Chapter 21

As he suspected. Her Natsu was perfect, perfectly evil and sexy as hell. He knew her portrayal would come out well. He had witnessed the birth of Mio and now he had the privilege of witnessing the creation process and birth of Natsu Kitagawa. A bully, A beauty and a siren. He feared for the heart of any man that would have to tangle with this particular persona if she decided to reveal herself off camera. He could barely survive. She had his blood boiling when they were introduced in the early morning hours.

When she awakened, she had a clear vision of what Natsu should look like, how she wore her makeup, how she dressed and how she should walk. She twirled around and the perfect outfit of tight, yet stylish dress pants donned her legs, along with a dark blue, flowing silk, bare shouldered fitted blouse that graced her torso. Her eyes were perfectly lined and shaded with tones of orange like a sunset. Her hair was straightened and slicked back stylishly and her lips perfectly plump and shiny with an erotic hint of red. She looked in the mirror and let Natsu slip into her skin.

Natsu smiled softly with narrowed eye and blew a kiss to her reflection. "Perfect... As always." She turned from the mirror. Gathered her bag, coat and scarf and left for work.

This wasn't how it was supposed to work out. She was not supposed to bounce back so easily. Chiori screamed in her mind. This girl was a monster! She was supposed to timidly back away and slink off to allow Chiori to take over the role of Natsu and fade into obscurity. How could things backfire so easily? She wanted to scream out the injustice. She wanted to rant and rave against the director's waffling viewpoint. How could he so easily just toss aside his view on how he wished the character to be portrayed? It wasn't fair! She deserved that part! She could be Natsu! Not that hack Mio!

So it was done. The director's words were final. He had liked the changes in Natsu and Chiori needed to step up and remodel her portrayal of Yumika.

It had been a long hard week for the entire cast but it finally worked out. Kyoko felt horrible when she discovered the outer and inner scars that Chiori carried with her. It just wasn't fair that someone so young should be so scarred and jaded. She wanted to do something for her, but knew not what.

She was pondering the thoughts as she retrieved the sodas for her friends the Ishibashi's. What could she do to help Chiori, to help take away those scars? Scars... Scars! That was it! There was no reason for a young woman to carry something like that if she didn't need to. Farasha had made a decision.

Her mind was so preoccupied with what she wanted to grant the wretched girl that she hadn't seen or, heard her approach. She did; however, feel the small palms on her back when she was pushed down the stairs and she did see said wretched girl's face look on in a panicked horror as she watched Kyoko fall.

As Farasha neatly folded the small piece of paper and place it in her pocket, she didn't think of vengeance or, how her calm, sly demeanor was seducing the male that had tried to cushion her fall. She still felt pity for the girl and determined that there was more than just petty jealousy involved in her actions. Chiori didn't feel like Sho or, any of her masters in the past. This girl truly needed help or, she would fall further into the darkness of self hatred.

She glanced up at the frightened girl peering around the corner at her and uttered the words from her heart to her. "Wash away your scars..." She whispered and the gift was given.

A sudden feeling of deep remorse at what she had done washed over Chiori. How would she ever make amends? What she had done was unconscionable. Her mind was flooded with remorse and the scars on the back of her neck burned as a reminder of her sins. She sank to the floor and her back rested gently on the wall behind her as she rubbed the reminder on her neck... only to find that it wasn't there. She stood quickly and ran to the restroom to confirm with her eyes, what her hand had felt. It was gone. The burn scars that she had carried with her for 10 years, were gone.

When she smiled at him and told him to forget the perpetrator's face, his mind blanked and could only focus on the beautiful, seductive female before him. What were they talking about? He could only remember that Kyoko had taken a tumble down the stairs. When he helped her up from where she had landed, he could only remember how completely and utterly enchantingly beautiful she looked. His mind lost all thought and his heart longed to embrace her. If Hikaru Ishibashi, age 21 was not completely smitten by her before, he most certainly was now. If she had asked him to be her slave for eternity, he would have immediately fell to his knees and begged for her to order him.

Huba Syd looked on from the shadows in his teen form and chuckled while shaking his head. "Sister, you know not what you do." He pitied the poor young man. Hopefully he would heal from her cluelessness in time. He looked to his friend and smirked. "Shall we go to dinner Ruto? I think we've seen enough here."

Ruto nodded in agreement and chuckled. "At least she didn't curse the poor girl." Ruto commented as they walked down to the cafeteria. "What do you think she is planning?"

Huba Syd sighed, a little worried. "I'm not really sure. This is so unlike her. I expected the poor girl to burst into flames or, turn into one of Farasha's favorite punishments." He commented.

"The beautiful one has changed considerably. Is it possible that there will be no punishment given at all?" He asked a little bit in awe.

"There is that possibility. As slim as that chance may be, it is still an option." He smiled and they entered the cafeteria to enjoy the sandwich that they had heard Farasha and Hikaru discussing earlier when they had planned on surprising her with a visit.

"What happened?" He asked with worry as he gently examined her sore wrist in his large hand.

"I fell down." She flippantly commented.

Green eyes narrowed and the newly donned gold runes on his temples glowed red with their reveal. "You're lying..."

Golden eyes grew wide in surprise. "Kuon..." She breathed out as the gentle fingers of her free hand traced his newly branded runes and caressed his sharpened visage. A look of remorse fell over her and confused him. "I am so sorry Kuon." She whispered in tears with her eyes closed and he was forcibly removed from her palace as the rains from her sorrow fell in torrents.

It had been at least two weeks since he had been evicted, once again. He felt so miserable for reacting to her injury the way he did. He had only been upset because she had lied to him and blew off the injury so casually. Did she not see how worried he had been?

As he sat on the little bench, in the hall of the studio where Dark Moon was in its final filming, he saw a rising storm stalking towards him in the form of her brother, Huba Syd. Instead of his standard silks that Kuon had become accustomed to, the boy was wearing all leather and his long hair was in a loose braid tied down with a leather strap. Expecting the worst from the male Djinni, he braced himself. Instead, he was met with a look of pity.

"Kuon... What happened?" Huba Syd asked him in his native tongue.

Kuon looked up at him in distress and sighed. He motioned for the teen to follow him to his dressing room and they sat down to privately discuss what had happened. "She injured her wrist at one of her jobs." He told him as he locked the door behind him so they wouldn't be disturbed. "I know she was lying... Someone hurt her." His runes began to glow and Huba Syd watched quietly, observing this new development.

I warned her this would happen. His thoughts called out quietly. "And then what happened?"

"She... She apologized and banned me from her palace. I... can't find her. She did all of her scenes for Dark Moon and I haven't even seen her in Tokyo since." He told him.

"I see..." Huba Syd said quietly.