They went with the route Miltz wanted in the end. They were already rushing to take off when Lucia gave his (very small) time estimate of how long it would take Demon Card to throw together enough people to pursue them. When he also mentioned that having all four lord of the Mystic Realm under his thumb meant that his men were more likely than not going to pursue them the whole way, Sieg dropped his argument and everyone agreed on the faster route.
Of course, Lucia doubted anyone too major had come along for this. His body had been stolen from Demon Card, not killed. Megido and the others, so long as they had hopes of him waking up, would be worried about what might happen to him, but it wouldn't be too pressing an issue. The enemy wanted him alive. Hopefully they would only send weaker demons after him.
Since the bed he'd been using ended up as a storage unit for his body, Lucia went to the meditation room where he and Haru had hid earlier to sleep. Compared to his own bed back at headquarters, it was a massive downgrade, but it still beat having to curl up on the floor in Mega Unit.
-o-
Lucia was content to make himself a pile of cushions to lie on and try to sleep, but Haru stayed awake. Outside the room, he could hear people getting frantic. Two ships were pursuing them now, and it looked like a smaller, third one was joining the chase. He wasn't going to harass Lucia for deciding to sleep. It was his body that was worn out, after all. Haru was still surprised that Lucia could sleep at all in the given situation.
He left the meditation room in the hopes of finding some way to help, but there wasn't much he could do. He could survey the situation. He could check people's mental state, but there was no one to relay this information to, no way to physically assist in defending the ship. And nothing he could do when Demon Card started to fire at them. He had to trust the people of Mildea to keep everything under control.
Haru found himself out on the ship's deck, watching the scene play out and doing nothing more than hoping for the best.
Early in the morning, maybe around three or four, they passed into the mystic realm. While they gained a little distance there, they didn't lose their tail.
Haru was deep in through, racking his brain for ways to help, when a hand appeared only inches in front of his nose and waved in his face. He whirled around to see someone who was supposed to be resting.
"I've been calling your name for five minutes," Lucia said.
"Really?"
"No. I just got here. It's impossible to sleep when the whole ship keeps shaking. Are we being shot at?"
"Well, we are the enemy."
"The enemy ship has their leader hostage on board... as far as they know. They are dead when I get my body back." Lucia growled.
"Speaking of dead, you killed you own men yesterday."
"Yes. And I just made plans to kill my own men again. Or did you think that was hyperbole?"
Haru was a spirit, but he still could have sworn he felt a chill settle in his gut. "How can you say that so casually?"
"It's not that special of a skill."
"Stop treating this like it doesn't matter! Thanks to you, those men are dead! There's blood on my hands."
"Oh no. What a nightmare." Lucia paused. "Actually, I did get blood on your shirt. Do you know how to wash that out? I've never had to worry about it myself."
"Lucia, people are dead."
"People die all the time." A shot from one of the pursuing Demon Card ships struck the shield around their ship harder than the others, and the entire aircraft rocked. "Since you people couldn't get me out stealthily, once we've returned to our own bodies people will probably die here. Let's just hope they live long enough to break this curse first."
"You have no soul."
"Our current predicament would suggest otherwise."
"Why do you treat every conversation like a contest?"
"It's not a conversation when you're lecturing me."
"Well you need to be lectured. Maybe if someone had tried to straighten you out earlier, you wouldn't be such a heartless monster."
"Maybe if someone had been around to 'straighten me out' I—"
Another shot rocked the ship, this time tilting it dangerously to its side. Lucia lost his balance and stumbled forward, sliding into the railing. Haru stumbled as well, and passed right through the railing and over the edge of the ship.
Lucia swore and looked around. One lone woman had been watching, curious about the conversation she could only hear half of. He took a moment to take her in, then estimated how high up the ship was, then looked back at her. "We lost Haru. Stay on course. The two of us will meet you at the altar."
Before the woman could process what he'd said, Lucia jumped over the edge of the deck.
-o-
Haru was picking himself up off the ground when he heard a crash not too far off.
Being a spirit who didn't think too hard about what he should or shouldn't pass though, Haru had fallen into a wooded area, passing through leaves but bumping against every branch before hitting dirt. From the amount of rustling, whoever else had fallen had stopped somewhere in the branches.
Curious as to who else had lost their footing, and hopeful that their ship might come back for this other person, Haru headed in the direction of the noise.
A few hundred yards from where he'd landed, Lucia hopped down from a branch. He'd torn Haru's jacket and had scratches all over his face and arms—Haru would have a scar to match Lucia's if he didn't get those cuts cleaned—but judging from the wince as he landed, the preexisting injury to his ankle was the only serious damage.
Lucia looked around, spotted Haru, and nodded. "Good. I was worried you might have landed further back."
Haru paused a moment, then resumed his stride. Lucia jumped after him? "I appreciate the thought, but you already crippled yourself falling once, and my spirit is immune to harm."
"That's nice." Lucia took a moment to inspect the tear to Haru's jacket, then looked up at the spirit. "Do you know the way to the altar?"
The way to the…? Haru gasped. "Oh God! No! Do you?"
"Yes. And if I'd trusted you to get their on your own, I wouldn't have jumped." Lucia gestured in a direction that, to Haru, seemed random. "Your friends aren't going to restore me if you're missing. Let's go."
When Lucia turned around and started briskly walking away, Haru hesitated a moment before following.
"Can we make it in time?"
"We'll find something."
"What if nothing comes up?"
"Something usually comes up. How adverse are you to theft?"
"Can we get there on time by foot?
"Tomorrow evening, assuming nothing stops us. It would be better if your friends send a Rune Wing after us, or if we can find some other ride."
"Let and Julia know dragons. Maybe one of them will help us." Haru paused. "How can you know how long it will take to get there, but not the land formations around your own base?"
Lucia pulled a golden chain from his sleeve, tossed it up once, and upon catching it, showed the item to Haru. The Sinclaire stone gleamed in his hand. "Your friends shouldn't have let me get near my body. Unfortunately, the other three weren't on my person at the time."
"You sleep with that on?"
Yes. Lucia looked away so Haru couldn't gage his immediate reaction, then said, "The curse knocked me out. Otherwise I wouldn't have slept in armor either."
"I thought that was a little weird."
"A little?"
"For you. For a normal person it would be downright bizarre."
Lucia snorted. "Alright. Now shut up and keep your eyes peeled for something that can get us to the altar faster."
Not so much to give Lucia what he wanted as to keep the conversation from lasting long enough to turn against him, Haru stopped talking and started looking up as he walked, hoping to spot a dragon or a Rune Wing that might pick them up.
In the three hours that they walked in silence, Haru didn't count the number of trees he walked straight through. That was a habit he might want to avoid getting into if he planned on getting his body back, but as a spirit it didn't faze him to pass through an object, and he could pass through anything. Although things he still expected to be solid, like the ground or Lucia, were still solid. So it was when he walked into Lucia and completely flipped over Lucia's crouched down form and landed on his back that he realized his travel companion had stopped.
"Warn me when you—" Haru saw the Lucia had bent down, expression pained, and stopped himself. He rolled onto his feet and stood before asking "What happened? Are you alright?"
"Fine. Just too long on my feet, is all."
"Your ankle was alright yesterday."
"I haven't had much time off of it since yesterday," Lucia growled.
"You shouldn't have jumped."
"If we took the time to set up a more thought out search party, we would have gotten too far away to track you down again."
"You couldn't use the Sinclaire to find me?"
"Mother only tells me what she wants me to know."
"It's creepy that you call it that."
Lucia sucked in his breath and pushed himself off the ground. "I can keep going."
"You're injured," Haru told him. "You're allowed to be vulnerable. If you need to rest, don't hesitate."
Lucia glared at him, opened his mouth, shut it, then shook his head. "We won't make it we stop to rest. Your body can support me."
"Oh. Right."
"And I am not vulnerable."
"Sure."
-o-
By nightfall Haru had taken to miming supporting Lucia as they walked. The rules for how tangible he was to Lucia at any given time seemed to waiver (just like the rules of how solid everything else was) and he wasn't sure if he was really helping, but Lucia hadn't told him to back off, so Lucia assumed he at least wasn't doing anything to further irritate the injury.
"It's getting late."
"We have to keep going."
"You aren't going to walk for forty-eight hours straight, are you?"
"No. We didn't have forty-eight hours to start with."
"We're walking nonstop." Haru shook his head in disbelief. "You know, if returning to your own body isn't enough to heal your spirit, you're screwed."
Lucia bit his lip and said nothing.
"Lucia?"
Lucia stayed silent and kept walking.
"I'm going to look for a nearby town or… something. Get us a ride. I don't feel right letting you walk like this."
Haru stepped away from Lucia, and immediately moved back to his side when the boy gasped in pain and nearly doubled over.
"Is it that bad?"
"I can deal with it."
"You're sweating."
Lucia growled, but sat down without being prompted and began to massage his ankle.
"I'll see about finding a ride for us," Haru said. "Stay put. I'll check the general area and be right back"
"Stay."
"Hm?"
"Stay," Lucia repeated. "This is messed up. The injury isn't as painful when I use your body and now having you nearby keeps it from becoming unbearable."
"The longer you walk on it—"
"The closer we'll get to the altar. Give me a minute, and we'll get back to walking."
STA: Sorry for the unannounced hiatus. I had some problems with needing to rework how the last few chapters would go at about the same time that I got sidetracked by something that essentially killed my motivation to write for the past two months. Hopefully I'll get the final chapter up before March. I'll be shooting for posting it on the 25th.
