Mikau: Hello! Well, it's finally done, the next chapter of TBT. There will probably be two more, another chapter, and then the epilogue. So much for the original "It will probably be about 20 chapters, maybe less." Right Kara. Right. I can never accurately guess the number of chapters that I'm going to write…Oh well. As it turns out, TBT is longer than the original I,SR even though I,SR has 74 chapters, it is only 516 pages long. TBT is now up to 560 pages, and it's still going. Anyway, this chapter is my baby. I've worked long and hard on it pretty much non-stop all of Spring Break. It's 12,800 words long exactly, and explains all the twists and turns and plot twists in TBT, and is pretty much the product of all my hard work the past year. I started I,SR on March 23 of last year, and am happy to say I think my writing has improved since then, but you can be the judge. I'm extremely proud of this chapter, so I hope you enjoy it!
Disclaimer: I don't own Shaman King.
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An Explanation
She punched him. She yelled and she cried and she punched him. And then I had no more desire to do so. She left and the look on his face was enough. I couldn't physically hurt him anymore than she had. Whenever a body is in immense pain, it shuts out all lesser pains, and focuses all of its energy on the greatest pain. If I hit him, then he wouldn't feel a thing. The pain he felt from Hoshi's punch would negate anything I did to him.
I tried to cut him with my words. "You bastard. I trusted you with one daughter's heart, and now you've gone and hurt both of them!" He didn't hear me.
Akira smiled at his handiwork. "You deserved it. You took away the woman I loved, and now I've turned the woman you love against you. I only wish I could do more to destroy you, you demon." The Tao boy retook his seat at my younger daughter's bedside.
Hana and his little gang stepped to one side of the room to murmur quietly and comfort each other. Anna and Yoh sat down on the couch that had been moved into the room for us and lightly embraced. Lyserg the detective stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, uncertain whether to try and arrest Lucifer or not.
Ivy sighed softly and wrapped her arms absent-mindedly around my waist. "Oh Hao what are we going to do?" She was all out of tears, so she could no longer cry or sob or weep. She sighed and closed her eyes, resting her head on my shoulder.
She looked beautiful again. She was acting like the woman I loved, and finally she looked the part as well. She was a little pale, and a little weak, but I couldn't have been more in love with her at that moment. When she had first walked into that hospital, I had thought I was hallucinating, but now that I knew she was real, it only seemed right.
I ruffled her hair and watched stoically as Lucifer slumped into a nearby chair and gazed unfeelingly into the floor. His nose had started to bleed, but he didn't seem to notice.
A thought donned on me. He loved her. He had his reasons for murdering my other daughter, and surely they weren't 'diabolical' as Hoshi had said. They probably weren't the least bit evil as everyone else expected.
"Where did I go wrong?"
Thoughts flowed freely into my mind, but I couldn't quite place where they came from.
"I've been planning for so long, but still everything fell apart. I was so careful, but she still hates me…"
Lucifer's thoughts trickled into my head.
I left her early this morning to go arrange things with my brother, and by the time I got back, it was almost time to set the plan into action. I stopped by the graveyard and visited Ivy's grave one last time before I set off to do the job. I remember I said the same thing I always did. I talked through my plans with her headstone and said as I always did: "I hope you can forgive me Ivy; I really don't mean any harm with my plots, but there's no way to get around the girl getting hurt this time. I promise not to let her suffer."
I went back to the house and knocked over the chemicals in Ivy's lab creating a new body, and then I set off for the Moon and Stars Café and Bakery. The truck with the pipes was in place, and the truck driver Ryu was inside talking with the headwaiter Lyserg about a Mr. Louis C. Fur who had ordered the pipes. Thorn was outside waiting for Akira because of the note I left for her.
I remember that I hesitated before melting the chains; I could lose everything if I went through with the plan, but then I assured myself that Hoshi loved me and would understand once I explained. I was sure that she'd forgive me. I even had a back up plan, but now it seems so pointless. She hates me. She wants me dead.
I whispered softly to myself to restore my courage, "To win a game, first you must sacrifice a few pawns." And then I melted the chains. I closed my eyes, unwilling to watch the pipes crush the poor girl. It was bad enough that I had to listen to her agonized screams. With the falling of those pipes, my whole world came crumbling down upon me.
I broke away from Ivy and offered Lucifer a Kleenex. "Your nose is bleeding, and I don't think the nurses want to have to clean your blood off the floor. This is a hospital after all, and everything must be sterile."
He looked up at me with dull eyes. "So this is blood, ne? I've never bled before…. It's different from liquid flames leaking out of wounds." He tried to smile, but as soon as a ghost of one graced his lips, it vanished and was replaced by tears. Not flames like usual, but wet, watery, human tears.
'Human…' "Oh my god! Is this what you talked to your brother about?" I gaped openly at him.
He nodded, still crying his broken heart out. "I thought she would understand if she heard me out, but thanks to him," Lucifer glared poisoned arrows at Akira, "She never wants to see me again. Once I clean this mess up here, I'm going to go die somewhere. I did this for her, but now there's really no point."
I really did pity him. Giving it all up for the woman you love and then being so easily rejected by her.
"What are you talking about, you little traitor?" Anna got up from the couch and approached the broken boy in the armchair, all the while glaring menacingly. "Don't pity him, Hao because he reminds you of yourself and Ivy. I had an agreement with him that he'd work behind the scenes to create opportunities for you and Ivy to get back together, and he went off on his own secret agenda to kill Thorn!"
"He's not a traitor Anna." Ivy stepped into her sister's path and looked pleadingly at her elder twin. "Can't you see he did it for love? I know it sounds crazy, but I don't think he intended to actually kill Thorn in the first place. Maybe it's like how the angels arranged for me to die so that Hao and I would get married. Did you ever stop to think that maybe Lucifer has some sort of other ulterior motive?" Ivy looked pleadingly about the room. "Lyserg, doesn't he get to say something in his defense? Doesn't he have the right to a trial? Let him explain. Maybe it's not really what we think it is?"
Anna rolled her eyes at Ivy's foolishness, but took a seat anyway back next to her husband. "Fine Ivy. Have it your way, but I think you're a fool for giving this demon the benefit of the doubt."
"I agree with Ivy." I put an arm around my wife. "All right demon, talk." I softly nudged Lucifer with my knee.
33
Everything was dark and everything was cold. I hurt everywhere. I was sore and pain seemed to freely wash over me like roaring waves. I was scared. I didn't know where I was and I was having trouble breathing. I tried to cry out, but to my dismay, my vocal chords produced no sound.
Black, everywhere I looked, everything I saw, black. Dark, dreary, dead, cold blackness consuming me. I willed my eyes to open, but even when they did everything was still consumed by shadows.
I tried to cry, I was feeling so sorry for myself, but my eyes would produce no tears. I couldn't hear anything either. Not even the ringing noise of silence in my ears.
There was nothing in this black hole I had fallen into. I was trapped in the void forever. I was lost in the darkness, and was slowly slipping into madness. There was no light, no sound, and all I could feel was pain. It was a horrible agonizing pain, but it wasn't enough to make me black out, and it wouldn't kill me. It was just enough to torture me for the rest of all eternity.
I wanted to cry or call out in pain. It was awful, horrible, and I wished with all my being that I would die and the pain would stop.
"Don't you think you're being a bit of a drama queen?" A voice came from out of nowhere and the silence seemed to be instantly dispelled.
I opened my eyes and found myself lying on the ground in some foreign land made almost entirely of volcanoes, lava, soot, and fire. A burning wasteland of flames: my personal nightmare. Even the ceiling seemed to be made of fire and smoke.
"Sorry. I don't know who sent you to the Torture District, but I'll be sure to punish them later. I specifically ordered you delivered to my bedroom." The disembodied voice continued to speak to me. It was then that I noticed the voice was attached to a rather devilishly handsome man with dark, silky, raven's wing hair down to his chest, reddish-brown eyes, black jean pants with no shirt, and a simple chain choker around his neck.
I blinked and tried to ask my whereabouts, but nothing came out of my mouth.
"It's okay, you don't have to say anything. I know very well that you can't. Don't worry. Your voice will come back in time if you're patient. Now, introduction time. I'm Diablo. You can call me Dia if you so wish, but don't call me Damien. I'm Lucifer's older, stronger, and immensely sexier brother. Follow me." With a wave of his hand, my legs stopped hurting, and I was able to move.
I followed him, not understanding why I had been brought to this strange place, and not remembering when I had arrived there. In fact I didn't remember much of anything. I was strangely calm at this discovery. I walked a step behind this strange man and tried to keep up.
While we walked I looked around to further inspect my surroundings. There wasn't much, just a rolling sea of wasteland. Death, destruction, fire, and ashes. A land of shadows lay out before me. We seemed to be following a path, but I couldn't see any set way that we could possibly be following. We walked up a hill and then down. Up another and down again. When we reached the top of the third hill, the entire scenery seemed to change. Back where we had come from, the land looked like a fiery desert wasteland, but at the bottom of this third hill, the ground changed from a clay-like red to an oozy purple. The sky from a dusty brown to midnight blue. I could now see the path we were following, a discolored periwinkle on the violet ground, and at the base of the hill was a lake filled with indigo water that seemed to stretch on for miles. Off in the distance I saw flashing lights surrounding a castle-like mansion. It was far away, but I thought I could make out the red and black bricks of the gothic castle.
"Aaaa…" I tried to speak to my guide, but still couldn't form intelligible words.
"Shhh. Remember, be patient and your voice will come back along with your memories." He smiled sickly sweet, and I got the feeling that I shouldn't trust him despite his good looks and charming personality
Something slithered pass, brushing up against my foot. "AHHH!" I jumped, grabbing at the closest thing to me, desperate to get away from the black cobra at my feet.
Damien chuckled lightheartedly as I held tightly to his arm. He seemed to find something amusing about my fear of snakes. "Shhh…. Take it easy. It can't hurt you in your current condition. Come along now." He smiled and kept leading me along, letting me keep a hold of his arm, not minding the least bit.
He led me down the path and we came to the docks. There was a small rowboat waiting there for us. He helped lower me down into the boat and then entered himself. "Botan. To the Hot Springs District."
With a simple command from the young man, a blue-haired girl appeared and started rowing us to our destination. "Yes Sire."
I was more than just scared. I was beyond all terror and panic and fear. I was so horrified by everything around me that in the end I felt nothing at all. All the pain my body had been under up until then was slowly fading away. I was numb to my pain and my fear. I looked over the side of the boat into the seemingly bottomless water. The dark blue surface was still and looked almost solid. It was like a mirror that I could reach out and touch.
And I saw my reflection. Long, mid-back length hair the color of crushed almonds gracefully flowed over my shoulders and fell in whips about my face. I had milky pale skin and startling brown eyes that were almost dark enough to be black. They looked like twin caves leading down to the center of the Earth. My lips were thin and pale and almost delicate looking. Not to sound vain or anything, but I was gorgeous.
My clothes were a bit messy though. I was wearing what looked to have at one time been a white blouse with some kind of cutesy saying on it, but now it was stained with dark, crimson blood. My blue jeans too were covered in the thick, smelly liquid. I gasped softly at the sight of all the blood. I felt dizzy and sick at the thought of being covered in it.
Damien looked back at me with a questioning gaze. "What's up?"
I motioned to my clothing, hoping that he understood I was asking why I was drenched in blood, and whose blood was it exactly that I was coated in.
He smiled his scary sweet grin again, and my stomach lurched. "Don't worry; that's yours."
I nodded, but didn't truly understand. I looked myself over again and tried to find a wound, a gash, a cut, a scrape, anything that would explain where the blood had come from, but I couldn't find any openings in my skin. I chewed on my lip and gazed back into the water at my pretty reflection.
"It will come back to you soon." Damien assured.
The pain had come back. I was sore again. It was most unpleasant to be in such constant discomfort. I folded my arms and rested them on the side of the boat. I lay my head on my arms and drifted off to sleep as the boat was rocked by the gentle waves.
It was dark and cold again, but I could hear and feel and see this time. I felt around in the dark for something, anything, but I was boxed in, trapped. Behind me was a wall, and close on both sides, within arms reach, were two more. Even the ceiling brushed against the top of my head. I stretched both arms out in front of me and cautiously inched my way forward. There was no wall there to stop me. I kept walking, hoping to find some way out of the darkness. As if in answer to my prayers, I saw a light. It was dim and far away, but it was a way to escape the nightmare world I had been thrust into. I walked at a gradually increasing rate until I was running.
Something stung my foot as I stepped upon it in the darkness and I tripped over something in my pathway. I fell to my knees and landed on the wet, stone tunnel floor. Water covered the path, soaking me as I fell into the stagnant puddle. I reached out in the darkness, trying to find the spiky object I had tripped over.
My hand made contact with something sharp and rope-like. A vine of thorns. More covered the watery path that lay before me. I trudged on through the cold wetness, groping for something to hold on to, but only finding more thorns.
There was a vast overgrowth of them. They covered the walls and matted the floors. They hung from the ceiling and grabbed at me. They caught at my clothing and tore at my hair. They reached out their amorous hands and lunged at me, raking against my skin, striping away my clothing, and tearing at my hair.
I cried out in pain as they overtook me, grabbing my legs and restraining my arms and tearing my clothes and touching and feeling and ripping me to pieces. Dividing me into little slices and dolling them out equally to each and every prickly burr on that vine. They wrapped their arms around me and completely entangled me in themselves. They surrounded me, encircling me in a thicket of briars, completely shutting out the light of day at the end of the tunnel from my eyes.
I stopped struggling. They seemed to like it when I struggled. I closed my eyes and let them take me. I let them do as they desired. They ripped apart my body and tore at my soul. I didn't care. If I died then the nightmare would finally end. The pain would stop, and I could stop being afraid of everything in my life.
I was afraid to live life to the fullest because I was afraid of getting hurt or in trouble. I didn't allow myself to fully fall in love for the same reason. The same goes for everything else in my life. I was afraid to act on my own or grow up or speak up for myself or try new things or make my own decisions. I was afraid to live.
And one who has never lived cannot die. And if I don't die, then the pain will continue forever. And I'll never escape my own misery.
"Thorn!" I could hear a voice from beyond the ball of thorns I was entrapped in.
"Thorn!" It seemed to come from beyond even the tunnel.
"Thorn where are you?" 'So Thorn is a person?' I trained my ears in on this voice.
"Thorn! Will you please just come out already! You win, I'm worried!" It was a woman's voice. A melodic voice I could listen to for a long time and still not get tired of.
"Thorn!" She sounded very distressed at not being able to find this 'Thorn'.
'Thorn. Now why does that sound familiar to me? Thorn. What an interesting name. I know I've heard it before though. I can't remember where.'
The voice called again. It seemed louder and closer this time. It sounded as if the woman were coming into the tunnel with me. I wanted to warn her about the thorns, but I still couldn't speak. I wanted to shout out, "Be careful or else the thorns will tear you apart!", but I couldn't speak. The only sound I could make was "Aaaa…"
She was still coming closer to me and my bed of thorns. I had to warn her to stay away or she too would join me in eternal slumber in my dark, dank, dreary tunnel in my ball of thorns. I had to save her, to help her at least. The thorns' grip tightened on me until I could no longer breath enough to mutter my "Aaaa…" I started struggling again, trying to break free and ward the woman off.
"THORN! Can you hear me!" 'This Thorn girl must be very lucky to have someone like that to care for her.' I struggled even harder against the restricting might of the thorn ropes.
'I'm Thorn.' My whole body stopped moving and I remembered this one sentence. 'My name is Thorn.' I tried to remember more. 'I am Thorn Asakura.' The steel cage of thorns I had been trapped in started to give way a little.
"Thorn!"
'I know that voice.' Light started to leak in through the vines.
"It isn't funny anymore! Thorn, come out NOW!"
'I have a sister. That's my sister's voice.' The briar patch melted away, slowly setting me free.
"Thorn!"
I got up and ran, breaking away from the last clinging branches of thorns. I ran for the light. It seemed so much closer now. It was as if I could almost reach out and be able to touch it. I ran through the home stretch of standing water and groping vegetation, and finally made it out of the tunnel.
I shielded my eyes when I reached the surface. The sun was so bright; it scorched my eyes and warmed my soaked, bloody skin. I stood there for a moment getting use to the light. Birds chirped, a soft breeze blew, and I could hear somewhere, not very far, but not terribly near, waves lapping up against the side of a cliff. Seagulls called to each other, greeting in passing, and the tall grass licked like a loyal canine companion at my scrapped and bleeding legs.
When my eyes finally adjusted to the bright rays from the sun, I looked around for the woman who had been calling for me. I was at the bottom of a hill standing in front of the entrance to the cave. At the top was a lone dogwood tree overlooking the cliff I had heard waves lapping up against. Seagulls soared majestically and gracefully dove over the ocean, calling to their brothers and sisters as they passed each other. As I walked toward the top, I noticed someone standing by the tree. It was her. It was my sister.
I began to run up the slope toward my other half, but I underestimated the vast distance I had to run, and soon got tired. I slowed my gate and began to walk breathlessly up the incline. It was to be a long walk. It was as if I was walking down a long corridor, trying to reach the end, but the hallway seemed to stretch out in front of me forever, growing longer and longer just to hinder my progress.
On my way up I passed a large group of people having a picnic. I recognized them all, but could not recall any names. There was my mother and father sitting at the picnic table, he telling some story or joke and she laughing, all smiles. She held a child I had never seen before in her arms, and she was pregnant again. The child looked no more than a few years old, perhaps one, maybe two at most. He looked directly at me and waved. My mother looked to where her child was waving and saw me. She gasped excitedly and motioned to her husband. He too looked up and they all waved, beckoning me over to them.
I waved back, but made no advances, so the child came to me. He walked pretty well, only stumbling a few times. He eventually made his way over to me and stretched his arms up way above his head. "Sissy!" He smiled and giggled at me. He had thick orange hair and light baby blue eyes. I couldn't help thinking 'What a beautiful child. He'll have tons of girlfriends when he grows up.' when I looked at him. "Up!" My little brother cooed, and I tried to obey, but as soon as I touched him, he disappeared along with my father and that wretched mother of mine.
Now sitting at the picnic table were my aunt, uncle, cousin, and his friends. The adult couple sat at the table talking, having some sort of conversation or another, while the teenagers sat on the ground in a circle, talking about things of little consequence. On my cousin's lap sat three children. One brunette, one blonde, and one with crimsony-brown hair. They all looked similar, and all were girls who looked to be about four or five years old. They were dressed in matching dresses of different colors. The blonde wore navy and sky-blue, the crimsony-brown one wore forest and pastel green, and the brunette wore gold and pale yellow.
My cousin looked up and waved at me, and soon the whole group was waving except one. A violet-blue-haired young man looked at me as if he had seen a ghost. He approached me slowly, but when he finally got close enough to touch me, he whispered under his breath, "Thorn." and he kissed me. But just like before when I tried to pickup my younger brother, when he touched me, he vanished.
This time the entire group appeared before me all at once. Uncles, aunts, mothers, fathers, children, and friends of the family all gathered in that one place. They waved collectively at me, and I waved back, but kept walking. I needed to get to my sister at the top of the hill. It seemed to me that I walked for hours on end, but it couldn't have been that long, when I reached the top I could still see the picnic goers. I looked down the hill and shook my head. 'What is this? Thorn in Wonderland? Or perhaps, Alice in Wonderland Two: Thorn Falls Down the Rabbit Hole?'
"There you are! I've been looking for you for forever!" The beautiful voice from before echoed in my ears once again.
I turned around and there she was. A woman with waist-length crimson brown hair the color of dead roses, and icy blue eyes that sparkled like a star-filled wintry night, pale skin to match my own, luscious red lips painted with a calculating grin, and wisdom in her eyes collected over her hundred years of life. Her clothes were tight, blue jeans, a white tank top exposing a good deal of her stomach, and a crocheted sweater that didn't look like it would keep out much of the cold.
"Where were you?" She didn't make a move toward me, but instead turned back to look at the sea.
I walked over to her and stood by the tree with my sister. "Hoshi?"
"Yeah?" She looked curiously at me out of the corner of her eye.
I smiled and shook my head. "Nothing." I could speak again.
My elder twin rolled her eyes at me and sighed. "Thorn, I'm getting married."
"What?" I turned to fully face her. I remember that she said she never wanted to get married. She always told me that when we were growing up and even when we were 14 and 15 and 16. She had never wanted to settle down and get married. It wasn't like she could start a family, after all, hadn't she specifically told me she was sterile?
"Lucifer proposed to me. After college we're getting married." She looked so happy. So, so happy. The way she smiled and laughed and smiled some more. I had never seen her like that before. Sure she had her cheerful times as everyone did, but now my sister was actually, blatantly happy.
"Congratulations." I threw my arms around her and cried with her. Hers were happy tears; mine were not. I had taken for granted that my sister and I would always live together with our father and the servants and his followers. We were twins. We were born together, and so we would stay. FOREVER. We belonged together. What was she thinking, splitting us up? We were practically the same person. Like a yin yang we were bound together. Two sides of a coin, the sun and the moon, the person looking into a mirror and her reflection, a person and her shadow, two socks, two shoes, chess pieces you need both black and white to play a game. We were bookends. You can't just have one or else everything will collapse.
My world was falling apart with her announcement that she was leaving me. I was her shadow, I couldn't survive the harsh light of day if she were not there. If there is no one to look in the mirror, there can be no reflection. A person is made equally of yin and yang, take away one, and you destroy the balance. Half a quarter is worthless. The moon is a dead star that reflects the light of the sun at night; without the sun, it is as if the moon does not exist. A sock or shoe without its mate is useless and gets thrown away. You can't win a match of chess if you have no opponent to beat.
I was falling into the darkness again. The cliff was crumbling beneath my feet and I was falling. The ocean parted to reveal a black void for me to fall into. Hoshi screamed as she watched my body drop to the sea below, but she soon forgot about me as Lucifer appeared beside her. They embraced and he kissed her again and again and again.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" I fell lifelessly into the abyss, and then I hit the ground.
"Ahhhhhhh!" I screamed again.
"SHHHHHHH!" There was someone else there, and apparently that someone didn't appreciate my screaming bloody murder. "God, why must you mortals make so much noise when having nightmares?"
I gasped and breathed heavily, trying to get a sufficient amount of air back into my lungs as I took in my surroundings. I was on the floor. Cold, black and red tiles covered the floor, and mirrors coated the ceiling. I was in a gothic style bedroom. There were two closets, a full-length mirror, a bedside table, a television to one side of the bed, a row of bookshelves, and a shelf on the wall holding all sorts of things that I didn't want to know what they were or what they were used for. I had fallen out of bed, and was lying on the ground next to it. I was wearing different clothes than the ones I had on when I went to sleep in the boat, and still in the bed beside me was that man that had been leading me around before, Damien.
I stood up and gaped at him. "What did you do to me?"
He stared blankly at me. "Beg pardon?"
"You raped me didn't you! While I was asleep." I glared furiously at him. "You had me in bed with you and I fell out when I woke up, and I'm wearing new clothes! You changed them yourself didn't you? Didn't you!"
Again he stared blankly at me. "You wish. I don't go around raping just anybody, and if I had raped you, I would have marked you with a three right in the corner of your eye. Take a look in the mirror; I assure you, there's no three."
I wanted to whip that smug, amused smirk off his face, but my own curiosity got the better of me. I stalked over to the mirror to scrutinize my appearance, but when finished, found nothing.
I turned on him and glared childishly. "Well maybe you didn't rape me, but you most certainly changed my clothing."
"You got me there, but you have to admit that that nightgown looks ravishing on you. I have excellent taste in women's clothing." The way he eyed me with those reddish brown portals to hell made me fear for my life and innocence and caused chills to run down my spine.
"T-that's quite un-gentlemanly of you." A pathetic insult, but the best I could think of at that moment.
"I haven't been a gentleman since…ever." He got out of bed and approached me. I backed away. "Come now Thorn, we have much to talk about. Like…have you ever made love to someone on a table?" With a snap of his fingers, a long banquet table appeared out of nowhere.
This made me back away from him even further. "Stay away from me. When my sister and father find out what you've done—"
"—Your father and sister pose no threat to me. Hao takes over Lucifer's territory when he comes down here for his 'annual visit'; the Hot Springs District stays totally under my control. Hao says he has no use for my harlots. As for your sister, sure she was a powerful witch in another life, but she too doesn't scare me. Interest and intrigue me, yes, but scare me? No. I bet she didn't tell you the whole story of her past life. She was quite the beautiful and powerful thing. I wanted her for myself, so I arranged for her death. The villagers found out her little secrets, and she was burned at the stake. Too bad her soul didn't come to me in hell when she died. She went to limbo to await her next incarnation. And then in her next life, the life in which she was your sister, then I got her. I—"
"—Would you stop monologing? It's rather annoying." I sighed in an extremely bored fashion and sat back down on the bed.
"Fine. Back to our little rendezvous." He disappeared. Simply there one minute and then gone the next. I gasped, now extremely nervous, weary of when and where he would appear next. Two hands clamped down on my shoulders from behind and I screamed. "A girl's first time should be on a bed after all, and the man should treat her like a princess, but we have little to no time for that, so let's just get right down to the fun part."
"NO! Leave me aloooooone!" I kicked and screamed and hit at him as he forced me down on the bed. I tried to get away, but like everyone else in my life, he was stronger than me. "HELP! SOMEBODY! HELP ME!"
"You're in a whorehouse. No one's coming just because you're screaming." He laughed and smirked as I cried and screamed. I struggled, but nothing seemed to help.
"Damien. Stop it."
He did stop. He stopped and looked to the doorway at the redheaded woman standing there. "Hello Adella. Can I help you with something?"
"Cut the crap Dame. Lucy is counting on us, and you're not sticking to the plan." The beautiful woman stepped forward into the room, standing to the side of the bed, in front of the TV. "Do you know the hell he's putting himself through for this to work? You're destroying all the hard work he's done up until this point; how could you do that to your own little brother?"
"Rather easily." The Devil snorted indignantly. "Who cares about his stupid plan?" And then he went back to undressing me. I squealed in terror and resumed kicking and screaming.
"I care."
He paused again at hearing her.
"You really are despicable, you know that. I can't for the life of me figure out why I love you! Well it doesn't matter. My sentence is only for a hundred years more, and then I'll be off to Heaven where I'll never have to see or deal with you ever again." Adella seemed to slap him with her words.
I could see it on his face as he tried to explain. "Do you know how long it's been since I've had a virgin?"
"A week. Deal with it." Her tone had a vicious, ruthless edge to it.
"That's what I'm doing, now get out." I cried even harder as he started removing his own clothing.
"Damien!" Adella rushed him, pushing him off of me.
I fell to the floor with a thud and scurried to put my clothing back on.
"Damn you!" Diablo growled at the woman, giving her a glare as sharp as daggers, as he grabbed me by the wrist, gripping so hard I feared he'd break it.
"I'll never forgive you if you rape this poor girl." Adella warned. "Take me instead."
He didn't even consider her for a second. "And why would I do that?"
"You said that you loved me!" She cried bitterly.
"I do, and what of it?" He shrugged, tightening his hold on me.
"I'm beginning to think that you don't even know what that means." She dropped her gaze and walked toward the door.
Diablo's death glare dropped along with Adella's eyes, and his iron grip loosened considerably. "Maybe I don't. But then, if not love, what's this feeling I have for you?"
"Please let her go. I'll make a deal with you; if you let her go and go along with Lucifer's plan exactly as he said, then I'll be yours forever. I won't leave for Heaven at the end of my sentence." Adella stood in tears as she gripped the doorway, her knuckles turning white.
Damien released me and walked slowly over to Adella, encircling his arms around her waist and kissing her delicately on the side of her neck. "If it means that much to you, let's get this plan of my brother's underway. I'm sorry."
A small smile lit the woman's face. "It's okay. I wasn't planning on leaving for Heaven anyway even after my sentence ran out. I couldn't stand the thought of leaving the man I love even if he is an evil bastard."
The demon smiled and flirted back. "I couldn't stand it if you left either, but hey, watch it. I may be an evil bastard, but I'm still king down here, so don't tell that to my face." He kissed her on the tip of the nose and redirected his gaze toward me.
I gasped and shrunk away in fear, cowering in the corner. Adella walked over and hugged me. "I'm so sorry about him. He may come across as a perverted, evil monster, but he does have his redeeming qualities. He won't hurt you anymore, so there's nothing to worry about. He's harmless, really."
I nodded, but her words really didn't have much of an effect on me. As far as I could see, there was nothing redeeming about that beast, and I didn't want to be in the same room as him for any longer than necessary.
Damien snapped his fingers and all at once the bed was gone, and was replaced by a couch in front of the television screen. The demon sat down on one side of it, and Adella sat next to him. She motioned for me to use the seat next to her. I hesitated for a moment, but decided to trust her. She reminded me a lot of my older sister.
"Okay, down to business." The lust-filled look Damien had been giving me before was now entirely gone from his eyes. "What's the last thing you remember before you met me?"
I thought back and tried to remember. "I remember the darkness and the pain, and then you came. I can't remember much before that."
"Try harder." Adella urged with a smile. "Think back before the darkness."
I closed my eyes and tried to picture it to remember all that had happened. "Well… There were lots of people screaming. A group of children shrieking and calling for their mother. Some people shouting for help and for someone to call 911. Someone was yelling my name over and over again. I think it might have been my father. Everything is such a blur." I stopped, getting a headache.
"Come on Thorn, you have to remember this for yourself or else we can't help you." The redhead clasped my hand and coached. "What happened before that?"
"I…I don't know."
"Yes you do." Damien joined the encouraging. "Now think hard. It's in there somewhere, you just have a bunch of cobwebs and dust covering it."
"I…I got a letter from my boyfriend! He wanted to meet with me about…something…. He was going to meet me in front of some restaurant, and we were going to have lunch, but…I don't know…he never came, and then some pipes or something fell off the back of a truck parked in front of the restaurant. That's when the yelling and the screaming started." I looked to them as if asking 'Is that enough?'
"There's one more thing you're forgetting; now, what is it?" Damien looked expectantly in my direction. "I'll give you a hint: it's the reason you're here. Where were you and what were you doing when the pipes fell."
I tried to remember, but nothing came to me. I closed my eyes and concentrated once again. "I suppose I was screaming with everyone else."
"And?" I was getting closer. I could tell by the cat-like grin on the devil's face.
All at once it came back to me in a bright burst of light. All my memories came flooding back.
There I was out front of The Moon and Stars Café and Bakery, and there was the truck with the pipes chained on the back. I watched it pull up, and I waved to my Uncle Ryu as he got out of the truck and walked inside to talk with the manager of the café. He smiled and waved back. I was waiting for Akira to come and eat lunch with me so we could talk about him being Lian. I had been waiting for fifteen minutes for that boy to show, but he still wasn't there yet.
My father walked by, but I didn't notice him. I was too busy staring at my watch. "Hey Thorn. What are you doing here?"
I jumped, but then smiled when I realized it was my father. "Oh hey Dad. I'm waiting for Akira to get here, so we can have lunch together. He's running a bit late though. What about you?"
"Akira? Really?" He looked completely scandalized. "I thought the two of you hated each other. Have you made a treaty or something?"
"Actually, we're sitting down and negotiating today. Apparently we've been dating for the past couple months, you see at the other party I met this guy named Lian, but we didn't see each other's faces because of the masks, and we sort of fell in love, but gave each other pseudonyms for some weird reason, and it turns out that I've been dating Akira. So we're sorting it all out today." And then I started rambling in some dreamy babble. "I bet he's going to propose when we're done talking! Oh, wouldn't that be so romantic! It'll be just perfect! Of course Akira does have some annoying personality flaws, but I can always fix that when we're married, right?"
Hao sighed and put a hand on my shoulder. "Sweetheart, that never works in real life. You can't change men. They'll always be jerks and perverts and…well, men. There's nothing you can do to change that."
"But you changed for Ivy." I pointed out.
He scrunched his nose at me and denied everything. "Did not. Not that much. Sure I gave up drinking and being suicidal, but that's not that much of a change. It's not like I was too attached to either of those things anyway."
I rolled my eyes and shook my head. He was too stubborn to argue with. "So what were you doing here again?"
"Meeting I—Valerie for lunch." He smiled lightly. "That reminds me… you and she have to have a serious talk later about Ivy. There have been some secrets kept from you, and it's time you learned the truth."
I nodded having no idea what he was talking about.
"Goodbye Thorn." He hugged me and smiled. "I'll see you later okay sweetie?" With a kiss to my forehead he was gone inside to wait for his own date.
I rolled my eyes and smiled again at his treating me like a little girl. I sighed and shrugged, realizing that I would never grow up in his eyes.
I heard a noise from behind me. I couldn't exactly describe it. It was a soft rumbling sound, a sort of grinding sound, chains clinking and the low growl of things falling. It was the sound of death.
I had barely turned around when I saw them falling. The pipes. I screamed, but didn't feel a thing. It happened too fast to feel anything. I tried to dive out of the way under the truck, but a pipe caught my legs and I blacked out from the pain of my crushed lower body.
"I'm dead." It came out as barely a whisper. "Oh my gosh…" I was in shock, but then I realized something else, "AND I'M IN HELL!" My mind raced, trying to think of reasons, excuses. "What did I do wrong? Oh my gosh, oh my gosh…. I'm going to be tortured for all eternity, aren't I? My cousin! I'm here for incest! I'm sorry; I'm sorry! Please let me go to Heaven! I'll never do it again! Never ever!" I was too preoccupied with my spazzing out that I didn't see the weird looks Damien and Adella were giving me.
Adella cautiously reached out a hand and placed it on my shoulder. "Umm…you're not dead yet."
"What?" I blinked.
Damien explained. "Your soul is detached from your body because I detached it, not because you're dead. You're currently in a state of suspended animation. That reminds me, Adella get up there and make sure the body is doing okay. Also, you can tell Lucifer that the plan is going more or less, smoothly."
"Right." Adella nodded and got up to leave. "Just make sure you keep your paws off the girl."
"Will do." Damien gave the nod and Adella left. "I guess I have some explaining to do?"
I nodded and scooted further away from him on the couch.
"All right then. We're keeping your body on Earth alive. You should have died on the way to the hospital, but you didn't because we didn't let you. I'm doing this because it's according to my little brother Lucifer's plan. He's the one responsible for this whole thing. He's been planning for what seems like forever. He's then one who melted those chains that were holding back the pipes. He's the one who ordered that they be brought there in the first place. Maybe it would make more sense if I had Lucy explain it for himself." Damien snapped his fingers and a remote appeared out of nowhere. He turned on the TV and flipped through a couple channels until he found the one he was searching for. On the screen there was a hospital room filled with people I recognized. They were all gathered around my brother's boyfriend as he sat dejectedly in an armchair. "This screen might not be as fancy and big as the one up in Heaven, but it does its job."
33
"All right demon, talk." I softly nudged Lucifer with my knee.
"I told you there's no point. Hoshi hates me, so what do I care if you all think I murdered Thorn for no reason? What do I care if you all think I'm evil? I don't care what you think; I don't love you." The bitter demon seemed to shrink even further into his self-induced depression.
"Look you, I don't care if you care what we think or not, tell me why you did this to my daughter, damn it!" I seized him by the collar of his shirt, expecting him to react at least somewhat. He was limp in my grasp, like a corpse. I set him down back in his chair. "That daughter of mine…she has you completely and totally whipped, doesn't she?" He nodded. "All right then. If you have a good reason for doing this to Thorn, tell us now, and I'll talk to Hoshi for you. You said you were so sure that she would understand once you explained, so why don't you explain it to us, and Ivy or I can go and explain to Hoshi." He didn't react at all. "But then maybe I'm trusting you too much by giving you the benefit of the doubt."
"Fine. I'll tell you everything." Lucifer's words were hollow, and his voice was dripping in monotone. "There's no need for you to talk to Hoshi for me, it's over, and I'm going back home. I do admit that you deserve an explanation, so I'll give that to you, but then I'm out of here.
"You know that I used to have a huge crush on Ivy. I did everything I could think of to get her in bed with me. I was a selfish, perverted little kid in puppy love. I didn't really even truly understand the real meaning of love because I had never been shown love before in my life. Since I had such horrible examples, my brother to name one, you can only imagine how twisted my definition of love was. Ivy refused me over and over and over again. She was making a new body for herself so she could go back to Hao and her children. I offered her a new body in exchange for her soul, but she never took the bait. One day I just gave up. I instead decided that if she wasn't going to be happy with me, she deserved to be happy with Hao, so I approached Anna about getting Hao and Ivy back together.
"We kept up our talks for a few years, making plans and remaking plans. I let her think that she was in charge and that the entire thing had been her idea from the start. We spent years constructing the foolproof plan, and a few months ago, we set it into action. One day, Ivy's birthday, she was mixing some chemicals in the lab, and they unexpectedly completely altered her appearance. I was the one who caused her appearance to change, not those chemicals. However, later, when she was mixing some chemicals again and they exploded, the chemicals mixed with my magic to change her hair and eyes different colors. An unfortunate side effect. Anyway, I didn't want Ivy and Hao to jump back into a relationship because then Ivy would never finish her body because Hao would distract her from her work, and it would be a big, fat, sloppy mess, so I created Valerie. Hao wouldn't recognize Ivy now that she looked so different, and with the help of an accomplice of mine, I planted thoughts in Ivy's head that she had to hide her true identity from Hao."
A little pixie appeared, as if, out of nowhere, and sat on Lucifer's shoulder. "This is my accomplice, Marie. She's half imp, half sprite. Her parents' tribes were at war, and so they intermarried. Marie is the result. We've been friends since childhood, and she was more than happy to do a couple favors for me. She has the powers of both the imps and the sprites. She bends people's wills and plants ideas in their heads. I'm sure she can do much more, but those two are basically what she did for my plans."
Marie nodded and smiled devilishly at all gathered in the room. She had bright red wings that glimmered as if they were covered in glitter, and a floor-length red and black dress with sparkles to match. She was really quite a lovely little woman with olive skin, henna-colored hair down to her shoulders, and dark brown eyes. The treacherous little thing, no bigger than a doll, flew around the room and landed on Thorn's pillow. She stroked my daughter's hair and gazed mournfully down at the girl.
Lucifer continued. "So now that Anna and I had a plan to get Hao and Ivy back together slowly, but surely, we had to decide how to get them to meet again. We thought for a while, but then the answer was apparent: Hao and Ivy's daughters. Hao seemed more protective of the younger one, so we chose that one to lure out with the help of Marie. Thorn met Hana, and got hurt, and so was brought home right to Ivy. Hao came to pick up Thorn and met Valerie.
"And you all know what happened at the Masquerade. Valerie and Hao met again, and Lian met Thorn. And I unexpectedly developed a huge crush on Thorn to replace my huge crush on Ivy. It didn't last long though, and like my first crush, the one on Ivy, I decided that Thorn would be happier with Akira who was the Lian guy she met at the ball, and so I developed yet another plan: one to get Akira and Thorn together. I decided that I might need help with this one, so I had Marie plant the idea to get Thorn and Akira together in Hana's head. Hana turned to his cousin for help with his plan, and Hoshi entered into my schemes.
"I felt a strange attraction to her, but I ignored it and continued on in my plots, now leading Anna and Hana along according to my will. Ivy and Hao seemed to be progressing nicely in their relationship, and I knew that they would eventually straighten out the whole Valerie business and everything would work out fine in the end, but Lian and Thorn were a different story. Akira and Thorn hated each other, but Thorn and Lian couldn't be more in love. This was a major potential problem. I disguised myself as a cat and went to the Onsen to spy on Thorn and Akira and gather information, and more or less figure out a way to get Thorn and Akira together. Then, if you remember, that fight broke out. Thorn and Akira went after each other and Akira insulted Hoshi, and I attacked Akira, and everyone got hurt.
"And that's when I came up with my brilliant scheme to get Thorn and Akira together without a whole lot of drama. I would need a lot of help from a lot of people, but I was sure I could pull it off. I wanted to attempt something like what the angels did with Ivy during Codename I,SR, so I made plans to kill Thorn. I had almost everything sorted out, how to kill her, how to lure her there, and I was sure I could find someone willing to carry out the assassination, but then, up in the makeshift infirmary after the fight, Hoshi approached me and asked for a favor. It was the most unusual thing too. She wanted me to fix the auditions for the school musical. Thorn probably would have gotten the leading role anyway, but still Hoshi wanted me to fix the cast for the entire production by bending the free will of the people in charge of casting. If I did that for her, she would owe me one favor. She closed off pretty much all the loopholes too so that I couldn't get a hold of her soul or things of the like. So I agreed to her terms. I had found my murderer. I was going to have Hoshi kill her sister. I know my original goal was to avoid as much drama as possible while getting Akira and Thorn together, but sometimes these things can't be helped, and drama is necessary.
"I felt horrible though. Guilty. The look on Hoshi's face when I told her what I was going to have her do…it haunted me. I felt so bad about it. But I couldn't do anything now that the deal was made. Up until that point, I had been using Marie to mess with other people's free will and thoughts, but then I decided that I wanted to learn to do it on my own, so I went to visit my brother, the real Devil, Damien, or as he likes to call himself, Diablo. I asked him about how to control free will, and he gave me my own little epic adventure to go on. I did as he said and gained immense powers. Then I visited Hoshi, and Ivy and Hao walked in on her trying to seduce me out of the deal we had made. I decided then that I would kill Thorn myself. I couldn't make Hoshi do it. I was slowly, but surely falling head over heals in love with her. Real love, not like the crushes I had had on Ivy and Thorn up until then. I held up my end of the deal and fixed the auditions the way Hoshi had said except I added myself into the cast list because I had a strong desire to be near Hoshi.
"I visited Hoshi one morning because I just wanted to be with her, and while I was there, she asked for another favor. This one scared me. She asked me to pretend to rape Thorn so that Akira could rescue her."
"YOU BASTARD!" Akira shot up from his seat and lunged at Lucifer. "You were the one that tried to rape her! I shot you! You should be dead!"
"I wish I were dead!" Lucifer shouted back. "I wish you would have killed me then, but you didn't! That brings up another point; do you normally carry a gun around with you? Because if you do, you really are a danger to society."
Akira pulled out his gun and held it to Lucifer's chest. "You're one to talk! Who's the danger to society!"
Lucifer sighed and looked down tiredly at the gun. "Look, do us both a favor and shoot. I'll say hello to your little sister for you if I ever visit Heaven."
Akira lowered his gun and put it back where it had been hidden. "How did you know about my sister, Jade?"
"I get a list of everyone who dies. Her name was on the list yesterday, so I knew she was going to die this morning. All I can say is: look on the bright side; she's no longer suffering from Leukemia is she? Look, I know you've been here all day, first mourning the loss of your baby sister, and then mourning over your girlfriend, and I'm sorry, but just sit down and let me explain." Remarkably Akira did as Lucifer said, and Lucifer went back to his story.
"And I did as Hoshi said and pretended to rape Thorn so that Akira could rescue her, but it turns out that Akira had a gun, and so he shot me twelve times. The bullets went in pretty deep, and didn't allow my wounds to close and heal, so I was in deep trouble. I poofed up to Hoshi's room, and she slipped me some laughing gas so that it wouldn't hurt as she pulled out the bullets." Lucifer paused awkwardly.
Lyserg tapped his foot impatiently. "Come on demon, don't leave out any details, this is all going on file."
This really seemed to disturb Lucifer, but he continued anyway. "Okay…if you're sure you want to hear this. Well…um…we sort of, kind of…confessed our undying love for each other and had sex..." He paused and raised an eyebrow at Lyserg who had been scribbling furiously in a notebook the entire time. Lyserg looked up at Lucifer, signaling for the devil to continue. Lucifer looked slightly uncomfortable under the detective's gaze. "…a couple times…" Lyserg resumed writing feverishly to keep up as Lucifer talked. "…and then every night after that…." The detective waited for the demon to continue the story. "Why on earth are you writing this down?"
Lyserg kept writing. "Because. It has to go in the report." Apparently the green-haired Englishman was writing down everything he said as well.
Lucifer sighed and looked rather annoyed. "So I guess you want step by step everything we did?"
"It would be preferable." Lyserg continued to write.
"No. NO. NO!" This was more than enough for me. "I do NOT want to hear what all that has been doing with my daughter, so Lucy skip ahead to what happened next."
Lucifer looked extremely relieved. "Oh good. Thanks. Um…after that…. Oh! That was just about the time when I talked to Hao about Valerie not telling him about her true identity yet. So I gave Hao that engagement ring that Ivy is wearing right now and told him to propose to Valerie so that Ivy would be jealous and confess. Actually, I had another reason to give that ring to Hao to give to Ivy. Inside the eyes of the phoenix is a tracker. If you look on the side of Thorn's neck, there's a small mark in the shape of a phoenix. That's a tracker too. I also gave a phoenix necklace to Hoshi, and there's a tracker in that one's eyes as well. At the party, Lian confessed that he was really Akira to Thorn, and Hao proposed to Valerie, and Ivy and Hao got back together.
"This morning I left early to talk to my brother about his part in my plan. I left a note for Thorn under her door saying to meet Akira out in front of The Moon and Stars Café and Bakery. I signed it from Akira, so of course she came and waited outside. By the time I got back, it was almost time to murder Thorn. As for how I would kill her, a Mr. Louis C. Fur had ordered a truck filled with cement pipes to be delivered in front of the café at the exact time that Thorn would be waiting outside. Before I headed over to kill Thorn, I stopped by Ivy's lab.
"Did anyone else notice she was dying again? The shell she's in now is deteriorating. She has, perhaps—oh let's make it a good number—thirty-three minutes left to live before her body melts away and she dies. I stopped by Ivy's lab and caused a huge fire and several explosions. The fire and explosions were a cover for what I was really doing. I made a new, fully functioning body, and returned Ivy to her original appearance.
"Then it was off to Moon and Stars to melt the chains on the pipes and kill Thorn. As soon as the pipes fell I was out of there, and off to the park to find Hoshi. When I got there, she got the phone call about Thorn, and I drove her here to the hospital. You know what happened after that." Lucifer sighed as he finished, completely heart broken.
"How was killing Thorn suppose to get us together!" Akira lashed out again at the depressed demon-boy.
"If you haven't noticed, she's not dead yet." A soft feminine voice entered the room. It was the nurse from before. We all stopped and stared at her. "Thorn should have died on the way to the hospital, but she didn't. Did you stop to wonder why?" The redhead walked over to Thorn's bedside and put a hand to my daughter's forehead.
Lucifer continued for the nurse. "My brother Damien is keeping her alive so that we can have this conversation. Her soul isn't in her body, it's with Damien down in hell, and if things are going completely according to plan, she's watching us right now. Adella?"
The nurse nodded and smiled. "We had a few minor difficulties to begin with, but after that everything went according to plan."
Akira glared at the woman in white. "You're involved in this!"
The redhead nodded again. "Yes, of course. How rude of me not to introduce myself. I am Adella, Damien's consort, and Book Keeper of the Hot Springs District."
"I don't give a damn who you are, what is my girlfriend's soul doing in Hell with the Devil's brother?" Akira's volatile temper exploded once again.
Lucifer shrugged Akira's rashness off. "Watching, seeing how much you love her, seeing that you're not a completely horrible, awful, terrible guy. That was the point of this."
"How is that helping us? I can't marry her if she's dead!" Akira argued.
"But she's not dead." Adella reminded.
Lucifer tried to explain. "Ivy, that body I created this morning was not for you. It was for Thorn. If you choose to use that body to save yourself, Thorn dies. It's your decision."
I looked at my wife. She had a blank face, and a far-off look in her eyes. She wanted to stay, to live, to be with me and our children, but she couldn't sacrifice the happiness of someone else for her own. She couldn't let Thorn die when she was the only one able to save her.
"Tell me Lucifer," Her lips moved slowly, her voice labored. "if I give up this body for Thorn, are you saying that we could transfer her soul into the fully-functioning body, and she would live like a normal shaman, and live as long as a normal shaman would?" Ivy was very careful in her decision.
"Yes and No. She'd be just like any normal shaman yes, but new bodies can't live on their own. Their lives are bonded to another human or shaman being. If you were to use the new body, Ivy, you would choose to bond yourself to your sister or Hao or someone around your same age, and then when—say—Hao died, you would die with him. If you gave the body to Thorn, you might bond her to Akira or Hoshi, and when they die, she dies too. Other than that, she'd be just like any other girl her age. She'll also be quite weak the first few days, but she'll get her strength back and be able to go home from the hospital soon enough. What do you say Ivy? It's your choice." Lucifer seemed to be holding his breath waiting for my wife's final decision. I was amazed to find that I too was holding my breath with him.
"Hao, could you teleport the body here?" She looked up at me with salty liquid draining from her eyes.
It was then that I knew for certain what she had chosen. I nodded and started to cry too. I held Ivy tight as I teleported the body in onto an empty stretcher.
"Give the body to Thorn." She buried her face in my chest and I held her tightly to me. I was losing her yet again.
"Done. Damien, send her up and into the new body." Lucy smiled half-heartedly at his plan coming to a close.
33
"You heard him. You get to go back. So I guess this is goodbye. It was nice meeting you Thorn." Damien switched the TV off and got up from the couch. He looked at me and raised an eyebrow. "What's the matter?"
I must have had a strange look of some kind on my face, or maybe it was that I had no look on my face at all, but he seemed to sense my inward turmoil. "Valerie is my mother…Ivy…and Akira loves me…I knew that but…his poor little sister…Jade…I only met her once, but I was very fond of her…she's dead…so young, but…dead. It's all so much to take in, all the plans and plots and everything. I've been moved around and manipulated like a chess piece, and then you want me to just get up off of this couch like nothing happened and go back to living? I just need a minute."
"You'll have several days. You won't be strong enough to get out of that hospital bed for at least a week, and there's nothing much to do in the hospital except sit and think. It's time for you to go home, Thorn." He seemed like a completely different person. His voice was so soft, and he seemed so kind. Was this the 'redeeming quality' Adella had spoken of? He placed a small box in my hand and said, "Give this to my little brother. He left it down here. Goodbye." He kissed me on the forehead and the whole world was again swallowed in shadows.
And then there was light. It was so bright and blinding that I couldn't open my eyes at first. Everything was white. Voices mumbled next to my ear. I could hear them all around talking at once. Talking about me. I couldn't make out the words, but the tone was anxious and worried. I was content to lie there and listen to the hum of their mixed voices as they buzzed in my ears.
Then the words and voices became discernable from each other. There was my father, and his wife, and then my uncle and cousin, and then my friends. My aunt joined in soon followed by the annoying detective.
I opened my eyes and it all stopped. They were standing around me in a circle, hardly giving me any breathing room. Adella forced them all back to give me some space. I tried to sit up, but my body was numb. I took in all the faces surrounding me and smiled. I tried to sit up again, this time having more luck.
"Thorn?" Akira looked uncertainly at me.
"Yes?" I smiled sweetly.
"I'm so sorry." He reached out uncertainly at first, and stroked my cheek lovingly. "I shouldn't have lied to you, and—"
"—Please. Don't start that." I leaned forward and lightly placed a butterfly kiss on his lips. "I forgive you. I can only hope that you forgive me for being so closed-minded. I'm the one who should be sorry."
He kissed me fully on the lips, much more heatedly than I had kissed him. "There's nothing to forgive."
Lucifer smiled and got up to leave, but Lyserg stood in his way. "You're coming with me demon. You're being charged with first degree murder."
My father set a hand on the detective's shoulder, and smiled mock-sweetly. "Leave him alone, Lyserg; he's done nothing wrong. Thorn is still alive and unharmed, so we're not pressing any charges. There's been no crime done here, so you don't have anything to charge anyone for."
The green-haired detective nodded and grudgingly left. Lucifer nodded his thanks to my father, and Hao went back to comforting Ivy.
Lucifer mumbled softly under his breath. "Well, this has been an interesting game. My pawns, Thorn and Akira are finally together. My rooks Anna and Hana worked nicely throughout the game. They remained particularly clueless, only seeing one side of the story the entire time, but that's okay. Rooks can only go in one direction each time they're moved, so I suppose it's natural. My knights were predictable, yet not at the same time ; always moving in an L shape, but so many different ways to move. Hao and Yoh's choices were predictable, but there were so many moves each could have made. My bishops, Damien and Adella, worked well together. There were only two ways they could have moved, with me or against me, and they never directly helped, but instead assisted me in a round about, diagonal, way. Ivy, my queen, the poor thing was manipulated horribly, but it was essential for the win. She was the second most important piece on my board. Without Ivy, everything would have failed. But I fear that I lost the game anyway. I lost my king, the only one I wanted to protect, the only truly important, deciding piece. I've lost Hoshi, and so I've lost the game. It's finally over, and that's checkmate. I lose. I was the grand orchestrater of this whole game. I was the one secretly moving all the pieces, but I can't help but wonder, was I my own pawn as well? It no longer matters. The game is finished, and I've lost. Hoshi…" He walked towards the door, and looked about ready to leave.
"Lucifer! Wait!" I called after him. The forlorn demon paused and looked quizzically at me. "Thank you for everything." I held out the box that Damien had given me. "Your brother said that you left this by accident down there, and he told me to give this to you."
He gaped, in awe of the small box. And then he smiled. A real smile shone through his depression. He took the box and put it in his pocket. "No, Thorn, thank you." He walked over to my mother, and smiled. "Try and be happy Ivy." She was about to say something, probably along the lines of 'How can I be happy? I'm dying!', but Lucifer took her lips in a heartfelt kiss.
Everyone gaped at the scene. We were all too dumbstruck to move, but that didn't mean my father couldn't yell. "LUCIFER!"
"Goodbye." Lucifer pulled out a small knife and stabbed my mother in the stomach. Ivy gave a sharp cry of pain, and Lucifer was gone along with Adella and Marie. They all simply vanished.
"Ivy!" My father rushed to my mother's side as she pulled out the knife, grimacing in pain.
"I'm fine. That bastard stabbed me! AND he kissed me!" She inspected the wound, glaring down at it. "Oh great, look I'm bleeding all over the place. Great." She paused and studied the blood on her fingers. "I'm bleeding…" It was a ghost of a whisper, and her eyes went wide with realization. A huge smile danced across her face. "Hao, I'm bleeding!"
He stared dumbly at her "You're…Oh my god."
She jumped into his arms and he swung her around, the both of them laughing their heads off and grinning like a pair of idiots. "I'm bleeding! After almost seventeen years! I'm bleeding!" But then fear entered her eyes. "Oh my god, I'm bleeding! OOWW! Put me down! Put me down! Ow! Ow! OWWW! I'm bleeding! Pain, suffering, agony! Complete bliss after sixteen years of nothing, but ooooooowwwwww; it hurts! Get a doctor before I bleed to death!"
I shook my head and laughed as the doctors bandaged her up and put her in the bed next to mine. She gazed happily, like a child with a new toy, up at the monitor that measured her heartbeat. "Isn't it beautiful?" She commented every once in awhile.
Hao sat next to her on the bed and nodded. "You're beautiful." They'd laugh and kiss and hold each other and talk and talk and laugh. Even I had to admit, though grudgingly, that they were the perfect couple, made for each other.
The others left, so it was only Hao, Ivy, Akira, and I in the room. Hao and Ivy were preoccupied with each other, so Akira and I had almost complete privacy.
"So you're really back here for good?" Akira took his shoes off and lay in the bed right next to me. He played nervously with my hands.
"Yes." I whispered flirtatiously.
"When did you become flirtatious?" He kissed my cheek lightly.
"Today." I rested my head on his chest. "Do you think we'll make it as a couple?" I couldn't help but ask.
He considered it for a moment, and laughed softly. "Look at the two bozos in the bed next to us. Their situation wasn't too different than ours, and look how happy they are. I'm thinking that we'll be fine."
I smiled and laughed with him. "You're probably right. We're fine." But then a thought struck me. "Hey, Aki? Have you seen my sister? I haven't seen Hoshi since I woke up."
He was silent for a minute. "Thorn, Lucifer and Hoshi had…a sort of…falling out when she found out that he was the one responsible for what happened to you. She ran off. I don't know where she went, but she'll be okay. She's one tough chick."
I was glad that he had a high opinion of my sister, but I was worried about Hoshi. "Actually, not really. She's human like the rest of us, maybe more so. She loves Lucifer, and if she thinks he betrayed her, then it will break her heart. I'm really worried about her Akira…"
"Hey, listen, she'll be all right." He was desperate to calm me. "Did you see the look in Lucifer's eyes? He was going to talk to her to get her back. I'm sure of it."
"If you say so." I still wasn't convinced.
He could hear it in my voice. "If you need more proof, what was that box you gave Lucifer?"
I smiled happily and kissed him again. Maybe things would be okay after all. "It was a ring case."
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Thanks To: isa18, Lady Valandario, MaiValentinefan, Touch of the Wind, HAO-Addictive, -BeLLe33-, Andrea Nefisto, DarkPisces33, acho0bl3ssU, yo wuz up, Hannah, thoughtless dreamer, K.K. Tori or none, Ayume Yamashira, and demon thing.
To Hannah: HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY! I hope it was a great one!
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