Author's Notes: What the heck am I doing, rewriting a story I never even finished? I don't know. Will I finish this one this time around? Again, I don't know. But I hope so, and I'm damn well gonna try! So. Stick with me here! By the way, this is not AU. It takes place two years after the events of Zero Two. Except of course, that whole crock with them grown up. You can forget THAT. Also, this fic is only half grounded in reality! And not researched in the slightest. So if you read something you can't ever imagine happening in real life, tell yourself "it's only a fic", let go, and just enjoy it. Let's see.. warnings and pairings. Warnings for mentions of murder. That's about it, I guess. Pairings are basically mentions of Daikari, and hints of Daisuke/OC. Not Mary-Sue. I don't do Mary-Sue, thanks. I don't remember if there are any other pairings in this. I'll mention them if I find them, ok? That said, I hope you enjoy!
Bloodlust (rewrite of Assassin)
by:butterflie
chapter one
Slinging his backpack over his shoulder, fifteen year old Daisuke stepped out into the bright sunlight of yet another new day in America, squinting his eyes from the glare. Even though he had been living in Florida for some months now, he still wasn't used to the weather conditions. Living in Japan had been much different than where he was now.
The weather conditions were the least of it, though. He had to adjust to a whole new set of customs and rules, a whole new language, whole new mannerisms, whole new lifestyle. Whole new friends. Nothing was the same anymore. It was hard. Sometimes he wished he hadn't wanted to start his life completely over by coming to America and leaving everything behind. Sure, most of the time it was worth it, considering what he'd lived through in Odaiba, but other times he found himself wondering if he hadn't made the wrong choice afer all.
He was surprised his parents had agreed to it, had agreed to let him just abandon everyone and everything in Japan and come to live with Mimi in Florida. Then again, his parents had seemed somewhat... eager to see him off. He supposed it hadn't been easy for them to find out their son had been turned into.. No. Forget that! It wasn't worth thinking about. It was over. Everyone had said so. There would be no more. No more screams, no more begging and pleading, no more of any of it. That's what they'd all said. No one had held him accountable, so he was free.
Why didn't he believe it?
It was the right choice. He knew it was. It had to be. Living in Odaiba after it was over, after it had all come out and all his friends knew.. it was just too painful. He couldn't stand to be around anyone anymore. No matter where he went or who he was with, he didn't belong. He stood out. He was different from everybody, and he knew it. It was why he had decided to leave in the first place. He couldn't stand the knowing looks, the whispers, the false sympathy of the girls, the pity. The carefully concealed horror and disgust.
"Uh.. Daisuke? Daisuke, Earth to Daisuke!" Matthew waved his hands in front of his friend's vacant expression, trying to get his attention as he had been for the last five minutes.
Daisuke blinked, looking at his raven-haired friend, noticing him for the first time. "Huh?"
"Finally!" Matthew exclaimed, letting out a mock sigh of exasperation. "Were you planning on standing on your porch all day, or were we going to meet Rachael?"
"Oh! Sorry.. I guess I was just thinking. Come on, we should go before she yells at us for being late."
Matthew laughed, dark brown eyes shining at Daisuke in delight. "It's probably too late for that! We were supposed to be there two minutes ago."
The look of pure panic on Daisuke's face at that statement caused his friend to laugh even harder. Daisuke stood there, faintly annoyed that Matthew was laughing at him, but after a moment joined in, realizing how silly he must have looked. "Mou! Let's go already! Rachael's gonna kill us!" he said at last.
Matthew nodded, a few gasps of laughter still escaping him every now and then as they started down the sidewalk toward the direction of the beach. Daisuke managed to hold his laughter in, though he couldn't help the smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. They purposely avoided looking at one another, afraid to set off a fit of laughter again.
When they at last reached the beach, they found their other friend standing there by a cooler, a towel slung over the crook of her arm, one of her sandaled feet impatiently tapping the sand as she waited. She flung her blond ponytail behind her shoulder, almost haughtily it seemed, as they approached. "Daisuke! Matthew!" she screeched when they were near enough to hear. "You two are seven minutes and twenty-eight seconds late! Where the heck have you been? I was so frightened out of my mind that some pervert would come up to me, and I would be completely at his mercy!"
The two boys exchanged an amused, knowing glance with each other, one that Rachael didn't miss. "What?" she asked huffily. "Why are you guys looking at each other like that! Hmph. I think I deserve an apology from you two for making me wait!"
Daisuke looked at Matthew, and then at Rachael, rolling his eyes. He loved his friend to death, but sometimes he felt she was just a little too self-centered. Still, he didn't want to start an argument. He just wanted to have fun. "Sorry Rachael. It's my blame."
The teenager gave him a look, brows wrinkling in confusion. "What?"
"It's my blame... err.. my... I mean, I was the reason we were late," Daisuke stammered, face turning red. He really hated English. Even after eight months, he still had trouble over the stupidest words.
"Your fault," Matthew informed him.
"My fault?"
"That's what you were trying to say," Matthew said kindly. "It's your fault that we were late."
"Oh. Thanks." Daisuke smiled at him gratefully.
"Are you two gonna stand there discussing the English language all day or are we gonna swim?" Rachael demanded, green eyes flashing in impatience.
Daisuke turned towards the fourteen year old and stuck his tongue out at her. "Aw, be quiet! I'd like to see you speak Japanese that well in just eight months!"
Rachael frowned. "I bet I'd speak it better than you speak English sometimes, Japanese boy."
"Stop calling me that! My name is Daisuke, not Japanese boy!"
"Whatever you say, Japanese boy," Rachael teased.
Daisuke growled and launched himself at her, preparing to knock her down and fight the way he used to fight with Ken and Takeru, but luckily Matthew intervened, grabbing Daisuke's arm and bringing him to a jerking stop. "Alright already! Enough you two! We came here to swim, not fight, remember?"
Daisuke pouted a bit, yanking his arm back from Matthew. "Mou! Gomen, gomen! Oyogimashou! Yosh'!" The former leader of the Erabareshi let out a loud yell as he flew down the sandy beach towards the waves of the ocean, Rachael's taunting already forgotten.
The two Americans stared after their Japanese friend as he threw his stuff down along the way before jumping happily into the water, laughing as a particularly large wave carried him out almost immediately.
"I hate it when he uses Japanese," Rachael commented in a sulk. "I can never understand a word he says. Why does he have to keep speaking it?"
Matthew shrugged at her. 'It's probably habit. After all, it's the only language he spoke the first fourteen years of his life. Having to switch to an entirely different language as suddenly as he did couldn't have been easy."
"Yeah.." she murmured, continuing to watch the boy in the distance splashing around and making a general fool of himself. "But you know.. I wonder why he had to? Did he not know he was coming to America? And it's really strange that his parents didn't come with him, that he lives with that girl Mimi instead. I've tried to ask him about it before, but he either tells me it's not my business or he changes the subject. Does he do the same thing to you?"
"He wants to forget his life in Japan," Matthew said as he finally started down after Daisuke.
She frowned. "What?"
Matthew stopped, looking back over his shoulder at the girl behind him. "That's what he told me once. He wants to forget Japan and everyone there."
"Why?" she asked curiously.
He shrugged. "I don't know. He wouldn't say."
She blinked, at last following after Matthew. "What's he hiding, I wonder?"
xxx
I wonder what everyone's doing back home.. Taichi and Yamato are probably arguing... Ken's probably doing some school project, and I bet Iori's practicing his kendo. Miyako would be helping her mom close the store. Takeru's maybe playing basketball, or intervening between Taichi and Yamato. Jou would be doing medical things. Sora would be at a tennis match. And Hikari...
He shook his head at himself, stretching out on his back on the towel, staring up at the darkening sky. Matthew and Rachael had long since gone home, and most of the regular beach crowd had as well. There were only a few stragglers here and there about the beach, along with a couple further down shore wanting a romantic night for themselves.
You've just got to forget it. Forget Japan, forget your old friends. Forget Hikari. You'll never have her, and it's not as if she liked you anyways. You're too stupid and too much like Taichi. You're not worth her time.
Suddenly angry with himself for letting his thoughts turn morose and bitter, he stood up abruptly, snatching up his towel and shaking the sand off it. He stuffed it back into the backpack he'd brought, and then headed back towards Mimi's house, a place he'd never be able to think of as home no matter how long he lived there. Still, he was grateful she and her parents had agreed to let him live there. Mimi knew what he'd done back in Japan, and how hard everything had been. He had a feeling she'd been the one to talk her parents into letting him live there for awhile. She was spoiled enough that they usually always gave in to their daughter's demands, something they must have done this time too. And he was grateful to Mimi, too, for giving up her freedom as an only child. She also took on a bit of responsibility where he was concerned, looking after him like he was her little brother. It was kind of nice to be someone's little brother again. Jun had recoiled from him ever since she'd learned the truth, and their relationship had been strained right up until the day he boarded the plane for Florida. It had hurt.
He was lucky enough in that Mimi's parents had gone to bed by the time he reached the front door, though Mimi herself was still up waiting for him. He'd seen her in the distance as he'd approached, a dark figure standing on the porch, arms crossed anxiously, body tense as she looked around. When he finally got to the steps, she was seething. "Where have you been?" she hissed at him, angrily tugging on a pink streaked strand of hair. "My parents and I were out of our minds with worry! You could have called!"
"I.. I'm sorry," he stammered. "I just.. I was at the beach with Rachael and Matthew, and I lost time. I didn't realize it was so late... I was just thinking." He looked down at the ground, hoping she'd forgive him and stop being angry.
She sighed. "Daisuke.."
"I'm sorry, I really am! I won't do it again!" he blurted out. "Please Mimi, I didn't mean to stay out so late!"
Another sigh. "Alright, alright. I understand. Just don't let it happen again, okay? Too many slip-ups and my parents won't let you stay anymore."
He nodded. "Sorry," he repeated again, helplessly, as she moved aside and let him in the house. He headed up the stairs to the small room he'd been given. It had previously been a guest room, but they'd let him turn into a room of his own, so he'd feel more welcome and not so much just a visitor in the house. It only helped slightly. He still felt out of place most of the time.
He locked the door behind him and dropped his backpack to the floor. He was so tired by now that he didn't bother to slip out of his swimming trunks, just merely flopped down on his bed, burying his face in the pillow and closing his eyes. Within minutes he was asleep.
xxx
The ringing of the phone beside his bed woke him sometime later. It was a private line that Mimi had been gracious enough to convince her parents to get him, so he had to answer it before someone else in the house woke up and got mad. Groggily, he reached out his hand and fumbled around on the nightstand until he found the receiver and lifted it up.
"Hello?" he mumbled sleepily, annoyed at whoever it was interrupting his much-needed sleep.
"It's not over yet Daisuke. Not by a long shot." Click.
Panic suddenly shot through Daisuke, and he sat straight up in bed, nerves tingling and adrenaline humming. Any lingering sense of wanting sleep was now gone. "Hello?" he said frantically into the phone. "Hello? Who is this? How did you get this number?"
But of course there was no number. He slowly hung up the phone and hunched up in his bed, drawing the covers about him. He spent the rest of the night huddled up that way, eyes wide as he stared about the darkness around him, seeing nothing, mind suddenly full of memories of the past year before this that he'd worked hard to forget.
He knew who had called him. And he knew they were right. He'd doubted it himself. It wasn't over. It wouldn't be. Not until one of them was dead.
end chapter one
Author's Notes: Yay! I feel this is much better than the original one. It came out better written, and it addressed a few things I ignored completely last time, such as the fact that Daisuke was living in America with Mimi and it was apparently okay with everyone. This time, it makes a bit more sense why he would be. Also, I fixed the age thing. Previously, I had Mimi 17 and Daisuke 13, but that was before I knew the right ages for them. So now it's fixed and Daisuke's 15, which makes more sense as well. I also cleaned up the formatting and grammar and spelling and whatnot, so this should read a bit easier now. However, the only thing I didn't really change was the plot itself. Scenes are largely unchanged, except of course that they're better-written and I've added in some things where I felt necessary. All in all, I hope this improved the first chapter greatly, and I plan to do this for the other three chapters that are already written! I hope you enjoyed this and let me know what you think of it, if you wish!
Oh, and the Japanese Daisuke spoke earlier? "Mou! Gomen, gomen. Oyogimashou! Yosh'!" means, "Geeze! Sorry, sorry. Let's go swim! Alright!"