recountal | falling;;

falling;;

Three months later.
??? Catacombs, whatever the fuck this country is called.

It is so dark that Chizuru feels almost like the darkness is real, tangible, sentient and capable of exerting its pressure and it's a struggle for her to keep walking. She can't see a thing. The only indication she has that she isn't completely and utterly alone is the sound of Saitou's footsteps, the rustling of his clothing, and the soft sound of his breathing, and though she's sorely tempted to reach out and take his hand or hold onto the back of his jacket she can't bring herself to do it because that's too childish. They're here for a very specific reason and they don't have time to waste with her being frightened.

It's been three months since that fateful day at their headquarters, when they had lost nearly everything. It's been a few weeks since Souji's coughing had worsened, and four days since he had collapsed; they'd managed to find him shelter and a good doctor to watch over him, but it's clear that something is horribly, terribly wrong. Frantic research, hour after hour hunched over old medical texts had told them that what Souji suffered from was incurable.

But the doctor, also a student of old legends and myths, had said that there were tales of similar ailments being cured in the ancient past, but the knowledge of how to do so was... gone. Locked away. Buried forever with those who had known it.

...and so they had to try. The catacombs of this civilization lie deep underground and Chizuru doesn't know what they'll find here, but it's the best (the only) lead they've got and Souji's body isn't healing itself the way it should be, as a knight...

The knowledge that he is depend on them to figure this out spurs her onward even in the face of her anxiety. It seems so petty, to be afraid of the dark when Souji has so much more to fear.

Somewhere far ahead of them, there is the flickering of candlelighht. Chizuru sucks in a sharp breath and can't keep herself from reaching out to take Saitou's arm, her clutching his sleeve like he's all that's keeping her from breaking down. She wishes she were stronger, but it's hard. It's been hard ever since that day three months ago, and she is sure the cracks are starting to show.

Assuming he doesn't stop walking when she grabs onto him for comfort, they draw closer to that flickering candlelight and emerge in an underground chamber with a high, vaulted ceiling - the architecture seems so advanced that if not for the fact that it was all buried underground she never would have believed this was a place people lived in the past. At their feet is some kind of track - the tunnel leading in here from the surface had, at one point, merged with a tunnel belowground that some sort of vehicle must have traveled on in ancient times.

There are two winged statues at the center of the chamber, and the only light in the room comes from the flickering candles at their bases, flames burning bright despite the fact that there doesn't seem to be any living soul around to tend to them. The lights cast long shadows on the statues, which face each other and hold a sword and a scythe made of marble, the blades coated with what looks, to Chizuru's eyes, to be dried blood. She hopes she's seeing things.

Then there is a rustle of... something. Chizuru can't pinpoint where it comes from, but a flame flickers into existence at their immediate right and it's as though it set off chain reaction, braziers set into the walls lighting themselves of their own accord. As her eyes adjust to the light, she bites her lip and takes a look at their surroundings.

There are two levels, though there are no stairs; the balcony above them is, for the moment, out of their reach, as are all the openings above them leading out onto it. Across from them is another dark tunnel that the track at their feet runs into; she can't see very far into it. There are other passageways set into three of the four walls - one at the wall their backs are to, two at the wall on their right-hand side, and one at the wall they are facing. None of them are barred by doors, but peering more than a few feet into them from this location is impossible.

She surveys the room with unease, her gaze lingering on the statues and noting that there seem to be inscriptions of some kind at their bases, before she looks to Saitou as though he can tell them what they ought to do. It's so quiet they could hear a pin drop - which is unnerving, considering the way their surroundings had lit up of their own accord. She has the awful feeling that they're getting in over their heads.

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...No.

Saitou doesn't make a sound in turn but judging from the expression on his face if she were looking, it's clear he's just been shell-shocked from not only the woman's body and the state of it but the fact that she does look like her and even with Chizuru in his arms he feels his blood run cold, his chest tightening slightly. He slowly brings up one hand, in the process moving to hold her closer as well as press his fingers to the back of her head and encourage her to not lift her head even once the initial fear wears off from the unexpected encounter.

That blood is fresh but like Chizuru, he feels this to be impossible because he doesn't... really understand what he is dealing with here. Even if he could stand to convince himself it's not her hanging from the ceiling and being hung out to bleed her dry, it doesn't mean he can be certain the physical situation is any less real.

And, even if it isn't, Belin had often spoken of things that weren't real still being able to do exactly the same as something that is. Danger is exactly that.

But, then of course, he's turned to look across from them and unintentionally his hold on Chizuru tightens as he feels he knows exactly what he's going to see from the man holding the bloody sword. Saitou approaches, cautious but once he's made it close enough to turned to see the man's face, it still brings forth an anxiety that he doesn't want to face. But, he has to force himself to look, to really try and think of this logically rather than emotionally ( but why why this sort of situation, why is she up there and he's done— )

Chizuru doesn't need to be urged not to look up; the sight of the hanging body has already frightened her into keeping her gaze pointedly away from that direction. It's not right, she's trained for better than this, but - she's terrified, and she doesn't know why she can't just get over it.

Saitou looks into his doppelganger's eyes and nothing changes. There is a cool blankness there that belies absolutely no life - but, this close, he'll see flecks of blood around the empty shell's lips.

There isn't much that Saitou can do to incite a response out of his lookalike, but whenever he turns away to look at anything else in the room - that's when Chizuru raises her head, just the slightest bit, and locks eyes with him. The man's hand - his right hand, not his left (which is holding his sword) - twitches. She gasps.

"S-Sai--"

She doesn't manage to even choke out his name before the man's right hand shoots out to take hold of her hair by the ponytail and yanks, hard.

"Blood..." The word comes out in a choked, guttural snarl, and the Saitou lookalike raises his sword with his left hand. "Give me... your blood..."

And then, a moment later - it opens its mouth wide and lets loose an echoing roar, identical to the one that had sounded before when they were on the lower floor.

Shit. He'd inevitably drawn his gaze back to the body hanging after noticing the remnants of blood on its mouth. And Saitou does turn to look when she starts stuttering, shifting just slightly so he can balance her better in one arm when he needs to drawn his weapon but then it doesn't seem to matter because she's yanked from him and he can only let go on instinct at hearing the gurgled words and while that sound would make most wince and hesitate he's already aware his chances for mistakes like that are already gone.

The Order was unique in its assemble in the sense they were all generally the same and yet it was finding their strengths and mastering them rather than try to stabilize weaknesses to some mediocre level. True they suffered consequence of letting the enemy use their weaknesses against them but the amount of dedication required makes them very good at never letting that happen. Saitou's was not strength or even necessarily speed (although he is quite fast), it's his grace of dexterity and agility that aid him and it's what allows him to be quick and flexible during close combat where others can not. So he's used to having to take on ambushes in far worse scenarios although he can't say he's ever had someone he's felt like the way he does about Chizuru has ever been in a similar situation. But victims had the highest chance of surviving and escaping when with him in hostile territory than most of the other knights and he will be damned if he lets emotion make him fumble and get her killed.

His hand goes for one of his swords and he unsheathes it before flicking his wrist as he swings it back behind him. The blade collapses into the whip and its bladed segments and he snaps it forward to go towards his lookalike's left arm in hopes to wrap it around the wrist. If successful, he'll yank outward and use the whip's hold to pull himself in just that much closer so that he's between Chizuru and the blade as best one can be. And following in fluid motion is a simple downward-angled tug from his weapon again to one side before he snap kicks right at the doppelgänger's elbow while maintaining his pull in hopes of connecting and snapping bone.

With any luck it will inflict enough damage that it'll have to loosen its grip on Chizuru, too.

Edited 2014-06-11 06:03 (UTC)

She is violently yanked out of Saitou's arms and she definitely feels like her heart might drop out of her chest - from safety to danger in less than a millisecond, and the creature is holding her by the hair so tightly that it makes her head hurt. When he pulls, she has to twist a little so that there isn't too much pressure on her neck because the last thing she needs is for it to get snapped.

Saitou is already in motion, though, and before the monster can sink its teeth into her neck his sword has become a whip and he's already wrapped it around the thing's arm. She is dropped and hits the ground hard, immediately pulling herself by her arms to scramble out of the way because the last thing Saitou needs is for her to get in the way of his fight. She'll pull back, pull out her bow, and then she can help, from a distance -

The monster lets out another roar as Saitou dislocates its elbow. But that doesn't seem to be enough to get it to cease, because although the bone is no longer in place it doesn't loosen its grip on its blade. It swings its arm from the shoulder instead in a wide arc, lunging forward with its other hand - and sharp, sharp claws - for Saitou's neck.

But, ultimately, it is a beast; it lacks the finesse Saitou possesses, and it will be dispatched easily enough in the face of Saitou's grace and dexterity. All in all, it won't take more than a minute or so.

...a minute during which a bolt from Chizuru's bow never comes. When the monster is still and motionless at Saitou's feet, there is nothing but silence which will be broken by the sound of his own breathing. Chizuru is nowhere to be seen.

Neither is the body that looked so much like hers. What is there is a now-empty rope, swaying slightly with residual motion, and a splatter of blood near an opening in the wall that is not the way they came.

The beating of his own heart never felt so loud with a creature clad in his identity motionless at his feet and he has to close his eyes the pounding hurts so much as blood pounds in his head and at his eardrums.

There's no relief, however, because he has not been alone in the past few months after the raid on the Order itself and he finds to suddenly be so has not calmed his frantic thoughts as it once could. His eyes dart around the room looking for her but he doesn't call out for her, eyes widening slightly at the empty rope and he follows the motion which leads from one thing to another and he's at that opening moving to pass over examining the blood. He makes haste to pick up his pace if he has to travel any distance after a few initial cautious steps, his sword still out of its sheathe and back to its standard form.

He has to find her, he can't lose her. Not here, not now and for so many more reasons than the feeling creeping through his chest being so very desperate and overbearing than one has time to bother figuring out in these types problems.

He does have quite a distance to travel. His footsteps echo through the hall as he makes haste, the slightest volume amplified tenfold - the hall finally opens out to the large chamber they had arrived in before. The way out is still blocked by the stone slab, but... something is different.

The most obvious differences are that there are lights again, and the scythe-wielding statue, at whose feet lay the inscription about death being the natural end of all things, is gone. There is just an empty pedestal where the statue once stood.

Those flames flicker out until a single entrance is illuminated, on the opposite side of the room. Saitou, should he choose to go down that path, will eventually come out in a small room whose ceiling stretches up almost impossibly. At the center of the room is an altar, and behind that altar is a wooden door that is padlocked shut.

On the altar itself is a naked young woman that looks like Chizuru, lying motionless with a slit throat, save for the subtle rising and falling of her chest that signifies breath. At the altar's feet is a young woman that looks like Chizuru, naked as well, her throat sporting a wound of the exact same kind. She is breathing heavily but her eyes are open and she looks up at Saitou when he arrives.

"Its friends," She manages to choke out, "Took my weapon... Tried to... Make me take its place..."

What friends? Chizuru doesn't elaborate on that, and also doesn't explain how it is that if the creature with her face had overpowered her enough that she lost her clothes and her weapons, that it is it lying there on the altar instead of her. "We need to... keep going, but... What if it wakes...?"

It's a good thing he is capable of reducing his reactions where others would betray themselves much more, but even Saitou as he approaches the altar to come and kneel down by Chizuru, bringing a hand immediately up to the injury at her neck before glancing up at the altar where the other Chizuru is lying still.

"...Take its place?" There's a lot to try and understand here, her words and he doesn't know what she means by friends or even the question on the creature waking up. "Yukimura... wakes from what?" What even happened to make it unconscious in the first place, if that's what is going on here.

He would have imagined that with the slit throat and the steady subtle breathing that its passed out from blood loss and not... well, not in any position to do much waking. He has a bad feeling about this, but with Chizuru's wellbeing at stake he can't do anything but follow whatever motions necessary to be most likely to save her. Starting to hold doubts and skepticism are not going to win him any favors in terms of her safety,that's for sure.

"The Reaper is... coming," She says after a moment, a shudder wracking her form as she tilts her head to look into Saitou's eyes. "They spoke of it. The one that looked... so much like you, it..."

She shudders again and reaches for his arms to cling to him tightly. "This is a horrible... horrible place." Her head turns toward the body on the altar and her eyes narrow. "The Reaper... it is sated by blood. The creature before wanted to... stop it. But, it had... been so long since... anyone ventured down here."

Her voice drops. "They began to... turn on each other. That was why..." Her hold on his arms tightens. "We have to... kill it. I wasn't able to... but if we spill its... blood, when the Reaper comes... we'll be safe..."

Her expression contorts into something almost vicious. "Please... without my weapon, I can't... you have to kill it. Before it wakes, because... if it tries to escape... the Reaper will come for us, next..."

"The one that looked like me is dead," he replies, his attention unable to draw away from her unnatural expression and very aware of how tightly she is holding onto him. Something in the idea of how they will be safe by...

"You want me to kill it as a sacrifice for this Reaper?" He asks, as if trying to verify her request. It's all a lot to take in and for him to simply do as asked, especially on the idea it will escape.

"There's no way to get out of here, it can't escape."

"The creature that... looked like you... tried to kill it before, to... appease the Reaper." She sounds like she might cry, but there are no tears welling up in her eyes. None at all. "If it wakes up... and it escapes further... into the catacombs, the... Reaper might find us... before it finds it."

She shakes her head. "I don't... want to die! If we leave it here... it might run... but if we kill it now... the Reaper will have its blood..."

She looks deep into his eyes, imploring.

"Please... I'm frightened..."

It's so hard to not appease her when she sounds like that and he is tempted especially with the way she looks at him. He glances up again before he turns his full attention to her once more, leaning in a little closer to press his lips to her head affectionately in solace. "Where are its friends, first? I... can't kill it without it changing its appearance from your face."

His comments are murmured to her hair, although whether or not his declaration of being unable to harm something that looks like Chizuru is up in the air on being true or not. He never speaks of his capabilities nor his limitations and that includes the two very precious weapons from Belin.

The small gesture of affection doesn't seem to do much to comfort her, sadly; she becomes more agitated when he says he can't kill the woman on the altar, and her hold on his arms tightens again - the strength of her grip is a bit more than he might remember it being, but perhaps that's because she's under duress.

"I don't know... where they went... they vanished. Please..."

There are still no tears. "You killed the other... with your face... when it looked like you. Please, kill that one... I don't want to die here..." Her gaze flicks down, then up at him again; when she looks at him, it's through her lashes, from half-lidded eyes.

"I'll do anything... if you just kill it, please..."

"What do you even mean by 'anything'?" Saitou looks somewhat unsettled now, especially with the look she is giving him. What is she going on about?

Saitou continues, though, attempting to explain. "My blades are permanently enchanted to be unable to harm the Grand Master of the Order as well as those taken directly underneath him to ensure they are not stolen or taken if one turns traitor.

"And I won't let you die here."

"I mean exactly... what it sounds like. If you... kill that thing for me, I'll... do anything for you..."

Her expression contorts into one of despair when he explains his swords' enchantments, though; and still, no tears fall. She looks from Saitou to the body on the altar, then to Saitou again. There is no recognition in her eyes when he speaks of the Order's Grand Master, no true realization that she is being discussed there.

"Please... that thing needs to die." The woman on the altar makes a soft noise and her hand twitches, but other than that she doesn't move, and the woman on the ground cleaves to Saitou and buries her face in his shoulder. "Please! Before we die... enchantment or no, you have... to kill it..."

That 'thing'. Even as she clings to him, his attention having turned at the slight movement he furrows his brow in concern over all the little pieces he's putting together and formulating an answer. And although Saitou can't bring himself to try and pry her away from him and put distance between them, that lack of recognition of the grand master alone makes him feel immeasurable doubt ( because it was so obvious she adored Hijikata in so any ways and would give the world to him if she could; she was one of them in a world far below where he was placed but she refused to let go and accept that, always pushing herself one step further and drawing everything when doubt overcame her back to the strength and capability to save him.

"You... Do not sound like her," Saitou finally says, flat and emotionally void but his body language is not tense with the anticipation or realization that he's made such.a gave mistake he understands now. It's impossible to tell, variations are so different. He's missing something and not just he suddenly strongly feels this is not the woman he came here with and he's rapidly shaking his brain for something previously occurred beyond the inscription to understand the sacrifice ( the woman, the altar ) and its meaning. "I... won't kill her," he sighs. They kill enough that he does it only when absolutely necessary. In truth, he feels he will have to in one form another but that is not this instant where he is not past any reason of doubt he knows which to point his sword at.

"The creature may be the only thing left that can give is hope to escape by locating the exit. We can't risk losing that."

Chizuru also would have such a hard time demanding he kill something or someone when it's not even being aggressive or able to defend itself. Life was too important for such flippant accusations and wishes.

"I don't sound like... 'her'?" The woman tilts her head to one side and studies his face, her own expression heartbroken. "You mean... I don't sound like... 'me,' don't you...?"

In spite of the sadness etched into every inch of her face - there are still no tears. Her hands tremble, however, and she looks uneasily from him to the woman on the altar. Her eyes are on "the creature" when he refuses to kill her, and it's a good thing too, because her expression contorts with rage when he says it - but that rage vanishes by the time she looks back.

"That... may be so, but, Sai--..."

"...nngh..."

The woman on the altar stirs, cutting the woman close to Saitou off - and it's funny, but it really doesn't sound as though she was interrupted; it sounds as though there wasn't anything more to the name she was about to speak. The woman on the altar sits up slowly, then, blinking and bringing a hand up to her head. "What... what happened..."

Then she sees Saitou, and sees the woman who looks so much like her, and her eyes go wide. Her jaw drops; she's left speechless.

It's an awful expression to see even without tears and. Saitou feels his chest tighten and there is guilt even though he insists he can not have any ( but what if she dies because she was telling the truth and he was too paranoid to accept her trust as fact ). But ask he is looking towards the Chizuru speaking and he voice ends, his expression flickers back up to the alter watching the unconscious woman groan and come to wake. When she looks in his direction and he sees her reaction he isn't quite sure what to make of it because is that simply a plot to seeing a mirror version of herself or is it something more?

"...Yukimura?" he questions out her name skeptically—it's impossible for him to address either one of them differently in his head. he is not sure what go so next but he has the feeling now that the other woman is awake that one way or another things are going to rapidly deteriorate into ruin.

"Saitou..."

The Chizuru on the altar keeps her eyes on him for a moment or two longer before they flick to the Chizuru by his side, and she swallows hard. She looks like she wants to say something, to warn him, but - her mind is hazy and it's hard to formulate the words. Before she can get anything out, though, the Chizuru closer to Saitou tugs on his arm.

"That... isn't me. It's the monster..."

Tears well up in the Chizuru on the altar's eyes and she shakes her head. "No, I--! I'm not a--..." Arguing isn't going to get them anywhere. If they're to survive, they need to keep moving, but how... The door behind the altar is locked tight. "We can figure that out later. For now, we need to... um, we need to keep going!"

She casts her gaze about the room, frantically trying to figure out if there's anything that can be used - and then she catches sight of some of her own skin and she looks down before yelping, bringing her hands around herself to cover herself. She'd known the other Chizuru had been naked, but she hadn't been expecting it of herself.

Somehow, the woman on the altar feels so much more familiar but he knows, too, that judging from her inability to argue with the accusation and awkwardness that it could be drug or magic related.

But, it's the tears in her eyes that really catch his attention before that reaction to her bare skin. Looking back the woman clinging to him, he slowly goes to rise to his feet and pull the other with him the same.is he really going to have to continue on with the both of them? The door is locked. Saitou has ended up looking away from both of them in their bare states, swallowing back questions of what exactly is happening here with this altar.

"What is going on...?" Does the other woman have any ability to make better explanation.

The woman clinging to him rises as he does, and doesn't loosen her hold - like she's afraid that if she does he'll cast her aside and she'll never be able to get him back. Something about that seems to bother the woman on the altar, who shifts uncomfortably before climbing down.

"I don't understand any of this," the Chizuru that had been on the altar says softly. "But if there's a lock... doesn't that mean there has to be a key?"

The Chizuru clinging to Saitou's arm wrinkles her nose a little and draws herself closer to him. "You... look for one. But if... you try and run without... taking us with you..."

The woman looks decidedly uncomfortable and drops down to poke around near the altar. She doesn't find a key - but she does find something etched into the side. "...u-um." Her voice is shaky. "Saitou, could you come take a look at this, please?"

It's some kind of an engraving, crude and simple - but it depicts a figure on an altar with its throat and belly being sliced open while a winged creature holding a scythe looks on. The doors in the etching are wide open.

Saitou is almost more preoccupied with the exchange between the two of them, wondering exactly what is being exchanged between the lines—it's as if they both know something and are exchanging it silently in addition to what they're saying to him. He doesn't try to pull away from the Chizuru holding onto him.

When he's addressed, however, he does go to step forward, to look at the engraving, his expression growing somewhat critical as he takes it in. It's not something he's unused to because as part of the Order, demonic cults are just as dangerous as the monsters and demons the Order hunts, but this just... it makes him feel uneasy. As far as he can see, it doesn't give too much of an explanation. He is unable to see what the reasoning is behind the ritual, but the doors being marked does signify something.

"...Ah." His fingers reach out to run across the engraving a moment. That, he can safely assume is the reaper. He briefly wonders if a sacrifice is required to open the doors... or if opening the doors leads to the sacrifice. Without a key, they won't know if it's the latter, but the former possibility is bothersome, too. It's obvious they're both halfway to being this individual on the altar with their throats slit, but...

"Why the belly?" he murmurs—one of them knows. If not both, perhaps, and he's the one at the disadvantage so there's no point holding back any questions he's asking himself in case he can get answers other than in his own mind's inner workings.

"I don't know--"

"Because it is where... new life comes from."

Both women speak at the exact same time. The Chizuru kneeling in front of the altar stares at the Chizuru on Saitou's arm, who stares right back at her, unblinking, and then both are silent.

Saitou may have noticed that the Chizuru clinging to him was the one who spoke of "new life" - because, being closer, her voice would have been just a little louder.

Saitou's thoughts are flying fast as he lets those words sink in and his mind is already tumbling over the inscription on the statue that had been gone when he returned to the main entrance.

"Are they taking it or are they eradicating the possibility..." he asks, still staring at it. Don't take more than you are willing to give. Don't take more—

That scythe, it had blood coating it—

"The winged creature with the scythe that is overseeing the sacrifice: Is that the Reaper?"

He doesn't think he needs any confirmation, his body tensing slightly before he glances up into the darkness as the ceiling seems to climb forever.

"It is the Reaper," The clinging Chizuru confirms, nodding a little. "The... creatures, they spoke of... the Reaper's scythe." She shoots the other Chizuru a suspicious look, before looking back to Saitou. "It will... be here, soon. I have... a bad feeling..."

The other Chizuru looks at the two of them and shivers. She wants to say something, and it's quite clear on her face - but every time she opens her mouth to do so, the words just won't come. Instead, she'll continue poking around to see if she can find a key of some kind... but comes up empty-handed.

From the entranceway comes a terrible, ominous scraping sound, like stone on stone.

"What about the scythe?" His words are a little louder, harsher as his attention is drawn to the entrance because great this is just going to be excellent. He can't even enchant his weapons with anything helpful because he doesn't know what the damn thing is, still.

Edited 2014-06-13 06:32 (UTC)

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