DARK DAY FOR ANIME - THE RIGHT DISHONOURABLE MARK A PAGE
<darkdayforanime@hotmail.com>
Disclaimer: Its PEOPLE!!! Yoshitoshi ABe and Aureole Secret Factory is
PEOPLE!!! No, wait.... maybe its baba ganoush....
----o
Ketsu walked across the field of grass, staring across the landscape,
feeling hollow and empty. She was sure she had heard Rakka's voice, but
there was no sign of the girl, nor could she tell from which direction the
voice had come. So she continued walking, searching for someone, anyone,
to appear.
But she knew she was alone, wherever it was she was now. The sky and the
grass filled her with uncontrolled waves of blue and green, so bright that
all sense of hue was gone and all she could see was monochrome. She placed
a hand over her eyes and continued on. There didn't seem to be anything
else that she could do.
It was because she wasn't looking that she stumbled across the path of
rounded gravel, feeling the crunch of the stones beneath her feet before
stopping and looking down. She looked up and down along the length of the
thin, white ribbon as it made its way through the landscape, one way up a
small hill before disappearing, the other into a stand of trees through
which she could see one or two man-made structures. After considering how
she couldn't remember seeing the path before she'd shielded her eyes, she
decided to follow it into the trees, as that seemed to offer more....
something. Anything. She didn't know what she expected to find. There
certainly didn't seem to be any more people there than she'd seen, or felt,
beforehand.
She entered the stand and realised that it went in far deeper than she had
expected. The path wound its way through the trees and disappeared. The
trees were somewhat evenly spaced, as if they had been planted and tended
to, though they were fairly random species. She couldn't remember the
names for them, no matter how hard she tried. She was sure that she had
known what many of them were called. There were large ones with smooth,
light trunks and dark, pointy leaves, and smaller ones with long, drooping
branches and lighter leaves. There were stubby, bushy plants and tall,
straight trees with fairly severe, dark green bristles. And she knew that
she had known what they had all been called once. The knowledge was being
denied to her, and she didn't like that very much.
Continuing into what now seemed to be a small forest, the path turned as it
approached a monument. Well, that was what it seemed like to her. Stones
arranged like a cairn, cemented together with a large metal plaque near the
top. She moved closer to see what was on the plaque, but it was empty. A
monument unfinished, incomplete, its intention forgotten. It was a
monument to nothing, on a path that seemed to lead nowhere, in a world
where there seemed to be no-one. Ketsu touched the plaque, as if she felt
she would gain something from doing so. All she felt was its cold metal
surface. She turned and continued on along the path.
Another turn and a small house appeared from behind the trees. Red brick
with a high, sloping roof of orange-red ceramic tiles, covered in moss,
plain wooden front door and small, functional windows with frames flaking
white paint, she made her way up to one of the windows and tried to peer
in. A net curtain made things difficult, but the room beyond seemed to be
empty. Walking up to the door, she tried the handle. The door opened,
though somewhat reluctantly, as if the hinges hadn't been used in some
time. She peered into the front hall of the house, but it, too, was
empty. No decorations, no furnishings. Nothing. An empty shell, waiting
for an occupant, waiting for someone to make something of it. But there
was nobody here, except herself.
She wondered if she should settle into the house. It didn't seem too bad
an idea. But she shook her head and shut the door, turning from it and
walking away, not looking back. The house had a history, but that history
was gone, now.
----o
An Haibane Renmei Fanfiction
Red Feathers in Old Home
by Dark Day For Anime
Part 6
Visions - Paradise - Lost
----o
"What happens to them?" Kana asked softly as she unlocked the front door
to the clock repairs shop. Maria, who was sitting on a perch behind the
counter, looked up from some of the paperwork her uncle had asked her to
retrieve, blankly.
"What?"
"What happens to people. From Glie, I mean, when they die?" Kana turned,
and without looking at Maria, made her way back to the small office behind
the desk. Maria watched her as she grabbed a broom from the office and
started to sweep the floor of the shop's customer area.
"I dunno. I guess they go where everyone else goes. Where the Haibane
go. Maybe. I've never thought about it before. In Glie, you're born, you
live and you die. What happens next is the great unknown and
unknowable." She shrugged and folded the paperwork into a neat bundle,
placing them into a leather satchel, which she then zipped up and placed
under her right arm. "Does it worry you? I didn't know Haibane thought
about such things."
Kana stopped sweeping and leaned against the broom handle, thinking for a
few moments. Then she shrugged and started again. "I've had friends leave
Old Home. People I got to know well. Most of you seem to forget them when
they're gone, because Haibane and townsfolk don't really get to know each
other that well. It's the rules, for the most part. But Haibane.... I'm
not sure. They don't die, as such, but you never see them again. It feels
like they've died...."
"Does it worry you? That one day you're going to follow them, and you
don't know when?"
"I don't think that really matters. I mean, none of us know when it will
be our turn to leave." Kana opened the front door and started brushing
what little dust she'd collected into the square. "I don't know if I'd
really ever managed to get close enough to any of them to think about them
for long. I don't like thinking about the past, anyway. It only makes you
realise how much you've lost, and that isn't my style at all." And with a
flourish she banished the dust into the world and closed the door to it,
trotting back to the office to quickly store away the broom. "So...." She
said as she shut the office door. "What are the arrangements?"
"Hmm?"
"You know...." Kana felt a little awkward about asking this. "For the
funeral."
"Oohh...." Maria nodded. "It.... will be in a couple of days. Depending
on the family, of course. This has thrown them right off.... Naturally
enough. The grandson, Kei, is making the arrangements."
"Hmmm...." Kana brushed down her work apron with her hands. "I wonder if
they'll let us attend. I'm not sure on the rules of this, whether Haibane
are allowed to attend funerals or not."
"I'm sure you're allowed. The family would be happy for you to...."
----o
Occasionally she would feel as if she were being watched, but there would
be nothing there when she would turn. It felt like having people call out
to her, then run and hide before she could respond. It leant a slightly
eerie air to the shady glades, the bright sun only just peering through the
treetops. Ketsu continued along the path, trying to ignore the
distractions. More houses and buildings of other descriptions. More
monuments, even fountains and wells, all following the path, all seemingly
clean and tended, but otherwise abandoned and unused, with no sign of ever
having been used. Their purpose simply seemed to be to exist, without reason.
A bit like myself, Ketsu thought. A bit like everyone.
She approached a turn in the path, now heavily lined with the tall, rigid,
dark-green trees and the lighter ones with long weeping branches, and came
upon a small hall, much like all the other buildings she'd passed, only
much neater, much cleaner, as if it had only just been built, but out of
old, second-hand materials. The path went past nearby the front entrance,
but something tempted her to stop. Near the double front doors was a
fountain, barely trickling water, like the pressure had been turned
down. At the stop of the fountain was a crudely carved figure, that of
someone with stubby wings and a rough halo. From this figure's
outstretched palms, the water trickled down into the plain, round base
pool. The water below was clear, fresh. She approached it, and could
smell the freshness of the water, tinged with a slight metallic tang. She
wasn't sure what the smell was. She looked back up at the figure, and saw
that the water emanated from the wrists into the hands before falling into
the pond. Like blood from cut wrists. She shivered and looked down into
the pool....
She had no reflection.
She recoiled, then looked down at her feet, which, in her perception, were
still there, but how could she be sure that she even existed? Maybe
everyone in this world was invisible, which was why she couldn't find
anyone. She patted herself down, to make sure. The tactile sensations
registered, but were they real? Was she real? She slowly stepped back up
to the pool and looked in. She now had a reflection, as if confirming her
existence also confirmed it.
Her face was partly round, partly thin. Her skin was pale and she had
deep, dark eyes that were close to black.... Trying to define the division
between the pupil and the iris was difficult. The thick, dark lashes
around her eyes, however, did strike a sharp border and gave her an intense
expression that she found somewhat discomforting. She brushed a hand along
her long, dark hair, as if recognising it for the first time. Her body
seemed thin and small underneath her clothes. How young was she? How old
was she? She didn't seem to know. All in all, she didn't think she liked
the way she looked very much. Then she noticed them. Protruding just over
her shoulders, the tips of two small, grey wings. And just above her head,
a dimly glowing halo.
She reached up and felt the halo. It was smooth and warm, and seemed to be
spinning gently on its own axis. Trying to stop it caused the hair on the
top of her head to stick up with static, so she let it go and peered over
her shoulder at her wings. She flexed her shoulder muscles and felt
another set of muscles working. The wings flapped, shaking off a couple of
loose feathers. She tried it again, feeling for the new muscles, and found
she could flap the wings at will.
Unfortunately, they were bloody useless. She doubted they were big, or
strong, enough to lift her from the ground. Unless, of course, her bones
had become honeycomb and lightweight. And even then, she doubted they
would work. She wondered what the point of them was.... Both the wings
and the halo. There had to be a point to them, some useful
function.... She looked up at the figure, with the strange, blood-scented
water trickling from its wrists. Was that her? A crude, ceramic version
of herself? She stared at the figure, but it was hard to see, apart from
the wings and halo, whether there was anything else that represented her.
'So, I have wings and a halo.' She thought to herself. 'What does that
make me? What the hell am I, even less, where the hell am I?' She turned
to the hall's double front doors. Large, wooden and plain, they weren't
particularly inviting, but she stepped up to them and placed her hands on
the latch anyway. It clicked open without effort, but the doors were, like
the previous house door she had tried, quite stiff on their hinges. A rush
of warm air struck her as the inside bled into the outside air. For a
moment, she felt as if her inner self had been laid bare. She shook off
the feeling as the doors opened wide, revealing the interior of the hall.
There were two small side rooms, little more than closet-sized, bordering
the entranceway. Further in, the hall opened up into a huge, empty space,
much like a church without its pews and altar. All along both sides of the
hall, large lead light windows cast a multicoloured glow onto the plain
wooden floor. And at the far end, she could see what appeared to be a
figure, cowled in a hood and cloak, kneeling before the far wall as if in
prayer.
She stepped into the hall, through the entranceway, and looked from side to
side at the lead lighting. Like almost everything else, there were no
defined patterns in the coloured glass, merely a bright chiaroscuro
representing nothing. Slowly, she made her way into the hall, her shoes
creaking the floorboards, as she approached the figure, who made no sign of
registering her presence.
The feeling she had had earlier, of not being able to sense anyone around
her, remained. It was as if this person did not exist, was not real. Yet
they seemed all too real as she stood behind them, waiting and watching
for.... she didn't know what. She only just resisted the temptation to tap
them on the shoulder....
----o
Kumiko entered the courtyard of Old Home for the second time in two days,
looking slightly less than her usual, professional self. This visit wasn't
for business, and she took a long breath as she exited the archway.
At the other end of the courtyard, the twins and Hana were loading a couple
of the crates onto a trolley they had found somewhere. Putting on a grim
smile, she approached them and was within a good twelve feet before they
saw her. Both twins looked at each other and quickly wheeled the crates
away before she had a chance to say anything. Hana bowed to her in apology
and followed in their steps, leaving Kumiko shaking her head in bemusement.
"There are times when they should call this place the 'Mad House'...." She
turned and looked up at the balcony. The doors were partly open and she
could hear voices. Steeling herself once more, she made her way into the
building.
----o
"Excuse me...." Ketsu began after clearing her throat. The figure's head
twitched, causing a soft, jangling sound, but they didn't turn. "I just
want to ask you a couple of things." She knelt down beside the figure and
could see that their mouth was covered by what looked like bandages. There
seemed to be small bells hanging from threads, dangling either side of the
figure's head, from underneath the hood. There also seemed to be small
bells on the collars of the cloak's sleeves. Ketsu bit her lower lip and
backed up, slowly. "Though you probably won't be able to tell me, even if
you did know the answers."
She turned and was about to stand when the figure clasped a hand around her
right wrist. She looked back and the figure was staring at her, though she
couldn't see their eyes in the darkness underneath the hood. The size and
strength of the hand made Ketsu think that they were possibly male,
certainly someone bigger and stronger than she was. She panicked for a
second and wrenched her hand from their grasp, falling back onto the floor
before standing and putting some distance between them.
She gazed warily at the figure, who did not move for minutes in what
seemed, to Ketsu, like a kind of silent standoff. She felt herself trapped
within the hall, and a sense of panic, the urge to run, started to build up
within her. Then he turned back and gestured to the wall. "What?" Ketsu
could feel her feet take a couple more steps back and stared at the
wall. "What is it?" Her voice sounded strangled with fear, which she
tried to suppress. Nothing had happened. He wasn't trying to hurt
her.... Wasn't going to lay a finger on her.....
The figure gestured to the wall once more, and blood shot from their wrist,
coating the wall. Ketsu put a hand up to her face in shock. "Oh
sh...." She swallowed as more and more blood sprayed from the figure: now
his face, chest and abdomen were belching red across the wall. Eventually,
the spray settled and he collapsed to the floor.
She stared at the blood, feeling acid rise in her throat, she turned to
run. The way out was in darkness. The darkness that was chasing her,
reaching out to hurt her. She looked around for a way out, but the
darkness had that way covered. It surged forward, eagerly looking to
engulf her, when it struck a patch of red light from the
lead-lighting. The darkness writhed and shot back out through the doors,
which slammed shut behind it.
Ketsu's legs collapsed underneath her and she sat hard onto the floor,
giving her tailbone a whack. She breathed heavily as she rubbed her sore
lower back and looked across to where the figure had been. Both he and his
sprayed blood were gone. For some reason, it didn't surprise her.
She turned and stared across the floor of the hall. Wherever the
lead-lighting cast a red glow lay an equally red feather.
----o
The door to the common room slammed shut as Hikari raced past Kumiko. "Oh,
hi...." Hikari said, spinning round to face her. "Sorry. Rakka wants me
to see if the house mother has some medicine, or something.... The new
girl will probably need some later. Gotta go." And with a little wave,
Hikari disappeared down the corridor.
Kumiko sighed and walked up to the common room door, knocking
gently. "Haaaaiiii...." Came a reply, and she slowly opened it, peering
in. Rakka was kneeling beside the bed with Ketsu lying on her front,
breathing heavily.
"I've.... I've come at a bad time, haven't I?"
"Kind of." Rakka applied a wet cloth to Ketsu's forehead. "The fever is
starting."
"Her wings...." Kumiko swallowed.
Memories of her little Haibane sister, crying helplessly on her bed at
home, entered Kumiko's mind. She was so young at the time, and knew
nothing about the Haibane. She'd stayed by Chigusa's side as the girl went
through what appeared to her young eyes as the worst of tortures. And she
watched, horrified, as those wings pierced her skin, exploding outwards,
spraying blood and oils across the room, flexing horribly....
painfully.... And Chigusa's cry of agony as they did....
Kumiko was rooted to the spot, unable to tear her eyes away from Ketsu's
back as Rakka loosened the ties that held the nightdress in place, peeling
it back and exposing the welts where the wings were starting to
push. "Kumiko-san?" Rakka's voice brought her round.
"What?"
"I'm sorry you came all this way to see this. It isn't very
pleasant." Rakka stepped back to the table, where the medical box was
sitting, and started to rifle through it, pulling out a roll of gauze.
"I've.... seen this happen before. Remember?"
Rakka turned to Kumiko, whose face had turned pale. "Are you sure you're
alright?"
"I'll be fine." Kumiko looked around the room. "As soon as I sit
down." And with that, she made her way to a chair and practically
collapsed into it.
----o
Ketsu reached forward and picked up the nearest feather. The redness did
not change out of the light. In fact, the feather seemed to glow even
brighter without it. There was a warmth emanating from the feather and
Ketsu held it to her. The hall was filled with the deep blood-red light,
and then....
----o
In the storeroom, Hana and the twins had managed to ring the regenerating
cocoon with stacks of crates at least two-high before they'd thought of
taking a breather. All three were already exhausted and they'd barely
started the job. The heat and humidity of the day was also rising, quite
rapidly, and the room, despite being larger than most rooms in Old Home,
was feeling dusty and stuffy.
"You know...." Hana slumped down against the wall after helping Yu heave
up the last crate. "....When the others find out about this, they're going
to be really, really angry." She crossed her arms and huffed.
"Of course they are." Sa grinned. "I wouldn't be doing this, otherwise."
"Yeah. She's a complete nutter who likes being beaten to an inch of her
life." Yu glowered at her sister. "Anyway, who says they're going to find
out?"
"Well...." Hana pointed at the cocoon. "It's glowing even more brightly,
now. It might do something, like explode, or something like that." That
sky-about-to-fall feeling was setting in for the day.
"Don't be stupid." Sa wiped sweat off her forehead and looked across the
crates at the cocoon. "It isn't going to explode. I think."
And the cocoon exploded.
----o
The house mother tutted as she rifled through the medicine cabinet in the
kitchen of her living space. "Honestly.... I've never known a Haibane to
need medicine during this time, before." She looked over her shoulder at
Hikari. "In the middle of class, too.... The kids are probably running
amok, as usual." Hikari laughed with embarrassment, pushing her glasses
further up her nose.
The walls and floor vibrated for a second, and they both looked at each
other. "What was...." Hikari managed to get out, before she heard a cry....
----o
Just at that moment, Ketsu let out a piercing cry, which shocked both Rakka
and Kumiko. Trickles of blood started to run from small cuts in the welts
on her back. Rakka knelt down beside Ketsu, wrapping the gauze around her
right thumb as she glanced back at Kumiko. "A small trick taught to me by
a friend. Helps to stop the newborn from biting their tongue, or something
like that." Rakka turned back and help Ketsu's head up in her left
hand. Ketsu's eyes were unfocused, but the pain seemed to be bringing her
around.
"Rak...ka?" She panted. "What.... Ughhhh...." She spasmed as larger
tears appeared in the welts. Rakka held her gauze-wrapped thumb into her face.
"Bite this. When it starts to hurt bad, bite really hard."
"But.... I'll hurt you." Ketsu's eyes turned to Rakka. They still seemed
somewhat clouded-over. Rakka shook her head and did her best to smile, kindly.
Ketsu looked down at the thumb and leaned her head forward, opening her
teeth. Then there was a ripping sound and she spasmed again, her teeth
latching onto the thumb hard. Rakka fell back as Ketsu's jaw muscles
worked repeatedly, drilling her teeth into the gauze again and
again. Kumiko let out a short cry as small splashes of blood sprayed
across the bedsheets....
"Chigusa...." She placed a hand over her mouth as two blood-covered....
things.... slowly squeezed their way out of Ketsu's back. Ketsu's entire
body was quivering as they now obviously formed a wing-shape. The tips of
the wings flicked away from the skin, and the wings spasmed outwards,
pulling on muscles that had never been used, and ripping further into
already-damaged skin. Just as the wings flexed, Hikari ran in in time to
hear Ketsu cry out once more, before she passed out and the joints of the
blood-splattered wings settled into their sockets, holding them in
place. Already, the skin around the exit wound was starting to seal over
with an unnatural speed.
The three of them looked at Ketsu in a shocked silence, before Hikari ran
into the kitchen. Kumiko managed to stand from her chair and made her way
across the room to Rakka, who was still holding her right hand up to Ketsu,
the girl's teeth having let go of her thumb, but one of her hands had
grabbed Rakka's wrist and her head was now nuzzled against it. Kumiko
knelt down beside Rakka, whose face, expressionless in the aftermath, had
been sprayed with some of the blood. Kumiko reached into the coat of her
business suit and pulled out a handkerchief and started to wipe some of the
blood away. Rakka didn't respond for quite some time.
"That...." Kumiko whispered to her. "....Still takes some getting used
to, it seems."
Rakka turned her face to Kumiko and smiled. "I think I'm stuck. She's not
letting go of my hand."
Kumiko reached up and gently prised Ketsu's fingers away from Rakka's right
hand, unwrapping the gauze from her thumb. Ketsu had done her best to part
Rakka with her thumb, but all she'd managed to achieve were a few layers of
broken skin and some deep indentations. "Better clean that up." Kumiko
helped Rakka to her feet. "Then we can clean her wings off."
----o
It wasn't much of a blast, more like a shedding of its outer shell. But it
still blew Hana and the twins across the room. They stopped when they hit
the wall, where they lay dazed for a few moments, before Hana crawled up to
Yu and latched onto her, screwing her eyes shut. Even then, she could
'feel' what was happening. All three of them could. They could feel the
presence that had emerged from the cocoon.
Sa and Yu watched as the powdered remains, which had clouded the room,
cleared away to the corners. The cocoon was still glowing, but more
faintly, now. In front of the cocoon was the floating figure of
Ketsu. She was clothed, in a dark jacket, shirt and shorts and large,
heavy-looking shoes, and she had a halo and the wings of a Haibane. Her
hands were clenched around the end of what looked like a red feather.
"Ketsu?" Sa whispered, and the girl opened her eyes, regarding all three
dispassionately.
"Ketsu." She repeated, as if learning the word for the first time. "So,
that is who I am, this time. I am.... Ketsu." The figure straightened out
and threw the feather in front of her. It exploded in a shower of sparks,
making Hana and the twins cry out in surprise and turn away.
Only Sa was brave enough to open her eyes to see what happened next. Ketsu
held out her arms and closed her eyes, smiling. Her hair changed colour,
becoming blond, and her wings enlarged, turning a bright shade of red, much
like the feather she had been holding. And her eyes.... turned a deep
shade of crimson. "One feather, Ketsu." Now her size and features
changed, to become someone completely different. To become the person who
had been in the painting Rakka had found.
The cocoon glowed brightly once more, rendering the new figure little more
than a silhouette, and the powder re-emerged to fill the room again, this
time imploding. A great inrush of air from outside rushed past them before
everything fell silent. The figure that had first appeared as Ketsu now
gone. Sa got to her feet and crept back towards the cocoon, which had gone
dormant. Hana and Yu had opened their eyes and were watching
her. "Sa.... be careful...." Yu whispered, but Sa was ignoring her. She
climbed over the crates and moved right up to the cocoon, daring to touch it.
BRRRRRRRRRAAAAARRRRRAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAARARRRRAAAAARRRRRRRRRRR.....
Sa snatched her hand away. The noise hadn't been so much a vibration as a
sound in her mind, much like the cries had been.... She climbed back over
the crates and bounded over to where her sister was helping Hana to her
feet, feeling a great deal of excitement.
"Man, that was so COOL!" She jumped up and down and glomped the both of
them. "Did you see that? That was just the coolest thing ever. I wish my
cocoon had been like this one."
"Yes, Sa. Very good, Sa." Yu held Hana's shoulders as Sa let go of
them. The younger girl was staring, transfixed, at the cocoon, her face
an unreadable mask. Her lack of reaction worried Yu, somewhat. She turned
back to Sa, starting to feel annoyed. "Would you like to remind us just
why the hell we're doing this?"
"What do you mean?" Sa let them go, nonplussed.
"What do I mean? Honestly, Sa.... Do you think either me or Hana are
going to go on with this after what just happened?"
"Well, be like that, then. I doubt you'll ever see anything else like it."
"And I doubt I'll want to see anything else like it." Yu shook her
head. "Now, do you think it might be a good time to tell the others about
this?"
Sa bit her lower lip. "Nothing has changed." Yu looked at her,
disbelievingly, then shook her head.
"I'd like to see what would constitute things changing." Yu's flat tone
belied her sarcasm.
"Look.... It doesn't change the fact that it involves Ketsu,
somehow.... You saw that much...."
"Well, yeah...." Yu started, before Sa ran over to where the trolley was
lying, picking it up. "It also doesn't change what we've both heard. If
anyone found out about this, then Ketsu could be in really deep doo doo...."
"Or we could be. I doubt anyone in Old Home failed to hear that." Yu was
about to deliver her sister a tirade before Hana let go of her and walked
up to Sa, her face a dark mask of fury the likes of which Sa had never seen
before. Sa had practically withered underneath the gaze when Hana slapped
her hard across the face, much to both the twins surprise.
"Now I feel better." She smiled at Sa, who held a hand up to her stinging
cheek. "Now, are we going to finish building this barricade, or not?"
"But...." Yu's mouth hung open. "After what happened, you...."
Hana turned to her, putting hands on hips. "Sa-oneechan is right. Who
knows what they'll do to Ketsu-oneechan if they find out about this. I
won't let them hurt her."
"Hana-chan...." Yu ventured, before realising there was an odd kind of
zeal in Hana's eyes. A chord had been struck in her 'sense of justice'
gland once more....
----o
Kumiko watched as Rakka brushed away the blood and grease on Ketsu's wings,
and remembered the time when she had done the same for Chigusa. Rakka
noticed her watching and smiled at her. "Penny for your thoughts."
"Hmm?" Kumiko blinked, brought out of her reverie. "Oh, just thoughts of
the past."
Hikari stuck her head out of the kitchen. "You know, about now I'd offer
you tea.... But the twins took off with the teapot and haven't brought it
back. So you're going to have to deal with coffee. Granulated, no less."
Kumiko shook her head. "It doesn't matter. We'll probably need something
fairly strong after this."
"Hmmm...." Hikari shrugged. "I'm so going to be toast at the bakery, so
to speak. This is the second day I'm not going to show up for work in a
row...." She paused for a moment. "By the way, did either of you feel....
well.... did things shake in here just as Ketsu's wings started to pop
out? It felt like an earth tremor, when I was in the house mother's
lodgings." Both Rakka and Kumiko looked blankly at her. "Oh
well...." Hikari shrugged. "It was probably the twins blowing up the
teapot, or something." And she ducked back into the kitchen.
A few moments passed as they listened to the kettle starting to boil in the
kitchen, before Rakka spoke. "Kumiko.... Is there a reason you came to
see us today? Are you still needing me for the festival, or something?"
Kumiko swallowed as she remembered. "Oh.... No. It isn't anything like
that. It's just...." She looked uncomfortable. "I just wanted to bring
you the news. It isn't very good news, though."
"What?" Rakka stopped brushing and stared at Kumiko, who felt put on the spot.
"Ummm...." She tried to think of the right way to say
this. "Fujita.... The builder who was here yesterday. He...."
"What? He can't come round to do the repair work to Old Home, after
all?" Hikari stepped out of the kitchen, holding two mugs. "That would be
s shame.... After all the inspection work he did yesterday. What is
it? An important job, or something?"
"No." Kumiko took a long breath. "He died last night, at his
home. Apparently of a heart attack...."
There was a very long silence that followed.
END OF PART 6
----o
DARK DAY FOR ANIME - THE RIGHT DISHONOURABLE MARK A PAGE
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FEATHER 2.0: 14th-18th September 2004
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