Chapter 4
The sound of frantic footsteps echoed throughout the stone passageway. Gasping for breath, on the lookout, run run run…I'm being chased! Panic overpowered all other emotions, as a second wind driven by adrenaline came.
Run, run, faster, harder, push, harder, they're closer, getting closer, they're right behind you, watch out!
Robin stumbled as she came around a corner, trying to regain her balance before crashing into the figure standing in front of her. The footsteps coming up behind her slowed, and came to a halt.
"Excuse me! Please help me, sir! Can you hear me? They're going to kill me, please help!" she pleaded, but to no avail. The figure seemed to not hear anything at all
"Turn around, or we'll shoot! Hands up in sight, and don't even think about using your craft, we have plenty of Orbo." called an authoritive voice from behind.
"Don't you think I would of flamed them by now if I could?", Robin thought to herself. Even if their orbo prevented direct attacks, it would have been easy enough to at least block their path in these narrow halls. She didn't even have to try to test it out on anything, she knew that her powers where somehow gone. There was an emptiness inside of her, a weakness that made itself quite apparent. Although she didn't know exactly why her craft wasn't working, there certaintly wasn't time to sit around and create theories. Right now, escaping danger came first.
"This is your last warning, turn around now! Men, be ready to shoot!", came the voice again, slicing through her thoughts.
Ignoring the command, Robin called to the figure's back more and more desperately. Still not getting a response, she clasped his hand between hers, imploring him with all of her will to show some reaction, some sign of life. He began to turn his head as the first bullet entered her shoulder.
Robin's mouth opened wide in a silent cry as two more shots struck her back. She crumpled noiselessy as her legs gave out, skirt full spread falling gently around her like a warm embrace to the hard ground. A small trickle of blood ran from her mouth as she gave a weak cough, adding to the pool collecting beneath her. The warm, vibrant crimson blood was sharp contrast to the icy gray floor. As her eyes closed for the last time, she saw the figure, her possible savoir, turn around, kneeling down beside her with a piteous look in his steel-cold eyes. The last image she saw was him pulling out a gun, pointed directly at her head...the world went black…click click BOOM.
"semenai de kesanai de makenai de
dare datte motteru hazu yuzurenai mono
ai dake yume dake kimi dake
sore dake ha hanasanai donna toki demo
doushi you mo naku ochitsukanai yoru
nani mo kamo nagedashitaku naru
tsube kobe iwazu ni sassato DOA o akena
rikutsu nante koneteru HIMA ha nai
juuou mujin tobi mawaritai youi shoutou mamori takunai
nakushita wake ja nai mada hajimatte nai... dakara
semenai de kesanai de makenai de
dare datte motteru hazu yuzurenai mono
ai dake yume dake kimi dake
sore dake ha hanasanai donna toki demo
nani ga hoshii nani ga shitai doko ni ikitai
yami o saite hashiri nukete tsukamitore
Through The Night"
Off-key voices sang boldly to the fast paced music playing in the background as Robin's eyes opened with a start. The intense volume added to the pulsing headache that seemed to come and go with the flashes of several strong strobe lights.
It was just a dream, a horrid nightmare. It had been so realistic, and her heart was still beating erratically. She slowly gained control over her breathing, giving a sigh of relief. Being awake sure didn't tell her anything about what was going on now, though.
She was in a small room with a simple long couch full of sprawled people, a huge movie screen with pictures and lyrics flashing by, tons of empty cups and cans, and about fifteen crazily dressed youths jumping up and down while screaming their hearts out into four mikes, one of them being Doujima. Looking around from the corner where she was lying, the night's events slowly came back. Lights flashing crazy colorful patterns on the plain walls added to the extreme atmosphere and high energy.
Robin stood up shakily, feeling as if she was going to be sick any moment. Luckily, Doujima had just looked in her direction, and called out to her.
"Hey Robby! Where were you? You've been missing for like, a whole hour! I was starting to get worried!"
"I didn't go anywhere. I think I passed out, Doujima."
"No way! Haha, you're so funny! Isn't this place great? I come here all the time with my friends whenever I get time off. I love karaoke bars soooo much. Hey, have you even had a turn yet? You have to sing next! I've got the perfect song for you!"
"I don't feel like singing, thank you." Robin replied with a wince.
"Hey, suit yourself! Do you want another drink, you look kinda pale. Actually, you look really pale!"
"Hey Doujima, how much longer are we going to be here? I'm sorry, but I'm not feeling well."
"Oh, whats wrong? Did you have to much to drink?" Doujima asked with a gasp. "We'll leave right away, okay? You just hang in there."
Doujima waved goodbye to her friends and walked Robin out to a main lobby where they waited for a taxi to come around to the entrance. It didn't take long to arrive, and Robin was quite glad to leave the loud building.
"Hey Robby, do you want to stay at my place tonight? It must be lonely in that apartment all by yourself, with Touko gone and all."
"If you don't mind, I would greatly appreciate it." she responded with a weak smile. She really didn't want to face that empty apartment tonight, she already felt vunerable enough.
Everyone had told Robin that it wasn't safe to live there after the break-in, but the apartment was close to the STNJ building and had everything she needed. She actually figured that the apartment might in reality be safer since no one would think she was stupid enough to stay there and wouldn't attack the same place twice.
Brightly lit buildings sped by through the taxi's window, creating beautiful patterns in the night sky. Doujima watched as Robin sank deeper and deeper into her own world. Her normal attire of gray and black wasn't really suitable for a karaoke bar, so Doujima had had fun dressing her up.
Robin still had on the ankle boots and black corset, but the gray dress had been replaced with a light pink shirt covered with fun red-toned polka dots varying in size with puffy princess style sleeves. A pair of bunched up forest green cargo pants and big black fishnets underneath finished it off nicely. Doujima had also taken her hair down from it's infamous pigtails and put it back up into two messy buns and brushed all of her bangs to one side, held inplace with a cute clip. A little bit of fun makeup and glitter, and Robin was a whole new person! Doujima was quite proud of the results and made sure they had taken several pictures to show the boys back at STNJ and as proof that it had really happened.
While Robin was sure dressed great, she didn't look so hot anymore. She was still pale and looked completely worn out. Doujima started having a guilt trip about talking her into this in the first place. Hopefully after a good night's sleep, she would feel much better.
"We're here, Robin.", Doujima payed the driver and showed Robin to the guest room. "Don't worry about getting up tommorrow, just wake whenever, I'll go ahead and call Michael to tell him we'll be in late, I seriously doubt he'll mind. There are some spare PJ's if you need something to sleep in, and of course you're welcome to use the bathroom to bathe if you'd like, it's the first door on the left down the hallway, okay? You feeling any better?
"I'm feeling fine now. Thank you very much, Doujima."
"Anytime! Good night, sleep tight!"
"Goodnight."
"Oh, and umm, sorry about tonight. I wish you could have had more fun, I just really wanted to get you out and you know-"
"Don't worry about it, it's not your fault. Sleep well."
As soon as Robin heard the click of the door closing, she collasped onto the enormous bed. It was a nightly ritual of hers to take an hour long steaming bath, but even as tempting as it sounded, there was no way the reward was worth climbing out of bed. She slowly stripped off her clothes, slightly dampened with fever sweat, all the while thinking how much longer it would of taken to remove her full-length pilgrim's dress. It was all Robin could do to kick off her boots and pull the thick down comforter over her shivering body. Hopefully, such horriffic nightmares would not follow Robin into slumberland as they had before.
"Yaawwwwwwwn! Moshi Moshi?"
"Hey Sakaki, sorry to call so late, it's Doujima. I'm not interrupting anything or waking you up, am I?"
"O wow, what have you gotten yourself into that's made you so considerate? Obviously I'm awake now, so don't worry about it." came his reply with a chuckle.
"Oh, haha, gomen nasai! You see, I'm not actually in any trouble, I just thought I should go ahead and tell you that Robin and I won't be in till later tomorrow, so you don't need to worry or anything."
"You wouldn't call just to tell me you're gonna be late, that a daily occurrence!"
"Hey! I don't -"
"Don't get so flustered, you know I'm just teasing you. Now tell me why you really called, what's wrong?"
Doujima pondered if she really should tell Sakaki or not. Of course she could trust him not to tell anyone else, but did she want even him to know? In the end, the cared a lot more about getting it off her shoulders than what he thought of her actions, and proceeded to tell him exactly how Robin's and her night out had gone.
"So, let me make sure I have this right, " Sakaki interrupted her story. "Not only did you take her to an adult karaoke bar, you let her drink, and didn't keep an eye on her what-so-ever, perfectly aware that's she's never been in a situation like that, never even had a drink, and that she's only 15? "
"Yeah that pretty much sums it up," came her guilty answer. "Nothing happened to her, but she's totally blitzed. She looked pretty shaky when we got home, and is probably already asleep. I just feel so awful, I mean ANYTHING could've happened to her and I wouldn't even know about it. Someone could've kidnapped her, killed her, even raped her and no one would know anything until it was too late. I don't even wanna think about all the horrid possibilities-"
Doujima's tirade was quickly cut off as small sobs punctuated by hiccups drifted over to Sakaki's end. He had planned to give her a severe earful, or better yet, let Amon handle it, but honestly, right now he felt like Doujima was punishing herself enough.
"Kuso…" Sakaki sighed, pulling a hand through his bed-tousled hair. No matter how mean they could act towards each other, he would be lying if he told himself that the sounds of her crying didn't have an affect.
"I'm on my way over." The words were out before Sakaki had even thought the option through, but immediately he knew that he had meant it. He hung up before even waiting for a reply. After throwing on a shirt and some jeans, he grabbed a jacket, his keys and bike helmet, and was literally on his way.
It took a while for Doujima to comprehend what Sakaki had just said. She had finally gained control of her tears when it struck her, and the dial tone she was getting from the phone receiver told her there was nothing to do about it now. For once, she was grateful her parents were never home, and without another hesitant thought, went to touch up her makeup for Sakaki's visit. It may be late after a long night, and Doujima may have just finished wiping her tears, but she damn well wasn't going to look it.
Japanese for this chapter-
Gomen nasai- apology, "I'm very sorry", you can simply say "gomen" for less formality
Kuso- equivalent of saying "damn" or "shit"
Moshi Moshi- means hello, I've only heard it used when answering the phone
Previous Japanese-
Baka - an idiot or stupid person, more vulgar than calling someone "silly", like "jackass:
Iie- no
Kawaii - saying something is cute, adorable
Nani - same as asking "what?" or "huh?"
Ohayo - equivalent of saying "good morning"
Comments…
1) The scene were Doujima is wishing Robin goodnight and offers her PJ's… I think most of us know that Robin sleeps in the nude, so it's kinda obvious to us that she wouldn't need PJ's, but I seriously doubt she would go around telling people… :P
2) The phone conversation between Sakakai and Doujima was with Michael originally, but the convo was kinda intimate and I really like the S/D pairing better, so I decided to switch them out since I simply don't have enough room to be making background love triangles, so sorry if it's a little OOC, hehe!
3) Lyrics from Through The Night, opening song to Outlaw Star, lyrics thanks to you can see, one more chapter done, and pretty damn short too, considering it's been a good few months since my last update. I've rewritten this chapter a lot, trying to decide exactly how I want this story to take shape, and I can happily say I now know where I want the plot to go. Because of this, all the future chapters will be a lot easier to write, so if I take a while, it's simply because I've grown lazy again. Also, I think I made a mistake when I first started this story because I really just wanted to do something short for my first, and if I continue the way I am, it'll be quite a while before I finish. The next fanfic I write will probably just be a 25-35 page one-shot, maybe a sequel or two but that's it. I just don't have that kind of commitment, haha!
Going back and reading this story through, I think I'm going a little too slow. I mean, I want to keep up the detailed and continue flourishing out the characters and all, but I think I will make the chapters a little bit more like the episodes, so instead of each chapter starting almost exactly where the last left off, I might put in some long time blocks. For example, I don't want to go in detail about Sakaki visiting Doujima or every second of how Robin wakes up with a hang over, I might pick up next week, haha!
Also, after FINALLY getting this written, I wanted to update fast, so there are prolly several mistakes .
Thank you SO much for everyone that has reviewed! I know it's only 21 but I didn't even expect to get that many, you guys are the best!
To: Cat/Wolf Witch Kyobi- I'm glad you're enjoying it! I know it's not very much Japanese mixed in, but I'll try to add a little bit more. I just don't want it to be to the point where people have to constantly look up word's meaning's, you know? Haha, and yes I agree with the tad of OOC'ness, but it's so difficult! WHR is such a visual series and when you think about it, there isn't a lot of dialogue, so it's tricky for me, I kind of have to interpret the characters for myself, and not everyone agrees! Ty for the review
To: SilverCrystal Tears- Thanks a bunch! I'll try my best!
To: In True Meanings- Hey sweetie! We need to talk more, haha! Thanks a mil for the review, glad you're enjoying it! Will try to!
To: AmonKnight- Yeah! It'd be lonely to not tell anyone, so I guess you wouldn't have anything better to do than go get drunk :tear: Wow, I'm glad you got so caught up! What nice reviews, haha, I'm glad you think I'm keeping them IC, I try! Thx again!
To: Lilith- 40 fanfics? That's a few more than I've read, haha, so thanks for the great critique! Thank you, I'll try to get more work up!
To: Zurizip- Woohoo, go Second Sopranos! I'm glad you recognized it, it's quite a pretty song, although rather repetitive, although I don't know if she's been to Italy, I know she's Italian, so close enough! I'm so flattered you like my style, and yes, both pairings are rather nice!
To: Ayjah- It is hard, for me at least! TY very much! I try to include everyone, I like most of the characters so I don't see the point in just using them as props.
To: young wiccan- Haha, thanks! Glad you're enjoying!
To: Katreda- Thank you!
To: Megan Consoer- I'm glad you like it! I'm trying to write more chapters as fast and well as I can! Please be patient with me, hehe!
To: wendyghost- Well, drinking does tend to make you lonely, glad you like that part!
To: Shinimegami-025- Hehe, lover's spats are so much fun to write! I think you got sp of Sakaki right, that's how I've always seen it anyways. Yeah, Doujima's gotta be quick to keep up! Thanks for the review!
