Set in game. When Presea attacked Alice at Altamira.
A Season in Hell
Decus was having a really bad day. First of all, he wasn't able to fulfill his mission; in second place he had been sent to the earth temple through a demonic portal that Ratatosk had made. A stalker, cry-baby brat like him didn't deserve such powers. It was completely unfair. It was frustrating to see how years of hard training to be the perfect bodyguard were useless against a brat who barely was able to wave a sword and hadn't trained in his whole life, just because he had had some kind of crazy luck. He and Alice had worked very hard to become who they were, and now two kids were able to stand against them just because Martel had smiled at them. The goddess had a weird sense of humor. And in third place he got lost in the Lezareno's exphere mines.
However if Decus had known what he would find when he arrived to Altamira, he wouldn't have cared for those little setbacks.
Decus was finally arriving to Altamira when his cell phone began to sound. "Hi my lovely princess, you don't know how happy I am to be able to hear your sweet voice" "So you succeed!" "Well I had some problems in the mines and I got lost but" "Well yeah, I understand but" "No, no! I'm not trying to make excuses." "Sorry… I completely forgot about it, I didn't take any exphere" "Yeah? Really!? A date!" "Well, you know, what would you call two people in a romantic underground mine searching for expheres?" "Well… I guess that makes sense too. Though I love the idea anyway" "Yep… In thirty minutes" "OK. You know Alice… I'm really happy to see that you have chosen me for-- Alice? Alice!?" Decus closed the caller. "Weird, I guess she has lost the signal."
(…)
Once, if I remember rightly, my life was a feast where all hearts opened, and all wines flowed. One evening I sat Beauty on my knees. And I found her bitter. And I reviled her. I armed myself against Justice. I fled. O sorceresses, O misery, O hatred, it was to you my treasure was entrusted! I managed to erase all human hope from my mind.
(…)
When Decus arrived at Altamira he saw what it seemed to be a pool of coagulated blood, but he didn't give to it any notice. After all it was the Vanguard and death was something he had become used seeing.
When he entered in the newly acquired base he saw a group of members having a conversation. They seemed a little nervous.
"I didn't expect what happened to Hawk." One of the soldiers said.
"No… It was really tragic," A woman said almost crying. "He really was a great superior."
"Yeah." Said other soldier in a sad voice, but he suddenly cheered up. "Did you hear what has happened to Alice? I can't believe it! I thought that Martel was never going to tend my prayers!"
"The truth is that the bitch deserved it!" a blonde woman said. "I know is wrong but… I- I wish she dies!"
"Hawk already said it." Other soldier said. "Someone like her was only tempting death. It was just a matter of time. The karma finally did its job." He finished smiling proudly.
"Yeah… And don't say that it was wrong to wish death upon someone like her. After all, if there is someone in the world who deserved that; that person is Alice. I only hope she doesn't survive." One of them said. "By the way… Do you know who the idiot was who warned the hospital wing?"
"Yeah. I think it was Richter who found her, but I really don't know why. As far as I know Richter didn't get along with Alice. I would have let her dead by blood lost. It's the painful kind of death that someone like her deserves."
"Yep… If he had let her there, she would be dead now, and we wouldn't need to wait to know if--" but before he ended the sentence, one of his companions stomped his foot. "Ow! What was that for? What's wrong with you!?"
The soldier pointed behind him. "Decus." She whispered.
"Decus?" He asked. "Well… Yeah, he has been a little weird lately." The woman denied with her head. "Oh… You mean that he'll be sad. Yeah… Poor guy."
All the soldiers looked at him in disbelieve.
"What? What's wrong? I know Decus, is very plausible."
"What's very plausible?" The leader of the espionage division asked.
The soldier froze when he heard the voice. Normally he wouldn't have been scared. Decus was known for being much more comprehensible than his companions: Brute, Richter or the most feared one, Alice. But lately, scaring rumors were being heard all throughout the Vanguard. Rumors about Decus beating his own soldiers until they were almost dead.
"Ah, hmmm…well, you see…" The soldier swallowed. "We have had an accident." He had to choose his words if he didn't want to end hurt, so he decided to find some help in his companions. "Right, partners?" But when he turned his head, there was no one to be seen.
"Well. I don't really care." Decus said in good mood. "Have you seen your leader? Alice and I have something to do." He said smiling and winking.
"Well, I'm sorry to be the one telling you this but… Alice has suffered a terribly attack and she is now being attended to."
Decus' world stopped. It just stopped. He couldn't believe what he had heard. "What!?" His mind was just unable to process the information.
"Someone attacked her from behind."
"No," Decus stepped back. "No, not to Alice… It can't be." He began to breath faster and harder as some tears come out of his eyes.
Decus pushed the guard aside and began to run, trampling anyone who was in his way. He finally grabbed a soldier by the collar and lifted him some inches from the ground.
"Where is it!?"
"What!?" De soldier asked in fear.
"The hospital wing! Where is it!?"
"D—down-- downstairs sir."
The purple-haired released the soldier and ran downstairs. Due the hurry and the fact that his vision blurred with tears he wasn't able to see correctly and stumbled, falling rolling down the stairs. But that didn't stop him.
"ALICE!"
He kept running until he saw some people dressed with white coats. The closer he was the more afraid he felt.
"No…no way…" He choked, denying what his eyes saw. "Alice…"
He entered in the room, pushing aside anyone who was between him and his beloved. "Out of my way!"
Terrified and impotent. Those were the only words to describe how he felt when he saw her. Her eyes were closed, her smile gone. Her once pink face had lost all its life and was as pale as the sheets that covered her body. The blossoming and full of life flower she once was, was now dying before his eyes and there was nothing he could do but grab her hand and cry pathetically, pleading for her life. He couldn't stop repeating the same sentence over and over again: "I failed you. This is all my fault!"
A doctor grabbed his shoulder. "We are not done yet." Decus looked at him. "Even though we had already healed her wounds, she has lost lots of blood." Decus looked desperate. "We'll do as much as we can. But right now we need you to stay outside and let us do our work. Do you understand?" Decus seemed to be out of the world. "Do you understand!?" The doctor asked a second time.
He rose up, looking at her one more time before leaving room, walking slowly. He sat on the floor outside the room. "Why? Why her and not me!? Why do you keep doing those things to her!? Haven't you already have enough fun with her disgraces?"
Decus keep silently cursing and demanding answers until he saw two familiar boots followed by a dark brown suit and a long red mane. His blood began to boil.
Richter entered in a room and as soon as he closed the door, he heard it open again. "I don't remember asking you to follow me." He said arrogantly not even bother to look who was. "Why are you here!?"
"You!" Decus said in a dangerous voice. "You are the culprit... This is all your fault!"
"What are you babbling about?"
"How can you act like that!" Decus ran toward Richter lifting his arm, ready to punch him. The half-elf was barely able dodged the attack, but before Decus was able to launch other hit Richter grabbed his arm and immobilized him on the floor.
"It's not my fault that the fool was so careless!" He shouted already joining the pieces in his mind.
But Decus didn't want to hear his explanations. "I won't tolerate you talking so disrespectfully about her in my presence!" Alice was half dead and Richter didn't seem to be concerned about her. "How could you! Don't you dare insult her!"
Decus twisted violently his body. Richter couldn't believe it. "Is he going to break his own arm!?"
*CLACK*
With his right elbow dislocated Decus was able to move enough to nudge Richter's face with his left arm, making him step back a few feet. Before the half-elf was able to recover, Decus kneed him in the stomach.
"Everything was going fine until we meet you!" Decus shouted, graving his own elbow in pain.
Richter furiously pushed Decus against the wall and pressed his face against it. "My patience has a limit, and you have surpassed it!"
"You filled her head with that bullshit!" Decus shouted trying to move. "It is all your fault! And the Vanguard! Our lives were fine until we meet you and your damn organization!"
"No one forced her to join us!" Richter was fighting to keep him immobilized. "And you followed her!"
"I just joined to protect her! And- and- and…" Decus couldn't keep it any longer. "And I wasn't there…" He stopped forcing against Richter and knelt, breaking in tears.
"I- I- I pro- pro… I promised her…" His words where choked by the tears. He wasn't even able to talk properly. "I promised her that I would be always at her side!" He screamed full of rage.
Decus rose up violently. Richter put a defensive position but this time the target wasn't him but his sword. Decus took Richter's sword and aimed his own heart.
"I'm a failure! If I can't protect her, I don't deserve to live!" Decus proclaimed aloud with tears all over his face.
Richter knew he wasn't joking. But it didn't make sense. All the time he has spend with the purple-haired guy was enough to know what he was able to do but this was too much even for him. Richter couldn't help but believe that it has something to do with the secondary effects of the absence of Solum's Core. Richter reacted as soon as Decus closed his eyes to stab himself. With one hand he took the weapon and punched him as fast as he could with the other.
Decus fell to the ground. He felt pathetic, he wasn't even able to kill himself successfully.
"Stand up!" Richter shouted angrily. "That's how you solve your problems? Running away like a coward!?" If there was something that Richter hated more than anything else, it was suicide. Only cowards kill themselves to run away from their problems. There is no honor in the suicide, just cowardice.
"Shut it up!" Decus shouted getting up. "Stop talking like you knew everything! Is too easy to talk like that when you don't love anyone! How could you know how I feel!? YOU HAVE NO IDEA OF WHAT IT'S TO BE NEAR TO LOSE THE ONE YOU LOVE!"
*CLACK*
"Aaaaah!"
Richter repositioned his elbow to shut him up. He was about to shout again when he remembered something that happened to him a few years ago. Then he understood how he felt.
"Believe it or not, I do." He said in a serious and melancholic voice. "I lost someone dear to me. That's why I know that you won't get anything by killing yourself!" Decus looked at him in disbelieve. "How will you protect her in the future if you kill yourself here!?"
"What… How was I even able to think to do something like that? What the hell is wrong with me?" He muttered holding his head back to his senses. "How could I've been so selfish…"
"Be strong and hold the pain!" Richter encouragingly said. "But you already know this, don't you?"
Decus dried his tears with his arm and left the room, not without looking back before leaving. "Thank you."
Richter just nodded. "I'm sure that it wasn't him. That reaction was caused by Solum's Core… If those attacks keep growing, we might need to take drastic actions." He thought.
Once Decus left the room Aqua appeared before the half-elf.
"Are you OK Master Richter?" The Centurion asked concerned.
"Yeah…"
She wasn't really convinced by his answer and she knew how much he dislike talk about his past. Bad memories. So she decided to change the subject.
"Nice speech by the way!" She said, trying to cheer him up. It didn't work. "I thought you disliked people like Decus."
"Not at all." He sincerely answered. "He seems to be just a lap dog. But no one put that chain to him. He did it himself and gave it to only one person."
"Chain yourself, be chained… You wear a chain anyway. Is there any difference?"
"One as big as hell and heaven…"
(…)
On the roads, on winter nights, without shelter, without clothing, without bread, a voice would clutch my frozen heart: 'Weakness or strength: with you it's strength. You don't know where you're going or why you're going: go everywhere, react to everything. They won't kill you any more than if you were a corpse.'
(...)
Decus was going to Alice's room with a book under his arm when he accidentally kicked a vanguard member's mask. Carefully he picked it up and kept going to his destination.
The mask was broken and it had some dry blood. He didn't care a lot about all this war, and he only joined the Vanguard to be near Alice and prove himself to her, but he wondered how many people have died for this. Most of the vanguard soldiers had families, friends, and some of them even had children. They fought for what they thought it was right, as anyone else, but some people saw them as monsters, and so they killed them like they weren't even humans. Decus wondered what kind of person could be so egocentric to kill others and think that they were the good ones. They were selfish, that was their excuse. What kind of person could do anything for their ideals as they did and consider themselves less selfish than them. But Decus already knew those people. They were too proud of themselves to see any other point of view but their own. He didn't blame them for what they did, they were just as them, but he hated to see how they thought so high of themselves, as if they were better than anyone else. Alice was right, they were just hypocrites.
"I guess that kill someone faceless makes it all easier for them." Decus said casually throwing the mask to the dump.
Decus finally arrived to the room when a doctor stopped him. "Sir, are you Decus?"
"Yes I'm. Why?"
"OK. Sorry, I'm new and I don't know all the faces." He answered, smiling. "Well Alice signed that no one but Decus should be able to enter in her room if she was unconscious or badly wounded. Just to be sure: What is your surname?"
Decus looked at him with a weir look. "It's a long story but we-- Alice and I don't have surnames."
"OK. Good answer. I just wanted to be sure. And don't worry, she'll be fine." The young doctor said leaving the room.
Decus finally entered in the room and took a seat beside his beloved. Though she still was unconscious, her skin had almost recovered its full color. He took out his right glove and tenderly caressed her soft cheek. He hated himself for taking advantage of her. He could have kissed her lips, but he didn't want to steal a kiss from her when she was like that.
He kept looking silently at her for some more time. Finally he took the book out he brought with him.
Since Alice was little, she had always liked reading books. Maybe because it helped her to avoid the cruel reality of the orphanage. Decus remembered that Alice's love for reading began with: The three musketeers. Book that Decus decided to read to her for all the nights. He smiled when he remembered Alice's smile and laughs when he dramatized the story with voices (one different for each character: D'Artagnan, Aramis, Athos, Porthos…) and performances. Maybe one of the few memories of that place that deserved to be remembered.
Decus had a hard time trying to find a book to read. It took him some time: The red and the black, War and Peace, The three musketeers… Until he finally decided for one: A season in hell by Arthur Rimbaud.
Decus then began to read the book to make her know that she wasn't alone.
Time passed and he kept reading without noticing that two golden eyes were nowlooking at him.
Maybe it was due all the drugs but she actually was liking it. It had been too long since Decus narrated something for her but she couldn't blame him for that. As he kept reading memories of the orphanage came back to her mind. When they were together, when she didn't need to deny what she felt, when she still had hope.
Suddenly she yawned. When Alice noticed it she put her hands over her mouth but it was already too late.
"Alice! You are finally are awake!" Decus said throwing the book and standing up ready to hug her. "I was really worried about you."
"Wow, wow, wow! Not so fast Dumbo-Decus!" She exclaimed back to her senses moving to the opposite side of the bed. "I'm not that bad."
Decus was disappointed by Alice's reaction but after all this time he hadn't expect a much better treatment. Besides, her well being was more than enough to make him smile and one more rejection wasn't enough to get him down.
Alice sat up in the bed, ready to leave.
"Need some help?"
"Why should I need any- aaaaaaah!" When she put her feet on the floor she almost fell. Her legs couldn't stand her own weigh if it wasn't for Decus, who was fast enough to catch, her she would have had a painful fall.
"Alice. You okay?" Decus asked lifting her and putting her arm around his shoulder.
"Yeah. If I see Hawk I'll teach him two or three things."
"Alice…" Decus said in an unusually serious voice. "Hawk is dead."
"What!?" Alice asked, not believing his words. "Hawkie has been killed?"
"We don't know who did it. He was stabbed at the back." Decus knew Alice didn't care a lot about her pets, but she really didn't like to see anyone breaking her toys. "When he was found, he had already lost a lot of blood. They couldn't do anything."
Alice looked sad for a second. "I can't believe that idiot let himself be killed so easily."
"I'm sorry."
Alice looked annoyed. "Don't be! There is nothing to be sorry about. That's what happens when you are weak."
Decus was worried. He hated seeing Alice like that. He knew that those kinds of events only pushed her further in her search of power. And he couldn't help but think that something really bad, worst than any other thing that had happened to her, was going to happen. And he was afraid, afraid of not being able to do anything about it.
Decus helped Alice to leave the room but after looking the sight that some Vanguard soldiers were giving to them, Alice left Decus and tried to walk by herself. "I can do it alone," she said. Walking weirdly, she headed to the exit.
Alice continued her path until she was out of the building.
She kept walking in the darkness, only illuminated by the dim moon's light until she arrived to the beach. The smell of the sea matching with the sound of the swinging waves was reassuring.
She didn't know what to think anymore. She had been denying it for far too long. To him, to herself. She thought that maybe if she kept denying it, the feelings would somehow just disappear. She had been wrong. She treated him like trash trying to prove that she didn't feel anything for him. But each day keep that farce was more and more difficult.
"Alice…" Alice didn't notice that Decus had been approaching.
"I already told you. I'm fine." She said, annoyed. "He just died for being weak."
Decus come closer to her, closer than usual. But this time Alice didn't complain about it. Maybe she didn't notice, maybe she didn't really care. "I've been thinking about it and-- and I want to quit."
Alice looked at him. The moonlight illuminated her porcelain skin as the breeze caressed her frail hair. "What are you talking about?"
"I want to leave the Vanguard," He said looking at her honey eyes. "And I want you to leave it with me."
"I won't." She said with conviction. "I'm not going to run away just because things are getting difficult."
"I don't want to see how you put your life in danger." Decus didn't want to argue with her, but it seemed the only way. "I'm sure that there must be other ways to gain power."
"And what do you want me to do!? Do you want me to hide!?" She asked indignantly. "I need that power. Don't you see what happens to the weak? It doesn't matter what Martmart and hers stupid companions say. Those hypocrites--" She said, hate filling voice. "It doesn't matter what they say, even they use the power to do what they want. They just kill people because they believe that their motivations are better. I won't let them do that to me!" Her hand closed in a fist. "I'm not going to let a gang of pretentious idealists tell me how to live my life. I haven't got so far to surrender now."
"But Alice-- What if something happens to you." He said almost pleading. "You don't need to push yourself so far."
She looked at Decus. "Do you believe that the goddess will do anything for us!? Do you think that if the goddess existed she would have let my parents to die, quartered by monsters!? Did she ever answer to your prayers when all the other kids abused you at the orphanage Decus!? Did she!?" Decus began to feel ashamed. "When everyone abused us just for being different, did anyone help us!? No! No one did!" Decus could feel some sadness in Alice's angered voice. "Go ahead. Run away as a coward! I don't care!" The voice was sadder each time. "Turn your bak. Betray me." she said in an almost inaudible voice.
It happened all too fast that she didn't know how to react. A second ago she was free, and now she was between Decus arms.
"I would die for you." He whispered softly. "I would turn my back to the world for you Alice."
Though Decus couldn't see it her eyes were wide open. Her mind and her heart were fighting in an epic battle as tears were trying to come out of her eyes. Between his arms she felt secure, she felt full, she felt warm, she felt loved. "Decus…" But at the same time she began to feel weak, vulnerable, almost at his merci. The panic began to take over her mind and with a fast movement, she left his embrace and pushed him away and slapped him with all her might. She slapped him so hard that her hand began to burn. But he deserved it for making her feel like that. "How dare you." Alice said pointing Decus, who was now touching his cheek with his trembling hand. "Don't come close to me. I- I hate you." She finished as she left the place, running without looking back.
Decus looked at the sky for an answer. As soon as he did it a raindrop wet his face and in less than thirty seconds, it began to rain. He looked at the sky with hate and screamed until he couldn't sceam anymore.
Alice stopped for a second but kept walking soon again, erasing all her thoughts and refusing even having it. She wasn't going to be weak.
(…)
"'Priests, professors, masters, you're wrong to hand me over to justice. I've never been part of this race. I've never been a believer: I'm of the race that sings under torture: I don't understand the law: I've no moral sense, I'm a brute: you're wrong…' Yes, I've shut my eyes to your light."
(…)
Decus just kept kneeling looking now to the moist sand and a frenzied sea. He was completely soaked but he didn't care, he just kept punching they sand. "Damn it!" And then, when he wasn't expecting it, someone softly kicked him. When he turned his head he saw a moist, annoyed, and irritated face looking at him.
"Hey! Come on." Alice ordered frowning. "Stop being a drama queen and stand up! This isn't a teenager story."
Decus smiled. She wasn't being kind. But at least she cared enough to come back for him.
"Stop looking at me like a lap dog." She said already leaving him.
Decus quickly rose up and ran after her. "It must be truth! The Iron-Maiden is working. Only twenty more days!" He finished in a dreamy singsong voice.
"Keep dreaming… Just don't come any closer."
She didn't know what to think. Her mind was a mess, but she still had a lot of time to rearrange her mind. Besides, in the good times and in the bad ones he had, and he always will be with her. And deep down, she was thankful for that.
Author notes:
1º
Now something curious about Alice and why I called the fic A season in hell. These are the names some Alice's attacks:
-The red and the black.
-A Season in Hell.
-War and Peace.
Do you know what they have in common? I'm sure some of you have already noticed it. The three are famous classics books. Also Alice's pets: Aramis, Athos and Porthos; are named as The three musketeers. It seems that Alice liked to read. So I decided to call this chapter "A season in Hell" in honor of my favourite Alice's attack and to this great book. I put some phrases of this book to separate the events instead of a line.
Other hint about Alice's attacks. Not all are book names like these:
-Exalted Flesh and Blood. (Erhöhtes Fleisch Und Blut)
-Winter daydreams.
Those are two are two famous classics musical compositions:Exalted flesh and blood (Erhöhtes Fleisch Und Blut) was composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. And Winter daydreams byPyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky.
Alice is an interesting character.
Reviews.