I own nothing in the sekirei universe.

I'm hoping once I get into writing chapters at regular intervals they will be at LEAST this length, but ideally longer.

"regular speech"

"thoughts"

[STORY START]

10 days later….

A blaring nuisance awoke Minato from another fitful night. Casting a glance at his alarm he groaned in frustration "waking up every other hour and its already 6…" In a last defiant attempt at getting any kind of rest he rolled over and pulled the covers over his head while slamming a fist down on the noisy alarm. "I just need another half hour of sleep…. Just... another half…" Minato's tired mind retreated once again to the darkness with the spotlight, where that damn woman laughed at him day and night, except now she had been joined by a few other entities that stood by her just out of his reach. The strangest thing was the noises they made, while the original miscreant continued to giggle the others were doing anything from panting like lust driven animals to shrieking in pain. One even sobbed uncontrollably from time to time. The other night one of the closer standing creatures disappeared, he was glad one of his torturers was gone, yet his conscience made him feel ashamed. As if there was some way hee could have helped, but chose not to.

The mocking tormentor stopped her laughter, inching forward and only stopping to lean towards him until they were face to face. Her features were blacked out; even under the spotlight she was darkened as if a can of paint was dumped on her. The shadows across her face twisted into a smile, and her mouth opened to speak.

"Hey Sahashi! Wake up!"

"Sahashi get up! What, you got a girl in there or something?!" the door to his apartment bulged in as heavy fists pounded on it.

"what the fu… Holy shit!" The time on his clock read 9:21, over an hour late, over an hour that his subordinates were locked out. Minato rocketed out of bed, ripping open his closet and pulling on whatever was the easiest to slip on. "shit shit shit shit shit!"

"Hold on Hokaido-san!" Minato yelled hoarsely as he raced down the hall on one leg while attempting to jam the other foot into a sneaker "I'm almost there Hokaido-san!" his watch read 9:30 as he ripped the front door open while fumbling with a set of keys. There his coworker was, staring up at him. Furious.

Arata looked about ready to chew him out, but after looking at the state of his supervisor he simply rubbed his temples and turned away, clearly not in the mood to argue "C'mon, the others are waiting…" grumbled the stocky man. As they made their way to work the fearsome dwarf whispered under his breath about "reaching levels of incompetence"

The walk in silence was nerve racking, he had never been good with criticism, and, as he now found, was less patient with criticism from those below him. It didn't help when he thought he saw something out of the corner of his eye. Actually it seemed more like every other time he turned his attention away from the ground he caught a glimpse of something else moving just out of his line of sight. As if a pack of animals was watching him, retreating when they thought he had spotted them only to resume their observation when his eyes cast down to his moving feet once again.

The duo saw no one as they approached the Uniformico package deposits entrance and the doors were still locked, aside from this was the obvious fact that the package deposit slot had been stuffed, and a small stack of cardboard boxes sat against the wall. This was definitely going on his performance review.

"Looks like the others got tired of waiting, I don't blame them. Did you at least bring the key?" The shorter mans tone bit at him. No one knew how much he wanted to rip the man a new one for being on his case so much lately. It wasn't helping his situation.

"Oh yes, yes I do!" exclaimed the young manager in response. Luckily he had remembered the key, and although it was difficult to find among the keys to every other part of his life he still had it.

"Good, don't let this happen again. I'm going to go call the others back and try to get ahold of all the people that were supposed to pick up packages this morning."

"Yea good work ethic, I'll get right to work too haha… ha…" His nails dug into the back of his scalp, this was getting annoying, and his sleep was consistently being disturbed by these nightmares. The lack of sleep had resulted in many late days opening shop. His deteriorating state of sanity wasn't what worried him; it was his job performance, he had just been promoted to manager and was being scrutinized. Hokaido was covering for him, sometimes, but his inability to keep up with his administrative duties along with his questionable attendance was losing business and would soon be noticed.

Trying to fully wake himself up was a losing battle, neither icy cold nor burning hot water had the desired effect of shocking him to his senses, and as he continued to try either smothering or slapping himself awake he spied a look at himself in the mirror. There he was, in a red sweatshirt, jeans and untied addidas. His face wasn't much better, he hadn't been able to shave the last few days and his hair was just as unkempt due to his new habit of oversleeping, dark bags completed his look of "Failure of the month". He couldn't even think of the last time he had brushed his teeth. All together he looked more like he should be a burger flipper than a pencil pusher and he decided he would stay banished to his office for the day. His office. The locked office.

"Oh for fucks sakes!" In his excitement of being promoted he hadn't latched his office key on with the rest of his keys and opted to simply pocket it, so this morning he had forgotten to grab it as he rushed out the door. He smashed his head on the wall, he was about ready to rip his own hair out, why was he making so many mistakes all of the sudden? He felt like such a loser, like he used to in middle school.

"Gotta calm down.. calm down and just take a breather... still plenty of time, after all its only-" The time display on his phone read 10:11.

"Fuuuuuuckkkk!"

Those coming into and out of the building saw only a red streak as Minato burst out the doors and bolted down the street to his apartment. The streets were crowded, as they usually were, and he had no concern for those that were in his way, he was at least two hours late to get started on any actual work and he didn't have time to stop or wait around for people to move. He was sure his prayers had been answered when people began to disperse in a wide formation in front of him.

"Gravity hammer!" there wasn't even enough time to see what all the commotion was about. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.

Why did all this have to happen to him? here he was, in the darkness again, late for work and surrounded by the PMS parade. But now there were two of them leaning in his face. "Wonderful..."

"Look can we just wrap this up? I'm really in the middle of something and whatever is happening is really hindering my ability to do my job!" The only sound was of the second figuring breathing on him rather loudly. "Personal space please!" he said as he tried to push the figure away roughly, but was met with what could only be described as a moan "what the... the fucks wrong with you, get away from me! Let me out of this place, I have a life and a job and whatever you are you're fucking it all up!" All the built up frustration of the last week, no, all the angst and anger of his whole life could be felt as he screamed in the womans face. Tears rolled down his face, he was finally going somewhere, finally doing something with himself and its suddenly snatched away from him by some figment of his imagination.

"Ashikabi-sama, are you ok?!" the new silhouette asked worriedly, he was taken aback by this.

"Ok? ok? I was just fucking fine until whatever the fuck YOU are came along! I don't even know whats going on right now! I could be drugged or dead for all I know!" With that he crossed his arms and turned his back to the two, only to find a third person standing just as close. "I can't even fume and storm off in here, where am I?!"

"please ashikabi-sama, please wake up, please don't die! I didn't even get a chance to... I need you!" Who did she think she was, coming along and fucking up his life because she "needed him" and for that matter why did she care all of a sudden, it certainly took her long enough to speak up.

"And what if I want to die now?! If I'm going to be haunted the rest of my life than what point is there in even trying!" He could tell the woman was shivering, and crying. What was the big deal here? why couldn't somebody just explain what was going on?

The spotlight burst above him, boring down on him like a giant blowtorch, he vaguely felt sensations across his face. Then the darkness was gone. It shattered off of ever surface like glass, cracking around his feed and disintegrating as it spread out around him.

"YOUR PREDISPOSITION HAS BEEN REALIZED. REFERENCING DATA INDEX... BROADCASTING... RESPONSE CONFIRMED FROM SIX OUT OF EIGHT, UNKNOWN ADDITIONAL RESPONSE DETECTED... ORDERS TO INITIALIZE REBIRTH PROCEDURES SENT... RESPONSE RECEIVED... VALIDATED."

"What?!.." the third woman in front of him was clear as the shadows fragmented from her skin. She was curvaceous, wrapped in a white kimono that left her chest open. Chains ran around her neck and between her breasts. Her slender face was framed with beige hair, and sullen brown eyes stared blankly into him.

"An-... and whats your problem? huh!" the sensations across his face continued, like smooth hands gently caressing him. He jerked away, whatever this nightmare of his was selling he wasn't buying.

"Please be still ashikabi-sama, its the only way" the voice of the previous woman made him turn around, the other figures around him were becoming visible, one by one. He only caught a glimpse of the second of the two apparitions behind him before he was blinded, and felt suddenly smothered.

Minato flailed his arms helplessly, he couldn't breath, something was suffocating him and he couldn't fight it off. Unable to save himself on his own his instincts took over causing him to try to scream for help. Nothing could be done, he was hallucinating and was being strangled by some THING that he couldn't even struggle to get away from. The light was blinding him, even with his eyes shut tight it burned his corneas straight through to his brain. He felt so uncomfortably warm, he was burning to death and suffocating, there was no worse way to die than this, being absolutely alone and afraid, not knowing when death would finally release him.

Then it stopped. His breath returned in sharp gasps and he suddenly felt the chill of the wind again. Was he dead? Was it over? He could faintly hear screaming and other unfamiliar noises in the foreground. Minato felt heavy and sluggish, and struggled to open his eyes.

Willing himself back to the world of the living was no easy task, but he did it, he was slowly pulling himself up. The first thing he noticed was where he was, he had somehow ended up in the middle of the street. A block away from where he remembered being what seemed like moments ago. Empty cars littered the road along with a few burning and broken ones and the second thing that hit him was the pain in his head and a warm trickle of liquid down his face. Wiping the liquid from his drowsy eyes he confirmed it, he was bleeding.

"What the hell happened..." Most of the street was empty by now, but there were still a few people screaming and running for cover. From what he had no idea, although judging by the bangs and crashes coming from back towards his office he was sure he didn't want to find out. He felt conflicted as he stood up to get his bearings, should he call the police maybe? No, lots of people would already be doing that. It was clearly too dangerous to head back to his building to clear people out so...

A scream broke Minato's train of thought just before a burning car went sailing across the street from the corner to slam into another building. Something was climbing out of the wreckage and he didn't want anything to do with it. His decision was set in stone; run the other direction and get back to the safety of his apartment.

"Ashik-!" A second car crashed on top of the first one. Definitely time to leave.

He wasn't sticking around long enough to see who or WHAT was being thrown around. The small pile of cars was being pried apart and the engine block from the top car was tossed back in the direction it came from leaving a trail of smoke and sparks. Ahead he could see a police road block and ran straight for it, police cars had been put out in a staggered line barricading the street, with law enforcement agents in SWAT gear standing behind a further set of wooden dividers to keep people from wandering in. Still people peered over the defenses to gawk at the carved up concrete, fires and the few remaining people fleeing to safety, himself included.

An explosion ripping apart a burning car was encouragement enough for Minato to not want to stick around, even when an officer came to check his head injury. The officer and his subordinates resisted Minato, trying to get him to stay and wait for paramedics to arrive to treat the injured but he had to get away from here, nothing was keeping him here with whatever was past the perimeter. Pushing through the dozen or more officers and the dense crowd was the easy part, but when he gave one last look over his shoulder he froze. Something was pulling him back, not physically, not even any kind of recognizable attachment, he just felt like something was trying to draw him back into the area. A serious conflict was going on in his mind, should he run and retain some semblance of sanity or try to make a difference here where he hadn't been able to with the other shadow that disappeared from his dreams.

There was nothing down the street now, no flying cars or screams or new gashes in the earth. People had started to disperse, ambulances had arrived to treat people and the fire department could be heard coming down the other side of the block. Even so, even if it wasn't dangerous to go back he didn't want to. His life was complicated enough already. "For that matter why do I even care whats going on down there, I just got knocked around and I'm covered in blood, I'm lucky I didn't wake up in a hospital!"

Hesitation flickered in his eyes, but he made his choice. he wanted his life back. he was adamant, he was done with this; it was time to take a few days off work and get his life back on track. The first thing he needed to do was get away from this place before whatever had caused all the commotion came back.

"Ashikabi-sama! where did you run off to?" too late. Murmurs in the crowd transitioned to worried tones and even further into screams as people tried to move back from the police roadblock, and to everybodies shock a woman rocketed into the air from the opposite end of the defenses and landed crouched on the roof of an ambulance. The stunned citizens that cluttered the street stared at the strange woman; she wore a simple purple, sleeveless sweater-top that exposed her stomach to the air and long finglerless, knuckleless gloves of the same colour that went past her elbow where they were met with some kind of arm band covered in pouches. Around her waist was a purple sash over a black pair of spandex shorts and black sandal-boots that went to her mid calf. To complete her look was short black, wavy hair that contrasted with her slim pale body. "Please ashikabi-sama we need to get away from here, where are you?" It was obvious from the torn and burnt spots on her clothes as well as the many cuts and bruises that she had been at the center of whatever had been going on mere moments ago.

"I have to get the fuck out of here before-" Minato froze as an impact sounded behind him followed by a gentle hand squeezing his shoulder.

"Ah there you are, I was worried for a moment. I think we should get out of here before they come back... ahikabi-sama? is something wrong?"

All he could do was stand there in shock. This strange woman that looked like she just clambered out of a burning building bounded over a crowded police roadblock with ease and proceeded to start trying to chat him up. He could feel the eyes of the nearby bystanders burning into the back of his head and it was making him light headed. Looking to his watch was the last straw, it was broken, but the hands had stopped at 11:40. He was becoming delirious from his head wound, being followed by a member of the PMS parade and most likely losing his job soon. It was like his own personal hell had been made right there just for him.

"Ashikabi-sama?..." the woman asked in concern but was unheard by her new master as he fell to the ground unconscious for the second time.

[END]

So how does everybody like what I've got so far? I could use some beta readers because as of right now I'm just doing this on my own. Any suggestions? comments, queries or concerns? Did this chapter feel rushed? Maybe too long? maybe my writing style needs to be refined. Let me know.

Just a warning this story isn't going to be conventional; there will be dire losses and Minato won't be chasing the "usual" goal that every other fanfiction has him pursuing. We control our actions, and in time our actions shape who we are.