The Devil's Advocate
A/N: Sorry about the long wait! I lost my plot bunny for this one! But then he came back.
Disclaimer: I own no part of VK!
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"I don't believe it. I refuse to believe that moron is the boy that I protected years and years and years ago!" Zero said.
"It makes sense though," Soshiki said. "Not even Koshima Ray liked you that much the minute he saw you. It took him a while. Then again, it took six days for Kuran-san to kiss you. It makes me wonder when you two are going to get it on…" He added thoughtfully.
"I- He- We- But-," Zero stuttered, trying to talk in complete sentences, but not knowing which point to address first.
"Oh yes!" Minrou added. Watching Zero squirm with discomfort was a very rare occurrence, and ever rarer was the amount of embarrassment. Minrou fully intended to make good use of the time he had. "You must tell me how things are between you two. Have you told him that you are Dia yet? Or have you moved in with him already? Did he propose yet?" Minrou watched in amusement as the ex-human flushed twenty different shades of red and mumbled something about taking the coffin out of the trunk. The purebloods looked at each other smirking with satisfaction. Too much fun.
--
"Kuran, that bastard!" Zero growled, looking into an empty trunk. He had just come outside to retrieve his gift from Riido only to find the coffin missing and a small note in the trunk saying 'Come get it!' signed with a rather loopy signature and an address.
--
Ichiru looked on AIM. He sighed. Zero wasn't on yet. The silver haired man tapped the table impatiently. He stopped when Shizuka placed her arms around his shoulder whispering a "what's wrong" into the skin of his neck.
"It's Zero. He hasn't contacted me for five days now. It's not like it hasn't happened before, but it's unusual. I have a bad feeling about this," Ichiru said quietly.
"A devil's instincts?" Shizuka asked, "It was never wrong before. Maybe we should go visit him…"
"Hmmmm. If he doesn't come on tonight then okay," Ichiru said.
Shizuka removed her arms from his shoulders. "I'm going to sleep for tonight, okay?"
Ichiru gave her a soft, "ahh" for confirmation, not turning his head. Shizuka walked out of the door to her room. She sat on the bed holding her head in her hands. Why does he care about Zero like this? Why? Is it because he loves him? She lay on the bed. I love him so much. I've given him everything he wanted. She closed her eyes, sleep pouring over her like water.
She didn't notice the soft child's giggle followed by a black feather floating beside her.
--
"Maybe we should contact him. Kuran-san, I mean," Minrou said thoughtfully the next day. He was sitting up, feeling much better than he had in days.
"No can do," Zero said, "I mean, we could tell him what's going on, but I doubt he'd have anything to defend himself with against a spirit. The Soul Stealer can sense us gods and devils, so there's no use on trying to protect them."
"You have to tell him though," Soshiki said, rubbing his arm. He just gave Minrou a large portion for his blood. "He has to know what's going on."
"Why didn't The Soul Stealer attack you when you were a child then?" Minrou asked. "It isn't exactly hard to take down a child."
"Without my memories, my spirit isn't there," Zero said, looking out the window to see a black car driving up the road, turning into the hospital. He closed his eyes. If it was an emergency then they'd call him, otherwise they know to leave me alone when I'm in Minrou's room. "Think of a body like a box; usually one soul fits in that box. But this body is different. This body has two souls. One 'Zero' the ex-human vampire. And one 'Zero' the god. It is almost always impossible for a body to have two souls unless a special instance happens. The 'Zero' you see now is the ex-human vampire 'Zero', not the god 'Zero'."
"I see… That makes sense," Soshiki said, "But what about your brother Ichiru?"
"The one you see and have met is the human side. Neither of us have actually shown you our god side," Zero said turning around and raising an eyebrow.
"Ah. Okay," Minrou said, "So what are you the god of?"
"Luck, purity and time," said a voice at the door.
Everyone whipped around at the unexpected intruder. Minrou jumped and the vase next to the door exploded, making the person at the door jerk alarmingly.
"Is that how you say 'hello' to people nowadays?!" The man said, "Geeze!!"
"Not my fault! Both of you have the bad habit of just appearing out of no where!!" Minrou defended.
Zero walked up to the mirror copy of himself, clapping him on the shoulder warmly, "Yo Ichiru, how have you been doing?"
"You guys really are brothers, with the same bad habits," Soshiki muttered.
"So?" Both silver haired men asked at the same time.
"That was not a complement," Soshiki added before Zero could say, 'Thank you!' "And why are you guys so infuriating?!"
"Cause it's interesting," both said with one finger pointed upwards to prove their points.
"Ugh…"
"Anyway, Zero! How come you weren't on AIM for so long," Ichiru asked, "I was getting worried!"
"Before that, have you seen or heard anything strange lately?" Zero asked, suspiciously.
"Strange?" Ichiru put on hand under his chin thinking hard, "Well Shizuka was still asleep when I went out today; I guess that's pretty strange. And you didn't sign on AIM for six days; that's pretty strange too."
Zero's face planted to the floor. "Not that kind of strange! The mysterious unexplainable kind of strange," Zero said.
"Not recently, why?" Ichiru replied, looking worried.
"Have you used your powers recently?"
"Nope."
Zero sighed, then said, "Good, because I have a nasty pit in my stomach. Something's about to happen and I don't like the feel of it."
"I had that feeling yesterday too," Ichiru said, "Hmmmm…"
"Could it have anything to do with the Soul Stealer?" Minrou asked sarcastically.
"WHAT?! The Soul Stealer? He's back?" Ichiru said alarmed.
"Yes, we met him yesterday," Soshiki said frowning, "Though not face to face…"
"Hmmmm… suspicious…"
"What is?" Soshiki asked looking up from placing another comfy pillow behind Minrou's head.
"Well, usually the god of fate and destiny would prevent us from meeting. To have forced us into a confrontation is rare," Ichiru said thoughtfully, "The god of fate really likes us after all. Us being Zero and I. The god of memories likes to work with the god of fate. In other words, they're probably plotting something."
--
Flashback (Zero's memories)
"So when we're fifteen, make sure we get our memories of our god time and powers back," Zero said sternly to a man with blue eyes.
"Sure," the god of memories said.
"And make sure you give back all our memories," Ichiru added.
"Okay."
Both silver haired men shot the god of memories a suspicious look. The god was a very playful one. Topped with the innocent convincing look and it was a deadly combination. It was very hard to tell if the god was serious or not, but both knew that the blue-eyed one would never do anything to harm a fellow god. It was an unspoken rule that all gods respected and cherished each other's presences. But being around too may gods, too long and they would come crave companionship.
Gods didn't make good friends. They made better allies than friends. Gods did favors for other gods to benefit themselves. Unless you were the god of fate, who would hit on both silver-haired boys every chance he got. Although lately, he seemed to try and pair the two good friends up; which was in a way even more disturbing.
The reason the god and the devil wanted to be born into the human world was because of the loneliness they both harbored. For too long, both have stayed in the realm of the creatures. For too long they have planned this trip to the human world.
All gods were blessed with the gift of perfection; the protection of all the other gods. But only one god kept the entire group of heaven together. The god of balance; also known as the first god. But the one that kept Heaven and Hell together was Zero. Ichiru was the leader of Hell after all.
Except back then, they weren't known as Zero and Ichiru.
(End Flashback)
--
"Ne? Soshiki?" Minrou asked when Zero and Ichiru left to catch up on 'old times'. Minrou looked as if he was going to fall asleep anytime, his head dropping a few inches. He was sitting on his bed, determined to get answers from his older brother.
"Yes, Minrou?" Soshiki asked, pushing his younger brother back onto his fluffy white pillows. Minrou needed his rest. Soshiki had to be prepared for tomorrow; another transfusion was taking place.
Minrou allowed himself to be pushed back and rested his head on the pillow. But he fought the overwhelming sleep creeping on him. "Did you know about those two? Zero and Ichiru?" He began to cough
Soshiki pulled up a chair to sit next to his brother, patting him gently on the back. "No, not directly from them. I suspected of course. You can't live with Zero without noticing some things off about him."
Indeed, the pureblood had woken up in the daytime (while the sun was out) to see Zero pacing slowly, back and forth, back and forth. But when he asked Zero what was wrong the next day, Zero would give him a very odd look and say 'what are you talking about?' Also there would sometimes be an odd feel that the movements Zero would display. Sometimes Zero would add an extra jump to his steps, for no apparent reason. Soshiki would sometimes walk past Zero's office during work to find the ex-human alone in his office, quietly arguing with some invisible man. But when the pureblood would look in, Zero would stop and go back to whatever he was doing.
"Oh," Minrou said quietly. "You know, when I possessed him, I couldn't really control him. Well, I was able to at first but then..." Minrou paused then continued, "I lost control over him. That's probably why he went crazy and murdered that vampire on the street."
"What now?" Minrou asked, more to himself than to Soshiki, "How should we treat him knowing that he is a god?"
"Like we always have," Soshiki said softly. Being a pureblood really isolated them from other vampires wherever they went. It was nice having someone treat them as living creatures rather than a fashion display. He could relate to Zero's position. Even when Zero had found out that he was a pureblood, he had still treated him as he always had; Soshiki was truly grateful for that. At least he wasn't being ogled at all day and night.
With a small jolt, Soshiki realized that he didn't really know Zero too well. Yes he knew the simple basic things about Zero, such as his past and birthday, but he didn't know anything about his friend. The pureblood still couldn't tell Zero's emotions apart, nor could he tell anyone what the ex-human's favorite color was. He had never known Zero's hobbies or his habits. Hell, the ex-human knew more about the pureblood than the pureblood knew about the ex-human.
Well, they could catch up on lost time.
--
"Well, what do you think?" Zero asked walking to his office with Ichiru striding next to him. Ichiru looked thoughtful, looking down at his feet, as Zero had filled him in. When Zero finished, he looked up.
"I think guarding Kuran Kaname would be our first priority. If we leave him like this, he could get his soul taken and cause a panic," Ichiru said, pulling out a small blue notebook. "Let's see if my notebook has any spells…"
"Your spell book would hold spells to transform your looks; I doubt it would have anything to do with protecting," Zero said raising an eyebrow, opening the door to his office. Ichiru glared from behind his book, and if Zero wasn't a god, he would've caught fire.
Ichiru flipped past the section of transformations into females, before landing on a page of summonings. "I could summon someone to protect him…"
"It would be safer to protect him personally," Zero said sarcastically. He turned around to see a wide-eyed Ichiru, "What?"
"What a great idea!" Ichiru said a smile breaking on his face, "You can personally protect him!"
"WHAT?!" Zero screamed. "I have work to do! I can't exactly take off! But there is another way… If you're willing to protect him in the shadows, we could possibly work something out… You should probably reveal yourself to him so that he knows. I don't mind if you use my name."
"I guess I wouldn't mind… for awhile…" Ichiru said slowly.
--
A Council member looked at his assistant. "Make sure to clean this up after you're done, I need to get home."
"Roger!"
As soon as the man was gone black feathers rained down.
--
"Another one carted in!" Soshiki said to a panicked Zero. It was the next day, and the patients wouldn't stop coming. They never got this busy.
"Same symptoms? Just collapsing and not waking up?" Zero asked, trying to sort the numerous piles of papers on his desk. He tipped a pile over by accident and cursed loudly.
"Yes! But this time, it is a twenty year old man!" Soshiki said, picking up the fallen papers swiftly and looking on his clipboard.
"Shit! It has to be him!" Zero growled.
"The Soul Stealer?"
"Who else?"
Zero slammed his hands down firmly on his desk. "I have to stop him! This is madness! He's going to attract unwanted attention!" He grabbed his jacket and turned to the pureblood, "Think you can care for the hospital for awhile? This might take from anywhere to a week to a couple months."
"Months?!"
"Soshiki! People are dropping like flies out there! Only Ichiru or a god can defeat a spirit! Preferably, Ichiru, because he is a devil. The soul stealer can't take the soul of people that are impure, so that saves Ichiru the burden," Zero said placing one hand on the windowsill. "Keep in touch with me using my cell," he said before jumping out.
"But--" And the ex-human was gone.
--
"Ichiru where are you?" Zero asked into his cell. He was running to his own house, looking for something that might help in his library. He glanced at the house next to his, noting a sickly looking girl looking out the window. Can't get distracted.
"Ah, I'm currently at a café, disguised as you," Ichiru said softly back, "Kuran is sitting a couple chairs away. I'm surprised he hasn't noticed me… Ah! He noticed me, gotta go bro."
Was that déjà vu? Zero asked holding his phone in one hand, looking at it while he fumbled for his keys with the other. Hmmmm
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"Zero!" Kaname said just noticing Ichiru/Zero and walking up to him, "I'm glad you're here! But why aren't you in the hospital?"
"I needed a break, so I asked Soshiki to cover for me," Ichiru said. Act natural, act natural, act natural…
"I see," Kaname said cheerfully, pulling up a chair and sitting at 'Zero's' table, "Must be tiresome."
"Uhhhh, yes," Ichiru said, "Well I have to go." He stood up, with every intention of leaving.
"I'll go with you," Kaname said standing up as well.
"It's okay," Ichiru said quickly. GET OFF MY BACK ALREADY!!
"Are you sure?"
"Yes." STOP THAT!
"Well, alright," Kaname said, "I have your cup by the way, come over to my house to pick it up."
"I'm afraid I lost the address, would you mind giving it to me again?" Ichiru said pulling out a sticky note. This is starting to get very creepy; just what relationship do those two have anyway?!
"Of course."
--
"That makes five!"
A little boy half pranced around. The walls next to him were covered in jars, each with a small glowing butterfly. The only difference was that some of the butterflies were red and some of them were white. He giggles, opening a jar and placing the butterfly he had by the winds inside. He clammed the lid shut.
"Soon, Diamond! Soon I will have your soul and you will pay for what you did to me!"
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A/N: Not very long this time. But I promise the next one will be long! Read and review as usual!