“Leave it to the Nobility. But so many of them wouldn’t have died so easily. In which case . . .”
Were those interred there human? Or were they—
At that point, Mia should’ve left. To the rational mind, there was no way remains from more than three millennia earlier could have retained their original forms. However, curiosity burned once more in her bosom, and in a spot less than three feet from her, she saw a coffin that’d been completely exposed. A pain shot through her back and waist as if a knife had gone into them, but she didn’t let that bother her. Inching over on her knees, Mia reached for the coffin’s lid.
I wonder if it’ll even open, she thought, but it slid off easily enough. It came as little surprise that even Mia didn’t have enough nerve to peek in right away, but rather she lowered her eyes and regained control of her breathing.
“One, two . . .” she counted, “three!”
She raised her head. There was a face right in front of her. The shriveled, desiccated face of a mummy, its eyes alone glowing.
Not saying a thing, she pulled back. Something cold came to rest on her shoulder. Her hand reached up to touch it. Icy fingers. Mia’s eyes stared straight ahead—at the figure about to leave its coffin. And it wasn’t the only one.
Rapid shifts came between darkness and light.
Light—the figure in the coffin stood up in the box.
Darkness.
Light—the figure got out.
Darkness.
Light—the figure was coming closer.
Mia watched a coffin in the distance . . . another coffin, still buried . . . Lids were sliding off or pried open, hands stretching out, figures rising . . . figures, figures, and more shadowy figures.
“Noooo!” Mia exclaimed, twisting her body.
There was an impact on her shoulder, but she quickly pulled free. Taking five or six steps on her knees, she rose and turned. Trembling engulfed her whole body.
Zoah was standing there. Due to the dizzying switches between darkness and light, for a little while Mia didn’t notice that there was something wrong with him. The shape of his face was strange. The right half of it remained shrouded in darkness.
“It’s gone . . .”
Half of his face was missing. And Zoah, too, was closing in on her. There was nothing she could do but retreat. She wondered how, terrified beyond belief, she must appear to him and the others. Were the hands he extended seeking some expression of affection, or flesh and blood?
Her back bumped against something. A metal pole. There was no place to run anymore.
She called out his name. “Zoah . . .”
The forest of arms moved forward. Out of all those limbs like hard, dead branches, Zoah’s hands alone still retained the semblance of a living person’s.
Her breasts were seized roughly. By Zoah’s hands. Mia let out an agonized scream. He was going to tear them off.
Suddenly, her pain subsided. Zoah’s hands slowly pulled away, following the arc his falling body described. It wasn’t clear whether or not Mia noticed the glittering needle that pierced his temple. The other walking dead also fell to the ground, one after another. Glistening needles were jabbed through their temples, their chests, their abdomens.
“It’s my hair,” said a voice off to the left. Just as before, the figure in blue astride the black steed had long hair that covered him to the waist.
“You’re—”
That was the only word Mia got out.
How many times am I gonna have to ask that? she wondered, suddenly feeling stupid. Blood loss and the pain in her back were rapidly sapping her strength.
“My name is Yuma. Remember that.”
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” Mia asked, staring intently at his black mount.
“Because he should be here.”
“By he, which D do you mean?”
“Either one.”
To this man, they were both probably one and the same.
“You’re an assassin, aren’t you?”
The man said nothing.
“Why are you out to get D?”
“He learned too much.”
“Like what?”
“If you knew that, you’d have to die as well.”
“Why did you spare me alone?”
“Because if I take you away with me, he’ll soon appear.”
“You keep saying he, but there are two Ds, you know. The real one and a fake.”
Behind the blue hair, something glimmered. Perhaps it was an eye.
“You don’t know anything, do you?”
It took her a few seconds to respond to those words. “Know anything about what?”
“I can’t say. When I slay him, have him tell you with his dying breath.”
“Don’t be so sure of yourself.”
“Get on my horse.”
The black steed came closer, and the pale figure in blue reached down from its back.
“Not a chance,” Mia said, backing away.
“Oh, my. Why not?”
“I don’t fancy being bait for you to lure D out.”
“Nevertheless, you’re coming with me.”
“The hell I will!”
“In that case, I have no use for you. I’ll have to do the same thing to you that I did to the others,” he said, turning his head—or actually, his hair—to indicate the legions of dead.
“Why?” Mia asked, cold sweat beginning to run down her face.
“You were with them. Perhaps you learned the same thing.”
“I don’t know anything. But if you’re going to kill me anyway, why don’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
“Everything. Like what you are, for starters.”
The rider said nothing.
“What a jerk you are!” Mia spat. “I give you whatever you want, but you won’t tell me anything about yourself in return—that’s despicable.”
“Are you crying?”
When he asked her this, Mia finally realized that she was. Zoah lay at her feet. First his head had been cut off, and now he had a hairlike needle through him.
“Yeah, so I cry. Is that a crime? A fortuneteller’s daughter is still a human being. When something sad happens, I cry. If something rubs me the wrong way, I get angry. What’s the matter with that?” Glaring at the man in blue, who was surely an assassin, she continued, “If you’re going to kill me, kill me already. But I’ll be damned if I’ll let a liar like you use me.”
“That’s interesting,” the assassin said, smiling.
“What is?” Mia asked, wiping her tears away with the back of her hand.
“Are you so loath to serve as my bait? Are you that smitten with the man they call D?”
Mia jumped up.
“D-don’t be absurd!” she stammered.
“Is it so absurd?”
“It—it sure is.”
“Fair enough, I suppose. What else do you wish to know?”
What is the other D? The question started to rise in her throat, but Mia hesitated. Looking around at their surroundings, she asked, “What is this place?”
“A facility constructed by the Nobility in ancient times. Certain experiments were conducted here over the course of nearly ten millennia.”
“What for?”
“The fusion of human and Noble blood.”
He said it so casually; she couldn’t comprehend it at first. Parsing the words one by one with her brain, she strung them back together to form some meaning. She still had to ask, “What did you just say?”
The figure in blue didn’t answer her.
“Mixing human and Noble blood? Is that what you mean? They did those sorts of experiments here?”
“Correct.”
Dizziness swept over Mia. She barely managed to keep herself upright by clinging to the pole, but the impact of that knowledge wasn’t about to leave her.
Mia searched madly for her next question. “Well, then—who was it that destroyed this pla
ce? There’s no way humans could’ve done it. Was it some falling-out between Nobles?”
“Not even a Noble could’ve done it.”
“Why not?”
“This place was designed by the Sacred Ancestor. Nobility or not, no one save him could so much as put a scratch on its walls.”
“Then who did it? I’ve heard there were extradimensional life forms and creatures from outer space who opposed the Nobility.”
“Not them.”
“Quit being coy and just tell me. You’re going to kill me anyway, right? Who did it?”
“It was—”
Just as Mia strained her ears to catch the indigo assassin’s reply, the ground quaked once more. It continued for several seconds.
Showing no signs of getting down off his horse, the assassin looked up at the ceiling and said, “That’s the sort of fight I would expect. But for all that destruction, not a single chunk of debris falls—truly the work of the Sacred Ancestor.”
Though the face he then turned toward Mia might’ve been devoid of emotion, his eyes gleamed with terror.
“All this quaking and destruction is because he’s fighting. What’s more, it’s getting closer. You truly have become unnecessary.”
His left hand, which had gripped the reins, slowly rose before his face, and then made a sudden jerk. Obviously he’d pulled out a hair. And like a lengthy needle, it would surely pierce Mia’s body. In this world where even now darkness and light continued to flash, death closed in on Mia with certainty.
“A pity we didn’t have more time together,” the assassin in blue said.
And then he swung his left hand. Off to the left. Only empty space lay there.
Turning in that direction, Mia peered into the blackness. A shadowy figure stood there. Shut in darkness, struck by light. But solitary and imposing.
Mia heard her own voice like some distant call savagely ablaze with hope.
“D . . .”
-
III
-
The mounted figure twisted around without any sign of agitation.
Something shot out, scorching the air as it went. A flying needle of unfinished wood came to a halt about four inches shy of the blue assassin’s face. Mia gasped, for what should be wound about the missile but a few dozen strands of blue hair. The assassin’s hair was able to act autonomously.
The first strike for each had proven ineffective. And the thought of what the second strike might bring left Mia immobilized. This wasn’t a confrontation between two men—it was one between a pair of demons. As the two squared off with fifteen feet between them, the light shone on them, and then darkness swallowed them.
Which D are you? That was the question that filled Mia’s head.
“You know who I am, don’t you?” asked the assassin in blue.
“He told me about you.”
At D’s soft reply, Mia’s heart swelled. Standing there was the real thing—the D she knew so well.
“How does it feel to battle yourself? And to knock this research center back to square one just when it was on the road to reconstruction? A battle between chosen ones must be something incredible.”
“Did you kill Origa?”
“That’s my job. Anyone who gains any knowledge of these experiments, regardless of how little that may be, is to be exterminated—that’s the order I was given.”
“By whom?”
“That goes without saying. If you don’t know that, you’ll never amount to anything more than a simple Hunter.”
The figure in blue rustled as if he’d been caught in a breeze. Or rather, he stirred like a snake. Each of them was primed for battle.
The assassin’s left hand reached for his hair. Taking hold of a fistful, he brought it to his lips. Fwooo! Mia’s ears caught the sound of him blowing. Hundreds of needles flew at D without a sound. D’s sword slashed through them, but the hairs weren’t cut.
Look. D’s blade was growing bluer and bluer by the instant. The hairs from the blue assassin were wrapping themselves around it.
“Your sword is useless now,” the assassin said, laughter tingeing his words. “Think you’ll be able to stop my hair next time?”
As he spoke, his blue arsenal rustled up like vipers rising to strike. D had been denied the use of the weapon that might ward off any fresh attacks.
“What?” rang a cry of surprise. The assassin twisted around in the saddle. From behind him, Mia had wrapped both hands around his neck.
“Hurry up, D! Make a run for it!”
Her sad cry became an agonized shriek a heartbeat later. A brightly gleaming needle pierced her through the chest and out the back.
However, the assassin in blue donned a puzzled expression. Mia had suddenly disappeared. Once again she’d called upon the same decoy spell she’d used on the brink of the great subsidence. Her true form was crouched next to the pole, where she had a hand pressed to her chest.
Would D flee, or was the assassin in blue going to make his move?
The result was unexpected. The assassin in blue suddenly wheeled his mount around and galloped toward Mia.
D bounded. In the intermittent light, his blade glittered. It no longer wore its sheath of hair. The sword he swung came down hard on the assassin’s shoulder, shaking the rider badly in the saddle, but Yuma narrowly managed to stay up.
Listing heavily to the right, the assassin galloped off into the depths of the darkness.
Sensing someone approaching, Mia raised her head. The pain of being skewered by a needle was rapidly ebbing.
Her duplicate was formed by her will, particulates in the air, and proteins expelled through her own pores, and the more detailed it became, the more its reactions mirrored her own. And that was why, to a certain degree, Mia experienced the pain that her duplicate endured.
“Are you okay?” D asked. His sword still rested in his right hand.
“Do I look okay? I’m beat to hell!”
“We’ll see to your wounds later.”
Mia was caught off balance. That was all D had to say after she’d disobeyed his orders and entered the dark abode? She’d been braced for a vicious tongue-lashing.
“Are you sure you’re feeling all right?” Mia asked him jokingly, but then she noticed that his stare was focused not on herself but on the darkness to her rear. It couldn’t be a new foe, could it? Was that the reason for the unexpected retreat by the assassin in blue?
As expected, the figure that approached from the depths of the darkness was also D. Needless to say, it was the impostor. The assassin had noticed him and fled. No matter how powerful Yuma might be, it would clearly be too dangerous to take on two Ds.
“No matter where you go, it’s just one endless battle with you, isn’t it?” the fake D said in a sarcastic tone.
While the voice was D’s, Mia got the feeling she was seeing another side of him, and it put her in a foul mood.
Perhaps sensing something, the fake D raised one hand and said, “Hold on. There’s no point in fighting any longer while we’re so evenly matched. Let’s take a rest. We’ve got this lovely spectator, too.”
Turning to D, Mia said, “Let’s do that.” But she didn’t even know why she did so.
The sword D lowered had blue hair wrapped around its blade. That was probably the reason he’d allowed the assassin to escape.
When it had appeared he’d be unable to defend himself from his opponent’s attacks, Mia had used her decoy spell. However, D now gave a twist to his wrist, and the strands promptly snapped, fluttering down to the ground.
“Well, I’ll be,” Mia said, but her words quickly streaked away from her as she fell toward the ground.
Just before she hit, D’s hands caught her and swiftly turned her over. And although she wasn’t sure exactly how he did it, she felt like her back had just been laid bare.
“What are you—”
“Just some treatment,” D said, and the pleasant coolness spreading across her back vouched for his
words.
“She sure pushed her luck,” a hoarse voice grumbled, and at that, Mia found tears welling in her eyes.
The pain flowed out like a tide.
Once she was completely lucid, a hoarse voice declared, “Good enough.”
D stood up again. How it had happened was once again a mystery, but the girl’s clothes were back in place.
“Even I can’t do that,” the fake D remarked with admiration after standing there speechless for so long. “That old dog gave you an edge. I guess it can’t be helped. Apparently you were the first in your class.”
Tossing his jaw at the two of them, the fake D said, “Come with me. I’ll show you what this place is really all about.”
And then he turned around and walked back into the darkness from which he’d come.
-
The trio was in a space reminiscent of a laboratory. Though the ceiling, walls, and floor were all melted as if they’d been assailed by the same high heat as everything else, the arrangement of what appeared to be deformed equipment and the atmosphere that still hung in the deathly gloom made the room’s former purpose known. Some thirty feet away, a machine that retained a cylindrical shape gave off periodic flashes of pale blue light.
“This is the core of the facility. Though it was thoroughly devastated, it comes as little surprise that it survived.”
Mia pressed her hands against her chest. It wasn’t the cold. An atmosphere close to a chill had stolen into her. Experiments had been conducted here that no human should’ve ever known about.
“Do you remember this, D? It’s the place where we were born.”
There was no reply. What’s more, it appeared the fake hadn’t expected one from him.
Gazing at the melted lump of material just before him, the fake made a haphazard slice at it. Melted or not, it was still apparently metal, but the material offered no more resistance than water as he bisected it with a diagonal slash.
“This is where the birthing device was. Do you understand, D? We were born not in our mother’s home or a delivery room, but in a room for experimentation.”
D stood there like a black shadow.
It was quiet. The stillness was such that it seemed to have been ordained in ancient times and respected by all of creation.
And then it was broken by an insolent voice, echoing in a hair-raising manner, “‘We were born.’ D, that means the two of you . . .”
Vampire Hunter D Volume 13: Twin-Shadowed Knight Parts 1 and 2 Page 10