Chapter Two: With Eyes Unseeing

"Lord Van, please answer me! Lord Van!"
           

 "Blood from the control chamber..."

                          
 "Van! Van, hang on! Can you hear me? Van, wake up!"

            
 
 "Van!"

          
 
 "Van..."

"Van…?" I mumbled, lolling my head to the side. Distantly, I could make out a slew of swear words and the grinding sound of metal on metal.            

"Hitomi?! Get out of here!"

I stumbled to my feet groggily; Van was standing about ten yards away, deep in combat with three people, jumping over what looked like to bodies on the ground…no… they can't be…

"I said get the #@$% out of here, blast you!" He shouted at me again, blocking gracefully a swing to his head, breaking my horrified stare down with the dead bodies on the ground.

"Excuse me? Where do you think I should run exactly?"

In case you haven't figured out where we where yet, we where in a forest, it was dark and there where some sad little men bent on taking over the world while cutting off my head, while some dude who I take was my boyfriend or something trying to protect my while getting his butt kicked.

And I had almost run myself to death, could hardly stand up and was bleeding.

Peachy, just keen peachy.

If I turned out to be this Hitomi chic when I got my memory back, I sure had dang good taste in men who where so not in touch with their feelings. I felt sorry for them, maybe I could get cable TV hooked up out here and instead of fighting, we all could go over to my house—wherever that was—and watch Oprah while drinking herbal tea.

"Hitomi, duck!" Van shouted trying to work the fight so he could be closer so he could protect me.

Of course, I dropped to the ground, quite shaken when I saw a flash of metal -- a sword--- where my head had been. There was the general name calling from the over weight smelly dude who owned the sword when he saw that he missed.

And this made me mad being called a large amount of four letters when the guy had the hygiene of a dead pig.

So mad I somehow managed to do a one-legged judo kick square at his stomach, knocking the air out of him and sending his sword in the air.

While he was stunned, I made a mad dash on my hands and knees towards the broad sword, hoping that I could use it somehow.

My hand had just closed around the hilt when he kicked my in the chest, making me see stars as I crashed through the air with the greatest of ease.

I looked up to see him as he neared me, his sword drawn and pointed at my neck, my breathing stopped and my heart skipped a dozen beats as everything started to slow down around me…

I rolled over to my side, trying anything to get away from the blade that was flashing through the air like lightning… I closed my eyes, praying that it would all end soon…

The blade crashed to the earth harmlessly to my side, less then a hair away, vibrating slowly.

I laid there for what seemed to be forever starring at that, thinking what if I hadn't been that fast or had eaten five or six extra Little Debbie's cupcakes, when somebody's hands roughly grabbed me from behind and hauled me to my feet.

And I, in the light of the current events and the multitude of times I had almost been decapitated in a short amount of time, screamed for all I was worth.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

"Hitomi! It's me!" Van hissed in my ear, shaking me slightly.

"Oh… sorry."

"Sorry? You almost scared me half to death you little fool." He said angrily his hands still on my shoulders.

"Nice to see you alive too." I said jerking out of his grasp and brushing my clothes off.

He snorted and absently cleaned off his sword on the tunic of the man who had the hygiene of a dead… guy.

The urge to throw up on Van washed over me, but I ignored it out of complete respect towards some guy who probably saved my life.

"You' re injured." Van said calmly looking at me after he had sheathed his sword.

"What?"

"You're injured." He repeated, cautiously touching the cut on my forehead. I flinched.

"No I'm not; I am in the best of health of my entire life."

Van half laughed and gave a high pitched whistle. "All the same, I must insist that you come with me to a healer."

"And if I choose not to?" I challenged, folding my arms across my chest.

"You forget which one of us is holding the sword, Hitomi." He answered, whistling again.

I frowned, "I am not afraid of you."

A horse came trotting out of the bush to my left.

"I never said you where," He shot back, holding his hand out to the horse.

"Then say that I choose to go with you---- and I am not saying I am --- I will only go peacefully under one condition."

"And that is?" He grabbed at the reins of the horse, twisting them about one hand.

"No more decapitations."

He half laughed, glancing sideways at me.

"Deal."

R&R… Copyright by Avaris Sky 2001-2004