Hey, it's finally here! Chapter nine of a Perfect Circle. I'm not sure how to feel about it yet, so I'll leave the judgment up to my readers. Let me know what you think in some reviews, and enjoy.
A Perfect Circle
A heartbeat. Pumping against a surface, fluently, darkness surrounding. Beating rhythmically, to a drum, an unconditional warmness evaporating what was left of ice and raw. Vision slowly proceeded blackness, blurred and obstructed, but the light was forceful in its rupture, and sensations of pale green, with overwhelming white that quickly dissipated to green and formations of purple again. The pumping sensation droned, absently in the subconscious while new forms of shape began to place themselves in Natsuki's eyes. The darkness subsided, and a wave of chastising pain struck her head quickly , and left. It brought a redness to her eyesight, that throbbed heatedly as blood pumps in the veins, and then slowly faded simultaneously with the sharp pain. Natsuki skeptically began to feel her surroundings. The feeling was transparent, although Natsuki's mind hollowly discarded this and began to take in the world surrounding her. Night yawned against her. Tall, veiling pine was shadowed by the dark that had unknowingly overcame the sun. She pushed her body upward slowly and then turned her head side to side, painfully, for random movements appeared to bring sharp pains into her limbs. Then she suddenly stopped drearily and took in the silence, and everything began to perturb her. How the sense to feel was not numb only when it felt pain, but the damp grass below her, the unquestionable air, the shiver of the wind was intangible. She minded the oncoming loneliness. It was neither cold nor hot.
Then there was hunger. What she did feel was an aware want to feed her unknown hunger, unknown until recently, when the senses were revitalized. She lunged forward so that her body was lifted upward, and flinched in the process, awaiting yet another strike of pain. But mysteriously, the action did not allow pain to come, so Natsuki opened her eyes and walked forward. Her surroundings seemed ominous, since she could not see beyond the darkness of the thickening trees on each side. She could not hear, nor taste, nor smell, if anything but the presence of silence. She continued, and before her there was a long, immeasurable path guided by the pines. The darkness around her was unnatural; there were no stars, and no luminary beams cast from the moon. Clouds could not be seen through the blackness. She began to toil as an intangible fatigue came over her body. Her vision became slurred again by even more darkness, that of closing her eyes, and then suddenly she could hear faint, moist sounds beneath her feet. The slight squishes became loud and apparent, as if stepping through marshes.
A fire erupted calmly in the distance. Natsuki stopped. Blood trailed the bottom of her bare feet. She took one step forward, and the sound of moist swampground reacted. The naked earth was violated by blood, drowned in it, illuminated by the flame. Another harsh jab of pain struck her against the collar bone and the shoulder, accumulating the nausea from the sight of endless blood. Her eyes averted upward, weakened and throbbing; a figure pronounced itself in front of the flames. It held a hand out to Natsuki, and belligerently did she try to run, only to fall, and her naked knees and hands fell into the blood. Strands of her hair draggled down against the red, the black red.
Then she found herself sinking.
In the subconscious, the heart throbbed, beating against the walls of her mind like an angry drum. Her hands and knees had sunk into the swallowing earth, and the parasitism was intoxicating as strings of blood fell into spasms and drawled against her skin, gripping the flesh and dragging it down. She breathed and gasped harshly as her upper body became conquered and devoured by the blood. Her whitened hand reached out , and her opposite shoulder thrust in order to try and pull the arm free, forcing her body outward, toward the mysterious figure, who still protruded a hand to the slowly dying Natsuki. Then Natsuki could feel the heartbeat begin to calm, as the flames beyond fall to darkness, and her eyes were slowly covered by red, and instead of perpetually warring for life she succumbed to her entire body being enveloped.
---
"Natsuki…"
A groan escaped her throat and bubbled up through her open mouth. Natsuki slunk her head to the side, then groggily, her slightly purple eyelids opened and allowed her a blurred vision of Mai sitting beside her. She felt an unconditional warmness and looked down, to weakly see that her hand was cradled into Mai's. A shadow moved itself above her, and Mikoto barely came into view from the top of her eye, looking down at her anxiously. Her sight then refocused itself, and the blur disappeared from her vision. The surrounding area was white, there was a hovering smell of adhesive and latex, and various parts of her body throbbed, as did she also feel her hand being warmed by Mai's palms and her body against a soft cushioning.
"Natsuki?" Mai asked softly again, and she bent her head down more in order to attract Natsuki's attention. Natsuki looked off, where the sink was, and where there were various tools and miscellaneous items. Then her mind reacted to the stimulate of her name being called and moved her eyes to Mai, who instantly offered a wide, gentle smile. Mikoto had a hand against Mai's shoulder and also smiled genuinely behind her back. Natsuki had to focus and consider, then she crookedly smiled, closing her eyes temporarily, for the beating upon them made it a task to keep them open.
"How are you feeling, Natsuki?" Mai questioned automatically, but also softly, because the ringing in Natsuki's ears was further rattled by the harsh vibrations of sound. She moved her head so that her eyes faced the white ceiling, then she slowly opened them, a strong gleam of the ceiling light off to the left, so she turned her head opposite the menacing gleam.
"I'm…" She allowed her burning throat to let escape whispers through her dry mouth. "…feel like a fucking wreck…" The words were quickly pursued by a harsh cough that soured the taste in her mouth. After the sudden fit, she turned to Mai, who held out a small cup to her. She settled her head higher against the pillow elevating her head and opened her mouth, allowing Mai to gently guide the liquid into her mouth. Mai brought the cup away, and Natsuki gulped, then breathed slowly and sunk her down downward. "Thank you…" She breathed.
Mai smiled genuinely. "Youko," The mahogany woman turned her head and called toward the concealed area of the white room. Youko appeared hurriedly from behind the curtain, clothed in a long laboratory coat and latex gloves. When she caught the sight of Natsuki's open eyes, she slowed her pace whilst approaching and smiled.
"Well, about time you're awake." She deadpanned, taking a secondary seat by Mai, in front of Natsuki, who in turn smirked with the best of her ability, before closing her eyes temporarily, then forcing them open. "How long exactly…have I been asleep?"
Youko then suddenly became crestfallen in her facial expression, and Mai lowered her brow in a sullen manner, and Natsuki felt a jolt in the grip Mai had on her hand.
"Two weeks, Natsuki."
Natsuki's eyes painfully widened, and then she forced herself upward hostilely. "Two weeks-
"Please, Natsuki." Youko ordered, standing up and automatically pressing her hands against Natsuki's shoulders. "Do not sit up so suddenly, your ribs are going through extreme recoveries." Then Natsuki felt the pain of her words, as a chasm struck just under her diaphragm, and she flinched and hissed through her teeth, letting Youko's hands force her back down. She breathed deeply for a few moments, Mai still anxiously eyeing her and clasping the trembling hand, then she turned her head with her brow furrowed in agitation as well as pain. "..What happened to me?" She demanded in a rasped voice.
"From what the police say, it appeared you got involved in a fight against five or six men." Youko began, as she simultaneously placed a dampened cloth against the Sapphire woman's perspiring forehead. "They informed us that the men were part of a lethal group found on the other side of Japan they had been trying to locate, so they don't plan on placing any charges for their deaths."
Natsuki frowned, opening one eye, the iris randomly dilating from the bright light in the distance. "…I killed them?"
"All of them." Youko deadpanned. "Investigators said that three of the faces were beaten in while one of them was torn off completely. They found small bone scattered on the scene, and most of them suffered broken necks and legs.
"As for you, you've suffered two broken ribs, excessive bleeding, one fractured shin and a broken collar bone. You're also still recovering from a virus given to you by exposure, since Mikoto found you a few hours after you passed out in a rainstorm."
Natsuki, opened the second eye and motioned her head cautiously upward, seeing Mikoto overhead, who smiled attentively.
Natsuki smiled weakly. "You saved my ass, kid."
"You owe me." Mikoto crossed her arms wantonly.
Natsuki looked momentarily at the light above, eyes instantaneously wanting to evade the burning such a strong light had caused. But Natsuki's lips had so discretely parted, and as she stared into the seething glare, her subconscious erupted into her present mind as the light resembled the great fire in her nightmares. How it pierced her pupils mercilessly, how it's ungodly glare exposed her. How it produced her a naked form to the wrathfulness and the coldness of nature. Then her eyes averted down to her hands. She gently jerked nerves and tendons that connected the metacarpals to the white and pale knuckles that so complementary developed her own hands. How the bones of her fingers contracted slowly, and then quickly, how she clenched those fingers into fists, and all of a sudden did she notice how the flexing of those hand muscles triggered the muscular equations of her forearms, and how the skin bore and tightened against each muscle, how it angelically flowed against the wiry, lean tissue. In the moment, she felt magnificent, to have beheld the role of such a beautiful and complicated organism.
But then, in a raw realization, she saw what she conceived as beautiful muscle, beautiful skin, was tainted and dirtied. Her swollen, large pupils of her eyes scanned over small smudges against the skin, how the years of aging and complexion to create something so awesome was so easily violated by dirty, infectious markings. Her lips parted more, for the sharp breath to escape her. Suddenly the feeling of life, the privilege, the natural sensation of life began to sink into the back of her spine from the center of her chest. For events so small, so unimportant they could be described to have never occurred, had been taking place before her horrified eyes, as tiny smudges of dark red blood stained, infringed and slowly destroyed her skin. How her eyes revealed it's process of curling tightly against her skin, pulling her away from light and from life, how it drowned her. Devoured her until she could no longer feel life, pulling her until she was under the blood, under the ground.
The blood was coming for her again.
Natsuki violently shot up and the sheets whirled around her, and she started to dart her head and her body form side to side, writhing as far back into the bed as possible. The three girls encircled her, trying to hold her down, but her body was enraged like a wild animal and she droned the same words horridly. "T-the blood… the blood…blood-blood…"
"Natsuki, Natsuki!" She was gripped harshly on the shoulders as Mai tried desperately to pull her back down onto the bed.
"The blood-the blood…The blood…"
"Mai, hold her for one more second!"
Mai had barely restrained her, until Youko wrapped an arm around Natsuki's torso from behind and secured her mouth with sleeping gas. Natsuki persisted to war against the toxin, but then her grimace was soothed as she fell deeply into sleep, slowly, and her body went limp in Mai's arms. The woman looked down at her, how her deep, diamond-blue hair sprawled gently against her, like strands of silk. Youko pulled the mask away and set it on the rack beside the generator behind the bed, and she turned to Mai, who's sullen eyes gazed down at the pained, sleeping form of Natsuki in her arms. And how it reminded her of Takumi.
"..Mai?"
But Mai had disregarded Youko's voice, and Mikoto's prodding against her shoulder. Mai disregarded the world, as the tip of her finger gently glided over the scars, and the smoothness of Natsuki's face.
'No matter what comes to hurt you…no matter what tries to conquer you. No matter how much you bleed, how broken you are…you'll always cheat death. It comes for you, and it will try to grab you away, but you just smile a wolfish smile and you look death in it's most cold and ruthless gaze, you laugh like a madman, and then you live through what no normal person could ever survive. It's simple, Natsuki…'
Youko pulled Natsuki from Mai's arms, gently lifting the body down onto the bed. Mikoto pressed her fingers tightly against the flesh of Mai's shoulder through her shirt, and she flinched.
"Mai, you need to answer Youko." Mikoto addressed her sharply, but calmly.
"Yes, Youko, what is it?" Mai pretended up a soft tone while turning her head to the doctor. Youko, in turn, dropped a pair of latex gloves in a small trash bin and replaced them with a fresh pair, looking Mai skeptically in the eye.
"Mai," Youko began, then gazed down at the strained form of Natsuki. "From what you've told me, Natsuki has no beneficial bearings on returning home. She must be forced to eat daily; her body is strong but it is too lean for the recovery process to occur efficiently. She may also suffer severe disease and pain from loss of food intake."
"So, then what is your question?" Mai automatically passed a strand of hanging hair to behind her ear.
"I'm going to ask that you either bring her into your home to aide her, or stay with her at her own home. She cannot be left alone to aide herself, and unfortunately an apartment complex fire has a lot of patients coming in. We are in dire need of room and need to move out other patients. Is this something you can handle, Mai?"
Mai listened to Youko, then she gazed down at Natsuki, who had since been resting more at ease, with a light snore. Her amethyst eyes looked over her scars, her bruises, the bitter reflection of her body when it was found in the cold rain. A reflection of her body as it writhed uncontrollably.
"What do you suppose she meant, Youko?"
"Excuse me?" Youko widened her eyes, and Mai looked back up at her seriously.
"When she began chanting "the blood". What do you suppose that was?"
Youko sighed and placed a hand beneath her chin. "She has been exposed to things most humans could not survive. It could possibly have done some psychological damage to her from the amount of damage she had taken as well as dealt. Which is another vital reason she shouldn't be left alone."
Mai looked off at Youko, slightly off to the side as her eyes wandered pensively, and then she looked onto Natsuki again. Gently, a smile came to her as a gentle hand placed itself over one of the raven-haired woman's.
It's so simple, my Natsuki.
"I will bring her home. And I'll stay with her, and will nurse her back to health to the best of my ability."
She could feel the slow smile of Youko opposite the hospital bed. "I expected no less from you, Tokiha. As you and I both know the mannerisms of Ms. Kuga, she will possibly deny humanly aide if we offer. While she sleeps, we'll bring her home in an ambulance so her body is comfortable, and we will help you rest her inside, the rest will be up to you. Nonetheless, we believe that if anyone is going to successfully heal her wounds, you're the only one she'd accept it from."
Mai looked a bit more attentively with a slight cock of her head. "What do you mean, Youko?"
Youko smiled astutely. "What do I mean, Ms. Tokiha?"
Mai let the deviant words sink in, and then she decrypted the meaning of those words, and she smiled pleasingly. "That's the truth, I hope."
"We'll see. For now, I just paged car-58. They'll be here to pick up Natsuki shortly." Youko lifted herself from the barstool and moved to scant areas of the white room. "Please gather your things, you two."
Mai still smiled genuinely, then turned her head downward to Natsuki, with her hand still gently resting upon the other. Her eyes gazed longingly, anxiously, following down each strand of burning sapphire of Natsuki's hair like a river in the outer reaches of space, where the stars illuminated the beauty of the universe.
'Natsuki…'
Save me from this fire.
'While you're too weak to fight alone…'
I cry your war-song.
'I will fight this war beside you.'
Every broken enemy will know.
'And just as you protected me, when I was weak,'
You've become invincible.
'I'll protect you, until you are strong enough to be the Natsuki I've grown to love again.'
You are indestructible.
'It's simple, Natsuki…'
You are the master of war.
'…I'm always here.'
And she clutched Natsuki's hand in hers once again.
