Okay! Chap three! Cool- im surprised I got this far. (I have some stories that have been put on hold for years- with months in between chaps.) I'm guessing that this will be a short chappy. I don't know yet. I wrote this before the chap. (Bad me.)
Lyserg: *golf slaps Mouse-kun*
Mouse: O_O The hell? What was that?!!
Lyserg: That was for writing all of this nonsense before writing the chapter.
Mouse: I know what it was for! What the heck is a golf slap?
Lyserg: Think of a golf clap. Same technique, but different message. Now start writing so that I'll finally find myself in the story one of these days. I bet my character is very unlike my true self. ^__^
Mouse: Geez. I try, you know. -_-
Anyway: Disclaimer: I don't own Cirque du Soleil or Shaman King. However, with more training, I will be a part of Cirque! ......I pray.
*People start laughing. Mouse-kun golf slaps them, then gets a smile of approval from Lyserg.*
A quick thing: Any shonen ai that may appear in the story from this point simply isn't- it's just the way the cirques live. But, it will seem to be, with a reason. Especially very Mantoh, or Mantou, or whatever. Maybe I'll make Yoh make out with Ren, too. Wonder about the reaction I'll get from people with that.
*Mouse-kun suddenly gets lots of reaction. Especially from Yoh and Ren.*
Mouse: /,_,\ Hey, c'mon! Peace, brothers! Make love, not war!
Ren: You have us make love and you can BET there'll be a war!
Mouse: ;_; Can't we settle this over cheese sandwiches?
Ren and Yoh: No.
Mouse: Uh-oh. Well, anyway, Chibi Team Rocket, this chappy, and the next, are dedicated to u (they include the Manta x Yohness that you crave so badly, especially chappy four) *Yoh jumps, pins Mouse-kun to the ground, and pulls her hair.* -...for helping me, and supporting this story. U are a wonderfully nice person ^_^ *Yoh pulls harder on Mouse's hair* OW! OW! A golf slap would have gotten the message across!
Hope you liked Chapter Two's Ren x Ren. ^__^
*Ren is now helping- or painfully taking over from- Yoh torturing Mouse.*
*Lyserg hunches down and watches Mouse's pained expressions with relish.*
Mouse: You OW! know, Lyserg, you OW! could OW! be helping me to OW! GET THESE TWO OFF OF ME! OW!
Lyserg: *to Yoh* She said that Manta was going to be part of it too. Where do you think he is?
Yoh: *Grips Mouse's hair like the reins on a mechanical bull with mechanical bugs, with a satisfying shriek from Mouse* He should be loading the bazooka.
Lyserg: Tisk. Wouldn't want to be you right now, Mouse-kun.
Mouse: O YOU THINK?!
Lyserg: All right then! Everyone, since Mouse-kun is, uh, somewhat occupied...*Mouse is half bent backward, thanks to Yoh and Ren, waving a bunch of cheese sandwiches around and screaming something about Jane Goodall.*....I will have the honor of announcing the story's start...finally......o_o so, here it is.
....: -~*~- :....
Yoh heard Ren's body slump to the ground. He could hear the other person- no, the other thing, shivering. The vibrations slowed slightly. Ren choked, and Yoh could hear a strangled noise come from down his throat. But, it didn't sound like a normal choke.
He had a headache, but that was nothing compared to the pain of minutes ago. He started to sit up, but he stopped halfway to his knees by the golden eyes of the creature swiftly turning onto him. He could feel the vibrations slowly start to start again. The creature stood up.
The next thing he knew, his hands were pulled out from under him and he was being dragged against the dirty, pebble-covered ground. When he was let go, a hand was flung across his eyes, clearing them of his blood. Yoh winced; He was under a beam of light. His head throbbing, he put his hand up to shield his eyes and looked up at this creature- the creature that looked so much like Ren. It looked down at him through those yellow eyes- yellow, angry eyes- the eyes he knew so well to be Ren's.
...: -~*~- :....
His hand were sweating- his fingers, trembling. His face, bathed in darkly white light, his eyes, full of terror for the almost inevitable. Tears dribbled down his pale cheeks and fell off in salty droplets to the crystal-clear water below...
"Ma–! Ma--!"
....: -~*~- :....
Yoh's arms were pinned down painfully by the creature's knees to the ground; His face was being squeezed and held up by the creatures hands, causing more pain than he had already had. He couldn't move- he was at the mercy at this maniac demon. The eyes that he had known for so long- always upset, often angry, but always controlled- were now maniacal, crazy. Blood poured from his wound into his eyes, and flowed from them down his nose and cheek and to the ground in dark, salty drops. He looked up at it through his own dark eyes which, for once, were full of apprehension, desperation- and were almost....
....: -~*~- :....
"MARINKASS!!!!!"
....: -~*~- :....
He felt pressure lift from his head and his arms. His head fell because the hands weren't there to stop it. He was startled; These eyes had changed, this creature had changed. The eyes- they weren't crazy anymore. They were grief-stricken, heartbroken, as though the creature could melt and yet never die; They were distant, and yet, staring right into his eyes. It backed away slowly, its eyes never leaving Yoh's; And, as suddenly as its expressions changed- it ran. Pushed itself from the light, and the sound of footsteps quickly growing softer.
Yoh pushed himself up, and saw it going down the alley, toward the light of the entrance; He immediately got up and ran after it, pumping hard, his footsteps echoing throughout the alley.
He turned into the bright street, and had to shield his eyes from the light. And once his eyes had settled, it was gone.
He turned and ran back down the alley, blindly. With no idea where Ren was, Yoh got down on his knees and felt about with his hands. He had hit quite a few things, including broken glass and a dead rodent, before his hands came down onto Ren's stomach. Yoh slid his hand up until he found the shoulders, and then grabbed Ren and pulled him out of the alley.
When they were back in the sunlight, Yoh was shocked to see that Ren's eyes were wide open, seeing nothing. His lips were bleeding slightly from the bitemarks. Was Ren dead? Yoh urgently felt for his pulse. No, he was alive. Yoh put his ear to Ren's mouth to hear or feel if he was breathing, and heard a strange sound from within. He used two fingers to scope out the cause of Ren's odd breathing- and pulled out a few black feathers.
Eyes wide and pupils tiny, he looked away from Ren, to where the creature had run before. Something atrocious- and deadly- was on the loose.
********************
Uggg....What a stressful day, Thought Manta. A day of extra studying for school tests WOULD be stressful. He was walking home from the library, his favorite place to study, as his home was often pressuring- even without the books and papers and memorizing.
Manta did not want to go home just yet; He decided to take a trip over to Yoh's house. Perhaps he was bored- or lonely- or confused. Maybe he could use Manta's help with his homework? ....But as he had just spent several hours studying, he surely hoped that something was keeping Yoh from doing it- or, even better, helping him complete it. Perhaps he had done it himself? The image of Yoh concentrating fiercely over a page of math problems entered Manta's head.
He had to fight off a fierce desire to laugh; Yoh certainly wasn't lazy, as many may have thought he was, but Yoh + Homework just didn't compute. And neither did Yoh + Studying. Oil and Water. But it was a perfect combination in Manta's case. Another thing that made Manta and Yoh so very different. It was surprising how they became a pair of friends, with such differences. But perhaps, the old saying was true: opposites do attract.
Far before reaching Yoh's house, Manta came upon a wooden entrance to what looked like a shrine. He had seen this entrance before, but sitting and cramming had built up energy within him, and he suddenly was curious about what the inside of this wooden portal was like. Gingerly, he stepped into the hidden world.
As it turned out, it was not a shrine- or not just one. It was a Zen garden- a perfect coincidence, as Manta could use something calming and soothing at the moment. There was plenty of greenery as well as stone in this garden. With each of Manta's steps, echoes surged across the clement courts and disappeared into the sky that stretched above. Every time the soft wind blew, the trees wavered and stretched their limbs and leaves, sending shadows waltzing across the gray stones.
That's odd, Manta thought, The wind isn't blowing right now, but there's a shadow that keeps moving....in that other shadow over there........
Manta's eyes stuck to that one shadow feverishly. It moved out of line with any tree, even in wind. Manta could feel his heart rate beating very hard and fast, though there wasn't any apparent cause for the extremity of it's hurry. It almost seemed to have a will of its own.
It was rapidly coming closer now- Manta could see that- from behind a stone pillar, out of the light- what, it had legs?!- it was alive!- the shadow quickly slid away from the body like a sheet- a very odd body, it was- it was at the upper torso- and then the creature slid back into the shadows faster than it had been exposed. What was that?! thought Manta.
But then the thing came quickly, around the other side. A little too quickly- it was exposed to anyone who cared to see, which it clearly did not want that to happen. Careful fear was its expression.
Manta's mouth fell open and hit the ground.
"YOH?!"
Yoh turned his head quickly to face Manta. Wide eyed and startled, he had jumped back slightly. Manta's heartbeat was going much faster now, even faster than it was a few minutes ago.
Yoh fell against the pillar, and rose, and fell again, and slid down it, and back up- a constant, but odious rhythm. Anguish was etched on his face, in place of his usual cheerful glow. His eyes, instead of their usual light, allowed Manta to read fear and pain with their unfelled tears.
Yoh's actions reminded Manta of an animal- an animal in a cage. This shattered his heart, knowing that people should feel free in a Zen garden, and Yoh had the most right to be free and happy than anyone else he knew.
But why was he acting like an animal in the first place?
"Hey, hey! Take it easy, Yoh," Manta slowly walked up to him. Yoh paid no attention; He continued to throw himself against the pillar. However, he had begun to do so with increasingly less force- so much less that he finally just stopped, leaning against the pillar, breathing heavily and staring down at Manta with exhausted, but frightened eyes. Manta himself wore a very worried look. He reached out and grabbed Yoh's wrist- and realized with a tightening chest that he was shaking heavily. His face and body was covered with cuts from where he had thrown himself against the pillar.
His body, itself, was covered with a picturesque article of clothing: the only thing was a soiled blue bodysuit, to which the almost all of the upper half of it had been ripped away, and the bottom half wasn't in the best shape itself, though it still held together. A shred of the material, presumably from the top half, acted as a belt to keep it all together. A few odd-looking flowers were caught in his hair. The oddest thing, however, was how the upper half of his face was deathly pale, while the bottom half remained his natural color.
His eyes suddenly rolled up into his head, and his eyes closed. His mouth clenched shut, and his head bowed down. To Manta's horror and confusion, Yoh slid down the pillar and slumped to the ground in a faint- and only his arm remained up, due to Manta's fingers clamped around his wrist.
Manta instantly dropped it, about to try and revive his friend, when Yoh suddenly pounced onto him. Because of the shock of Yoh's sudden energy, it took him quite a few seconds to realize just what happened. What had happened was that Yoh had jumped up and clamped onto Manta like one would grab onto a life buoy when about to drown. Yoh's head was right next to his, and Manta could easily feel his heartbeat and breath. The breath was evenly paced, though accelerated greatly, but his heartbeat- his heartbeat was irregular. Manta's own heartbeat raced faster. What was going on? What was wrong?
Manta realized that Yoh was about to faint again; His grip lessened, his arms grew slack, and his head put more pressure on his shoulder. His face rested against his neck. Sweat dripped off of his forehead and onto Manta's shoulder. After a few minutes of this, Manta started to back away, with the idea of letting Yoh rest on the ground. But Yoh let out a little throatily moan, and the slack hands suddenly grabbed Manta's shirt very tightly.
"¿Che cosa è sucedió?"
Manta stopped. What the fuck?! He thought, Yoh doesn't know three languages. From his studies, Manta knew quite a few languages, and hearing Yoh speak those words threw him off. But....perhaps Yoh had integrated with a different ghost, one that knew both Italian and Spanish?
Yoh looked up into Manta's face. "¿Chi son-vous?"
Manta stopped short. He knew that Yoh's consciousness was still there, even if mixed with another's. And Yoh would never try to scare him with what he just said.
'Who are you?'
Thoroughly terrified, Manta started to back away from Yoh. When the hands gripped tighter still, he ran out of his grasp and stopped about ten feet away. But what he saw snapped his heartstrings.
Yoh lay on the ground, gripping the stones so hard that his fingers turned white. His face was scrunched in pain and sweat fell off of him in torrents.
Manta could just stand there and watch.
Yoh lifted his head off of the ground with great effort, and said, "Libre......... Frei.............. Livre...........Libero............!!!"
Manta knew each word that he said. In French, German, Portuguese, and Italian, he had said one word: "Free."
Free? What? He saw Yoh lay on the ground in pain, and remembered how he had thrown himself against the wall of the pillar, until Manta had soothed him. Was he trapped inside the garden? He couldn't find his way out? But- why didn't he just say so? But then, he hadn't been acting normally since Manta had first caught him in the garden.
Hoping that Yoh would understand, he came slightly closer and said, "Vamanos." Yoh looked up at him, breathing hard, but he clearly understood. He slightly nodded his head and thrust his hand out to Manta.
Manta paused, debating to himself whether to grab the hand or not, before shakily sliding his hand against the other. When he found that Yoh did not do anything otherwise, he grasped it firmly and pulled Yoh to his feet. When he was up, Manta started running to the wooden exit, dragging Yoh behind. But as the exit became clearer, Yoh started running faster until he was the one dragging Manta along.
And finally they were back on the street.
Yoh breathed in a huge breath of air and let it out, smiling hugely, which was quite an improvement in contrast to the wince and whimper that he had before. Manta stared up at him now, clearly confused. Yoh looked down at Manta, blinked, and imitated his expression. He couldn't hold it for long, though, and let it go with a docile giggle.
Manta's eyes widened. What the fuck?! What was wrong with Yoh?!
"Grazie, Monsieur!" he said, bending his knees and bowing his head for a split second, and returning to his regular stance.
Manta stared. Yoh had just curtsied at him. And he still was speaking multiple languages.
Was this Yoh?
Manta shook his head and, with questioning eyes and a courteous smile, he bowed and said, "De nada."
Lyserg: *golf slaps Mouse-kun*
Mouse: O_O The hell? What was that?!!
Lyserg: That was for writing all of this nonsense before writing the chapter.
Mouse: I know what it was for! What the heck is a golf slap?
Lyserg: Think of a golf clap. Same technique, but different message. Now start writing so that I'll finally find myself in the story one of these days. I bet my character is very unlike my true self. ^__^
Mouse: Geez. I try, you know. -_-
Anyway: Disclaimer: I don't own Cirque du Soleil or Shaman King. However, with more training, I will be a part of Cirque! ......I pray.
*People start laughing. Mouse-kun golf slaps them, then gets a smile of approval from Lyserg.*
A quick thing: Any shonen ai that may appear in the story from this point simply isn't- it's just the way the cirques live. But, it will seem to be, with a reason. Especially very Mantoh, or Mantou, or whatever. Maybe I'll make Yoh make out with Ren, too. Wonder about the reaction I'll get from people with that.
*Mouse-kun suddenly gets lots of reaction. Especially from Yoh and Ren.*
Mouse: /,_,\ Hey, c'mon! Peace, brothers! Make love, not war!
Ren: You have us make love and you can BET there'll be a war!
Mouse: ;_; Can't we settle this over cheese sandwiches?
Ren and Yoh: No.
Mouse: Uh-oh. Well, anyway, Chibi Team Rocket, this chappy, and the next, are dedicated to u (they include the Manta x Yohness that you crave so badly, especially chappy four) *Yoh jumps, pins Mouse-kun to the ground, and pulls her hair.* -...for helping me, and supporting this story. U are a wonderfully nice person ^_^ *Yoh pulls harder on Mouse's hair* OW! OW! A golf slap would have gotten the message across!
Hope you liked Chapter Two's Ren x Ren. ^__^
*Ren is now helping- or painfully taking over from- Yoh torturing Mouse.*
*Lyserg hunches down and watches Mouse's pained expressions with relish.*
Mouse: You OW! know, Lyserg, you OW! could OW! be helping me to OW! GET THESE TWO OFF OF ME! OW!
Lyserg: *to Yoh* She said that Manta was going to be part of it too. Where do you think he is?
Yoh: *Grips Mouse's hair like the reins on a mechanical bull with mechanical bugs, with a satisfying shriek from Mouse* He should be loading the bazooka.
Lyserg: Tisk. Wouldn't want to be you right now, Mouse-kun.
Mouse: O YOU THINK?!
Lyserg: All right then! Everyone, since Mouse-kun is, uh, somewhat occupied...*Mouse is half bent backward, thanks to Yoh and Ren, waving a bunch of cheese sandwiches around and screaming something about Jane Goodall.*....I will have the honor of announcing the story's start...finally......o_o so, here it is.
....: -~*~- :....
Yoh heard Ren's body slump to the ground. He could hear the other person- no, the other thing, shivering. The vibrations slowed slightly. Ren choked, and Yoh could hear a strangled noise come from down his throat. But, it didn't sound like a normal choke.
He had a headache, but that was nothing compared to the pain of minutes ago. He started to sit up, but he stopped halfway to his knees by the golden eyes of the creature swiftly turning onto him. He could feel the vibrations slowly start to start again. The creature stood up.
The next thing he knew, his hands were pulled out from under him and he was being dragged against the dirty, pebble-covered ground. When he was let go, a hand was flung across his eyes, clearing them of his blood. Yoh winced; He was under a beam of light. His head throbbing, he put his hand up to shield his eyes and looked up at this creature- the creature that looked so much like Ren. It looked down at him through those yellow eyes- yellow, angry eyes- the eyes he knew so well to be Ren's.
...: -~*~- :....
His hand were sweating- his fingers, trembling. His face, bathed in darkly white light, his eyes, full of terror for the almost inevitable. Tears dribbled down his pale cheeks and fell off in salty droplets to the crystal-clear water below...
"Ma–! Ma--!"
....: -~*~- :....
Yoh's arms were pinned down painfully by the creature's knees to the ground; His face was being squeezed and held up by the creatures hands, causing more pain than he had already had. He couldn't move- he was at the mercy at this maniac demon. The eyes that he had known for so long- always upset, often angry, but always controlled- were now maniacal, crazy. Blood poured from his wound into his eyes, and flowed from them down his nose and cheek and to the ground in dark, salty drops. He looked up at it through his own dark eyes which, for once, were full of apprehension, desperation- and were almost....
....: -~*~- :....
"MARINKASS!!!!!"
....: -~*~- :....
He felt pressure lift from his head and his arms. His head fell because the hands weren't there to stop it. He was startled; These eyes had changed, this creature had changed. The eyes- they weren't crazy anymore. They were grief-stricken, heartbroken, as though the creature could melt and yet never die; They were distant, and yet, staring right into his eyes. It backed away slowly, its eyes never leaving Yoh's; And, as suddenly as its expressions changed- it ran. Pushed itself from the light, and the sound of footsteps quickly growing softer.
Yoh pushed himself up, and saw it going down the alley, toward the light of the entrance; He immediately got up and ran after it, pumping hard, his footsteps echoing throughout the alley.
He turned into the bright street, and had to shield his eyes from the light. And once his eyes had settled, it was gone.
He turned and ran back down the alley, blindly. With no idea where Ren was, Yoh got down on his knees and felt about with his hands. He had hit quite a few things, including broken glass and a dead rodent, before his hands came down onto Ren's stomach. Yoh slid his hand up until he found the shoulders, and then grabbed Ren and pulled him out of the alley.
When they were back in the sunlight, Yoh was shocked to see that Ren's eyes were wide open, seeing nothing. His lips were bleeding slightly from the bitemarks. Was Ren dead? Yoh urgently felt for his pulse. No, he was alive. Yoh put his ear to Ren's mouth to hear or feel if he was breathing, and heard a strange sound from within. He used two fingers to scope out the cause of Ren's odd breathing- and pulled out a few black feathers.
Eyes wide and pupils tiny, he looked away from Ren, to where the creature had run before. Something atrocious- and deadly- was on the loose.
********************
Uggg....What a stressful day, Thought Manta. A day of extra studying for school tests WOULD be stressful. He was walking home from the library, his favorite place to study, as his home was often pressuring- even without the books and papers and memorizing.
Manta did not want to go home just yet; He decided to take a trip over to Yoh's house. Perhaps he was bored- or lonely- or confused. Maybe he could use Manta's help with his homework? ....But as he had just spent several hours studying, he surely hoped that something was keeping Yoh from doing it- or, even better, helping him complete it. Perhaps he had done it himself? The image of Yoh concentrating fiercely over a page of math problems entered Manta's head.
He had to fight off a fierce desire to laugh; Yoh certainly wasn't lazy, as many may have thought he was, but Yoh + Homework just didn't compute. And neither did Yoh + Studying. Oil and Water. But it was a perfect combination in Manta's case. Another thing that made Manta and Yoh so very different. It was surprising how they became a pair of friends, with such differences. But perhaps, the old saying was true: opposites do attract.
Far before reaching Yoh's house, Manta came upon a wooden entrance to what looked like a shrine. He had seen this entrance before, but sitting and cramming had built up energy within him, and he suddenly was curious about what the inside of this wooden portal was like. Gingerly, he stepped into the hidden world.
As it turned out, it was not a shrine- or not just one. It was a Zen garden- a perfect coincidence, as Manta could use something calming and soothing at the moment. There was plenty of greenery as well as stone in this garden. With each of Manta's steps, echoes surged across the clement courts and disappeared into the sky that stretched above. Every time the soft wind blew, the trees wavered and stretched their limbs and leaves, sending shadows waltzing across the gray stones.
That's odd, Manta thought, The wind isn't blowing right now, but there's a shadow that keeps moving....in that other shadow over there........
Manta's eyes stuck to that one shadow feverishly. It moved out of line with any tree, even in wind. Manta could feel his heart rate beating very hard and fast, though there wasn't any apparent cause for the extremity of it's hurry. It almost seemed to have a will of its own.
It was rapidly coming closer now- Manta could see that- from behind a stone pillar, out of the light- what, it had legs?!- it was alive!- the shadow quickly slid away from the body like a sheet- a very odd body, it was- it was at the upper torso- and then the creature slid back into the shadows faster than it had been exposed. What was that?! thought Manta.
But then the thing came quickly, around the other side. A little too quickly- it was exposed to anyone who cared to see, which it clearly did not want that to happen. Careful fear was its expression.
Manta's mouth fell open and hit the ground.
"YOH?!"
Yoh turned his head quickly to face Manta. Wide eyed and startled, he had jumped back slightly. Manta's heartbeat was going much faster now, even faster than it was a few minutes ago.
Yoh fell against the pillar, and rose, and fell again, and slid down it, and back up- a constant, but odious rhythm. Anguish was etched on his face, in place of his usual cheerful glow. His eyes, instead of their usual light, allowed Manta to read fear and pain with their unfelled tears.
Yoh's actions reminded Manta of an animal- an animal in a cage. This shattered his heart, knowing that people should feel free in a Zen garden, and Yoh had the most right to be free and happy than anyone else he knew.
But why was he acting like an animal in the first place?
"Hey, hey! Take it easy, Yoh," Manta slowly walked up to him. Yoh paid no attention; He continued to throw himself against the pillar. However, he had begun to do so with increasingly less force- so much less that he finally just stopped, leaning against the pillar, breathing heavily and staring down at Manta with exhausted, but frightened eyes. Manta himself wore a very worried look. He reached out and grabbed Yoh's wrist- and realized with a tightening chest that he was shaking heavily. His face and body was covered with cuts from where he had thrown himself against the pillar.
His body, itself, was covered with a picturesque article of clothing: the only thing was a soiled blue bodysuit, to which the almost all of the upper half of it had been ripped away, and the bottom half wasn't in the best shape itself, though it still held together. A shred of the material, presumably from the top half, acted as a belt to keep it all together. A few odd-looking flowers were caught in his hair. The oddest thing, however, was how the upper half of his face was deathly pale, while the bottom half remained his natural color.
His eyes suddenly rolled up into his head, and his eyes closed. His mouth clenched shut, and his head bowed down. To Manta's horror and confusion, Yoh slid down the pillar and slumped to the ground in a faint- and only his arm remained up, due to Manta's fingers clamped around his wrist.
Manta instantly dropped it, about to try and revive his friend, when Yoh suddenly pounced onto him. Because of the shock of Yoh's sudden energy, it took him quite a few seconds to realize just what happened. What had happened was that Yoh had jumped up and clamped onto Manta like one would grab onto a life buoy when about to drown. Yoh's head was right next to his, and Manta could easily feel his heartbeat and breath. The breath was evenly paced, though accelerated greatly, but his heartbeat- his heartbeat was irregular. Manta's own heartbeat raced faster. What was going on? What was wrong?
Manta realized that Yoh was about to faint again; His grip lessened, his arms grew slack, and his head put more pressure on his shoulder. His face rested against his neck. Sweat dripped off of his forehead and onto Manta's shoulder. After a few minutes of this, Manta started to back away, with the idea of letting Yoh rest on the ground. But Yoh let out a little throatily moan, and the slack hands suddenly grabbed Manta's shirt very tightly.
"¿Che cosa è sucedió?"
Manta stopped. What the fuck?! He thought, Yoh doesn't know three languages. From his studies, Manta knew quite a few languages, and hearing Yoh speak those words threw him off. But....perhaps Yoh had integrated with a different ghost, one that knew both Italian and Spanish?
Yoh looked up into Manta's face. "¿Chi son-vous?"
Manta stopped short. He knew that Yoh's consciousness was still there, even if mixed with another's. And Yoh would never try to scare him with what he just said.
'Who are you?'
Thoroughly terrified, Manta started to back away from Yoh. When the hands gripped tighter still, he ran out of his grasp and stopped about ten feet away. But what he saw snapped his heartstrings.
Yoh lay on the ground, gripping the stones so hard that his fingers turned white. His face was scrunched in pain and sweat fell off of him in torrents.
Manta could just stand there and watch.
Yoh lifted his head off of the ground with great effort, and said, "Libre......... Frei.............. Livre...........Libero............!!!"
Manta knew each word that he said. In French, German, Portuguese, and Italian, he had said one word: "Free."
Free? What? He saw Yoh lay on the ground in pain, and remembered how he had thrown himself against the wall of the pillar, until Manta had soothed him. Was he trapped inside the garden? He couldn't find his way out? But- why didn't he just say so? But then, he hadn't been acting normally since Manta had first caught him in the garden.
Hoping that Yoh would understand, he came slightly closer and said, "Vamanos." Yoh looked up at him, breathing hard, but he clearly understood. He slightly nodded his head and thrust his hand out to Manta.
Manta paused, debating to himself whether to grab the hand or not, before shakily sliding his hand against the other. When he found that Yoh did not do anything otherwise, he grasped it firmly and pulled Yoh to his feet. When he was up, Manta started running to the wooden exit, dragging Yoh behind. But as the exit became clearer, Yoh started running faster until he was the one dragging Manta along.
And finally they were back on the street.
Yoh breathed in a huge breath of air and let it out, smiling hugely, which was quite an improvement in contrast to the wince and whimper that he had before. Manta stared up at him now, clearly confused. Yoh looked down at Manta, blinked, and imitated his expression. He couldn't hold it for long, though, and let it go with a docile giggle.
Manta's eyes widened. What the fuck?! What was wrong with Yoh?!
"Grazie, Monsieur!" he said, bending his knees and bowing his head for a split second, and returning to his regular stance.
Manta stared. Yoh had just curtsied at him. And he still was speaking multiple languages.
Was this Yoh?
Manta shook his head and, with questioning eyes and a courteous smile, he bowed and said, "De nada."