Melvin Mikagami sat brooding, on a throne of skulls, on a dais of blood, in a castle of skulls. He REALLY had to redecorate. But this was how the place was furnished when he rented it; unsurprisingly, it was cheap. But this whole 'glory in slaughter' thing was really very tacky. He thought on all that had happened in the past days. In a way, it was lucky that the first person to find him had been that spider girl. So much soul in her... she had provided a very good meal. But still. And then there was the girl who seemed to live there. And something clicked with horrible certainty. That girl would be his brother's daughter. That girl with a great potential for... either. She was placed perfectly in the balance of things. And that magical girl his brother had worked with to defeat him. He clicked his fingers, and a large tome appeared in his hands. Flipping through the pages, he came to the correct page. And swore fulminantly enough to fuse glass. ******************************************* Dark Heart High Netherworld Educational Institution for the Universal Propagation of Evil founded by Mads ******************************************* This Episode By: Doctor Nightfall Chapter 32: Introspections! ******************************************* Yuri Mikagami sat in her room, deep in meditation. Alright, it wasn't really meditation- she was reading improving literature. To be absolutely honest, it wasn't even that. It was a copy of Vogue. She'd already read it umpteen times already and was running out of things to do; since she was grounded for the forseeable future, she couldn't even go out and buy a new one. So she re-read her magazine collection again. Then there came a knock on the door. "Can I come in, dear?" "Yes, mum." She obediently sat up straighter, and then watched as her mother sat beside her. "Now, Yuri. We're still very disappointed in you for breaking the rules about the party. But Uncle Melvin getting free wasn't your fault." Yuri perked a little at this. "But..." She drooped again. "You are still grounded for a week. Because of the party." "Okay, Mum..." "However, we're calling someone in to have a look at your armour. We're going to see if we can get you the 'help' feature disabled, and one of those materialisation units. You know, so you can just say something and have it appear around you." "Really?" "Yes, dear. It's not safe with Uncle Melvin wandering about the area...." Yuri knew her mother was hiding something. "Mum?" "Yes?" "What's really going on?" Mrs. Mikagami looked at the door. "Yuri... Melvin is not just a megalomaniacal maniac, he's unprecedentedly homicidal. We just want you to be safe." "...OK, Mum." Mrs. Mikagami kissed her daughter on the forehead. "Dinner will be ready soon. Go and wash up." Just after Mrs. Mikagami left the room, there was a thudding noise from outside the window. And then another. And another. Opening it, she found three arrows with notes tied to them stuck in the frame, alongside each other. *** Balabalalde sat in his room. There was something wrong with him. He couldn't eat, couldn't sleep. He couldn't think of much. Just a cute girl in his class... He had come to a few conclusions. Possibility A: He was under a curse. Possibility B: He had caught something icky. (The fact that he had used the word icky went completely unnoticed by the rest of him.) Possibility C: He was l...lo... impassioned. Possibility A was ruled out quickly. The wards always around him made him pretty-much impervious to such things. Possibility B was discounted quickly too. He couldn't get sick. Which left... Oh dear. There was, he knew, only one way he could help himself. He sat down and wrote a love letter to Yuri. After he had fired it to her window, he walked off cheerfully. It was a great shame he'd written it in Aklo and not Japanese... *** Craig Maimsworth was also deep in thought. Yuri was related to that... monster that had killed his father. Yuri was very much against that thing. His family had teamed up with hers to defeat it before. Yuri was the Enemy. Yuri was the enemy of his enemy. Therefore she should be his ally... This was going to be awkward. He gathered a piece of paper and a biro and wrote. 'Truce? Maimsworth.' He fetched out his bow and arrow. He hadn't used it in years; the embarassing thing was... he was extremely good with it. The main problem was that his family's traditions frowned on the use of Bows in general. He could spit a fly in midair with a snap shot... but his father would have disapproved. His father... He tied the note to the arrow, aimed at the window of Yuri's room, and fired. The he reached out to grab the binoculars that he had knocked off. *** Ki Tamaida also had a message tied to an arrow. This was neither a love letter of a declaration of truce. He had just come into possession of some highly worrying information, and wanted to know if it was true. As he let the arrow fly, he saw two other arrows speeding in the same direction. This was very, very strange. Hopefully, it was nothing too serious. *** 'And there shall come forth a child of both light and darkness, from a champion of light seduced by the night, and a lord of the damned graced by His hand. She shall balance the world.' Amakusa leant back in his armchair, and looked up from the book. "As you can see, it does match her." "Yes, but is it her?" Akurei stood in the doorway, four of his six arms folded. "I don't know." Akurei blinked. "You don't know?" "No, I don't. There have been dozens of such children born over the centuries. The prophecy is very vague on everything else- no mention of powers, or anything like that." "How come I never heard of these others?" "Because they're generally seriously hushed up. No one likes to see a traitor." "..." "Besides us." *** Author's note: Sorry, I'm tone deaf. In truth, though- this chapter has been hard to write. I have had shifts of totally LUDICROUS natures to deal with (4 16 hour shifts, 1 17 hour shift and a 12 hour shift... *THUMP*) and have only just got round to sorting my notes into coherence. It would have been longer, but... Oh well. Just be glad I didn't imply that Amakusa and Akurei were in a passionate affair... P.S. I'm really not trying to turn her into a Magical Girl. Just having a little fun... *** Yuri didn't know what to make of the notes. One was unreadable, and seemed to be some horrible curse, which might have been written in verse. Obviously from Yasuko. Craig wanted a truce. That was... odd. Ki wanted to meet her tomorrow. Well... she'd see what she could do. And then her mother came in. "Oh, is that method back in fashion again?" "This was in fashion!?" "Oh, yes, when I was a girl. I would wake up and find my window resembled a porcupine..." She smiled, drifting back off into memories. She pulled herself back with a start. "Oh, yes. Wear this bracelet." It was silver, with a large emerald set in it. Yuri thought it looked flashy. "What's this for?" "That's the Materialiser. Slap it and say 'Serpent Soldier Yuri, Ready!'" "Serpent Soldier Yuri, Ready!" And she howled as her clothes exploded off her and reformed as armour, with her floating, twirling in midair, surrounded by tendrils of shadow. "THAT'S NOT FUNNY!"