The seven people gathered in Guren's office at the earliest possible hours of the morning, the sky was still dark and there was no indication that it would rise anytime soon. Soon, after everyone was gathered, they made their way into the early hours of the morning. Huddling together for warmth, their breath mingling with each others so much that there were white vapors that rose ever upward in one steady stream. Each of them cupped their hands in front of their faces, breathing hot breath into them and releasing the captured air into the sky.
Parked right in front of them were two large cars. "We're going to need to split up. One person who knows how to drive in each car, and one person that can protect the car." Guren announced, his voice booming in the silence of the morning. "I'm going to drive one car, and I want Yuuichirou with me as well as Shinya. The rest of you can choose where you are willing to go, however, I want Kimizuki to drive."
Too tired to complain, Yuu made his way to Guren's car and took his place in the backseat, knowing that he most definitely was not going to be able to sit in the front. He laid down, spreading his entire body as far and as comfortably as he could to the edges of the seat. Shinya took his place in the passenger seat, and Guren took his place in the driver's.
Yuu could feel his eyes slowly getting heavier and heavier as the tendrils of sleep tugged at his consciousness. He didn't want to pass out from sleep, sleeping meant reliving that terrible night all over again, and twice in one day was a little too much for him.
Hey, Asuramaru?
What is it?
Can you do me a favor and NOT send me nightmares right now?
I haven't sent you a nightmare in a fortnight at least.
What do you mean, I just had one.
That wasn't me, it was the other part of you.
Yuu puzzled on these words, he had been having nightmares for the past week, all of the night that had taken his life from him. Asuramaru had always given him nightmares, pulling at his will, breaking down his wall, weakening it. They were always about the same night, replaying the same images playing over and over in his mind.
He still had to wonder about what Asuramaru had said, he had always hinted towards Yuu being part non-human. There were sometimes when he laid awake all night, thinking about what he could possibly be, he wasn't a vampire, that much was sure; he had no desire to drink blood, nor did he have fangs that sprouted from his canines as soon as he smelled blood.
He closed his eyes, inviting sleep with open arms. Maybe whatever supposed other part of him would just bug off and let him sleep for once. Of course, he knew how likely that was and prepared himself to see faces of his dead and dying family once more. Only this time, it wasn't the family he had been preparing for.
"What kind of person do you think you are? You are the spawn of a demon, no one will ever want you! It's a wonder that I've put up with you for this long." Yuu felt his mother hit him hard in the head. His small body was covered with bruises, small little cuts here and there.
The floor was his friend now, the only friend that was always there for him when he fell. He was meeting with his friend now, while his friend gave him the cold shoulder, as usual. He felt the all-too-familiar pain in his abdomen as well. Dragging her foot to kick him again, his mother braced herself on the counter. She pushed her foot through the air, so that it was going as fast as possible.
Yuu felt the impact each and every time she drew back and swung forward. His breath was pushed from his lungs with the force of each kick. After so many strikes that he had lost count and his whole body had turned numb, he could hear the audible crackof what he presumed to be his rib.
He cried out one more time, feeling the pain explode in his chest. He was just glad that it wasn't his father. He slowly began to crawl away from his mother, but her foot was unrelenting.
"P-please, mom- mom, just let- let me- go." Yuu begged, choking on the saliva in his mouth. He could taste his own blood in the thick liquid, making it even more difficult to breathe. There were tears that were streaming from his eyes, he was crying too often, maybe everyone had so many tears that they could cry and if they used them all up now, he wouldn't be able to cry anymore.
"I am not your mother. Believe me when I say this because if there is one thing that I swear to in this life, it is the fact that you are no son of a man. You have no right to my kindness. You're like a dog with a disability, a puppy really. What I'm doing now is a merciful euthanization. You have no right to live."
He tried to pull himself even further away from his mother, and eventually, she kicked him with enough force to send him a good distance. He took this opportunity for what it was, pushing himself up, and almost collapsing again from the pain in his chest. He pushed through it because he didn't want another broken bone.
He made his way down the hallway and locked himself in the bathroom. The locks in his room had been taken long ago. His mother pounded on the door, pounding, pounding, pounding. Yuu curled up in a ball, drawing his knees to his chest and putting his hands on his ears, trying to block out the sound. It was no use, as long as his heartbeat, he could hear that insistent pounding in his ears.
"Shut up! Please, just-just SHUT THE HELL UP!" He screamed through the door. Then burst into a fit of coughing that didn't let up until after he screamed in pain.
The pounding stopped. "Yes. Yes, I suppose you're right." Came his mother's soft reply, "I do suppose I have been a little bit rough with you. Do you want me to look at your bruises for you?" Her voice was soft and forgiving, Yuu fell for her soft voice. His naive seven-year-old mind fell for her forgiving voice.
He unlocked the door and was pulled into his mother's heartless embrace. She was like a snake, squeezing the breath out of his lungs, shifting that bone that had been broken. His fragile body couldn't take much more of this, it was going to break. "M-mom," He gasped, "Mom, p-please stop, you're hurting me. Mom." He could feel his body going limp, his breath being restricted and everything slowly going black.
He heard one last thing before the darkness enveloped him, "That's the point, my dear Yuuichirou."
Yoichi sat in the passenger seat of the car Kimizuki was driving, it just seemed right. They had stayed up all night in that little hollow, idly chatting and leaning on each other. Yoichi didn't want to leave him alone, and Kimizuki didn't seem to want to leave either.
So they sat in silence once more, as both the girls had fallen asleep on each other in the back seat. Yoichi liked the silence, it was comforting and constant. Yoichi was able to look at Kimizuki the entire way there as well, to make sure he was still alright even after last night.
"You know you really don't have to watch my back at each and every opportunity," Kimizuki said, breaking the silence. "I really am fine, what you saw there was a moment of weakness on my part and I really don't need you to be there at every twist and turn whenever something goes wrong in my life."
"Kimizuki-kun, that's not what I was doing." Yoichi started to explain, "What want is to make sure that you don't hurt yourself, for both Mirai's sake and my own. I can't bear to see you hurting like that, just knowing you were and that I couldn't tell is bad enough, but now I want to know when you're suffering, I want to know you."
There was a silence between them for a while after Yoichi's last word, when finally, he heard him whisper one word, "Why?" The word was one barely audible in the vehicle, but Yoichi heard it loud and clear in his own mind.
"Because you're my friend. But you're more than that. You're someone I can always trust and count on. You're someone who will always help his friends, who will always be there for them, and that's a difficult job because no one will ever ask you if you're sad, they'll just give you their problems with a smile on their face saying, 'here fix it.' No one will ask you how you're doing. So, I want to be that person to you. And you can be that person to me. Because, I'll be honest, Kimizuki-kun, I like you."
"Why do you idolize me like that?"
"Because you're strong and independent. You're caring and dependable. You're able to put on a blank face, an emotionless mask that can let you think and do whatever you want. You can muster up an air around you that makes you unreachable. It gives off a feeling that speaks of power. And I'm weak. Is it wrong for a peasant to idolize a king?"
Kimizuki faltered for a moment, had this kid just called himself weak? Hell, he's stronger than I am, especially in psychic resistance, just because your body is weak doesn't mean that you are. He opened his mouth to say the words that went through his head but stopped when he glanced over at Yoichi.
He was smiling, his eyes had lit up and he was watching everything Kimizuki did. "Anything and everything you come up with to bring yourself down, I will tell you seven things to bring you back up. Each and everything will be one-hundred percent true. Don't try and come up with excuses for why you can't do this, or why they're better at that than you. Because it doesn't matter. I can almost see what you're thinking and I'll tell you that it doesn't matter. Nothing matters to me, except for you."
Despite the mask that he had put up, Kimizuki felt a small smile play on his lips, something that hadn't happened in a long time, too long of a time.
Mika sat in the pews at the cathedral. No one ever came in here anymore, so it was a good place to get away from all of the people. A place where no one would look for him and he could try to reason out his thoughts.
Akane and the others are dead, he told himself, I saw them die. I saw their pale bodies fall to the ground, devoid of blood. I saw the holes in their chest, a stark contrast to the previously mentioned. I saw them die. What I saw was an illusion, a hallucination. There is no other logical explanation for what I saw.
He needed to lay down, he needed to close his eyes and get over it. It was a nightmare except it happened when I was awake. He needed to rest, maybe he hadn't been sleeping enough. He was just about to drift off to sleep when he heard the worst thing that he could imagine.
Hey! Hey! Mika! Mika, what are you doing over here all by yourself?
No, not that voice. anything but that voice. The voice so innocent and pure. It was a voice that came from before that night. A voice that had been so full of hope that he had put there. Hope that he had encouraged, and watched grow. He had nurtured the hope that still remained in that voice, although he eventually reaped what he had sewn. He had seen the hope in those green eyes fade into nothingness. He had heard the hope bleed from his voice.
Come on, Mika! I found a new book that will help us! I'm sure this one will help us for sure, we can find out their weaknesses in this one, it'll be better than last time, I promise, Mika.
Mika slowly raised his head. There, sitting right in front of him, his face so close to the other, were the green, green eyes of his friend. They were shining and full of hope, just like the nights that they would stay up all night plotting against the lives of the vampires that held them captive.
Mika! Why don't you say something! Come on, we can find a place to hide before they find us.
He knew that he was seeing things again. He was seeing his precious friend again. He tried to tell his mind to ignore it, he tried to tell his mind that it wasn't real, that it was all a fiction created by himself. He wasn't sure if he was relieved or despaired at the sight of Yuu still standing there.
He looked so small, and weak. His mind had only known the twelve-year-old Yuu. He had four years of height built up over him. Even seeing Yuu, he couldn't make his lips curve upwards like they once did. He couldn't force the thing that had once come so naturally to him. It was now beyond his ability to do such a simple thing.
He couldn't make Yuu recognize that he was family until the very end. He couldn't save Akane and the kids. He couldn't stop Krul from creating a vampire out of him. He couldn't stop himself from drinking her blood on that first day. And now, he couldn't even stop seeing these visions. No matter anyway he looked at it, he was a failure at everything he tried to do.
Mika? Mika what's wrong? Why aren't you smiling Mika? Are you okay? Please talk to me, I don't like it when you're like this.
The guilt ate him up inside, no matter how he was feeling, or where he was, he could never see that face on Yuu. His precious Yuu. So, for Yuu, and only for Yuu, he put on his most dazzling smile, the first smile in a long while, and it pained him to do so.
Mitsuba had fallen asleep on Shinoa. Well, okay, it wasn't entirely one-hundred-percent, voluntary and it wasn't entirely one-hundred-percent entirely up to Mitsu when she fell asleep. Shinoa may or may not have slightly reached over and put her head on her shoulder. It was out of the goodness of her heart, at least that was what she told herself.
She loved the tiny breaths that Mitsu would puff out, blowing her hair away from her face every time. Mitsu's hair was soft, incredibly soft and it smelled sweet. It reminded her of something, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it.
Slowly and carefully, she leaned her head on the blonde's and watched through the front window. She was sleepy, Mitsu's hair was so soft, and the cabin of the car was so quiet that she couldn't help but close her eyes to sleep.
The sun shone brightly through the windows, but Shinoa had found the perfect place where she wouldn't be blinded immediately. Her father and Mahiru were yelling at something again. These days it wasn't uncommon.
"Christmas! I'm telling you something horrible will happen on Christmas! Why don't you believe me? You create me especially for this reason, and yet you refuse to listen when I tell you what is going to happen?"
Shinoa calmly played with her dolls by the window, it was a way to ignore whatever her father and sister were yelling about this time. She could try and retreat to her room, but that would only draw attention to her, so she continued to play.
"Because, how could it possibly happen on Christmas? What you're suggesting is impossible! This is genocide, it would be the end of the human race if it were actually to happen."
Shinoa's dolls were always together, they were always around each other and the bigger one was always there for her little sister. Today they were all going out together for a little dinner.
"That's exactly what they want father! Of course, they want you to think it's impossible, why else would they try it? If we think that it's impossible, we won't try and make a vaccine for it! Father, you need to listen to me. Something is going to happen, mark my words and if you don't act on them, we will all die and the humans will lose this battle!"
Shinoa loved the way her doll's eyes reflected the sun, she could move the little piece of light around the entire room and it could go from one side to the other in the blink of an eye, she wished that someday she could move that fast, or maybe she could inflict as much pain as the sun did when she accidentally got it in her eye.
"How could they possibly engineer a virus that would wipe out everyone over the age of twelve? You can't do that, how would it interact with the cells of a body that is almost thirteen? How does it deem a body the right age? Think this through, Mahiru, there's no possible way that it could work."
Shinoa smiled as she slowly rose from her place by the window, she made her way upstairs, quieter than a lioness on the hunt, and entered her room, freezing as her door made the smallest of squeaks. The commotion hadn't stopped downstairs, but now it was dulled and she couldn't hear any coherent words.
"I really don't know, okay! I'm only telling you what I saw, and so far, nothing I've seen has been wrong, so why would this be?"
Shinoa quickly closed her door to shut out the yelling that had reached her room. She could still hear them through the door. While she couldn't understand them, their voices could still be heard up here. She made her way to her bed and covered her ears with her pillows, blocking out the angry voices that she could almost still hear through the layers and layers of feathers.
Knowing that no one would be able to hear her, she let the tears flow.