[D15 EN] - One Last Watch for the Hikaru (Expecting)

[Nozomi]

They weren't going into the tunnels, but rather keeping watch over the entries into the City Outskirts. There'd been trouble deeper in apparently earlier in the evening, so the guard rotations were being kept up strictly, not only at the camp itself but right at the outskirts and edges of the encampment. Phi looked over to the others as she squatted there, eyes at the ready and watching everything that might be coming out of this god forsaken place. No mask, no hood, but in the dark and gloom of the night that was far less bothersome.

"I... am seriously looking forward to a proper bath when this shit is done," she muttered to them.

[Jiyo Sora]

"Now who's gone soft?"

Sora grinned, in spite of their situation.

"One little hellscape and she cries about a bath!"

[Nozomi]

She gave him a light punch in the shoulder and shook her head. "Have you smelled yourself, Sora? When the rivers are clean, so help me god I am going to shove you in there myself if you don't bathe properly," she managed, snickering and barely avoiding that hyena laugh of hers. Little too loud for this place.

"Heard one of the Nezumi bit it fighting some flaming horror down there." A grunt. "Gonna get his name right when we toast him after this is all over. Lotta good folk risked their life for this thing." She didn't say 'it had better be worth it,' but oh she did feel that.

[Jiyo Sora]

"Ch'jak'matt. First Nezumi I ever met. Ayumu barely lived. Xia took a bit of a beating. Umeno too."

Sora sighed.

"More names for the records."

[Nozomi]

"Ch'jak'matt. First Nezumi I ever met. Ayumu barely lived. Xia took a bit of a beating. Umeno too."

Sora sighed.

"More names for the records."

"We've come this far. Only him and those poor bastards among the guards with the skinriders," a shudder. She'd heard about Umeno, but they said she was ok, and that was good. She was rather fond of the little taciturn girl with the giant mallet strapped to her back. "We should say a prayer of thanks to Jurojin for getting us this far. Now we just have to get through tomorrow to make sure we have records for them to hear."

[Jiyo Sora]

"I can't speak for the whole rearguard, but Kinyoubi is under orders to get the hell out if things go badly."

[Shinjo Koyama]

Koyama appeared, somewhat belatedly, and absent-minded. He wordlessly waved to his kith and sat on some fallen arc. There was some conversation already going on he didn't want to intercede into, so for the time being he focused on guarding.

[Nozomi]

She waved over at Koyama, jerking her head. There was no strong reason that they had to be split up right now. The holes into the warrens were all pretty well cut out, so they could keep an eye on them from roughly the same area. She looked over at Sora and raised an eyebrow. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you've taken a shying to protecting that girl of yours," she teased a little. "But good. She's been through enough. I'd have left her back with the nezumi if I completely trusted it to be safe."

[Jiyo Sora]

"She, ah... insisted."

[Nozomi]

"If you are not careful," she said, reaching over to punch him in the arm and snickering at him softly. "You are going to get tied down by that girl and she is going to make a respectable man out of you. Perish the thought, all of us made into respectable, upstanding souls by the people that managed to snare us." There was a bit of an implication in that.

[Jiyo Sora]

Sora grinned.

"I knew you'd hit it off with the Nezumi."

[Nozomi]

She snorted and punched him in the arm a little harder this time. "I did finally get that poor bastard's name right in the end. It took me two weeks to get the pronunciation right, but cut it out you. No.... no, I found someone else. I honestly didn't come here looking for it, but it kind of found me." She shrugged. "I don't think any of us would have pegged me as someone who'd fall for a holy man, honestly, but here I am."

[Jiyo Sora]

That got a chuckle.

"Well, anyone Nanzi hates as much as he hates Shinsei is probably a wonderful human being. I'll have to come to the wed-"

His eye assaulted him with a vision, so strong that he nearly dropped to his knees. Like it had done during the tournament, it showed him a myriad of futures spanning from the moment- and unlike the tournament, it was filled with nothing but nightmarishness in most cases.

Phi and Shinsei, smiling, looking down at a saddled bundle. A vision of black feathers and long claws impaling them both, then devouring the screaming baby alive. Phi and a child, in some stone building with a statue of Shinsei in the room, the structure shaking. A massive clawed hand smashing through the ceiling to scoop them both up and crush them to jelly. A pregnant Phi sitting by Shinsei's side, taking a sip of something steaming, handed to her by a robed figure... and then screaming as cramps overtook her.

Horror after horror, layered one on top of another. For the first time in quite a while, Sora tried to sift the visions. Tried to find a way out.

Phi. A baby. Shinsei, there but not there.

"... there can't be a wedding."

[Nozomi]

"... there can't be a wedding."

She was about to make a quip, about to say something when the words came out of his mouth. They didn't match the other words that had been said, the tone he'd had. She'd been about to say something nasty about Nanzi behind his back when he ... the fucking hell? She nearly snapped his head off right there. Her eyes looked like blazing red furnaces and her hand was on a tonfa before she stopped, calming herself. Stilling herself.

"Why? And know that I like you Sora, which is why I'm not bashing your head in right now, so I suggest a good explanation," she whispered in a low hiss.

[Jiyo Sora]

"Phi... think about the man you love. The man who loves you. Think of who he is... and the enemies he has made. Jigoku will do everything it can to extinguish his bloodline. Everything. You cannot... make it official."

[Nozomi]

"Phi... think about the man you love. The man who loves you. Think of who he is... and the enemies he has made. Jigoku will do everything it can to extinguish his bloodline. Everything. You cannot... make it official."

'He doesn't even HAVE a bloodline you...'

What the hell was he talking about? Of course the man had enemies and of course Jigoku was on that list. They were all enemies of hell right this moment. She stared at him in confusion, her face getting angrier by the second before the hand on her tonfa froze and if an albino girl could have gotten paler than death itself, she would have. She looked down, her eyes widening with absolute shock and her lips quivering. She put a hand to her midriff and then blinked, stopping. No. No, how could that. It shoudn't be possible to know. How could he possibly know?

How could anyone... and her eyes snaked towards Koyama. Koyama who she trusted as much as she trusted Sora. And suddenly, there were visions swimming in her head. Faceless babies, faceless shinsei, monsters around every corner, demons killing Shinjo and Koyama in their beds just because they knew. She could feel a cold sweat beading on her forehead and she put her hand to her body, knowing it was too soon. There wouldn't be a kick, not for a long time yet. Hell, she wouldn't even have the sickness.

He lips quivered and she stammered for a second. She looked up and mouthed to him 'are you sure I'm pregnant now?'

Fortunes, I should be happy...

[Jiyo Sora]

Sora simply nodded.

"All visions have their trigger. There's only one constant in the river of them I just experienced."

[Nozomi]

She stammered. She struggled, and she was fighting back tears and when they started to brim into her eyes, she looked over at Sora pleadingly and reached out with a hand to clap him on the shoulder. "Taka was a good man, though wasn't he? I kind of wish... wished he'd stuck around, but I guess I won't be going home with him when this is all over." Taka... had been one of the guards the bog hags had killed.

"You'll help me make sure his family remembers him fondly, right? We don't always get to have happy endings, but I want them to know he died well." She was going to need to practice this lie, but considering the situation, she was doing remarkably well at it. She wasn't sure if Koyama would buy it if he overheard much, but she hoped for the sake of the fortunes, for himself, for his family and his wife, that he did.

...she'd need to talk to Saruko and Shinsei.

[Jiyo Sora]

Sora nodded. Once.

"I always thought you were too good for a flatlander like Taka, personally, but you youngsters have your own ways, and he was certainly a brave man."

[Nozomi]

Sora nodded. Once.

"I always thought you were too good for a flatlander like Taka, personally, but you youngsters have your own ways, and he was certainly a brave man."

"I might have had a little to drink that night... but he was a good man," she murmured, leaning in close and whispering as the tears welled up, her voice choked. 'Please... please don't tell me I have to leave him behind. Please let the lie be enough. I can be his student. I don't want to be without him. Not when I just found him...'