Rated PG-13 for language, and I am not kidding!
The Characters and Story of Shadow Hearts belongs to Sacnoth and Midway. Again thanks to Gutterfiend for transcriptions, which I freely changed! And for some reason, the address skipped out from the first chapter, so for those interested: www.firstworldwar.com. Great site, not the usual dry history. And, in case it is not obvious, Italics are the Past, not necessarily from the script.
What went before:
It was a standard prison transport cart with steel rings in the floorboards beneath the bench seats, its side panels merely reinforced wood. Margarete checked the interior and found one ring literally yanked from the floor, the shreds of wood evidence of great strength used against it. Margarete fingered the wet sawdust before checking the exterior. That showed no signs of distress other than the usual for such a vehicle. After the accident, it was pushed off the road, so Margarete followed the trail out onto the muddy road. There was a deep gouge in the roadway where the cart had overturned, and the faded remains of heavy boot-prints around that; the prisoner's were smudged with the chains bound to their feet, but another set of prints showed distinct from the rest. These were huge footprints, no shoe or boot could leave these marks. It looked more like an animal's foot, large with five toes ending in sharp claws; the toe claws leaving punctures in the dirt when the creature walked. Margarete shuddered.
"Good God," she breathed. "Could he have fused?"
Chapter 2: Lost in the Haze
"Dead people don't speak. It's just in your memories." - Koudelka
The prison transport cart trundled heavily down the dirt road toward the prison, its wheels skidding through the soft dirt of the roadway. Just before Aarau, one of its wheels slid into a rut and the cart toppled. Prisoners and guards found themselves entangled within, each struggling for purchase on the now tilted floor. The guards attempted to control the prisoners and prevent both injury and escape. Yuri, however, his mind in a grey fog, acted without thinking. One hand reached out and grabbed the chain binding him to the floor, yanking it will all his strength. A moment later, the chain came loose with a squeal as the steel ring came up from the floor. The guard next to him realized the danger as his prisoner was escaping, and tried to restrain the man, but Yuri merely knocked him aside, and punched one fist through the back door. The reinforced wooden door went flying and Yuri jumped from the back and ran, his mind hearing a lone voice telling him to change, change, change. Before he had taken half a dozen steps, he had grabbed his fusion, a dark companion in his mind, and melded his soul to its dark power. The fusion Amon stomped onto the roadway, then jumped across to the verge and down into a gully. A heartbeat later, he crashed through the scrub and into the nearby forest.
He ran for nearly an hour, stomping through brush and low growing trees until the urge to escape ceased to scream in his foggy mind. Then he paused, resting one armor-clad arm against a tree and felt the fusion release, the grip on his soul become easier and his sudden transition back to Yuri happened in a flash. Near exhaustion suddenly sent him slumping to the ground, his knees digging into the mud. Yuri felt his strength melt away and his muscles shake and cramp with fatigue. Confused, he looked around. Thick trees surrounded him, rising in blue-shadowed ridges ahead of him while behind him the lower valley was hazed in low-lying clouds. Rain still drizzled down from the lowered sky and Yuri shuddered in his wet clothes.
"Where the hell am I?" he muttered, his first coherent thought in weeks. With a sigh, he turned his back to the tree and sat down, facing the way he had come. Shivers of fatigue and cold wracked his thin frame and his stomach growled its empty protest.
'Okay, rest then food,' he thought. 'And then – I have no idea.' With a sigh, he closed his eyes and slipped into fretful slumber.
They swam ashore at Dalian. The stupid plane from the stupid airstrip had developed engine trouble and the stupid thing had fallen from the sky like a stupid rock. Yuri ground his teeth in frustration. Why the hell had he trusted that blond idiot with the explosives to get them safely away? She was a foreigner for crying-out-loud!
'Ah shit, what am I thinking,' Yuri mused as he squeezed the water from his trench coat. 'So am I.'
"Hey, Margarete, what was with that plane? I thought we were done for!" Yuri said.
"I-I never dreamed we'd crash! Never --! What a… a gutless plane that was! I'm – I'm sorry!" Margarete stood up from the dock and brushed at her coat uselessly.
Yuri and Alice stood up, Yuri frowning at Margarete. "You almost bought us a one-way ticket to hell!!"
"Don't you glare at me, Yuri. That's not very nice. Look on the bright side: we're all still alive, right?" But at Yuri's continued glare and Alice's marked silence, "Okay, okay, I said I was sorry. Sheesh!" Margarete turned and headed up the dock toward the small town.
"Should you be so hard on her, Yuri?" Alice asked in her soft voice.
Yuri looked at the diminutive blond and sighed. "Probably not, but – " he shrugged. "C'mon, let's go."
They joined Margarete at the Sea Turtle, a small restaurant. She was talking up the bartender and was gesturing back toward the two as they entered.
"Come on, just some lunch or something. We haven't eaten and the kid's hungry. You don't want to piss off a hungry growing boy," Margarete said loudly.
The attendant nodded. "All right, but you'll have to come back in an hour. The owner is helping a sick man."
"An hour it is then."
"Maggie, what the he-" Yuri started to ask but Margarete grabbed his arm and pulled him outside.
"Humor me, kiddo."
That night tragedy struck. Alice was attacked by a dead spirit, Li Li, and was struck down with a deadly curse. Unable to prevent it, and equally unable to offer a remedy, Yuri offered up his temper to the night. Fortunately, help was on the way; a Taoist Adept named Zhuzhen. Once the aged adept had arrived, they began the healing process, first for the town and then for Alice. It meant fighting. And yet more fighting and Yuri was in his element. By the time midnight had arrived, the curse of the dead Li Li had been lifted and Alice was recovering. Moreover, Margarete could finally stop making excuses to the locals for Yuri's horrible behavior.
"If you don't stop behaving like a Mongol, I'm not going to feed you!" she had said at one point and Yuri, puzzled, stopped in his frustrated punching of one hapless doorway. "No matter how many times you hit that door, it's not going to produce a cure. So stop it!"
Yuri's jaw clenched but he stopped hitting the doorjamb and instead took his fists to the monsters. And once Alice began to recover, he sat by her side and refused to move, even when it came time to eat. Instead, the proprietor, called Sea Mother, served them where they sat, with Yuri offering suggestions on items he thought Alice might like, and the whole time trying not to laugh at her childish attempts at chopsticks.
Later they walked across the town square toward the inn, Zhuzhen and Margarete leading the way. Yuri stayed back with Alice and pulled her aside before reaching the inn door.
"Tomorrow we'll try to find a way across to Shanghai. But Alice, I want you to be more careful," he said.
"I am being careful, Yuri. I wasn't expecting Li Li ..."
"It's not just that. It's the monsters. And Margarete. And ... and other things," he finished on a hesitant note. "I just don't want you hurt. I promised to protect you but..."
"I know. I believe you," Alice said with a shake of her head. "I know you'll protect me. Now, let us get some sleep, okay?"
Yuri nodded and followed her to the inn, but his thoughts were not on sleep. 'It is just I think I like you, Alice,' he thought. 'Front, back, side, any way I picture it I come up with liking you.'
He sighed as they settled in for the night.
'I must be crazy, fallin' for a girl like you,' he thought. 'Darkness and Light ... how can it work out?'
It was full dark and clouds obscured what starlight there was. Yuri opened his eyes to the night and renewed confusion. He shook his head to remember where he was and realized he hadn't a clue. Hunger warred with cold and he climbed to his feet, patting himself down, feeling for his weapons. Nothing.
'What the hell happened to my gear?' he thought.
"Shit! This just – shit!" he exclaimed. "How do I hunt without my friggin' claws? Damn!"
He turned to face the mountains and sniffed the inclement air, but no smell of smoke or food came to him. With a sigh, he pushed away from the tree and began to climb higher. Somewhere there had to be a village.
Margarete made slow time through the scrub with the mud sucking at her boots and the wet shrubbery smacking her in the face. For each weal she had on her face she silently offered up a curse on Yuri's life. If she ever caught up with him, his existence would belong to her! She swore it! After climbing for a couple of hours she stopped to rest against a tree, surveying the surrounding countryside. There was the far expanse of the Black Forest to the east and below the distant shimmer of the Rhein and the slow rising of smoke from cook fires just to the north. She wondered if Yuri had headed for food.
'Knowing the kid, he's probably starving, as usual,' she thought. It was when she brought the canteen to her lips for a drink that she noticed the deep gouges in the base of the tree. Claw marks. The kid had been here. Fused.
"Holy Saint Catherine," Margarete breathed. Even with the passage of time, the gouges looked fresh.
"He must have rested here too, then." Forgetting her canteen for a moment, she looked up toward the ridge. "Bad weather. Maybe fog. At night, he would not know that villages lay just behind him in the north and that ahead was Alsace -- and the German Army."
Steep mountain, then valley, followed by more mountains and a valley again. It seemed endless to Yuri, who no longer felt the hunger grinding in his stomach. The cold was the biggest ache for him, along with the one in his heart. He was confused, but continued his westward traveling, wondering why he was here, alone. Where was Alice? Where was Margarete? The night ran to an even chillier cold before dawn began to inch its soggy way in the east behind him. Finally, he stopped to rest, putting a tree to his back and his face toward the sun.
'Humph, all this time and I'm heading west. Wonder what's ahead? And do I really give a damn?' His thoughts were a jumble as he hunkered down, wrapping his arms around his knees, trying to control the shivers that threatened to rattle his teeth. 'If I don't find some shelter soon ...' he let his thoughts trail off as he took a deep breath and settled down for a little rest.
Shanghai. Den of iniquity. One of the biggest cities in the East and home to pirates, prostitutes, pit fights and Dehuai. Yuri's first impression of Shanghai was throwing up on the quay. And on the boardwalk. And again on the street in front of the Cypress Hotel.
"Just let me die," he muttered as Zhuzhen checked them in.
"Not before you bathe. I am not sleeping in the same room with your filth!" the old man said and poked Yuri in the back with his staff.
"Screw the bath. I wanna sleep."
"After the bath; and don't think I won't force you, kid," Zhuzhen made threatening motions with his staff and Yuri, rather than argue a loosing proposition, relinquished.
"You'll feel better once you're all cleaned up, Yuri," Alice offered helpfully.
"I doubt it," Yuri muttered. 'I hate baths. Baths are for women. And babies.'
However, having decided bathing was not worth fighting over, Yuri went at it with a vengeance, scrubbing with soap then plopping down into the hot water of the tub. It wasn't until he stepped into the room, towel wrapped around his nether regions that he discovered his efforts in vain.
"What about your hair?" Zhuzhen asked.
"What about it?"
"It's full of lice! Get back in there and scrub!"
"You're full o' ... Ow!" Zhuzhen's staff made contact with Yuri's backside and, avoiding yet another swing of the deadly instrument, Yuri ducked back into the bathroom.
"All right, Goddamnit! Stop with the stupid staff! I'll do the hair! And where's my shirt?!?"
"We threw the filthy thing away. Margarete got you a new one, but that one is char! Now WASH!"
The others prepared for sleep to the concert of grumbles, splashes and curses emanating from the bathroom.
The next day found Zhuzhen gone to visit a friend and Alice alone with Yuri. Yuri, fully dressed, was sleeping like a log and Alice was wondering if she should wake him when a young Chinese girl came in asking for help. Yuri was instantly awake. He heard the quick explanations of the young woman, and then ran downstairs, Alice and Qiuhua, the young woman, right behind him.
Yuri found Zhuzhen at a small bar across from the hotel. It was little more than a dimly lit standing room bar with a small platform for live musical performances. Zhuzhen was on the floor and hovering above him was a ruthless looking thug. Yuri instantly disliked the black-haired fiend.
Yuri knelt beside Zhuzhen, "Hey old man, you alive? I thought you were off eating pot-stickers, not getting yourself half-dead. This guy do this to you?"
Zhuzhen grinned. "What's the matter, kid? You sound like you actually care about me or something."
"Or something," Yuri said before rising to stare with deadly intent at the dark–haired antagonist. "So who the hell are you and why are you beatin' up an old man?"
"My name is Wugui and I own this establishment --"
Yuri snorted. "I know you now," he said. "Yeah, you work for that reprobate Dehuai."
"Who are you?" Wugui asked.
Yuri shook his head as he put on his claws. "Doesn't matter since yer gonna die right here."
"You're mad, Russian. I am a Master of the Game of Death."
"Oh shut the fuck up!" Yuri shouted and jumped to the attack before Wugui could posture any more. He landed two quick blows then jumped back as Wugui suddenly struck out with lightening speed, but missed. Yuri chuckled.
"Not good enough, 'servant'. Wanna try again?"
"You bastard!" Wugui growled and changed his tactics, taking up a martial stance, he made a few passes with his hands then gestured at Yuri. Yuri felt a surge of power coming at him from the little thug, but held his ground, letting the power wash over him.
"That the best ya got, punk? Here, just for you!" Yuri slid in quickly and punched Wugui in the chest, the neck and the face, sending him crashing to the floor.
"I changed my mind, jerk! I'm gonna let you live, but you go tell your boss, Dehuai, that he better hide his girlie magazines, 'cause I'm coming for them, and him!" Yuri picked up the beaten Wugui and, with a kick to his butt, sent the man fleeing up the stairs to the street. "Stupid bastard."
Zhuzhen looked from Yuri to Qiuhua and her father Zhen. "Thank you, Yuri. I – I want you to meet someone, but let's do it back at the hotel, shall we?"
That morning Yuri met Zhen and heard the tale of his father, Ben Hyuga, and his battle against Dehuai fifteen years before. He also heard Zhuzhen's confession of guilt.
"We knew that facing Dehuai in his tower could mean our deaths, but Colonel Hyuga, your father, was insistent we go. He had reasons beyond just following orders from his Japanese superiors. However, it was I, who was his support in this matter. It was I who had to kill him, Yuri. When he tried to fuse with the monster that Dehuai called up, and failed! He made it my responsibility to stop him. We knew he had a wife and a young son; we did not think they had survived. I – I'm sorry. I truly am."
Yuri remained silent for long minutes, his amber eyes boring holes into Zhuzhen. "My mother died. Father never returned. I outlived them both," he said softly, a shadow passing over his countenance. "I understand what you did, Zhuzhen. But let me tell you this, old man –" Yuri paused for a moment, gathering his feelings under tight reign. "If you cross me, I swear to you, I'll kill you dead," he said with a growl.
"Yuri! Zhuzhen didn't mean to keep things from you," Alice cried, distressed by the blinding anger she saw in his glowing eyes and the wave after wave of pure, raw emotion emanating from him.
"I know that, Alice. I'm just sayin' –" he paused and turning to the windows, kicked the floorboards.
There was continued quiet conversation behind him and Yuri heard Zhuzhen mention Wuhan, so he knew that would be their next destination. But right now he didn't care. He turned toward Alice.
"Go for a walk?" he asked quietly.
Surprised, Alice nodded.
They left the hotel and walked through the marketplace, stopping to look at the different wares. Neither spoke, merely walking and gesturing at odd items of interest. Down by the quay they found a small food stand, the owner offering up quick fried items from the wok, and a delicacy. Yuri smiled and bought a handful of Thousand-Year-Old Eggs.
"Here, try one," he said with a lop-sided grin.
"1000 year old eggs, Yuri? Umm," Alice hesitated. "Are they any good at that age?"
Yuri chuckled. "Nah, you gotta try it first."
"All right." Alice broke into the mottled brown egg and found that the egg wore the same pattern of brown cracks that the shell had worn. "Oh!"
"Come on, Alice. It's no stronger than my breath in the mornin'," Yuri said, and dodged a well-placed swat from Alice.
Nevertheless, she did bite into the oddly mottled egg and, with eyes wide, quickly swallowed the whole thing.
"See, I tol' ya!" Yuri laughed.
Alice nodded. "It is good. But why do they -?"
"Call 'em 1000 year old eggs? Hell, I dunno. I just know to eat 'em. Here, have another."
The two walked companionably toward the docks, eating eggs.
"Thank you, Yuri. The eggs were good. And I am so glad you've calmed down. I don't want you to blame Zhuzhen," Alice said once they reached the end of the dock, their feet resting just at the edge of the wharf.
"No, I understand, Alice. I do. But I never got to know my father; an' my mother died. All I have are memories, and not pleasant ones at that. I have spent my life trying to find my Dad, only to discover he has been dead all these years. I – I just feel stupid is all."
"No need to, Yuri. I know you're hurting."
Yuri turned to look at the diminutive young woman whom he had promised to protect. "I'm not. I am fine. Really," he said, but quickly turned away from Alice's piercing look.
"Should we go back now? Or do you want to walk some more?" he asked.
"Whatever you want to do is fine with me, Yuri. I just like being in your company," Alice answered.
Midmorning found Yuri once again climbing, putting the sun to his back; he began to warm a little and hoped the rain was gone for the day. The ground was soggy with water and fallen leaves and pine needles and more than once Yuri found himself sliding down to land hard, elbows in the mud. By noon, he stumbled on an abandoned cabin. It was situated near a mountain meadow. Fencing showed where small animals, possibly goats, had resided. Now all was empty. Yuri kicked in the sagging door.
"Shit, dust. Just my luck," he muttered and then headed for the small kitchen. He found mostly dust in the small cupboards, but he also found food. A small can had eluded the owner's reaching hands when they abandoned the place and Yuri snatched the label-less can. He quickly searched the drawers and came up with a small knife jammed in the back.
"Yes!" A quick downward thrust and the can was punctured, sweet sticky syrup erupting onto his hands. Yuri pulled back the can lid and drank the liquid with a sigh. Then he pulled out the contents.
"Peaches," he chuckled and ate them, savoring the sweetness. "Alice's favorite."
When finished he looked around the cabin. Its meager furnishings were broken, and nothing remained of the bedding but a scrap of blanket. This Yuri snatched with delight and, wrapping himself in its filthy comfort, curled up in a corner to sleep.
Margarete followed the trail of broken shrubbery up into the mountains and through the first pass. The trail was northwesterly and Margarete was thankful she still wore the German courier's uniform, but seriously doubted it would convince any real German soldiers she encountered. So far, her luck held, with nothing more than blisters to annoy her, but she knew her luck would not hold forever. Somewhere, ahead of her by two weeks at least, was that crazy Russian boy, and Margarete had no idea if she could find him in time.
She looked down at the small satchel she still carried. Yuri's life was in that bag; his gloves, his claws, newly obtained passport; and Alice's book. The last book she obtained before they went up to the Float to fight Albert and God. She was sure there were memories in the bag as well. But how to get it to Yuri. And, could he survive for long without weapons? Margarete sighed and continued climbing.
By nightfall, she had made the pass above Mulheim but could continue no further. Darkness and the remnants of the snowfall of two weeks ago were preventing any further travel. She sat on an outcrop overlooking the valley below, the trees murky with smoke, a few still wearing their frosty white coats. Fires burned in hearth and woods, soldiers were there and war. She was torn between her duty and her desire to find and help her friend. She drank a little from her canteen and chewed the hardtack from her pack, the while weighing her options.
'I can continue for a little further,' she thought. 'But I will have to pull away from this before long. I have to get to Strasbourg. If he's gotten that far, maybe I can find a clue, but if not –'
Margarete climbed back from the outcropping and settled down in the woods, pulling out Yuri's satchel. She had never considered going through his things, and would not under normal circumstances. But now? Now was not normal. She opened the small case and pulled out the leather pouch with Yuri's Nightbird claws. These deadly instruments Margarete had seen in action and so left them in their pouch. Below them was a small cup, cracked and chipped but otherwise intact. She squinted at the cup, seeing squiggles that could be writing on the surface, but as she could not read it, she put it down next to the claws. On the bottom was Alice's book, the Holy Book of Flesh. How often had Margarete seen the young woman open the book to pray? Or to attack? Obtaining the sacred book had been Alice's crowning achievement and all her friends had been proud of her. Even Yuri, although he acted like an ass at the time.
"What's the big deal, Alice? It's just a book!"
"But Yuri, it's the most holy and sacred text," Alice said with enthusiasm.
"Yeah, kid, just because you're an unwashed heathen doesn't mean everyone else is!" Margarete had chided him.
"I am not. I took a bath – in Shanghai! You know that!" And at the others' laughter, "And, what's a heathen?"
The kid was like that. He knew damned well what it meant, but had to play the fool to defuse the situation, whether it needed defusing or not. Why he especially played the game with Alice, Margarete alone knew. He loved her. She had seen it that time in Dalian and realized her own hopes of a dalliance with the young Fusionist were lost; he had eyes only for Alice.
Margarete was about to put the book back when she spotted a glimmer in the bottom of the satchel. Reaching in, she pulled out Yuri's talisman. It was blood red and glowing sickly. Margarete gasped. She had seen this talisman before, worn around Yuri's muscular neck. Moreover, she knew that Yuri needed to clear it before it got this dark. However, she had never seen it this blood red. Surely, that was not right!
A/N
I would like to thank those readers and reviewers who left me messages. Blessings be upon all of you. I would also like to thank the writers and members of Yahoo Groups Shadow Hearts. They have had more than a little influence in getting me started on writing again. To wit: Nights Mistress, AriesCelestial and Greyfriars to name but 3 of them.
Reviews: Somebody : who are you? Hehe. I am glad you are enjoying this. Keep coming for the rest of the tale.
Aegis: Yeah, I know bikinis were not around then, but Margarete had a cute little number on in her last scene in the game; the one with the cell phone, the champagne and the KA-BOOM in the background! Consistency I guess.
In addition, I admit this was a little AU, however I feel it's justified. After all, no one would WANT to sleep in a room with Yuri after those first couple of days ... ewwwww!
More darkness to come in chapter 3, and it gets a bit ugly.