Chapter 34: Finale, Yet Not the EndEverything was white. It wasn’t that everything was painted white or covered in white, there was simply an absence of all color. Also, there was nothing. No walls, no ceiling, no floors, even though Risa wasn’t floating. She could feel something solid underneath her bare feet, but she couldn’t place the material. She wasn’t sure how long she had been here, time had quickly lost all meaning, but she was sure of one thing.
She was dead.
She was dead and this was her hell. She was going to go mad eventually, trapped in this space with no one but herself and her memories. She was sure that she would be haunted by her past misdeeds as a self inflicted punishment, forced to relive her worst days forever and ever until her mind simply stopped functioning. Here was the insanity already!
She crouched down, hugging her knees to her chest, feeling herself begin to hyperventilate. How was she supposed to come to terms with this? She was afraid, more scared of anything in her life. The one thing she never wanted to face was herself.
She sat like that for a long time, rocking back and forth, sobbing into her legs, scared and confused. After a while, she finally began to calm, now laying on her side, her mind a pleasant blank. Maybe, if she could just stay in this state, things wouldn’t be so bad…
“But don’t you want to go back?” a familiar voice sent Risa nearly jumping out of her skin. “Don’t you want to see Ai-chan again?”
She knew the speaker before she had even looked up, but her shock dictated that she had to make absolutely certain, “Lin Lin?” The younger girl smiled down at her gently, “Oh, god, I am dead!”
“Well, not quite.” Lin began to explain, reaching down to help Risa up, “Right now, you are actually laying in a hospital bed, being kept alive by life support.”
“So I’m in a coma?”
There was an uncomfortable pause, “…Sure. Although, you weren’t supposed to survive at all.”
“I wasn’t?” Risa wracked her head, her memories after the fight with Ai were pretty hazy.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” Lin asked, furrowing her eyebrows.
“Um…” Risa wracked her brains, after the fight she had left the manor. She remembered driving angrily… The coke! “Oh man, did I OD?” Her friend just nodded, “I knew it was stupid, but I still did it anyway. Getting involved in all of that stuff.” Risa looked down for a moment, then turned back to Lin in confusion, “This doesn’t feel like what I remember my last coma to be like. Last coma, sounds stupid when I say it like that, but I remember darkness, punctuated by people talking to me.”
“Well, your ‘last coma‘,” Lin curled her fingers like quotation marks, “was just a thinly veiled plot device the author used to get you out of the picture long enough for Ai to come to understand how to do what was needed for the business to thrive.” There was a pause.
“What?”
“I mean that was different, see, this time it’s not really a coma, per se. Although coma is probably the best word to describe your body’s position right now, you aren’t waiting and struggling to go back like before. This time, you’re trying to move forward.”
“I’m trying to die.” Risa sighed dejectedly, “Why haven’t I?”
“Well, the life support is keeping you tied down, but that’s not the point. The point is, I’m here to offer you a second chance.” Lin grinned happily at her own declaration, but Risa frowned.
“Is that really such a good idea?” At her friend’s questioning look, she continued, “I mean, you said I was supposed to die. Is it really okay to mess with the future like this?”
“Well, if I wasn’t supposed to do this, then why do I have to power to help you?” The Chinese girl asked seriously, “Ultimately, it’s up to you. If you say no, then I’ll stay with until they finally decide to unhook the life support. If you want to go back, though, then I will help you to do that.”
“I need to think about this.” Risa said slowly. There was a long pause in the conversation and finally, Risa asked, “How am I not dead?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said I wasn’t supposed to survive at all. Why did I?”
Lin gave an enigmatic smile, “Free will.” When Risa looked confused, the Chinese girl just smiled wider. “I guess now would be the time to fill up the rest of the chapter with meaningless dialogue, huh?” She sat down on what appeared to be nothingness, continuing with her words before Risa could analyze her strange question. “Life, no, the world, no, EVERYTHING is like tree branches.” Lin held her hands up in front of her, palms together and fingers towards the sky.
“It all begins at the same place, but also not, as a tree also must widen as it grows. Maybe you’re born into this world on the wrong side of the tracks. Maybe you are normal and live a simple life with a loving family. Maybe you decide to become an idol in your favorite Japanese girl group. Maybe you fall in love with a girl or guy your own age, or two years older, or a year younger, or maybe you don’t find anybody in your life to share yourself with.”
“No matter what life you live, you will make choices.” Lin split her hands apart, the heels of her palms touching to form a ‘V’ shape, “Maybe they’re small ones.” she put her hands back together, instead only splitting her left index finger away, “Maybe you decide to have chips for lunch or maybe a sandwich that happens to have bad mayonnaise.” She split her other index finger apart so that both were now separated outward from her hands.
“Maybe it wasn’t chips, maybe you had nothing, maybe it doesn’t really effect how your day goes.” Lin curved her right index finger so that it rejoined her hand, the tip touching just above the knuckle of her middle finger. “Or maybe that bad mayonnaise sent you home early and you avoided that twelve car pile up on the free way.” She closed her right hand into a fist with a quickness that made Risa jerk.
“Most of the time,” she continued swiftly, “two trees will intersect.” Lin held her hands up, crossed together like an ‘X’. “Sometimes they just cross each other, but other times, they will become intertwined together, like vines.” She closed her hands together, fingers locking, “Not necessarily romantic, but indicative of a bond all the same.”
“How do you know all this?” Risa asked incredulously.
“Well, no matter how many lives we live, there is only one soul. And only one Heaven and Hell.” Lin chuckled at something only she seemed to find humorous, “When you die, all of those lives come together on this plane. Time and space don’t exist here, so I know and have experienced everything my other selves have and will experience.”
“Is there a God, too?”
“No, and Heaven isn’t really Heaven, either. It’s just a place that souls collect so that they can either move on or do stuff like this. I mean, miracles happen every day, right?”
“What about Hell?”
“Oh, Hell is real, but whether or not you go there is up to the soul. I mean, if you have all of the knowledge of every life you’ve ever lived or will ever live, you have to be able to judge yourself. Hell is really only a place of self punishment, the soul stays until they feel that they have repented and they’re ready to move on to their next life. That’s why every life, while fundamentally the same, will make different decisions.”
“But, if you have already lived every life, how do you become reincarnated?” Risa felt her eyebrows pull together as she tried to puzzle that question out.
“Try not to think about that too much.” Lin laughed gently, “You don’t need the headache. Anyway, I was telling you why you hadn’t died. There was a man who was also supposed to die that day, you know?” Risa shook her head, becoming engrossed in Lin’s words again, “He was going to jump off the roof of his apartment building and kill himself. He even dragged himself all the way over the safety fence and stood on the edge, looking down. Then he realized something.” Lin paused for dramatic effect.
“What?” Risa asked when the silence had stretched a bit too long.
“The time. The man realized that the first people to find his body would probably be the kids leaving home for school. His conscience wouldn’t let him do the deed there, around all of those people, so he thought of the most secluded place he knew of.”
“The bridge.” Risa breathed out. It was off a seldom used back road, perfect for some privacy.
“Yes, the bridge. He traveled all the way there with only a quick pit stop for some rope and cinderblocks. Just as he was getting ready to tie the rope to his ankle, he heard it. A screech of tires, the roaring engine. He looked up to see your car barreling towards him. The man was certain that, one way or another, he was about to meet his end.”
“Instead, the car swerved at the last moment, crashing through the rotten wooden railings and over the side, down into the river below. The man couldn’t believe his luck! Then he thought of the driver and, after calling the police and paramedics, dove over the side. He pulled you over to the river bank and performed CPR on you until the ambulance arrived and took over. Somehow, you managed to survive the ride to the hospital before you flat-lined. And, miraculously, they managed to bring you back long enough to hook you up.” Lin smirked a bit, “Both my doing. Not bad for someone relatively new to the whole ‘Guardian Angel’ thing, huh?”
Risa hummed in contemplation, “If I die, what would happen?”
“Well, Ai-chan would leave the gang, which would be absorbed into Reina and Koharu’s groups. You’re really more interested in Ai’s future without you, though, aren’t you?” Lin said knowingly, “She would get a job as an OL and wallow in her self pity and hatred for years to come. Eventually, she would say yes to a suitor of her’s, go on to marry him and have a few kids, grandkids and great-grand kids, but she would never feel truly fulfilled. Your ghost would haunt her throughout her life, the guilt she had for her part in your death never leaving her. She would have an average life of safety and security, if never being actually happy, she would be content.”
“And if I live?”
“Well, things between her and Eri are being worked out on their own, you know? So you don’t have to worry about that one. Convenient, I know.” Lin rolled her eyes, “When you come back, you two will make up, that I know for sure, but beyond that, there are so many choices. You have the potential to unite the entirety of the Japanese underworld. The unity between the three Tokyo gangs is notorious all over the country and the strength of your influence will continue to grow. If it continues down this path, you will begin to attract attention.”
Risa was unsatisfied with her vague answer, but didn’t push once Lin fell quiet, “So, what would you have to do to bring me back?”
Grinning slowly, Lin replied, “Well, I would need a bit of help. I’ll go get her if you were interested in that path.”
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After thinking about everything that Lin had said to her, Risa decided that, yes, she really would very much like another chance at life, so the other girl disappeared for a while, promising to bring back someone who could help. This left Risa some time to think.
She’d absorbed a lot of information, but she really wondered if it would all matter. She had decided here to make things right and to do what needed to be done, but would she really be able to keep to this decision? Was this selfish? Was this what was best for everyone? Was this what was best for Ai?
After thinking for a long time, Risa could only come to one conclusion. “I want to see her.” Her heart had been aching these past six months that she hadn’t felt that intimacy with her lover and it ached now at the thought of never feeling that again. Was it selfish? Yes, but she didn’t care. Her whole life she’d done nothing but what she wanted and that wasn’t about to change now.
Besides, she was confident that she could work things out with her lover. She had never thought otherwise about that. Nodding to herself, she began to practice in her head the things she would say when she saw Ai next.
“Risa-chan?” Lin Lin’s musical intonation of her name brought her attention to the younger girl as she reappeared with another figure in tow. Risa was surprised that the other figure was a girl even younger than Lin, maybe about 15 or 16, with short black hair and a small, round face. “I brought my friend. This is Sakura-chan!”
The girl bowed, “Please take care of me.” She said quietly, then shared a knowing look with Lin. Before Risa could ask what that was about, the two girls placed their hands on her shoulders and began to glow radiantly.
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“Ai-chan?” Ai looked up at the sound of her name, meeting Eri’s sympathetic gaze, “It’s time.”
“I know, but that doesn’t make it any easier.” the older woman felt her eyes drawn to the comatose body of her lover, laying still in the hospital bed. The decision to turn off the life support and let her go had been made a week ago after months of deliberations. The doctors were convinced that Risa would not only never wake up, but never be able to survive without the aide of machines ever again.
Even Ai had to agree that was no way to live. As much as it pained her, she felt that this was ultimately the best thing to do for her proud lover. She felt a light grip on her arm and looked up at Eri again. Over the months that Risa had laid in this bed, the two had slowly worked out their differences. Ai felt that it was her fault that Risa was even in this bed and her guilt was, surprisingly, only assuaged by the former cop’s words.
“You are both only human, the mistakes you made affecting each other equally. If you really want to repent, then you have to find a way to move past your guilt. I need to, as well. I want to start by making things right between us and that way, we can have each other to lean on.”
Ai needed the forgiveness from Eri as much as she needed forgiveness from Risa. Now, though, it appeared that she would have to let her lover go before getting that forgiveness and she’d been trying for weeks to come to terms with that.
“I’m ready.” She wasn’t.
“I know.” She did know.
Ai held Risa’s unresponsive hand in a tight grip as the doctor began to shut off the various equipment that kept the gunner from going to the other side. Finally, the respirator cut off with a click and the ventilator slowly drained of air. Ai held her own breath as she waited to hear the fading beeps from the heart monitor.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
After a moment, Ai blinked in surprise; her lover’s heart was still going strong, even though everything that had been keeping her breathing was gone. Apparently the doctor realized this too, because he called in a small team of nurses to begin checking over the gunner in amazement. Ai was vaguely aware of them saying that they were going to run some tests to check for more brain wave patterns or something to that affect, before they were wheeling Risa out of the room.
It wasn’t until Eri shook her did Ai realize that she was staring at the open doorway with tears running down her cheeks. Risa would live, she would be alive, she would have a chance to come back to her. The relief she felt brought Ai to her knees.
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Even though Risa was making a recovery, it was still very slow. She would be in a coma for another six months, Ai at her bedside constantly. Even through the inactivity, though, the gunner was still finding ways to surprise her.
“Pregnant?!” Ai cried at the doctor’s diagnosis, four months after the beginning of the younger girl’s recovery. “What do you mean? How is that possible?”
“To be honest, we don’t know.” the just as bemused man confessed, “We’ve confirmed that’s she’s four months along, which would mean the pregnancy would have happened while she was in the hospital, but there were no signs of any penetration, forced or otherwise. Even then, you’ve been with her night and day, so I think you would notice any strange visitors to her room.” It was true that Ai had become something of a permanent fixture to her lover’s room, having left most of the gang’s day to day operations in Saki’s capable hands.
The doctor eventually left Ai alone to let this information sink in by herself. At first, she was repulsed by the thought of the inconvenience, but then, Risa’s baby bump began to show. That’s when it really hit Ai that her lover was having a baby, that there was a tiny life growing inside of her. With her ear pressed over Risa’s steadily beating heart, Ai gently stroked the gently sloping belly. She decided it was their baby, no matter how it came to be.
When Risa awoke the next day, Ai took it as a good sign.
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Recovery was slow going, but the gangs continued business as usual. Saki began bringing reports to Risa as soon as she was able to entertain guests, but Risa pretty much left everything up to the girl’s capable judgment. “Maybe I should just let you take over for me permanently.” Risa said, semi jokingly to the girl one day after it had become apparent that she didn’t really need any help from Risa or Ai.
Saki was vehemently against the idea, though, “No! I mean, no, that’s ok, I’m just keeping your seat warm for you. Besides, I don’t have what it takes to maintain order the way you do.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, Captain, you’re doing great.” Risa chuckled at her, “But I do plan to be back on my feet soon enough, don’t you worry.”
Reina also had some new developments, that she went over on one of her very rare visits. Risa and Ai knew she cared, since Sayu sent her thoughts whenever she visited, it’s just that her love for them was outweighed by her hatred of hospitals. Seeing her in the room was drove home the importance of her news.
“New members.” Reina said without preamble, dropping a few files in Risa’s lap. “Eight pieces of fresh meat.”
“Why so many?” Risa asked curiously, skimming through the dossiers and noticing that most of them had been given high ranks in their two groups in the few short months they had been with them.
“They were a package deal. I decided that we needed some new hackers and when I went looking for the best, I came across these kids. Iikubo and Ikuta are the hackers, the others have various other skills. Fukumura is a chemist, Ishida is a master swordswoman, Sayashi is a ninja, Suzuki is a master of disguise, Kudou is a mixed martial artist, and Sato is, well, something…” Reina rolled her eyes at the thought of the last girl, “They all apparently grew up together, so they were more than simply reluctant to leave each other, but I took four into my group and the other four went to yours. Kusumi wasn’t interested in any of them, since she’s still sorting the mess left behind.”
Risa took a little while to skim through their files, looking at the notes Reina had left on her thoughts on each of them, chuckling a little as she reached Sato’s file, “Looks like they’ve grown on you.” She smiled knowingly, watching Reina blush a little and grumble at her, “If you trust them, then I trust them.” she finally concluded, getting raised eyebrows from both of the girls in the room. “What? You’re a good judge of character, if you think they’ll be helpful then I trust your judgment.” Reina nodded and that was that.
The gangs were in good hands and Risa was free to concentrate on her recovery.
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Two Years Later
She was on the hunt. Her prey was somewhere on the premises, also hunting for her. She knew that she had to be quick, there were no room for mistakes. She peeked around the corner, back to the wall, checking to see if the coast was clear. She was so absorbed in her task that she failed to hear the muted foot falls behind her.
Before she could react, hands closed around her waist and lifted her in the air with a squeal, “There you are you little escape artist!” Erina cried, pulling the little girl into her arms securely, “We gotta get you washed up for the party, Sakura-chan.”
“No-pon! Don’t wanna-pon!” The soon-to-be two year old cried, squirming in the hacker’s arms. Erina tended to be the default babysitter for the girl, all too happy to do so due to her massive admiration of the girl’s mother and the fact that Sakura was just too cute.
“Well, that’s too bad-pon~!” Erina responded playfully, taking the girl back into the bathroom to finish getting ready.
Downstairs, Risa was surveying the impressive mound of Sakura’s birthday presents with a slight grin. There were offerings from their allies all over the country; the Nakazawa clan in Kyoto, the clans in Sendai, Saitama, Sapporo and Hiroshima, even the newly appointed clan in Yokohama, which came about at Risa’s behest. In just 2 short years, they had aggressively spread their influence across the nation and had even made contact with a few foreign organizations, thanks in part to an old friend of Risa’s with international contacts.
“It looks great.” The gunner turned at the sound of Sayu’s voice to see the very pregnant woman waddle into the room, her lover and the MaaDuu combi on her heels. Reina was bickering playfully with the younger two, one arm captured by the grinning Masaki and the other arm resting lightly against Haruka’s shoulders.
As soon as they entered fully, Masaki broke from her beloved Tanasa-tan to run over to Risa at full speed, crying out her name jovially as she latched onto her waist. Duu was only a moment behind her, having turned to look to Reina for permission first before joining her partner in crime. The two only separated from their excited retelling of some story when Reina gently chided them not to crowd the gunner as she came over.
The dining room began filling with people as more and more guests arrived, Risa casually chatting with whomever as she waited for her wife and daughter to come down. The gangs were on top of the world and even though that meant that they were never really safe, today was a day of celebration for all. The gunner turned when a familiar presence appeared at her side, Ai slipping against her as naturally as puzzle pieces would, their daughter held against her hip.
Things could only go up from here, Risa thought, embracing her wife and slipping her hand against the other woman’s slight baby bump. The ride was only just beginning.
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OMG it's been so long, but I've finally finished this thing.
(even though I know it's crappily short and not at all awesome) I don't really have much to say, other than my understated thanks to everyone who has read this thing and stayed with me up to this point and my great relief that it is finally over. My great epic is finished after so many years! *dies*
Now onto my next one.
Topic: Black and Blue (Ch 34 6/4 The End!) (Read 153157 times)