Author: babyg @ babygxpress
Foreword: Finally, pt 2 is out! For those who have been waiting for it, enjoy! Oh and do tell me if its nice..... or not.....
Akai Hana pt 2
It was night. An owl passed by the window of a particular inn and let out a loud hoot. It did this several times before finally flying off, after having caused the tenants in it a little disconcerted. In one particular room, Gojou slept on, not hearing anything.
In the dark, suddenly, a pair of feet made the slightest tap on the wooden floor. The moon, who shone through the window at that moment, framed a young girl's face, making her red hair slightly visible. Her pink eyes glittered in the light. She looked down at the sleeping heap before her, an unreadable expression on her face, her hand outstretched for a moment, something else glinting in it.
"Why did you not do as I told you to do!?" A man's gruff voice floated through the night.
"...... Don't worry o-nii-sama. I have my own plan. I will let no one stop me."
Gojou, sleeping, moved uncomfortably. Something was poking him by the side.
"Yeeoow...... what the hell is that?" Gojou mumbled, forcing his eyes to open. He came face to face with a pair of huge pink eyes staring at him.
"Go-chan! Ohayo gozaimasu!" A huge smile formed on her face.
"Wahsai! Don't wake me up like that!" Gojou's eyes popped out as he pushed her away and hurriedly got up.
"Cheh! I thought you liked being greeted like this!" Li pouted.
"I do, but not by little girls!"
*Boing* *crash*(Oops, Go-chan, was that your head?)
Li sat at a table, attacking her food with gusto.
"Ai.... Li-chan.... what a big appetite you have!"
"*chomp* I'm a growing kid...."
*clink* //...roll....//
"Shit, I dropped my coins...." Gojou crawled under the table to retrieve his coins.
Chien Li stared at the now vacant seat, her fork loaded with food, paused in front of her mouth. She licked her lips hungrily.
Later on in the day, as they were just exiting another inn, a sore loser who had just lost a heap of money to Gojou, sought a fight together with his friends. Although Gojou managed to protect Li and himself (he is a good fighter), the man, who knew he was about to lose, slashed his sword blindly in the air. The tip of the blade caught Gojou's arm; a nick appeared and soon blood was seeping out.
Li gasped in horror.
"Go-chan! Your arm!" She rushed over to him, and took his arm
He tried to shake her off. "Nandemo ne."
"Ie. Its quite a deep cut." She held on firmly, tore a piece of cloth out of her blouse. Gojou sighed, giving in reluctantly. No one did this for me before....
Suddenly he felt something licking at the cut. He looked down and saw Li licking up the blood around the cut, almost hungrily. His expression turned to disgust, and he tried to shake her off.
"Don't move Gojou. I have some healing powers. Like this, I can cure your cut." As she finished speaking, she looked up and showed him his arm. The cut which was originally there had closed, and only a faint scarlike line was visible. He gasped in astonishment. She smiled, then wrapped the piece of cloth around it.
"Although its healed, its still very delicate. You should be careful."
"H-how..did you do that?"
"Secret."
"Ch'."
As each day went by, Gojou seemed to have bad fortune; big thugs were trailing him and each time he got into a worser fight than the other, and almost always received a cut or more. But each time, Li was there to do her 'wonders'. And so Gojou thought himself very lucky indeed.
On exactly the fourth night after Li 'moved' in with Gojou, the night was still again. Gojou slept even more soundly than before, and didn't even budge when an owl hooted loudly, just outside his window.
"Why have you not killed him?! Didn't you tell me you would? What happened to your plan?!" The moonlight shone through the thicket, where a young man was pacing up and down agitatedly.
A girl stood leaning against a tree, not answering. To be sure, I don't know why myself. The night I tried to kill him, the first night, something stopped me.
"Answer me, Chien Li!" The man's voice turned menacing as he grabbed her by her collar. "Have you forgotten what this guy did to our mother? He tortured her till her death! Are you going to turn a blind eye to this? Don't you want to avenge her death?"
The girl shook herself free angrily. "I don't need to be reminded! I know what to do myself!"
The man's voice turned sickly sweet. " And be sure that you do, my lovely little sister. I know you have tasted his blood. But I didn't, and remember I can't live much longer. Bring him to the hut tomorrow night. And after we've killed him, and have his blood, " he pulled Chien Li into a tight embrace, " We can go off somewhere far together, and live many more happy years. Don't you want that too, Li? I love you." He said, bending down to kiss her.
Chien Li sighed in contentment. "I love you too, Tze. And I will bring him here." She pulled away. "But first, I need to make him fall in love with me, so I can get his blood from him willingly. He'll never know what hit him."
The man started to protest but she silenced him by placing a finger on his lips. "Don't worry. Everything will turn out right for us. I just don't want him to be unhappy or hate us for doing this."
"Yahoo, Go-chan! We've won again! What a huge pile of cash this time!" Li's voice echoed throughout the whole inn as she collected the money Gojou had just won from a tableful of men. He leaned back against his chair, looking very smug. The whole table looked at him despisedly.
"Let's goooo! Thank you and we'll come again, minna-san!" Li sang out as she pulled Gojou along with her. She didn't stop under they reached a deserted alley. Suddenly she stopped and smelled the air. Without a word she rushed towards the forest nearby.
"HoI! Where are you going? ....Ah-hoi!" Gojou ran after her worriedly.
Finally she came to a stop, somewhere in the middle of the forest. She turned around again, trying to look for something. Gojou reached her, panting heavily.
"What the hell is wrong with you??"
"Shh..." Somewhere nearby, a faint sound of crying was heard.
Li rushed towards the sound, Gojou beside her. They came to a clearing, and in the middle of the clearing, a small boy, barely aged 4 was hung on a tree, wailing for his life. Red flowers of all kinds were placed in a ring around him. There were flowers sprinkled all over his body too, all red in color.
Li gasped in horror, dropped the money bag with a huge Clink and tried to save the boy. Before she could reach him, however, a man suddenly appeared.
"Step back!" He ordered.
"Hoi hoi, what's the idea of playing around with a kid?" Gojou asked, eyebrow raised.
The guy smiled a lunatic smile, took out a huge sword, and without hesitation decapitated the poor little boy. His terrified screams would forever haunt Gojou as his blood splattered everywhere. Li screamed in horror and held on to Gojou. Gojou, amid the gory scene, noticed that the guy was lapping up the blood hungrily. He grimaced.
He pushed Li aside and with a "Stay here, and don't open your eyes", he attacked the man. The man, whose sword skill equaled him in strength, put up an amazing fight.
Finally after two hours, they both retreated from each other, snarling, but very tired and worn out. The man disappeared then, leaving a trail of red flowers behind him.
"Go-chan! You're hurt!" Li rushed over to him. He stood up, staring at the trail of flowers that were left behind. The image of the poor boy came floating in his mind. Li stood beside him, trying to persuade him quietly to go home.
Even after a week after the ordeal, Gojou never fully recovered. The screams of the boy he failed to save came to haunt him every night. However, Li was by his side everytime he awoke, sweating from yet another horrible nightmare. Li helped him through everything, even if he hated to admit it. Li was his saviour, from reality.
Or so he thought. Every night, after washing his blood off from his cuts, Chien Li secretly collected it in a bottle and sent it to a particular hut in the forest. Each day, when she found the cuts were beginning to heal, she nicked it so blood would flow once more, and she could have enough to send to Tze, her brother, who was also terribly hurt.
However, each day as she did this, a terrible feeling of guilt washed over her, each day more than before. She was falling in love with this Gojou, who seemed dependent on her, who treated her nicely, never asked anything from her, just her company. With him, she felt a sense of peace, to escape from the real world.
But she was also torn for her love for Tze. Both of them, brother and sister, had endured terrible mocking when they were young, because they were orphans, left unwanted by their mother. But, before their father passed away, they were a happy family, with both a mother and a father who cared for them. But then, their father passed away, and their mother married another man. From that time on, she acted as if she didn't know who they were, treating only one son as her rightful one; Dokugakuji. There was another one, the red-haired one. She hated him. Probably because she was reminded of them through his red hair, which they too both had.
They knew all about this, because they had often peeped in without their mother's knowledge that they were there. Li insisted on this because she was really close to her mother before, and although her mother disowned her now, she still wanted to know what was going on. She saw that particular day, when the young Gojou presented her mother, with a bunch of red flowers. Her mother had begun beating him. When they were a family before, all of them loved red flowers for as their father put it, " a symbol of love and caring."
In their young minds, they thought their mother still loved them, still remembered them, which was why she hated Gojou for bringing the red flowers. They had begun to use red flowers as their symbol ever since.
She and Tze had endure so much together, gone through everything together. They had both cared for no one but themselves. She loved and cared for Tze too, that was totally obvious, but......
"Ow! You're hurting me!" Gojou yowled suddenly.
Li jumped. Gojou had not given out such a huge reaction ever since that fateful day. She looked down and saw that she had been exerting a huge amount of pressure onto his arm, resulting in blood flowing out more than she needed.
She hurriedly took a cloth and pressed down on the wound tenderly. All this while, Gojou was staring at her. When she was fussing over his wound, he thought she looked like an angel.
"Li-chan...." he took her hand and pulled her closer to him, " Li-chan, thank you for staying with me through all this."
"Ie, what's a friend for, right?"
"Will you stay with me? I need you."
"...... I...."
"Please. Promise me."
"....But..."
He stared deeply into her eyes, moving closer. Li returned his stare, entranced. He bent down to kiss her.
Before he could reach her, his window burst open, and a figure stood on the ledge, holding out a huge sword. He jumped off and pulled Li towards him, pointing the sword dangerously at him.
"Stay away from Li." he said with a growl.
Gojou recognized the man. "Its you! You bloody son of a bitch! Let go of Li-chan! If you dare hurt her, I'll tear you into pieces. "
The guy burst out laughing hysterically. Then, Gojou realized that Li wasn't struggling. She looked very downcast.
"Tze... stop it. Its not fun anymore."
Gojou stepped back as if he was stabbed. Tze? She knew him? This guy who killed a boy mercilessly? The guy whom he had fought a week ago?
Tze stopped laughing and glared at Gojou.
"You are really simple-minded. Have you never thought of why those thugs all attacked you and always did their best to slash you up even if they knew they were in for certain death? Did you think Li actually had such an acute sense of smell that she could smell a boy crying in the forest that far away?"
"Stop it Tze!"
It was right. Why didn't that entered his mind before? She really couldn't have smelled that boy from that far, he saw it now. It was just that he didn't make himself see it; he wanted to believe in love.
"Is that true, Li?" His voice sounded cold and expressionless.
"Mo, yamete yo. I'm tired of all this. I'm so tired." Li sank down to the ground.
"Who are you guys, anyway? And what do you want from me?"
"Why my dear boy, your blood of course. It could save us from this terrible disease we are having now, so as our mother said. Oh, and she was your mother too. The one who hated your red flowers." Tze sprinkled a new spray of red flowers over to Gojou. The sickeningly sweet smell was suffocating.
Gojou stumbled back. His mother, the one he longed for love from, had actually told them to kill him. And now Li, who was just pretending, also out to get his blood. In his dazed and confused state, he ddin't realize that Tze was about to slash him. However Gojou tripped over a can that was left lying on the floor, and the blade only caught him in the arm; the arm which Li had been pressing just now for his blood.
" Ooh, Red flowers.... the color of blood!" He heard his stepmother's voice clearly.
"Tze, stop it! I don't think mother's right! Nothing can stop our disease. Look, you've had Gojou's blood for a week, and nothing's happened." Li said, standing behind Tze. Tze turned to look at her.
"But mother said....."
"Mother was wrong!"
"..... I don't care. Even if his blood is of no use I will still get it. He was trying to kiss you for godsake!" Tze eyes burned and he turned to attack Gojou. Gojou was slumped against the wall, not noticing anything, too absorbed in reliving his childhood.
"Tze!"
What happened then was so fast. Gojou saw Tze's sword raised, it was glinting brightly as if beckoning hungrily for his skin, just as he saw it slash down, he had closed his eyes. Its over, I don't need to live with this anymore. I want to die.
No burning sensation. No skin opening. But blood was splattering everywhere. It felt good. He could feel it as some of it hit his face, and he stretched out his hands. Someone fell into them.
He opened his eyes slowly. A very bloodied Li was lying there beside him, her face contorted into a peaceful smile, eyes shut. He went speechless with horror. Tze too, was like a statue. His arms were still outstretched as if holding the sword, which was now embedded in Li's back.
Gojou snapped out of it, and shook Li. Hard.
"Li!Li! Answer me! What are you doing? Its not the end yet! You were about to promise me you would stay together with me right? Right! Li! If you don't get awake now, I'll kill myself too. There's no use living on anymore." Right. What was stopping him? There was no sense in living anymore. He reached to pull out the sword from Li's back.
But Li, faintly lifted up a hand to stop him. He held her hand tightly to his cheek, sobbing as he never did before.
"Go-chan..... you must live.... You can't...change anything.... by dying.... But if you stay alive.... you might be able.... to change something.... Just don't go... the way.... me and Tze... did..."
Tze, hearing her voice, rushed to her side, tears also falling.
"Tze.... I love you...... we were together..... everywhere...... now that I;m not.... with you.... promise me.... you will live..... despite everything..... okay?" Li grimaced slightly as a trail of blood came out from the side of her mouth.
"Noooo! I can't! I won't! We were meant to be together! We won't be apart!"
"There's hope if you still live. Live. Both of you, Live. Live, if its just for my sake. You'll discover.... how precious life is." And with that Li's hand from Gojou's grasp and hit the floor. Red flowers, with their sickening smell appeared in Li's place as Li's body dissolved into nothingness.
To the supposedly slashed heart the softly crossing wind is gentle
The sunset comes to take me
Finally laying me to eternal sleep
Don't be sad 'Coz it's all right
Sayonara byebye Stay fine
'Coz I'll always be there for you
Don't be sad I'll be going
Mistaking it for a loyal greeting, it repeats
Sayonara byebye Stay fine
Be sure to live, for life is precious, you'll find it's kind
Don't be sad Don't be sad
Don't show me a face that took a sudden hit
Don't be sad 'Coz it's all right
I'll be free from my suffering now
Sayonara byebye Stay fine
'Coz I'll always be there for you
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Don't worry, Li. I won't disappoint you." Tze said softly as he looked up at the full moon hanging in the sky.
"Yes. I will live for both of us. That was what you wanted, right?"
In the morning, Gojou packed up all his belongings and headed for another town. He couldn't stand the smell of the red flowers that had clogged up his whole room, even him. It had taken more than 10 washes to get rid of that smell.
He wanted to forget everything. Love does not exist for me. I won't lie to myself.
But Li's words kept coming back to him.
" You can't change anything by dying. But if you stay alive, you can at least change something."
"Gojou! Hoi Gojou! ERO-KAPPA !"
Gojou groaned. Something was shouting right in his ear..... something familiar. He opened his eyes a tiny bit and found Goku staring at him.
"BAKAZARU! Are you trying to take advantage of me!" He jumped back 10 feet.
"If you're done lazing around, we're going off."
"Gojou, the mist's cleared. Lets go."
Gojou looked up to find Hakkai, smiling, and Sanzo, arms folded, sitting in the green jeep just outside the cave he was in. Goku was pulling him up too; saying that he wanted to get to a town quick; he was hungry. Gojou reluctantly got up. As he was walking he stepped on something soft.
Looking down, he found the red flowers he had seen before; their red tint seemed to have faded. He smiled as he stepped off the flowers and climbed into the jeep.
"Li, I stayed alive. And I changed too; did you notice? I have a purpose now. Tore reach wherever we're going to in the west, and to kill my 3 bothersome so-called friends when we reach our destination."
babyg: Woohoo!!! It's done It's done *clap clap* Finally its done! I had so many ideas for this chapter that I kept contradicting myself and had to check and change the content three times! Yikes! Originally I wanted Dokugakuji to have something to do with Li, but the words just couldn't come. Oh well, its done, its done! 3 cheers for me! Ooh, and yes I actually wrote this 'song' this time! The only words taken were 'Sayonara, byebye' from Yuyu Hakusho.
