Disclaimer: I do not own Rosario + Vampire
Chapter 7: Lysander Rising
Moka, the academy vampire, began to stir in her bed the second she laid her head down on the fluff of its pillow. From there, she felt a constant feverish chill slip gradually over her by every excruciating hour she reclined. Even though the event that led to her separation from the boy she liked drifted farther and farther away, her stress continued to stack. Her heart raced hard, struggling to cope with her starved state of anemia.
Even though she wanted Tsukune back for no greater reason than to just talk with him again, she couldn't deny a few…lesser reasons as well. He, for instance, had the healthiest, richest, sweetest tasting blood of any creature she had ever known - man, animal, or monster. What she would give in exchange for his presence and permission to taste it once again.
Her stomach rumbled slightly, and she blushed a light streak in startle and embarrassment while she gripped her sides so as to ease the noise. Gritting her petite fangs, she knew there was hardly anything to do but to let the stress overtake her and for the anemia to do the rest. Sure she had tomato juice, but that salty stuff was nothing compared to what Tsukune used to so mildly and politely offer her. …Or at least didn't put up a struggle over it like a lot of the humans she used to know probably would have.
'Tsukune…I know it doesn't matter to you a whole lot at this point…but I remember your kindness. Please…please find your way back so that I can apologize to you. Then, if you'll ever come to forgive me like I hope you will, things can finally go back to normal.'
But she was lying to herself, and she knew it. Her thoughts did nothing to encourage her. Where was he now? If he really meant to come back, he surely would have already done so, or in the very least, let himself be found.
She knew she wasn't quick to get angry with anyone. What happened with Kokoa back in the lobby was highly unlike her, and she had surprised herself. But more than anything, she had never been angrier at Inner Moka. Her more potent side must have surely sensed this, because she had since become unusually quiet for the past couple of days.
And now there was no Tsukune.
There was no Tsukune to check on from her large dorm room window on lonely nights. No Tsukune, for whose bright, innocent, brown eyes could stare right back into hers. No Tsukune to talk to and share lunch with, no Tsukune to offer her breakfast…
She never completely wrapped her mind around it and accepted it. She couldn't. He was only gone for about a week, sure, but you would have no idea how much a week would seem like…like…four years.
She buried her face in the cushion of her pillow in shame. 'You probably look as pathetic as you feel. You have to stop torturing yourself like this. You're a big girl. You have to get used to the fact that Tsukune wasn't always meant to be around you.' If this had been Ura-chan lecturing her, she would have surely screamed at her as loud as her lungs would let, but in all manner of truth, this was what she was saying to herself. 'You're happy…just to have met Tsukune in the first place.'
Her white nightgown did nothing for her even under her warm blankets, and the cold sweat sensation came on again, stronger than before. She nearly came to the point of gasping quietly to herself a couple of times.
She tossed and turned and turned and tossed. The stubby wings of the chibi bat clock she kept on her nightstand showed her that the hour was slowly waning away.
'2:46…? My God…I've been pushing it. At this rate, I won't be in any shape at all for tomorrow's classes…' She cringed weakly. 'Ririko-sensei is going to butcher me come math hour…'
But through her wears and worries, the curtains of her eyes grew heavy; she slowly succumbed to a light, fidgeting sleep.
Then they opened again. She was still in her room. But all of her fatigue, all of her weariness, everything that could have ever promised her a delighted rest had left her. She kicked her sheets up and sat on the edge of her bed to sigh hopelessly. Realizing suddenly that there was no longer any point to wasting time trying to get something that wouldn't come, she set a bare foot off onto the cold floor.
An audible, horrid scraping sound, like a fingernail grazing a chalkboard, caused her to snap her head to look around in severe startle. Her heart thumped inside her chest while she continued to survey the room. Her window, which was so massive that it practically filled the entire wall, was completely black. She realized it was night, but it was odd that she wouldn't be able to catch a tree branch or a flicker of light from a lamp post at least.
'Ah~. That window… How weird. I can't see anything out the other side…'
The scratching sound subsided. She held her breath in anticipation for something else, but when nothing came, she let herself exhale and crept near the unnaturally dark window. She put her hand out open-palmed and began to let it slowly approach the glass. When the mere tips of her fingers touched it, the scraping sound came again, ten times louder than it was before, and Moka jerked her hand back to let out a brief scream.
'Wh-what's with this noise?? At first I thought it was a mouse, but…'
She could see the damp imprint on the window left by the hand that touched it. From around it, a fog filled the glass, and small scratches developed, spontaneously growing longer and bigger, more visible, cracking like ice as the terrifying grind continued screaming in her drums. She covered her ears in pain, and was finally forced to her knees. "Ah! I can't take that sound! St-stop!!!"
Black ink gushed down the gaps in the window made by her handprint, and the entire frame burst asunder while the sickly liquid pooled through. The millions of glass shards drifted supernaturally around her, and she closed her eyes while they inevitably closed in.
When she was sure that the sound was gone, she lifted her hands from her ears and opened her eyes, and her pupils instantly trembled in shock when she saw that nothing of the bedroom she knew was recognizable. Instead, she found herself standing in the middle of a small, hexagonal room surrounded by six towering walls of mirror. There was no exit in sight. She was trapped in.
Feeling especially vulnerable in her pajamas, she slowly backed up from her scared reflection until she bumped into the mirror behind her. As she turned around to regard it, she heard her own voice speak for her.
"Hey, Moka-san." She gasped upon realizing it was her reflection talking from the silverish mantle. "…You know what you should do when you see Tsukune again…?" The voice seemed polite. Soft, amiable; her own. But then her image threw a fierce hook punch out at an invisible target in front of it. "Smash him!!!"
"Eeah?!!"
The poor vampire staggered back and was cornered by another mirror bearing that same image. "Rip him to nothing!" It rallied vigorously, like a devoted spectator of a school brawl.
Moka was so hurt and taken aback by the words sounding just as they would if they were coming from her own mouth used so violently against Tsukune.
"You know you want to, Moka-san! You're starving, aren't you? Poor girl… You crave his blood; it's your very nature!"
She turned her head quickly for another direction. Two more of her reflections side-by-side caught her eye, and in unison they declared, "You're naïve, Moka-san."
Another way; a different reflection. "Please don't be stupid, Moka-san." The phantasm contorted her face slightly, and added impatiently, "Just think about what you are!"
By now the girl's heart was thumping like crazy. She wanted to scream again, but no sound emerged. She felt deprived of air, forced into silence.
"Do you have what it takes? Moka-san?" The reflection behind her asked through the tall plate of glass behind her. "You are a vampire. You are a monster. Humans are too wayward and prejudicial. It's not your fault – it's theirs. Humans…are the real monsters."
"Quiet!" She found herself able to speak again, but it gave her no relief to their verbal onslaught. The strain in making herself audible again merged with her downheartedness, and she fell to her hands in knees. "Not all humans are evil! Stop saying such horrible things!"
"But conspiring against the people that shunned you in your childhood is a good thing. Isn't it, Moka-san?"
She couldn't look through the creases that kept the mirrors apart and the illusions in their own glass cages. Every time she tried, an image, not looking like Inner Moka, but her own self, would call her name. Looking down now, with her face aimed at the floor was no different. There was a reflection waiting there all the same.
"You won't get anywhere by lying to yourself, Moka-san. Why do you think vampires are so scarce now? The pinnacle of power doesn't just die away at any cause. Humans have kept our numbers under for centuries. …You are only fooling yourself by offering them your faith."
She averted the face as much as she possibly could, and while she rushed to her feet again, another image was waiting for her.
"Come on," she watched in frozen fear as one of the mirror images wrapped her hands around her neck to imitate strangulation, shouting, invoking, "Just kill him already!"
"He's yours," Another of the faces looked much more calmly at her while she spoke. "He can be all yours, Moka-san. Or if you don't want him…I…could always take him off your chest for you. That blood…that taste…all of it…" Closing its eyes in ecstasy, the image of the vampire put its fingers to its lips, as if relishing in delight. Then it broke away swiftly and finished with a moan of pleasure, a potent flare of her emerald eyes, "Capu-chuuuuuu~."
"No!!!" Moka let everything out in a frantic dash for the last mirror that spoke to her. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes in brace was the identical twin standing on the other side, giving her an innocent smile; her green eyes content.
Moka smashed the wall with a spur of adrenaline she never knew she had, and the floor dropped as she flew through, as if she had just thrown herself out of a window.
She fell someplace dark. She fell, and she fell, and she fell forever. All she could do was scream the rest of the way. Before her agonizing, vertical journey would finally end to put her out of her misery, all of the voices of her own that rang from the sizeable mirrors all chimed together and finished in a united monotone.
"Remember your place."
She grunted in pain only when her body joined with a cold, hard surface. Opening her eyes with fatigue and drowse, she found herself sprawled out of her bed, a sheet clinging halfway down with her.
She didn't waste a moment to scramble back up. "Ura-chan!!" She shouted in a helpless tone.
A well-adjusted voice answered her summon, emulating from the cross on her choker. "Easy. I had it too. From your eyes, I saw everything."
Moka breathed heavily and put a hand to her chest, right next to the glowing heart of the rosary dangling around her neck. Both sides of Moka were wide awake.
"That dream I had…those mirrors! Where does this all go? That seemed too real to be a dream!"
"It was a very vivid dream," Inner Moka's agreed. But from the part of the vampire's soul where she clung to and slept, she secretly knew the reason behind it. But doing her best to cover it up, she instead chided "Omote. You really must eat more. The more malnourished you get, the more your mind weakens. And don't forget that whatever happens to you happens to me too. Why don't you go back to the tomato juice, or charm some of the other boys at school into giving you a refreshing sip."
"U-Ura-chan!"
"Preferably a strong, healthy one with A-positive, and…"
"I don't want anything!"
The other voice stopped. And she screeched to a halt herself, and lowered her head meekly. She knew what Inner Moka was like when she felt that she practically had to argue with how to keep her own health up. It was, after all, originally Inner Moka's own body to begin with.
"…Are you…are you being picky about feeding, Omote??" Her stern voice was gradually elevating at just about the rate her patience was wearing. "Do you remember what happened the last time you decided to neglect your health? You're such a pain to get with."
"It's just…tomato juice doesn't help the anemia all that much."
"So use your other resources."
"They aren't my resources! I would feel like taking something from someone else without their permission. It's indecent!"
"Omote! You have to do something; it's already affecting your sleep patterns. You're not thinking clearly, and your not thinking is inconveniencing. You realize that?"
The pink-haired girl stood up in a somewhat defiant manner, but found herself using it only to scoop up the sheets sprawled on the floor and resituate them back into under the covers in the traditional bed-making way.
"Tsukune always offered…" She mumbled as she began to sit down. Her heart jumped when she saw a tiny flicker of light flash from the rosary in a manner of startle. And even though Outer Moka feared having to live with her more assertive self if she dared arguing, she had no real choice at this point but to venture that Ura was more startled with what she said than Omote was about her reaction to his name. "All of what my reflections were saying to me…hearing it all from my own mouth was so stressful. They were trying to coerce me into doing things to Tsukune…"
"Tch…" That was the very name that Inner Moka was struggling to avoid, and now her candid counterpart was rubbing it around her. Well, she couldn't say that she wouldn't have seen it coming. Knowing another person's dreams meant knowing whom she dreamt of the most. Knowing whom she dreamt of the most meant knowing whom she thought of the most.
…Of whom they both thought of the most.
There was no coincidence as to why they had the same dream. There was immeasurable guilt for why Tsukune had to go missing, and why they have no idea where he is now. Maybe he just went home. He was a good friend of that strange and ominous Bus Driver – maybe he just decided to pull out before worst came to worst for him. But then she remembered something he said. The very last thing he said to all of the girls before the next year came.
"I'll be alright," he said. Though his face looked pained for a moment that all of his friends were leaving him on a bus charted for the academy, or perhaps everyone else's' homes. They all knew that none of the ayashi were meant to stick around the Human World where he was, especially if the Board Chairman demanded them back. "…I'll return soon enough. I don't want to be separated from everyone either." His uncertainty melted away from his face in an instant, and was replaced by a confident spark in his eyes. "We'll meet again! Definitely!"
And they did meet again. Definitely.
"Ura-chan." Even a voice as soft as her partner's could drag her away from her thoughts.
"Hmmm?"
"We've argued about this before. I want you to know ahead of time that I don't wish to stage a repeat performance. But…" The innocent side tried to think of the least subjective way to ask the following question, "Do you…miss Tsukune?"
The light on the gem of the Rosario dimmed. There was a long silence. Then Outer Moka was thrown into complete outrage when her question was deliberately attempted to be averted.
"School starts in a couple of hours. If I were you, I'd try to get as much sleep as I could. And since I am you…"
"Eeeeaaaah! Don't go ignoring my questions, I just wanted to know!"
"Omote, what have we talked about?! We promised to lay low from thinking about Tsukune."
"That's right…" She hesitated for a moment, to question her own boundaries, and ventured to finish, "We did."
"Hey. Don't twist my words. It takes two of the same thought for each of us to share the same dream. I suppose I can blame myself for that. I should have known that you wouldn't have been able to stop thinking about him, so maybe I should have tried harder to—"
"Do you see what you're doing, Ura-chan??" She inquired rashly.
"No, Omote, what am I doing?" She dared menacingly.
Her other half staggered under the force of her words, but did her best to recompose herself and even out her breathing. Deciding to chuck out what she originally wanted to say, she instead asked, "Did…did you ever care for Tsukune? Just once?"
"Did I ever once…" Inner Moka tried her best to follow her words. But the issue, the flaw that she had was to try so hard never to expose the slightest hint of weakness. Since early childhood, she wore her pride as naturally as she did her own skin. Why should someone that she had only met a little more than a year back tear away something she had accumulated for years? Where then would all of her self-respect, or any manner of respect for that matter go to? How would life be then?
She didn't want to know. She didn't want to face it. She was…afraid to.
"D-Did I ever care about him?" She stammered on some emotion bordering outrage and indecisiveness. "Who was the one that protected him, week after week?" She demanded hastily, not giving her any time to respond. "Who was the one that made sure no ayashi could crush him? Who was the one that stood up for him, from the very moment he met me, understanding that he was a human and accepting it in spite of a fact that it isn't natural for a human to attend a monster school?"
Her other side swallowed hard, flopping her head back onto her pillow and gazing despondently up at the ceiling. If this kept up all night, then she'd really be delving into insanity by the time she had to go to school. Outer Moka was smart, just like Inner Moka, but their wills differed in comparison. There was just too great a difference in fighting spirit to compete. But though she was too timid to really express herself openly to the other, she already had the comeback plotted solidly in her own mind, where it would be safe from her other.
'Who was the one that bothered pulling off that rosary, risking your scorn because you hated being woken up no matter what, just so that all of our lives could be saved? Who was it that protected Youkai Academy from the Anti-Thesis with his own body? Who was it that kept us well fed day after day, who was it that decided to play the odd one out and become the only human we ever made friends with, who was it you never ONCE thanked?! Who WAS it, Ura-chan??!!'
That was how she could have answered. That was how she decided not to answer. She wasn't so worried or wrapped up or obsessed with vampiric pride as the real vampire of the two was, so sucking in her words and keeping them locked there would be less of a problem. But Inner Moka was just so stubborn. There were times in her life that neither of them believed that the other would understand how they felt. And yet these two conflicting personalities are forced to bunk up and buckle down into one body. Thanks, God.
Turning to the side to adjust herself more comfortably, she waited around for about a minute for her drowsiness to return. As her lids became heavy, her vision of the room darkened, but something pulled her back awake.
"…The answer…is yes." She heard her counterpart's deeper voice finally utter, tried in a way that would preserve as much of her self esteem as possible. But Inner Moka's rationalization skills weren't the best, because she never had to use them very often. Kicks usually got points across just fine.
"Mm?" She responded dryly, but undeniably curious.
"I said yes, Omote. Yeah, he was alright. I guess you could say I…um…" There was a pause that Outer allowed her to take, recognizing this as possibly a huge step for her other. "…I…accept…to have him around." She tried, hoping that this answer would be enough to suffice the both of them.
The pink-haired girl shrugged lazily, curling up in her covers. It was enough. It wasn't enough to make her completely take back all of what she thought about her, but she realized in a somewhat surprised way that this was probably one of the nicest things that she said about anybody. It might as well have been for Tsukune. Out from a yawn with cute tiny fangs jutting out, she ended the conversation.
"Okay…yeah, Tsukune was okay, wasn't he? He was the most…okayest……" She was so far into her drowsiness that she could no longer compose her words right. Flopping silently once and for all, she tumbled slowly back into slumber. Even though she really didn't want to face a nightmare as traumatizing as the previous one, she needed sleep. Badly.
From inside the Rosario, Inner Moka silently rolled her eyes. As quietly as possible so as not to rouse the young girl from her rest again, she whispered irritably, "Haaaah…good night, Omote."
No more bad dreams visited that night.
"…So really all you have to do is memorize the Quadratic Formula and you should get around just fine with today's assignment." Ririko Kagome lectured to her students later in the day, her long, slender tail swinging slightly this way and that out from under her backside – a mere segment piece of her true form. The lamia eyed around her classroom through rounded spectacles. "Even though factoring using this equation isn't always going to be successful, the purpose of today's lesson revolves around finding your solutions. We'll discuss factoring as we go later into the chapter."
Moka had her head down, her long locks of hair sprawled over her desk, a crumpling heap with fatigue. Her eyes were comically swirling in a daze. 'As expected, I came ill-prepared thanks to my horrid night. I couldn't focus if I tried…'
"Pssst. Omote. Stand up straight. It's important to keep up with grades."
It was failure to launch. Moka couldn't regard her own warning with action. Around the classroom, the other girls, standing out from the sea of green uniforms with their own unique fashion trends, had no doubt noticed her grogginess, highly different from her usually awake demeanor.
The lamia quickly noticed too – highly evident from her steadfast approach to the front of her desk. Light enough, but loud enough to be heard through the wooden surface, a ruler was slapped onto the edge by a teacher desiring of her attention.
"Mo-ka-chan," she had a way to roll back nerves of even her most hard-headed subjects by calling names or saying short statements in a syllable-by-syllable lag. "Are you having trouble following along?" Her cold eyes told her everything; that she was fully aware of the vampire's unwanted drifts beyond the walls of her share of the school's institutions, and that she didn't appreciate it. A hand adamant on her hip, the adult towered over her crouching student. "If you want a private lesson…"
The young S-Class ayashi quickly caught the hint and shot herself up straight as a plank. "Ah! N-No, Ririko-sensei, you don't need to do that! I was just zoning out a little. I'm fine…"
"Oh? You seem to be making very good friends with that desk you're sitting on. Why don't you be a friend of me too, Moka-chan, and show us how to do Example 1…" She dipped her head down at the bottom of her laggard student's desk towards the bin underneath, adjusting her spectacles with a silent remark of disdain when she noticed that her textbook was still tucked in.
"Um! I'm sorry! I promise to follow along…" 'Scary.' She added in her thoughts. 'Ririko-sensei is so scary if someone falls behind during her lecture…'
"Page 334, sweetheart." She growled irritably as she rounded to the front of the board.
With all of the respect made due of a budding Japanese student, Moka stood up straight for the class to answer the question, doing her best to ignore the shaking of her weakened legs, cursing her own dire need for siesta. "'Page 334; Example 1: x2 + 3x – 4 = 0…um…well…" 'This should be so easy. I feel like we've covered this before… Argh! Why isn't my mind working?' She clenched her teeth down in anxiety and unparalleled frustration, but alas, only smoke filtered through. She had already forgotten the steps. "…I don't remember exactly…how to start, but…" 'Now I know how Tsukune felt… This is embarrassing stuff.'
"But you don't know." Kagome went ahead and finished for her, arms tightly wrapped over her black, seductive lacings tucked beneath her coat. "Okay then. Why don't you go look for Tsukune-kun some more after class, see if you can find him?" An impending ray of light flashed bitterly through the lens of her glasses. "After all, you two did such a stupendous job working last year…" She muttered in a wallowing grudge, but quickly disposed of the evidence by slapping on a cheerful smile.
A few columns away and a few rows back, Kurumu stifled a tempted grin. She knew what the sensei was talking about, and it had nothing to do with studying. More or less, a bloody blow against the face to pay for trying to enslave Tsukune. Watching a vampire end others' dirty work did have its kicks.
She wished she could jump in to cover Moka about her current dilemma, but the truth was she had no real idea herself. Happy she had stood awake enough to keep from being plucked out by slippery instructor herself, she could only keep her mouth securely fastened shut.
The vampire gazed back down at the book lying face open in front of her on the small table. Before the discussion could continue, there was a colossal disruption to the algebraic lesson, as well as presumably the rest of the academy, when a powerful tremor shook the room, causing many of the students to yell in startle. The lights above their heads, off during the daytime, were suddenly triggered into a bright and violent show.
"Eah??!! What is it?! An earthquake?!!" A girl questioned out loud, covering her ears with fright.
"It feels like a 6-pointer!" A boy added lively.
Mizore shielded her eyes from the brightness and squinted. 'What's going on??'
In another flash movement, a loud and angry buzz generated from the ceiling lights and then winked out, the raw, provoked energy with it. It raced out towards the window in the form of a charged bolt – out to freedom. Escaping the classroom like a glowing snake, sleeping out around and under the glass without managing to break it.
After another moment, the rumbling of the room died down, and students were heard rushing out into the halls from other classes, likely to run and make sure no friends of theirs were injured in neighboring rooms.
Moka, although undeniably shaken by the sudden jostle and beyond weird activity with the electric lights, was secretly relieved that the interruption happened while she was being held hostage under the demanding lamia serpent woman, whom she hoped had forgotten about her.
"What in the world…?" Kagome straightened her glasses in alert. "What could have caused this commotion? As the sensei, I demand to know what interrupted my lesson!"
A few students had already crowded to the windows, noticing the electrical flare slither through, and curious to know where it went. Among them were Kurumu, Yukari, and Mizore.
"Sensei," the succubus spoke up sternly, "you better come have a look at this."
Crossing her arms in a skeptical pout, the teacher approached at a leisurely pace, wearing her special fishnet britches up to her thighs. She stopped at the very end of the window to glance for herself, and she instinctively threw a hand over her mouth in absolute worry. "Oh my…!"
Outside, entangled among the telephone wires standing tall around the academy limits, was a long, bright, surging storm climbing through the circuits, as massive as a bolt of lightning coming down from the sky itself. They watched endlessly, mesmerized at the white static discharges on the ground crawl up and around the poles to conjoin with the more evolved strains of energy, gradually darkening into a deep and ultraviolet purple ray that was now actively clawing its way for one direction riding along the wires. The beauty of the unusual sight was absolutely indescribable. But along with wonder, there was also fear in some of the academy students' eyes, because something so beautiful could also pose dire threat. They had no way of deducing for themselves what the nature of those radiant electrical surges was, anymore than they had a way of knowing just what to think about it.
Strain after strain met up, collecting together until the wires could support no more added content. With a brilliant burst, the strings of the telephone poles burst into sparks and flames, assuredly severing the power to many sections of Youkai Academy. What survived of the static buildup crept in a gruesome living manner towards wherever the ending lines would take them.
"This is one bad omen." Mizore deadpanned darkly.
"Perhaps we should inform the Headmaster, ne sensei?" Yukari almost pleaded for something to be done.
"I have a feeling he already knows." Kurumu responded, nose nearly pressed against the window glass, eyes following the blazing current as far as it kept in plain view.
"Well that's just ridiculous," the math instructor grievously announced. "Power's probably going to be out for the rest of the week. And the Chairman's probably not gonna like paying for the damages either. Honestly, are there any other peculiar problems left to happen around this place?"
'Uh, Ririko-sensei was one of the more peculiar problems,' all three of the girls who witnessed her past transgressions thought in the exact same words at the exact same time. 'Hypocrite…'
"I'm issuing a message now, just to be safe." The lamia was already at her computer, actively clicking the mouse.
"But didn't the electrical overflow fry the power lines?" Yukari asked the question just in time to receive the appropriate answer.
"…Damn it: yes." Kagome furrowed her eyebrow in irritation. Yes it did. "…Nevermind!" She announced, flipping her frown upside-down to cover her stress. "Just because we don't have power, class, doesn't mean we can't be here to learn~. Now let's all pay attention to sensei~~…"
"Awwww, but Ririko-sense—"
"Sit, damn you!"
In a flash, everyone obeyed, not wanting to invoke the wrath of the powerful ayashi instructor. The end of the class period was approaching, but not even an earthquake and a power outage combined would be enough to wrench the poor souls free from her coils.
While their migraines would continue for just a while longer still, the ghostly electrons that erupted from the lighting system escaped to elsewhere…
The sky around the academy had darkened evilly since the incident at math hour. At the cliffside edge boarding the monster school, the scarlet seas below became awake and aggravated into stronger waves. At the ending telephone pole, the living, charged plasma had crossed to the conclusion of its journey. Full, raw, wild, it sank down the sloping wire and into the earth below. A great chasm split open below, meters in front of the hollowed eyes of the scarecrow rocking the tip of the cliff. Whitest light peeked out from under while voices below argued.
"We're almost out! Don't let go, whatever you do!"
"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!"
"Ah! I said to hold on!"
"Oh fuck you think I'm trying to let go?!"
A hand tore out of the ground, fingers clinging to the soil for everything dear. In a heave of effort, another arm came up, and with combined efforts, two bodies dragged onto the ground in exhaustion.
"Did it…" The first one to stand up was someone very familiar. As he explored his surroundings with his eyes, he hesitated on the finish. "…work?" He circled slowly around when he noticed the huge buildings in the background. A benevolent smile gradually widened and opened on his face, and his charming brown eyes lit up with triumph and cheer. 'Yes…!' His head was booming with inward applause. 'Yes!'
"Well I'll be damned…" The second person stood up. "So this is Youkai Academy, huh?" It was the ghoul that had challenged Tsukune back in Paradise. He looked much different than he did back when. His black hair was much shorter and much better kept. On top of that, there was not a hint of gore on his body – not a scratch or leak of it to behold. He was transformed into a beautiful young man, in spite of his not-as-beautiful vocabulary. His undead eyes still cast no reflection, but apart from that, he looked perfectly normal.
"I can't believe it…!" Tsukune was the other person, standing right next to him, rushing out to the edge of the cliff to get a sniff of the air. It smelled like summer. The most beautiful summer he had ever known. He held his hand to an earpiece almost too small to notice, and spoke into it with uncontainable excitement. "Doktor-sempai! Sempai, it worked! We're out! …I'm loose!"
The speaker in his ear gave a harsh static tone at first, adjusting to the signal, but slowly, an audible and recognizable voice chimed in. "Heheh, I'm happy for you, boy. The Zarathustra Experiment transpired marvelously. For the moment it was a one-time fling, but after years of strenuous work and effort here in Paradise, we've finally found a way to project particles through space and reissue them wherever we want! Welcome back to the Youkai Academy!"
"That sounds so weird, sempai. 'Welcome back'… Yet it doesn't feel as though I've been here before."
"It's thanks to the M.W.M.'s lovely toys (and myself of course) that you're here at all," The scholar's charmingly soft tone reminded him, "Zarathustra for throwing you back, and my precious Compass of Order for making these four long years pass as nothing to a wink for this school, ensuring that you can re-meet your previous companions and recapture some of your memories."
"I don't care what the hell you say about magical relics of any kind," the ghoul replied brusquely, "Getting here with them or no, I can't stand magic. It's the only thing that can hurt me. The rollercoaster ride it took to get over here is a shining example of that!"
"But you're perfectly unharmed." Tsukune replied, clearly already worn by his temperament.
"Tell that to the jelly sloshing where my organs used to be."
"Now, now. Remember; you're both here for two good reasons. Eins is to gain Mikogami Board Chairman's trust and support. We want the Dark Lords on our side for the belligerency against the Fairy Tale organization. They'll be little nasty thorns in our side otherwise. Zwei, to seek out the enchanted whip Belmont. It's likely to be around the exorcist's office. Reverend wants it to...get his land legs back on. We want you to by all means indulge on reuniting yourself with your previous life, but you must also think about the mission. We've all spent too much time with each other to just walk out of the door after all, haven't we?"
"All the better reason to just walk out of it…" The ghoul mumbled, gazing off to the side.
Faustus evidently heard him.
"…Um. Please?" He begged in an utterly half-hearted way.
"Well actually, now that I think about it, we don't necessarily have to return." Tsukune realized, scratching his cheek. "We can stay here as long as we'd like, without consequence to consider."
"Oh dear, always one step ahead of me," he remarked sarcastically. "But wait! Oh, that's right, I'm not the one trapped here. It's no bluff that I can whip away over to where you're at lickety-split and give you a well-deserved spanking."
"That…gives me all the motivation I need." He concluded with a shiver.
"Thought it might. I don't give the lightest of all spankings. You have a couple of weeks to complete your assigned tasks. Ooh! Ooh! This almost slipped me! Go search that incredibly absurd-looking scarecrow over there to your five o' clock! Myself, Reverend, and Officer all took the liberty of presenting you with…quite a unique present."
"A present…for me?" He wasn't sure what to think. It was a wonder what the occasion might possibly be. "Um, okay. I'll go have a look." He wandered over to the ever-smiling jack-o-lantern on the tall wooden post draped with rags and stuck a hand inside. Shuffling around for a moment, he pulled out an old, elegant box and set it to the ground gently. It was pretty fair size. The boy's eyes glistened with childish curiosity.
"Open it! Open it! Ahh, but first! Siegfried! Adjust the focus of the lens over your right eye so that all of us can see! I feel just like I have a son, here!"
"Yeah, yeah…" The ghoul rolled his dead eyes and complied with the man's wish. The hidden camera aimed on Tsukune, who felt a slight tingle of embarrassment now that additional attention was on him.
"Ah no please, take that off of me." He beseeched, aware that there must have been at least a dozen spectators watching him from the other side. The ghoul grinned cunningly for his companion's awkward feeling. Finally the boy gave up and unboxed the container. His eyes widened when he saw a beautiful crimson color. As old, dusty, and worn as the box looked, he would never have expected to see something so intact and new-looking inside. It must have been untouched for years, yet not a flaw in sight.
Scooping it up to reveal its wholeness, everyone discovered it was a school uniform, perfectly distinct from any of the green uniforms the actual students attending have. It was the same general design, but it bristled with a flowing rose-red elegance, individual details engraved into its collar. He was holding up only the shirt and jacket part, but he saw additional pieces of the set still inside. The slacks, the shoes, the tie.
For a moment he was speechless; hopelessly mesmerized by the outfit's prime and singular beauty. "I don't…I mean…how did you…?"
"I do hope it fits."
Tsukune took a moment to bring the suit up to his face and breathe over it. It smelled fresh. Like breathing in the very fabric of nature itself.
"I love it…" He said, already beginning to undress out of his older black garbs he casually wore while he was still in Paradise. "You can't even begin to imagine how long I've yearned to try out something new."
The ghoul they called Siegfried reared his head towards a distant direction, taking the camera angle away as Tsukune applied all of the touches to complete his new look.
"Okay," he finally announced from behind. "How do I look?"
The animate corpse twisted his head around to look again, and everyone watched as the teen turned his torso this way and that to give them all a full look, as excited as a boy on his first date. To sum it all up in one word: perfect. The suit was an absolute fit, and he could have sworn that he heard applause and whistles of grandeur come out through his earpiece. Before he knew it, a smile was wrapped around his face.
"Superb. You have the spitting potential that marks vampire." The voice was filled not with admiration, but of absolute assuredness.
Tsukune turned his head slightly to the statement. "Vampire?" He asked, confused.
"That suit – that very uniform you're wearing right now, right this minute belonged to a very special and significant individual to ayashi history. No, not just that…what you are wearing right now once belonged to a Dark Lord of Youkai Academy. One of the absolute mightiest."
"You…" The charges in his body were bursting at his seams with anticipation.
"That's right," Faustus answered his bewilderment. "And a mighty vampire he was. The Dark Lord Shuzen. What you are now wearing was his personally custom uniform that he wore when he himself was a student of Youkai Academy."
Tsukune's eyes shivered with shock. "Him…" He was educated enough the long years he spent working in the other dimension to pick up on whom such a renown and successful ayashi someone in the virtually unreachable caliber of Lord Shuzen was. A legend. What he was wearing belonged to a legend.
"You may not be a vampire." The voice in the speaker belonged no longer to Doktor, but to Garandou. "But you have more potential and significance than any man I have ever known. It befits you well."
"Thanks." He replied. He knew no other way how. It was a dream, but it wasn't at all like any of the surreal, vivid nightmares that he used to dream if he ever tried to sleep.
Finally. After over a thousand nights of unrest and torment…a good dream.
"Oi. What gives?" The ghoul spoke up, cancelling the camera function so that the others back in Paradise could no longer see. "Don't I get a uniform so that I can blend too?"
"Siegfried! That was rude!" Faustus was back on. "You cancelled the function! I wasn't finished looking."
"He gets a kickass trend, am I not so fashion-worthy?"
"Why surely you didn't expect me to think of YOOUUU…" The scientist mocked. "Go stake one out for yourself."
He crossed his arms. "Tch. Fine. …Prick."
"Lout."
"Pussy."
"Scrotum wears."
"Okay, enough you two." Tsukune spoke up. "Thanks for the gift, I appreciate it. But can we go now? I'm anxious to explore what I only waited around for about half a decade to!"
"Hm, okay, okay, you have your new Youkai Academy entrance files ready, correct?"
"Hai." They both responded.
"You're set to go. There's no call to look conspicuous, so I won't be chatting with you for a while. Remember your objectives. Mmmm~ oh cripes, why didn't I give you guys a group hug when I had the chance~~?!" He cried out, making a somewhat pathetic attempt to stir their parting into a huge melodrama. "Go... Cut transmission before I do something drastic. Just…just remember to dream a little of me, that's all a man asks, that's all…!!"
"…Good-bye, Dad." Siegfried mocked the authoritative position he was making it seem like he had with a growl as he tore the headpieces away, severing the communication system.
"Finally, no strings." Tsukune sighed with relief while he continued examining his new outfit – one that had once belonged to one of the greatest ayashi alive. "I should've asked how they managed to ever get this thing…"
"A story for another time." The ghoul that he was once enemies with answered after a moment. But a lot can change in four years, or more specifically, in the blink of an eye. "We who come from Paradise…always work in mysterious ways."
They took a moment to turn their heads up towards the burning ruins of dangling electrical wires and occasional sparks off what had once been called a telephone pole.
"Did I do that?" Tsukune asked. "How embarrassing."
"Those powers of yours are freakin' dangerous," his partner chastised. "Keep 'em restricted."
"Are you ready, Siegfried?"
"I'm ready…" The eyes wheeled over at him. "…Lysander."
"I've never gone without thinking of the friends…of the possible grand friends that I once made here, on this land. ...Not even for a day." Tsukune, the mysterious being that came from Paradise bearing an apparent new title, was no longer speaking to his undead partner, but across a forest of gnarled trees, into an institution at work and beaming and budding with young, charismatic life. "Especially the one whose name Garan-sempai gave me the end of his deal."
His disguise for slipping into the school was perfect. In spite of his slightly pale skin and his decorated new attire, he was sure he looked exactly like the person he did before he ever left the place. The long, gaping metal wound was no longer with him. It was healed over completely. His eyes were no longer gold, but the most handsome shade of brown. There was not a trace of ayashi to spot. …But he had most certainly not left Paradise with nothing.
Peering at the towering monuments that marked the establishment the two were heading towards, his pupil passively dilated to let off a hint of sinister gold to mark its true color.
"So now, Akashiya Moka…where are you?"
A/N: Yes, I know, he's finally back! Sorry I took so long, but you see, I actually started writing an idea for this chapter earlier, and wouldn't you know, fifteen pages into it I decide "Mmmm I dislike it." XD I had to start from scratch, or I just felt you all would be confused out of your minds. But hey, I've also been to complete another project – the cover for my story. I thought the illustrations went pretty well for my first lineart. If you're curious, just go to Deviant Art and type in "R+V: What Love Takes". It's not letting me post the link for some reason… T-T But I thought I'd let you know. I think you'll like it! ;D