Disclaimer: Yami no Matsuei belongs to Yoko Matsushita and that's it.
Stuff: Oi, oi, oi… What a late update! ´`.´`; I should have added this long ago, but better late than never. ^^ This fic contains spoilers for the Gensoukai arc, so… You don´t want to know, you don´t read it, kay? Though since we all know that it´s also AU, there won´t be that much. (In case anyone doesn´t know what I mean, theria.net´s a great place to look it up.^.~)
+ ~ Hisoka´s POV ~ +
"There is just one way to cancel the progress."
Kurikara smirked at me, both of his dark red eyes glowing with malicious glee.
"And that is to kill one of us two."
The edge of the sword trailed the curve of my neck, softly scratching it enough to draw a little blood, but not enough to do any mentionable harm. The smirk widened.
"I wonder… Regarding your powers, what would happen if I just cut your head off, here and now? Would you still come back to life again?"
Suddenly I felt ill. I felt it. I felt his emotions as clearly as if they were my own ones. His burning hate and anger, the rising sour lump of annoyance this whole situation was building up in him and more. Much more.
-I grinned maliciously as I saw his eyes widen in shocked surprised. I smirk as I feel him reading my emotions. What a disgusting feeling!
It felt like someone shuffling through them, pillowing them up in front of my mental eyes. Making me remember everything again that I've stashed away that carefully. Making me admit to each one of them.
I had chosen the sword with great care, knowing that Futsu no Mitama wouldn't hesitate killing him, as would Ame. I can feel his fear now. It was there, tainting the air and his face in the same way, waking the killer instinct in me. Gods! How I wanted to tear his white little throat out, to rip his limbs off and bury my hands deep into his torso, ripping his bloody innards out one by one until even the shinigami wouldn't come back to life again…
I shudder at the mental picture of it, the black part of my mind urging me to make it true… Just let go of every bit of sanity I'm clinging to and feast on his broken body… My hand that wasn't holding the sword was clenching and unclenching by now, being a visible sign of my inner turmoil. Just a cut… Just a cut and I'd be free again.- I withdrew with a audible gasp.
Gods! Kurikara tilted his head slightly, meeting my eyes with an amused look. The shikigami knew that I had read his thoughts. Licking his suddenly dry lips, RyuOh seized me up calmly. This time, the blade passed my throat without as much as drawing blood, swinging lazily back to its starting point. Kurikara grinned. I froze.
His slit eyes caught mine, gleaming with evil intention. Just as I was preparing for the worst, the fire-shikigami's grin widened. Seconds later the pressure of the blade vanished as it returned to its place in its hilt.
Stepping back, the Dragon King studied me with a mocking smirk before he turned to leave.
"You can count yourself lucky that I´m not half as bad as Sohryu, and the others seem to think I am."
I stared at him. A joke? That was all a joke?! Seeing my flabbergasted face, he started to laugh. "What? Did you think that I was serious?"
He laughed a bit more.
"…" Inwardly, I groaned. Why, just why, did I always have to get caught up with such crazy shikis? Wait, make that ´guys´. I mustn't forget my workmates back in Enma-Cho.
The sound of a breaking stick brought my attention back to Kurikara. The Kouryu had reached the end of the clearing and was about to leave me completely. He must have felt my lingering gaze, as he turned and returned my inquiring look wit a smug expression.
"Don't tell me that you expected me to stay with you."
I faltered. I hadn't thought about that, yet. As he was becoming my shiki, it would be just normal that he'd stay near me. On the other side, he'd also made it pretty clear that he wanted to cancel the bounding and I _did_ fail his test, so had no rights on him. Except that wasn't what I had been thinking about.
"No… That's not it. You're just going to leave me here?" I paused to give him a reproachful look. "You said that I could stay with you until the others find me again."
For a moment, Kurikara just stared at me, stunned. Then he started laughing, looking honestly amused. "Yeah. But one should believe that you'd be able to survive 5 minutes on your own. Besides, they shouldn't need to get here anyway… I don't care much for their company, and I think, they also don't care for mine."
He turned to go, but decided otherwise in mid-move. "A piece of advice, though. Go back to where you came from. Return to Juo-Cho and take that partner of yours with you."
+ ~ + ~ + ~ +
Seeing the hurt in the kid's eyes as he processed my words, I added. "The Gensoukai´s currently a very dangerous place, not only because of the wormholes, especially for two unsuspecting shinigamis like you. It would be the best for everyone involved if you would listen to my advice." Pushing an irritating branch out of my way, I turned to go. –This time for real.
"Well… Take care! Especially when dealing with Sohryu´s children."
With this, I left him standing in the clearing. I could just hope that he'd listen to what I've said, or otherwise he was going to find himself and his partner in more trouble then they'd like to. I had meant what I said about Sohryu´s children. I had met the older one just for short time, but it had already been long enough to tell that something wasn't right.
From what I'd heard about ReiTai Kijin, he was supposed to be very calm and gentle, caring about others. Not the type that attacked without thinking about the consequences. And now the very same guy attacked me without caring about what his attacks could do to those who were behind me? Destroying a whole forest just to get me? A bit suspicious, if you asked me. I wouldn't be surprised if a certain old acquaintance of mine would be involved. We will see.
The rush of something big travelling through the air as well as the following faint noise of raised voices (Ahh! Tsuzuki! Take your hands off of me! – G-Gomen Hisoka!! I was just so glad that you're not hurt…) announced that his companions had found the boy. A few moments later I could hear them leave.
Gone…
Now I was alone again. Just me and my swords, like it had been for so long. Once there had been a time when I enjoyed the company of others, but now; now I don't know how to react to them anymore. Not really. It was just as hard as figuring out who I really was now. Murderer, monster, traitor or mere weapon…?
I didn't know. I honestly didn't. Sohryu had slashed my right eye and I still didn't hate him, right? Once again a thing I wasn't sure of.
Like so many things recently.
Why did it bother me so much to become the kid's shiki, honestly? Was it really the loss of freedom or the lack of experience of the shinigami, as I pretended? His character? Or was it because it was wholly my fault that it had happened? That I wouldn't get away without restrictions had been obvious from the very first moment that I touched Gensoukai again. I guess it could have been worse.
Still… The thing with Sohryu´s son bothered me. What could have reasoned such a radical change in behaviour? He hadn't given a damn about the soldiers he was supposed to lead against me (and whom I'd killed later. Blame my short temper.) No, remembering his speech, they were nothing more than decor for him. Such an unconditional loyalty to his father…
Unconditional loyalty…!
My eyes widened with sudden realization. So this was what he was up to! Suddenly all facts fitted together perfectly, leading to a shocking result. If this was true, my binding with Hisoka was the last thing to worry about. There was still hell to pay, and if I was right, it was coming closer goddamn fast!!
I cursed under my breath, startling both Futsu and Ame. No time to explain. I immediately had to warn the others…! I could just hope that it was only the boy. Whether he wanted to or not, this time Sohryu just _had_ to listen to me!
A dubious sound caught my attention. What was this? The surrounding area had grown suspiciously silent, a clear sign that somebody was on the hunt. But who should be stupid enough to try and hunt –me-?!
It was coming closer now. My trained instincts kicking in, I changed into a fighting stance, my hands resting lightly on the handles of my trusted swords.
It was close now.
I still couldn't quite believe that somebody could be that keen on dying. There! In the back, coward!! I whirled around, ready to blast whoever it was into afterlife – And froze in shock as cold metal dug itself right into my forehead.
Slowly dropping to my knees, I still could hear my swords cry out in horror as from far away before darkness engulfed me.
+ ~ + ~ + ~ +
It was on the break of the late afternoon when we finally arrived back at the palace. Despite Tsuzuiki´s attempts to cheer me up (he had been really worried about me), I was still in a bad mood.
It wasn't really bad, actually, but more like thoughtful. The meeting with Kurikara RyuOh had given me more than enough things to busy my mind with, honestly. Was it really that bad for a shikigami to become the partner of one of us? It was hard to believe that.
Especially while watching Tsuzuki falling face first from Byakko´s back once again, as he tried to climb from the huge white tiger's back. The youngest of the four gods was laughing gently at his master's clumsiness before turning into his human avatar form and helping my partner up. Even I was hard put to keep my stern face at Tsuzuki´s wails sometimes.
If there was one thing about my partner that I could trust, then it was the older shinigami´s ability to feel when I felt bad and cheer me up. No clue how he did that, but he did and I'm always grateful for it. –Though I'd rather let myself being roasted in the fires of hell before willingly admitting that to anyone.
…It's important that you're seeing them as friends rather than pets…
That's what he'd said, right? Remembering the words with which Tsuzuki had explained the working of a partnership with a shikigami to me, I silently trudge down the corridors next to him and the chirpy tiger-shiki. As a friend, huh? Was it that what Kurikara had meant? The reason the he was refusing me even yet? That-
"- Hisoka? Hisoka!"
"Huh?!"
I jerked out of my gloomy thought. Probably a bit too abruptly, since both other men (I'll not count that Byakko was actually a summonable god who had just taken on the form of a human) were watching me with worried expressions. Tsuzuki was the first to speak again. (Guess he was already used to such reactions from me.)
"Ne, Hisoka, we were speaking about how dangerous these wormholes are getting and what could have happened to you." Byakko nodded, emphasising what his master had said. "That's true. Honestly, I´m surprised that you managed to get along in that forest without getting hurt. It's not the most human-friendly in Gensoukai, really not."
He looked at me, and I knew that he was waiting for an explanation. What to say? Somehow I didn't really want to tell them that it had been Kurikara who had let me through the forest. Tsuzuki would understand, I'm sure, but Byakko… Despite the fact that the western guardian beast didn't seem to hate the Dragon King like Sohryu did, I couldn't be sure of his reaction. Before I came to make up a halfway plausible story, fate interfered.
Better said, Touda interfered.
"Tsuzuki!!" The fire shiki sped the last few meters to where we were standing, looking worried. Seeing the shiki´s condition, Tsuzuki immediately sobered up. "Touda! What's wrong?"
He didn't have to ask if something was wrong. When it caused even Touda to act in such a way, there was definitely something wrong. Very wrong. Behind Tsuzuki, I blinked. I was still not used on seeing the self-proclaimed ´bad´ shiki without his visor. The fact that with its removal his hair had also grown long again wasn't particularly helping.
Short after his visor had been destroyed while fighting with Kurikara, Touda had started acting strange. Turned out that the visor hadn't only been a device to restrict the fire types destructive powers, but also had been slowly brainwashing him. Brainwashed to obey the emperor's orders. So when the visor had forcefully been removed, that had left Touda in more than just a struggle about his sanity. For a short span of time he'd gone crazy, fighting for the control of his own body.
In that time he had even attacked Tsuzuki, whom he'd accidentally had mistaken for the celestial emperor. – a thing the shiki was still very sorry about. Especially since he obviously liked my partner very much. On the positive side, it had been enough to tear him out of his rage and put him back to normal. Still, I could feel his feelings of guilt leak out of his uncaring shell every time he laid sight on Tsuzuki. I didn't enjoy it. Though, today was different.
Today the only thing coming from Touda was a feeling of alertness, putting me immediately also in the same state. The fire shiki gave us a weary look.
"Somebody has intruded Tenkuu. It's a spirit that powerful and with such an amount of viciousness that half of our systems have gone berserk."
Behind me, Byakko gasped. Touda paid no attention to him. "Sohryu sent me to look for you. You and Hisoka have to return to your rooms immediately. Stay there until we generals have found the intruder." I already knew what Tsuzuki was going to say before he started speaking.
"I want to help."
"No."
"But-" Touda gave him a look that made him turn chibi and hide behind me. "No." Seeing the shinigami wincing at his harsh words, he added. "This intruder is powerful, Tsuzuki. So powerful that Sohryu even sent Kijin and Tenku to their rooms and forbid them to come out until it was over. " He gave him a stern look. "Please go to your rooms. None of us wants you to get hurt."
Please? Touda said ´please´?! That comment was startling enough without the expression on this shiki´s face. So it came that neither of us protested when we were led to our rooms.
What none of us had considered was the possibility that the intruder could already be waiting there.
______________
CONTINUE . . . ?
Hey there! I´m back again and with a new chapter – finally! ^^ Yeah, I know, I know, my writing speed´s anything else than fast… Gomen! ^^; I hope this chapter makes sense since I was in a pretty strange mood when I wrote this. If not, just let me know! Anyway, about your questions; I´m still not knowing which pairing I´m now definitely going to write. (And that despite the voting… Gomen, gomen, I´m such a baka.^.^; I´ll work on it!) Especially since I´m not the best at writing any sort of romances or such… ^^; But there will some of it, definitely! Just keep youre eyes open and let me know what you think of it!
In other words: Thanks for reviewing and please keep doing it!! ^_^