I'm not THAT mean. I wouldn't make you guys wait that long for the next chapter again, especially at my cliff hangers. ^^
Thanks for all the awesome reviews from,
`pseudoCalibrator
`The Shameless Carrot -Zhane17
`Black White and Superstitious
`Saints-Fan-12
`iDontCare
`Awesome D.T
`(even though your review was for a much earlier chapter) Allagenda-chan
Enjoy the YuuMi~! :3
By the way, is my romance writing still sucky? 0_0 I hope not... That would suck. -_-'
~Tiruneko ;3
X~56~X
"GUMI!" Someone shouts from inside the RV as the door flings open with contact from Rin's boot. Bullets immediately start flying out at Teto, who collapses behind the boulder for protection.
Inside of the van Miku cowers on the floor under the window, shaking and hyperventilating. Oliver and Lapis file out after Rin, Lapis armed with a tire-iron and a pack of fireworks, Oliver with a hammer. Len stops just seconds before going out, IA's hand gripping his shirt, her face contorted into fierce and brutal anger, harsh, especially for a child. IO hovers behind her, her even closer following shadow.
"Lenny." IA points towards Miku with her eyes. Len bends down to IA's level, cocking his gun.
"Go in the back bedroom, lock the door. We'll come get you, stay away from windows." Len puts a hand on IA's head and IO frowns from behind her, glaring daggers at him.
IA nods and grabs IO by the wrist, pulling him into the back room and leaving the door open, just a crack for Miku. Len realizes Miku is hyperventilating on the floor, refusing to move. He bends down and puts a hand on her back. "Miku. Go with IA and IO." He says gently.
"W-what if it happens again?" She croaks, eyes filled with panic.
"You'll be fine. It's not going to happen again, and if it is, I'll come get you. I promise, Miku." With that he rushes out of the van, firing cover shots.
Rin rushes forward with Oliver to take care of Teto, and as soon as Len gets outside his eyes fall immediately on Yuuma, collapsed to the ground on his knees, a blood covered form in his arms. His eyes are wide, his pupils practically the size of pin pricks, his face drips with sweat and he can't even breathe.
Yuuma screams.
"Lapis!" Len shouts for the blue haired girl. She rushes over and darts into the RV coming out less than a second later with a white first-aid kit. She turns to Len.
"Go get her." Lapis gestures to the rock. Len nods and darts off as Lapis collapses next to Yuuma on the ground. "Yuuma, put her down." Yuuma is completely unresponsive. "Yuuma!" Lapis shakes him. "I can't help her if you don't put her down!" Still nothing. "Yuuma!" Lapis takes it upon herself to pull Gumi from his arms and lie her down on the grass. Yuuma stares at his bloody hands as if he's never had any before.
Lapis tugs Gumi's shirt up slightly, revealing, on the lower right side of her stomach, just above her hip, a small abscess in her side. Lapis sighs briefly. "It grazed her." She looks over Yuuma's still statue-still head. A small bullet hole is in the side of the RV. "Your sister is a terrible shot." Lapis mutters, popping open the first aid kit. Gumi groans a guttural noise like an animal and blinks for a long moment, her eyes snap open and her head contorts. Lapis gasps in surprise.
"How are you still conscious?" Lapis stutters, watching as Gumi's eyes travel downwards to her own injury. She groans, squinting her eyes closed. She mutters an obscenity bitterly, lifting her arms so Lapis can get a better look.
Yuuma's head snaps to look at Gumi the second she speaks. After what seems like an eternity, he breathes. Gumi's eyes snap and clench closed for a second and she begins to sweat a little bit, her breath ragged. "…L-lapis." She puffs. "…It was a… g-graze wound. G-get a… a…" She gulps and inhales sharply. "…a gauze pad…" Her voice croaks. "…p-peroxide… antibiotics… fill the syringe with… six…" She pants heavily.
"What about pain meds?" Lapis gasps, surprised. Gumi shakes her head no.
"Lapis- I'm gonna' bleed out…" She pants.
"R-right." Lapis presses a large section of gauze pad against Gumi's side and Gumi winces, yelping out in pain for a second, then biting her lip.
"…Y-you h-have t-to move me… before I p-pass out…" Gumi pants, wincing in terrible pain.
"R-right…" Lapis turns to Yuuma while reaching for more gauze. "Y-Yuuma! Please I need you to help me move her!" Yuuma still sits frozen, entirely petrified, staring off into space. "Gumi-" Lapis pants, "he won't even move!"
"Yuuma!" Gumi shouts, causing pain to rocket up through her body like a fire. His head moves ever so slightly towards her. "Pick me up… right now!" Her voice barks despite her immense pain. "Yuuma!" She shouts, her voice croaks as Lapis presses deeper and her bleeding finally slows.
Slowly, as if in a dream, Yuuma sits up and pulls his arms around Gumi's upper back, under her shoulders. Her voice gasps like a tiny shriek suddenly and she clenches her jaw shut, forcing herself to calm down as Yuuma's fingers graze the scars on her back. Lapis reaches around Gumi's ankles and the two manage to pull her in the RV and lay her across the table top. IA stirs from inside the back room and darts out, slamming into Yuuma's legs. She shouts his name and Yuuma stares out into nothingness.
Lapis pulls Gumi's blood soaked and tattered shirt off and tosses it to the floor, pressing the gauze in deeper. "IO, go get me more towels, Miku, pour this over the wound!" Lapis shouts, thrusting a bottle of peroxide into Miku's shaking hands.
Yuuma's breathing, if it hadn't been at a complete standstill before, halts all together looking at the complete canvas of Gumi's injuries unmarred by her clothing, past, and the new, gushing and bloody, that he caused.
"Gumi…" He whispers softly, everything about him shaking. Her eyes, still clenched as tight as possible drift upwards to him upon opening and she bites her own lip until the point where she draws blood as peroxide pours all over her wound, stinging and burning in absolute agony. She writhers, then, unable to hold it back anymore, yelps out loud, whimpering as she bites her own hand to stop from screaming.
Suddenly Rin, Len, and Oliver come rushing in, slamming the door behind them, Len crawling up into the driver's side. Oliver gasps.
"Jesus!" Rin shouts, tossing a map over Len's head and into his lap as the car begins to speed away. Gumi practically screams as the car hits a bump in the road and the sting of antibiotics being injected into her wound burns even more.
"Lapis, is Yuuma okay?" Oliver asks, looking at the frozen pink haired boy with gradually growing concern.
"I-I think he's in shock." She stutters. Seconds after, Gumi's eyes flit closed and she passes out from pain. Yuuma's eyes instantly widen and he lurches, grabbing her hand and squeezing it until his knuckles practically turn white.
"G-Gumi." He stutters, panicking.
"She's just unconscious." Rin assures him in her gruff and slightly forceful tone. Yuuma seems to not hear her and simply stands still, gripping Gumi's hand and staring off into nowhere.
"God. What happened?" Lapis mutters softly, looking at Rin while still bandaging Gumi around her scars and her newest wound.
"It was Yuuma's sister." Rin explains.
"Did you…?"
"No, of course we didn't." Rin throws her hands above her head, exasperated. "We tied her to a tree and ripped off her tracker. Len smashed it and we took her guns and money." Rin sets down three pistols, the black one she used to shoot Gumi, and two smaller silver pistols with a box of bullets.
"We should get her into the back bedroom." Lapis says, putting her hands to her forehead and sighing deeply, feeling her own sweat against her forehead. Rin nods and she and Oliver pull at Gumi, eventually carrying her into the back bedroom and draping her across the queen sized mattress that folds out of the wall. Yuuma follows like a ghost and stands hovering over the bed as if nothing else is there to him.
"Yuuma?" Rin gives him a questioning look and waves her hand in front of his face. No response. "Maybe you should lie down…" Rin trails off, putting a hand on his shoulder as the van hits a bump in the road. Yuuma suddenly snaps out of his trance and glances at Rin like he was only just realizing she was there.
"R-Right." He stutters crawling over to the opposite side as Gumi. Rin gives him one more bizarre look before closing the small narrow door.
Yuuma reaches a shaking hand out and rests it on top of Gumi's arm, gripping her gently and listening to her ragged breaths. He can feel a lump rising in his throat and his eyes growing heavy and tickling with the pinch of tears. He can't seem to breathe anymore. His head is pounding with Teto's words and his mind flickering, reliving the same moment over and over again as she sped in front of his body. He was ready for death. She was embraced death. She smiled.
As she jumped in front of him, he saw it. She smiled. As a bullet rammed into her stomach and blew a hole in her skin, she smiled. He cried. Is crying.
~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~X~ ~ ~
About five hours later, holed up somewhere just outside of a large city, Len nudges Rin from where he sits in the parked RV. Oliver and Lapis took Miku, IA, and IO to the bathrooms inside of the gas station, leaving the two twins sitting side by side on the bench under the window of the car. Rin glances at him.
"What?" She mutters, placing a strand of licorice between her teeth.
"…So, Oliver?" Len gives her a coy smile and she elbows him in the stomach.
"Shut up!" She grumbles at him. "What do you really want to talk about, because I highly doubt it has anything to do with my love life, Len." He sticks out his tongue at the thought and Rin smirks. "Spit it out…"
"I had a dream about Mom and Dad last night." Rin's face goes pale.
"Oh." Rin shifts on the bench, setting the bag of licorice beside her and looking up at Len, a small expression of unreadable paleness on her face as she looks up at him. Len stares at the floor in front of them, just under the table, where there's a small stain of Gumi's blood. That was bound to happen sooner or later, no matter the circumstances.
"It was you and me, both sitting on Dad's lap and Mom was sitting across the room watching us. Dad was crying and so were you. Then we were back in their room, at our old house, the one on Yule Street, and it was the day where…" Len's voice drops off. Rin scoots closer, putting her head on his arm. Len leans into her slightly.
"Remember that one time when you were six and you fell of your bike and broke your ankle, so I killed you with the spokes?" Rin laughs. Len flicks her in the temple.
Grumbling, he replies, "That actually hurt, like a lot more than the broken ankle."
"Yeah… I wasn't the efficient killing machine then as I am today. It also didn't help you wouldn't stop wailing." They both laugh. "We used to kill each other all the time." Rin laughs, ", just because we could."
"We were really stupid." Len sighs. "We don't talk about stuff like we used to. I kinda' miss that."
"Well, it's not just us anymore." Rin says, folding her legs under her and sitting cross legged, handing him over a licorice vine. She looks up at him, giving him her best creepy stare. She begins laughing. Len shakes his head. "So… Miku?" Rin raises one eye brow and Len's face flushes pink. Rin punches him in the side, laughing. "I'm just kidding… or am I?" She wiggles her eye brows and Len tugs her bow out of her hair.
Instantly a blanket of feathery, dirty golden hair drops over her eyes and she begins swatting at Len like he's a bee. She forces him onto his back, splayed out on the floor, her trying to crawl on top of him to grab her ribbon. "Len!" She shrieks, reaching madly. He puts his foot up and smacks her in the forehead with it, forcing her to stop moving. She flails angrily, cussing at him at the top of her lungs.
The door to the van opens and Oliver walks in holding armfuls of food and snacks. He turns pale as Rin and Len become visible on the floor. Rin's face turns a scalding shade of red. Len starts to crack up, laughing his head off to the point where he's rolling on the floor. Rin takes this opportunity to jump on top of him and rip the ribbon from his hands, cheering madly.
"A-a-alright then…" Oliver walks in and dumps the food down on the table. As Lapis comes in and shuts the door behind her.
IA crawls on top of one of the chairs around the table and picks out a bag of pretzels, which she hands down to IO. Oliver hands her a Styrofoam box with steaming Chinese food inside and tosses her two packs of plastic utensils. She scrambles off of the chair and over to the bench and IO sits shoulder to shoulder with her as she pops open the box. IA and IO both eat out of the same container, talking softly to each other at the same time.
Oliver and Rin sit next to each other with Lapis across and Miku and Len on the bench, all eating and talking about normal things for once.
Then the door to the back bedroom flies open with a bang. Gumi stands in the doorway and stalks forward, shutting it behind her. Rin nearly drops her food, seeing Gumi for the first time like this.
Gumi's shirt was absolutely ruined, and removed by Lapis. She has on a surprisingly, relatively new looking black bra. Just below, the skin of her stomach is visible. A large jagged scar wraps all the way from her left shoulder, across her chest, and down past her hips, disappearing under the waist line of her black jeans. The bandage wraps around her lower stomach, but does not hide the fact that you can still see a few of her ribs. She's a lot skinnier than anyone had imagined. Her arms look incredibly frail without her usual heavy leather jacket on and without a crowbar held under them. Her face looks hollow without her goggles. As she turns to close the door to the back bedroom behind her, Len can't help but wince and Oliver can't contain a small gasp. Lapis cringes and Miku looks away. Somehow her back looks even worse to the only other two that have seen it. The canvas of gaunt slashes and white circular burn marks leave not a single patch of skin clear on her back. The jagged scar that slashed across her chest and stomach comes over her shoulder and all the way back down to her hip on her back as well, a giant upside-down U slashed over her shoulder and on either sides of her body.
She steps away from the door and out into the main space of the RV, facing everyone nervously. Gumi shifts her position and reaches a hand out.
"C-can I have my shirt?" Her voice sounds nothing like her at all. It's unsure and shaky and childish. Her cheeks flush with pink.
"Sorry- uhm… it got completely ruined. You wouldn't be able to wear it…" Lapis says, feeling ashamed just looking at Gumi's scars again. She can't take her eyes away. No one can. Not even IA and IO.
"…a jacket or something?"
"We lost them all in the hotel explosion." Lapis says, feeling worse every passing suggestion.
"…great." Gumi mutters under her breath, standing in the awkward and heavy silence that has now blossomed in the room.
"How does it feel?" Lapis quickly changes the subject.
"What? Oh." Gumi looks down at her bandage, as if she had forgotten she was shot. "Uh… well it hurts." Gumi casts her gaze down to her shoulder where the one jagged U-shaped scar is. "…I've had worse."
Oliver shatters the complex silence. "What happened to you?"
"Uh… Yuuma's crazy psycho sister showed up and shot me." Gumi gives him a weird look, knowing that's not what he was asking about, but also praying he doesn't ask again.
"No, I know that. I mean… those."
No one speaks or moves for a long time.
Rin stares at Gumi, confused and slightly hurt she wouldn't tell them about this. They all at this point know about what they saw online. None of them, besides Miku and Lapis, however, knew about the extent of her assorted traumas.
Still no one says or does anything.
The door to the back bedroom suddenly flies open, causing everyone to jump. Yuuma stands in the door frame, maybe a foot behind Gumi, panting, sweat rolling off of him. His features instantly relax upon seeing Gumi, standing. His face instantly falls upon seeing the bandage wrapped around her body.
"…you shouldn't be up." He says flatly, stepping forward. Realizing she doesn't have a shirt, his eyes fall to her back. Every part of him screams to hold her.
"It's fine." Her voice is dark, her eyes sad as she grabs her arm, incredibly uncomfortable and embarrassed.
"No, it's not. You were just shot." He touches the part of her left arm he knows has no scars on it. She flinches, just barely, but doesn't swat him away.
"Wait-", Rin stands up. "Aren't you… surprised?" The blonde stares blankly at Yuuma. The pink haired boy's eyes return to Gumi's back.
"No. He knows." Gumi answers for him.
"And you didn't tell us?"
"I didn't tell anyone, Rin!" Gumi fumes, eyes suddenly spitting fire.
"Why wouldn't you tell us something like this?" Len asks.
"It's not really a common topic to bring up, Len. I'm not going to walk up to you and say, 'oh, hey, I know you're an immortal demon being hunted by a cult of crazy bird enthusiasts, but check out these scars I have all over my back'." No one speaks. "You want to stare? Stare." Gumi turns around, facing Yuuma now, but her back facing everyone else.
With her face now facing Yuuma, she dips her head down for a fraction of a second, and he can swear he saw tears in her amber eyes. Without really thinking Yuuma pulls of his grey T-shirt and pulls it over Gumi's head. She gasps slightly but doesn't stop him as he pulls the shirt over her. It hangs off of her shoulder and shows the bend of the long jagged scar and it goes far past her waist, almost to her knees, stopping towards the middle of her thighs. The sleeves cut off at her elbows. Her back is still facing everyone.
Yuuma reaches forward, grabbing Gumi around the back of her neck, careful not to touch her scars, and pulls her into his chest. She sinks into him and as if receiving some silent command that it's okay, Yuuma wraps his arms around her back and hugs her deep into him. Once close enough that no one else can hear, he whispers.
"I'm sorry."
"No." She says at a normal volume, her voice returning to normal. "You're alive."