A/T: Hi everybody! *dodges all the rotten tomatoes and eggs and the occasional brick*

I know I deserve all of that, but if you have the patience, I'll let you know after the chapter. I've put off putting up this chapter long enough, so, on with the story.

A big shoutout to all the lovely people who left reviews - Thank you so much, Pinkdoughnuts and Apple Cake (now I'm hungry) for leaving reviews! I know I'm a bad person, but please leave reviews if you read, people! It makes me happy!

Don't own anything except the story and the characters I'll be making up on the way. The rest is all Hetalia, and I wouldn't dare otherwise.

Chapter 11

"Mind the wound," Nat warned, and Shree looked at her as if she was crazy.."I'm cleaning your wound, Nat. I shouldn't mind it."

Nat braced herself, and hissed in pain when Shree patted it slowly with a damp cloth. Shree hummed a song as she cleaned Nat's wound, and Shree's throaty voice calmed Nat down. It had the same effect even back in the days of their training as future deputies, whenever Nat felt homesick. The two had been roommates in the Academy, and had also been classmates. Shree had been one of Nat's closest friends in her own age group, and had stayed that way all those years.

Shree stopped humming at the knock on the door, and both of them looked towards the door, Nat looking over her shoulder.

"We're a bit busy," Shree said, to which Nat asked her, "Who's there?"

"Your friends and Om."

"It's if importance, my dears," Om said. "Natalya, with your permission, I shall tell you everything from the doorway."

Nat heard Alfred go, "Aw, dude! Why can't we go in?" and Raj hushing him loudly. She bit down a smile, and looked at Om. "You can come inside and sit down. Just...stay on that side of the room."

Om nodded, and turned to the others in the corridor to say something to them. Nat grabbed the sheets and held them to her bare chest. From the corner of her eye, she saw Shree grinning, and narrowed her eyes. "Ei. What?"

"Nothing," Shree singsonged, and continued to medicate Nat's wound. Nat rolled her eyes, and heard all of them come in.

The room was well furnished to one side, and Nat thanked her stars that her back was facing that way. They all sat down, growing quiet all of a sudden upon entering the room, probably on seeing her bare back, Nat assumed. Even Alfred managed to tone down, an accomplishment for him. Shree greeted everyone in the room one after another with a smile or a nod, and picked up the medication paste.

"After deliberate thought," Om began, "I have come to certain conclusions. I would like to share them with you all."

Nat made no indication of acknowlegdment, but Shree nodded for the both of them, and Om continued.

"Natalya, you and your companions shall stay here until your wound heals. With the doctors and medicines available here, you should be fine in a week's time. During that time, our priests here will chart out a course for you, as well as a new, more secure barricade nonagram to keep demons from other Realms, from reaching here for some time. While it's stronger than the standard barricade Katyusha charted out, its potency is for a far shorter time. I feel that the risk is worth it, since I know of your competence, Natalya.

"In the meantime, I shall try to communicate with the demon, and" -

"He doesn't want to talk."

Except for Nat and Om, all eyes turned to Alfred, who had spoken. Alfred slid his glasses up his nose, frowning. "He doesn't want to talk to anybody."

"Did he tell you that specifically?" Om asked calmly.

"Well, he doesn't talk per say, like, we don't communicate like that. But I can tell, somehow. He's very insistent.

"We want to help him go back to his Realm, to his home," Om said, and raised his hand when Raj opened his mouth to talk."

"He says he'll only talk to Natalya, or anyone Natalya trusts. He won't talk to you, though. Sorry," Alfred said apologetically, and caught Raj muttering something about talking disrespectfully.

"No, it's quite alright. Thank you, Alfred," Om said, smiling. "That leaves only one person, then. When they leave, you will go with them, Shree."

"Me?" Shree squeaked, and pressed Nat's wound with a little more pressure than necessary, causing Nat to howl in pain. All of them rose, but Om sat them down, and walked to Nat, who seemed to be cursing incessantly in her native tongue.

"Would you mind if I bandaged you, Natalya?" Om asked quietly.

"Dy. If she does that one more time," Nat hissed through clenched teeth, "I'll forget we're friends."

Om smiled. "You could never forget that," he said, taking the pot of ointment from Shree. He gently applied the ointment on the rest of the wound, his movements soothing Nat.

"I was thinking about this, but I felt I would be doing the wrong thing if I didn't ask you first, Shree," Om said, putting the pot down and picking the bandage, holding the roll and the unwound stretch of cloth in either hand. "You are one of the few people who has honed the gift of being able to travel through another's mind at your will. If we must realize the full intention of Johnny Doe's contract with this demon, we must train someone to communicate with the demon at will, and have it respond. That person, I feel, is Alfred."

"Me?" Alfred squeaked, pointing at himself with his thumb.

"You are the closest link to the demon, Alfred. IF the demon needed to trust someone, it would be you. After you, it is Natalya. Unfortunately, Natalya travels your mind with great risk to herself, for if she is not able to return, she will have to be exorcised. Shree can enter and leave her person's mind, and if er were to teach Natalya starting from this very moment, it would take far too long, far longer than we have. For as long as you stay here, Shree could try to establish communication with the demon, but in case it doesn't happen, she could teach you how to do it. That will take longer than the time it will take Natalya to heal. In such a case, if Shree came with you, it would help you to establish a connection with the demon. She could train you to work with the demon, to understand it properly. It is what we need happening at the earliest."

Silence ensued, broken periodically by Nat's heavy, pained breathing.

"If she doesn't go?" Alfred asked.

"IF she doesn't go, I will come," Om said quietly, "and Raj and Shree will take over my place."

"I will go, Alfred, Duruni," Shree said, and got up. "I'll need some time to start working." With a bow to Om, she walked out of the room.

"Where is she off to?" Alfred asked.

"Library, probably," Nat said, and looked up at Om, who had finished bandaging her shoulder. She picked up the shirt lying next to her, and carefully pulled it over her head with Om's help, talking as she wore her shirt. "There's a lot of reading involved behind what she will have to do later."

Matt got up and hurried off, and Nat, who had turned around by then, stared awhile in bemusement. She slowly shook her head, and turned to those seated. "Raj, please show them around. Send someone to me after sometime - I shall make a list of supplies that we need to take."

Raj nodded, and looked at the remaining three. "I shall show you around the temple." He rose, bowed at Om, and left the room as well, with the three following behind him.

"You aren't leaving anytime soon, Natalya," Om said, in Natalya's native tongue.

Nat responded in kind. "I know. But it's better for me to keep myself busy in a time where I need to be busy."

"You need rest, Natalya. That wound will heal quicker if you rest," Om said, and tuned towards the door. "I shall do the thinking for you, Natalya, only if you agree to rest."

Nat gritted her teeth, and pulled aside the bedcovers with her able hand. Without a word, she got under the covers and pulled it to her nose. "I feel like a child."

Om chuckled. "That is not so much of a bad thing as you feel it to be, Natalya. Only children know how to laugh from the heart." With a smile, he left the room and left Nat wondering about the meaning behind his words.

Matt was absolutely blown away by the sheer expanse of the library. The titles were in various languages, and were arranged topic-wise and language-wise. Matt recognized most of the languages, having had to master them over a span of five years as a teenager. He pulled out a volume, and went through the pages. It seemed to be a commentary on a previous title, and was filled with all sorts of definitions, and words that were directly translated into the commentator's language. Matt replaced the book, and carefully read the cover titles of various books that followed.

Matt shook his head suddenly in the middle of the fifth volume that he had pulled out and was going through. He buried his head into the yellowed pages with a chuckle, and rested his head on the book for a while. His head was full of thoughts, and then not at all. He didn't know what to think, or what to believe. With a sigh, he raised his head, and closed the book.

Time to go find the dusky warrior-priestess.

Matt walked through the corridors, his fingers lightly running over the engravings of the shelves. He realized that no part of the space within and without the temple was wasted. Somehow, it all contributed to the sense of calm and serenity he felt in each temple. Even though every bit of space was used, it never felt cluttered.

The corridor opened up to an array of tables arranged in a circle, on side of which were shelves of books encircling the arrangement of tables. And at one such table was seated a sleeping Shree, surrounded by tomes and tomes of fat volumes.

Matt walked towards the table, his eyes, shifting from reading the volume titles to looking at the sleeping priestess. In sleep, she and Natalya looked very alike - both of them slept with their hair open, and both of them covered their faces while they slept. Matt quietly sat down in front of her and picked up a volume, absently noting her lush, pitch-black hair, and began to read.

It was about Realms, something he remembered Natalya and Priestess Katyusha talking about when they'd first met. The language of the explanation was simple, and the more Matt read, the more he grew absorbed into the book. So deeply engrossed he was that he felt the prick of Shree's gaze long after she'd begun to stare at him.

He looked up from the book, and found her brown eyes looking at him curiously. "How long have you been sitting here?"

Matt shook his head, his untied curls bouncing around his face. "I have no idea. I just started reading this book..."

Shree's eyes widened as she looked at how much Matt had finished. "You have read so much"-

"Oh, no. I just read very fast," Matt explained, embarrassed for no reason he could think of except that she felt she'd slept for a long time because he'd nearly finished a quarter of a book, but it was just that he read really fast, and plus she'd been sleeping before he'd come and - okay, he really needed to stop his mental rant before he started blabbering before her.

Shree rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. "Still. I must have been sleeping for a while now. What are you reading?" she asked, and reached out to the book. She raised the book and read the title. "Do you actually know how to read the text?"

"I was trained in several languages when I was younger," Matt said, making note of the page number before putting the book down.

Shree kept staring at him, but before he could ask her what was so interesting on his head, she began to speak. "You don't look a lot like him."

"Excuse me?" Matt asked.

"You don't look a lot like him. Your brother does, however. He's a splitting image of your father."

Matt felt a rush of tumultous emotions, in the face of which all he could do was chuckle. His laugh, however, had none of the humour he was usually disposed of.

He runned his face wearily, and looked up at Shree. "It's nothing," he said in answer to the look on Shree's face. "All of this...I don't know what to feel about my father anymore." He looked back up at Shree, and he didn't know what made him continue - must have been the look on her face. "Alfred...hates his guts. Always has, and I don't blame him. But, for me...he was a good father. And now...I don't know anymore."

"If he was a good father, then you don't have to think any further," Shree said. "What he has done to some of us was not as his decision as a father. They were his decisions as an individual. Whatever they were, don't forget your father."

Matt looked at Shree, wanting to ask her something, but he...he was scared of the answer. Shree recognized and understood the look on his face. With a small, sympathetic smile, she said, "It's okay. When does Alfred go to sleep?"

"In the afternoon?" he asked. She nodded. "Probably in...a couple of hours.""Let me know when he does. Until then, I'm not moving anywhere. And no, I don't mind if you stay here with me," Shree said, observing the look on Matt's face. He had a very expressive face that didn't hide any of the anxiety that he felt at different points in a conversation.

The only other person she knew with a face so expressive was Om. But, then again, the only expression on Om's face was tranquility and happiness, so maybe Om didn't count as much. Still, for someone she had just met, she was able to read his immediate expressions quite well. Or...was there more to Matt than anyone could say?

It would be interesting to know exactly who this curious, expressive person truly was.

'I don't want her in.'

'What are you talking about?'

'That dark woman. I don't want her in here.'

'Do I look like I have a choice in any of this? Bro, I haven't had a choice from the day I got this mark.'

'Are you alright keeping your choiceless existence that way? Are you alright listening to others dictate your actions? Are you going to remain a puppet? Are you"-

'Stop it.'

'It is true. You are weak. You are a puppet - no, you are fit to be a puppet. You are' -

"Stop it, demon."

I opened my eyes, and recognized the priestess's buddy walking towards me. The demon, unlike me or the priestess or her buddy, did not have a body - he was invisible, but I could feel him there...like a presence. No, no, not a ghost - a presence.

The demon growled at her, but I could feel he was scared of her. She could, too, for she didn't stop walking towards me. She sat down with her legs folded, and smiled at me.

Woah. She was pretty, in an exotic way. She had a really cute smile.

"My name is Shree Sharma. I come from a long line of priests and priestesses working in the Shankha Mandira. My father was the Om before the current one. My mother is the Head Priestess for the Shankha Mandira in the south. And I'm here to help you help each other" -

'We do not need your help' -

"If you didn't, you would not still be within Alfred. We wish to help ourselves, Demon, and also help you. Do not be a hindrance to what we do." She looked over my head as she spoke to him, and I wondered if she could actually see him, or whether it was just me.

"I am going to tell you everything about myself now."

I looked at her. She sounded like she wasn't going to leave out any single dirty secret of hers, which wasn't the normal behavior of someone who's just known me for around a day. Hell, I don't tell me dirty secrets to someone I've know for years, let alone someone I've known for a day.

'Someone like your brother,' the demon said out loud, and Shree looked at both of us, confused. Damn this demon back to where it came from.

"Anyways," Shree continued, "why I am doing this is simple. I need you to understand that whatever I might - no, will tell you can be used against me. I shall not leave anything out. But, you will be able to use nothing against me, because if I have the courage to tell you, then I have the courage to tell anyone else you may tell it to. I give you the power to destroy me, but, in the end, it is useless against me itself." Shree laughed a little. "You do not follow me, Alfred?"

I think I did, and I told her so.

"I'll show you. And if the two of you feel it's of any use, then you can try it too, with each other. I'm not here to teach you to gain control over the other. I want you to know that you two can live with each other, for however long you have to."

The Demon seemed to be subdued now - he wasn't as angry. That's when it hit me - I didn't know. I didn't know if the Demon was a he or she. I didn't know the Demon's name. I didn't know if the Demon was old or young, if he/she had children, or someone to love.

I knew nothing about someone who lived in my own head.

"We know even less about our own head," the demon said. "We're scared to open up to our own selves. Unless we can tell ourselves who we are, there is no possibility where we could truly explain ourselves to others."

"It's a fear which can be surpassed easily, but only if we decide to do so," Shree said. "I was probably worse than both of you when it comes to stubbornness," she chuckled, "but, in this profession, to have faith in someone you see...as different from you, you must have faith in yourself. I'm not here for that. I want both of you to know it's possible to hold complete power in a powerless situation, and I want you to trust me. So, here it is. I am Shree, and this is my story."

Nat woke up, and rubbed her eyes blearily. She remembered opening her eyes many times in between her sleep, but she wasn't sure if it was a dream or not. She slept a drugged sleep, and she wasn't sure if it was day, night or a week later - Nat remembered having slept a week away after returning immediately from the deputy training, and waking up with a burning hunger. She lazily stretched, feeling the soft sheets shift under her. She was capable of sleeping almost anywhere, but there was a certain sense of luxury she felt in sleeping in a soft bed, a certain feeling of...being pampered. She'd ever rarely felt that.

She felt her eyes drawing shut, and sh didn't bother fighting it. With a yawn, she rolled on her uninjured side and lay motionless, enjoying the feel of the sheets.

"Feeling better?"

She hummed in response, and opened her eyes. If it was possible for her to relax even further, at the sound of Om's voice, she did. She slowly urged herself into a sitting position, and smiled at him. "Much better. What day is it?" she asked in her native tongue.

Om chuckled. "The same day, Natalya. I sensed you to have stirred, so I came to wake you up."

Nat stretched her uninjured arm, and swung her feet onto the ground. "What now?"

"You must relax after you have just woken up, Natalya, but you will not practice that," Om sighed. "Now, you rest and regain your strength. Shree is working with your friend, Alfred" -

"He's not my friend," Natalya muttered.

- "and his brother Matt can read the texts in the library, almost all of them."

"Really?" Nat asked, frowning.

"Yes. And did you know Gilbert is a doctor?"

Nat didn't bother replying - she just stared at Om in shock. "A doctor."

"Yes, a doctor. He was Alfred Jones Senior's physician."

"He doesn't look like a doctor," Nat muttered, but the point Om was trying to make was loud and clear. With a sigh, he picked her shirt lying on the side of the bed, and pulled it onto herself. "What are the rest of them doing?" she asked, pulling on a pair of slacks.

"Alfred is with Shree. The other three are in different parts of the library, studying. What will you do?"

Nat walked around the room, and pulled up a staff. "I'm going to find Raj, and train."

"But your arm" -

"I still have the rest of my body which is perfectly alright. I'll...I'll stick to what I'm good at, Om."

Om understood exactly what her point was. She wasn't comfortable talking to people to get to know them, and she took her own time in finding out about people. And if she understood that she had to get to know them, if for nothing else but just because they would be together for a while, he wouldn't bring it up again. And he was sure she understood.

"He's in the dojo. I'm sure he would appreciate a partner."

"I'll make sure he does," Nat said quietly, and with a bow to Om, she left the room.

With a quiet smile on his face, Om left the room as well, with a single thought in his mind.

How curious these children are.

A/T: Yeah, so if you still have the mindframe to forgive me, here it is:

My laptop's gone whack. I previously didn't have it with me in the hostel (I don't live at home now; I live in the hostel, which has very limited wifi), and when I took it with me, it worked for about two hours before it stopped working. It refused to switch on, and I had to give it to servicing. I continued to write down chapters - I'm mid chapter 13 right now - but I had no way to upload them, since does not have the services to allow me to upload via mobile, or I don't know how to do that, so if someone knows how to upload via mobile, PM me. Please.

And college is...tough. I won't go so far as to say I'm depressed, because I have been in depression and how I'm feeling now is nowhere close to how I was feeling way back when. But yes, I'm having a bit of a tough time - I'm away from home, living in a hostel for the first time and having to do everything on my own. A lot of people do it all the time, but it's my first time, and although I am doing my dream course (I'm doing veterinary science) it's been...a bit disappointing, if I must say. I love the course - I love what I'm learning, and most of all the classes feel like I'm coming to a room, listening to stuff that I love, and going out. It's like that. The people and the mentality...I'll admit to you, and only you - I hate it. I absolutely hate it, because I have never encountered such people in my life, and the amount of politics and narrow-mindedness exists...I don't know what I was expecting, but in terms of environment, mentality and people, this definitely was not it. Ever. My roomie's a darling, and I love her, and I've found some good friends, but I'm dealing with stuff right now.

Basically, this rant was to tell you that I got caught up in finding my place in my new college that the fact I didn't have my laptop escaped me. And by the time I remembered and started using it, it stopped working. And when I gave it for servicing, I had to start preparing for exams around the same time I was supposed to get back to the person servicing it, so it's been a really long time since I've seen it. I've got a new laptop, and I'm writing on that right now, but I still want my old laptop back because ALL MY STUFF IS ON THAT AND IF I DON'T HAVE IT I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WILL DO.

So yeah, kinda dying on the inside right now.

But it's not all that bad...I've got my holidays going on now. I'm going to make sure I get a data card to take with me to Manipal (I'm going next week! Yippee!) so that I can upload chapters there. I will try to be as consistent as I can, and give a warning before I randomly disappear for a long time.

I'm really sorry, guys. I'll try to make it up to you the best I can.

All my love,

R. K. Iris.