After the reunion, the two of them returned to civilization when they saw that despite getting carried a long way by the river for presumably hours, there was still a city nearby. There, they eventually came across an empty junkyard where they spent the night by taking temporary refuge in an old albeit very much intact abandoned car. Not the most ideal place to stay, but it was better than not having any sort of roof and walls at all around them while they dried off and slept.
Before dozing off for the night though, they did have the time to explain to each other everything that catalyzed the events up to the bridge collapse. Or at least, Mion explained to Kai, because the latter couldn’t bring himself to say he almost betrayed his friend out of poor judgement. All Kai did tell was that his own kind found out about their secret, adding a white lie to it by saying he was able to meet Mion again by sneaking out way past bedtime, and hoped it’d be convincing enough.
To Kai’s relief, it seemed to be, as Mion asked no further questions about the story before going on to tell his side of things.
“So that’s what you meant when you mouthed those words to me…” Kai muttered, shocked at the revelation, as well as the thoughts of what could’ve happened to both of them if Mion hadn’t done what he did. “And I assume it was them too who destroyed the bridge right after you told me the coordinates to your sub-faction’s entry point?”
Mion nodded. “What they were really trying to do was just kill me and take you, I’m sure…”
Kai sighed in relief that such a thing didn’t happen, and said with gratitude, “Words can’t express how thankful I am to you for saving my life again… but please don’t do it at the cost of your own.”
Mion reached out a hand to hold Kai’s and said, “At the moment I didn’t care about my own life as I thought I’d be dead no matter what I did, I just wanted you safe and nothing else.” He too then sighed as if the same things were going through his mind as well, before adding, “And even though everything took a completely unexpected turn, I must say… thank you too, for being alive.”
“You’re still alive too, that I should be thankful for too.” Said Kai, before noticing Mion’s face grow slightly dark at the mention as he muttered, “Oh darn… if they didn’t definitively see me die then that means they’ll try to track me down to make sure of it.”
“What?!” Kai gasped. “Falling unconscious into a river full of fierce currents isn’t enough to convince them? I mean, YOU almost thought I died-“
“You don’t know how they operate, if they actively went out of their way to kill me but didn’t see me die for themselves, nothing can convince them otherwise.” Said Mion, the relief from moments ago gone to be replaced with utter seriousness, “Aw man, they’ll probably be especially persistent because I’m a rogue demon in their eyes, and you ought to know how merciless they are towards them… Plus, you now know where their sub-faction is, assuming they believe you survived too…”
Kai knew enough about previous examples of rogue demons to know there wasn’t a single one so far that managed to successfully avoid detection and termination. That, added with what Mion just said, gradually made Kai fully realize they were still in danger. To add insult to injury, both he and Mion had found out on their way to find shelter that the river’s current had washed their phones away from them. There went any chance of Kai contacting his fellow angels for help. Then again, it WAS possible for them to track Kai down like Miyu and the other demons could with Mion. However, there was still the problem of the angels thinking Mion was evil, so even if they were indeed able to find Kai, he figured it would only be of any help for him and not for Mion.
Panic-stricken worry filling in the gap where his own sense of relief was seconds before, Kai muttered more to himself than to Mion, “What should we do…?”
Mion heard it and, taking it for an actual question directed at him, replied, “For now it’ll be best to keep moving. Tracing me will lead them straight to me if I just stay in one place for a long time.”
“So we’ll have to constantly be on the move while trying to come up with a definitive solution?” Kai asked, which Mion corrected in a surprisingly stern tone, “No, I will – you go back home.”
“Wait, what?” Kai asked in disbelief. “Are you saying we should split ways? But-“
“I’m the only one they’ll be able to trace.” Said Mion. “If they do believe you’re alive with me, they’ll know even just by tracing me alone they’ll also be able to get to you. I can’t let them do that, if they ever catch me I’d rather have you safe with your folks rather than with me when it happens.”
“That’s more reason for me to not leave you!” Kai argued. “You’re telling me to pretty much leave you behind in danger for my own safety! You think after everything we’ve been through, I’d dare abandon you to a deadly fate, when I could instead help you avoid it? You know, as your friend?!”
Mion argued back, “I’m telling you, it’s suicide to keep staying with me! You forgot how I was even willing to give my life to save yours? Would you rather it be both of us then?!”
“You’re the one who suggested the idea of constantly moving while cooking up a real plan, if you’re so sure they’ll catch you to the point that you don’t want me with you, then why even bother with the idea in the first place?” Retorted Kai. “Admit it, you have hope of getting out of this alive, so help me ensure that hope of yours becomes a reality!”
By now Mion was the one in disbelief. Surely Kai was aware of the danger they were in unless he only pretended to pay attention to all that he told him, and yet that still couldn’t make him leave for his own safety? He understood Kai just wanted to help him out of this because they were friends, but that also acted as the same reason for him to not drag the innocent angel into it. So he kept trying desperately to convince him, “Just go unless you wanna die, alright?! That’s my final word!”
“Then make me go!” Said Kai, those being his own final words. “Those demons out there can’t make me go, so I’d like to see what YOU will do!” And he sat back in his car seat with his arms folded.
Mion sighed deeply through his nose and sat back in his own car seat. He knew he was beaten, as he had no idea how he could force Kai to stay out of this mess. After a moment of silence in which both of them took some time to calm down, he said absent-mindedly, “Guess that’s just an angel thing demons like me can’t understand, huh – wanting to save those in trouble no matter the cost.”
Kai replied, “You seem to have a good understanding of it yourself, seeing how you already risked danger twice to save me… you can consider this as me returning the favor if you want.” He paused for a moment and added, “On top of that, the river’s carried us all the way to a city that we’re both complete strangers to. I doubt I’ll be able to find my way back home without so much as a map.”
“Yeah well, fair point, since both angels and demons mostly operate in areas where their sub-factions are located. Don’t know why I didn’t think of that.” Mion agreed, before continuing, “And besides, as opposed to all the previous instances of rogue demons getting hunted down where entire sub-factions of hell did the deed, we’re up against only three individuals, so… that’s gotta be something, right?” though he didn’t have much confidence in that statement. Mostly he was just saying it to loosen up the tension from their argument.
“They really hate the idea of getting chewed out by their leader, don’t they?” Kai muttered, to which Mion nodded. Then he added, “Are we allowed to spend the night somewhere like here though? I thought you said we have to be on the move to avoid detection.”
“I know, but lest we forget they need sleep and rest as much as we do.” Mion replied. “Other than that, yes – we can’t stop for anything. So for now, let’s dry ourselves and rest while we still can.”
And that was the last thing Mion said before his exhaustion got the better of him and he dozed off. Kai, on the other hand, remained awake for a bit longer, his head swimming in thought again.
This time his thoughts leapt to all the fellow angels back at his sub-faction, and how worried they probably were over whether they’d find him alive. No doubt they’d send one or two angels out on a search to find him, but would that mean good news considering the current circumstances?
With Miyu, Daichi, and Ren still out there in search of Mion, there was no knowing which of the two search parties would come across their targets first, which was a huge risk in and of itself. Even if the angels got to them first, it couldn’t lead to any good. Inori’s initial plan was to take Mion to Kai’s sub-faction for interrogation, so no doubt that very thing would happen if Kai and Mion were found by them. Regardless of whether Mion was proven innocent, the fact that he was taken to a sub-faction of heaven would mean the demons trying to find him could be lead straight to it just by tracking down his traces. And it wasn’t like either Kai or Mion would be able to convince whoever came to find them with words until any kind of interrogation was done to find out the real truth.
Kai sighed deeply. What kind of complicated situation did he find himself in, where he had to turn away from his kind to not drag them and himself into danger? This even began to raise doubts within him regarding his duty as an angel, whether he was doing the right thing. Was it really right for him to go to such lengths just for a single friend?
Kai glanced for a bit at Mion, who was still sound asleep, then turned back to his extremely messy state of mind. “But I can’t just leave him all alone when he needs help either… that’s not what an angel does, isn’t that also what I read in the archives?” He thought hard to clear any sense of doubt from clouding his judgement on what he was to do about all this, and eventually made up his mind.
“I’m sorry, everyone…” He muttered, “…but this isn’t just for me and Mion, it’s for all of you… I hope you can understand when this is all over…” and he proceeded to repeat these thoughts in his mind to convince himself to sleep.
* * *
When the sun came up, the duo left the junkyard and set off on foot so as not to inadvertently draw any unwanted attention from humans, and thus none from their pursuers as well.
“If we do fly and draw attention, considering human tech these days, word about two winged flying people and where they were spotted will spread like wildfire. If so, it’ll be impossible for Miyu, Daichi, and Ren to not hear about it on their way to get us. Might as well take a photo of ourselves in a recognizable area and put it up on Facepage or whatever that thing is humans use.” Mion had said.
“Sounds about right…” Said Kai, before asking, “And the same logic can be applied to them too, I suppose? Like, if they fly in an attempt to find us faster, we’ll know of it too?”
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Mion nodded. “Yes, and they won’t want that since exposing their location will only help us get away from them, so they can’t risk it as much as us.”
“What a predicament.” Kai exclaimed, and Mion said, “Still, good to have someone who knows their stuff on how the enemy works, right? So we can at least have some kind of strategy like this…” to which Kai nodded in agreement.
One other silver lining about this so-called slower moving was that unlike mortal beings, eating and drinking wasn’t a necessity to them as an angel and a demon. Therefore exhaustion out of hunger or thirst wasn’t a problem for them as they kept walking and walking to who-knew-where. There was no particular destination in mind, nor was it possible for them to set one. As long as the three demons were onto them, for now they just had to get as far away as possible from any place they stayed for the night, which so far was the junkyard they’d just left.
On the other hand, not even being supernatural entities made them immune to exhaustion out of too much moving around. This required them to take some breaks every few hours or so, prompting Mion to say during one of them, “This is definitely gonna slow us down…”
Kai dully looked down at his empty jean pockets. “Neither of us have any human currency on us, no thanks to the darn river, so I don’t think getting a ride is an option either.” He lamented.
“Not to mention it’ll severely hinder our chances at finding proper shelter for lord knows how many nights to come.” Added Mion. Looking around desperately for anything that could be of assistance, he muttered, “There’s gotta be something we can do…”
Kai joined in on the search, feeling like they were just grasping at straws at this point. As much as he wished they had a solution, it just didn’t look like luck was on their side this time.
That was when Mion’s eyes fell on a nearby flight of stairs leading down to a subway station and he said, “Kai, can you stay here and brainstorm for a moment? I’ll be right back…”
* * *
“I don’t know how you thought of it all of a sudden, but man, we got lucky.” Kai exclaimed as he and Mion stood on a platform waiting for the train to arrive. They were at a subway station after Mion had gone off and came back to Kai with a modest bit of money that was more than enough for them to get a ride there. “Though I do feel sorry for whoever unknowingly dropped such an amount on the ground for you to find. Oh, can’t be helped…”
“Yeah.” Said Mion, guiltily averting his eyes to the train tracks before them. What actually happened was he went down the subway station while Kai wasn’t looking and pickpocketed a passerby’s wallet for money, though not all of it that was in there. He then deposited the stolen wallet in the subway’s Lost And Found, before returning to Kai and lying about where he found the money.
“I really hope this’ll be the only time I have to resort to criminal antics…” Mion thought.
Completely oblivious to any of this, Kai asked, “How far do you suggest we go on the train? Does the end of the line sound fine to you?”
Not wanting to think any more about his little act of thievery, Mion quickly replied, “Probably yes, the farther we travel from where we last were the better…”
Kai nodded, and there didn’t seem to be much to talk about after that as they kept waiting.
Some seconds passed, and there came the distant sounds behind them of a train arriving at the other side of the platform, followed by a crowd of people coming down the stairs onto the platform to catch the upcoming ride.
Kai and Mion paid little attention to the people getting off or on the train behind them before the doors began closing, until they noticed something a little off.
Three of the people who’d come down the stairs onto the platform showed no sign of being in a hurry to catch the train, and didn’t even seem to care about the doors closing as the train prepared to leave. Then things escalated when the three people began turning around to face the other side of the platform, the sight of which made Mion panic and grab Kai’s arm firmly, whispering, “Run.”
Miyu, Daichi, and Ren were in the station with them, ready to attack.
The moment Mion whispered the word to him and began running with an iron grip on his arm, Kai instantly deduced what was wrong. As a defensive move, he summoned his crossbow on his forearm to open fire at the lunging demons. Of course, they dodged them all to get out of harm’s way.
“We’re in a really disadvantageous position!” Kai told Mion as he continued firing. While they were at the far end of the platform as they ran, the three demons stood their ground before the stairs leading out. They were trying to block the most likely escape route even while under attack by Kai.
Mion groaned, “I really thought we wouldn’t have to resort to this…” and without any time for Kai to so much as ask what he had in mind, the demon spread his wings and flew straight for the train tracks, still holding on to Kai tightly.
“Oh good lord!” Kai screamed at the sheer extremity of what was happening, but knew there was nothing else for it and spread his wings too as he and Mion flew through the dark subway tunnel.
Sure enough, they could hear the trio in pursuit from a distance behind them, along with an angry female voice – Miyu – ringing through the tunnel, “You can’t run from us! Give up now and we’ll consider making it painless for you and your little sneak!”
All Kai gave in response to that were more arrows from his crossbow that missed their marks and embedded themselves in the tunnel walls instead. This prompted the demons to retaliate with their own attacks in the form of several shurikens Mion had to help Kai dodge or deflect with his sword.
Pretty soon, everyone was zipping about this way and that with about half a dozen projectiles flying at each other every couple of seconds. And there seemed to be no end to it either, what with them only able to do so much within the limited space of the subway tunnel.
This continuous shootout-accompanied chase also forced everyone to fly faster and faster in an attempt to either get away or catch up. In fact, all of them were going so fast at one point, that they actually whizzed past a whole other station without any time to stop there, probably leaving a number of people wondering what just sped past them that wasn’t a train.
By the time they flew through the tunnel long enough to pass a second station, Kai and Mion could feel their wings mere inches away from reaching their limit and giving way. Something other than constantly flying in one direction while shooting had to be done before it was too late.
“Got any bright ideas? Because I’m out of them!” Mion said to Kai, just as he thought he could see a distant bit of light even amidst the chaos their chase was making inside the huge concrete tube.
Kai had noticed that with every station they passed, both the train tracks they were flying above and the ones on the other side of the station platform lead into one wide tunnel, with each line of tracks close to the tunnel walls across from one another. Right now somewhere far ahead, above the tracks next to the ones beneath them, there was a light – a pair of them, in fact.
Knowing what this meant, Kai’s mind quickly formed a plan for them to escape this immediate danger. Though he couldn’t help but doubt whether the plan would work at all, as it required them to do something greatly insane – as if what they were doing right now wasn’t insane enough already.
On top of that, the window of opportunity in which it could work wouldn’t remain open for more than a good several seconds, so he had to make up his mind and act fast. He said, “I do have one, but… it’s completely mental!” and held Mion’s arm tight as Mion himself had done earlier with him.
“I’ll gladly take mental over dead!” Mion replied with desperation. Without any time to explain the plan in detail, Kai simply said, “Up onto the ceiling when I say ‘up’!” into Mion’s ear so as not to let the three demons behind them overhear it. And speaking of hearing, Kai also noticed a familiar rumbling noise coming from the tracks, along with the lights very clearly moving in their direction.
It was do or die. His grip on Mion’s arm tighter than ever, Kai took a sudden hard turn from the right side of the tunnel where they were originally at to the left side, which was where the rumbling noises and the pair of lights were coming. Mion only had a second or so to realize the noises and light belonged to an oncoming train before Kai pulled him upwards screaming, “UP!”
Mion did as he was told and sharply flew up towards the ceiling with Kai. At first their eyes could only make out a brief bright flash that was the lights at the front of the train, before everything went back to dark. Meanwhile their ears could only hear the sounds of the train shift from in front of them to beneath them in just a split second, accompanied with the startled shrieks of their pursuers swerving out of the way of the train. The next thing they felt was the backs of their bodies hit the tunnel ceiling hard, and then they were rolling violently along the roofs of the train cars.
Had Kai and Mion not stopped themselves by getting a firm grip on their weapons and stabbing them through the train roof, they certainly would’ve fallen off the train for the demons to get them. Yet there they were, lying down on the train roof, still holding onto their knives or arrows embedded securely into the metal below them. Watching the tunnel roof flash past their eyes faster and faster, Mion muttered, “That really hurt.” While massaging quite a few aching body parts.
“If we were humans that would’ve more than just hurt…” Kai muttered back. He was both relieved and in disbelief at the fact that his improvised plan, as crazy as it was, had actually worked. “And looks like this train was just beginning to depart from the station it was at when we landed on it, judging by how it’s picking up speed right now. We were lucky.”
Mion cautiously rolled from his back onto his stomach, minding the low gap between the train roof and the tunnel ceiling they were lying on. “Not my favorite way of riding a train, but at least we finally threw them off our tail-“ He was saying as relief began settling in, when suddenly, an arm came shooting out from the edge of the train roof to grab him by the shoulder. The arm was then followed by a head with a furious snarl etched across its face, a face that Mion recognized as Ren’s.
Apparently the demon had somehow managed to latch onto the side of the train in the process of dodging it, and right now was grabbing at Mion in an attempt to throw him off. “Threw us off your tail, did you?! Should’ve tried better than that!” He growled, his eyes full or murder.
Doing his best to keep himself from getting thrown off, Mion reached for one of his knives that he had left still embedded in the train roof using his free hand. Unfortunately for him, like most tense situations of this sort, the weapon was just out of reach. To add insult to injury, Ren was stronger than Mion, so even with one hand he could be seen very slowly pulling the desperately resisting Mion closer to the edge. “How’d you like me to end you; throat slit or heart impaled by my sword?”
“None of the two!” Ren heard a second voice shout at him from nearby, and before he knew it, he felt an incomprehensible pain in the arm pulling Mion. Instinctively pulling his arm back, Ren saw to his utter shock that there was no longer a hand attached to the end of it; just a bloody stump.
Having seen what was going on, Kai had quickly scrambled over to the scene while pulling one of Mion’s knives out of the train roof. He’d then took just enough time to taunt Ren with the one-liner before bringing the knife down on his wrist. The deadly sharp blade sliced through the arm like a saw through a balsa wood plank, leaving Ren’s wrist in the stump he was looking and screaming in pain at, all while his severed hand fell off and out of sight.
Mion took this opportunity to punch Ren in the face hard enough to knock him off the side of the train. He too then went out of sight, followed by a bright flash of light and a series of sounds that were unmistakably his screams and the crackle of electricity.
Crawling back onto the train roof properly, Mion was panting heavily from the adrenaline rush of the near-death encounter. Kai asked if he was okay, before looking over his shoulder and muttering, “I do hope dropping him onto the third rail is a surefire way of throwing him off our tail.”
Mion nodded at Kai’s question, and said, “Many thanks for the save, I really thought he was gonna kill me right there…”
“Don’t mention it, you’ve already done the same for me twice before.” Kai reassured him.
Mion smiled a grateful smile at Kai. He then glanced up at the ceiling above them seemingly starting to slow down and asked, “I think we’re stopping soon – wanna get off of here for a proper ride?”
Kai didn’t need to be asked twice. “You read my mind.”
However, even after getting off the roof of the train and onto the station platform without attracting unwanted attention, things didn’t exactly go as they’d hoped. While Kai and Mion were waiting for the next train to arrive, everyone present at the station including them were informed to exit the area, as the lines were suddenly out of service due to a disturbance. And when they asked what kind of disturbance had caused the trains to shut down, they heard it was some sort of fire in the tunnels, which greatly unnerved Mion.
“There’s no doubting it, this is their doing.” Mion whispered to Kai as they made their way back to the streets. “They must’ve seen what we did to Ren and took out their anger on the subway tunnel.”
“Well then, we can’t stay around here unless we’d rather face their wrath again.” Said Kai. He glanced at a bus driving past them on the road and asked, “Do we have enough money left for a bus?”
“Just the right amount.” Mion replied, checking inside his pockets. “That’s both good and bad news for us. Because it means we definitely don’t have enough to stay the night at a proper place.”
Kai sighed. He looked up at the sky which was in the middle of turning from blue to orange. He thought for a second, then spoke up, “Putting as much distance between us and them is the first thing to do. We’ll think of a solution to the shelter problem on the way.”