Back to ze past

"Come here." Yuki pulled Taro into a hug.

Alexander set his army up and puffed his chest out.

Taro hugged Yuki, pushing back the cynicism that threatened to make him speak out again. He gave a small laugh. "Too much is happening."

Rhun made his army attack, and then feigned shock when he found himself losing.

"You just need to sit down and have a breather." Yuki told him. "Just relax."

Alexander gave an evil laugh.

"Maybe." He said, drawing back and shaking his head. "Didn't mean to take it out on you."

"Retreat!" Rhun called, and gathered up the last of the 'living' toys, bounding away. "We've been defeated!"

"Its fine." Yuki said.

Alexander grinned. "I won!"

"Not really." Taro shrugged anyway and sat down.

"You always win!" Rhun exclaimed. "You're too good at these games, Alex!"

"Because I'm awesome." Alexander grinned and started to pack up. "We should put this away before Kate gets home."

Yuki sat beside him and looked at him carefully.

"Which will be any minute now." Rhun agreed, collecting the toys and piling them back into their box.

"When's Kate coming back? Might even be degraded to stealing some of Mori's wine." Taro sighed, resting his arms on his knees. "And the people should know Elizabeth's alive... They can't go long without a leader before they start panicking." He said with the ghost of a smirk, which quickly turned into a frown. "I would like a drink. I'm getting a drink."

Yuki laughed slightly. "Since when do you drink?" he rose an eyebrow at the vampire.

Alexander nodded. "I'm hungry anyway."

"Since... Since now." He decided, flashing Yuki a smile. He searched through the cupboard and found a bottle of red wine. "Want one?" He asked, pouring a glass for himself. It did smell nice, and it looked nice, not like Sake. So much nicer. Red was nicer than the clear of rice wine.

"Yeah, let's go wait for her then."

Yuki rose an eyebrow. "Mori's gonna be pissed if he finds you drinking his stash." He shook his head and looked down at his hands.

Alexander nodded.

"Would he notice? He's been as out of it as everyone else around here." He stated, watching Yuki and taking a drink from the glass. "Too preoccupied with everything he's not saying." He swilled the wine and looked down to the red whirlpool. "Wouldn't notice if I were to wave it in his face."

Rhun grinned and went down into the main room with Alex to wait for Kate.

Yuki lent back in his seat. "Its like I'm listening to a bitter Fool and not Taro."

"Bitter vampire." Taro corrected with a wry smile, shaking his head. "I have one use."

"You have alot." Yuki said. "What you lack is the ability to see it, or to put it into some kind of use."

"I'll find a use." He said, downing the rest of the glass. "I will. In any case, there's nothing to do here yet. Not until Elizabeth steps up. And that, that will be something. We'll feel like right lords won't we? Lord Yuki. What will we do then? Such purpose." He set down the glass and admired it."

"He, Yuki? Should Kate be back yet?" Rhun asked, looking over to the demon before glancing at Taro. "That's Mori's."
"I'm well aware of it." Taro said with another wide smile.

Yuki nodded. "He is aware. He just enjoys drinking it far too much to tell Mori and yes, she should. Why isn't she back?" He looked around curiously.

"What if something happened to her?" Alexander said in a little voice.

"She went to get groceries. What could possibly happen?" Rhun asked.
"We could go and look." Taro suggested, glancing to Yuki. "It'll be getting dark soon."

Mori hopped up and left Elizabeth, walking downstairs and snatching his wine back from Taro. "Hoi!"
"Ah, not as dull as expected, I see."
"What's that mean?"
"Nothing at all."

"Anyway, we'll be off." Yuki grabbed Taros arm and pulled him outside.

Taro brushed Yuki from him and folded his arms, starting to walk in the direction of the market.

"Taro. Stop this." Yuki said. "It isn't you. All this cynisim and anger built up." He sighed deeply. "Look, just stop."

Taro stopped in his track with an amused smile. "There. i stopped. Can we get back to looking for Kate yet?"

Yuki growled and held his head. "Taro! Come on. This is just... Alright come here." He pulled Taro into an ally way. "Alright. Hit me. Knock me out. make me bleed or just do something."

He sighed in exasperation. "Since when were you masochistic? I'm not hitting you."

"Then what will make you stop acting this way?" Yuki asked. "This really isn't you at all. Taro.. Please. I just wanna help I mean, you're so angry and bitter and that smile- you promised you wouldn't do it unless you were actually happy."

"This one? Surely you missed it. Can't join then, smile at them. And I can't join them because they're holding out on me." He said, leaning in close. "Let's find the missing Kate and be done with it." He turned away and walked from the alleyway, arms by his sides. "Or do you really want to continue this pointless discussion."

"I want to continue this." Yuki said. "I just came back and I feel like I'm losing you."

"You're not. I'm right here."

Yuki sighed deeply. "Alright. You know what? You win. We wont talk about this at all. You know what we'll do? We'll pretend like this never happened and just smile and go on with our lives like everything's okay while on the inside we're slowly dying." He pushed past Taro and kept walking.

Taro smiled sadly and followed along, making for the market. He stopped still. "Wait," He called to the rat. "I can smell blood."

"Where?" Yuki asked.

Taro nodded down a side street and carefully stepped down the path. When he reached the source of the blood he stopped once more and his eyes widened. "Oh god." There was Kate, covered in gashes and gore, the pavements painted red.

"Oh shit." Yuki swore and bent down beside her. "What could have done this..."

Taro just shook his head, unsteadily crouching down and half reaching out for her. His hand stayed still in the air. "Ripped her apart, whatever it was." He managed after a moment's struggle. Half of her neck was gone. "What... What now?"

"We can't leave her here." Yuki said quietly. "But e can't take her home."

"Mori took you home." He said and shook his head. "But that didn't go well. We could..." He pulled off his coat and wrapped her in it. "Is there a morgue around here?"

"Umm. I don't know. You lived here right? Wheres one?" Yuki asked

"Should be down that road." Taro said. "If I remember." He gathered Kate's body into his arms and slowly stood up, steeling his face to blank.

"You lead." Yuki took Kates body from him.

Taro nodded and swept past Yuki, walking to the Morgue. Once she had been placed down and covered, the man who worked there let them go and Taro took hold of Yuki's arm, thoroughly shaken. "What are we meant to tell them? We don't even know what happened."

"We'll just say the truth. That we found her like this in an ally." Yuki said.

He let go and nodded, one hand lifting to cover his face. "Let's go then. They've got to know."

Yuki nodded. "Come on." He wrapped an arm around Taro and walked back home.

Taro didn't push Yuki off, and instead hung onto him as they walked back, not letting go even when they got back to Kate's house. Rhun opened the door for them and Taro let his hand fall from Yuki's arm.
"Where's Kate?" He paused. "Why have you got blood on you?"

"We need everyone here for this." Yuki said softly. "Can you get your Mum and round everyone up?"

"Yeah..." Rhun backed up and went upstairs, telling Evelyn they all needed to go down on his way to his mother's room. Mori went down too, and Rhun pushed open the door and peered inside. "Mum? Yuki says he needs everyone to come down for a moment."

Elizabeth awoke slowly. "Hmm? Yeah, okay." She climbed out of bed and went over to the door. "Whats going on?"

"Something about Kate, I think. They just went looking for her." He said nervously, fiddling with his sleeve.

"Okay. Come on." Elizabeth wrapped her arm around Rhun and led him downstairs. She looked to Yuki and Taro curiously before sitting down.
"whats going on?" Evelyn asked. Yuki sighed deeply.

"Kate won't be coming back." Taro said quietly. Rhun balled his fists.
"Yes she is! She is! Everyone around here can't keep dying!" The boy snapped. "She's fine!"

"Rhun. Hush." Elizabeth said softly. A small boy looked up.
"Mum wont be coming back?"
"What happened to her?" A small girl asked.
"Is she Sick?" Another asked.
"Did she get a new job?" Another boy asked.
Elizabeth looked at them sadly.

"I'm sorry." Taro murmured, head bowed. "I'm so sorry."
"Why didn't you go looking earlier?! Why didn't you offer to go with her? If you weren't so busy being such a..."
"Rhun." Mori said with a sigh.
"Jesus." Rhun muttered furiously and stormed off upstairs.
Taro bit his lip anxiously and then shook his head and walked away, the small voices ringing in his ears.

Evelyn stood and went after her brother. Elizabeth stood and went over to the children. She bent down and spoke a few soft words to them. They all had tears in their eyes. The girl, Maria, gripped onto her bear tighter while her sister held onto her dress. gregory, one of the boys held his toy soilder and looked down sadly. Elizabeth brought them into her arms.

Rhun kicked the wall and then yelled in anger. both at everything and at the pain his foot was now in. "Damn it! Why does everyone around us keep dying?!"

Taro found a deserted corner upstairs and dropped down into the floor, hunching his shoulders and drawing his knees up to his chest. His chest was tight with guilt; unnecessary breaths a struggle. Rhun was just angry. He didn't kill Kate. It wasn't his fault that the children didn't have a mother. It wasn't. Was it?

"Rhun please. You have to stay calm." Evelyn said. "Kicking things wont help."

Elizabeth hugged the children close and rubbed their backs. She sighed deeply and tried to hold her tears back.

"Kicking things very well may help." he muttered. "For all the helping everyone else does." He sighed. "I'm so sick of this. Maybe we are unlucky! Kate was fine before we showed up!"

"Rhun. Stop it." Evelyn said. "We're not bad luck. Bad things just seem to happen around us."

"Twins are bad luck." He said haplessly. "And look what's happened to everybody. Yuki, Taro, Mori, even out Mum and now Kate."

"Rhun stop!" Evelyn snapped. "Its not your fault so don't blame yourself."

Rhun sighed and fell silent, shaking his head. "Why does everyone die?"

"Because its life and thats just that. You're born, you have a couple of years and then you die. You can't change that." Evelyn said.

"I know. But they don't even have a father at the moment."

"So? Neither did we." Evelyn said. "But at least their father will come back."

Quivering in his corner, Tosh stared blankly at the wall. He had only met Kate days ago and now she was gone. Katee who had welcomed him into her house. What if it kept up like this, if everyone here died and he waas left alone again... Or worse yet, what if everyone died and the church came back for him, there would be no one to protect him, he'd have to live like that again. He couldn't do that, go back to that way of living. Not that he'd been shown how good life could really be.

Taro stiffly got up and went in search of Tosh. He didn't have a family to be with, and he was willing to bet that Mori, as he had been since Elizabeth died, was still rather detatched. And it wasn't as if he wanted to be an iscolationist.

He found the boy and sat down next to him, leaning back against the wall and placing an arm around the child. "It's okay."

---

"Yeah. I suppose." Rhun agreed.