"Now what was that last night," Zelgadis asked himself as he walked through the crowded daylit streets. "I don't think she was human." He paused at a booth where a gaggle of school girls were giggling over the collection of cheap jewelry and knick knacks. A small silver cross caught his eye for a moment.
He looked at it somewhat whimsically. He couldn't believe that he was actually planning on buying the trinket and wearing it. He didn't believe in demons, at least not demons that walked, talked and could rip your throat out in the blink of an eye. Up until now he had only dealt with immaterial, hard to sense "spirits" that might have been some sort of psychosomatic phenomena.
"She wasn't human," Zelgadis decided then. He turned to the booth keeper and bought the little cross. "She exuded a...presence of some sort that made that other creature turn tail and run." The crowds faded around him as he began to pass through the small park yet again. It was much less threatening in the daylight, but there was still something. Then he heard that laugh, the laugh from last night.
He quickly and quietly moved towards the sound taking cover behind some of the thick trees of the park. He saw Kenji standing in a clearing across from a stone statue where the girl from last night sat in front of her purple cloaked friend. Zelgadis watched, half entranced as the girl beckoned Kenji towards her.
The red-headed girl seemed to float towards him, with Kenji just staring into space. As Zelgadis watched she leaned in, closed her eyes and bit into the boys neck. Kenji blinking was the first sign of life that the boy had shown so far.
"Kyuuketsi!!!!" Zeladis shouted, snatching the cross from his throat and launching it toward the girl like a holy bullet. He winced as the girl, still feeding from the boy's neck, caught the trinket. A second or two later the girl pulled herself away from the boy.
"H..how.." Zelgadis stuttered backing away.
"This is pretty," the girl said, flashing a lopsided grin his way. "Thanks."
"How can you be out like this in broad daylight?" Zelgadis demanded before something grabbed him from behind and he seemed to be pulled out of the world.
The world was a place of twisting, black shadows, and flickering blood-red lights. The place seemed to shimmer as if the realm was filled with an air warping heat. Sound was muted, and the girl's laughter seemed to be the only thing Zelgadis could hear.
He watched, helpless as the red-headed girl brandished a glittering ball before the still passive Kenji. She floated impishly above the blackish-red ground, ignoring the pull of gravity, if there was such a thing in this world. Kenji reached out, silently begging for the glittering ball in the red-head's hands. She tossed the ball towards him, it floated slowly, as if the air were actually water. The boy caught the ball and held it close to him, then he lay down on the ground and seemed to fall asleep. The image of the boy then faded silently away from Zelgadis's sight.
Zelgadis stared across from his position at the purple cloaked figure in the smiling mask. The girl seemed to descend like a rock out of the alien, sky and danced about a moment, staring at the cloaked figure as if asking for advice. Then she hopped over to him. He glared at her with what he knew was impotent fury.
"Who are you?" Zelgadis asked.
"My name is Lina," she told him sweetly. "I thought I suggested that you back off of this matter."
"Do you actually think I'm going to listen to a monster?" he demanded. She winced and glared at him angrily for a brief moment. Then she shook her head sadly.
"Why do people always say that?" she asked seriously. "What makes me a monster?"
"You prey on the blood of the living," Zelgadis noted angrily. Lina laughed, her thin shoulders shaking with each quiet explosion.
"I am alive," Lina noted. "And to stay that way I must feed on the blood of beautiful people. This is as natural to me as breathing. And I can grant eternal life, not like that...imposter."
"You mean the other vampire?" Zelgadis demanded.
"Vampire," Lina laughed again. "He believes its a vampire, how about that, Xellos? That thing is just an imitation, a blood-thirsty beast. Now, I really think that you should be leaving this alone from now on. Good-bye, Zelgadis." The girl and then her companion vanished from sight, and then Zelgadis was back in the normal world, the sound of Lina's trailing laughter coming to him softly on the wind.
He immediately stood up and ran to where Kenji was still staring blankly into space.
"Come on," he said. "We should get you to a doctor."
"Why?" Kenji asked. "I feel fine."
"Fine?" Zelgadis repeated. "Yesterday you were determined to avenge your love beyond all common sense."
"I'm fine now," Kenji said. "Everything is so calm." He sat down on one of the swings behind him. He let the child's swing carry him back and forth, while he merely stared into space. Zelgadis just looked on, in shock.