FicWad

She knew where the girl in black was. The image was so compelling, it was almost as if someone had hung a picture in front of her. The rain was practically a vertical river, but Tohru ran on, following instincts she didn't know she had. A voice in her head-her sanity, perhaps?-wondered what in the world she was doing. Shigure was going to kill her. What could she tell him, after all? That she'd disobeyed him because she wanted to bake a stupid cake then took a fancy to a girl nobody else could see? Even she was having trouble believing her own story. She had better stop this nonsense and go back, apologize to Uo-chan, scamper back home and wait for Haru like she was supposed to.

The voice was drowned out by another onslaught of images. Her fifth birthday, when her mother had taken off the charm bracelet and necklace she always wore and fastened them around her small arm and neck. A strange bedroom, with a woman standing over a man's sleeping form, her black hair rippling about her naked body, her dark eyes glinting coldly. A red-haired boy kneeling beside a brown-haired girl on a ship's deck, an odd mixture of disgust and compassion on his face. A little girl lying as still as death while a little boy sat beside her, her hand gripped tightly in his own. A tower rising above a misty lake, and a pale-haired boy standing at the window, gazing up at a moonless sky with violet eyes that were both infinitely cold and infinitely sad.

She stumbled as the last image flashed through her mind. "Please stop," she muttered, pressing a hand over her eyes as if to block out the visions. "Please. I don't understand any of these."

Come, Tohru. I will hold them off.

"Hold them off?" She dropped her hand and looked around with rising consternation. The massive gray wall loomed up before her, with what seemed like hundreds of guards patrolling the area. A black gate opened up a few meters away. Somehow, she'd managed to run all the way across the Inner City toward the central gate.

She balked. "Oh no, not Outside. Shigure-san warned me. Besides, I didn't bring my gate pass."

You don't need your gate pass. Just do as I say.

"But-"

Please, Tohru.

She swallowed. Mother, what do I do? She looked back at the street she had come from. She could turn back. She should turn back. It was the right thing to do...wasn't it?

The important thing is to choose to live.

She bit her lip, then began to walk toward the gate. She could feel the stony stares from the guards, but to her surprise, none of them tried to stop her. She came to the gate, where the sour-faced gatekeeper immediately barred her way. "What do you want?"

Her mouth opened and closed a few times before she found her voice. "I-I'd like to go Outside, please."

"Inners are not to go Outside without a special permit. Governor's orders."

She blinked, taken aback. Now what was she going to do?

The gatekeeper eyed her suspiciously. "What's your name?"

"H-Honda. Tohru Honda. My father was Kazuya of the Honda clan," she added helpfully.

"Honda, eh?" The gatekeeper screwed up his face. "I know the Hondas. One of the sons shacked up with an Outsider. The family disowned him. It was that red-haired slut, you remember her?" he said to the snickering guards beside him.

Tohru bowed her head. Apparently they didn't need her gate pass to give her grief about her mixed heritage. "Please let me pass," she whispered.

The gatekeeper laughed nastily. "Half-bloods don't have any problems going out. It's getting back in that's the problem." He leaned in closer, forcing her to step back. "You plan on showing me your gate pass, girlie-"

He choked and turned white. As Tohru watched in shock, the man staggered back, his eyes bugging out and his hands going to his throat. The guards looked at him in alarm but made no move to help him. Judging from their bewildered expressions, it was likely they couldn't.

Come, Tohru.

Her limbs felt as they'd turned to sand, while the gatekeeper gurgled and glared at her with a mixture of outrage and terror. "What have you done?" she gasped.

Hurry.

She ran past the frozen guards, and with eyes half-closed, she drove into an alley, hoping to lose herself in the crowd. Only when she slipped on a piece of fruit and nearly fell into a puddle did she slow down. Clutching her cloak tighter around her-she'd lost her umbrella during her mad dash-she shoved dripping strands of hair off her face and looked around.

She was in a marketplace. Then again, most of the Outer City was a market place, a place where ships and city dwellers came to trade. But the word "marketplace" seemed inadequate to describe the chaos around her. Stalls were crammed into every corner, spilling onto the streets in a profusion of decomposing fruits and vegetables, rags and animal droppings and assorted piles of refuse. There were people everywhere, shouting their wares and screaming at children running underfoot. The smell hit her all at once, salty sea air mingling with the sickly sweet stench of rotting fruit, and she swallowed convulsively. A man bumped into her, nearly sending her stumbling into a pile of apples. He looked over his shoulder to swear at her, and was knocked over himself when a small troop of guards galloped by on their horses.

Feeling dizzy, Tohru edged away from the street and tried to figure out what to do. The wall was only a gray line over the rooftops. She'd managed to run farther than she'd thought. A shiver of dread ran down her spine. It was the first time she'd ever gone Outside alone. She and her mother had always gone together, and later at least one of the Sohmas always went with her on market trips. Now that she was alone, the marketplace seemed so much more immense and hostile and-she shook herself. No time for that now. She came here to find the girl in black, not stand around quaking in her boots. This was her mother's world, after all. There was nothing to fear.

Her brave thoughts were jarred by the sight of several men looking in her direction from a nearby alley. The speculative gleam in their eyes made chills break out on her arms. She walked quickly, not sure where she was going as long as it took her far away from the men. She glanced back over her shoulder and her heart jumped when she saw that the men had followed her. She quickened her pace, but the men were still there.

"Oh somebody please help me," she mumbled and began running in earnest, ducking into alleys in an attempt to shake the men off. She turned a corner, looked over her shoulder, and ran right into a brick wall. She staggered, rubbing her head, then gasped when the men appeared at the end of the street. She pressed herself against the wall, and nearly screamed when a hand closed around her arm.

It was the girl in black. "This way," she said, and pulled Tohru into a side street. It opened up into a courtyard, in the middle of which a platform of some sort was being built. There were liquor stores all around, but the faces that looked out of them were vacant and empty-eyed, and Tohru knew with a sinking feeling that they were not going to get any help from that quarter.

The girls ran to the center of the courtyard, and when they could run no further, the black-haired girl turned to face their pursuers. The men had fanned out in different directions, surrounding them. Tohru shrank against the girl's side. She looked at her, and to Tohru's surprise, the dark eyes were completely serene. Lifting Tohru's hand, she touched the back of it to her lips in an oddly reverential gesture. "Don't be afraid, Princess," she said softly. "This was meant to be."

The men pounced. One of them grabbed Tohru's arm, and she shrieked and pulled away...and then things became rather confused. She stumbled back and the black-haired girl stepped between her and her attacker, raised her arm-and lightning shot out of her open palm right into the man's face. He screamed and fell back, his body jerking like a maddened puppet. His companions froze, but Tohru wasn't sure what shook them more, the sight of their fallen companion or the sudden appearance of a vengeful demon with a shock of white hair on top of a black coat, who promptly began thrashing them to within an inch of their lives. The girl lifted her arm again and Tohru wavered, unsure whether to help or flee, but then the demon in the black coat spun around so that she saw his face for the first time. She gave a cry and began to run, but didn't see the body that was flying toward her at top speed until it crashed into her, sending her sprawling onto the street. Her head slammed against something hard, and blackness swallowed her up.