Vampire Hunter D Fan Fiction ❯ Dark Encore ❯ Shadows and Specters ( Chapter 5 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Dark Encore

Chapter Five: Shadows and Specters

"But where will you go

With no one left to save you from yourself

You can't escape

You can't escape…"

- Evanescence, "Where Will You Go"

Author's Note: This chapter was actually a real nightmare to get uploaded, as the document holding it and a bunch of other stuff decided to scare me half to death by disappearing. Luckily for me, there was aid readily available, and the document was recovered with relative ease. I hope this doesn't happen again in the future, my poor heart can't take much more of this!

~*~

"You're Meier Link, are you? I don't believe it."

A breeze whistled its seemingly lonely way by after Erika made that statement. Whether she didn't believe him or whether she was trying to irritate him was unknown; despite her words, though, one hand went to her blaster and she shifted her weight uneasily. Whatever his identity was, she didn't trust him to just stand there and not attack for a while longer. She knew he was dangerous.

Meier Link smiled his cold smirk again before replying, "You don't believe me, eh?" Something in his tone of voice - A split second after he said that, Erika realized there was something he had deliberately left unspoken, and that she knew exactly what it was. She could hear it in her mind… 'Then I will make you believe.'

A split-second was all the time the legend needed to attack with an accursed dark blade. She noted that, curiously enough, the blade seemed to be part of that cloak of his…perhaps it had something to do with manipulation of matter? She couldn't tell and - as the blade swung towards her - she realized she probably wouldn't ever be able to find out…

In that lethal moment, a dark shape swirled in front of her, blocking the blow with a blade of its own. Erika looked up, up, up in the hopes of finding out who it was. The wide-brimmed, dark hat and swirling brown-black hair told her immediately who it was. D had saved her life, without a doubt, for the second time in a row! Shaking herself out of the shock, she took a few steps away from D and then a few more so that she could take stock of the situation. Most likely, D had been following them for some time now - why she did not know; either that, or it had been a mere coincidence…no, it could be no coincidence. What was it that Leila had said once? 'There's no such thing as coincidence, my dear, there's only destiny, whether you think so or not.' No wonder that the old woman would say that; after what had happened to her, she had become quite the believer in destiny.

Right now, Erika was quite near thinking that Grandma Leila had been on to something there, when she had said that. If D hadn't been there, she would have died, and if she had died right then and there, she wouldn't have been able to carry out what she considered her mission…and Rose would be in even more danger than she was already. Rose! Just remembering the sister she hadn't been born with made her recall that Rose had followed her out of the van…and was probably right behind her…"Ah, crap." Addressing the battling people as if they could hear her, she said, "Beggin' your pardon, but I need to get a friend of mine out of danger." Obligatory politeness executed, she turned around to Rose. "Now, Rose…"

Her voice trailed off and her eyes widened at what had happened. Rose's eyes had taken on a strange light golden tint and seemed to be incapable of reflecting the moon or anything else. Her hair had somehow gotten free of its braid and fell past her shoulders - it might have been a few inches away from elbow length by now, she hadn't been checking - in all its curling red glory. This could probably be on account of all the wind, but what was with her eyes? They were different now, and not just because they had lost all ability to reflect the light. Erika was stunned; was Rose victim of a split personality or something? "Rose? Hello? Is anyone there, Rose?" She had to raise her voice over the sound of the combat - apparently D and Meier were evenly matched; not too much of a shock really.

She could care less about that at the moment…

The hazel-eyed girl looked at her carefully before whispering in an ethereal, ghostly voice, "My favorite flowers…" A tear slipped down the strange girl's face and it suddenly hit Erika that whoever was speaking, whoever owned those lightless eyes, had an insanely heavy burden upon her back and that reminding her of anything that could cause pain would do no good. Hesitantly, Erika reached out to give her a hug, but a pair of paler hands stayed her own. One of them released one of her hands and then gently placed itself against the side of her face. Meeting the light gaze, Erika nearly started when she saw a faraway, sad look there. Then the girl spoke again. "No, don't. Don't be upset, dear companion. I chose this long ago."

Back at the fight, Erika's assumption was quickly becoming true. No matter how many times each tried to throw the other off balance or somehow defeat them, D and Meier were unable to do so. Quite frankly, D was getting annoyed, and so was Meier, and both undoubtedly for the same reason - why was it so blasted impossible to finish the fight at long last?! Meier nearly snarled as he swiped again and was blocked again. While D was not nearly so prone to displays of anger, it was obvious that he too was irked by this inability to either defeat or be defeated.

With the battle clearly at a stalemate, Meier decided to opt for conversation while parrying swipes and attacking in his own turn. "You seem to be doing rather well these days, dhampire."

A long pause in which there were several metallic, loud CLANG-ing noises that could only have been produced by blades striking each other. "For someone who is rumored to have gone insane, you seem to be doing well also." There was an unspoken question there - Are the rumors really true, or did you somehow remain sane after what happened?

The unspoken question got a spoken answer, "So humans call grief 'madness' these days, do they?" Another clash of blades, and Meier was in the dhampire's face, glaring at him darkly. "You understand nothing…"

"I chose this long ago." For some odd reason, a strange voice could be heard over the din of their battle and resultant chat, and both looked away for a moment to see what was going on - not good to turn a back on potential enemies for long, after all. The potential enemies in question were looking rather harmless - the blonde girl was currently carrying the red-haired, apparently quite unconscious one to the van parked nearby, which was obviously theirs, as neither one of the descendants of the night would go around in a van while in their right mind.

And despite all rumors, Meier Link was clearly in his right mind - for the most part, anyway; he probably had at least one screw loose, and Left Hand would probably yap about it if nobody else were around.

D looked back at his opponent only to see that, for reasons unknown, Meier Link had withdrawn from the battle. It took a moment for D to figure out exactly what was going on. "He's playing a game…" Then he considered what Meier had said during their fight - 'So humans call grief 'madness'…' He quickly came to one possible conclusion, which was: "…and he might be trying to lose."

After this brilliant conclusion, D once again disappeared into the night…