A/N: SURPRISE! 3 Days not over yet, so here's another chapter!
'A Blooming Heart Aches'
Thunder and lightning rips through the sky, a strike of light illuminating the blackness, highlighting the sorrow of the day as the steady snowflakes drop from the sky like frozen tears. A figure in the growing darkness and the flurry of snow is lost, as a boy stumbles to the ground and into the middle of a mess that had begun as another ordinary day, though the spreading crimson pool full of withered petals spoke otherwise. If only he had told her the truth, he had owed her that much, now that he could see it more clearly.
"This- this is all my fault..." the boy says, as he feels the blood pooling among his teeth and gums, coughing as he tries not to choke as his own body fails him. He falls forward into the peaceful snowdrift, just feet from the one he was chasing after. Drops of blood splatter into the snow as he coughs once again, this one harsher than the first, as he spits out withered and once blue petals, stained purple.
"This is my penance..."
"Says who?" another voice asks.
Earlier
Dreams of marshmallows, the scent of cloves and cinnamon, and the taste of creamy, spiced pear sorbet, were intruded upon by the rays of sunlight streaking in through his window, and the faint whimpers of another. Opening his eyes, already feeling the weight of another pressed against his body, Rito does a double take as he realizes he had begun nibbling on something in his sleep, something all too warm and soft to be a pillow. Spitting it out, and catching a flash of red in his field of vision, he quickly sits up while stripping the covers off to reveal a trembling pinkette, whose cheeks were tinted red and breathing was heavy. "R-Rito," Lala whimpers, looking away scandalously as the orange haired child processes this new information, "Y-you need to s-stop doing that in you sleep..." Lala, removing her slobbered up tail from underneath his weight, pulls free from his bed and blushes slightly as she sits a bit away from him and dries her tail off shyly.
"Sorry Lala, I didn't mean to..." He gets up and starts to rummage through his drawers for clothes he can take to the bathroom and shower up, before Nana or Mikan came up and discovered something was wrong. His thoughts froze at that, his mood dropping as he remembered that wasn't true anymore, and even Lala noticed the shift in his mood. The floor felt a little chilly as he stepped upon the carpeted surface, so he takes a look outside the window, past Lala, to see the foreboding winter clouds gathering outside the windows, frost touch the outside just barely. "It looks like it will be a sudden snow storm; maybe they'll cancel school if we get enough to warrant it," Rito states, as Lala gets up from his bed while walking over to Rito while wearing his comforter, grabbing him from behind to lean on him with her whole weight, "Lala- stop, what are you doing?!"
"It's too cold to think about school, just come back to your bed with me and warm me up," she states, as she wraps him up with the blanket, "My room is too cold to sleep in alone..." He breaks free from her grip, his stuff still in his hand, and turns to face her.
"Stop it Lala, your joke is going too far," Rito firmly says, taking his stuff with him and opening the door, "Your room is so full of technology and gizmos; I know you have to have a heater up there..." Lala stops as he walks out the door, grasping her hand closed and frowning as he continues on.
"But I don't want to sleep alone up there without my sisters."
/*/*/*/*\*\
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Nana and Momo had moved out of the house at the end of their second year of high school, things weren't sounding too good out in the galaxy, and both princess' were needed by their father and mother, respectively, to continue keeping the peace. The rise of a new version of the terrorist organization. Eden, led by some crazed masked alien dictator named Marduke, had forced Nana to step up and follow in her father's footsteps in leading the troops in a two-fold attack on terror. Momo, on the other hand, had been requested by the girl's mother to learn how to not only learn the art of diplomacy, but use her healing powers over the vegetation to bring back life into the scarred worlds the madman left behind in his wake. Unfortunately, as crown princess meant to inherit the throne, Lala herself was unable to follow either, as even Zastin had left to escort Nana to their father on the frontline, leaving her in Rito's care as Earth was the safest, and furthest from the front line of the war they could be.
Mikan was alone with Celine down below, setting up food for her, while waiting for Lala and Rito to come down from their morning routine. Since Nana and Momo had left, she could no longer risk leaving Celine alone, te curious toddler could get into all kinds of trouble when left alone, so she had reserved herself to letting the two of them figure out their new routine without anyone waking them up. Looking out at the ominous clouds looming on the horizon as she grabbed some plates and utensils down for Lala and Rito, now that she heard the shower running, and placed them upon the table while Celine merrily ate away at the food set before her. Deciding the quite house needed a little noise to it, she turns on the news to check the weather forecast and see what they were predicting.
"-and forecasting is showing a sudden cold snap, as an unexpected channel of wind from the Bering Sea has changed course and directed across the majority of the districts of-" tuning it out as she finished plating some dishes and bringing them to the table.
"Huh, I wonder if that means school is canceled..." Mikan states, as she watches the weather channel give its expectations for today's forecast, "Sorry Celine, it looks like you won't be seeing Mikado-sensei today." The girl happily babbles as she finishes up her food, the disappointment she could have been feeling overshadowed by the yummy and warm food that Mikan had made. Mikan instead smiles wistfully, wishing she could be as cheerful as the child, as she sat down to eat her own breakfast next to the youngest Yuuki household member.
By the time she managed to clean up Celine's mess, after finishing off her own decent breakfast and making a call to Ryouko Mikado to confirm that school was going to be canceled, the beginnings of snow began to fall to the ground and begin to stick. "Amazing, we might just get a decent snow this year, Celine," Mikan states, turning to the child, who beams up at the younger Yuuki sibling in return.
"Mau!" she agrees, as she hears the trudging footfalls of Rito coming down the stairs, followed by Lala, who remained in her pajamas despite Rito having changed, "Mau, mau!" Celine quickly rushes over to Lala to show her the snow coming down, while Mikan watches her brother serve up some food for himself and get a bottle of seasoning out of the cupboard for the Devilukean princess.
Hearing a knock at the door, Mikan can't help but wonder who it is in this weather, coming to their house so early, that she opens the door expecting one of their friends to randomly have shown up. Surprisingly, no one was waiting at the door, at least not one of their friends, thought it appeared to be a short man with a mushroom cap for a head and a mailman's uniform. "Galactic mail delivery service, we get you what you want, wherever it is and wherever you want it!" the short man, with equally sized arms and comically oversized shoes states, holding up a brown paper package, tied with string and a couple of air holes put inside its packaging, for Mikan to take, "Delivery for one Lala Satalin Devi-luck?"
Mikan doesn't exactly know what to do, looking back at where Rito and Lala were sitting, before turning back to the small alien(?) and addressing him. "I can take that for them," Mikan states, as she reaches forward to grab it, the man(?) letting her take it from him.
"No problem, miss, enjoy and please use our service again!" he cheerily states, before turning around and walking with his feet a blur as he leaves for hat looks like an ordinary mail delivery truck, before it shoots upwards into the sky, as she watches in awe.
Taking the package inside, where it was much warmer than the freezing cold temperatures outside, she notices the package itself was fairly freezing as she set it down on the family room table, taking a note she noticed tucked inside the brown wrapping paper.
"Dear Lala,
Hello from your dearest, youngest sister,
here's hoping this letter reaches you.
As you can see, I've sent you a care-package
With mother's approval, of course, from the planet
Duran. It's a special kind of flower I was hoping
You and Rito could plant for me in my virtual garden.
I can't really tend it much, on my free time, but I tho-
-ught the two of you might like this very rare variety.
It's the most beautiful plant, but requires you to keep
it cold until you are ready for it to bloom, otherwise
the scents die off too fast. The natives call it a stra-
-nge name, but I figured you would recognize it when
you see it.
Hope all is well back home
Your loving sister,
Momo Belia Deviluke"
Wondering what it could possibly be, Mikan wants to open the package to see it, but the sudden tugging of Celine at her leg causes her to focus on the littlest member of their family. "Mau!" she states, pointing to the clock, and Mikan smiles realizing that Celine wanted to watch one of the kids shows about a futuristic magical girl who saves the Earth against an evil organization utilizing an alien technology that turns people into the monster of the week. Ai Cure Z, or something like that.
"Lala, Rito, you both got a package and a note from Momo,"she states, before turning the television on for Celine, "Come get it and see what it is in the kitchen, otherwise Celine will get upset I'm interrupting her show!"
Rito comes over and grabs the box and the note from the table, before bringing it over to the kitchen table a few feet away and resumes eating, just as Lala took the note and scanned over it.
"I wonder what is inside it?" Lala states, as she begins to remove the string from the wrapping and tearing into the brown packaging. A simple cardboard container with a little bit of tape was inside, and Lala carefully removed the tape and began to open up the box to see inside it. What she found were four or five closed buds, connected to a single plant, as Rito paused in his eating to lean over and see what the contents of the box were. Just as suddenly as she opened the box and realized what its contents were,she quickly tried to close the lid, but was too late. The sudden exposure to light and shift in temperature from both warm bodies leaning just a bit too close, and the five seed pods burst and squirted out a pink mist not unlike Celines, except vastly different. Unable to catch her breath in time, the pink haired princess inhaled the thick mist, alongside Rito, who was beginning to cough, as the coating of pollen settled in his mouth with a bitter taste.
"*cough*Lala- *cough* -what was that?" Rito asks, waving the quickly dispersing remains of the plant and settling a look at the now spent plant that assaulted them both, "What did Momo send us?" Lala tries halt her own violent coughing fit, as she tries to compose herself enough to answer Rito's question.
"That- *cough* -plant was Lovers Cross, and it's not something Momo- *cough* -would have sent either of us," Lala finishes clearing her throat, before putting a hand up to stop Celine or Mikan from crossing the threshold over to the kitchen, "Stop, don't come any closer, the spores may not have full dispersed yet.." Lala wraps the plant back up in its packaging, before sealing it in an old dish towel and putting it in a new garbage bag and not only sealing it, but knotting the actual trash bag to seal it as well. "We can't take any chances with Lovers Cross, as it's a highly invasive, symbiotic plant that replicates through a mold it sprays out of its seed pods; anyone caught inhaling it into their lungs becomes a carrier." She takes the bag and tosses it out into the backyard in the growing snow.
"Carrier?" Mikan states, as she worriedly looks at both of the two newly infected individuals, holding Celine back as she does so, "Carrier for what?" Lala coughs, a painful look crosses her face as she does so, before turning to Mikan with a straight face and grabbing Rito's hand as she gathers her courage.
"This plant is one whose home planet is frozen nine months out of a standard earth year; it's explosive seed pods are usually how Lovers Cross spreads naturally in its own environment, once the planet thaws enough because of its maturation period being so fast," Lala says quietly, as she squeezes Rito's hand as he begins to go through another coughing fit as well, "Remember that I said it spreads its seeds through a mold?" Mikan nods, as Rito stops his fit. "The mold is the actual, flowering Lovers Cross, and it is the most dangerous part of the plant," she continues, "Inhaling the mold made us carriers of its parasitic spores; as it begins to infect us, it will treat us like those seed pods and propagate... it will literally begin to bloom inside of us." Mikan covers her mouth, shocked at that, as Rito covers his mouth as another hacking fit overcomes him.
Lala covers her own mouth, as she tries to stop a cough from coming out, only for her to feel a wet and warm splat come from out of her mouth. Pulling her hand away, she realizes that blood and a fleck of something else was there. "Lala, what is it?" Rito asks, as he pulls his own hand away from his mouth to take Lala's. He pulls the object away from the blood by a non-bloody corner, and he realizes it looks something like a flower petal.
"No- no, it's already starting," Lala states, as Mikan hands her a tissue to wipe away the blood from her hand, "I need to get upstairs to try and get in contact with my Mothers ship right away, maybe Momo can tell us how to fix this before it gets any worse..." Another coughing fit hits both of them, and this time Rito feels the blood between his fingers as he pulls his hand away. Wiping it off on a tissue he grabs for himself, there appears to be a piece of a petal broken off onto it, so he looks up at Lala and she meets his eyes with a look of worry.
"Ok, let's go," Rito states with urgency, as he begins to follow Lala up to her room, "Let's deal with this, and fast!" Mikan can't help but watch with dread as she clutches onto Celine and hugs her tightly.
"You say it came through Galactic Mail Delivery?" Momo states over the video call, after answering on their other's ship halfway between Earth and Andromeda, "Whoever sent it must have known the Terra expanse is a designated neutral zone; Galactic Mail Delivery is legally allowed to continue its business in earths vicinity as long as it scans for illegal substances and smuggled goods..." Momo rubs her chin on the screen, and sighs as she puts a hand to her head in aggravation. "Damn it, Lovers Cross isn't considered an illegal good; it's practically a common houseplant when in a secured bio-dome," Momo states, as her eyes glance over to Rito, "How are the symptoms, both of you, so far?"
Lala puts her right hand over her left wrist, wringing it slightly, as Rito puts a hand on her shoulder from the side. "Not- not pleasant, Momo, we ar- *cough*" eyes going wide as her respiratory systems autonomic response kicks in, she covers her mouth and hacks for a solid minute, falling to her knees as the violent spasms hit her hard. Rito grabs her by the shoulder to steady her, as she pulls her hand away to reveal scarlet colored petals sitting in a sticky pool in her palm.
"Not good if you're spitting up flower petals already," Momo says with worry lacing her voice, eyes creasing in fear as she watches her sister clean the blood from her hands, "This isn't something simple we can just fix you up with, there's only two known successful cases of it being cured, and the methods and results of both weren't very... evident." Lala and Rito look at each other, before looking up at the screen and nodding for her to continue. "A-alright, alright, -sigh- if you both insist knowing," the younger Devilukean princess turns on her feet away from the twos view, taking a deep breath and returning to the screen, "First, the most successful attempt was an incident where a foolish man accidentally poisoned himself after stumbling into a patch of Lovers Lace; he was removed to an isolated hospital ward and the spores were surgically removed from him." She hesitates to continue, as Rito begins a coughing fit, but swallows her anxiousness to continue her story. "He survived the surgery that removed the fungal strain, but, he was never the same person after the incident; the mold had spread beyond his lungs and infiltrated the patients nervous system through the stomach lining, compromising his mental process through means unknown," Momo puts her thumb to her mouth and bites on her thumbnail, as her tail twists behind her as if in agony, "The second surviving example is little more than a story that the plant gets its name from, about two lovers who experienced the dangers firsthand, and yet managed to survive an ill fated death, after fleeing their hometown when their people were on the verge of burning them to death to avoid the plague spreading."
"So not good odds," Rito asks, as Momo nods in return. He turns to Lala and holds her a bit closer to him, once he notices she is on the verge of tears, and in pain from the coughing fits. Instead of falling to pieces, Momo steps aside and a new person is seen and heard on the video screen.
"The story goes that both of them ventured out into the snowy wilderness to etch a life out for them, and one of them found a cure for the disease after sacrificing his arm to a witch for his lover," Sephie interjects, a sorrowful look on the mother's face, albeit it was obscured by her commonly worn veil, "I believe it means that there is a cure, somewhere out there, but your best bet is to find the person who completed the surgery and get them to see if a better way has been found to remove it, before either of you are lost to us!" Lala brightens up a bit at her mother's comforting appearance, the anguish in her voice ringing clear and causing her child to cry a bit at her own show of affection.
"Mother, it's good to see you!" Lala states, as Rito merely avoids his gaze of the mature woman, in favor of hacking up more petals, "I'm sorry thi- *cough* -isn't the best of circumstances, but-"
"Say no more, my dear; I can't believe the galaxy has gotten so scummy as to resort to biological terrorism, but I've since informed your father of the details," Sephie states, trying to sound comforting, "He's dispatched a medical ship to Earth's moon so you can get the best care, but your best option for getting results is actually already available for you on Earth." Lala is curious at that odd notion, but Rito sputters out his response between coughing up blood and spitting out larger petals from between his bloodied gums.
"*-ugh*-'s Mikado, Ryouko Mikado, isn't it?" he says, wheezing between harsh gulps of air, wiping the blood onto the back of his arm and no longer caring about it, "Our teacher, she's practically a genius in experimental medical procedures, she's cheap, and she's a runaway for various reasons..." Lala looks at Rito in concern, but Sephie merely laughs a flat and fake tone at his deduction.
"Yes," she responds plainly, a sorrowful smile gracing her usual mature and cool disposition, "Eden's runaway scientist, the elusive 'Medical Saint', is the doctor who performed an illegal and dangerous surgery on your father, King Gid of Deviluke." The shock that crossed not only Lala's face, but Momo's captured in the corner of the screen, was matched only by Rito's stunned expression of hearing the cold hearted bastard King had once fell victim to this same plant. "He was trying to be nice, it was our third date, in an unexplored region of space which the galactic war hadn't touched yet," Sephie goes on to explain, "I had been wanting to explore, so your father taken me on a tour of the many planets he had visited in his youth, to train his body; I hadn't heeded his warning about the danger of the place, and he took a fall meant for me into a patch of Lovers Cross." She smiled, a cold, heartless smile at the distant memory, but the tears welling up in her eyes shone through the darkness. "He's never been the same, since then, of course, never quite as attentive as he once was, but he tries to love me like he once did," she openly admits to her daughters, likely for the first and last time, and Rito nearly felt like he was having a brush with death at this secret between family members, "I don't want you to die, or to lose that love between you two, so please, Rito, I beg of you to save my daughter and yourself before it is too late for either of you."
With that declaration hanging in the air around them, Rito nodded and took Lala by the wrist, before pulling her away from the screen and towards her room. "Come on, we need to get dressed," he states, as he pulls her away, "It's snowing, and we'll have a bit to walk to Mikado Sensei's." Lala pulls her hand out of his grasp and stops, surprised by his change of tune to this morning.
"Rito, why are you panicking, we still have time," Lala states, confused as she stares at him, "The nearest bus isn't scheduled to come by for.."
"We don't have time to take a bus, or the circumstances either," he interjects, raising his voice at her misunderstanding of his urgency, his eyes burning as he meets her gaze, "If we take the bus, the chances of us getting stuck in the snow increases, as does the risk factor of getting seen coughing up blood and flower petals; anyone who sees us doing these things on a bus will likely think we have a highly contagious disease, and we'll be forced to go to an Earth hospital with no likely means of getting any form of proper care." She stares at him, surprised by his forward thinking attitude, content with his answers, she goes into her room to change into the proper clothing.
"I'll meet you downstairs," she says as Rito uses the transporter down to the second floor of the Yuuki house. Stepping into her room, a few wobbly paces, and she falls to her hands and knees.
*co-co-*
*cough*
*COUGH*
*Cou-*
"Blergh-"
*splat*
A pool of red and bile, which had choked her until she could get it out of her airway with much force. Eyes tearing up and blurry at the force, which nearly caused her to pass out into the vile remnants of her fairly light breakfast, and tears were coming down her face as she tried to compose herself a little bit. By her own calculations, they had little more than a few, precious hours left without immediate consequences, if she went by the fact that the item floating in her blood was a drenched forget-me-not.
That was something she hadn't told either of them, when she had confirmed they were indeed infected by Lovers Cross.
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Some Time Ago
"No,"their King Gid stated, as his youngest daughter approached the throne to gain her father's favor for another one of her whims, "Caritate is a protected system for a reason, and THAT planet especially is forbidden for you and your sisters to visit, no exceptions." At that she looked crestfallen, before that stubborn streak that she could chalk up to her father over took her.
"But WHY father?" Momo asked, as Lala and Nana stood stock still at their sisters outburst, while their Father remained calm and stoic as always while seated next to their Mother, Queen Sephie, "Mother told me you took her to Onsra when you were dating, that the planet was extremely beautiful when it was close to its sun and entered its defrost period..." Their father stood up at their daughters heated retort, and was about to speak his mind, when his loving wife's hand strayed his attention to herself.
"Momo, darling, I you think we don't understand your frustrations; why we ask you to obey these stipulations we set out for you, one day we know you'll understand all these rules are for your protection," Sephie Michela Deviluke interjects, giving her husband the chance to regain her composure, and allow her daughters childish tirade to end, "We were young and newly in love teenagers then, we didn't even know the dangers of Onsra until we were the ones who got in over our heads; the system, the planet, wasn't even charted back then." She smiles gently and has her draw closer, putting a hand to her daughters cheek as she draws the attention to herself. "Your father and I were the ones who chose to make Caritate a protected system," she explains, as she lets her hand fall from her daughters face, to cross them neatly over her own lap, "Not only for the inhabitants of the planet's own safety, but those unlucky travelers who would one day stumble upon a world they were unprepared for... it was as simple a solution as we could make then."
Momo pouts at this, understanding what her mother is saying, and doesn't push it anymore, before rejoining her sisters standing behind her. "Now that that is settled, your mother and I have more work to prepare for," Gid states from his throne, turning to Zastin as he speaks, "Take the children to their lessons, Zastin, and please, make sure Lala doesn't disassemble another cruiser if you lose track of her..."
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The matter had ended with that little revelation, and now the reason behind it had become much clearer since their mother had revealed the truth. She had tried not to worry Rito by lying about how much time they had to get this problem fixed, but of course leave it to Rito to realize the problems she hadn't thought of, when it came to human culture. Despite having remained among them for three years, her grasp of human culture, of the thoughts of her own husband-to-be, still eluded her intellect and understanding. She could smile, though, realizing that of course he would think of them, of his own people, when it came to this unknown and alien disease, who wouldn't think of protecting their own in such a situation;it just showed her, though, that Rito was showing those simple qualities of forethought she had seen in him, that could make him a great ruler, one day.
Ignoring the blood for now, and thinking about Mikan and Celine as she got ready, she decided to enact something of a spur of the moment decision once she got back into the Yuuki house and met Rito and the other two at the base of the stairs.
"Mikan, Celine, I want you two to leave the house, and not touch anything in the family room or the kitchen," Lala orders, much to Rito's surprise, and Mikan's, "I fear the spores may not have dissipated yet, or they could still get on you and be transmissible through direct contact with your clothes and other things; you weren't in direct contact, and we stopped you from getting close, but I think it would be best if you got changed and met up with us at Mikado's." Lala smiles a bit sorrowfully, as she takes a look at the interior of the house and turns to Rito with a sheepish smile. "I'm afraid I'll have to get in contact with Smutts and Maul,too, and see if we can get a clean-up crew to isolate and contain any of the spores if they contaminated the stuff in your house," she informs the two siblings, "I'm afraid we'll have to quarantine the house, and that means you'll have to inform your father, and may have to stay with him until we can ensure everything is cleaned up properly; I'll have to check with Momo just in case, but the spores shouldn't stay viable for very long." Mikan nods, as does a serious looking Celine, which is a bit silly for the child to be as if she understood them, but Mikan kept a wide berth of Rito and Lala, and took care not to get too close to them already, just in case.
"Well then, let's get going," Rito states, dressed up in his winter coat, as he goes to open the door to outside the house, "The snow's only getting worse out there while we wait..." As he opens the door, the streets outside are paved with snow in total white-out, as the heavy snow keeps falling from dark and ominous clouds. Stepping out into the fresh snow, Rito takes the lead in starting down the road towards Mikado's house.
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Back in Lala's Room
A sleeping Peke, who had still been recharging after a long night of Lala's sudden bursts of inspiration before bed keeping her awake, the little robot's audio receptors were ringing as she tuned into the waking world. Blinking slowly, and wondering where Lala was, she realized that her mistress' D-Dial was ringing, so she went to answer it. What she saw on the screen surprised her, as she realized the holographic form of Nana was in front of her optics.
"Peke?" Nana says, surprised the little robot had answered her sisters device, "Where's Lala, I heard something had happened!" Peke's eyes widened at this news, and she turned to go out of the room. "Wait!" Nana called out, before the little robot could fly away, "I have urgent news regarding a New Eden sighting near Earth, you need to warn Lala!" Peke turned back to the D-Dial''s projector and waited for her younger charge to continue. "I need you to inform Lala that an old Solgam base was raided in the Outer Fringes, and an ancient weather altering device was stolen by the new head of the organization," Nana continues, "He's been using it to leverage unaligned planets all over your sector of space, and we think he's set Earth in his sights; even though it's practically a S-class planet hosting an F-class civilization, the number of illegal alien refugees may make it enticing enough to try and force into his organization." Peke's swirling eyes turned into X's as she realized that the danger of Earth getting targeted, with Lala hiding out on the planet as well, had incredibly serious ramifications.
"If they find out a Princess of Deviluke is on this planet, they may try and capture her and use her position as heir of the throne against your Father!" Peke states, realizing with extreme anxiety that she had to find Lala and fast, "Lala-sama!" With a whirl of her wings, the little robot burst out the door to find her mistress in a blind rush.
/*/*/*/*\*\
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"We're not going make it, are we?" Rito asks, after they were both on their way, deep into the snowstorm and far from the ears and eyes of Mikan or Celine, "We aren't fine, and it's only going to get worse, isn't it?" Lala doesn't know how to answer him, as they both walk further, one foot in front of the other through the white landscape, following the signs and streets as best they could while they were still visible to the naked eye.
"No, I'm sorry," she ends up saying, her voice lowering, until she stops and begins to cough up more blood and petals, and even Rito stops to go back and help her back to her feet, "I'm- I'm fine, now, we need to keep going before this storm gets-"
*CRASH*
Krrrkah
*BOOOM*
Both stopped in their tracks, as the white sky lit up like an explosion happened among the darkened clouds. Rito turned to Lala, or shook her head and had no answer for why a thunderstorm would be happening within a snowstorm such as this. They resumed walking for a bit more,though the wind began to pick up, as the heavy snow began to fall even more with the temperature, and Rito had no choice but to break the growing silence between the two.
"Japan isn't the kind of area that would get this kind of weather; I've heard of occurrences of thunder snow in the west, but our weather and location just isn't conductive to it," Rito states, as he stares up as more bolts of lightening flash across the sky, illuminating the black thunderheads against the growing whiteout, "This weather- it isn't natural, not at all; Lala, what do you think-" He turns back to look for her, but she is gone from his sight, and he freezes in place in hopes of calling out for her. "LALA!" Rito calls out, standing still as he raised his voice over the howling wind, "LALA, WHERE ARE YOU?" He realizes quickly as the heavy snow whips by him, that the tracks he was leaving behind had been swiftly covered over as they walked, and he couldn't even see the faintest impression of his steps. 'Of course it gets worse,' he thinks to himself, as he feels the unnatural coldness begin to freeze his sweat and tears, as the wind whips around him, 'I must have lost her when it began to get worse, she must have lost track of my footsteps-' Thoughts broken by a sudden influx of pain in his chest, he doubles over into the growing snow and begins to choke on his own body's reaction to the foreign objects growing in his lungs. A splattering of blood later and a large flower, similar to a white rose stained pink by his bodily fluids, and he watched as the intense cold not only froze the disgusting object, but seemed to make it whither and die upon direct contact with the cold.
Maybe it was just his imagination, but the cold weather jacket he had thought would keep him warm was quickly losing its effectiveness the longer he stood still, as the illusionary warmth he had been feeling with his active movements began to bite and tear into his bones, becoming a chill spreading fast and deep into his body. Deciding he couldn't stay still and hope Lala would find him, he knew he would have to turn back and hope he would not end up walking in circles as the visibility decreased with every passing minute. He could only hope he would stumble upon Lala in his blind search, and bring them somewhere the cold could be fought off, otherwise hypothermia and the growing urge to sleep nestled somewhere back in the irrational part of his mind, would become something much more deadly.
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The unnatural snow and ice, the wind that tore through his jacket like it was tissue paper, was something old and primal, it screamed like the ancient winters must have when they were unleashed upon earth's distant past. The whispers in his mind, as hallucinatory as they were, rationally came upon the same conclusion: this would be the beginning of a new ice age if nothing were done. He had to find Lala, he had to fix this, and with her help, he could maybe even get the courage up to be brave for once in his life. Maybe he could tell Lala the truth, about that last summer, during the pool party and the misunderstanding following it, that he felt something. But he would have to find her first, and as achingly slow pace through the snow was, he had plenty of time in his growing haze of fog, to get memories and emotions jumbled and mixed up. The cold had begun to seep into his thoughts, making it harder to think as he coughed and choked on his own blood, every other step painful as the action tried to clear his muddled brain.
It seemed like the snow was letting up, finally, as he stumbled upon tracks that couldn't have been covered fast enough for him to ignore the slightest indentation as a sign. Beginning to follow them, the snow level began to drop with ever passing minute, until the whiteout became grey, grey to black, and then frozen winds dropped to a mere whisper. As if walking through a wall of wind, the break in the clouds was like the eye of a hurricane, and Rito realized that the snow was thinnest hear, as if by design, as the sun began to soothe his muddled brain and warm frozen skin. Finally, he could see a limp form covered with snow, and he realized that a light dusting of snow was still falling around him, though nothing like what he had been seeing, the pink hair poking through the light dusting was enough to snap him back to full panic. "Lala!" he called out, as he slowly began to pick up his pace and walk closer to her, until he broke out into a full run to draw closer.
*BOOM*
KRRrrKKKK
*FLASH*
A burst of cold and sudden wind, and the blue skies became a dreary black, as if the weather was against his approaching the fallen princess. "No!" he cried, as he fought off the wind and walked ever steady, ever sure of his destination, towards her with determination. He felt his body wanting to retch out more blood, but held the bile down, as he fought with every ounce of strength being sapped from his body with constant snowfall blowing his way.
Thunder roars out and lightning rips through the sky, a strike of light illuminating the blackness, as the steady snowflakes drop from the sky like frozen fists against his steadily weakening body. Her figure in the growing haze of ice clinging to his face, as snow blinds the boy as he stumbles to the ground and into a spreading crimson pool of his own making, heaving with what little strength he has left in his body. Withered petals clung to his face and hands as he tries to reach out for her, seeing she is so close to him.
If only he had told her the truth, that he had still loved her, even if she had misunderstood and rejected his attempts to repair their relationship. But he could see was her body in the pile of snow, body heat drawing out of her with ever dire second she remained face down in it.
"This- this is all my fault..." the boy says, as he feels the blood pooling among his teeth and gums, coughing as he tries not to choke as his own body fails him. He falls forward into the peaceful snowdrift, just feet from the one he was chasing after. Drops of blood splatter into the snow as he coughs once again, this one harsher than the first, as he spits out withered and once blue petals, stained purple.
"This is my penance..." he grits out, as he finally reaches her, and pulls her out of the snowdrift, "I don't get another chance to make you hear me out..."
"Says who?" another voice interjects, and as he wearily tries to look up at the man who approaches them, he quickly begins to feel a wave of nausea and tiredness overcoming him, as he realizes the man has the oddest looking helmet, with a roman numeral carved into it.
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Not expecting to find anyone at the center of the winterish anomaly, the man smiled down at the two sprawled out teens before him. He hadn't expected the one to walk right into his lap,but both of them? The chance was just too good not to count as a lucky break for him. When he had came to this universe, it was to search for these two kids, and now they were both in reach. Knowing he would have to hurry and get them medical attention, he put his hand to his ear and looked upwards through the break in the storm, and opened a channel to his ship in orbit of the planet's moon. "It's alright, I found the kids, their both intact, but require immediate medical attention," the man, with the roman numerical numbers IV etched into his helmet, states as he holds up his other hand to get their attention, "Tell the others to withdraw from the planet, the main objective has been obtained; we can let our little toy go wild now." The man is smiling as he holds up a remote and presses a button, revealing a blue, glowing sphere in the sky as a cloaking mechanism is disengaged. "This is the true power of the Taoist Pearl, whose user wasted his freezing ability on petty murders, eh?" the man stated, unimpressed, chuckling as he calls for a pickup, "Kranz Marduke, three for retrieval at my location; the weapon has been armed-"
Before he could even finish his words, the sphere suddenly and swiftly burst. The tinkling of glass could be heard as it broke apart, flakes of ice and snow in its wake, as it shattered like a snow globe would if it hit the ground in mid-air. On alert, Kranz turned his attention to the air, as if waiting for something to kick up a cloud of snow as it landed, yet nothing came.
"Sorry to disappoint you," a voice whispered from behind him, as he felt a stabbing pain in his chest, "You are the fifth one on my list, and I'm not playing around anymore." Looking down, Kranz realizes he has a sword twisted through his body, a broken one at that, but more important than the pain was that he realizes that the shattered remnants of the Taoist Pearl seemed to have been stuck, frozen in place upon the sword, even as his unknown assailant pulled it free of his body. The madman had to have known the Pearl had been at temperatures of absolute freezing, that would have shattered even the toughest of metals, yet he had still taken the risk and cut through the pearl like it was an ice sculpture. Fortunately for Kranz, the pain was immediately numbed by the super cooled instrument, the frostbite setting in almost as he watched the bruised looking skin turn impossible colors around the stab wound. Turning around to face his attacker, Kranz spun woozily to face a man as brave and foolish as he was to attack him like this.
"Greetings and farewell, former Chronos Number Four," a man with an eerily similar helmet to his own, carved with its own version of the letters IV over the right eye instead of the left, the man was practically a mirror image of the killer he once was. He had orange-blonde hair, though, instead of Kranz's dark hair, he was shorter too, as was the fact he seemed to be dressed in vaguely familiar armor, overlaying a flowing, white robe.
Kranz smiled, genuinely, for the first time in a long time, at finding someone he could respect in spite of the cowardly sneak attack. As he fell backwards into the snow, vocal cords already too frozen to give his attacker the words of respect he deserved to hear, he already understood the fact that he was mistaken about the man's way of dealing with him. He was a fighter it seemed, he had faced his brethren and lived, so the understanding that one not judge their opponent outwardly seemed to be his way of dealing with his opponents. If he were not already a dead man, he would have been proud to call this man a worthy foe, though both of their lives had already been cut too short.
"You did well Kranz, when I tracked you to your base on that frozen planet in the Caritate, I almost overlooked the fact you sent Rito and Lala Lovers Cross as a symbolic end to their relationship," the man tells the cooling corpse, as the frostbite freezes his ever cell finally and totally ending his enemies life, "You left the sword behind, in a patch of Lovers Cross to keep anyone from foolishly trying to use it, because you knew it was the only thing that could destroy your 'ultimate wea-*C-c-coughh*" he wheezes out, as a stray drop of blood escapes from beneath the mask, "-weapon; but you never thought I would willing retrieve the sword, especially if it meant keeping you from killing dozens more of innocent worlds using its power."
He lets the sword fall from his grasp, his hands to numb from the cold to hold with his right hand anymore, so instead he grasps its handle with his left and quickly tries to drag it over to where Rito lay face down in the snow, the blood and withered flowers draining from his mouth slowed down as his core body temperature dropped with every second. "You never even thought of using it for good," the man says, as he uses his numb right hand to move Rito's left hand to where he can force him to grasp the broken sword with his own hand, "Now, I need you to listen to me, Rito Yuuki, so wake up... wake up... C'mon!"
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With the slightest fluttering of his eyes in response, fighting off the sleep in his mind, Rito Yuuki barely could comprehend anything but shadows and a annoyingly bright light. "-ight it, Yuuk-" the muffled voice seemed to say, as he felt something cold and biting like metal being pushed into his hand, "-ke up, come on, don't slee-" Eyes flickering, as the biting cold in his limbs seem to be relieved, drawn into that cold and biting thing in his hands, he tries to focus on the strange, muffled words. "word, use the sword, draw the cold out," it said, and he tried so very hard to do that, "Good- good, Rito, you're doing it!" The voice was so hopeful, so strong, and he quickly felt the warmth in his body returning, and the pain that had been wracking his body seemed to be numbed, gone even. Feeling something try and drag him upwards, out of the snow so he could be assaulted by the blinding light, he felt the soreness and stiffness of his limbs leave his body, until he could clearly see the form of his beloved Lala nearby.
Not even hesitating, and feeling the coldness in her body even from his position being propped up by another, it was as if he could see the life, the warmth of her core being crowded out and smothered by the cold. He raised the sword as feebly as he could, and without even having to touch her with the sword, withdrew the cold from her body until he was feeling the warmth of her inner fire like it was once again a roaring blaze. Happy, and finding the burst of strength quickly fading fast, he dropped the sword to the ground and felt himself succumbing to the blackness of sweet unconsciousness. Before he passed out, he saw the corpse of another as he felt their fire be extinguished, and got a glimpse of the passionate flame that had stoked him back to the waking world, helmet though obscuring his face, he knew exactly who it was behind the mask, as if the face behind it was his own. "Take it," he whispered weakly in his final moments of wakefulness, "Ease your burden, repentant one..."
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"-ito, Rito, Rito!" a voice called to him, as he slumbered peacefully in the warmth, "Rito, please wake up, Rito!" Feeling a warm hand clasped around his own, he opened his eyes to see the crying face of Lala standing by his bedside, holding his hand while he slept the feverous dream off.
"L-Lala?" he croaked out, his throat extremely parched, burning as if it had been cut a thousand times over, "What- where am I?" Looking around the room, he saw Celine leaning into a dozing Mikan, who looked dressed in pajamas and covered with a thick, wooly blanket.
"I see our miracle child has woken up!" a saucy Mikado stated with a smile and a clipboard in hand, as she walked into the room, "Not only did you manage to get lost in a freak snowstorm, you managed to avoid hypothermia completely, melt the snow around you both like you were literally hotter than the weather itself outside, and also manage to somehow burn the Lovers Cross out of your system..." She puts the papers from the clipboard down, and smiles down at the both of them. "Honestly it is a miracle you both are alive, but the good news is I can say with one-hundred percent accuracy that the Lovers Cross in your system was killed off by intensely selective hypothermia; it seems it isn't an extremophile like you too," she jokes, though she sighs all the same, "Get some rest, and I'll wake you both up in the morning." She leaves the room, and only the soft snoring of Celine and Mikan are heard, besides the sound of the medical instruments.
"How?" he croaks out, directed to Lala, "Don't remember..."
"Peke came after us," Lala supplies, "We were both unconscious but signs of a battle were apparent all around us; a man my Father identified as the infamous 'Marduke' that's been terrorizing planets in this sector of the galaxy was found dead nearby." She leans into him, feeling his warmth, and his hers, even through the thick and heavy blanket. "Apparently he had signs of stabbing and intense frostbite, like a frozen sword was run through him; apparently it might have destroyed an ancient weather altering device before it ran him through and killed him," she reports softly, so as not to scare or wake up the other occupants of the room, "We found traces of blood, and flower petals that weren't the same as the ones you and I were spitting up; DNA tracing hasn't brought anything conclusive back yet, but Father and Mikado-Sensei will let us know if anything comes up, especially since whoever was infected by the Lovers Cross had much more advanced symptoms than we both did in our few hours of exposure."
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Somewhere on the dark side of the Moon
The air was thin in the small atmospheric tent he had set up in the shadowed side of the moon, but it was the safest place for him to hide in plain sight. Some miles above his head, a Devilukean destroyer was in orbit, the Emperor's own personal starship, and if he had been somewhere on the opposite side of the moon, either the world below or the ship above could find him easily and with enough time. So he hid in the shadows and prayed no one was looking, while he felt the tightening in his chest grow worse with each passing hour, and there was no longer anything he could do about it. What little power the Taoist Pearl of this universe held within it, to freeze and safely remove the threat of the Lovers Cross from this world's Rito and Lala, had been exhausted, as had the weapon he used to kill Marduk.
Wiping a bit of crusty blood from his mouth, ignoring the bitter taste and the petals stuck in his teeth, he felt the machine as it worked in vain to try and purge the infection from his body. His iron throne, his mobile fortress home, was a technological miracle that had scanned and brought him across countless worlds and universes in their long journey, and the truth was that both of their days were slowly running out. Ever since he had used the spatial jump function to bring him to and from Earth, the virus had taken hold and would have choked him out, if it wasn't for the fact that he was using his machine's miraculous power to target and revert the cellular age of the spores and force them to regress from their blooms into a dormant state, but still they grew with an unabashed pace inside his body; unhinged from the natural course of time as his own body was, this allowed them to whither and die within his body, only to be reborn in the next moment. His armor naturally tried to regulate and suppress them, but it was futile, and he felt like his life force was being chipped away from within him;worse than any blade, hit, or blow he had received in all the thousands of worlds he had walked since his birth into this new role.
Unplugging himself from the machine, which was little more than a five foot platform with room for two standing on it, and instead he chose to lean on its four foot tall by two foot wide safety railing. Removing his helmet, which was dangerous in such a thinly maintained atmosphere, he sees the stains of blood hit the platform, unsealed by the action of removing his protective gear. Wondering how long it had been since he had last seen home, he realized that the end of his journey might just be drawing quicker to its end with ever ragged breath and painful minute that passed him by. Turning the helmet around to stare at the engraved letters on its front to remind him of his promise made, of his duty sworn, and of his eventual reunion with the one he had loved the most of all...
Replacing the helmet of his head, he turned to grab the discarded, broken sword and picked it up to swing aloft to get a better look at it in the sunlight reflected off the Earth itself. "Lunatique, open the abyss and prepare to receive and analyze another sword for its properties," the man with the mask says out loud, "We need to figure out what New Eden is doing, targeting Rito's across the multiple timelines, and how they are organizing a multi-dimensional terrorist organization with all of these radically different agendas..."
Fading into existence, a green eyed blonde girl that is dressed in a simple, black dress that reaches down to the floor, is kneeling on the empty spot while being projected from the same apparatus where he had connected to the machine. Standing to revealing the pale, bare feet of the adult figure, the dress stopping at the height of just below her knees, one could see that this woman would shimmer as she walks over towards the man. Eyes turning a deep magenta as she lifts up her hand to take the blade from her companion, with her free hand she puts it out to the side and opens a rift in space. "Abyss isolation protocol initiated, item #3,759 has been categorized and profile of resident time/space of origin noted and recorded," the monotonous voice states, as the girl takes the dull, blue sword and inserts it into the rift she had made, before another swipe of her hand closes it, "Previous user and owner noted as Rito Yuuki, trace amounts of Taoist Power identified and classified as weak, low threat, label: 'Freeze'." The blone continues to speak, identifying more and explaining as he watches. "Identity of former user of 'Freeze' based power: Deek Slathky, deceased, is now noted as well," Eyes returning to a spring green, rather than the magenta, the construct of light turns to her companion to regard him, "Noted unsuccessful use of totally spent Taoist power, hereof labeled 'Freeze' to remove previously undocumented biological organism, titled Lovers Cross, as failure." A frown crossing the constructs face, he smiles at the fake display of emotions, knowing she meant well at the sympathetic reaction to what he already knew.
"I'm going to die," he simply responds, "The pearl was spent saving this world's Rito and Lala; I'm fine with that, but we still have more work to do Yami..." Breath hitching at the slipup, the emotionless personality of his machine doesn't make any show of response, and he humorously barks out a stressed filled laugh. "Sorry Lunatique, it's just you remind me so much of her..." he states, knowing the machine did not really care what her designation was, since he had given it to her anyway. To the machine, a name didn't really matter much. "Lunatique, prepare for another jump; I feel like we'll get closer to finding that bastard Shiki this time..." he states, as he looks up to the Earth and the looming ship eclipsing most of his view, "They're always one jump ahead of us, but I know that this time I'll get him, and he'll tell me exactly where to find the Doctor, I just know it."
"Probability of expectations being fulfilled: 0.00013%," the machine responds, before breaking down her form of light and returning to inhabit the time traveling device, warming up the Dirac Warp Engine, prepping the Infinite DXcel, as he called the device.
He couldn't call it anything else, really, though he wouldn't add 'Pyon-Pyon' or the honorific '-Kun', to the device, but he would honor her last invention with a name befitting its creator's personality. A time machine, one that had been modified of course after the initial jump, but all in all the overly pleasant result was a device he could use against the maniacs who had ruined his life, his world, with their crazed experiments being carried across through proxies that were little more than puppets who didn't know the truth. Then there were bigwigs like Marduke, whom he had learned after a few separate encounters were more often than not able to disappear and reappear in other timelines, as long as an active White Taoist Pearl existed in their current reality. He had taken out four, now five, of their number: Marduke, Ghoul, Zagine, Baldorias, Maro.
He knew there were still yet more of these madmen out there, whether they were innocent or not in one reality, they were still crueler yet in ten others. He knew of at least of their numbers who had committed herself to self-destruction, after a botched transference had stranded her within a virtual construct of a world that had quickly broken down due to her presence in the game causing logic errors that forced them to abort the game, with a golden watering can of all things. He had honestly wondered if she had gifted them the power to defeat her, using that watering can, though he had confirmed her presence had been removed and eliminated like a common computer bug. He had almost been worried when he saw another version of her located in that reality, but he had checked and confirmed that the duplicate had existed as a television character long before Kyouko's own insertion into that reality.
"Trouble Quest, man I haven't thought of that game in years," he said to himself, looking up at the sparkling jewel of his home planet yet again, "Momo and Nana had me so worried that they had kidnapped you, Lala, and then they stranded us in an unfinished game like that..." He chuckled at the distant memories, they felt like they were a lifetime ago, but he cherished the good times he had with his former love and his friends and family.
"I'll save you, over and over again if I have to" Rito Yuuki affirmed to himself yet again, as he watched the Devilukean ship pull away from the planet, "Ten odd years of time lost, made up with ten odd years of ensuring the mistakes of the past and present never lead to another tragic future like ours, my love." The memory of that gorgeous woman, the one who began his own troubled quest, lingered in his mind. "One day, I'll find you, I'll thank you for this fourth chance at life," he says to the blue jewel, as he turns back to the machine and uses the stump of a tail left from the cannibalization that led to the chimeric, cobbled together, sort of masterpiece that was her final gift to him.
"But first I have to save myself," he states, as his hands grip the safety railing, and he feels his power and conscious thought flow into the machine, "Let's see what universe number 3760 brings us..." In a flash of white light, an afterimage of rippling, red space lights up the scarred and untouched dark side of the moon, before fading back into the dark.
All was right with the world.
.
.
.
.
And then all of space and time imploded.
A/N: Well, a nice little surprise, to be sure. I mean, three chapters in a day? This is the follow up piece to Chapter 52 of To Love Ru: I Struggle. Hopefully it lives up to its predecessor.
Don't forget to favorite or follow, or leave a review about what you think. I haven't forgotten my story, I just have a hectic life and writers block hits you like a brick sometimes. Hope you enjoy, and have a great week(end?)!