Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction ❯ Somehow, Someday ❯ Coming Home ( Chapter 6 )
[ P - Pre-Teen ]
By: chanel_jay 
Given a short vacation, Skuld returns to the Earthrealm for a visit.
Anime/Manga: Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 07.07.2002 | Pages: 5 | Words: 3.9K | Visits: 709 | Status: Work In Progress
Given a short vacation, Skuld returns to the Earthrealm for a visit.
Anime/Manga: Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 07.07.2002 | Pages: 5 | Words: 3.9K | Visits: 709 | Status: Work In Progress
Author's Notes:
I particularly enjoyed writing this scene, so much that once again it became long enough to be a chapter by itself. This story is certainly growing longer than I thought it would be! I hope you will continue to read it up until the very end!
Oh, "Hottokenai no Sa" was sung by Touma Yumi (Urd). You should listen to it if you haven't heard it yet. It's a really fun song.
And Lind smiled in the final issue of her story arc!! My intuition was correct! Guess I won't have to change that particular scene after all! ^_^
CHAPTER SIX: COMING HOME
"I'll be right back . . ."
Belldandy entered the kitchen and slid the shoji close. The smile she had on her lips disappeared as she held the tray she had been carrying close to her. A diamond ring - small so it would fit with Keiichi's budget, but overwhelmingly full of his love - twinkled as the last remaining rays of the sun shone on her finger, yet no matter how much she looked at it, she couldn't bring herself to lighten up her downcast mood.
True, she was very happy when Keiichi had finally asked her hand in marriage. There was a time when Belldandy worried that the heavens would object to their engagement, but nothing has happened for the past few weeks, so Urd had managed to convince her to set her worries aside.
"If Kami-sama was going to protest, he would have done it the moment Keiichi had placed the ring on your finger!" Urd had told her. "So relax and enjoy the fact that you're finally engaged!"
Belldandy bit her lip as an image of her older sister crossed her mind. "Onee-san . . ."
The feeling of emptiness that had been tugging at her since her sister had left finally overcame her, and she struggled hard to prevent her tears from falling.
Behind the closed doors of the kitchen were the sounds of people holding a party. All of Keiichi and Belldandy's friends were there, celebrating their impending marriage. The former members of the Motor Club had been passing around bottles of sake for the past few hours, as most of the visitors had gathered around the karaoke machine that Ootaki and Tamiya had brought with them, filling the house with songs of drunken happiness.
Even Keiichi's parents were out there, with Morisato Keima keeping close to the only two women who kept him quite in control of himself, while steering clear of all the others, particularly Fujimi Chihiro, who was quite intrigued with Keiichi's father. His wife Takano had enticed some of the visitors to a game of mahjong, and from the looks of it she hasn't lost a game yet, judging from the looks of the other players. And Keiichi's younger sister Megumi was chatting with a group of motorcycle enthusiasts . . .
. . . and then Hasegawa Sora suddenly asked where Belldandy's family was . . .
While her fiancé was surrounded by his family and friends, Belldandy was alone.
She shook her head. Keiichi's friends were *her* friends, and his family were *her* family.
Still, she could not help but wonder what the day would have been like if her sisters were there.
When Skuld had left four years ago, the temple was suddenly, uncomfortably, quiet. Even the sounds of Sigel being chased around by Banpei couldn't cover the silence. The number of times Keiichi and Belldandy had to repair Banpei as a result of one of their chases had only served to remind them of who was missing among them.
It took months before they had adjusted to Skuld's absence. By then, Urd began to make enough noise to cover her little sister. Belldandy always had to be on guard, as her older sister reverted back to the habit of harassing Keiichi by the hour as she had done before Skuld had joined them. Thankfully, the demon Mara had laid quiet for all those years, and their only real troubles came from Urd's mother Hild, who decided to grant her daughter the occasional visit, resulting to the small amounts of chaos in the temple that normally would have been caused by two sisters fighting each other, with poor Keiichi somehow always getting stuck in the middle at times.
Now even Urd had been sent back home.
As a goddess, Belldandy had a right to visit them, as she and Urd had been doing every once in a while whenever they wished to see Skuld. But visiting was different from actually being with them every day, and since she was about to marry a mortal, Belldandy was not sure she would be able to visit them at all.
[ Is this my punishment? That I have to choose between the man and the family that I both love? ] Belldandy thought.
The shoji behind her slid open without her noticing, and Keiichi entered, looking for his fiancée. Upon seeing her standing there just in front of the wooden door, trying to find solace by hugging a tray, he made his way towards her and held her shoulder.
Belldandy turned around and leaned against him, seeking the comfort that only he could give. Keiichi in turn wrapped his arms around her, supporting her frame as she quietly cried.
"I . . . I'm sorry . . ." Belldandy said moments later as she wiped her tears from her eyes. "They have gone through so much effort to hold this party for us, and I'm supposed to be happy . . . but . . ."
Keiichi smiled warmly. "I understand. Urd's departure had been very hard for you."
"I know that they seem to have brought you so much trouble . . . but . . . Keiichi, am I selfish for wanting my sisters to be here?"
"No," Keiichi answered, shaking his head. "They've been with us for so long, it's hard to imagine life without them. Even for me . . . they're my family, too, Bell-chan. I want them to be here to celebrate with us just as much as you do."
He held her closer. "I . . . I know you cannot make promises you can't keep. But at least . . . promise me . . . that you'll *try* not to leave me, too . . ."
"Keiichi . . ."
"Even if they don't come back . . . we'll find a way to fill in the gap that they've left. We'll create so much happiness that they wouldn't be sorely missed! Just . . . stay with me. Don't leave me . . ."
"Keiichi, I have promised that I would stay with you for as long as you wished ever since we had created that contract many years ago . . . the fact that I had answered yes to your proposal would serve to bring that promise to a higher level, for even marriages are sacred in heaven . . ." Belldandy reached out and placed the tray that she had been holding on a nearby table before embracing Keiichi in return. "We have gone through so much . . . No matter what happens, I will always find a way to return to you, just as I know that you will always be there for me, waiting. I love you, Keiichi."
Keiichi felt relieved, grateful that he had voiced out his fears. "I love you, too . . ." His head inched closer to hers as she looked up, prepared to receive his kiss . . .
"WHAT IN THE WORLD . . . !!!"
The sound of Tamiya's booming voice broke the intimate moment between the couple, and they both sighed. "They must be wondering why the food is taking too long," Belldandy said, blushing.
"We should hurry then," Keiichi said, his hold on her loosening for a moment.
Before Belldandy could move, however, Keiichi leaned over and kissed her anyway.
[ I don't have any excuse not to kiss her anymore . . . ] Keiichi thought as he slowly pulled away.
Belldandy smiled brilliantly. Keiichi watched as she began to hum a song while piling delicacies on the tray.
[ Besides. I like it better when she's happy, and it's probably one of the very few things a mortal can grant a goddess. ]
"Shall we?" Belldandy asked, carrying a fresh new batch of munchies for the visitors to eat. Her fiancé nodded, and they walked out of the kitchen together, prepared to face the rowdy bunch of people that were their friends.
*****
Keiichi was lucky he was not carrying the tray of food, because if he did, he would have mostly likely dropped it.
Almost everyone who was in the living room was now staring at the TV screen where those who had been singing had been following the lyrics to the karaoke that they were playing. To Keiichi and Belldandy's surprise (and to Keiichi's horror), Urd was right there on the screen, staring right back!
"Oh . . . uh . . . umm . . ." Urd stammered as she tried to think of a way out of her current situation. "Th - this is a pre-recording from the Goddess Musical Productions, providing you with . . . with lovely, easy-to-follow karaoke selections that would make a singer even out of the most tone-deaf person! In this disc, we had decided to provide you with one extra song for all of you to sing along with! So ladies and gentlemen, let me present to you our lovely guest karaoke singer, which is myself, of course, here to sing 'Hottokenai no Sa'!!"
While the rest of the guests inside the room applauded and started to sing, with Tamiya and Ootaki flipping the disc jacket around, wondering why this was the first time they had ever seen this track and how they would be able to access it again, Keiichi slapped a palm on his face. "I don't believe this . . ." he muttered. "That was too close!"
"I'm sorry, Keiichi . . ." Belldandy told him.
Keiichi looked at her. The goddess looked very sorry for what happened, but there was an ecstatic twinkle in her eyes - a joy, Keiichi was sure, that had been brought about by the knowledge that her sister's departure was not for good.
"It's nothing. That's our Urd, all right! Always finding a way to make a grand entrance in any event!" Keiichi said with a smile. In a way, he too, was relieved that Urd had returned. [ She's certainly enjoying herself, considering that she could have gotten us into big trouble, ] he thought, watching as Urd was singing all out on the television screen. [ I wonder how she'll be able to take them 'back to regular programming'? ]
"Hey, hey, hey, look who I found!!" Megumi suddenly said, appearing in the hallway behind Keiichi and Belldandy. She looked quite flushed with the amounts of sake that she had been drinking . . .
Megumi pushed a bewildered black-haired girl into the room, and everyone suddenly found something else to ogle about. As everyone's attention was diverted, Urd started waving around in the television screen in an attempt to bring her audience back to her.
"Keiichi! You never told us you already had a child!! No wonder you wanted to get married!!" Chiharu gasped.
"She's NOT my child!!!" Keiichi yelled.
"Oh, really? Then . . . hey Belldandy, you never told us there was someone younger than Skuld!" Megumi said as she shakily returned to her seat on the floor beside her father. "Why don't you join the party, kid? It's a party for everyone!"
"Aww, look, she's so cute! She looks just like your younger sister!" Takano said, looking quite drunk herself.
Belldandy didn't answer. She couldn't. As Keiichi looked at her once more, he saw that she had covered her mouth with her hand in shock, and he was sure that there was a huge smile behind that hand as her eyes were filled with tears. The only thing that was stopping her from hugging her little sister was the tray in her other hand, so Keiichi reached out and took it from her. Belldandy gave him a grateful glance and, as he predicted, took a couple of steps towards Skuld and enveloped her in a warm embrace.
Skuld was not very happy. Four years later, and still everyone thought she was just a kid!! Her hands clenched tightly into a fist as she resisted the urge to throw a fit - she had to have learned *some* control during those years she had been gone. The moment Belldandy hugged her, however, she felt just like a child, and for some reason tears fell from her eyes as well.
Urd took this time to sneak out of the screen as everyone watched the small reunion.
After a while, Belldandy finally moved back and looked at Skuld. "Tadaima . . ." Skuld told her, smiling.
Belldandy nodded, beaming. "O-kaeri nasai."
"Ne, ne, Belldandy-sempai, what's her name?" Sora asked.
"Jeez, don't you recognize her?" Urd said, suddenly appearing behind Keiichi. He tried to catch her gaze, but she avoided them, as if she was guilty of something.
[ Oh oh . . . ] Keiichi thought.
"She *is* Skuld. I picked her up this morning. She's on vacation, and she's staying for a short while," Urd continued.
"N-no way . . ." Sora muttered.
"She's your youngest sister?? The darling little child who didn't know how to play mahjong?" Takano asked. Skuld made a face as she heard the word "child".
"B-but she hasn't grown a BIT!!!" Megumi exclaimed.
"I DID, TOO!!!" Skuld finally yelled.
Keiichi's head began to hurt as they were faced with yet another problem. [ How are we going to explain this to them now? ]
Fortunately for him, he did not need to explain anything. All the visitors pretty much deduced everything by themselves:
"She still looks so young!"
"Maybe she hasn't gotten rid of her baby fat yet?"
"How old is she anyway?"
"Should be around 16 to 18 or so, right?"
"Hey, maybe it's with the genes!"
"You're right! Look, even Belldandy and Urd did not seem to have grown older either!"
"Yep, that must be it!"
"They're so lucky! They don't seem to age so easily!"
"I don't know - Urd looks old enough to be my mother."
- laughter -
Keiichi sighed with relief. [ Thank goodness they're all drunk!! ]
In the meantime, after hearing the less-than-discreet conversation, Urd gritted her teeth, small sparks emanating from her tightly clenched fists. [ All right, you . . . !!! You're going to *get* it later!!! ]
"Hey, Urd, you didn't tell us that you were producing karaoke videos!"
"Yeah, how do you get it to come out again?"
"We were not able to finish it!"
Temporarily forgetting her anger, Urd jumped up to the makeshift stage and grabbed the mike. "Why look for that track when you can have the real thing?!? Now that Urd the Magnificent is here, the party has *really* begun!!! Alright, everybody, let's go for another round!!"
Everyone cheered.
"Skuld, it's so great to have you back! C'mon, join us!" Sora said, pulling a protesting Skuld with her towards the low table.
Belldandy allowed her eyes to wander, the site of both her sisters present inside the room filling her heart with happiness. She instantly regretted having ever doubted the Almighty. "Thank you . . ." she whispered.
"What?" Keiichi asked, looking at his fiancée.
Belldandy shook her head. "I was just thanking him," she said.
"Oh. The entire night turned out great after all, huh?"
The middle Norn nodded happily.
"Here, I'll take care of the food. You go ahead and enjoy the party, okay?" Keiichi said.
"Are you sure?"
Her fiancé nodded before giving her a peck on her cheek. "Go on."
"Thank you, Keiichi . . ."
"Belldandy dear, come sit over here!" Keiichi's mother called.
Nodding, Belldandy walked over to the low square table that served as the mahjong table for the past few hours. "Would you like anything, Takano-san?" Belldandy asked.
"You've been working so hard the entire day, dear, that it's about time Keiichi took over. Just sit down and have a chat with your friends and your future mother-in-law."
Skuld's head snapped towards their direction as she distinctly heard the word "mother-in-law".
"So what's your secret, Belldandy? How do you and your sisters manage to look so young despite your ages?" Takano asked. All the other girls, much to Keima's distress (who was sitting as close to his wife as he possibly could), began to gather around them as they strived to hear the secrets for attaining a youthful look.
"Eh?"
"How many times a day do you put astringent on?"
"Do you place a mud pack every night?"
"What about wrinkles?"
Belldandy blinked at the sudden barrage of questions. "But . . . we don't really do anything."
"Really?"
"You mean it really *does* have something to do with your genes?"
"Are you sure?"
"How lucky!!"
"I wonder if it's possible to get a genetic implant or something . . ."
"C'mon, Belldandy! We'll be family soon! You could at least tell me, right?" Megumi asked.
"Hey!"
"That's so unfair, Megumi!"
"You can't hog everything to yourself just because she's going to be your sister-in-law . . ."
Skuld suddenly stood up.
Shocked, the people gathered around the table turned to look at her. Skuld looked at them momentarily, before bowing in apology. "I - I'm sorry. I just arrived, so I have some unpacking to do . . ." She then ran out of the living room, bumping into Keiichi in the process.
"Hey, be careful!" Keiichi told her as he recovered the thankfully empty tray from the floor.
The young goddess stared at him for a few moments, her face expressionless, before walking away.
"What happened?" Keiichi asked as Belldandy stood to a stop in front of him.
"She didn't know . . ." Belldandy answered. "I forgot to tell her. She didn't know, and she found out from the worst possible way."
*****
After picking up her backpack from the bathroom where she had dropped it, Skuld had started to proceed to her old laboratory, but her hands stopped just as she was about to slide the shoji open. *Was* this still her laboratory? After all, she had been gone for four years, so they must have changed it already.
Placing her bag next to her, Skuld sat on the wooden porch leading out to the backyard. The noise in the living room at the front of the house had been partly muffled by the closed shojis, so she was able to find some peace and a small amount of quiet from her location.
The sun had already set for quite some time, and purple and blue hues enveloped the twilight sky. Bright stars have begun to appear - stars that never seemed to have changed for millions of years.
Yet Skuld knew that in places were there was no bright light, a new star was already born there, hundreds of light years away, it's light still out of view from the Earth. And that in places were there was a star to the human eye was now in reality darkness, a darkness of which was waiting to be discovered as well.
[ Everything changes . . . ] Skuld thought. [ I know that. When I come back here, I can't expect everything to stay the way I remember them. ]
[ So why had I suddenly ran out of the room? ]
She sighed as she stood up. Spotting a pair of slippers on the stone step leading to the grounds, she slipped her socks into them. [ I might as well check on Banpei and Sigel. I can't do anything until I've asked them where I'm going to be dropping my things, and I'm not in any hurry to go back to the living room. ]
"Skuld, wait!"
The young goddess turned around and saw her older sister standing at the corridor leading to the porch. She gave Belldandy a small smile. "Hi."
Relieved that her sister was not going to run away, Belldandy approached Skuld, sitting beside the place where the youngest Norn stood. "Skuld . . ." she began.
"I'm sorry," Skuld suddenly said.
Belldandy looked surprised at Skuld's sudden outburst. She was the one who was supposed to apologize, not her little sister.
"I've barely been here for ten minutes, and then I acted all bratty again," Skuld continued, refusing to meet her sister's gaze. "No wonder they all think that I'm still a kid."
"Oh, Skuld, they think you're a child because you look that way." [ Even if, up in the heavens, you *are* still considered a young girl in their eyes. ]
"Still, I shouldn't have run out like I did. I'm sorry."
Belldandy shook her head. She patted the wooden floor beside her, inviting Skuld to sit next to her. "I'm the one who should be sorry. I am your sister, and you deserved to hear the news from me, and not from another person," she said as Skuld sat down.
"You're . . . you're really doing it, aren't you? You're going to marry him."
"I love him," Belldandy answered.
Skuld remained silent.
"Are you . . . still against him?"
The youngest Norn shrugged.
"Skuld . . ."
"It's still a huge shock for me," Skuld finally said. "I know that things will be different. Four years is a long time. Yet a part of me still wishes that everything would be the same as before . . ."
Belldandy wrapped her arms around her. "Skuld, knowing that things have changed is different from accepting them, and even then not everything could be altered by the decisions we make. Just because Keiichi and I have decided to get married, it does not mean that everything else will have to change. You're still my little sister."
Skuld sighed. "I know."
"So . . . do you still hate Keiichi?"
The truth was, Skuld had nothing against Keiichi. At least, she had grown to like him during the past few years that she had been a member of the Morisato household. It was her love for her elder sister, bordering on over-protectiveness, which made her dislike him. She didn't wish to see Belldandy hurt by any mortal *nor* god . . . and she had a feeling that even if Belldandy had fallen for any immortal being, Skuld still would have objected to their relationship.
Skuld stood up.
"Where are you going?" Belldandy asked.
"To Banpei and Sigel. I'm going to be doing some upgrades." Skuld finally looked into her sister's blue eyes. "If Keiichi ever becomes unfaithful to you or makes you cry, he'll be sorry!!"
Belldandy smiled.
*****
[ Ahh . . . peace and quiet . . . ] Keiichi happily thought as he walked towards his room. All the visitors had finally left after half a day of partying, the drinking somewhat toning down near the end so that everyone would be sober enough to go home. The sisters were unpacking the few things Skuld had brought with her in Skuld's old laboratory, which Keiichi had turned into his own laboratory after she had left, so not much had really changed. If anything, Keiichi would dare say that everything was back the way they were before.
"Ah, no, Urd, don't drop that . . . !!"
Keiichi winced as he heard a small crash inside the laboratory, which resulted in a fury exchange of words between Urd and Skuld. "Yep, everything is back to normal," Keiichi told himself.
Upon entering his room, Keiichi was greeted with the site of his brand new color television, smashed on the floor.
Then he remembered Urd's guilty look . . .
"URD!! What happened to my TV!!!" he yelled, running towards the laboratory.
"It kind of fell while I was getting out of it earlier . . ."
"Aaargh!!"
"Keiichi, I'm sure Skuld would be able to fix it for you . . ."
"Yeah, why don't you get her to fix it?"
"Why do *I* always have to pick up after the mess you've made?!"
Welsper, the resident cat (who was coincidentally a demon) of the Morisato household, shook his head as he listened to the noise inside the temple. Rolling his eyes, he covered his ears with his paws and tried to get some sleep despite the racket.
[ Here we go again!! ]
Japanese words used:
kami-sama - Almighty
o-kaeri nasai - Welcome home/back
onee-san - big sister
shoji - sliding panel door
tadaima - I'm home
I particularly enjoyed writing this scene, so much that once again it became long enough to be a chapter by itself. This story is certainly growing longer than I thought it would be! I hope you will continue to read it up until the very end!
Oh, "Hottokenai no Sa" was sung by Touma Yumi (Urd). You should listen to it if you haven't heard it yet. It's a really fun song.
And Lind smiled in the final issue of her story arc!! My intuition was correct! Guess I won't have to change that particular scene after all! ^_^
CHAPTER SIX: COMING HOME
"I'll be right back . . ."
Belldandy entered the kitchen and slid the shoji close. The smile she had on her lips disappeared as she held the tray she had been carrying close to her. A diamond ring - small so it would fit with Keiichi's budget, but overwhelmingly full of his love - twinkled as the last remaining rays of the sun shone on her finger, yet no matter how much she looked at it, she couldn't bring herself to lighten up her downcast mood.
True, she was very happy when Keiichi had finally asked her hand in marriage. There was a time when Belldandy worried that the heavens would object to their engagement, but nothing has happened for the past few weeks, so Urd had managed to convince her to set her worries aside.
"If Kami-sama was going to protest, he would have done it the moment Keiichi had placed the ring on your finger!" Urd had told her. "So relax and enjoy the fact that you're finally engaged!"
Belldandy bit her lip as an image of her older sister crossed her mind. "Onee-san . . ."
The feeling of emptiness that had been tugging at her since her sister had left finally overcame her, and she struggled hard to prevent her tears from falling.
Behind the closed doors of the kitchen were the sounds of people holding a party. All of Keiichi and Belldandy's friends were there, celebrating their impending marriage. The former members of the Motor Club had been passing around bottles of sake for the past few hours, as most of the visitors had gathered around the karaoke machine that Ootaki and Tamiya had brought with them, filling the house with songs of drunken happiness.
Even Keiichi's parents were out there, with Morisato Keima keeping close to the only two women who kept him quite in control of himself, while steering clear of all the others, particularly Fujimi Chihiro, who was quite intrigued with Keiichi's father. His wife Takano had enticed some of the visitors to a game of mahjong, and from the looks of it she hasn't lost a game yet, judging from the looks of the other players. And Keiichi's younger sister Megumi was chatting with a group of motorcycle enthusiasts . . .
. . . and then Hasegawa Sora suddenly asked where Belldandy's family was . . .
While her fiancé was surrounded by his family and friends, Belldandy was alone.
She shook her head. Keiichi's friends were *her* friends, and his family were *her* family.
Still, she could not help but wonder what the day would have been like if her sisters were there.
When Skuld had left four years ago, the temple was suddenly, uncomfortably, quiet. Even the sounds of Sigel being chased around by Banpei couldn't cover the silence. The number of times Keiichi and Belldandy had to repair Banpei as a result of one of their chases had only served to remind them of who was missing among them.
It took months before they had adjusted to Skuld's absence. By then, Urd began to make enough noise to cover her little sister. Belldandy always had to be on guard, as her older sister reverted back to the habit of harassing Keiichi by the hour as she had done before Skuld had joined them. Thankfully, the demon Mara had laid quiet for all those years, and their only real troubles came from Urd's mother Hild, who decided to grant her daughter the occasional visit, resulting to the small amounts of chaos in the temple that normally would have been caused by two sisters fighting each other, with poor Keiichi somehow always getting stuck in the middle at times.
Now even Urd had been sent back home.
As a goddess, Belldandy had a right to visit them, as she and Urd had been doing every once in a while whenever they wished to see Skuld. But visiting was different from actually being with them every day, and since she was about to marry a mortal, Belldandy was not sure she would be able to visit them at all.
[ Is this my punishment? That I have to choose between the man and the family that I both love? ] Belldandy thought.
The shoji behind her slid open without her noticing, and Keiichi entered, looking for his fiancée. Upon seeing her standing there just in front of the wooden door, trying to find solace by hugging a tray, he made his way towards her and held her shoulder.
Belldandy turned around and leaned against him, seeking the comfort that only he could give. Keiichi in turn wrapped his arms around her, supporting her frame as she quietly cried.
"I . . . I'm sorry . . ." Belldandy said moments later as she wiped her tears from her eyes. "They have gone through so much effort to hold this party for us, and I'm supposed to be happy . . . but . . ."
Keiichi smiled warmly. "I understand. Urd's departure had been very hard for you."
"I know that they seem to have brought you so much trouble . . . but . . . Keiichi, am I selfish for wanting my sisters to be here?"
"No," Keiichi answered, shaking his head. "They've been with us for so long, it's hard to imagine life without them. Even for me . . . they're my family, too, Bell-chan. I want them to be here to celebrate with us just as much as you do."
He held her closer. "I . . . I know you cannot make promises you can't keep. But at least . . . promise me . . . that you'll *try* not to leave me, too . . ."
"Keiichi . . ."
"Even if they don't come back . . . we'll find a way to fill in the gap that they've left. We'll create so much happiness that they wouldn't be sorely missed! Just . . . stay with me. Don't leave me . . ."
"Keiichi, I have promised that I would stay with you for as long as you wished ever since we had created that contract many years ago . . . the fact that I had answered yes to your proposal would serve to bring that promise to a higher level, for even marriages are sacred in heaven . . ." Belldandy reached out and placed the tray that she had been holding on a nearby table before embracing Keiichi in return. "We have gone through so much . . . No matter what happens, I will always find a way to return to you, just as I know that you will always be there for me, waiting. I love you, Keiichi."
Keiichi felt relieved, grateful that he had voiced out his fears. "I love you, too . . ." His head inched closer to hers as she looked up, prepared to receive his kiss . . .
"WHAT IN THE WORLD . . . !!!"
The sound of Tamiya's booming voice broke the intimate moment between the couple, and they both sighed. "They must be wondering why the food is taking too long," Belldandy said, blushing.
"We should hurry then," Keiichi said, his hold on her loosening for a moment.
Before Belldandy could move, however, Keiichi leaned over and kissed her anyway.
[ I don't have any excuse not to kiss her anymore . . . ] Keiichi thought as he slowly pulled away.
Belldandy smiled brilliantly. Keiichi watched as she began to hum a song while piling delicacies on the tray.
[ Besides. I like it better when she's happy, and it's probably one of the very few things a mortal can grant a goddess. ]
"Shall we?" Belldandy asked, carrying a fresh new batch of munchies for the visitors to eat. Her fiancé nodded, and they walked out of the kitchen together, prepared to face the rowdy bunch of people that were their friends.
*****
Keiichi was lucky he was not carrying the tray of food, because if he did, he would have mostly likely dropped it.
Almost everyone who was in the living room was now staring at the TV screen where those who had been singing had been following the lyrics to the karaoke that they were playing. To Keiichi and Belldandy's surprise (and to Keiichi's horror), Urd was right there on the screen, staring right back!
"Oh . . . uh . . . umm . . ." Urd stammered as she tried to think of a way out of her current situation. "Th - this is a pre-recording from the Goddess Musical Productions, providing you with . . . with lovely, easy-to-follow karaoke selections that would make a singer even out of the most tone-deaf person! In this disc, we had decided to provide you with one extra song for all of you to sing along with! So ladies and gentlemen, let me present to you our lovely guest karaoke singer, which is myself, of course, here to sing 'Hottokenai no Sa'!!"
While the rest of the guests inside the room applauded and started to sing, with Tamiya and Ootaki flipping the disc jacket around, wondering why this was the first time they had ever seen this track and how they would be able to access it again, Keiichi slapped a palm on his face. "I don't believe this . . ." he muttered. "That was too close!"
"I'm sorry, Keiichi . . ." Belldandy told him.
Keiichi looked at her. The goddess looked very sorry for what happened, but there was an ecstatic twinkle in her eyes - a joy, Keiichi was sure, that had been brought about by the knowledge that her sister's departure was not for good.
"It's nothing. That's our Urd, all right! Always finding a way to make a grand entrance in any event!" Keiichi said with a smile. In a way, he too, was relieved that Urd had returned. [ She's certainly enjoying herself, considering that she could have gotten us into big trouble, ] he thought, watching as Urd was singing all out on the television screen. [ I wonder how she'll be able to take them 'back to regular programming'? ]
"Hey, hey, hey, look who I found!!" Megumi suddenly said, appearing in the hallway behind Keiichi and Belldandy. She looked quite flushed with the amounts of sake that she had been drinking . . .
Megumi pushed a bewildered black-haired girl into the room, and everyone suddenly found something else to ogle about. As everyone's attention was diverted, Urd started waving around in the television screen in an attempt to bring her audience back to her.
"Keiichi! You never told us you already had a child!! No wonder you wanted to get married!!" Chiharu gasped.
"She's NOT my child!!!" Keiichi yelled.
"Oh, really? Then . . . hey Belldandy, you never told us there was someone younger than Skuld!" Megumi said as she shakily returned to her seat on the floor beside her father. "Why don't you join the party, kid? It's a party for everyone!"
"Aww, look, she's so cute! She looks just like your younger sister!" Takano said, looking quite drunk herself.
Belldandy didn't answer. She couldn't. As Keiichi looked at her once more, he saw that she had covered her mouth with her hand in shock, and he was sure that there was a huge smile behind that hand as her eyes were filled with tears. The only thing that was stopping her from hugging her little sister was the tray in her other hand, so Keiichi reached out and took it from her. Belldandy gave him a grateful glance and, as he predicted, took a couple of steps towards Skuld and enveloped her in a warm embrace.
Skuld was not very happy. Four years later, and still everyone thought she was just a kid!! Her hands clenched tightly into a fist as she resisted the urge to throw a fit - she had to have learned *some* control during those years she had been gone. The moment Belldandy hugged her, however, she felt just like a child, and for some reason tears fell from her eyes as well.
Urd took this time to sneak out of the screen as everyone watched the small reunion.
After a while, Belldandy finally moved back and looked at Skuld. "Tadaima . . ." Skuld told her, smiling.
Belldandy nodded, beaming. "O-kaeri nasai."
"Ne, ne, Belldandy-sempai, what's her name?" Sora asked.
"Jeez, don't you recognize her?" Urd said, suddenly appearing behind Keiichi. He tried to catch her gaze, but she avoided them, as if she was guilty of something.
[ Oh oh . . . ] Keiichi thought.
"She *is* Skuld. I picked her up this morning. She's on vacation, and she's staying for a short while," Urd continued.
"N-no way . . ." Sora muttered.
"She's your youngest sister?? The darling little child who didn't know how to play mahjong?" Takano asked. Skuld made a face as she heard the word "child".
"B-but she hasn't grown a BIT!!!" Megumi exclaimed.
"I DID, TOO!!!" Skuld finally yelled.
Keiichi's head began to hurt as they were faced with yet another problem. [ How are we going to explain this to them now? ]
Fortunately for him, he did not need to explain anything. All the visitors pretty much deduced everything by themselves:
"She still looks so young!"
"Maybe she hasn't gotten rid of her baby fat yet?"
"How old is she anyway?"
"Should be around 16 to 18 or so, right?"
"Hey, maybe it's with the genes!"
"You're right! Look, even Belldandy and Urd did not seem to have grown older either!"
"Yep, that must be it!"
"They're so lucky! They don't seem to age so easily!"
"I don't know - Urd looks old enough to be my mother."
- laughter -
Keiichi sighed with relief. [ Thank goodness they're all drunk!! ]
In the meantime, after hearing the less-than-discreet conversation, Urd gritted her teeth, small sparks emanating from her tightly clenched fists. [ All right, you . . . !!! You're going to *get* it later!!! ]
"Hey, Urd, you didn't tell us that you were producing karaoke videos!"
"Yeah, how do you get it to come out again?"
"We were not able to finish it!"
Temporarily forgetting her anger, Urd jumped up to the makeshift stage and grabbed the mike. "Why look for that track when you can have the real thing?!? Now that Urd the Magnificent is here, the party has *really* begun!!! Alright, everybody, let's go for another round!!"
Everyone cheered.
"Skuld, it's so great to have you back! C'mon, join us!" Sora said, pulling a protesting Skuld with her towards the low table.
Belldandy allowed her eyes to wander, the site of both her sisters present inside the room filling her heart with happiness. She instantly regretted having ever doubted the Almighty. "Thank you . . ." she whispered.
"What?" Keiichi asked, looking at his fiancée.
Belldandy shook her head. "I was just thanking him," she said.
"Oh. The entire night turned out great after all, huh?"
The middle Norn nodded happily.
"Here, I'll take care of the food. You go ahead and enjoy the party, okay?" Keiichi said.
"Are you sure?"
Her fiancé nodded before giving her a peck on her cheek. "Go on."
"Thank you, Keiichi . . ."
"Belldandy dear, come sit over here!" Keiichi's mother called.
Nodding, Belldandy walked over to the low square table that served as the mahjong table for the past few hours. "Would you like anything, Takano-san?" Belldandy asked.
"You've been working so hard the entire day, dear, that it's about time Keiichi took over. Just sit down and have a chat with your friends and your future mother-in-law."
Skuld's head snapped towards their direction as she distinctly heard the word "mother-in-law".
"So what's your secret, Belldandy? How do you and your sisters manage to look so young despite your ages?" Takano asked. All the other girls, much to Keima's distress (who was sitting as close to his wife as he possibly could), began to gather around them as they strived to hear the secrets for attaining a youthful look.
"Eh?"
"How many times a day do you put astringent on?"
"Do you place a mud pack every night?"
"What about wrinkles?"
Belldandy blinked at the sudden barrage of questions. "But . . . we don't really do anything."
"Really?"
"You mean it really *does* have something to do with your genes?"
"Are you sure?"
"How lucky!!"
"I wonder if it's possible to get a genetic implant or something . . ."
"C'mon, Belldandy! We'll be family soon! You could at least tell me, right?" Megumi asked.
"Hey!"
"That's so unfair, Megumi!"
"You can't hog everything to yourself just because she's going to be your sister-in-law . . ."
Skuld suddenly stood up.
Shocked, the people gathered around the table turned to look at her. Skuld looked at them momentarily, before bowing in apology. "I - I'm sorry. I just arrived, so I have some unpacking to do . . ." She then ran out of the living room, bumping into Keiichi in the process.
"Hey, be careful!" Keiichi told her as he recovered the thankfully empty tray from the floor.
The young goddess stared at him for a few moments, her face expressionless, before walking away.
"What happened?" Keiichi asked as Belldandy stood to a stop in front of him.
"She didn't know . . ." Belldandy answered. "I forgot to tell her. She didn't know, and she found out from the worst possible way."
*****
After picking up her backpack from the bathroom where she had dropped it, Skuld had started to proceed to her old laboratory, but her hands stopped just as she was about to slide the shoji open. *Was* this still her laboratory? After all, she had been gone for four years, so they must have changed it already.
Placing her bag next to her, Skuld sat on the wooden porch leading out to the backyard. The noise in the living room at the front of the house had been partly muffled by the closed shojis, so she was able to find some peace and a small amount of quiet from her location.
The sun had already set for quite some time, and purple and blue hues enveloped the twilight sky. Bright stars have begun to appear - stars that never seemed to have changed for millions of years.
Yet Skuld knew that in places were there was no bright light, a new star was already born there, hundreds of light years away, it's light still out of view from the Earth. And that in places were there was a star to the human eye was now in reality darkness, a darkness of which was waiting to be discovered as well.
[ Everything changes . . . ] Skuld thought. [ I know that. When I come back here, I can't expect everything to stay the way I remember them. ]
[ So why had I suddenly ran out of the room? ]
She sighed as she stood up. Spotting a pair of slippers on the stone step leading to the grounds, she slipped her socks into them. [ I might as well check on Banpei and Sigel. I can't do anything until I've asked them where I'm going to be dropping my things, and I'm not in any hurry to go back to the living room. ]
"Skuld, wait!"
The young goddess turned around and saw her older sister standing at the corridor leading to the porch. She gave Belldandy a small smile. "Hi."
Relieved that her sister was not going to run away, Belldandy approached Skuld, sitting beside the place where the youngest Norn stood. "Skuld . . ." she began.
"I'm sorry," Skuld suddenly said.
Belldandy looked surprised at Skuld's sudden outburst. She was the one who was supposed to apologize, not her little sister.
"I've barely been here for ten minutes, and then I acted all bratty again," Skuld continued, refusing to meet her sister's gaze. "No wonder they all think that I'm still a kid."
"Oh, Skuld, they think you're a child because you look that way." [ Even if, up in the heavens, you *are* still considered a young girl in their eyes. ]
"Still, I shouldn't have run out like I did. I'm sorry."
Belldandy shook her head. She patted the wooden floor beside her, inviting Skuld to sit next to her. "I'm the one who should be sorry. I am your sister, and you deserved to hear the news from me, and not from another person," she said as Skuld sat down.
"You're . . . you're really doing it, aren't you? You're going to marry him."
"I love him," Belldandy answered.
Skuld remained silent.
"Are you . . . still against him?"
The youngest Norn shrugged.
"Skuld . . ."
"It's still a huge shock for me," Skuld finally said. "I know that things will be different. Four years is a long time. Yet a part of me still wishes that everything would be the same as before . . ."
Belldandy wrapped her arms around her. "Skuld, knowing that things have changed is different from accepting them, and even then not everything could be altered by the decisions we make. Just because Keiichi and I have decided to get married, it does not mean that everything else will have to change. You're still my little sister."
Skuld sighed. "I know."
"So . . . do you still hate Keiichi?"
The truth was, Skuld had nothing against Keiichi. At least, she had grown to like him during the past few years that she had been a member of the Morisato household. It was her love for her elder sister, bordering on over-protectiveness, which made her dislike him. She didn't wish to see Belldandy hurt by any mortal *nor* god . . . and she had a feeling that even if Belldandy had fallen for any immortal being, Skuld still would have objected to their relationship.
Skuld stood up.
"Where are you going?" Belldandy asked.
"To Banpei and Sigel. I'm going to be doing some upgrades." Skuld finally looked into her sister's blue eyes. "If Keiichi ever becomes unfaithful to you or makes you cry, he'll be sorry!!"
Belldandy smiled.
*****
[ Ahh . . . peace and quiet . . . ] Keiichi happily thought as he walked towards his room. All the visitors had finally left after half a day of partying, the drinking somewhat toning down near the end so that everyone would be sober enough to go home. The sisters were unpacking the few things Skuld had brought with her in Skuld's old laboratory, which Keiichi had turned into his own laboratory after she had left, so not much had really changed. If anything, Keiichi would dare say that everything was back the way they were before.
"Ah, no, Urd, don't drop that . . . !!"
Keiichi winced as he heard a small crash inside the laboratory, which resulted in a fury exchange of words between Urd and Skuld. "Yep, everything is back to normal," Keiichi told himself.
Upon entering his room, Keiichi was greeted with the site of his brand new color television, smashed on the floor.
Then he remembered Urd's guilty look . . .
"URD!! What happened to my TV!!!" he yelled, running towards the laboratory.
"It kind of fell while I was getting out of it earlier . . ."
"Aaargh!!"
"Keiichi, I'm sure Skuld would be able to fix it for you . . ."
"Yeah, why don't you get her to fix it?"
"Why do *I* always have to pick up after the mess you've made?!"
Welsper, the resident cat (who was coincidentally a demon) of the Morisato household, shook his head as he listened to the noise inside the temple. Rolling his eyes, he covered his ears with his paws and tried to get some sleep despite the racket.
[ Here we go again!! ]
Japanese words used:
kami-sama - Almighty
o-kaeri nasai - Welcome home/back
onee-san - big sister
shoji - sliding panel door
tadaima - I'm home