I'm sorry D8
Really guys, with all the document transfers in computers and whatnot, I thought I lost this chapter. Found it though.
Sorry for leaving you guys hanging for so long. I'm not a good updating writer, I'm a bad example for fanfic writers everywhere!
Hope you enjoy this chapter though. It's slowly revealing more of the actual plot.
I own none of the characters you've already encountered in Princess Tutu.
Fakir woke up to the white of the ceiling of the hospital room, itching to get up and train again. He was getting slow, and he needed a serious fall back into his daily routine.
"Fakir, don't push yourself too hard." Mythos reminded, suddenly emerging from behind the medicine cabinet.
Fakir sighed. "When did you become the mother hen?" "I'm just saying, is all. You're recovering so just let it slide for a little while longer. In the meantime." Mythos said reasonably. "You're right." Fakir said.
Mythos looked back at the knight and saw him staring out the window past the scenery lit by the waking dawn.
"Anything wrong, Fakir?"
"No. I just thought I saw a flying alligator." Fakir said simply, not a hint of sarcasm in his tone. Not that it mattered; the statement was quite irrational in itself, so even an idiot could tell that he just escaped the question.
"Ah, Mythos... Tell me, what do you think of Princess Tutu?" Fakir asked suddenly.
It had been a week since the incident, neither had they seen nor heard from the Princess. She disappeared, just as she always had, and although there was joy in Kinkan for the return of their warriors and beloved leaders, both had fallen into a thoughtfulness that could not be figured.
"I love her, Fakir." Mythos said simply, looking at Fakir as though he had asked the simplest thing in the world. (which, to Mythos, was)
Fakir sighed. "Even if she won't tell you who she is, and even if she keeps running off?" Fakir wondered aloud. Even if you don't know her, you still claim to love her?
"I will leave it to her to decide when she tells me. I trust her with all my heart Fakir, or at least as much of my heart that I possess now. I really... I really need her to complete me." Mythos said solemnly.
Fakir had no response to that.
"I'll go back to sleep, if that's what you want." Fakir said, lying back down on the clinic bed. "The rest will do you good, Fakir." Mythos said soothingly, with a small smile.
The smile at least lifted Fakir's spirits slightly, but his mind still plagued him with the thought of her always crossing his sight.
Ahiru...
"The pulse is regular. Set the temperature 1.2 degrees lower to adjust. Condition is stable." Said the mechanical monotone.
She set the levels carefully, watching the specimen's soft visible lines floating in the tank. Tutu had wanted to do this for a long time, and she wanted everything to go well.
The specimen seemed fine at the moment, developing steadily and requiring her patience for its long overdue development process.
She sighed, thinking about Ahiru, about how the duck girl hadn't come out for the last week since the incident. She had had no black outs, neither had she gotten the tunnel vision she was used to when Ahiru used their body, and so she decided to try coaxing her beloved other out.
Sooner or later she'd have to face it. Either this experiment would be a success or it wouldn't. Tutu just hoped for both their sakes that she could cross her fingers for everything to go right here.
The house was empty, open to all the world but noticed by no one. Fakir tried to be cautious, but there really was nothing threatening around. It was just... empty.
Fakir didn't know what he wanted to do by then. Mythos could very well start the plans to defeat the Raven, and everything would probably go well. That had been his goal all along, right?
So then why...
"Huh?" Fakir turned, looking around but seeing only woodland. It didn't... it wasn't supposed to make sense, but he followed the natural flow like a leaf in the river, walking to where he found a lake.
He stooped over and looked at his unwavering reflection in the clear water. And then he saw the figure in the mist. It was like a dream. She was a spectre dancing on the glass, to no effect but the tiniest of ripples fading away quickly. IFind me.../i
"Oh." Fakir turned around quickly, the dreamlike state broken when an apple rolled on the wood and hit his foot.
And there she was. The two stood silently, staring between but never at each other, letting the air do the moving for them while they just stood paralyzed.
Fakir picked up the apple. "I was wondering how you were doing." He said, wiping it on his shirt and walking over.
Ahiru, as sure as Fakir was that it was her, took it from his hand, and slowly smiled, uncertain at this turn of events. "Ah, how did you-" "You left the door open, you moron." Fakir chided. "You should be more careful of your possessions."
Ahiru stepped, taken aback. "Ah-Well I- Uh- I thought you might come back so I-" She didn't even bother to finish, her stuttering besting her speech. Fakir got the point.
"You didn't have to. I didn't think you might." Fakir said, his voice even.
"I'm sorry. Don't call me a moron." Ahiru muttered, her words returning his statement defensively.
"Anyway... It's not safe for you to stay here." Fakir said bluntly. Ahiru didn't ask why; she knew at least that much. She had waited, in fact, for something bad to come after her, after all she'd done, but it was all her luck that made it so that Fakir had come before the bad things.
"I know, but... It's not like I have anywhere else. I never really had any relatives. Tutu did, but well... Ah, I can't say. Well, I don't know. I mean, I know but I don't-" "Don't hurt yourself." Fakir interrupted, an almost sheepish, amused look on his face.
"Huh?"
"You stumble on your words so much, you might hurt your head." Fakir supplied dryly.
Ahiru might have argued, but she just smiled, smiled for all it was worth, now that Fakir was here again. Fakir saw the look and turned away, hoping that the heat of his face was just from the noontime sun.
"You can stay with us. We have a place you can stay." He continued.
Ahiru looked doubtful. "I don't think they'd want me there." She murmured.
"Don't sweat over the small things. No one knows what you do, all right? It's not my place nor anyone's to judge. You saved Mythos in your own way, and you shouldn't forget that." Fakir said seriously, taking her hand in his calloused one.
Then he transferred that hand to her shoulder, which he squeezed in a mildly comforting way, earning a small smile from the shorter redhead.
The standards for living in Kinkan were excessively depleted, but the town was content and happy, even, especially when the Prince came to each house to help however he could. He was the same, and yet an entirely different person as well. This was a decidedly good thing, the town mused.
Fakir arrived back at the gate of Kinkan, a high wall where nothing short of a jet plane could cross. Something that the Raven could probably acquire, sure, but the townspeople were much more cautious than that. Once one crossed that wall, they would find nothing more than a ruined city.
The townspeople themselves, though, had a different way of crossing. Fakir reached into his pocket and took out a green stone, fitting it into the carving of a jester on an old wall's face, the wall itself in ruin and hidden by the thick green of the forest.
Once he did so, the stone began to move, and a secret passage opened up for them. Ahiru looked into the darkness apprehensively. "It's okay. I'll be right behind you." Fakir assured.
Ahiru slowly descended, step by careful step. There wasn't a single light shed in the first flight down, but as they went along, it stopped at a dead end.
"Huh-"
"Why is a raven like a writing desk?" The sudden question reverberated all around them but Ahiru couldn't place where it was coming from.
"I know that riddle." She murmured. "I's not supposed to have an answer."
She couldn't see Fakir's face, but almost sensed the strange knowings his presence entailed. "Why not?" Fakir responded.
"Indeed." And the wall before them vanished like nothing. Ahiru balked. It wasn't a hologram; she'd bumped into it solidly enough to be sure. But it seemed...
"Come on." And they stepped into black light.
Now Ahiru could see as they descended, the little she needed to, her yellow shirt neon in the dark light. They moved on, until Ahiru could see the light at the end, soon giving way to a town.
"Ah... Where are we?" She asked in wonder.
"Golden Crown."
Mythos was gone. That was the first sign.
The Midsummer sect escaped the trailing ravens easily, hiding in the trees, silent and watching. Hermia, on orders, had collected information, something she urgently had to bring back to Kinkan. This... this could change everything.
She hurried on with her two companions, their small group running swiftly toward the ruins, an item in hand. Her chestnut red hair fluttered slightly with each leap she took to hurry back, and out of her peripheral, she saw something hurtling at them.
She jumped out of the way, only in time as the black and red raven soldier tried to tackle her. She glared the black-suited enemy down, emerging from her inner pockets some small weapons, getting into defensive position.
The raven looked up. She stopped.
"No... no-"
"Prince, there you are! We were worried!" Arakumi chided, putting a hand on the shoulder of the sleeping man.
He was laying on an old bench in one of the unused churches, white hair and blouse flecked with the gray of dust. The large woman Arakumi shook her head. "Honestly, coming all the way here." She extended her anteater claws and pulled him up, carrying him out of the church without waking him.
"Really now..." She looked down. Her eyes widened.
Mythos held his chest with a pained expression, blood on his fingers. "My Prince!"
"He's not hurt. That blood...well, I don't know where it might have come from. Mythos doesn't blee- he's not hurt. Thank you, Miss Arakumi." said the doctor.
"Yes, Doctor." The anteater woman left without another word, but she looked back for a moment in worry.
The Doctor (for he was known by no other name) looked down at the sleeping Prince. His brows were knit in pain and his sleep was less than comforting, but he wouldn't be snapped out of it. It seemed that he was in another world entirely.
The Doctor had already cleaned his hands of the blood, collecting a sample in case. He tested it while Mythos began to toss in the bed slightly, moaning somewhat.
"No- don't do it- I can't hurt- no!" He lashed out, his flailing arm upturning a medical tray. The Doctor grabbed his one arm then the other, opting to use the restraints to keep him steady.
Mythos kept struggling, but not so much as to hurt anyone. His blows were unusually weak, and his face retained a pained expression.
The Doctor returned to the tested vial of blood. It had tested human.
The Doctor looked back to Mythos, only to see that his hands, once again, were stained with blood.
"Thirty two percent progress."
A/N:
For now that's it. I don't know when or what I'll update with. Sorry guys.