RESPONSES


Phoeniz727

Toli: Hey guys! About the trivia...that's just a little something we put at the end of some of the chapters to help the readers better understand Slain and its characters. They're quite fun to write, really. And in case it was hard to tell, most of the characters are quite OOC in this story, so Tea doesn't have as much patience and understanding as she should. Hmmm...I never knew about that soda thing...I'll have to try it...

Mena: Aw, I wanted to hear the inside joke. Oh well, I'll just pretend I know it. Sister, since we never say exactly how Yami does it, can I tell them now?

Toli: Sure, why not.

Mena: Great! Well, see, Tea said in the last chapter that vampires drags their fangs through flesh. That's so they have an easier way to obtain blood. All Yami had to do was bite his victims without dragging his fangs to set Yugi up. Terrible, ne? Anyway, thanks for reviewing!


Ksaturn

Mena: Thanks so much for the compliments! We're glad you like the story. We work hard on it...well, it's mostly Toli, because it's hard for me to write scary stuff without going insane. But anyway! Arigato again for the review!


Masami, Mistress Of Fire

Toli: Hey Masami!

Mena: (waves piece of paper happily) Hi, Damie-chan!

Toli: They just OUGHTA give you a walking cast! I mean, how do they expect you to get around? Walk on your arms? Learn how to leapfrog?

Mena: I bet if I had a curvy cast, Damie-chan would carry me...(blushes and smiles fondly) Here's my latest picture, Damie-chan. It's us at the park! We're holding hands! And ignore that giant red spot on your left leg...that's ketchup.

Toli: Masami, who else do you know that The Wind might go after? You have to figure out who's next and warn them! Hahahaha! "nice cushy mom"! That cracked me up so good! Anyway, (takes a breath) thanks for keeping up company!


kristen89

Mena: Isn't it just terrible? Poor Yugi feels so bad for what he did...but it was Yami that convinced him to do it! Yami is too slick a villain!

Toli: (rubs hands together in glee) I know. That's what makes it so great.

Mena: (throws out hands) Wait! Don't bop Tea! She's basically the main character and we can't have her slaying vamps with a head injury! If we keep updating, do you promise not to whop her?


Eve-Of-Misery

Toli: Yes, I know. Sometimes humans are such unreliable creatures.

Mena: O.O But...aren't you a human?

Toli: (evil grin) That, my dear sister, remains to be seen...

Mena: O.O; Help...


Toli: Hi, everyone!

Mena: Welcome back! Let's all say WDOY together...

Jesselda: Let's not.

Mena: T.T

Toli: Well, let's begin the chapter, before Mena causes the second Flood


Warning: The rating may--MAY, key word here--have to be raised to R because the violence and graphic stuff will get worse. If the story is ever high enough for R, please let us know immediately so we can keep it from being deleted. And there may--MAY again--end up being a little bit of Joey/Tea. We don't know as of yet.
EIGHT: Danger On All Sides

CEMETERY

(three days later)

Tea stared sullenly at the giant rectangle-shaped hole in the ground. Inside it was a coffin containing her aunt's body. It was the funeral. About twenty yards away, there was another funeral for someone else.

Joey and Serenity stood on either side of Tea. All three were dressed in black. Behind them were two of Tea's aunt's friends, a few of her co-workers, and her boss, who she had been dating and who also promised to cover the expenses of the funeral. Joey had a comforting arm around Tea's shoulders, and she welcomed it gladly. She wished that there was something she could have done.

As she tuned out the minister's droning, she thought back to the night she had discovered her aunt's body. She still couldn't believe Yugi had murdered her aunt. And Tristan. Why had he done it? Had his pain become so intense that he had had to make a kill-or-die decision? Or had he simply been stringing her along the whole time, like Serenity suspected? But something at the back of her mind was still bugging her about that night. Something Yugi had said. She tried to remember what they had first said to each other.

"T-Tea," Yugi stammered, "Please, before you jump to conclusions, let me explain--"

"Did you kill my aunt and Tristan?" Tea demanded, cutting him off.

Yugi's head shook wildly. "No! No I didn't! It was--"

"Then how come there's blood coming out of your mouth, like you just had a snack?" Tea went on.

What had Yugi been about to say? Was he going to accuse someone else? Tea almost wished she had let him finish. But there was too much evidence pointing to him. And no one else had been on the roof with him. He had to be guilty. Right?

Tea could feel a strange feeling at the back of her mind. It was her vampire senses. They were toned down but not turned off during the day. She thought she could feel someone's eyes on her, and glanced over at a grove of trees nearby. She thought she saw someone watching her from behind one, but the silhouette was gone before she could decide whether or not it was real.

Strange, Tea thought.

Vampires didn't come out during the day.

THAT NIGHT

"Joey! Come on, help me!" Serenity said. She dragged the large trash bag through the balcony door to drop it in the disposal chute.

"Comin'," Joey said. He put down his plate and unglued his eyes from the television to get up and help his sister. Walking through the balcony door, he watched her slowly drag the bulging trash bag and shouted, "You can do it, yes you can!"

"Quiet up there!" someone yelled from down below.

Serenity glared at her brother. "You know what kind of help I meant," she said.

Joey laughed and took the bag from his sister. "Yeah, I know," he said. He dragged it to the chute much faster and dropped it in.

Serenity looked up suddenly. "Hey, did you see that?" she asked.

"See what?" Joey asked her.

Serenity pointed at a dark shadow that was dropping towards them. "That," she answered.

Down below the crotchety old man heard the two teenagers who lived above him scream. He thumped his ceiling with his cane. "Keep it quiet up there!" he growled.

Joey and Serenity's mom walked out onto the balcony. "Joseph, Serenity, is something wrong?...Joseph? Serenity?" She looked all around. "Where are they?"

TEA'S APARTMENT

Tea was just about to jump out the window for another night of vampire slaying when someone knocked on the door. She sighed, put her gun on the coffee table, and went to answer it. Then she sensed a vampire nearby and had a feeling it was in the middle of a kill.

"Whoever you are, you'll have to wait," Tea said to herself as she picked her gun back up and jumped out the window.

She found the vampire, terrorizing a lock-in at a church, and killed it. She killed seven more in the span of three hours.

"I guess I'm having a slow night," Tea said to herself. She stood on the edge of a twelve-story building's roof, looking down at the street. Then she sensed a vampire nearby and turned.

"Don't shoot," the small figure said. "I'm only bringing a message."

Tea stared at the small figure. It was a girl with blond hair in pigtails and yellow eyes and small fangs like Yugi's. She held her gun out anyway, and said, "Let's hear it."

"My master says that you aren't as invulnerable as you think," the vampire said. "He has captured Joseph and Serenity and if you wish to see them again you must do two things."

Tea gasped. "What?!" she cried. "Just who is your master?"

"My master is Yami," the girl said. "The leader of our sect, ruler over all vampires that find their food in this city. He says that you must convince his younger brother to become a vampire and then you must turn yourself in to him all within twenty-four hours or he will kill them both and let us divide them up amongst ourselves. Not only that, if you try to deviate in any way from the terms of this deal, my master will unleash every vampire under his reign on the day of darkness."

Tea could feel rage boiling inside of her. The vampire smiled a thin smile. "He says that if you kill me, he will immediately destroy your friends, so I suggest that you watch where you point that gun." Then the vampire turned and walked into the darkness.

SOMEWHERE ELSE

Serenity leaned on her brother's shoulder, trying not to cry. She was more afraid than she had ever been. Joey wrapped a protective arm around her. "Don't worry, sis," he said, "if any vamps wanna take a piece outta ya, they'll hafta get through me first."

"I'll bet you anything this is Yugi's doing," Serenity said. "Maybe he was mad because Tea exposed him for the liar he is and he wanted revenge."

"I dunno about dat," Joey said.

"Oh, it wasn't Yugi," a voice said from out of nowhere. Serenity instantly latched onto Joey's other arm as a figure walked out of the darkness that was surrounding them. "It was only his older brother." Yami's cape lifted behind him and seemed to disappear into the darkness.

"Whaddya want from us, you jerk?" Joey demanded.

"Trust me, you almost aren't worth the effort," Yami replied. "I'm only using you as bait to get what I want. If I don't get what I want, then I'll have my subjects destroy the city and give you to some of my friends and let them decide what to do with you. Of course, when it comes to humans, we vampires seem to have a one-track mind."

Serenity tried not to whimper audibly.

"You better not be plannin' to do anything to Tea, or--" Joey growled.

"Or what? You're a feeble human. I could break your neck like I was tearing a thread," Yami replied. "Don't get any ideas. Your life is on the line, and you probably won't make it out alive anyway."

"Don't be so sure," Serenity said through her trembling. "Tea could destroy you faster than you think. You'll never get away with this."

Yami laughed derisively. "Do you think your words frighten me, human girl? You have a lot to learn about vampires, and especially about me. I don't scare easily. Although I couldn't say the same for my brother." For a brief moment a frustrated look crossed his features.

"That isn't exactly a bad thing," Serenity said, getting a little braver. "Your little brother is just as evil as you are. You should be proud."

"You're actually mistaken," Yami said. "Although I'm pleased to see I fooled you as well as your vampire slayer friend. You see, I set my brother up so he could realize exactly how fickle your kind is. I killed those two people you found, and then I left under the pretense of needing to go kill another vampire slayer. You all fell for it quite nicely, almost as if it was all an act. Unfortunately, my brother still wants to become human, despite all of your obvious flaws. That happens to be one of the terms for your friend to get you back: she has to convince my brother to become a full-fledged vampire."

"Why's dat so important to ya, huh?" Joey asked.

"Yeah. If you really care about your brother you'd let him do what he wants," Serenity put in.

"My brother is misguided," Yami said shortly. "He doesn't realize the full danger of becoming human. And your ridiculous opinions don't sway me either. Do you think that you can win me over with condolence debates?"

"Sure wouldn' hurt if ya learned a little about compassion," Joey snorted.

Yami's eyes narrowed. "Shut up." A black wave of some sort slammed into Joey and threw him against the wall he had been leaning on.

"You can't tell me you're doing all this simply because you want what's best for Yugi!" Serenity cried.

"Since when were you on a first-name basis with my brother?" Yami demanded without raising his voice a notch. "Whatever you call him. That doesn't matter as of yet. Come with me." He didn't give her a choice; he stepped forward, grabbed her by the arm, and almost literally dragged her away.

"Come back hea wit' my sista!" Joey yelled.

There was no reply. Then the girl that had confronted Tea earlier appeared out of the darkness and stared down at him (NFT: he was lying on his side since Yami had thrown him against the wall) with yellow eyes.

Joey stared up at her. "You...you're Arthur Hawkins' kid, aren't you?"

"Not anymore," she replied. "I am no longer anyone's child, now that I'm a vampire. But that is not the issue at hand."

"Do I wanna ask what is da issue at hand?" Joey said.

Rebecca smirked. "No."

DOMINO'S STREETS

The little figure was running as fast as he could. He had a feeling that he was doomed. There was no way his brother had any more patience with him now, and now that Tea thought he had betrayed her, her home was no longer a refuge. He was alone on the streets again. He hadn't seen his brother since the incident at the park.

How would he survive now? Ever since he had made the colossal mistake of going along with Yami's idea, he had been even more steadfast in not drinking anyone's blood whether he murdered them or not. And during the day, it was even harder to acquire human food. What would he do?

"Stop right there, pal."

Yugi froze. He slowly turned to see who was addressing him. Some tall guy in all black with long black hair in a ponytail and green eyes was pointing a gun at him. "Not another step," the guy said, and fired.

Yugi dodged to the left. The bullet streaked past him. Yugi immediately started running again. Behind him he heard the guy's voice. "Hey! Come back here!" A wildly aimed gunshot zipped over his head. Yugi raced into the nearest alley and found a tall brick wall blocking his path. He jumped as high as he could and managed to grab the top of the wall. He scrambled up onto the top and was about to jump over the other side when he heard another gunshot.

This one didn't miss. Yugi felt an incredible pain shoot through his right side, even worse than the pain of being starved had been. Startled by the new excruciating pain, he lost his balance and fell off the wall, landing on his hands and knees on the other side. He could feel something warm and metallic-smelling running from where the pain was the worst and saw a dark fluid dripping off of his side. Slowly he stood up, bracing himself against the wall. He placed his left hand over his injury and pushed himself off the wall.

Just then the guy who had shot him came leaping over the wall. He didn't land on the ground; instead, he fell in a dumpster. Yugi stared at him and tried to take a step forward to run away. It hurt too much to move. The guy scrambled quickly out of the dumpster and stood facing him, gun pointed and ready to fire. "One less of your kind to hurt innocent people," he said as if this was some action-packed TV show. He looked less serious with bits of old food and paper sticking out of his hair.

Yugi didn't even bother explaining. He simply leaned against the wall and waited for the shot, hoping it would be quick.

Suddenly, a wind kicked up. Yugi looked around and gasped as it seemed the scenery around him was passing very quickly. He thought he felt someone's hand on his arm for a split second. Then the strange things stopped happening, and Yugi found that the wall wasn't there anymore. He stared up at the large building in front of him. Where had it come from? He was no longer in the alley with the guy about to shoot him. Instead, he was here. Wherever here was. Maybe he could find somewhere to hide in there.

Yugi took one hesitant step forward, trying hard to ignore the pain that shot down his leg when he did, and very slowly entered the building.

END CHAPTER


Toli: End Chapter! We gotta go now, guys!

Mena: But we'll be back with another exciting chappie! So, would you like a teeny spoiler for the next chappie? Would you? If not, then we'll seeya. But if so, keep reading!

Jesselda: If you dare.

Mena: Anyway, I know this is a dark fic and all, but next chapter, something good will be happening for Yugi. He's going to meet someone who wants to help him...a special dedication for whoever guesses who the guy is!

Toli: Time to go, sister! We don't want to spoil it too much!

Jesselda: Here's a hint: the guy's a secondary character in the show who had not already been mentioned in this story. Why am I telling you this? Ah, whatever. I'm gone.