A/N : Sooo...I know I haven't been updating for a while now and what else can I say but "Sorry", life's been hectic and I couldn't really find the time to sit down and write until a few weeks ago.
I really hope you'll enjoy this new chapter though, so please r&r (I'm always good with constructive criticism by the way, so go ahead ;))
Disclaimer: I ,obviously, don't own Meitantei Conan
Chapter 12: Gamechanger
"Little ghost-girl. I want you to remember what we told you."
"And don't forget to tell the Shinigami that we received her payment."
"The pact was fulfilled."
"The Augur kept his word."
"We entrapped the rotten essence, little dead girl."
"We gave you a new chance."
"Use it well, or despair will fall upon you should the spell break."
"And if you ever feel like it you are free to visit us is a lonely thing."
"May you be blessed, no matter the sins you committed in the past."
"Awaken now. Byakuya Riko."
My eyes instantly snapped open as the last echoing words died out inside of my head.
I remembered everything now.
My visit to the Augury.
The strange deal with Tamiel that it had told me about.
I sat up with a groan.
My body felt stiff and sore, which was most likely a result of me falling asleep on the floor in front of my bead.
I narrowed my eyes when I realised that there was a warm duvet covering my curvy frame.
My bed was empty.
"Tamiel?!" I asked out loud, slightly panicked as I scrambled on all fours to hurriedly stand up.
I cussed loudly as I slammed my shoulder into the doorframe on my way out and when I stubbed my toes on my race down the staircase.
"Tamiel?!" I shouted out again, this time receiving a response as the little god of death poked her head out the door of the kitchen, looking like Byakuya Eri again, her trademark smile greeting me.
Somehow it didn't seem all that unpleasant anymore, the smile that is.
"Oh…" I hurriedly made my way towards the girl, gripping her tightly by the shoulders and shaking her slightly.
"Do you know how worried you had me for you?!Where were did you disappear to? What even happened?! Are you feeling alright now or does it hurt anywhere?" The questions all tumbled out my rapidly moving mouth at a surprisingly fast pace , the words becoming slightly jumbled.
"It's alright now, Rio-nee. Thank you."
The little girl's face morphed into the most gentle and loving expression of eternal gratefulness that I'd ever seen anyone display, stopping me short in my tracks.
"You Idiot. Don't ever leave me all on my one here again. I'll kill you." I sobbed as I felt a familiar pressure build up behind my eyes.
I drew the god of death in a tight hug, stubbornly refusing to let her see the fresh tears that were now pouring down my face like a hot,salty waterfall.
Sobs wracked my body as Tamiel simply stood still, patiently patting my back as she waited for to cease my cries that were painfully rubbing raw my throat.
My heart felt heavier than ever when I realised that, had the Shinigami died yesterday, I wouldn't have ever been able to rely to her that I actually needed her.
She would've died all alone.
"You look like you killed someone." the god of death mocked me playfully, making me release her in favour of looking at myself in the reflection of the windows for the first time since my little desperate operation on the cold floor tiles of the kitchen.
She was right.
My previously light clothes and pale skin were coated in dry blood from head to toe and the annoying, sticky liquid had even found its way on my dark brown, wavy locks.
I grimaced.
I'd have to throw away my once white over-knee socks...there was no saving them.
"I might just murder you if you ever pull something like that again!" I told her, narrowing my eyes ,that were now red from crying, at the girl.
"Promise." Tamiel nodded happily, making her short black hair bob up and down.
"How did you even end up like that?" I pressed on, more than just a little curious as I brushed away the last remnants of my tears with both my hands.
"I had to get something from HQ...the others didn't seem to agree with me taking said thing." Tamiel told me evenly, her smile never fading.
"Might that something be...the spell that the Augury kept on talking about?" I asked carefully, thinking back to the cryptic words that the strange echoing voice had told me about.
Tamiel's eyes widened excitedly when I mentioned the strange being and her small hand gripped my chin in a creepily strong grip for a seven year old, turning it to side to side.
"You remember?How is your head? Do you notice anything different?" the little girl inquired hastily, eagerly awaiting my reply.
I freed myself from her grip and carefully took a look around, squinting my eyes as I gently massaged my now throbbing chin.
The colours around me somehow seemed sharper and more vivid.
My body felt lighter and it was as if the troubles of last nights had never existed in the first place seeing as I wasn't feeling the effects of it.
Another strange thing was that my head was cleared and I actually felt at peace.
Bad thoughts had been running through my mind since I'd arrived here and I now found them gone for the first time.
I let out an amazed breath of air as I looked at my pretend little sister.
"What the heck is going on?" I questioned, barely above a whisper as I continued to look at my reflection in amazement, wanting to take see if my body had undergone any sort of physical changes as well.
...No such look.
I sourly huffed at my reflection.
"I made a deal with the Augury so that he'd cut off the influence that the essence of a certain person was having on you." Tamiel told me cheerfully, clapping her hands together.
"Wait, a certain person?!…? And what spell was the Augury talking about?!" I desperately pressed the girl for more answers to satisfy my curiosity.
Was that how Okiya Subaru had felt yesterday?
"I won't be able to use my powers for a while, that's why I needed you to be able to protect your own mind. The Augury agreed to my request in exchange for a spell that will hide him from anyone searching him out with bad intentions. That old creep is really protective of his own dimension…" Tamiel elaborated, nodding her head along with her words.
"What the hell is going on here…?"
My head was spinning, still trying to adjust to my changes whilst all the while trying to make sense of the Shinigami's confusing admissions.
"Mr. Shin...never existed in the first place." Tamiel told me as her smile suddenly seemed a little sad.
"What?!"
"But-"
The Shinigami interrupted my outburst by placing her small finger on my lips in a shushing gesture.
"I was the one that created this house. I was the one that hid you away in this pocket dimension after reviving your soul."
"That...how? What…?!"
Chills crawled their way up my back as I froze in place.
A sickening, foreboding feeling settled in the pit of my stomach, making me want to just childishly cover my ears so I wouldn't have to hear the next words to be spoken.
I felt like I'd be better of not knowing.
"I was also the one that went against all of my orders and the Shinigami code of honour to ensure that you'd live the best life possible after dying unexpectedly like that."
"That's why, right now, I am a wanted fugitive in my world...one of the worst at that." She admitted with an exhausted expression that felt foreign and out of place on her face, making my feelings of nausea worsen even more.
"They might be able to track me when I use my abilities...and if they find me...they have received urgent orders to execute me without any hesitation."
All I could do was to stare at the Shinigami in front of me as the pressure of her fingers against my lips vanished and she gave me another gentle smile that still somehow spoke of an underlying sadness.
"B-but why…" my brain felt like it had just short circuited, unable to come up with any proper words above the conversational ability of a three year old child.
"I committed treason because...It was partly my fault that you died."
My mouth snapped shut and my eyebrows instantly arched upwards, almost disappearing into my hairline.
It took me a while to think clear again as hot anger, heavy weighing dread and dizzying confusion were mixed together into a lethal poison inside my mindd.
But in the end it was my icy cold self control that reigned victorious over those three.
And I wanted an explanation.
Now.
"I want the whole story." I voiced my thoughts, building a mental wall in between my logical thinking side and the ancient,angry one that just wanted to smash and destroy everything in my way.
Especially the little grim reaper in front of me.
"You were always going to die that day."
My heart stopped for a few seconds at that statement as a strange, hollow feeling spread through my whole body, making it go numb.
So unbelievably numb.
A numbness that provided sanctuary and prevented me from having a complete mental meltdown.
"Your bad karma wouldn't have been enough for your soul to be reincarnated for the next twenty thousand years so the court made a common decision to simply banish your essence, your soul if you will, into non-existence."
All air was knocked out of me as I felt like I'd just received a hard punch to the gut.
It was stomach-turning.
I mean, I didn't fully understand what she was saying, but I definitely got the gist of it. And it wasn't good.
"I would've simply...ceased to be then?" I breathed, greatly disturbed at that prospect.
Tamiel's reply was a simple nod as she displayed an uncharacteristically grim frown on her pretty face.
I unceremoniously let myself stumble to the floor and onto my knees, unable to support myself any longer.
When I looked up again I found myself on eye level with the short Shinigami...a strange feeling to say the least.
"Let's just say that I had my own, selfish reasons for not letting that happen- which is the why you're still alive right now." Tamiel told me with a small smile.
I was still stupidly staring at her, my body unable to move as my mouth opened and closed on its own accord, not able to produce any sound except for a single, strangled whimper.
"You were supposed to be pushed in front of your train home by a heavily intoxicated man...but I instead arranged for Yonehara Haruto to kill you along with his girlfriend in an attempt to cover up his crime."
My sanity had officially just bidden me goodbye and handed in an official leave of absence.
"As cruel as it sounds...the thirty second time difference in between the head on collision with the train and slowly bleeding out from a sliced neck was all I needed to guide your soul to this world." Tamiel explained, sounding like she was trying to explain something to a child, which I found strangely funny in a macabre sort of way seeing as she was the one looking like a seven year old.
I simply didn't know what to think anymore.
Everything I'd known since coming here had just turned out to be a lie.
And my new life seemed way more complicated than what it was worth.
Maybe eternal damnation into nothingness wasn't so bad?
"That's a ton of trash and you know it."I scolded myself angrily.
I didn't want to simply disappear as if I'd never even existed in the first place.
"T-thank you Tamiel…" I stuttered, blinking at the Shinigami that seemed momentarily taken aback.
So was I.
Did I really just let these words slip out?
"You're not going to get angry? Or shout at me? Slap me?" she made sure, mustering me unsurely.
"Just who do you take me for?!" I drawled, my left eye twitching in annoyance as I felt a few involuntary tears slide down my cheeks.
"I know that I act erratically sometimes, but I'm not so blind and selfish as to oversee the fact that you actually saved my life, nor am I going to get angry at you for preventing me from vanishing. forever." I added, furrowing my eyebrows a I slowly regained my bearings, having somewhat digested the information I'd just been given.
"You're more reasonable that I made you out to be…" Tamiel murmured, making me narrow my watering eyes at her once again.
"I'm not that bad of a person once you get to know me properly...I just have a talent for scaring others off." I huffed, slightly embarrassed.
"I know." Tamiel nodded, a nostalgic smile on her face.
"How would you know? We two are still in the scaring-off-phase." I told her in a prickly manner.
"I know you better than you might think." the Shinigami told me with her trademark smile.
I rolled my eyes at her.
She was starting to sound like a right psychology-quack now.
"So how does this 'essence thingy' work then? And can't I still be tracked by the Shinigami ?" I questioned the little girl, getting straight to the point.
"Ah, there might still be moments where the person you were cut off from will try to take control over your mind again...especially in moments of mental weakness" Tamiel explained, making me panic a bit.
"W-what person?!H-how do I stay in control?!" I shrieked, automatically reaching to cradle my head.
"Someone who wants your sanity, that's all I can tell you so far. And to answer your second question- you should be fine since the Augury will protect you in those moments." Tamiel sighed with a fond smile on her face, slapping my hands away from my head as she went on to cradle my face in her small palms.
"Everything will be alright." she assured me, seemingly looking into my soul as her charcoal orbs met my brown ones.
"This is stupid." I sighed, closing my eyes (a little unnerved by the staring competition that I'd involuntarily been forced to compete in) as I leaned into her touch with scowl on my face.
"This is some straight up bad B-horror movie crap." I thought sourly.
"Wait...If you can't use your powers anymore...doesn't that mean that you won't be able to provide for us?" I suddenly realised, jerking my head away from the little girl.
"Ah..yeah,that's right…"the Shinigami admitted sheepishly.
"Didn't you find some of the manuscripts for my novels?" I asked with a sigh.
"Guess I'll just have to take up writing again…" I thought in a defeated manner.
Trying to come up with ideas for new novels after publishing all of the manuscripts that I owned right now seemed pretty stressful considering the mess I was finding myself in.
"If I'm right about what you're planning then that's a surprisingly good idea…" the Shinigami nodded.
"Looks like I'll have to debut again...that stuff is so freaking nerve-wracking!" I whined loudly, angrily messing up my mane of brown locks.
"That's the spirit!" the little girl told me enthusiastically, flashing me a big grin.
I huffed at her in a frustrated manner.
"I don't know about you...but I could use some breakfast right now." I stated grimly before getting up, changing the topic as I walked inside the kitchen to rummage through "the wonder fridge".
I spent the next two hours cooking everything that Tamiel and I were having even the tiniest craving for.
All I remember after that was falling asleep at the table whilst complaining to my pretend little sister about the cross-examination that Okiya Subaru had put me through just a day earlier and that she just couldn't imagine how freaking hard writing a crime novel was and how shitty most publishers were.
Looks like the Shinigami wasn't so bad after all...