Chance Encounters

Trouble..
Italics = dreams




The pink cherry blossoms float silently around me, as a gentle breeze sways the branches too and fro. A small, fragrant, bud lands in my open palm, and I stare in wonder at the little flower. Such beauty in something so small.
Looking around, the blossoms are everywhere, dancing all around me so thick it’s almost blinding. A smile tugs at the edges of my lips, and I cannot refuse the desire any longer. Peeling red lips back in a child-like smile, I am over come with the urge to dance with the Sakura’s.
Unable to find a reason why I shouldn’t, I open my arms and spin in circles pretending to be one of them. My eyes grow wide as I watch the sleeves of my kimono take life and glide over the petals. The red, pink, and white silk is fashioned after falling cherry blossoms. No longer am I a girl, but one of the many dancing petals.
Laughing loudly as a blossom lands across my face, tickling my nose, I grab at the little thing pinning it to the bun holding the mass of black hair.
“Asira? Asira where are you?” a familiar voice sounds through the wealth of pink and white fluttering buds. Ceasing my dance, I recognize that voice. Squinting crimson eyes, trying to find the owner. “Little one? Where are you?” she calls out again.
“Okasan?” the child like voice asks. “You cannot see me! I am not Asira! I am a cherry blossom tree!” Pulling at the many folds of silk, the cool fabric rustling around the silence, “You see, Okasan, these are my petals.”
“Silly girl, you are no more a blossom than I a butterfly,” the mother laughs at the antics of the seven year old. “Come along now, the Sakuranbo-hana festival is beginning, and it needs it’s priestess.”
“Well, than mama, you are a butterfly. Your wings will carry you across the winds, and you can rest in my braches! You are so beautiful, no one can deny the fact that you’re the butterfly,” I tell the stunning woman walking towards me. She truly does resemble a butterfly. The deep purples, reds, and blues of her elegant kimono look like the colorful wings.
“Alright then, only if you promise to keep the hornets from stinging my fragile body. Their stingers are sharp and will pierce the thin wings, then I will never be able to fly again,” she tells me softly, with a small smile gracing her features.
“But, Okasan, how ever will I do that? Besides, the hornets have every right to reside in my petals. Who am I to turn away them?” I ask her quietly. I do not want her to be injured, but the bees have a right too…

The dream fades, leaving me feeling empty. I can still smell the cherry blossoms and the perfumed scent of my mother. Oh, Gods, how I miss her.
Struggling to open teary eyes, they’re greeted by a cold white tiled ceilling. Where the hell am I? The last thing I remember was working out with Ty, then…
Jolting up, the blood rushes to my head. “Oh, SHIT!” I yell, searching for my cell phone. That phone call, I remember it now.
“Hey, Wings, you’re finally awake,” Ty’s concerned voice floats from behind the Japanese style door (1). The stunning blond walks into the room, which I now recognize to be my guest room, she looks at me with a funny look to her aqua eyes. “I was about to make bets that you’d sleep forever.”
“What?” I ask her sarcastically, “how long have I been out?” Some thing doesn’t feel right about this…situation.
“Oh, about three hours or so,” she winks at me, the unusual look gone from her features. “I lost track after the first hour.” Now, I know something’s not right.
“Ty, did anything…strange happen to my while I was asleep?” I ask meekly. I don’t know how to ask her this any other way. This is a delicate situation, and I trust her but some things aren’t meant to be known by others.
“What do you mean strange? Other than the fact that you drooled all over you pretty silk pillows, you remained still as the dead,” she tells me, relieving my worries. Good, I did not want to explain why Oni spirits are floating around my house. “Even when that monstrously huge beast you call a dog came over and licked your face, you remain motionless,” she laughs.
“Larz was in here?” I question more to myself, than my guest. That’s an oddity in itself. He won’t come near my room even if his fur was on fire. I really don’t blame him, the demonic aura’s that cling to this room are strong and he’s sensitive to them.
“Yeah, he came in shortly after I put you in here. Which, I hope was okay. I mean…I know how you are with your room.” Yeah, I know. My room is my personal sanctuary to the outside, no one is allowed in here. Except the choice few, and even they make me itch to get them out.
“That’s fine, but if you wouldn’t mind leaving now, I would like to change,” I tell her. I really should shower, but I really need to take care of something right away. Mainly a phone call to Agent Breezy. I will not take this case involving Bane. It’s taken me weeks to get over the last encounter, and three thousand miles as well. I’ll be damned if my reprieve is going to be broken now, assignment or not.
“Okay, I gotta get going anyways. I have a reading with a client in an hour, duty calls,” she states, walking towards the sliding door. She stills in between the paned cloth door, speaking softly she says “Oh, and Wings, thanks for today. It meant a lot to me.” Then she’s gone.
Um, that’s new. Thanking me for the workout, I mean. But, just as the thought comes to the surface, it’s replaced with another. She’s not thanking me for the workout, she’s thanking me for giving her my name. Hmm, well that’s interesting. And, she still uses ’Wings’ when she calls me? Well, at least she’s smart enough to realize I do not like being called by name.
Swinging pants clad legs over the side of the bed, the thin material of the workout pants glide across the silk with a smooth sounding ’whoosh’. Placing bare feet on the Tatami mat, wrinkling my nose at the cool straw, I stand up. The muscles in my legs scream at the added pressure. I guess it serves me right for not stretching them after a hard workout.
Waddling out of the room, and into the hallway, Larz pads over to me wagging his large tail. “Hey you,” I call out to him, reaching down to ruffle the scrap of fur at top of his head. “Hmmm, I think you need to have a few hairs cut, Pal, they be growing like weeds.”
In mock annoyance, he nips the underside of my wrist. Larz HATES bathes, and groomer’s are his personal devil. It’s an interesting, albeit comical, scene to see him at the grooming parlor. The poor groomer, a small woman named Sally, tries to wrestle with a two hundred pound plus dog. It just spells disaster, luckily Larz is as gentle as a fly. The most he does is runs from her, soaking wet and soapy. One day he even succeeded in getting out of the parlor. The frantic woman called me on my cell phone crying so hard. I felt terrible, and told her not to worry, he’s mostly likely at home waiting for me.
Sure enough, sitting on the front step of my house, was a disgruntled and soaked Larz. I just had to laugh at him, big head drooped between shoulders and tail tucked. The epiphany of pitiful pouch.
A.F.I.’s “Silver and Cold” blasts through the hallway, jolting me I run to the ringing cell phone. Grabbing the little thing, flipping it over, “Moshi-moshi?”
“Ah, Konnichi Wa, Asira-san,” came the melodic reply. Of all the…this is just what I needed today.
“Konnichi Wa, Fin. And, what to I owe the pleasure?” I ask. Conversations with Fin are always a rare treat, as in the treats that stick to your teeth and make the dentist yell at you.
“I heard you had an…incident. Are you well?” he asks in an even tone. It’s always a gamble with him. Do I tell him the truth? Or, tell him to screw? When dealing with Finverra, as in the King of the Daoine Sidhe, it’s a tight rope to walk across.
Finverra, known as Fin in the present time, truly is the immortal fairy of the Sidhe. He’s not what you would expect when thinking ‘fairy’, in fact he’s the polar opposite. Although he is tall and willowy, seemingly around the age of 23-24, his demeanor is…well…interesting. Standing at about five feet ten inches, with long blond hair which he dyes every week, and honest to gods violet eyes that just shine with mischief, he’s stunningly gorgeous. And an ultimate pain in the ass.
Fin, being the last true King of the Tuatha de Danaan, has unlimited power and a killer sense of humor. Once holding court at Knockma, which is now gone, he owns a novelty store by the name of ‘Knock, knock, kockma!’. That’s not even the worst part, Fin is a psudo-goth-punk. Can you imagine it? A gothic fairy?! It’s laughable.
What’s not laughable, is the fact that he is cahoots with both sides of the underground clans. The little bastard plays them, both of them. He considers himself a stragigist, a master at his little game. I consider him homicidal. Once they find out about his little game, he’s one dead fairy.
“Yeah, just friggin’ peachy. You?” Screw the truth, it’s none of his damned business.
A deep, rumbling, chuckle floats through the phone lines causes shivers to race down my spine. Even over the cyber lines of the telephone, he still holds power over people. “I’m sure. My dear lady, don’t you know there’s no lying to me?”
“Take you glamour and shove it up your ass, Fin. I am not in the mood for your shit today,” I hissed at him, flipping the phone shut.
“I wouldn’t do that, Asira. I have something to tell you,” Fin’s voice yells from the partially closed cell. DAMN HIM! He’s infuriating at times.
“What! You have thirty seconds to spit it out before I hang up.” Stupid males, how I loath thee at times.
“Your brother’s in trouble.”
For the second time today, the world has spun. Those four little words sink deep into my chest, causing it to tighten and ache to burst.
“What kind of trouble, Fin?” my voice shakes, forcing the question out.
“The kind with sinfully good looks, dark hair, and goes around with the pet phrase ’Bane’.”
“FUCK THIS,” I yell into the phone, slamming it shut. This means war, fuck the fragile peace between clans, fuck the forced alliances, FUCK Bane.
Nothing means more to me than Ravenar. Nothing. And, if one hair is hurt on his body, I will slaughter them…slowly. I will feed them to the Oni residing just under the surface of my farce.
Feeling the wondrous power awaken within the blood, crimson eyes bleed black as the power searches for a way to lash out. The demons held captive in my body quiver with a desire for flesh, the delicately kept control spirals into the abyss.
“ASIRA! Knock off your tantrum, your going to fucking kill us all!” the far away, shaking, voice of Finverra scream into the fallen cell phone.
It does little to aide the power struggle within myself. The Oni warriors want out so badly, and who am I to stop them?