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BEHOLD! A DIFFERENT ICON!
So, I decided I had to do something to keep my mind off of it after the devastating loss, so I played Starcraft II beta with a friend of mine. Another sent me a beta key, so I had a chance to try it out. Besides absolutely failing at the game, it does seem quite fun, though very strategy based as you might imagine. How you play, how fast you play, what you do, etc. are all vital to what happens in the game. I'm not particularly that good in those things, but hey, I'll try.
Then after two weeks without a Negima fix, finally the RAW came out today, with spoilers mysteriously never appearing. It was simply a character development chapter, but I did enjoy the shots of characters which are my favourites, like Yuuna obviously. Her mother being a Magic World native (and maybe her father, who knows) makes her have a personal vendetta against the evil organization right now (since her mom died in a mission involving them). It's a lot more complicated than that, more than just two sides and a black and white issue, but I think explaining it in that simplified way works well. I am expecting awesome things to happen with Yuuna in the future especially since Kazumi is not one of those characters who will ever get a backstory explained (because likely she doesn't have an interesting one) and is only there to serve the vital mmorpg role of intelligence gathering, just like a few other support-only girls. Ako already had her turn, though it's still possible for more considering she's insanely popular (breaks into the main character realm of popularity!) and same with Chisame. Ku Fei already got her pactio, so she may only be reduced to fighting scenes, but who knows.
Oh and Sayo, well she still has story to be told! When that will happen I have no clue, it does not look like anytime soon, so I can't expect much now. Right now is Yuuna's turn, or at least soon!
Speaking of Yuuna's turn, a few entries below this I released a brand new fanfiction! One I actually started working on two years back, but reading it over I found it rather unsatisfying, with its pace really odd and pretty much everything poorly done. I guess I didn't like my writing too much back then. Since it was still short and I very much love the premise of this new AU story, I decided to rewrite it, so here's the first chapter of the renamed "Drop of Red" staring Yuuna Akashi being a main character for once! She certainly fits the mold!
And obviously my other favourites are hanging around too:
A Drop of Red
Chapter One: To Live and Die
She put her mug down, looking through the window of the landau to see dozens of familiar mountains and trees decorating the scenery. She felt herself hopping around in her seat as the horses galloped their way through the curves and dents of the trail, leaving herself nothing close to preoccupied inside the coach. The warmth was a pleasant welcome for her, feeling the side-effects of nothing but the cold rain for such a long, almost eternal time. She sat back, relaxing at the comforting sight, nothing but more trees and almost-smiling clouds until she got back home. Almost like a mini-vacation in a way, even though she was going home.
"Akashi. We have arrived."
Yuuna popped open her eyes. Too relaxing, the trip felt. Nonetheless she was here, digging through a few coins to tip the driver; she let herself off the carriage, reeling in the incredible atmosphere of society. So long had she been working in a farm far off into the countryside that she had almost forgotten what a crowd felt like. Her old house wasn't far back, and nothing would stop her from heading there anyway. The first thing she knew she had to do was greet her waiting father, such a long time since she's seen his face. The past six months were really like six years.
Since she had been gone, the town changed a bit. The old library that used to be nearby the marketplace had been destroyed, likely a surprise attack from the opposing nation. Yuuna wasn't terribly interested in books, but the loss of literature was still a depressing consequence of the war. There would be copies of those books elsewhere, but how would one find them now? She quickly scurried through the streets because being panhandled by a few of the shadier residents and nagged at by the nosy merchants was not something she dearly missed while in the countryside. Finally she saw the unmistakable swinging doors and quickly entered. Anywhere else she would've been too young to come in, but around here nowhere cared.
Besides, it wouldn't have been very convenient if she wasn't allowed in her own home.
"DAAAAAD! I'M HOOOME!"
Dumping her bags and rushing through the oddly-empty tavern, Yuuna helped herself to some milk in the fridge. Not as fresh as the farm obviously, but the taste was refreshing after nothing but prune juice was offered in that ride back. She stretched and plopped her behind on one of the stools, almost waiting or expecting something to happen.
"DAAAAD! I said I'm home!"
Yuuna turned her gaze at the doorway at the back of the tavern, seeing no one come in to greet her, but even more strange, no reply at the very least must've meant her father wasn't home. It wasn't strange to see her careless father forget to close down the tavern before he left, so she continued to down her milk, throwing the cup into a sink and then place a closed sign at the doors. She ascended upstairs to her bedroom. Nothing had been touched since she was gone, giving way for a smile on her face. She wandered around the other parts of the house wondering if anything had been changed at all. Besides the house looking sloppier than usual, it didn't seem out of place whatsoever.
Finally Yuuna decided to take a peek down at the end of the hall, where her father's study was. She never went inside that room often, her dad preferring to work on whatever he usually did behind closed doors. That didn't mean she couldn't check it out herself when no one was home. After all if her dad wasn't there to enforce the rules that meant there weren't any rules at all! At least, that was always how Yuuna perceived it, no matter how many times she was scolded throughout her childhood for just that attitude.
Besides, the door was usually locked. Yuuna's father wasn't that careless...
Click.
...With the exception of today.
Yuuna happily swung the door open, eyes closed and grin wide just to prolong the great gut feeling that the door actually wasn't locked.
"He's always so forgetful..."
Everything froze at once. The light, seeping through the almost-curtained windows shone straight onto a cold petrified face, surrounded by shelves and shelves of books, most having already toppled onto the ground somehow, dripping wet.
Her hands moved on their own, throwing herself onto the floor and cradling the broken toy crumpled on the ground, "Dad! Why are you sleeping on the floor!? Dad!?"
She felt something moist on the back of her father's head, and pulling it out from under him saw the scarlet that almost threw her onto the ground as well. Everything hit her at once; she shook the man more, similar to a little girl playing with her old rickety dolls, except with blood. No movement was returned, and as reality started to dawn on her, she out of her blurring vision dampened by tears noticed a crinkled piece of paper slip out of her cold father's hands.
She wiped her eyes, red smearing onto her face, the words sharpened in her vision...
Yuuna, by the time you read this, I will be dead.
I know this is very sudden, but I have a final request for you. I've asked you to do many tasks over your life and sometimes you listened, but for this I need you to listen for the sake of everything...
...There is a girl captured at the gaol close by. You must break her out and get her across the border to the neighbouring country.
I am sorry I could not have been a better father to you. I am sorry I cannot explain further, but my time is running out. One day everything will be clear to you, until then, be strong and stay in high spirits.
It's what your mother always wanted.
The letter fell out of her trembling hands, softly wavering back to the floor. She closed her eyes, clasping them between her fingers, the salty liquid mixing with scarlet, smudging on her face. Under her eyelids was only darkness, a nothingness where everything could be closed away. She would suddenly fall from a high ceiling and wake up just before she hit the ground, and everything would be okay.
But it wasn't.
Although frightened, opening her eyes showed that same gruesome body, sprawled all over the soiled carpet and she saw her name again repeated multiple times on the letter. Yuuna, Yuuna, Yuuna it read, three, four times, always fusing back together into to that strong black ink, breaking apart, and returning again, over and over and over...
Finally, she blinked, a droplet falling from her eyes onto the name, mixing with the ink, dampening, turning the bold into gray, into a translucent form, fading, fading away, almost. The blotched mark at the beginning of the paper was still legible, somehow still able to read that name...Yuuna.
"Strong..." Yuuna muttered, finally looking away from her fallen father, instead finding the window instead, the light still shining onto them, almost trying to undo the damage that had already been done, almost trying to dry up her tears.
"...looks like there's going to be a great escape tonight..."
-
The only thing that could be seen throughout all this darkness was the dim gleam desperately trying to make its way into the boxed cell. Cobwebs greeted the valiant light while rusted bars and unsaturated walls silently growled back at the sight. A clear message came from the only human sitting in the cell, her eyes tightly closed and her figure almost completely motionless. She looked like another one of those bodies that in many years to come would be nothing but a skeleton, leaning onto the wall, serving as terror to anything that bothered to enter by then. That would've been true if she had not opened her eyes mere milliseconds later.
She took a deep breath, throwing her arms into the air, only for them to violently fall back onto the ground, almost pulled back like an overpowered rubber band. The chains were tightly bounded around her wrists, leaving her limited mobility. She always wondered why there needed to be chains, as if anyone could even get out of the cage in the first place. Sitting at one tiny corner in the cage really did leave the rest of the space unoccupied and thus useless. That wasn't minimizing space at all!
Oh, she had been here too long, complaining about unused space in a bloody jail cell. What else could she do? Count the strands of web still intact at the other corner of the box? Sadly she could barely make out anything at the other side, light not having reached far enough to give her anything useful to do. Sometimes she wondered why they liked to prolong her life until death, why execution couldn't have been immediate. Maybe they took this time to laugh at her doomed position, to take pride that they, the kingdom, had caught her doing whatever her crime was and now all she could do was think about the end of her insignificant life for these last few days.
Maybe it was torture. After all she couldn't even remember the last time she ate.
She decided to close her eyes, throw herself back deep into her thoughts. Memories always seemed to be painful for someone in this position, but she was always able to find herself self-selecting anything even remotely good. This was the only thing left to keep her sane besides death itself, anyway. She remembered the days, running through the deep snow not to rush to do an errand, but just to play, to have fun in the soft, yet freezing cold fluff. Her younger self was making snowmen, making snow angels, and even throwing snowballs at poor unsuspecting strangers and laughing at them while they wondered what on earth was going on. When was the last time she saw snow, she wondered. When was the last time she even felt cold?
She shivered.
Perhaps her reminiscing was getting a bit too realistic. She opened her eyes and shook again, the familiar frightening feeling of icy cold air felt up her feeble back. Sudden chills were usually the sign of something bad, something like she was about to bite it in just a few minutes.
"That's just great," she muttered to no one in particular. She was very much looking forward to that execution date, just to at the very least flip off or raspberry that stuck-up stupid princess again. Seeing her annoyed face would've been an enjoyable last sight of life.
"What's just great?"
She jumped, her hands stretching the limits of the chains and so were her ankles. Was that her imagination? Not only was she dying but maybe she was starting to see things as well, then again she really thought she'd have been going crazy a long time ago and not immediately before death.
"Who's there!?"
A response, "You can hear me?"
"A hallucination wouldn't be very effective if I didn't hear it, now would it?" The prisoner replied, not even expecting an answer and knowing full well anyone close by would probably deem her crazy. Of course, did anyone care? Not really.
"I'm not a hallucination!" The voice responded. Although it was in a slightly agitated tone this time, the feeling of the voice itself remained soft, like whoever was there, if it wasn't her imagination, was nowhere near threatening at all. Even if she was, did it look like it mattered at this point?
The chained girl still felt pulses of cold, like a soft icy breeze blow around her body. She looked around, trying to see if she could see this...this thing, "Hey, come out. I bet I can see you too!"
"I don't think you can..." Her words were immediately thrown out the room, with the prisoner noticing this floating translucent figure from afar. When the being drew closer, her own existence glowed with warm light, contrasting the cold air that revolved around her; she illuminated the doomed prisoner before her.
Red hair, messy, spiked by a bit, and tied in a very crude ponytail were the first traits the floating glow stick noticed. The dull blue eyes were next likely such because of the prisoner's condition, and then everything else came to her sight.
"Red eyes and silver hair, that's rare."
The hovering candle of light jolted backwards quickly, surprised at the chained girl's reply, "You...you can see me!"
"I didn't think I could imagine up something this cute."
The redhead grinned, seeing the strange being bounce backwards in disbelief once again, trying to raise her quiet, gentle voice, "I'm real! Real!"
"Oh I get it. You're an angel, here to bring me to heaven! ...Don't you think this is an odd place for an angel to come to?" The living girl started, "I mean it's so dark, dirty, depressing here...More suited for a Grim Reaper, or somethin'."
"I'm sorry...I'm not an angel either..." This time a genuine feeling of sadness escaped from her mouth, whereas before there felt as if there was an aura of sorrow surrounding her, but it didn't feel as strong as now, "I'm sorry for bothering you!"
The being was about to float off, back into the depths of the darkness, and a place like that certainly wasn't hard to hide in considering the poor lighting inside the dungeon. The other girl of course would have no way of going after her, except with words.
"A ghost then?"
The spirit threw herself around, the prisoner's response startling her, "You...how did y-you...?"
"Well, I did eliminate the other options," She responded, looping her wrist around, the chain clanging along with it.
"...and...you aren't s-scared?"
The prisoner leaned forward slightly, extending the chains to sit closer to the ghost despite the chills she radiated, "You're kidding right? It looks more like you're afraid of me."
The spirit blushed, her near-transparent form left the red on her cheeks to a much lighter tint, suitable for her faded appearance, "I'm...not very good at being a ghost..."
"Better for the both of us then," the living girl grinned putting her arm out, "Asakura, Kazumi Asakura."
The spirit hesitated, "Ah...er..."
"Yours?"
"Oh...uh, Sayo...Sayo Aisaka," the phantom responded softly, still in disbelief that not only could this person before her hear her, see her, and not fear her, but for someone supposedly imprisoned and thus a criminal, she seemed incredibly nice.
Kazumi threw her hands back, surprising Sayo slightly, and rested her head on them instead of the dirty stone wall, "What a relief!"
"Eh?" Confusion. That was Sayo's status.
"I thought I'd spend these last few days all alone! I'd probably go insane before I get off'd...that is if I haven't already," she said, "It's a good thing you showed up, Sayo-chan!"
Sayo shook her hands, almost trying to shield herself from the sudden onslaught of the lack of formality from Kazumi, which attacked her in quick succession, over and over again. She was not used to someone who lacked such tact at all, but at the same time it felt refreshing in a way, like something new and exciting was starting to pick up in her afterlife, even if it was only temporary.
"I mean...well, we shouldn't get too close...Asakura-san," she explained, looking away, "If you're going to...to...go later, I'll just be alone again..."
No wait, whatever could Sayo be thinking? She too had not have spoken to a single person this entire time, and staying distant from the one person she can finally communicate with just so she won't be sad later would be selfish. After all she had been pretty lonely and depressed around here for so long, something like this was a gift, a direct present from whoever was keeping her in this state. Even if Asakura was only to be with her for a few days, it was better than nothing...
"But we should take advantage of this rare opportunity!" Sayo continued, changing her word's direction drastically.
Kazumi smiled again, this time a softer, milder smile, not one someone would expect from a person like her, "I'm glad you agree."
"So, what should we talk about--?"
"FIRE! FIRE!!!"
The immediate trail of smoke started to flow into the cell, draping itself into every corner of the room, flooding it with its pungent puffs. Kazumi slammed herself against the wall, a natural reaction to keep herself away from the fumes of poison, but that obviously would have no effect. Just when things finally started to look bright did the whole world fall upon her again, and now she would probably die much sooner than she had expected. Oh well, meeting Sayo was better than no one at all. It would be the one thing she wouldn't regret throughout her less-than-perfect life.
"What about the prisoners!?"
"Leave them here! We were going to execute them anyway! Run for your lives!"
"Man, I'd rather get hanged or lose my head than this..." Kazumi spoke quietly, trying to keep herself conscious. She would stall death from coming because that was just the instinct of every living being. Even if she knew all she had before this was a few days of life, it was better than croaking now.
Even though every guard was heard to have run off like underpaid cowardly commoners, footsteps were still heard getting louder and louder, until an unknown female about her age came barging at her cell. With a loud pop, she blew the door right open, the hinge itself almost crashing into Kazumi's head, just grazing her hair. How many close calls would she be getting through today?
That was not her first thought though, "Who are you!?"
"I'm Yuuna Akashi! And I'm here to save your sorry ass from this hell!!"
Everything was over. It began again...
How was it? I liked it, but maybe some people like the other version better. A few things were altered, some scenes changed etc. I found the other one forced a lot of wangst far too easily and went against the character. Ah well. Until then, Spotto is starving and signing off!