By: Datenma
"Chance Meeting" is a very special chapter because Barbelo-san has kindly volunteered to be my beta reader! I am sorry this took so long. I have school now and my mother wants me to get straight A's because I am in my second to last year of high school. I am college bound soon, in less than two years. Anyway, on Wednesday I will be turning sixteen. My crush is supposed to do something cute but I don't know what it is yet ::blushes:: He's so cute.
Bloody Hearts is going to be my current project. Until I finish this one, everything else is on hold. I apologize for the inconvenience of that but I have to learn to work on one story at a time and BH is before MA so this takes priority. Also, there is a prologue that goes before this chapter. It is about Robin and Alex, before Robin was a vampire and his life as one before he met Ivan. So there will only be hints in that one. Alex/Robin, surprisingly enough, since those two do hate each other. Anyway, the next chapter might take a while. School as well as the fact that I need to work on my original stories some more. I have been neglecting them because of my mad drive to write GS fics XD Bad demon ::bops self::
Read and review please! Aishiteru!
Chapter 2: Chance Meeting
It has been a month since Jasmine and I moved to the academy with our aunt and uncle. They had to adopt us and now everyone thinks that they are our real parents and not just our aunt and uncle. I suppose it is better that way, to protect the secret of the academy of others but sometimes it is unnerving when people ask me how my parents are when I know that they are dead and buried in the cemetery behind the academy under unmarked graves.
I have been learning basic training of a slayer, the hunters who are responsible for actually killing the vampire, whereas Jasmine has been training to become a healer. Healers are the ones who heal the injured hunters. Other than just training and attending school in the academy, life has been boring. As far as I know, there have been no more vampire attacks since the one on my parents but I do hear hunters going out at night when they think that the younger students are asleep in their beds.
Tonight is the same but this time, I am going to follow them. I hear soft footsteps outside of my room and hushed whispers as a small group of people pass my room. I hop out of bed as quietly as possible, careful not to wake Jasmine in the other bed. I slip my bathrobe over my pajamas and open the door, regretting that the rooms start on the second story of the house. Our room is on the fourth story and there is a thorny rosebush right under my window. Gulping, I grab onto the vines next to the window and pull on them, making sure they are sturdy before climbing out of the window and scaling down the side of the house.
I hide behind the rosebush as the backdoor to the mansion opens and three figures wearing dark cloaks walk through the doorway and toward the back gate, heading to the forest that lies behind the mansion. I bite down on my bottom lip but hurry after them, not wanting to be left behind. I have not left the security of the academy since I came here with my sister. This is going to be the first time that I have left since then. The last thing I need now is to run into a vampire.
After an hour of running through the woods behind the cloaked figures, I begin to tire and lean back against a thick tree trunk to try to catch my breath for a moment. I wipe the sweat from my brow and lean forward, resting my hands on my knees. The people seemed to be in a hurry, it was almost as if they were trying to meet someone. I sigh and pull away from the tree, looking around to find that the figures had disappeared.
My breath leaves me; fright gripping me and freezing me in place. All I know to do is panic but I cannot even do that. I take a step forward but my knees buckle under my weight and I drop to the ground, holding my hands out to keep my face from hitting the grassy forest floor as well. I would have been able to go back if they had gone in a straight line from the academy but there had been so many strange twists and turns that I knew my brain could not possibly turn them all around to make a perfect map back to the mansion.
I let out a small groan and look up at the thick brush of tree branches overhead, blocking out the milky starlight. Without even the stars to guide me back, it seems that I am stuck out here. Someone could come looking for me, though. Jasmine will wake up, find me gone, and tell the others and they will send a party out to search for me. However, there is no reason for them to go looking through the forest.
My vision begins to blur as tears well up in my eyes. I blink, causing them to fall from my eyes and drip down my cheeks, splashing onto the grass with a dull plop. I know I should try to stay calm, try to think positive thoughts but I cannot help it. I was stupid to come out here and it is going to be all my fault if a vampire comes and attacks me. I do not have the proper training to handle a vampire yet, not even the weakest one, considering that the weakest vampire ever would have ten times the strength of that of a normal man.
I sniffle and hug my legs to my chest, tucking my knees under my chin as I curl up into a little ball and lean back against the tree again. I have not changed but should I have expected myself to change after such a short time? Even with my parents' death hanging over my head as a constant reminder of my weakness and stupidity, I have not changed one bit from the whimpering little boy who ran to his mother whenever he received a bruise from falling off his bike. I still cry when things get to be too much for me. I am six, though, aren't I allowed to cry when things become a little too hectic? I mean, that Gerald kid cries whenever Jasmine pulls on his hair or stomps on his toe and he has been at the academy longer than I have.
I begin to rock back and forth, humming a soft lullaby my mother used to sing to me when I had trouble sleeping after waking from a nightmare. I hiccough now and again, the quick motions shaking my body like small tremors. It does not help, though. The lullaby reminds me of what I have lost. "All my fault." I whisper under my breath, stopping and lifting my hands up to my face and grabbing a handful of my bangs and gripping the strands tightly until it causes pain. "It is always going to be my fault. I am never going to be able to do anything right."
A twig snaps behind me and I turn around quickly to see a young man in his late teens standing behind me in the pale moonlight, wearing an old-fashion, white ruffled shirt with black pants and a black silk cape with red velvet inside. I blink at him, startled by both his sudden appearance and his attire. I tear my eyes away from his clothes and pause when my eyes lock with his, burning golden eyes. "Do not say that." He smiles down at me kindly before kneeling next to me and placing a hand on my head, pushing back my bangs and patting down my hair. "You should not put yourself down, little boy. I am sure that there are many things that you are good at. Everyone is able to do at least one thing right in their life." He pulls his hand back only to offer it to me, still smiling, "My name is Picard. Who are you?" I take his hand timidly, tears still streaming down my cheeks. Even if this person is being nice to me, I cannot help but feel that there is something dangerous about him and yet…
"I am Garcia, please take care of me." I hiccough and his smile widens.
"Are you lost, Garcia?" I nod and he stands up, pulling me along with him gently. I trip over my feet and he catches me. "Do not worry. I will accompany you back to your home." Still holding onto my hand, he pulls me along down the path. For a long moment, the only sound that breaks the silence is the echo of our footsteps in the grass accompanied by my pathetic sniffling. He pauses and turns around, kneeling before me again and resting his hands on my shoulders. "Have you ever heard of the story about a lost boy meeting a prince?" I blink and shake my head. "This might cheer you up then." He sits down and the ground and pats his lap. I blush slightly but sit down on his lap, his arms wrapping around my waist as he pulls me close, my head resting on his chest. This is weird. This is really, really weird. "There once was a young boy, around your age. He was very curious and he loved to cause his older sister trouble but one day, when he thought that it would be fun to make her worry, he journeyed into the woods that they lived in. He waited until nightfall but his sister still had not come looking for him, so he decided to head back home. However, he had never been out in the forest at night and everything looked different so he soon became lost. Then, a wolf found him." He trails off after that, lost in his own silence for a long moment.
I tilt my head back curiously, looking up into Picard's fiery golden eyes, "What happened to him?" Picard's smile disappears for a moment as he reaches up and brushes the tears away from my cheeks, pulling his hand back slowly and looking at the clear liquid on the edge of his finger.
"What do you think happened to him?" His smile returns as he goes to answer his own question, "The prince of the land happened to be out for a midnight stroll in the forest and he hears the boy's frightened screams and comes to his rescue." He laughs. "I know it sounds corny but I never have been able to get that story out of my head. It always cheers me up when I think about it. I thought it might be able to do the same for you." I smile in spite of everything I had been feeling earlier. It is not because of the story, far from it. It is because of Picard. He is different from everyone else. I like him. There is something else, though, but isn't that the way it always is? No matter what, there is always something else.
"Picard, you're different from other people. You do not look like a human." For the second time since I met him, his smile disappears but his eyes sadden along with it, the burning fire dying for a moment. He smiles at me sadly then, shaking his head slowly. "Are you an angel?" He shoots me a startled look when I say this but it leaves his face in a second, pervious smile returning.
"Far from it." He lifts me up with ease and sets me on the ground before pushing himself up and taking my hand again. "Let's get you home, Garcia. You do not want to worry your sister, do you?" I gaze up at him but he shakes his head. "Please do not ask questions. I fear that this is going to be the last time we see each other ever again." I feel my heart tighten painfully and I hold my free hand to my chest, wrapping my fingers around the folds of my pajama top.
"But…why? I like you, Picard. You're nice to me." I say, hating how it sounds. I am whining again. This is pathetic but I do not want this to be the last time I see him. I want him to become my friend, even though he is probably over ten years older than me.
"I cannot tell you." He whispers, "I do not want you to hate me." Even though he was giving off an air of a dangerous person, one I should not be following now, I could not help but feel some emotions for him. I did not understand them then but I did know that Picard was different from anyone that I have ever met before, different from anyone I ever will meet in the future and no one will ever be able to take his place in my world.
I stop and feel a slight tug on my arm as he tries to continue down the path. He turns to face me and I look up, holding his eyes with mine. "Why would I hate you?" It must have been weird for him to hear those words from a six-year-old because he gave me a very strange look before he turns his head to the side, smiling at the ground weakly.
"I cannot tell you because I know you will hate me for it, that is why everyone else hated me." I found myself wishing then, like many times after that, that I were just a little bit older. If I were, maybe I would have been able to understand what he was trying to say to me, understand what he was feeling but what could I understand about being hated by everyone? I was only six and I had lived a sheltered life after moving to the academy. You had to get along with everyone there or else end up being a very bitter person. He does not give me much time to mull over these thoughts. He squeezes my hand briefly and turns to look down the path again, pulling me along. "We have to hurry, you do not want anyone to start to worry about you, do you?"
I try to hold my ground but he manages to force me to follow him, half carrying me and half dragging me behind him. All I could do was stare at his intense profile. I notice as his eyes dart back and forth whenever there is a slight movement somewhere in the bushes, almost as if he is expecting someone to jump out of the shrubbery and try to jump him. Nothing does though and we reach the back gates to the academy in a matter of minutes, far sooner than it had taken me to get to the clearing I had followed those cloaked figures to.
He leans back, dropping my hand back to my side and starting to walk away from me. He turns around and flashes me a brilliant smile, the motion not quite reaching his eyes, "I want you to forget about me, Garcia. I think that it will be better for the both of us if you do that." I open my mouth to protest but my brain fails me at that moment and I can think of nothing to say to him. "The two of us…it would not work out. We cannot be friends. I know that is what you want, I can sense it but there is so much against that friendship that it would be a lot easier if you just forget about me."
"But I…" I stop myself, not quite sure of what I wanted to say to him. There is so much that I do not understand, about the world, about myself and especially about him. I can tell that he is right, though, that it would be easier if I were to just forget about him, but how easy is that going to be? This person saved me, but I question if my life was really in danger now that I am standing just outside of the protective gates surrounding the academy, my room only a few yards away.
"It will be easy for you to forget about me. You are young and you still have so much of your life ahead of you. It is dangerous for you to even be talking with me." He watches me for a long time before walking back to me, kneeling in front of me and pulling me into a tight hug. "When I first saw you, I did not know what to think. I am afraid, Garcia. I do not know what I am supposed to do." His breath ghosts across the sensitive flesh on my neck, I feel my cheeks warm, and stumble under his weight.
"Picard-san…" He pulls away, crimson tinged tears in his eyes.
"I am sorry. I have to go before I do something that I surely will regret for the rest of my life." He quickly brushes his lips against mine before disappearing in a blur of color. I take a step back and trip over a rock, landing on the ground with a thud. I do not care. I barely noticed the change. I lift a shaky hand to my lips, touching my fingertips to the place his lips had been moments before. Even though it was my first kiss and it was with a guy, I do not mind at all.
"Picard…"
-TBC-
::claps hands together:: I hope that was good. If you want some inside info or just feel like having an insane time with a friend, my AIM name is "Datenma". Yep, just like my current pen name. It is going to be a little harder for me to get on now. I need my sleep since I stayed up super late talking to my best friend on Sunday. I have two three-day weekends lined up so I can catch up on my sleep now.
Also…gay men are pushy! Do not hog a Gravitation manga when a gay man is lined up to read it! I'm not sure if I mentioned this before but if you want to check up the story status or just how wild my life can get, my LiveJournal name is "ShinzoOkoku" Thanks for reading. Review please.