I apologize if this chapter has some errors in it. I can't be perfect, you know?
Well, anyways, here is the ninth chapter of Dancing in the Stars. I'm so proud!
Adam and Brant begin to prepare for their plan, we learn how Jasdero is still 'alive', and David and Krory come face to face--almost literally.
Oh, and the Noah kick butt. That too.
My profile is not working for the computer I normally use, so I apologize if you guys were getting way impatient with me for not updating it for more information. I have to use a different computer if I want to update it, so you'll have to bear with old dates and all that jazz. I hope it begins to work again.
Advise and enjoy! I hope.
The Akuma screeched as its body was slashed through by a white sword. As it dissolved into the air, it caught a glance of a boy with white hair before it vanished completely.
The nearby Noah smiled at the sight.
Tyki hummed to himself as the Teeze cut through the swarms of Akuma, and as the Akuma passed through him. Taking his lighter out of his back pocket, he struck a match and lit the cigarette dangling between his lips. "Almost done," he muttered to himself, feeling satisfaction in his bones. "Almost done, then we can go home and relax."
Behind him, Tyki could hear Road making her way through the Akuma, casting her dreams onto them until he could hear them breaking, inside and out. "Nice," he called out.
Road giggled. "Thanks." She hopped next to Tyki and grasped his arm. Immediately, the swarms of Akuma began to pass through her too—a neat little trick that Tyki had been carefully practicing since the crashing of Noah's Ark.
He took a last drag on his cigarette before asking, hoarsely, "Have you seen the twin cadaver anywhere?"
Road started. Then, she frowned, worried. "No, I haven't. Have you?"
"Nope. Hence, the question." He lifted the cigarette up again and breathed in the scent of ash and tobacco. "Do you think he got held up somewhere?"
Road, still frowning, sighed. "I suppose so. David does do that."
Tyki looked down at Road. It was at these times that he worried about her—sometimes, she seemed too sad and old for her body to take. "He'll be fine. Don't worry. Sooner or later, he'll show up looking all excited and bloodthirsty with his gun out and ready to go."
Road looked up and smiled before letting go of Tyki's arm. "I'm sure he will."
---
Krory was currently, not a very happy exorcist. He had already devoured several Akuma, and while it certainly stimulated and boosted his energy levels, he was still rather concerned over the tiny little incident from before:
The Noah.
As he tore his teeth into another Akuma's armor, he remembered the way the boy had looked as he had reached his black tipped fingers towards him. Murderous. Furious. Terrifying (to his weaker, more human, self). And—
Sad. The boy had looked sad.
Krory licked his lips as the Akuma vanished, pursing the bloody rims together. Perhaps later, he could attempt to go and try to make amends. He knew that even if he did this, the boy could never forgive him, but it would be at least an effort to become co-workers. If they were to live in the same building, then at least they could try to get along somewhat. At the very least, they could be cooperative allies.
Suddenly, he smelled the scent of fresh blood. Not Akuma blood either—human blood. Two of them, he thought to himself. Close, too. About where Lenalee was—
He stopped. His eyes rimmed with black widened before he began racing back up the hill.
Lenalee hadn't come down from the hill that day. She hadn't made it onto the battlefield, where Krory would have been able to see her. Maybe—
"If that is so," he said, gritting it out from between his teeth, "Then I will not let my friend die."
---
Lenalee gasped. "You!"
The figure nodded, bowing mockingly towards her. "Me."
She opened her mouth several times, finding each time that she couldn't put together the words to describe how shocked she was. Finally, she managed a strangled whisper. "Why are you in my head?"
Jasdero smiled, the look playful and psychotic at the same time. Lenalee shivered. "Oh, it's not just your head I'm in, Exorcist. I can be anywhere I wish."
A sickening realization reached Lenalee as she recalled how trouble David had looked before. "Why are you doing this? How are you doing this?" she asked cautiously. "The dead can not come back to life unless cursed for eternity. That is the rule of this world."
He smiled condescendingly. Another chill ran up her spine. "That's because I'm not dead."
Lenalee felt confused.
She must have looked confused as well because Jasdero held out his hand to her, still smiling that same cruel, twisted smile. "Come here. I'll explain to you how I am still here—and why you have taken my other half away from me."
She didn't take his hand, but she stepped up beside him and looked expectantly.
His smile grew wider. "Don't trust me, do you?"
She narrowed her eyes. "Not one bit."
Jasdero's eyes darkened to black and gold. "What a wise choice."
---
The darkness isn't frightening. It's rather comforting actually, with little swirling patterns and the feeling of swimming in thick cream.
Maybe, he thinks, drifting slowly through the pressing black, I can stay here for a long time. I wouldn't have to worry about getting back up. I wouldn't have to worry about getting hurt or being left behind anymore or leaving anyone else behind. I wouldn't, would I?
Comforted by this, he continues to drift on through the dark, swimming in the black cream.
Suddenly, the darkness shifts, and the sensation of being lifted came to him.
There is noise, and he listens carefully through heavily lidded eyes. A voice, a man's, drifts towards him in the darkness. It sounds familiar, not liked, however.
The sudden rush of emotion hits him, and it takes him a few moments to define it as hatred.
But why? He thinks, being lifted upwards. Why do I hate this voice so much?
He can just barely make out the voice now.
"Hang on, brat," the voice growls, the sound echoing softly. "Don't die on your family just yet."
My family…?
A sudden flurry of memories pelt him. A girl with messy black hair, ash skin, and a mischievous smile, two older men with wavy coal hair and cunning smiles, a woman with a haughty, regal demeanor—
David.
The voice is feminine, soft and firm, and he cannot define it as a family member's.
David.
"Who are you?" he whispers towards the sound. It is coming from the light, from where the other's had. "Why are you calling me?"
David.
And suddenly, another series of memories slam into his brain, memories of a girl and short black hair, of flying boots and a kind, sweet smile.
David.
"Lenalee," he says, punctuating the darkness for the first time. It begins to whirl furiously, swirling up into the light. "Lenalee?"
David.
He remembers broken bones and screaming and Lenalee lying in the dirt with blood coating her skin.
His heart jolts.
I can't leave Lenalee behind.
"I'm coming, Lenalee," he says towards the light, beginning to rise again. "I'm coming back."
---
David awoke with a start. The person's shoulder was slightly broad, firm, and clothed entirely in black—or perhaps that was just his increasingly blurred vision. He could feel his arms wrapped around the person's neck, and he thought blearily for a few moments that that might be painful for that person.
Suddenly, he became aware that he could smell blood coming from the person.
Akuma blood.
His eyes shot open, and he jerked his head to the side to catch a glimpse of the person's face next to his. He blanched with horror at the familiar pale skin and the odd black and white hair that had haunted his nightmares so many times before.
"You," he whispered.
Krory turned his head towards David, breathing out a sigh. "About time you woke up, kid. I was starting to wonder if you were ever going to open your eyes."
David didn't answer, instead choosing to look at who was resting in the exorcist's arms.
His blood ran cold.
"Lenalee," he whispered.
She didn't move, the side of her body still caked with her own blood. She merely kept breathing raggedly, her chest barely fluttering with life.
David felt like crying. "Shit, Lenalee."
Krory frowned. "Clean out your mouth, brat. She'll be fine, don't worry."
David immediately found himself blanching with anger. "How the hell do you know if she'll be fine?" he shouted. The vampire-like exorcist winced as the sound directly entered his ears from the side. "You can kill people, but you can't tell if they're going to be all right or not!"
Krory glared at him with oddly colored eyes. "Be silent. She will make it. Lenalee is not the type of young lady to die when she is needed. Besides—" and here, the exorcist smiled slightly, and David was suddenly struck by how nice the man actually looked. "She has people waiting for her here."
At this, the vampire gave David a small smile, and David flushed with sudden realization. "You—you think—" he spluttered. "You think she's going to come back for me? Are you trying to kid me or something?"
Krory smirked. "I don't think so. I know so."
David's flush got deeper.
Krory frowned. "How much blood do you have in your body if all of that goes to your face?"
David blanched.
---
Brant stood in the doorway of the mansion's hall, sighing in boredom outside of the changing room. "You done yet, Adam?" he called out from behind him. "It doesn't really take that much time to dress in a suit, you know."
"For a slob, maybe," his partner's cool reply was.
Brant groaned, knowing that his partner was implying towards him. "Oh, come on. I don't look as bad as you think I do, just because I only took five minutes to change."
The door creaked open slightly, and Adam's doe-like brown eye peered at him from the crack. "Well, you look like you," he said, smiling slightly as he quickly shut the door again.
Brant smirked. "Why, thank you—" he suddenly stopped, realizing the real meaning. "Hey, wait a minute! That was an insult, wasn't it?"
"Oh, maybe," Adam replied loftily. The sound of rustling clothing was heard. "Anyways, I have to look very proper for this, Brant. It wouldn't be easy to get many people to trust you if you don't look right for the part."
"Adam, you look like a girl. You've never looked right for any part—ow!" Brant rubbed his head from the swift punch through the newest crack in the door. "Hey, man, that really did hurt!"
"Serves you right for insulting me." Adam sighed. "Can you tell if the invasion is over yet?"
Brant looked out of the window. He smirked. Smoke was rising from nearby buildings, screams echoing across the streets as people ran out of the burning buildings before blood splattered out of their bodies from the bullets lodging themselves in their bodies. Fire leapt up from a barn on the far side of the small town, Akuma swarming around it and laughing insanely as well as swarming around everywhere else. The massacre was huge.
"No. Want me to call them off?"
Adam was silent before replying. "How loud are the screams?"
Brant's smirk turned into a full-fledged grin. "Musically loud."
Brant could almost hear the soft, yet sadistic smile unfurling on Adam's lips on the other side of the door. "Then let them continue for a longer while."
Brant's eyes darkened as his grin turned positively murderous. "Excellent."
---
She watched the series of images fly by her, her mouth parted slightly in awe at the vivid colors and shapes forming in the little snapshots. Her hair fluttered slightly at the speed, and, instinctively, she reached up to brush it behind her ear.
The boy beside her merely watched the images as well, his hair billowing behind him. His face was expressionless.
Lenalee made a note that these images were most likely very, very important if he was making an effort in not showing what he was thinking.
Some of the images became sharper, and Lenalee glanced at them, only to reel back in shock.
Jasdero's arm pressed against her back. "You aren't going anywhere. Watch."
She swallowed.
The image in front of her was of Jasdero screaming and writhing as hands (so many hands) covered in crimson blood reached for him and began pulling him into a pair of huge black doors. A gate, she realized suddenly, horrified. It's a gate!
Jasdero was screaming and pulling away from the hands. She could hear his screams, and they made her want to break down into tears right there and then.
"I can't leave yet! I can't die yet!" he was screaming. "David! I can't leave David behind yet! Please! Please, damn it, please!"
The figure before the gate was unmoved, merely examining the back of his hand.
"Please!" Jasdero was now crying, tears running quickly down his face in crystalline rivers. "Please! David! Don't make me leave David behind yet! I don't want him to die because I was weak! Please—"
Suddenly, the hands began to lessen. The figure looked up, surprised.
Another pair of ashen hands reached down from above and grasped Jasdero's arms and pulled him up to the surface. He was sobbing freely now, smiling gratefully.
"Thank you," he sobbed. "Thank you, thank—"
Then he froze, his face twisting in horror.
Lenalee stared as well, transfixed. It was like seeing a child's dead body—it was certainly terrible, but it was just so terrible that you just couldn't look away from the horrible sight.
The face was Jasdero's, leering horridly with sunken eyes and a smile that didn't reach its cold demeanor. "You wished for us to live," it rasped out. "And live we will—in the spirit's world."
His eyes were wide, and he began to scream again.
The face laughed, arms still pulling him up. Lenalee saw David's back above the two of them, limply lying on a table and breathing harshly. His arm was throbbing white with the Innocence, and his face was twisted in a horrible expression of pain. Her own heart throbbed and twisted at this helpless display.
"Come now," the face laughed. "Let us go to the world between life and death."
And then the image ended.
"In the spirit world," the real Jasdero said next to her, "I learned that the Earl had tried to revive me, but had only partially succeeded. Thus, I was forever trapped between the land of the living and the gates of death until David himself died or was destroyed." He smiled bitterly. "Obviously, neither happened."
Lenalee, still horrified by what she had just witnessed, burst out, "But that doesn't explain how I somehow 'took David' from you."
His smile turned even bitterer. "Up until the time you met David, he had never forgotten me, not for a moment. Therefore, I was still a healthy, happy and nourished soul, even half dead. I had not been forgotten—that was such a great relief. But when you came along—" His face twisted into a hard expression. "He began to forget. He was happier than he had been in ages, and all thoughts of me began to vanish from his mind. I began to fade—not completely, since he was not dead. But I began to become lost. I forgot my name. I forgot my memories. I almost forgot—" His voice turned very small, and he looked away. "I almost forgot David himself."
Lenalee felt a wave of sadness come upon her as he began to shake. "That's why I had to keep reminding him that I was still here—that I was not just something he could forget, or throw away. I was someone who kept him here! I was someone who—who—" His voice became choked. "I was someone who kept him alive and happy, back when I was still human."
She reached out for him, and he flinched. She touched him anyways on the shoulder, gently. "David never forgot you, Jasdero."
He turned back to her, his eyes wild and filled with rage. "How would you know that?" He screamed. "How would you know that, when he's never really told you how he feels? How would you know if he even cared that I had existed?"
Lenalee looked at Jasdero with a heavy sadness in her heart. "I know because he still doesn't feel whole. He's mentioned that he's 'half of a person', that he can't just let your 'killer' go free." She looked at him intensely, but she wasn't really seeing him. She saw David, looking away in pain and old memories. "Don't you see? David can't forget you. He never can."
He stared at her, uncertain, before shaking her off and screaming, "Shut up! You're a liar! A liar!"
"Jasdero—"
His image began to dissolve, and the black began to lift. She could begin to feel an overwhelming pain on her side, and she doubled over, even as the ground below her began to crumble.
"Liar!" he screamed. "Liar!"
She began to fall.
"Liar!"
---
Suddenly, Lenalee groaned and shifted, some of the dried blood cracking off of her skin and falling to the ground in tiny little pieces.
David looked at her sharply, breathing harshly from the shock of the movement. "Lenalee!"
"Girl," Krory said anxiously. "How do you feel?"
Her eyes fluttered open. "Krory? David—" Suddenly, she curled into herself, coughing. "What happened?" she asked between coughs. "We were running—no, I was running, and you caught up to me. Then—" She coughed harder, blood coming out of her mouth and landing in her hands. David felt his heart stutter and jump at the sight of the fresh blood. "What happened to my body?"
Krory covered her mouth. "Enough. You're injured enough as it is, and if you continue to talk, you will hurt yourself even more."
She fell silent, but her eyes lifted up to meet David's.
A jolt went straight through his heart, and he had to look away. He didn't want to see her like this because he knew it was his fault. If he hadn't distracted her, she would have been fine now. She wouldn't be like this, helpless and bleeding on the outside and inside.
She would be safe, like Jasdero would have been if David had just been more careful.
"Where are we going?" he asked, just to break the awkward silence.
"Back to the Order. We can't have you two out on the battlefield like this," Krory explained shortly. "You would be a hindrance, and you would definitely be killed off almost immediately."
David frowned before falling silent again and turning to face the speeding trees. The green flashed past his golden eyes in a huge blur, the green melding with the blue in the sky overhead. That image, mixed with the strange warmth coming from Krory's shoulder, was oddly comforting—even if the warmth belonged to Jasdero's 'killer'.
He heard the sound of fighting below and screaming as well, but he didn't turn to look just yet. Frankly, he was just a bit tired of seeing people fight.
David closed his eyes, and let the sound of wind rushing past put him to sleep.
---
Lulu Bell spun around and slammed her foot into the Akuma's chest. It snapped and shattered, the microscopic pieces floating into the air and vanishing.
"The last one is dead," she said quietly, wiping off some of the blood from her cheek. "Cyril."
He appeared almost instantly by her side. "Good," he sighed, exhausted as his hands dripped Akuma and human blood all over the floor. "Now we can go home, right?"
"Yes." Yet, she frowned, but tried to distract herself from the nagging unease at the back of her mind. "Why is there human blood on your hands?"
He shrugged. "The Akuma were coated in it. It's only natural that I pick it up."
"I see." Finally, she could take it no longer, and as they were walking back, she blurted out, "Cyril, I have the feeling that someone is watching us."
He looked at her, startled. "You too?"
Lulu Bell arched an elegant eyebrow. "You actually noticed, Cyril?"
Cyril pouted, insulted. "I'm not that unobservant, Lulu Bell. Yes, I have noticed. And what's odd about it is that it seems to be coming from the house we used to live in over there." He pointed up, and Lulu Bell looked in the direction his finger was towards the old house.
She frowned. "Do you think someone could have broken in?"
"Quite possibly. In these times, I wouldn't underestimate anyone." His eyes darkened, and he continued to stare at the huge glass window in the middle of the house's wall. "Or anything, for that matter."
Lulu Bell felt goose bumps rising on her arms, partially from the shock, and partially from the realization that Cyril could actually be serious at times. It was quite the surprise. "Do you think—"
"—that an Akuma could have broken in? Yes. It's quite likely."
"But why?"
Cyril was silent before responding. He sounded quite troubled as he tore his eyes away from the window. "That is the question that I have no answer for."
Lulu Bell was left behind as she stared up at the dark, enormous window. Her brow furrowed.
What are the Akuma planning?