Persona - Mask of Origins

Yuki stood back and watched, not knowing how Zain would react if she interfered.

 

Closing his eyes, Zain coughed, "Anything else you freaks wanna say to me? Or can I continue alone down the street?" He knew he was grinding on the shadows nerves. "That's it! Rip his head off, I want his blood!" Clawed fingers ripped at his face and fangs pierced into his neck, "For real? You're kidding me, you boys want to actually feed on me and "rip my head off"? How old fashioned." They growled and ripped more at his neck.

 

Yuki decided she had seen enough. She stepped in and started dispatching the shadows.

 

The remaining shadow dropped Zain and dashed off.

Zain looked up at Yuki, blood soaking into his clothes and laughed a little, "Who would've imagined. The last thing I see is my dear sister as my angel come to take me to Heaven. Though I doubt I'm going to Heaven. Are you perhaps here to deliver the bad news. I'm going to hell aren't I?" Lifting his hand from his bleeding neck, he smiled and waved his fingers at her, "See? Human blood. No longer black and sticky."

 

Yuki healed him before slapping him hard.

"Idiot. I come to apologize for how I acted and you go suicidal. What happened to the free spirited Zain I knew?"

 

Zain blinked through the sting on his cheek and gave a surprised look to Yuki, "Wha....I...I'm not suicidal. I wanted to think and I guess I forgot they were here. I just...couldn't stand the thought of my sister thinking I was another monster when I'd been cured of one thing. This..." he gestured to the crystals on his skin under his shirt, "Is not what I planned. I don't even know what it is."

 

"I don't think you're a monster, Zain."

 

Zain rubbed his eyes as if he were tired of hearing that.

"I know what it issss. If you would not violently attack me for a ssssecond for me to tell you." Nichoi crept out from behind a grave, his pale skin covered by a large trench coat and leather gloves. Even his head and face were covered with a hat and scarf. He was dressed for winter. "How long have you been standing there?" "Long enough to know you're condition as well as mine."

 

"So what happened to Zain?" Yuki asked.

 

"Well the cure definately cured him. But his body, having been a shadow, reacted to the cure like a toxin at the last second. He would've needed a larger amount of the cure to purge all the shadow blood in him, but that would've killed him. The shadow blood and your cure, formed a crystaline substance within you and now will crystalize your body from the outside in. The last to crystalize will be your viatal organs and you could possibly die." Nicholi shrugged and cautiously lifted Zain's shirt, "Yes, I'm quite certain of your toxic disease. I'd advise not sharing bodily fluids with any other shadows, lest this happen to them too."

 

"Figures curing him wouldn't be that easy. I guess you should look into some way of fixing this, Zain."

 

Zain nodded, though he didn't have a clue where to start.

"There is no cure." Zain gaped at Nicholi as he spoke so calmly, "At least, not anymore. It was destroyed a long time ago. At least, that's what I read in the Doctor's notes."

 

"There has to be a way. I'm sure Toji might have found something in his father's notes."

 

Nicholi shook his head, "I've already read them. There's nothing. The Doctor wrote, the section of his notes on the crystalization process of shadows was lost in a fire the night his son was born. It couldn't be helped. The Doctor meant to restart his research on it, but risking the shadows that were sentinent to perform such an experiment would've set him back dearly. For what, I do not know. perhaps his army of shadows like me or something along the lines of that."

 

"We'll find something, I'm sure."

 

"We could always go back and ask the doctor." Nicholi suggested and Zain growled, "No one's going near that place."

 

"That's out of the question. Security is probably on high alert at the moment."

 

Nicholi smiled, his smile was human, save for that snake-like tongue flicking in and out. "That's not a problem for my kind. I should be able to get you all inside. It's a simple job of k-" "No killing innocent people. I won't have any of that. Even if they are guards for someone like your "doctor"."

 

"Right. Just get the info and get out. No bloodshed along the way."

 

Nicholi's blood red eyes seemed to lower to their feet instead of looking them in the face, "Then your mission is impossible. They would shoot an abomination like me on sight. It is impossible to get near the Doctor without killing those around him."