Tekeshi sat up suddenly, the world still a mess of blurriness. He didn't feel like he was still in the same place though. He also couldn't feel Jakkasu anywhere nearby. That meant that Utsuki wasn't nearby, she had the sword on her back when the car hit them. Where was she, and where was he? This was old at this point and the circumstances were threatening to send him into a panic attack.
"Kodomo, breathe. Breathe, in, and then out. Ok, can you tell me what happened," he couldn't tell which of his parents was talking to him, the sound was severely muffled.
"Car, rammed, deliberate," he was having trouble speaking.
"We know that part, what happened to 'Suki," the only three people that referred to her by that name were him, Asusa, and his mother, so he knew who was talking to him now.
"Don't know. Dark shape, bright flash, black," things were starting to clear, and he felt his ring being pulled off.
"Ok, that should help. Tekeshi, someone kidnapped 'Suki. During the kidnapping they shot you in the head. Yukari said that even with your remarkable healing, and that being the only major wound you took, it may take several hours to several days for it to clear completely. Are you able to able to understand me well enough?"
"Haha, I, trouble, thoughts. Pain, very bad, pain," it was starting to become unbearable, and darkness took him over again.
How long it lasted he didn't know. He just seemed to float in a void, completely incapable of thinking or feeling. He couldn't even have emotion regarding it, it was just simply nothingness of a variety he couldn't even comprehend.
Waking he called out, "Haha."
"Tekeshi, are you awake again. Please stay with us, you keep falling in and out, please stay," he could make out the panic in his mother's voice.
"Moka, we need to let him rest. Yukari has said that unless she can find a way to remove the bullet he will continue this cycle of coma and semi lucidness. The more he rests, the stronger he will get to undergo surgery," he heard his father as he faded again.
The next time he woke was different. He felt weak, and not the kind of weak where he didn't measure up to being a vampire. He felt a level of fatigue that he couldn't describe, but his thoughts were much clearer. Reaching up he could feel a bandage on his head, and a small round wound on his skull. It seemed to him that it felt vaguely like it may have been shrinking while his hand was on it.
"Tekeshi, oh thank any and all gods that there are. Can you understand me," he wasn't able to make out the emotions in his mother's voice right then, but he could understand her.
"Mom, I can. My thoughts, are still a little hazy. What is going on?"
"You underwent surgery a few hours ago. Yukari removed a nine millimeter slug from your head. The people that put it there kidnapped Miss Shiraishi. Do you remember anything, anything at all about what happened," he heard his father's voice.
Opening his eyes things were still blurry, "Not much. The light went red right after you went through. It seemed like it stayed that way for a long time, and then it changed to green, or blue, I'm actually unsure on that part. My mind says it should have been green, but the light looked blue."
"Kodomo, focus. What happened when the light changed?"
"Uh, I accelerated, and then I heard a car start to go balls to the wall. I swung my bike around to take it head on to protect 'Suki, she came off the back and slammed against a car, not lethally hard, maybe enough to knock her out. I came off and hit my head, I stayed awake, barely, saw what I guess was a leg. Everything was blurry at that point. I started looking up to the top of it and everything went black."
Things were starting to clear up as his father came into his vision. His face didn't look quite right. He didn't smile all that often, mainly when things were just overly happy, but he never really frowned. At that moment though he had the saddest and most worried frown on his face that Tekeshi had ever seen on anyone's face.
"This was a big deal. It got out on the news before either my agents, or the Imperial Family, could head it off. It gave us some footage of what happened. I think they meant to make you dump the bike, and weren't prepared when you turned into them. It did look like she was alive when they took her, I don't think they want her dead."
"How long, Dad?"
"A week. We haven't had any luck finding her."
A voice from off to one side caught their attention, "Master Aono, a gentleman and lady came up to the manor. They are waiting in the parlor, they want to speak with you and Master Tekeshi."
Tsukune turned to the door, "Did they say who they were Gustave?"
"Yes, sir. They said that they were Mistress Utsuki's parents. They were very insistent, and quite panicked."
Tsukune's face became hard and angry, "How dare the..."
"Gustave, send them up here. Dad, cool yourself, not everything is as you think you know it," Tekeshi interrupted his father.
Tsukune couldn't quite believe that the rather handsome, though still short, man was the same one that he had met before. The same with the tall beautiful woman that was with him. At one point she would have even matched Moka in her appearance.
"Mr. Aono, I would like to introduce myself a little more appropriately compared to how we met previously. I am Shiraishi Mamoru, and this is my wife, Shiraishi Tamiko. I know that our appearances, are rather not what you may have been expecting. We were under the influence of a curse that was imposed by my family. Your son, somehow, was able to break it. I know that we said we would disappear, but things have changed greatly."
"You know what happened," Tsukune's voice was cold and emotionless.
"It was shown on the news in the U.S. as well. Beyond the fact that my daughter was taken, was the fact of who took her, and why they shouldn't have been able to take her. They were members of my family, and they should all be dead."
Moka cocked her head over when this was said, "Dead. That does make this interesting, and much more concerning than it was before."
Tsukune leaned forward and looked the man in the eyes, "From what I have been led to believe, you're from a clan of yokai hunters. Do you know what we are? I feel that you do, and you would walk right into the spider's web knowing what danger that could bring."
"Mr. Aono, the Shiraishi Family was simply a branch family with a very specific purpose. I have seen much worse than you. I saw much worse released and kill my family. You assume that I am simply a fly, how do you know that I am not actually a wasp?"
"We have more important things to worry about right now. Unless you have forgotten, 'Suki is missing. We need to be focused on finding and saving her. You can have your dick measuring contest later. Mr. Shiraishi, you said that they were Shiraishi, how do you know," Tekeshi really could care less about any tensions the two were experiencing.
He held his hand up and displayed a mark, "This is the mark of the Shira. Pointed at the wrist would mean that you were Shirayoshi, towards the thumb Shirayama, the heel of the hand Shiranoma, and at the middle finger Shiraishi. All of them had this mark pointing at their middle finger. I don't understand how, as leaving the village without being given a mission was strictly forbidden. To my knowledge there was nobody missing from the village the day my brother unsealed a nodachi that contained a powerful vampire like being that had been sealed for over four hundred years. I took Tamiko and Utsuki and ran. I noticed that there were bodies missing when I returned to see what had happened, and assumed that they had been consumed. Apparently they survived, and may have moved to another village that belonged to one of the other Shira Clan branch families."
"It is possible, but why would they want to take her?"
"She turns sixteen in a couple of months. They planned to retrieve her around the time she turned sixteen, and we never had a chance to tell them exactly when her birthday is. My Uncle was among the missing bodies, and if he is still alive and leading them, I fear she may be in danger. He always claimed that he loved me and my mother, even if he didn't care for my father. I think he had an unhealthy obsession with my mother, and after she died he may have somewhat lost his mind."
Moka quietly asked, "Do you think he would harm her?"
Mr. Shiraishi closed his eyes, "He was a vain and vindictive bastard during my childhood. Not to mention that he was very manipulative. He was able to convince people to follow him without question. He would have executed me, Tamiko, and Utsuki when we went to the village without a second thought."
Tekeshi took a breath, "Would her having a demon bound to her put her in danger beyond that?"
"It may save her life, if they can find a way to bend her to their will. Making a contract with a demon was not unheard of as a way to contain them, and use them as a weapon. Most likely they will have sealed the demon she is contracted with, and brainwash her. How did she come to contract with a demon again?"
"Deesseedra was summoned to kill her. Due to events I ended up cutting her in half, and 'Suki swallowed a few drops of her blood. She is what is known as a Witch of War, there are others, and one of them is teaching her. I will not lie, I have been confused on most of the stuff that has been happening this month, and the two or three weeks preceding. I also just realized that my bike is gone, and the ones that ran us over, are in for a world of hurt, because that motorcycle meant a lot to me."
They had left Tekeshi to get some more rest and finish recovering, and moved to Tsukune's office. That the atmosphere was tense would have been the understatement of eternity. Moka and Tsukune only knew the situation between Utsuki and her parents from Utsuki's viewpoint. It had been strong enough that they were having trouble understanding that how they had acted was truly from the effects of a curse being placed on them. Moka could seem cold and unfeeling to people that didn't know her well, but she couldn't comprehend ever acting that way under any circumstance.
"I don't really understand much of what is happening right now, but please help us find my daughter," the acidic hatred that had been in Mrs. Shiraishi's voice before was completely absent.
Tsukune didn't even look up from where sat with his head rested on his fists, "We had planned to save her regardless. However I find it so convenient that you have changed your tune so much in such a short period of time. Do you truly have no clue of what your husband here knows?"
The woman shook her head, "Mamoru hasn't told me much. He said he didn't know how to explain it, and that you most likely at some point. Mamoru, what is it that is going on? I just want the last fifteen years to make more sense. All this witch, demon, all of that is making me scared. Just what the hell is going on?"
"I told you years ago about my family, however the curse probably took most of that from you. I was born into a clan of yokai hunters. Well a branch family to a very politically connected clan anyways. The Shira were at one point so entwined with the power structure of Japan, that it would have been impossible for the country to have existed. However they kept to the shadows. I don't know at what time they disappeared, but from what I have been able to put together it was in the late 1500s. I don't know any of the details, but first the family of merchants, the Shiranoma were somehow accussed of funding rebels, and all were put to the sword."
"That's horrible, even the women and children?"
Mamoru nodded, "It was a time when evil men had control of the world, not that that has ended. No man or monster that seeks power, is anything but evil. There was a family of samurai, the Shirayama. I am not quite sure what happened there, I just know that the men died out in battle, and the others of the family disappeared, most likely abducted or killed in secrecy. Then the main family, the Shira, were drug into public and executed. No one knows why or on whose orders it was done. Not long after the Shirayoshi just seemed to cease existing. They were shinobi, so they may have known what was going on, and just wanted nothing to do with it."
"What about your family? Somehow they weren't touched in all of this. Why," the woman was confused.
"I don't understand it myself. We would have been the easiest to eliminate, we weren't even trying to hide until one of our elders in that time decided that we should hide our village in order to survive. One would need to know how to find it to even have a hope. It wasn't even unheard of for members who had come and gone for decades to suddenly disappear trying to come home. It came to the point that the Shira gave an order to all of the families that remained that they should execute any who should stray. Eventually we learned that the Imperial Family had declared that yokai hunters were such a precious resource, that none could be executed for any reason, save they fell to being yokai themselves. That is the only reason we survived that day."
"All I remember is darkness and then waking up, hazy. Honestly everything from then until now is just hazy in my mind, like I was living a life that wasn't mine, and I just woke up from it."
"I was trained as a swordsman in my childhood, and I probably would have become one of the priests, or hunters had I never left. I never learned much about these curses, except that they were imparted from items of great malice."
"Will they do something like that to Utsuki?"
"They won't, because he already knows where they have taken her. If their own village was not longer habitable, then go to the next village that would be near impossible for anyone to find. The Shirayoshi village."
Everyone turned to see Tekeshi in the doorway. He was steady enough on his feet that it appeared he was fully recovered. He was dressed as usually would be out of school. In one hand he was holding a sledgehammer halfway up the handle.
"Kodomo, you should still be in bed. What are you doing up," Tsukune stood up as he spoke.
If the teen noticed the order in the question he didn't bother acknowledging it, "They took 'Suki a week ago. We can't afford to wait any longer if we know where she is. I just wish he would stop beating around the bush, and ask us straight up to go with him and get her back."
"Tekeshi, this is an adult matt..."
"Shut up. You hesitate too much in these situations. You aren't a human anymore, you need to understand that. You could rule this world, and that you don't should be on your own merit, not from your ideas from when you were a damn human. Besides, you were my age fighting a full on war that still hasn't ended. I'm blooded, and I don't hesitate. Whether you like it or not, I am going."
"Tsukune, as much as I hate to, I have to agree with him. He is her protector, and her friend. He was the one that was harmed when they took her. It is his responsibility to retrieve her," Moka's voice was low, and very deliberately paced.
Tsukune turned to his wife, "Moka, he is a child. I don't care what he has done, or what we did. He has the chance to get away from that, he shouldn't have to live that life. He should grow up with peace, or at least as much peace as is possible."
"Then he wouldn't be a vampire. We wouldn't. Vampires are not peaceful. No matter what we will have some conflict we are subject to, it is who we are. We may do everything that we can to minimize it, but we can't eliminate it. I know you wish it was otherwise, but it is reality," she said as she stood and took Tsukune in a hug.
Tsukune took a deep breath, "I know. You win. Tekeshi you are going."
"Also, I am never coming back to this house after I finally get back to school. This has been the worst month ever," Tekeshi said as he walked out of the room.
Moka chuckled, "That is literally the best argument I have ever heard for never coming home again. I love our son, and that weird personality he has developed."
A/N: It has been nice being able to get back to writing. I kinda wish that we had a larger fandom, but I appreciate every read and review. I want to hear where people would like for it to go, what they think of the characters. What they hate, or can't understand.