I Am Become Death

by Masterdramon

For seven chosen individuals, death was but a new beginning; a chance offered by the Gods of old to join a mission greater than themselves, and to bring a final end to an inescapably chaotic world. Seven-part miniseries.

5. Part V: Carly Nagisa

I Am Become Death – Carly Nagisa

Disclaimer: In case you haven't figured it out yet, I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's. All Yu-Gi-Oh!-related characters, settings, etc. are the intellectual property of Kazuki Takahashi.

[-]

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses
your understanding.

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its
heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the
daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem
less wondrous than your joy.

– Kahlil Gibran, On Pain

[-]

Carly Nagisa hated her mother.

To clarify, there was no longstanding animosity between them; no abuse or neglect or other chronic issue, which would cause an irreparable rift. But right now, at this very moment, Carly hated her mother.

Being a teenage girl raised predominately at home, their dairy farm being the only thing Carly saw regularly apart from school for nearly sixteen years, this was to a degree only natural. Hell, it was expected.

Suzuki Nagisa, for her part, was largely numb to this; Carly had more or less come out of the womb obstinate, pushy, and constantly asking questions of everyone in sight. That didn't stop her from holding her head in exasperation as the bespectacled teenager started back into her.

"C'mon, mom! It's just for one day!" she shouted, her hands balled up into fists that – despite her current anger – both of them knew she would never dare use.

"For the last damn time, no!" Suzuki shot back. "No daughter of mine is running off to a place like…like that!"

"Like the city?" asked Carly in disbelief. "But you and daddy used to take me there all the time! What's wrong with me having fun there with my friends just this once, huh?"

"We took you there when you were a child, to play games or take pictures or whatever," said her mother with a shake of her head. "But don't try to pull one over on me. I know what kinds of places teenagers go to 'have fun' in the city."

"It's not like we're gonna be running to…like…some fucking strip club, or anything!" exclaimed Carly, her glasses nearly slipping off her face as she leaned forward. "Just dinner and a little dancing! You know my friends, we wouldn't…"

Her mother raised a hand to cut her off. "I don't want to hear any more about this," she declared sternly. "You're not going, and that's final!"

Carly wanted to respond to this, but white-hot anger pushed out any intelligent retort she could come up with. So instead she simply let out a loud wail of frustration and stormed off, slamming the front door behind her as she ran off into the fields.

Just seconds later, the kitchen door opened as well – Keisuke Nagisa having chosen that exact moment to enter with a large milk jug held in his arms. The timing was so perfect, in fact, that Suzuki couldn't help but wonder whether he'd just been waiting outside for his wife and daughter to stop arguing.

"You know, I really don't think it would be that bad to let her go. Just this once," said the broad-shouldered farmer, more or less confirming his wife's suspicions. "I'd be comfortable with it so long as we set a curfew."

Suzuki sighed deeply. "That's because you are absolutely incapable of saying 'no' to your precious little princess," she replied. "So it falls to me to be the bad guy. Every…single…time."

"Queen," he corrected with a smirk as he put down the jug. "My baby girl's a queen, not a princess. Otherwise, that'd imply that we are royalty too. And we are, of course, but simple farming folk."

"Except that 'queen' is also a hereditary title," she couldn't help but point out, if against her better judgment. "It's pretty damn difficult to become a queen without some royal blood."

"Not if she starts up her own kingdom someday," Keisuke responded playfully. "Then she can title herself whatever she wants!"

"I…am not having this conversation with you," said Suzuki with a groan. "Besides, I have a hard enough time trying to convince her to get more involved with the farm without you constantly swelling her head like that. You'd think, considering it's your family that's been working this land for four generations, that you'd give a bit more of a damn…"

"Well, frankly, my dear…no, I don't," admitted her husband, his expression growing a lot more serious. "Carly hates working the farm. There's no way she could ever be happy doing it her whole life."

His voice lowered even further as he added, "Besides…neither of us has any clue how many years I've got left in me. I'd rather spend that time encouraging my baby girl to follow her dreams, than to think she'll be nothing but miserable once I'm gone."

Suzuki sighed again – though this time, in defeat rather than exasperation. "Fine, fine…you've made your point," she murmured. "But, Keisuke…as long as we're on the subject…"

"Nothing new from the doctor, honey," he interjected, fairly certain where she was going. "Just like the last twelve times you asked."

"And when did you last see him?" Suzuki demanded pointedly.

"Err…a couple months ago, I guess?" Keisuke answered, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "No, wait…closer to three, now. I remember it was right before your birthday…"

"Keisuke, you have leukemia!" his wife shouted, her eyes going wide at the casual way he was talking about it. "You need to pay closer attention to keeping your appointments regular!"

Her husband just chuckled. "Suzuki, I love you…but you worry too much," he said. "It's not like I'm gonna just drop dead tomorrow."

Under her stern gaze, however, he eventually added, "Okay, okay…if it'll make you feel better, I'll make an appointment with the specialist for next weekend."

She sighed again and nodded. "Thank you, dear," Suzuki told him, before walking back over to the front door and gazing through the nearest window. "And while you're at it…could you do me one other favor?"

She didn't need to specify; it was fairly clear what it was that she felt herself incapable of doing. Not without starting that blowup all over again.

"No problem, honey. I'll have our little queen back here in time for dinner," said Keisuke, pulling his coat back on and heading out the door.

[-]

At present, said "little queen" was sitting by the riverbank, trying to skim stones along the water. "Trying" being the operative term. She'd never been awfully good at it to begin with, and in her current emotional state her aim suffered even further.

Still, it passed the time.

If Carly was to be completely honest with herself (and she would never, ever do so in front of her mother), she'd have to admit that Suzuki Nagisa had at least a shade of a point. Yeah, there probably would be a bit of not-quite-PG dancing when they went clubbing, knowing her classmates…and yeah, she'd heard rumors about some of them buying fake IDs so they could get drinks…

But Carly herself wasn't very likely to participate. She was sixteen, for God's sake! And even if she'd been a little older…she was still Carly Nagisa. The gangly, geeky, unattractive nobody who was just lucky she knew the right people to even get invited on this trip.

Truthfully, she hadn't at all been expecting it. A friend of a friend of her lab partner in biology class was celebrating her sixteenth birthday – and since said birthday girl was pretty much the hottest, richest, and most popular person in school, it'd been the talk of the entire town for weeks.

Ayasato was that kind of town; small enough that everyone knew everyone else, or close to it, and incurably gossipy.

The latter suited Carly just fine, given her proclivities. Ever since she'd received her first camera at the age of eight, she'd gained the reputation of never being found without it (certainly the most benign of the various reputations attached to her). The school paper had seemed the obvious next step, as soon as she was old enough.

But while she did still fill a column in Ayasato High School's weekly paper, out of a sense of obligation if nothing else, she was proud to say that she now played on a larger stage.

It was no great secret that by the year 2024, the vast majority of "traditional" newspapers were either dead or on their last legs. The Ayasato Gazette, unfortunately, was no exception. With a relatively small circulation, limited only to its own rural community and to a couple newsstands in the city, it'd remained just beyond the edge of extinction for years based on two factors.

The first was that the paper was very cheap to produce – relying almost exclusively on stringers and freelancers, all of whom generally accepted lower salaries out of some sense of communal pride. Again…Ayasato was that kind of town.

The other was its longtime editor, Kousuke Kunisaki, who was…well, "dedicated" was probably a good term.

She remembered the day she'd first met him quite vividly. It'd been two years ago. D-Wheels had been a fresh thing back then, and famed stunt driver Hiroto Honda was demonstrating the new line with a cross-country exhibition.

And as luck would have it, one leg of the demonstration had taken Honda and his team straight through Ayasato.

Naturally, as soon as she learned of this, Carly had begged and pleaded with her parents to let her go out and watch the procession. She loved Duel Monsters (well, more watching than playing it; she knew the rules and even had her own deck, but she was no good at it) and she loved shiny new pieces of tech even more, so there was no question that she and her camera were eager to observe.

Finally, they'd relented – and by that, Carly meant that her father had caved in, and her mother had decided arguing further wasn't worth the energy.

Unfortunately, she'd hardly been the only person in town frantic to get a glimpse of celebrity. The sides of the streets were packed with fans of the famed "Steel Samurai"…not to mention all those who'd come out simply to see what all the hubbub was about.

As such, Carly had decided to make what, for a fourteen-year-old, had seemed like a bold and daring move: climbing on top of the nearest roof and taking her pictures from there. By the time the ever-klutzy girl realized the fatal flaw in this plan, however, she was already hanging for dear life from a loose drain pipe.

Thankfully, Kunisaki-sama had been hanging back around the same area in order to take his own shots, and had managed to catch her before she hit the ground. "Carefully there, little missy," he'd said, grinning. "I'd really rather cover 'Stunt Driver Extraordinaire Dazzles Crowd' tomorrow over 'Local Girl Breaks Every Bone in Her Body.'"

Once Carly had taken a moment to catch her breath and process this, her attention had turned to the camera around his neck – one vastly more high-tech and professional than hers. "Are you a reporter?" she'd asked him.

"Guilty as charged," Kousuke had replied with a chuckle. "Used to be a freelance investigative journalist. Did a lot of duel reporting too. But at a certain point, you just get too old for the field, y'know? So I came back home and started my own little paper. You ever heard of the Ayasato Gazette?"

Carly nodded. "I read it every day! Don't really know anybody else who does, though…not even my folks…" she'd told him, fidgeting nervously. "Honestly, my friends just think I'm kinda weird for it…"

She looked rather embarrassed, but Kousuke just chuckled in response. "Hey, I'm just glad there's somebody in your generation interested in reading a newspaper, period," he'd said. "Is it merely academic, or do you have a bit of the journalist's bug yourself?"

"Err…yes! Well, I mean, no! But…uh…kind of…" Carly had sputtered in response, shaking her head before appending, a bit more clearly, "I mean…I write for my school paper. But I don't know if that really means anything…"

"It's certainly a good first step," Kousuke had stated thoughtfully. "Though if you want my advice…"

Carly hadn't gotten to hear his advice, though…or at least, not on that particular day. Because at that moment, the entire procession had gone up in flames.

The next few days had been very strange ones. It was rather sobering to think that the death of a celebrity was the most interesting thing ever to happen to her hometown, even if it was probably true. Still, the descent of an international news crew onto Ayasato, for the first time in its history, had put Kousuke Kunisaki's tiny, no-name paper into an interesting position.

The media needed eyewitnesses, and the Ayasato Gazette's throng of stringers and freelancers were ideally placed to provide the necessary coverage.

Unfortunately, it seemed as if every single person Kunisaki-sama had ever employed was present for the exhibition – which meant nearly all of them were recuperating from severe injuries. And the rest hadn't been so lucky.

What all this added up to was genuine demand for a local story that could be circulated globally, and space on the staff for someone new to write it. That was how Carly had gotten the offer.

Kunisaki-sama needed someone fresh to investigate the "catastrophic equipment failure" that'd claimed Hiroto Honda, his entire eleven-man crew, and thirty-five members of the audience; being editor-in-chief, he risked running into some ethical issues if he did the whole thing himself. Carly fit those specifications perfectly, age be damned.

Not that her byline ever exactly mentioned she was a high school freshman, but still.

That week's Ayasato Gazette ended up outpacing the paper's average sales by a factor of over a hundred. Overnight the town became a household name across the world, and the newspaper which had broke the story shot from nearly bankrupt to comfortably successful.

Not everyone had been particularly happy with the article, however. After carefully examining the state of the incident herself, taking down the testimony of thirty eyewitnesses, and holding interviews with every official and investigator willing to talk, Carly had put everything together and determined that the story of said "catastrophic equipment failure" didn't stand up to logical scrutiny.

And that was exactly what she'd written.

Naturally, KaibaCorp hadn't much cared for their official story being accused as a cover-up. But while they'd made their position perfectly clear in several successive calls to Kunisaki-sama (and he'd made his position perfectly clear, and rather vehemently so, in his replies), they'd never gone so far as to file a libel suit.

Still, when he'd turned up dead in his home a little over four months later, apparently overdosed on methamphetamines…

Well, Carly didn't have any proof. But she definitely had her suspicions.

[-]

That had been two years ago. She had a new editor now, who was nice enough but entirely inoffensive. Carly's time with Kousuke Kunisaki as a mentor had been brief, but it'd lasted long enough for his attitude as a firebrand to rub off on her, and so above all she resolved to never stop pursuing the truth.

Ayasato was a small town, without very many secrets…but one by one, she tracked each of them down all the same. Her new editor would often caution her against using overly inflammatory language, but rarely actually censored her; even he had to admit that issues containing her articles sold far better than ones without.

These days she had both a regular news column and a regular opinion column, as well as a responsibility to cover local events as they came. It didn't pay all that well – a competitive salary, for her or any other reporter, simply wasn't in the budget – but honestly Carly would've probably done it for free.

Writing was the only thing in her life that wasn't school or the farm, and that alone was worth a printing press' weight in gold.

"Deep in thought, little lady?" asked a gruff but kind voice, breaking Carly out of her lengthy reverie.

"Oh…hey, daddy," she replied softly, watching as he sat down next to her by the riverside.

"Heard you had a bit of a dust-up with your mom," said Keisuke Nagisa, one calloused hand on his daughter's shoulder. "I always hate to see my two favorite girls fighting. Anything I can do to help settle things?

"Not unless you can get mom to try seeing things from my perspective," Carly murmured. "Just for one damn second…"

"Why do you want to go to this party so badly, sweetheart?" he asked her, smiling warmly. "I'll listen to whatever you have to say."

Carly hesitated for a moment, but eventually gave in; as much as Suzuki got on her husband's case for being unable to refuse his daughter anything, the truth was that it went both ways. Especially when her daddy's eyes shone like that.

"I…well…look, it's not that I hate it around here, okay?" she sputtered out. "It's just…sometimes, I need something different. Everything around here's always the same. Same schedule, same events, same faces. And school isn't much better."

"But you write those big fancy articles now, right?" responded Keisuke. "Surely that must be exciting."

"Not really," said Carly, shaking her head vigorously. "The only article that ever got me real traction was my first one…and that was piggybacking on a tragedy, so it's not like I could really celebrate it. And since then, it's just been covering vegetable contests and bake sales. I mean, I like doing it, don't get me wrong, but…well, it doesn't solve the real problem, does it?"

She turned to face the coming sunset, the twilight refracting off her glasses brilliantly.

"Besides…" she added, "…what I really want, more than anything else in the world, is to be a reporter. Not just a writer."

"And what's the difference, baby girl?" her father asked, turning to face the same way.

"Reporters actually get to go out into the action. They get to pound the pavement, get the interviews, and make a story," Carly explained. "Writing out the article? It's fun, but it's the easy part. It's not what makes me wanna do it. It's not what makes me need to do it."

There was a lengthy silence following this, before Keisuke told her in a quiet voice, "You know that going out with these girls won't solve your problem, either."

"I…I know that," admitted Carly in a whisper, averting her gaze from her father. "I know it's a just a temporary fix, at best. But…well, I guess you could think of it…as a preview? As a test run?"

Keisuke raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean by that, sweetheart?" he asked coolly.

There was another long pause, with Carly visibly tensing up, as if unsure whether she should voice what was on her mind…before finally murmuring, "I wanna move to the city after I graduate."

The other eyebrow rose to match its fellow. "I'd wager you haven't mentioned this to your mother yet," said Keisuke.

Carly gave a snorting, sarcastic laugh. "Oh, right. Given how much she flipped out over me spending one night in Neo Domino, I bet she'd just love the idea of me moving there permanently," she shot back, probably sounding meaner than was intended.

"You know that she just wants you to be safe, right?" her father replied after a moment's pause. "You can't blame her for that."

"She doesn't just want me to be safe. She wants me to be her," Carly replied bitterly. "Shut the hell up, work the farm, meet someone, settle down. Never go anywhere interesting or do anything important."

And then, without thinking, it slipped out. "I hate her…" she added in a murmur.

At this, Keisuke's expression finally shifted, becoming sterner and more lined. "You can't possibly mean that," he said.

Carly's first instinct was to agree to this and apologize; she'd spoken thoughtlessly, without consideration and without any genuinely deliberated malice. But his response had made her start to think on the subject…and the more she did, the less willing to apologize she became.

This wasn't the first time her mother had pulled shit like this, after all. Oh sure, the early years had been nice – freshly baked cookies and trips to the park and a great bounty of hugs. But ever since Carly had grown old enough to act, as Suzuki often put it, "willful"…

Take the first time she'd tried to arrange a date, for example. As a rule, Carly didn't get asked on a whole lot of them.

It just so happened that one of her girlfriends (or perhaps more accurately, a passably friendly acquaintance who was also a girl) had wrangled a dinner with the notoriously cute and notoriously uninterested Jinbei Tanigawa…though he'd only accepted on the condition that dates be found for his two best friends as well.

So Carly had gotten pulled in to fill one of those slots, out of proximity more than anything else. She knew nothing about her prospective beau, "Yoshizo Hayashi," except that given the choice between the three boys, he'd been the one not taken by the main girl and her bestie.

Which, in the grand scheme of things, might've meant they shared some things in common after all.

Of course, Carly had never actually gotten to meet him. After eavesdropping and getting entirely the wrong idea about the proposed "group date," Suzuki Nagisa had started wailing her head off about Carly being lured into the lifestyle of a deviant and a pervert, and called the whole thing off.

Still…that paled in comparison to what'd happened just a couple months ago.

A journalism conference was being held in Tokyo, and Carly had been delighted to learn that the Ayasato Gazette had received an invitation. And she'd been even more delighted when her new editor, the enigmatic Shiro Hakushoku, had informed her that he'd be occupied with undisclosed business the week of the conference. So he needed someone to cover for him…and Carly had been his first choice.

To say she was excited would've been an understatement of indescribable proportions. This was the sort of opportunity that made careers.

An entire week spent rubbing shoulders and attending lectures with the biggest names in journalism from across Japan? Literally dozens of chances to run into the editor or news magnate who could provide her with a ticket out of her insignificant little town, and into the great wide world of international news?

But as Carly was still underage, sending her on such a business trip required parental approval. Normally she got around such things by making sure to ask her father first, but he'd been off visiting his sister in Kyoto at the time, leaving Suzuki Nagisa solely responsible for making the decision.

And of course she'd said no. Carly "wasn't ready" to travel that far, or to spend that much time away from home.

So the high schooler had been forced to turn down the best damn thing ever to be offered to her. Her blood was boiling just thinking about it.

The date, the conference, and now this…just the latest in sixteen years' worth of Carly's mother interfering with her life, trying to mold the spirited young girl into something as boring and worthless as herself.

Carly did hate her.

"No…I do mean it!" she shouted aloud, taking her father aback. "I hate everything about that bitch! And I'm sick and fucking tired of pretending I don't!"

Her father was quiet for a long time following this outburst, ultimately sighing deeply and running his fingers through his graying hair. "Carly…you need some time to cool down," he said. "I don't think it's a good idea for you to go out like this, whether to that party or anywhere else."

Carly looked like she'd just been slapped in the face. "Wait…you don't mean…?" she stammered anxiously.

"I told your mother I didn't have a problem with you going to the city tonight, and I stand by that," he told her, hands on both of her shoulders now. "Even if it's a mistake…I think that you're old enough to make your own mistakes, and deal with the consequences."

"So what, then?" demanded Carly, looking very hurt. "You changed your mind? Just because I said…"

Keisuke held up a hand to interject.

"It's not about that. Well…not just about that," he responded. "Look, sweetheart…parents make mistakes too. She might not say it to you outright, but your mother knows she sometimes comes off too strong with you. She's a little overprotective, true. And she can be judgmental, and jump to conclusions about what you're up to a little too quickly. I admit that."

The weathered farmer sighed again, his eyes on the last golden rays of the sun as it dipped below the horizon.

"But all that only comes out of how much she loves you, Carly," he added in a low voice. "Whether or not she's in the wrong here is irrelevant; I need you to at least try to see it from her perspective. Because I won't be around to be a buffer between you two forever."

Carly bit her lip. Her father's condition was something she knew of intellectually, but which she did her best to force into the back of her mind whenever possible.

It was easy to forget, seeing him now – big and strong and healthy, the physical and emotional pillar she'd never known to fall down for even a moment – that he was even sick at all. He certainly wasn't going to drop dead tomorrow.

Still, the reminder was enough to distract her from coming up with a retort.

"Come on, baby girl. We should get back inside before dinner," Keisuke said after a few beats of silence, lifting his daughter to her feet and beckoning for her to follow.

Deep in thought, her eyes turned to the ground, she did so.

[-]

Carly had gotten through dinner, and then the rest of the evening, without saying very much of anything.

While neither of her parents had precisely used the word, for all intents and purposes Carly was grounded. Honestly she probably could've gotten away with hanging out in town if she'd asked her father…but what would be the point? Everybody who was anybody had already left for the city, or was just about to.

It wasn't fair, not one bit. But the sting of her father's "betrayal" had sapped her of the energy to argue. She could tell her mother still wanted to (or at least, felt a need to continue railing), but with Carly holding her tongue, Suzuki Nagisa seemed reluctant to start back up.

Eventually, she excused herself and retired to her room, flopping down on the bed hours before she typically did.

She wasn't the least bit tired, so with little else to do, Carly picked up her tablet and began shuffling through pictures. Unsurprisingly, she had quite a number of them. Most she had taken herself, but the earliest – the ones preceding her first camera – were her father's handiwork.

He was no more than an amateur himself, but he'd taught her everything he knew about camera technique and composition. With his whole life spent managing the same patch of land, Keisuke Nagisa was extremely diligent about keeping photographic records of everything he could, from the livestock to all maintenance work he did on the house.

It might be something of a cliché, he'd say, but when dealing with lawyers and insurance agents, a picture often really was worth a thousand words.

Carly paused over a photo of herself at age seven, blushing furiously beside her grade-school teacher as she timidly held up a red ribbon. Second-place in a poetry contest, she recalled. Her father had been so proud…proud enough to reward her with said first camera on her eighth birthday.

Seeing herself looking so pathetic stirred something in Carly, and she put down the tablet to bury her face in her pillow.

The part of her that was still thinking reasonably knew that the best thing she could do was sleep on things and, whether she meant it or not, apologize in the morning. Her mother might not accept it, but her father would, and hopefully that would be enough.

But that particular part was also being told to go fuck itself by every single other fiber of her body.

She flipped over again, letting out something between a shriek and a low growl into her pillow.

Just then, there was a knock on the door.

"Carly? Are you alright?" asked her father through the hard wood. "I thought I heard something."

"It's…nothing, daddy," said Carly, trying to keep the anger out of her voice – and not altogether succeeding.

"Look, I…know this wasn't what you wanted to happen tonight, sweetheart," he went on, his voice very quiet. "But we'll talk in the morning, okay?"

"Okay…" murmured Carly, for the first time in her life just wishing for her father to go away. "Whatever."

She was silent after that, so she could plainly overhear the sounds of his feet moving across the planked floor and closing the door to her parents' bedroom. He always went to bed at least half-an-hour after his wife, and fell asleep quickly.

So in a few minutes…Carly would be the only person awake in the house…

Her eyes went wide.

No…no, she couldn't. She couldn't…right?

She was a good girl, after all. She didn't steal, or cheat, or hurt people. She wasn't a liar or a deviant. Today excluded, she didn't even talk back very often.

And yet…and yet…

Her mind was already whirring into overdrive, turning over the numerous possibilities and potential pitfalls at lightning speed.

Her father always got up promptly at six in the morning, and the driving distance between Ayasato and Neo Domino was a little under an hour. That meant that she could spend up to six hours in the city and be back in bed in time, without anyone being the wiser.

She knew where the keys were, and she knew how to drive; she'd never done it unsupervised, admittedly, and she didn't exactly have a license per se, but she could drive.

And tomorrow was Saturday, so she wouldn't have to be up for school. So long as she toughed it out through her morning chores, without looking too visibly exhausted, her parents wouldn't have to know about her skimping on sleep.

The car's mileage and fuel indicators were a potential problem, admittedly. Her father was usually meticulous about keeping track of those sorts of things…but her mother wasn't, and she'd been the last one to drive it. With any luck, a few dozen extra kilometers wouldn't be noticed.

It took the emotional side of Carly's brain several moments to catch up with the analytical side, and realize that she'd seriously just broken down the logistics of stealing the car.

Well…borrowing, strictly speaking, depending on one's personal definition of the term. But nevertheless…

Carly's blood was pumping, and adrenaline was shooting all throughout her body. There was no way she was going to be able to sleep tonight, even if she didn't sneak out. But was that a further reason to go…or a reason not to?

Carly mentally forced herself to picture what the worst-case consequences could be of such a decision.

She could get into an accident, for one thing. She'd never driven anywhere but on Ayasato's quiet country roads. What if she inadvertently ended up violating some weird city traffic rule she'd never heard of? If she got pulled over, there was no way she'd be able to explain herself without getting arrested.

Okay…she'd just have to be extra careful. And lucky. Very lucky.

A bead of sweat ran down Carly's forehead. "Lucky" was really the last word anyone she knew would've used to describe her. And if she was particularly unfortunate tonight, there were dozens of other things that could go wrong.

Both her parents usually slept quite soundly, but what if one of them had to get up in the middle of the night to grab some water or use the bathroom? What if the sound of the car engine happened to rouse them?

And even if she did make it to the party without them noticing, assembled there would be all of Ayasato's most well-practiced gossips. Who knew how many of them could – or would – blab about her presence there, or toss it all up online?

These were all reasonable points; strong reasons that going would risk far more trouble than it was worth.

And yet…and yet…

Carly pictured her mother lecturing her just a few hours ago, and her blood boiled. How many times was this going to happen? How many times was Carly just going to let it happen?

She was sixteen, for God's sake! Was she just going to lie down and allow herself to get treated like a fucking infant forever?!

"No, goddammit!" Carly finally whispered out loud, tearing away the covers and leaping to the floor.

Even if it didn't make all that much rational sense, she had to do this. To prove a point, to herself if no one else.

This was the day Carly Nagisa would finally be free.

[-]

The streets of Neo Domino were even more confusing than Carly had anticipated. They twisted in all sorts of strange directions, with so many flashing lights and weird signs plastered all over the place that the young girl's head was spinning within minutes.

Not helping was the fact that she was proceeding at a snail's pace, bumper-to-bumper with the vehicle in front of her pretty much from the moment she entered the city limits. The drive to the city had been a relatively simple and quiet affair, but now Carly wasn't entirely certain she wouldn't get there faster if she just jumped out and walked.

What were all these people doing out so late, anyway?

Well, in any event…Carly was at least pretty sure she was getting close to her destination. She had a map on her phone and directions on her tablet, plus a picture of the club that she'd looked up online.

The lights were getting brighter and more numerous in this area, and the streets were beginning to fill up with people; mostly of the younger sort, but more than a few who weren't. Names of countless nightclubs, bars, and restaurants – more than Carly had ever seen before in her entire life – flashed by in a blur.

Finally, the bespectacled teenager gave a relieved smile as the sight she was searching for came into view: a neon sign reading Carnival Night.

Even Carly, who was as far from being "plugged in" to these sorts of things as a young woman could be, had heard of this place. Lynchpin in the entertainment empire of the world-famous Roba family, this one nightclub had led to hundreds of casinos, hotels, and dueling arenas the world over.

Drawing its aesthetics from the Roba brothers' past careers as circus performers, Carnival Night was as garish as it was exhilarating. And even decades later, it was still the place to be for the youth of Japan.

The three-story club was popular enough to have its own parking garage, which Carly timorously pulled into. Finding a spot took nearly twenty minutes; the place was that packed.

Throngs of people stretched in every direction that Carly could see as she made her way to the front entrance, and for a few moments she was seized by the overpowering urge to run as far away as possible in the other direction. She wasn't particularly comfortable even in smaller crowds, and with something like this…

Still…she'd already come this far, hadn't she?

Clutching at her bag, Carly pushed forward to the rainbow-hued double doors. There was a line, but there didn't appear to be a bouncer or anyone like that checking identification. Which was good, because it hadn't occurred to Carly until that exact moment that she didn't have any.

None that wouldn't get her booted out for being a minor, anyway.

All considered, between the confusing drive over, parking, and waiting in line, it was nearly an hour later than Carly had planned that she actually managed to enter the club. The first sight that greeted her, however, made her decide right on the spot that it was worth it.

It was as if someone had taken every color and sound that Carly knew, and a few dozen others she'd never even imagined, stuck them in a blender together, and set to frappe. Hundreds of people stretched all across the massive, circus tent-like hall, packed tightly together in various pulsing throngs.

A live band was performing at earsplitting volume at the far end of the club, the very air vibrating with every chord and drum beat. It was the kind of music that reached inside you and made you need to move, and the swaying masses on no less than five separate dance floors obliged accordingly.

Strobe lights moved in time with the beat, flashing a different color every second as they illuminated various decorations fashioned after carnival rides or circus acts. A human cannonball (though upon further inspection, robot cannonball was probably a more apt term) fired off every fifteen seconds precisely, while an automated trapeze performance went on above everyone's heads.

For Carly, whose ordinary conception of "exciting" rarely strayed beyond a few subtitled American action movies, it was almost too much to even process at once. Every turn of her head was another sight of utter marvel, and the young farm girl had to bite down on her own fist to keep from squealing in awe.

Now this was a reason to sneak out!

"Hey…don't I know you from somewhere? Here for the paaaaaaarty?" asked another teenaged girl, hanging off the arm of an attractive guy and clearly far too drunk to stand up on her own.

This managed to shock Carly out of her reverie, and accordingly she gave the other woman a once-over. She did indeed look familiar, but Carly couldn't place her immediately.

"Yeah, yeah…you're whatshername's friend, riiiiiiight?" the girl slurred after a few seconds, swaying until she was collapsed over her companion's shoulder. "Like…I think we have lit together, or something?"

"Err…maybe…" murmured Carly.

"Well, whatever! Get a drink in your hand, biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitch!" exclaimed the girl, before grabbing her male partner by the hair and beginning to make out fiercely. Carly took that as her cue to walk past.

Once again, Carly felt a spike of panic as she drew close enough to get a better look at the patrons in this area. Many of them were indeed students that Carly recognized from school, by face if not by name.

Despite their apparent ages, nearly all of them were drinking, and that girl by the entrance didn't even seem to be the most visibly intoxicated one there. One booth she passed saw several girls she knew from gym class slumped over the table, either unconscious or very close to it.

Another contained a few members of Ayasato High School's football team, who were passing around pills that Carly very much doubted were prescribed by a doctor.

The first girl was also far from the only one to be engaged in "amorous activities," and indeed by some of her peers' standards she'd been positively restrained. Carly almost felt dirty simply from watching how some of the guys and girls (and in a few cases, guys and guys or girls and girls) were dancing with each other, rubbing against each other, and in a few of the booths farthest from the light…

Carly shivered and flushed as she nervously made her way closer to the band. It was ridiculously loud there, but at least the sights were more exhilarating than intimidating.

Before she could make her way over to one of the few empty booths set up near the stage, however, a hand grasped her shoulder. She jumped and gave a shrill yelp (thankfully, mostly drowned out by the music), before turning to see one of her fellow writers on the school paper.

"Carly! Glad you could make it," he said with a smile. "Did you just get here?"

"Oh, uh…yeah. Yeah, I just…got here…" she mumbled. "Didn't really think things through about what I'd do once I did, though…"

The young man chuckled. "Hey, I hear ya!" he replied, gesturing back at a nearby dancing group with his thumb. "Most of the other guys on the paper are over there. And I think I saw your girlfriends over near the birthday girl. You should go say hi."

Carly nodded slowly. Truthfully, it probably wasn't all that accurate to say she had "girlfriends," though that's what she'd call them to her parents or teachers. They were more a set of girls who didn't particularly mind acknowledging her as she passed them in the halls, and wouldn't immediately object to getting partnered with her on an assignment.

But that was certainly an improvement on the rest of the student body. Carly wasn't unpopular, exactly, in that she wasn't typically singled out for bullying or verbal abuse. There was the occasional snickering at her overlarge glasses or klutzy demeanor or fondness for old thick books, but most of that (operative term, most) had died down by the time she entered high school.

No, it was simply that to most of her peers, Carly was something of a nonentity. A handful knew of her simply because there weren't a whole lot of people in a town like Ayasato who'd been globally recognized for anything; still, the general disinterest that the average high school student was likely to have in the news media precluded her from being recognized much.

And otherwise? She was plain, unassuming, and painfully awkward in any social situation. Her marks were good but not stellar, and she certainly wasn't even the remotest bit athletic.

In short, to all but maybe ten or fifteen students in the entire school, Carly Nagisa was for all intents and purposes invisible.

Still…if the friendliest of those ten or fifteen were here, then there was still hope of this night turning out as amazing as Carly had built it up to be in her mind. She bowed her thanks to her fellow student-journalist, before heading off in the direction he'd indicated.

Now that it'd been pointed out to her, it was impossible to miss the cluster of students in question. There were about two dozen of them, sprawled across six booths and chatting animatedly.

Balloons and a gigantic Hello Kitty doll marked the point where the birthday girl was sitting, a bowl of sake in her hands and a half-eaten bag of chocolates spread in front of her. Carly's lab partner in biology class – the one who'd invited Carly in the first place, and who was now laughing uproariously at said girl's right shoulder, seemed to notice Carly staring, and waved her over.

"Hey Carly! What're you doin' just standing there?" she called out, scooting over to make some space. "I just got done sayin' that we didn't think you were coming!"

"I…got delayed on the way here," said Carly as she uneasily sat herself down. "Err…thank you for thinking of me, though…"

"Well, of course she did. It's not like I invited you for no reason," chimed in the birthday girl after swallowing her sake.

"Umm…okay…" murmured Carly, a little put off by the other girl's tone. Still, not wanting to be rude, she quickly added, "Happy birthday to you, by the way. I'm sorry I didn't really bring a gift or anything."

The girl gave a dismissive wave of the hand. "Just so long as you've got your camera," she replied coolly. "And can you do me a favor and get an angle where my ass doesn't look fat? That happened with the yearbook photos last year, and dammit was I pissed…"

Carly blinked a few times. "Err…am I missing something?" she asked after a few seconds.

"You do write for that news thing, right?" responded the other girl. "Even got published around the world or some shit? I mean, I know those dweebs on the school paper are writing something on it, but I think this party deserves a little more than that."

"You…want me to write an article for the Gazette? About your…birthday party?" said Carly, rubbing her head in confusion.

"Hey, you write up crap about fairs and festivals and shit like that, right?" demanded the birthday girl, now looking rather irritated. "So what the hell's the difference?"

Carly had to admit that she had a point there, if crudely put. And in any event, her instinct under such a harsh glare was to shrink back. "I'll…bring it up to my editor on Monday," she told the other girl. "But I can get started on the photos now if you want."

The girl nodded, taking out a compact from her purse and beginning to touch up her makeup. As her girlfriends moved to do likewise, though, realization hit Carly like an electric shock.

"Wait…no, I can't do that! I'm sorry!" she exclaimed, more shrilly than she'd been intending.

"Excuse me…?" asked the birthday girl, her glare intensifying.

"Well, it's nothing personal, but…uh, the thing is…" stammered Carly, trying to sound as sincerely apologetic as possible. "I…kinda snuck out tonight. If I publish an article, they might find out I was here…"

A heavy silence fell over the group of students for several moments. Then, the girl gave a big, snorting laugh. "Are you fucking serious? How old are you, bitch?" she sneered.

Before Carly could answer – not that she was going to anytime soon, as her mouth had suddenly gone rather dry – she then turned to her friends and shouted, "Hey, looks like someone didn't get permission from mommy and daddy! She better be careful, or they might make her sit in the fucking corner!"

Every girl there immediately began to laugh their heads off at this jibe; Carly's lab partner was the loudest. Slowly, the bespectacled reporter backed away, beet-red and determinedly avoiding eye contact.

She tried to say something in protest, but her body (particularly the parts of it governing speech) had a nasty habit of shutting down in situations like this.

Eventually, the lead girl's own mirth died down, and she returned to her previous coldness as she said, "Well, if you can't at least make yourself useful, kindly get the fuck out of my face. Hang out in the club for as long as you want, I guess…but stay away from us. We clear, bitch?"

Carly swallowed. "Y…Yeah. Clear…" she mumbled, before shuffling off in a random direction, the only thought on her mind being getting as far away as possible.

[-]

Carly spent the next few hours sitting alone at a table, sipping something she really shouldn't be sipping and generally trying as hard as she could not to cry.

She should've known that they wouldn't have bothered inviting her of all people, without some sort of angle.

And really, that wasn't what was depressing her. Surely there were other people here who'd been invited for reasons other than genuine fondness – because they let the more popular girls copy off their schoolwork, for example, or because they simply had money to throw around. This wasn't much different.

The insults and laughter at her expense weren't really what were bothering her, either; they weren't exactly fun to hear, but she could ignore them. Or try, at least.

No, what was truly causing Carly Nagisa to sulk was the realization that she'd been 100% correct. The better part of her brain had told her outright that this would be a bonehead move, risking everything for the sake of so little, and now she wasn't even in a position to enjoy the few hours of frivolity her hasty judgment had bought her.

She drank a fair bit more, and even tried to dance with some of the local boys for a little while, but her heart wasn't in it. Plus, she was fucking terrible.

In the end, she left the party less than two hours after arriving, alone and dejected.

The drive back was slow and uneventful. Carly was exhausted – the rollercoaster of emotions her time in the club had wrought upon her had wreaked havoc upon her earlier manic energy – and more than once felt herself come close to drifting off at the wheel.

Still, almost nobody else was on the road at the time (for who'd actually be traveling this early to a backward township like Ayasato, anyway?), so there was little consequence to Carly's occasionally erratic driving.

During her more lucid moments, Carly tried to keep herself focused on ruminating over the night's events, in order to stay awake if nothing else. But for the most part her tired mind ending up repeating the same mantra over and over: something to the effect of "if this is what 'freedom' feels like, then it can go fuck itself."

Only less vulgar. Or more vulgar, sometimes. She really wasn't thinking straight.

At least…until she pulled off the main road onto the dirt path that led to the Nagisa farm, and bolted to full consciousness in an instant.

The first sign that something was wrong was the flashing lights. Nothing inside, outside, or even remotely connected to their farm flashed like that (or at all), and the intense blitz of red and white was enough to kick her adrenaline into gear.

As she neared the edge of their property, the source of the lights became crystal clear: an ambulance was parked outside their front door, with a couple uniformed paramedics shouting orders she couldn't hear through the open doorway.

Carly had scarcely a few seconds to ponder what they could possibly be doing there before her hands shot to her mouth, and her eyes went wide with fear.

For being led out on a wheeled stretcher was none other than her father, his eyes closed and his body unmoving.

Parking hastily, Carly leapt from the car and sprinted toward them, trying to call out to her father but finding herself unable to make a sound. Still, she managed to catch the tail end of what one of the paramedics was saying to her mother as they followed behind the stretcher, the latter clutching the hand of her husband for as long as she could.

"You did good to administer CPR until we arrived, ma'am," he told Suzuki Nagisa, who was clearly trying her utmost not to dissolve into a blubbering mess. "It's a slim one, I won't lie…but you may have given him a chance."

The older woman nodded slowly, apparently rendered just as speechless as her daughter out of shock.

"You can ride with him in the ambulance, if you want," the paramedic offered after a few moments of silence.

Suzuki looked visibly torn, her eyes locked onto the open ambulance doors as she bit her lip. But eventually she shook her head and said, in a very quiet voice, "I…I want to, but…I need to wait for…"

Suddenly, purely by instinct, the housewife turned her head, and her eyes met with Carly's own.

And they were burning with fury.

"Get going to the hospital," she murmured to the paramedic, her tone shifting to one so low and so terrifying that the man hastened to obey without another word.

Both of the Nagisa women watched on, rooted in place, as the doors closed and the emergency vehicle began the drive back to the main road.

Then, at the moment that Suzuki Nagisa saw it turn the corner and disappear from view, she strode over and slapped her daughter hard across the face.

"What the hell were you thinking?!" she screamed, enraged tears streaming down her cheeks.

Carly fought back tears of her own as she clutched at the spot where she'd been struck, feeling a big red welt already beginning to swell up there. "I…I don't…!" was all she could manage to stammer, her mind a jumble of pain and confusion.

"Keisuke went into cardiac arrest an hour ago!" bellowed her mother, looking very much like she was readying another blow. "You know damn well there's no hospital in Ayasato!"

Carly's blood went ice-cold as she heard these words, and as the first hint of their implications trickled down her spine. It was true, after all. Ayasato had used to have a dedicated hospital, but budget issues had led to its shutdown years ago. A couple small clinics still existed to address basic checkups or dental appointments, but none of them had an ambulance to send on such short notice.

Which meant that, absent a car to drive, the closest vehicle they could've procured to transport her father in his time of emergency was…

Was…

"We're going to discuss this more – a lot more – once the night is over," Suzuki whispered, her hand lowering but her eyes remaining as furious as ever. "Right now, give me back my damn keys."

It didn't even occur to Carly to disobey. Cringing under her mother's fiery gaze, she handed over the car and wordlessly climbed into the back seat, clutching her shoulders and shivering as they headed out after the ambulance.

[-]

The drive to the hospital was excruciating.

If Suzuki Nagisa had thought that the best way to punish her daughter was to let her stew in silence, then she'd been right on the money. Though she certainly wasn't looking forward to having it out with her mother, the waiting was far, far worse.

Every clearing of the throat, every glance sideways, set Carly even further on edge. It was unbearable, knowing that the time she'd have to explain herself was rapidly approaching, and yet unsure whether any given moment could be that time.

And the big problem was that Carly didn't have anything to say in explanation. Even as the minutes ticked by – five, ten, twenty, thirty – no words came. Her mind had more or less shut down the moment she saw her father being carted away.

She did a mental double-take there as she realized that, with her own father at death's door, she was far more preoccupied with selfishly protecting herself from her mother's all-too-justified wrath.

The pit in her stomach deepened so much that she almost vomited.

Carly felt just as sick with herself half-an-hour later, as they pulled into the parking lot of Domino General Hospital. Despite the late hour, the place was abuzz with activity, with more people coming and going about than Carly could count.

But neither Nagisa woman stopped to check any closer. Suzuki, for her part, didn't look like she had a single thing on her mind other than getting to her husband's side, and Carly hastened to follow behind.

"Can I help you?" asked a harried but kindly looking receptionist as they burst into the building.

"Suzuki Nagisa, wife of Keisuke Nagisa," she said shortly, a deep tremble only barely kept out of her voice. "He was taken in under…under cardiac arrest, sometime within the last hour…"

The receptionist typed on her computer for a moment before replying, "It looks like your husband's in surgery right now, ma'am. I can have a nurse escort you to a waiting area."

"Yes…of course," murmured Suzuki, nodding politely to a middle-aged woman in scrubs who beckoned them to follow her. "Thank you for that…"

Almost robotically, she rushed after the nurse, a silent Carly bringing up the rear. The older woman led them to the emergency room, beckoning to a set of chairs before quietly entering the OR.

About a minute past before a gray-haired surgeon exited out into the hallway, removing his mask and sighing. "You're Mister Nagisa's next of kin?" he asked of Suzuki.

She got out of her chair to face him directly, her face both incredibly stern but also somehow very, very weak. Carly had never seen her mother look quite so old as she answered, "Yes. Now, please…just tell me…"

The slow shake of his head spoke the story before he even uttered another word. "I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but…" he began.

"No!" Suzuki suddenly exclaimed, grasping the doctor by his collar and screaming into his face. "Don't you dare! Don't you fucking dare!"

The doctor, not unsympathetically, waited for the woman to get that out of her system, collapsing on the floor as the tears finally began to flow once more. Then, with the patience of a man who had said this a hundred times before, he told them, "I'm truly sorry, ma'am. We did everything we could. If we'd got him in just a few minutes earlier, we might've…"

The man continued to speak, but Carly had stopped listening at that point. A horrible feeling, like numbness punctuated by random bursts of sharp stinging pain, had been creeping up the teenager's body from the moment she'd seen her father prone on that stretcher, kept at bay only by the assurance that she might not hear those words.

But she had. Her worst fear, the one thing she'd been dreading even more than the "mere" news of her father's demise, had been confirmed.

Carly Nagisa had killed her father.

[-]

The rest of the night passed Carly by like a blur. Her mother wasn't even attempting to maintain her composure as they went through the procedures requested by the hospital, weeping openly over the paperwork they asked her to sign and generally looking as if she might collapse at any moment.

To an outside observer, it might seem that Carly was handling the news a lot better; her eyelids were damp and puffy, and every once in a while she sniffled, but otherwise she seemed relatively calm.

But this was less because of genuine serenity and more because her body was apparently in the process of shutting down. The moment that she'd learned just how close they'd come to being able to save him – that if she'd arrived back home just five or ten minutes earlier, or better yet, not stolen the car for such a fucking stupid reason in the first place, things might've turned out differently – it was as if a cork had been pulled out of her, causing every last iota of energy to leak away.

She was unbelievably exhausted, yet could in no way sleep. She was completely devoid of fuel, yet could in no way eat. There simply wasn't anything in her now.

She was just…empty.

Still, she followed right behind her mother as they went through the motions the hospital staff demanded, excusing herself only once: running off to the bathroom to dry heave violently upon seeing her father's body being carted away, a white cloth covering his face but still so unmistakably Keisuke Nagisa, with calloused fingers from decades of farm work and a scar on his chest owing to a tractor mishap in his youth.

Further arrangements, for the funeral and for who knew what else, could wait until another night; Suzuki clearly wanted to get out of there as soon as possible, and Carly certainly wasn't in any position to object.

The drive back home was no less quiet than the initial one. If Carly had had to guess, she would've presumed that her mother didn't trust herself to get into an even less emotionally stable mindset while she was driving…and she probably would've been correct.

Not that Carly was really in any position to guess, of course. Her mind was a complete blank, beyond that single, all-consuming mantra:

I killed my father. I killed my father. I killed my father…

By the time they arrived back in Ayasato, the first golden rays of the sunrise were beginning to poke their way over the horizon. It was truly a beautiful morning, Carly reflected hollowly. The kind that her daddy had loved so very, very much.

Strictly speaking, this was around the time for both of them to get started on the Saturday chores, but Suzuki was clearly not in the mood to either insist on the point or to do them herself. Instead, she was as silent as ever as they pulled into the garage, unlocking the front door and revealing a house that was outwardly no different than it'd been a day before, and yet would in no way ever be the same.

There was still more paperwork to be done, when time was permitting; Suzuki absently set it down on a table and headed up the creaking stairs, toward her bedroom. Lacking any kind of feeling of direction, Carly did likewise. As much as she knew she didn't deserve it, sleep seemed like the greatest thing in the world right now.

Her mother paused, just for a little while, as she was pulling open the door…her eyes set upon the bed that she'd shared only hours ago. Without looking at her daughter, her voice utterly hollow, she finally spoke up.

"I'm not going to yell or get angry. Not right now, anyway," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. "Just tell me the truth. You took the car to go to that party, right?"

Carly, frozen at the threshold of her own bedroom, said nothing in response. Words simply wouldn't come.

Suzuki seemed to take her silence as an affirmation, however. "Well, in that case…" she went on, still facing away from her child, "…I just hope that it was worth it."

The door closed after that.

And tears finally began to flow, free and clear, down the teenager's face.

[-]

"That's what you see?" asked Misty Lola, her warm and compassionate voice contrasting strongly with the inhuman eyes that bored into Carly's own. "When you use your powers to your fullest, that is?"

Carly Nagisa sighed, nodding slowly. This had seemed a sensible idea at the time – linking their minds so as to remove the barriers of physicality as the two Dark Signers reached a critical point in their training. It was simply far more efficient for Misty to imprint the knowledge of these higher-level techniques directly onto her brain, rather than demonstrate them one at a time.

But the disadvantage, of course, was that it made it painfully clear what an utterly pathetic wretch she'd been in her youth. She'd already made a bad enough first impression on her fellow emissaries of Hell, and she'd spent the past several weeks trying to move past it to as great a degree as possible.

"I tried not to pry too deeply, but…" Misty said, shifting uncomfortably. "Well, that's easier said than done when the memories are that…visceral."

Carly just nodded again, pulling her knees up to her chest and crossing her arms over them.

There was a lengthy pause before Misty added, "Do you mind if I ask…what happened after that?"

Carly tilted her head back up. "You can't just see it?" she replied with confusion.

"They're your memories, Carly; colored by your own perceptions," Misty answered with a shake of the head. "After that night, they're far more…vague and jumbled. Difficult to read. It'd take me a few hours more of mental contact to even begin making sense of them."

This explanation caused something to click in Carly's mind. "But…wait," she said, looking confused again. "What about that point where my parents were talking when I was out of the house? How could 'my' memories contain something I wasn't present for?"

Misty tapped her chin a couple of times, apparently considering this. "Hard to say," she responded. "Though…I suppose one possibility would be that, given your natural proclivity for fortunetelling…"

She tapped Carly's transformed deck, and the Fortune Lady Lighty that sat on top of it, as if to prove her point.

"That, perhaps…you may've been a natural low-level psychic in life," Misty added, her eyes immediately growing sad as she uttered those words. "Even if your senses weren't attuned enough at the time to actually realize it, they might've at least picked up on the conversation subconsciously. And as our gods hew any and all skills we possessed as humans to their absolute maxima…"

Carly didn't have to ask why her mentor's voice was cracking somewhat as she discussed her theory, instead merely hugging the other Dark Signer around the shoulder.

"In that case…well, there's not really much that did happen in those years, but I'll do my best," she said soothingly.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," whispered Misty.

Carly just shook her head. "It's fine, Misty-san," she declared. "I can't keep running from the past here. To truly be a Dark Signer, I must embrace it; use it. Both you and Aslla piscu have taught me that much."

This made Misty smile slightly as the other woman went on to explain, "My mother loathed me from that day onward – not that I really noticed, when I was so busy loathing myself. I barely noticed half the stuff going on around me anymore, at home or in class…not a good quality in a reporter. So I quit the school paper the following week."

"What about your town's paper?" asked Misty. "That Ayasato Gazette?"

"I tried to quit there too," Carly replied, closing her eyes briefly. "But Hakushoku-sama – my editor, that is – refused to accept my resignation. He reduced my assignments and my workload for a while in sympathy, but he managed to convince me not to throw my career away entirely."

Misty seemed to wince involuntarily at this, as if she had some kind of headache (not that the dead were truly subject to such things).

"Misty-san, is something the matter?" Carly asked, looking worried.

"No…No, it's nothing," said Misty, waving a hand nonchalantly. "You just reminded me, when I saw that second editor of yours – that 'Shiro Hakushoku' guy – in your memories…"

The elder Dark Signer paused for a moment, apparently in deep thought, before shaking her head.

"I thought maybe he looked a little familiar, but…no, like I said, it's nothing. Just imagining things," she concluded. "Please, go on."

Carly was still a little concerned, but nonetheless continued, "As for school…well, within a week, nobody but me seemed to remember that stupid party at all. So I probably could've kept some friends – for a given definition of 'friends,' I guess – if I'd really tried. I didn't, though. I withdrew from everyone, peers and teachers alike. And nobody really cared enough to try to persuade me otherwise."

The younger woman gave a short, humorless laugh. "You know, I even had a boyfriend for a few weeks back then," she added, her dark eyes narrowed. "Never went anywhere, of course; my heart was never in it. Hell, I don't even remember his name anymore."

"Is that why you ended up coming to Neo Domino after all?" asked Misty. "Nothing left for you in your hometown?"

"I guess that's one way to put it," said Carly with what, were she still breathing, might've been a sigh. "My grades went to shit once I stopped paying attention in class, so college wouldn't be an option for a while. Which meant it was either stick it out on the farm for another year or two after high school, or…"

Misty placed a comforting hand on her protégé's shoulder. "What did your mother think about it?" she murmured, clearly knowing that this was a difficult subject.

Carly gave a snorting, humorless laugh. "I think you can guess," she answered bitterly. "I mean, we'd pretty much stopped speaking to each other after that night, anyway. This was just the last straw."

The Dark Signer began to absently play with the hem of her cloak. "We argued for hours when I told her I was leaving," Carly went on. "I don't even remember what we said to each other. Just a helluva lot of shouting. Before I knew it I was slamming the door, screaming that I never wanted to see her fucking face again…and getting the same thing screamed right back at me."

Carly looked up to meet Misty in the eyes, and answered the unspoken question glistening within them. "No, we never reconciled," she said in a flat tone. "That was the last time we ever spoke. I don't even know if she's still alive."

Misty was silent for a moment, before finally whispering, "I'm sorry…"

Carly just shook her head. "There's no need to be," she responded in a low voice. "I made my choice. I made a lot of choices. That's why I'm here, with you…with everyone. Even if I wanted to lose myself in regret, I couldn't do so. I can't afford to be weak anymore."

Misty closed her eyes and nodded, unable to argue with this. Then, after a few pregnant seconds, she got to her feet and straightened out her dress.

"That's enough training for today," she declared. "It's probably best that we give your mind several hours to rest after such…strenuous activity. Besides, I've got a bunch of errands I need to run in Neo Domino today. We might not have another chance to gather supplies and resources before our King arrives."

The Dark Signer then ran a glowing hand across her eyes and face, casting a glamour that made them appear as if she was still human.

Turning to the still-sitting Carly, her expression softened as she added, "Actually…why don't you join me, Carly? You should be capable of maintaining a simple glamour like this by now. And frankly, I think a few hours outside this place might do you some good."

Carly bit her lip. "I'm…not sure that would be a good idea, Misty-san," she said, looking downcast.

"Don't make me force you," replied Misty, pulling the other Dark Signer to her feet by the arm and dragging her to a mirror. "Come on, let's see it."

Carly gazed into her reflection – a visage that was both terrifying and trembling at the same time – and found herself turning inward, as she often did now in moments of uncertainty. It still tended to feel more than a little strange to have another voice sounding off in her brain, but at the same time…

Go on, Carly Nagisa.

"Are you sure…?" Carly whispered aloud. Misty didn't have to ask whom she was addressing; she was constantly doing much the same thing with Ccarayhua, after all.

You have earned a few hours of freedom, My host. And in any event, your mind must be clear if you are to succeed in the path you have set.

The undead woman nodded slowly, closing her eyes and marshalling all her concentration. When she opened them up again, they had the appearance of life once more.

"Okay…I'm ready," she spoke after a few moments, still staring intently at her reflection.

Misty just smiled, and proceeded to lead the way.

"Carly and I are heading into the city. Need anything?" the avatar of the lizard god called out as they passed by the closed door to their (for lack of a better term) garage.

"Find me some tunes that're fucking epic!" shouted back the voice of Kiryu Kyosuke, who – based on the sounds emanating from inside the large room – was working on one of their D-Wheels. "Nothing I've heard before, though. That may seem impossible, but c'mon, I know you bitches are up to it!"

Though they couldn't see either of their fellow Dark Signers, the rolling of Demak Kera's eyes was almost audible as he chimed in, "And by that, our colleague means to say he needs a new socket wrench. Oh, and while you're at it…pick me up a current newspaper, will you? There's only so much Rudger's divination can tell us, and obviously we don't get internet down here."

"Will do," said Misty shortly, Carly bringing up the rear with slightly raised eyebrows.

[-]

The trip to Neo Domino was simpler than Carly had been expecting; she couldn't wait to learn that "teleportation by geoglyph" trick. Still, they couldn't well manifest the mark of the lizard in the midst of a crowded street, so they still had to do quite a bit of walking to get to the city's business district.

They split up, at that point: Misty heading off to a hardware store to pick up Kiryu's equipment, and Carly went off in search of a newspaper. They'd meet back up in a nearby park once their respective errands were complete.

It was utterly surreal, being back here. After having built it up all her life as something truly incredible, the day she'd arrived in the city two years ago – for the first time as a prospective resident, rather than a simple day tripper – Carly hadn't really known how to feel.

On the one hand, there were so many simple wonders from her purely rural perspective, from D-Wheels racing across the streets to jaw-dropping sales on all sorts of top-of-the-line electronics her young mind had only dreamt of. It was hard not to get swept up in it, if she had the inclination to do so.

Of course, on the other hand…well, she'd had laundry hanging from the inside of her car more often than she'd really prefer to admit.

Ultimately, everything she'd saved from her meager wages at the Gazette had disappeared within about a month. Nothing had prepared her for the expenses of living on her own; hearing about the rent in even the crappiest apartment she could find nearly gave her a heart attack.

The upshot was that she'd ended up living on the streets for about half a year, sleeping in her car and writing up cheap web content to generate enough money for food and water. Going to bed (for a given definition of "bed") hungry hadn't been an unusual occurrence.

The less stubborn parts of her brain had more than once considered calling home and asking for a little money. Pride had forestalled her, however.

Carly Nagisa, the shy and pathetically clumsy farm girl, had needed to die in order for Carly Nagisa, Neo Domino's greatest ace reporter, to be born. As such, it would've been counterproductive to reestablish any connection between those two lives.

Besides…it wasn't like her mother was likely to help her out, anyway.

And in the end, she had managed to land a freelance job with the Neo Domino Bulletin a few months later, which – together with careful saving and continuing to do some web stuff on the side – had eventually meant a decent apartment and some clothes without holes.

But that'd been enough for her. Whether busting criminal operations or simply covering a few street duels, the young girl had lived for journalism.

She wrote, and the world responded. She wrote, and the world changed.

Unbidden, a thought arose from the innermost depths of Carly's mind: had she written anything since she'd been reborn? It somewhat disturbed the young Dark Signer that she couldn't immediately answer "yes."

She couldn't remember a time before she'd known how to write. She kept a journal, of course, and added random little scrawls into it at least daily. Article ideas, poetry, some truly awful yaoi fanfiction which should never ever see the light of day…

But the last entry in that book, wherever it was now (Security evidence storage, most likely) was dated the day she'd tried to infiltrate the Arcadia Movement. Over three weeks had passed since the night she'd died, plenty of time to get back into the habit, and yet…no, nothing. Not one single, solitary sentence.

Carly shook her head as she stared out at a newsstand from a dark alleyway, watching the vendor light up a cigarette and kick up his feet. There was no point in worrying about this now.

It really isn't all that important, in the grand scheme of things, the part of her mind that was one with Aslla piscu reminded her.

So why was she hesitating?

Levitating over one of the papers would be laughably simple. The man wasn't paying any particular attention to his wares, and even if he had been, obfuscating his senses wouldn't be a difficult matter.

But all the same…

It would be the first newspaper she'd ever touched with hands of Death. And something about that was arousing a visceral, negative reaction in the young Dark Signer.

The feeling wasn't in any way rational, of course. Carly was quite proud of the body she now wielded, a finely hewed weapon for slaughtering Signers. Death had purified her, perfected her, stripped away every last weakness or flaw – leaving a being truly worthy of becoming this world's Dark Queen.

If anything, it was those cheaply printed pages which were unworthy of being touched by her now, rather than the other way around. At least, that's how she attempted to rationalize it inwardly.

Neither she nor her god were fooled, however.

Ashamed of herself, Carly withdrew back into the shadows.

[-]

Half an hour later, the strange mental block that was keeping her from simply running off with a paper remained as implacable as ever, to Carly's intense consternation. Aslla piscu was being unusually quiet, but she knew that the Earthbound God was disappointed in her.

She didn't like that feeling.

Still, if Carly couldn't overcome this inexplicable obstacle, then she would simply have to work around it. This was why she was currently infiltrating the main headquarters of the Daily Duel; confronting the problem at the source was the only surefire way to ensure that it would no longer be an issue.

Plus, Carly noted with a wry smirk…this was the place where her longtime rival Angela Raines worked. As she snuck into the woman's private office, the plentiful shadows shielding her from prying eyes, she began to contemplate a number of potential revenges against the blonde reporter – the woman who'd seen fit to humiliate and insult her at every possible opportunity over the past two years.

True, there wasn't really much point to it…especially when Angela was just going to die alongside the rest of humanity in a matter of weeks, regardless.

But she was already here, after all, and it would be a nice way to make up with the hummingbird for her earlier slip-up. The Jibakushin fed directly off feelings of malice and vengeance, and while inflicting sweet retribution upon Angela could in no way compare to the meal a Signer represented, the bitch might at least make for a decent snack.

Carly only had to lie in wait for a couple of minutes before Angela returned to her desk, intensely scrutinizing the transcript of an interview with Shoji Manjoume. She was so focused on her work that Carly began to doubt whether she should've even bothered hiding herself.

Several ideas for inflicting payback, some more lethal than others, danced across Carly's mind as she stared at the back of the other reporter's head. It was probably best that she get this over with quickly; she still needed to grab that paper and then rendezvous with Misty before too long, after all.

But that didn't mean she couldn't have a little bit of fun with her first…

Carly moved to begin approaching the blonde reporter from behind, but fell back into the shadows almost immediately as the door to the office slammed open. Someone was here to see Angela, and judging by the fact that the door had nearly been knocked off its hinges, they weren't happy about it.

As such, the Dark Signer's mind began to whirl with regard to whether she should come back and finish this later…but all thoughts of leaving died quietly as she saw the face of Angela's visitor.

"I'm sick and tired of getting the damn runaround from your secretary! You will answer my questions, and you're going to answer them now!" shouted Jack Atlas, striding forward and slamming a fist upon her desk.

"Jack…" Carly whispered under her breath, scarcely believing her fortune – and unsure whether it was a good or bad one. The cards had foretold that they wouldn't confront each other until the Day of Judgment.

To see him now, resplendent and full in view just meters away…

Ultimately, Carly just shrank back out of indecision, letting the conversation unfold.

"Well, what exactly is it that you want, former King?" asked Angela, apparently unimpressed by the duelist's confrontational demeanor.

Jack's face tensed at the disparaging title, but he seemed to let it slide as he answered, "It has to do with this."

He then pulled a heavily crumpled paper from his coat and threw it onto her desk. It was an obituary page, with one of the articles circled in heavy red pen. As Carly's inhuman vision focused in upon it, she soon realized who exactly the obituary was for…

Herself.

"Yeah, I wrote this. And a couple hundred others just like it this year alone," Angela said with disinterest. "What of it?"

Jack jabbed a finger at the last paragraph. "Right here!" he bellowed, his other hand pressed into a tight fist. "Carly Nagisa leaves behind no kin apart from her mother, who wholeheartedly requests that she be contacted should any additional information about her daughter's present state be uncovered."

"And your point is…?" Angela replied in a drawl. She earned another ground-shaking fist upon her desk for her troubles.

"My point is that her contact information isn't listed in the damn article! And no one at this paper seems willing to tell me over the phone!" the blond duelist responded. "So I came here in person to demand some fucking answers!"

"It isn't our policy to print random people's addresses and phone numbers for all to see," said Angela with a roll of the eyes. "And I'm going to guess nobody wanted to tell you because you kept shouting at them. Why would we endanger a source by connecting them to someone who's just going to yell their ear off?"

"I am not going to yell at her!" yelled Jack.

Angela let that hang in the air for a few moments, before asking, "So…why do you want her contact info in the first place? Do you have some 'additional information' to share?"

Jack immediately drew back, growing visibly flustered. "I…well…" he stammered, before erupting into another great shout. "How the hell is this any kind of your business, anyway?!"

"It isn't, necessarily," stated Angela with a smirk. "But regardless, right now I'm the one holding information you want. And in exchange, I'd just love to know exactly why Jack Atlas, famed pro-duelist, is so damn obsessed with the death of some no-name klutz of a repor…"

She was unable to finish that sentence, however, before Jack brought down his fist again…this time smashing a decorative ornament on her desk to pieces. "You don't get to talk about her like that!" he roared, getting right up in her face.

Her mask of casual detachment melted away in an instant, replaced by abject terror; he was quite clearly not fucking around.

Instinctively, her hand began reaching under her desk, searching for the silent alarm switch.

He preempted her, however, by adding, "By the way, if you were planning on doing anything stupid…you should probably know I'm currently staying as the Director's honored guest. I had breakfast with a Security Officer and the Director's personal secretary just a couple hours ago."

Slowly, she withdrew her hand, but shifted her expression to one of determined defiance. "So what? Are you going to threaten to have me arrested if I don't comply, then?" Angela demanded.

"I'm not going to threaten anything if you just give me the damn number already," said Jack, glaring fiercely.

She seemed to be taking a long time to mull over this, before finally sighing and beginning to tap at her keyboard. A moment later a printout appeared from a nearby machine.

"Just take it and go, then," she murmured, not meeting his eyes. "But, for what it's worth…whatever I thought of Carly as a reporter, I never wanted her dead. And I certainly didn't wish this on the woman who raised her. She's been through enough already, so…don't make it any worse for her. Please."

"That's the last thing I ever want to do," replied Jack quietly, before snapping up the paper and leaving without another word.

[-]

In the rush to chase after Jack, thoughts of exacting vengeance on Angela were quickly forgotten as Carly moved silently through the building.

That peculiar mental block seemed to have fled from her mind as well, as she quickly snapped up a few papers from the lobby and stuffed them under her cloak, not breaking her stride as she raced to keep up with the blond duelist.

Her mind, too, was racing to process what had just occurred. Carly hadn't even thought to check for her own obituary at any point over the past few weeks (not that it would've mattered much, because as Demak had noted, they didn't have internet access in their underground citadel).

To think that not only had Angela written it, but apparently, contacted her mother about it as well…

It'd been over two years since they'd last spoken. Not so much as an e-mail or a Christmas card since. So why would she…?

Carly shook her head as she leapt from one rooftop to the next, deciding that trying to follow that mental path to its conclusion was pointless. Better just to find out directly.

Below her, Jack was pushing his way through the crowd with all the subtlety of a freight train, which at least made him easy to shadow.

Where exactly he was going was less clear, but eventually his movement patterns made it clear that he had no precise destination in mind; he was glancing down every alleyway they passed, apparently looking for a place he wouldn't be disturbed.

Eventually, he seemed to settle on one, and ensconced himself on the far side of a dumpster. Were Carly not looking down from so high above, he would indeed be completely hidden.

This puzzled the Dark Signer for a moment, before she recalled a piece of Jack's and Angela's earlier exchange: Jack was staying with Rex Goodwin, presumably along with the other Signers (which, Carly suddenly noted, was probably something she should mention to Rudger…in the unlikely event that he didn't already know).

If he wanted to make a private phone call, returning "home" might not be an option.

In any event, Carly hid herself behind a vent on the roof, focusing with all her might on the young man below. Despite the distance, her hearing was far beyond the capabilities of any human…meaning that if she concentrated hard enough, she could pick up the conversation as clearly as if it was happening a meter away.

Both sides of it.

"Hello? Who is this?"

Jack gripped onto the phone tightly, remaining silent for a few more moments before answering, "My name is Jack Atlas, and I…!"

"Never heard of you."

This seemed to fluster Jack for a moment. "How can you not…?!" he blurted out, apparently without thinking. "I'm the most famous professional duelist in all of Japan, for God's sake!"

There was a derisive snort on the other end of the line.

"So…what? You're trying to sell me some cards or something? Well then, you can just hang the hell up right now, because I'm not…!"

"No, nothing like that!" exclaimed Jack, gritting his teeth in exasperation. He took a deep breath to calm himself down, before adding, "This…this is about your daughter."

There was a lengthy pause, then…

"…What?"

"This is Suzuki Nagisa, correct?" asked Jack in a softer voice. "Mother of Carly Nagisa? I read her obituary."

Another pause.

"Oh, I…I see. I'm sorry, I just…I'd forgotten all about it. I told that reporter woman everything I could, but…no one ever called. Before you, I mean…"

There seemed to be some sort of muffled sound – one which Carly could almost swear sounded a lot like sniffling – on the other end now.

"I apologize. I didn't want to cause you more pain," he said, in that frank and blunt way that was so distinctly Jack. "But I got to know Carly very well. I thought you might want to hear what I have to say."

"Oh God…yes, please! Just…tell me first, and tell me straight. Do you know for certain what happened to her?"

Jack tensed up at this; without realizing it, Carly did as well. Finally he responded, "No…No, I do not. But I know how I'm going to find out. And I will."

"Do you…really mean that?"

"More than I've ever meant anything in my entire life," stated Jack with conviction, his head held high. "Look…I can't promise that I can tell you everything. I don't want anyone else getting involved in this if they don't have to. But if you have any questions, anything I can do to set your mind at ease…I'll do my best."

"In that case, Atlas-san…could you tell me how you know my daughter?"

Carly didn't miss her mother's use of the present tense.

"That's…a complicated story," Jack replied after a few moments. "The short answer is we met because she was writing an article on me. And when things went south, she…helped me out. Gave me a place to stay for a little while."

"Didn't you say you were some famous duelist or something? Why would you need 'a place to stay' from someone like Carly?"

Jack pinched his brow. "I'd rather not get into all the messy details," he said. "But here's what's clear: I was at my lowest point, and she brought me back. That's the reason I'm the man I am today. And I'll never be able to repay her for it."

His tone was shifting as he spoke, becoming softer and less rough with each word. "I…I tried to," the Signer continued after a lengthy pause. "By pushing her away, keeping her out of it. I was going after something truly dangerous, and I couldn't think of any way other way to protect her."

"Then I guess you didn't really know Carly at all. Because if there's one thing I know about my daughter…it's how nothing will stop her when she's got a story in her sights. Nothing can stop her."

"Yes…I know now that it was a mistake," Jack admitted, sounding so remarkably vulnerable in that one moment that he barely even seemed himself. "If I'd let her tag along like she wanted to, at least I could have…I could've kept an eye on her. But I didn't. And she paid the price."

"But…but, wait. You said…"

"I don't know whether she's dead or alive. That's the truth," Jack murmured, a catch in his throat. "But I won't lie – if she is alive, she's in grave danger. So I don't know whether the mission I'll be going on soon will be a rescue…or revenge. But either way…"

His fist clenched tight. "I will do whatever it takes to find out the truth!" he declared, authority and determination returning to his voice. "And I'll tear apart anyone who gets in my fucking way!"

There was a long period of silence on the other end of the line. Finally, hoarsely, Suzuki Nagisa spoke up once more.

"…You're in love with my daughter, aren't you?"

Jack froze in place, the phone nearly slipping out of his hand as he tensed up in shock. Some distance away, Carly did likewise.

"Wh…What do you…?" stammered Jack through clenched teeth. "How did you…?"

"I don't really need an answer, Atlas-san. You've already said more than enough to make it clear. You sound so much like my husband used to, in a way…and that's all I need to know for sure."

There was a pause, as Jack continued to stare forward in stunned silence, before the woman went on.

"If you're really that determined to save Carly…then I want you to promise me something. When – and I mean 'when,' not 'if' – you find her alive, there're some things I'd like you to tell her on my behalf. Can you do that for me?"

Jack took a deep, rattling breath, steeling his entire body as if in anticipation of her next reply…before finally saying, "…Yes."

"Please…tell her that I'm so sorry for the last words we spoke to each other. Tell her I didn't mean any of it."

"Tell her that her mother misses her every damn day."

"Tell her that I forgive every mistake she's ever made…every little thing that ever came between us. And that I'm ready to apologize for every time I wronged her in return."

"Tell her…that her father's death wasn't her fault. It wasn't mine. It wasn't anyone's."

"Tell her that she's the smartest, most beautiful, most perfect little girl in the world. Tell her that I couldn't be prouder of the woman she grew up to be."

"Tell her…that her mother loves her. Always…"

When this flood of words came to an end, it wasn't because Suzuki Nagisa was out of things to say; it was because her voice had grown so incredibly strained and weak that she simply couldn't speak any longer.

Jack, for his part, seemed unsure of what to say in response…while Carly seemed unsure of even what to think.

Everything she'd just heard flew directly in the face of everything she knew about the world. So far as Carly Nagisa was concerned, her mother had ceased to exist two years ago…and it'd been almost four since they'd spoken to each other without thinly veiled contempt undergirding every word.

The obvious explanation, of course, was that Suzuki Nagisa was lying. But then, that simply begged the question: why? Why would she pour all this out to a complete stranger – at no real benefit to herself – if it wasn't true?

Carly clutched at herself, only barely realizing in time that her composure was beginning to slip, and grasping back at it tightly. She was only vaguely aware that Jack was still speaking into the phone, shaking her head and tuning back in only as he was hanging up.

The blond duelist, for his part, remained still for a fair amount of time after pocketing his cell phone. Carly couldn't see his face, but his entire body was tensed up, not a muscle moving or relaxing as the wind softly billowed the edges of his coat.

Finally, wordlessly, he strode out of that alleyway.

Carly moved to follow after him, but pulled herself back just as quickly. If what he'd told Angela was true – and Carly had no reason to doubt him in that regard – then he was staying with Rex Goodwin now. And even for an avatar of Death, assaulting the Director's mansion might prove…problematic. Rudger had said as much, the other day.

Besides…Carly wasn't really in a fit state to confront him today, anyway. She was still quite shaken by what she'd just heard, and even as she tried to shut it out of her mind and focus on the task at hand, she knew it would be haunting her for the rest of the day.

In any event, it didn't really matter. The day when they would next meet was coming soon enough.

It was Destiny, after all.

[-]

When Carly found Misty about fifteen minutes later, she was sitting daintily on a park bench and softly chuckling at something a little boy had just said.

There were four of them, all elementary school age and all chatting excitedly. Carly almost had to smile; it was obvious why Misty was happy to have them around, but would they be so jovial if they knew they were laughing it up with a dead woman?

In any event, once Misty noticed her approaching, she gave a slight nod and told the children, "I'm afraid I've got a bit of grown-up business to get to, kids. But we're gonna play again soon, okay?"

"You mean it, Misty-sama?" demanded a young girl with a pronounced lisp. "Really soon?"

"I promise," Misty said with the tiniest of smiles. "In only a few short days, everyone in this city is going to be playing together."

"Wow…cool!" cried a third child, pumping his arms up in the air. "We'll see you then, Misty-sama!"

As soon as the children were out of earshot, Carly sat down next to her mentor and whispered, "I'm surprised you'd be so disingenuous with them. Not that I particularly mind, but…it doesn't really seem like you."

Misty folded her hands in her lap, the smile disappearing completely from her face. "I haven't been 'like me' for quite a bit of time now," she replied quietly. "I'm just glad it'll all be over soon."

"Misty-san…" murmured Carly with concern.

The other Dark Signer just shook her head, however.

"Besides…it isn't really a lie, is it?" she asked, her expression brightening back up a bit. "These children will lose their mortal bodies once the Underworld and the Earth are as one; that is true. But once each and every one of their souls have been harvested…in a sense, they really will all be together. Preserved for eternity in the bosom of our gods."

"Hmm…I suppose I never really thought about it that way before," said Carly thoughtfully. "Do you really think we'll be able to save everyone that way?"

Misty sighed – or she would've, if she still breathed. "Honestly…no," she admitted. "Realistically speaking, it's going to be a bloodbath no matter what we do. Any who die from unrelated causes – falling rubble or car crashes or such – may simply end up being casualties of War, and nothing else. I don't like it, but…well, in the end…"

"The utopia that the King shall craft in the aftermath will be well worth it," Carly finished for her, nodding with determination. "We both know that. We've both seen it."

"Yes…we have," stated Misty after a brief pause, before shaking her head and attempting to smile again. "Well…enough about that. Did you accomplish your business here?"

Carly extracted the rolled up Daily Duels from her cloak and nodded again. "Hopefully this will satisfy Demak," she said. "How about you?"

Misty shrugged her shoulders. "It only took me about five minutes to find the wrench they asked for," answered the other Dark Signer. "Even had plenty of time left over to find Kiryu a CD. I figure he deserves a reward for being a little bit less of a pain in the ass than usual lately."

That got a small laugh out of Carly. It was rather short-lived, however, as Misty followed up by asking, "So…why did it take you so long, anyway? I've been waiting here nearly an hour."

Carly didn't respond for a little while, and when she finally did, it was without making eye contact. "I think we'd better start heading back. It won't be much longer to sunset," she muttered distantly.

Misty looked stunned by the sudden change in demeanor, but did not pry. Carly was grateful for that. Much as Rudger was always going on about how there were to be no secrets amongst their "family," well…there were certain things she preferred to keep locked away in her own head.

Of course, it wasn't like even that was an entirely private place anymore. Inwardly, as she and Misty got up from the bench and began the trek out of the city, she beseeched the god that dwelled within her heart for its opinion.

It did not hesitate to give it.

I have made no secret of My…ambivalence…toward your plan for the Signer of the Wings, My host. This is why. Your judgment and keen mind for strategy – otherwise impeccable – are invariably skewed with regard to him.

"That isn't how I see it," she whispered within her own mind, though her mouth remained closed and her face remained impassive. "On the contrary…Jack is the one subject on which my judgment always holds true."

Believe Me, Carly Nagisa…it is only because I am well aware that I cannot dissuade you from this path, that I choose not to stand in your way. If it is a mistake, then it is yours to make.

"And I appreciate that," said Carly, entirely sincerely. "Truly, I do."

Then what is the matter?

Many things flashed through Carly's mind as she struggled to come up with an adequate answer for this. Memories of long days spent gazing over great stretches of farmland toward the horizon, longing to experience a life beyond it…of long nights, hunched over a beat-up journal and scribbling furiously as she honed the one craft that made her feel truly special…

She saw one man who believed in her dreams, and a hundred others who did not…countless days of humiliation, until that fateful night it'd all come crashing down…

Successes and failures, big scoops and colossal duds – a remarkably full career, bursting with the greatest highs and the most miserable lows, cut short when she'd least expected it…

Most of all, though, swimming through her mind's eye were three faces, each turned away from her. One was a man whom she didn't go a day without missing; the first person she'd ever killed, although certainly far from the last.

The man who had paid the price for her former self's weakness. Her foolishness and frivolousness and stupidity. Her greatest mistake, marked forever in the form of a kindly smile she would never see again.

Losing him had been the start of the Darkness in her Heart, she knew – the Darkness now so great that it threatened to swallow up this entire planet and never let go. In some ways, therefore, she knew that it'd needed to happen. Destiny was at play here, and she had no say in the matter.

Even four years later, though…that didn't make it hurt any less.

The second face was lined and worn, a life of stress and worry resulting in wrinkles decades before they should've manifested. It was of a woman she hated, far more deeply than her petty rivalry with Angela and far more personally than her general loathing of the Signers.

And it was of a woman who hated her back in return. Or, at least…it was supposed to be.

Basic logic would dictate that it be so, after all. There was no reason why, after countless arguments and vicious insults and cold stares – after she'd done her utmost to shackle her family down to a world without a future, only to be abandoned by a slain husband and a spiteful daughter – she should feel anything other than resentment for the child who'd fled with nary a glance backward.

That after all that, the sanctimonious bitch could still be in a state of mind where Carly was at the forefront of her thoughts…and not in the cold, methodical sense of simply wanting to know what'd happened to her for its own sake, but with such an active misery in her voice…

It made Carly distinctly uncomfortable. Mostly because acknowledging that it was truly the case would also mean accepting that there was something worthwhile in the Carly Nagisa of Ayasato, who'd been tossed aside long ago so that the Carly Nagisa of Neo Domino City might live anew…and who, in turn, had been summarily executed to make room for Carly Nagisa, the Dark Queen of this world.

Which brought Carly to the final face.

Some people might find it strange just how deeply ingrained Jack Atlas had become in her heart; they'd only known each other for a matter of weeks, after all. But those people most assuredly had never been in love.

Neither had Carly herself, she knew now. Every other bond of affection she'd experienced across her twenty years of life simply paled in comparison, like flickering light bulbs set against a blazing sun.

It wasn't just that he was a gorgeous specimen of the human form, or that he was a world-famous duelist of nearly unmatchable skill. Both were true, of course, and certainly increased his appeal in her eyes. But those were fuel for silly schoolgirl crushes, the likes of which she'd had on any number of pop singers when she was a teenager.

What she felt now was…different.

If nothing else, she had the ultimate proof in the simple fact that her feelings hadn't changed one iota after dying. Becoming one with a literal god had widened her perspective in so many ways; it wasn't like her former, weak self would've been able to stomach killing one person, much less the millions that would need to be sacrificed to ensure a better world.

Yet even as a walking corpse, his stoic face and piercing, violet eyes captured her unbeating heart just as thoroughly as they had when she'd still been alive…if not moreso.

Still, it wasn't as if she'd ever expected him to return those affections. Not yet, anyway. In all the time they'd been together, she'd been her usual klutzy, spastic, useless self – hardly girlfriend material, by any stretch of the imagination.

That was why she'd decided to accept this power in the first place, after all. To make herself worthy of him. The perfect Dark Queen to the King of Riding Duels.

And yet…after what she'd just heard…

Carly shook her head. He'd never actually responded to her mother's accusations, merely reacted with shock…and really, who wouldn't in that situation? This was just Suzuki Nagisa jumping to conclusions, like she always did.

That was what she told herself, at least. But her thoughts wouldn't remain this jumbled up and murky if she was entirely certain.

Because on the off-chance that her mother's claim had been right on the money…the very foundation of who she was now would crumble away in an instant.

What if, simply to entertain the thought…he had fallen in love with her in turn? What if all she'd done to reshape herself into his perfect partner had been for naught?

Or worse…what if the manner in which she had changed caused him to rescind that love? Every improvement that her god had made upon her mind, body, and soul had been for the better; she knew that.

But was there any guarantee he would agree?

Finally, with all this coursing through her mind in a tangled mess, the answer to her Jibakushin's question echoed in a quiet whisper: "I don't know…"

Then…allow Me to set your mind at ease.

She listened, rapturously.

There is a reason that I chose you, Carly Nagisa…above every other human that has ever before died.

Most of My brethren chose quickly, but I was patient. I knew that eventually, a truly unique soul would come to the Underworld. One that would give Me strength. One whom I could give strength.

Your indomitability, your everlasting persistence…none can stop you when you set your mind, and consequently, none can stop Us. Do not allow petty fears and doubts to sneak into your Heart, and defeat what a thousand enemies could not.

If this man, the Signer, is what you truly desire…then let nothing else matter.

Draw strength from the pain of your past, but do not dwell on it.

And bring to a Final End all else that remains.

Are We understood?

"Yes…yes, we are," answered Carly aloud, her downcast expression dissipating in an instant. "Thank you…"

This one, Misty heard, and she turned to her pupil with a small smile. "Did you have a good talk?" she asked kindly.

She didn't need to request context, even if she hadn't actually heard the conversation itself. She could gather the important details entirely from the other Dark Signer's physiognomy, which had brightened considerably.

"The best," Carly told her, returning the smile; if it were capable of doing so with its beak, Aslla piscu would likely have done the same.

"Now…let's go home."