Author's Notes: Sorry, the months just seemed to fly by, but I really should have gotten off my bum earlier to get this done. It's fairly long, for me anyway, so I hope it makes up for the wait, somewhat. Also, if you notice any discrepancies in logic, my explanation is that dreams don't make perfect sense. So I'm cheating, what of it? Just humour me, okay?
Thanks to Ti'ana, Meruru-chan (heh, I'm just a tad late right? It's here, it's here!), Ophelia Winters, lozz-pilgrim (well, you know with dreams and stuff, there's many, many loopholes), Lakshmi (you are pretty much on the mark. The cherry smell is actually benzene, but artists use it as a paint thinner just like turpentine, which I think is closely related. Just for that I officially dedicate this chapter to you!)
Dedicated to Lakshmi whose perceptiveness figured out the eerie smell.
Disclaimer: CCS, not mine. This story, no money involved. Eyes, want to sleep. Good night.
Dark FantasyChapter 9: Speakeasy
The ground spiraled in closer around Syaoran and the black tarmac grew to encompass the entirety of his vision. His heart was lodged deep in the pit of his stomach as he dived headlong towards the pavement. And when he slammed into it, a powerful, shuddering burning pain spread suffused his entire body. There was no consciousness of where he had connected first; his whole body was awash with same fiery twisting agony. His bones twisted and broke apart under his skin, the raw white spears tearing ruthlessly into connecting muscle. And accompanying the pain was an odd sense of disconnection where his vision was steady but his brain seemed to rattle around in his head and melt.
The tremors of the collision ripped through him and he screamed for all he was worth, until he was raw in the throat and smothered with the pain that kept recirculating in his chest. When he felt as if he would be seared straight through, the ground dissolved away and he felt himself falling again, like falling through the surface of water, with his heart pounding madly against his shattered bones. Free falling through molasses and then suddenly buoyed up with an undulating force, held up like a sacrifice, propped up vertical.
And nothing else was real to him until his eyes once again began to take in what was around him. His whole body ached, but mercifully with a only dull sense of being battered. The sky above him was black, framed with the rising walls of two tall buildings. A dangerously unstable looking fire escape jutted into his right peripheral vision and he could start to make out the sounds of car tires on wet road and the eerie scuffling of shoes. He tried to crane his neck to explore the rest of his surroundings, but the searing pain erupted with the slightest movement.
Time trickled by like the metallic stickiness that dripped from the corners of his mouth. His head still spun with a disconcerting nausea and his limbs weighed him down as if they were driven into the wet concrete ground and pinned by invisible bonds. But as the neon lights began to flicker into existence and the alley began to lighten with the cumulative fluorescent effects of awakening lamps, his body fuzzed over and tingled. It was an itchy sensation, growing deep inside of him and spreading over his face and into his head. It manifested itself by causing hypersensitivity, so acute that he could feel the precise detail over how the ground was sharp with glass and pebbles and how the dark night was overcast with thick gray lines of clouds and how the crunching of the car tires in the background grew lower in pitch as it sped away.
It all added up in his mind and screamed at him to move. The contact with the ground was too unbearable, the sounds too raw. He slowly moved his fingers and was relieved at the absence of red haze inducing pain. Soon his arm was carefully bending up towards his head and he was tentatively pressing his palms against the ground and putting his weight on them.
The buildings spun a little as he stood up on his feet and he was acutely aware that his feet were numb and seemed ready to buckle under his weight. But he managed to slowly turn around and lean against the brick wall of one of the buildings. The sight before him was very familiar. The street was slick with recent rain and cars were passing intermittently across his vision. Only a handful of people were walking about on the sidewalks, men with coat lapels up to shield out the wind, women carrying bags, teenagers talking animatedly to each other. The billboards above the building across the street glared with green and red lights, offering a new and exciting deal to all who were fans of a local radio station. Win big indeed, thought Syaoran as he righted himself and began plodding forward, feeling his legs become sturdier and his footsteps surer.
He knew this street very well, it was only a block away from his apartment. In fact the little Chinese restaurant he usually got take out from was just a few stores down from his current position. His stomach growled and he remembered the time when he was with Sakura in the noodle house. The thought of her seemed to flick a switch in his head and a deep sense of dread clenched his stomach. This was still the dream, and judging from what had happened on the hospital roof, there was a dangerous maniac lurking somewhere.
Goosebumps trailed up one arm and down another. It was then that he noticed that despite the normal sounds of everyday life, there was a strange roboticness to every action. The teens walked exactly five paces and burst into laughter, then another five and the same laughter. The shoppers alternated beats between their footsteps and the rustling of their shopping bags, and the cars crunched the road in rhythm to each other in drawn out bursts of scraping. Even the billboards buzzed with a measured certainty.
Syaoran carefully emerged onto the sidewalk and frowned down the street. He had no idea which direction to go, but it wasn't as if it mattered. Somehow he'd be caught up with. And he was right because at that moment a taxi came roaring down the road and screeched to a halt in front of him. The door popped open and a raucous jazzy blaring of trumpet and piano throbbed from the stereo.
He stepped back, startled at the sudden entrance of the black car. But nonetheless he peered in and squinted in the dimness. Staring back at him was a pair of green eyes and a cheeky grin.
"So where to?" Sakura asked, while chewing noisily on some gum and popping a few bubbles with loud rhythmic snaps.
"Sakura?"
"That's my name. Where are you heading mister?" She smiled the same meaningless curve of the lips and nodded her head along to the strange pulsating music. "You getting in or not?"
Syaoran eyed the street around him uncertainly. Something prickled against his skin and the more he stood underneath the flickering neon gaze of the billboards, surrounded by the hypnotically discordant notes of the radio, the more he knew that something dangerous was approaching. But he was caught in whatever this was, this unintelligible plot and he could do nothing but acquiesce. He nodded gravely and slid into the passenger side seat.
Sakura gave him another vacant smile and drummed her hands on the steering wheel. "So where you going?"
Syaoran had no idea; the lamp lit street laid in front of him, the two curbs converging to a fuzzy point at the horizon. She had given him the decision for the destination but he knew that the decision was not in his hands, it was what the dream demanded, what whatever had created this world wanted. And he had no illusions about Sakura either, as he watched her bobbing head and bouncing hair. She was just as human here as she was in that coma ward. She might have been next to him in the physical presence but her body had no consciousness. It was only a tool for something, and he knew enough to let her fulfill her mission. "You decide"
An almost lifelike smile appeared on her face before descending behind the plastic mobility of her blandly pleasant face. "You're the boss. Tokyo Tower it is."
Syaoran grimaced. He looked towards the metal structure through the window of the cab, looming high above roofs and lit red, a monolith of steel. Whatever awaited him there it wouldn't be harmless.
The drive was a quick one, the scenery jumping ahead with the bass from the radio. Whole blocks disappeared between point A and point B, all under the malevolent gaze of an anaemic moon. Sakura, herself was as animated as ever, tapping her sneakers and fingers to whatever bits and pieces of melodies drifted from the speakers. Occasionally, she'd stop, and the music would fade and then restart with them having skipped another block or another district. It was when they jolted to a stop underneath the massive feet of the tower that she turned and stared at him for a long moment with almost sentient eyes. Her voice dropped low and solemn, her eyes turning away from his and staring up with a touch of fear towards the top of the tower. "He's up there." The air hung heavy with apprehension for a fraction of a second before she turned her gaze back to him. "So am I…"
As the last word died into stillness, Syaoran could feel the cold run through him and a slight pressure settling on his shoulders, pushing him against the ground. His ears ached and popped and only then was he aware that he was now traveling up the tower in an elevator. The ground was getting farther and farther away and through the glass walls Tokyo spread out before him like the expanse of an open field, dotted with millions of square molehills.
When the elevator slowed to a halt and the doors parted, he found himself rooted to the spot and couldn't bring himself past the threshold. The observation deck wasn't the open viewing platform and many small fast food counters that the real Tokyo Tower had. This was a walled in lounge, padded with overstuffed sofas, scattered with green leafy potted plants and choked with the dim, perfumed atmosphere of a demure piano bar. Even the carpet underneath his shoes was foreign, lush and airy instead of rough and industrially close cropped.
Even rich sparkling chandeliers hung overhead, casting long jagged rainbows against the walls. But it was not the room that stopped him at the elevator doors. It was Sakura, draped over a scarlet sofa in the center of the room. When she raised her head slightly to acknowledge his entrance, he knew that whatever she spark of life she had down at the base of the tower was no more. The eyes were vibrantly green, but without animation. She was in a strange dress, sequined and beaded, slipping off her shoulders. Flashy jewelry across wound around her neck and wrists, rubies, diamonds, emeralds. Her hair was crimped and matted close, in a way that was exotic but overly foreign. It recalled to him the American 'Roaring Twenties' that he had seen a documentary about a few years back.
But the spell that had bound him to his spot disenchanted when a familiar sharp toned voice called out to him. He then realized Sakura was not moving for a reason: she was posing. Posing for the white haired man propped off to her side, face and body half hidden by the large canvas and easel before him. He worked dexterously with gritty swishes of his brush, occasionally plunging into globs of different colours on the palette on his knee. Haruka looked up momentarily and locked his dark eyes on Syaoran. "Why don't you join us?"
Syaoran hesitated but finally took a tentative step into room. He had to keep reminding himself that the frail looking man, smiling at him in a friendly fashion was a dangerous criminal. That Sakura was in fact one of his victims.
As if Haruka knew his thoughts, he smirked in Syoaran's direction. "You want to know why."
Syaoran took another step towards furthering the distance between them, prowling in a slow half circle. "Yes."
Another few quick dabs and scrapes against the canvas. "She's beautiful isn't she?" He gestured to Sakura. Syaoran made no reply. "You know she is. Such beauty shouldn't be destroyed; I am preserving it."
Syaoran made a sound of some kind to keep him talking as he took careful inventory about the space around him for potential weapons to defend himself with. "You kill innocent girls. How is that preserving beauty?"
Haruka smiled condescendingly at Syaoran, as if the light of wisdom was beyond the grasp of the simple Chinese man. "Beauty is short-lived." As if to illustrate his point, he put his brushes and palette down, got up and went to crouch down at Sakura's side, taking a savage hold of her face by her chin. He pointed the emotionless face up at Syaoran, pressing the red painted lips together in a nasty parody of seduction. "This beauty only lasts so long. Before it sags and wrinkles and dries out. And this body, it fills out and loses its perfect lines. In death, the memory of beauty is preserved in art."
Syaoran, having spotted a heavy looking glass bottle of liquor at the base of Sakura's couch, sneered. "Art? Murder is art?"
Haruka remained unaffected. "If that's what it takes." He let go of Sakura' face, letting her head drop back to her three quarters profile view.
Syaoran suppressed a shudder at the cool self-assured tone that Haruka had spoken with. "So why stop?" As sleep starved as he had been, he had devoured all news regarding the mysterious serial killer during his extended sabbatical leave. Sakura had indeed been the last victim and the news agencies were warning of the 'lull before the storm.'
Haruka's eyes actually seemed to twinkle. "I don't continue until I've captured everything. Her picture is unfinished. It lacks vitality. Life."
Syaoran took a secretive step towards Sakura. "Because she's still alive. She didn't die like the others,"
"If you will." Another flurry dabs and strokes. He met Syaoran's eyes. "But it has been a fortunate occurrence. It's given us a gift of these dreams, hasn't it?"
Syaoran frowned. He had taken it for granted that his dreams were the conscious act of some extraordinary person. He wasn't a spiritual person. But Sakura was clearly only slightly more than a puppet and Haruka seemed genuinely innocent of this specific machination. But that didn't mean he wasn't a cold-blooded killer. Syaoran inched forwards slightly in soft stunted movements until he was hovering over Sakura's prone form. If Haruka had noticed his approach, he was oblivious of the fact, eyebrows furrowed into a deep crease between his eyes, the picture of concentration. Syaoran looked down at his feet and nudged the glass bottle with his feet. It was definitely heavy enough should he ever needed it.
Haruka seemed to be attuned to his growing apprehension and executed a particularly violent slash of colour across the canvas before setting his paints and brushes aside. He rose calmly from his seat yet in a quick movement, brandishing a gleaming bit of metal. His voice was somewhat bemused in an ironic kind of way. "People don't seem to realize how well a weapon a plaster knife can be."
Syaoran pushed down his rising fear and snatched up the bottle from the floor, holding it out before him in a defensive gesture. His other hand grabbed Sakura's arm and yanked. But she was dead weight, shifting slightly but still limp across the velvet cushions. Haruka was getting closer, the vicious short knife menacing in the crystal filtered light. Struck by a last desperate thought Syaoran looked up at the chandelier above, dangling with prisms and flame shaped electric bulbs. There really was only one chance. Hoping for the best, he flung forefully the bottle upwards and hunched over to protect himself and Sakura.
The din of shattering glass and the crackle of electricity sizzled through the air. Sharp pieces rained down all over around Syaoran and he noticed that the air was suddenly impregnated with a smoky bitterness. He dared to untuck his head to see Haruka also stunned and hunched over to protect himself from the glass. But Syaoran's attention was drawn immediately to the sparking remains of the chandelier and the dark alcohol that was aflame all over in patches on the furniture and carpet. At that moment, Haruka unbent and in front of the backdrop of flames and littered crystal, he looked indescribably nightmarish.
Syaoran fumblingly grabbed at Sakura again, scrabbling to lift her off the couch before the fire licked her sequined dress or her pale cold skin. As he hefted her weight away from the sofa, he was painfully aware that he could never hope to outrun Haruka with the extra burden. Besides, there was nowhere to go. He backed up a few steps, but his space was limited, trapped by the spreading fire. Haruka was steadily getting closer, materializing through the thickening acrid smoke one limb at a time. Burning furniture surrounded him and he tried to kick a burning throw pillow at Haruka. The older man easily dodged and it tumbled past him, but then with a muffled crack crashed into the easel and landed flat on the canvas, wet paint shimmering in the fire's light before it leapt onto the white canvas and consumed it with a malicious crackling sound.
The smoke was getting even thicker and Syaoran was feeling its effect, his eyes stinging and head spinning. Haruka stopped his advance and had leapt towards his burning painting, desperate to put out the blaze, even trying to use his bare hands to smother the blue orange flames. And through his tearing eyes, Syaoran could see the horrifying image of the fire jumping and catching Haruka's clothes. And then he shut his eyes hard against the resulting agonized howl and the stomach turning stench of charred flesh. He still remembered from his residency the water welts and broken crusted boiled pustules the patients in the burn ward had. The dizziness and nausea spun around him faster and faster, and an enormous pressure on his shoulders seemed to want to pound him into the ground. His body creaked and his muscles tore apart and his eyes felt the searing red of his blood boiling.
He screamed in agony. And then his body dropped out of sensation all together.
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Terada wiped the slick sweat off his forehead with the already soaked through sleeve of his shirt. "How high?"
"Still 170, doctor."
"Shit. Push another 500 milligrams." He lifted up one of Syaoran's eyelids and shined a light into the distressingly small pupils. He looked up at Tomoyo, frozen in horror off his left. He tried to hide the growing futility on his face but she saw it anyway and paled considerably. "We're going to bring him back Tomoyo. We will bring him back. What?" The nurse was tugging urgently at his sleeve.
"Doctor, it's going down. Fast. 130 and dropping."
Terada sighed in disbelieving relief and spied the full hypodermic in the nurse's hand. "Did you push the last 500?"
"No, doctor. I was just going to when his pulse just started to slow down all of a sudden. It's at 110 now."
Terada frowned. What had just happened? He caught Tomoyo's relieved face, still sick looking and ready to collapse but relieved nonetheless. She just stared back at him. "How?"
"I don't know. It doesn't make sense…" They stared at each other in wordless confusion until another doctor arrive in the doorway and shook his head dazedly. Terada noticed the strange silence in the ward. "Was it the Kinomoto girl?"
The man nodded slowly. "Just coded for no reason at all. And then right before we were going to shock her, she just started breathing again. Pulse returned to normal like nothing had happened at all. I don't understand it..."
Terada took a worried look at Syaoran and then at Tomoyo. "I know the feeling."
Silence drifted over the room again for a few minutes before another nurse knocked on the door. "Sorry to bother you Terada-san, but that local artist with the heart attack just died. A few reporters want a small statement. Should I tell them to wait?"
"No." He took a final look at Syaoran to make sure everything was satisfactory, willfully squashed his confusion, and forced himself back into the role as Chief of Staff. "Alright nurse, where are the reporters?"
Tomoyo watched Terada disappear behind the metal doors of the elevator. The nurse and the other doctor had both left too and she was alone with Syaoran and the slowly beeping heart monitor. And an inexplicable mystery. A few doors down the hall was the Kinomoto girl, another piece of the impossible puzzle. Tomoyo slid fatigued into a badly padded chair at Syaoran's side and tried to find a logical explanation of all she knew, but when her pager beeped her urgently an hour later, she still had no answer, only many more questions.
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Author's Notes: Well, one more major chapter to wrap everything up, and then probably a happy S+S epilogue. Drop a review, won't you?