My Immortal

Why bother starting out with "Once upon a time"? This all happened fairly recently, about a year ago in fact. My family was killed, I was targeted by a sorcerer and the only one who could save me died… multiple times. This may seem strange to you, it was to me too at first, but I guess it's rather complicated to explain. At the very least I can tell you my story. The story of a girl named Emiko who grew on a farm just outside the city limits, and how she became me.

About a year ago I was just like any other peasant, working for her share of profit on a farm my family owned just outside the city of Dragon Mouth. Day after day, night in and out I dreamed of something more, something to drag me away from this place that held me by the throat. I would usually spend my evening's enjoying my dinner in solitude as I starred at the bright luminance of the moon. That is, only HE came… I heard a shot in the distance that night. A faint glow caught my attention on the far side of town. It slowly started growing as it seemed to move closer and closer to the farm. The city had caught fire and the sound of gun shots rang through my head louder each time before the cities sirens started echoing through the night! My door flew open while Michelle ran in to grab my wrist.

"We have to go!" She yelled dragging me out the door. Why was she so frantic? Michelle never loses her cool…ever! I started to panic something is happening and I need to know what. I ripped away from my sisters' hold and dashed out the door running forward into the fields.

"Emiko, get back here! We need to go now!" I ignored her calls as my curiosity got the best of me. What can I say? Curiosity killed the cat, and I needed to know what was going on. The rest was a blur. I remember hearing the animals scream when a shadow appeared from nowhere a faint, vile laugh to match sinister yellow eyes; and watching my sister go white as I heard a shot… the rest was black. Total darkness as I heard talking, but no words, and shout, but no sound. I fell deeper into this strange abyss and I just couldn't bring myself to even lift a finger. So I let it take me, this strange darkness.

I awoke the next morning to a glaring sun, and nothing more. I groaned when the yellow rays pierced through my opening eyes. Giving my eyes a moment to adjust I realize that I felt cold and wet. I then noticed that I was lying in the field, immediately scenes from the previous night flooded my head. The terrifying screams and those eyes… the same shade as the now bright sun. I scrambled to my feet only to fall back down into a sickening mush. Looking down I saw that the once fertile dirt was now soiled with blood, but whose? My blood? I'm not injured, I think. The wetness I felt… it was blood, my own, dried down my leg. My chest felt sore and empty. The next thing that crossed my mind was my family. I ignored the pain as I ran to the house. Although it was untouched on the outside the kitchen and bedrooms were burned to a crisp.

"Mother!" I screamed. I ran though the house searching for the slightest hope that someone was near… or at least alive…

"Father! Michelle!" I was scared, more than I ever had been in my entire life. The house was empty so I returned to the field. I remember Michelle was in the field with me so I retraced my steps. Although I wish I hadn't. I found Michelle, pale, cold, and life less. I cried. I heard her scream from last night as I heard the gunshot again; it all played in slow motion, forcing me to watch… but something was wrong. Her body was clean, no blood, no dirt. She wasn't shot. Not a single wound was on her body. How? This is my fault, had I followed her to begin with she'd still be alive. Mother… I said a prayer for Michelle and apologized multiple times, too many to count. I need to find mother and father. With that I stood to come face to face with the brightest blue eyes I had ever seen.

"Yo." said the man in front of me. Rage boiled inside of me. How in the world could he be so calm when my sister was dead in front of me? He was tall, pale, and had shoulder length hair the color of fire. Black pants and white turtle neck sleeveless padded shirt and a blood red belt with a pistol and a katana. He had stitches up his arms and black wraps around his arms.

"Who are you? And where is my family?" I tried not to sound too pissed although I was pretty close to punching him.

"Dead." My heart broke. Into thousands of pieces I could probably never find again.

"D-dead?" I asked, tears welling up in my eyes.

"Dead." He repeated. I broke, down into nothing. My thick brown hair stuck to my face as the tears flowed. They were gone; I didn't even think to ask him how he knew. I just fell to the ground and cried.

When the tears stopped, I'm not really sure, but none the less, facts caught up with me. I'm here with a stranger claiming my family is dead and I never bothered to ask why. For all I knew he could have been the one who killed them. I stood up straight and landed a hard punch in his jaw; he didn't even flinch or stumble, just chuckled and took my hand.

"Why so upset, Em?" He asked in an almost flirty voice. Jerk…

"Don't call me that! It's Emiko to you!" I screamed and jerked my hand away. "Just who the hell are you? Why are you here? What happened? And how do you know my family is dead?" The questions just wouldn't halt, I needed to know.

"I saw the accident and tried to save them…I'm sorry I couldn't. You're city was attacked. So I came to help."

"Thanks but no thanks jerk! You didn't help at all! The only thing you're doing is succeeding in making me mad! Now who are you?" I was furious! He acted like nothing was wrong like the remains of the city weren't a grave, like my home wasn't a pile of ash and Michelle was still alive.

"My real name isn't for ears of a mortal." You could practically see the question marks floating around my head. Did he just say, mortal?

"Who are you…or…what are you?"

"Call me Reno, yo! I'm a demon. A fire demon to be more specific, dropped from the heavens when I fell in love with a human." He smirked and held out his hand. "Wonderful to finally meet you."

"Well, Reno, I don't need or want your help and it's not a pleasure to meet you." I know it was harsh but I wasn't in the mood to deal with some idiot pretending to be some holy being. He frowned suddenly very serious.

"Em, we need to leave. He will come back."

"Who?" I turned to face him.

"Sephiroth. The sorcerer who killed your family and destroyed this city, he knows you're alive and will come back to finish you off." He looked very serious, but I couldn't bring myself to believe him.

"You said you're a fire demon correct?" He nodded. "Then I will blame you for my home being in ashes. How do I know you are not this Sephiroth person?"

"Because if I were you wouldn't be breathing…" Okay yeah fair point but I still wasn't convinced, something was off about him. He sent chills up my spine and I couldn't bring myself to look into those blue eyes. He sighed before grabbing my arm and dragging me away from my house and sister.

"No! What are you doing? Stop it!" I started to kick and scream. "I'm not going anywhere! Especially not with you!" By this point Reno was getting annoyed.

"Do you want to live or not? You stay here and you will be now better off than your sister over there! Now unless you want the life sucked out of you I suggest you calm yourself and follow me!" I stopped, frozen in the fear and pain as heat shot up the arm he was holding. It burned like no other, seeming to tear my muscle apart and held my breath and bit my lip to fight back tears. I had to stay, right? I had a responsibility to revive the farm. But what would be the point? The city, its money, the shops, and all of its people were gone. Then again, this is my home, or rather was.

"Come with me, and I will protect you." He released my arm and stepped away. "Please?" What choice did I have? It's not like I had anything to lose. I looked back to my sister and waved goodbye hoping that somehow she would forgive me for leaving…

"Fine." Without missing a beat Reno grabbed my wrist one more, threw me on his back and started running. The burning sensation was back and on top of the heat, his hold on my wrist wasn't exactly gentle. Needless to say I was not happy. I kicked and screamed more flailing my legs and yelling at him to put me down. What pissed me off even more is that he seemed completely unfazed by this entire sheared. This little episode I was having lasted only a bit longer before everything went black again. I heard shouts, metal clinging on metal and the one sound that made me shudder, a gun being fired. Suddenly my mind was flashing with all the events that happened in the last 24 hours. Even something I had never seen before were playing. It was Reno, I saw him with wings… large black wings that were larger then him, sprouting out of his back; and his eyes, they weren't that impossible blue, they were a dark crimson. He was holding a short thin katana, the blade was no longer then his fore arm. His hair, it was unbelievable it grew longer and flowed like a river of fire. The scar on his cheek was new as well, and none of this was making any sense. Everything went black again.

The next I knew I was cold. All warmth had left me and that laugh had returned… that same evil laughter that I heard before my sisters cry, those bright yellow eyes that pierced through my very heart had opened before me and the shadow took form.

"Don't think you're safe human… Your precious angel can only protect you for so long…" the shadow let out a deep horse chuckle and disappeared, leaving me screaming in my sleep. I sat straight up sweating and panting as my eyes darted back and forth. A cave?

"Reno?" I searched the cavern for any sing of him, but there was none. "Reno!"

"Shhh, I'm hear, Em." The warmth flooded through my body as he appeared by my side. For a moment he actually looked like he meant good, like he actually care, then that stupid smirk crossed his face and any respect I had for the idiot demon had vanished.

"Where am I? And why did you grab me and run? Darn it all, Reno, what is going on?"

"Calm down princess! Least you could do is thank me for saving your life."

"What?" There was a silence. One of those awkward ones that people try to avoid. "You saved me?"

"Yeah, and it wasn't easy either man. Your not exactly as light as you look…umm… no offense. I mean it's just that-"

"Stop while you're ahead pyro."

"Right… sorry, yo." I sighed and laid back down on the cot I realized I was sitting on.

"Reno? What's going on? He turned a shade paler then I thought humanly possible, wait, scratch that he wasn't human. That silence stretched across the cave again. Then he suddenly spoke up.

"You're special. Your whole family is. There's only one way to kill a person like you. By sucking the very life out of your body… the sorcerer is very powerful; he can drain you of all your strength blood and life little by little one at a time, or as quickly as he pleases. Be happy. Your sister died quickly ditto with your parents.

You were his goal. You see, your family is…well, partially immortal. You have a certain number of lives. Each depending on your personality and intentions, and can very well change with time. Even if one of these lives weren't taken by age, murder, sickness, etc. they can be taken in anyway. They can even leave you if they feel danger and that they wont make it. It's strange. Anyway, you for some reason keep attracting lives, every semmi you cross-" "Semmi?" I asked. "Uh, yeah, half mortal. that's what we call your type. Anyway, every semmi you cross you take at least one life. You have far more lives then any other semmi and for that Sephiroth is furious. Legends says, 'that he who steals a thousands lives can never die' meaning you'll become purely immortal. It's never happened before and he wants it to stay that way. He wants to keep the semmies in line."

"You lost me…" I sighed and stared at the cavern ceiling it's hard to keep what he says in your mind. I wasn't really sure what all he was talking about. "So… I'm immortal?" I sat up again looking directly into his eyes.

"Not yet your not." then something struck me. He said I'd become immortal like him and that Sephiroth wants to keep us in line.

"Reno, are you working for Sephiroth?" with that he went cold and still, he didn't even blink and you could practically see the wheels turning in his head, debating whether to answer or not. Then finally, "Yes. All fallens do technically. He looks after us, and keeps us from…" he gulped. "from falling further down. If you know what I mean…"

Another sigh. "I'm afraid I don't follow Reno."

"He's a fallen himself. But unlike a lot of us it was on his own choice. It hurts him to see us leave or be forced out because he regretted it the second the gates to heaven closed. But he couldn't return. He doesn't want us to fall to the other side. To hell… he's actually helped some of us return to the heavens. However he himself can never go back. It's been to long."

"I'm afraid that doesn't explain why he's after me."

"He hates you. He hates all semmies. Because they can die and he can't, he's forced to walk this earth until it ends and even then he's forced back to the skies. He longs to give up his immortality, after all some of us, like me, are born an angel not all are just reborn followers of the Lord. He hates how mud-bloods can have the best of both worlds. Experience life after death, but can give it up just as easily.

"So, why doesn't he want me to be an immortal.?" some things were making sense to me, but not everything. I had about a million questions, but something told me I wasn't going to have them all answered tonight.

"Yow know, princess, I'm not really sure. " he turned to me and smirked. All happy and loose again like he was when I first met him. "For now lets just get some rest, agreed?" he rolled out a cot on the other side of the cave and I just glared at him. "Why are you calling me princess?"

"Well you need a nick name; Emiko is too long and you don't want me calling you Em apparently, so your new name is now princess." His smirk only grew.

"I think I prefer Em…" I pouted, why did he insist on making this a pain in the ass? I sighed and rolled over on my cot slowly drifting off to sleep, I heard Reno mumble a good night and I grunted in response.

That night my dreams brought me the darkness of the night before, it felt like so long ago yet it was only a good 24 hours or so. I squirmed at my sisters scream and woke up panting when those bright yellow eyes broke through. I looked around the cave, Reno was snoring softly and seemed to be knocked out; meanwhile the fire was still going strong. I was thankful for the fact that he could control fire so easily otherwise I probably would have froze in my sleep. I curled my knees to my chest and hugged them tightly. Even with the fire and it's controller I felt cold and empty, I didn't even know Reno and he seemed to know so much about me. I saw his katana and pistol laying by the fire; I must have been crazy for what happened next, but I needed to know if what he said was true. I picked up the pistol and pulled the trigger to my head. The shot rang through the cave and Reno immediately woke up and ran to my side catching my as I collapsed. I felt the blood and a sharp pain, but I was still alive! How?

"Damn it, Emiko! What were you thinking? You're such and idiot!" he grabbed the pistol from my hands and threw it on the other side of the cave quickly ripping a piece of cloth off his pants and pressing it to my temple. "I'm still alive?" I whispered, barely audio able.

"Yeah! Thank, God! What were you trying to prove princess?"

"You were telling the truth. I have more then one life…"

"Well one less now!" he sighed annoyed and put my hand to hold the cloth to my head. He then started digging through his pack and pulled out some gnaws and a liquid. "Hold still." he removed my hand and poured the clear substance on the cloth wiping away the dried blood and the wound. He then took the gnaws and rapped it around my forehead and back around to the wound.

"Listen to me, Em, you are not! I repeat, not! Going to do this again okay?" Why was he freaking out so much?

"O-Okay… I, I just needed to know."

"You don't trust me do you?" I shook my head, it hurt to tell him but why lie about that?

"No. I don't."

"It's okay I understand." he sighed again and sat back down on his cot. "Just don't do that again. Alright?" this time I nodded and laid back down as tears started to form. If that part of his story was true, what else was? I feel asleep that night crying softly and slept a dreamless sleep.