Vampire Hunter D Volume 13: Twin-Shadowed Knight Parts 1 and 2 (18 page)

“Excuse me,” she called out, and he turned in her direction and came hobbling over. He was dragging his right leg.

“You've awakened, have you?” the old man said, standing in front of Mia and gazing at her face.

Although she couldn't tell in this darkness, his skin had a black luster to it. It hadn't been baked by the sun, but rather seemed to be simply filthy. As for his age—nothing could be gathered from his eyes, which were as intrepid as could be, but he had to be a lot more than seventy. He was completely covered in wrinkles.

“Hurry up and undo my bonds,” the girl said, extending her arms.

“There are no bonds of any sort.”

“There aren't?” Mia said, absolutely sure she'd been tied up.

“How clumsy you are. What've you come here to do? Oh, I suppose it doesn't really matter. Regardless, you're going to die.”

“Die? What for?”

“I will make an offering of you to my god.”

“Your god?”

“Yes.”

“Thanks but no thanks.”

“What an amusing girl you are,” he chuckled. “Too precious to use as an offering. However, the situation is unavoidable. This underground prison is worse than any hell, but thanks to my offerings, I've survived here five thousand years past my allotted span.”

“That's incredible!” Mia said, genuinely amazed. But she could see how living that long might make anyone superstitious and put the same look in their eyes. “Who in the world are you?”

“My name? I had one, but I've forgotten it. Oh, I know—long ago, I was called Neer, so let's make it that.”

“Mr. Neer, is it?”

“Does that seem strange?” the old man asked, shooting her an intense look.

“No, not really,” Mia replied, feigning a smile. His eyes had a gleam to them that was beyond the pale. Realizing there'd be no use reasoning with him, Mia decided to escape under her own steam. Fortunately her hands and feet were unfettered, and her magical accouterments were still safe in her waist pouch. She had to run off as soon as possible to D, or the fake D, so they could ascertain where the sway reactor had gone. Under no circumstances did she want to hinder their actions.

Mia felt mildly surprised at her new resolve. At some point, she'd come to view D and the fake D in the same way. Though identical in appearance, inside they were as different as heaven and earth. Mia also felt a shudder closely resembling fear deep in her heart.

“Girl,” Neer called to her. Without her realizing it, he'd moved back over by the exit.

“My name is Mia.”

“Come here—Mia.”

Checking the contents of her pouch with her fingers, Mia went over to him with an innocent expression on her face. The glow was increasing. On reaching Neer, she saw that what she'd taken to be an open exit was in fact filled by a massive plate of glass. It was a window.

“Five thousand years ago, this observation chamber was used exclusively by a certain being. Though no trace of them remains now, there were rows of the Nobility's mysterious devices, and pale Nobles and android servants scurried about in the service of said being. Here he stood, gazing at the god below. He probably didn't consider it a god, though. Because he himself had made it, you see.”

She could tell that the light was coming from down below. Pressing her face to the glass—which actually seemed to be a material far more permeable to light—she turned narrowed eyes toward the glow. Within that intense light, which she could somehow withstand, something with color and shape squirmed.

What's going to come out of it?

But even as the essence of an ineffable terror stabbed into every inch of her, Mia couldn't look away. Chaos began to give way to form. Just like when the universe was created. It was coming. Out of the light—and drawing closer. Heading toward Mia.

Now!

A scream gushed from the mouth of the fortuneteller's daughter. Steeped far too deeply in the colors of fear, it carried echoes of horror.

A sound rang out from the glass. Something had struck it—Mia's greatest fear.

Jumping in surprise without uttering another sound, Mia then began to slowly back away. She didn't even notice that she'd gone right past Neer. When the enormous window had shrunk to about the size of her face, her back struck something solid. Turning, she stared hard at it. An enormous thing towered blackly there. At first she thought it might be some kind of offertory shrine. But it wasn't.

I see.

But even though she understood what it was, she couldn't accept it. Its true nature had become clear, but the staggering size of it made the recognition of that fact impossible. A seat loomed over Mia's head, while to either side of it, much further up, armrests ran parallel to the floor like elegant avalanches, and to the rear the backrest rose high into the darkness of the air—it was a chair. Devoid of ornamentation, the pitch black throne couldn't help but convey the incredible dignity of its owner.

“That is the chair of the master of this chamber—the being of whom I spoke.” Neer's tone was wan and shuddering, but at the same time full of pride. “He would sit in that chair and gaze through the window. Actually, from that position, there's no way he would be able to see down below. He did not look, but rather he must've sensed. Sensed what? You wouldn't understand. No one would. No one but me. His thoughts focused, working the blue nerve cells of the Nobility to their utmost to feel—and I alone know what he glimpsed with his mind's eye. Because I—”

There the old man broke off as if robbed of his voice.

“Oh—he comes!” he shouted, turning and looking at Mia as he extended a bony finger. “My word. He's coming. The great one comes. Can you hear the sound of his footsteps? Oh, there is but one—it is unquestionably the sound of the great one's footsteps. The squeak of the stone floors he treads, the echoes off the rock walls, the sound of footsteps that send cracks through the ceiling.”

Mia didn't hear a single thing. She was looking not at Neer, but at the window behind him. The light was creeping higher. Coming up from below. The thing that she'd seen.

And from behind them came something that terrified Neer. His Adam's apple trembling, Neer shouted. The end of his finger twitched as if all the vitality in his body was crammed into it.

And Mia saw. Saw the nightmarish face plastered against the window.

“He's coming!”

“Aaaah!” the girl shrieked.

The windowpane shattered into a million scattering pieces.

The door swung open wide.

A suction-cup-covered tentacle in a horrifying shade wrapped smartly around Mia's waist. In a position that made resistance difficult, she was dragged toward the window.

Shapes rushed forward. Two figures. Both wore the same clothes. Closing on Mia with unbelievable speed, one wrapped an arm around the girl's neck. A second later a silvery gleam flashed in Mia's eyes, and she was thrown to the floor. Forgetting the pain in her derrière, she pulled back with a frightened squeal. The severed tentacle was flopping around by her feet.

“Who are you two?” Neer asked, stomping his foot with vexation as he faced them. “You're not him. But I was sure those were his footsteps. The great one came. Came alone. But you two aren't him. Who are you?”

The pair of figures—the two Ds—stared quietly at the old man.

“You were only talking about one person, right? You said that he had come,” one of them said as if posing the question to himself.

“In which case, one of us would be a fake.”

What the other D said froze not only Mia, but the wholly uninformed Neer as well.

-

I

-

"
G
ood thing the motion detectors still work,” that D continued.

Not knowing which was which, Mia looked from one to the other. Not only did they look exactly the same, it seemed as if there was one D existing in two places simultaneously. Mia's cheeks flushed red. There was twice as much beauty.

“I knew there was someone else wandering around this underground facility besides me, but it looks like we've finally caught him now.”

From that, she could tell it was the fake D.

“Who are you, old-timer?”

“Neer,” the old man answered weakly. Like Mia, he was mad from the gorgeous features of the pair.

“Given your age, you've probably got seniority over me. How long have you been here?”

“Since about five thousand years ago.”

“Five thousand years?” the fake D said. As he knit his brow, his right hand unleashed a flash of light.

The old man's shirt split open from the base of his throat to the solar plexus, revealing iron-brown skin. It was a flexible metallic epidermis that looked and moved like genuine skin. With it, he might well last another five millennia.

“So, old-timer, you're a cyborg?” the fake D said with a grin.

“I prefer to be called a demihuman!” Neer snapped.

Gazing at his bloodshot eyes and the foam that spilled from his lips, the fake D once again lashed out with his blade. This time the old man's helmet was split in two, falling to the floor. Once Neer's hairless pate was exposed, the fake D stared at him intently and pointed to his right temple.

“That scar—I don't know who gave you it, but it's from a sword. I see. So that's why your brain-support system malfunctioned. But the support systems the Nobility put into their cyborg servants are supposed to be made of an indestructible metal. Even I couldn't cut through it.”

Touching one hand to his temple, the old man said, “I'm not funny in the head. Leave the girl with me and get right on out of here.”

“What do you intend to do with her?”

Neer's eyes were drawn to the other D, who stood over by the throne. It was he who'd posed the question. Once she'd determined which was the fake D, Mia had gone to the other D's side.

“Make an offering of her to my god.”

“No way,” the girl said, clinging to D's arm. It felt like she was touching steel. She automatically let go of him not only due to her shock at that, but even more because the very act of latching onto D filled her with an almost religious feeling, like she was committing a sin. She was as shaken as a person who'd just heard the voice of the gods.

“There's something down there below the window—but it's no god,” Mia said, pointing a trembling finger at the devastated glass, then at the tentacle that'd finally stopped moving.

Looking down at it, D asked Neer, “Is this your god?”

The breath caught in Mia's throat—the old man had bugged his eyes and shook his head vehemently. He was the picture of complete insanity.

“Don't be absurd. My god isn't a repulsive creature like this. It is a being of rare beauty. Because I myself created it.”

“Created it? You made a god?”

For the first time, Mia truly felt how insane the old man was. All that was down at the bottom of that light was this monster.

“This god you say you created—I'd like to see it,” D said softly.

Neer scoffed, “Surely you jest. My god belongs to me alone. It is a god precisely because only those who are worthy can see it. And that means me and him.”

“Him?”

“The master of this chamber. The one for whom I built this place.”

“This whole spread—you made it?” Mia said, her eyes wide.

“Indeed. I was an engineer who worked exclusively for him—that is, the great one.”

“An engineer—so that's why you're called Neer.”

“Look at us,” the fake D said, grinning broadly as he gave a toss of his chin to Neer. “Take a good long look at this face. Doesn't it bring back anything?”

Not a word from the old man. Crazed though they were, his eyes managed to focus intently for a few seconds—and unexpectedly opened as wide as they'd go. Hues of fear and astonishment had taken hold of them.

“It . . . it can't be . . .” he mumbled, his lips barely letting the words out. “It can't be . . . It's simply not possible. He . . . The two of you . . . are his? Are you the great one's?”

“The light!” Mia exclaimed in a shrill voice, pointing toward the window. “The light's coming up!”

“Old-timer, what was this room for?” the fake D asked as he watched the window out of the corner of his eye.

“This one—this is where offerings are made . . .”

“You fool. That's just what you've been doing here. I mean originally. What was it in the beginning?”

“In the beginning?” Turbulent clouds closed in Neer's eyes. He knew. But terror rooted in some deep psychological level guarded him from understanding and confessing.

“Look—Look at it! That's—”

The color drained from Mia's face, leaving her pale as a waxwork.

Light filled the room. The source of the light shone beyond the window, and in its depths, a form familiar to them all flickered, trying to take shape.

“It's a face!”

Oh, how striking its features were, and how gorgeous.

“I've got it!” the fake D exclaimed, nodding. “What are you thinking about now, old-timer? That thing? Him?”

There was a succession of strident sounds. Neer's teeth were chattering out of fear. “I . . . I was . . .”

Seizing him by the chest, the fake asked, “You were what? Who were you thinking about? That—”

As he pointed toward the face beyond the window, his own expression was a ghastly sight.

“No, it was him, wasn't it? The master of this chamber, right? That is your god. A sick god created by a sick old man—yes, I do believe it was you who made that thing. In this room, the light beyond the window takes the form of your thoughts.”

“That can't be,” said Mia. “Then what I saw was—”

“It was whatever you were thinking about at that moment. Weren't you scared, utterly terrified, thinking that the thing in the light would be your worst fear? Well, that's what appeared.”

Both D's form and his words were swallowed by the light.

“Stand back,” D said, taking Mia by the shoulder and pulling her back by the throne. The light also enveloped the chair.

“D!”

The gorgeous form launched himself at the waves of light. His whole body quivered.

Light is made of particles and waves—photons and light waves. A single wave of that light or a single photon contained a ruinous amount of energy. Some passed through D's body; others sank into his muscles, his organs, his bones, discharging their fatal power. Imagine a human being exposed to a powerful dose of radiation.

“Are you all right?” the fake D said from nearby.

“Yeah, more or less.” Perhaps D bothered to respond to each and every remark only from a sense of closeness from being the same.

“What'll we do?”

“Don't I know that without having to ask anyone else?”

“Oh, shut up,” the fake D replied furiously, staggering. The intense energy load had overwhelmed his body's defenses. “Damn, it's gotten to my legs. Okay, I'm gonna kill the old-timer. It's his imagination that gave rise to this monstrosity.”

Neer was laid out on the floor. As D turned in that direction, his legs buckled badly. Both knees hit the floor, and then his hands followed suit.

“D,” Mia said, peeking out from behind the shelter of the throne.

“Stay where you are.”

Rising to his feet, D staggered over to Neer.

The old man's eyes were wide open with fear. He realized D's intention.

Moving, D tried to say something, but no words came out. His body melted into the whiteness. The gigantic face had lined up with him and was blasting him with a concentration of light energy. D was expressionless as he bore the agony of being seared to the bone.

“Do it! Kill me. Do it in the name of Muma!” Neer shouted, his mouth open as far as it would go.

Right before his eyes, D drew his sword. The edge of it gleamed white.

“Aaaah!” the old man blathered as D took care that the edge didn't strike him, hitting him instead with the flat of the blade and knocking him out. As a product of Neer's imagination, the titanic face should vanish once the old man lost consciousness.

“I'll be damned,” the fake D groaned from nearby.

The face didn't vanish, and the light within it only grew brighter.

“Time to move,” D said. Whether he was addressing himself or the fake D was unclear.

As D kicked off the floor in a manner suggesting he didn't give even a thought to the ferocious attacks, the fake D sprinted after him. His hair fell out, and the skin on his face began to peel and fall off. At ten paces, D went through the face. Running another ten, he turned around. The face was closing on him.

“This thing's gone beyond its creator,” a hoarse voice said. “It can maintain its existence through its own will, and it's out of its mind with a savage hatred of you.”

“It's my job that it hates.”

The enormous mouth opened as wide as it could go, and D jumped back fifteen feet. Right to the base of the throne.

White flames tinged the face's lips. It had gnashed its teeth together. A momentary delay resulted.

D flew into the air. Leaping up onto the throne, he looked like a blisteringly hot knight. The face continued to pursue him. Swirling white heat enveloped both the throne and D. Within it, there was a single blinding flash of light.

The colossal face suddenly donned an agonized expression and reeled back. Its closed eyelids were enveloped by flames, its screaming mouth split open, and muscle fell from jaws and cheeks that could take no more. White flames burst open, and from the cracks even hotter flames erupted, connecting with others and burning everything off the face. Just for a second, the face turned to the heavens and howled. It looked like a scream from a gigantic severed head that'd been set on the throne. A heartbeat later, this golden instant of death dissolved into flames. And when the last of the self-destructive flames melted into the air, all that remained standing on the throne was the young man in black.

“You did it!” the left hand said with genuine admiration to D as he silently sheathed his longsword. Perhaps it was amazed. “There was nothing you could do but counter a monster produced by a crazed mind with an even stronger force of will, though smashing it like that—wow, blood really will tell.”