whiteshade of blackness 'gaku october 16, 2006
10 Breathe
'... Colle', what's a mother like..?'
He was swinging his feet that were dangling from the high metal table lazily.
"Hmmm... I don't know..! Like the skies, probably..."
The snake-skeleton's eyes glinted with green gems inside, they glowed in the darkness like a predator's eyes marking its prey.
"Yepp..! A clear-sky with a round white-moon and specks of shimmering stars behind in warm daylight..!!"
The face in the skeleton's jaws smiled ruefully.
'...You could see moon and stars in daylight...?'
He cocked his head in question.
The older man snickered, and messed the boy's hair excitedly.
"Of course you can !! If not, what's that waste of an enormous sheet of sky good for..?!"
. . . . . . '...That's not the answer to my question...!'
He furrowed his brows a little. The snake-skeleton shook with laughter...
". . . . . Actually, ...you are the answer to your question ...!"
The snake-skeleton bowed its face down, whispered the words offhandedly, ...but knowing he could hear him nonetheless...
...As he expected, the boy didn't say another question . . . . whether he understood or just gave up his curiousity, sometimes the boy still acts impulsively he gloomly noted...in this forsaken place, being as the boy himself, it's a crime..!
"Say..., I'll take you to the garden after I finish here, what'd you say..?"
'...Really ?' then he smiled a boy's smile 'Arigatou..!!'
"Hmm..."arigato", hu?"
the skeleton hid the face completely, the murmured words were flat. He himself couldn't understand what the excitement of watching the rocked-plants and the remnants of them, but the boy seemed to see them as something mistifying.
"...don't act so human like that, they're expendable...!!"
...just as the words of an extinct race's language the boy sometimes used unconsciously
"...The Air is dispersing !" Lyea half-shouted through the gusting wind from the Forest in front of them. Kyllea staunchly stood behind her, holding her left hand out to ward off the hurtling wind from her Lady.
Not far from her side, Deia stood with uncanny resolve masked her face. Something's definitely wrong, she could feel it from the beginning she came to, but this was pass definitely-wrong, the worse part of all this was that she couldn't feel her Prussian anymore after they've broken through the Land's Barrier...but that's not really what clawing her awareness right now, she could sense something approaching from her deepest core, something dreadfully frightening yet brighter than the Stratus...something untouchable. Something forbidden... something she had longed for all eternity...
"Howard...?!" The Lord's voice sounded small in the billowing Air, despite his Veilled protecting him around his figure.
"Nothing I could do... the Air is awakened rejecting something entering or exiting the Land..!!" ..using the Forest as the shielding slaughter-ground... "It only occur once that I knew of...!!" he deliberately cut his sentence there... –it only occured once when Deia was brought to this Land.
Kyllea stared at Deia sidelong. ((...Kylle.., finish yet ?))
A flash of childish curiousity entered her mind, Kyllea narrowed her eyes, he always played with the preys...! ((Hurry finish the intruder off before our Lady's Dearest got there, or you got demoted...!!))
A silent chuckle.. ((If that even possible...?))
((I'll demote you from existence..!!))
((Haa... Sister's so scary...! I just thought that I would try to investigate the intruder's abbility first since it might be in our benefit later concerning the compact-power issue...!)) He answered lazily.
((What's the purpose of that ?! There's no need to investigate the soon-to-be-deceased subject !! You could do your out-of-curiousity research afterward, hurry and dispatch the intruder now !!))
((Hummm... they've gotten out of the Barrier..!))
"..What ?!" Kyllea hissed the word out unconsciously, and caught herself immediately. She spread her sense around in quick search, and reliefly noone realized her slip.
((...So ?! What are you doing now..?!)) She composed herself.
Another slight chuckles... ((..Protecting the Land from the intruder...!))
To noone's eyes at the very moment, on the outerside of the Land's Barrier, the boy was standing like a statue in his glory of whitefire bombarding the Barrier with enormous power trying to get through it with killing resolve, a flash of violet eye in his mind... his face was a mask of death devoid of all emotions...
---------------
. . . . . . "Why do you like them so much..? They're just dead remains of plants..!"
the snake-skull cocked to one side then to the other. To his tediousness, they're all looked the same as just that..
'. . . . . they're dead...!'
the silent mind-words answered slowly as if in awe
the skeleton snaped at the boy's direction
". . . . You like... deaths...?"
Colle' asked hesitantly, even knowing the boy's reason of existence, it was sometime downhearted him... the boy was such a beautiful creature to his -snake skeleton's gem- eyes..
the small head nodded slowly once,
'...dakara... the deads won't die...'
a long pause filled with only silence and damp humid air and darkness..
"Hng...right !"
the lips in the snake-skull lifted at one edge in a sinister smile
"I rather like collecting living speciments, though...!"
-...as what you are...!
---------------
"...Out of my way..!!"
Deia said flatly to the boilling Air, there was no time for being concern of it, her Prussian was being erased from her present, and she wanted him back, now..!!
Lyea stared at her rigid posture after hearing her words, as also the people who came along with them behind. All eyes noted that there was no sign of the black-aura exuding from her, to the Lord's (and co.s) relieves. As there was nothing happened, either...
"OFF...!!" Deia barked out.
Lyea blinked, it was the expression she knew of her Dearest in anger, not the scalding Wild's-expression like back then in the chamber.
Kyllea stared at her sidelong with composed scrutiny.
A few moments passed with only the wind's billowing sound filling the present like a solid creature with one will to reject any living-thing to enter the Forest, then suddenly an invisible power sliced through the solid mad Air in front of Deia, straight to the Forest, leaving a trail of calm path for her. It was as if you cut a straight sum of a pudding with a knife leaving an empty gap between... only, this mad-billowing Air was NOT a pudding...!
While the others gaped, Kyllea stared at Deia's back walking composedly on the path to the Forest. She narrowed her eyes...
---------------
Kylle watched the intruder's form in swirling whitefire with no small amount of appreaciation. He had to admit that it was something you'd want to set your eyes upon even if it was staking your life in exchange. But noone mortal in this world could penetrate his Barrier from the outside, that is unless he let them intentionally. Chuckling, he continued his surveillance wondering how long would the intruder's going to last.
A flash of warning came from his-half's awareness, and he noticed a slight difference in the Air almost spontaneously. On the outerside, the boy sensed a presence from inside the Land, when suddenly a thunderous beat from within the craft-plate burst out exploding black-currents from his chest. He widenned his eyes as his body collapsed forward as if bowing to the Land, while his lower body's posture remained the same. He fisted his hands on either side of his body.
...Noone...NOTHING...! ..in this world worthy of lowering his head to...!!!
His chin trembled in rage, staring at the ground and his feet that weren't touching it... feeling his core being sucked of essence by the parasite deposited in his chest... feeling the presence who stimulated the parasite's actions trying to get towards his being... using his stollen essence nevertheless !!
A face burned in his surface-memory relayed behind his whiteflame-irises... a human's face with long silvery-purple hair and purple eyes smiling at him... His hands fisted so tightly that his pointed nails broke his palms skin, the blood dripped from between his fingers was shimmering with raw power, incinerated the ground's soil spontaneously that immediately scattered by the whirling wind and whitefire around him...
. . . . OMAE o. . . korosu . . !!
Kylle noticed the change in his subject of surveillance's disposition, while his awareness told him that someone with the opposite power was approaching from the innerside of the Forest. Defending from two-ways attacks was not to his liking...
((...Damn..!))
...if only he's allowed to let them to obliterate each other...-then he'd watch, of course...
In the Underspace of the Forest Kylle smirked ruefully... He rather liked the idea..! Watching the two birds killing each other, and he didn't even have to throw a stone. A deep chuckle erupted from his inside, growing to full out laughter that reverberated the whole Forest..
On the edge, Deia felt the Forest as if it was trembling with excitements, like an individual living creature...the pulses rippling through it was almost like a laughter. She stopped frozen on her tracks as the Air sliced her left cheek bleeding. Widened her eyes in realization for the first time... This Forest is alive..!!
Still on the verge of his joyfull laughter, Kylle said with a fervor... ((...Come now! Come, Milady's Pet...!! Your beast-pet is impatiently waiting to kill you !!)) and continued with another meryfull laughter.
Damn, if he knew it would be this easy from the beginning, he wouldn't even have to induce those foolish villagers' mind to kill the small beast of intruder...!
He tsked... and smirked (( The things you'd do for your Motherland...!!))
...- isn't that right, ... Mother...? Looked up to the Stratus above... feeling its dispersed lights penetrating his being... feeling the Forest pulsing along with his heartbeat... Being alive felt good !!
---------------
Deia walked as silently as she could, trying to conceal her presence as best as it's possible. Cold sweat ran down her back, never in the past that this Forest disturb her awareness so much like now. Her mind was filled with alertness she felt her eyes as if going blind. Relaying prussian orbs staring at her with a Wild's naiveté to counter the mental disturbance the Forest attacked her with with, she held her head high and kept walking with gracefulness of a royal towards where her heart knew that her Prussian was waiting.
---------------
The boy stretched out his right hand towards the Land, the whitefire whirled down and sucked in by his body, being concentrated in his open right palm in a bright little ball of white-light.
Kylle, prefering that the intruder should rather use that immense power he'd detected to his Lady's Pet coming this way, opened a slight gap in the Barrier so the intruder could come in without damaging it.
In a flash second there was a reflection of himself on the Barrier's surface that rippled as if of water, then gone to invisible Barrier again. After it happened for three times, the boy lowered his right hand and absorbed back the white-light to his hand, he narrowed his eyes and blasted his whitefire again to protect his being and floated pass the Barrier slowly. Aside from a light white-currents charged the Air, there was nothing else happened from the penetrated Barrier.
He stood unmoving for a while, then slowly but certain he looked up to the high giant tree branch at his far rightside. Stared straight to the other being's eyes there.
Kylle sat lazily on the branch with a rueful smile on his immaculate fairish face, his shining bright-red irises stared back unflinchingly. With hair the color of blood and long pointy ears protruding from both sides of his head, the boy knew that this being was not a human. From each of the outeredges of his slightly slanted eyes were two redlines down his cheek as a supposedly body-mark of status or something like that. A bandanna covered his forehead under his long bangs, his hair was long messy-cut around his head that reached his waist, and a long 'tail' of braid snuck out of it that reached his ankles.
He drooped his eyes in a supposedly smile that hidden behind the end of his braid he was playing with in front of his face. Noticing the recognition in the whitefire-eyes on his, he chuckled slightly..
((...Yes ! We've 'met' before... I thought that you really could see me back then, but I didn't think that you could be able to recognise me still afterwards...!)) Straightened his back and dropped the braid end.
(( Well... I never really 'met' YOU, though...!)) His red eyes flashed with fiendish interest.
A bright white explosion incinerated the space Kylle was at, the energy ate the Air at the exact area that it didn't even produce a sound of blast, just a deaf second and the warped space around it. After the explosion, the surrounding space bounced back to its supposed state, rippling with a ringing sound. A big 'hole' created in the exploded space, inside it another layer of barrier shimmering with multiple specks of colors dancing in endless flow.
((... My, my... What a bright self-introduction..!! You're a straightforward type, aren't you.. )) Kylle solidify himself from the scattered ashes of the incinerated-space still floating around in the Air, and transfered himself to the space behind the indifferent boy. But before his body solidify to concrete object, the bright explosions strucked again, this time blasted his body along with the Forest's trees behind him leaving his body a poor remain of ragged-doll with chunks and parts missing in large holes.
But he chuckled again deeper, and shrugged himself to normal figure like nothing happen.
((Definitely not a chatting type, hu...?)) Kylle smiled calmly and flicked his head a little to dodge the next blast directed to blow his head off.
((Though I'd rather like to play with you myself, I'm in a bind here...!)) He lifted his hand palms open in front of his chest, not really a surrendering gesture, just a sign for the boy to stop his attacks.
((The one you're after is not really this dear-me, right..?!)) his smile never faltered.
((How about you just let me watch and I won't disturb you ?))
The surface-memories relayed to his eyes were of this entity sitting on the giant white-tree branch smiling at his surface-self, some were as if pleasant images, some were of his figure among the villagers and hunters and mercenaries, moving as if in slow motions, whispering deceiving words to their very-minds. While his surface-self struggled to survive with all his might, Kylle was there too, everywhere... with the same angelic smile still on his face.
The boy's whitefire-eyes stared at him undaunted.
Kylle chuckled.
(( No answer means 'no', hu...?!))
The whitefire surrounding the boy swirled its flames to spheres around him.
Deep chuckle.. ((..Even if I myself say it's quite an intimate invitation, but I'd have to decline your offer. Even so, I like my playground as neat as they are, though...!!)) Kylle flicked his fingers upward before the boy blasted the spheres again.
Then a low heavy groan sounded from the whole Forest, almost like a grating sound of a gigantic living metal-thing being awakened, it reverberated through out the Air, travelled along the Forest's canopy surrounding the whole Land, coming towards them.
The sound stopped a mere second, the space gone deaf, then suddenly a vivid colorful light blasted down upon the boy, trying to crush him down. The soil around him in the vivid light were floated upward by the assault, while the effect was contradictory for him. The whitefire flared in wild dance trying to oppose the pressure, the spheres of whitefire had been fired upward towards the light's source, but they had been nullified easily by the light's enclosing wall, sucked to a screwing maneuver along the wall upward to nothingness.
The whitefire blasted itself, soaring vertical, slicing the light's wall with several white lights... then a booming sound was heard.
In the thick layers of ashes and soil and dust, after a moment of silence, stood a transparent tower of crystalized light. It stood solid and perfect for a few seconds, then a crack appeared on its surface, climbed up along the vertical structure followed by uncountable cracks that were intermingling with each others. Then with a clear chiming sound the tower broke into thousands of pieces and shards and specks of light-dusts showering around the standing boy in the middle, without the whitefire surrounding his figure.
Kylle stood blinked with large eyes on him, then clapped his hands continously with an awe-shock-to-silenced expression on his face, even that he sweatdropped a lot.
. . . . . . . "...I've never seen anyone do THAT to break that-... 'THAT'...!!"
"...COOL...!!!" he said outloud...
...-I'm in a NO-cool situation, then... Damn !!- he thought to himself, while still applausing the monstrous entity in a boy's form in front of him.
---------------
"...What was that..?" Lyea asked mostly to herself looking around at the Forest's surrounding.
"Milady, it's dangerous in here, you should go back to the Castille...!" Kyllea whispered behind her with a small bow to her head level.
"We have to retrieve..-"
"The missing people should be able to be rescued by the Charms..!"
"But Dearest is...-"
"...-Safe with my-half ! Milady, with all due respect...!"
"... I'm NOT a standing ICON of this Land, Kyllea...!!" Lyea said hotly, staring chalengingly to the maiden's maroon eyes.
"... No, Milady...!" She said amenably albeit sounded a bit tired. And they continued their walk through the Forest.
((...Yo, sister-mine...?)) just then Kylle opened connection in their one-mind.
((...I'm not your sister..!!))
((...hahaa, cute ! ... new circumstance here...! Our little intruder here turned out to be an immortal...!!))
(( What ?! What do you mean imm-...!! )) greeted her teeth, let out a slow hiss.. (( Seal him !! ))
(( Tried THAT.., didn't work ! ...But cool !! )) a childish cuckle.
Kyllea narrowed her eyes.
(( ...What are you doing now...?! ))
A squealed laughter ((...Dear-me ?! Playing hide-n-seek..!!)) another shrill..
((...Kylle...!!)) she hissed dangerously
(( Ahaahaa...!! I mean it, sister-mine, I'm hiding-he's seeking...! –Ouch !!))
---------------
... A blast managed to incinerated his 'tail' behind his running figure, Kylle hissed out a swearword in ancient language, then flicked it back to normal and curled it around his left wrist. Without seeing with his eyes, he knew the boy was tailing him like a white lightning, without a sound, and without needing solid surface for his footing. Even that he kept randomly transfered to other places in rapid shifts, the boy kept getting to him even before he manage to solidify his body in each leap.
While the whole time he was feeling sorry for his ruined playground...
---------------
(( ...Kylle, take him below..!! ))
(( Ahh ! Can I use some digested suplements down there ...??? )) He asked with sweet tone.
Kyllea silenced for a moment, then..
"Milady, what if we're already too late to find the missing people save...?"
"We'll find them anyway, and we'll go back to the Castille together, ...all of us !" Lyea answered silently, in the back of her mind she knew there were many things that were hidden from her knowledge, too many in fact, so she just tried to keep holding to what she think is the right thing to keep. She could only keep walking straight, with a naiveté of a child, because this Land corrupted many things.
Kyllea nodded obediently, quite a distance behind them a young Charms followed their steps stoically, while the other including the Lord had separated in many directions.
(( Kylle, you can't digest the missing people in the Under, Milady's bidding ! ...just deal with him below so there's nomore damage to the Forest ! ))
...a mental snort... like he didn't want his playground to be as neat as ever..!!
---------------
Noting that the boy didn't have his whitefire to protect his being anymore, Kylle tranfered for the last time feeling his nerves tingling with gambling exitement. The boy frozen for a fraction of second when Kylle appeared in front of him in his personal space, opening his right palm to his face. When a bright redlight exploded his vision he managed to swing his right hand and struck the offending hand in front of his face to his side in teared state. The left hand came shooting to grab the boy's neck, but his fingers only managed to brush the ethereal skin as his left shoulder blown along with half of his body.
So the boy had anticipated that, ...Kylle leered widely, his bright-red irises narrowed down to almost a slit vertical line in each of his widened eyes. But not this one ..!!
The boy perceived another presence behind him, and suddenly a pair of hands snucked from behind his back and blasted a redlight to his chest where his craft-plate planted. He felt a surge of power from it countering the blast, using his body as a battleground. He tried to lift his hand but Kylle in front of him grabbed both his smaller hands in his.
"...NO !" he hissed, "You can't win against your own seal in your chest, stop fighting or you'll give more damage to yourself...!!"
The one behind him who kept shooting the redlight chuckled deeply, the boy widened his eyes and arched his head, his eyes countered another Kylle's eyes. The Kylle behind him smiled sweetly and kissed the top of his head. "Sweet dream, Little Deity...!"
And the three of them plunged down to the ground, where the white soil opened like water surface swallowing them.
---------------
Deia gasped as she felt a surge up her nerves and fell down forward on her knees. Her breath was labored and cold sweat ran down her chin to the ground. Feeling her body trembled uncontrolably, something's wrong, something's wrong... her mind kept repeating the words. A Charms who had been following her ran towards her with concern and crouched at her side.
"...Lady Deia..?" he asked silently.
"...the...space sucked... under...!" Deia gasped the words with difficulty. The Charms widened his eyes, he turned his head in several directions fast. Noting that there was noone else beside them in the area, not even a smallest beast.
Deia's hand grabbed his white cloak brought his mind back to the little girl, she seemed like trying to say something else but couldn't. The Charms bit his lower lip for a while, then nodded to himself.
"Milady, I'll try to make it short...!" he whispered and took a couple deep breaths, "...this Forest was... well, Howard used to call it our Land's mine-field, it consisted of the upper-space, the one as the common Forest that we already knew, the other one was the Underspace, the Forest that we Charms were afraid of... It was believed to be made of layers of other-spaces where the Forest devoured any living things that entered them. The deeper the layer was the harder for them to get out, and rumors had spread even between the villagers that this Forest had its own will and sometimes acted as though a living thing itself...!" –of course, there were still things he skipped.
Deia's gaze stared him with alert. That's why the other Charms separated ways from her, to enter this Underspace without revealing to her ?
The Charms looked down guiltily, "Yes, I know how to get there... but Howard strictly forbid me to take you to the Underspace. There's too many risks and..-"
"...How...?!" Deia asked brokenly between her gasps.
Staring back at her eyes that were full with determination bordering to desperation, the Charms silenced for a few moments, then staring back to the ground he uttered a small "...'m sorry.."
Deia tossed the Charms' cloak in her hand and forcefully threw her body upward. After staggering a few steps forward she stood slumply but rigid with stubbornness. The Charms turned to her, intended to say something, but he widened his eyes in disbelieve when he saw that Deia opened her Harmony-link, trying to formulate her Harmony to do what ever she think she have to do.
"...Milady..!!" the Charms threw his body spontaneously covering her small body to the ground, a purple cloud of aura shimmering around them, while the older Charms tried frantically to pushed the Harmony down to her opened link back before the Forest manage to devour it...her..!
"Opening Harmony-link in here is suicide...-!" his words stop abruptly when he countered Deia's gaze who flicked at his sidelong. It said 'tell me your way, or I'll do it my way'...
He was strucked speechless with jaw dropped for quite a moment, never in his Charms' live that he had managed being ... blackmailed...?? In fast thinking he formulated Howard's (..face ?) reaction on the matter; he'll be hell-ragingly mad with a (fatherly..??) grin on his face and a ruminating summon-camel (which was gossiped could chew a Charms) behind...The worse part would be General Odin; with carnivorish sneer holding his awaken talisman-sword fulminating the air with its Fairs' power and a black warsteed baring its beast's teeth behind... Then, the worst would be The Lord's reaction should anything happen to his youngest daughter; he'd be... staring at him with a straight unreadable expression, ...and staring...and staring... and staring... and just staring... if that didn't work out; ... the hurt puppy eyes brimmed with sheen of tears...------ AAAAAAAAAGGHHHH...!!!!!! Can't have that..!! NEVER that...!!!! The WHOLE LAND will hate him if he ever make The Lord crying his puppy eyes out...---------
"... What're you thinking...?!!" Deia whispered low suspiciously with eyes two slits of purple light burned at his face which was melted with cold sweat like heavyrain.
The young Charms jerked his mind back to reality, and noticed that both his hands were painfully gripping hair at both side of his head; the small Lady was lied on the ground, and he was half crouching covering her feet with his white Charms' cloack spread wide... talking about illicit display... He was fossilized for a second, then swiftly kneeled at her side in a blur of white, bowing repeatedly chanting his apology again and again.
Feeling her self composed again with her Harmony shielding the sharp atmosphere in the Forest, Deia sat up and stared at him with poised face. "...I'll tell on you to my father; ...or you could just -" she stopped intentionally; the young Charms stopped alertly.
"... Or maybe, to my father and Howard...?" she faked the thinking pose; "...AND Odin...???" with an innocent face, then bloomed a beautiful smile.
"... AND Lyea, AND all the Charms, AND the whole Castile... ANNNND the WHOOOLE LAND... the Fairs, the Spells, the Voids, the beasts, the plants, the weird-noses-looking flower-pet at Howard's bedroom window, the sneezing alcohol-alergic whistler wineglass of Father's , the-..." (and so on)
Is she for real...?? That was what his braincells whispering to each other in his frozen brain. While the Lady Deia in front of him distractedly counting every things that came to her mind using both her hands' fingers with a happy face. When she'd got to the 'name' of "Untamed Jelly-brick of the Seventh Grinning-Pan" (the name of an 'alien' she made once when trying to cook a dessert a few years ago that had managed to DIGEST more than half of the castle's kitchen), the young Charms sighed defeatedly...
"Milady..."
"Sooooo...????" Deia sharply focused her attention at his face.
The Charms smiled a tired affectionate smile, "Alright...!". Deia beamed at once, "With one condition,...-"
"I won't tell on you to noone...!!!" she gave the brightest smile she could muster. "No, not that..!!" he said counter cuttingly with a sweatdrop.
He sighed again "You have to promise me that you WILL survive..!!"
"What ever happens !!" He stared at her eyes with a no-nonsense seriousness, "You will survive even if that means sacrificing my live in the process !! Can you do that ?!"
Deia blinked, "Wha-...!" caught her words and recomposed herself in only a full second, she stared back at him with a collected resolve burned in her purple eyes, she nodded once.
She looked down to her lap in silence, and after a few moments she said calmly "...I don't know your name !" (as most Charms usually use their appointed Charms-name rather then their given name, since they familiarize each other with their inimitable Harmony signature).
The Charms didn't answer, after some moment passed Deia looked up at his face inquiringly. He kept his lips shut tightly with a sense of pride wrenching his expression. When Deia opened her mouth to ask again, he answered cuttingly in a blow of breath with instant tear-tracks on his cheeks,
"Seventh Cloud, grin-tamer of the Seventh Grinning-Pan...!!" it was from the very incident that he was famous of taming Lady Deia's "accidental-party" accomplices.
Deia's laughter brayed out like music, and a flash of silvery purple brushed his sight. She was hugging him with a soulful air, for a short seconds he felt the heavy atmosphere of the Forest lifted and he felt serene. "Thankyou..." Her whisper brought him back, though.
She looked up "We'll all go home ! All of us !!" and said in a sure tone.
---------------
It was soft, the Air didn't felt like sharp blades cutting his body inside out; felt like floating...
He tried to open his eyes several times, when they did he realized that he was in an alien world of clouds and smokes. The air moved like layers of silky smoke as of river's currents, the pillars resembling trees were of white clouds, he couldn't see the ground under his weightless body but he was sure it was of plushy clouds too. Countless smoky ropes were extended from the 'sky' to the 'ground' like the ropes of a boat's sails. If possible, the light even felt velvety...
He felt sleepy.
... kaeritai... (1) his heart whispered to himself.
Between awareness and unavoidable sleepiness, with alarms wrecked his tired almost unresponsive mind, he closed his eyes again. Even though his instinct told him that he won't beable to open his eyes again the second time once he surrender his consciousness to the alien world.
((...at least you won't go in pain...!)) a soft breathy telepathy weaved in the smoky air.
He jerked his eyelids half open, and after a long moment he perceived a pressence behind his body. Firstly, of a pair of smoky hands encircled his chest, then the light brushes of airy-wisps of hair that were floated around him, then the feeling of securance from a kiss on top of his head, a small serene smile on its velvety lips. He felt like drunk... overwhelmed in an ecstatic way...
...felt like dying... in a nice way, ...perhaps too nice.
......want to go home...
((...Don't you have a home ?))
the boy blinked;
((...at least somewhere to go to..)) –besides here
'...I don't need home !'
his stare became somewhat unreadable with frosty edge, he swallowed his dry throat once and looked down at his bare feet
- I need you...
...I need you... he repeated the words halfconsciously, stretched his right hand to the figure's face in front of him, or at least tried to; but he only managed to lift a few fingers while the figure's form was slowly dispersing from his mind. His breath hitched, even though the air in that alien world was so very easy to breathe, he didn't want that... he wanted his misery..., his beautiful black-misery with one purple eye in the darkness.
I bleed for you ... !!
His heart screamed, and a thunderous pulse from the craft-plate jerked his already wrecked body. Feeling as his heart would stop anytime now, he let the destructive power he'd tried to conceal all this time loose. A monstrous black energy blasted soaring sky and groundward...
Stared wide-eyed at the many layers of "skies" the power hollowed out far upon him... feeling his body lost to the odds...
he stopped breathing...
---------------
Deia watched with big eyes as the last row of the circles finished, the young Charms licked his bleeding right forefinger once to close the bitten wound. The blood circles of incantation drawn on the Air was floating like a round mirror in front of them. Deia blinked.
"...Now I enter..??" she half asked doubtfully.
"It's just like the Key, milady...we make the door first" he smiled.
Deia wrinkled her brows. That many works...?
"Then we have to knock..!"
"KNOCK...?!" she asked skeptically.
"It's bassically sincronizing the Wave of our plane with the Wave of the Under-plane; the resonance will-"
"Open the gate ?"
"No, swallow you..!"
Another blink, deeper brows. "----How ?" A resonance could swallow...???
"It will disperse you to the Under's wave-type !"
"You mean like convert my body to Wave...?!"
He nodded, "Yes."
If she fails to concentrate her Wave-body in the Air means she'd be the same as dead; being what called as the alien-substances that were feared of as the tale-teller of the Air, digested and recycled. Sounds like organic-trash !! Or organic-fertilizer...? May be... parasites ?? Well, she sure didn't want to be degraded to the same level of compost or manure ! Anyway, she WILL get her Prussian back save and sound and nurture him to health; furthermore, to give him a happy life; and she won't have it any other way.
"I'll be your shield, Milady. You don't have to wory about concentrate-failure in the Air, just concentrate on getting your objectives." he said with a knowing smile, Deia was egoistic sometimes, but she never intentionally put any other being on the loss.
"..., I know." she half answered to herself.
The young Charms lifted both his handpalms opened to the circles, formulating the Wave in his body, when a telephatic shout boomed in his mind.
"SEVENTH !! What're you doing ?!!"
He jumped and spontaneously twisted his neck it sounded a loud crack. Deia stared wide-eyed at his neck, not hearing the telepathy since it's not intended for her.
"...Thrice...! I... well..."
"You're sending Little Lady to the Under ?! ARE YOU INSANE ??!!"
A whitelight flashed around them, and when it stopped a younger Charms around mid teenage was crouching on the white ground, his wide cloak flowed behind with additional long scarf around his neck giving him to tails.
He stood and faced her, his air was straightforward, and his face clearly showed his disagree to them.
"Little Lady, those who are not able to stabilize their Wave in different air ARE strictly FORBIDDEN to go outside the Land Barrier and/or the UNDER !"
Deia stared, under the gauze-like bandana around his head she could 'see' another eye on his forehead with her Harmony. This was 'Thrice', the famous Charms gossiped by the people as the descendant of a chimera. She never really met him this upclose before, with his abilities far surpassed common human-Charms he was usually sent to many fieldworks.
"...You have horns..!" Deia said mostly to herself. There were four of them, although they're covered from commoners' eyes, the small horns adorning his head were seen clearly by her eyes. A red line-like mark above his third eye half covered by the bandana. Ah, one of the Special Force..!
"Milady..!" he scowled.
"Yes ?!" Deia answered surprised from her distraction.
"Old Howard and the others had managed to retrieve the missing people. So they're absolutely coming this way, SENSING the formulation of going to the Under...!!" he glared to his older comrade sidelong, intentionally pressing the last words.
"Better get ready for your funeral! I'm not covering you this time...!" practically, because there's nothing he could cover this time. 'Seventh' paled despite his innocent 'what do I do?' smile.
"How about Prussian ?!" Deia clinged to his front cloak surprised him a little. "He should be in there? I thought Odin's taking him outside..!" he answered automatically.
She opened her mouth instantly, but finding no proof of what she believe to be the case. She clamped her mouth and staring at the grounds. While 'Seventh' tried a few words with him, a firm glare from his younger fellow shut him up completely. He looked to the muted Deia guiltily, and joined her staring at the grounds.
'Thrice' placed his open palm in the center of the blood-circles floating in the Air, the space rippled a few times then the drawn blood ceased to dusts and joined the white ground. He turned to them without another stare to the dusted circles.
"We should head back to the Castile, Little Lady."
Deia bit her lips stubbornly, but didn't refuse when he ushered them back. With every small steps she took, she felt as if her heart failed her. Time slowed down, and her breath felt hardened as if breathing mud, the Air around her felt like congealing, and her sight misty. Up front she could see the others coming her way, but her heart was left behind.
She stopped. Lyea was the one in front of them all, she had a relief smile on her face. She was wording something, their father behind her after Kyllea, Howard was from the direction of their right, followed by a few Charms. Two other Charms was from their left. Seemed like the other Charms had gone back with the retrieved people.
But her heart was left behind...
Deia grated her clamped mouth, then without warning she dashed back to the ground where she knew her Prussian was under. She ran as fast as she could knowing that the Charms could stop her as easily as extending their hands anytime. She didn't hear the surprise shouts calling her name, didn't see the worried faces, didn't care the people running behind her. As fast as she could,...or her heart dies.
A flash of whitelight catched up to her with no difficulty, she felt rather than saw 'Thrice' extended his hand from her side to stop her. The shimmering of the tears from her eyes caught him, though. He just compromised himself to stay close to the Little Lady like a shadow at her side, with a hand at her front going to encircled her small body, he ran along almost backpedaling.
Suddenly the ground shake violently with a loud roaring sound. Deia fell forward to his waiting hand and 'Thrice' stopped, covering her body with his flowing cloak. A deafening crash sounded not too far ahead, where the dusts of the circles left on the ground, as a monstrous power exploded from under it.
Deia closed her eyes in 'Thrice''s embrace, waiting the explotion wave to die down. Her heart beating painfully as if it'd exploded too. She tried to wrench her eyes open, and when the air cleared of the projectiles blown by the blast, in the middle of the dust-rings surrounding the explosion point and white-smokes and blacklight... was her Prussian floating in mid-air.
She couldn't even call his name by the sheer relief and too many feelings piled up that bursted out instantly, and just threw her body towards him.
'Thrice' saw the wide hollow in the ground that led to the Underspace, he immediately snatched Deia's body and the boy's floating smaller body in the way. They landed quite a distance from the hollow that was groaning loud an almost painful inhuman sound. He lowered both his charges on the ground, where the boy lied lifelessly and Deia crouched at his side. Stood at their side, 'Thrice' stared unblinking at the hollow gap closing on itself, he was dumbfounded by the many layers of the Underspace he managed to glimpse while he was flashing above it.
The panic voice of Deia calling Prussian's name brought his senses back.
"He's not breathing !!" Deia cried. 'Thrice' crouched too, sensing the missing heartbeat he couldn't sense from the unconscious boy.
Deia blindly brushed his face a few times, trying to wake him up, but he's as lifeless as a dead clay-doll. Putting her hand on his chest, didn't find the beating of his heart, Deia put both hands and prepared to give him a cardiac massage.
"...I wouldn't do that...!!" Howard's breathless voice sounded behind her.
Deia froze, her mind tried to decipher his words. Suddenly her frantic panic driven acts stopped, as if a different consciousness took over her previous mind. She sat back putting her hands on her lap, and she exhaled slowly as if started to breath again. With shaky fingers she unfastened the boy's tunic under his cloak, and found the uncanny bruise in his chest.
Howard flinched a little, staring at the little girl distractedly brushed the blackened chest.
"...why..." her shaky whisper almost unheard.
"...Girl,..." Howard said guiltily, but seeing as Deia had stopped caring her surrounding, he shut his mouth.
The other people stopped at a distance. Lyea was going to run to them, but The Lord stopped her.
Deia sobbed silently, still brushing his pale face blindly, calling him over and over. Her cries got louder with the passing time, but her Prussian lied still.
Lyea cried without a sound, mostly because Deia's cry stabbed her heart so painfully. She unconsciously gripped Kyllea's sleeve. The maid turned her face to her, then gave a small reassuring smile sadly.
((...It's better for both of them this way, Milady. That boy's an immortal.))
Lyea looked at her, after a few moments she asked in her heart '...immortal ?'
'..you mean like... the Pre-Dark Era Immortals..?' (2)
Kyllea nodded a little.
Lyea stared back at the lamenting scene, '...even an immortal dies, Kyllea...'
And Deia was begging him unendingly.
'...and the ones left behind by an immortal still feel sad...!'
Unknown to everyone, he was still there all along, hearing every word his Human cried, the touches her cold shaky fingers gave him. Her warm tears seeped through his closed eyelids, with last desperation he tried to open his eyes. Summoning all his shattered consciousness back to reality, to his Human's reality.
Deia froze when she saw the eyelids fluttered open slowly. Just slits of grayish prussian color, but they're really moved.
Not daring to breathe, she ever so slowly touched his chest, her broken whisper broke the silent air.
"...Pru...?" there's still no heartbeat under her palm, nor the up and down movements of the chest indicating his breathing.
The despair wrecked her once again, killing the flicker of hope with certainty. "...Please !"
The boy just stared blindly at her, unmoving. 'Thrice' dared himself and was going to say that maybe it was just a reaction of muscle contraction that were wetted by her tears, but he swallowed the words when he realize that the boy's head was leaning a little at her open hand cupping his face.
"He couldn't breathe the Air, Lady Dee...!" Howard said silently.
The slitted eyes fluttered close and with difficulty they opened a slit again, then closed completely.
"NOOOOOPrussianpleaselivepleasepleaseplease..!!" Deia cried frantically.
"Honey, ... you're weighing his leave. Let him-.." The Lord hadn't finish his words.
"-Free of his misery..?!" Deia breathed explosively. "I KNOW MISERY, BEING DEAD DIDN'T LIFT THE PAINS AWAY!!!" Then yelled at the top of her lungs at them, making The Lord jumped by the weight of emotions carried in her voice, by the stranger's expression shadowing her face. It was as if she spoke out of experience, someone else's...-
He swallowed once.
-...voice..?
The boy's body jerked up once almost as the same time as she finished her scalding yell. This time his eyes were wide open, but still they're glassed and unseeing. He was trying a few gasps, but seemingly his lungs wouldn't work. Just a poor resemblance of fish out of water.
And that was his last leap trying to catch and hold on to his lifethread.
And as if knowing it, Deia instinctly covered his open mouth with her own.
...breathe through me..!
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(1) japaneese, of course; means '-I- want to go home'
(2) will be explained in the next chapter, hopefully it'll be the last chapter of the current timeline. n n;
This chapter is the longest so far, for any of you who've been waiting patiently for new updates, YAAAAAYYY...Wu-chan's already being fixed, and currently being the fave of the house's inhabitants (for playing PC games), we have to actually queuing!