5. Grand Entrances (II)
"I am afraid I cannot allow that, Elder Goddess Roma."
Belldandy stood in front of Keiichi, arms spread wide to shield him from the Elder Goddess.
"Child, do you realize what you are doing?" Roma asked, staring daggers at the Goddess of the Present.
"Belldandy!" Keiichi whispered urgently, both feeling glad and yet horrified by the danger his beloved was facing. He only needed to glance back to see Peorth still lying on the ground unconscious. Peorth was a Goddess First Class, but she was knocked out by Roma with a single lightning bolt. Beside her was the equally unconscious Matthew, who was also attacked by the Elder Goddess. Skuld and Urd attended to them nervously, unsure of what would happen next.
Keiichi had no intentions seeing Belldandy suffering the same fate.
"Keiichi-san, please stand back," Belldandy said, a resolute look on her face as she stared back at Roma.
"Why are you defending that mortal, Belldandy?" Roma asked, a bored tone in her voice.
"If you have indeed watched us, then you should know the answer," Belldandy replied evenly.
"Child, what good is it for you to spend so much time with a mere mortal? I am only doing this for your own future good," Roma stated kindly.
Belldandy was not deceived by her honeyed words. "Elder Goddess, you can never understand the feelings I have for Keiichi," she said, glancing back at the Japanese man and smiled. To Keiichi, it was positively radiant... and the words she spoke struck deeply within him so that he remained absolutely speechless.
Roma was folded her arms and sighed.
"I -do- understand, Belldandy. Do not think of me as an unfeeling person. I know what you are going through," she smiled, more realisitically this time. Perhaps, even with a twinge of wistfulness...?
Then her eyes hardened. "But do you honestly think you can be with this mortal forever? Watch him grow old and eventually die while you remain the same as you are?"
"I just wish to spend as much as I can with Keiichi-san," Belldandy replied without hesitation. There was no tint of blush, no embarrassment. It was something she truly wanted.
For Keiichi, despite the gravity of the matter, it was the best thing he ever heard.
"Very well, Belldandy... if that's the way you want it," Roma sighed again. Belldandy smiled and relaxed, seeing how the Elder Goddess had slumped her shoulders in defeat.
Thus, nobody expected it when Roma unleashed yet another thunderbolt, this time hurtling it towards Belldandy.
The Goddess of the Present couldn't even raise her arms or shriek in terror as the lightning slammed into her, the bluish energies coursing through her entire form.
As she fell limply on the ground, time seemed to stop for Keiichi, Urd and Skuld.
It was only when the dull thud of Belldandy's body hitting the charred grass reached their ears that they understood the impact.
"BELLDANDY!"
"SIS!"
Even as they crowded around the unconscious Goddess, who now joined the ranks of Peorth and Matthew as being knocked out by lightning, Roma nonchalantly wiped her hands.
"Belldandy!" Keiichi shouted as he held her, not caring the heat. Beside him, Skuld was already crying.
"I did not want to do that, but it could not be avoided," Roma said, twirling a lock of her silvery-white hair.
"You MONSTER!" Urd screamed. She leapt up into the skies and launched a lightning bolt of her own at Roma.
Roma made a show of turning her head aside, yawning and merely slapped aside the lightning. The bolt of electricity literally bounced off her hand and struck the ground at a tangent.
"Oh please," Roma smirked as a circular energy field shimmered around her.
"Damn, a protection spell!" Urd cursed.
Back on the ground, Belldandy stirred slowly, her eyes opening to see the worried faces of her loved ones.
"Belldandy...?" Keiichi whispered as he craddled her head, his eyes close to tears.
"I... I'm alright, Keiichi..." Belldandy whispered hoarsely. It pained his ears to hear her talk in such a voice.
"Come now, I did not hurt her -that- much," Roma said, taunting Urd who was still hovering in the air.
Incensed, Urd repeated her futile attacks. Each of her mighty lightning strikes bounced off Roma's shield and hit everywhere except for the intended target. Roma herself began exchanging lightning bolts of her own. She too did not bother to actually aim, she merely launched bolts at random.
Urd, focussing on all-out attack, did not bother to shield herself, instead relying on her speed and intuition to avoid the strikes and counter with her own.
It was a sort of a dance of the furies, the two goddesses firing tremendous energies at each other, one using a shield to deflect while the other twisting and turning in the air to avoid.
Meanwhile, Skuld hastily errected a shield barrier of her own with an umbrella-like device she pulled out from her dimensional space. Planted on the ground, the umbrella discharged a field, encasing the non-combatants within a protective area.
"Urd's throwing everything she's got at her and it's not even making a scratch!" Skuld said, looking over the back of her shoulder nervously as she scanned Belldandy's body with a handheld device.
"Why... why is this happening?" Keiichi asked, looking at the tempest of lightning fury swirling around them. Belldandy had no answers, all she could do was to shake her head slowly as she lay in his arms.
"What can we do!?" Skuld wailed in near panic. When Keiichi saw the futuristic umbrella device was turning red with heat and starting to emit gas, he understood. The forces of nature banging on the forcefield was overpowering.
The forcefield finally collapsed with a bang. Urd turned to look and saw her sisters and Keiichi unprotected. Thoughts of attack forgotten, Urd rushed down to be with them.
Urd gasped when Roma suddenly appeared in front of her.
"You should never look away in a battle," Roma commented, right before she blasted Urd right out of the sky.
The Goddess of the Past fell slowly like a fallen angel, landing with a dull sound on the ground and unmoving thereafter.
"You are no match to me, you miserably little half-breed," Roma sneered, casually blowing at her smoking hand as she dramatically lowered herself to land before Keiichi and Belldandy.
"Just.. just who is she?" Keiichi whispered to Belldandy.
Belldandy shook her head negatively. "She's... she's an Elder Goddess, the first of the Creator's servants. She is one of our... teachers... we are no match for her..." she answered slowly.
"Now that all the drama is done with, perhaps you will now obey me," Roma said, staring down at Keiichi coldly. She snapped her fingers and Matthew's unconscious body began to float towards her.
"No, I won't go," Keiichi refused.
"Honestly mortal, do you think you can possibly stop me from taking you with me?" Roma asked.
Keiichi simmered with anger. His eyes were shut, his fist closed and trembling. "Why... why do you have to treat them so bad?" was all he could say.
Roma laughed heartily. "Do you wish to fight? After what I have done to that demonspawn?" she said, looking at Urd's prone body.
And at that very moment, there was a loud explosion. Since it occured behind Roma, even the Elder Goddess was surprised. The entire ground shook violently like an earthquake.
As a fissure opened, there was an outpouring of light and glow. Keiichi felt a prickly sensation running down his back, a sense of tremendous awe and pressure that nearly overwhelm them.
He was not alone, as Belldandy and Skuld felt it too.
Elder Goddess Roma as well, for she stared with her mouth open, eyes wide with shock as a figure emerged from the opened crack on the ground.
"I see you have been talking behind my back again Roma," Hild greeted, her icy eyes belying the smile on her face.
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Written in between many interruptions over a long period of time. Please forgive any inconsistencies. C&C welcome.