These things kept bothering Kid. He couldn't even sleep. He contemplated all that was going on recently. It wasn't just that something 'wasn't right;' it was that something was 'wrong.' Ame was here, but she wasn't herself. Was she finally growing into her full power as an Inochigami? Even so, it felt like there was a strong sense of… pressure on her soul. She wasn't growing into her soul, she was expanding beyond its limits.
Kid wasn't sure if he was actually thinking logically anymore. He'd always had a sort of conscious awareness that he was much more susceptible to Madness than his friends. It worried him to think that everything might actually be okay and he was just imagining the whole thing. But no, it couldn't be that simple! But he also didn't want to face the reality that if Ame was beginning to corrupt her soul or something… maybe she wasn't as innocent as she had always led them to believe. What if… she'd always had a plan to destroy the world or something like that? What if she'd reset the world a million times just to get it perfect? Maybe they'd vanquished her in all the other worlds, and she rewrote their memories to remember none of it?
He knew she had that kind of power. She was absolute, which only corrupted.
The next morning, Kid could only think of that word Ame had said. Resolve. He couldn't trust Ame anymore. And as long as everyone else blindly followed her, he couldn't trust anyone else.
"Hey."
Kid looked up from his plate at the table. He thought he was alone, but Nagi was standing on the other side of the table with a solemn look on his face.
"Kid, I know you're starting to doubt things," he said, his eyes searching Kid's. "You can trust me; Ame is my sister. I know that something isn't right with her, and I know how dangerous she can become. As long as you're in this precarious position, even your weapon partners won't fight her if she pursues you. I want you to take this."
He handed Kid a metal baseball bat. Kid swallowed and nodded seriously.
"Don't kill her," Nagi warned. "Unless you have to. We're trying to keep everyone else safe, so we need to be careful. I'll keep an eye on Ame; you just keep yourself safe. You're the only one who can stop her, no matter what she becomes."
"Right," Kid nodded. He got to his feet. "Thank you, Nagi. It's nice to have someone on my side."
The Truth; Who Is Ame, Really?
Kid was walking to school alone that day. He was on edge. He knew Ame was clever enough to shake her own brother. He gripped the bat a little tighter and quickened his pace. What if Ame… what if she'd sent out Rem, and the Spider Queen, and the Demon Lord as ploys? What if they were all part of a plan to get the academy to trust her? Now she was under Lord Death's protection from his own son.
"KID!" a familiar voice yelled. Kid raised the bat offensively and spun around to face Ame. She had run down the street in order to catch up to him. She was about to tackle him when he held the bat almost at arms-length out.
"Stay back!" he warned. Ame stumbled to a stop and stared at him incredulously for a moment.
"Kid?" she asked. "Are you okay? I know I've been gone so long…."
"How long have you been following me?" Kid demanded, his voice steely.
"I just found you," she replied.
Miitsuketa…
"That's a lie!" he shouted. Ame took a step back. She looked hurt, and Kid felt a sliver of hope that he actually knew who he was talking to. "You've been acting weird lately. I know you're up to something, and I won't blindly worship you like everyone else. I need to know if you're really up to no good!"
"Kid," Ame breathed. "Why would you…?"
"Just tell me!" Kid yelled. Ame was silent for a moment before replying seriously.
"I'm not up to anything bad," she replied. "How could I be? I've been gone for days, haven't I?"
"No, you were home just this morning," Kid said. He saw Ame's face change to a look of horror. He lowered the bat and cocked his head to the side. "Where… were you, exactly?"
"I was spirited away," Ame replied, ducking her head down. "I felt something in the Grim World and went to investigate. My body was somewhere no one would be able to find or move it. However, when I got there, whatever the something was was already gone."
"But… I saw…." Kid looked away for a moment, back towards the academy. He looked down as his cellphone began to ring in his pocket. He put his phone to his ear and answered it. "What is it, Nagi?"
"Kid, it's Ame! She's gone crazy! We're at the school; you have to come quick!"
Kid glanced back at Ame for a moment, who shifted forward upon overhearing Nagi's voice. They both began running to the academy. The sight that greeted them was atrocious. The once beautiful DWMA was in shambles. Windows were smashed, foundations were crumbled. Pillars had toppled to the ground. Whoever did this had also attacked the students, who had evacuated the building and were standing in groups, ready to fight.
The culprit was at the top of the steps, looking up at the sky at a floating figure.
"You're an imposter!" Waka yelled. "Ma Cherie kisses way better than you do!"
Kid looked at who he was yelling at. It was… Ame?! The white-haired girl with the wolf ears and tail, clad in a short pleated rad skirt and white blouse, was staring blankly at Waka. She was holding a brilliant sword of flames that greatly resembled Ame's Seven Strike. But… Ame had been with Kid. She was standing right next to him! How?
The other Ame turned to them.
"So, Kid, did you find the answer?" she asked sweetly. "You're wrong. Because I'm not really the Amaterasu you know. I am the Demon Lord."
Kid felt as if someone had stabbed him in the gut. Such sudden terror is too great to put into words. They had worked so hard… and now she was back again.
"I'm here now," the demon continued. "But I'm afraid the goddess of the sun can't fight me when there is no sun."
Ame looked up at the sun as a dark shadow began to cover it.
"I came on the day of the solar eclipse, where my power is at its peak, and Ame's is at its all-time low."
She lunged at Ame, taking a bite out of her side so suddenly that Ame couldn't even react. Ame collapsed to one knee, holding her bleeding side and gritting her teeth. Kid put a hand on Ame's shoulder.
"Ame, what are you…?"
"Get the others," Ame growled. "Just do it!"
The demon lord grinned, holding out her hand to reveal an iron ball…. Had she recovered that from Ame's body? She put the iron in her mouth and swallowed it whole.
"Nothing to increase my strength like a manifestation of sin," she growled happily as her eyes began glowing red. "What is this taste? I taste… deceit and… fornication. It's delightful!"
Ame shifted to her wolf form and lunged at the demon lord. The two wolves clashed and began tearing at each other. Ame was thrown across the courtyard. Several tendrils of light began glowing around her body, scattering in all directions and leaving her as nothing more than a small white wolf. She had no markings or divine instruments. Most importantly, she had no ink. Meanwhile, the Demon Lord became a large black wolf with a red Solar Flare on her back. In her human form, she was a shrine maiden with black hair and red eyes.
The two began fighting again. Ame backed away as her friends, meisters and transformed weapons of the DWMA, began their attacks on the demon lord.
"Pitiful," the demon snarled. She flung her tail in a line across the yard, and pillars began collapsing. "I'm just getting started. Inuyasha told me you'd be better than this."
"Where is your pathetic errand dog now?" Maka demanded.
"Unfortunately, as long as Ame is in this state, any being from the Celestial Plain cannot be contacted, my Inubaka* included."
Waka intervened, unsheathing Pillowtalk and attacking the demon lord.
"You won't have my Amaterasu," he growled as soon as he got close enough. "Not over my dead body!"
The demon threw him aside and licked blood off her fingers.
"That won't be a problem," she said. "With enough power to manifest my own body instead of borrowing one, I can do anything! Inuyasha taught me all Amaterasu's brush powers. Watch this."
Waka felt several sharp pains on his body, almost like bullets.
"Ink bullets," he said, regaining his footing.
"Gift bestowed upon the weilder of Snarling Beast," Demon Lord nodded, motioning to a golden wheel that suddenly appeared on her back.
"You manifested your own weapons?" Kid asked. "How?!"
"Stop asking dumb questions," the Demon Lord snarled, power slashing Ame and tying her with vines to one of the pillars. "You should know of all of us, what goes on in my head. After all, you're the one who created me. You know me."
"What are you talking about?" Kid wondered quietly.
"Men are created from wolves, and sin is created from men," she said, her glowing red eyes piercing the darkness of the eclipse. "I am not created from Ame, but created from you, silly boy."
"Shut up! That's a lie!" Kid shouted, shooting at her. She only laughed and teleported right in front of him, her face inches from his. Kid tensed, but before he could move, a black shadow came between them, forcing the other away.
"That's enough!" Lord Death yelled, wielding Death Scythe and swinging it menacingly at the demon. He stood protectively between her and Kid. "I'm not going to let you hurt my son again. This is my city, and I should be the one to tell you that you aren't welcome here!"
"I've never seen Lord Death so angry, not even at Asura," Liz thought to herself. As the battle between the gods continued, the students took cover anywhere they could. Ame didn't join them; it was as if it never occurred to her that she was safer with her friends. She just kept watching the battle, standing out in the open. She couldn't fight; she was no more than a regular wolf!
"What is that crazy wolf doing now?" Blackstar asked.
"Damn it, we should be out there doing something!" Kilik growled in frustration. "Even if this is a battle against ultimate evil, we can't just sit here and do nothing."
"Even with how strong we've gotten," Maka said. "A battle between the gods is no place for us. We're so… useless."
"Will both of you shut up?" Soul asked. "Stop doubting yourselves and do what you can! Sure, we can't fight now, we just have to wait it out until we can fight."
"You're weak," the demon lord said to Death as she struck him down once more. "You lack the power that your son now has, and he lacks the power that you still have. It's a give and take between time and space that creates an unstable infinity."
"How did you know that the eclipse would weaken Ame?" Lord Death growled.
"After I found out that her odd eye could see past what others see, I knew she was of the moon tribe," she explained. "She is both of the moon and of the sun, and when there is an eclipse, all her divine powers cancel out and she is left as no more than a normal Honshu wolf."
"That can happen?" Spirit asked. "And what about you? You created yourself in the spitting image of Ame! Why aren't you stripped of your power and left to the mercy of death?"
She lowered her head, her face contorting in a smooth grin. "I am not exactly like Ame. I can summon the sun, but I am not of the sun. I can see through the moon, but that does not make me of the moon. It's taken me centuries to recreate Ame's genes into my body. I am of nothing but evil, and now I have the power of O-kami Amaterasu."
"Okami?" Spirit questioned. "Don't belittle her because she's weak*!"
"Ignorant fool," the demon purred. "Death, would you really go against your father just to make a fair world? A peaceful world? All this time, you've been hurting yourself."
Lord Death's grip on the scythe tightened in frustration. He wished she'd leave his father before him out of this.
"Hurting yourself," the demon lord mused. "And someone else."
She turned to Ame and threw one last blow; a collection of seven swords coated with madness. Lord Death jumped into action, leaping in front of Ame and holding his arms out protectively. He wasn't afraid to die; even if he died, Ame was the only one that could restore a more peaceful world. Ame was thrown against the wall from the force of the impact. Blood streaked down the wall as she stumbled to her feet and fled. As a wolf, she still feared humans as she had before, if not more so.
Liz tore her eyes away from the scene as Kid stirred. His eyes widened, an expression of knowing horror on his face.
"Father," he choked out. He bolted upright and ran across the courtyard to where his father lay, motionless. This looked familiar. Lord Death had blocked a fatal shot from Asura before. He'd done it to save a group of people, but Kid couldn't help but remember in that moment that he had been saved too.
"You disgust me," Waka said to the Demon Lord. The girl turned, her face turning to a frown. "Killing children? Destroying families? Where does it end?"
"It ends at the point between morality and immorality," she replied matter-of-factly. "I am Evil. I am the only evil that shall surpass good. Remember that."
She turned and flashed out of sight. Waka returned his attention to the ground. Kid was kneeling next to Lord Death, a trembling hand clenching a fold in his cloak. Waka could see tears falling down his face in streams.
"Please," he whispered quietly. "Please don't leave me. Please, Dad…."
He felt so alone. Where was Ame? She should be here, mourning with him. Lord Death was like a father to her too. No, he was more than that; he was the coolest dad ever to her. Kid only wished he could have realized it before, or even when this happened when Asura attacked. Stupid, selfish….
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
That would be another chapter completed. :) I've actually had this and many other chapters written for months but wanted to wait until I got some feedback like reviews. Yeah, didn't work out that well XD
*The demon lord refers to Inuyasha (literally 'Dog Demon') as 'Inubaka' (Dog that is Stupid), probably referring a very belittling pet-master relationship between the two.
*Here, Spirit thinks that the demon lord is referring to Ame as 'Okami,' which implies a regular wolf instead of a godly wolf. However, the Demon Lord was actually saying it "O-Kami" which means 'Greatest God.' More will be explained about Ame's new title in later chapters.