Vision Of Escaflowne Fan Fiction ❯ Following Jupiter ❯ Beautiful Blue ( Chapter 5 )

Chapter 3

Beautiful Blue

From the picture on the wall

To the bedpost that's touched them all

This is where I live

This is where I do my screaming

How do you say, I love you in so many other ways

This is where I live

This is what I do best

*****

Leaunna didn't know why she cried so much. She'd always been strong. She figured that it was everything that had been bottled up inside of her, everything that made her angry, everything that made her sad, finally when she saw him come after her, when she thought he was going to kill her, it was a reason to cry.

She hadn't open her eyes yet, still awkwardly feeling that he was there, but when she smelt the sent of food she couldn't help opening her eyes as it invaded her nostrils. She sat up and looked around there seemed to be no one in this room. It was filled with beads and jars and assortments of certain stuff.

`Ahhhhhhh' came a horse voice with a thick drawl to it, through the bead ropes hanging down in the doorway. Leaunna looked behind her, shocked. In front of her was a fairly tall, very skinny woman with brown hair hanging down around her face, and many wrinkles; she had many beads on and weird looking cloths, from Leaunna's point anyway. She had dark eyes, which sunk into her head and was covered in thick make-up.

`What am I doing here?' Leaunna asked cautiously. Her stomach growled and the old woman looked at her coking her head a little so that her one eye was looking at her like a bird.

`Hungry are we?' she said in an eerie voice that gave Leaunna goose bumps.

`No' her stomach growled again.

`Come with me dear.' She went to grab Leaunna's hand and she pulled away distinctively, still looking at the old woman. `Come on dear' she said sternly grabbing for her hand, yet again, and succeeding. The old woman's talons digging into her skin.

`Oh don't be so fragile dear, Dilandau wanted to see you'

`Dilandau? This is starting to seem weird." Leaunna thought. The old woman dragged her by the wrist, pulling her closer until they reached a little room where the sent of food was coming from. There was one plate set with food, one was already cleared and there was a man standing by a window, with a sword, cleaning it, looking outside into the vast worthlessness. It kind of reminded her of Phoenix.

`Sit down dear and eat'

`How do I know that it isn't poison?'

`It's not poison, you idiot.' Dilandau said comely, turning around. `I need you remember? I'm not about to kill you. Just yet'

`Oh so your going to what? Keep me hostage until you've fucked me enough and THEN kill me? What the hell is wrong with you?'

`What?' he said, still not completely understanding what she meant by being "fucked"

`What, what?' she said being forced to sit down.

`I don't exactly get your……… language.' Dilandau said though gritted teeth sheeting his sword so he wouldn't do anything that might take away from what he wanted.

She sat down as the table and started to eat greedily. They both watched as she ate. When she noticed she looked up. `What are ya'll staring at me for?' she wiped her mouth and stood up. `I think I'll go now' she got up. `I think you'll stay' Dilandau spat.

`Listen to me and listen well, I need you to bring back my slayers. Then I will find Folken and'

`Folken?' she asked surprised. `Folken's dead'

`What? How do you know?'

`I've read the book… Folken killed Dornkirk and by the way Hitomi explains it, fate guided the sword right into Folken heart…everything is gone'

`Right then, it'll be worse for you.' He grabbed her shirt and brought her back into the room where she woke up in.

`Sit down dear'

`Would you stop calling her dear' Dilandau harshly yelled to the old lady.

`I'm sorry d- I'm sorry but we're going to need one of you fingers' to their surprise she started to laugh.

`Your joking right'

`No, now which one do you want it to be? This one?' Dilandau reached out and grabbed her middle finger.'

`NO!' she jerked her finger back. `That finger's too important'

`Hurry up. I'll just pick one'

`You aren't going to cut my finger off.' She replied nervously.

`Fine this one will do' he grabbed her ring finger and took the knife from the table, rolling up the sleeve on her sweatshirt.

`This might sting a little' she struggled too much for him to do anything. He looked at the woman in front of him. `Do something?' he ordered. She just stared. `NOW?' he yelled again. Dilandau gave her the knife and grabbed her arms and put her on his lap. He stepped on her feet so that she couldn't kick. The woman took her finger and put it on the top of the table to other four underneath it. She brought it up and them she brought down the blade and cut off her finger she screamed and she cried and she woke up.

Her head was throbbing with a despicable headache. She sat up in bed and rubbed her head. Remembering what had happened previously, she looked at her left hand, all fingers intact. She closed her eyes, breathing heavily.

`A……… dream' she whispered though hyphenated breaths. `Just a simple……… dream' she looked at her alarm clock. `I wonder why it didn't go off!' she screamed in her head.

She flew her covers off and shoved on a pair of flairs, and a baggy sweatshirt and ran downstairs. Larry was sitting in his usual place, by the television, and was watching some kind of game show for old people.

Ever since her mother had divorced when she was eight, re-married when she was nine and died when she was twelve, Leaunna had lived with Larry. The only reason he kept her was that he got money, $ 500 every month in fact, and only used it on himself practically. He said that she was entitled to $ 150 out of that money, and she was grateful.

`Hey!' he bellowed form the living room, `we're out of groceries. Get some after school'

She stopped and yelled back; `I just bought groceries,'

`Shut up! We're out of groceries now get them after school'

`Okay. I gotta go, bye' she murmured and slammed the door and left for the bus into town, to get to school.

When she arrived at school everything went so slow, so boring, so unusual for her. She was used to her friends being more open with her, but today they seemed to be keeping something from her. Something that she felt was a big part of her, inside.

She sat through a very boring French class. This class went slower than the others. The teacher drowned on about the making about `La belle a la bete'. She closed her eyes sleepily, but her friend across from her poked her silently.

The next class that she had was law, then Phys Ed. In this class they played "Ringette". She was the goalie for her team and she watched as her teammates all ran after the round, black, fiber like ring and poked at it like chickens in heat. Finally it came to Math. It wasn't much of a thrill, it just went moderately fast and as the final bell had rung for them to go home, she quickly left the class.

She was walking home, coming back from the mall and was very uneasy about something. She knew something was wrong and she knew that she was going to find out. As she quickened her pace she started to replay things in her head, over and over. About her strange dream and about the way this day had been going just like in her dream just like when she met that stranger.

Leaunna stopped abruptly, and her heart raced.

`This, this is a dream, what had happened to me WAS real!' she dropped the bag and started to run to where she had first met Dilandau. To her surprise, he wasn't there. She leaned against the tree, breathing heavily. Suddenly everything around her stopped. Nothing was moving, nothing was making a sound.

`Strange' a voice came from behind her.

`Wha?' she said, turning around to face a man.

`Its strange' he said again, a deep

`Where am I?' she said calmly, but sternly. `I know this isn't reality'

`But it is? Isn't it?" he walked ahead of her and turned around again. `Reality is what you make. You see, your living your life how YOU wanted it to happen before. You didn't want to believe that this was a dream, and as a result, Dilandau wasn't where he was the first time it happened was he?'

`Obviously not' she said with a flat tone, still not taking her eyes off the man.

`But you are right in a way, this is a dream but, it's also your reality'

`I'm sorry?'

`Look over there' Leaunna turned and looked in the direction he was pointing to.

`What? Look at what,' she squinted against the sunlight sunshine towards the figure with a newspaper in his hand, looking like he was trying to get her attention, `that's my father. He's supposed to be dead.'

`I don't understand' she said turning around back to the man. She stared in shock when she realized that he was gone. Everything was back to normal.

*****

Leaunna awoke with a start and was breathing heavily. She could hear two people arguing. She looked around the dark room and spotted two dark figures and she clutched the bed covers hoping that they didn't hear her wake up. She winced and looked down at her fingers there was an assortment of bandages on her left ring finger and whimpered loud enough for the heated argument to end. One figure looked at her and started to walk over to her, the other remained.

`So, your awake'

`Wow, way to state the obvious' she rolled her eyes, her voice dripping with sarcasm. The man gave a scornful snicker.

`A lot sooner than I thought, now what shall I do with you?' he said bringing his finger and thumb up to his chin and placing it there as if to mock her.

`Maybe you should let her go, you've gotten what you wanted' the other man said. She recognized the voice.

`You' she whispered to the man and then looked at Dilandau. `Why do you need me?'

`A simple question, yet I will not answer'

`Why not?' she raised her voice.

`Don't you dare yell at me'

`Dilandau' the other man grabbed him and held him back. `What are you going to do with her?'

`Kill her. She's made me angry, I think I'll do it now!'

`Just let her go' the other man pleaded, `this wont turn out well'

`Get off me' he pushed the other man away and looked back at Leaunna. She swallowed.

`I'll let her go' Leaunna's eyes were hopeful then he said, `if she begs enough' he snickered.

`You know,' she spat `Like I always say, "It's better to die on your feet than to live on your knees"'

`You want to die then?' he whispered though gritted teeth.

`I wanna go home' her teeth were clenched like his. He grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the bed.

`Hey! Let go of me! Hey aren't you going to help me?' she was yelling at the other man while trying to maintain her gravity in one spot and pull back at the same time, but he kept jerking her forward, closer to the door.

*****

After a while of struggling she just gave in and walked with him down the hall. A few times she struggled, the last time she did it her stopped suddenly and pushed her up against the wall and took out his sword, from then on she just walked, never taking her eyes off the hilt of the sword or his hand.

They reached a door and her punched in a code on a pad near the opening of the door and it automatically opened. Then, shoving her in, he murmured, `now, be good.' he derided and she gave him a look that made him snicker and then it closed again. Leaving her in semi darkness, her only light was a candle in the corner, slowly going down.

This room was very simple it consisted of no windows, one bed in the corner (it reminded her of a small hospital bed, only less comfortable looking,) it had a small table on a table in the corner, which held up the candle, and another table at the foot of her bed with nothing on it.

*****

She walked slowly over the bed and sat down on it and kicked her feet for a while. When she got bored of that she laid down on the bed, feet still over the bed from the knees down. She brought up her left hand and looked at her finger. It didn't hurt as much as she thought. The only thing she really thought about on the topic was why they wanted her finger, she thought that maybe it was because they needed something to torture her with.

She knew Dilandau. He was one of those sadistic, overly excited about pain, pretentious bastard, and sociopath, among other things. She didn't feel the need to be arguing with him more than she is now, he might go hostile. If he isn't already.

She sat up again and rested her hands on her chin and elbows on her knees. It seemed as if she was in there for hours and she was beginning to get really hungry again. She groaned in frustration.

`I'm so unbelievable bored, it's unbelievable' she said aloud to herself. `I would do anything for a badminton racket, net and birdie, not to mention an opponent.' She stretched her arms, yawned and fell back again, this time face into the gray, thin covers.

`What do they want with me?'