Evanescence Exodus
My black backpack's stuffed with broken dreams
20 bucks should get me through the week
Never said a word of discontentment
Fought it a thousand times but now
I'm leaving home
Kana loped down the street, carefully avoiding cars, as she tried to put as much distance between herself and the Kinomoto house as possible. She was getting tired so she laid down in an alley, taking refuge in a large cardboard box. There was a clap of thunder and it began to rain again. Kana laid her head down on her front paws and sighed. She found herself reliving things that she had long since put out of her mind, her painful memories that Vickory had told her to put out of her mind. Her pain made her weak, he had told her.
Here in the shadows
I'm safe
I'm free
I've nowhere else to go but
I cannot stay where I don't belong
Twelve year old Kana was smiling, an action she hadn't preformed in centuries. This was when life was perfect, her mother held her hand, her father kissed her cheek. Both told her they loved her and she giggled. "So, what did you think of the play, Sweetheart?" Her father asked.
"I loved it, daddy," she chirped. Her mother smiled.
"Where to now?" her mother asked.
"Home, I guess. I'm tired and we've got church in the morning." They turned down an alley, the shortest way home. Kana had walked down this alleyway a hundred times and had never had to worry. There had never been a reason to feel afraid. Suddenly, she felt a presence behind her as a hand lock on her hair, jerking her away from her parents. He placed the barrel of a gun to her fox red hair.
"Give me your purse!" He ordered, giving Kana a hard jerk. Her mother obliged, as well as her father, handing him his wallet. The man smiled wickedly and threw Kana into the wall behind him. As she hit the ground, she heard two gun shots and looked up, seeing her parents lying on the ground, not moving. She felt the wet tears stinging the back of her eyelids and the man turned to her. "Better not cry, little girl. Wouldn't want to mess up that pretty face." He raised the gun and Kana closed her eyes as he fired.
Two months pass by and it's getting cold
I know I'm not lost
I am just alone
But I won't cry
I won't give up
I can't go back now
Waking up is knowing who you really are
Kana jerked herself awake and she realized with relief that it had only been a nightmare. The sky was growing steadily darker. She was whimpering as she used her nose to move the hair on her shoulder, revealing a small scar, a souvenir of that horrible night. She barely survived that night. When she awoke in the hospital, she had changed completely. A nice church family had come to get her but she disappeared out the window, revenge in mind. She had trained hard over the next several weeks, but she had never intended to kill her parent's murderer. She had gone to his house and, before she knew it, his blood was on her hands. Like a wolf who tastes blood, she became addicted. She become a huntress, a killer, an assassin.
Here in the shadows
I'm safe
I'm free
I've nowhere else to go but
I cannot stay where I don't belong
Here in the shadows
I'm safe
I'm free
I've nowhere else to go but
I cannot stay here
Show me the shadow where true meaning lies
So much more dismay in empty eyes
Kana growled, leaping up from her bed. She paced irritably, unable to sit still. She thought about Sakura. She thought about how she had been so kind to her, even when she growled her away. Sakura didn't know that Kana had once been human, or the things she had done as a human, the lives she had taken, the murderous games she had played, the sadistic way she had lived. But things changed. People changed. Maybe, she could change.
Suddenly, something clicked in the corner of her senses. She sniffed the air and could sense the presence of a Clow Card. She smiled wickedly and stood, sniffing again. She could smell which one it was, Fight. She remembered the little bitch. She bolted down the street, eager for a fight. She was frustrated, and she felt like taking out her pent up energy on something that would fight back.
As she neared the source of the scent, she caught another scent, Sakura and her friends. She quickened her pace, her heart pounding. As she reached the street where she saw Sakura, Tomoyo, and two other kids she didn't know fighting off the Fight card. Sakura turned around and saw her. "Su-Suki?" she asked. Kana wagged her tail and turned to Fight, who was bearing down on the strange girl. Kana lunged, taking Fight's arm between her teeth.
"Seal it, Sakura!" She barked, but then, she realized that she hadn't barked. She had talked. Sakura was staring. "Do it, now!" Sakura was roused from whatever it was that gripped her as she raised her wand.
\"Return to the form you were meant to be! Fight!" The card was subdued, and Sakura picked up the card with a smile. The boy was eyeing Kana with a weird look on his face.
"Sakura, your dog can talk."
"I knew she looked familiar," Kero said, hovering close to her face. She growled at him, her eyes telling him not to tell the kids.
"Where, Kero?" the strange girl asked.
"She used to be Clow Reed's pet. He gave her magical powers. She probably didn't even know she could talk," he lied hesitantly. At least he respected her wish not to revile her dark past to her only friends.
Friends, she realized with astonishment.
"Suki, this is Li and Mei Lin," Tomoyo said. Kana smiled.
"And I am Kana," she said, unaccustomed to talking for sometime. Sakura reached out her hand and Kana placed her paw in it.
"Nice to meet you."
"What are you doing out here anyway?" Tomoyo asked.
"I came to find you guys," Kana lied effortlessly.
"You weren't home when I got home," Sakura said.
"I ducked out of the rain and fell asleep," Kana lied again. Sakura smiled and then picked up a pencil out of her pocket and wrote her name on the card.
"I'm tired. Let's go home," she said. Li nodded in agreement as they all started to walk off. Kana lagged behind, as did Kero.
"You were going to run away, weren't you Kana?" Kana shrugged. "Why?"
"I don't belong here, Kero. I don't know how to be in a family. I haven't had one since I was twelve." Kero looked over at where Sakura and Tomoyo were giggling at a shared joke between them and Li and Mei Lin were talking about something that had happened at school.
"All you need to know, Kana, is that that little girl over there loves you. To her, you aren't an assassin, you're her pet, her friend, her comfort, her confidant. Sakura doesn't care about your past. All she cares about is that you are here with her now. You have a family, right there in front of you." Kana smiled gently in the direction of the golden haired girl as she beckoned her forward.
"Come on Suki, I mean Kana. Let's go home."
"Home," Kana whispered and, with a bark, she bolted over to the girl, leaping into her opened arms. Sakura giggled and hugged her back. Soon Tomoyo and Mei Lin had joined the embrace with Li scratching her behind the ears. She barked and wagged her tail as she bowled Sakura over, licking her face.
"One day, Kana my dear, you will meet someone. You will refuse to let yourself grow close, at first, but soon you will be unable to resist the emotions that you were never allowed to experience. The one who will brake the spell will be the one you least expect. You will feel drawn to her for reasons beyond your comprehension. You will not be able to go on with your life until you find her."
Clow Reed's voice leaped unbidden into her mind. I guess he wasn't such an idiot after all, Kana thought as she challenged Sakura to a race home.