The girl and her two assassin servants sat perfectly still as they watched the ripples across the surface of the small puddle change with the scrying image that was contained within it. They were all of Kane. The boy was of average height, his hair buzzed into an undercut, with the longer top part of it dyed carnation pink and turquoise blue. It was an odd look for Mages, who tended to prefer a more old fashioned appearance, despite how far things had advanced one hundred and twenty years into the future. Kane was walking about a market place in the town square. His servants clearly invisible, hidden from the public's eye.
The girl's fingers had curled into fists he knuckles white as her hands quivered with rage. Something about this boy, riled her up so much. His life belonged to her. She would be the one to feel his life blood seeping through her fingers, and she would be damned if she let anyone else get there first. She stood, her knees locked and her visage tense. "Come on you two. We have work to do." She said brusquely. Then proceeded to march her way out of the cave she had made into her home for the past few months.
Kane examined a ripe tomato proffered to him by one of the salesmen. "And you're sure this will make good salsa?" He said.
The man spoke with a strange accent, "Yes, of course, you add the cilantro, it will make the best salsa."
Kane passed him the money, and put the tomato in his basket, before continuing on his way to the next booth. He'd decided that to thank Abeytu for providing him with shelter, he would make tonight's dinner. He knew the other boy had a taste for foreign food, and so he sought to try his hand at nachos. At that moment, the hair stood up on the back of his neck, and he realized he was being watched. He began to rapidly dart through the crowd, hoping his unpredictable movements would make them lose his trail. He found himself cursing the fact that his hair was such a bright color. What he wouldn't give to have plain black hair right now. As the nagging feeling didn't subside, he sighed, setting the basket aside as he made his way through a labyrinth of twisting back ways and alleys, praying that he could at least find a place where he wouldn't be observed, and it would be unlikely that anyone not involved in the holy grail wars would be hurt.
Kane let out a string of colorful language as he found himself cornered in a dead end between two large, smoke stained brick buildings. He examined the buildings and thanked whatever god that had been listening when he saw that the windows were dark and boarded up. A girlish giggle sounded from behind him. "Oh, what is this? Little fly caught in a web?"
Kane curled his lip in a snarl and whirled on the girl, expecting Giselle Matou. When he saw who it was, he froze.
"...Momo?"
The small girl laughed wickedly. "The very same."
"But that's impossible. You… you died."
"Well, that's a very pleasant way to say that I put a bullet in my brain."
Kane flinched.
"And you're right, perhaps I shouldn't be standing here. I wouldn't be, but I had some help."
Kane didn't realize he had been slowly backing away until his back hit the wall behind him.
"But I'm not the same, I had to pay the price." The girl reached up to the zipper on her sweatshirt. She pulled it down, revealing that underneath, she was wearing nothing at all. Her torso was mutilated with scars and stitched together flesh.
Kane gagged as the stench of rot hit him.
Momo raised her eyebrows, blue hair falling forward out of her hood and over her breasts. "Oh, my apologies. That would be my intestines. You see, I'm quite dead. There are maggots in my left ear."
At the mental image, Kane felt his stomach to a slow roll, and fought desperately to keep his breakfast down.
Momo seemed to grow angry. "You know, when I first realized I'd been brought back, my first thought was of you. I wanted to try again. I wanted a second chance. I wanted to make you love me. But slowly, over a month, after my arm fell off, and I had to stitch it back on, I realized that you would care for me even less than you did then. Because what am I now, but Frankenstein's monster?"
"I'm sorry-" Kane tried to defend himself, but knew he couldn't. Not against her.
"You're SORRY? I BLEW MY BRAINS OUT BECAUSE OF YOU AND YOU'RE SORRY?! That's not good enough. I want you to suffer. As I have suffered. I want you to have your heart crushed, and then I want you to die. And then, in four years, I will dig up your grave, and I will cut you open, dig around in your insides, stitch you up, and then return you to the world of the living. And you will rot away slowly, as your skin splits open, as your organs turned to soup inside you, and you will know, that the only person that could ever understand what you're going through is me. And then? I will turn my back on you, and leave you to die again, broken and alone, because I put a bullet in my brain because of how badly you hurt me, and all you could say was "Sorry." You sad son of a bitch."
Kane snapped. "Do you even know why I'm here?! I've been suffering, guilt addled, and half crazy, for four YEARS because of what I knew I had done to you. Because it was my fault, and no one else's. Because even if I was pressured to do it, I should have stood up, for you. Because it was wrong, and I should have known better. I poured away my life, I spilled my own blood, searching high and low, to hell and back, for a way to bring you back, to atone for my sins. And the only thing I could find powerful enough to do so, was the Holy Grail itself. So I risked everything, to win the holy grail. For you."
Momo faltered, part of her seeming to want to stop. Her eyes welled up with tears. "It was you. It was your fault. I can never forgive you." She said.
Kane recoiled. "Lancer!"
Momo cracked a horrifying smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Oh, you would call to your poor serving boys to protect you? Well I'm sorry, I'm afraid they can't hear you." Momo drew closer, and pulled a dagger it's place on her belt, turning it over and over in her hand.
Kane bowed his head, resigning himself to his death. This was fair. He'd killed her, if indirectly, who better to end his life?
He didn't make a noise beyond a slight intake of breath as the dagger sank into his abdomen, somewhere below his ribs. He let a slight smile grace his lips as the pain caused his vision to fade out and he sank towards the ground, prepared for whatever she had in store for him.
Momo struggled. "No! I won't let you kill him!" She yelled. She looked down, her eyes finally seeing the pool of blood, and she felt the stickiness on her hands. She screamed, her tears spilling over. "Why?! Why him?! You could have made me kill anyone else!" She threw the knife aside and sprinted out of the alley, unable to bare the sight before her.
When Kane came to, he felt like he had been hit by a truck. He blinked, trying to bring the world around him into focus, but his eyes felt dry and full of sand. He started to raise a hand to rub at them, but someone stopped him with a firm grip on his wrist.
Damascus' voice came from somewhere to his right. "Don't, you'll re open your stitches."
"Damascus?"
The daintier boy continued. "You're lucky, we almost lost you."
Kane blinked rapidly, finally bringing at least the objects closest to him into focus. From what he could tell, he was back in his own house, in his own room in bed. He looked at Damascus. The boy's hands were bloodstained, his black hair bundled in a loose knot at the back of his neck, presumably to keep it from also getting full of blood. His lips were pressed into a firm line, as if that past few hours had been very stressful for him.
"What happened?" Kane inquired, his voice rough.
"You were stabbed. We don't know by who, but Diarmuid found you relatively quickly, and was able to bring you back here, while Cu Chulainn came to get me." Damascus smiled half heartedly. "Good thing you had two servants, huh? If you'd had only one, I wouldn't have been able to reach you in time. You would have died."
Kane nodded, still feeling light headed from the blood loss.
"So, who was it, that stabbed you?"
"Assassin's master."
Damascus' eyebrows shot up. "Really? Did you see her? Do you know who she is?"
Kane's stomach did another slow roll. "No. It all happened too fast."
