"A blood sample?"
Komui stood in his office, knee deep in paperwork as he explained the reason for summoning two of the Exorcists. He smiled benignly at the them but, somewhat unusually, both were frowning at him.
"Yes, a blood sample," Komui confirmed.
"But Komui-san already has a sample of my blood," Yuki protested calmly.
The young girl was obviously not happy and Kanda could only roll his eyes. He put the unusual reaction down to a fear of needles. She had reverted to the more serious side of her personality; the one with a harder expression and much better posture. She was practically glaring at the Chinese supervisor, her arms crossed over her almost non-existent chest and lips set into a firm line. It had been downright disturbing for Kanda when he'd thought the gaki was a boy. Now that he knew the truth, he could put it down to her being a female and the fact he wasn't meant to anticipate or understand the sudden change.
"I'm afraid the abnormality in your blood has disappeared, as you predicted it would," Komui informed her. "So we need a fresh sample so we can continue testing."
Yuki raised an eyebrow but nodded anyway. Komui turned to Kanda, trying to ignore the wariness smouldering in Yuki's large blue eyes.
"Also, Kanda," Komui began a little nervously. "During your check-up after your last mission, it was revealed you're lacking in a few essential vitamins. We don't intend to change your diet or give you tablets, it should be easy enough to sort out with a shot. If you wouldn't mind going to the infirmary as well, they'll be happy to do it as soon as you're ready."
Kanda frowned. As far as he was aware, his diet was quite healthy. It needed to be, otherwise he would start to fall behind in missions and Kanda would rather have died than fail a mission. He opened his mouth to say that his diet was fine when the gaki interrupted him.
"Which vitamins?"
"Pardon?" Komui asked, beginning to sweat.
"Which vitamins is Kanda-san lacking?" Yuki repeated calmly.
"Er… um…" Komui fumbled. "I… don't know?"
Komui started to sweat heavily under the scrutiny of both of the Exorcists. Kanda had no idea why the gaki was suspicious in this situation but he certainly wanted to know what he was being injected with.
"Check," Yuki insisted.
Suddenly springing from his place, Komui dived into his paperwork and dug out what appeared to be the relevant information. He flicked through it hastily, seemingly desperate to be free of suspicion.
"Ah, here it is!" he exclaimed with relief. "Vitamins C and D. There, there's your answer."
This seemed to pacify the female Exorcist. Her frown faded away and was replaced by her normal good-natured smile. Komui too seemed to relax, apparently relieved to see Yuki back to normal. Kanda simply went 'che' under his breath, trying not to draw attention to the fact he had no idea whether the answer was feasible or not.
"Gomen nasai," Yuki apologised. "I shouldn't have doubted you, Komui-san. However…"
At the last word, her voice had suddenly taken on a sickly sweet quality and Kanda turned to look at the gaki through the corner of his eye. She had closed her luminescent eyes so that only one detail of her face could be seen through the shadows; her smile. At that point in time, the gaki grinned widely, similar to that of the Cheshire cat as it disappeared into the darkness. The overall effect was incredibly unnerving.
"… If you were to do what I thought you might," the gaki continued, her voice still sweet as the berries of a belladonna plant. "– And I am sure Komui-san does know what I suspected him of – then I shall be very, very upset."
Komui's sweating increased tenfold and his left eyebrow twitched violently. However, the gaki continued to grin before suddenly turning about-face and walking towards the door. She paused as her fingertips grazed the handle of the doorway and quickly turned to face the two males.
"Ne, Kanda-san," she said, back to her normal manner. "Could you show me to the infirmary? I don't know where it is yet."
"Che," Kanda grunted.
He pushed past the younger Exorcist, roughly connecting with her shoulder. An odd smell wafted up to Kanda's nose but he ignored it as he stalked off to the infirmary. He noticed the gaki following him out of the corner of his eye but his mind was on the odd smell that seemed to pursue him. It was vaguely like a flower, though he couldn't place it because it also held a metallic tang. It wasn't unpleasant, quite the opposite but it annoyed Kanda because he had no idea where it was coming from.
Kanda started visibly smelling the air for a few seconds before noticing that Yuki was staring at him. His cheeks turned an unnoticeable shade of pink before he recovered his senses and glared at the young woman. She merely smiled, though it looked slightly strained.
"Is something wrong, Kanda-san?" she asked, her large eyes scanning his face.
"There's a weird smell," he grumbled.
Suddenly, the gaki's face went bright red and averted her eyes. Even through the gloom of her hood, Kanda could still see her blush. She shuffled about nervously and mumbled.
"Sorry, it's the perfume Lenalee-chan gave me," she apologised. "You don't mind it, do you?"
Kanda vaguely considered answering the question but decided it wasn't worth it. He wandered away and Yuki concluded that it couldn't be that bad if he hadn't insulted it/her. She shrugged and followed the senior Exorcist dutifully.
Yuki sat on her bed in her room, staring at the ceiling. Now that she was away from prying eyes, she didn't have to smile or act bubbly like she always did. She could be silent and think. Yuki was more than aware her attitude annoyed people but she preferred her life the way it was now than how it had been before she'd started wearing the mask. And now… she'd been wearing the mask for so long that it had become a physical part of her. Yuki would just as puzzled as the person who asked if anyone wonder; which side was the real her?
A twinge in her arm reminded her of her present troubles. Though her Innocence could deal with flesh wounds and bruises almost instantly, like it had during her first mission, muscle pain seemed out of its reach. So, although Yuki could suffer being stabbed through the stomach with only half an hour or so of pain (provided she didn't bleed too much and die before her Innocence could heal her), a measly injection left her in pain for hours. But it wasn't really the blood sample that worried her. It was the need for it. As far as Yuki knew, the properties of her blood that the Science division wanted to test shouldn't have 'degraded' this fast. The sample had been given less than a week ago and it took almost a month for it to 'degrade' in most circumstances.
The fact that Kanda had been given an injection of 'vitamins' on the same day as the Science division took an unnecessary blood sample made her imagination burn. Although it was entirely possible that Kanda was deficient in vitamin C and D (a diet of soba didn't contain many fruits and Kanda didn't seem to spend much time outside) it still sounded untrue to Yuki.
Because of the nature of Yuki's Innocence, it could be transferred to some extent with her blood. Although on Yuki's previous three experiences had yielded nothing but benefits for the secondary hosts of her Innocence, none of them had been Exorcists. The possibilities of an Exorcist being injected with her blood worried Yuki.
Though often seeming airheaded, she was actually quite intelligent and it allowed her to see many outcomes to such a situation. The optimistic view was that an Exorcist would react no differently to any other human. The pessimistic and – in Yuki's mind – much more realistic view was that her Innocence would be rejected by the original Innocence and the Exorcist would suffer the consequences. There were very few examples of an Exorcist with more than one Innocence, Yuki could only really confirm one case but there was a possibility there were more.
The worst part was, in previous experiences, it had taken around three weeks for her Innocence to make its presence known in a secondary host. Only then would Yuki be able to confirm her fears and confront Komui.
There was also the problem of what to do if someone really was injected with her blood. It still wasn't actually certain that Komui had actually gone against her wishes by doing so, even though it was a strong possibility. However, if they had, it would be an irreversible change. Diffusion would make it impossible to gather Yuki's Innocence once it had made it into someone's blood and, in such circumstances, her blood had retained its healing properties until the secondary host died.
Yuki shuddered at the thought. Her own parents had been two of the three people who had been subjected to Yuki's blood. Her mother had, of course, swapped blood with Yuki while she was still in her womb and her father had accidently put an open wound to Yuki's grazed knee. Though the death of a loved one – particularly one's parents – was never a pleasant experience, the fact that her Innocence had been in their systems had made it all the worse.
She grit her teeth, tearing her eyes from the blank ceiling as the images flashed through her mind. She wrapped herself into a ball, closing her eyes tightly and covering her ears: anything to block out the memories. Eventually, the images and the haunting memories faded away though they still left Yuki with a heavy feeling in her chest.
She uncurled herself and reached under her bed, fumbling for one of the few personal items she carried. Finding something, Yuki pulled it out, only to be confronted by the wrong item. A white, hardback book with two masks painted on the front; one laughing and one crying. She sighed and put it beside her, reaching once again under her bed. She pulled out an almost identical book, this time with a lotus flower in full bloom emblazoned on the front. Third time lucky, Yuki thought to herself but some how managing to pull out the wrong book yet again, this one with a small, vague lake-scene.
Finally, on the fourth try, she pulled out the item she had been looking for. Once again, it was practically identical to its three predecessors but the design on the front cover was different. Red paint had been dripped across the front, bearing an odd and disturbing likeness to freshly spilt blood. Yuki flicked past pictures of morbid and disturbing things, until reaching the half-finished one at the back. Two hours she toiled away until the picture was done and the heavy feeling was gone from her chest.
She left the room to get lunch, leaving the book open at the newly drawn picture. A girl lay dying in a pool of shining blood while a figure looked over it, making no move to help. The girl had long curly hair, sprawled out underneath her and the figure – male though it was – also had long straight hair and a sheathed katana by his side.
A/N: here we go. By the way, if anyone wants to see a picture of Yuki, I drew a picture of her on Photoshop (it's my first attempt) and here's the address; http : / /hopefulcreations./art/Yuki-chan-98934217 ( you need to take the spaces out first though). This is her face without her hood (obviously), the hair went a bit wrong on the shading so sorry about that. If anyone would care to comment, I'd be grateful though please be nice. If anyone wants to see her in her in Exorcists' uniforms or in the dress then tell me and I'll get round to it eventually.
Tainted Light; lol, I know, this is fun to write as well as read.
Greenteamoose; thanks for your support and I'll change the typo right away! And the sketchbook things was meant to be a prod in its own right… but I suppose I did that kinda wrong. Oh well, room for improvement.
LunasDarkSpirit; sorry about that, I had masses of stuff to do but I'm back. Also thank you for spreading the word about my story, soon the cult of YukiXKanda shall spread across the world mwahahaha (dissolves into fit of coughing).
Yatsuki; yup, I'm back. You can't get rid of me that easily.
Lala-tan; this soon enough?
Sandcat; normally astrology is so vague its accurate but Kanda's is so out of it I just had to put in there somewhere.
Jeanne124ave; I haven't forgotten, don't worry and STAY AWAY from the chocolate… it's really bad for you (I should know). Hm… Tyki and Yuki… that's an idea but I'm not promising anything.
Itachisneko-nya; thanks for your patience, here's the next one.
Lovely Ai; your wish is my command, here's the next one.
