Chapter 24: Dying of the Light
There was not getting past this sensation of helplessness Mew as feeling right now. Kairi was a hostage twice over. Her captor untouchable twice over. His emotions were running high, and one wrong outburst would let the demon in his head loose.
"I didn't think I'd run into this problem..." Mew thought as he edged back and forth in front of Pluto. Every approach at the moment was unwise. But there was a bright side to all this.
"You can't hurt me either," He nudged his head up at all the sharp instruments pointing his way, "So I don't know why you're showboating."
"Is that so?" Pluto sternly replied. The tips of his weapons protruded a little more from the rifts. Mew felt their aggression pointed right at him.
"Why don't we test that little theory of yours?" Pluto stood still as the weapons fired one at a time like ammunition from a gatling gun.
Mew widened his eyes and tumbled to the right, then swung his sword to deflect the rest. He should have just let them hit. By Gabriel's explanation of the Rite's rules Pluto would die the moment Mew's skin was cut.
Pluto sent more weapons after Mew, their numbers appearing infinite in scope. Mew kept his knees to the ground and propped up his sword to defend. He was pestered by the clang of metal and the berating sounds of his opponent.
"Unfortunately for you the Rite only accounts for what is bound to our aura. My magic relies on a wholly separate energy pool." Pluto propped up one sword before his chest and two rifts formed behind Mew. He turned and snagged one spear in his head while the other plunged itself into his hip.
On reflex he snapped the spear he held in two then quickly dove his hand down to rip the other one out. As if this wasn't bad enough, he had to endure Pluto's seemingly endless lectures.
"The Aurians of old created the Rite to solve political disputes without fear of outside interference. But how short-sighted they were. A power like this can fell entire armies or even make the gods yield if utilized properly."
"He keeps saying that but..." Mew held a hand to his wound to cauterize it and stood up, "I wonder if its true?"
There was doubt, a call to challenge the man's claims. Mew pulled his sword from the ground and pointed it out from his shoulder. The storm of weapons subsided, as if his foe was challenging his challenge.
Mew squinted and kicked up running straight for Pluto. The elven king held his head high and his arms motionless. A few feet away from striking Mew had a cold sensation creeping up his chest and put a strangehold on his neck. He then stopped, the tip of his blade poised to puncture Pluto's forehead.
Pluto smirked as the blade was withdrawn and remarked, "There is no way you can beat me. You should have just accepted my mercy."
He drew his saber with the hourglass and cut along Mew's chest in a single swift stroke. It stung with a long burning sensation, but the after effects would linger for far longer.
"Gravitus' judgment would be swift. But I, on the other hand, shall inflict a thousand years of suffering upon your mortal shell." Pluto's voice was starting to come out slower. Mew could've chalked it up to the bastard loving to hear himself talk. But when he went to hold down his wound his hand took longer to get there than it should've.
Mew hopped back to evade two weapons fired upon him. They scraped the sides of his legs. That shouldn't have been possible, he reacted in time.
"What's going on?" Even his thoughts were moving slower than normal.
He swung his sword around quick as a whip to try and outpace the weapons. Pluto resorted to striking from different angles and scraped up Mew's legs. Mew retaliated by jumping away, his foe uninterested in pursuing.
Mew turned up the heat around his body and slowed down the weapons. Mew was thinking fast but that painfully contradicted what his body appeared to want.
Even commanding his arm to swing his sword demanded an intense feedback from his brain. And Pluto wasn't letting up. He forced Mew's body on the move with constant weapons and the occasional chain whip.
The first body part to break was his left elbow from multiple chain lashes. The ligaments in his wrist went next when a lance punctured across the top. The pain endured twice as long and stacked on top of the pain of a warped perception of time.
Pluto saw no reason to come closer. His foe was wrapped entirely in his thrall. There was no mercy. No breaks. This was no honorable duel of ideals. It was a slaughter, plain and simple. And Mew found himself the victim.
"This isn't good." He thought as a chain coiled under his already mangled arm and tried to tug it off.
At the very least he could apply heat to melt it off, but while he wasted precious brain power on that two spears impaled in the back of his shoulders.
"Gah!" Mew lurched forward as the weapons drilled in deeper. He grit his teeth and forced them out with a grunt. He then thrust his head towards Pluto and hung his sword to his knees.
"All living things are designed to perceive time in increments of a second. When that perception is slowed the brain is unsure of how to respond. Nausea, increased nerve pain. And all this from just one cut. I wonder...What shall be your pain threshold?"
Pluto pulled the hourglass blade from the ground, the unsheathing noise grinding against Mew's eardrums like sandpaper. Mew widened his eyes and looked to his sword. His body's instincts demanded he swing, but to do so would end his life. Pluto kept his magic on him as he crawled closer.
"There's got to be something I can do. Think!" The work Mew demanded from his brain was too much even for the time he had to spare. His eyes were still on his sword so long as flashes of red didn't blind him with pain.
On the hilt of his sword were eight triggers like what were on a pistol, each a different color. They usually go beneath anyone's notice from the way he held his sword and truth be told, he had forgotten they were there. Seven were useless by now but the eighth, which was pure white, may just be Mew's ticket out of this mess.
"If his Drive is 'blessed' then..." Mew's heart raced and he jumped back to try and avoid Pluto's slash.
A mesa of chains rammed into his back to force him back into place. The situation was perilous. His body craved the desire to fight back. But his heart grounded him in reality, telling him to save Kairi.
There was so much pain and yet, this seemed to drown out all other noises. There, Mew found some degree of focus, and it told him that perhaps, there was some way to satisfy both parts of his urges.
Pluto successfully cut him and time crawled even slower in all parts of Mew's perception. A single word thought split his cranium into pieces.
"Focus...!" Was all he had to tell himself to keep his sanity glued together. He slipped his hand slightly off the sword so his fingers could reach for the white trigger.
Pluto slashed him deep across the chest. It had the same effect as before. Mew's singular heart beat now felt like a drum built for a god. He tried to jump back, put even the littlest distance between them.
But only he was constrained to this problem. Pluto was moving at normal speed. He cut Mew twice more along the chest. Mew felt his finger on the edge of the trigger as his perception got so slow that it was almost like he had stopped. Suspended in the air, he suffered indescribable pain as he tried to pull the trigger.
Yet Pluto had one last move to make. He took his other blade and touched the tip to the portion of Mew's chest wound before his heart. His mind was on fire and it took minutes to process this pain. Pluto's spiel, however, would feel like it'd last for hours.
"When this blade punctures your chest cavity, it shall do so nice and slow. Your brain will scream for mercy for years but it shall never come. And when this blade's tip reaches your heart...It will shrink until the arteries break off, and your innards fill with blood."
Pluto pushed the blade in a millimeter at a time, for he had all the time in the world. He bore his cold stare into Mew's eyes, ensuring his face would be the last he'd ever see.
"Such is the fate of a fool."
Mew was so close to the trigger, yet so far. The blade, comparatively speaking, was closer to his chest. Could this really be the end? It just seemed too cruel to die here without a chance to learn from his mistakes.
And worst of all, he'd die a failure. And that pained him more than anything Pluto could ever do to him.
Every person he fought along the way flashed in his head. The promises made. The expectations unmet. But once Kairi appeared in his head he focused solely on her and the time, however brief, that they spent together.
And the image that lasted the longest was the sight of her on her knees, crying her heart out to him...
"I..." Mew's heart thumped hard, tapping the tip of Pluto's brain. His finger tugged at the white trigger, and it begun to budge.
"I will not die!" The trigger was pulled, the tip to Pluto's blade on his heart. And then Mew's blade shone bright white, consuming its surroundings in blinding light.
Pluto got distracted, grunted in irritation. But when he was allowed to open his eyes, Mew was gone. Pluto stared at the blank icy expanse as a stinging sensation tickled the side of his neck. A katana of diamond and steel grazed the space below his left cheek bone and its tip stuck out of the corner of his eyes.
Pluto jerked right and slashed his sword up. He panted for a few moments, the hairs on his wrinkled face sticking up on end.
"Impossible..." He whispered with a twinge of fright to his voice. A sharp flash of light dragged his attention back ahead, where there his enemy stood at last, renewed in body and spirit. But something had changed...
Mew was now clothed in a long, thin holy robe with a chest brace similar to what archers wear. His legs were covered by these strange metal socks with strappings going up in a series of interconnecting crosses. A gold ring embraced each wrist, and a ruby sheath laid by his left hip. His hair had turned a silvery-white, his eyes a bright yellow. And gently, a pair of angelic wings spread from his back, casting their shadow upon Pluto via the light summoned overhead.
Pluto stared at the boy's holy visage and his body began to tremble. He gripped his blades tight and remarked with a scowl, "You mock me as though it'll make a difference..."
A chain began to rise on each of his sides and he declared, "Take whatever form you wish! I will wound your blasphemous hide a-"
Pluto blinked and the next thing he heard was shattered glass. He turned to his chains, and found them pinned to the ground by swords of light.
When he looked to Mew he got a silent smirk in return.
The boy then pointed his katana out and turned to his side. He bent down and pointed the tip of his blade into his sheath, which began to glow faintly.
Pluto slanted his brows and a drop of sweat went down his ear. He summoned dozens of weapons from the rifts, only for more swords of light to ram them back in.
"What?"! He proclaimed as he turned back.
A mild tremor briefly shook his feet. He faced Mew again and swore he was closer. Pluto kept his swords drawn up to his waist and edge back, firing off all the weapons and chains he could to disturb his foe.
Whatever Mew's blades of light didn't deflect he simply sped away from in a flash. His posture remained unchanged, and he slowly pushed his katana deeper into the sheath.
Meanwhile, wrapped in chains so tight, Kairi began to stir.
She had felt something warm wash over her face, forcing her eyes open. She instantly shot her gaze towards Mew and was barely able to keep up with his movements.
He was making a complete fool out of Pluto in a completely unknown form. Its power was far beyond what Mew had displayed before, if such a thing could even be believed.
"That power is...Light?" The holy presence was comforting to see in this current predicament she found herself in. Finally, she noticed the chains that bound her and tried to budge herself free. No go. They were simply too tightly wound around her.
"Damn it!" She cursed aloud as her hand fell limp is suspension above her head.
She swiftly recalled what led her to this moment and her eyelids sagged. She mustered whatever strength her body could take to squeeze her fist and jerk it around. Again, the chains insisted she stay in place like the "good little girl she was".
She distracted herself from the guilt she felt by watching Mew fight. A tidal wave of blackened steel emerged from behind Pluto and crashed down upon Mew. He casually hopped atop the chains and in the blink of an eye crossed it to the other side.
Beams of light cascaded from above and annihilated the chains down to the atom. Mew sped to the left as a hail of blades fell from behind Pluto's head and his katana rested only a fourth of the way inside of the sheath.
All this power and speed outclassed every Planetary Aurian the two had met along the way by a mile and a half. If this was the case, then why did Mew hide it for this long? Kairi suspected a downside to its use, but the way Mew expertly handled all that raw power cast doubt on this claim.
Her eyes trembled as she raised her head ever so slightly. Even now she finds herself questioning the kind of man Mew is. That there was no definitive answer either spoke volumes of how little she knew about him, or about how much he hid from her.
And yet there was no doubt in her mind that there was something curious about the way he fought now. He wasn't attacking Pluto head-on even though he appeared to hold every advantage. Mew enjoyed fighting up-close and personal, she knew that much. He also loved to toy with his opponents a bit, and of course Pluto seems to have earned every bit of mockery Mew could muster.
But that wasn't it. The truth was closer to Kairi than she cared to admit. It was faint, but she could sense a connection of aura from her heart to Pluto's. Her heartbeat started to race as her eyes softly widened, upon which she coldly gasped the truth.
"Pluto...put the Rite on me."
That was it. That HAD to be it. Her being held hostage prevented Mew from striking Pluto down where he stood. She had to face the truth. She had become a liability, and there was no one to blame but herself for this.
"I thought I was ready to fight...A-And now look where that got me," She wiggled around in her chains and pouted, "Locked up...And useless."
That word echoed in her head multiple times - "useless". She hated that word more than anything, and now it was the perfect adjective for her.
"No..." Stewing in her anger and self-loathing wasn't going to accomplish anything. Seeing Mew fight even under these intense odds lit a fire under her heart that burned away the concept of uselessness from her head. She curled her fist and did her best to look at her surroundings. Two rifts helped keep the chains raised.
"If I could just disturb them..." But how? The answer, as it turned out, was already within her.
"My staff...!" She had just enough wiggle room to summon her staff in her free hand and grit her teeth in determination, "Orichalcum can disrupt magic!"
She fidgeted her hand around to push one end of the staff into one of the rifts. She had to work fast, cause she had no idea how long Mew's new form could last.
Speaking of such, the boy continued to speed around without taking a single hit from Pluto's magical onslaught. His arsenal of light weaponry matched the elven king's weaponry, and the chains were laughably slow.
Pluto was too iron focused on what he originally set out to accomplish to try anything different, even though his prowess as a dark magician surely allowed him access to a fortitude of skills.
Mew's mere presence now made Pluto's wrinkly skin crawl. His gruesome grimace stretched across his face and turned into a scowl. The ground trembled again, its strength far greater than before.
"What is the meaning of this?" Pluto muttered aloud, "What does this fool think he can accomplish?!"
Mew heard every word but didn't say a single thing back. His eyes remained locked on his opponent, his katana now halfway into the sheath as a plethora of light struggled to burst forth out of it.
Pluto continued to send his weapons out. The battlefield was now so thick with blades, spears, lances and chain links that Mew had to start dashing atop them. His sprints were light as a feather, the wind at his wings.
Pluto went from scowl to smirk and barked at Mew loudly, his voice filled with pride, "You forget your place! So long as the Rite holds I am untouchable! Though, as if you'd ever be able to breech my divine protection to begin with!"
He felt he just had to keep at it until he wore Mew down. Surely the boy wouldn't keep up this foolish charade forever, right?
The ground quaked. Pluto's eyes widened as he almost stumbled onto his back. He struggled to remain upright, his beaded eyes locked onto the boy as he felt the entire planet tremble. The breadth of Mew's wings spread as far as the tips would go, then folded in towards his back.
The katana was now three-quarters of the way in, and the light within the sheath was unfathomable. If even a glimmer of it broke free, Pluto felt he'd be forever blinded by it. Cold, dirty sweat trickled down the sides of his face and were caught upon his grizzly hair.
"Where is he getting all this power from...?!" Pluto gruesomely decried the boy's strength until his eyes glimpsed at the skies above.
There lied a sight that'd turn the king's ashen face pale. All the stars that littered the depths of space flickered on and off, their glints of light cast off and dragged across millions of miles of space to feed into Mew's sheath.
"By the gods..." Pluto gasped as he swung his head down, upon which Mew's smirk widened and still he denied the elven king the right to hear him speak.
He took a step back, an action considered involuntary on his part. He gazed down upon his shaking feet then back up at Mew. The boy had inched closer, the power he constrained in his sheath sending the whole planet into a quaking fit.
Pluto forced himself to grin and inched further back towards the bound Kairi. He propped his swords up and continued fruitlessly sending blades, spears and lances towards Mew. His stance on the matter, though shaken, felt as strong as ever in his head.
"You will die if you strike me, fool. You'll give your life for hers? Don't make me laugh. You do not have the guts..." Pluto was getting no answers from Mew besides the smug look on his face and the peerless gaze in his eyes.
Pluto's teeth rattled together as he bit them down and squeezed his hands around his blades' handles. Mew's katana was so close to being fully sheathed that it left the king's heart racing to see what would come next.
Kairi, meanwhile, had managed to poke one end of her staff into the rift. Immediately the results were seen, as the rift's image distorted and began to fade away. The chain snapped off and Kairi tugged her staff free, only for it and her now freed hand to drop towards the ground.
She hung on to the staff and swung her arm back up. There was still one rift to break before she'd be able to get out. She had more wiggle room now, and could take in deeper breaths.
She paused for a moment to look over at Mew. He still held a flighty air about him but his stature looked a lot more serious and confident than what he normally displayed. For the first time Kairi saw him in the heroic light he was meant to be seen...And it inspired her to resume focus on what she was doing.
Pluto stopped fifteen feet away from his prisoner, with Mew matching him with every movement. No more speed tricks. A simple step was all it took to bring the elven king to trickle sweat in fear.
"Do not take me for a fool," Pluto murmured with his eyes starting to widen with a scathing gaze, "You think you can look down on me? Your power is a sham! A gift you did not earn! My power comes from the heavens! My purpose blessed by the gods! You have not earned the right to look down on me, you worm!"
The katana locked fully into the sheath, the light concealed from all who'd dare look upon it. Mew hunched over and stared straight over at the elven king. He stopped in place, becoming still as a statue as the man's rage boiled over in a heartbeat.
"I AM YOUR KING! AND YOU WILL ANSWER ME!" His face contorted beyond the pale for such a "divine king", and he swung his blade back to where he presumed Kairi's neck would be, "OR THE GIRL SUFFERS!"
But his blood-curling scream of insubordination deafened him to the sound of Kairi's other chain snapping.
He swung his head back, watching as his "hostage" broke the last rift and regained her freedom. The bundles of chains fell to the ground, unable to keep her off the ground.
The wind whispered, and Mew suddenly appeared in front of Pluto. The king turned his pale face back and found his head reared back in shock, his heart dropping to the bottom of his chest.
"Gotcha." Mew furrowed his brows and widened his eyes as he ripped his glistening katana free from the sheath. The cold grasp of Death scattered across his body as he dragged all the light he gathered into one powerful stroke.
His blade cleaved right through Pluto's divine aura, shattering it like glass. His armor was torn through like paper, a fissure left in his chest. The king gagged up dirty yellow blood, his head lurching out as he dropped to his knees.
Kairi was blown back a little from the sheer force of Mew's slash, her eyes wide and stagnate. Time felt like it slowed as her heart raced, beating loudly like a drum.
"W-Why...?" She gasped as all color became flushed from her face.
Pluto staggered back, the blood spewing forth from his chest as he dropped to his knees, barely able to use his swords as crutches. Mew closed his eyes and stood upright, his head held high.
"THUMP!" His heart beat one resounding sound, then went dead silent. An invisible string of aura snapped from the space between Pluto and Kairi and struck his own aura harder than anything he's ever felt.
In the blink of an eye his Light Form was turned off and he felt completely drained of his energy. He weakly raised one hand to his chest and felt no response. His skin and blood went cold, and his vision quickly faded.
"Heh..." He had the strength to smile before the invite of the grave dragged him slowly to the ground, flat on his back.
"I hope...I'm right about this..." He whispered faintly as his landing proved soft upon the icy wastes, the last light he summoned floating high above his body.
Kairi fell to her knees and her hands followed suit. She slowly shook her head, feeling like she was a part of a nightmare.
"Get up..." She whispered a blunt statement of denial to no effect.
"Please..." She begged again, and again.
There was nothing she could say or do to reverse what had been done. Mew had succumbed to the Rite's secondary effect. He had taken his last breath, and for as best as she tried she couldn't make it what it was he said.
He was dead. And it was all her fault.
"Ghhh...!"
But the nightmare did not end there.
Pluto stirred, his body refusing to put even a toe in the grave. Black magic surrounded his body and penetrated his gaping chest wound, stitching together flesh and sinew anew. He grit his blood-soaked teeth and started to stand, only for his head to lurch forward and more blood escaping his body.
"Bas...tard!" He cursed in indignation as he forced himself upright and ripped his swords free from the ground. His body was mangled, with a thick scar still present across his chest to remain an eternal reminder of his failures.
"You thought you could kill me...Me?!" He gasped with the ragged breath of a madman as he dropped the tip of his blades to the ground and dragged them alongside his feet towards Mew.
"A-A king...does not yield!" Pluto stumbled on his footing. He could barely make it over to where Mew was lying.
"B-But this wound you inflicted upon me...E-Even with all the dark magic I have available to me it seems I cannot heal it." Pluto managed to steady himself above Mew's lifeless body and raised both his blades high above his chest.
"And for that...Y-You shall be remembered..." Pluto's eyes widened as far as they could go as he screamed at the top of his lungs, "AS STAINS ON MY BLADE!"
"NO!" Kairi screamed, her body springing to life as she rushed straight at the elven king and swung her staff in the way of Pluto's blades.
Their weapons locked with a flash of vermilion sparks. Kairi held the strength advantage and forced Pluto's blades up. But in one swing the king forced her staff off and turned his full attention upon her, his expression a mix of rage and disgust.
"You..." He scowled, then quickly smirked. With his body cracking and bleeding this little girl's teary-eyed attempt at defiance was just the thing he needed to see to regain some of his confidence.
"Have you learned nothing from before...?" Pluto held his head high and sliced his blades down to his hips, one tip pointed at Mew's head, "Weakened I may be, but I am still strong enough to discipline you again...If you so wish."
Kairi widened her eyes and tear drops trickled down her cheeks. She held her staff firmly in her hands and thrust the end of it at Pluto's face while growling at him to "Get away from him!"
"Him?" Pluto nudged his head down to the right and laughed, "What do you care about this corpse?"
The elven king found her staff smashing against his left shoulder. But his Drive flickered to life and protected him. He tilted his head up and with a smirk remarked, "Apparently...More than I was led to believe."
Pluto stood there as Kairi put her full fury into every swing, her staff repelled by his barrier. The recoil hurt her arms but she didn't care. Her body moved on its own, smashing away at an unbreakable wall.
"He was a fool to the bitter end, and his death was in vain."
"You...don't know anything about him!" Kairi screamed in retaliation as she smashed into the side of Pluto's head. The king did not flinch. There was no threat to behold. Only another pesky fly...
"Face reality, 'princess'. He never saw you as anything more than a prize to obtain..."
Kairi's heart felt like it was on fire. It burned with an intense rage, but also other feelings she couldn't put into words. Maybe she didn't know everything there was to know about him. She knew he was a pervert, and she knew he was completely terrible at taking a hint.
But as she squeezed her watery eyes shut momentarily, she could swear she could almost see his smile. She remembered all the training they'd done, all the times he'd helped her. And finally she realized – she accepted what she had somewhere wanted to believe all along. In the face of Pluto's cynical lies, she could not hold back the truth she'd finally acknowledged.
She swung her eyes open and exclaimed, "YOU'RE WRONG!"
She clenched her staff in both her hands. A faith warmth and light radiated from her headband as it briefly touched her chest. And Pluto, narrow-minded in his ways, clenched his teeth.
"He was...MY FRIEND!" She leaped and the radiance from her headband filled her staff.
"Insolent...CHI-!" Pluto began to raise his blades and found his left on the blunt end of Kairi's staff.
He coughed up blood and staggered back, his blades dropping back to his knees.
"I-Impossi-" Before he finished gasping in surprise Kairi landed and thrust her staff into his chest, breaking the unpatched skin, "GAAAAAH!"
"And he..." Kairi bent over and drew her staff alongside her hip. Her eyes locked onto the fear and panic in Pluto's eyes as she began to swing her weapon upward, throwing all her strength into smashing the underside of his chin.
"Was a better person than you'll ever be!"
Pluto's jaw smashed together and he was thrown off his feet. He flew fifty feet off the ground then fell twice as fast onto the back of his skull. His withered hands dropped his blades, where they went sliding along the ground.
Kairi stood over him, her staff pointed at his skull. The proud elven king laid there, becoming a true disgrace to his name as he swung a hand up as a silent plea for mercy. Kairi widened her eyes, her fists taut with fury, and thrust her staff down beside Pluto's head.
She bore the weight of her anger down upon Pluto with her gaze and told him with her teeth clenched tight, "Mew already killed you, so you can stay here and bleed to death for all I care!"
She pulled her staff up, put it over her shoulder, and upon turning away from Pluto declared, "I...will kill Gravitus myself."
Pluto spat up one jolly laugh as he retorted to the girl, "Kill Gravitus? Kill Gravitus?!"
Kairi gleamed over her shoulder slightly, unfortunately indulging the elven king's madness.
"You stupid girl...If you could not best me on your own...What hope can you expect to have against him?" Pluto waved his sharp fingernails at her and grinned with a chuckle, "He is beyond us all...And your time to repay him is soon to time..."
Kairi turned her head away even though that just left her looking down at Mew's body. Her eyes sunk and she muttered his name to herself.
"Mew..."
Just then, Kairi widened her eyes as that ball of light she saw before dropped straight down towards Mew's chest. It was absorbed into his skin and left some ripples behind.
Kairi suddenly felt a spark of life coming from Mew and rubbed her wet eyes with her hands. She ran right over and slid on her knees to his chest. She put one ear down to it and lo-and-behold, there was a heartbeat.
"Mrrmmm mmm..." Mew murmured and Kairi quickly sat upright. He followed suit with a surprising spring in his step.
Letting out a yawn like he'd just gotten up from a nap, Mew rubbed the back of his head and mumbled in a casual tone, "Huh...so that's what that feels like. Definitely a lot colder than I expected..."
Kairi whimpered and her cheeks pushed the tears out of her eyes. Mew turned to her and with a smile remarked, "Oh hey, you got out all on your own!"
He then closed his eyes and chuckled quiet and awkwardly, "Hahaha oh wow..."
"H-H-How..." Pluto's confused gasps drew Mew's attention back. He stood up, crossed his arms to his chest, and approached the elven king.
"How...are you still alive?" Pluto demanded an answer, one Kairi wanted too.
"Hehehe..." Mew brushed the bottom of his nose like it was no thing and grinned from cheek-to-cheek, "Its not complicated! Once I figured out the Rite thing wasn't a bluff I left behind some of my energy the moment I went Light Form. That way once I triggered the Rite and my concentration dropped due to, y'know, dying and stuff, the energy would fall onto my heart, give it a quick jump start, and badabing badaboom I'm back in action!"
Mew nudged his brows up a couple times and remarked in a more stern tone of voice, "You aren't the only one who can exploit loopholes."
Pluto dropped his hand to the ground and snickered with a slight hint of joy, "So once again...you played around like a fool and hoped for the best."
"...Savor your second chance at life while you can fool...You will not be able to best Gravitus the same way you bested me..." Pluto's eyes drew shut and he collapsed flat on his back.
Mew sighed and turned around while rolling his shoulders. He came face-to-face with Kairi, who stood there flabbergasted beyond belief. Her cheeks remained dripping as she shook her head and curled her fingers up by her cheek.
"W-Where do you get off...?" She gasped.
Mew put his hands behind his head and remarked, "I know, I know...It was a crazy idea. But hey! All my time watching Dragon Ball Super finally paid off!"
Kairi pounded Mew's chest with both her fists and he let out a very bad sounding cough. She hung her fists in place and exclaimed, "Don't you EVER try a stunt like that again! I-If you do...I-I-I'll kill you!"
When she dragged her fists off of him Mew put a hand on his chest and murmured, "You almost killed me now, geez...Just cause my heart's beating doesn't mean its back to full health..."
Mew took in a few deep breaths while Kairi pouted at him some more. He then gathered up the energy to stand and remark, "Why don't we get out of here and chat somewhere where its warmer, alright?"
Kairi silently nodded her head and with the two in agreement they made their way to the portal. At long last the nine Planetary Aurians had been defeated. Now there was nothing standing between them, and the man up top...
But right before they entered the portal Mew stopped for a moment and grumbled. He turned away slightly but the fact of the matter is he couldn't hide from Kairi that he was clutching his chest.
"Are you ok?" Kairi murmured, causing him to turn around and reply with a grin "Of course!" as he always would.
"Are you sure?" She asked again, squinting at him with her glazed over eyes.
Mew grunted and nearly put his hand back on his chest, then with a casual wink and smile told her, "Yes, absolutely!"
He then tried to dismiss the topic by going right for the portal, but Kairi wasn't going to drop it. He was clearly forcing himself to keep going because of course he would, Gravitus is just up ahead. And from the power he displayed, as much as it pained her to admit it, he was the best shot of beating that man.
But with the time of confrontation being nigh Kairi was more worried about seeing Mew go to the fight. In the heat of battle she declared Mew as her friend. She said that. Those words came out of her mouth. Even if Mew didn't hear her she couldn't take it back, these feelings of concern for someone she wished the death of only a few days prior.
Fighting Gravitus was something she had waited and prepared herself for for two years and now...She was wanting to wait just a little longer, just to make sure Mew was ready for the fight. He was a tough nut to crack, but if she didn't say anything then that nut'd be cracked in two and this time there'd be no mending it.
"I...have to say something!" She determined. Though what that'd be, exactly, was something she wasn't sure of as she walked into the portal.
Next Time: Reflections of...