Chapter 23: Bakuro; Revelation

Upon seeing Natsume's tail frozen, something within Mikan took over her and propelled her towards the male bodyguard. Not knowing if it was fear or courage, Mikan grabbed onto Natsume's hand and hulled him towards herself. Maybe it was the fact that Natsume had saved her on countless events and this was the only time to repay him, but when her hand touched his, Mikan instantly felt that she had done something right.

Covering her body with his, it was as if time stopped for that brief moment. She could feel his ragged breath on her bare skin and his tensed body within her arms. Then as soon as she felt her body temperature rise, the frozen corpse of the mononoke slammed into her back. With a jolt, she quickly flicked her tail to move out of the way, dragging Natsume's heavy body with her. Despite the danger of the mononoke being gone, the ice from Natsume's tail did not stop creeping up his body. Mikan heard Natsume take in sharps breaths of air and felt his fingers curling into a tight ball every so often.

Seeing how seven women (four were doppelgangers) are attempting to haul him quickly to the palace, Natsume attempted to move his tail, but this was only met with a sharp stabbing pain throughout each joint in his tail.

Upon reaching the infirmary, Mikan somehow knew that placing her hands over his tail was the correct thing to do and once she did, she fell into a trance. In that moment, she heard soft whisperings as if they were telling her the ancient words to reverse Nobara's Alice. The words were foreign to her but yet she instinctively understood what they were meant to do. Within her mind's eyes, she could see Nobara's Alice etching itself to the various nerves and muscle within Natsume's tail and as long as she focused on that position, the spreading of the ice Alice stopped.

After she had prevented the diffusion of the ice Alice, a consistent string of words started being repeated in her mind. Not knowing what they meant, Mikan spoke the words in her mind in repetition and slowly, the ice Alice gathered together where her hand was. Immediately Mikan could feel a cool, small stone form within her palm and as the Alice was removed, the chanting in her mind grew softer.

As soon as she had successfully removed all of the Alice, there was complete silence and Mikan slowly opened her eyes. Looking into her palm, she slowly opened it to reveal a small ice blue stone. Assessing Natsume's tail with her own eyes, she was overjoyed that Nobara's Alice did not affect Natsume anymore and before her, Natsume's bright red tail started swishing slowly.

"Good thinking Mikan-hime! Using a nullification stone to remove the effects of another Alice!" Tsubasa exclaimed.

Mikan's head immediately whipped towards him.

"Nullification stone?"

She had clearly remembered that her pouch was drawn shut. During the elimination of the mononoke, Mikan did not have the time to pull open the pouch which she kept all her Alice stones. What on earth was Tsubasa saying? In fact, at that moment, everyone's eyes were drawn to the small brown pouch which hung at her waist.

"Mikan… I thought you didn't have an Alice?" Misaki looked quizzically at her, noting that the pouch had obviously not been opened.

"The last I checked I know that I didn't have one."

"I don't, do I?" Mikan stared at the group with surprise. "I mean I know I was born without one. The whole palace knew I was a child born without an Alice, that's why they pitied me; the first born but without an Alice."

Looking around for an explanation, she saw Nobara smiling.

"Why are you smiling at me like that?" Mikan questioned the vessel of the aqua stone.

"It is not that you are born without one, it is because there are no means to detect your Alice." Nobara explained.

"What do you mean there are no means? Didn't the royal physicians report that the child within Yuka-sama was to be born without an Alice, just like Izumi-sama?" Misaki questioned Nobara with furious eyes.

Nobara put up her hands, signalling to them to calm down, "Yes it is true that Mikan-hime was declared to be a being without an Alice, but as you all understand, the Nullification Alice would nullify all other Alices, that would include any detecting Alice that the physicians have. As such, Mikan-hime was thought to have no Alice, but instead, it was because her Alice has been activated before she was born."

Mikan looked at her hands and mumbled, "so that means… otou-san had the nullification Alice?"

"Yes, that is correct." Nobara nodded in her general direction.

"That means, my father was ridiculed and laughed at by the court because they never knew that he had the nullification Alice?!" Mikan was getting more agitated.

She remembered the snide comments passed by the royal members during the annual banquet, where they would laugh at the king for being a puppet king. She remembered the scornful looks she received from her stepmother, how the royal household looked at her with such pitiful looks. She remembered all the tears she shed in private because of her lack of Alice.

"But that does not mean that either you or your father are any lower in status within the eyes of your people." Natsume softly broke the silence.

Yoichi and Tsubasa swam towards her and took a hand each.

"What he says is true hime, we have never once passed judgement on the King just because of his lack of an Alice. We would throw down our lives for any of the royal family members." Tsubasa tightened his grip on her hand.

"Likewise Mikan-hime, the army has never chosen who to offer assistance to merely based on the presence or absence of an Alice. Well, Koko and I don't anyway." The silver haired boy grinned cheekily at the princess.

"Thank you." Taking a deep breathe, Mikan allowed her anger to dissipate and she tightened her own grip on the hands of the guards while looking around at her companions on this journey.

Reo cleared his throat with a soft cough, "I'd hate to break up the happy reassurance, but were we not here to investigate a way to help Ibara-hime's Alice to its original state?"

Realising that the group was still amidst the waters of the graveyard, Mikan let go of both Tsubasa and Yoichi's hands before swimming up to Nobara, encouraging her to continue her explanation of that fateful day's events.

"As I was telling you before we were interrupted by the attacks, I was at the graveyard trying to stimulate the movement of water. However, just as I was about to activate my Alice, I felt this overwhelming burn throughout my body." Nobara explained.

Beside her, Reo nodded and added, "it is true. In that short moment, Nobara-hime's body glowed bright red and then it disappeared, as if it a trick of the light."

"Immediately after, I brushed it off as the sun's light dancing on my skin and a warm current happening to flow by. I didn't feel any pain nor felt that anything was out of sorts, that's why I ignored it. However, once I moved my arms to move the water like I usually do, nothing happened. Reo and I just floated there waiting for something to happen, thinking that maybe the water took a longer time to respond. But as I repeated the motion, it soon became apparent that my Alice wasn't working." A distraught Nobara covered her face with her palms.

Raising one hand and gently placing it on Nobara's shoulder, Reo continued in her place, "you could say out of desperation Nobara panicked and what happened next, you all saw at the graveyard. A jet of ice flew out of her palms and dropped to the bottom of the ocean. Whenever she gets emotional, ice would start to form rather than water."

Reo looked down at Nobara to see her still refusing to look up. "It has been this way for three years, regretfully with no signs of improvement."

Everyone within the room remained silent, unsure how to respond to the strange occurrence that the Aqua vessel was afflicted with. With the clanging of the large bell which indicated the time, the group jolted out of their thoughts.

Nobara raised her head and her eyes were lined with tears, wiping them away with her right arm, she got up from her seat and moved to the door. "It is late, let us all return to our rooms and rest. Perhaps the solution to this problem will come to us tomorrow when we are fresher. A lot of things have happened today and I'm sure all of you are tired. Please do not worry about it now and retire for the night."

The group bowed at the departure of Nobara and one by one, Yoichi, Misaki and Tsubasa left the medical clinic after wishing Natsume well. Since the medical staff had left earlier due to Nobara wishing to speak in a more private setting, Mikan was left within the room. Seeing as everyone else had departed, Mikan turned to Natsume with a cheerful smile.

"I hope your wound heals fast."

"Hopefully." Natsume grunted out.

Mikan began swimming to the furthest algae by the window and began covering it with the darkened cover beside it. One by one, as the algae lights were covered, the room began to darken, leaving only the small portable algae beside Natsume's bed and those at the door as the only light source.

Noticing that she had successfully made the room more cosy, Mikan wished Natsume good night and turned to swim towards the door but Natsume grabbed her wrist.

"Hang on." Natsume pulled the covers off his tail and got up while holding on to Mikan's wrist.

"You shouldn't be moving…" Mikan began but immediately kept quiet once Natsume gave her an annoyed look.

"Stay." And at this, he swam to the clinic doors before pulling the door shut and locking it.

Looking quizzically at Natsume, Mikan was about to ask what he was trying to do before he commanded her to take off her shirt.

"Wh-WHAT?!" Mikan practically screamed while hugging her shirt even tighter to her body.

Sighing loudly and in a frustrated tone, Natsume swam to one of the glass cabinets and using the dim lights, found a clear blue jar with a pasty white substance. Swimming back to her after closing the doors to the cabinet, he opened the jar and stuck his fore and middle finger into the substance.

"Strip or I'll do it for you." Natsume's tail began hurting a little so he sat down on the bed, with Mikan's back facing him.

"I don't like the tone you're taking with me…" Mikan started protesting but Natsume used his free hand and gently prodded her in the back. "UGH! THAT HURT!" Mikan roared.

She instantly whipped around only to catch Natsume's smirking face looking right at her. Mikan's eyes widened and her cheeks suddenly felt very warm. Was it the poor lighting or has Natsume always had that mesmerising look? His crimson eyes were gentle yet piercing, his nose was angled just the way she liked it.

"Are you going to take off your shirt or are we going to sit here the whole night while you admire my sculpted face?" Natsume raised one eyebrow.

Narrowing her eyes, Mikan turned her back and compromised by raising her shirt an inch. Taking it as a sign of submission, Natsume immediately pushed the shirt up to her shoulders such that her entire back was exposed.

"Nice bra." He commented cheekily and Mikan attempted to turn around to smack him on the head but got hit first with his left hand that held the shirt up.

"Stop moving idiot, it's hard to see where your bruise starts and ends with this lighting." Natsume complained while gingerly applying a thin layer of the medicine on Mikan's skin.

"Mi… Misaki told me that this was the undergarments which the merpeople wore. You can't expect me to be wearing a corset underwater can you?" Mikan tried explaining herself, hoping that as her voice filled the air, her nervousness would disappear.

But of course, how could she calm her heart down when there was only a flimsy thin string around her neck and her body holding the two shell-like cups around her breast? If Natsume was as cheeky as she knew him to be, all he needed to do was to pull one string and the entire garment would fall off her body.

Reaching for the jar on the side table beside Mikan to get more medicine, Aoi's Alice stone which hung round his neck brushed against Mikan's bruise and she winced.

Feeling her jerk away from him instantaneously, Natsume quickly looked down and noted the red Alice stone swaying innocently. He muttered an apology and went back to applying the lotion on the unattended parts of the bruise.

"Is most of it covered yet?" Mikan asked while staring at a particularly interesting spot on the ground.

"Not yet. Hang on for a bit more. It's pretty bad." Natsume replied in a robotic manner while trying to suppress his anger at his inability to protect Mikan.

Mikan squirmed in her seat and this earned her a light tap on the head by Natsume.

"Sorry, it just feels a little uncomfortable. The lotion is making my skin really really hot." Mikan tried explaining her discomfort.

Ignoring Mikan's inability to sit still for a few moments, he continued applying the medicine and surveying the damage which was done to her skin. Feeling the softness beneath his fingertips, the bruise stretched from her mid back to the bottom and from side to side. He knew such an injury would be sustained when the frozen mononoke's corpse fell on top of her while she was shielding him. Firstly, it wasn't a small mononoke and secondly, when something that large and heavy hits you even in water, it is bound to leave a giant bruise.

"I could have dodged that stray aim of Nobara's."

"Yeah well, you could, but you were busy with the other mononokes."

Feeling Mikan winced again, he stopped and gently blew on the areas with the now transparent lotion. Immediately, Natsume noted the goosebumps that formed on Mikan's neck and arms. While the sudden rush of cool air was not unwelcomed, it came as a shock to her.

"Can you not do…" Mikan began her flurry of complaints but was cut off by Natsume.

"You said it was burning, so I'd try to alleviate it. Do you ever not complain Mikan-hime?" Natsume purposely emphasised the last word.

Pouting, Mikan returned to stare at her spot on the ground while trying to ignore the pound of her heart in her ears. Sure, what he was doing was a really nice gesture, but she wished that he would hurry up as her self-control over her heart was waning.

Suddenly without warning, Mikan felt Natsume's lips on the skin of her back.

"WHA-"

"I'm sorry." Natsume quietly whispered.

Mikan took a deep breath and dared to turn around, only to see Natsume staring intently at her back. "Why'd you suddenly apologise? Don't tell me you put that lotion all over my shirt."

"I'm sorry that you had to have this bruise. It really says a lot about me being your bodyguard." Natsume mumbled.

Raising one hand, Mikan gently patted his head and allowed it to bounce up and down.

"I don't blame you. It was me who shot out of position to cover you. Is it really that bad?" Mikan enquired and turned around quickly to allow Natsume to get a better view of her back.

Natsume again planted a kiss on another part of the bruise before answering her, "it is."

Mikan's breath caught in her throat. The intimacy of it all caused her body to swell with heat and she could feel her skin flushing.

"I have yet to put the medicine here," and he kissed the most left side of her back, "here", he kissed the most right side of her back, "here", Natsume lowered himself to kiss the small of her back, "and here", raising himself up, he kissed the middle of her back.

Each time he kissed her back, he could feel her body shudder with his touch and with each kiss, it made him bolder and bolder. By the time he had kissed the four corners of her back, he knew Mikan's body was tensed in anticipation.

"Mikan…" He whispered gently into her ears while slowly caressing her back to spread out the lotion.

"Mikan…" He whispered gently and was replied with her soft groans.

Unsure whether it was because he was pressing on her bruise too hard or because she was enjoying his, he dared to tease her, "Mikan… are you in pain?"

Mikan shook her head slightly in response, as if entranced by his touch. He glimpsed at her face and noted that she had closed her eyes in an attempt to control her breathing. But in the dim lighting, he could see her chest rise and fall in an uneven pattern.

Slowly he moved his right hand around to her stomach and began to draw light circles. Immediately her breath hitched and she clenched the bedsheets. Moving his body closer to Mikan's, Natsume lightly kissed her beneath her earlobe while holding on to her shirt.

"Natsume…" Mikan moaned. Taking this as a good sign, Natsume gently turned Mikan around and looked her in the eyes.

Seeing that her eyes were glazed over with passion, he cupped her face with both hands, allowing the shirt to cover her back once again.

"Mikan, I…" He started his confession.

He didn't know when it started, but there was always this strange tightening feeling in his heart when he looked at her. His stomach would always do flips when he saw her smiling and today when she reached out to protect him, his soul literally tore at him. He needed to tell her, needed to express in whatever little words he could of this insatiable desire he had of her. He needed to let her know of his feelings.

Mikan grabbed the back of his shirt to steady her swaying body but in that moment, she didn't shy away from his gaze. In fact, she somehow liked revelling in his intense look. The things that he did to her body simply by caressing her drove her over the edge. She was caught in between a high and reality because he stopped touching her. The places where his hand and lips once were was burning and she ached for him to return back to whatever he was doing.

"Mikan…" His low voice entranced her further.

"Hm…?" Mikan hummed back while pulling herself closer to him.

"I…" Natsume began but Mikan sealed his lips with hers.

In that moment, it was as if words could no longer describe how he was feeling. Natsume prayed that whatever happened, he hoped that actions would be able to transmit what he was feeling inside. Though he was taken by shock by Mikan's bold move, he did not reject it.

Slowly but surely, Natsume moved his lips on hers, kissing every inch of her lips and her hands slowly snaked their way around his neck. He licked her lower lip, tempting her to open up just a little and as if by instinct, Mikan parted her lips and gave him access to the crevice of her mouth. Dancing with such fury and passion, their tongues fought for dominance.

Natsume, careful not to rub on her bruise, felt that he could not keep his hands idle on her body as the kiss deepened. Lowering it to her belly, Mikan's breathe hitched sharply in his mouth and the moment shattered instantly as her eyes shot open.

Pushing him away from her, she looked down at his hands while holding him at arm's length.

"I… we…" She fumbled for the words to form, to explain why she interrupted such a heated moment.

How could Mikan explain that while kissing him, a flashback of memories came back. She saw blood, she saw a dagger, she saw Natsume having the dagger plunged into his heart.

Natsume tried to brush aside her hands, to resume what they were doing, but when he lifted her chin to look into her eyes, he saw tears threatening to spill out.

His own eyes widened in fear. Was she crying because she realised that what they were doing was not entirely acceptable? Was she crying because she regretted what had happened? Or was she crying because she somehow felt his burning passion for her and wanted to reject him?

"What's wrong?" Natsume asked though his throat was closing up on him.

Mikan clung on him and her tears cascaded down her face. In a soft whisper, she confided in him.

"I… I saw you die."

This surprised Natsume very much. He didn't know how much he could endure if Mikan told him that she never wanted to see him again, but now having heard that she saw him die, it was a million times better than being rejected.

"What do you mean you saw me die? I'm here in front of you, aren't I?" Natsume tried consoling her.

"I saw blood everywhere… I saw black feathers floating… in puddles of blood. I saw you scream… while clutching a silver dagger which protruded… out of your chest." Mikan sobbed heavily while trying to explain herself.

Wrapping his arms around her, he soothed her hair and rocked her gently. "It's ok… it's all right. I'm here…"

After Mikan had calmed down, she spoke into his chest, "was that your past death? Or was that a premonition?"

Natsume placed his chin on top of her head and let out a deep breath.

"Truthfully I'm not sure myself, because until now, I don't fully have my memories of being a Shinigami yet."

Mikan's head jerked up and this caused Natsume a great deal of pain. Rubbing the top of her head, Mikan looked frantically into his eyes, "if you find out that it was a past death, you must let me know."

Natsume moved his jaw in an attempt to assure that it was not broken then looked down at Mikan's pleading eyes. He had no idea when Kami's sword would show him another memory within the plane of memories or when he would recall his previous death. But seeing how frightened she looked, Natsume promised Mikan that he would.

Another bell toiled to indicate that it was now two in the morning. "Look, it's late. I'll send you up to your room. You should go get some rest so that we can tackle Nobara-hime's problem tomorrow. Besides, seeing my death whether it was the past or the future isn't a good sign of your mental stability right now."

This earned him a light hit from Mikan as she got up from his bed and swam to the door to unlock it. Natsume followed closely behind while they were moving to her room. Once there and Mikan was inside, he bid her good night at her door.

The moonlight gently bathed Mikan in its glow and Natsume was once again reminded of the multitude of feelings he had for this woman.

"Natsume?" Mikan called out to him to disrupt his thoughts.

"Hm?"

"Thanks for putting the lotion on my back."

"Hm…" Natsume replied nonchalantly. "Good night hime."

"Good night Natsume." Mikan replied while blushing furiously as if the events of the night suddenly dawned on her.

"Oh Mikan." Natsume added in as if like an after-thought.

Mikan paused her motion to close the door while waiting for him to continue what he was about to say.

"I like you Mikan." With that, he helped her close her room door and swam away, back to the medical clinic.

Hi all, thank you for following the fanfic until now. This is the last chapter to be edited and for those who waited patiently all this years, I hope the next chapter continues to excite you! :)

Please leave a review to let me know your thoughts!