Midnight. The first hours of day that once happened to be the most frightful. The golden moon was larger than usual today. Many of its craters, large and small, were visible.
Flandre wondered if she could spot the Lunar Capital somewhere on that clump of rock. The vampires might appreciate it, since she was given the liberty to select a location for them. They wished to see the full moon of this world one last time before moving onto the next. In time she decided on the park, as it had a nice view of the sky, unobstructed by the city's buildings. A small gust of October wind stirred the fallen maple leaves on the ground. Over the clearing of the trees hung the moon. The vampires gazed at it with full attention, some reverently, some longingly.
"This portal of yours," Swallow approached her, "what if it malfunctions?"
She tore her own gaze away from the heavenly body. "I think it's a little too late to ask that."
"…I had expected so." Swallow chuckled. She appeared to be the only one not so attached to the shining orb in the sky. "It's time for me to meet this dear sister of yours you seem to fond of."
"Just know that she has a tendency to condescend," Flandre warned, if not a bit excessively.
"What vampire doesn't?"
"You seem humble enough."
"Make me six hundred years younger, and you would reconsider your opinion."
The two of them conversed with a degree of carefreeness that was only seen in companies of old friends. She had only known her for a while, but Flandre felt a great connection with the vampire. In many ways she resembled Remilia, yet at the same time she exhibited enough contrasting qualities to stand apart. What she sees in Swallow may just be the one thing she wanted when she was young.
They took slow walks around the park, taking in the quietness of the night and telling each other tales of their travels around the world. Swallow's accounts took place over the ages and utterly fascinated Flandre. She fought in dozens of wars, assassinated a minor but conspiring king in Europe, gave her blood to a dying man in rural China (who ended up becoming Heron), met the famous Princess Kaguya during the Heian era, briefly took up the position as the de-facto leader of the Triads, and so forth. Flandre's own adventures over the past years paled in comparison, however memorable some of them may be. At one point, while Swallow was telling what had happened to her werewolf companion, a small, dainty girl no younger than ten approached where they sat. She was one of the ever-busy kids taken in by Swallow who delivered blood and took care of the small errands. Once they cross to Gensokyo, there wouldn't be any of that. Flandre will make sure.
"Sister Swallow, have you seen Haruto?" The girl asked. "He was here with me earlier today."
Swallow wasn't worried. Maybe she didn't show out of consideration. "It's always him." She said, eyeing the group a little further down where he was supposed to be with. "He must be having trouble saying goodbye to that girlie."
The thought would have been sweet, albeit bitterly melancholic, had Flandre not ran into Mayumi yesterday. Now she just wished Haruto would hurry up and dump her. "I do not fathom," she simply said, shaking her head. The girl looked disappointed, but she gave them a nod and walked away. Flandre watched her small figure leave. "Maybe we should find him. It's almost time."
"Fine," Swallow stood up, "not like you were interested in what I had to say about Tenzo anyway." Before Flandre could refute her point she already went after the girl, looking a little more hopeful. Perhaps this was what she needed.
They were just about to leave the park in search of Haruto when he came running towards them. "Everyone," he was covered in an unsightly mixture of blood and dirt. "We have to go. Now."
"Easy there," Swallow placed a hand on him, shooting a glance to Flandre. She felt for the book inside her jacket. "We'll start going in a minute. What happened to you, boy? Did her parents chase you out?"
"Mayumi," he panted, resting his hands on his knees. "She's…dammit. They've kept an eye on us the whole time."
The girl who lead them to the entrance shrieked at a direction outside the park. She then crumpled to her knees. Part of her face was blown away, the other half slowly dissolving. A bright, powdery smoke dispersed from where the round struck true, and her body hit the ground with a light thud.
There was no need to issue an alert. Everyone knew, regardless of where they were at the park, that she had fallen. Flandre tossed the book to Swallow, who quickly scrambled for everyone else. That was when they came in. Bizzare, emerald goggles covered up their eyes, their black attire virtually shielded them from plain sight. It was Flandre's first time seeing them in Japan, but she could tell right away that they were the enemy, the same ones who had been driving their kind to the edge of extinction. No others could so much look like the pure embodiment of death.
"Go!" Flandre charged towards them. "I'll handle them!" Her foremost target reacted with impressive speed, the barrel of his combat rifle trained at her temple under less than half a second. But, she found out quickly, they were still human under those masks. Flandre cleaved the glistening bullet of silver along with the man in half with her weapon, an unusually large clock needle with a slight crook by the center. Laser sights quickly found their marks on her back, however, and before the gored body of her first victim touched the ground she was already surrounded. They fired without the slightest hesitation.
They were confident in their victory, and she was eager to prove them wrong. She stabbed the clock needle down and used it as a boost to leap out of the encirclement, then she called back her weapon, which dragged itself across the earth and made mincemeat of the one who got in its way. The remaining squad followed up immediately, turning around all at once and let loose a hail of refined silver in quick bursts. None met its goal, as they were just bullets in the end.
Another squad of the soldiers emerged from the other side sooner than she could retaliate. They gunned for Swallow's group. Flandre was determined to rush to their aid, but the suppressive fire on her side was too risky to ignore. The only way to get there was through them. Fine then, she glared at the soulless eyes of the vampire hunters, bring it. Flandre did not move out of her way to dodge the bullets this time around. She simply deflected them skillfully with her needle, slowly but steadily making her way towards the group. Even with numerous silencers attached she could hear the guns ablaze behind her. Just a little longer…
The soldier she faced began to retreat. They covered each other by firing at separate intervals. "Alpha squad, requesting for backup." Flandre caught somebody speaking amidst the gunfire. It was English, and distinctively American. "This one is different from the others." Their help came almost at once. A bullet sleeker and longer than the others tore through her hoodie. The image of the girl's obliterated face flashed through her. It was the sniper from before, and she shuddered to imagine what would have occurred if she hadn't swung her head out of the way. Her adversaries used the support to withdraw, flipping outside the park's walls one at a time. She tried to go after them, her outstretched palm throbbing with a primal thrill.
…Should I?
She took cover behind a large maple tree in time of another shot. The sniper was somewhere inside the building which was still halfway under construction. There shouldn't be anybody else inside. Flandre didn't like to use her power, but it had to be done. She climbed atop of the tree, positioned herself on a branch hidden by the foliage, and aimed. A pulse coursed through her hand, an indication that she had found the "eye". With a simple grasp of her palm the building began to collapse, crushed its own weight. By the time it finished falling, everything was in pieces. There was nothing from the rubble that could be considered intact.
The ones behind her took no notice of this. A massacre was what she saw when she turned around.
"No…"
Less than a dozen had escaped through the gap. Over three times the amount lay lifeless on the cold pavement, a repulsive smell of blood mixing with liquified silver sent down a one of a kind fear. She made a mad dash towards them. Swallow, bleeding a river from her right eye, was attempting to retreat further into the park with the remaining group of vampires. Flandre hurled her weapon, piercing through one of the shooters, then latched herself atop of another and clawed his eyes out.
They showed no remorse on shooting their teammate. Flandre raised him to stop the bullets and would have plunged into them were it not for the suspicious sphere rolling her way. It came to a stop by her foot, and by the time she realized what it was, it was too late.
Ah.
She shielded most of the white explosion with the body of her victim, but several splinters of silver pierced through her thigh and abdomen. Flandre felt her strength waning. Her legs gave away, and she no longer felt the rest of her body. This was pure, blessed silver, refined with the intent to kill. One fragment could stop the mythical body from functioning. It took all she had to maintain her consciousness, and by then she was lying helplessly on the ground.
They put more rounds through her, primarily her limbs and her torso. The one at the front took out a white knife and carved irregular lines on her body. None of them needed words to convey the intense, seething hatred they felt for her kind. Even with her receptors dead, she could feel centuries of pain from those movements. Was it retribution they delivered, or was it simply mindless revenge? Regardless, Flandre did not scream. She looked at each of them in the eye, hidden by their fiendish visors. What lied behind those? Eyes of scorn, she thought. Eyes of fear. Eventually, the one cutting up her body grew tired of the senseless torturing. He gestured a signal to his team. A bulky man in a gas mask stepped out from the soldiers. He wore a golden necklace of Christ crucified on the cross, and he carried a pump in place of the firearms, which connected to the twin cylinders behind on his back.
Flandre squinted her eyes at the unusual equipment. Fire?Do they plan to burn her body?
The man turned the valve on his pump and pointed at the bodies.
No.
Water.
Her kin instantly dissolved under the pressurized stream of the tranquil liquid. This type of water didn't kill by drowning. If it did, it was a miraculous mercy. The few unfortunate souls who still had a pulse met a most horrifying end. Their flesh melted, and their bones turned into gobs of goo. And they were still alive. The man hummed an unfamiliar tune as he did his job.
So they are the ones who had rid the world of our kind. Flandre closed her eyes as the last pile of corpses burned. Humanity had truly evolved into the apex predators of the world. Maybe she can let the darkness take over before it was her turn.
Farewell, Swallow. She succumbed to the exhaustion that was gnawing at her. It's a shame we couldn't get to know each other better. And Sis, goodbye. I'll be going ahead of you, wherever that might be.
I'm sorry.
White. All she could see was white. The desolating cold made her body numb. She collapsed onto the snow, drained of the will to keep moving. The maid who walked before her stopped for a moment. All she wore in place of her usual uniform was a crimson scarf, yet her hands were warmer than anything Flandre felt. Dare she say even the sun?
"We're almost there," she said, "just a little longer."
Where were they going? She couldn't remember their destination. All she knew was that they had to go forward, and that they have been.
"I can't," Flandre stated. She could barely keep the ice from intruding her thoughts. "This is my limit."
The wind blew harder, and a blizzard soon followed. Snow piled in her eyes. She struggled to maintain her vision. The silhouette of the maid, who was too perfect and too elegant for her own good, was fading.
"That is what you believe." She walked away from her and faced the blizzard. "Please remember, young master, that so long as tides of time still turn, there will be people who love you, who care about you."
"Wait…" Flandre wanted to her to stay. She reached out towards her with a weak grasp.
"I'll be going ahead," she with her back turned. Her dress fluttered wildly at the coming storm. "Mistress was never satisfied with my service, Flan."
"Come back!"
"But I hope was good enough. For you." The former head maid of the mansion showed her a smile cooler than the snowstorm before vanishing into the bitter maw of the freezing gale.
"…an!"
Something echoed in the darkness.
"…lan!"
Was it the devil that's calling out for her?
"Flan!"
Or was it the judge?
She saw the full moon first, then the hunters. Their emotionless eyes stared overhead.
"Flandre! Flan!" A voice shouted her name. It was strangely familiar. Who was it? "Is that you?"
"Are you all right?" Another followed. "Who are those people?"
The moon was larger than usual today. She wondered if the Lunar Capital was visible.
"Answer us, Flan, please!"
The voices persisted. They came from somewhere behind her. Her head ached from trying to place a name.
"Hey, piss off, and leave our friend! My dad is Yakuza! He'll skin you!"
Flandre lay there, staring at the moon. Then her eyes widened. No. It's those two. No no no no no. Why were they here? It was past midnight. They shouldn't at a place like this. Why?
"Sir, those are civilians." One of the hunters said. He sounded fairly young.
"We have our orders." The scratchy voice of his superior replied. "Just put them with the bodies."
Wait,
They never heard her pleas.
STOP
Bullets don't negotiate.
The girls didn't get a chance to finish their screams. All that managed to come out was a soaked croak from one of them.
"Flan…?"
The moon changed its color, and something inside her snapped.
"Bravo squad, come in! Bravo squad!"
"It's…" Crackle. "…It's a monst—" Cut.
"Return to cover bravo squad! Move move move!"
The park was not what alpha squad remembered to be. The moon covered the sky and it was red. At the center floated Flandre Scarlet, except she was not Flandre Scarlet. Her wings were fully spread, her brilliant crystals glittering from the crimson rays of the moon. She held the clock needle on one hand, a freshly pulled spine the other. There was only blood in her eyes, and she smiled at them, the type of smile that girls reserved for special, intimate moments.
No amount of gunfire could stop her, the creature that once answered by the name Flandre Scarlet. Just one touch of her fingers disemboweled you. Some exploded into bits of flesh and entrails from being just looked at. Those were the lucky ones.
"You fucking monster!" The man with Christ necklace cried, spraying his holy water at the highest output possible. She charged into the stream headfirst, her face disintegrating. "Hahahaha! Fucking vampire bitch!"
But there were more than just one. Another stabbed him from behind, then another to his left, another right. They didn't kill him, so they pulled out and stabbed again. And again. And again, until his pump was relieved of its last drops. But they didn't care. They stabbed until he remained as recognizable as the bodies he burned.
"Shoot!" the captain of alpha squad directed. "Shoot! Don't stop shooting!" His men obeyed with gurgles and choked groans from their severed torsos and decapitated necks. He never knew love. He had a wife and a child left behind overseas, but he never felt any love for them. The only thing he enjoyed was to kill, and ordering to kill. Now that he was being killed, killed in all manners perceivable limitations of the flesh, he understood, if only a little. One of them giggled, and one of them snickered, and one of them chuckled, and one of them had a nice laugh…
And then there were none.
The first and last thing I ever saw was the moon. When I came to, it was already there. Its luminescence called out to me, just as it did when I gazed at it every night beneath the mansion.
"Had a good dream?"
It was Swallow's voice, that much I could tell. Her face entered my field of view. A dried stream of blood coated her cheek, and a battered hole of flesh lied in the place of her right eye, as if a drill dug inside for a while before changing its mind. "…You look horrible," was all I said.
She blinked, or at least tried to with the mess. "I don't know, do I? Shit, you shouldn't be the one talking."
I laughed. My lungs and my throat hurt. "How did you like my performance?"
"I think I understand the humans a little better now," she said, looking away. "Seriously, this scene doesn't belong in a nice park like this."
"That was the real me." I tried to smile. I don't know if I did. "What do you think?"
"I knew you were different," she shook her head, "but I never imagined this. You may just be his descendant after all."
We watched the moon together for several precious moments. It didn't occur to me that it was beautiful until now, lying on the wet, rancid ground and on the verge of death. You don't appreciate the beauty of something until you lose it, or so they say. In my case, I was about to.
"Hey," I greeted Haruto when he poked his head in my view. He was covered in more blood than before. I wondered how much of it came from himself.
"…You don't look so good." Was all he said, before shoving off to somewhere.
"He must be having it hard," I said to Swallow. I couldn't see her, but I was sure she was close. "I bet he's already blaming himself."
"Should've kept him on a tighter leash, huh?" I heard her say to my right. She was closer than I thought. "No matter what I do, I always end up spoiling my kids."
"It isn't your fault. Or his."
"It's the world's."
I tried to find something to argue back, but my thoughts were growing weak, so I stayed silent. "Hey," there was something I wanted to know before I go, "would you mind doing something for me?"
"…Name it." I heard her getting up. "This old bird is at your disposal."
"Would you mind bringing the bodies of two girls to me?" I said. "A pretty blondie like me, and one with short hair and a black hat."
She returned with Haruto a while later. "Couldn't find them. Are you sure they were here?"
"That's weird," I said. "They were just here."
"Friends of yours?"
"…Yeah." I looked away. Why did they have to come? Because of me, they were robbed of their lives. I couldn't even blame the vampire hunters. They did what they believed in. And I killed them all. So much for my pacifism. It was nothing more than a petty sense self-righteous idealism in the end. If Sis was here, well, she would laugh. A minute later Haruto came back, grunting.
"I got nothing."
"That's fine," I told him, "I probably just imagined them. Hey, Swallow?"
"…Yeah?"
"How many?"
She didn't have to ask what I meant. "Fifteen."
"Out of…fifty-five? Six?"
"Six."
Fifteen. That was the population count of the vampires in this world now, give or take Swallow and Haruto. Fifteen managed to survive this onslaught and escaped to Gensokyo. That was fine by me. Fifteen was better than zero. Or worse, just me.
"Look," it was Haruto, "I…"
"Save it," Swallow ordered. He had no choice but to comply. I would have done the same, with that tone. "Come on, we've had more than our fill of this world tonight. It's time to go see this mansion of yours."
"Do you still have the book?"
Her answer was a solid no; all that was left of My Love for the Stained Glass of Yale, a New York Times best-seller, winner of several awards, one of 21st century's classics, and a limited edition signed by the author was a scrap piece of paper, likely ripped from a page in the book. A minuscule portion of the gap remained, and it was more than enough to transport us home. Well, them.
"Go on without me," was all I mustered to say. It was funny. I had prepared a speech the night before. Now I couldn't even recall what I had for breakfast.
Haruto didn't say anything, but I could nearly hear the frown. Swallow reappeared in my vision and made sure I saw her look of disappointment. "You never planned on coming, did you?"
I shook my head. It took more effort than I realized, and now my neck stopped responding and my head was spinning. Oh well. Swallow and Haruto turned to leave.
"Wait," I stopped them. There was one last thing I needed to do. "Here. Take this. Give this to my sister." I handed Swallow the broken tip of Laevateinn. For such an old thing it had served me well. "She'll know what it means." Swallow took it without words and gave me a last, lingering look before disappearing into the torn page with Haruto. Then a wind blew, and it was swept off somewhere into the night sky. A dog barked in the distance, and crickets began to chirp. At times I heard an owl hooting. The night was becoming alive again.
With nothing left to do with my life, I relaxed my unresponsive body and used my remaining strength to grasp the moon. Even with my perspective, it was too large to hold. Memories of Gensokyo came flooding back. Memories of the mansion, the festivals, the incidents, the spell cards. Those were the days. Maybe I shouldn't have left.
No, I thought, and I knew why. I don't regret leaving. The world was more than just a sealed paradise inside a mountain range. Others may pursue it, but I seek what they have. There were things in the outside world that Gensokyo doesn't have, and I've come to know many of these during my years of wandering. If given the choice again I would retrace my steps in a heartbeat. A sheltered life inside a sterile land wasn't something that called to me.
Another wind blew, a trail of leaves follow its wake. People call winds the patron of travelers, and they couldn't be more right. They originated from somewhere, like all vagrants, but they couldn't be contained, so they wandered, home to home, town to town. I guess it's fitting that I should die a drifter's death. But the wind had one last surprise for me. The page from earlier flew back, and I used what little strength remained in my stretched fingers to catch it. On it read page three hundred eleven, the last page of the book before heading into a small biography of the author and a few blank pages.
When I die, if you would be so kind, bless my passing with cherry blossoms. For I will die without regret—let the flowers represent the beauty of the life I lived. So speaks the poem.
'Interesting, isn't it?' He says, beaming. 'The Japanese had all their light and darkness figured out.'
I wonder.
It was strange. Renko had already told me about this part. I shouldn't get so emotional over it.
"It's beautiful," I found myself whispering, with tears rolling down my bloodied eyes. The wind took back the scrap piece of paper and my hand fell to my chest. "What a good ending."
Somewhere I heard the ticking of a clock stop.
