WARNING: This chapter moves very fast!
Vignette Sixteen:
Autor sat quietly in his piano class, patiently waiting his turn to play for the teacher. He had come to school that morning with Fakir and was probably going to be tailed by Fakir all day once class was over.
He sighed. So much for his 'power'.
A knock at the classroom door jolted him from his thoughts. The student that was currently playing stopped and looked at the door as if he'd never seen such a thing before.
Well, answer it, idiot. Autor thought bitterly. Don't just stare.
The teacher placed his grade book on the desk and walked over to the door.
"May I help you?" He asked upon opening the it.
Autor instantly froze. Hoffnung stood in the doorway.
"One of your students has been called to the main office." Autor shivered, why did he get the feeling that he was the student that was called out. "I'm to take Autor with me right away."
Crap!
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Between the chill of the German night air and the constant bickering of his heart(s) Mytho had gotten no sleep. He had continued to wander the woods until the fog had made it near impossible to see through the thick foliage of the trees. Exhausted he slumped down at the base of a wide tree.
"Don't stop now!" Commanded one of his shards. "If you fall asleep in this God forsaken weather you'll catch pneumonia and die! And us with you." He indicated himself and the other shards present.
"I say we should pick a direction." A second shard suggested. "One direction and stick with it. We'll either end up back in town or smack into the wall. If we get back to town, then we can find Fakir. If we run into the wall we-"
"We'll get a nose bleed." Finished a third shard snidely.
"We could fallow the wall back to town." The former corrected.
"All of you!" Mytho snarled from his seat at the tree's foot. "Will you just give me five minuets of SILENCE!?"
The three bickering shards regarded their host coolly.
"They were just trying to help." A fourth materialized. "You didn't have to yell at them so severally."
Mytho glared at the piece of his heart that dared talk back to him. His eyes flashed lavender momentarily as he spoke. "You presume to instruct ME in how I address MYSELF?"
The hapless shard shrunk away from the piercing gaze and vanished back into the bottle as did the other three. Inside the bottle the fifth shard which had not spoken the entire time chided them for their foolishness, but Mytho heard none of this so it's not would recounting. He leaned back against the tree trunk and fell asleep.
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"I think it's this way." Ahiru pointed down a tiny path obscured by thick underbrush. She held her Hope necklace out in front of her as if she were dousing. It's soft glow cutting through the fog far better than the sun was managing.
"If you're sure." Was Rue's only response.
The two girls followed the glowing jewel down the path and past a wide tree; the gem glowed majestically until they had past right by.
"Ah! It's dimming!" Exclaimed the confused campaigner. "We must have past it!"
"Well, we can't see anything in this fog." Rue commented mildly. "Let's try backtracking."
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A rustle in the bushes behind his tree, his resting place stirred him from his nap. Unable to see what had disturbed him through the fog, Mytho felt it wise to relocate to a less vulnerable position. Thus leaving his place by the tree and continuing down a different path.
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Fakir stalked the Academy halls nervously; he was worried. Neither Ahiru nor Rue had come to school today. If it had been just Ahiru or just Rue it wouldn't have bothered him as much, he could have easily explained it away as "female problems". But having both Princess Tutu and Queen Kraehe absent was reason to worry.
He turned a corner just as the music students; specifically the piano students were leaving their room. If he didn't know where Ahiru or Rue were, he could at least keep track of Autor, the traitor.
Fakir leaned against the doorframe and watched the young musicians file out of the class. The moment Autor stepped out he would grab him before the pompous fop could get away.
The steam of students slowed to a trickle then stopped. The room was empty save for the teacher and Autor had not come out.
"Excuse me." Fakir stuck his head in the classroom to address the teacher. "Do you know where Autor is?"
"Oh, Yes." The teacher looked up from his desk. "He was called out of class early for something urgent."
"Chikusho!" Fakir cursed in Japanese as he stormed back out of the class and down the hall. No one bothered to mention to him that he was German and shouldn't know Japanese let alone Japanese swore words.
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Ahiru and Rue came back to the same tree they had passed minuets before.
"It's not glowing as brightly anymore." Ahiru stated glumly. "I wonder what's wrong."
"Maybe the shard's moving." Suggested Rue.
"Okay…" Ahiru held her necklace out at arms length in front of her and turned in a slow circle.
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Mytho wandered the in the fog until his nose collided with something hard and wall-like.
"See?" Shard number three materialized. "I told them we'd get a bloody nose, but did they listen to me? No-o."
Mytho fixed his heart with an icy glare.
The shard shrunk away from the piercing gaze. "Shutting up now."
"This isn't the wall." Mytho said more to himself than to… himselves. He followed the thing he'd collided with until he reached an end. "It's a house! We're… I'm back in town!" He exclaimed happily.
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Autor followed Hoffnung out to the gazebo behind the school. Each step filled him with a stronger sense of dread.
"Are you going to kill me?" He asked suddenly.
Hoffnung turned to smirk at him. "Maybe. That all depends on you."
This did nothing to calm Autor's nerves. He stopped in his tracks and gazed downward at the ground. "Nothing seems to be going right." He muttered.
"That IS the nature of a tragedy." The feathered Prince stated flatly. "Now, where is my father?"
Autor continued avoiding his eyes. "I… I don't know."
"You don't know."
"I cut him down and told him to get out." The passive pianist elaborated. "I turned my back to him so that I wouldn't see him leave. I don't know where he went or where he is now."
"I see…" In less than the blink of an eye the Raven Prince had pinned Autor to one of the gazebo pillars by a hand to the throat. "Then I have no further use for you."
He tore open Autor's jacket and the shirt underneath with his eggplant purple fingernails. He trailed a loan finger over the bare skin of musician's chest. It was a gentle almost tender gesture but it left Autor's flesh burring as if a hot poker had branded him.
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Mytho continued in the direction he'd been traveling before colliding with the building wall. He would send one of his heart shards ahead to make sure there wasn't anything obstructing his path as he slowly made his way to the Academy. The fog made it so dame impossible to see!
The surrounding cloudbank was illuminated by the red glow of one of his returning shards.
"We're almost at the school!" It exclaimed happily. "There's a path that leads to the woodsy area behind the school. You know, where the gazebo where Fakir tried to pierce us is? That area!"
"Great." A landmark! Oh, gracious goodness, a landmark! Something he could use to navigate his way back to Fakir!
And then he heard the scream.
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Fakir was searching all the out-of-the-way places in the school for Autor. Where could he be? Call out of class my backside!
Just as he was rounding a corner a horrible scream pierced his ears.
What was that? He rushed off to find out.
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Rue and Ahiru were following the glow of the shard of hope when they heard the scream.
"What was that, Rue-chan?" Ahiru looked at her companion, concerned.
"I don't know." She replied. "But it came from the same direction that the Hope is leading us. It can't be good."
The two quickened their pace.
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"WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Hoffnung froze when that awful bloodcurdling scream pierced his perfect Princely ears. Half way between a screech of surprise and a squeal of girly delight, it offended his senses so much so that he had to turn and find the source of the offending sound.
Two girls stood in the fog, just barely inside his range of vision. One was looking rather embarrassed and trying without success to pull the other away. The other seemed purely over joyed to stay and witness what ever she assumed Hoffnung was about to do to Autor.
"Come on, Lilie!" She tried again to pull the blond away. "We're sorry. We didn't mean to disturb your rendezvous."
"Tee hee hee." It was less a 'tee hee' and more a cackle. "I had no idea that the best dancer in the school and the best musician in school were a couple! Oh, please, Pike, can't I stay and watch?"
"NO!" All parties involved shouted simultaneously.
"C'mon!" Pike pulled extra hard and dragged Lilie after her into the obscurity of the fog.
Autor breather a sigh of relief and sank to his knees. Had he really just been saved by a shonnen-ai/yaoi fan girl? Honestly, what were the chances?
Hoffnung yanking him back to his feet cut his relief short.
"Don't worry." It wasn't a comforting statement. "This little moment of embarrassment will be short lived. As you will be."
The hand was back on his chest, this time the eggplant purple nails were digging into his skin. Autor cried out in pain.
"Autor!" A voice from the fog.
"Fakir!" He shouted back.
"Grr! Another nuisance!" The wicked Prince growled.
At that moment, Mytho emerged from the fog in the opposite direction.
"Hoff-chan!"
"Father!"
"Mytho!" Both Fakir and Autor said this.
"Fakir!" This was Mytho.
And then the Princesses appeared.
"Rue!" Mytho gasped his wife's name.
"Mytho!" She ran to embrace her husband.
"Mother!"
"Hoff-chan!" This was Ahiru.
"Ahiru!" Fakir rushed to her side.
"Fakir!"
"Oh my gosh! We MUST stop saying each others' names!" Hoffnung all but shouted.
Mytho passed the bottle containing the five heart shards he'd been caring to Rue. "Will you hold these for me?"
"Uh sure."
"Ah, the heart shards." In an instant Ahiru had transformed in to Princess Tutu. "I'll return them to you."
"No." Mytho held up a hand to stop her. "If I'm going to save my son I need them out of me for the moment."
"Huh?" The pink Princess blinked in confusion.
The five shards materialized in their human forms.
"Don't worry. He has a plan." One informed her.
"After all." Another began. "All he ever did while we were strung up like that was think."
"Hey I know you!" Ahiru smiled. "You're the five shards that were sealing the gates to the city! You're the shards that seal the Raven!"
Hoffnung, whom had remained silent during all this laughed mirthlessly.
"Why do I get the feeling that that's a bad thing?" Fakir asked no one in particular.
"Quiet, all of you." Mytho ordered. He glared at his son standing in the gazebo. "I will save you from yourself, Hoffnung. One way or another."
Mytho struck a dramatic ballet pose and his clothing melted away in a swirl of black feathers. The wind swirled and shifted the fog, momentarily obscuring Myhto from view. When he could be seen again, they all gasped.
It was not King Mytho that was standing there, neither was it Prince Mytho or Hearless Mytho. No. The one whom stood in the place of their hero was none other than Raven Mytho!
Fin for now…
(A/N: I finished the last part of this chapter between 2:30 and 3:00 am. So I'm sorry if it confuses you.)
Thanx:
Jishinibaka-chan: You were half right. The shards were reacting to the five that Mytho was carrying.
James Birdsong: Yes. Yes, I can say my story is cool. I just don't think it's "divine". But it is very cool.
Camicw: Wow… my fan fiction an anime… you have given me the best complement I have ever received on my writing. Thank you so much.