A/N:
Hey, I'm not dead .w." Sorry for not updating in so long. I've had this chapter written up since I uploaded the last one but I've never gotten a chance to just sit down and edit/type it up until now. Terribly sorry for that...
So anyway... I have nothing more to say than sorry and if anyone is still reading this, you're amazing 3
On with the story!
There were very few things that Spain desired in his relatively short feline life.
One was sunshine. Warm, summer sunshine. Oh, how he missed the blissful heat of Sogno's summer sun.
Another thing was fresh, clean air: another blessing that had disappeared at the birth of Sadik's reign.
The last thing he wanted was peace and quiet. Somewhere silent where he could just sleep the day away. Preferably somewhere with warm sunlight. And fresh air.
But here, shoved roughly in a dark, scratchy, suffocating canvas bag with a notebook digging into his tiny spine, he possessed none of the things he desired.
Human screams rang and echoed in his ears, barely muffled by the cloth prison the Host had shoved him in. His brain rattled as he was thrown about with every step the Host took as he ran. The human stopped every few seconds (sending Spain directly into the corner of the damned notebook) before his body was jerked forward by some other force that Spain couldn't identify with the lacking senses the bag caused.
The panicked murmur of the green-eyed shadow's voice filtered through the cloth and screams, speaking to the host, but Spain couldn't make sense of anything; brain too jumbled to decode anything of the human language. "You have to go back to town. If the patrol catches up to us-" That was the Host. Spain could tell that much.
"I'm not going to abandon you in the middle of the forest with those… those things chasing us!" The shadow's voice cut him off as he tugged Lovino close, causing the Spain to be crushed between the notebook and Antonio's chest. "I can't lose you! Not again…" the shadow murmured in depressed panic.
"Moron, you're not going to lose me…" The Host muttered back, affection hidden under a thick layer of false annoyance and true fear. "You said it yourself; I have to figure out my path on my own," the Host paused and shifted, spinning a 180 to look at the shadow. "The town needs you. I need to go alone for now, but no way in hell are you going to lose me, got it bastard? I'll find you again whether you want me to or not!"
The shadow chuckled sadly; regretfully. "Just be careful okay? Stay hidden and do not fight the Patrols. Just keep running."
The Host nodded but didn't speak, throwing his arms around the shadow in a quick, tight hug, murmuring weakly in his ear "You be careful too… Bastard…"
The shadow chuckled and he murmured warmly, pulling away just far enough to look into Lovino's eyes, leaning close. "Nothing, not even death will keep me away from you for long, mi amor. I will find you again… I always will…" his lips hovered teasingly over the Host's…
A loud shout and an even louder howl jolted the lovers out of their peaceful trance and, with a few quick words, Antonio turned to face the oncoming threat as Spain was once again jostled uncomfortably as the Host took off away from his shadow.
As the notebook smacked him again, Spain bit back a yowl. There wasn't any point in distracting the Host from his uncharted path.
.~.~.~.~.
Lovino stumbled through the underbrush with animal screeches and shouts ringing and fading in his ears and tears trying to blind him and slow him down. The Italian would have none of it; desperately rubbing the useless water away from his eyes to clear them.
Ducking behind a rock ledge in he side of a hill, he crouched to catch his breath, muffling a yelp behind his hand as Spain wiggled at his back in a silent plea to be released from his cloth cage. Carefully, quietly, Lovino let him slide out and quiver near his feet as he waited for the aching in his lungs and legs to fade enough so he could run again-
The rocks he hid behind shattered and sent both him and Spain flying into the underbrush. Spain hopped to his feet as Lovino struggled to stand, holding Antonio's hunting knife defensively out in front of him.
The Patrol-creatures appeared over the remains of the rocks, broken teeth shining within amused, feral smiles.
"Is this really the Host?" one croaked out in mucus-soaked laughter. "He's so small! This little meat sack isn't a threat at all!"
The other two laughed loudly and a bloody mucus-and-saliva mixture dripped from the cracks between their stained teeth.
"Fuck off!" Lovino yelled, forcing his legs and voice not to quake with fear. There was three of them – viscous, animalistic hunters – and only one of him. Just Lovino; who had never fought a day in his life. He was going to die and there was nothing he could do to prevent his fate.
His grip on the knife tightened and the little of bravery (or was it stupidity?) that had hidden itself away somewhere inside him spoke up from its' hiding place in the back of his mind. He was no use to Sogno dead. Whether he knew how or not, he was going to have to fight-
One of the Patrols leaped at him suddenly, pulling him out of his thoughts. As he stared death in the face, Spain headbutted the back of his knee; causing him to collapse on himself and the Patrol to fly over him. Focus, Lovino, focus!
Getting to his feet again, he slashed at the second Patrol, luckily catching it across the jaw and tearing through muscle and earning him a howl of pain and rage. The creature struck him in the hip with a clawed paw, sending him onto the, now slippery and crimson, rocks for the third time.
Rolling away from another swipe, Lovino plunged the knife into the Patrol's foreleg, quickly ripping it out of the torn flesh to take a stab at the screaming Patrol's eye. The knife found a new home between the blind blue eyes; luckily just as effective as Lovino had hoped it would be. The dead Patrol crumbled inward, almost falling on top of Lovino and splattering him with blood.
The Host barely had time to catch his breath before a new set of claws smacked him in the back, accompanied by a screeched cry of anguish at its partner's death. Lovino tumbled farther down the rocky hill, losing Antonio's knife somewhere along the way.
The Patrol was on him before he had a chance to search for it; its jacked teeth catching his leg as he rolled away. He let out a scream as he felt flesh tear and bone shatter under its teeth and fought not to look down at his chin or throw up, clawing forward with his hands as the Patrol tried to bite him again.
The Patrol screeched something he couldn't understand before jumping at him again. What could he do but throw his arms up in the useless motion of defense? He was weaponless, wounded, exhausted; hopeless! So he threw his arms up and shut his eyes, ready to die-
There was a flash of bright blue light on the other side of Lovino's closed eyelids, accompanied by a yelp of surprise from the Patrol. Lovino opened his eyes slowly and squinted into the bright, ice-blue light of a large, rectangular shield.
Lovino's jaw went slack and he sat up slowly, the shield moving with him and keeping a fragile barrier between him and the patrol. The bright light sparked a flashback of him controlling a much thicker, less transparent, and definitely more durable shield and distracted him from the threat of the Patrol as it jumped at him, shattering the shield but leaving Lovino unharmed.
The Host scrambled to his feet and ducked behind a tree to dodge the Patrol's next attack. Closing his eyes, he willed some memory, any memory, to give him some sort of recollection of how to fight-!
Lovino's body began to move on its own, pulling him onto his good leg and into hauntingly familiar steps and motions as his eyes slid open to see warm, orange sparks begin to form between his hands which he held out in front of him as if he knew what he was doing.
Forcing himself to stay cam, he grabbed at the faming sword hilt as it materialized in front of him. As the sword formed, time seemed to speed up again and the Patrol resumed its attack. The sword seemed to know what to do even though the Host didn't; swinging itself up to block the Patrol's claws. It swung back, forcing Lovino to duck and step away from the Patrol before pulling Lovino forward so that it could take a stab toward the Patrol's chest.
The flaming blade sliced across the Patrol's shoulder, drawing dirty red blood and a surprised howl from the ugly creature. The thing seemed to freeze for a moment before a horrified, anguished scream erupted from its jaw as the shallow cut the sword left suddenly burst into flames and began to eat away at the dirty flesh. The animal wailed in terror as the fire engulfed it and burned it to death.
The shrieks must have alerted a larger pack of Patrols because before Lovino could turn and see the third Patrol; at least twenty more erupted from the trees at the top of the rocky hill.
Willing the sword to fight, Lovino was able to fight at least a few of them off and keep the rest a bay, but they just kept coming!
The Host was eventually knocked onto his back and his broken leg gave out below him, the link between him and the sword shattered and the blade fizzed and disappeared even as he rolled onto his stomach and grabbed for it.
A Patrol's claws lashed out at him and he raised his arms again to try and create another shield. The dirty-razor claws slashed through old scars and pulled a scream from his lungs as the bloody flesh of his arms allowed another memory of a different shadowy creature's blind rage to resurface.
Lovino weakly tried to curl up into a more defensive position as the Patrol continued to attack him, pleading for someone to make their tearing claws and teeth stop-
"Enough!" An unfamiliar male voice shouted from somewhere behind the group of Patrols.
The bulldog-gorilla creatures stopped their attack as soft footsteps made their way through the crowd and closer to Lovino. The Host weakly lifted his head to stare blearily into the white-masked face of Sadik Adnan. In a small sign of defiance, Lovino bared his teeth and spit at him. The bloody saliva splattered over Sadik's boots and dribbled down the Host's chin as he attempted to shuffle away from the dictator.
His pathetic retreat was stopped by Sadik's boot pressing him into the ground. He smirked down at the scowling Host. "Hello, Romano," he chuckled. "I think it's about time we met face-to-face, don't you?"
.~.~.~.~.
The Patrols in Sogno had begun to recede after word had passed between them of the Host now under Sadik's control. Soon only their corpses and the destruction they dealt on the city and its people was all that was left to show of their presence.
Amidst the mourning townsfolk, Arthur sat on the remains of a house's foundation as Alfred quietly, gently, tended to his ripped wing and other wounds. The young man's own bloody scalp an shoulder remained untouched in favor of his angelic lover, much to said lover's distress.
As the two spoke wordlessly, Gilbert, carrying an unmoving, broken-limbed Vash, walked through the debris toward them with Francis and an emotionless Lili close behind.
"Did you find them?" Arthur's anxious question hung heavy and unanswered in the air as the four tended to the wounded. Vash was carefully placed within the fallen house; there would be time for proper rituals after the living were safe.
Eventually a set of hurried footsteps could be heard thundering toward them and they turned to see Antonio's shadow form running over to him, the look of worry on his usually smiling face becoming stronger as he became more and more human.
"Antonio!" Francis caught his friend's anxious gaze. "Where's Lovino?"
"He… He hasn't come back this way?" Antonio panted worriedly, looking between the six. "He's not here? We split up; I thought that he would circle around and come back-"
"You split up!" Arthur gaped. "Are you completely idiotic? How the hell could you have ever believed that you should split up?"
"He said it was fine! He told me to leave! I… I couldn't disobey my heart…" Antonio trailed off in despair. How could he be so stupid? He had just left his love alone in dangerous woods with only a tiny knife to defend himself. He knew there was Patrols in the forest behind them and he still abandoned his heart… Their Host…
Antonio fell to his knees and held in bitter tears. There was nothing to gain from his personal sorrow.
He had just lost his heart again and with it, the only hope for his world.