Love is just a four-letter word.
--Bob Dylan
Song Title
Cherry cola curls whipped across her face. Shadowy eyes, the color of a crisp winter morning, shifted across the dark alleyway to insure no followers. She sighed, a twisted sigh of cynicism and contempt, as she lay her back against the cold bricks. She fumbled in her jacket for a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.
She stuck the filtered tip in her mouth and lit the front, the flame radiating a quick burst of warmth.
She sucked down on the cancer for a few minutes, then removed the last fourth or so and crushed it under her bright blue sneaker. She pulled the sides of her coat tighter, closer to her body, thinking
//Where the hell is she? Come on, Rita, bring me the little bastard.//
Minutes passed. Finally, a pair of steps could be heard in the distance.
She shoved her frostbitten fingers into her pockets and pulled out a chrome .35. Her fingers slid across the biting cold surface, as she cocked her partner and pulled into the street.
"Marie Octavious, do you plan to kill me?" A girl with soft violet hair, cut closely around the ears, and laughing aqua eyes, gave a slinky smile and, in a upbeat flirty voice, said, "I should have known you'd turn against me. That toy you carry is your only friend."
The opposing force rolled her eyes as she pulled back. "Where is he, Rita Enin?"
"Who?" She laughed, her willowy figure shaking as she went haw, haw.
"Diez, that's who." Marie smiled. "You seem to be forgetting, kid, I hold the upper hand. I still have OZ connections." Her eyes narrowed, her smile grew more grim. "If I get caught, I can always get out. But they won't let *you* leave until you've had another operation." She spun her chrome around her finger lightly, her face showing a 'who-cares' expression. "Too bad, too. Those magnets hurt like hell."
Rita's face grew considerabley paler. "I-I was just joking, Marie Octavious-sama, he's up at the Toriyama Hotel. We can visit him now." She turned, looking over her shoulder every few minutes, and began to lead the way to the infamous Toriyama Hotel.
The walk was cold and bitter, neither trusting the other, both secretly yearning to hold their peices within their fingers, ready to fire if the other one tried something funny. Rita had never liked Marie, Marie had never liked Rita. But they were the only survivors of that chaos at the OZ laboratories...
"Here it is." Rita pointed at a towering building, a large gothic hotel from before even the colonies. She stopped to read the plaque on the front gate, a huge iron cast eyesore that was rusting away at the edges.
// It was owned at one time by a woman named Shisuno Akumo, back in the years before living in space was no longer a children's tale. Back when God wasn't a word, a reason, to fling into your opponents face to justify your cause. Back when...//Rita shook these thoughts from her head.
The two unlikely allies soon reached the brazen brass door with the numbers 8910 running across the front.
Marie nudged Rita with her elbow and indicated towards the door. Rita gave her a sneer and knocked. The sound of cold flesh over bone hitting hard brass resonated through the empty halls. In a few seconds, as Rita raised her fist to knock again, a whispy voice called out.
"Who's there?"
"It's me, Rita Enin!" Rita spoke in an urgent whisper. "I've got M8 with me, now let me in!"
The door was answered by a young, thin face, with tufts of cornsilk hair growing wildy about him. Large royal purple eyes held a bitter coldness, and they were topped by split mousy brown brows. Marie looked down at him in awe. Never before had she seen such a wild, beautiful creature.
He reminded her, somehow, of a gallant unicorn. And his eyes reminded her of a graveyard at night. Dark and cold, forbidden to all but the dead. His eyes held secrets and despair, and Marie no longer wished to look upon them. She seemed to notice Rita avoiding them too.
"R9?" His voice was soft, light, as if it may blow away at the slightest breeze. "Oh, it's you." He looked Marie up and down for a few minutes, then, "And you're M8?"
Rita frowned. "How many times I told ya, kid? It's Rita Enin and this here is Marie Octavious. Preferably, Rita and Marie." Her voice heightened as she waved a finger comicly. "We can't have you going around calling us that, boy. It's a safety hazard."
The boy nodded mechanically, obviously not enlightened. He walked to the large canopy bed and sat. "So, listen, thanks for saving me from that home and all, but why do you guys need me? I'm just a 13 year old kid. I have no desire to get into the affairs of runaway lab rats."
Marie clenched a fist menacingly. "Runaway lab rats?! How dare you, you little brat, you-you" She sighed heavily as she regained composure. "Hey, Rita, why *do* we need this kid?"
Rita grinned. "He goes by the name of Diez Decanem."
Marie looked at Rita as if she'd just turned into the Blue Fairy. "Uh, yeah, so?"
Rita pulled out a peice of wrinkled paper from her jeans pocket. "He *goes* by the name Decanem. I did a little research. Read this."
Marie took hold of the green parchment, smoothing the creases as best she could. What she saw amazed her. It read:
Date of Birth: April 13, AC 182
Place of Birth: L2V1894- St. Mary's Hospital
Name: Diez Henry Catalonia
Father- Hernandes Catalonia
Father's Place of Birth- Spain
Mother- Cassandra Speigelman
Mother's Place of Birth- New Republic of Poland
That was it. No seal of authenticity, no ghost marks. But the paper itself was unique to the OZ registered hospital birth documents. That had been put into action in 176. Thank God for them now that St. Mary's was OZ registered.
Rita crept up behind Marie. "You know what this means, right? Right?!" Her excitement was too much. She almost saw stars as she said, "No watermark! This means that Hernandes or whoever wanted to keep this a secret! An OZ man with a secret birth?! It isn't much, but it's ammunition, right?"
Marie looked ahead, a dead serious expression frozen in her features. "You *idiot*! Look at the name of the father!"
Rita frowned. "'Hernandes Catalonia'. Yeah, and?"
Marie practically screamed. "Catalonia! Dorothy Catalonia!"
"Who?"
Marie smacked her forehead. "The granddaughter of Duke Dermail."
Rita's expression went 180. "Ohmyholyjesus...This is a helluva lot bigger than I thought..."
Diez listened quietly from the bed, absorbing everything. In his head, sentences and random thoughts spun like cotton candy. //Catalonia? Dermail? The man who killed my mama?// The eyes grew darker and darker with every thought, until they were almost black. //That bastard! I'll kill him. And these two idiots are just the tool to use.// He flopped back onto the bed, lids closing. //Yeah, I'll kill him...//
Moira smiled from between the two sleeping persons beside her. She looked softly up to the milky skinned boy to her left.
//Quatre-sama, my golden prince.// Her eyes turned towards her braided koi.
//Duo, my dark angel.// She wrapped each arm into the folds of one of the boys' elbows and lied back.
The rocket ship wouldn't reach the moon for hours, but she wanted to live every second at full attention.
She snuggled even deeper down, getting a few glances from a nosy old woman wondering why on earth a little girl would be traveling with a couple of teenage boys. //Well, we're not on Earth, are we, ya old bag?// Moira giggled at her thoughts. //I wonder...//
//Will this Hilde woman be nice? Will I have a family like other kids?// She looked at Duo again. //Is he... in love with her?//
She shook her head. //No way. He loves me, and no other women.// She began to fall asleep, her last thoughts of the brilliant wedding she and Duo...and Quatre would have.
--Bob Dylan
Song Title
Cherry cola curls whipped across her face. Shadowy eyes, the color of a crisp winter morning, shifted across the dark alleyway to insure no followers. She sighed, a twisted sigh of cynicism and contempt, as she lay her back against the cold bricks. She fumbled in her jacket for a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.
She stuck the filtered tip in her mouth and lit the front, the flame radiating a quick burst of warmth.
She sucked down on the cancer for a few minutes, then removed the last fourth or so and crushed it under her bright blue sneaker. She pulled the sides of her coat tighter, closer to her body, thinking
//Where the hell is she? Come on, Rita, bring me the little bastard.//
Minutes passed. Finally, a pair of steps could be heard in the distance.
She shoved her frostbitten fingers into her pockets and pulled out a chrome .35. Her fingers slid across the biting cold surface, as she cocked her partner and pulled into the street.
"Marie Octavious, do you plan to kill me?" A girl with soft violet hair, cut closely around the ears, and laughing aqua eyes, gave a slinky smile and, in a upbeat flirty voice, said, "I should have known you'd turn against me. That toy you carry is your only friend."
The opposing force rolled her eyes as she pulled back. "Where is he, Rita Enin?"
"Who?" She laughed, her willowy figure shaking as she went haw, haw.
"Diez, that's who." Marie smiled. "You seem to be forgetting, kid, I hold the upper hand. I still have OZ connections." Her eyes narrowed, her smile grew more grim. "If I get caught, I can always get out. But they won't let *you* leave until you've had another operation." She spun her chrome around her finger lightly, her face showing a 'who-cares' expression. "Too bad, too. Those magnets hurt like hell."
Rita's face grew considerabley paler. "I-I was just joking, Marie Octavious-sama, he's up at the Toriyama Hotel. We can visit him now." She turned, looking over her shoulder every few minutes, and began to lead the way to the infamous Toriyama Hotel.
The walk was cold and bitter, neither trusting the other, both secretly yearning to hold their peices within their fingers, ready to fire if the other one tried something funny. Rita had never liked Marie, Marie had never liked Rita. But they were the only survivors of that chaos at the OZ laboratories...
"Here it is." Rita pointed at a towering building, a large gothic hotel from before even the colonies. She stopped to read the plaque on the front gate, a huge iron cast eyesore that was rusting away at the edges.
// It was owned at one time by a woman named Shisuno Akumo, back in the years before living in space was no longer a children's tale. Back when God wasn't a word, a reason, to fling into your opponents face to justify your cause. Back when...//Rita shook these thoughts from her head.
The two unlikely allies soon reached the brazen brass door with the numbers 8910 running across the front.
Marie nudged Rita with her elbow and indicated towards the door. Rita gave her a sneer and knocked. The sound of cold flesh over bone hitting hard brass resonated through the empty halls. In a few seconds, as Rita raised her fist to knock again, a whispy voice called out.
"Who's there?"
"It's me, Rita Enin!" Rita spoke in an urgent whisper. "I've got M8 with me, now let me in!"
The door was answered by a young, thin face, with tufts of cornsilk hair growing wildy about him. Large royal purple eyes held a bitter coldness, and they were topped by split mousy brown brows. Marie looked down at him in awe. Never before had she seen such a wild, beautiful creature.
He reminded her, somehow, of a gallant unicorn. And his eyes reminded her of a graveyard at night. Dark and cold, forbidden to all but the dead. His eyes held secrets and despair, and Marie no longer wished to look upon them. She seemed to notice Rita avoiding them too.
"R9?" His voice was soft, light, as if it may blow away at the slightest breeze. "Oh, it's you." He looked Marie up and down for a few minutes, then, "And you're M8?"
Rita frowned. "How many times I told ya, kid? It's Rita Enin and this here is Marie Octavious. Preferably, Rita and Marie." Her voice heightened as she waved a finger comicly. "We can't have you going around calling us that, boy. It's a safety hazard."
The boy nodded mechanically, obviously not enlightened. He walked to the large canopy bed and sat. "So, listen, thanks for saving me from that home and all, but why do you guys need me? I'm just a 13 year old kid. I have no desire to get into the affairs of runaway lab rats."
Marie clenched a fist menacingly. "Runaway lab rats?! How dare you, you little brat, you-you" She sighed heavily as she regained composure. "Hey, Rita, why *do* we need this kid?"
Rita grinned. "He goes by the name of Diez Decanem."
Marie looked at Rita as if she'd just turned into the Blue Fairy. "Uh, yeah, so?"
Rita pulled out a peice of wrinkled paper from her jeans pocket. "He *goes* by the name Decanem. I did a little research. Read this."
Marie took hold of the green parchment, smoothing the creases as best she could. What she saw amazed her. It read:
Date of Birth: April 13, AC 182
Place of Birth: L2V1894- St. Mary's Hospital
Name: Diez Henry Catalonia
Father- Hernandes Catalonia
Father's Place of Birth- Spain
Mother- Cassandra Speigelman
Mother's Place of Birth- New Republic of Poland
That was it. No seal of authenticity, no ghost marks. But the paper itself was unique to the OZ registered hospital birth documents. That had been put into action in 176. Thank God for them now that St. Mary's was OZ registered.
Rita crept up behind Marie. "You know what this means, right? Right?!" Her excitement was too much. She almost saw stars as she said, "No watermark! This means that Hernandes or whoever wanted to keep this a secret! An OZ man with a secret birth?! It isn't much, but it's ammunition, right?"
Marie looked ahead, a dead serious expression frozen in her features. "You *idiot*! Look at the name of the father!"
Rita frowned. "'Hernandes Catalonia'. Yeah, and?"
Marie practically screamed. "Catalonia! Dorothy Catalonia!"
"Who?"
Marie smacked her forehead. "The granddaughter of Duke Dermail."
Rita's expression went 180. "Ohmyholyjesus...This is a helluva lot bigger than I thought..."
Diez listened quietly from the bed, absorbing everything. In his head, sentences and random thoughts spun like cotton candy. //Catalonia? Dermail? The man who killed my mama?// The eyes grew darker and darker with every thought, until they were almost black. //That bastard! I'll kill him. And these two idiots are just the tool to use.// He flopped back onto the bed, lids closing. //Yeah, I'll kill him...//
Moira smiled from between the two sleeping persons beside her. She looked softly up to the milky skinned boy to her left.
//Quatre-sama, my golden prince.// Her eyes turned towards her braided koi.
//Duo, my dark angel.// She wrapped each arm into the folds of one of the boys' elbows and lied back.
The rocket ship wouldn't reach the moon for hours, but she wanted to live every second at full attention.
She snuggled even deeper down, getting a few glances from a nosy old woman wondering why on earth a little girl would be traveling with a couple of teenage boys. //Well, we're not on Earth, are we, ya old bag?// Moira giggled at her thoughts. //I wonder...//
//Will this Hilde woman be nice? Will I have a family like other kids?// She looked at Duo again. //Is he... in love with her?//
She shook her head. //No way. He loves me, and no other women.// She began to fall asleep, her last thoughts of the brilliant wedding she and Duo...and Quatre would have.