Someday, Somehow
I wish you'd unclench your fists
And unpack your suitcase
Chapter 3: Who wears the pants?
He leaned in pressing his lips hard against hers; he wasn't trying to seduce her, like the last time. This time it was to establish dominance, to prove whom she belongs to.
His arms tightly wrapped around her arms holding her prisoner inside them. He forced her mouth open, and slipped his tongue, she was his to do what he will. She had no say in what he did to her.
She struggled in his arms to get out, but the more she struggle the more his arms closed tighter on her. Not allowing her room to breathe, so that she would have to depend on his breath.
He moved his mouth on hers, deepening the kiss. She had stop shrugging, but also not excepting him fully. He could seduce, infiltrate her mind, but that would be too easy. He wanted her to be in complete control when he finally came into her.
Why? He wasn't sure why.
He moved his arms down her back, cupping her butt, bring her up more to him. He could smell her body starting to response to him, even though she wasn't excepting it yet. The girl was fighter, good.
He ended the kiss and stared down at her. His eyes somewhere between a mixed of gold and red. She stared back into them, not flinching; her breath heavy as she tried to regain the air she had lost.
He leaned back down to recapture her lips but stopped. His ears had picked up something up something moving in the bushes towards them. He quickly put himself between the bushes and Nikki.
A human child struggled out of them before falling in front of them. His face was covered in blood, making it hard for him to see what was in front of him. He struggled to get up, crying out in pain.
"It's okay," said Nikki trying to wrap him in her outer kimono. The blood penetrated through the cloth and started to stain the hands that held him. "Your safe."
She looked up at him with her eyes widen, telling him to do something.
"Nikki," he said trying to claim her, his eyes telling her that this was out of his hands.
"Do something," she screamed at him. He was a little taken back by this; was he being order by a human?
"Do something," she said crying.
"I can't," he said. Trying to explain to a human the laws of life and death was like trying to explain to a fish what was like to drowning. It was beyond their abilities to comprehend that there was something that they could not interfere with.
He looked past the child as the clocked figure came forward to claim the child soul.
"What do you mean you can't, or is it you wouldn't," she yelled. "Damn it." She kept looking at him and holding the child tighter.
He took a deep breath trying to remember she was human and this was beyond her ability to comprehend. "Nikki, it's dead,"
He watched as Nikki unwrapped the child, to see that his eyes had frozen into a dead glaze. His little chest wasn't moving, and he had gone limp in her arms.
"No," she whispered, as if the child was hers and not someone she just met a couple of seconds ago. She buried her face into the fallen body.
He bent down and laid a hand on her for comfort. Human grieved too much over death, as if it was something that was unnatural.
She jerked away from his touched and got up. With the body in her hands she took off into the forest, as if she got away from him, somehow the boy would come back to life.
He watched her run, not really sure he should go after her, yet. Human grief was an arcane emotion, one that had the tendency to bring on more death.
"Never understood humans, to begin with," said the cloak voice that was standing on his right.
Sugimi shook his head, and looked at the grim. "Me either."
"I still need the soul from that body," Death said signing.
"I'll hunt her down in a couple of minutes," Sugimi said.
"A human?" Death said. "Now I have seen everything."
Sugimi looked at death, not sure what to say. He really wasn't the type of youkai that like associating himself with human, and tried to stay clear of them. He personally couldn't stand them, but she had fascinated him somehow.
"What caused the death," he said not really caring.
"War, what else…don't understand these human, they kill and then get piss off when they are the ones kill…at least this one is a child," Death said.
"War?" Sugimi asked. "There was a batter close by,"
"Yep, about the same directions that your human was heading, Chinese invaders I believe," said Death.
"Why didn't you say something," he said taking off after hers. Give it up to that human to run back into trouble.
Nikki kept running, not sure where she was going or when she stop. How could something be so cruel as to allow a child to die such a terrible death?
She stopped in her tracks as she came out of the forest into a clearing that was covered with the worse stench. Her nose wrinkled trying to block the smell.
The village that should be have lain in front of her, was nothing but ashes that were slowly dyeing. She could see a couple of animals running around trying to find some reason to this.
She took a step into the village, tightly clutch the body as if it would protect her. The place seemed something out of those hell drawings that she had seen a couple of times. She took a breath, trying not to smell the air.
"Well, well look at what we have here."
Nikki quickly turned around to see two soldiers standing next to one of the burn house. One of them was dragging a girl behind him, only holding her by the hair. She could hear the faint cries from the girl. They spoke in the voice of the invaders, the once that she heard some whispered about. She had learned the language, because all ladies learn Chinese, but she wasn't use to it be spoken so shabby, that she had to dissect the sounds to figure out what they were saying.
"Looks like we wouldn't have to share," said the other one.
Nikki didn't know what they meant by sharing, but she would bet it wasn't something she wanted to know. She took a step back, clinching the soaking body in her hands and trying not to look scared.
"You monsters," she whispered. "I demand you let that girl go and leave this village this instant."
Both men looked at each other before bursting out laughing.
"You demand, your highness, and pray what power do you have to demand such a thing," said the one not holding the girl. He started to walk forward, Nikki refuse to flee.
"I think I am going to have some fun with you," said the guy taking hold of her hand and knocking the body out. She watched the body fall to the floor and lay there like a child's doll.
"Let go of me this instant."
He looked at her before grabbing her body and forcing his lips on her. She could hear his buddy in the background cheering him on.
She remembered some ladies at the court talking about area between the legs of a man were very sensitive. Deciding she had nothing to loss, she thrust her knee into his crouch and pushed him away. He bit onto the lip, as he fell, taking some of it with him. Nikki could feel the blood rush over her mouth, and taste her own blood once. It was warm, and had a lingering taste, something she couldn't put her foot on the moment, but her taste buds had tasted before.
He fell to the floor in an agonizing pain, cursing her as a bitch. She didn't care as long as she got away from him.
"Why you little bitch," he screamed after the pain had left and flew after her.
Nikki grabbed her lip, trying to keep the blood from flowing and ran. She didn't get far before the guy that tried to take part of her lip with him, caught up with her. He turned her around before laying the back of his hand across her face. She fell to the floor, her face throbbing in pain. The heat rushing up to her face and some of it came through her nose.
"I'm going to screw you to death, you bitch," the man said, starting to take off his pants.
Nikki looked around for some sort of weapon; she wasn't going to give up that easy, not when her and the girl's life were in danger. She had faced a youkai this morning; she could over come this too.
They were differently Chinese soldiers; they had that familiar smell that of Menoumaru. Damn bug.
Menoumaru wasn't in sight, he would have never dirty hands with the blood of humans, but he never put it past himself to allow his loyal followers to rape and plumage.
He heard a faint cry, and headed towards the sound. It figured that the human got herself in trouble. Taking off after the sound, he followed it to where he saw the human on ground. Her face was bruised and bloody, but she was facing her enemy without the fear in her eyes.
He didn't know withered to be proud of her or kill her. The man reached up grabbing her and pulling her towards him.
Sugimi eyes turned red, no human touches what was his. He could feel the blood flow through him as he springs towards him. His claws ripped through the weak armor and flesh, causing blood to be spread everywhere. He could hear the breaking of the bones, as the slip, and the tiny pieces flinging everywhere.
He looked at her; his breath was strong and forced, his eyes boring down into her. She gasped as she looked back at the elongate face and blood red eyes. They weren't human eyes but completely stretched across his eyeball with a slither of black. His hands were covered in the Chinese man fleshed and blood. He lifted his hands towards his face, taking in the smell before spring after his buddy.
Nikki picked herself up watching as the other cried out in mercy only to be cut down to size. The girls that he was holding cried out before running. He didn't go after her, but turned and looked at Nikki, half expecting her to run in fear, but she stood there just looking at him; no fear, no hatred, nothing in her eyes.
He sat in one of the trees watching the going on in the village. The few that had survived, was trying to pickup what was left and starts over. He could see the children all staying together, protecting each other.
There wasn't much left to the village, one sack, a couple of chickens, and a handful of people, mostly too old or too young to do anything about what happen. Winter was soon coming; these people weren't going to make it.
He had seen this scene over and over in his eight hundred years of existence. Humans didn't last long in this world, and the more death they produce the more lowly forms of his kinds came into being.
They would find their way to this village and finish off what was started. The smell of blood, flesh, and fire was too strong for them to resisted.
"My Lord?"
He looked down to see her standing there. Her hair had come out of the rag and was paste on her swollen face. The lip had stop bleeding a couple of hours ago, but left behind a purple bruise.
"Those men who attacked," she said looking out on the village, "They were from across the ocean."
He nodded not sure what to say. How could he explain this war wasn't between humans but between demon, him and Menoumaru, and that humans were dragged into it.
"Why are they invading us," she said. He looked at her, as she climb into the tree and sat down next to him. He was shocked, not many humans liked to climb trees, but she seemed very comfortable in them.
"Greed, power, land, rights," he said not looking at her. "Why do humans invade?"
Nikki sat there for a couple of minutes thinking about what he said. It seemed like a bleak reality on the whole situation of humanity and war. But he was an outsider in her world. She had heard the priest talk that youkais live by their own rules and laws, different from those of humans. And like the ants on the ground and the birds in the sky, they might have contact with humans from time to time, but mostly it was brief. Not interfering or getting involve, so it left the question on why did he get involve in this.
"That's the ironic part of that," said Nikki looking at him. "When we do the invasion it is right, but when it done to us it's considered wrong. But I guess you can justified anything you want."
That wasn't the answer he had expected from her. He expected the more of a way didn't protect them earlier question. Most humans believe that a youkai could solve anything.
"That's one way looking at it."
"Where is Myoga," she asked.
"Probably ran off somewhere," he said, not sounding too upset, almost five hundred years with that flea in serves, he has learned by now not to expect him until way after the battle.
"So what now," she asked.
"Get some rest, we head out in the first light,"
Nikki looked at the village; she knew what was in store for them. But she couldn't leave them. They didn't have anyone to protect them.
"What about them?"
"What about them."
"We can't just leave them," she said. "They will die."
He sign, he had figured this issue would come up.
"Yes, we can," he said.
"Maybe you can, but I can't."
"And what do you suppose we do with them, I can't afford to take a bunch of humans with me."
"You're taken me," she said.
He looked at her, thinking I have a reason for that. But he didn't want a bunch of old disease man and young children following him all over the country.
"We are not taking them with us," he said getting down from the tree and walking away. Something told him he just lost his first real argument with this girl.