Kagami walked along the path deep in thought. Her locket had been bothering her again. She had told her mother, but was told it was her imagination, and that the locket would never hurt one of their family.
"Ah, mom's right. It MUST be my imagination." That's when the locket grew warmer.
Kuran Mansion-
The doorbell rang, and Hanabusa opened the door. "Morning, Kagami!"
Without a word, Kagami dropped her bag and went upstairs.
"Are you still angry at me? But you said you forgave me yesterday!" Hanabusa followed her.
Still silent, Kagami opened the first door. Nobody was inside. She turned to Hanabusa. "Where is Sora?" Her voice sounded robotic.
"Over there…" Hanabusa pointed. "What's wrong with you? It wasn't that big a deal for you to stay angry for so long…"
The door that Hanabusa had pointed opened and Sora came out. "Hi, Miss Kagami!"
Kagami picked Sora up. "Are we gonna play?" Sora asked enthusiastically. Kagami moved back downstairs, and Hanabusa followed. He protested when she started to walk outside.
"Hey, where're you GOING? KAGAMI!" He laid a hand on her shoulder. Almost mechanically, she turned her head.
The sound of concrete cracking explosively filled the driveway of Kuran mansion. Akatsuki, who was walking towards the door, lifted his head up. "What the hell?" He was in time to see Kagami jump into the tall trees surrounding the Mansion, and Hanabusa following her.
He had nothing better to do, so he followed too.
"Since when is a hill here?" Hanabusa nearly shrieked. But he didn't. That would be too girly. And shrieking would take up too much time; then he wouldn't be able to follow Kagami. With his luck, Kagami would get away, and Yuuki would have Kaname beat him up. With a sigh, he continued running.
Kagami didn't move with the usual smoothness all Vampires had. It was more like a human. A bit clumsy, and slowing over rough surfaces. Nevertheless, she managed to evade Hanabusa and continued into a stone tower.
Hanabusa paused before he entered. The incident in the Bell Tower back in Hillson Village came rushing back. But this time he would be fighting a vampire of equal status, not a puny Level E. He facepalmed, and muttering something about 'why me?' went inside.
"Kagami? Kid? Are you two in here?" Hanabusa called into the darkness. He hadn't seen a door into the tower, but there was one now, and it was locked. "Man, I wish Akatsuki was here. I could do with a bit of lig-" His sentence was cut short, as he felt a sharp pain between his shoulder blades, knocking him to the floor. After a small coughing fit, he managed to get back up.
Standing in front of him was Kagami. Though she didn't look much like it. Her eyes seemed unfocused, as though she weren't entirely awake.
That was when the voice spoke. "I assume you came looking for the child?"
Hanabusa didn't quite react the way the owner of the voice wanted him to. "Looking? LOOKING? I FOLLOWED HER. And it wasn't easy, either! Do you have any idea what those branches in that stupid forest did to my clothes? Do you have any idea what they COST? And why are you hiding in the shadows like some stupid Fairy-Tale villain? Who's you're role-model? The big bad wolf? Or perhaps its Snow-White's stepmother!"
The fairy tale villain voice was thrown. "I-I could force her to-"
"To WHAT? Something horrible clichéd, like stab herself?" Then what he had said reached Hanabusa's brain. "CAN you do that?"
The fairy tale villain voice said nothing. The room grew brighter, and Hanabusa could make out a flickering image in mid-air, as if it was projected. But he had known Kagami long enough to recognize her Noble Vampire's powers when he saw them. The fairy tale villain voice had spoken the truth. Kagami WAS being controlled. Her powers over the mind, enabled her to make people see things that weren't there, sort of like a haluucination. But she needed physical contact for the beginning, and moreover, registered contact (i.e, the person needed to know she had touched them). Then Hanabusa realized why Kagami hadn't simply run away, and instead taken the time to hit him. He had certainly felt getting hit...
The image was of a figure with a cloak on. It was surrounded by shadows, and the hood was up, leaving no possible method of recognition.
"Let me ask you a question," The fairy tale villain voice said.
"What is it?" Hanabusa asked. He knew what was coming. The were always the same. The villain held someone the hero considered important hostage, after an epic battle with minions, it would turn out somewhat like the situation Hanabusa was in now, and then the villain would make a demand. Sometimes a valuable something. Sometimes the Hero's life. Sometimes to kill an enemy.
"I need something done. Would you do it?"
Hanabusa groaned. He had been exactly right. "Get to the point!"
The fairy tail villain voice, which obviously belonged to the projected image person, seemed slightly miffed. "Fine then. I want you to bring the girl's family to me."
"Who? Kagami or the kid?"
"The kid."
"You wouldn't be nice enough to let them both go if I pretended I was scared, would you Mister Fairy Tale villain?"
"I would have if you hadn't just called me that."
"Oh, you mean Mister Fairy Tale villain?"
"Yes, that."
"And why do you want me to do that?"
"Enough questions! Attack!"
Hanabusa looked around. Did this horribly clichéd villain have a lion or something? Then he felt a fist collide with his chest. He got knocked backward. "Oh," He wheezed, "Kagami's going to attack me!"
Then he noticed Kagami had acquired a shadow ball from somewhere. Just like in the movies! She appeared to be preparing to charge. Hanabusa remained calm, trusting the movies. It was always like this. The hero refused the demand, villain ordered hostage to attack, on the presumption that hero can't hit the hostage, then the hostage fights back, millimeters away from hero's face, then the hero destroys villain.
Unfortunately, it appeared neither Kagami nor Mister Fairy Tale Villain had seen these particular movies, as Kagami's shadow ball impacted with him, and her foot impacted with his face. A few seconds later, Hanabusa impacted with the wall.
"Ow…" He muttered. "I guess the movies got it wrong…"
Kagami's Mind POV-
"You idiot!" Kagami's own thoughts sounded hazy to her. "Why didn't you run?"
A new voice invaded her thoughts. The same voice that she had heard when she had been walking up the path to Kuran mansion.
"Because he thinks you won't hurt him. Under influence from movies."
"He WHAT?" Kagami mind-yelled. "I TOLD him to lay off those things because it was going to his head!" She growled. "Let me kick him."
The voice seemed taken aback. Generally, people it possessed went 'Oh no, please don't hurt him/her! I'll do anything you want!' This was…different. But the voice liked it. "Glad to oblige…" It said, and indeed obliged.
"Oooh, nice kick, Mister Voice! But you should have aimed for his nose."
"I'll do it next time."
"Great!"
Normal POV-
He hadn't imagined it. He was SURE of it. It was most certainly Kagami who had kicked him in the face, not Mister Fairy Tale Voice. Nobody else ever kicked him with that much commitment. But now it was most certainly Mister Fairy Tale Voice who was standing in front of Hanabusa now.
That was when a blast shook the entire room. Mister Fairy Tale Voice cursed and said things that most certainly would not have been included in a Fairy Tale. The image began to disappear, and Kagami jumped straight up, into a hole in ceiling. Hanabusa tried to follow, but unfortunately the hole closed up, and he just hit his head, instead.
Then a section of the wall was blown off to reveal Akatsuki. "Are you all right?" He asked his cousin.
"Yeah, yeah."
"That's not a very nice way to speak to someone who just saved you…"
"Saved me? I could have gotten out of here myself…" Hanabusa was still sore about his…sore head.
Akatsuki smiled smugly. "That was a nice move with the jump."
"Nobody asked you, so shut up."
"Ok, but to think I was going to help you with your…predicament."
Hanabusa was interested. "Help? How?"
"You know how Ichijou's family has those top-secret records on all the HUnters?"
"Yes, I thought of that too, but the problem remains that they're TOP SECRET."
"Well, I convinced Ichijou to-"
He was cut off by Hanabusa, "Bribed Ichijou, more like. What did you do? A week of free manga?"
"A week and a half."
"That smiling idiot would do anything for manga…"
"You're complaining?"
"Not at all, let's get going."
Hanabusa paused before knocking on Ichijou's door. He always hated coming here… Taking a deep breath, he knocked- once, twice, on the third try, the door was whipped open to reveal the otaku most people knew as Takuma Ichijou.
"Hi, everyone!" He said in an uber-happy chirpy voice. "How are y-"
Hanabusa pushed past him. "No time for pleasantries. The records. Now." He knew he had to stop Ichijou before he said something along the lines of 'I watched this great anime today!' If that happened, he would be unstoppable.
"But I want to tell you about thi-"
"RECORDS, ICHIJOU. NOW."
"Fine, fine." He muttered at them, and after leading them into a spacious sitting room, went to gather the records.
"Stupid otaku…" Hanabusa muttered, thinking how those stupid movies couldn't be any more wrong.
Ichijou came into the room with a pile of scrolls and ancient books. Hanabusa looked at them in dismay. "We have to go through ALL of those?"
Ichijou dusted himself off, and coughed. "No, not all. Give me a description of her family."
Hanabusa and Akatsuki stared at each other. Ichijou waited. "Well?" He asked.
"We don't know much." Hanabusa finally admitted. "Kagami was the one always talking to her."
"Then get Kagami."
"That's sort of…hard to do at the moment…"
"And why's that?"
Hanabusa explained, after which Ichijou sat down, then muttered something to Akatsuki. They both suppressed laughter, and Hanabusa shot up. "What's so funny?" He demanded.
"Let's tell him. I like annoying him." Akatsuki told Ichijou. When Ichijou nodded, "Ichijou just said how you were such an irresponsible person, losing both the child an-"
Hanabusa knew what was coming next. He pounced on Akatsuki, clamping his cousin's mouth shut. Akatsuki wrestled free, and could have left it at that, but said anyway- "I was just going to say 'friend'. You thought of something else, didn't you? Getting ideas, are we?"
"No, of course not. Kagami is just a friend." Hanabusa said, blushing slightly.
"Ah, but how much of a friend?"
Ichijou intervened, due to fear of his house being frozen over then completely burnt to ashes. Well, more a fear of the manga and anime CDs in his room being frozen over and then completely burnt to ashes. "Please don't fight! Can't you tell me ANYTHING about this girl's family?"
"Um…"Hanabusa thought. "I remember! The kid said that her family moves around a lot!"
"Moves around a lot…" Ichijou discarded a bunch of scrolls altogether. He flipped through some books, and then put them away. Finally, after an uncomfortable 15 minutes, he narrowed it down to a single page.
"Here it is. These families," He gestured at the list on the page, "are the only possible ones."
(A/N: I have lost motivation. Nobody reviews anymore... *Anime Cry*
On another note, I had to fight every instinct I possessed to type Fairy 'Tale', instead of Fairy 'Tail'. Its official. Anime is brainwashing us. But we don't care, do we?)