The Shotgun Approach
Chapter 10: The First Move
A/N: Sorry for the confusion the POV change caused last chapter! Next time it will be in bold at the top (though I did put in an author's note the last time too xD). This story will every so often change POVs from Ettie's, to Yusuke's, and also Hiei will make an appearance too. But anyway, onto chapter 10!
Back to Ettie's POV!
*Edit: So, half this chapter originally uploaded in italics and it irritated me to the point I had to delete all the formatting. Hopefully it's fixed now.
. . .
Unexpected.
And certainly not part of the plan.
This entire night was in total ruin. But I might still get what I needed in the end, if I made my moves with care.
I was aware that my apartment was being watched. It'd been that way since Obon. Someone cunning and quick. A demon who hid its presence so well not even Yusuke or Hiei had detected them.
Yet I had. I was certain it was done with intent.
And I was also certain it was a particular member of what I had come to realize was a terrorist group. The ones behind the bombings, killing humans and demons alike. Killing humans because they were beginning to realize that not all demons were monsters. That they could become useful members to human society and help in its advancement. And killing demons because they had renounced the old ways by coming here, to human world.
It wasn't just a couple of people.
It was an entire organization. A much bigger scope than what I accounted for.
But it changed nothing. It just made what I needed to accomplish a hair more difficult.
"I did as you asked," I said, clapping the cellular phone shut. It was snatched from my grip a second later.
"No shit, my hearing's just fine."
My captor was a rather sour young man of about twenty, would be my educated guess. He wore dark concealing clothing. And a mask over his face like a true amateur.
But I could see the outline of a gun at his hip, even in the darkness of the ship's hold. I could disarm him easily enough, but it would start a fight I wasn't willing to participate in. He was just a human, after all, and far more fragile than I was.
I'd allowed my capture in the hopes I would be taken to someplace I could gather information.
Instead I was dragged to a shipping port, deserted at this time of night, and then hauled onto one of the boats. Once properly tied up, my captor had forced me to call the King and demanded I put on a "good show" of being panicked.
Without his knowledge I'd called Kuwabara instead. The last used number in my cellphone.
Yusuke would notice I was faking the poor connection and that my panicked tone was forced at best.
Much to the annoyance of the young man in front of me, I was neither panicked nor afraid. And each second I stared him down another proverbial bead of sweat formed on his brow.
"If he doesn't come in the next hour I'll shoot you and leave the body somewhere he can find it."
I said nothing in return, my face just as impassive as the second he'd used a taser to take me down. It'd caused me more surprise than pain. But did allow a moment of negligence so he could put me in handcuffs.
Handcuffs I could have easily frozen and snapped in half by now if I'd wanted.
At my lack of response, the man pulled his gun and hit me on the side of the head with the butt of it. It cracked like a whip but there wasn't enough force for my head to turn. I could feel the sting of broken skin and the trickle of blood down my cheek.
I snaked out my tongue and licked some of it up, coating my lips in red. I was sure my eyes were shining with some unholy color in this darkness, and I could hear when the human's heart picked up it's tempo.
He froze, gun rattling in his shaking hands.
He had no knowledge of the power housed within an S class demon.
It was almost sad, and I could sympathize with the man. But that did not mean I would bow to him.
"You're a monster," he said.
"Yes," I breathed. "That is true."
This was starting to look like a waste of time. Why was he the only one here? Surely there must be someone in the shadows pulling the strings. I could not be the only one moving pieces across the board.
For a moment he looked rather horrified, before his eyes wandered away. He pressed two fingers to his left ear and listened.
An earpiece.
Whoever was calling the shots was smart enough to stay hidden.
He spoke quick and concise words in English. A language I had yet to master. And then he knelt to the ground so we were eye level.
My knees dug into the rough metal and the handcuffs were too tight and whatever he was about to tell me was not going to work in my favor. Yusuke was here. I could feel his energy as well as those of the others. All four men had come to my rescue.
"If you do not flee here you will be captured," I said.
All fear was now gone from the lines of his face, though I could still see the trepidation swimming in the vibrant blue of his irises. "They won't even reach the boat," he said. "All you demons are the same, hungry for blood and death. He came here without any hesitation...and walked right into our trap."
"Your people have watched me long enough to realize I mean something to him," I said. Not a question, but a statement of fact.
"When his girlfriend left we thought we lost our bargaining chip. Lucky for us the king's a horny bastard."
They'd planned to take his human lover. How long had this organization been in the works? Since Yusuke became king?
No...before that even, when that brash young boy first showed up in demon world and changed everything. They bided their time. Waited until he was king. Just so they could undermine him and destroy all he ever planned to achieve.
"Who is your leader?" I asked. Ice skittered up my palms, towards the cuffs. Slow...slow. Don't let him see or hear.
My captor stood to his full height and grinned down at me, lifting the pistol and pointing it so it was centered on my forehead. "I don't know the boss' name, but I can tell you who we are, considering you're about to die."
He cocked the gun, the sound ominous. Gooseflesh raised the hair on my arms. The ice creeped an inch further.
There was no earth here and an ice wall thick enough to stop a bullet would take time to build. I always had access to water, water was in the air, in our blood and sweat and tears. But I could not produce elements out of nothing.
At such close range I had only a hair's breadth of time if he pulled the trigger. Demon or not, I was not infallible to a gunshot.
Keep him talking. Keep him distracted.
"And what is this terrorist group called?"
His eyes narrowed into a glare. "We aren't terrorists. We're fighters striving for the greater good."
"I'm sure that is what most terrorist organizations believe."
His finger squeezed the trigger, jaw tight and teeth clenched. Deflect him.
"I'm sorry. It is unjust of me to cast judgment without first knowing."
His finger relaxed. The ice crumbled, cuffs falling to pieces in my cupped hands.
"Soon enough the entirety of all three worlds will know our name—Atarashi Yoake, the rising of a new dawn."
A new dawn...? That was the name of their organization? A New Dawn?
The Dawn Organization then. There were rumors...whispers in the underground and amongst the criminals who came in and out of the hospital. Always the same words—a new dawn. Now I understood.
It was not just a simple saying. And with my suspicions all but confirmed I once again asked, "And who founded this organization?"
He seemed to forget himself, drunk on the power of holding a gun and having me at his mercy. I used the shards in my hands to slice open the tender skin at my wrists. Deep enough that it could kill me if gone unchecked. But I needed the blood.
"We don't know his true name. But he...he is a god amongst us. A true denizen of what could be an ideal world. We know him as The Aesir."
Blasphemy, was the first word to cross my mind before it went completely blank. The blood poured from my wrists to the floor and I did nothing. I did not move or breathe or think.
The Aesir...
Stunned, I could do nothing when an explosion went off outside, shaking the ship and sending it careening further into the ocean. Close enough to cause damage I realized. It could very well sink.
The man stumbled, gun falling from slackened fingers to skitter across the floor. When it neared me I kicked it further out of his reach when he scrambled to pick it back up.
"Bitch," he swore, jolting to his feet and chasing after the pistol.
I used this distraction to build an ice barrier between me and my captor, made from my own blood. The blood his human eyes were too weak to see in the near darkness of the ship's interior. It shone like a massive ruby in the small amount of light from the portholes, slick and smooth.
The gun went off scant moments later, in a poor attempt to break the barrier. I stood from my prostrated position and sealed the wounds on my wrists closed with another layer of ice. With my blood mixed in it should be nearly impenetrable. The entire thing was permeated with pure youki.
I couldn't waste anymore time. The information was shocking, but if I hung around too long I could be in real trouble. Best to reflect on it later.
I was weakened by the loss of blood but I still had enough strength left in me to wrench open the door. I jammed my fingers into the crack and pulled with all my might. The deadbolt snapped, the door flying open, the metal clang when it hit the wall loud and jarring.
I stumbled through the opening...and right into someone's arms.
"There you are," he said.
I looked up into the eyes of Kurama, who cast me a too kind smile, before looking past me and into the room I'd trapped my once captor.
Upon his observations, he looked back down at me with an eyebrow raised towards his hairline. "I see you did not need our assistance."
But his eyes took in the wounds and the paleness of my skin and the giant block of iced blood I'd left behind.
"Where's Yusuke?" I asked instead of explaining.
"On the docks dealing with the remaining stragglers," he said.
"No one was hurt?"
"Kuwabara contained the explosion well enough, though it did damage the boat and parts of the docks. I suppose I should retrieve the fool that captured you before it sinks..."
But before he could even take a single step into the room, the sound of the pistol firing went off again. And I sensed when the life force left the human cowering behind the wall of blood.
"How cowardly," said Kurama, the tone of his voice devoid of any emotion at all.
Where as I...I was saddened by this loss. The senseless loss of life...once again perpetrated by whoever was behind this. The Aesir...I reminded myself. That is what they were called. The mastermind behind all this...carrying such a blasphemous name.
I whispered a prayer into empty space, "May you walk in peace into the halls of Valholl."
"Valholl?" Kurama repeated. "When Hiei spoke of you using Old Norse I thought for sure he was mistaken."
I floundered for something to tell him, some explanation that would make sense. It was a dead language after all...here in human world anyway. And it remained rare even in the Makai.
But I was saved from having to say anything when the sound of pounding footsteps heralded the arrival of Urameshi Yusuke. He came dashing around a bend and when he spotted me he didn't slow down. He barreled forward until he his arms reached out and wrapped around me.
I froze, stiff as stone.
"I was worried about you," he breathed into the crown of my head, causing a warmth to sink through the strands of my hair.
He pushed away, holding me at arms length, eyes darting from the prominent egg on my forehead, to the dried blood on my cheek, to the bands of ice sealing my wrists closed.
"They hurt you," he growled.
I smiled to placate him. "Just my head. The rest I did to myself."
He brought up a hand, running the pad of his thumb across the already closing wound on my temple. The remembrance of the kiss he'd surprised me with earlier resurfaced and an unwanted blush bloomed across my cheeks.
I stepped away from him. "We should probably go before the ships sinks," I said.
"It's not going anywhere quick," he said. And the authority in his voice caused me pause.
This was the king. Not Urameshi Yusuke. Not the teenage boy I still saw every time I witnessed that light in his eyes.
But a grown man with more power at his disposal than any demon should rightfully have. I could only imagine...if it had fallen into the wrong hands...
A tremor slipped down my spine.
Yusuke breezed past me, eyes alight with an anger I was never privy to witnessing first hand. Until now.
He crossed into the room I'd been held captive in and stopped in front of my frozen blood wall. He brushed a hand down it and his palm came back red, the ice having begun to melt. Next thing I knew his hand was glowing a blue so bright it hurt my eyes, but I couldn't look away. He shattered the pristine surface of my barricade and it crumbled to shining red shards.
He stared down at the body of my kidnapper with a face so cold it should have belonged to Hiei. He squatted, lifting up the bastard's arm and checking the innermost part of his wrist. A tattoo was there, a symbol that made my gut twist.
From behind me I heard Kurama ask, "The same?"
"Of course it is," was Yusuke's reply. "But you knew that already."
He dropped the man's arm with disgust and then his eyes were back on me. I stiffened, that look...it was...
Too much, I thought. It was too much for me right now. So I brushed past Kurama, and without so much as a look back, made my way off the ship. By then I was stumbling from the loss of blood and I was dizzy and nauseous and starting to spiral down into that deep, dark hole I went to when I've gone without the pills too long.
Upon reaching the docks my progress was stalled. A good portion of them were in flames. Some were no longer safe to walk on and others were destroyed completely, just pieces floating on the water now.
I could see Kuwabara in the distance, keeping watch over what appeared to be a hostage. But the only way I could reach him at this point was to swim...and I didn't know if I had the energy anymore.
It was during my second attempt at lowering myself into the water without just falling in like the wreck I was that Hiei came to my aid. I was lifted from the dock's planks with little care and even less concern for any kind of pain I may be in. With a gust of wind and a sudden plummet towards solid ground, I found myself on the other side.
Hiei did not immediately put me down. And the way he was holding me made it impossible to see his face.
With barely a whisper, he said, "You will tell me everything you learned here today, Etternia. Leave nothing out. Or suffer the consequences."
I was about to scoff, perhaps even tell him to kiss my ass for lack of better words. But he continued on and in the same breath said, "Your life is finite. No matter how strong or capable you think you are. Do not go making unnecessary risks."
And then I was placed on the ground, a little rough, but I managed to regain my footing instead of falling flat on my face.
Hiei flitted off, to help Yusuke I assumed, and I was left to collect myself. I dug around in my pockets for the bottle and heaved a sigh of relief that it was still there. By the time the drugs hit my system Koenma's men were filtering around the port, collecting evidence and beginning the process of clean-up.
I flopped down beside Kuwabara after he gave his statement and handed over the prisoner one of the boy's captured. The man went willingly...and he would most likely die when he reached the Spirit World. Just as the other had.
"Glad you're okay, Ettie," he said, clapping a hand to my shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze.
I twirled the piercing in my lip between my teeth and nodded absentmindedly.
He spoke beside me for awhile, telling me of his feet of daring when he lessened the explosion of the bomb and caught the guy who set it off (with the help of Hiei and Kurama). And even while my mind expolded with thoughts of The Aesir, I was still curious enough to turn to him and say, "I did not realize your powers worked that way."
Kuwabara grinned at me, all too happy to talk about his abilities. "I've gotten really good at creating protective barriers. So all it took was pulling a big one up and directing the blast as far from the boat you were on as I could get."
"That's all, huh?" I joked, bumping my shoulder into his.
"Are you okay, I mean honestly?" He jerked his head towards my wrists and frowned. "Maybe we should take you to a hospital. Or a healer."
"I will heal them myself in due time, do not fret."
"Listen, I know demons' regeneration rate is faster than a human's but you lost a lot of blood..."
"And that's the funny thing about bodies, they're always making more of it."
He sighed. "Urameshi won't like this."
"Yusuke does not get a say in it."
He looked like he wished to say more, argue with me further, convince me to get the help they all thought I so desperately needed. But one of Koenma's men called him away and even though he implored me to wait I chose to slip away during the chaos.
I walked home alone. Curled up in my bed alone. And let bitter tears stain the sheets beneath me.
. . .
Blood spattered skin. Flames, deep and terrible and all consuming. A heat wholly different from that fire and far more pleasurable. Then ice. Ice so thick and cold it turned my hands numb and made my teeth click together.
The river ran red. The trees bowed in their grief.
And I awoke with vomit in my mouth and sweat on my brow, thankful it was such a short distance to my wash room.
I wretched until my stomach was empty and aching. And then I rose, swept my sweaty hair out of my face, and went to brush my teeth. Much to my dismay, the toothpaste ended up all over my mirror, after I spat it out thanks to the surprise waiting behind me.
"Pathetic," he sneered. "You did not even notice my presence, not when I entered your home nor when I witnessed the unfortunate end of that disgusting display."
I refrained from rolling my eyes and continued to brush my teeth, when I finished, spitting into the sink where it belonged, I turned to him. "Talkative this morning," I said.
"I came to collect the information I am owed.
I did scoff this time. "I owe you nothing, Jaganshi Hiei."
But a cruel smirk twisted his lips and I knew instantly what I'd forgotten. "You owe me your life, Etternia, as disparaging as it is. You will do as I ask or the debt will remain unpaid."
I should have known he would not let the incident on Obon fade to distant memory. But telling him what I knew would give him too much insight into things I was not ready to divulge. However, I could not tell him nothing, or he would become even more suspicious of me than he already was.
He knew I was in a difficult position, I could see it in the way his eyes dilated with pleasure at my predicament. He would get something he wanted either way. So with a heavy breath that rattled through my chest, I wandered towards my balcony, barefoot and in only a long t-shirt that did little for modesty's sake.
I grabbed the bottle off the top of my dresser, only to have a hand shoot out and close over my own. He pried open my fingers and wrenched the glass from my grip. Hiei set it back down and I watched as it rolled towards the edge, swallowing thickly.
"Why?"
"It is best you are clear minded."
I pursed my lips; he was toeing a fine line. If he thought I would allow him to invade my mind he was sorely mistaken. "Come then," I said, pulling open the sliding door that led out onto the balcony.
Hiei burned away a circle free of snow, drying the single chair and top of the tiny table. He leaned against the doors, leaving me no escape minus jumping, and I took a seat. I should have made coffee; made him wait. But I supposed it would only have prolonged the inevitable.
I did not wait for him to prompt me. I began, as if I was ripping off a bandage. "As I am sure you are aware, my capture was a farce. I allowed them to take me in the hopes of learning something useful. I knew that my building was being watched ever since Obon and I knew Yusuke's constant presence here is what forced them to act."
"Get on with it, woman, I know all of this."
I chewed at my piercing, running my tongue over my front teeth, catching at the chip in the left one. I recalled how I got it, the same time as the scar above it arcing through my upper lip. The dream came back, swirling around in my brain so devoid of the drug I would soon be desperate for.
"Focus, Etternia. What did your captor tell you?"
"Not much...not enough." The ground where my feet touched turned to ice. "They're a terrorist group known as the New Dawn. I'm still not certain their goal is as they say it is, to return the world to its natural order by killing off the demons and humans who have chosen to cohabitate. I feel as if...it's more sinister than that."
"Slaughtering hundreds of people is not sinister enough for you?"
The words dripped with sarcasm but I ignored it, pressing my toes into the snow still beneath the little table. I slid them back and forth on the ice, my skin having long grown used to the feeling of being frozen.
"Where is Yusuke?" I asked, tipping my head back to look up at the cloud darkened sky.
"I told him to stay away."
"And he listened?"
"Stop trying to change the subject."
"I have nothing else to tell you."
"And I can tell that you are lying. What of their leader? Surely he spoke of them?"
I stood from the chair, no longer able to just sit still. I climbed onto the balcony's edge, not caring when snow soaked my skin. I wished winter would never end.
It kept the fire at bay.
"He..." I was forced to pause again, the words getting lodged in my throat. I shook my head, feeling when my hair fell out of the messy up-do I placed it in earlier. "He said that their leader wanted to build the ideal world, that he is a god to them."
I did not tell Hiei what the leader of the New Dawn was known by, that blasphemous name unable to fall past my lips. And he did not pry further.
I heard the sliding door open and I turned just in time to catch my pill bottle out of midair.
"I do not consider the debt paid. You owe me far more than just bits of useless information."
I swallowed a pill dry, ignoring the look of disgust the fire demon cast me. "I repay my debts," I said.
And he would string me along for whatever length of time he thought was suitable, this I knew. And part of me could not be brought to care.
Hiei looked me up and down one final time, his gaze pausing at my wrists and the fading bruise on my temple. "I will cover your shift today. Try not to do anything else foolish."
And then he was gone, leaving behind nothing but a breeze that smelled faintly of steal and campfire.
. . .
A/N: I've been waiting for someone to guess what type of mythology I'm basing Ettie's race off of but there's been no takers yet xD I always end up sneaking that type of thing into my fics (okay, perhaps it's not so sneaky) because I'm a huge nerd in that regard too. Also, Ettie is a pacifist, but I'm super excited to show off what she's capable of in the future ;)