Crimso's Notes
So once again, I am in science class after taking a test. You may be thinking "Crimso, why in the world are chapters started in class so often? And why do you inform us of this?" Well, one is that I usually have periods in class with no work to do aside from this, and two is that… well, I don't know. I need something to say here. Well, I think my test went all right. I always forget how to show the bonds between elements, though. I mean, I know the types and what they do and why, but I forget how to draw them. Well, I hope I did all right with that. I did something I remember doing before.
Note one: This chapter will have many scenes in different places.
Note two: Watanagashi is approaching very fast. Keep this in mind.
Note three: More info in this chapter, but action in next. Keep in mind everything here is important, like usual.
~~~~X~~~~
Chapter Thirty: Loss of All Hope
When Mion woke up, all she felt around her was cold darkness. She could remember this darkness, this coldness, but it had been ones that she had been hoping to forget about over time. Unfortunately, that darkness and coldness had now come back when she thought that she would never experience such a thing again. When she escaped from the cell of the basement, she believed it to be the last time she would ever be met with such a feeling. Oh, how wrong she had been.
Her eyes shot open as she looked before her, finding one of the servants standing there with a smirk on his face. She was located in the back room of a spare cell that was kept next to the wooden door that lead to the main room away from the other cells that she recognized from previous experiences, and for some reason she could not point out; the door had been closed. It was a great metal door and she could not hear anything that was going on behind the door. She looked at the servant with scared, wide eyes.
"How nice of you to come back, Number Twenty-Seven," the servant greeted her sarcastically. "We missed you so much when you were gone. Now where did you happen to run off to? Nice horns, by the way. Those are new." He smirked as he looked at the top of her head, to the white horns that had grown quite large over the last few days.
She didn't say a word.
"Oh well, I'm sure the person that captured you can answer everything for us. Just give me a moment and I'll be back." The servant creaked the door open and stepped out, closing and locking it instantly.
She was now all alone in her cell, her whole vision covered by darkness and the cold feeling of being completely alone. While it wasn't particularly dark, she felt like her whole world was painted black, even though she could see the world perfectly well through her green eyes. She was breathing heavily as she looked around, looking for someone, anyone that was there to comfort her in some way.
But there was no one. They hadn't captured her sister and Keiichi wasn't captured along side of her. She was now all alone. The warm feeling that had been beside her when she was in her cell with her sister was now nothing, leaving only the cold feeling behind. Her whole world was in the middle of a winter storm, a winter storm in the middle of the night.
Fear overtook her like never before. She had always thought about how things would be without her sister in her cell with her, and she was now actually experiencing it. She realized only now how much she relied on her for her survival. She had always said to herself if it weren't for her sister, she would have probably been asked to be murdered by her master. Now, she really was wishing that her master would just walk in here right now and kill her. The coldness of death was better than the coldness of being completely alone in a boring, dark cell.
She let out screams and cries as she banged her fists against the wall of her cell. This area in the back of her cell had no bars; it was simply enclosed by a steel door and thick stonewalls. She could not see the world outside of her cell right now, even if it was only the dark of the basement. The lock was on the other side of the door, so there was no way that she would be able to get out. Trying to break down the metal door was just silly, and the walls weren't going to break anytime soon.
She let out a whimper as she curled up in a ball, hoping to give herself some warm by lying down in such a way. She had gotten warmth from being close to someone, so being close to her own body should help a little… right?
It didn't work, though. No comfort was given by lying in this way. She shifted about, hoping that she would get the warm feeling somehow. It didn't work no matter what position she tried to be in. She was getting very uncomfortable lying on the stone floor like that. It could not compare to the soft, warm blankets of the futon. It was cold and hard, a place where no one would want to sleep on. Mion really wished that she could have a futon so that she could at least be somewhat comfortable, but she knew that the servants would not comply with such a wish. They believed that demons didn't need things like futons to keep themselves comfortable and warm. Up until recently, she didn't even know what her own face looked like because she had never been able to look in a mirror or own one. Glancing to the side, she realized that the mirror Keiichi had given her was still there. The servant was to come soon, so she didn't want to grab it and cause him to notice and wonder where she had gotten such an object from.
She grumbled as she shifted on the floor, hoping that she would be able to get some comfort somehow. However, there was little comfort available in a cold, dark place like the placement, be it the feeling she got around her from emotions or the material that made up the spot she was lying on.
Suddenly, she heard the clicking of the door being unlocked and then moments later the door being slammed open. Mion picked her head up as she looked at the figure before her, which happened to be none other than a very, very, very angry Oryou and a servant behind her.
"Servant, close the door and make sure she does not get out!" she yelled out as she stepped into the back room, then moving to stare at the girl in front of her with eyes full of anger like Mion had never seen before. The servant did as he was told, and the door was closed, the servant standing in front of the metal door to make sure that she didn't attempt to run around the old woman when she was in the room and escape once again.
Oryou's eyes were fierce, and it was enough to make Mion's heart race increase with pure fear.
"WHAT IN THE WORLD WERE YOU DOING, YOU DEMON?" snapped Oryou, startling the poor demon.
Mion hesitated. What was she supposed to say?
"I demand to know everything that happened! Start from the beginning!" hissed Oryou.
She hesitated again. She didn't know what to tell her.
"Well, go on! Explain everything."
She said nothing.
"Fine then. Tell me about how you got out," she ordered.
Mion didn't want to say anything about that. It would get Keiichi in trouble.
Oryou was not pleased at all with the silence. "Okay then, why don't you start by explaining about why you were cuddled up with a human male when you were found?" she growled.
Mion didn't know what to tell her about that. If she were to explain the feelings she got when she was outside, the feelings that she was not supposed to know about, then she would be punished. Demons weren't allowed to know what the meaning of words like happy, sad, and love were, so if she were to use any of them, then she would be hurt badly for learning about them. Of course, she would then have to explain who told her about them.
"…I…I...I…I…" That was the only thing she could find the words to say.
"Demon, if you don't explain in five seconds… then I'll punish you in the most brutal way I can think of."
She bit her lip as she tried to think of the simplest way she could explain without using the words that Keiichi taught her. All emotion use was banned from her vocabulary. It was strange, she thought, how it was almost impossible not to use them now that she knew what they were, while back then she could easily not use them. How did she speak back then? How did she manage to avoid using such strong and powerful words? She couldn't even remember. These emotions had become such a part of her that she could not explain something without using how she felt, especially when it came to the identity of the warm feeling Oryou was now asking her to explain. What would she think if she knew the truth?
Then she realized that there was no point in hiding it. So what if she got beat up? Not saying such words would be accepting that she was no more than a demon who could not understand emotions, a demon who was overpowered by humans. She knew better than those demons. And besides, if that was what it meant to be a demon, then she was not a demon.
"Because of the warm feeling I get when I'm around him," she explained.
Oryou raised an eyebrow. "The warm feeling?" she repeated.
That was the simple way to put it, hopefully to calm her down before she said her next words.
"Because I love him," she clarified.
That was it. All the rage and fury in the world must have come to Oryou all at once for her eyes were blazing with anger hotter than the embers of a burning fire, looking hot enough to cause anyone she looked at to ignite and burn into a pile of ash. She balled her fists tightly as she clenched her teeth together, getting ready to release all her rage onto the girl.
"You… you… YOU FOOL! " Her screams echoed through the small room. "How dare you get close to a human in such a way! And how in the world did you learn about such a thing? You demons should not know what the meaning of such a word is!" Her voice blazed with fury. "Why you little brat! I should have just killed you the moment I first laid eyes on you!"
Mion tried her best not to be intimidated by her, but it was very tough. Oryou was a very scary person. "I don't care!" she screamed. "You say that demons should not know what emotions are, but I do! All demons do! It's your twisted images that made demons look the way they are. You know what? I don't care about your hold on me. So what if I used to be a Sonozaki demon? I'm not Number Twenty-Seven! My name is Mion! I'm a free demon now, and you have no more hold on what I do. That boy saved me from your clutches. He taught me games, and it made me very happy. You know, I was shocked when I first explored the world, but it was very enjoyable to be out there with the sister I loved so much! And I learned things that you could have never taught me, the world you tried to hide from me! But your grip on me did not stay. I now know things, and there's nothing you can do about it! You're just weak and afraid that people will find out who I am." This woman was related to her. What was the word for that, again? Keiichi had said it before. It meant the mother of someone's mother. "Isn't that right, Grandmother?"
Speaking that one word was like pouring gasoline on her already blazing flame of rage. Her eyes sparked with fury and disbelief as she stared at her granddaughter's stern face, a small smirk of triumph on her face. There was no way that her grandmother's rules would bind her anymore. She needed to claim this happiness for herself.
"…You… how in the world did you find out…!" she yelled out to the girl.
"I just did. You're my grandmother. You stole Shion and I from my mother when we were born because you thought we were cursed and then you turned us into demons and kept us down here. You were too soft to kill us, both times. Because we're you're granddaughters, " she explained, seeing disbelief painting her grandmother's face with each word she spoke more about the subject. "Now I know who I am, and there's nothing you can do about it! I was once human, and I've become human again! There's no way in the world I'm letting myself stay down here!"
Fury seemed to be getting the best of Oryou, and she was practically burning in her own rage now.
"How dare you find out! ? How dare you say such a thing to me! ? It doesn't matter if you were once human, you are demon now, whether or not you are my granddaughter!" She howled out. "Servant!" she yelled as she turned to the man beside her with harsh eyes. Even he seemed to be scared of how much anger she had within her. "Get me my katana! I swear to Oyashiro-sama that I'm going to do it this time! I'm really going to kill this girl! I will show her that I am not soft and that I can really do it!"
Mion's eyes went wide, but she tried to remain calm. Would Oryou really kill her? In her mind, she was soaring back through time, her line of sight being replaced by her own when she was much younger, when she had made her first attempt on their lives.
The usually lively Sonozaki basement was now tainted with the smell of death and painted with crimson blood splattered about the walls. Dead bodies of demons, demons who were loyal to the Sonozaki family and their master, were in every single cell.
Two young demons, given the numbers Number Twenty-Seven and Number Twenty-Eight sat in the back of the room, their cell the last one in the whole basement. They watched with wide eyes as the head of the Sonozaki family stood in front of the cell closest to them. The demons within the cell writhed in fear as they stared up at the old woman, her katana stained with blood from the demons she had killed. She had ordered them not to protect themselves, so there was nothing that they could do to save themselves, and nothing that they could do as the old woman brought the blade of her katana down on the head of a demon.
The demon next to the now dead demon yelped as he stared as his fallen comrade. He stared back at Oryou, just in time to get a quick look at her before he too was met by the shining blade of the katana. The final demon in the cell wanted to run, but she knew that she could not. The silver of the sword was the last thing that she saw.
Now, only two demons of the thirty-five Sonozaki demons remained. Number Twenty-Seven and Number Twenty-Eight were holding each other tightly as they looked up at the old woman who was approaching them quickly, the katana in her hand. They could both feel tears form up in their eyes when they realized that she would not spare them. She hadn't even spared Kenji, her head demon and most trusted of all of them. There was no way that they would be spared if he hadn't been.
Oryou unlocked the cell and stepped inside of it, holding her katana over the heads of the two girls. Number Twenty-Seven clutched onto her sister tighter, realizing that it would be the last time that they would be together. They were both going to die. Even if the basement was cold, they didn't want to leave each other.
A young boy stood in the corner, his eyes wide as he watched the old woman murder all of his demons. He was around two years younger than the young demons in the cell and he had forest green hair and eyes. He had been yelling the whole time, screaming at her to stop murdering the demons, but he was strangely silent now, simply staring at the whole scene with horrified eyes as he realized his grandmother was really going to kill the two of them.
She closed her eyes as she positioned for the kill. If she swung down, she could easily murder the both of them in seconds.
The twin demons held each other closer. This was their last time together. These were to be the last moments of their lives.
But the blade never came down.
"Takeru, I've grown weak," the old woman spoke to the boy in the corner. "I cannot kill these two, even if I wanted to."
The boy looked surprised. "But Grandmother…!"
"I know, Takeru, I know. But no matter how hard I try, even if I tried again now or years later, I will never be able to kill those two. That I am sure of."
Those words burned sharply in Mion's mind. There was no way that the woman before her would kill her. She had said herself that it wasn't possible, even if it was years from that moment.
That's why she faced her fears as the servant handed her katana, the sword glistening just as Mion remembered it. In her heart and in her mind, she knew that her grandmother would not be able to bring that sword down on her head, even if she wished for it. She stared up at the old woman with determination in her eyes. There was no way that she would be afraid of that blade, even if it looked as if it was about to take her life.
Oryou positioned the sword above Mion's head, and she stared at it, seeing her own reflection in the blade. She realized that her eyes had strength in them that she had never seen before, a challenging look that told her to take on the fear before her as if it wasn't even happening. And that was exactly what was happening. She was not afraid of the old woman.
She stared down at the demon that was her granddaughter and clutched the sword tightly. There was also determination in her eyes, the determination to kill the demon before her after two failed attempts. And she was sure she would do it this time.
The sword was brought down, causing Mion's eyes to widen. She wouldn't… would she?
But the sword stopped inches above her head, and the old woman sighed as she drew the sword back. She looked over to the servant and handed him the sword. "Just forget about this, servant. The scene before you didn't even happen," she told him, not wanting to seem weak before a servant. The servant nodded in acceptance and walked out of the room, the katana in his hands.
Mion looked triumphant as she stared at the head of the Sonozaki family. She had defeated her for a third time.
Oryou kept her angered face on, pretending like she hadn't just failed to kill her granddaughter for the third time in a row. She did not want to seem weak, even though Mion knew that she secretly was. This woman had tried to kill her three times, and each time she had been unable to bring herself to do it, simply because she was her granddaughter, even if she had been turned into a demon and tossed in a cell.
When the servant returned, Mion noticed a chain leash and a roll of duct tape in his hand. "Good, you knew what I wanted you to do next. You know what to do, then," she told him. "I'll leave the rest to you."
Oryou gave Mion one last angered look as she stormed out of that cell, enraged and embarrassed that she had shown her soft side in front of one of her twin granddaughters and a servant.
The servant smirked at the demon girl as he walked over to the wall and hooked the chain onto a hook in the back. He duct taped the part of the chain used to open and close it so that the girl wouldn't use her hands to undo it, and then he lunged towards Mion with the other end. She let out a large yelp as the man clicked the other side of the chain to her collar, then wrapping that in duct tape. It would be hard to get all the tape off. Mion moved a claw to the back of it and tried scratching at it, but it was just too much.
She scrambled as she tried to undo herself from the leash, but it was no good. The servant backed away, and Mion felt the need to slaughter the man right there for doing such a thing to her. She ran towards him with fierceness in her eyes, only to yelp out in pain as the leash tugged at her neck. He was too far away for her to reach. She began to reach her arms out and desperately slash the air, but he was too far away for even that to hit.
The servant was annoyed by this behavior, and he reached for a rope that was hanging on the side of the cell. Ever so carefully, the man ran and grabbed the girl's wrists and began to bind them together with the rope. Mion tried her best to scratch him off, injuring him quite a bit when she scratched the man in her fit, though he winced and tried to move on from the injury. When the rope was bound, he smirked at her. There was no way she could get her wrists free from it.
"Let me go!" she screamed out. "I'm a free demon now! You can't bind me! I know who I am now and I know what emotions are! There's no way I'm going to let you do this!"
The servant simply shook his head, wearing that same disgusting smirk on his face. Slowly, he walked up to the growling girl, and with as much strength as he could; he pushed the girl and forced her down on the ground. She struggled about on the floor; though found that it was impossible to get up with her wrists bound together like that.
"You are not a free demon," the man told her. "You may think that you're a human, Number Twenty-Seven, but no matter what you do, it's only a game of make believe." He reached out and ran a finger down the length of her left horn, just to remind her that she was not human and never would be considered one as long as she had them. "You're only a demon."
And with those words, the servant left.
Mion screamed out as she tried to break free from the rope and the leash. Her neck ached as her metal collar rammed against the skin of her neck as she tried to pry the hook from the way by struggling forward, though there was little she could do while she was still on the floor with her wrists bound together. She yelled out as she buried her head in her wrists, her fangs gripping the rope and gnawing at it. It was a thick rope, and no matter how hard she tore and gnawed, it looked like it would be impossible to break free.
But luck appeared to be on her side. The ropes snapped after a good while of gnawing, and Mion pulled herself upward with her now free arms. She ran for the door, yelping again as the length of the leash cut her off. Knowing that it was impossible, she screamed out again in frustration. She banged her hand against the rock of the wall over and over again, hoping that it would somehow help, even though it would be almost impossible to break through it.
She turned around and lowered her head, then beginning to ram the wall with her horns over and over again. She looked like a wild animal as her horns hit the surface of the wall, doing nothing but making a large sound. It was hurting her to do it quite a bit, too.
Minutes passed, and Mion found herself lying on the ground, breathing heavily. The wall had not been chipped, and it would not break. They had been made sturdily so that demons could not do that. A single tear drifted down her cheek as she realized any way of escaping from this place was completely impossible and the spark that was her hope instantly diminished to a pile of nothing. More tears came down as she realized that there was nothing but cold here, and there would be nothing but cold when she stayed down here. Her sister was gone, Keiichi was gone… everyone was gone.
There was nothing but her, the cell, and the dying ashes of her hope.
~~~~X~~~~
Shion looked out the window of the house she had been staying in, once again wondering where her sister could be. Perhaps she was with Keiichi, all snuggled up in the futon, or perhaps she had been captured and was now lying on the hard ground, the surroundings she were in empty of all warmth. She herself had not been able to sleep at night due to the lack of the warm feeling. Sure, the futon itself was quite warm, but it wasn't the warmth that she was searching for.
She whipped around when she heard the sound of the creaking door, instantly being greeted by the smiling face of Houjou Satoshi. He was a boy that Shion had been getting used to being around, and he was quite a nice one at that. He did not betray her and give her back to the Sonozakis like most people would do. He had accepted her when she said to call her Shion and not Number Twenty-Eight and he had allowed her to stay in his house.
"Hello, Shion," he said gently, smiling at the girl.
Shion smiled back. "Satoshi-kun."
He wandered over to the girl and sat down on her futon, and Shion then did the same. She did not know what else to do. She had been looking out the window for long enough, so a short chat would be nice to change things up a bit.
"Your sister hasn't been captured," he told the girl. "I asked my friend, who is a Sonozaki. He said that the demons that had been stolen had not been returned."
Joy rose up inside of Shion. That meant her sister wasn't suffering, and she was not sleeping on the hard ground of the Sonozaki basement. It was mostly likely that she was still with Keiichi, but the possibility of her getting separated from him and being out lost in the woods or taken in by someone else who had agreed not to send her back to the Sonozakis was also plausible. But just the fact that she was safe was enough for her to feel relief.
"Thank you, Satoshi-kun!" she cried out.
He nodded. "I want to make sure that you're happy, so I have to find your sister. To tell you the truth, I went out looking for her in the woods… but…" he rubbed the back of his head, embraced. "…I couldn't find anything."
"Ah…" Well, that was okay. He had to have done his best, right? But Shion really did miss her sister.
Satoshi gave her an embarrassed smile. "Well, I won't give up. That's for sure."
"Thank you, Satoshi-kun," Shion replied, a warm smile on her face. He had tried his best to find her, and he seemed determined not to give up on it.
There was silence that followed for a little bit, but it didn't last when Satoshi decided to break it. "So, tell me about her."
Shion blinked. "Huh?"
"Your sister. Tell me about your sister."
Shion grinned at the topic. There was just so many things she needed to say about her sister. She was a very interesting person, after all. "Well, as you know already, my sister and I are identical twins. We've always been together, and just as Rika said, we were taken away from other mother and turned into demons when we were very little." She sighed at the thought. She didn't remember it, but it must have been terrible for her to go through such a process when she was that little. "We never had anyone but each other. We were the only demons in that cell and we spent every moment of every day together. It was just the two of us."
She smiled. "My sister is an interesting person. She's like me in several ways, other than just appearance, but she is also different from me in many ways. We, as demons, are not allowed to own anything. But my sister one received a gift of cards from a servant and the two of them would play together every day, and she learned to be very good at it. She's very rough when it comes to games and fighting. She also uses strange tactics to win… I think that's what someone called it once." Shion scratched her head. She faintly remembered Keiichi saying something about Mion in a small, pointless conversation that they had had once. It was a word to describe her. "…I think the word you use is tomboy. I don't know, though. But she's that."
"That's a word for a girl that's a lot like a boy, so I guess her competitive nature when she's fighting is why she was called that." He smiled at her. "She sounds like a wonderful person. We're very lucky to both have sisters."
That was right. Satoshi and Satoko were siblings, even if they weren't identical twins or anything like that. "What is it like with Satoko? I've seen you two talk to each other before, but I want to know more."
"Satoko is a few years younger than me," Satoshi spoke. "Her favorite thing to do is make traps, and she's called a prankster." He sighed as he looked to the side of the room, a concerned look on his face. "I think she goes overboard sometimes, and I worry that her traps will hurt someone, but they're keeping her safe for now. She was able to beat the kidnapper, but… that aside…" He shook his head. "No, I need to believe in her. Even if she's younger, I have to believe in her… but I'm worried that she'll get hurt one day. She's still a little girl."
"You shouldn't be so worried, Satoshi-kun," Shion spoke to the boy, a reassuring grin plastered across her face. "If she can trap the kidnapper and prevent herself from getting in such a situation, I'm sure that she'll be fine! You have to believe in your sister. That's what I learned from years. I never thought that we would ever get free, and sis kept trying to convince me otherwise, but we did. I learned from that that I have to believe in her no matter what, even if the situation seems hopeless. Like how we managed to escape." She left out the details about Keiichi rescuing them, obviously, but the message was still the same.
When they were in the basement, Shion had been hesitant to trust Keiichi. She had believed that the servant who had given Mion the deck of cards and had treated her well compared to the others would save them, but he never did, which caused all hope she had to disappear. When Mion tried to convince her that Keiichi really would save them, she had refused to believe her at first.
But Keiichi really did come to save them.
And from that, Shion learned to believe in her sister. Trust was one thing you needed from a sister no matter what.
Suddenly, Satoshi reached out and patted Shion on the head, ruffling her hair as he did so. She looked up at him, confused.
"Thank you, Shion. I think you're right. I'll try to believe in my sister a little more after hearing those words from you." He smiled at her. She noted that his smile was very soft and warm. "So once again… thank you."
"You're welcome, Satoshi-kun," replied Shion with another grin on her face, though she doubted that hers was as warm and soft as his had been.
~~~~X~~~~
It was afternoon, and the Sonozaki Manor was almost quiet, which was a little odd for how things usually were during the afternoon. Oryou was sitting in her futon, going over what had happened earlier in the day with Mion, known better to her as Number Twenty-Seven. She was glad to hear that she had been captured and returned, though it was not happiness gained from knowing that something stolen from you had come back. It was relief that she had returned.
She hated to admit it, but those two demons were special to her. Even though she locked them in a basement and treated them terribly, they were still her previous little granddaughters. At times, she regretted what she had done to the two of them. Turning them into demons and allowing them to rot in their cell did no good for anyone. It only caused pain for her, the twin demons, and their mother.
She had never bothered to tell her daughter that her daughters were still alive. In truth, she was afraid of what she would have to say about the whole thing. She would be completely enraged to know that she had taken her daughters away form her without a reason and thrown them in the basement. Really, killing them would have put them to better use than what she was doing with them now.
She really hoped that the person who stole them would be captured so that they could be killed for the Watanagashi. It was coming up soon, after all, and there was no sacrifice. The murderer who had killed Kimiyoshi and stolen forty-three of his demons was also on her list, but she didn't know if they were the same person or not. It would be very hard to track them down.
Oryou didn't even know if there was going to be a sacrifice. The Watanagashi was in two days. If they couldn't capture the man before then, then it was likely that there wouldn't be one. No one had tried stealing demons or killing anyone since the whole thing happened. It was all quiet amongst other thieves and murderers.
The sliding door to her room opened, revealing the figure of her daughter, Akane, standing there with a concerned look on her face. Oryou did not react at all to this other than nodding to her daughter, acknowledging that she had come in.
"Mother, you've seemed a little tired recently. Has the recent killings been doing this to you?" she asked her gently, moving to stand in front of the old woman.
That had been a part of it, but what was really concerning her was the situation with her granddaughters. She knew that she couldn't hide the secret from her daughter forever, and if the end of Onigafuchi were really coming like her grandson has predicted… then the subject of the twins would come up.
She didn't know if her granddaughters were really the twins from the legend, but they didn't seem like it. Honestly, they seemed to be more of the good guys than anything else. They didn't look like they wanted to cause harm. Thinking back to the talk she had had with the older one of the granddaughters earlier, she sighed. She knew the truth now, and if she ever got the chance to meet her mother, she would definitely tell her who she was.
The time to tell her was coming. But she didn't want her to.
She had already escaped once, and she had been heavily concerned that Akane would find out who the demons really were during the search, among other things. But while she had found out, she did not see her mother. She doubted that she even knew what her mother looked like. She had done a number of other things, though. She had learned about emotions, become more human than demon, and she had fallen in love with a human boy.
Things were getting complicated.
"Mother…?" Akane spoke, noticing the uneasy look on her mother's face. "Is there something wrong?"
"It's just what everyone's been saying, Akane. Your son has been telling me all about how he feels that the end of Onigafuchi is coming, and that it is to arrive on the Watanagashi. I have not yet chosen a sacrifice, either, and it has been complicated," she told her.
Akane sighed. Her mother had always been the one to put too much work on her shoulders, especially since she wanted the Sonozaki family to look nice in front of all the other families. They had once been the weakest, but they were now the strongest of all three of them, passing by Kimiyoshi in seconds. Now that the old head was dead, and the new one wasn't doing very much but stand around and worry, the Kimiyoshi family had fallen in deep third. There wasn't much of a reason why she should be concerned about it now.
"I'm worried for Takeru," Akane admitted. "I mean, he may be the Hero and all of that, but he's still my son. I know who he is. I don't think that he can be all that heroic or anything like that. He… doesn't seem heroic to me." There was genuine worry on her face. "Takeru isn't that kind of person. He's not a hero."
"But that's the legend, Akane. Your son is the hero," Oryou told her, causing another look of uneasiness to grow across her daughter's face. "He is the right number birth in the family. He is certainly the Hero from the legend, and even if he doesn't look like it, I'm sure that boy can become the Hero when the time for it comes. He's ready for anything. I've been preparing him with a lot of extra training and I am sure he will be fine. He is a Sonozaki, after all."
But Akane's uneasy face did not clear up, even after that.
Oryou grumbled and shook her head. "Or is it just because you don't love that boy, Akane?"
Akane looked away. "Mother, you know I don't hate Takeru. I love him. He is my son, after all," she muttered.
"Don't lie to me," grumbled Oryou.
Akane sighed. "…Mother, it was true that I did not love him when he was born, but I grew to love him over the years." She looked uncomfortable with the topic.
"Of course you didn't love him. I wasn't expecting you to love him. I forced you to have that boy when you were still heartbroken over the loss of your twins. You told me that you didn't ever want to have another child, but I forced him on you." She shook her head. "It took you several years before you truly loved him. And even now, you wish that you kept those twins instead of him. You would trade them for him."
She looked down at the ground, showing a moment of sorrow. She was usually composed about things, but Akane would often show this side of herself whenever someone talked about her children. Her life as a mother had been very complicated. Her first two children had been taken away from her, and then she was forced to have another that she didn't even love until a few years after his birth. She couldn't deny it when she said that she would have preferred to have the twins and not him, but that was no longer the case. She wanted both the twins and her son now. Had it been years ago, she would have given up the boy for the twins in a heartbeat.
She hated talking about it with Oryou especially, as she was the one who supposedly killed her twins.
"Mother, I love Takeru now. My days of me dreading his existence and birth are long gone. I'm fine. Really, I am." It was a bit of a lie, seeing as she was not fine with the fact that two of her children had died before she got even a look at them. "I just wish you would have let me keep my twins… or at least look at them." She looked up at her mother, hopefulness in her eyes. "You saw them, Mother. Please tell me what they looked like. Were they boys or girls? Was one a boy and one a girl?"
"You really would trade his life for theirs," Oryou commented.
Akane narrowed her eyes. "Answer the question."
Oryou remained emotionless. "…It will only hurt you to know, Akane."
"Please, Mother. Answer the question." She would not compromise with this. She needed to know.
"No, Akane. I'm not going to tell you. It will hurt you. You are already hurt enough by it." Oryou was firm with this. There was no way that she was going to answer her question. She of course knew that they were identical girls, but if she were to say that, she knew that Akane would drop her love for Takeru, even if those two were already dead. She knew that she had been wishing for a pair of little girls. Knowing that she had been carrying just what she wanted would break her.
Akane looked down at the floor again. "I guess it's for the best," she decided. It really would hurt her to know, even if she wanted to.
"It is. I've done too many things to hurt you," Oryou spoke. "Even things that you don't know about."
She was referring to the fact that she was hiding her twin daughters from her, and also the fact that they had been rotting in the basement for seventeen years as demons that were rarely fed. But she didn't say it, of course.
Akane looked curious. "Mother?"
Oryou sighed. "Just go, Akane. You don't need to know the truth. If you know the number of things I've done to hurt you that you don't actually know about… it will hurt more than if you knew before hand."
Akane was still curious about it, but she knew that it would just hurt to talk about it, and that it would bother her mother if she didn't comply to her orders, so she just nodded to her mother and left the room, wondering what she could have been referring to.
Meanwhile, Oryou sat there, thinking about everything. Maybe one day she would give her daughters back to her. Maybe.
~~~~X~~~~
Keiichi sat at his desk, staring morosely down at his math homework. Chie had distracted herself with a book about curry, so she did not notice the fact that he wasn't doing any work at all. She also didn't notice the fact that a few of the younger students were discussing various things at the front of the room. How she didn't notice it when she was right in front of them, Keiichi would never know. She really did manage to distract herself with curry books. It was actually kind of amazing.
But that wasn't what was on his mind right now. He was thinking about Mion, and how he had lost her last night. …And how the man had said that he would be back for him.
"Hey, Watanagashi is the day after tomorrow!" a kid whispered to another kid.
"Yeah, I know. My mom says she's going to cover my eyes this time. I don't want to see guts again…"
Lucky kids. He would have to endure seeing the man's guts get ripped out right before his eyes… provided that the man was caught… and that he didn't get him first.
He didn't know what to do. He couldn't tell the police or anything like that, because then they would find out about Mion when he explained to them about what happened and how he had said he would be back. If he tried to explain things without adding Mion in, it wouldn't make any sense. Why would the man just leave without killing him when he easily could have done so, making it possible for Keiichi to tell them about his encounter and how he would be back for them?
Rena was watching her friend with concerned eyes. She knew what had happened, and she knew how heartbroken he was over it. But she couldn't say anything to him at this time, seeing how Takeru was seated right next to her and was occasionally blabbing to her about the various things he would do if the Watanagashi was some kind of romantic festival rather than a gruesome festival where people watched brutal murder happen. If she were to make a comment, then obviously Takeru would notice.
Keiichi was heartbroken. Mion was someone he cared for, someone he taught, and someone who he had fallen in love with. He couldn't even believe it when he thought about it. He, the former loser kid who spent his time running about allies trying to shoot kids with a model gun, was in love with someone, and was now heartbroken over the fact that he may never ever get to see her again.
Things were not going well for him at all. He lost his friend, he lost his parents, his other friend was off somewhere in the forest, there was little he could tell anyone expect for Rena, and he was now probably about to be killed.
And there was nothing he could do about any of this.
His head collapsed on the desk. Well, with the upcoming Watanagashi, it was possible that they would be able to find out who the murderer was and kill him before he got to him. It was a long shot, but he hoped that it would happen. Otherwise, he was about as good as dead. That man had defeated Mion, made Shion run away and disappear, killed the great head of the Kimiyoshi family, stolen forty-three demons, murdered eight, and possibly even captured many children in the night and killed them without being caught, if they were indeed the same person.
It was unlikely, though. He should just be digging his grave now so that he could lie where he wanted in death. His parents had gotten a cheap burial out in the yard. He could at least have time to dig himself a hole where he wanted to lay for the rest of his life, seeing as he had some time before his death.
It wouldn't be very long, though. He knew that the man would come for him soon. Maybe it would even be tonight.
He would have to lock everything, even though he knew it was hopeless. The man had gotten in the locked house before; it was possible for him to get in again. How he did it, Keiichi would never know, but that was beside the point. All that mattered right now was that he was going to die, and he had to do things he wanted to do before he was going to do it.
He didn't know what that was, though. There wasn't anything he could do before his death. Everything he wanted would take too long, and half of it was already impossible.
He wanted his parents back, and he wanted Shion and Mion back. He wanted to live in a world where Mion and Shion could be accepted, and then they could spend their life together. He wanted people to accept him and Mion as romantic partners, and wanted his friends to become friends with her and her sister, too. Seeing as he couldn't bring his parents back and rescuing Mion was just about impossible, the things he wanted in life were already things he couldn't have.
Is this really how my life is going to end? Just like this?
He was only sixteen. He wanted to live to become older. Now, more than half of his life was going to be cut short.
He now found himself wishing that he had never come here. Then, he would have never had his parents killed, and he never would have fallen in love with Mion. Things would be better just being at home and shooting kids with model guns. That was a far less dangerous adventure than the one he was having now.
But if you didn't… then Mion and Shion would never have seen the outside… and they would have never learned about emotions.
Keiichi rammed his head on the desk yet again. Even so, it just caused heartbreak… even though they would have been heartbroken without him.
What does it matter? Everything is ending now, anyways. It's already… too late…
~~~~X~~~~
Crimso's Corner V.2
Ee… that was a kind of dark ending line there. And a dark chapter title. Poor Keiichi. I hope things get better for him. Well, I don't hope. I know whether or not they will. And I'm not telling! Mwhahaha. Speaking of which, we're almost to the end of BFB. Can you guys believe it? It feels like I've been with this fanfiction forever. It's so… strange, to know that this one will be over soon and that the next will come around fresh and new. It feels unreal to me. Just like how the ending of GED felt when I wrote it. It was all like… "Is it really over? It can't be over. …Wait, it is?" And I'm sure it's going to be the same. There is going to be less than ten chapters left, meaning we're in the 30-40 range. I was hoping it would just be around 35, but it looks like that's not going to happen. I know what's going to happen the next two chapters, but the rest is a blur. I mean, I have the events planned, but the number of chapters is unknown.
But I can't look ahead now. It will take a little while longer, so hang in there. This chapter didn't have too much, but it is still very important. Look at all the elements! Very, very, very important things here.
That said, I'll be writing a little over break. My teachers are bitter because we get an extra two days off and they don't (because of parent teacher conferences) and they are dumping homework on top of us to show how annoyed they are. Seriously. I have five history readings to do and a bunch of English homework. I did my science already. I have a Spanish test on Monday. At least my math teacher was nice.
That said, please review! Reviewers will get another Keiichi plushie, but this one is super huggable unlike the other one, so that you can hug him because of all the crap he's going through in this fanfiction. Poor, poor guy. If you point out typos, feel free to have some ice cream or any other kind of dessert. If you prefer not to have anything sugary like dessert, you can have some of Rena's cooking. She's really good, if you remember. Actually, everyone in Higurashi is good at cooking. Except for Keiichi. He's awful.
~Crimso