I'm sorry for taking so long to update! I'm so bad!
This chapter is dedicated to Encrypted Pseudonym. You sent me such a loong review! I was so happy!
Oh, by the way...
QUESTIONS FOR THE REVIEWERS!
1. Could you tell me inyour next review what country you're in? I mean, I've had review from Italy and England...Does anyone live in Canada?
2. If you live in Ottawa, Canada, are you going to go/already go to Colonel By High School? That's where I'm going next year...
3. Please give me a list of other animes you'd like to see a fanfic written about!
Now, reviewers!
Encrypted Pseudonym- You have no idea how overjoyed I was to get such a long review! I totally forgive you for not reviewing before! I'm glad you thought it was funny...because I don't really think it is...-sad- Oh well. Review more?
Torri-Chiobie- Well...he does get hurt...
windstar- Wow...you totally predicted stuff...are you reading my mind?
K'onix- Cool! You reread the chapter? I'm so happy! I like ice cream too!
Sugar911- Sorry for taking such a long time to update...
ariotlatio- I know. Just can't resist the bad boys!
FieryEyes- Yes...-weirded out a bit-
Inoure- I just like hurting my characters...Heehee! So, your name's Margaret? How does that relate to Kit?
blackkaosrose- Someone dying, eh? -suspicious smile- Thanks for the yo-yo!
Glimmern-glitas- Things in this story never stay that way...-mysterious smile-
Saphimire Karishnikova- You're welcome! I probably will continue it. You should continue yours if you have ideas.
That's it!
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The next day, Aya bounced into class with a smile brighter than Mariah's fluorescent hair. She'd taken Kirei's advice to heart.
" Wow, this is certainly a change." Emily smiled, taking Aya in.
Aya giggled sheepishly, looking down. Maybe she'd overdone it? Her shirt was neon pink and her skirt a bright, ruffled yellow. Colourful, artificial feathers hung from her braids and she'd tucked a fake green flower behind her ear. Assorted pieces of jewellery with large beads and carved wood clattered as she walked. She honestly looked like some Technicolor Native on drugs.
" Ah! It burns!" Mariah yelled, shielding her eyes as she came closer.
Aya threw a feather at her.
" I think I preferred yesterday's clothes." Brooklyn joked, coming up from behind. " But I'm glad you're feeling better."
Aya mock-curtsied, but as she tried to stand up she yelped. " Owww…my earring's stuck on my necklace."
" That's what comes of being tacky." Brooklyn laughed, bending forward to untangle the beads. His hand accidentally brushed her cheek as he worked, and he could feel her skin heat up.
" Thanks." Aya murmured, standing up properly.
" You're welcome." Brooklyn smiled cheerfully, pretending as if nothing had happened.
Mariah started to ask something, but someone rudely pushed past her. It was Tala.
" Don't block the door." He growled. Mariah hotly retaliated, but he paid no mind. As he passed Aya, she distinctly heard him hiss "tacky" at her.
Aya's eyes stung with hot unshed tears. She gritted her teeth and wiped a hand over her eyes, clearing them.
" As if you're any better!" She shouted angrily, sniffing. Tala ignored her, walking back to where he had sat yesterday.
Aya bit her lip in combined rage and hurt. Tala was so cruel! He could make her feel like nothing in five seconds flat.
" Ignore him." Brooklyn whispered, touching her shoulder. " That isn't the Yuri we know."
" I know." Aya spoke with difficulty, her voice cracking. " Thank you."
" Let's sit down." Emily came over, her wide green eyes sympathetic.
" Let's!" Mariah crowed, obviously trying to forget the behaviour of their former friend.
It was a distressing sight, Aya thought. People like Emily and Mariah and Brooklyn could ignore it, but the ones who had been truly close to Tala were much more deeply hurt. Some, like her and Ian, were trying to block it out and pretend he had always been an enemy. Others, like Kai, Bryan and Spencer were in denial, refusing to believe he was gone. In fact, despite Kai's cool words, they often confronted Tala. This very week those three had been suspended for fighting. They said they were trying to knock some sense into him.
" Aya, I want to show you something my parents got. Would you like to come over for dinner and a movie after school?" Brooklyn asked quietly halfway through the class.
Aya considered it, and nodded. Brooklyn's face lit up, but she wasn't paying attention.
Yes, some most definitely tried to block it out.
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After school, Aira dropped by the local hardware store to pick up a few bullets. He wasn't sure when Kei would come, but he wanted to be prepared. Of course, he wasn't actually going to shoot his brother; the gun was just for intimidation. Aira sighed. As if Kei could be intimidated.
What had he gotten himself into? How could he possibly stand up to Kei? The white-haired man had been in control for as long as he could remember.
Aira drove home, and as he entered his house, he made sure to lock all the doors and windows, and to turn on the burglar alarm.
He carefully set the gun on the coffee table in the living room, and went upstairs to take a shower. He tried to reassure himself as he shampooed his hair.
It wasn't like Kei was going to appear tonight, he reasoned. The chances of that were slim to none. Yes, Aira decided, Kei would wait for some night in the distant future, when he was unprepared.
He had absolutely nothing to worry about. Aira rinsed himself off and pulled on a terrycloth robe, feeling much less anxious than before. He smiled to himself in the foggy mirror, and wiped off some of the condensation that had gathered.
Maybe he would watch a movie tonight. Aira's thought drifted off as he towelled his hair. Pasta and 'Gone With The Wind' sounded lovely.
Aira hummed the opening to the movie as he exited the bathroom, but a noise suddenly made him freeze.
The burglar alarm rang, shrill and high-pitched, making Aira's heart pound with fright.
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" Isn't it beautiful? My parents had it custom-made in Italy. They're known for their glasswork."
Brooklyn and Aya stood before the most exquisite thing Aya had ever seen.
It was a thin sheet of stained glass about the size of a desk, and it had a miniature world on it. One part of the glass had tiny trees rising up in forests, while the other corner was composed of planes of glass erected in mountains. Another part had been stained blue with tiny waves for water, and the last was grainy and yellow, like a desert.
The best part were the tiny glass creatures resting on the glass. There were minute merpeople and water serpents on the blue, unicorns and pegasi in the forests, dragons and gryphons on the mountains, and salamanders and a sphinx in the desert.
" Oh my god! This is so cool! Wow!" Aya gasped in pure joy, leaning in to examine a unicorn nibbling at a berry bush.
" My favourites are the pegasi." Brooklyn said, stroking a tiny rearing stallion with his forefinger.
" How come?" Aya cocked her head curiously.
" Because they can fly. I would love to fly. Away from everything…" A faraway look glazed over Brooklyn's eyes.
Aya felt uncomfortable, like she was intruding on something private. She looked away, studying the glass dimension. " I like that one best." She pointed to a particularly magnificent dragon figurine. It was amazingly detailed, with light glinting off every tiny, darkly iridescent scale. Its wings were spread and it reared up in anger. The same rage shone in its blank, jade glass eyes.
" I don't like that one." Brooklyn said quietly, looking down.
" What? Why?" Aya looked up from where she was scrutinizing the dragon.
" It…reminds me of something I'd rather forget." Brooklyn said slowly. There was an uncomfortable silence. Then he laughed. " Anyway, you can have that one."
" What? No, I couldn't accept that!" Aya shook her head wildly, but Brooklyn pressed the glass figurine in her hands.
" Take it. I have plenty more." Brooklyn gestured to the other frolicking dragons.
" Thank you." Aya said sincerely, gently holding the statue. " This must have cost your parents a fortune." She referred to the entire piece of art.
" Two, in fact. But it's for my eighteenth birthday." Brooklyn chuckled.
" What do your parents do, anyway?" Aya asked, holding up the dragon so that it caught the light.
" They're in the art business. My father owns a successful crystal and glass company." Brooklyn's gaze was on the glass world again.
" Amazing." Aya breathed, marvelling at how the black scales had a brilliant iridescent sheen in the light.
" Yes." Brooklyn replied absently, his unfocused eyes staring at the dragon.
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Aira tried not to breathe too loudly, although it was hard when he was fighting off hyperventilation. He carefully put down his towel, and tightened the sash on his bathrobe.
Cautiously, he took a step forward, feeling extremely grateful for his thick, sound-muffling velvet carpet. He crept down the stairs, turning at every small noise, clutching the banister tightly. As he made his way down, he swore to himself that if he were alive at the end of this, he would keep the lights on in his house all night long.
He hesitated on the bottom step, reluctant to step off the safety of the stairs. His eyes darted around, searching the dark corners of his house for movement. He wondered if he should call out.
" Hello?" He whispered, afraid. His whisper however, was lost in the still blaring burglar alarm, and Aira sighed in relief, glad no one had heard him.
He stepped down from the stairs, and instantly winced, looking around frantically. The second his weight transferred to the floor below, a board had creaked loudly.
Suddenly, the burglar alarm shut off. The silence rushed in, reclaiming the night. The hairs on the back of Aira's neck stood up, and he could feel a cold sweat forming. The quiet was worse than when the alarm was on, although now Aira could hear very creak and rustle in the big house. He pricked his ears, listening hard for footsteps.
When he didn't hear anything, he lightly stepped on the thick carpet to muffle his footsteps, and he crept towards the living room. As he walked he noticed things about his house he had never noticed before. In the dark, the abstract sculptures and paintings looked positively sinister, and there were shadowy corners everywhere. Aira decided that after this, he was getting Kirei to live with him. It was just too scary alone.
The hallway seemed to stretch on forever, but finally Aira arrived at the living room.
He scanned the dark room carefully, but he saw nothing out of the ordinary. The furniture was unmoved, and everything was where it had been. All the DVD's and VHS's and CDs were stacked neatly, like before. The cushions were arranged in the same way on the sofa, and the coffee table hadn't been disturbed either. The remote, the bottle of water, the notebook and the gun were still there. Wait. The gun? Aira's eyes snapped back to the table. The gun! It was gone.
A deep, freezing terror set in. It was hard to breathe, and the air seemed stifling hot, even though he was horribly cold.
A cold snout of metal pressed to his temple. A voice cold as ice and just as sharp hissed into his ear.
" Miss me?"
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" What do you want to do?" Brooklyn stretched, placing his hands behind his head.
" I don't know." Aya shrugged, lying on her stomach next to him. They were on the living room floor, lying below the glass world.
Aya scanned the room, looking for something to do. She saw a bit of a black box poking out from under the television stand. " Is that a Gamecube?"
Brooklyn cracked open one lazy, jade-blue eye. " Yep."
Aya crawled forward and looked through the game discs. " Can we play a racing game?"
Brooklyn chuckled, getting up. " Alright."
And so, after a few minutes of setting it up…
" You know, Aya, you're supposed to drive on the road." Brooklyn commented wryly on her fifth defeat.
" Shut up." Aya said half-heartedly, pressing the 'try again' button. She couldn't understand it. She loved racing games, yet she sucked.
After another unsuccessful bout, Brooklyn set down his controller. " Remind me to stay far away when you've got your licence." He teased.
" Oh!" Aya flared in mock-anger. " Take that back!" She tackled him.
They rolled around on the floor in a serious battle of tickling, until they both gave up out of exhaustion.
Aya giggled as Brooklyn lazily tickled her again. He crouched over her, supported by his hands and knees. They were both panting, out of breath.
" You – give?" Brooklyn asked between huffs.
Aya nodded, not being able to talk.
As the seconds passed, as strange look came into Brooklyn's eyes, and a more serious expression appeared on his face. Aya became distinctly aware of the position they were in.
Brooklyn lowered his head until his bangs brushed her forehead. Aya's eyelids lowered slightly, and she tentatively licked her lips.
With that small motion, Brooklyn's head dipped, his spiky hair framing Aya's face. Her hands came up and threaded through his hair, bringing him closer.
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Aira closed his eyes, trying not to move a muscle. His breathing was deep and slow, as if he were schooling himself not to panic.
" It's nice of you to provide me with a weapon." Kei continued. " But that's really making it too easy." With that, he tossed the gun away, the thud of its impact muffled by the carpet.
Aira spun around and backed up, his eyes wide with fear.
Kei tsked. " After your words on the phone, I really expected something better."
" G – get away from me!" Aira gasped weakly, pressing himself against the coffee table.
" I'm disappointed. I thought you would be a challenge." Kei continued to step forward, fingering his cane.
Aira's legs quaked, but he bit his lip fiercely, thinking of Kirei. He stood firm, but he clamped down on his lip so hard it bled, as he was using the pain to distract himself from the terror of the moment.
As Kei came closer, Aira's resolution gave out. He ran as fast as he could from the room, darting up the stairs and along the second floor's hallway. His breath came in quick gasps, his heart was beating so hard it hurt. He had no idea where he was going, but he needed to figure that out and fast.
" You can't run, you puff." Kei shouted, his voice coming from the stairs. Aira ran into the study, thought better of it, and slipped out again. He just stood there, like a deer in headlights. The fear was overpowering rational thought.
The opposite staircase! He'd go downstairs the other way, leaving Kei to search blindly upstairs! Calmer now that he had a plan, Aira stealthily travelled the length of the hall, turning the corner to see the staircase. Crossing over in a couple long strides, he was soon at the head of the stairs.
Just as he was about to go down, a hard hand pushed him. Aira tripped, and fell. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion; his body hitting each stop like a bag of bricks. Each impact painfully knocked the air out of his lungs. Then, he hit his head hard on the banister, and rolled off the staircase.
Aira groaned and gasped in pain, arching his body as he rocked from side to side, trying to breathe again.
" You can't outsmart me, you fruitcake." Kei's voice was different now, harsher, more menacing. The teasing, ironic edge was gone. Aira screamed in pain as Kei brought down his heavy silver cane. He thought he could hear his ribs crack. Each blow was like a whiplash, sending an arc of burning fire up his body. He struggled to stay conscious despite the pain.
Then, as Kei stopped and rolled his brother onto his stomach, Aira steeled himself, trying to gather enough energy to stand.
A horrible, scorching agony ran through him suddenly as Kei raked the cane's dragonhead down his back, the fangs tearing through his robe to lacerate his flesh. The fangs ripped and scraped in every direction, devouring his flesh. Aira knew if this kept up, he would die.
" I'm going to rip out your eyes, as I didn't seem to finish that job on Kirei." Kei hissed.
Aira's eyes snapped open, having been tightly clenched. He gathered al his strength, taking advantage of this momentary respite. He rolled away from Kei, hissing every time the gashes on his back touched the floor, and stood up. He was shaky, bowed over, and weak, but he was standing.
Aira heard the click of a gun being cocked. Kei must've taken the gun after all.
" Watch out." Kei whispered hatefully. Using the last of his energy, Aira hurled himself at his brother, knocking the gun from his hands. Kei fell, and the gun went off.
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Aya pulled away, gazing into Brooklyn's clear jade-blue eyes. She smiled, snuggling close, resting her head on his chest so she could hear his steady heartbeat.
Brooklyn stroked her hair and opened his mouth, but a sudden noise from the television made them both sit up. The TV had been left on after their racing matches, and a newsflash was playing across the screen.
Aya gasped, recognizing the man on the screen. It was displaying police cars and an ambulance, sirens full blast as policemen escorted a man in handcuffs to the car.
" Oh my god." She whispered, riveted.
A reporter's voice came on. " Twenty-one year-old Airashii Namasaki, a local art teacher, has been arrested for the murder of his brother, twenty-five year-old Keishii Namasaki, of Namasaki Law Firm."
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