House of Fallen Angels
Disclaimer: FLCL storyline with my own, Yuri Hyuga does not belong to me, he belongs to Shadow Hearts, and Yevonites belong to Squaresoft's FFX!
Episode Six: Closed Minds
BGM: FLCL – Selfish (A-b)
"Joshua...why's dinner so spicy?" Hyuga glared down at the boiling curry. "This style..."
"It's called Ifrit style curry!" Yuri grinned, scooping a spoonful and shoving it down Aria's throat. "It's good, right?"
"Yeeeaaaarrrrgghh!!!" Aria exclaimed, spitting them out. "I told you that I hate spicy foods!!! Pweh, pweh!! Water!!! Get me water, grandpa!"
Joshua seemed to be eating calmly, glanced at him, then got up.
"You're such a child, Aria." Alyssa adjusted her sitting position next to him, nibbling gracefully on her the curried rice. "Hmph."
"Alyssa...? Where's Flonne?" He placed the spoon down and stood up, peering around the room. He was about to run and search, until Hyuga grabbed his sleeve. His father glared, so the boy sat down, suddenly quiet.
"Who cares." Hyuga muttered, spooning the curry. "But, tell me. Alyssa, what on earth are you doing here? You're the President of the hospital's daughter right?"
"It's no big deal."
"So then why aren't you home?"
"Yuri ran her over with his motorcycle, and-" Aria chuckled nervously, trying to mix the laughter in so that his father wouldn't hear it too clearly.
"What?!?" His father stood up this time. "You ran over her with your bike?!?"
"It's no big deal." Alyssa murmured, scooping another spoon into her mouth.
"But!" Hyuga hissed, "Yuri!"
"Get me some water, Joshua!!" Yuri hollered into the kitchen, then shrugged his shoulders at the frustrated father, before turning back to the dinner. It wasn't like he would care anyway.
"It's no big deal." Alyssa and Yuri said at the same time.
"Why don't you get it yourself?!? You free-loader!!!" Aria screamed at the rebel.
"......Why don't you call your father, Alyssa-san?" Hyuga grumbled, walking over to the phone, picking it up along with a phone book, which he flipped through quickly. "I need to have a short conversation with him..."
"It's no big deal."
BGM: FLCL – Carnival (Inst.)
"What are you so worried about?!" Aria snapped at the staring semi-angel. "Alyssa's a good person, she's no trouble! I'm sure of it, she's been my friend for a long time now."
The boy picked up two coke cans, and stalked out of the kitchen. But Joshua continued to watch him until he left, with a worried gaze plastered upon his face. Then he shrugged, turning to wash the dishes.
"Nyow!" Autumn wiggled in a child's grasp, as water poured the soap from his fur. The tickling drove him to the depths of light happiness and annoyance, his voice mixing with mewing and purrs.
Florina was smiling softly, but her growling stomach made her sad. "I'm so hungry...Autumn-sama..."
Lifting the black cat into her lap, she tied her hair up, and poured the water over herself. She suddenly halted when a bright flash disfigured her sight, followed by the sound of a camera click.
"How's the water?"
With a gasp, Florina covered herself and glared up at the figure peering through the window. "...it's fine."
"Hm." Yuri lifted the camera off his right eye and smiled quietly. "That's good..."
"Myrow!!!" Autumn hissed, standing up in her lap. "Hisss..."
Yuri watched her glare a little longer before she turned back to scrub the soap on. "Do you think I'm a bad man, Flo?"
"......Hungry." Was all she whispered, head down.
The older man stared a little longer, noting that she was pretty cute, before turning to leave, fingering the camera.
"...Yri-san...?"
He looked back over his shoulder. "Yeah?"
"...I don't think you're a bad person..."
"Ah?" This came to be a surprise for him and he smiled, slightly. "......heh. That so...?"
"So you're not staying for tonight, Alyssa?" Aria frowned, closing the door behind him. They were outside and the sky was growing an unpleasant gray, like rain would fall. He was dressed in a fresh new pair of clothing and a crammed backpack, slung over his shoulder.
"It's no big deal." She shrugged, wearing the outfit she wore before, but this time a soft scarf with green stripes. "Your father was nice enough to inform my mother about the accident."
"God, wish he'd do something nice for my sister..." Aria mumbled. "...Oh! Uh...could you not tell anyone about you being over here...it's kind of...well..."
"Yep. It'll be our little secret, okay?" His friend smiled.
"Thanks!"
-----------------------------------------
"......I see. So my father is in jail now......all right, I'll wait at the bridge then...don't try to tell me what to do." She cupped the cell phone closed, leaning back against the railing, watching her breath in the air. "Pathetic......what now, huh? My life's falling apart. I've tried...I've tried really hard to follow the rules...but I can't stand it."
Her eyes met the ground, turning her glazed look into a glare, "and you're probably laughing your head off right about now..."
"Okay, so what exactly happened when you ate me?" Throwing a ball, Aria could be seen playing pitch with Joshua. But he simply returned his question with a puzzled look, irritating Aria.
"Look! I'm just a kid! I don't listen to the news, my teachers, or other adults, all right?! So that's why I should be the one who's asking the questions here! Not you!!" The ball aims at the teen's head, but he catches it, "...man. I sure hope Flonne's all right back at the house with dad and Yuri......ow?!"
"My head's starting to hurt..." Alyssa mumbled, her face in her arms. "I just wish...my anger would go away...somehow."
A small ball formed on top of her translucent, blue hair, and started to grow. It kept growing until a squid-like pot, a smile face hooked onto its body, with four long tentacles-legion pulled itself out, but then reattached to her head, as a living hat would.
Next thing Alyssa knew, she was floating twenty-two feet above the ground, however she merely thought all this to be a dream. "...this is the first time I've ever had a dream about flying..."
"Why'd you hit me with that ball?!" Aria screamed, throwing his glove to the ground., then snapped his eyes back angrily at Joshua. "Good grief! It makes me wonder if you even have a brain, you freak!!! Why don't you ever say anything?!?"
Alyssa tilted her head to the side, her eyes upon Joshua.
'Well this is odd...I've never seen him before...who is that, he looks stupid, Aria-kun's friend? Look...they're practicing baseball. Hmph...not that it'll do him any good.'
She then started searching the area. 'That's strange...that freak of nature girl who thinks she's an angel all the time isn't around. And here I thought she always followed her Aria-kun...?'
"All right, I'll start trying to bat the ball now...uh...?" The boy froze, mid- way to reaching for his bat, and simply stared up at the legion. "...not another one..."
"I wonder what these sub-conscious thoughts mean..." Alyssa murmured, still thinking she's in dreamland, while one of the tentacles flung itself at the shaking boy.
Luckily, Joshua took the obligation to grab the bat and bash the tentacle away, as his other hand lifted Aria off his feet and threw him over his shoulder.
BGM: FLCL – Advice (Vocal version)
"You two can't escape me!!!" Alyssa shrieked at the two, who were soaring over the water, making zigzags, trying their hardest to break contact with the enraged adolescent.
"What's going on?!?" Aria cried, voice mixed with confusion and fear, "why's Alyssa trying to kill us?!? She's my friend for God's sake!!!"
Joshua risked a glance at the boy, not a good choice, for Alyssa had somehow gotten ahead of them, and the Squid-pot swung a bone-breaking crack at his face, sending them both into the water.
"Gasp!" Aria and Joshua quickly broke to the surface, and when Aria started wishing Yuri was here, he called himself crazy. "Aggh??!?!!"
A pair of tentacles entwined themselves around the swimmers and drew them from the water, not much later, flinging them off into the air. Aria crashed onto the ground, swallowing dirt, while Joshua slammed into the concrete.
"A-kun? Polly-sama?" A familiar voice asked curiously. "Why are you eating dirt, A-kun? If you're hungry, then I'll give you some bread. Polly-sama...why did you run into the wall like that?"
"Heeaaa!!!" Autumn hissed, pouncing up on Florina's shoulder, eyes narrowing at the floating girl above.
"......oh look Autumn-sama...it's Satan's Mistress..." Looks like she found another nickname.
"What did you just call me now?!? You obnoxious hypocrite!!!!!" Alyssa caterwauled, aiming one of the tentacles towards her.
Joshua shook the rubble from his hair, saw the danger, and rushed to the child's side, grabbing the limb, and swung the legion over his head.
Even though the Squid-pot mashed against an on coming car, Alyssa's enraged insanity enabled it the strength to quickly leap back at them.
She didn't allow Joshua to get to Florina on time and traveling the few meter distance the tentacle wrapped around Joshua's ankle, tightened, and stopped him dead within his steps. He fell short and felt his leg jerk out from underneath and with it, as a reaction, went his other leg. The response to this, Joshua fell onto some nearby rocks, scraping his hands and bumping his bottom jaw, his top teeth harshly nipping his bottom lip, drawing blood in a small squirt.
"Flonne!!" Aria spat the dirt from his mouth, and yanked his sister off her feet. Leaving Joshua behind, he shoved a stunned driver out of his car and cranked the pedal.
Simply outraged, Alyssa, threw Joshua back into the water, and flew after them.
BGM: Linkin Park - Runaway
"Come back here!!!" The belle demanded. "Aria-kun! Hand her over right now!!!"
"What?! No way, not until you get that thing off your head!!!" Aria spun the car's wheel to the best he could with Florina smacking at the window trying to get out. And he praised God for not giving her the knowledge to unlock car doors. "Alyssa snap out of it!!! What did Flonne ever do to you?!??!! You don't hate her do you?!?"
"?!?!??" The tentacle stopped short, and she became immobilized, "that's right...what'd she ever do to me???"
But the legion was getting to her head, and her anger was just too much to bear. So a troubled outcry let itself escape her lips as her reasoning slipped away; she needed someone to take the blame.
Aria whirled the wheel madly to the left, ignoring the fact that he was only in elementary school, in a desperate attempt to evade the thrashing limb, which crashed the monolithic terrain beside them.
Soon a siren wailed, making Florina start whimpering, her terrified eyes watering in tears. "A-kun!!" She sobbed in childish noise.
"Stop the car and the flying object!!! This is the police!" A static voice rang itself into the already stressed boy and girl's ears.
"I don't have time for this!!!" Both blighted at the same time.
"Wahahaha!!! You're being bad! That's good!! Very, very good!!!" The obnoxious adult concluded, his motorcycle driving at an illegal speed to catch the car.
Alyssa blinked at him and he her. "...well...looks like you've matured...now all you need now is a Mali-aaarrrggghhh!!!??!!"
Yuri obviously wasn't watching where he was going, or else he wouldn't have tumbled down off the side of a right turn.
"The heck?" Was all Alyssa could say as a response.
But the claiming devil wouldn't go down that easy, well, at least not without getting into the action. He hoped to surprise Alyssa by leaping from the lower ground and smashing his guitar into the floating form's body.
Err! Failed!! The squid-pot had two brains processing, its and Alyssa's combined. So it quickly turned itself over and she kicked him away, back down the hill. But he tried again and again! "Great-grandpa, stop it!! Alyssa-chan is still attached to that THING!!!"
"Argh! F—k!! Huh? OY! Aria watch where you're-"
Aria screamed when he watched the ceiling of the car rip off and a tentacle rope him, then tossed him into the police officers' front window. "Arrgghh??!!?"
The federal vehicle collided with the stolen one, the impact casting Florina out of her seat and into the wheel. Her vision blurred through tears, and the angel tried to scamper away, but the legion yanked her out by the wrist. "No, no, no! Aahh!! Papa-sempai!! PAPA-SEMPAI!!!"
Yuri pushed his face out of the gravel and shut his eyes at the panic- stricken weeping of the angel. Angel! She was an ANGEL!!! But those words...'I don't think you're a bad person...' ...her feelings.
"Ah! D—nit!!!" He cursed, flinging himself at the legion. "Let the kid go, you piece of s—t!!!" Hanging onto Alyssa's shoulders, he brought his guitar in one swing and sliced the weapon into its eye.
It wobbled, dropping the child to the ground and spitting Aria's friend's unconscious form along with her. "JOSHUA!!!!!"
Arriving at the older man's demand, the semi-angel ate Aria again and blasted the bleeding Squid-pot into another dimension.
Epilogue
BGM: Hoobastank - Crawling in the Dark
I dropped my guitar, the legion was beat all right...but why did I do that? What the h—l was wrong with me? I've never felt so confused before. And the kid...oh yeah, Flo. Huh?? Now what? Was my body compelling me to check on her, why the f—k do I care? "Oy! Flo, you still alive?"
She was curled up in a defensive form, and when she looked at me...I saw that she was crying, and I laughed, but it was nervous..."Heh...pathetic."
I earned another sob, but then something else...she got up and I think she's going to hit me, but she-"WHAT THE H—L ARE YOU DOING???!!!??"
My mind drowned out everything, Aria's shouts of complaints, Joshua's shuffling feet approaching us, and the polices' groans.
...The kid...she's hugging me...
And I cried.
-Ending Credits/Preview-
Draw me, Draw me
Draw me Blessed Saviour
Into Thy Presence
Let me See Your Face
Draw me, Draw me
Draw me Blessed Saviour
Lord, I can come to You
By Your Great Grace.
Thou Art Worthy
To Receive my Offering
Fruit of my Lips, O Lord
I Bring to Thee.
Lord, I Love You
I Lift my Heart Before You
Lord, May my Spirit
Give its Praise to Thee.
Kero Guardian: Boy! I really, really like this chapter for some reason! I thought it turned out great, especially the last parts of it. Twisting Yuri's emotions is pretty fun. Oh, and sorry about the songs at the end, I just couldn't think of any FLCL music to fit the situation. And I hope Florina doesn't seem annoying. (Sweat!)