Grief

Summary: Lanhua and Lady Bat have been secretly seeing each other. When Michel finds out, he forbids them to see each other anymore. Alala sets up a tryst for the two lovers, and when Michel discovers this, he kills Lanhua and Lady Bat. All that's left now is Alala, and Michel's hot on her trail...Oneshot, LanhuaxLady Bat

Disclaimer: I don't own Mermaid Melody.

Grief - keen mental suffering or distress over affliction or loss; sharp sorrow; painful regret (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)

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Alala sat, huddled up in the corner, praying that he wouldn't find her. Her comrades had been slain mercilessly, and much blood had been spilled. She desperately didn't want to share the same fate...

Lanhua...

She'd been killed slowly, painfully. Alala had distinctively heard her screams, and what had she done? She'd run, and now she didn't like herself at all. Her best friend had needed help, and Alala had run. Cowardly...

Lady Bat...

He'd been murdered relatively faster, but more blood was spilled and he'd obviously experienced much more pain. Michel had used the classic vampire slaying method - a blade chucked at his chest, with direct, shocking precision. Alala had been hiding behind a rock and the dagger had moved too quickly for her to catch it. She would never forget his sharp, sustained screech as he realized it would hit him squarely in the chest. Slow...

Alala had never felt this sort of feeling, not even when she was trounced by the mermaid princesses. She felt guilty, that she could pick out, and she felt an extreme feeling of sadness, grief, Lanhua had once taught her.

Grief is a feeling everyone gets sometimes, and it's horrible. You feel very sad, and you can't stop crying. You might experience grief when you lose something precious to you, or someone close to you dies.

Being the cheerful, happy girl she was, Alala'd once thought grief was something she'd never experience. Apparently, she'd underestimated the value of her friends.

"Lanhua...Lady Bat..." she whispered, not being able to contain the crimson tears.

"I hear you, Alala. Come out and I might not make it hurt as much..." Michel's voice intimidated her. It really always had, but never this much.

"Michel-sama..." Alala walked out from behind the rock. If it was the last thing she did, she would tell him how she felt. He wouldn't care, but she needed to tell someone that happy Alala had experienced grief.

"Alala...I knew you'd come out like a good girl." Michel took a step closer, and she shouted, "WAIT!"

He raised an eyebrow questioningly.

"Can I tell you one last thing before you kill me?"

The angel sighed. "Go ahead, Alala."

"I'm - I was the wings of dreams and decadence. I was so happy and joyful...and then Lanhua told me about a thing called grief. She said I was lucky to have never experienced it. The way she described it...I thought I was too." She looked up at her master. "But today, you killed Lanhua and Lady Bat. And I experienced it. It was a sad, disgusting feeling. I felt like my world was falling apart, and I couldn't do anything about it. I felt like a fortune teller'd just told me that there was no way we could win over the mermaid princesses. It was like...it was exactly like you'd killed my two best friends, Michel-sama!" She dissolved into a fit of sobs.

"Nice speech. Can I kill you now?" Alala nodded, closing her eyes and bracing herself.

"Wait, not yet. Let's have you mentally suffer first." Michel smirked at the fairy, who was literally shaking in her boots. "Do you know that if you hadn't set up that stupid tryst, and if you would've just supported my idea that their not talking to each other would dullen their feelings, they wouldn't have died today? Heck, you wouldn't be hearing this, and you wouldn't be experiencing this grief, as you call it. And you wouldn't die today either."

Alala managed a weak smile. "Absence makes the heart grow fonder...they would only grow disobedient, Michel-sama."

He narrowed his eyes and delivered an left blow to her face with his leg. Alala was thrown back a few feet, and a thin trickle of blood ran out of her mouth.

"Don't you dare defy me, Alala. I'm still your master."

"Whether I defy or not doesn't matter...I'll die either way," she answered softly, blood running out as a tributary would run into a river.

He smirked. "Glad to see you still have your wits about you, even when you're about to die. Seeing as I can't force any mental suffering into you...goodbye, Alala."

"Goodbye, Michel-sama."

Darkness descended upon the fairy as the dark angel carved her open with a sharp rock.

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Up in Heaven, a vampire, a butterfly, and a fairy embraced under a weeping willow tree.