CHAPTER 10. THE DRESDEN SLATES
"If something ever happens to me and black blood is spilled from my veins, this is where you have to take me..." then, all the world was swallowed by the thickness of the black blood coming from her pierced heart by a copper blade, then someone laughed with rejoice and behind a curtain of copper head a voice was heard:
"Do you really think she is safe from me?" And he saw those copper bloody eyes while everything was flooded with black blood…
Munakata woke up in the middle of the night. His memories were treacherous within him in the middle of his dreams, he was extremely agitated and took his PDA dialing at high speed. " Fushimi! Go to Hikari's room, now! I know it's 4 am! Do not be stupid, I do not care if Ryuu-san told you to be outside, this is your Captain talking, NOW!" He heard footsteps at the other side of the line and he couldn't take his mind off from those eyes, those eyes like thousands of liters of blood were rotting inside them and were laughing with Mei's corpe below them. "Fushimi..."
"She is sleeping." Fushimi responded. " What are your orders, Captain? Beside from babysitting?"
Munakata sighed: "Babysit at the room, that is my order, only Ryuu-san and me are allowed inside, kill anyone else, specially if you see a copper headed girl…" he heard a low voiced curse from the other side.
"I will see it done, sir." Said Fushimi and they ended communication. Munakata standed up and went to the window where he saw the city, he opened it and lightened up a cigarrette. What was that dream for? Was it right to drag her to Ryuu-san? Directly to one tied to her past? He arranged his glasses and let himself remember while smoking.
"Hey, Reishi! Keep up! I want to put this as soon as possible!" Mei said while jumping in the street and looking back to him with her hair recently chopped. Munakata sighed, he had stopped saying he disliked being bossed around, it was useless. "Come on, my love!" When she says something like that bossing around there was nothing left to say, she disarmed him in every way.
"If you keep jumping around and doing silly stuff you may fall, Mei-chan." He said while climbing the stairs to their new apartent. Almost a year had already passed from their engagement, but only a month had passed since him obtained his kingly powers as the Blue King, after becoming 'equals' he had decided tobuy her a wedding present and both went looking for a place of their ow, that extremely empty loft in one of the highest buildings of the city had been the answer and he liked it, he could see the Shizume bay in the distance and the city lights at night. He could imagine that place as home and this was their first going out to buy something for their apartment. Mei was making such a fuzz about it and he was going to give her another warning when the banister did not hold and she fell down ten stories down into the staircase. "Mei!" He looked out for her but there was no body, she appeared infront of him with a big smile and sit down to take a breathe. "What were you thinking? Really this enthusiasm mascara is really…
"Ouch." She said and he saw her leg, it was broken with the bone on the outside. "Can you put it back on its place, Reisi?
They were on the loft, silence surrounded them and he had done it, he put the bone back in place and had done arguing with her about going to a hospital, he just dedicate himself to clean the wound with hot water and was putting some bandages on it. She took his hand then and started counting. Munakata didn't know what she was doing but he saw how the bandages lighten up like if they had electricity flowing from the clothe and when she reached up ten it stopped. She smiled at him and began to remove the bandages, the terrible wound was gone and the bone was back to its place without being broken. Munakata stayed sitting beside her with bewilderness in his eyes until she took his chin on her fingers and made him see her.
"Reisi, if something ever happens to me and I start bleeding, but black blood is spilled from my veins and body because I am at my limit of injuries, this is where you have to take me, my life and death secret card at the skirts of the Kagutsu incident. I have sent the location to your PDA." Munakata saw his device. "It may seem a normal hospital but in there is the only doctor in the entire world that can treat me and make the black blood go away: Ryuu-san, he is my older brother and he knows everything from my past… our past…
" I thought you only had one sister.
"Yeah, but Ryuu always took care of us after father died… he learned about our existence and the slated and he is the one who treats me when my black blood come out, when it shows that I am at the limit of my injuries and I could be lost towards the darkness of power such as my sister did a long time ago, I can still be saved and keep bleeding in a red color as the sunset. If I can get healed on a matter of tens… of ten seconds this is where you have to take me, no matter what and do not let me bleed black until I become dead and wake up. Do you understand?
"Yes." He said and leaned to kiss her, just the thought that maybe she could be lost into darkness or become someone he wouldn't be able to recognize made him uneasy, for all that power had been ackowledge to him, he will never let it happen, he aimed for justice and order and she was part of all the justice he wanted to bring to the world. " Now, do what you wanted the most by jumping around." He said to her and she smiled back going for the picture they just framed that was on the bags. She put in the encounter near the entrance to the living room and put it with a big smile and dancing around until the firm grip of Munakata on her waist made her stop and they smiled to each other before embracing on a sweet kiss to mark the start of their life together. The photograph was that one from their picnic trip to Osaka four months ago, at that time he didn't know she had one pretty similar with another Blue King, Habari Jin some years ago.
Munakata finished smoking and turned to see the photo in the counter at the entrance of the loft where they were both smiling, he barely smiled genuinly to anyone without that smirk of 'knowing it all' he always wear, but that photo was the start of a collection their both shared and was unique between them. He did not care about learning about Habari Jin later, nor Mikoto, what mattered was what he knew about her and that above all of the three hundred years she spent looking for a king to be her equal, they found each other, she found him and comitted herself to him above everyone else who was completely dead. Nothing else mattered in their relatiosnhip, it was hard to accpet in the beginning when he obtained his powers and learned that he proposed to that magical being withut her ever telling him the truth about her in those four years of dating each other, but now, it was part of the things that made her the woman for him and made him kneel before her and made the vow. Mei always says he is her king, for him, she was his queen despite the history behind and the troublesome of maintaining peace, in the end he was always searching for the real order of the world and with their powers combined they will probably be able to shape the world in their proper direction.
"But there is always the copper side of the coin… the rotten one." He said still watching his dream before his eyes. " The board is getting more players on the game, it is becoming more interesting, but for now, the copper coin should be leftin the shadows since the other players of the shadows had come to appear in the scene." He said to the moonlight that was starting to turn into sunrise. " I should better take a shower and get going.
Hikari Mei opened her eyes to find Fushimi watching her sleep while playing with a knife between his fingers siting on one of the couches of the hospital room. Apparently, he was still deciding if killing her was a good idea or at least try to make her respond some of the questions left over the dream she managed to meet in his subconsciousness.
"If you have anything to say, is better to say it than let the people waiting." She limited to say at his gaze and then she closed her eyes again.
" There is a legend between the Seven Kings told first by the Golden King, Kokujoji Daikaku, right now dissappeared: 'Behind the scenes of the Slates there is a Queen bestowed with the knowledge, power and comprehension of the world from where our Swords of Damocles absorb their own proper power, she manages the destiny of the Dresden Slates at her own will and seize the swords from which we obtain our kingly right, she does it to know the state of our own condition, if she would like, she could make all of us have the Damocles Fall at the same time, if that was her desire we could only watch our own power come from the sky against us, falling to our own destruction The Silver King might be the First but the Golden in Purple Queen guards the Seven Kingdoms that we possess with her all mighty Sword of Theocles, behind her all mighty knowledge that makes her the Queen of the Slates.' But it's not only a legend, is it?" Fushimi spoke without hesitating and Mei opened her right eye which she turned to see him from the corner of her sight.
"Every legend has a hint of truth on it…. Maybe it is true or maybe is just part of it or, maybe and just maybe, it is an incomplete legend, that you will never know because I do not know, Fushimi-kun, but is part of the fun on the ride…
"How come that everyone says that bloody sentence! I am not having FUN on the ride! I am not crazy, nor hallucinating what happened, I want answers, Queen of the Slates!" He shouted standing up and demanding answers like a crazy man. She laughed making him more angry.
"Queen? Me? Really, Fushimi-kun, you really have a very interesting thing of putting things, demanding was never your speciality and well, tell me, do you demand answers to your king in this same unmannered way? Or is it because you are not hearing what you planned to hear? Because you do not know the answer to the same legend you think you know from a tale between kings, which I may add, do not believe in such tales…. Tell me, are you going to tell your theories to your king outside the door." The door flung open and Munakata, bestowed all in a white shirt with dark blue pants, appeared with a critic look to the situation inside the room. "Or are you going to stay there, all shaken off, without saying a word, Fushimi-kun?" She smiled again and grinned, he clinched his tongue in disgust and left the room without waiting to be dismissed.
"Wow, you really pissed him off this time.… I assume you feel better, Mei." He said with a grin adn she laughed. "What can probably be so funny?
"Nothing, I was waiting for my fiancé to come for me all dressed up as a miltary man, instead a regular man is coming to take me back, do you asked for a regular day off duty?
"Will that be a problem?" He got closer and her eyes met while he leaned over her, she said no with a move of her face and they kissed. " You can be so reckless, you know?
"Hell, who is talking! Did you…I know about the crack on your sword, I felt it even before the mission 44… it has grown and…" he put two fingers on her lips and made her say no more.
"Later." She nodded when Ryuu-san came into the room with his white robe. "Ryuu-san, how is Hikari Mei, and spare no detail, please.
"So formal, geez, you really are the Blue King, Munakata-san. That clansman of yours is making a fuzz about a queen in the hospital until he went out.
"Yeah, he thinks I am a Queen.
"Well, he is not wrong, are you not 'the Queen'?
"Yeah, but I can't openly admit it until the time has come, and even worse will it be to admit it to a clansman of my king, I owe him all my respect." She turned her gaze to Munakata who smiled with his eyes and took her hand.
"Geez, Mei, you really….just looking to you both makes me sick, let's better get into business and well, first of all, her injuries are almost closed, except the one created by the last bolt across her chest, she had a blood transfusion and I am making some more tests to see how her red blood pressure is coming back and how the black is being deployed to the depths of her body, I have other tests to see, but if the percentage is good you can go directly to the Slates to get healed completely, that would be the first prescription and I will make you take the two shots a day for a month to increase your red blood with a syrum I developed in this years so we can prevent have your black blood from coming out in an upcoming battle. I do not know the King here, but I want to preserve the Mei I have known for over a hundred and eighty years quite a lot longer without finding out she can turn like her sister at any turn of events. This syrum is on a beta phase" he showed it to them will putting the needle into her arm and glowing while going through her system." but I am sure the sinthesis of it within your Theocles power in your heart and spinal cord will make it sufficient for another hundred degrees of battle against at least any king, against your sister, well I know she is dissappeared, but against her I dunno guarantee you any success.
" Do not worry, Ryuu, I am not planning on fighting her any time …
"I made a change it could resist Hisui's Nagare attack a thousand times now, the syrum will let your red blood cells increase almost to a normal human state and be able to heal in about two seconds and not ten as until now you have been doing.
"So I could fight Nagare?
"If you need to, yeah, but by the grimace on his face I think he will not let you.
"You think…"added Munakata and arranged his glasses. "We will talk later." Making it clear he was not about to discuss that matter there, it was not the time.
She nodded and Ryuu asked Munakata to join him outside for some indications and paperwork, letting her rest a little while the syrum made her dizzy and made her fell asleep to regain some strength. "Do you think you can escape from me for eternity, Mei?" She heard while falling into the depths of her own dreams, she flinched but forgot those words.
"We almost have arrived, wake up, my beloved." Munakata moved her in the car sit during the traffic lights. Mei barely opened her eyes.
"Mihashira Tower." She murmured.
"Yeah, Ryuu-san told me that the syrum will be reactivated with your rehealing process when you are at the Slates, it will increase while your power does it too, you have to come here two times a week to make it stronger and your red blood cells reproduce at a higher speed." He turned to watch her and decided to wake her up until they were all the way up into the Dresden Slates.
"When I watch you standing up like that with that amount of power surrounding you I come to think you are invincible, but from now on I will remember that video projected on the plaza and know that maybe sometimes you do not need to exceed expectations for the greater good. You put yourself in danger there and back in the mall when you make me leave you." She was with her arms opened and suspended from the power she was receiving from the Slates with her eyes closed, she like how it felt.
"It was part of my plan." She limited to respond she was transforming the energy into something positive and canalyzing it through her hurting body so she could feel better at no time.
"And you left me out of it." He said with a plain voice.
"And you let your Sword of Damocles crack for something I had under control." Munakata clenched his teeth in disbelief and decided to enter the Dresden Slate that overcharged against him. He was about to deploy his sanctrum when a path was opened to him so he could go to her.
"You made a very dangerous move, Reishi, you know you can't come close to me when I am doing this." She controlled the power force and move her arms so it could be deviated somewhere else but him.
"You decided to go on your own, that, and you decided to leave me behind and let me watch you die.
"Are you upset, Munakata Reisi?" She opened her eyes that were glowing gold and he was under her, she descended swiftly and looked at him. "Is it possible you are really hurt? You, so emotionless 'nothing can penetrate my barrier' captain of Scepter 4? What would you do if I decided to go again on my own?
"Never more, you heard me, Mei?" She smiled and passed her arms around his neck.
"No, I did not." And she kissed him letting the power flow from her to him and the Dresden Slates bathed them in overflowing bolts of silver, gold and blue, Munakata had never felt that kind of warm and overflowing godly power before, she was really out of league, if she could resist that on her own for her own healing process he could not imagine what kind of battling power she could really have, he recalled that he felt something like this when he knelt before her and made the vow, now that he was recalling he had never seen her sword but that was nothing he cared about, he embraced her with both his arms and let the power flow in equal harmony and admiration, not letting his power take control but let it flow with hers and the Slates, in the end, that was what Hikari Mei was looking for for three hundred years, for an equal with whom she could blend her power and shape ,in the future, the will of the Dresden Slates.
"I love you, Munakata Reisi, my Blue King." She thought and when she did the image of black blood flooding the floor from her piercing heart by a copper blade made him gasp, shout and wake up in the middle of the night.
He could smell the flowers and their blue fresh scent all over the department, he had decorated it with quite a few for a welcoming dinner for her, he could still feel how her body was getting cold within his arms like in the dream and turned over when he felt his hand being hold by another, warm and which he knew well. Purple against copper, that had always been the issue, but why now? What was happening to him and his dreams? He cursed touching his forehead angrily.
"Reishi?" She said in a little voice from the shadows of the bed.
"Sorry, keep sleeping, is nothing." He said and laying over again turning her back to her so she could not figure out what he was thinking by looking at him, she was the only one who could do that specially when they were in the shadows. Both her arms hold him from the back and that surprised him, he could feel her pulse and breathe on the back of his neck.
"I will not die to her." His heart stopped for a split second. "She is bothering me in my dreams too... but for now is Jungle, then we will manage her, I will keep her at bay from all our territory and all over Shizume City, I will not die to her or on you." He took both her hands into his and both of them closed their eyes and dreamt, giving their own power to the other so they had pleasant dreams this time without the nightmare of the copper haired girl.
"Adolf, no, Isana Yashiro, when are you descending?" She thought before lettting her dreams take over and wished upon a silver star for her silvered hair missing king to arrive, not knowing he was already falling from the skies towards them.