Fragments of a Shattered Mirror
Disclaimer: I do not own, have not owned, and will never own Bandai or the .hack franchise, including the anime, games, manga and characters, situations, items, and places therein. I do, however, own this plot. It's mine. My own. My precious! Muahaha! (yes, as a matter of fact, I was watching LoTR whilest writing the latter half of this chapter… -drools over Faramir- The actor is hot, and I love the actual character… muah…)
Futher Disclaimering: Uh.. It's chapters like this one that earn this story a 'T' rating. Umm.. I'm rather graphic in my description of yon wounds.. uh.. Sorry if that grossess you out, but you have been warned. Oh, and, uh, please don't kill me for what I do to certain characters in this chapter! Please! If you kill me, I won't be able to remedy the situation at all…
More notes and blathering: Also, please don't kill me for being really late with this chapter. You have no idea how busy I've been and will be. Therefore, I've had little time to work out the numerous problems I was having in writing this. However, hopefully, I've solved the troubles I had. A certain reviewer, who shall remain nameless, reviewed the last chapter twice and, uh, to thee I dedicate this chapter! All right… so you shan't remain nameless…
This chapter be dedicated to Twilight! (Even though you'll probably be really mad at me for what I do to Balmung)
Chapter 13
The pain of being impaled twice was not the dark one's, but Kite's. The burning agony filled his senses, but, to his credit, he didn't faint. He did collapse, but he collapsed upon Tsukasa, who was there preventing him from falling to the ground. The hurt did not abate, but grew stronger, especially because it felt as though fire had been poured into his stomach and one lung collapsed. The World swayed and blurred before his eyes, growing dim at the edges. But, he would not let himself succumb to the pain. He weakly clutched at his stomach, though it did little to stop the gush of blood.
Hot and crimson, the liquid filled the impaled lung, making breathing difficult, dripped in a steady stream down his chest and spurted out of his stomach. His shirt, ensanguined, was mostly a dark scarlet, now, and the fluid splashed sickeningly into a small puddle that was growing slowly at Kite's feet. Quite sick with the pain, Kite groaned softly, face contorted in anguish. He did something between a cough and a retch, spitting up blood.
The dark one merely laughed, impaled though he was. "Don't you realize, fools, that if you hurt me, you hurt him? This is his body and he feels the pain. Much better than mere possessing, if I do say so myself. So, go ahead. Kill me. You'd kill him, too, and rather painfully. After all, it's not my life. It's his."
Tsukasa completely ignored him. Instead, she attempted to heal Kite. To her consternation, the healing spells didn't work. Well, at least not the way they were intended. The bleeding slowed, though Kite shook with convulsions as he continued to cough up copious amounts of s blood. Mimiru, too, tried to heal Kite with items, but Kite was in no condition to swallow the potions.
"It might help to remove your swords, idiots," remarked the dark one, his tone off hand and condescending.
Hesitantly, glaring at the dark clone, Orca slowly pulled out his sword. It shone not with the light gleaming off metal, but with the light reflecting off of the blood slicking the surface. Some of the warm liquid dripped off onto the grass. The odd thing about this was the dark one seemed not to have any blood. He seemed almost to be… hollow on the inside.
Anyway, as the blade slid back along the wound, as Orca withdrew it, new searing pain assailed Kite's stomach and he groaned, clutching harder at the wound as fresh blood welled out of it. Considering the volume of blood spilt upon the ground and staining his cloths, it was a miracle he was alive, much less conscious. Orca gazed at his friend, eyes clouded with anxiety.
Tsukasa swiftly cast a healing spell and the wound in Kite's stomach healed, though a scar could clearly be seen upon his digital skin. Like the earlier wound, the blood remained. Still, color did not return to Kite's cheeks and the wound through his lung was still there. Breathing still was agonizing.
"Now the other blade, perhaps, fool?" suggested the dark one, in a droll tone and rolling his eyes. "We don't want Kite dying, do we? Don't look at me like that. If you leave a sword through him, especially through the lung, he'll likely die. In fact, I can feel his pulse weakening and his mind slipping into a blood and oxygen deprived darkness. I think he's choking on his own blood, although he seems to have coughed up half of it…"
"Shut up!" screeched Mimiru, who was a sickly shade of green.
Balmung removed his sword – it, like Orca's, had a slick of blood coating it – and Tsukasa healed Kite. "Come on, Kite," she whispered, eyes clouded with worry. "You can pull through."
The gash mended itself, as did the lung. However, due to Balmung and Orca's distraction of watching Kite to see if he was all right, they neglected to watch the dark one. He made good use of the moment by kicking Orca aside and delivering several deadly slashes of his queer blades to Balmung. The winged knight cried out in surprise and fear, for his hit points were very much diminished. Although he managed to block the next slash, the blade master was sent flying. To the player's eyes, his status flashed red, alerting him to his dangerously low health points. To the ears of Kite, Tsukasa and the dark one, a distinctive shattering sound was to be heard, and a blue sphere appeared just to explode in sync with this sound.
"Noooooooo!" cried Tsukasa and Kite as each made a futile lunge for the dark one or Balmung.
In spite of their effort, the dark one lifted his wrist and the bracelet unfurled. At the same time, the bracelet of Kite himself flashed brilliantly and threatened to activate fully. It was all Kite could do to keep his own bracelet from activating, and yet, it was not enough. His arm jerked up and forward, the ring encircling it unfurling in a near mirror image of the dark one's. A shudder wracked Kite's body as the bracelet painfully pulled energy from the boy to fuel its actions, and the twin blade cried out in despair.
Threads of many colored lights spun away from the two bracelets, converging upon Balmung, poor Balmung. (A/N: Ahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Err… –looks distinctly uncomfortable as Balmung fans threaten to kill the author- Onto the rest of the story! –flees- ) He cried out as pain ripped through his body, literally, though he remained frozen in place. The light retracted and the knight collapsed with a low groan. He attempted to push himself up, but his muscles wouldn't respond. Balmung's mind slipped from his aching body into darkness, and his digital body turned grey and faded.
- - - - - - -
A college dorm
A tall young man, in his senior year at college, was seated at his computer in a dorm room. The room wasn't big, but it was big enough for the neat 22 year old and his room mate. Currently, he was alone. Neuro goggles covered his eyes and his hands were clenched around a controller. Abruptly, he let out a strangled cry, body locking into its pose, controller slipping from his grip. His pulse raced, breathing becoming ragged. His body's tremors were quite obvious by the shaking of his slightly shaggy (though not exceptionally long) sandy brown hair.
A sickly groan escaped his lips just as his roommate entered and, to the roommate's horror, the tall youth collapsed onto his desk, head clattering onto the keyboard before he slid onto the floor.
- - - - - - - -
The World
"Balmung!" cried Orca, voice torn between rage, horror and disbelief. His eyes looked first to the dark one, then to Kite himself.
Kite, shuddering violently, fell to his hands and knees. His breathing was ragged as he stared at nothing, horror and self-loathing filling his wide eyes. The eyes then squeezed shut, and his gloved hands closed tightly around the digital grass, tearing some from its roots. Slowly sinking back to a kneeling position, he lifted his hand before his eyes, staring at his right wrist.
"No…" he murmured, voice taut with mental anguish. "How? How could… How could I? Balmung… No…"
Meanwhile, Mimiru gasped in horror and stopped her movement, staring at where Balmung had been, then at Kite, then at the dark one. Her eyes rested the longest upon Kite. But then, they narrowed in a glare as she looked upon the dark one. Sword held before her, Mimiru stepped forward, face set in grim defiance.
"You son of a bitch, what the hell do you want? Why are you doing this?"
"Revenge," replied the dark one, eyes fixed not upon here, but upon Kite, calculating something.
"For what? Against who?"
The dark one rolled his eyes, then said, slowly and with great condescending in his tone, "Against a great many people, especially a certain twin blade and a certain wavemaster." The black eyes glinted with sudden fire. "And those who aided them!"
"Why?" asked Orca and Mimiru together. "What is the point of making them, of making us suffer more?"
"Wouldn't you like to know," sneered the dark one, his tone reminiscent of a certain green haired player killer. "Perhaps my daughter could explain. She, after all, is the root of this all."
Tsukasa, who had stared first at where Balmung had been, then at Kite, now shook her head slowly and looked balefully at the dark one. "You want to cause grief to Aura, too. You, who has ever sought to destroy your own daughter, would use us against her." A mirthless smile touched her lips. "Like you haven't already caused enough. If you want to harm her so badly, why not just drop the barrier you hold about this place and let her in? Then, use your supposed powers and delete her. Or can't you? Do you still have your limitations? You still have your boundaries. You aren't strong enough. Not yet. So you use the one with the power to strengthen you. Kite. Because you have not the strength to delete and absorb the data of others, you latched onto him to usurp his energy, his strength, his power. And now, you defeat and absorb others'. Am I not right, Morgannaaaaugh!"
The others had all turned their attention to Tsukasa, watching the wavemaster slowly step towards the dark one as she spoke. The dark one glared at her with venomous loathing. As Tsukasa uttered her final query, though, the dark one exerted his strength upon her through the strange connection forged by her earlier partial data draining. The wavemaster's body was jerked upward a few inches as if a hook fastened at her chest was yanked. Her limbs stiffened straight, and her staff fell to the ground.
"Yes, you fool," came a snarled reply. "Right you are, but you have irked me once too often. Rather than letting you watch all those you care about die, such as, perhaps, a certain heavy blade over there, or perhaps that axe woman, I'll deal with you now."
Mimiru and Orca were both poised to attack, but they hesitated, unwilling to do damage to the dark one at the cost of hurting Kite again. Kite himself had now staggered to his feet, gazing forlornly at both the dark one and Tsukasa. He tried to mentally break the hold upon the wavemaster, but he met with an imposing wall without hole or chink blocking any intrusion into the mind of Morganna. However, the twin blade had a different plan to at the least distract the dark one. Drawing his blades, he was about to implement it when the area around him flickered. Static buzzed and sizzled about Kite, the dark one and Tsukasa. Then, a cross between a trio of golden rings and a polygonal orb surrounded the three, and they disappeared.
"Kite!" cried Orca.
"Tsukasa!" shouted Mimiru.
The two players ran forward a few steps, as if they could somehow follow the others. But they could not. And, not knowing where the trio went, neither Mimiru nor Orca could follow. Lowering their swords, they gazed at each other with worried confusion.
The slight chime announcing teleportation resounded behind them, causing both to start and spin about, blades once again raised. However, they relaxed upon seeing who it was and struggled to speak, to give some explanation. Mia, worry in her golden eyes, Helba, staff clutched tightly in hand, Elk, looking distinctly anxious, and Aura, vivid azure eyes wide and frightened, stood there. Mimiru and Orca's stammered words faltered as Helba shook her head.
"We know what happened," said Helba. "Aura… she could watch it. She showed us."
"We couldn't come before because Morganna had sealed this area off," stated Mia, stepping forward and scanning the trampled ground around them. Her eyes rested longest upon the dark stain of blood where Kite had stood.
Elk murmured, "Where d… do you th- think they a- are? Aura?"
She shook her head. "To a place separate from others. The upside down castle. It is still there, but it is completely sealed from external access, even by the gate at the cathedral. I do not know if… if I can reach there…"
"But I think I can," said Helba after a moment of thought. "Yes… I had nearly cracked the barrier around this place when it had dropped. So, it shouldn't take too long to disintegrate the other."
"But," interjected Mimiru. "What can we do once we get there? If we attack the dark one, it'll only hurt Kite, and if we hurt Kite bad enough, he'll die. If not in the World, but maybe in the hospital."
"And if you kill him merely in the World, it'll only allow Morganna to bind herself more fully to him," added Mia. "But, there's a chance if we can weaken Morganna, or at least open some part of her up to intrusion. It may be possible to separate her and then destroy her."
"How?" asked Orca.
"That depends entirely on you four, Kite and Tsukasa," said Helba. "If you can find a way to weaken her, then I can find a way to delete her, or at least separate her from Kite. Aura, I can count on your assistance in that area, can I not?"
"Yes," said the girl. "Then, we can release Balmung as well."
"Right," said Mia. "Well, then, are you ready? Let's go!"
She lifted her sword into the air upon her cry. After a moment of exchanged glances, the others lifted their swords or staves to meet hers. (Aura merely nodded grimly, having neither staff nor sword to lift.)
Author's CornerMuahaha! Well… I really did have problems in writing this, besides having little time in which to write it. Oh.. Speaking of little time, don't expect the next chapter for at least two weeks, likely longer. School play is next week, final exam for Honors Biology is next week, AP bio exam is a week from Monday.. and, well… I've also got other school work to do… like a project on Ovid among other things… Yeah.
I want to thank anyone who still remembers me and reads, then reviews this chapter, even if you hate it. Yeah… I'm not really sorry about what I did to Balmung, though. I kind of had that planned out for a while now… And, well, it just fit in well to add to Kite's misery… I couldn't cut it out for all the Balmung fans! I, too, am sort of a Balmung fan.. or at least a Fan of Balmung in the Twilight Manga… -hugs Balmung the administrator- He's more mature than in the games, and oh so much more awesome. Specially with hapless Reki (who is also awesome… especially because he would rather be studying history than work as an assistant) tagging along. I loved that manga… I've reread it at least five times, I swear….
Anyway, this is all beside the point. Please forgive me if this chapter sucked, and forgive me even more for being late. I can only blame the lust for good grades in school and the desire to do really well in classes so that I can get into all the honors courses I am signed up for next year… (Yeah.. Next year, if you expect writing from me, you will REALLY have to be patient.. ehehe.. I am so gonna die even if I wind up being in regular US history rather than honors. Lessee… honors chem, honors precalculus, honors english 10 (American lit), Latin 3, Possibly honors US history, sculpture, band, and gym so I can get gym credits, thus rendering me studyhall-less… oh crap.. damn intellect… damn thirst for knowledge… and damn not wanting to be bored in a slower paced class… oh.. and damn my mom urging me to take as many honors courses as I could… gaaah)
Ok.. Sorry about that rant there…
It has just dawned on my how insanely busy I will be.
Oh well… I have all summer to finish this story.
Anyway, on to replies to my reviews!
Twilight: Well, I replied to your 2cd review via email. Buahaha... Please don't kill me for data draining Balmung! I mean, it went towards the good cause of Kite torture.. (speaking of which, there'll be a boatload in the next chapter.. muahahaha.. and Morganna beating up on Tsukasa, too...)But anyway, as you see.. I've worked out what I was having trouble with... and.. yeah. Hope you like it!
Windchaser90: I didn't update soon, but I updated! Muahaha... Yeah... Actually, the more I think about it, the more one of the endings makes more sense than the other.. So, I may just post one ending, or I may post two completely different from what I wrote down. It all depends on where my little torture muse takes me.
Dragon's Hitokiri : Sora: Boing! -leaps away, then jumps onto your head and starts poking you with his katars-
me: Kite: -glares at me- Why can't you just let
me kill Morganna and get it over with? Me: Because then the story
would suck. All right? Shut up and take your pain
medication... Anyway, Here's the next chapter!
Theatre-sama: -hands you a plushie Skeith wand- See? It's furry and squishie! Well, your story is somewhat confusing.,.. I think that's because you jump around between characters and places, but it is interesting. I haven't reallyhad time to review it.
Cassiopia: You laughed when the dogs died in Where the Red Fern Grows! How..? I loved those dogs! And Bridge to Terebithia! Man.. you're heartless... xD
Steeple333: Yeah.. Actually, that was what I was thinking of when I made the dark one... The omake Balmung vs. Kite... xD Oh.. that woudl be soooo cool if they (bandai) did a volume of Kite gone evil...
Twilight Memories; Ok... The cliffhanger has been resolved.. with another cliff hanger of sorts!
Spirit Alleron: But... Torturing Kite is fun! And Morganna already took her revenge on Sora... Besides, major revenge on Kite and Tsukasa only makes sense... They stole the spotlight from the disembodied voice that be Morganna... Yes, of course K & Tsu romance will grow... I may not do much with it... But it'll be there. I really don't like slash, either...
Wind Kaze: -hugs you- Why must you take so long with Paradise Sin! -sniffle- Anyway, muahaha.. Another cliffie here.. sort of.. I mean, I tell you where Kite, Tsukasa and Morganna are, but not what is going on there... Muahaha...
Thankies all for reading & reviewing! Maybe, by the end of this story, I can have over 100 reviews! (Yes.. I'm hopeful!)