Sequel 8

I think this feeling.. Is what my dad would describe as a broken heart. The same thing that killed him when mom died. The same thing that he warned me of just before he slipped away.

It hurt. It choked off my air and my words. I felt like crying but I couldn't even do that. My chest burned and ached, and the idea of pulling it out was better than enduring it. The idea of living with it made me what to scream.

As the ball of light from the pitiful king of god comes bearing down on Scorpio and I the bastard turns, holding me out of the way.

"Please!" I yell, but Scorpio only gives me a sweet smile.

"It's okay, I won't leave you." I shake my head.

Why was I always powerful and useless? Why couldn't I do anything right? Before those questions haunted me in every waking hour to the point I wished I'd never open my eyes again. How come even after everything I pushed myself through, I still couldn't hold onto the ones I loves? First mom, then dad, all of my friends that I pushed away, and now I couldn't even hold onto Scorpio.

"No," I say, just as the energy ball licks at Scorpios back.

Something wells up in the deepest part of my chest. Scorpio slowly leans his head down to me, and for a split second, I know every single emotions he has towards me, as if I had his power.

The warmth in the bottom of my heart swells until it materializes and spreads, covering Scorpio and I in a single instant. The energy ball touches it, and the light that I let slip molds into the kings and they cancel each other out, both evaporating.

"I refuse to lose anyone, ever again. Especially you, Scorpio. I'm selfish, remember? I'm foolishly greedy… I don't want to wait til you find me. I want to be with you now."

Though the king's power was nullified, my vision goes white as whatever I did folds me up and… did I pass out?

Am I..dead?

"Hitomi?" Scorp's voice suddenly snaps me out of my stupor and the white dissolves to show the ceiling of the throne room. I blinked languidly, still fuzzy as Scorpio slowly helps sit me up. I'm uncertain why I'm sprawled on the floor.

I'm aware enough to lurch out of Scorp's hold, though.

"No touch!" I slur, still not fully conscious. "You kay?" He chuckles at my broken words, but nods.

"Yeah, the shock weakened… Probably because of this.. It's gotten a lot lighter." His fingers feather across my collar bone. This time, he's barely zapped, and that gives him imaginary permission to help me to my feet. Seeing the pissed off king, I surmise we're still alive and that id done something I wasn't supposed to.

For the… third, fourth time now?

"You…" He grinds out.

"Guessing you didn't suddenly take pitty.."

"No, he was really trying to kill us with the energy he hit us with." I then raise a brow for Scorp to explain, but he just walks past me and stares the bewildered King of Gods down.

"It wasn't just anyone who allowed me to meet Hitomi and learn how wonderful humans can be. It was you, your Highness." Scorpio stared with his normal void look. "You were the one who saved me from my miserable human life… That's why, despite everything, in my heart of hearts, I don't hate you, your highness. Were you planning on saving us all along?"

"I didn't know. This is the conclusion your actions called for. It was actually my intention to erase the both of you." Though the King says this, his tone wavers.

"I...I'm grateful to you." Scorpio goes red at his own words to the king. "I wouldn't be here right now if it weren't for you."

"Scorpio…" it's the first time I see the look I expected on the king of gods that my parents believed in. Warm and kind eyes, a small happy smile.. "Look at you, saying all these cheeky things to me. You never used to speak to me like this. But… Enough. I'm no longer interested in that woman. Do as you please." He waves a hand at us, shooing us away.

"Mama… I'm going to take the boxing classes no matter what!"

"Hitomi-!"

"It's so I can protect you and daddy!"

"...What?"

"I want to protect everyone, so imma start with boxing. Then imma do carrot tea, and tye kondo."

"Do you mean Karate and Tae Kwon Doe?"

"Mhmn! I wanna protect you guys, so I have to learn how to beat up meanies! And… And I know you don't like it but… You told me that no matter what happens, I have to hold onto the people I love, because they mean more than anything, and I love you and daddy!"

"...I never wanted you to grow up and have a life that you needed a reason to fight but… I guess there's no way to avoid it. I don't care anymore. Do as you please. But just know, Hitomi-chan, one day you're going to meet a person who's going to try to protect you with everything they got. What're you going to do?"

"Imma protect them!"

"But they won't need protection."

"They will! Everyone does! Imma be their knight n' shining armor, and protect them, even if they're a knight too."

"...You really are something. Hurry, shoo, go and see daddy. He's all excited to spend time with you."

"Kay! Love you mommy!"

"Love you too, Hitomi."

"Hitomi, your mark is gone.."

"The mark had almost completely faded, even before I did anything. You really are tiresome, woman. You didn't do a single thing I wanted you to."

"It's because I'm a knight…"

"What?" I blink, pulling myself completely out of the memory.

"Scorpio is my knight in shining armor, you know. And all he wants to do is protect me.. But the problem is I'm a knight too and can only think of protecting him… So with him in mind I couldn't do anything you wanted, and with me in mind, Scorp couldn't either." The king scoffs, waving at us even harder, wanting us to disappear.

Slowly, I turn to Scorp, who's already looking my way.

"So...I guess we aren't dying."

"Yeah."

Both of us seem stunned for a moment, and then we're smiling and grabbing at each other. He swoops me into his arms, dipping me back. He kisses my collarbone, where the mark had been, and then kisses my cheeks as he hugs me to his chest. I laugh, kissing the top of his head as he nuzzles my clean collar.

"This is all because of you. Thank you, Hitomi."

"You're thanking me? Maybe I should interrupt you and the king for selfish reasons more often-" I'm quick to send the King of Gods a look. "Joking, joking."

Scorpio smiles, lifting me up as he snaps his fingers.

We head home.

That evening, after all the gods both chastise me and congratulate me for living (giving the exact some speeches to Scorpio), the gods of the Punishments invite us to a party in the heavens.

The room we end up in is giant, shiny, and centered with a large dining table with candles and fine china. It really was a godly room.

"Phew!" Ichthys says at my side, relaxing in his chair. "I haven't felt this free in forever."

"I guess, in the end, we were right to force our way into the heavens." Dui smiles at me as Zyglavis sends daggers. He was still pissy about the idea that I had convinced Ichthys and Dui into helping me get to the heavens so easily after he told strictly to do nothing of the sort.

When the asinine king decided he was no longer "interested" in Scorpio and I, which was mutual, he erased Dui and Ichthys' marks as well.

"Well… We may have had our sins erased, but in exchange we got a mountain of annoying work pushed on us."

"Now's no time to complain." Zyglavis said with an eye roll. "This is all the King's plan. You should be thankful." I snorted as I raised my glass to my lips, which got me a glare from ponytail.

"Oh Ziggle, you're so uptight as ever." I nearly choked on my drink, my coughs turning into loud laughter.

"Ziggle!" Zyglavis' face fell even more.

"Don't call me by that weird name you two." Ichthys joins my laughs, and Dui breaks out a smile at it.

"Why didn't you tell me to call you Ziggle when I couldn't pronounce your name?!" Zyglavis dead panned.

"Because then I would've never agreed to letting you keep your memories."

"Don't worry, Ziggle's playing." Ichthys winks at me and I try not to let loose another snort. At this point, I had noticed the unfamiliar face in the room, who was watching it all with obvious enjoyment.

"By the way, Who's…?" Zylgavi- no, Ziggles noticed my pointed nod.

"His name's Partheno. He's the god of Virgo.

"..It's a pleasure." The pinkette said, having heard my confusion from is spot by Dui. He smiles gently at me, and his eyes crinkle and - oh, he has a teardrop beauty mark. I also thought those were pretty.

"Nice to meet more of the family." Ichthys chokes on his drink this time, and I laugh at his struggle.

"Where's Krioff?" Ziggle asks Dui, who shrugs.

"I'm guessing he's also apart of the Department of Punishments?"

"Yes," Partheno says, "He rules over Aries." The pinkette then looks with a frown to Ziggle. "Zyglavis, you know Krioff hates showing his face at parties."

"If only he had a slightly more cooperative personality.."

"Aw don't say that. If you guys were chosen as gods because of your cooperation, Scorp and Leon would be out of the job." I say, careful this time as I take another sip of my drink. Ziggle gives a heavy nod in agreement to my statement.

"That reminds me," Partheno says, leaning forward. "The kin said that from now on, Scorpio will only be working directly under him at his discretion."

"Bah. Stingy." I say, ignoring Ziggle's glare my way.

"What in the world did you all do to make the king act like this? I swear, he's just as brash and reckless as you all are."

"You just noticed?" I asked.

"It's true!" Ichthys propped his chin up on the ball of his hand.

"You've acted selfishly enough, Ichthys." The greynette is immediately shut down as Ziggle spins his sharp look to him. "Consider how difficult it is for the rest of us to clean up after you."

"Pfft, mad at me already? That was fast."

"Ichthys, you and Dui are in trouble for bringing Hitomi Wakahisa here."

"..I'm sorry." Dui says softly, his eyes flickering to me and then to floor. The two look like kicked puppies as Ziggle's chastises them.

"Don't get on them too much. I forced them to take me here. I'll take full responsibility." I then lower my aloof front and bow my head. "It if was for them, none of this would've happen. They would still be sinned, and I might still have my own mark, for all we know." Ziggles surveys me, and then sighs.

"Regardless.. We should be grateful to the king that everything ended as it did."

"He could destroy all of the heavens, erase it all, if he really wanted to." Ichthys says, but it's like he's commenting about the weather.

"Wish he would- oof!" Dui kicks my ankle under the table.

"You're right about that, Ichthys." Scorpio's voice is suddenly in the room, and we all look to see Scorp in the doorway.

"Scorpio, did you talk to the king? About the job…"

"Yeah, everything's fine now, Dui. That job conflicted with my work for the Department of Punishments."

"What.. does that mean?" Scorp see the worry in my face, and he smiles.

"Don't look so upset. Everything's fine now."

"..It better be. I'm expecting smooth fucking sailing after the bullshit we just went through." He rolls his eyes and knocks his knuckles gently on the back of my head as he stops behind the back of my chair.

"Alright, let's go."

"..What? You literally just got here. You missed the food, too. It was really good." I tilt my head back, trying to meet his eyes with my frown.

"Hang around here too long and one of these guys might try to make a move."

"These guys? Never." As I say this, Dui slips an arm around my waist and Ichthys leans over to set his head on my shoulder. I then nod and look to Scorp. "See, aren't they just the best friends."

Scorpio's glare could kill. He then turns his back on me and walks out of the room.

"And that's my clue to follow before sourpuss forms a plan to kill you two." I knock heads with Ichthys and push my chair back to stand.

"Our vice minister really is handful."

"You can say that again Ziggles."

"Try me, Hitomi." I laugh, giving him a mock salute as I ruffle Dui and Ichthys heads of hair.

"Don't let mean old minister gut you guys while I'm off." I then turn to Partheno and bow. "It's also always nice to meet someone from the Department. I hope I can meet you when Scorp isn't having a tantrum." Partheno laughs, twirling one of his pink locks.

"It was a pleasure, goddess." With the formalities out of the way, I hurry to run after my own god.

"Is it okay for me to stay in the heavens for the day?" My question is out as soon as I close Scorpio's bedroom door behind me.

"Yeah. Considering what you're body's been through, I think you should stay here tonight. I cleared it with Zig before I went to speak to the king."

"Scandalous." I laugh, tip toeing over to Scorp's bed like I'm sneaking into his room at night and don't want to let his parents know. "Also, I always knew Zig was team Scormi."

"...Scormi?" He climbs onto his bed just as I sprawl myself onto it.

"Yeah. It's the ship name Hiyori came up with before we confessed."

"Ship name?"

"Yeah like the combination of our names because she thought we should date."

"But ship-"

"Never mind." He frowns, but gives up in favor of curling me up to him and pulling his blanket over us. "Since neither of us are "letting go" anytime soon, I can give you a lesson on modern hum-"

My words are swallowed as he kisses me. "I don't want words now." He says, pulling me closer. "I want you."

"Well damn," I say dumbly, going completely red. "I mean, jesus-"

"I can finally touch you…" he proves his point by trailing his fingers over my clean collarbone. "I want to make sure we're really here together, that this isn't a lie or an illusion…" I snicker, setting my hand on his cheek.

"You know, I kind of thought I'd never touch you again. That mark.. Really messed me up."

"...I'm sorry. I shouldn't have left you."

"It's fine," I say slowly, shutting my eyes as I pressed our foreheads together. "I just got trapped in my own head, I think. Started remembering things from my own past, too."

"I know how that feels." I open my eyes to see that his are boring into me. "I… Don't like being without you when I do." I smile, way to happy at his confession.

He closes the back between us and kissed my forehead, then my cheeks, and then my lips.

"Your face is red," He murmurs,

"So is yours. It's not like we can help it," We frown at each other, and then simultaneously smile like dorks.

"Stop reacting like that," he says, childishly trying to hide his smile, and failing. "I won't be able to control myself."

"Huh?" I say, poking fun. "You, lose control? Can that even happen?"

"Of course," His words are slow, his eyes following his own hand as it falls from my cheek, down my neck, and rests where my sin used to be marked. His fingers push at the spot. "It's just that… I always held back, thinking about the effect I could have on your body…But then I couldn't touch you because of that evil mark…" He pulls me up so he can rest his face on my chest. I splutter, unable to react to his incredibly embarrassing words.

"Scor- ow!" My face goes red as he bites at my collarbone. I can hear the blood pounding in my face. "S-Stop!"

"A red mark like this looks much better on you than that black one did."

"I'm going to kill you…" I mumble, pushing his face away to look at the already bruising mark on my pale skin. "My uniform won't hide a hickey... Hiyori is going to see… That dumb king couldn't smite you, but I will!"

"A hickey?" He asks dumbly. "Oh, you mean the burst capillaries?"

"I'm going to die. You just bit me without even knowing what's called? Are you a wild animal? What if the other gods see this!?"

"This is the proof that you're mine. There's nothing embarrassing about that, is there?"

"Do you really think that me, of all people, is going to let anyone think that I'm single while they're coming onto me? Do you remember how hard it was for even Leon, the minister of the department of wishes, to make any kind of flirt my direction." Scorpio blinks, smirking when he remembers the bruise I gave the lion the second day I met him.

I look at the growing hickey again.

"You might as well have written your name on me…"

"Can I?" The look I gave Scorpio immediately has him bowing his head from my gaze."You're complaining, but your smiling," He bravely comments. He then smirks. "That's right.. You're always lying to me… In that case, why don't I give you another?"

"I'll smite you. Don't you dare-" He pounces, straddling and pinning me down. He kisses me.

"Quiet. Quit chirping away like a noisy little bird.." He then pulls away, smirking. " But...If you just have to make noise, I'd rather hear you make some sexier sounds…"

"Say something like that again and I'll ask the king to try and kills us both again."

"You know… you get violent when you're embarrassed." I avert my gaze, trying to hide from Scorp's all knowing look.

"No.."

"You're lying again…" Scorpio then tips my chin back so he can look into my blue eyes. "Hitomi… I'll be kind, and I'll do what you say, so, don't worry so much and… Give yourself to me."

"I-I mean, that's, cool n'-n' all but, I mean I'm not saying no, or yes, I mean. Scorp babe I love you lots n' I know we almost died and-"

"If you keep blabbering I'm going to bite your tongue off." I feel dizzy with how much blood has gone into my faze. I'm in a warm haze that doesn't go away, and only gets worse, as he starts to kiss me again.

What breaks the heat is his cold fingers suddenly pushing up the edge of my shirt. I shiver at the touch.

"I told you not to get me too excited."

"Teased too much, huh?" I cup his cheek, and his hand immediately goes over mine.

"I want to feel you."

"Je-sus!" I nearly keeled over.

"I want you to feel me too. It looks like I'm greedier than I thought…" He then kisses my burning cheek. "I want every part of you to be mine."

"Then, I gotta make this clear," I finally say. "I- You took my first kiss so, I've never done anything with anyone, no matter how confident and how well I fake it." At this, I can tell my words makes Scorpio happier and more excited that he was before.

That feels like a good and bad thing.

"I'll love you so sweetly and gently that you won't have time to be nervous or scared." He resumes nuzzling my cheek and running his hand in comforting circles on my hip. "I want all of you to be mine… Please only love me, Hitomi." I sigh softly, my shaking hand move to his shoulder.

"Since… it's you…"

"Don't worry, I won't do anything mean our first time."

"...That just sounds like you have mean things planned for later." He kisses my pout and I finally let my body relax.

If it's with Scorpio… Hell, I think I can handle doing something full of love if I was able to so easily accept death as long as it was with him.

Plus.. It's Scorp.

I'd do anything for Scorp, because I know he'd do the same.

...I've fallen pretty hard, but I think this was the one height I wasn't scared of falling from.

~Blessed Ending~

OKAY! I'M SORRY! I KNOW YOU ALL WANTED LEON- but his story makes me so mad and it's so hard to write Hitomi into it because it's so serious for the first couple of episodes- and lets be honest, Hitomi wouldn't go along with any of his shit, but has too for walk through reasons.

I'll try my absolute hardest to start it, but I might save Leon for later and do one of the other gods. ~