Dark Chocolate, White Diamonds
By Dixxy
Chapter Seventeen: Talpa's Near Return
(Keisha)
I looked at my boyfriend in shock and disbelief. There's just no way that thing can be Talpa! "You're kidding me!" I said. That COULDN'T be Talpa. Either Kento was going crazy and playing a very NOT funny joke on me , or the demon was playing some sort of a sick game with us. "Didn't Trulpa kill him to drain his powers?"
Yet, even from my awkward view of him, I could clearly see that Kento's eyes were wide with terror. His face has gone oddly pale, and it wasn't the same Kento I was used to seeing. The Kento I knew and loved was a relatively cool-headed teddy bear who always had a good joke on hand and a hefty appetite to go with it. This Kento just looked scared. "I, I thought so, too. . . but. . . it sounds like him. . . and I can feel him. . ." he stuttered dumbly.
Slowly, an armored figure was partially materialized onto the throne. It wore a black and gray armor with seven huge blades on its back. A red face plate was surrounded by two long pigtails of white hair and a dome shaped helmet with two huge stag like decorations on top. I sensed a dark evil much like Trulpa's radiating off him. It must have been Talpa. Even I couldn't deny it any longer, and I'd never met him before. This was Talpa. This was Trulpa's brother.
We were both in BIG trouble.
His form still somewhat see-through and occasionally fading a little, Talpa stood up and walked over to us. The floor shook slightly as an armored foot slammed against the floor with each step taken, a clanking sound echoing off the walls. Kento held my hands, trying to comfort us both. "So, Kento of the Hardrock, you thought I was defeated?" asked the former Dynasty emperor.
Kento shook his head, snapping out of the slight trance he'd been in. Now he just looked pissed and irritable. "No! It can't be! Trulpa killed you! She sucked what was left of your powers out of you and took over your entire army! You CAN'T be alive!" he argued. "You're dead, gone, you aren't coming back! This is all some kind of a bad dream. It has to be!"
"Oh, but you aren't dreaming. However, you are correct; I'm not alive. My sister did drain what was left of my powers, though I hadn't realized she'd taken my army," Talpa said coolly. He began to pace back and forth before us, glowing eyes centered specifically on Kento. The demon did, however, occasionally throw a glance my way. Though I couldn't see it, I could sense his eyes were looking me over- evaluating me.
"You're a ghost," I said slowly, piecing everything together. Talpa turned to me in mild interest. "A spirit of some sort. Trulpa wasn't able to completely destroy you- enough of your spirit was left so you could turn to the Dark Wing to regain power little by little so you could come back and take revenge on your sister- I was supposed to be the final ritual."
"My, the little whore is smart, isn't she?" said Talpa.
"Don't you DARE call her a whore!" said Kento, beginning to struggle against our bonds. I felt him jostle me, a small cry escaping my lips. Afraid of hurting me, my partner in arms ceased the action. Talpa laughed at his fruitless efforts at escape, getting a snarl from Kento. I frowned, thinking that the former Nether Realm lord was playing him to get a reaction.
Talpa chuckled evilly to himself, his eyes glowing red. "Oh, I'm sorry, Kento of the Hardrock, did I insult your little slut?" he spat bitterly (Kento growled again). "Just a little wench to fulfill your hormonal pleasures, I see? Just a cheap little screw to satisfy your dirty needs. Perhaps even bear your children? Maybe she'll die during childbirth. That would be nice, wouldn't it?"
I could sense Kento's unrest towards his former arch enemy. I didn't try to calm him down anymore- this was becoming his battle very quickly. After all, it was this. . . thing before us that he had originally been sworn to defend the world against. "I swear, Talpa, if you think you're going to touch a hair on Keisha's head, you've got another thing coming! I'll blow your ass from here to the moon, rip out your insides, and THEN I'll kill you!" From there he started to swear in wild strings of Japanese and Chinese, mixing in a few choice words Anubis had yelled at the boys for using (plus a few phrases Ria had picked up to confuse her teachers that I knew the "colorful" translations to). I could feel his emotions pouring out in a torrent of rage, all of them directed at Talpa because he had insulted me.
Oh, Kento. . .
Talpa watched in some form of amusement as Kento's temper got further and further out of control. "Hmm, your mouth hasn't ceased in the past year and a half, has it? Still as sharp as I remember," he said. If his face could have moved, I swear, he would've been smiling some cruel grin. "I'm intrigued to know how you ended up in this country, but it is no matter. If you are here, then you are here. It was please me greatly to have you watch me enjoy your little bitch, eh?"
"Like hell you will!" I snapped. Now MY temper was going off. I shook the ropes, glaring at our captor with as must ferocity I could muster. "If you think one damn minute you're going to get your filthy, slimy demon hands on me then you've got another thing coming you ass hole! I'm not going anywhere or doing anything with the likes of YOU!"
"That's what you think, little girl," he said. His eyes glowed. "I don't suppose that Kento told you about this, or did he?" Slowly, Talpa raised his hand and the two of us were enveloped in an extremely excruciating pain. Kento tensed up and began screaming in agony. I felt the bond between us begin to pulsate as I, too, cried out in anguish. I wanted it to stop. The torture we were being put through was inhuman. I wasn't sure if my body could take much more of it. Is this what that demon did to Kento, Sage, and Cye that broke the barriers? Is this what they were subjected to all that time? Is this was Trulpa did to keep them in check? I thought absently. It burned me to think Kento had to go through it again.
The pain stopped, leaving both of us breathless. We both leaned forward, panting and gasping for air. Talpa laughed, as did the Dark Wing. I looked up at them. I saw my grandmother amongst them, laughing at me pain. She was enjoying watching me suffer. Me, her own flesh and blood. Had she laughed like this when my parents died? The thought sickened me to the point where I wanted to throw up. My own grandmother. . .
Don't worry, Keish, I forgot about something.
What, Kento? How could you FORGETTING something be good?
Even if I remembered it, it would still be here. After you left, I got a bad feeling and went over to your place and found Evan tied up. He filled me in on what happened and, after I told him I was going after you, he insisted on coming with me to rescue you, even after I told him how dangerous it was going to be. Evan didn't care- all he cared about was rescuing you, Keisha. So, I brought him with me.
Evan's HERE? Kento, why is he here? He could get hurt!
Yup. He's in one of the back rooms, though by now he's probably left already. And since the clan and Talpa are both busy, then they obviously don't know about him being here, Kento thought. I felt him mentally grin. That's good for us. If Evan is able to pull something, we MIGHT live.
I wasn't sure if the thought that Evan was at the complex made me feel any better. He was my older brother, sure, but he didn't know what he was doing. Evan had no super powers, little if ANY training with any sort of defensive art, and I wasn't sure how well he'd handle a life or death situation.
I turned my head up to see what Talpa and the clan had been doing. The clan was chanting something while Talpa had taken his seat back on the throne/altar thing. His fingers drumming on his knees as he waited for something. "They're starting," I said. I turned my head to Kento. "They're really, really, really starting this ritual- Kento, we don't have much time."
Kento's eyes wandered. "Come on. . . come on. . ." he said.
Suddenly, I felt myself being lifted into the air, and I yelped in surprise and pure horror- this was a bad thing. This must have meant that things were really beginning to roll. I looked down to see that, indeed, Kento and I were being lifted high into the air. I screamed, getting frightened. I could even hear my lover beginning to panic.
"Oh God. . . oh God. . ." he repeated over and over. He held my hands even tighter. "Keisha. . ."
"Yes?" I said.
"If we don't live through this, I love you," he said. "I always will."
I nearly cried. Even though things were looking bad, those words meant everything. "I love you, too," I said. I closed my eyes. We had stopped our ascent, the two of us hanging in the air with our legs dangling down below us. "This is it. We're going to die."
"At, at, at least, at least, at least we're, we're dying, dying to, to, to, together," he said. Kento's voice was getting shakier, as if he, too, were beginning to loose hope. We turned to look at each other, and slowly joined our lips in what we thought would be our very last kiss.
As if it were a dream, I began to feel drowsy and sick. The ritual was beginning. I tried to resist the feeling, struggling to escape it. From the movement behind me, I could see Kento was fighting it, too. Below us, the chanting intensified, and Talpa began to laugh. I felt a dark evil surrounded me, trying to suffocate me. I screamed, getting scared. I didn't want to die!
THUD!
The sensations stopped, and Kento and I found ourselves on the ground. The ropes were loosening up, my boyfriend untangling us from it. The clan was rushing over to where Simon, the High Priest, had been standing. Talpa was moving in that direction as well, screaming something in Japanese.
"What is he screaming about!" I asked.
My boyfriend looked either happy or panicked. "Evan! He must've grabbed the High Priest's Staff or something to stop the ceremony!" said Kento. "While that was, in essence, a good idea- EVAN! YOU IDIOT! GET OUT OF THERE BEFORE YOU GET YOURSELF KILLED!"
"EVAN!" I screamed. I heard him scream as the Dark Wing advanced on him. My anger focused on the clan. On Simon, their leader. On Talpa, their master and my lover's arch nemesis. And my grandmother, who had sacrificed my parents- her daughter and son-in-law- and tried to sacrifice me. And now they were all trying to take away the last family I had; Evan. He was the only family I had now. He was my brother. He'd gone with Kento to save me even after my lover had told him that it hadn't been a good idea. There was no way I'd let them get away with hurting my brother!
As my anger intensified, I felt a powerful throbbing begin to bubble up inside my head. I fell to my knees, clutching my head as the feeling intensified. I winced, crying out in pain. Kento dropped to my side, looking me over in concern as I continued to wail in anguish.
"Keisha!" said Kento. "Are you all right?"
I held my head tighter, trying to stop the pulsating pain. I screamed out a few times, unsure of what was happening. It felt like my head was ready to explode into a million pieces. I dug my fingernails into my scalp, desperate to stop it, but nothing was working- if anything it only got worse.
Kento wasn't taking it much better. He had his hands on my shoulders and was trying to snap me out of it. "Keisha, you're only hurting yourself!" said Kento. "What are you doing? Don't scare me like this!" I could tell he was worried, but I was more worried about the sudden migraine from Hell I had suddenly received.
"My head. . . it hurts. . . AH!"
Kento held my wrist. "Fight the pain. . . you can get through it. . . come on, girl, I know you can do it. . ." he encouraged. He looked at me with concerned and worried as I stared back through tear soaked ones. "I need your help. I can't possibly stand down the Dark Wing AND Talpa by myself! I need you!"
"AHH!" I threw my hands out in front of me, the air seeming to ripple as the Dark Wing was tossed in several directions away from my brother. Evan stood where they had once been, holding Simon's staff in confusion. I stared in disbelief at what had just happened, not sure WHY they'd flown all over the place. "What in the-"
"Telekinesis!" said Kento. "You can use telekinesis!"
"Tele-what?" I asked.
"The psychic power that lets you move stuff with your thoughts!" said Kento. "Try it again!"
I decided to try out Kento's idea, raising my hands into the air. I concentrated on the one of the Dark Wing clan members, one of the women who had helped with the oils and gels. I tried to lift her into the air and found the task easy. She screamed, her arms flailing around as she tried to get back to the ground. I decided she'd be happier up in the rafters and placed her there. I almost laughed as she stared at the ground, screaming.
Kento looked at me, grinning. "I like this new power of yours."
I nodded, getting to my feet and turning to my boyfriend. "Let's kick some butt and get out of here," I said. I turned my attention back to the problem at hand and made a fist, slamming it into my open palm. "These guys are going to pay DEARLY for killing my parents, and they're going to pay NOW!"
