Layers

Chapter Seventeen

By: Brenli and Jael

Uriel hadn't slept all night. His clocked showed a miserable three thirty in the morning and he had not slept at all.

He sat in the familiar dull glow of his desk lamp, his fingers wrinkling the edges of the papers he clenched tight. Before him was a piece of information he had felt like he had waited ages for. Raphael's assistant had sent it to him, a sketch from an old and vast archive of medical records leftover from the Great War.

The medical records had limited information, and were labelled only as "Celestiel". The lack of information concealed inside the emailed copies didn't surprise him, so many injured soldiers had poured into Raphael's hospital. Many with injuries so horrific the patient could only have been given a swift, merciful death. Any others were given little more than bandages to hold them together, and sent back onto the front lines. The War had been brutal, and he clenched the evidence of it in his hands.

The sketch was only of a naked female back, roughly and hurriedly detailing her wings. God, how horrible…! One of her wings had been completely severed at the first joint, a bit of bone protruding from mangled flesh. Bitten off, the records said. Prognosis…? Dismal.

Uriel sighed and pushed the papers away. He had heard of very few cases of an Angel losing part of one wing. While losing an entire wing meant a slow and agonizing descent into the hungry, horrifying madness of a Ghoul, sometimes… sometimes losing part of a wing meant survival. But Angels with these injuries were treated terribly… like lepers. Like they could lose their minds and attack anyone around them in an instant.

Suddenly, so much of the history he had collected on Celestiel made sense. She was once an ambitious warrior, a hero to some… but she lost part of her wing and none of that mattered. She wasn't even permitted to take a demotion from Powers to join the Guardian Angel division.

Brushed aside like she meant nothing… that had to have been horrible.

Uriel took one last look at the sketch of Celestiel's wings before tucking it away, and he didn't know why, but a vision of Serissa's tattoo flashed through his head.

An Angel with a broken wing…

The second she drifted through his mind for the hundredth time that night, Uriel angrily shoved his papers away. He grabbed for his phone and dialed Jinho for the fifth time. When the call rolled straight to voicemail, yet again, he muttered a curse and tossed his phone onto the pile of papers and notes he had so tediously been keeping.

He suddenly had to fight the urge to shove it all off his desk with one sweep of his arm. What was the point of all of this? Pouring over all of his notes and research on Celestiel yet again? In the hopes of finding something new? There wasn't a point. The only purpose was to distract him from a building feeling of dread that knotted in the pit of his stomach. To distract him from a feeling of helplessness.

Sending Jinho to follow Serissa was supposed to give him answers. It was nearly four o'clock in the morning, and Jinho had yet to give him anything. Truthfully, Uriel was beginning to worry for the man. Had something happened? Oh God… was Judas right? Was Serissa up to something?

No, no… that couldn't be it. It couldn't! Uriel was on his feet and pacing the floor. He didn't want to believe it. He didn't want to believe that the horrible misfortune that had followed him his whole life would dare tread on what he had with Serissa. It just… wasn't fair.

The ringing of his phone cut through the eerie silence, and Uriel felt it jolt him to awareness. He scooped it up off his desk, felt his heart leap to his throat, only to be instantly deflated when Doll's name flashed over his caller ID. He considered letting it go to voicemail… he didn't want to talk to Doll. Not now. Not when he was feeling so vulnerable.

But he answered anyway.

"Hey, Uriel."

Uriel sighed and sat down in his chair. He found it strangely comforting that Doll didn't use 'sama' at the end of his name much, anymore. He didn't deserve the title, anyway. "Doll, it's three o'clock in the morning. Is everything okay?"

"I knew you would be awake. I wanted to know if you've been doing okay."

"Me? That's… a strange thing to ask me, Doll."

"Not really. I've been talking to Sara. She said you were acting a bit off at dinner."

"Off? How so?"

Doll paused, and he could hear the sad smile in her voice. "She said that lately you've been happier. Lighter, she said. And today you just… weren't. I wanted to know if you were okay."

Uriel pinched the bridge of his nose. Oh, how he ached to pour his feelings to someone he knew would listen. Even then, the words were bursting in his ruined throat. "I'm…"

"Uriel… you know you can tell me."

"You don't need to remind me. Sometimes, I think you are my only true friend, Doll."

"Uriel…" He heard the ache in Doll's voice and it nearly broke him into smaller pieces.

"Doll. I'm afraid."

"Afraid? Of what?"

"I've given my heart to a woman, Doll. And it frightens me."

There was a long and uncomfortable silence that followed, and Uriel could have sworn he heard the softest of relieved sighs come from Doll's mouth. "There isn't anything wrong with that, Uriel."

Uriel's false voice quivered. "Then why do I feel like she's holding a knife against my chest? With one move, she could be the end of me. I shouldn't… feel like this. I shouldn't feel this sickening foreboding inside of me."

"Do you love her?"

"Yes." He heard the plastic of his phone creak under his tightening grip. "But Doll, it's so much more complicated than simply loving her."

"It doesn't have to be. Listen… love isn't as strange and complicated as people like to say it is. It's not. If you love her then truly, completely, love her. Don't do as you did with Alexiel… or me. Don't hide your heart with a mask of pity and self-doubt. That is the coward's way."

"Doll-"

"Don't argue. I promise you that if you hide this, if you find reasons to run from it as you did before, then the knife you fear will be the end of you. If you say you love her, then love her. Grab onto her, hold her tight, and don't ever let her forget how you feel. I know you, Uriel. You are a man who loves with everything you have, and if you ever let yourself really give your heart away… any woman would be lucky to have it."

Uriel let out a shaky sigh and rested his forehead in his free hand. "I don't know if I can do that… not this time. Not until I know her feelings for me are true and honest."

"Then you're a fool." Uriel could hear the soft smile in Doll's voice and it made his vision blur with emotion. "Love may not be complicated, but it's not perfect. You can't expect to receive something so grand if you're not willing to give it, unconditionally, first."

"But I'm not even sure I know her."

"You know enough about Serissa to know exactly how you feel about her."

"But Doll, I…" Uriel's words suddenly stopped dead when a realization made his bones freeze. "I never told you her name." The line was silent except for soft breath on the other line, and Uriel rose to his feet, gripping his phone tighter. "You're not Doll. Who is this?"

"A friend. A friend coaxed to silence when my Master lost her youth."

Uriel's cheeks paled. "You are one of the Shinryu…? But how…?"

"I saw fit to borrow your friend Doll's voice to deliver a message to your ears, and your ears only."

"But without Lilith-"

"We Shinryu are not without other means of communication."

"But why have you stayed silent until now? Why haven't you helped us?"

"Because all is exactly as it should be. Now be silent and listen to me, we only have a few moments left." The line crackled. "I am not trying to deceive you when I encourage your love for Serissa. In the end, it may be that love that prevents the catastrophe you fear."

"But why-"

"Listen. I give you this wisdom, now: With pain and sorrow and endless toil did Serissa's sad story begin, and only with patience, understanding, and love… will it end. Only you can save her, now."

Uriel's heart was pounding in his ears, and he clung to his phone like a life raft at sea. "Save her from what?"

The phone line clicked dead and Uriel remained frozen, listening to nothing, and staring straight ahead. His blood was rushing, his heart pounding in his ears. What just happened? The Shinryu had contacted him? Him? About Serissa? Why her? A thousand new frustrating questions sprang up in his head. How could his love for her prevent the catastrophe he feared? Which catastrophe? Surely it couldn't have been the Armageddon they were all hoping to stop… Could it?

Uriel suddenly hurled his phone against the wall, so overcome with fear and injustice that he couldn't stop himself. The device bounced over the plaster and split into pieces. No one, not even Jinho or the Shinryu could just give him an answer!

"Uriel?"

Startled, he spun to see the face of all his questions standing in his open doorway. He hadn't even heard her come in. Despite the troubled look on his face, Uriel didn't rush to her like he wanted to. "What are you doing here?"

The question and Uriel's standoffish tone threw Serissa off guard. "I… I wanted to see you."

"Shouldn't you be working?" Uriel's feet carried him closer to her. He ached to pull her into his arms. He ached to shake her and scream and demand answers, even if he wasn't entirely sure what the real question was, anymore.

"You're always encouraging me to ditch, aren't you? I… I needed to see you." Serissa took steps to close the gap between them further. She wasn't sure why she was there. She was shaken to the core by her confrontation with Jinho and the short conversation with Azrael that followed, broken and hurt and fraying around the edges. And reason wasn't the thing that brought her back to this room… She wasn't sure why she was there, or why she felt the need to be in Uriel's arms again. She just did.

She nearly sobbed when Uriel's rough grip took her shoulders and pulled her to him, wrapping her in an embrace that broke both their hearts. "Serissa, where were you, tonight?" He murmured into her hair.

"I… I was at work."

"Were you?"

He sounded suspicious, like he didn't believe her, and that realization made Serissa push him back. "Of course I was. What are you saying?"

"Serissa, I asked Jinho to follow you tonight."

"You did what?" Serissa recoiled away from him, her eyes slightly widened with dismay. "Why?"

"Judas… told me some things. About you and what you do for him."

Serissa let out a soft breath, feeling her insides churning. "And you believed him? Judas?"

"What do you expect, Serissa? You don't tell me anything. Ever. I just want to know what you're hiding!"

"I'm not hiding anything!" As soon as the lie left Serissa's mouth, she felt tears sting her eyes. Oh, if he only knew all the things she was hiding. He would curse her, hate her. And in that moment, she saw how capable he was of such a thing. The thought of made her want to collapse, throw herself at his feet and beg for forgiveness. But she couldn't… not now. Not with so much still at stake. Her lips quivered and she turned to flee from him, only to be stopped by his rough grip on her elbow.

"Wait…! Please! Don't…" He pulled her closer, spun her around and pressed a needy, broken kiss to her lips. "Don't shut me out." He murmured to her, his hands threading into her hair tight enough to make her flinch. "Not now."

"Let me go."

"I can't… I don't want to." He kissed her again and held her close when her knees buckled. "Serissa, I lo-"

"No!" Serissa bellowed and shoved him away, using the back of her jacket's sleeve to wipe away a tear falling down her cheek. "Shut up! What I do with my time isn't… isn't any of your business!"

"Serissa."

"No. Just… don't." Serissa couldn't bear to see that look on Uriel's face for another minute, so she turned and fled out of his room. She was surprised and hurt that he didn't follow her. It only pushed her tears out faster.

She couldn't see. She couldn't breathe. By the time she reached her room, she planted her hands on her desk and leaned over that… accursed computer, trying to blink away the water in her eyes. She brushed the trails of tears off her pink cheeks and finally noticed what the blinking screen was telling her.

Virus synthesized. Ready for execution.

Ready for execution… ready.

A wave of nausea struck the woman and she turned and hurried right out of the room, the image of that screen burned into her retinas and into her very soul.

Ready for execution…

She didn't know how she made it to the bathroom down the hall. Her knees cracked against the tiles and her hands gripped the cool porcelain of the toilet as she lost her stomach's contents into the bowl.

Ready… The virus was finally ready.

xXxXxXx

"So... heavily guarded?"

"Yes." Her eyes were hollow rubies to go with her hollow voice. The two other I-Children shared a look she could only describe as uncomfortable. "Raziel insists on it... just in case the Uprising decides to pay the neighborhood another visit. Better safe than sorry."

Another uneasy pause.

"You don't have to move into my house if you don't want to... I just thought..." Nema shrugged her ivory shoulders. "We have imposed on Serissa so much, that's all. Then again, she did say you could stay here as long as you needed... So if you'd rather look for a place of your own-"

She seemed to be talking more to herself than to them, and Nyssa cut her off. "What you're saying makes sense. We'll keep considering the offer, now that your place is under watch."

Nema only nodded, whatever whisper of a smile she had to give them appearing and disappearing so quickly, it looked more like a forlorn quirk of the lips. Maybe that's all it was...

The couple shared another glance, Rujiel gently rocking his infant daughter as they both quickly, quietly looked around the main room. Something had happened... furniture was broken and haphazardly mended, or else missing. Two legs of the table put back together with a few nails and rings of duct table. A lamp was gone, it's place marked out with a light ring of dust. Nema sat in one of a pair of chairs, but it's partner was nowhere to be found. A bowl had been glued back together so that it could hold all the broken, jagged shards of glass she'd been using to fight against the circumstances placed upon her... "How goes the glass experiment-"

"I gave up trying." She looked up at him with eyes as good as dead, and worry thrummed through their veins. If either of them could sit across from her, they would have...

Nyssa settled for planting her snowy-pale hands on the table to lean over her. "Nema, what's going on...?"

Nema didn't know how to respond, and the struggle to form the words, to organize them in a way that made sense, made tears line eyes that were sore from so much prior crying. From tears shed when she was alone.

The glimmer of those tears sent Nyssa's pale brows arching together in concern. "... Is it the Uprising? Azrael?"

The very mention of that man and his horrid group pushed tears out of her eyes and a ragged laugh out of her mouth, which she tried to cover with her hand.

Nyssa and Rujiel shared a frown. "... Nema?"

"That man...!" Sharp shards filled the hollow tone of her voice, turning it into a hiss. "That... cult!" Her chair scraped hard against the ground as she stood, and the heels of her boots came down like daggers stabbing the floor as she began pacing. "God, sometimes I feel like I should have killed him the second he started yelling out about justice! Blinding all these poor people, our poor people, with talk of this prosperous future!" Her hand fell hard onto the table, rattling glass, her other hand pressed so hard against her chest, she almost wished she could grab onto her heart. Maybe pull it out. "Like I don't want that! Like I don't want those things for them!"

Nyssa's eyes had grown wide, and Rujiel took a half-step backward, gently hunching over little Lilliel. "Hey... Take a breath, Nema..."

But she spoke over them, her voice rising and shredding upon itself. "But what am I supposed to do? It is so! Hard! To do anything, fucking anything in this damn government!" She shut her eyes pointlessly against spilling tears and ranted and wailed, "What am I supposed to do? Dismantle everything?"

A soft gasp left Nyssa's lips, her white waves of hair slipping over her shoulders as she shook her head. "No, how would you even-"

"I should! Maybe I should! Maybe that's the glorious stupid answer and I-"

"Nema, enough!"

"Nyssa!" Rujiel suddenly shouted, rousing Lilliel. He reached out, almost made the mistake of touching his beloved while lightning crackled around her hands... hands clasped hard onto Nema's shoulders.

She released her almost as soon as she'd grabbed her, and Nema slowly, silently slumped back down into her chair with eyes both wide and hopeless. "I'm sorry..." Nyssa apologized with her hands held up, "You needed the jolt."

Nema wished she could say that it helped, that it put all the pieces together in a way that made sense, in a way that made things attainable and... happy, and... Her wet, white lashes fell over her eyes, and she wept. "I feel like I'm killing myself for nothing. Like everything's falling apart... for no reason. I have nothing to show for it. It's not enough..."

"Nonsense. It's enough. You're doing all you can... it's not your fault that most of our people don't understand that." Nyssa tried to console her, though it seemed to be in vain, only making the troubled, broken Queen of Rabbits weep more.

Rujiel made an attempt of his own, offering Lilliel to Nyssa in some small, silent way of comforting her, too. "Come on, Nema... don't cry. What does Michael think about all this?"

Her hand covered her mouth again in some sad attempt to muffle a sobbing kind of laugh. "I don't know..."

Rujiel's garnet eyes blinked. "... You haven't talked to him about any of this? How you've been feeling?"

She gave him more sobbing laughter. "When am I supposed to talk to him?"

When? "... Nema, he's your husband; you talk to him whenever you're with him."

"I'm never with him. Ever." Nema sniffed back her pain and felt it burn in her chest. "Even when he's here. That's when he's tired and just can't be bothered with anything; that's when he sleeps. He spends so much of his time with that horrible Princess, he may as well be married to her! Not me!"

Neither Rujiel nor Nyssa could begin to conjure up the words needed to reply to Nema. They'd known that she was stressed... understandably stressed. And since coming here, they'd learned that Michael spent the majority of his day sparring with and training the Princess of Evils... but this...?

She spoke again, and it was a hopeless plea for release. "I hate sleeping beside him and feeling like he's a world away. I hate that I miss him and he's just in the yard... Just outside the window."

It was either perfect timing or horrible timing, that the door swung open, that he stepped in with a towel draped over his shoulders, with a water bottle at his lips. His blue-green eyes slipped from Rujiel, to Nyssa... and widened when they settled on his wife.

Before he could so much as pull the bottle away from his mouth, Nema was speaking, fueled by her shattering pain, jagged as glass. "Oh God, what's this? You're here? The sun hasn't even set, yet! You have so many hours left to spend in the yard!"

"What?" The word was choked with water, and his fiery brows knit together as he drew his arm across his mouth.

"Lilith!" Nema hissed the name out as if it cut her tongue to speak it. "Why hasn't she ensnared you until the middle of the night?"

"She's sick!" Michael snapped defensively. "I don't know what the Hell happened, but she's fucking pale! I sent her to her room!"

"You didn't join her? She wants you to!"

"What?"

Nyssa reached out with her free hand to hold onto Rujiel's, and when he spoke, it was with a hoarse cautiousness. "Michael, we're gonna head out."

The Fire Angel was too shocked and distracted to give a single fuck about what Rujiel had to say, his hand swiping through the air in the direction of the door. "There's the door."

They gave him a wide berth as they slipped swiftly out of the room, and heard him bellow a demand for Nema to repeat herself from behind the slammed door.

"I think you heard me just fine!" She stood so fast that the chair toppled right over, clattering angrily in their ears.

"I don't think I did, Nema!" Every little trace of blue left his bewildered, angry green eyes. "Where the fuck did that come from?"

"See?" Nema simply sneered. "You heard me perfectly."

Michael could only quickly shake his head in confusion. Join Lilith, in her room? Nema, crying, yelling at him? What did he do? "I still don't know what the fuck you're talking about, Nema!"

"You don't? Really? After all this time with that hussy of a Princess? The way she begs for more of your time, which I guess is just free to give, isn't it...!"

"All we have while we're down here is time! And where's the begging, Nema?"

Nema's red-rimmed, ruby eyes narrowed at him. "Wow..."

"Wow, what?" Michael hissed, stomping after her as she crossed to a window, pulled aside the curtain. "Are you going to calm the fuck down and start making sense?"

She ignored his question, pointing at the view the window offered, at the backyard. "It's like you think I can't see you both down there!"

"What's down there to see, Nema? I've been training her!"

"And she's been enjoying it! Enjoying it too much!"

"... You think she wants me." The accusation came out flat and offended.

Nema tore the curtain back down across the glass and began to feverishly scream. "You are so thick-headed sometimes! I just want to punch a hole into your stupid skull!"

"Watch it!" He yelled over her, tried to close the distance between them, but she kept moving away... stumbling slightly, hands held out to keep him from her, cutting him deep... making him just that much more bewildered and angry.

"I don't think anything! I know! I know because she told me so, and she doesn't seem to feel a single shred of shame for it!" Nema remembered that confrontation, remembered her threats, remembered how the majority of them didn't seem to matter to the former Dragonmaster. "Of course, why should she? It's not like you've ever done anything to make her feel like she doesn't stand a chance!"

"She doesn't!" It felt ridiculous to say it, ridiculous and unnecessary. "We're married!"

"Are we?"

Two words, two more verbal daggers stuck deep in his chest, and he roared from the pain of it. "Now who's being thick-headed, Nema?"

"You spend hours upon hours with her every single day, come home and you don't even touch me...!"

God, was that what this was about? "I've been tired, Nema! You know that!"

"I'm tired too, Michael! I'm so fucking tired of this...!"

Some fearful tremor worked through his limbs, froze him to the floor, which was saying something for the Fire Angel... and it made the rage in him come up sharp and cruel upon his tongue. "Nema, you can't be this stupid! I have to train her!"

"Why?"

"To protect you! Celestiel fucking crippled you, Nema, did you forget that? As a group, we have to make up for what you lack!"

The silence hurt so much more than all the screaming had... The way teary eyes cast themselves at the carpet, the way her chest rose and fell to contain her weeping. "What I lack."

Why did he say that...? Suddenly he would have given anything to take those words back and swallow them whole. "Nema, come here..."

"No..." She saw his hands reach for her, and she was back to retreating, desperately trying to keep him away, even as she needed him. She hated this...

But Michael insisted, closing the gap between them, taking her by her arms. She struggled and murmured a series of 'no's, and he hated this... "Nema, stop it, st-"

She struck him hard across his dragon-covered cheek, hurrying around the table and the bowl of glass shards like they were meant to keep him from her. "I thought I was more than an Aion! What happened to that? That's what you told me! Were you lying? Spare me the bullshit; I don't want it and I thought you didn't, either!"

"Nema...!" Her name was a frustrated cry on his lips. "Calm the fuck down and listen to how fucking stupid you're being!"

"No! You listen to me! You listen to me because God knows you haven't given me a second of your attention for months!" Nema screamed across the table at him. "My being crippled by that masked bitch doesn't mean you have to start turning everyone here into a soldier and putting everyone who isn't through fucking boot camp! I've mended! I'm capable! I can't pop people open, but I'm capable! And I've proven it!"

"When, Nema? Fucking when?"

Nema wanted to scream and sob and throw that little bowl of glass shards into his green-eyed face. "I was there when Azrael tore through our neighborhood. I held my own. I saved Lilliel!"

"And you bled out of your fucking face!" He bellowed in reply. "We fucking had this stupid conversation already, Nema! If Barbiel hadn't shown up when she did, you would've been riddled with fucking bullet holes!" Michael's voice shook at the very idea of it, and that pushed more rage out of him. "And then you bled out of your face! Don't stand there telling me you're battle-ready when you ended up bleeding out of your face; I don't wanna hear it!"

Nema had flinched with every razor-edged word, opened her mouth to speak, but his fists slammed hard against the table, making shards of glass shiver just like she did.

"And what about you burning the shit out of your old headquarters, Nema? Don't give me that fucking shit about 'that's what I would have done' because I don't give a fuck! It's not what you do! And you're so fucking proud of what you did; you should be happy I didn't hand my damn phone over to you because I don't think Raziel would even let you into the damn building if he knew how fucking justified you feel! I'm about to drop your ass into a cage, Nema! Before you fucking hurt yourself!"

Nema blinked the tears out of her pale lashes and felt them burn down her cheeks, red eyes meeting unforgiving green ones. "... Is this over?"

Michael pushed away from the table with every bit of disgust radiating off of him. "Yes. This is fucking over."

He should have realized the second she held up her ivory hand... but it had taken watching her pull the rose gold wedding ring from her finger, the pink, heart-shaped diamond glinting warningly in the light of their room before she dropped it into the bowl of sharp, broken shards of dark glass. It had taken that much for the weight of her question to crunch through the anger and the upset.

He hadn't meant that.

He'd meant anything but that...

But Michael couldn't find the words as he stared at her tear-streaked, miserable face. Some desperate instinct made the fingers of his left hand twitch, his thumb tracing over his own rose gold wedding band.

"... Goodbye." The word was so final and painful that she couldn't stand to be in the same room with it, turning, striding quickly for the door.

"Nema, come ba-"

"Enjoy Lilith." She half-hissed, half-wept, and that was all it took for foolish rage to overtake him.

"F... Fine! Leave! Fucking leave! Come back when your fucking head's screwed on right!" Michael bellowed and screamed, kicked the table so hard that it toppled right over, his water bottle spilling a river of clear liquid across scattered shards and an abandoned wedding ring. The plastic rolled... and stopped at a pair of shoes.

His son's little shoes.

When had Nathan entered the room? Had he always been here? Had he slipped in behind his father? Suddenly Michael wanted to find someone to blame for all of this, someone to tear to pieces... but he didn't have that luxury. Instead had he a toppled over table, a wife without her wedding ring, a son who'd seen too much. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know what to say to Nathan and his wide red eyes and his quivering frown. "... Nathan..."

The young boy stepped away from him as soon as he spoke, inching toward the door.

"Nathan, please..." Michael hadn't had this kind of screaming match with Nema in so, so long... and he'd been proud of that. Thankful that his children hadn't seen them act like that before, counting on them never seeing that. Suddenly he felt like he was begging to his son, but the boy fled too, and he couldn't blame the child.

He couldn't blame the boy for running to the parent who had also fled, who hurried down the hall with her thumb tracing over her naked finger.

This was a mistake, a part of her screamed, making her cry all the harder for it. Her wedding ring hadn't ever felt heavy, but now her hand felt too light, awkwardly weighted. Like she'd cut off a part of her flesh... Nema wanted to crash back into the room and put the ring back on and sob like an infant, no matter what Michael did. Whether he stayed or left her... She just wanted the ring back. That little piece of him. That piece of them.

This was a mistake, but she wanted to run away from it. She wanted to disappear. Jinho hadn't meant it the way she initially thought he did, but she wanted to leave, and go somewhere she'd never been before, and hide, and be inadequate and miserable. She wanted to not exist...

Her children were a painful flash through her mind, and Nema heard herself sob out loud. God, what was she going to do...? She couldn't disappear from them, she couldn't.

The ruined Queen of Rabbits passed Serissa's door, and through the trouble, chaotic scramble of her brain, she rationalized that she should tell the woman that she was leaving. Hopefully that meant the Uprising would steer clear of her mansion, right? Prophecy or not... "S-" Nema sniffed back the broken sob and cleared it out of her throat, raising her pale fist to knock on her door. "Seri-" The rest of the name stuck in her throat.

The door had swung open freely... strange, considering it was usually always firmly shut. Then again, the Revenant was always either sleeping or busy, if she was even home at all... Maybe Nema had caught her when she actually had time, for once. She couldn't decide if that was a blessing or a curse. She wanted to keep this brief. "... Serissa?" She tried again, peering into the dark room, and her eyes focused on a bookcase that had been moved aside. A dark passageway was revealed, a set of stairs leading down who knows where... Nema's thumb traced over where her ring once was, and again, she considered running back and putting that ring back on.

Instead she fought through her heartbroken desperation and blinked back her tears, striding into the room. "Serissa...!" She called down the stairs before descending them. Surely she was somewhere down here; why else would the passageway be open and available...?

Once she reached the floor, Nema still hadn't found her. The room was awash in darkness, save a dreary greenish light coming from a couple of monitors that had been hooked up to an oversized computer tower. She almost thought to leave...

But that dreary, almost toxic kind of light illuminated white porcelain sitting beside a keyboard. White porcelain, equally-white dreadlocks spilling from behind it. Before Nema could stop her emotionally-frayed self, her hands had lifted it... the white rabbit mask.

Celestiel's mask.

Shock ate through all her anguish and made her drop that mask back onto the desk, taking a full two steps away from it. Celestiel's mask...!

"Nemaelle, what are you doing in here?" Serissa's voice cut through the air like a knife, and she stood in the doorway, her hands braced on the jamb.

The second she heard the woman's voice, a frightened tremor struck her from head to toe, and she moved too fast for words. The earring slipped from her earlobe and morphed from cross to sword, the clear blade catching the light from the monitors as it swiped before her protectively. Her breathing came out in puffs as she remembered how utterly useless her fight against Celestiel had been… what this woman had taken from her…

And the brandishing of that sword didn't even draw a flinch from Serissa. Her red rimmed, tired eyes stared harshly at the woman standing in front of her secret work station. "You shouldn't be here."

"I almost wish that I wasn't." Nema answered honestly, even as she steeled herself against… the unimaginable. She wished she had her power back… that easy, mental kill button, even as she remembered that it hadn't worked on this two-faced woman before her. "But only almost…" Maybe that was foolhardy of her. Maybe she had a deathwish. It was still true.

"You know that isn't going to do you any good, Nema." Serissa said, tiredly gesturing at her sword. "Put it away. Let's talk."

"About what? How we've been living in the enemy's house?" Her sword shook in her hand. How horrible was it that she wasn't surprised? Everything else had crumbled… and again, her finger traced over the naked flesh that once had rose gold wrapped around it.

"About what we're going to do about this. About how you know my secret now, and what we're supposed to do about that."

The laugh that seeped from her snowy-pale throat was dry as dust. "A waste of time and energy." One boot slowly, silently slid to the side, and she gently leaned on it. She was sneaking around the monster taking up her only escape route, pointlessly and desperately…

"Nema, please don't be foolish." Serissa sighed. "I'm tired. I am worn to the bone, and I don't want to fight with you. I don't want to hurt you. I've already come to an arrangement with Jinho, and I'm sure we might be able to come up with one of our own, if you would just listen."

"Oppa?" Mentioning his name was just enough for the blade of Nema's sword to drop just an inch. He'd been a wreck when she last saw him… not a bit like himself. Disheveled and angry and… desperate to leave. Desperate to get her to leave… The katana blade dipped down another inch. "That's why he left. It wasn't Lucifer. It was you…!"

"I wasn't aware that he was leaving. But that seems like something he would do, I guess." Serissa took a single step towards Nema. "Nema, I already know you well enough to know that you won't go for the same deal I gave him. You're too stubborn for that… but I'm begging you. I am… begging you, Nema. Don't make me hurt you."

Her sword raised up once more, and she continued slowly moving across the line of the desk just behind her, her free hand running against the wood. "Or you'll what? Kill me, I suppose? Find some other thing to forcibly rip out of me?" Nema knew all those things were very likely. "Come now, Serissa- wait." She laughed cruelly, sadly. "I'm sorry. Celestiel. Come on, now… we both know you're not the type to beg." That certainly wasn't the Celestiel she remembered…

Mouth curling into a sad, wry smile, Serissa nodded. "I'm not the woman I used to be, that's true. But think of your children… think of your husband."

"He doesn't need me." She hated how her voice cracked and whined pitifully around every syllable, and she hated the way she actually wished her children didn't need her. She didn't want anyone to need her… and then her ruby eyes caught the shuffle of a pale form behind a worn filing cabinet. The smallest sign of a gasp left her before she could stop herself, and now she was just hoping he'd run away. Disappear. Immediately.

But Serissa didn't notice the small child hiding in the room. "So be it…" She pulled her blade out from a cluttered shelf beside her. So much like their last meeting, when Serissa was only a terrifying masked woman, she was behind Nema before she could blink, fisting her hand into Nema's pearly white hair and wrenching her head back. She murmured in Nema's ear, and her voice broke with a soft, subtle sob. "I'm so sorry…"

Nema's eyes went wide, and foolhardy impulses took over as she cried out to her son, "Run!" Fighting against the fingers in her hair, flipping her grip on her Angel Crystal sword so that maybe, just maybe she could get some kind of cut on this traitorous woman's body before she could cut her.

Her single word caught Serissa off guard, and as her sword raised, it only prompted her to do what she felt had to be done. With one swift, sure slice, she dragged the sharpness of her blade across Nema's neck… pressing deep enough to sever both carotid arteries and her windpipe. In a way, Serissa felt like she was cutting into her own soul when she administered the stroke she knew would end the Rabbit Queen's life. And when her lifeblood gushed forth and soaked her hands, she wanted to take it all back.

Nema wished she could have screamed, though she wasn't sure what she would have called out. Urges for her son to run. Cries to this two-faced woman to wait, as if she would wait. She wasn't sure that Serissa, that Celestiel, would… blood poured from her, warm and thick and coating her torso.

"... Ma…!" The boy was too shocked to think of self-preservation, tripping from behind the filing cabinet, red eyes wide and teary, sobs caught in his throat.

Nema couldn't see a single thing, her vision dimming, her throat stinging, air going nowhere and her lungs aching, for it. Her sword-wielding arm reached out, the blade pointing back up the stairs before it clattered to the ground, before her ruby eyes went glassy and empty, and the Queen was no more.

"... Ma!" Nathan's wail was a battlecry in his pale throat, and he was moving without thinking, pulling a pair of knives from each pocket of his baggy shorts. He remembered how his mother had scolded him for bringing them, and it made him weep harder as he threw them, the one meant for Serissa's head whizzing by and miraculously lodging into the wall, the other nicking the arm that held his dead mother's body up.

And then he was picking up his mother's sword, gripping it with sweaty little hands and finding it awkward and heavy, and he didn't care. His mother was dead…!

Serissa let Nema's limp body land on the floor with a wet thud. "Nathan…!" Horror seeped into every cell of her body as she watched the boy's grief-stricken, terrified face. "Nathan, you…!" She had just killed the boy's mother, right in front of his eyes!

Great, big tears were suddenly spilling from Nathan's eyes, tumbling down his pale cheeks, as he tried in vain to pick up his mother's sword. "You killed her! You killed her!" He grunted with the attempt to lift the crystalline katana from the ground, and the weight of it made him stumble, made him cry all the harder for it…

"Nathan, p-put that down." Serissa stuttered over her words like a fool, her heart fracturing at the sight of the boys tears. "I…" She didn't know what to say. What could she say? All she knew was that she had to keep the boy quiet. Calm. If he caused a fuss, everyone in the house would be attracted to her room.

The poor boy pushed through his fear, through his anger, letting out a cry as he gripped onto the hilt with both trembling hands and tried to swing. The arc was crooked and wobbly in the air, and Nathan yelled out, "I'll kill you!" He hiccuped the words between aching sobs, "Like you killed her!" The weight of the sword made it hard to run, but he didn't care. His mother was dead and he wanted Serissa dead in return…!

His haphazard swings threatened to cut into Serissa, so she reached out with her free hand to grab the boy's wrist, to force the sword away… and Nathan's weight fell into her.

She froze.

No. No no no…!

She felt the blade of her spear pierce into Nathan's chest, and when she did, it was already too late. She didn't mean to harm the boy, but when he charged her she didn't pay attention to where her own blade was. And…

"Oh my God…!" Serissa let out a strangled sob and removed the blade out of instinct, throwing both her spear and Nema's sword aside.

The bite of the blade burned worse than any superficial scrapes he'd ever acquired in his meager five years of life, so badly that it had briefly stopped his cries. It wasn't until the metal had left his skin and blood began pumping everywhere that the sobs returned, though this time they were weak, whimpering, little hands holding tight over the wound like that might keep the blood from spilling all along the floor.

That whimper from his mouth, that horrified, pain-filled whimper made Serissa let out another sob. Her hands grabbed him, pulled him close, and she fell with him, holding his little body against hers. "Nathan…? Nathan, listen to me, you're… You're going to be okay! You're…"

But the last thing the boy wanted to be is within the arms of the murderer of his mother, and he struggled, wailing wordlessly until he'd managed to free himself from her grasp. The landing sent a painful shudder through him as he reached one blood-smeared hand out toward Nema, grabbing hopelessly at nothing, one more sad whimper leaving his tear-soaked throat before he was too weak to move, too weak to see, too weak to breathe anymore.

And when Nathan was too weak to move, Serissa was there to pull his limp body back to her. He wasn't moving, wasn't breathing… his body was so still. "This wasn't supposed to happen." She said, tears rolling out of her eyes and dripping onto Nathan's blank face. "This wasn't…"

Serissa felt her throat tighten into another wailing sob. All she could think of was an oath she had made so long ago…

That she would never again raise her blade against the innocent.