Faye staggered as she got out of the Uber,she walked up to the gates and stood staring at the massive iron that stood in front of her. On the other side of that gate,were her family,her real family. She pressed the bell and the gates opened immediately. It was her father and he was staring back at her with tears glistening in his eyes as he stepped aside for her to go in.
"I'm sorry." He said.
Faye smiled for a second, wondering why he was the one apologizing when it was supposed to be her. She had neglected to pursue her own chaotic selfish leads in her life. Even after craving a family,some closure so much, she ended up loosing it all when she finally got so close to her.
"She called for you up until she gave up." Kenzo said.
Faye was starting to feel her eyes burn severely. She tried to close them but the burning was even worse. Her father drew her closer and embraced her, she bursted into tears realizing the reasons her eyes burned so much was because she had been trying to force back the tears. She felt weak,she felt helpless and desolated. Her father had called her on her way here and had broken the news of her mother's death to her. Her mother, she had never really got to hold her,touch her and feel the warmth of her embrace. Her body shook as she cried in her father's arms,she thought in that moment about really being cursed to have all of these things happening to her.
René woke up with a pounding headache and the first thing he had asked was;
"Where is faye?"
Tanaka who had been sitting besides him and waiting on him turned and looked at him for a few minutes before he responded.
"She went home."
He looked out the window and at the serenity of the grey mountains. He wondered what René's reaction would have been if he has said 'she's dead' instead of 'she went home'
"Home." René repeated the word like he was in a trance. He got out of bed and noticed the lard bandage wrapped around his lower rib cage. The memories of the day before came flooding back.
The birds chirped loudly as he walked along the corridors of the large mountain palace with walls covered in ancient written talismans. He wondered if faye had felt our of place being here. He turned open the door knob of a particular room. Most of the items,furnitures and beds were covered with white fabrics and alot of the had still collected dust. He opened a large metal red box on the floor and gently grabbed one of the items in it. A doll, a black haired doll with blue eyes and red lips,the dress on the doll was covered in a bit of mud stains.
"Don't you think it's time you tell her?" Tanaka's voice came from the wide opened door. He was leaning against the frame with arms crossed against his chest.
"She used to love this doll." Rene smiled ignoring tanaka's question. Hé sat down at the foot of the bed that looked like the sheets were often changed,it was the only thing in the room with no dust.
"She doesn't even remember it nor would she ever be able to" Tanaka shrugged.
"You know, at first, I really thought I could handle it,I thought I had it under control and I'd be able to man up and tell her." He half smiled like he was reminiscing.
"She's hurting,it always hits her bad." Tanaka nodded. He understood Rene but he felt for faye too, maybe her the most because she was the most fragile of them all.
"I need to find her,she needs to know the truth." He suddenly got up and walked out of the room bumping into Tanaka who held him to steady him for a few minutes before letting him go.
When he found her,she was standing before her mother's corpse that laid on the metal table in the morgue. She was quiet,he stood by the door silently, not to disturb the moment. When she finally turned to him,she looked at him with eyes that were hollow.
"René..!" She called and slowly walked over to him like she was having the difficulty of walking.
"Am i cursed." She asked and his heart broke to a thousand pieces at the tears in her eyes.
René didn't answer because he didn't know what to say. It was all his fault after all. Maybe if they hadn't met,she would have probably had a better life,a rainbow on mash soft clouds type of life but life seemed to be the hardest for her. He held her quietly and gently rubbed her back and let her cry in his arms. Deep down in him he was contemplating wether to tell her or not.
"You're destined apart!" There was a sudden rumbling in the room and A pale looking figure in a delicate gold embroidered red robe descended into the room through a portal that whirled in the celling of the room.
Her beauty was illogical and faye stared at her clinging tightly to René. She looked up at René but he didn't have the fear she had. His face was calm and as he looked down at her face too, he gave her a small smile,kissed her and told her it was okay.
"What do you mean?" Faye asked the woman. She looked too beautiful to be human, though her features were delicate, she exuded a silently powerful aura.
The woman gently held her hands together in front of her. She waved a hand against one of the walls and it seemed like faye could see some things, people,mountains. She saw her father,her mother,her young self, René, young René in his tengu form. The mountains they had travelled through to take René to his father when Kenji had stabbed him. Faye moved out of René's arms and walked closer to the wall, she glanced at the still body of her mother on the metal table before she turned her focus to the projection on the wall. She watched her life unfold before her, she broke down and began to cry.
"René… why didn't you tell me?" She asked turned to him after it all disappeared. He had his head lowered, he was crying too.
"I'm sorry.." he looked up at her with tear filled eyes. "I'm really sorry."
He drew closer to her and wrapped his arms tightly against her sobbing but she didn't hug back, her arms stood limps against her body instead. There was a sudden flash of light and the pales magnificent figure was gone. Faye moved out of René's arms and walked out of the morgue in a trance like state,her mind completely disolated. She wanted to be alone,she didn't want to talk, she just wanted to scream.
"See?.." a voice said behind her in the hallway. She snapped out of her trance and turned around to find Kenji leaning against the wall. He wore a black leather jacked and black pants that looked tailored to perfection. His arms were folded against his chest.
she stood there staring at him and when he began to advance towards her, she began to back away quickly with staggering steps.
"I told you, that you belonged with me not him" he said, a menacing smile on his face.
She fell and when he yanked her up to her feet, he looked at her like he was scrutinizing her. She stared back at him and he noticed how hollow her eyes were.
"Faye!!" It was Rene he was running towards her and Kenji with greatly strained efforts.
Kenji turned to stare at René and smiled devilishly.
"If i can't have her,we both lose!!" He yelled before he stabbed her with a long knife. The same knife he had stabbed René with. He laughed one more time before he vanished into thin air. René had stopped and stood frozen staring at Faye's limp body on the floor.
He leaned against the wall to catch his breath. He had began to bleed and the white bandage was now stained with his blood. He dragged his body to where she laid,her eyes wide open,tired and staring at the ceiling. She was still breathing but suddenly spurted out blood.
"Faye!! Please stay with me." Rene pleaded. Although he knew it was impossible to save her. The knife used on Faye was poisonous and he had only made it alive when used on him because he wasn't human like Faye.
She smiled at him, her eyes glistened with tears. The pain was traveling fast across her body. She had really lost the will to live. If anyone had told her the boy she had met at the orphanage some years ago who protected her so fiercely would be the one to drive a knife through her to death,she wouldn't have really believed it.
The last thing Faye thought of was Diasuke before she closed her eyes,the lights were bright and a hand was stretched to her from it. Rene couldn't see Faye but she could see him, she could also see her limp lifeless body in his arms. She was crying, she turned around and walked through the wall and when she closed her eyes and opened them, She was standing in front of her son. She thought he could see her but she was wrong, she tried to hold him but couldn't. She screamed but nobody could hear her. The door burst open and she turned around to see Rene carry her blood stained, lifeless body in his arms.
Her father was sobbing and holding onto her body. She turned around and walked out of the house. She couldn't feel the air but the wind was blowing heavily and the dark clouds in the sky gathered. There was sparks of lightning in the sky and when it began to rain, she really wished she could feel the rain on her skin but she couldn't, she couldn't touch her son ,she couldn't feel the wind, air or the rain. She helplessly stood in the streets watching others scamper for safety from the rain. She wanted to be wet by it but she couldn't be.
"It's time to go" she turned around startled by the deepness of the voice. There was a man behind her, in a white robe. Although he was talking to her,he was looking past her.
"Where?" She asked and turned back to look at the woman scolding her child while gently yanking him by the hand along with her.
"To weigh your soul." The man answered.
"It's really over isn't it?" She asked rhetorically.
"It isn't over untill it's all over again." The man answered and walked forward towards her. He gently grabbed her hand and began to walk with her towards the white lights.
She didn't struggle,she didn't decline, she just followed him quietly. The lights did hurt her eyes and when she opened them again, she was standing before the woman who had appeared to them at the morgue.
"We meet again." Amaterasu said with a delicate smile.
"You are Amaterasu" Faye said gently. She had read about the Japanese goddess of creation as a little girl at the orphanage.
The goddess smiled.
"Are you my creator?" Faye asked.
"Not quite" the goddess answered.
"It's time to weigh your soul." the man who had brought her here and was standing behind her said.
Faye felt something leave her body for a few minutes and then return like it had been thrown back at her again.
"You'll live your past life behind and reincarnate and maybe this time, you'll end happily" the goddess said to Faye.
"What about my son,my father,what about Rene?" She asked
"When you go, it won't be as the same as before. You won't even remember." That was the last thing the goddess had said to her before she felt her Spirit being pushed out of the heavens. She was falling
"It won't be as the same as before, you won't even remember" the words echoed in her head before she closed her eyes.