Disclaimer: I do not own HYD or any of its characters
A/N: I just wanted to thank everyone who has R x R. I love to here from ya'll.
As a reply to some of ya'll: Tsukasa is dreaming in the first few sentences about Tsukushi. He is in bed alone, but misses her even while he sleeps.
In Chapter 2 they aren't really flashbacks, but alternate possibilities of what could have happened if Tsukasa had never been born.
The last line of Chapter 2 means that they aren't happy anymore because no he's dead. Their marriage was great up until then.
And as for Hoshi Kouchu, shame on you.
Grace stood in front of Doumyouji's limp body. Together they stood before the stairway where they had originally met.
"Now it's time to go."
"No." He demanded with his head still facing the floor.
"Please Doumyouji-sama; you don't have anything else to hold on to." She walked over to the staircase and tapped her fingers on the gold handrail.
"I have a lot to hold on to." He looked up at the child with tears in his eyes. "I was important to them. What will their lives be like without me in them? Show me the future."
"There is no such thing." The voice came from a young woman in her late teens. She looked like Grace but older and her hair wasn't in pigtails but in a ponytail. Her eyes held a deeper sense of maturity and wisdom that replaced the innocence in his former guide's eyes.
Doumyouji looked back at the staircase and Grace was gone. "Who are you?" He said looking back at the young woman behind him.
"I'm Mercy. I get the really difficult clients."
Mercy walked over to him and extended her hand. "What you're looking for doesn't really exist. There is no way to see the future because it hasn't been written yet."
"I can't let go. Not without knowing what's going to happen to them."
"Wishes are a funny thing, they seem so gratifying until they've been granted and then you wish that you'd never wished for it in the first place." She waved her hand in front of her and a blue and green elevator appeared.
"No, I'm not getting into that." He said backing away.
Mercy let out a slight chuckle before she entered the elevator. "Believe me," she started bemused, "this isn't the elevator to hell." She watched as he stepped in and faced outward, "but it sure will fell like it."
The elevator dinged and the door split apart to show an executive office. A young man in an expensive looking suit slaved over a desk full of charts and files. He had short wavy hair that was faded around the sides above his ears. He looked worn out and by the way he was choking back his coffee it was apparent that he had missed more than just a few days of sleep.
The door to his office slid open and an elderly form of Doumyouji Kaede marched in.
"God, this woman is never going to die is she?" Tsukasa gawked at his mother, who had to be at least seventy years old.
"She will eventually." Was Mercy's only answer.
"Riku, have you finished the reports I asked you for."
"I'm almost done grandmother." He never took his eyes off the paperwork, for fear of catching a glimpse of her cold and condemning eyes.
"Ugh," She grunted turning back to the door. "You're slower than your father used to be." She walked out the door and before it closed she turned on the back of her heal and added. "Make sure they are on my desk in fifteen minutes." With that the door slid closed.
"That's my son?" He looked at the young man's face and he had to have been at least twenty years old. Tsukasa's heart melted at the sight of his eldest son. "My son has turned into that bitch's errand boy. My son was not born to be a gopher."
"You're right." Mercy walked over to the desk and looked over the papers absently. "But that's what happens when your father isn't there to teach you how to have a backbone." She quickly lost interest in the boy's activities and turned her attention to the pictures on the mantel behind him.
Tsukasa followed and in the midst of the menagerie of frames was one picture of the four of them. Tsukasa lifted it from its place and lovingly fingered the sides. "This was my family. My beautiful wife and my two wonderful children." He put the frame down and looked over the others. "Even if I wasn't there, there has to be a picture of the three of them."
"The three of whom?" She asked glancing over the pictures as her partner frantically looked at each one. "Where are they? This is the last picture of the family. Tsukushi was pregnant, where is the picture of your little brother?" He questioned his undistracted son.
"Maybe I can shed some light on that." Mercy took Tsukasa's hand and led him out the sliding double doors.
The double doors led to a dark hallway in the mansion he had always called home. Doumyouji stood at the base of the stairs as he watched Tsukushi walk out of their daughter's room.
"After losing you she never really slept anymore. Always worrying that something might happen to the children. She would drive them to school by herself, and tuck them in bed herself, but always on guard."
He watched in horror as she missed a step coming down the flight of stairs leading to the foyer.
"TSUKUSHI!" His yell covered by hers as she went tumbling down the stairs.
He couldn't move as the lights flashed on and the maids came running out of almost every room to see what had happened.
"Someone call an ambulance." One of the maids yelled and a few of them ran off to get a phone.
Tsukasa could see the doors opening at the top of the stairs as little hands flung over the railing. "MOMMY."
"Take care of the children." The maid ordered. "They don't need to see this." And a few maids ran up the stairs to tend to the crying children awaiting them there.
"Does she die?"
"Not here," she paused, "but the baby did."
"Oh God, Tsukushi, I'm so sorry."
"For what?" Mercy asked walking away. "You didn't plan to die. In fact you've been fighting it since you found out."
"I promised her that I would never leave her."
"We all make promises we can't keep." She walked over to one of the doors.
The next room was light blue with white clouds bordering the top. It was a hospital's day room. There were patients walking around in their robes, some dragging around their IVs.
"Why are we here?" Doumyouji scanned the room for a familiar face but he didn't recognize anyone.
"Over there in the corner." Mercy pointed to woman looking out the window.
"No." Almost inaudible, a plea more than anything. He looked at the back of her head. Her long brown hair had been shaved short and it was covered in bald patches. He journeyed to the table where she sat alone her arms clutching her legs in front of her.
"No, Tsukushi, what happened to you? You were stronger than this."
"You never got a chance to see her in her low and weak times. When you first went back to New York and that senator's kid had to save her from some rapists, when your mother kidnapped you and you told her to go back to Japan. If Rui hadn't been there she probably would have never made it back home." Mercy took a seat next to his wife and laid her head in her hands. "No matter how strong she seemed it was always because you were there to cheer her on or at least she had the hope of you cheering her on."
"She wasn't weak like that."
"I don't make the news, I just report it." She sighed deeply and continued. "After losing you and the baby she just couldn't cope. It started with her pulling out her hair and then she started forgetting things. To pick up the children, whether she had eaten or not, where she was or where she was going. She slowly started to lose her mind."
Tsukasa fought back the tears that had started to pour over his face.
"One day your daughter came home and Tsukushi was lying in a puddle of her own blood."
Tsukasa turned over her wrists and there was a scar with stitch marks as evidence that she had given up. "No. She wouldn't. She couldn't leave the children."
"I don't know why she did it, because she didn't leave a note, but she's been here ever since. In this catatonic state, staring at the walls or the windows, whatever they point her at."
Mercy got up and started walking towards the door.
"Can't we just stay here a little longer?"
"Why?" She stopped but didn't turn around. "This isn't a visit. There's nothing you can do to connect to her, you're dead and these are only pictures."
"I want to stay with her."
"Then haunt her, but you can't stay here. I told you this wasn't a good idea. You're way too attached to her to move on." She continued walking to the door.
"I said I want to stay."
"I said you're coming with me." She spun around and when she made eye contact with him he appeared next to her.
"How… did…?"
"I told you this isn't real Doumyouji-sama. These are just pictures of thing that might happen. Again, the future is not yet written and there are limitless paths that someone could take. This is just the most likely path."
"Then why not show me the happier path. The one that will make it easier for me to let go."
"I don't get to pick and choose the future, like I said I only report the news."
"So this doesn't bother you?"
"What?"
"This," he said scanning the room. "It doesn't bother you that these are good people. My wife my kids don't they deserve a better life than this?"
"One, I don't have any control over their life, for the hundredth time, and two, no it doesn't bother me because fate doesn't care about good and bad." Mercy walked over to one of the men sitting by the fish tank. "Does it matter that this man used to be a pediatrician? Do you care that he was a great man who saved thousands of lives before he was shot in the head by some jerk that wanted the fifty bucks he had in his wallet."
"Then why let things like this happen to good people?"
"You aren't seeing the big picture. Everybody suffers: thieves, rapists, doctors, mothers, businessmen. It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done; when the bullet has your name on it, it just does."
"What about my daughter?"
"Tamari is the only one that lives happy ever after with the great husband, the great kids and the dog in the backyard." She lied.
"I want to see it."
"No, you've wasted enough of my time."
"I WANT TO SEE IT." He looked straight through her because he could tell she was trying to cover up something.
"Please Doumyouji-sama, just let it go. This is not the path that your family has to take. They can have happy lives."
"It's not your job to pick and choose what I see. Just show it to me."
"As you wish, but remember you've been warned."
Mercy stepped through the door and it led into a very beautiful parlor. On one of the bar stools a young woman, about eighteen, sat mixing her drink. She had curly black hair which she styled at shoulder length. She wore in a short black cocktail dress that was sheer at the shoulders. Her eyes which were caked with make up seemed annoyed if not poignant.
"Is that what you're wearing tonight?" Doumyouji spun around to see that the voice belonged to an older gentleman in his mid- to late forties.
"I know him," Doumyouji recalled. "That's Charles London. He's been competing with Doumyouji Corp for almost every contract this year."
"I don't see a problem with it." The young lady answered.
"Of course you don't." Charles interjected sarcastically as he made his way to the bar. "Drinking already I see."
"I've only had two or six. I'm still working on making you handsome."
That little shot earned her a slap in the face.
Doumyouji tensed as he balled his fist.
"Your grandmother told me that you needed a little taming, and don't you worry I'm the perfect man for the job."
"That bitch married my daughter off to this jackass?"
"She needed a bargaining chip. After you died London went crazy with his competitive nature blowing all of Doumyouji Corp's offers out of the water. The offers were so low your mother couldn't even hardball them. She was losing more contracts than she was winning, so she did what she had to, to keep the company in the black."
"She sold my daughter for a quick fix to an ongoing problem."
"Go upstairs and change." Charles pushed her and she stumbled out of the seat.
"No." Tamari shot back. "You don't tell me what to do."
"Listen sweetheart," He said placing his hands on her chin. "I can go to this event by myself if you don't want to go, but if I do I'll make sure you have a good reason to miss it."
"If you lay one hand on me I'll…" She started shaking.
"You'll what? Call the cops. I OWN the cops. Tell your grandmother. I'm a few steps from shutting your families business down for good anyway." He grabbed her shoulder and she noticeably winced in pain. "You're running out of options here love." He threw her towards the steps. "Go get changed."
Without fighting anymore she stalked up the stairs to her bedroom. She pulled out a longer sleeveless red dress and the shoes and clutch to match. As she changed Doumyouji watched his daughter in the mirror. She had bruises of every shape, size and color covering her body. As she slipped on the dress she walked over to the vanity.
"He beats the shit out of her."
"He meant what he said." Mercy said taking a seat next to his daughter at the vanity. "It's usually worse, but he restrained himself this week, knowing about the party."
"I've seen enough." Doumyouji turned for the door.
"But you're gonna miss the best part." She said pointing over to the battered young woman. "This is the part where she drinks the bottle of sleeping pills with the Grey Goose chaser."
"I think you've had enough fun at my family's expense."
"You think this was fun." Mercy got up and headed toward the closet. "I've wanted to kill myself since I met you."
A/N: Please continue reading and reviewing. I love hearing from ya'll.
