Prayer Wheel
Chapter 4
A/N: First off, I'd like to thank all the people who left me such wonderful reviews for my humble little tale. Princess Michelle, Takita, Kazuya-sama, chandavatika, kuni-hwoarang, and Jayne too (=P), this one's for you!
"Jun. Please wake up."
Mother Azami's aged old hand gently touched Jun's cheek. She stirred in her sleep, a groan of pain escaping her lips. Mother Azami shook her head and turned to Sisters Riyu and Narin.
"She won't wake up. It's not a coma...not that deep...but she simply can't will herself to leave the world of her dreams. Things have grown too traumatic for her in real life, it appears..." Mother Azami once again shook her head, her wrinkles deepening as she frowned in concern for her raven-haired daughter.
Autumn had arrived at the Shinryuu Mountain Convent. The trees were flushing brilliant hues of browns, reds, oranges, and the leaves were slowly drifting down from their once-content perches on the branches. The summer had lapsed to the fall while Jun had slept; she had not regained consciousness for almost two weeks. Jun's favorite season was the fall, for many new types of birds often showed themselves, but it appeared thus far that she would not wake to experience them.
"Mother Azami..." whispered Sister Narin. "Should we tell the authorities?" Mother Azami, without turning to face her, shook her head again.
"A squad of police would simply scare off the sacred spirits that will eventually cure our Daughter Jun. This affair must be dealt with in a wholly spiritual manner. I do not know what evil menaces our little convent, but I am sure that it cannot be controlled by physical force."
"Mother Azami, that's unreasonable!" said Riyu, hysteria beginning to penetrate her voice. "There's something severely wrong with Sister Jun already, and you expect us to solve this ourselves? What happens when more of us collapse and don't wake up? If we can't call on outside forces, we need to at the very least get Sister Jun to an infirmary or something of the sort..." Azami rose from her seat; her face, normally composed, now started to grow angry.
"Are you familiar with the concept of 'psychic noise', Daughter Riyu?" Riyu, recoiling a little at the abnormal tone of Azami's voice, shook her head. Mother Azami opened her lips to speak, but at that moment Jun very suddenly sat up from bed.
"Mother Azami? ...Sister Narin? Riyu?..." Jun looked around her room, her vision slightly blurred by half a month's worth of sleep. She then looked out the window, and upon seeing the trees and their red-orange leaves, gave a gasp of shock. "How long have I been asleep?"
"Two weeks, Jun..." said Sister Narin. Jun, alarmed, turned back to face the three women in her room.
"Has...has anyone else been attacked?" Jun inquired, concern suddenly welling up in the pit of her stomach.
Mother Azami spoke. "Fortunately, there have been no other attacks..." Jun was relieved to some extent, but her own plight still remained up in the air. She got out of bed and bowed to the three. "Thank you for watching over me while I slept. Now, if you will excuse me, I would like to get changed and bathe." All of the sisters bowed to Jun in return, even Riyu, who had never been particularly fond of the Kazama herself. As they departed out of the room, Jun gave a deep, appreciative breath of the crisp autumn air. In a world of dreams, she could never experience the true beauty of nature; an incentive she had used to will herself from her catatonia.
Just as Azami had told Riyu and Narin, Jun was too terrified to once again face the real world, so she locked herself in her existence of sleep. She couldn't remember anything that happened in her daze; it was the sensation of having a dream that seemed vaguely familiar, but not being able to recall even a single detail about it. However, upon awakening, Jun felt a new impetus burning to find out what exactly was going on at Shinryuu Convent.
Of course, after two weeks of remaining in one spot and sweating, a bath was definitely in order for the disheveled Jun. She walked into the simple bathroom, which consisted merely of a toilet, bathtub, a small mirror and a cabinet to hold what few toiletries Jun was permitted to have. The nightgown slipped off her weary shoulders and she turned on the hot water. Even the steam seemed to relax her weary and aching muscles, and she took a sigh of relief. She slipped into the bath and immediately the catharsis spread over her. The sensation of the hot water against Jun's skin relieved her mind of her troubled thoughts, and the only thing on her mind was the blissful warmth washing through her body. Wisps of steam escaped from the pool of hot water, filling the room with a thick, humid fog. Jun, sighing once again, slipped underneath the surface of the water, her hair drifting about her in a black halo.
(Don't open your eyes.)
The command burst through Jun's head clearly, in a voice quite obviously not her own...the voice of a man, a dark-sounding voice. Jun slightly panicked and did not open her eyes, because, as everyone knows, it is foolish to open one's eyes in a bath. After a few more moments of silence, she simply passed it off as a product of her imagination and drifted back into her dreamlike state.
Jun's bath, like all good things must, came to an end. She hated to see it go, because after such a hellish night at the convent it was truly a boon, but the water was starting to stagnate and Jun hated lukewarm water. She pulled the chain plug out of the drain and emerged from the water. Wrapping a towel smelling faintly of lotion underneath her shoulders, she allowed a smile to cross her face for the first time in what seemed like an eternity. She strolled over to her dresser to find her habit, kneeling down to open the drawer on the bottom, and gasped at what she saw inside.
Bugs.
"What?!" screamed Jun, falling back from the open drawer. Hundreds of bugs were writhing through Jun's open dresser drawer, the clicking of their legs and pincers making a sound most unsettling to her. There were many types of awful insects; beetles, centipedes, flies, maggots, all of them heaped up on top of each other, wriggling in the most grotesque of ways.
Jun stood back up and peered into the dresser; the bugs were still there, still squirming about, still collectively making their repulsive sounds. If there was one facet of nature that Jun could do away with, it was that of the insects. She just could not bring herself to hold them with the same esteem as the magnificent creatures of the air or land. Of course, comparing the insects to other animals wouldn't help her get them out of her room, so she thought briefly about how to dispose of the sudden infestation. Finally, Jun came to a conclusion; she took the dresser full of bugs and threw them out her window. Since her bedroom faced the side of the mountain, the bugs (and several habits that were in the dresser along with them) would simply fall out of the walls of the convent. She cringed a little as the heap of insects hit the ground with a stomach-turning 'plop!'.
Despite the fact that none of the bugs appeared threatening or dangerous, Jun was still extremely confused about their sudden appearance, and in her clothes drawer to boot. In fact, a lot of things weren't making sense to her...
"Does this tie...into my attack?" she mused to herself out loud. Jun decided to herself that it was time to do a little studying.
A/N: Well, once again I'd like to thank everyone for reading this. I'm not in it for the reviews, but...it's really nice to know that someone is reading what you put so much effort into, and enjoying it to boot! This is turning into something longer than I anticipated...=P I hope to incorporate some of the other Tekken characters into the fic - not so much as primary focuses, but at least how they have viewed Jun's departure from the whole fighting scene and all that. I am trying to keep this focused on Jun, after all.
Chapter 4
A/N: First off, I'd like to thank all the people who left me such wonderful reviews for my humble little tale. Princess Michelle, Takita, Kazuya-sama, chandavatika, kuni-hwoarang, and Jayne too (=P), this one's for you!
"Jun. Please wake up."
Mother Azami's aged old hand gently touched Jun's cheek. She stirred in her sleep, a groan of pain escaping her lips. Mother Azami shook her head and turned to Sisters Riyu and Narin.
"She won't wake up. It's not a coma...not that deep...but she simply can't will herself to leave the world of her dreams. Things have grown too traumatic for her in real life, it appears..." Mother Azami once again shook her head, her wrinkles deepening as she frowned in concern for her raven-haired daughter.
Autumn had arrived at the Shinryuu Mountain Convent. The trees were flushing brilliant hues of browns, reds, oranges, and the leaves were slowly drifting down from their once-content perches on the branches. The summer had lapsed to the fall while Jun had slept; she had not regained consciousness for almost two weeks. Jun's favorite season was the fall, for many new types of birds often showed themselves, but it appeared thus far that she would not wake to experience them.
"Mother Azami..." whispered Sister Narin. "Should we tell the authorities?" Mother Azami, without turning to face her, shook her head again.
"A squad of police would simply scare off the sacred spirits that will eventually cure our Daughter Jun. This affair must be dealt with in a wholly spiritual manner. I do not know what evil menaces our little convent, but I am sure that it cannot be controlled by physical force."
"Mother Azami, that's unreasonable!" said Riyu, hysteria beginning to penetrate her voice. "There's something severely wrong with Sister Jun already, and you expect us to solve this ourselves? What happens when more of us collapse and don't wake up? If we can't call on outside forces, we need to at the very least get Sister Jun to an infirmary or something of the sort..." Azami rose from her seat; her face, normally composed, now started to grow angry.
"Are you familiar with the concept of 'psychic noise', Daughter Riyu?" Riyu, recoiling a little at the abnormal tone of Azami's voice, shook her head. Mother Azami opened her lips to speak, but at that moment Jun very suddenly sat up from bed.
"Mother Azami? ...Sister Narin? Riyu?..." Jun looked around her room, her vision slightly blurred by half a month's worth of sleep. She then looked out the window, and upon seeing the trees and their red-orange leaves, gave a gasp of shock. "How long have I been asleep?"
"Two weeks, Jun..." said Sister Narin. Jun, alarmed, turned back to face the three women in her room.
"Has...has anyone else been attacked?" Jun inquired, concern suddenly welling up in the pit of her stomach.
Mother Azami spoke. "Fortunately, there have been no other attacks..." Jun was relieved to some extent, but her own plight still remained up in the air. She got out of bed and bowed to the three. "Thank you for watching over me while I slept. Now, if you will excuse me, I would like to get changed and bathe." All of the sisters bowed to Jun in return, even Riyu, who had never been particularly fond of the Kazama herself. As they departed out of the room, Jun gave a deep, appreciative breath of the crisp autumn air. In a world of dreams, she could never experience the true beauty of nature; an incentive she had used to will herself from her catatonia.
Just as Azami had told Riyu and Narin, Jun was too terrified to once again face the real world, so she locked herself in her existence of sleep. She couldn't remember anything that happened in her daze; it was the sensation of having a dream that seemed vaguely familiar, but not being able to recall even a single detail about it. However, upon awakening, Jun felt a new impetus burning to find out what exactly was going on at Shinryuu Convent.
Of course, after two weeks of remaining in one spot and sweating, a bath was definitely in order for the disheveled Jun. She walked into the simple bathroom, which consisted merely of a toilet, bathtub, a small mirror and a cabinet to hold what few toiletries Jun was permitted to have. The nightgown slipped off her weary shoulders and she turned on the hot water. Even the steam seemed to relax her weary and aching muscles, and she took a sigh of relief. She slipped into the bath and immediately the catharsis spread over her. The sensation of the hot water against Jun's skin relieved her mind of her troubled thoughts, and the only thing on her mind was the blissful warmth washing through her body. Wisps of steam escaped from the pool of hot water, filling the room with a thick, humid fog. Jun, sighing once again, slipped underneath the surface of the water, her hair drifting about her in a black halo.
(Don't open your eyes.)
The command burst through Jun's head clearly, in a voice quite obviously not her own...the voice of a man, a dark-sounding voice. Jun slightly panicked and did not open her eyes, because, as everyone knows, it is foolish to open one's eyes in a bath. After a few more moments of silence, she simply passed it off as a product of her imagination and drifted back into her dreamlike state.
Jun's bath, like all good things must, came to an end. She hated to see it go, because after such a hellish night at the convent it was truly a boon, but the water was starting to stagnate and Jun hated lukewarm water. She pulled the chain plug out of the drain and emerged from the water. Wrapping a towel smelling faintly of lotion underneath her shoulders, she allowed a smile to cross her face for the first time in what seemed like an eternity. She strolled over to her dresser to find her habit, kneeling down to open the drawer on the bottom, and gasped at what she saw inside.
Bugs.
"What?!" screamed Jun, falling back from the open drawer. Hundreds of bugs were writhing through Jun's open dresser drawer, the clicking of their legs and pincers making a sound most unsettling to her. There were many types of awful insects; beetles, centipedes, flies, maggots, all of them heaped up on top of each other, wriggling in the most grotesque of ways.
Jun stood back up and peered into the dresser; the bugs were still there, still squirming about, still collectively making their repulsive sounds. If there was one facet of nature that Jun could do away with, it was that of the insects. She just could not bring herself to hold them with the same esteem as the magnificent creatures of the air or land. Of course, comparing the insects to other animals wouldn't help her get them out of her room, so she thought briefly about how to dispose of the sudden infestation. Finally, Jun came to a conclusion; she took the dresser full of bugs and threw them out her window. Since her bedroom faced the side of the mountain, the bugs (and several habits that were in the dresser along with them) would simply fall out of the walls of the convent. She cringed a little as the heap of insects hit the ground with a stomach-turning 'plop!'.
Despite the fact that none of the bugs appeared threatening or dangerous, Jun was still extremely confused about their sudden appearance, and in her clothes drawer to boot. In fact, a lot of things weren't making sense to her...
"Does this tie...into my attack?" she mused to herself out loud. Jun decided to herself that it was time to do a little studying.
A/N: Well, once again I'd like to thank everyone for reading this. I'm not in it for the reviews, but...it's really nice to know that someone is reading what you put so much effort into, and enjoying it to boot! This is turning into something longer than I anticipated...=P I hope to incorporate some of the other Tekken characters into the fic - not so much as primary focuses, but at least how they have viewed Jun's departure from the whole fighting scene and all that. I am trying to keep this focused on Jun, after all.