Episode 99 Goodbye Friends

“…capture the Phoneme!”

“Wait, that’s the Phoneme?!”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t know what she looked like when you headed out…”

“Well, I had an idea that she was female…”

Silver is suddenly shocked into complete wakefulness by spasms of agonizing pain. She grimaces, clenching her eyelids shut. At once, she hears the two voices arguing above her, one male, another feminine.

‘Female voice…’

Without warning, an arrow shoots through the air, and strikes the empty space between Recelo and Midori. The two of them step back in alarm, and turn to gaze at Silver on the ground.

Her bow is still drawn, raised in the air and pointing straight at Midori. “It slipped, I suppose,” she states slyly, struggling to her feet. With the assistance of her bow, she stands upright again.

“Recelo, you moron,” Midori says, coldly ignoring Silver, “you mean to tell me you were so soft that you didn’t deal her the fatal blow?” She hits Recelo sharply on the head with her hand. “That’s pretty pathetic.”

“You!” Silver cries demonically, pointing straight at Midori.

Midori looks at Silver curiously. She points to herself. “You talking to me, woman?”

“You killed Tide!” Silver persists, pointing furiously at Midori. “You! It’s all your fault!”

“Tide?” Midori repeats the name, confused. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“If…if it weren’t for you…” Silver gasps, her wounds opening wider from her concerted effort to speak, “if it weren’t for you, Tide would still be alive!”

“He’s dead?” Midori says, her bright green eyes darkening. “I see. To be honest, at first, I didn’t think that twerp would be worth anything. But he proved to be quite valuable, causing trouble for nearly everybody, eh? And now he’s dead. How interesting.”

Midori bursts out laughing, giggling in a manner far from feminine. “I don’t know what you’re getting so worked up about with the death of that loser! He betrayed you. Anybody would see that he wasn’t even worth mentioning. What makes him so important to you anyway?”

“He was my friend,” Silver murmurs quietly. “AND BECAUSE OF YOU, I HAD TO MURDER HIM WITH MY OWN HANDS!”

Midori suddenly stops laughing, placing her hands at her hips as she watches Silver tremble dangerously from both her anger and her wounds. “Revenge? That’s your motive for saying these things?”

Silver stumbles abruptly, nearly falling to her knees until she stops her fall with her bow. “I’m going to kill you for forcing me to murder Tide.”

Midori sneers, shaking her head proudly. “I’m afraid I had nothing to do with your decision to kill that weakling. It was his decision, not mine, to betray you. And it was your decision, not mine, to take his life. I’ve nothing to do with it.”

She turns and walks away, leaving a shaking Silver to watch her leave. “Wait!” Silver cries futilely.

“Recelo,” Midori says imperiously, “finish her off. Her sob story has lost my interest. I’ll take the Phoneme over here and we’ll be on our way to capture the other two.”

‘Other two?’ Silver wonders suddenly. Her eyes widen, as Midori easily picks up an unconscious Ayame from the floor. ‘Come to think of it, why are they after Ayame? They can’t be—’

The edge of Recelo’s sword slices into Silver’s shoulder, sending her dropping face first onto the ground. Silver spits out dirt, and moves to push herself back up with her arms, but finds her entire body is paralyzed.

“I…I can’t move!” Silver cries out loud suddenly. Tears begin to stream down from her eyes.

“Of course not,” Recelo grunts somewhere above her, “not when you’ve got all those injuries weighing you down. You’ll be lucky to live through these as it is.”

“Are you going to finish me off?” Silver retorts angrily, glaring at Recelo. She sniffs, as her tears cloud her eyes. “I’ve lost. You’ve taken Ayame. You have the right to kill me.”

Recelo merely gazes down at Silver’s motionless body for some time. “Tch!” he shouts suddenly, spitting blood onto the ground. He retracts his sword, and holds it over his shoulder. He watches as Silver slowly closes her eyes, while tears continue to trail down her face.

Recelo raises his sword just over Silver’s neck, but at that moment, the brief image of a young girl crying for help flashes across Recelo’s mind. He freezes, and looks down at Silver again. “Tch! You’re disgusting. Just lay there and die, all right? I can’t stand looking at you weep.” Without another word, Recelo turns and follows Midori into the night.

“EXPLOSION!” Ryuu howls, jamming his sword into Blod’s detached arm. The entire street around him is at once engulfed in flames. The fireball explodes and expands outwards, searing everything in its path. Around the perimeter of the battlegrounds, screams erupt as innocent civilians attempt to barge their way out of the crossfire.

Blod leaps back as a scorching storm of fire passes by her, charring everything in sight. Then abruptly, the flames disappear, and only several thin lines of gray smoke remain from the blast.

Ryuu strides confidently out of the haze of smoke, his sword raised and pointed straight at Blod. “The same trick won’t work on me twice. You can remove all the limbs you want, I’m not gonna let that beat me.”

Blod suddenly begins cackling, a cold, harsh laugh. Ryuu freezes, taken aback by the abrupt, coarse laughter of the female Fatalist. “What’s so funny?” Ryuu growls under his breath.

“You must be joking if you honestly believe you can defeat me,” Blod mutters maniacally. With a disgusting squishing noise, a new arm rapidly forces its way out of the empty socket left by Blod’s detached arm. The new arm is grasping a new sword identical to the one Blod had thrown away.

Ryuu appears taken aback for a moment, shocked by the sudden regeneration of Blod’s arm. However, he quickly recomposes himself. “Heh,” he smirks, “unfortunately, I’m not joking!”

Blod raises her sword in both hands, aiming it at Ryuu. “You don’t stand a chance,” she sneers. In an instant, Blod leaps upon Ryuu, and swings her sword down hard.

Ryuu meets her sword and darts past Blod in a flash of blue light, turning around in midair and landing a clean blow across Blod’s back. The girl freezes in her tracks, stopped by Ryuu’s well-timed slash.

“You may have caught me off guard last time, but I refuse to lose again!” Ryuu shouts, as Blod falls meekly to the ground.

But even as Ryuu finishes speaking, she turns around with a demented leer, and propels her katana deep into Ryuu’s shin. Ryuu’s eyes grow wide, as he topples over and lands on top of Blod.

Meanwhile, the screams around the two of them continue to ring on, as the last remnants of the bustling crowd push and shove themselves out of harm’s way.

Blod pulls herself away from Ryuu, and stumbles into a half-bent stance, hovering just above Ryuu. She gazes down upon him, smiling to herself. She reaches down and grabs the hilt of her sword, intending to pull it out of Ryuu.

However, a hand charred with soot grasps the cold blade of the sword. Blod steps back in surprise as Ryuu laughs in triumph. “Explosion.”

Blod is blown back by the second explosion, and she slams into the wall of a building as the flames fan out from the epicenter of the attack. The building crumbles upon the impact of Blod colliding with it. She slowly forces herself up, grimacing painfully. On her right side, her arm is again torn off, blown apart by Ryuu’s attack.

Eyes flaring with hatred, Blod attempts to reconstruct her arm once more. However, Ryuu steps out of the flames and sprints towards her, his sword poised to kill. “I’m not gonna let you do that!”

“Damn it,” Blod mutters to herself, “it’s not growing back quickly enough.” She clenches her teeth, bracing herself to dodge Ryuu’s direct attack.

Exactly one second before Ryuu reaches Blod, a hand stretches out and pushes Ryuu back. With an electrifying blast of light, Ryuu is hurled backwards, as Ice the Fatalist appears between Ryuu and Blod.

“Ice!” Blod cries, eyes widening upon sight of the Fatalist.

Ryuu scrambles back onto his feet, holding his head where he’d fallen. “You…!” Ryuu cries, surprise etched into his voice.

“It is time for us to depart,” Ice hisses to Blod. “Our goal in this city has been completed. We must hurry so that we may catch up to the Third Phoneme. There is no time to waste.”

Blod grits her teeth, glancing back regretfully at Ryuu. “Fine, then!” she bursts out in frustration. “I’ve had enough of playing with this piece of trash anyway.”

“Just wait a minute!” Ryuu shouts challengingly. “Where is Sasha?! And what was your intent in showing up here anyway?!”

“I wouldn’t imagine relating our plans to you,” Ice retorts coldly, gazing blankly at Ryuu behind his mask. “As for the blue-haired girl you seek, I have placed her in a safe spot in this city. You may locate and retrieve her, if you wish.”

Ice turns back to Blod, delving into the pockets of his robes and retrieving two scrolls. “Let us leave now,” he murmurs to his colleague.

“Hold on!” Ryuu counters. “Where do you think you’re going?! I’m not finished with you yet!”

“Do not bother stopping us,” Ice replies, “it is futile. You have not the strength to challenge me.”

“To hell with you!” Ryuu howls, drawing his sword. He runs forward and slashes at Ice, but the latter merely deflects Ryuu’s charge with a wave of his hand. A bolt of lightning shoots out from Ice’s finger, and throws Ryuu back far into the air. He lands on the ground several yards away, falling roughly on his back.

Ryuu hastily forces himself into a sitting position. “Wait up, damn it!” he cries, even as Ice and Blod disappear into thin air with the assistance of their scrolls. Ryuu stands up and stares into the empty night air now, devoid of all noise except for the shocked murmuring from the crowd of onlookers and pedestrians.

“Damn it…” Ryuu mumbles to himself.

“So is Apple gonna be taking autographs or what?” a girl’s voice asks from amongst the crowd.

Zack and Shuriken stand squared up next to each other, panting heavily from frantic scrambling. Across from them is a grim-faced man with dark hair, staring leeringly at the two comrades. In his hands he holds a Dragon Shine Bow, drawn taut and loaded with a pair of arrows.

‘Fain…’ Zack thinks, as he continues to meet the Fatalist’s gaze, ‘this’s the guy that’s been followin’ us and tryin’ t’kill us. Never thought he’d show up s’soon. This ain’t gonna be easy…’

“Ready yet or not, Shuriken?” Zack says out loud.

“Ready,” Shuriken growls bluntly.

However, Shuriken no longer looks like his normal self. His entire body is a hulking mass of watery shadow, darker than the night. Long skewers of the same blackish material protrude from the tattered clothes on his back, as well as from both his arms and legs. In his hand, he grasps an Avenger of equal gruesomeness, with a glaring yellow eye at its center. Most conspicuous, however, are Shuriken’s glowing yellow eyes, encircling a blood red pupil.

“Level Three Paradox Transformation…” he exclaims in a deeper, warped version of his voice, “…is complete!”