Betwixt Heaven and Earth
Fourth Divide: Ripples
"Why have you come?"
Tezuka Kunimitsu allowed himself to smile slightly at the young woman standing in the doorway in front of him. "I think it would be better to discuss this inside." He looked briefly over his shoulder at the world beyond. "I do not want to take any chances."
"...All right. Please, come in." With that, she stepped aside, and held the door open for him so that he could step over the portico and into the room beyond.
He nodded his head in gratitude as he walked in, turning to look at her as soon as he was inside. "Thank you, ."
gave him a look that was steady, unreadable – a sharp contrast to the surprise that had been so clear on her face when she first opened the door. He could understand why: after all, she would not have expected to see him, especially since he had been absent from her life for nearly ten years.
But things were different now. Things were changing. He could not stand aside as events unfolded – not while there was something he could do.
"I thought that you would be busy at studies with your grandfather," remarked as she gestured for him to follow her, the two of them heading for the large living room where usually received her guests. "As I understood it, you were not meant to return for quite a while."
Tezuka nodded. "That is true, but I could not watch what was happening all around me and do nothing. Especially since...I am partly to blame for some of what has happened..."
stopped dead in her tracks. She whirled around to face him, and her eyes were wide in horror. "You could not possibly mean-"
"Yes," Tezuka replied, cutting her statement short. "Echizen is behind all of this."
groaned, and put a hand to her head. "Dragon Gods have mercy on us all... That child will be the death of us if he keeps this up..." She looked at him once more, and this time, there was fire in her eyes. "This could only have come about if you had shared with him secrets that should not have been shared."
"I assure you that I did nothing of the kind."
"But he could not have gained so much power so quickly had that not been the case!"
"As I have told you before, whatever secrets that I have deemed too important to share with him, I have kept secret."
"Well, whatever you have shared with him seems to be giving him far more power than he ought to have," replied tartly. "And here I would have thought that you, a distinguished descendant of Abe no Seimei, would have more sense in his head than that."
Tezuka flushed in shame and anger at the accusation – one feat among a few more interesting ones that only could accomplish. "I will repeat what I have said, : I have shared no important secrets with the boy. Whatever I have taught to him is harmless. If I am responsible for anything, it is only for having shown him his potential. Even you, Dragon Mage, cannot accuse me for being in the wrong by doing that."
gazed back at him stonily, before she turned around so that her back was facing to him. "Very well then, onmyoji, I shall take your word for it." She sighed, and then turned around once more to face him. "What is it that you have come to me for? You would not have come here unless there was something you needed."
A small smile once again appeared on Tezuka's face. She was reason enough for him to temporarily abandon his studies as an onmyoji, but of course he did not tell her that, and he would never tell her that. He had come for a reason, one that was important because it concerned not only himself but also others who, like him and , relied upon the Veil to keep them hidden from the world.
His face became serious again, taking on an expression that he used very often when he was dealing with something important. "I came here to look at the Scrolls of Abe no Seimei(1)."
looked at him for a long while, and Tezuka was once more reminded of just who was watching over her and who was educating her. This was no ordinary mortal who dabbled in the mysterious ways of magic: she had been educated, carefully and deliberately, by forces that were far greater than any he could comprehend. Although he was one of the most talented onmyoji to come around since his famous and esteemed ancestor, his learning was puny in comparison to what she had already learned.
Finally, looked away, and waved her hand in a beckoning gesture. "Follow me then. I will take you to the scrolls."
--~*~||Ω||~*~--
"Radar says there is a ghoul to your left, Niou," murmured into the wireless headset that Niou had given her.
There was a brief crackle over the line, and then Niou spoke up: "Okay , let's get a couple of things straight here. First of all, please speak a little more loudly. Sometimes we can't hear you over the screaming the ghouls make when we kill them. And secondly, you really ought to learn the twenty-four hour direction method. Instead of telling me left, right, front or back, you ought to say something like ‘Ghoul at 2100.' It makes things so much less troublesome."
The latter end of the sentence was lost in the midst of a high-pitched wail, one that caused a shiver to travel up and down 's spine. She had been hearing those screams for some time already, and she knew that these were the death screams of the ghouls as Niou and Kirihara cut them down. She was unused to the idea of killing anything, her experience having been limited solely to various video games, but even then the sound effects of even the most gruesome games paled in comparison to what she was hearing.
Deciding that it was probably best if she did something else, she tuned out the screaming ghouls, and instead focused on another task that she had been given: pinpointing the location of this Echizen Ryoma whom her erstwhile friends seemed desperate to find and eliminate. According to Niou and Kirihara, the laptop they had given to her was supposed to allow her to "scry" for information. Although she was unfamiliar with the term outside of an RPG context, she began to think of it as the supernatural version of the Internet.
What surprised her, though, was that in spite of her lack of knowledge and experience regarding scrying, found it extremely easy to do. All she had to do was focus her mind on what she was looking for, as if her brain was a modem that she could link up to the rest of the supernatural world, and from there, she would use the computer to access the information she needed as if she was really on the Internet. When she thought of it that way, it really wasn't all that hard to do – in fact, she found it extremely fun since her brain worked faster than any modem could ever hope to work.
In the midst of following a trail of information that she found promising, a brilliant flash of light crossed her field of vision, and when she disappeared, she found herself standing in the middle of an all-white room. In front of her was a teenaged boy with dark hair and wide, amber eyes, for all appearances no older than twelve or thirteen at the most.
Apart from the fact that she had gotten to this room a bit too quickly for her own liking, what troubled her the most was the fact that the boy didn't seem to be quite solid. He looked almost like a really bad hologram, since he seemed to be quite fuzzy around the edges, and kept flickering in and out of sight.
The boy blinked at her, as if surprised to see her, before he smiled a smile that made shiver due to how sinister it looked. She wondered all of a sudden how such a young boy could have a smile so evil.
"Well, well, well... Are you looking for me?" The boy's voice was sweet and crooning, almost as if was a child who was about to get punished. "Mada mada dane. You haven't quite found me just yet. Still, I suppose that I can't let you go without some sort of reward, right? After all, you are the first to find me..." Once more, he smiled that wicked, wicked smile. "I hope you enjoy my gift. Have fun."
There was another flash, and once more was back in reality, with the laptop in front of her as it had been only moments earlier. This time, however, she felt a chill run up and down her spine, and she got the distinct feeling that someone – or rather, something – was standing behind her. Slowly, she turned to look, and what she saw made her gasp in horror.
A row of ghouls was standing right behind her, all of them gazing down at her with hungry, hollow eyes. A low, rumbling sound emanated from them, and she realized that there were probably more of them than she could see at the moment.
The rumbling also reminded her that they were probably very, very hungry.
Skittering backwards off the bench she had been sitting on, reached into her bag, and pulled out the gun that she had been given. A small part of her wondered if the bullets would have any effect on the undead, but her survival instinct immediately negated all unnecessary thoughts as she turned the safety off, pointed her gun, and started shooting. Her first five shots took down five of the ghouls, but that was all. What was worse, the ghouls were advancing towards her, walking in a slow, but sure and deliberate, shuffle.
Over her headset, she heard Kirihara complain: "Argh! Zombies! These will be hard to bring down..."
Suddenly reminded of their existence, pressed the button on her headset, ensuring that both Kirihara and Niou would hear her. "Get your sorry asses over here quickly! I've got ghouls on my tail!" She heard one of them snarl, and on instinct she fired her gun. The one she shot dropped to the ground and didn't move, but the others just stepped over their newly-dead comrade and kept heading towards her.
"What the hell?! How?!" That was Niou's voice, which was followed by three ghouls screaming to announce their expiration. "Don't worry, we'll be there!" The line went dead with even more ghouls screaming in the background and a short, sharp click.
let go of the headset, and faced the ghouls that were approaching her. She realized that she had not choice except to defend herself until Niou or Kirihara – or both, if her luck held – arrived to protect her, and so she lifted her gun, pointed it at the ghouls, and started shooting the ones that got too close. For a while, it was an effective strategy, but soon, there were just too many of them to hold back, and feared that in a few moments, she would run out of bullets.
The ghouls stopped within three feet of her, and blinked, lowering her gun only slightly to look at them. What in the world were they doing? Why weren't they attacking?
She got her answer a few seconds later. The sea of ghouls parted as another one of their kind approached, only this one was bigger and taller than the others.
Only this one had no face.
wanted to scream when she saw the creature, but she could not. Her voice had become frozen in her throat, while her body stood rooted to the spot where she was standing, paralyzed in fear. Even if she could, there was nowhere she could run: she was utterly surrounded on all sides by other ghouls.
There was no escape. Death was to be her fate, and it had taken the form of this faceless, groaning monstrosity.
"So then, do you like my gift?"
Those were the last words that heard in her head before a wave of nausea overcame her, causing her to slump to the ground in a dead faint, not knowing what was to become of her.
--~*~||Ω||~*~--
The shift in the air was palpable, almost like a wave of pressure that rippled through her consciousness before moving on, traveling elsewhere. She lifted her head, and turned to look into the distance.
The Veil had rippled. Something had happened.
"So you have felt it too then, child?"
She glanced up at the being that stood before her: a man tall and handsome, with piercing eyes and long dark hair, his clothes covered by a cloak of raven feathers. Upon his head he wore a crown, which bore golden deer antlers. In response to his question, she nodded her head. "I have, My Lord."
He nodded his head solemnly. "I see. Then you also know that many things are about to happen – things that you might not like." He tilted his head at her, a small smile on his lips. "What are you to do, my child? What course of action shall you take?"
She did not reply, even if it would have been the polite thing to do. Still, she gazed out into the distance, her eyes seeing a normal street, though she knew her companion could see far more than that.
"Maybe it's time you paid them a visit," the man remarked. "You do know that he has been looking for you."
She shook her head. "Finvarra's son can wait."
"But Finvarra's son also happens to be very much like his father: impatient, occasionally brash, and desirous to get what he wants by any means possible."
She looked up at the man, a teasing smile on her face. "I did not imagine that Lord Oberon would be so willing to hand over his adopted daughter so quickly to another man."
Lord Oberon, King of the Fae, smirked. "I never said that I was handing you over to him, . I was merely pointing out the flaws of his character. Moreover, there is no way that I willingly allow the Daoine Sidhe to take you so easily."
, adopted daughter of the Faery Court ruled by Titania and Oberon, glanced up at the king. "Nor would I wish to join their ranks any time soon. I am quite happy here with you and Her Majesty."
However, she knew that Oberon was right: something was going on in the world, and there was no way that she could choose to ignore it. She would have to choose which side she would ally with, and from there she would have to decide what she should do with the considerable power that she had behind her.
She had a feeling that one of her closest and dearest friends was also facing the same situation, but she knew that, in the end, would choose to adhere to her code, and that was, in the end, to ensure that the Balance of the world was not upset.
As for she... Well, that was another story entirely.
Still, she knew that she had some amount of time left before she made her decision. Trouble, after all, had its own time and its own place. As far as she was concerned, the real trouble would not begin until much later.
Indeed, she still had some time – quite a bit of time left.
Proceed to [ The Fifth Divide ]
Return to [ The Third Divide ]
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Kage
29.May.2006
(1)= The Scrolls of Abe no Seimei are completely and utterly fictional, and do
not exist in real life. I just made them up for the purposes of this story.
Again, story and dialogue was lifted from Akatsuki.Saga's Ten of Swords,
with the exception of the scenes regarding Fae [Mia] and Dragon Mage [Kaida]. I have, however,
changed and expanded dialogue and exposition in order to suit my writing style.
THEME MUSIC: "Gothic Power" – Christopher Field
NOTES: