made for the dead and undead alike. One who just woke from a long slumber, another bound for a deep, recuperative one.
Now is the time for rest; the sleepless nights are coming, and there will not be any tranquility like this for some time again.
Now is the time for calm, only the storm will come later.
Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ
Of all the brothers in the mansion only one comes to see her in the night; the who cares least. Truly, he was the only one who had nothing to do with the incident that occurred over two decades ago.
Still, after everything, after what happened, still, even, after how he swore he would no longer get involved with the troubles of and among his siblings, still he feels that same, nostalgic, almost magnetic pull to her that he had experienced even when they were mere children. That lead him to wonder, then mesmerization, and finally back to amused intrigue; who are you, really? What have you done to us? What will you do? Where are you? Have you changed? When will you be back? Will you ever?
He swore to himself that he wouldn't get involved but here he is, alone, standing before her and staring like he used to do when she thought he wasn't looking. Staring and wondering. Reiji always thought he understood her best. Truly he was wrong, though he knows Reiji would throw a fit if he wasn't superior to him in even something as petty a matter as that. No, he's better because he can sit back and observe. Observe the subject in its natural form when it thinks it's alone and unobserved.
No, Shu knows Chouko. Better than the triplets, her full-blooded relations. Better than Subaru who had always watched her. Better than Reiji who obsessed over her. He knows because he's the least involved. He knows her the truest because his opinion is unbiased. He sees her for what she is.
He knows what would happen if she woke up, and a small part of him knows that they might deserve some bit of her wrath. But damn, if that didn't sound like a headache of trouble!
So as he stares at her heavenly face and his eyes roam down her sinful body and all around to see if anything is amiss, he finds his hand on the face of the glass lid, muttering;
"Stay down, Chouko."
Then he lets Tchaikovsky take him away into another world, turning around to leave her tower.
And he doesn't see her lift one eyelid in a near-perfect imitation of himself, as she peeks at his retreating back. She smiles.
It's time.
Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ
He's loved her since they were preteens. She's loved him even longer. She has always been the light in his life that chased away the darkness of his nightmares and made him feel happiest and loved. She would hold him in his fitful sleep and drive away the bad dreams like a guardian angel. He has loved and does still love her. But even still, he dreads seeing her in the dreamland. In dreams she torments him and makes him quake like the child he used to be at the mere thought of going to sleep. At the thought of seeing her face and the hatred in her eyes.
In life she was an angel who loved him. In death she was a Shade who loved to torture him.
He had been told once that confronting your fears could only bring you peace. He doesn't remember who said that to him. It doesn't matter anyway, because that advice can't apply to him. The embodiment of his true fear was, to all the world, dead. He couldn't speak to her even if he wanted to, which meant that the only part of his fear that he could confront was her series of vengeful wraiths that she sent in her place to torment him.
Once, he had also been told that the best way of warding off apparitions of deceased people one used to know, was to gather an object that the dead one used to fear and keep it around as a sort of talisman. Chouko hated all things gruesome and cruel, so he figured that if he slept in an old Iron Maiden then she wouldn't dare to try and hurt him in his sleep.
But as he looks up at her bewitching form leaning over him in his iron coffin, he wonders if it's a useless effort. Perhaps he was meant to be punished for her death. His undead heart seizes painfully in his chest just at the sight of her, while his mind scrutinizes every inch of her image. White nightgown. Petals in her hair. Long, purple waves, marble-white skin, pink lips, deep, violet eyes. He pauses at that. Kind violet eyes. Her lips quirk into a soft smile that mirrors the gentleness of her eyes. This isn't the face of his nightmares.
And yet, he's hesitant. She likes to play games. Always in his nightmares.
"Chouko...?" He's nearly stunned for words. "Is this a dream?" Or the beginning of another nightmare?
"What do you think, onii-san?" Her voice is light and airy, not weighed down by grief and anger as he remembered. She looks like a peaceful angel, blinding and radiant with the rays of the sun beaming through the windows and coating her skin in a golden glow.
His heart beats again and he draws in breath. He gets out of the coffin slowly and moves to stand before her.
She looks...so...
"I...haven't dreamt of you in so long," really dreamt. "...I missed you…" it's the most true thing to come from his lips in years. "Visiting isn't the same; you seem so close to me, but you feel so far away..." He could look at her comatose body and remember the good times they'd had together, but couldn't bear to see her in his nightmares picking up where she left off.
If this is another nightmare...
"I'll never be far away from you~" But she sounds tranquil and unburdened. This must be his dreams recalling the time when she was most at ease.
How long has it been since he's seen her this way?
He reaches out to grab her hands, stroking the smooth backs with confliction.
This can't be a nightmare.
"Still, it's not enough. That damn tableware otaku, how dare he take you away from me...!" His fingers shake and his handsome face contorts in rage and the smallest glimmer of sadness.
I'll never forgive him!
"Let's not talk about him~" she grabs his face in two absolutely delicate hands, threading her fingers through his hair in an effort to calm him.
I'll never forgive him...
"You're right, he's nothing, certainly not worth talking about." He looks into her eyes with wonder and disbelief. "I can't believe you're here. What I said before, it's not exactly true: I dream of you often, but it's not the same," he reaches out to run his hand softly through her long hair, admiring the texture. Not a nightmare. "You're never as I remember you, as I remember you when you were by my side; happy. Instead you're always crying and angry, just like you were that night," a dark shadow of the past passes over his face. "Just like you were when he-"
"Shhhh~ it's done," the pads of her thumbs stroke his cheeks with rhythmic and soothing circles. "It's okay, that's over. I'm here, with you, right now~"
He smiles under her hands.
"Sounds exactly like something you'd say," his eyes take on a glow reminiscing in the sunnier past: "You look just the same, as well; beautiful as ever. Happy as ever..."
"And why shouldn't I be? I'm here with you, aren't I?"
"That's true," but he frowns for a second. "Though you've never felt quite this real in my dreams before."
"Then let's savor these moments," she leans in to whisper tantalizingly against his lips.
He closes his eyes to meet her halfway.
"Ah-ah-ah", amusement apparent in her voice as she says suddenly, pressing a finger to his lips when he tried to lean in. "But first, let's put on this, shall we?" She tempts, brandishing a sleek, black blindfold from thin air.
We've never done that before...
He looks at her mildly curious, inspecting the object: "What for?"
"I want you to feel me, not with your eyes but with your body. I want you to feel every inch of what I am about to do to you." She whispers teasingly into his ears.
He smirks -well if it's a dream- and goes along with it, "well, in that case".
His vision goes dark and then void, he feels fingers carefully tie the strings behind his head.
A brush on his palms and she's leading him by his hands; "come with me~", she teases again. He's led to a thin table-like surface, which she promptly pushes him on, before she straddles him by the waist.
And she's right, because aside from the feel of her weight on his body and the hard surface underneath his back; it's like the universe has dropped off entirely and they're the only two people in the world.
She's so different, but wonderful.
"I like this feisty side of you," Ayato comments.
It's certainly a change from how these dreams normally go.
"I thought you might." She pushes his chest down as he tries to sit up, grinding her lower body with his to keep that down too. He groans as she kisses all along his neck, sensually running her hands down his arms that had threaded fingers through her hair. She takes his hands and links their fingers affectionately, saying: "I want your hands in a very special place, right where I can see them," and she puts them down at his sides. In lightning fast speed, they are buckled by the shackles attached on adjacent sides of the table, strapped down so that they can't move.
"Shackles?" He chuckles. "A dominating move."
"I learned from the best," she calls out, knowing that he liked hearing her call him the best, as well as her acknowledgement of him being a dominant man. Now he has to see with his body.
"I'm so proud," he teases.
"Not yet, but you will be," She teases right back.
She leans down again, pushing her curvy chest against his so that he can feel her lushness, and kisses him aggressively. He groans into the kiss, it's nothing like the last one they shared so many years ago; back then it was gentle but passionate, with slow movements that were soft yet sensual and somehow irrevocably innocent. But these...these are raw. They are rough and aggressive and so, so fierce. So much so that they can almost be described as angry in their fervor. He likes both ways with her, but he has to admit...this side really turned him on.
This is fierce, this has teeth, this kiss is slightly bloody, but he likes it that way...especially as it was her. This is a side he never saw of her when she was conscious years ago, this is a completely new side that he has never seen her display at all before. And just the thought of him being able to draw this kind of response from her, whether in real life or the dreamworld, fills him with immense pleasure. Dream or not, he needs her. So he responds in kind.
Her grinding on him takes on a rhythm as she runs her fingers through his hair. The intensity of the kiss has by now gotten so high that for a second he imagines that he can actually feel her body heat, but he dismisses that immediately. Vampires don't have body heat... Yet still, only she can make him feel this way, like he's alive and not just existing. Like blood isn't the only thing that can get his undead heart pumping, like his life didn't depend on it...just her. He only needs her. He didn't have to be the best for her, he wanted to be the best for her, but even without that, she made him feel like the best, and he loved that about her. She gave his life, life. And kissing her now, even if just in his dreams, he feels more alive, more like he's living than he has in a long time.
She was the fire, the intensity, she made things real even in a dream, and he knows she can feel that intensity too when she takes her hand from his hair to grip the table behind him.
If any other girl had turned him on and then dared to tease him with their kisses for this long, he would've been very angry. But not her; he can kiss her forever. And being reunited with the lips that he only ever sees in his dreams, makes him feel like he does during a full moon; like he is flying.
And then suddenly he is falling.
The back of the table near his head drops out and her lips leave his with a biting drag of her sharp fangs across his mouth, cleaving a bloody gash as its trail.
"Ah! What the hell?" He winces, feeling the vicious, jagged slash going from bottom lip to his chin.
Suddenly his head is a lot closer to the floor than before, and his legs are still on the table where they were, yet now more up in the air. He's tilted downwards.
"Oh wow! We must be going hard to make the leg of the table fall out. Hold on, let me get it!"
And he feels the weight of her leave him, and then in her place just air.
He can hear her footsteps though as she walks around to where his head rests.
"Did it break?" He asks, as he's still tied up.
"Nope. Just collapsed." There are a few seconds of silence before she speaks again. "Oh, wait! Found something."
But before he can ask what she found, his mouth is stopped.
And he's drowning, water comes from everywhere at his face. Going up his nose, in his mouth, and everywhere in between. It's chasing the oxygen away wherever pockets can be found, and just when he's about to burst, it stops.
He is in such shock that for a moment he doesn't realize what happened or why he couldn't break from his bonds, before it all dawns on him. His bonds were made of silver, as were the rest of the shackles in the room, so that not only could brides not escape them, but vampires also. And if they are attached to a table, then there is no question where he is right now. The table didn't just collapse, she made it collapse; this was a waterboarding table.
And then he starts shaking. This is the nightmare that haunted him most; that night in the lake. Cordelia, looking disdainfully at him, and his beloved Chouko standing beside her. And though she was crying that night, it was the face she made in his nightmares that stuck with him; a miniature version of Cordelia with purple hair and disdainful eyes to match. She stood there right next to Mother and watched, watched because he was too pathetic to save, because he wasn't worth anything in her eyes.
And though his mind screams at him to show her that he isn't some scared little boy anymore, he shakes even harder thinking about the look on her face.
No. He reminds himself that she had loved him, had always loved him. She wouldn't let him drown. And it's that thought that steadies his when he speaks: "Chouko, what are you-?"
"Don't tell me you don't know. You can't figure it out? I thought you were supposed to be the best. Right, Ore-sama?"
He stiffens at her use of that name, something about the way she said it just wasn't right. "No, I can't figure it out. This isn't like you. Why would you do this?"
She wouldn't do this to him, she loved him.
"Why does one do anything? Why do vampires drink blood? Why does day go to night? Or night into day? ... why did you kill Mother...?"
Silence reigns.
His undead heart starts with a squeeze, and constricts with the uncanny, unnatural feeling of fear, one he hasn't felt since childhood. The blood he has in his body freezes, and all he can feel is his heart seizing to the rhythm of his body's tremors, and the serrated stare of his sister slicing through him. It cuts him open like a knife and leaves his heart exposed to her disdainful gaze as she analyzes it clinically, and deems it unworthy. Pathetic.
"Cho-"
She slaps him and his head whips one way with force, then the other way as she gives the other cheek the same treatment. "Don't you open your mouth to lie to me. Don't you dare lie to me! I want the truth, nothing else!"
He can handle her slaps. Truthfully he feels nothing, his guilt and fear far overshadowing shallow pain. He has to make her understand. "The truth?" He says.
"Yes."
"I did it to protect you."
Her heavy breathing stops, and her voice is small when she asks: "From what?"
And where her voice is small, his is strong, he has to be strong if he has any chance of convincing her; "from her."
He hears a growl from behind his head before she huffs loudly. "I can see I won't be getting a real answer at the moment. No, you're much too distracted, you're probably still a little sleepy. I have just the thing."
And that horrible, pressing force is back on his lungs and weighing on his mind. Suddenly he's displaced into a watery abyss with an unrelenting stranglehold on his oxygen. Falling deeper, his blood boils at the back of his head putting great, heavy pressure on his brain and making it feel like it is about to explode. Everything will be okay as long as he gets a little air. He can do anything - even convince her - as long as he gets through this. He can make her love him again as long as he made it through. But it seems as if every consolatory thought takes up more oxygen. No, there is nothing outside of the watery prison.
And then it's gone.
"Are you awake?"
And her voice is angelic. But she is an avenging angel on an ungodly, destructive path. She will not be swayed. Still, she is his angel, and she won't hurt him. She can, but she wouldn't, and that's why he loves her. And even if she did, it is all just a dream. Painful it may be, but he hasn't seen her in a long time, he almost can't recall the sound of her voice. And he needs that. He will bear this if it means being with her for the few hours he was asleep. Besides, so far this is far in the way the kindest she's been in his dreams to date.
"I love you, Chouko, I wouldn't hurt you." He has never said that to her, those three important words, before. He was too afraid and ashamed of such a human emotion, and by the time he came to terms with that, she was gone and he had no one. But saying it to her, even if only in a dream, he feels less guilty, like a weight has been lifted from him, like maybe she could understand why he did what he did. 'I've always loved you, Chouko. I could never hurt you, unless it was for your own good and happiness.'
She pauses for a second, as if surprised to hear it.
"Lies! You did hurt me! You killed her, and she loved you!" The distressed young woman shrieks.
And he is smothered again by that undeniable force, and he can feel her anger through the wave after wave of pressure. And he's drowning...and shaking. For some reason, this feels more real than the last time, whereas his head had been gargled and fuzzy before, now his mind is in sharp awareness. With her scream and the water now crashing on him...he really does feel like he's drowning, and this wasn't a dream.
The water suddenly stops, and just as he gasps to replenish his lungs, the air is knocked from him as a heavy weight drops on his stomach.
Can it be?
This is real. This was real. Somehow, some way, this is actually happening. She's awake and she's drowning him. No, no, no. He shakes even harder, she wouldn't torture him water, she wouldn't do that. She loved him. She knew his fear of drowning. She wasn't that cruel. She isn't.
"How dare you talk of love? If you loved me, you would've known, that nothing could hurt me more than you killing her! And for what?! All she ever did was love you! And you killed her!
And you're gonna get what you deserve!"
He shakes and trembles in anticipation. But what he feels next isn't a watery grave, it is piercing and sharp. A knife.
He arches his body up, hands pulling at the restraints in surprise.
"You filthy murderer! You're not worthy of her love or mine! I hate you!"
But her words hurt more than the knife ever could.
"I hate you!" Stab. "I hate you!" Stab. "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!" And she punctuates each line with a heavy stab into his exposed abdomen.
And as painful as it is, it's only superficial; a vampire cannot die from petty stab wounds. He'll let her get her anger out, even if that means getting stabbed a hundred times, if she will forgive him. If she'll consider forgiving him. He can't lose her again, not after all he did to protect her. He can convince her as long as she lets him, but he can't do it if she won't, that is certain. It's not as if she'll kill him anyway. She would never do that.
She would take out her anger on him, stab him a couple of times, then stop, cry a lot, he'd heal, she'd hug him, and everything would be okay between them. They're better than petty fights, they would move past this, and with him, they would go back to being the power couple; better than ever.
No, he thinks; she might stab him a bunch of times, but she couldn't kill him. At that thought, he relaxes and resolves himself to just lie there and take it.
Though it certainly hurts like hell.
"I hate you~!" she stabs him one last time, her voice breaking out into sobs, and she begins crying loudly onto his bloodied chest; small hands gripping his opened shirt, and head nearly in the crook of his neck.
Her wailing is loud and distressing, and he doesn't like hearing it. It even causes her to shake harder than him. And he remembers what a kind soul she was, that even though it had been many years since he'd last spoken to her, technically it was about only week ago in her mind. She's just like a small, innocent, troubled child. A small, innocent, troubled child who had just lost her mother, at the hands of her brothers, no less.
And so he feels sad for her. He wants to console her, take her within his arms and embrace all her sorrows until they are gone. Unfortunately his chest is bleeding and his arms are restrained. But he also feels a small sense of happiness and relief; anger and crying are some of the first few steps in getting over grief. He'll help her get through this, he just has to wait until she is all cried-out.
Though her sobs sounds like they might go all night, in their vigor.
"-b-bastard! Have you nothing to say for yourself?!"
"I'm sorry, Chouko. Agh-!" He winces from the pain that erupts on his abdomen at every word. "I didn't want you to hurt like this. I did what I did for you, and our family. And soon enough, you'll realize that, and later down the road," he pauses, wondering how he can word this, "you might even end up thanking me," he adds as an afterthought.
"Why would I thank you...?"
"Despite what you believed, Cordelia wasn't a good mother. She abused me, Kanato, and Laito-"
"I don't believe you-!"
"And manipulated you into thinking it was okay. She had her claws so deep into you. You were her prized chess piece; she used you to control us. She didn't care what she did to any of us, she never loved you."
He hears a big intake of breath, a huge gasp. He knows it won't be easy to process.
"No..."
"I know it's going to be hard to accept-"
"You filthy liar! DIE!"
And just as he thinks she might stab him again, the weight bearing down on his abdomen disappears, and the blindfold is torn from his eyes.
He turns his head to see Subaru restraining Chouko, hissing and snarling at him like a rabid animal. "Let go of me! Let go!"
She's kicking and screaming and positively hysterical.
All of the brothers are present; Laito; paler than should be possible for a vampire and looking at Chouko like he is seeing a ghost, Kanato; hands digging viciously into his Teddy and face practically hiding behind the bear, Reiji: standing near the raging girl with eyes avidly roaming over her like he's re-memorizing his favorite book, and Shu: lazily unshackling his arms. It is a strange occurrence to see them all together in the same room by their own free will, but it doesn't surprise him. She could always garner attention.
And even though there is so much to analyze and look at, all Ayato can see is her. Her beautiful, hissing face and the silver blade in her hands.
He sits up.
"One pilfered carving knife," Reiji picks a serrated and bloody kitchen blade from the floor. "A vial of concentrated relaxants from my personal stores," he looks pointedly at Chouko who won't meet his gaze. "And," he grabs the silver knife from her vice-grip, "I believe this is yours," and he hands it to Subaru who accepts it in one hand, using his other to serve as a restraint to Chouko by wrapping his hand around both of her wrists.
He's that strong.
It seems to irritate her.
"Urgh!" she grunts in frustration, "get your filthy hands off of me, you freak!"
Subaru tenses and releases her out of shock.
She runs up to Ayato who is just sitting up, "I'll kill you!" she screams as her hands poise to choke him, when Shu snatches her in motion.
"Ay. Shut up. You're so noisy." And he yawns loudly in her ear.
"Ew! Do not yawn in my ear you perverted weirdo! Let me go!"
But Shu just ignores her and looks over his shoulder at his little brother.
"I'm gonna take her away," he says, before walking off with her through the door. Reiji just grits his teeth and gives a curt nod, not that his brother was asking for permission, anyway.
"She wasn't the manipulator, you were! You always hated her and tricked our brothers into killing her with you! Liar! I'll hate you forever! I-I'll kill you, I swear it! If it's the last thing I do!" Chouko screams from her position strung over Shu's shoulder.
"Geez woman," Shu complains at the abuse on his ears.
And then Reiji swoops in and injects the remaining contents of the vial she had used on Ayato, into her bloodstream. "I'll kill you, I'll-!" Is all she can get out before the drug kicked in and knocks her out.
"Much better." Shu nods at Reiji before carrying her out into the hallway and passed Yui who is waiting, horrified and surprisingly up, outside the door - the last vision Chouko sees - and out of the room with two of three triplets with pain on their faces, one brother jealous even of the fact that his older brother carried the female out, one tsundere left looking ashamedly at the hands that the woman had called "filthy", and the final triplet who can only ponder the silver blade. The silver blade that rested in her hands, yet had had no blood on it. And that's when he realizes why...
She had been saving it for him.
She really meant to kill me with it.
Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ
A/N: ATTENTION TO ALL OF MY DIABOLIK DOMINATRIX READERS:
I've decided to do something new, as a sort of promotion for the story. Basically it is a way to get more comments from the readers: anyone who comments on a chapter will receive a private message with a snippet or sneak peek of the next chapter. I thought it seemed like a cool way to get more comments without holding chapters hostage or doing anything crazy, so from now on this promotion is enacted!
Comment on the story for your sneak peek~!
...
And once again; shout-out to everyone who read this chapter even when it was a horrible mess!
