Well, last night I was up super late and decided to finish writing the last few words of Keyboards and Writer's Block. It's exactly 8,888 words, just like I promised!
Now, go get some popcorn, or as I prefer, Ramen, and a nice fizzy rootbeer float, sit down, and enjoy!
It's been a long, hard road to the finish, and now here it is, I present to you...
~8*The End*8~
Rebekah White sat back in her office chair, unbelievably bored with the career path she had chosen.
Why a book agent? Why did she have to have the childhood dream of helping aspiring authors reach their goals and get their books published and get them famous to the point where they leave her to sign the movie rights of the book over to some bigger agent? Sure, if you find that one rare diamond that decides to come to you with a work of art that has been turned away by so many idiotic big time agents who want nothing but cliché stories with predictable plot lines, it could mean big money and good exposure for both agent and author. But a diamond happens so rarely, and for Rebekah, she hasn't even had a nice looking rock.
Every single book sent to her has had the same exact plot, boy meets girl, they fall in love, a boy with more money and better looks than boy number one comes along in an attempt to steal girl away, something random happens, and the original pair get married.
It was the same thing over and over, in fact, it got so out of hand with all the romance submissions she was getting that she had to be extremely specific on her agents profile as to what she wanted in a client's book. She wanted murder mystery, no cliché plot, no romantic crud, and if there was a touch of romantic crud, she wanted it to build up gradually and then be destroyed by murder.
Maybe Rebekah was asking for too much, because now she wasn't getting any submissions at all. Apparently she scared away all of her potential clients with the whole "I love murder" thing. All she wanted was to find the next Agatha Christie, a suspenseful, talented author with tricks up his or her sleeve and a psychopathic mind.
And then her computer made a bleeping sound, and a new email came through.
"A submission? Really?" Her mind was doubting that it was exactly what she wanted, but she took a look anyways.
And she looked and looked until she was drowning in the words before her, and as she reached the end of page ten, she knew she had found her diamond.
She reached for her phone and dialed the number that her potential client left in the email…
88888888
"Maybe it just wasn't meant to be…" Kid whimpered to himself as he laid on the couch in the living room and drove himself insane with all the little critics that were running through his head, belittling his writing skills and claiming that he just didn't listen to his creative energy the way he should have.
'Hey now, your story was magnificent, I mean, I was in it, so it must have been. Don't be so hard on yourself. You completed an excellent book, even if you did end it with Tess and I both shooting a gun at the same exact time and therefore killing each other. Your agent will probably tell you to change that, you know.' Simon said as he arrived into Kid's thoughts and began talking to him.
"There is no agent, there never will be." The broken hearted reaper placed a small black pillow over his face and sighed, considering the attempt of suffocating himself so that he wouldn't have to deal with the humility of his book being rejected.
'You sent it to one agent less than an hour ago, you're not even considering how long it might take the email to reach her, or how long it may take her to read it, or how long it will take her to decipher your ever so fancy wording skills…'
"It's called proper English!"
'It's called imitating Shakespeare so that you can confuse people and sound smart. Come on, that part where you had me reciting a poem for Tess outside her window was far too fancy shmancy for even good old Walter himself.'
"William. His first name was William. And I thought you told me that I can't control what happens to my characters, I just write down what they say."
'Right, and what you wrote the first time was fine. But then you went back and changed all the words so that my dialogue went past three pages of describing her facial features!'
"I can't help it, it didn't seem right for you to just say "Hi, you're pretty, I love you." I wanted the moment to be passionate."
'Passionate is one thing, Kiddo. But when you describe the shape of her eyelashes, you're going overboard.'
"Eyelashes are a very beautiful part of a woman!"
'But they do not have to be described as the Feathers of fawns in a wintery breeze! Fawns are female deer, they don't have any feathers!'
"It's artistic dialogue, it makes no sense but it sounds nice anyways. Most women would kill to have an attractive man say that to them, you know." Suddenly, Kid and the imaginary Simon heard the symphony Moonlight Sonata begin playing randomly somewhere in the room.
'I do believe the ghost of Beethoven has invaded your home, Kiddo. Perhaps to tell you that I shouldn't have died in the last chapter of your story.'
"That's not a ghost, it's my phone." Kid got up from the couch and began searching the room for the little rectangular telephonic device that was playing the soft, beautiful and yet haunting theme, but before his hand could reach its place on the side table, the song stopped playing.
'What number is that? Do you know who it is?'
"Quit being nosy, Simon. And no, I don't know who it is…" Kid took another look at the number before realizing that it could possibly be that agent he just sent his book to, "Unless it's her!"
'Her? Her who? Your mother? Your aunt? Your sister? Your brother who prefers to be called a…'
"Simon shut up! I'm calling her back, so be quiet!" He put the phone up to his ear, awaiting the sweet sound of success. Agents typically don't call you unless they really want to speak with you, and they don't typically really want to speak with you unless they want to take on your book.
"Hello?" A woman's voice rang in his ears, could it really be her?
"Yes, who's this?" He squealed out nervously, a smile popping up on his face as he awaited her answer.
"This is Rebekah White, is this the author who just sent me his story A Fine Day for Death?" Kid was elated, so elated that he really had to release all this elation welling up inside of him before he continued talking to her.
"Excuse me one moment…" He said as he pressed "Mute" on the phone and placed it gently on the couch.
"YES! FINALLY! WOO HOO!" He jumped up and down just like Patty does whenever a Spongebob marathon comes on, and he fist pumped the air once or twice before settling down and grabbing the phone again.
"Um, sir?"
"Yes, I'm here."
"I could hear you." Confusion and embarrassment arose as he looked down at the phone and realized he apparently didn't press the mute button well enough.
"Um… I can explain…"
"Don't bother, I know you're probably very happy, Mr. Elliot."
'Mr. Elliot? What's she talking about? Your name isn't…'
"I'm using a fictitious name, Simon!" Kid responded to the voice in his head that was so clear it sounded like it was right in the room with him.
"Excuse me?"
"That was um, that was a friend of mine asking a question… Anyhow, my first name is Elliot, the last is Death…"
'So you kept the Death part of your name just to confuse me, right?'
"Shut up!"
"Oh I see, so you based your main character off of your friend?"
"What? No, he isn't my friend, I mean he's… Um, Simon is just a nickname for him… He's a dog."
'A dog?! You pass me off as a dog?'
"You're talking to your dog?"
"No! I'm… Ugh, anyways, my book…"
'Don't just ignore me! I am a part of you! I am a part of your very brain! I could embarrass you so badly right now you wouldn't even know it!'
"Oh yes, your book! Well, I must say, Mr. Death, um, do you mind if I call you Elliot?"
'I could make you have a sneeze attack…'
"No! I… I mean no, you can call me Elliot."
'I could make you begin choking for no reason at all…'
"Well, Elliot, you have an amazing talent for writing. Your story captured me at the first sentence, and I'd absolutely love to read more of it…"
'I could make you start singing the theme to Cheers…'
"You… you do? You really like it that much?"
'Making your way in the world today…'
"DAMMIT, KNOCK IT OFF!"
"… Elliot, are you alright?"
"Yes I'm fine, continue…"
"Oh, um, well, I'd like to see more of your book. Actually, I'd like to see all of your book, and I'd like to meet the fine mind behind it as well."
"Really? So you want to read the full manuscript?"
"Of course I do! You have me in far too much suspense to wait a single day more! How about we meet tomorrow, do you know a place where we could, say, have lunch?"
'Sometimes you wanna go…'
"Sure! How about where everybody knows your… DAMMIT DAMMIT DAMMIT!"
"… How about the Tea House?"
'And they're always glad you came…'
"Yes, yes that sounds great."
"Great! I'll see you tomorrow, Mr. Death!"
'You wanna…'
"Yes! Yes, okay, see you tomorrow, bye!" Kid quickly hung up the phone and shot a death glare at the imaginary image in his mind.
"Thank you, Simon, for making me look like a schizophrenic while I was on the phone with a potential book agent!"
'All writers have their own form of crazy, haven't you ever seen Secret Window?'
"I'm about to become that guy in a second if you don't go back to where you came from!"
'You've already tried killing me once, it didn't work. I'm telling you, she's going to love me so much, she's going to force you to bring me back as a permanent character to your books!'
"Or how about I just bring you back so that I can create a new character who's an axe murderer and you become his first victim?"
'Alright, alright, I see where you're heading with this. I'm just so lonely after Tess died that I have no use but to bother you until you give me a new reason for living!'
"Honestly I don't even want you to go on living. All you do is bother me."
"Kid?" They suddenly heard a female's tired voice and footsteps coming down the stairs, "Who are you talking to? I heard a lot of yelling." The chestnut haired girl reached the bottom of the steps and rubbed her eyes a bit as she waited for a response.
"Um…"
'Holy caboli, who is THAT?'
"I have great news, Liz!" Kid ignored Simon's attempt at being a pervert and continued talking.
'I've just realized I've become a crazy bastard case!'
"I've just realized I've become a… Damn you, Simon!"
"…Are you okay?" Liz took a few steps towards him and placed her hands on her hips. Kid is usually crazy, but not so crazy that he'd talk to himself, then again, there was that time when he was rearranging the bathroom, he talked to himself a lot that time…
"I'm fine, I've just caught a little bastard."
'Excuse me?'
"Bug! I've caught a bug. Anyhow…"
'I'm not a bug either, you fool!'
"ANYHOW, an agent just called me up and said she wants to meet me tomorrow to read the rest of my book. She liked it. A lot."
"Awh, Kid, that's great!" She walked over to him a little faster and hugged him, her warm body making him calmer even though he had a human version of that damn sword Excalibur stuck in his head, making his life a living hell within a few short minutes.
"See, I knew you could do it. So…" Liz stepped back and sat down on the couch, crossing her legs as she eyed him intently, "Why don't you do a reading of your book for me so that I can judge it for myself?"
'Yes, my chance for greatness! The sexy lady shall see my amazing crime solving abilities for herself now!'
"Actually, I'd like for us to talk a bit more about, you know…" Kid took a step towards the couch to prepare himself to sit down next to her.
'NO! You bastard, this is no time for you to talk about sensitive subjects! This is time for your girlfriend to fall in love with me!'
"Shut up you crazy jackass!" Kid looked up and yelled at the image in his head, which earned a confused glare from the woman on the couch.
"Listen, I have no clue what's going on with you today, and I really don't care, but I told you five thousand times, I'm not going to…" Kid hushed her words with a sudden pair of lips pressed to her mouth.
'You're doing this to spite me, aren't you!? No crazy makeout sessions while I am present, understand!?'
Kid ignored the little British ingrate and continued the kiss, a long, soft, sweet and tender kiss that was filled with emotion and the slightest quivering of lips. It felt nice, it was like a little fire started in his stomach, and when he let go to see her reaction, he ended up smiling into her loving eyes.
"Go on… You can continue your protest." She whispered softly to him. A flow of electricity went up his spine and he closed his eyes, being forced back onto her lips by her soft hands combing through his hair.
He soon changed his position from being bent over to having his legs placed directly on the sides of each of hers on the couch, and his hands were both on her cheeks, holding her face as though it was a priceless sculpture.
She wasn't sure on where to move her hands too because she was afraid that if she didn't place both of them in a perfectly symmetrical position, Kid would get mad at her and go on about how it's a complete turn off for him.
But when he began biting at her lip gently and begging for her to open her mouth just a tiny bit, she couldn't help but grab onto his hair as hard as she could and moan as she fought him, denying him entrance simply to tease him. He didn't like that too much, so he took his lips away from hers and gave her a mischievous grin before leaning down to her exposed collarbone and kissing it, directly in the middle. He pulled away and kissed it again, and again, and again, seven more times exactly, to make up a total of eight times that he kissed that one precious part of her. He looked into her eyes after he was done and leaned over to her ear, blowing in it softly to emerge a slight giggle as she held his head closer to her.
"Will you finally let me be everything for you?" He whispered, his words flowing into her like a cool breeze on an autumn day.
"Only if you're sure… And only if you don't let it ruin your life." She whispered back, certain that he was making a huge mistake, yet agreeing to let him do it anyway because he was just too damn stubborn to reason with.
"I'd happily give my life for you."
"But I'm not worth your life…"
"You're worth the universe, and more." He kissed her lips again, soft and slow, and she moved her hands down from his head to his shoulders, and then ran her fingers down to his lower back, which triggered him to smile into the kiss.
She felt numb with pleasure, ecstasy drifting throughout her body before she lightly pushed him away and placed her hands at the front of his jacket, slowly undoing the rectangular buttons until she could slide it off his shoulders and expose his white dress shirt. He leaned down and kissed her again, this time stronger as she allowed him full entrance into her mouth. She slowly reached her hands towards his little skull pendant and took it off, allowing it to fall into her lap as she then began to undo the buttons on his shirt, slowly exposing his soft chest to her.
He leaned his head down to her ear again and began to whisper sweet nothings to her as she softly rubbed his bare shoulder with her warm hands.
"I love you." He gasped out, butterflies raging at his insides as he realized what those words meant.
'I love you… It means I'm always going to be there for you, I'm always going to care for you, I'm not ever going to leave you.'
To his surprise, instead of hearing an "I love you too" he heard the symphony "Moonlight Sonata" coming from his pants pocket.
"I think your phone is trying to increase the mood."
"More like ruin it." He reached into his pocket to hopefully just put it on mute, but when he noticed that it was his dad calling, he realized that it could be important.
"Hello?"
"Son, we have an emergency, I need you to come and see me immediately, and bring Siren." He sensed the worry in his father's voice, which let him know that whatever this was, it was serious.
"Is something wrong?" Before he could get a response, the phone hung up on him, and he was left completely confused, and a little bit scared, as to what on earth was happening.
"Did something happen?" Liz asked, seeing the frightful look on Kid's face as he hurriedly stood up from his position on the couch and re-buttoned his shirt.
"All he said was that there was an emergency and we need to go see him now with Siren." The minute his shirt came to being at least halfway buttoned up, he hurried towards the stairs and ran to get Siren.
"Siren! We have to go, there's been an emergency!" Liz followed him just in case he had any issues with the often unpredictable girl and needed some help getting her down the stairs.
He got to her bedroom and tried opening the door, but it was locked, and the girl wasn't answering him at all.
"Siren, come on! You have to open the door, something bad is happening!" Yet again, no response.
"She's not answering? Do you think she's okay?" Liz asked as worry filled her features and her heart began to race faster.
"I don't know, she might be asleep."
"Try knocking."
"Siren! Come out! We need you!" He banged on the door, obviously very nervous as thoughts raced through his mind. Still nothing.
"She's not coming out, I'm going to go get something to unlock the door." He began walking away, but was soon stopped by the fact that Liz was already working on that herself with her fingernails.
"No need." She successfully got it open and the two of them rushed inside the dark room, which was slightly illuminated to a light blue hue as the ending daylight shone inside from the window.
"Siren?" Kid said as he walked over to the bed and patted the ruffled blankets to try and wake her. "She's not here." He lifted up the mess and realized that she was gone, not a single trace left of her.
"Kid, look!" Liz called as she pointed to the window, noting not only the fact that it was open, but there was some strange green light glowing in the sky.
The reaper walked over to the open window and stuck his head out it to get a better look at the strange illumination above. A large formation of glowing green clouds were swirling around at a slow pace, quick jolts of blue lightning lighted it up even more as they randomly scattered across the strange materialization.
"…What is that?" Liz asked as she covered her mouth and stared at it from the side of the window.
"I have no clue, but we have to find Siren and bring her to my father as soon as possible." He stepped away from the window and hurried out the door, "I'm going to look for her up here, you go downstairs and see if you find any trace of her."
Liz complied and headed downstairs, checking the laundry room, the linen closet, the dining room, anywhere that she could possibly be hiding. Meanwhile, Kid was searching the bathroom, his bedroom, his closet, even under his bed, but there was no sign of her anywhere. She didn't even leave a note.
After both searches came out to be unsuccessful, they regrouped and tried to come up with a new plan.
"If this is a major emergency, we have to go see my father whether we have Siren or not. Time is wasting, and who knows what the hell that thing is outside nor what it's going to do to us."
"It looks like it's getting bigger…" They both looked out the giant window in the living room and saw that the formation was now developing a cone shape, and was beginning to look like a tornado. It began to spin faster and the glowing light was getting larger, and it was clearly evident that whatever it was, it was deadly.
"I could keep searching for her around town and you can go see your father to see what's happening …"
"No, that's dangerous. I'm not letting you out of my sight as long as that thing remains in the sky, who knows what it can…" Kid was cut off by a sudden, earth shaking "BOOM!" and the sound of glass shattering everywhere. When they turned around to see what caused the noise, they noticed a large truck was somehow thrown into the window, smashing it and most of the wall to pieces. There appeared to be a glowing light coming from inside of it, very similar to the light in the giant cloud.
"We have to go. Now." Kid grabbed the shaken woman's hand and rushed her out the door, immediately the two were enclosed by a loud, overbearing wind which surrounded the entire area and was accompanied by the sound of car alarms and screaming from the random people in the city.
The two trekked through the whirlwind of dust and small random objects that flew around with ease as the enormous tornado above continued throwing cars and lampposts among other things in all different directions. Close by, a large metal tower was stricken by a massive bolt of lightning, sounding a haunting "CLASH" throughout the city. The tower then gave out an eerie, lingering moan as it slowly fell to the side, crushing every building that was in its way on its trip to the unforgivable ground.
Kid then reached his hand for Liz's side so that he could have a better grip on her and pull her out of the way quicker lest anything come flying at her.
As they walked, it was becoming increasingly hard for them to continue on. The winds were becoming stronger, the tornado was becoming larger and more threatening. More and more things were flying around, larger, heavier objects beginning to join the many cars and trucks that were already blowing through the air like leaves on a fall day.
But then suddenly, a large car came flying at the couple from the back, flying towards Liz to be exact, and before Kid could react and pull her out of the way, it smashed into her full force, pulling her far away from Kid's grip and contorting her body into a C shape before sending her flying to the ground as the car flipped over and landed a few feet from her.
"Liz!" Kid screamed at the top of his lungs as he rushed to her side, immediately picking her limp body up from the ground and laying her gently upon his lap.
Her face was scratched badly from its impact with the gravel, her beautiful features drenched with the blood that the devastated reaper tried his hardest to wipe away.
Her mangled arm was bent backwards from the impact of the car. Her leg seemed to be broken too as it seemed to be much limper than the other.
But what he worried about most was the baby.
An unborn life not even a month old couldn't possibly survive such a horrific event such as the one that just happened. The poor little one didn't have a chance; he or she didn't even get the opportunity to see the light of day, or even have its gender defined. That little miracle, although conceived in a very unfortunate circumstance, had so much ahead of it, and now it would take a miracle simply to at least allow its mother to be okay. No doubt, losing the baby was enough to land Kid in a depression, but he prayed and prayed and cried and pleaded on his hands and knees, just please don't let Liz die too.
"Please, wake up… Open your eyes, please…" He whispered through his tears as the crystals of sadness fell down onto her expressionless face, mixing in with her blood and combining both of their elements into one light red droplet of water that flew down her cheeks and landed onto his leg.
He stroked her face with his shaking hand, totally ignoring the mess of screaming and loud crashes and bangs and winds that were whirring around his head. Everything was silent within his mind, his ears were fully tuned to her, awaiting a noise, just one single noise from her lips to tell him she was okay.
But she didn't make a single sound.
"You can't just give up on me…" He lifted her limp little body up so that he could hold her close to his chest. He didn't want to check her pulse, he didn't want to deal with the fact of knowing for sure that she was gone.
"Come on, Liz! You have to come back to me, you can't just leave me, you can't just leave your family like this. You have to be here for Patty, it would be so selfish of you to leave your precious little sister behind like this, you have to come back, she needs you. I need you. You were going to be a mother, you were going to be a wonderful, caring mother who was going to give birth to a beautiful new life… Don't you still want that? Don't you want to be a mom? Don't you want to hear your little miracle tell you how much she loves you? Isn't that enough to live for?" After still not receiving any response, he began to give up on hope. But before every last ounce of him gave up on a miracle happening, he lifted her head back and kissed her one last kiss before saying goodbye.
And that's when he felt a heavy impact hit him in the back of the head, which sent him flying forward and tumbling over the girl that was in his arms.
He turned around and saw a girl with glowing green eyes and four long tentacles coming out of her back. Upon her head were three lines that circled around her head.
"Siren?"
"Siren, in Greek mythology, a sea nymph, half-woman and half-bird, who was believed to sing beguilingly to passing sailors in order to lure them to their doom on the rocks she sat upon. Yes, it is I, not that you'd give a damn."
"Are you doing this?! You have to stop it! Look at what happened to Liz!" He protected the girl's body with his own, standing over her on all fours to ensure that nothing hurt her any more than she already was.
"Happened, to affect somebody or something, especially in an unpleasant way. You brought this upon yourself. I was going to let you live. I was going to let all of you live because I loved you. But then you betrayed me." She took one step closer to him, and he got ready to fight her, as much as it would hurt his heart to not only have to deal with Liz's passing, but also to have to fight the girl he came to know as his twin sister.
"Siren, it was just a dream you had, I know how upset you must be, but you and I could never be together, we're practically the same person!"
"Shut up!" She screamed, one of her tentacles shooting out to the side and stabbing the ground right next to Liz's head.
"Siren I love you with all my heart, but not the way I love Liz. I love you like a sister…"
"Sister, a girl or woman who has the same parents as another person. You said you loved Liz as a sister and nothing more… And then I caught you in the bathroom about to suck her face off. Very brother-like of you." She began to raise another tentacle, aiming it so that she could hit directly underneath Kid and stab Liz in the heart, which would finish her off for good if she wasn't already dead.
"I lied, okay? I'm sorry that you had to find out this way, but recently I've found myself falling in love with Liz. I never wanted to admit it to myself though because she was already with someone else and…"
"Someone, same as somebody, an unspecified or unidentified person, also an important or well-known person. Don't think I don't know about Liz. There was an opposite version of her in my universe too. Only when I first met him, Lars, he didn't take quite a liking to me unlike your version of him."
"He tried to mug you, right?"
"Tried, proved through experience or testing to be good, effective, or reliable. And yes, only I wasn't as strong as you were when the same happened to you. I couldn't take him down, I couldn't beat him. I was afraid. If it weren't for his younger brother Patrick, I wouldn't even be here…"
"Lars, stop it! It doesn't feel right to be hurting her like this, she's just a kid! We have her money, let's just go!"
"There's so much more that I want from this cutie then just her money, Pat. Don't you see how she flinches every time I move? Don't you think that's sexy?"
"You're drunk, Lars! Please, you're not thinking straight! Leave her alone!"
"W-w-what are you going to d-do with m-me…?"
"I wanna make you one of us, sweetheart. Imagine how nice life would be with two strong men by your side. Come on, baby, don't you want us?"
"Knock it off! This isn't right!"
"You're so soft, I didn't really hurt you all that badly, did I?"
"P-please, let me go, stop touching me!"
"Wow, now aren't you feisty? I thought I already taught you your lesson. Do you need another one?"
"Lars, don't!"
"Patrick, transform for me. I think it's time we finish her off, she just ain't listening to reason."
"I won't."
"What did you say?"
"I said no, Lars! I want to leave, I don't want to kill her."
"Fine then. I was gonna make her death nice and easy, now I'll have to get rough."
"Lars stop!"
"What the hell?! Pat, get out of the way!"
"No! You leave her alone! You're only doing this because you're a coward!"
"How am I a coward?! You're the one who's afraid of having some fun with a pretty girl."
"I don't want to kill her and I don't see any reason for us torturing her like this! You're abusing her because she's a young girl who can't fight you back and it makes you feel powerful!"
"Get the hell away from me before I kill you too."
"What? Why… Why would you even say that to me? I'm your own flesh and blood, I'm the only family you…"
"I don't need family. Mom and dad proved that to both of us when we were kids. I can live on my own, you're just a leech, another mouth I have to feed. You'd be better off dead just like her."
"You… You bastard!"
"Hey! Get off me!"
"Run! Run as fast as you can, okay? I won't let him chase after you, just go!"
"You're letting her get away! Damn you, Pat! Dammit!"
"… Things worked differently for you. Here you are, the opposite version of myself, ready to die for the opposite version of the same person who tried killing me. I don't know how you got her to fall in love with you, to treat you kindly instead of cruelly, to trust her to sleep in the same house as you given her criminal background. I hate her. I hate every single version of her that I have met. She deserves to die!" Siren shot out her aimed tentacle faster than the bullet from a gun, but before it hit Liz, Kid grabbed it with his hand and stopped it dead in its tracks, and as he squeezed it with all the force in his body, he yelled to her at the top of his lungs…
"You're wrong! She's not the same person as the version you met, and she's not the same person that she was before! This is the woman I love, and nothing is going to change that, do you understand?"
"Understand, to know or be able to explain to yourself the nature of-"
"Stop!" He screamed again, tears streaming down his face as he slowly raised himself from his place on the ground and stood before her. "If you want to fight me, then fight me already, but try to hurt Liz one more time, and I swear I will kill you."
Siren smiled widely at him and reached out one of her tentacles to rub his cheek. She came closer and closer to him until she was directly in front of him.
"I have the strength of four different versions of yourself combined. That's why I have these fancy tentacles. They can slice through anything. Do you want to know the real story of why I killed four different versions of you and me?"
"Quit stalling. Just fight."
"Stalling, to stop making progress, or cause something to stop making progress. Actually, I'm not stalling, I'm simply informing you of something you may find rather interesting." She placed another tentacle upon him and wrapped it lightly around his neck like a snake. His golden eyes followed her, intent on making sure that she wouldn't harm Liz, and if she seemed to be planning on doing so, his focus would ensure he could stop her in time. "I didn't run around devouring the souls of my alternate selves just because mommy Death said to. Mother had noticed during her research that the alternate versions of me were all rather strong, with or without a weapon, and yet I was extremely weak, to the point where I wasn't even able to develop a friendship with a weapon partner that was strong enough to even allow me to use them, despite my being a reaper.
"She didn't want her heir to be a weakling, she didn't want to leave her precious city in the hands of someone who couldn't even deal with getting a paper-cut. So she sent me on a search to find a willing alternate version of myself and bring him or her back to replace me as heir. I couldn't stand the thought of my own mother replacing me, so I began doing some research on my own.
"It turns out that a reaper can become incredibly, dangerously powerful, enough to destroy an entire universe with only their minds if they eat the souls of other reapers. I then learned that all reapers possess these tentacles, but only those who have digested at least one soul of their alternate self may be able to use them.
"Well, when I was sent to the first universe to begin my search for the perfect replacement heir, I found out a way to convince the students at the alternate academy that Lady Death's daughter was an imposter, and I was her real daughter. They teamed up against her, fought her, and won, and soon I was able to devour her soul. After becoming stronger from it, I willingly went to other universes, doing the same thing over and over until I came here…
"Upon meeting you, I felt like your life was different from the others. You had a family of friends, you didn't shield yourself away like the others. I came to admire that in you, and I began to feel bad about the actions I performed. I decided I would eventually ask you to come back to the alternate universe with me so that you could replace me as heir, since you're the only person I wouldn't mind replacing me. I didn't want to kill you, Kid.
"But now, I see that you're nothing but a liar. A cheating, evil liar… And that is why I'm going to kill you and devour your soul." Her tentacle's grip on him tightened, and he tried to find a way out of it, scratching at the black snakelike object with all his might, but she was far too strong. She aimed another tentacle up in the air, and forced it down into his back, sending it directly through him.
He choked on the blood that was now seeping up his throat, and soon his pale lips were covered with the crimson liquid.
"S-Siren… I n-never lied…"
"Yes you did! You lead me on… You made me think you loved me. You held my hand, you cuddled with me. Those aren't things you do if you don't love someone, therefore, you're a liar!" She stuck another tentacle through his back and he coughed again, his shoes becoming soaked as he stood in a pool of his own blood, not being able to move at all. He began to imagine the lifeless body of Liz lying behind him, and he continued to think about all the times they would have shared together, had he listened to her, had he seen that Siren was unstable, had he seen that it wouldn't be a good idea to show her loving kindness, had he not invited her into his home long enough for her to fall in love with him. If he had just left Siren with the police, neither of them would be in this situation.
But if Liz truly was gone because of this, because of something that he was partially responsible for, then he'd have to fight this, he'd have to keep living for her.
He held onto the tentacle that was around his neck, tighter and tighter and tighter. He forced every single ounce of his strength into it.
He thought about all the anger he was feeling now, anger towards Brad for ditching Liz like a jackass, anger towards Siren for causing this storm and hurting the woman he loved, anger towards himself for all the mistakes he had ever made…
And then every single ounce of his anger and frustration shot into his palms, increasing his grip until the tentacle literally snapped in his hands and released its grip on his neck.
Siren gasped at the pain and retracted all her tentacles back to her so that she could observe the damage, all while Kid fell to the ground, holding his neck and rubbing it to try and get the blood flowing back to his head.
"You… You broke it…" She rubbed at the tentacle to try and stop the pain, but it was currently bleeding a black fluid all over the place. "YOU BROKE IT!"
She forced her remaining three tentacles at him, connecting them at the tips so they formed an arrow shape as they went straight for his chest, but before they hit him, he threw his hand up and slowed their impact as they went straight through his skin.
He then bent his hand downwards and grabbed onto all three at once as he rose up from the ground, his left hand still around his neck as he took a step towards the girl and thought of a move to bring her down.
But before he could do anything more, she retracted her tentacles again and raised them above her, sending one flying at his cheek, which left a scratch as he dodged it. She then began backing up, and he began walking forward, dodging left and right as she tried sending at least one of her sharp appendages through his body, but all she could get were little nicks and scrapes upon his face and through his shirt.
She sent all three at the same time, this time having two on each side of him to prevent him from dodging as she sent one towards the middle of his chest. He saw the action coming and quickly kicked the tentacle as it was coming for him, which sent it backwards a bit, and then he spun around and grabbed it before she could process what just happened. He pulled it as far as it would go before chopping it with his free hand and yet again breaking it.
"Stop it! That hurts me!" She yelled out as he continued to walk towards her and she retracted her second tentacle, trying to work out a new battle strategy.
She got angry with his agility and tried wrapping her remaining tentacles around him, but he slipped out from underneath and kicked her legs, which sent her flying to the ground, and made her extremely angry.
As her frustration grew, so did the storm, which was now beginning to tear buildings apart in her fury. She shot her two tentacles at him mindlessly, trying to hit him at least once as he continued to come at her laying figure.
Finally, one of her appendages hit him just below his heart, going straight through him instantly, and she used his surprise as an advantage to send another tentacle through his neck, which caused him to go almost entirely limp.
She retracted her tentacles and his body fell to the ground, the blood beginning to pour out of him like a waterfall, soaking into the road below him as his golden eyes shut and he began to give up the fight.
Siren stood up and was raising her tentacles again, ready to slice him to pieces, when suddenly the sound of a gunshot rang throughout the area, and Siren fell to the ground in front of her twin.
Kid raised himself and looked around to see what happened, and he saw Liz a little ways away from them, sitting down and holding out her arm, which she somehow was able to transform into a gun barrel without the rest of her body changing.
He raised himself more and slowly got to his legs, and even though he'd be unable to talk for just a little while longer until his body was able to heal the gaping hole in his neck, he stumbled over to his beloved and fell down in front of her, holding her tightly in his arms as he cried into her chestnut hair.
Words weren't needed to explain the way they felt to know they were both okay.
Slowly, the storm began to recede, and a beautiful midnight moon replaced it, and for once its mouth wasn't dripping blood for whatever reason. The young reaper boy caressed his love's face and starred into her eyes that reflected the starry night perfectly, and then both pairs of eyes shut lovingly as tears of happiness filled them and their lips closed the gap in-between them.
A feeling of warmth enclosed them in each other, their love seeming to erase all the badness that just went on. Liz pulled away for a moment and blushed as she looked straight into his eyes and whispered.
"I love you, too." Unable to talk, he mouthed back "I love you more", and as if mocking him, she then mouthed "Prove it", and so he kissed her again, tears of happiness still falling down their faces, mixing in with each other's.
But then Siren began to raise herself up from the ground, and gave out a moan of pain as she looked around at the damage she had caused.
"No… This wasn't supposed to happen again…" She stood up and took a few steps towards the lovers who were sitting on the ground, and just about scared the heck out of them as she quickly knelt down in front of them, crying intensely and pleading to them for forgiveness.
"Please! Please! Please, I'm so sorry! This wasn't supposed to happen! I'm sorry! I didn't want to hurt anyone!"
"You destroyed the city, Siren! What happened to you? Why were you being so evil?" Liz asked, speaking for Kid as he focused on healing himself.
"I…I don't…"
"There you are! Young lady, get over here right this instant!" A long, tall, black figure who resembled Lord Death completely, only with a more womanly shape, approached the trio and stood right behind Siren, her large hands on her hips as her skull mask showed a very disappointed emotion.
"M-Mom?"
"Thank goodness I've found you, I've been looking in all eight universes for you for days! It's time to come home now, Siren, I know what you did and I'm not happy about it one bit."
"But mom, I-"
"No buts, you are in extreme trouble, young woman. You're going to be facing dungeon time the minute we get back to our universe. Now come." She placed a hand upon Siren's head and waited for the young girl to rise. The tear filled reaper girl gave one big hug to Kid and whispered in his ear…
"Check the mirror…" And her mother dragged her away without another word. The remaining two were completely confused as to what just happened, but deep down inside they figured it would probably be for the best…
88888888
"Can you please stop pacing, Kid? I don't know how to deal with people who pace a lot." Crona slouched over in the waiting room chair, joining his other friends who were all ready for the stripe haired reaper to end his impulsive pacing and just sit down. He had good reason to pace of course; right now they were all waiting to see whether or not Liz's baby survived the accident with the car.
Patty wasn't her usual giggly self either, sure she was sitting there drawing giraffes to pass the time, but she was actually very nervous, what if her little niece or nephew didn't survive? It was a sad thing to think about, so she tried not to think about it that much at all.
Everyone pretty much had their own way of dealing with the pain of waiting for either good news or bad news. Maka was continuously playing with and adjusting her engagement ring, Soul mostly just sat there and stared at her, his thoughts weighed down with how he's going to react when the news comes, and if it's bad, how he's going to comfort his pal Kid since he knows it will pretty much kill him. Black*Star dealt with it by borrowing money from everyone and playing with the snack machines, going back and forth at least a hundred times, and taking at least ten items out each time he came back from a new machine. His partner sat patiently and blushed in embarrassment every time her meister came back with a handful of junk food. Crona hummed lightly to himself, his eyes dancing around the hospital as he tried not to think of all the people who have died here, or who have had serious, life threatening, unidentifiable diseases here, or how many babies have been born here, or how much blood has been lost here, or all the horrifying things that have happened here… It was awful. And of course, his girlfriend was just sitting next to him, seeming to be so calm as she drew her pictures.
Then there was Kid who kept on pacing back and forth, whispering things like "I should be in there with her, why won't they let me at least wait outside her door" and driving everyone crazy in the process.
To think that a little thing that nobody even knew existed until a day ago could cause so many people to sit here patiently and pray for it to be alright, it was actually pretty amazing.
Everyone was also a little worked up over the giant storm thing that happened outside just hours ago, and to think it was caused by Siren, it's even more unnerving. That girl was their friend, she had already made her place in the group known, and then suddenly she was gone, like she never even existed.
And then a doctor, who ever so slightly resembled Dr. Stein, only with brown hair and no bolt in his head, came walking towards them while holding a clipboard. Kid ran to him like a moth to a porch light, his hands in a prayer formation as his eyes eagerly told him to just spit out the news and get it over with.
"What's the news? Is it good? Is it bad?"
"Well, I've got some bad news for you all." He said while adjusting his glasses, his voice extremely monotone as he totally disregarded Kid's plead for an answer. The reaper felt his eyes begin to tear up and he slowly sunk to the ground, everyone else's expressions weren't all that different from his as reality set in on them.
The doctor cleared his throat before speaking again…
"The bad news is that, unfortunately, there are no more coconut dream wafers because someone keeps on raiding all the vending machines." Everyone stared at the doctor in confusion, why the hell was he talking about cookies at a time like this?
"Wait… The bad news isn't about the baby?"
"The baby? Oh, yeah, the baby is fine. Since one of its parents is a weapon and the other is human, there was an even chance of the baby either being human like the father or a gun like the mother. Upon the impact from the car, the baby somehow transformed into a gun before any damage could be done, which therefore saved the little one's life." Kid's face lit up like Las Vegas, and he was almost ready to hug the doctor. It was a miracle, a true miracle.
"If you want to see the mother, she's in room 224, but I can really only let one person in at a time right now as she's still pretty shaken from everything that happened and too many people might get her anxious." The doctor waited for someone to stand up, but everyone already knew that it was Kid who should see her first, and he really, really wanted to. Even then he looked over at Patty to see if she wanted to go ahead, but she gave him a smile and continued her drawing, figuring that she should stay with Crona and make sure he didn't get anxious since he wasn't all that fond of hospitals.
"May I see her?" Kid asked lightly. The doctor nodded his head and turned around, escorting him to the room that she was in.
They walked down the long hall of white doors, nurses and doctors all passing them by as they walked to their destinations, but everything seemed so blurred as Kid's heart raced with anticipation of seeing Liz, and knowing that her baby, their baby, was perfectly fine.
The doctor opened the door for him and Kid walked inside, laying his eyes upon Liz who had one arm in a cast, and quickly sitting down next to her as she perked up with delight from seeing him come in first.
"You heard about the baby? Pretty crazy, huh?"
"Yeah, it's a miracle." He reached his hand out to rub her belly, sighing at the warmness of the area that was now home to a new living soul.
"I just can't believe it… I must really be meant to be a mother if even after all of that, this little one is still okay." Kid sighed before kissing her cheek and whispering a request to her…
"If you don't mind, I want to suggest a name for the baby…"
"Okay, I'm listening."
"Kiseki… I think her name should be Kiseki."
"Kiseki… I like that…"
*Sniff* Well, there you have it, there's the end...
So! Doing the whole fight scene was extremely hard for me, not only because I'm not at all good with writing fight scenes, but also because I didn't want the fight to go on for too long since I had come to like Siren and her many strange ways and didn't want to kill her.
I hope I made the scene with Liz emotional enough. I personally don't think it's enough to strike a tear, but then again I'm not that emotional of a person, so it's hard for me to write tear-jerker scenes. Typically, if there ever is a scene I've written that makes you ball your eyes out, it's obviously because I had just found out one of my favorite shows has been cancelled shortly before writing the scene. That's about the only thing I get emotional over. That and those damn ASPCA commercials... *Sniff* those things get me every time. Poor puppies...
For those of you who haven't already googled it or figured it out by now, Kiseki is the Japanese word for Miracle. While I was writing this, I was noticing that towards the middle I mention miracles a lot, so out of curiosity I went and Google Translated the word Miracle into Japanese, and it came out with Kiseki. I was thinking "That'd be such a nice name for a baby!" so I went ahead and decided "Yep, that'll be her name."
I think it would be cute for the baby to be a girl, so I have Kid mostly referring to the baby as being female. Not that I have anything against it being a boy, but I do have some plans for little Kiseki that would make a little more sense with a girl than with a boy...
And by plans, I of course mean that I'm making a KaWBII!
I couldn't just end it there! There is sooo much crap that needs to be revealed!
Plus my cousin Jake, or as he calls himself, Super Kid, has been giving me lots of ideas for what the second book will be like. Keep in mind that he's seven years old and is now, for some reason, obsessed with Symmetry, and I did not have anything to do with it! But, I think it's super cute so I find every excuse in the book to brag about him. :) I love my cousin!
Also keep in mind that I wrote another version of KaWB specifically for him so that he stops going on my fanfiction page and reading my stories. It's basically the same exact thing as this KaWB, only without the cursing and such. No, I'm not letting him read this version... I don't need him running around the house yelling "Bastard!" and then being asked by my aunt on what on earth I'm letting him read.
Sorry that I'm making this authors note so damn long but I got a lot to say, okay?
The part with Simon was super easy to write. In my head I picture him as looking like Jack Simon, or better known as November 11, from Darker than Black, yet having the same annoyance power as Excalibur. I admit I've had similar situations to Kid's incident with Simon, me and my protagonist Joey from Monster Academy would often argue over what he should do next. Sometimes he didn't want to make the most cliche move, even though the most cliche move was the only sensible move to make.
I was totally inspired by AT for that part where Simon tries getting Kid to sing the Cheers theme song and almost succeeds, I couldn't help but giggle to myself as I wrote it. I can't help it, I love Simon Day!
Rebekah White's name was something I didn't really catch onto until her lines were all already written out, and being a lazy name maker, I didn't want to change it to something else. Just be happy I didn't go with the last name Black as I had originally planned.
Well, as for the part with Siren, it kind of upset me that she was pretty much an un-alarming good girl up until she caught Kid and Liz in the bathroom together, but I guess jealousy can get anyone ticked off to the point where they bring on the apocalypse. Nobody bite my head off for that, okay? I tried making it make sense, I just sort of failed. Oh well, you got the point out of it I'm sure, Laura is a psycho world destroyer, who is also really annoying with her dictionary definition thing.
Now that story one is finished, I can get working on the sequel! Yay! Oh boy this is gonna be hell...
Hopefully story two will be more planned out, because honestly, this thing was a freaking train wreck, a happy, funny train wreck, but a train wreck nonetheless.
I'm gonna go eat some soup now while watching funny videos of cats...
Saying goodbye for the last time in KaWB...
-The Symmetricalist
