The steamer was dingy, rusty, and the least likely boat to be considered "seaworthy". Kanda glanced dubiously at the Frenchman standing by Ellis' side, Nthanda pouting at the less-than-reputable craft.
"If this thing had more holes in it, there wouldn't be a boat left," Ellis mercilessly remarked, less than impressed with her guide's choice of tug.
In the meantime, the port of Joao Belo milled about them with amazing ferocity, the life of a whole trade-city flowing down to its docks to put its innumerable cargoes in the holds of ship and schooner and steamer. There was not so much a crowd here as a current, the flow of people and parcels, in and out and around the streets that tread close to the wharves where the ships were soon to take their leave.
"Zis is ze fastest ship, if you want to make it to Dar es Salaam in any kind of time. Zey, ah, specialize in avoiding certain governmental obstacles," the Frenchman said, rubbing his mustache between thumb and forefinger, a habit that Kanda had come to quickly despise.
There was no telling how many times Kanda nearly shaved the man in his sleep, just to deprive him of the tic. The samurai blew a stream of air out of his nose with excessive force and began the shameful walk towards the gangplank. Ellis watched him go with some trepidation before giving the French guide a dry once-over before following him.
"Kanda, we don't have to take his word for it," Ellis huffed as she climbed up the gangplank in all her skirts. The constant sunlight and humidity did not help her complexion or her incessant sweating.
"I'm aware," Kanda said, his stride long and purposeful as he approached a man who looked like he was supposed to be the owner of this fine... vessel.
He was as greasy as the boat upon which he stood. His hair was thinning on top, the sides a little less willing to die without a fight, and his face was wrinkled and weathered by years of standing in salt spray. He wore no coat, as it was much too hot for that, though he did wear a cotton shirt with several large stains of oil on it, his trousers sloppily hanging underneath a gut that threatened to overflow.
"What do you think you're paid to do, just loaf?! Get that jib where it's supposed to be, James, before I shove it right up your -"
"Captain?" Ellis called quickly, before the poor lad in Kanda's arms was suddenly exposed to a rather... colorful vocabulary. While the boy couldn't speak yet, that didn't mean they should teach him bad manners. You could never begin too early.
The captain in question turned to Ellis, one of his eyes wandering off to the left while the other remained firmly fixed on the woman standing next to a tall Oriental holding a child in his arms. Behind them, he could see the Frenchman Dupre, a more washed out explorer than any the captain had had the unwillingness to do business with.
"Aye, I'm th' captain. What do you lot want?" the captain asked, crossing his arms over a barrel chest. Though he towered at nearly six foot, he had the distinct feeling that neither person was perturbed by his size.
"They wish passage," Dupre shouted, and Kanda nodded.
"We need to get to Dar es Salaam," the Japanese man stated simply, putting down the dark-skinned child who was squirming towards the ground. The baby crawled at Kanda's feet, and the captain frowned, both eyes finally focusing on the two with more fervor.
"What'll'ya pay?" the captain asked.
"How does five hundred British pounds sound to you?" Ellis offered. Kanda's face remained stoic, though on the inside he was trying his hardest not to choke. Five hundred pounds? That was a ridiculous amount of money. Surely a ride on this bucket of rust wasn't worth that much. Nevertheless, he could see the mention of money working its magic on the old captain, who seemed to be mentally running those bills through his hands. He took a deep breath and thought.
"Dar es Salaam is fraught with pirates. The sultan there's been about as useful as ! #$%^&* on a croc. I'm headed ta Madagascar, and I ken drop you off," the man pushed, and Ellis merely stood her ground.
"Dar es Salaam is our destination. We have a rendezvous there," Ellis stated, and Kanda shot her a puzzled look. They did?
The captain nodded solemnly.
"How can I be, ah... assured of your goodwill 'n keep them pirates off our back?" the captain posited, glancing down at the long sword strapped to Kanda's hip. They had expected that, and Kanda sighed through his nose, walking towards the mid-deck. He stood there and stated, "Throw something at me, anything."
The captain stared at him, then back to Ellis. The stately older lady motioned that it was perfectly acceptable to lob the nearest object at her compatriot.
"Be sure it's something you don't mind losing," Ellis reminded him as the captain picked up a tack from the rigging. After a second thought, the captain reconsidered and instead rummaged in his pocket. Finally, he pulled out a beaten apple (at which Ellis tried not to gag) and tossed it to Kanda. Lazily, the man sliced it in half in mid-air, hardly trying.
"Aaaah, so he's in the deal, is he?" the captain laughed. "Gonna have to do better than that."
Kanda quirked an eyebrow, not deigning to give a response. Suddenly the captain lobbed the tack he'd held in his other hand at Kanda at full speed. Kanda's eyes tracked it easily as it arced towards him, the wood sailing like a baseball straight for his head. He ever-so-slightly turned to the side and sliced down with Mugen's edge, the tack falling in two pieces to either side of him. By now, several sailors had stopped their work to watch this sudden show of strength, and they whooped appreciatively.
"If he can act as security, four hundred pounds," Ellis offered.
The captain gave her a nasty look, eying Dupre over her shoulder with a telling expression. The Frenchman put up his hands in defense, and the captain looked back to Ellis.
"We'll see about that. Men, go fetch the porter and tell him to bring up a basket a' fruit."
"Zey are noht serious," Vanya said with a straight face as she hobbled toward the ship.
The name, Faithful, was inscribed on the bow of the steamer, and it was clear that this ship could barely get across a puddle, much less the ocean. Lavinia, lagging behind the Russian CROW, stared at it as well with a look of awe, though inspired more by disgust than amazement. The Rhodesian ridgeback whined with apprehension.
"Perhaps its nicer on the inside than the outside," Lavinia suggested breathlessly as the servants and Dingane also stared incredulously at the supposed craft they were to take to Dar es Salaam.
"Miz Lavinia, if it is better inside than outside, it will prohbably be one step abohve 'public restroom'," Dingane mentioned as he led the entourage towards the gangplank.
"Perhaps we have the wrong ship," one of the servants said.
"Yes, there are many steamers here called Faithful," another tried to reason.
"I don't see why we don't go by land. The sea does not agree with my stomach," the third servant muttered.
As they approached the ship, it became abundantly clear that there was some kind of hubbub going on atop the deck. There were cheers and shouts, with sailors sitting on the bridgehouse of the steamer or hanging off the gunwales. A great cry erupted from among them, and Din frowned darkly. What could possibly be going on up there? He walked up the gangplank with decisive steps, pushing his way past curious onlookers and quite a few smelly seamen. He wrinkled his nose at the smell of salt and human body odor before finally being able to see what the hubbub was about. His face suddenly split into a smile as Lavinia, Vanya, the dog, and the three attendants made their way to them.
"Vat is going on? I'm too short, I cannot see," Vanya complained, trying to get a peek over the shoulders of so many men. It was easy to forget that Vanya was no bigger than a child, perhaps just shy of five feet tall. The dog poked his head between her legs for a better look, and she shooed him away.
"Mr. Kanda is p'forming," Dingane said without taking his eyes off the makeshift arena in front of him.
There was fruit scattered all around Kanda's feet. The deck was littered with sliced objects, including a few light bulbs, a hairbrush, three different shaving tins, a beer bottle, and, oddly, what used to be an anchor. Kanda himself was lightly spattered with the remains of several different sorts of fruit and the contents of whatever bottle had been thrown at him. Ellis, in the background, was cheering Kanda on raucously along with the other sailors. The captain, standing off to the other end of the 'arena', looked less than pleased with Dupre the Frenchman standing at his side, who also looked sheepishly proud of his client's abilities.
The crowd seemed more than happy to see Kanda continue to show his skills.
"Throw a chair!"
"Go get a chicken and throw it!"
"Let's see him cut open a suitcase!"
Next to him, Vanya sniffed.
"Show off."
"He's amazing," Lavinia sighed wistfully, her hands clasped at her chest and her eyes misty. Din rolled his eyes at the two women and their myriad reactions. Neither of them were truly enjoying the show, it seemed.
Suddenly, someone came out of the hold with something in their hands, and Din's eyes widened. The fruit in the man's hands was perhaps the size of a mid-sized dog, and it probably weighed as much as one, too. It was covered in thick spikes and had to be carried with gloves. Dingane laughed, hands over his stomach as he doubled over and slapped his leg. They couldn't seriously think they were going to a throw a durian at him? It would stink to high heaven!
"Is he really going to be able to cut through that?" Lavinia gasped, jostling her way forward past Vanya and Din, her hands to her mouth.
"I've seen him do better zen zat," Vanya muttered.
The man readied the durian in his hands, Kanda standing straight up, not in a stance or anything. Mugen still lay in its sheath, as that seemed to be the agreement of this little show - the blade had to be drawn while the object was in mid-flight.
"Throw!" the captain shouted, and the man threw the fruit as hard as he could at the samurai. The crowd cheered, Ellis probably being the loudest, and, within a heartbeat, the durian fell to the floor in five separate pieces, Mugen out to Kanda's side. The crowd exploded into applause, and Kanda put Mugen back in its sheath without a word, though the look on his face couldn't be much more smug than it was just then. He was good, and he knew it.
Din suddenly frowned as a shadow passed over the small crowd on the ship, and the man looked up with a feeling of trepidation. With wide eyes, he dragged Lavinia and Vanya to the deck just as a massive mechanical bird swooped down from the sky, plucking up an unlucky sailor from the crowd. The audience soon realized the danger they were as the man screamed in the air, and they scattered like ants before the rain. The bird Akuma sat atop the bridge house, tearing away at its catch, and Din grit his teeth, once more wishing that he could do something about the menaces that attacked humankind.
His eyes strayed to Kanda, who was already running towards the demon-bird, fighting his way through the crowds.
"Come on, we have to find Ellis," Din ordered, ferrying his entourage towards the older lady standing near the gunwale with Nthanda in her arms.
"That was awfully sudden," Ellis gasped as she watched the bird peck at Kanda from its perch, the samurai having a hard time getting up on top of the bridgehouse. Screaming split the air with terror as another landed on the deck to join its brethren, and its red eyes suddenly latched on to the group. Vanya stood between her compatriots and the demon with bored resilience, face as mask-like as ever.
"I vill tehk care of it," she sighed, removing spell tags and jogging over to the other abomination.
"Do we 'ave passage?" Din asked Ellis, who was trying to contain a bloodthirsty Nthanda.
"I have - oof! Child! - managed to whittle our - ah! - price down to three hundred and fifty pounds, but he's stubborn. And after this - Nthanda, no pulling hair! - there's no telling whether the captain will let us go or not," Ellis confessed as she juggled the baby in her arms. She gave him a swift spank, and Nthanda yelped with a pout before crying.
"Anklebiter," Ellis muttered as she turned her attention back to the fight.
Vanya had the second Akuma under wraps, while Kanda dispatched the first. So far it seemed they had the upper hand, though there was no telling how long that would last. The captain was shouting at Kanda, and Dupre was nowhere to be seen. The ship was an array of chaos, what with sailors trying to salvage bits of damaged steamer and other sailors deciding this was a little too high above their paygrade. Din looked for Lavinia and company, but it appeared they had found a suitable place to hide for the duration of the battle. The dog, meanwhile, was happily panting and thumping his tail against the floor.
After another fifteen minutes, the Akuma were destroyed. Kanda climbed off the bridgehouse, splattered with blood, and Vanya walked over to meet him, limping slightly and wincing with every other step.
"Vere is the other sailor?" Vanya asked, looking up at the bridgehouse then back to her partner. The Japanese man's face blanched, his white face made stark against the blood splashed on his shirt and face.
"Coup d'grace," Kanda muttered, wiping Mugen's blade off on his pants, and it was only then that Vanya realized that the blood on the blade was much too red to be an Akuma's. Vanya nodded sadly, and a pall fell over the deck of the ship as sailors either came out of their hiding places or stopped what they were doing originally. The captain stormed his way to the two, face red and eye a-wandering.
"What in the blue blazes was that creature?" the captain shouted, spittle flying.
"Akuma. They're demons," Kanda stated tersely.
The ship's silence drew on as the captain digested this information. Finally, the man spoke.
"Demons? Demons, they... they attacked my ship? That's what those were? What kind of fool do you take me for?"
"They're with the Church," Ellis explained from amid the growing group of sailors, walking forward.
"The Vatican?" the captain spit, and Ellis' look darkened.
"We are willing to offer you protection -"
"The Vatican has its own soldiers to fight demons? Why haven't they attacked me before? God knows, none of ours are devout."
Ellis shuffled uncomfortable from foot to foot until Din finally said, "They follow Exorcists. The demons tehke human form and ken hide within the pohpulace to hunt other people, but an Exorcist is too good a target to remain hidden. Their johb is to lure them out o' the crowd, kill them, and then report bahck to their superior."
The captain looked between Vanya and Kanda, then to Ellis and Din. A sloppy grin crossed his face as he began to laugh, a slow, rumbling laugh that made the skin curl. It erupted into guffaws, and Ellis' face turned red while Din stood stony-faced. Neither warrior moved an inch as the other sailors angrily glared at the Exorcist with his black coat and silver trimmings, flashing death in the sunlight.
"Seven hundred pounds," Ellis said slowly, eyes closed tight. Her lips drew together as the captain took in the promise of money, coin like none he'd ever get just from selling his contraband. He stared at Ellis.
"You're the pocketbook, eh? Eight fifty."
"Seven fifty."
"Eight seventy-five and I won't take a shilling less. You endangered my crew and mislead me. We're lucky we only lost Johnson. He was a lob anyways, not much loss there."
Behind the man, Kanda's hand tightened on Mugen's hilt.
Ellis' eyebrows drew together as she stared the man down over the tops of her glasses. Nthanda put a hand to her face, recognizing her anger, and the woman broke concentration to look at the babe. With a great breath out, she finally stated, "We will pay your eight hundred and seventy-five pounds. But that extra three hundred seventy-five is split directly to each sailor on board. Is that understood?"
The captain chewed it over. Five hundred for him, three seventy-five for the other useless runts on board. And he got his own one man army in the bargain. The man may be plagued with demons, but he could at least fight. It was better than going home to his screamers and that shrew with nothing but a few coins after selling the contraband, feeding the ship its due in repairs, and sending these idiot children called sailors home to their mams.
"Aye, 's unnerstood. But y'd better not cross me, woman. Sea's got room for a few more of yer like."
He ran like a wolf chased by men, the sounds of the night crashing around his head like Chinese firecrackers. His hands reached through the trees as the screeching noises came closer and closer. Tears were in his throat, but he did not permit them to breach past that wall, did not give them passage, did not allow them to break his stride. The forest ended suddenly, like the end of a page, and he fell into the fields beyond. His sword dangled like a toy at his hip, almost too long for him, as he sprinted under the light of a full moon.
Too late, he realized he had come to the killing fields.
The meadow around was wide and full of tall grasses, hiding within their waves the bodies of those who couldn't escape. He saw them in their tan uniforms, and his feet crunched on dust too red to be earth. His eyes roamed, stricken, as he listened. He knew they would come. He was the last. He was the last of them.
They had died. They had all died, leaving him here in this wilderness with the monsters. Everywhere he went, they fell like blades of grass scythed by some mighty hand. Their lives were so fragile, their eyes too quickly dimmed by a bullet or a blade. Even the others, the ones who wear the black uniforms and the silver buttons, the ones called Apostles, fell like chaff to a thresher's floor. Why was it that those God loved, loved so much as to give them weapons to fight back, could so easily be dashed to the ground like china?
Here he was, last one standing, and they came over the horizon a dark cloud. Finally, the tears came, and he couldn't fight them anymore, unwilling to wage war on two fronts. Frustration broke free like a bull out of a pen, rampaging his tiny, wind-up heart. It was always him. Every time, every single time. He knew it would come, just like it always did, but that did not lessen its bite.
In the labs, he had endured it for the sake of his purpose. Now, he suffered through for the sake of his own life. Under his breath, he recited a line of verse, the only verse that in this moment ever seemed to matter.
"He who looks to save his life shall lose it. He who would lose his life will find it. He who looks to save his life shall lose it. He who would lose his life will find it. He who looks..."
Him. It was always him. Help seemed so far away. The screaming was closer. Their guns glinted under the pale moon, and he stood his ground with shaking hands, knowing he could do it, but always wondering why he should. And the question that begged an answer spun in his mind as they fell upon him with bullets like teeth, cackles on the wind as they bore down.
Why, why, why was he always the last one standing?
The sound of thunder cracked just as the bullets seemed to plunge through flesh, and dark eyes flashed open. They met the dark ceiling of the freighter, the room swaying with the motion of the waters outside the hull. He licked his lips, the memory still fresh upon his mind. It was no particular memory - instead, a composite of too many instances to count, all blurring together into a single moment. He looked down upon his chest to see Nthanda awake and groggy, babbling with a hand to his face. He moved it away as he sat up, clutching the babe as Nthanda suddenly began to cry, recoiling from him.
"Hey, shh, quiet. There's nothing here," Kanda said brusquely, looking around the room. Too late, he realized he had said those words more for himself than for the baby that was crying against his chest. He slowly swung his legs out of bed, his bare feet hitting the cold, wooden floor. The boat rocked underneath, and his stomach roiled like a shaken champagne bottle. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, trying to regain control of his mental faculties.
He couldn't dwell. He had long learned that dwelling was a sort of death, to wrap yourself so much in the past that the present remains locked outside. No, he couldn't dwell on this, couldn't let his mind rest on the sore memory of so much pain, so much terror. Those moments had happened when he was so young and caught up in each individual life, so intent on the new faces he'd seen, even if he'd remained silent and merely watched them rather than participate. He knew better now - each life, no matter how big or how strong or how wise, was too easily ended in but a moment.
He stroked Nthanda's back and tried not to look out the porthole on the left hand wall. To stare out into the darkness was to fall into seasickness, and he'd had enough of emptying his stomach. He felt like most of the trip had been spent hugging a pot to his chest, waiting for his stomach to rebel against him.
The young man looked to the hammock across from him, and he was surprised to find it empty. Din had chosen to bunk with him, as well as the three servants that toadied to Lavinia's every whim. While the three servant were happily snoozing on mattresses pushed against the bulkhead, he could clearly see that the hammock across from him was swinging wildly without a body inside it.
Needing a walk anyways, Kanda stood up shakily and tried to lay Nthanda down, but the baby shrieked if he tried to leave him alone. Surprised by the sudden fear in Nthanda's cries, he chose to keep the tyke with him, though he was getting to be a heavy burden to carry. He was almost a year old now, and he finally started to weigh it. In the beginning, Kanda had never noticed how unnaturally light the baby had been, but now he recognized the baby was on the verge of pudgy.
Gently rocking with the ship, Kanda opened the door to look out the hall, right and left. The dim lights gave the hallway an eerie atmosphere, coupled with the flashes of lightning. As a bolt flashed, Kanda could see the long shadow of a man at the top of the stairs to his left, near the door leading to the decks. Din's profile was stark, a deep black in contrast to the lightning that flashed for just a few moments. Then, when darkness fell, he was painted with gold-tinged light from the electric lamp by his head.
Kanda climbed the stairs to stand by the Finder and tried to ignore Nthanda's crying. The two stood near each other without a word as they watched the waters outside threaten to swallow their steamer.
"You're not asleep," Kanda stated, Nthanda finally calmed to the point of drowsiness. Din gave a brief smile, his lips twisting into a familiar expression of cheerfulness. He shrugged his shoulders and continued looking out into the night.
"Couldn't. No' wi' the ohcean like dis, anyways," Din said, his words almost lost in the rumble of the ocean. Kanda watched the white foam wash over the gunwales uneasily. This ship had already looked sketchy as a dark alley after a jailbreak, and the creak of the seams did not help Kanda's weighing sense of anxiety. Din must've caught the tension in Kanda's back and shoulders. The dark-skinned Finder put a hand on the man's shoulder once before removing his hand. Kanda, despite himself, felt that much better.
Yet, the dream haunted him. He could not depend on that friendly touch. It was a reed that would snap in his hand the minute he put all his weight on it.
"How'd you last this long?" Kanda suddenly asked. "Why did you decide to do this with your life?"
Kanda had seen Din do so many other, amazing things. For one, he was a very good shot. He could nail a bird from what seemed like miles away. Besides that, he knew at least two languages, how to put up a camp, start a fire, the works. Why was such an accomplished individual working in the Vatican as cannon fodder?
Din pursed his lips in thought. The samurai knew that Din had said something about his mother, or his sister, or both - something to that effect. The Vatican didn't pay that much, surely, but who knew? European coin went far in Africa.
"Firs', jus' cuz my mum needed it. She needed medicine, the kind y' dohn't get without a fat wallet. I musta been... I dunno, twenty? Ver' young. An' now... well, I t'ink I'd gone crazy if I evah did anyt'ing else, Mister Kanda. Knowin' them monsters're out there, waitin' t' take someone down. Wearin' th' uniform, bein' in the action, 's all I know now," Din stated as he stared at the window. His brow furrowed, as if an unpleasant thought had made itself known.
And in Kanda's mind's eye, he thought about the faces of the Finders who called out for help, who fought to the last, who begged for their mothers...
"After this, you should retire. You're getting old for a Finder," Kanda suggested. Din snapped his head towards Kanda with surprise.
"Quit? Mister Kanda, I'm only t'irty-three," Din laughed. "Y' sayin' I'm old already? Jameson was in my division 'n he's got more gray hair than I got hair 't all. This ain' a job y' just quit," Din answered, half-joking.
Kanda's scowl didn't change as he continued staring out the window. The lightning flashed once more, and the man's face was lit in stark relief, black and white. Eyes dark and expression darker, he said, "I'm serious. After this one, go back home. I hardly think anyone will die without you smiling at them."
Din chuckled at the quip, but he leaned on one foot and cocked his head, thinking about it.
"'N do what, Mister Kanda? What do I do after I quit the tan jacket and the phone pack? Go home, live with m' whole family sellin' tobacco 'n gettin' fat?" Din asked playfully.
Kanda shrugged, looking down at Nthanda, who'd fallen asleep completely after a conversation's worth of rocking and back-rubbing. His scowl softened a bit, but his eyes still remained almost like dark pits in his face, made even more apparent when the lightning struck. There were frown lines on his forehead already, dug deep by endless bad situations and worse decision-making.
"Find a girl, marry her, have two and a half kids and a dog. Live, I guess," Kanda suggested, not looking up. Din's stared at Kanda pensively, finding the oddly mundane answer strange from the taciturn boy. In that moment, he wondered if that was, instead, what he wanted. With the look Kanda gave Nthanda, the theory gained more weight.
"Aye. Guess you're right, Mister Kanda. Ain't gettin' younger. Though I ain't got a girl in mind," Din stated, hands behind his back as the ship continued its ceaseless shifting. "What 'bout you, Mister Kanda? What'll you do?"
Kanda looked up, his head snapping up like a rubber band pulled to breaking point. The Japanese Exorcist frowned heavily and shook his head.
"No point thinking about that. Got the devil to pay first." Now where did that come from? The lie had been smooth as moonshine down a booze hound's throat.
"Surely ya got some girl ye thinking 'bout?"
"Haven't got time."
"Ah."
The two continued to stand there, watching the waves. Now, Kanda's tight grip and fidgeting had lessened as he watched the sea in an almost hypnotic fashion. On that note, Din mentioned he needed to get some shuteye, and Kanda merely nodded, staring out into the water's depths.
He felt bad about lying to Din, a moral pinch he'd never experienced when lying before. His eyes tracked down to Nthanda's sleeping face as he thought of the true reason there was no point to thinking about life after the war, when the world burned down and the blood filled the fields and the tombs collapsed to give up their dead.
No. The reason was simple. He would, and forever, be the last one standing.
A/N: Hello, all! I've been on something of a writing spree, so here you are with another chapter after... well, three months. Anywho, better late than never, right? This one's a little bit short, as I felt that continuing on with what I had in mind might end up making this chapter a 7k rather than the 5k it is right now. Hopefully you can forgive me that.
Anywho, I thought I'd do something a little different with the questions. Instead of me asking you questions about the story, I'd like to ask you questions about yourselves. What are your favorite hobbies? What's your favorite novel, graphic or otherwise? Who are your most beloved or hated characters? What genres do you enjoy? How did you get to reading fanfiction? What is your general age group (high schooler, college student, working adult, etc.)? What do you consider your greatest accomplishment?
That's all I've got for now. Here's to hoping for another installment soon! Thank you all, and God bless you!