Episode 11: Division (Son)
Daisuke's blindfold had gotten stuffy, hot air pressing up against his eyes and keeping them from even opening slightly. Grendel's strong arms pinning his own behind his back prevented him from reaching up and adjusting the uncomfortable strip of fabric, and as the dark-skinned machine led him out of the limousine he stumbled on the step down. Ahead of him he could hear Trinity's lab coat swishing against her legs as she walked, could smell the stale ashes of her perpetual cigarette. Beyond the smoke he smelled something else—salt? The ocean. She'd taken him to a dock; listening, he detected the crashing of waves on piers. Oh, this was not good. He couldn't afford to get stranded at sea or whatever she was planning on doing to him.
Grendel stopped moving before Daisuke did, understandably, and so the young man tripped yet again. Ahead of him, Trinity had also stopped; he could no longer hear her heels click against the ground.
"Give him here, Grendel," the woman ordered, and Daisuke felt himself be passed over. Long nails bit into his arms as she held him tight; he heard the clicking of a cocked handgun and felt the barrel press into his temple. "That's so you don't move, honey," she assured him. "I don't want to have to shoot you."
"That's a relief," Daisuke replied, and the barrel pressed harder.
"Don't try me, though," she warned, then addressed her machine again. "Go ahead, Grendel. You know what to do."
He laughed the low grunts of a thug, and thundered off. In the distance Daisuke could hear a crash; someone screamed, and a shot was fired.
"The Celestials!" someone yelled. "Protect the Celestials!"
"Hey!" came another voice, and as more crashes were heard in Grendel's direction footsteps came dashing over. The gun was removed from his temple; he heard a shot, wincing, and the footsteps stopped. Trinity sniffed, and the gun returned to its original position.
"Let's go," she told him, and they started walking again. "Going up."
He felt himself be led up a ramp and onto a bobbing surface—a boat? Now the sounds of fighting were closer; he could hear Grendel laughing, and someone moaned in pain.
"They say they're so strong, but they don't even fight back," the android scoffed as the voice on the ground moaned again. A frightened murmur swept across the deck—how many people were here, anyway?
"What do you want?" asked a lone voice with strength left to speak, clarion amid the uneasy rumblings. Trinity shoved Daisuke forward, digging the gun even harder against his skin; he flinched.
"Is his mother here?" she demanded. "I want to make a bargain."
o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
The telemeter signal had moved, and no one knew what to make of its new location. Either J's system was no longer to be trusted at all, or...
"But this is great!" Monica protested as Kyoko fretted to herself. "Pictures of Celestials will be worth a lot! And I bet they won't fight back too hard either!"
"I just don't understand why, if he was imprisoned as Boma said, the people who captured him would take him to the Celestial ship," Kyoko pointed out. "And it's not going to be easy getting on that, either. Security is bound to be high."
"Dai got on," the small girl argued obtusely. "So it can be done."
Sighing, Kyoko shook her hair out and replaced her sunglasses. She wished Boma had decided to come with her group rather than help Giovanni look for Clair; he, at least, would have had no trouble breaking on. The werewolf couldn't really be blamed, she supposed, for not wishing to run the risk of discovery by the syndicate if he could help it, and she figured his failure to catch Clair's kidnapper had likely rankled his pride. He had also said something strange as he left with the bodyguard—said he felt like he'd known the girl from somewhere...
"Maybe we should wait until he leaves the ship," she proposed, and turned to Shun to see if the plan met with his approval.
But Shun was gone.
O0o0o0o0o0o0
Coward.
The word flew wasp-like after him as he pushed his way through the crowd; but he would not let it sting him, elbowing people out of the way in an attempt to catch up to the two companions hunting the second captive. The girls had J to defend them and to free Daisuke; one man with a handgun was hardly likely to turn the tide of war. But then...why had he even come, if not to save his brother? How serious was he, then, about slipping away afterwards, of trying to start anew?
Coward, the wasp buzzed. You already have. What are you doing right now? You're running away. They don't need you there either, and you don't even like Vampire. Forget them, you coward. You don't want to save them anyway. Go back to your brother and prove that Daisuke isn't the only Aurora who can save others instead of hurting them...
Yet how could he look his little brother in face now, knowing the deed had already been done, that he'd already turned away? And how could he, if the signal was correct...
His throat tightened, clenched in anger. No. If he went on that ship, if he saw them, there was no telling what he might do. It fit, somehow, in the warped world of his mind that they should keep him from his brother at last. Their carelessness in the face of those who cared...Daisuke had inherited that, hadn't he? And it infuriated him. To see his brother falling into the lackadaisical patterns of the scattered, selfish woman who had forsaken her greatest responsibility and instead pursued her own happiness...such apostasy from duty was unforgivable, and he did not wish to see it repeated in his only sibling.
But, damn it, wasn't he running from his responsibility now?
Stopping to gather his thoughts, Shun sat down on a bench along the street and tried to collect himself. He had three visible options, he decided: go after Daisuke, go after Clair, or run away entirely. The first option would prove his love and duty to his younger brother but perhaps throw him in the midst of the creatures he most detested; the second provided a way to perhaps save a bit of face and still see his brother again, but did not guarantee a happy reunion or even a reunion at all, should he fail in his primary objective (which seemed likely); the third denied all ties to the world tethering him in place and forcing him where he did not wish to go, including some ties he did not particularly want to break. Plus the guilt would be him forever, but in the face of his other options it was so tempting, so easy...
Was this how she had felt? he wondered suddenly. Torn between family and the man she loved, she broke off her chains before they broke her instead? For a moment he felt a brief, potent stab of sympathy; then his mind and soul hardened, and he stood. He would never take the path she had chosen. He would not fall into that pit. But he was not ready to face her kind again either; understanding her was not enough, it made his disgust even more complete. That only left option two, then. The middle ground, in technicalities the most difficult. But, absorbed in solving the puzzle, maybe he would be able to forget the boy on the boat whose brother had abandoned him.
For now, he reminded himself. We're all going back to Judoh together. I'll see him then, and we'll talk it all out. He'll forgive me; he always has.
Will I, though?
Celestials, he reminded himself, and his resolve cemented. He trusted J to look after his brother, as always; the only way the machine could defect in that duty was safely tucked away where no enemy could ever reach it. Let partners take care of partners. It would be enough for Daisuke that his brother had even come.
"Shun."
He turned and found Boma sitting next to him on the bench. "Boma," he replied simply.
"I thought it was you. Where are the others?"
"I changed my mind," Shun said through a still-tight throat. "Daisuke is now with the Celestials. How can I help look for Clair?"
o0o0o0o0o0o0
Usagi started to place the young man on the bed, but at a gesture from Leorza she deposited the limp body in an armchair facing where her Master himself sat. At another flick of his hand, she excused herself, locking herself in the bathroom to be out of the way until her Master had need of her.
Sitting back in the rich burgundy throne, the king surveyed his heir. Clair had lost weight, Leorza noted, but he'd also gotten taller. The young man's bangs were still dyed that ridiculous blue, and he still wore that obscenity on his lower lip. Reaching over, the old man gently tugged it off.
His son's long eyelashes fluttered at the sensation. Vision swimming, lilac eyes rested at last on the man in the other chair. "Papa..." he murmured. "I wasn't lying. You're really here." Smiling, he tried to laugh and instead, gasping for breath, nearly fell out of the chair in stifled hysteria. "Y-y-you didn't leave me..."
"My beloved son." The words came unwieldy to his tongue after two years of disuse; unlike Shun, Leorza once acclimated to another way of life did not transition back easily. "What have you done?"
Clair stared at him uncomprehendingly, grappling with the question. A bleak smile split his face. "'M Vampire, Papa. Just like you wanted me to be." He slid down in the armchair until his head was the only part of him propped up. "Isn't that good?"
Breathing in a sigh, Leorza brushed his fingers across the amulet inside his coat for strength. Perhaps interrogating the boy while the new blood remained in his system was a foolish idea. "Listen to me carefully. Why are you in Magnagalia?"
"I'm bored, Papa..." Clair giggled to himself. "And there's a friend I need in my debt."
Leorza frowned. "There was no need to come yourself. My beloved son, Vampire's place is within his empire. Leaving it makes you vulnerable."
"Giovanni's with me..."
"Where is he now?" Leorza asked pointedly. "And where are Mitchal and Ian?"
Clair smushed his lips against something on his hand. "...They...they died, Papa..."
This was news to Leorza. "How?" he demanded, sitting up straighter in his chair; then, thinking it over, amended his question. The conversation, and his subsequent plans, could not progress until he had more information. As did most of his dealings with his son, the query turned into an order. "Tell me everything you have done as Vampire."
So his son, amid vapid laughter, told him. And Leorza, in spite of himself, was impressed by the last part of the story. Shop Echigo...his best friend's pet project...now in the hands of Company Vita. Why, that would be near-unstoppable...but the rest of the tale...
He had to clutch the amulet with a vicelike hand lest that same hand reach out and throttle his son. So all the news reports had been true; no, they had been tamer than truth. Napalm? Threatening other families with grenades? Kidnapping Celestials on a whim? Fixing the market? Pursuing personal vendettas at the company's expense? Nowhere in his painstaking lessons had he taught the boy to be that showy and extravagant. Caution, prudence, well-laid plans: those had gotten "Lorenzo Leonelli" to the top of the pile, and they should have served his successor equally well.
True, even he had tired of playing that safely and had thus showed Trinity a bit more of his hand than he'd intended to originally, but he still had several aces up his sleeves and plenty of backup ideas in store. Clair, though...
"My beloved son." He interrupted the still-rambling, still-groggy young man. "Whatever possessed you to do such things?"
He smiled like a child. "So you'd see them, Papa. So you'd look down and see that I was Vampire like you always wanted. I wanted to be more than you ever wanted...I wanted to do it my way..."
"There is no your way!" He stood; Clair's irises drifted lazily up, following him. The sight of that smiling stupid face, not knowing how badly it had erred, made his skin ripple with disgust. "There is only the path I have laid out for you. Obviously you did not study hard enough. I am appalled at your behavior. I left Vita in your hands thinking you would be able to look after it in my absence. I see now I was wrong."
"But Papa..." Clair's face seemed almost tender with hurt, a scolded puppy shrinking backwards with liquid eyes; he cursed himself for drugging the young man, as even a rebel's anger would have been preferable to him at that moment than the crawling slime he had created from the thing he had spawned twenty years ago. "I thought you'd be happy. I did it all for you."
"Ruining my years of---Running amok with my--" He could not think, could not focus, was shaking with badly suppressed rage. It had been building since the beginning of the tale, since the napalm incident, and had only mounted in intensity since. He could feel his ribs literally creak as the anger filled him and threatened to break loose; shaking, he tried to pour himself a glass from the blue-green decanter, but could only force a few drops, barely a trickle, down his throat. It was enough to spark the first bits of the reaction, and in some ways that was worse.
The dark-haired woman emerged brilliant and smiling from the pool, scattering droplets from her outspread, waving arms as she beckoned him to come closer; he ran to her on a child's legs and let her press him against her body. "It's safe for us, my beloved son. We Wise shall not fall into the same stupor as our Rahman and Loah brothers. No, we are responsible for them in their simple happiness; we bear the burden of reason so they may be free."
"I want to be free, Mama," he complained, nuzzling against her collarbone and tasting the liquid speckled across her skin. "I want to be happy."
"My beloved son." She ruffled his hair affectionately. "Our happiness must always be different. Now run along!"
"Leorza!"
"Echigo!" Kissing his mother on the cheek, he ran to see his friend. "How are the Loah doing? It's my responsibility to ask!"
Behind him, his mother laughed; his friend hoisted him onto broad shoulders. "I'll have him back by sundown, Vita," he promised the woman.
"Thank you, Echigo..."
Echigo...his son was Echigo now...for Echigo was dead...and he hadn't even known it until after the fact. Echigo had been so clever. Echigo had had everything, despite being of the wrong class. He had sworn to protect Echigo and ended up codependent on the older man's patronage. The Loah aged more slowly than even the Wise; had he not been assassinated, Echigo could have ruled from the shadows for centuries.
But now he still lived, and Echigo was dead. Leorza had been dead in Judoh but alive elsewhere while Echigo remained alive to his followers but fed the vermin below ground. What had been his error, his ever-clever reclusive friend? What had he finally done? He had trusted...like Leorza had trusted...did that mean he would fail, as well?
"Papa..." a strangled voice hiccoughed. "Do you...hate me, Papa?"
Blinking the fog of the connection away, he stared down at the scene below him. He stood over his son's fallen, bruised body; one fist ached, as if he'd hit something with it. Clair, still smiling, stared up at him with dilated pupils through a black eye; his chest was already beginning to flush purple from a blow. "Papa..." he whimpered. "I'm still not good enough, am I?"
Staring at both his hand and the wretched thing on the floor with utter revulsion, Leorza stepped back, away from the scene and from what he had done. He had sworn never to lose control, but here he was, beating senseless his own creation. Was he truly such an abysmal excuse for a god? He had to keep the young man's love to be successful, not flay it out of his blood!
"U-Usagi," he ordered, ashamed that his voice quaked. "C-come here."
"Yes, Master." She came out and flinched, seeing Clair on the floor. "Master, why?"
"I need you two to do something for me," he told the pair, sitting back in the chair and forcing Lorenzo Leonelli back into place. "Usagi, return my son to his friends, but remain yourself unseen. We are finished for now. My beloved son, you must promise me something."
"Anything, Papa." The boy touched his own face in amazement, mildly puzzled at the sore spots.
"You must bring your friends here, but do not tell them where they are going. I wish to talk to them as well." Eliminate the threat with as little effort and mess as possible. Sending Usagi again would be foolish; her method of dealing with obstacles left too many stains. "You must do this for me. Do you understand?"
He nodded and coughed and laughed at the same time; Leorza swallowed as the bile rose in his throat. "Excellent, Clair. Well..." He steeled himself for the lie. "Well done."
Sighing in contentment, Clair's entire body relaxed and he let his joy suffuse his entire being. A rare expression of peace alighted on his bruised face. "Thank you, Papa."
"We shall go, then," Usagi said, picking Clair up in both arms like she was cradling a baby and walking to the door. "I shall return shortly."
"Very good." Something was still bothering him, nagging at his mind—oh yes. Usagi had reacted upon seeing his son's condition. She was supposed to be placid. Unhooking the amulet from where it hung in his coat, he walked over to her and placed it around her neck. "A loan until you return," he explained. "To give you comfort against the unpleasantness."
She flushed with the same joy as Clair, even smiling a little. "Thank you, Master," she replied softly, then turned and walked out solemnly. He watched them until they turned the corner down the hallway, then went back into his apartment and shut the door. That was that, then. He hoped the promise made under the new blood would stay rooted as a conviction in his son's head even after the effects of the diluted liquid wore off.
Did that really tie everything up he needed to? He was in talks with the Celestials about his plans—not explicitly, but dropping just enough hints and spinning ideas just so to make them more appealing—and he had Trinity pacified for now. How had he managed that...?
Remembering, he swore. So not everything worked out after all. The young man from Judoh knew of him, and even if he never got back to his home country, he could still spread the word.
Leorza's work was not finished, then. Gift to Baroness or no gift, he still had to kill Marius's boy. Nona's boy.He was a bearer of ill tidings for her all around, wasn't he? First it had been the revelation about her elder son, and now he would have to send his waif to kill her baby.
Thinking of the deed that way made him smile.