Death
Music: “Yuki no Hana” by Mika Nakashima, “(Baby) I Want You Gone” by Agnes, “Every Heart (Instrumental)” by BoA
0.0
Those last moments had been in the cold, in the dead of night when shadows attempt to extinguish the light from the world.
His last living memories were of her tear-filled blue eyes gazing at him across the snowy ground and the cold sidewalk against his bruised cheek. The droplets from her eyes had made holes in the white crystals that had fallen from the sky and blanketed the Earth, innocent amid the blood and gore that stained the snow a macabre crimson. Dimly he realized that this was his life splattered everywhere on the ground; due to the large amount of red on all of the surfaces around them, he had a feeling his life was soon ending.
With trembling fingers, he touched her hand, the only thing within reach. That incited more tears from her, and she inched her fingers closer to him.
“Don’t leave me,” she pleaded in a voice that was barely above a stage whisper. “You can survive this. Just hold on a little bit longer…”
His injuries were legion, and exsanguination threatened to snuff out his life with every passing moment. He was aware enough to face the reality of his impending demise. He wished he could live, just for her.
“I am dying, Relena,” he managed. “I cannot stop it. My injuries…are too severe.”
“No,” she wept. “We can save you. Just hold on a little bit longer.”
His mind flashed upon their attack, remembering the force of his assailant crashing into him with its claws bared. Luckily, she had been unconscious throughout most of the assault, leaving him to protect her without her trying to get in the way. But his body had suffered in ways a living body could not survive. Sheer will had had him emptying his gun clip into the mysterious creature that had appeared while they had been on the way from back her car to the banquet they’d gotten all dressed up for. He hoped by now–mostly for her sake and not his–someone noticed that they had not returned.
His eyes fluttered as the darkness overtook him. She clutched his hand with her own, and a bit of life sparked inside of him.
“I can’t keep doing this…” he whispered. “My life…is going to end…”
“Then mine will, too.”
It almost swallowed him whole, that yawning black, but he fought it despite his earlier statement. He had to say this. “You…live… World…needs you…”
“And the world needs you, too,” she insisted.
He disagreed but was too tired to argue. He heard the sirens now but he knew they were too late. Too much of him was gone for him to care about his own lost life. He had achieved his objective this once, when it mattered. His only regret was that he would not be able to protect her from future danger. He didn’t know how he knew, but that monster would be back.
“Mission…incomplete…” he choked out. She clutched his hand again but it failed to spark him. Sound fled him first as if the clamor was being sucked up into a large vacuum, then touch faded away. His last breath came out in a pitiful puff of steam.
He focused on her battered face until it was replaced with complete darkness.
0.1
They looked down at the Earth with their omniscient eyes, taking in every joy, every triumph with the same reaction as every failure, every heartbreak. All of them had been living for many centuries and were not moved by what they saw before them. The death of a mere human was as commonplace as blinking. When Heero Yuy died, the Sentinel of Shirohoshi did not so much as bat an eyelash.
Then she swung into the room, bringing Emotion along with her.
She was undoubtedly the leader here, whether they liked it or not. She was over three thousand years old, but didn’t appear to be a day over thirty-five. Her long blond hair fell in wavy cascades down her shoulders and back, and usually her blue-eyed gaze was serene. Tonight, it blazed with fury and threatened to sear anything in her path.
The Sentinel looked up in unison at the entrance of the Prophet. She paused, hands clenched into fists, and swept a rather displeased look upon them. If looks could kill, they’d all be covered in cream cheese as the Prophet’s toast.
“You have some explaining to do,” she remarked tightly.
The oldest Sentinel, Malcolm, spoke first. “I hardly believe there is any need for your brusqueness, Ingrid.”
“And I hardly believe there is any need for your impertinence,” Ingrid snapped, her accent making her words clipped. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this is the Shirohoshi Constellation-not Malcolm’s Celestial Playhouse of Perpetual Clusterfuck. I am the White Star Prophet and you do answer to me. I said you have some explaining to do. So explain why one of those fucking demon beasts is roaming the Earth and slaying mortals without my knowledge.”
The other Sentinel winced at Ingrid’s language. Malcolm seemed perturbed she would speak to him that way. Much to his dismay, he was the older, more experienced of the two of them and she had turned out to be the Prophet. The first female Prophet in their ageless history. And half-mortal to top it all off.
He squelched the urge to strike her and addressed her implied question.
“We did not know the being had been summoned until it was too late,” Malcolm explained. “Whoever summoned it was masterful at cloaking its power signature.”
Ingrid suppressed a growl and called up several freeze-frame stills onto the screens before them. The Sentinel shifted nervously in their seats as much as jaded centuries-old beings could.
“Fifty-five hundred deaths,” Ingrid ground out as she mentally flipped through the images on screen. “Fifty-five hundred innocent people slain because of a fucking oversight. This did not just happen overnight. It takes years for something this powerful to burst onto the mortal realm and kill like this.”
“We are hardly psychics, Ingrid,” Malcolm argued. “We have done all we could. Mortals violently die every day and we can barely keep up with this creature.”
Anger mounting and staining her pale cheeks red, Ingrid replayed the violent death of Heero Yuy, the demon beast’s latest victim. Ingrid noticed a telltale twitch in Malcolm’s left cheek. Yeah, can’t take the heat can you? Bastard.
“If this is all you could do, I’d hate to think what fate is in store for humankind,” Ingrid shot back.
“Humankind is destined to fail.” One of Malcolm’s cronies, a Sentinel named Philip, spoke up and earned a glare from Ingrid. Perhaps he was emboldened by his friend talking back to their mistress, or just plain stupid, but he continued with his statement. “Why should we try and stop the inevitable?”
Her anger mounted to unimaginable limits, and a ripple of power moved through the room. Ingrid was old enough to know how to bank most of her power; the simple outburst would have incinerated the room if she had let it flow unchecked.
“Because, you thoughtless fool, if we allow something to ravage the mortal world, what would stop it from coming here?” Ingrid demanded.
“Our world is protected from such beings,” Malcolm argued. “We have safeguards that the mortal world is too primitive to use.”
“And that is what we are here for,” Ingrid shot back. “We are given the duty to protect all living creatures with evil. Your function is to monitor and forewarn against danger in any realm, for they are all ours.” She lowered a weighty stare upon him and saw his fury bobbing underneath the veneer of superior calm. “If you fancy yourself one of these safeguards, Malcolm, I believe we probably would all perish.”
Malcolm had no response for that. Incensed, Ingrid swung out of the room and teleported to Astrophil where Queen Stella and the Celestial Council were.
0.2
On Astrophil, the home realm of the Angels and the training ground for Archangels, Queen Stella of the Legion of Angels and the Celestial Council received her big sister with a troubled heart.
The dilemma of the mysterious demon beast on Earth had already reached Stella’s ears, and she found herself as incensed with Ingrid’s Sentinel as Ingrid herself was. They had been discussing broaching the subject of the Sentinel’s failure to act with the Celestial Council as well, and the sisters could not agree whether to wait or act now. The eradication of the beast was their main concern.
“This has horrible ramifications,” Stella remarked. “If a demon beast with this much power is moving about the mortal realm, it could do significant damage.”
Ingrid said nothing; Stella had only vocalized what she had feared the moment she discovered what had been happening. She moved to the window, her sky blue robe fluttering around her slender frame. She watched the Archangel recruits on the training ground as Stella moved around behind her.
“I could send some Archangels to fix the problem,” Stella suggested. She moved to her desk and sent a memo to the Archangel Commander about the situation. Ingrid continued to stare out of the window as disquiet rolled around within her.
“We can rid the Earth of the beast, but that doesn’t address the concern of its creator,” Ingrid pointed out grimly. “That worries me more than the beast itself.”
Stella pursed her lips together for a moment before opening her mouth to speak. She was interrupted by a knock on the door.
“You may enter,” she called out.
A moment passed, and then the ornate double doors came open to reveal a petite woman with dark skin behind it. She was dressed in full Archangel Regalia, but her wings were tucked in considerably, diminishing her usual intimidating presence. Severely cut black hair fell to sturdy shoulders, framing a face that was built better for smiling, but Anita Arnold wasn’t known for her winsome smile. She was notorious for her blade, however, which suited her just fine.
“Your Highness,” Anita began as the doors closed behind her, “I was on my way up here when I received your memo. There is a pressing matter I need to discuss with you.”
Stella marred her pretty features with a frown. “Anita, what is the matter?”
“One of the new recruits, Your Highness,” Anita responded. “I believe he might be able to help you with your problem on Earth.”
Stella’s brow crinkled pensively; Ingrid meanwhile continued to stare down at the sparring as Stella peppered Anita with questions and rebuttals.
“But there is no way we could send a newbie Archangel to Earth,” Stella was saying. “Anita, you know the rules!”
“I know of the fifty years of training that an Archangel must endure before he or she is allowed to walk the Earth once again,” Anita said. “I understand the reasoning behind the edict. However, Your Highness, I am asking you to make exception for these extenuating circumstances.”
“If I make exception now—” Stella began.
“With all due respect, my Queen, I think the situation warrants some drastic action. Exceptions have to be made.” Stella’s jaw set, signaling her contrary sentiments. “Please do not dismiss my idea until you see his potential.”
Stella huffed, showing her age. “Fine.”
Anita bowed deeply, then motioned to the window where Ingrid was standing.
Stella walked over to the window and stood dubiously beside her sister. Anita soon joined her, scanning the sparring matches until she saw the right one to suit her demonstration.
“Right there, near the entrance to the northern fields,” Anita said. “The one with the dark hair. That is him.”
Stella and Ingrid both looked where Anita instructed. A young man, not quite thirty, was sparring with one of Anita’s better captains. His expression was schooled to blankness, but his features were still striking even without expression. As an Angel, the perimortem injuries he had sustained were gone. The loose Astrophil-issue white pants and shirt failed to hide his musculature, clinging to him as he moved fluidly around his opponent.
“When did he come to Astrophil?” Stella wanted to know.
“Your Highness,” Anita responded in a slightly awed tone as if she were about to reveal a phenomenon, “he is very newly dead.”
The sisters shared a look of astonishment. Most often, the newly dead suffered from acute disorientation caused by their new state of being. It usually a couple of weeks for even the most gifted mortal to be at a cognitive state. For a mortal to enter Astrophil fully aware of his or her senses was akin to a demon walking through the Gate, a rarity. Brow furrowed, Ingrid turned back to the window and peered more intently at the fight as Stella stared thoughtfully into space. Her mind raced with the new information as something brimmed at the edge of it, a revelation of sorts.
“Commander,” Ingrid said slowly, “what is the name of this gentleman?”
“Hiroshi Yuy, if I am not mistaken.”
Hiroshi Yuy. Ingrid mentally flipped through her vast memory for the place where she had heard that name. It did not take long; she had only watched him die tragically moments before. She watched as he felled his opponent with a swipe of the sword. Once the fight was truly over, he put the sword away and helped the Captain to his feet. Ingrid silently admired him for his honor. A sudden gust of wind blew his shirt and pants against his body, giving everyone a peek at his body underneath the cloth. He seemed to care less; however, more than a few female recruits craned their necks to look at him.
“Well, you know what my vote’s gonna be,” Stella said with an impish grin.
Anita had the grace not to react while Ingrid sweatdropped. “Trust Stella to be bowled over not by the fact that he adept at fighting but by the fact that he looks like an underwear model…”
Stella held her grin and went to her desk to formulate a persuasive argument for the rest of the Celestial Council.
