Persona - Mask of Origins

Zain looked up at her, his only solstice of normal, "Yuki...he's gone. What am I supposed to do without Orphan? And Cara...she...I have nothing."

Eden tapped her staff beside Zain and touched a glowing pale hand to his shoulder, "you have me. I am your Persona now, I will take Orphan's place and protect you."

 

"Cara and Orphan ought to return soon, I hope."

 

Eden helped Zain stand and he spotted Daieko lurking in the shadows. "Why is he here? Yuki... we should go home, away from Deathchild."

Daieko nodded as if he agreed and backed into the darkness.

 

Yuki walked home with Zain, silent the whole way.

 

Zain enjoyed the silence, his mind rattled with Orphan and Cara's disappearance and Eden's new arrival and attatchment to him. He could feel her light creeping around in his head, warming him against the chill. "Yuki?" he said, breaking the silence, "Your dreams...you always talk about them with Toji and Toya. Not saying I've been evesdropping but, the way they're kinda silent a lot..." He didn't know how to voice his thoughts, "I'm sorry Yuki, I've been so wrapped up in my own problems and now with Deathchild...I should be a better brother."

 

"It's alright, Zain. I rarely like to talk about my dreams to Toji and Toya anyway. The horrors I see in my dreams are things I just want to forget about."

 

Zain nodded, "I understand." When they arrived at home, Zain went to his room, picked up his guitar and sat on the window sill, playing whatever came to mind instead of a real song. It sounded familar to him, what he played now, but the memory was lost to him. Eden stood beside him, her voice was simple and pure. No words came from her but just sound. It was fitting with the song.

 

Yuki fell asleep as she listened.

 

He stopped playing as he saw Daieko outside his window, "What do you want?"

"Your orders, Zain. A shadow is lurking around the school, I need it for my experiment. You want t be human again, go and kill it and give me a vial of it's black blood."

 

Yuki slowly woke up when she didn't hear the music playing.

"Why'd you stop, Zain?"

 

was in the room with death child

 

Zain closed his eyes and carefully responded to Yuki, "I have to go out for a bit, Yuki, I'll be back to play some more later. It won't take long, just a few minutes."

Daieko was getting impatient and he had other things to do. Sliding a small dart into a blowgun, he shot Zain in the shoulder and waited for his violent response.

Zain glared at him from the window and felt a twinge in his arm, "What did you hit me with Deathchild." Daieko shrugged as if it were nothing, "Your orders will appear on your arm in black ink, so don't be alarmed. I've created this and it's quite helpful when I can't stick around to explain everything." he faded into the darkness and Zain sighed, staring at his arm with the new black inked tattoo of a few details on one shadow he had to hunt. "Like I said Yuki, I'll be back in a few minutes. Please, don't worry about me."

 

Yuki nodded and started to watch tv.

 

Zain carried his lance out the door with a shimmering Eden following on his heels.

He stared at the school, the lights turned off, it did look a little scary but he didn't see any shadow. Daieko couldn't be lying about this, his life was at stake too. Movement to his left had him dashing off into the darkness after it.

 

Yuki stretched and went out for a walk in the snow.

 

Hours of tracking something he barely could see in the dark, Eden alerted him to something behind him and the shadow tackled him to the ground. Wrestling with it, he examined it. Sharp serrated teeth clashed together, vainly trying to bite him. "Disgusting!" his single word echoed through the empty courtyard and Eden brought down her staff through the shadow, stopping barely before she impaled Zain. He relaxed and threw it off him.

 

Yuki continued her walk, going by the school.

"I don't know why I'm always at peace when it's snowing. I guess it's because I was born during a snowstorm." She thought to herself.

 

Though Zain had killed the one he was supposed to, as soon as he gathered the blood needed for Daieko, more shadows filled the courtyard, "Damn."

Eden noticed Yuki before she noticed them, curling her shimmering fingers around Zain's shoulder, she released the block Orphan had kept inside Zain and let him take his shadow form.

Zain breathed easier as his body cracked in places and the changes he'd experienced became visual, "Thanks Eden." The red had widened in his eyes, almost eliminating all the purple. It could be safely said that he didn't look like himself anymore.

 

Yuki caught sight of Zain and mistook him for a shadow. She drew her scythe, ready to defend herself.

 

Zain snarled and launched himself at the other shadows, forsaking his lance for his claws, he ripped at them savagely. Throwing him off them, they swarmed on him, piling on top of Zain until nothing was left but a moving mass of shadows. Eden slammed her staff into the ground and light errupted from it. Desintegrating the shadows on Zain. He stood and spoke through his fangs with his normal voice, "That's enough Eden!" Her light died away and she turned to look at Yuki. Zain's red eyes followed hers to Yuki. His bloodlust locked away by Daieko's potion, he felt depression engulf him at her drawn scythe. She wasn't defending herself from the shadows, but from him. "Yuki..."