Leila waved lazily as the three Brothers trudged off through the sand, dressed for desert traveling. Her hands rested then on her curvy hips as she surveyed the surrounding area. The tank was covered in sand and just as stuck as before – more so, really. However, the gargantuan palm trees that surrounded a crystalline lake of an oasis provided them with shade for now.

Kaiou and Tsukai were at the pool, filling water canteens. They were daring each other to get into the water. This was one of the few places you wouldn't find mysterious monsters living in the water.

Just as Kaiou pushed Tsukai into the water, Lelia climbed atop the tank and opened the top hatch. She dropped in easily, pulling down the hatch and sealing it shut. She turned slowly, eyes adjusting to the darkness in the tank.

Grove stared back at her from his bed. The heart monitor beeped faster.

“Those kids.. they're just outside,” Grove rasped, his voice carrying warning. Leila smiled.

“I'll be sure to be quiet,” she responded, her smile widening. Her eyes gleamed in an unpleasant way as she neared Grove's side.

He stared up at her, his eyes wide and fearful. She reached up into the compartment above his bed and took out a syringe and a bottle of fluid. She drew some of the mystery serum into the syringe, then carefully placed the bottle back into its compartment. She tapped the needle of the syringe and depressed the plunger a small way, a stream of serum arching through the air to land on Grove's cheek.

Smiling lovingly, Leila brushed it off with her thumb. He grasped her wrist in his skeletal hand, ready to fight.

But he would give in.

He always gave in.

Unsettling Futures

By Jamie Carlson (a.k.a. Cardinal Syn)

and (the real) Nida Richards
Chapter Eight:
“Bridges, Getting Stabbed in the Chest, and Puerto Rican Whores”

“How did you sleep?”

Lilium nearly jumped out of her skin as the gravelly male voice cut into her reverie. She sat with her back to the door, chin on her folded hands, leaning against the back of the chair she had sat in while Meier described Charlotte to her. She twisted around, looking behind herself with wide brown eyes.

Mashira stood in the doorway, his golden eyes studying her. She had been so lost in thought that she hadn't heard the door open and close behind him. She scooted around so that she faced him, cheeks pink from embarrassment.

“Y-yes, I slept fine, thank you,” she stammered. “I'm.. I'm sorry, I was in my own little world for a while.” He smiled as he moved further into the room. Lilium noted his graceful stride, every movement boasting animalistic power.

“No need to apologize to me. You shouldn't let your guard down like that, however.”

“You're right. I'd hate to be kidnapped,” she quipped, rolling her eyes to look at him as she turned away from him to lean against the back of the chair. He only laughed at her small jab.

“Well... you do have a point, but so do I. If you'd been more careful in Gaelin, you wouldn't be here.”

“If I'd known what sort of things were out there, I would have been.”

Mashira looked at her quizzically as he perched stood behind her. Her mood, which had been playfully irritated a moment before, had turned dark. The hair on his body rose as he felt a surge of something from her... emotion? A sort of hollow sadness washed over him, but only briefly. He shook it off and moved to sit on the foot-wide chair back and gaze down at her. She lifted her head and looked up at him, and he decided that this was a lovely pose for her – her upturned face, somewhat triangular, looked sweet and innocent, and he could see just the hint of her breasts through the top of her white dress.

Tempting innocence. Maybe that was really why he'd taken her for Meier, less it just being chance.

“You two look like you're getting along quite well,” a sultry voice purred from above them. Lilium jumped yet again, looking upward to find Caroline above her. The Barbaroi woman hung upside down, her body only visible from her hips down, back arched to look at them both. Locks of her long green hair slithered out of the ceiling and hung down to form a curtain around Mashira and Lilium. Her green-painted lips were parted in a knowing smile, her full bosom defying gravity as the skintight one-piece she wore held them in place.

“Considering we kidnapped her, I think we should be grateful that she's so forgiving,” Mashira replied. Caroline retreated back into the stone ceiling, then reappeared a few feet away as she dropped down. She landed gracefully on her feet.

“It looks like the magnetic storm should pass by tomorrow eve,” Caroline advised them, her voice more businesslike now. Mashira nodded.

“The carriage will be ready by tonight in case we have to leave in a hurry.”

Lilium lay her cheek against her folded hands on the back of the chair, face turned away from them. She stared in silence at the wall, listening but not really hearing.

I know it was his voice, she thought, firm in this belief. It was definitely him. That sound... it was the same sound I heard when he used his sword on the bridge... Was I really dreaming? ... I had to have been, I've not got a psychic bone in my body. Right? I mean, I'm kind of an empath... and emotional sponge.. but how could I have been connected with D's mind? And... that feeling...

Mashira stopped talking mid-sentence, his attention jumping from discussing their next step in reaching Charlotte to Lilium's back. He smelled... salt. Water.

Slowly, he slid off the chair and moved to where he could gaze clearly at Lilium's face. Tears were flowing freely from her eyes, but she wasn't sobbing. He expression was deeply sad, but she wasn't in hysterics. Caroline came over to see what he was looking at, and brought a hand to her mouth, which formed an O of surprise.

“Why, dear, whatever could be the matter?” Caroline asked, a pinch of genuine concern in her voice. Mashira knelt in front of her, drawing her eyes from the wall and forcing them to focus on his face. Her eyes were so somber, so sad.

“Why are you upset, Lilium?” he asked gently.

“ Actually, I'm not,” she replied, her voice a soft whisper. “But he is... Though I highly doubt he ever shows it.”

Mashira and Caroline exchanged a long, confused glance. Mashira turned back to the young woman whose eyes held someone else's sorrow.

“Do you mean the Master?” Mashira cocked his head. Meier was fairly easy to read, and was always sad when something happened that separated himself and Charlotte.

“No.” Lilium closed her eyes and let the tears fall. “No, not Meier at all.”

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

The symbiont in D's hand felt something wash over the Hunter. D had felt this off and on since meeting the girl in the white dress. In concerned D, as well as the occupant of his left hand. When D had to force the mysterious presence from his mind, Left Hand had begun wracking his brain for anything he had heard of in his long existence that compared to what D was experiencing now. Never during Left Hand's attachment to D had he known the Hunter to have trouble keeping a damn slip of a thing out of his head.

What really perturbed him was the fact that the little git didn't seem to realize she was doing it.

It was the secret behind asking Alex about the girl and if she had any abilities. With Alex asleep, the symbiont was considering asking D to let him near the kid, to see what “his” mind revealed about Lilium. Yes. That would do.

“Hey, D,” the hand grunted. “Lemme check out that kid's mind and see if he” - he emphasized the word mockingly - “really doesn't know anything about any abilities his friend has.”

Silence that stretched on as D considered. Finally, he moved away from the wall he had been standing near – memorizing a map of the area, taking into account the local hidey-holes for vampires – and returned to the main hall. Alex's snores echoed through the room. D knelt by the girl-pretending-to-be-a-boy's head and held his left hand above her forehead.

Images came to the symbiont. He focused on thoughts of Lilium. The locale was wrong – odd – too bright, too happy, to... pre-Apocalypse. He filed this information away for later.

Lilium sketching a picture, Lilium pointing at the screen of a television set and laughing, Lilium before him as they swing-danced, laughing in embarrassment as she misstepped, Lilium pouting. Lilium crying... There.

Lilium seated tailor-style with Tarot cards in front of her. A chunk of raw, unrefined quartz in her right hand as she read them. Looking up, puzzled. She was reading for the tawny-haired girl. A feeling. A feeling of feelings... what? Emotion. Empathy, he realized, but weak, so weak it didn't make much of a difference, and the ability to read Tarot. That was it. Not true Precog but the ability to read their energy through the cards. And something about really liking crystals.

Suddenly, the scene changed. Lilium was nowhere in sight. Just some old man and a young boy standing near the edge of a cliff with a flock of sheep in arms reach.

"Now, grab one of the sheep."

"Yes Grandpa," said the small child happily as he wrapped hisn small arms around the fluffy exterior of a nearby Ewe. the elderly man grabbed one as well.

"Now throw it off the cliff!" the old man instructed with an air of extreme machismo as he demonstrated the proper technique; giving out a gutteral cry as he watched the animal falm to its death "WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooo!"

The poor lad's eyes swelled to an enormous size as tears began to build at the edges. His small arms only clinged tighter to the soft creature.

Finaly, a voice -

“Hey, what the fuck – Oh. You have some nerve!”

The scenery went black, and a lone figure stood before them, arms crossed. It was Nida.

"If there's something you want to know, ASK. Otherwise stay the fuck out of my head or I'll show you some really disturbing imagery. Though, a rather dark and effeminate being like yourself may actually enjoy them..." She relayed the last with a flirtatious wink, her lips curling into a mischievous smile.

The Left Hand laughed.

Crude, but a little kinder than how D had dismissed Lilium.

Several hours passed. They were now both up and about and preparing to move. D had informed Nida that they could travel to the Barbaroi villiage without having to pass through the storm. Now that she had rested, they could be on their way, and it was very likely that Meier and his entourage had not been able to travel.

“So, you say you got into my head because you wanted to know how Lilium got into yours?” Nida asked, incredulous, looking at D's hand like it was trying to tell a really bad joke. “She can't do stuff like that.”

“Are you able to ride horses 'back home' as well as you do here?” D's left hand retorted. Nida stopped midway through strapping on the borrowed wrist-mounted mini crossbow.

“No. I ride well, but not like that.”

“Then it's possible her empathy is stronger here, though how she was able to pick up on D like that is beyond me,” the hand sighed. D frowned slightly. He hadn't spoken a word since before Nida had gone to sleep. His hand was quite chatty, however, and asked the next thing on his mind. “How did the four of you get here? Your ignorance about the Frontier... the places I saw in your head. You're from the past, aren't you?”

Nida shrugged.

“To be honest, I have no idea. And I can't say if this is our future or another dimension or if I'm dreaming and this isn't real,” she responded jovially. “We fell asleep at Dad's and woke up in that Gay Men place. Then Lil got kidnapped. You know the story from there – you've been there for most of it!”

“Well, you ain't sleepin', kiddo, that I can promise you.”

“That's exactly what I would expect my dream to say!”

“ Do you plan on following me all the way to Lilium?” Nida queried once they were ready to go, mounting her horse. D didn't respond, merely urging his horse into a trot. She took his pulling ahead of her as a response. “Oh, so I'm following you now?” she merrily chirped, and gave her cyborg horse a soft kick with her heels. It snorted, shaking its head, then followed after the hunter, giving him and his jet black cyborg horse a wide berth. “My horse doesn't seem to like you much!”

“... That isn't uncommon,” D responded after a pause. Nida gave him a questioning look, then decided he was being emo and promptly ignored his comment.

“So, where do you think they went, if not this resting house?” Nida finally asked after an hour's ride northward on a winding dirt road. D looked over at her, his wide-brimmed hat shielding his face from the sun. “I'm assuming we're heading there now?”

D's answer was as monotonous as ever, but for some reason, Nida felt an uneasy sensation creep between her shoulder blades as his words slid through the still morning air, heavy and thick and molasses.

“To the village of the Barbaroi.”

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

Mashira and Caroline stood outside the door leading into the den where Meier slept. Lilium was inside, sleeping – apparently whatever had caused her to cry had also caused her to become exhausted. Caroline leaned against the door, her pose casually provocative. Her delicate features were scowling darkly, marring her beauty.

“That girl is more trouble than I had thought when we kidnapped her,” Caroline murmured in her honey-thick voice. “Who would have thought the Master would take her with us? And now this.”

“I find it fascinating,” Mashira responded lightly. “If not the Master's heart she is feeling, could it be...”

Caroline's head snapped up and she stared at him, eyes wide. A sinister gleam crept into her gaze, and a hint of her ferocious nature bled through as her mouth twisted up into a smirk.

“The Vampire Hunter... no, it would be far too delicious,” she chuckled. “It couldn't be him. She's probably thinking of some lost lover.” The tension left Caroline's body and she slumped back against the door. Mashira sighed.

“Yes, you're probably right. It would be too easy, and Master Meier Link would never allow her to be used as a weapon – not even against a Hunter such as D.”

“You sound worried,” a grizzled voice pipped. Mashira turned his head toward the voice, Caroline's eyes rolling languidly in the same direction. The Barbarois elder sat before them on his little unicycle. His colorless eyes pierced the two. “As well you should be. The Hunter is almost certainly on his way here. He would have learned by now that the resting house is abandoned and empty, and he would immediately head this way. His horse is far swifter than any other – you'd best be ready to flee as soon as night falls, and fight if need be.”

Mashira and Caroline stood up straight as rods. The urge to battle seemed to radiate from them.

“Protect our employer at all costs. The carriage is ready. As soon as the light is dim enough for movement, you will go.”

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

Nida was keeping up with D perfectly. The only thing she couldn't seem to do was keep her horse from getting tired. It seemed to her that D was going a little slower than she had expected, but couldn't be sure if he really was or if she was imagining it. It was sure a really fucking long ride from the resting house toward the mountainous hills and crags that the Barbaroi apparently inhabited.

As they drew nearer to the towering gates that blocked the way in, D's horse slowed. Nida kept in step to his left and a little behind him. As they approached at a leisurely pace, the ten-story-tall wood and steel doors gave a terrible shudder and began to open on nearly silent hinges.

That must take several gallons of WD-40, Nida thought to herself.

She felt a chill creep between her shoulder blades as a thick mist curled out from the rapidly widening gap between the doors. The fading sunlight cast a reddish glow to the fog. Strange sounds – cackling laugher, chittering, some sort of slithering – seemed to echo on the walls of the vast crevasse around them. Her horse shied, eyes rolling. Nida tried to soothe it as it tried to rear her off, fear overtaking its sensors. D's horse made no move. Whatever power he had over cyborg horses, she really wished she had too.

Nida ended up having to slide off her horse and let it run. D didn't pay her any heed as she trudged along beside him, her wrist-mounted crossbow at the ready.

They passed the threshold. Nida focused ahead, but could see the bizarre shapes surrounding her.

They're only ducks, this is duck hunt. Quack, quack.

D stopped his horse. He dismounted, standing in front of Nida. She peered around him and saw something kind of bizzare – a little old man on a unicycle. His cotton-white hair flowed around him on a breeze that cut through the canyon. The same breeze stirred D's long hair and tugged longingly at his cape.

“You have respect for your elders, I see,” the old man stated in a voice as leathery as his skin. He smiled and Nida got the oddest sensation that this man would be the type to download the kind of porn that had lots of pretty people, probably all boys. Pretty boys? No wonder he was staring at D.

“I am here for the Count Meier Link.”

“And I'm here for Lilium!” Nida crowed. The old man's eyes skipped over to her.

“Ahhh, I had not dreamed the mighty Vampire Hunter D would have a companion.”

“He doesn't, we're just sort of both after the same thing,” Nida responded, crossing her arms in a manly way. The old man's strange eyes studied her up and down.

“Well, now, a beautiful man and a lovely boy, what a wonderful fight this shall be, for we cannot allow you to have either of them,” the old man chuckled. “I truly regret the need to battle with you – such a creature as yourself is truly deserving of nothing less than the utmost respect of the Barbarois!” the old man said to D as he glided backward on his unicycle.

There was sudden movement. A mellifluous sound rang out and a silvery white flash cut through the air above Nida's head. The remains of a spider-person, trisected, lay on either of her sides and behind her. Gritting her teeth, she took aim at a werewolf that barreled toward them and fired, the silver arrows she “borrowed” from Borgov finding purchase in its eye. It howled in pain and anger before collapsing, grey matter leaking from the wound.

As D skillfully dispatched a giant with muscles of steel, Nida kept firing at the advancing Barbarois.

It's just like Duck Hunt, they're stupid little ducks – Quack, quack quack... Quack... quackquackquack, Nida let out a roar as she stabbed a strange tentacle-bearing woman in the throat with one of the arrows. “QUACKQUACKQUACKQUACKQUACK!” she bellowed.

Apparently, this disturbed the Barbarois as they hesitated in their fighting – which was fatal as thin stakes of white wood were launched from D's left hand and embedded themselves in foreheads and hearts, and his elegant sword took off the heads of a group of zombie-looking creatures.

Nida managed a rather superb head shot from a distance, through the window of one of the smaller, ground-level caves. Grinning, she fought her way in, and disappeared inside. D didn't bother going after her, but when there was a break in the fighting, he glanced over his shoulder. Her head appeared and disappeared from the window, up and down in the same spot, a satisfied expression on her face. After a few moments she reappeared.

In response to D's questioning glance, Nida flashed her teeth in a wicked grin.

“It just isn't a proper gank without some tea bagging action!” A coarse laugh erupted from D's left hand.

“Kid, you ain't got the equipment for that!”

“Then D can do it next time!”

“ENOUGH!” a snarling voice ripped through the fray. The stragglers from the battle immediately retreated into the shadows yet again, creating a path before D and Nida. The man and woman who had kidnapped Lilium stood before them. The man's upper body had taken a shape more like a normal werewolf – Nida recognized him only by the red vest he wore.

“This fight is ours!” Caroline purred. Suddenly, her long green hair spiked into the ground. Rather than sending up dust from the impact, it seemed to meld with the ground. Nida found herself being lifted into the air, thrown over D's left shoulder as he leapt easily out of the way of the stalagmites that suddenly burst from the earth where they had been standing.

Nida had too good a view of D's cyborg horse as a stalagmite rose below it and impaled the creature. Its death squeal rang in her ears. After D had set her back down, she whipped around and immediately sent an arrow flying. It struck Caroline between the eyes. She fell backward with a shriek. Her body landed hard on the earth as her hair returned to its natural form.

Shock registered in Mashira's wolf head. Respect lit up in his yellow eyes as he turned toward Nida and D, his stomach extending out into another wolf's head as he threw back his head in a long howl.

“Fools, enough playing around,” the old man snapped. Caroline lifted a hand weakly and pulled the arrow from her forehead. She stood, shaken, eyes filled darkly with bitter hate as she glared at Nida. 100 yeards distanced them. Nida had skill. “The coffin is loaded – be gone!”

Suddenly, Mashira spun about and sprinted toward the far side of the canyon. There, a black carriage with a team of six cyborg horses stood in wait. Nida gave a snarl and began dashing after them, only to be passed by a black wind.

D swung his sword, but it was met with a metallic ringing as Meier appeared before him.

The sun had finally set. Nida hadn't even noticed.

Count Meier Link had his black cape pulled up, and somehow the material itself had taken on a molecular structure like steel. He pushed against D, red eyes gleaming.

“Leave us in peace, Hunter,” he intoned softly. “Lilium comes with me only so that I may keep you from harming her. And the girl I go to meet is coming with me willingly as well – so leave us be!” Putting all his force into the movement, Meier pushed D back. D used the momentum to extend his leap backward – he landed only ten feet away from Nida. Meier's eyes moved from D to Nida as he stood ready, arms at his side, body still as a statue.

“Are you one of her friends?” he asked softly.

“I don't appreciate your kidnapping Lilium,” Nida responded casually. She looked past him to the carriage. “You're not protecting her from D, I'm saving her from you.”

“You are wrong,” Meier replied softly.

“Yes, Meier, I would kill her if she gave me no other choice,” D's voice cut through Nida. She glared at him darkly. “If she chooses to leave your side here, I promise not to hurt her. She will be in no danger of becoming a slave of the Nobility if I kill you.”

“You will do no such thing!”

Nida turned to the new voice. Lilium stood halfway between Meier and the carriage. The night breeze tugged at her hair and dress. The glow of artificial lights on the carriage and all around them in the cavernous holds that were Barbarois homes cast multiple shadows around her, and set the white dress she wore to shimmer.

Lilium's hands were clenched at her sides as she glared at D. The Hunter gazed steadily back.

“What sort of cold-blooded ultimatum is that?” Lilium strode forward now, showing a hint of the almost aristocratic grace she seemed to possess only when truly angry and determined. “So you'll kill one or both of us, is that it? Oh, how merciful!”

D was not phased by her sarcastic comment. He took a step forward, his sword held out, tip lowered toward the ground. Meier stepped to block his path, but Lilium stepped around him. She met the Hunter half way, but kept more than an arm's length from him.

“If you want to cut me down for having a compassionate heart, then do so.” Lilium's voice was nearly steady, but carried the barest hint of a quiver. “Just leave Meier and Charlotte alone. He loves her, whether you want to believe that or not.”

Suddenly, her serious mood melted away and she threw a bewildered look at Nida.

“Nida, did I just sound like some little religious twit trying to win the 'Christianity is the One True Way' argument by saying 'God loves you whether you like it or not'?” she asked incredulously. Nida nodded, a pained expression on her face. Lilium sighed, putting her hands on her hips. “Dammit, I didn't have enough time to think of a better way to put that.”

Nida laughed. “Come on, just come back. If Mr. Emo kills you, I'll be massively pissed off.”

Lilium's gaze met with Nida's. She opened her mouth to speak, but suddenly her expression changed again. She looked afraid.

D was emitting a heavy miasma. Blood light blossomed in his eyes. Lilium wasn't looking at him though. Her eyes had grown glassy and distant. Slowly, she dropped to her knees. Her head dipped forward – she looked like a doll someone had carefully set down into a kneeling pose.

Meier looked from Lilium to D. D's right hand twitched.

Meier moved quickly then. He swept Lilium up and turned. D's sword cut the corner of Meier's inky cape off, but missed much else. Meier carried Lilium to the carriage. Within moments, the horses were urged into movement by Mashira's whip.

Nida cried out in alarm and ran after them. It had happened too quick for her to follow. She was pissed. She knew she could have talked Lilium into coming back!

D stopped her.

“You can't chase them on foot.”

“Nor can you,” the Barbarois elder interjected. He glided over to them, a quizzical expression on his wrinkled face.

“That girl – you know, I believe she may truly mean the words she says.” He gestured.

Two of the more human-looking Barbarois led in two horses – Nida's, and a fresh mount for D.

“Take them and go. If that girl continues to stand in your way, I somehow doubt the Master needs any further protection from us.”

Somehow, Nida felt the old man was mocking D.

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

Lilium had passed out almost as soon as Meier had lifted her from the ground. Meier was concerned – he didn't fully understand what had happened. He held her in his arms, cradled against his chest.

He did, however, know three things after that exchange in the Barbarois village.

D was formidable – Meier may not stand up against him in a one-on-one match if it continued past where it had stopped at the village.

Lilium's “episode” was echoed by D's sudden showing of his Vampiric side.

And finally... when D had made a move to dispatch his enemy, it wasn't Meier he had been aiming for.

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

“What the fuck is wrong with you,” Nida snarled. Her teeth gritted, she rode next to D yet again. “Have you never heard of diplomacy?”

It had been two hours since they left the Barbarois camp. Those two hours had been spent in sulky silence as Nida brewed over what had happened. She felt sure she could have convinced Lilium to come back with her, had she been given the chance. But, nooooo, D had to go all Rambo on their asses. She had finally gotten tired of the silence as they rode on the trail of the carriage, toward the desert.

D remained silent. Nida urged her horse forward and cut in front of him, angling her steed so that she blocked his path. The horse shied again, not wanting to be so near him, but she gave it a pat as she glared at the gorgeous youth. D pulled his horse to a stop and stared back at her, eyes hidden in the shadow from his wide brimmed traveler's hat.

“You attacked Lilium! You just hauled off and took a swing, and if that guy hadn't RE-kidnapped her, she would be dead! She wasn't even defending herself!” Nida pointed up the road. The tracks from the cyborg team and carriage were faintly visible on the hard-packed earth. “What the hell is up with you? You act all chivalrous one minute, then you're being all crazy the next! Are you emotionally unbalanced or something?”

D's soft voice interrupted her rant.

“Your friend needs to learn to control herself. When she stopped concentrating on her anger and let herself become vulnerable, she broke into my memories again. They were not pleasant ones.” Nida stared at D, confused. She shook her head.

“I don't get it. So, you were pissed off that she saw something you didn't like so you tried to bisect her?”

“No. It would seem she has the ability to force someone's mind into the past.”

“You mean.. it wasn't really Lilium you were trying to kill. I guess it's a good thing Meier saved her then, man wouldn't you have felt like a shit!” Though Nida seriously doubted he would have felt bad at all, maybe disappointed at himself... for maybe two seconds.

“Meier did not save her. I hesitated when I realized what was happening.” D's voice was calm, matter-of-fact. D was so fast that even a vampire count could not truly beat him if D moved first. Nida decided that if she ever had to fight him, she'd fire first, and from as far away as she could get.

“If that's the case, though, why isn't she causing anyone else trouble?”

D pulled on the reigns, and his horse backed up. He urged it forward and around Nida's mount. She wheeled her own horse around and nudged it into a trot so as to keep up with him. His final reply was devoid of any emotion, but Nida suspected he was more bothered by the situation than he let on.

“I don't know.”

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

Lilium's head hurt.

It hurt a looooot.

“Whahapp'n'd?” she mumbled into Meier's chest. When she registered it as his chest, she jerked backward. Meier's arm around her shoulders kept her from falling backward from her seat in his lap to his coffin. They were in the carriage, and she wasn't sure how long she had been unconscious. She looked up at him, blushing a little – she was, after all, only 16, and didn't have a lot of experience (read: no experience) with waking up in a man's arms. It also felt awkward because she was sure Charlotte would be alarmed by this sight.

“You collapsed when confronting D. He attempted to cut your head off.”

Lilium's eyes widened. Meier sounded angry. There was a certain possessiveness to the way he held her. His eyes were narrowed, and in the dim artificial light of the carriage, his eyes shone with in inner light.

“It wasn't his fault,” she murmured, voice rusty from sleep. She cleared her throat. “I think I made him do it.”

Meier looked down at her, his aristocratic features drawn into an expression of shock. Lilium smiled up at him sheepishly.

“Something... I... Since I came here --” she stopped mid-sentence. A flush crawled up her cheeks. He stared down at her, one eyebrow arched. She sighed. “Come on, you didn't notice? I'm so not from around here.”

She explained falling asleep in one place and waking up in the other. She told him about the odd pull she felt when D was around, and her odd trips into what seemed like his mind. It explained the Hunter's lack of focus around her. She also admitted her empathy felt heightened, and she was deeply disturbed by it.

Meier didn't make much comment, but seemed lost in thought. Finally, she asked where they were.

“We're in the desert. The carriage is having trouble passing through the sand, so it will be dawn before we reach the other side. However, I do believe they are quite a ways behind us.”

By 'they”, he surely meant D and Nida. And they had not seen hide nor hair of the Brothers Markus since the bridge incident.

Lilium moved from Meier's lap to the seat next to him. She looked up at him after a while, and tilted her head at the tiny smile playing at his lips.

“Meier Link, what are you smiling about?” she asked with a playful poke to his side. He looked down at her.

“It sound to me like the girl from another time and the Vampire Hunter D are connected by the red thread of fate.”

» » » » » » » » » » » » Ω « « « « « « « « « « « «

D and Nida reached the desert by dawn. The tracks from the carriage disappeared into the sand. It would be impossible to follow them exactly as the winds in the desert covered the tracks made within it in only a matter of hours, and they were about two hours behind due a need to rest the horses.

They moved into the desert quickly. It was dangerous, even in daylight, and the best thing to do would be to cross quickly.

As they began to cross, D stopped. Nida pulled up behind him. Her horse was fidgeting.

The cracked earth leading into the sand dunes was rumbling. Fine sand lifted into the sky. Spouts of sand and dust burst skyward as huge sand mantas flew into the sky. Nida gaped.

She turned to D. “What the hell's with that? Do we go under them?”

“We'll catch one as it goes up and jump across them. It will take us across faster,” D advised. He didn't give her rime to protest. Trusting in her new found equestrian skills, Nida followed close behind as D's horse gave a leap.

They were suddenly on the back of one of the monstrous creatures. They began jumping from one to the other as they passed in the sky, only feet from each other.

But as this story has shown, luck never really is on our heroes' sides.

Nida somehow managed to land her horse's steel clod cyborg hooves on a sensitive spot on one of the mantas. Squealing angrily, its giant tail whipped up and around...

... and impaled D through the chest. The Hunter grunted and fell back. Cursing loudly, Nida slid off her horse as soon as she landed. She ran over to D, who was splayed back on the saddle, on the horse's rump. His hat had fallen off, and his eyes stared blankly at the sky.

Nida jumped when a rough voice let out a curse louder than Nida's had been.

“Always through the goddamn heart!”

D's left arm twitched and rose. A grizzled face appeared in his left palm. His arm twisted awkwardly to look at Nida. The little face with the impossibly deep voice gave her a disgusted look.

“He's always getting stabbed through the goddamn heart! You know, I'm the secret to his survival – if he didn't have me, he'd have been dead a long time ago!” the face snarled. The possessed arm looked back to survey the damage. A hooked barb the size of a spearhead had pierced D's chest. Red blood oozed out of the wound and trickled to the ground.

“I don't have all I need to take care of this here – there's a field on the other side, I can get proper earth there... And I'll need some water from your pack, some fire – we can use the portable lantern. Once I've got all that, we can pull the barb out and I can get him up.” The left hand pointed to D's saddlebags.

“Could you please get some rope out of there and tie him to the horse so he doesn't fall off? And slap his hat over his face so it doesn't burn in the sunlight.”

Nida was too shocked to really protest, and she knew that if she went head to head with Meier and his bodyguards, she would need D's help. She fetched the hat and covered D's face. His left arm moved to rest over where his eyes were, weighing the black traveler's hat down and leaving the palm exposed so the symbiont could talk.

“Now that Grumpy's down for the count, while you're helping me out, why don't I tell you some stories?” the Left Hand snickered. Nida's eyes brightened.

“Yaay, story time!” she cheered as she knotted a rope around D's torso. It was made of super-strength micro titanium wires woven together with nylon and coated with a special oil that kept the metal from rusting and the rope smooth. D wasn't going to fall off any time soon.

Nida followed the hand's directions through the forest. She used the silver bolts she had left to fend off the occasional desert creature – giant scorpions, the occasional sand worm – and the Left Hand inhaled – to Nida's morbid amazement – a cloud of purple mist that was some sort of dissolving demon that would have settled over D and his horse and dissolved and digested him within a 15 minute timespan.

“What's up with D and bridges?” Nida asked at one point. The hand laughed.

“Boy's cursed, I tell you! Two times out of five that we have to cross one, it breaks, he falls off, or something else bad happens,” the gravelly voice imparted gleefully. “Usually it's the horse that suffers, and sometimes nothing painful happens at all – it's just funny to watch.

“And let me tell you, bridges aren't the only thing he's got trouble with,” the Hand chortled. “Women and chest wounds! Let me tell you about this Puerto Rican whore we ran across once...”

According to the Hand, the “lady of the night” was enamored with D, and would follow him around. She wasn't the first woman to fall for the quiet, beautiful Hunter, for sure, but had been the first to use particularly nefarious means of getting his attention. She had seen to it that every woman around had heard D had enjoyed relations with the whore, and he lost face rather quickly. It was bad enough being a dhampir hunter – now he was relegated to the same type of Hunter trash that passed through that town on a daily basis.

Apparently, the whore and getting stabbed through the chest ended up hand in hand. She'd been enraged when he refused to take her with him, and had caught him off guard and impaled him with a stake. Naturally, Left Hand came to the rescue as he always did, and D was revived and moved on.

Still, the story left Nida in stitches. D had been quite young then, and more trusting than he was now, but still – it gave her some satisfaction to know he wasn't quite the superman Gary Stu he seemed to be.

They reached the end of the desert, Nida leading D's horse while they galloped full tilt. It was a bizarre stretch of land, only thirty miles across but nearly a hundred long – a result of defective weather control equipment in the area.

They found a good patch of land with loose enough soil. Nida untied D and tried to lower him to the ground.. but his foot was stuck in the left stirrup. The horse got spooked by Nida's annoyed shout (apparently, D's horse charming skills didn't work when he was... well... dead) and it ran off. Nida gave half-hearted chase on foot, trying not to laugh as it he hung upside down from the horse and was dragged across the grass.

Finally, Nida walked the horse back to the spot where her own was tethered to a lone apple tree and freed D from the horse. His body dropped heavily to the ground. The left hand was howling with laughter.

“D-don't tell him that happened, he... He'll cut me off for sure for letting it!” the Left Hand wheezed as it caught its breath once it was done laughing. “Okay.. down to business.”

As Nida lit the portable stove, the Left Hand began using D's fingers to dig into the dirt. Nida heard crunching sounds from where it was digging and noticed that, although a hole was appearing, the dirt itself was gone.

“Are you eating the dirt?” she asked curiously, hands limp at her sides as she gazed down at the hand burrowing into the earth. Her reply was a small belch.

“Yep. I need earth, air, fire and water --”

“Gonna summon Captain Planet? Wait, you still need Heart -”

“- to heal his wounds and revive him.” The hand sucked in air next. Wind roared in a small cyclone, sucked deep into the core of whatever the Hand had for a stomach. When it stopped, a rush of answering wind – air replacing the vacuum that had been created in the atmosphere around them – nearly knocked Nida off of her feet.

“Shit! Can you blow as hard as you suck?”

“I can create hurricane force winds,” the hand replied proudly. It finally turned to the small portable stove. A blue thermonuclear flame burned clear and bright in its base. The hand began sucking the flame into its mouth. When it was done, the stove had completely shut down. “This is useless now,” the hand said, its small mouth glowing white-hot. “That's damn delicious. My favorite kind of fire!”

Last, Nida emptied the water skein into the small mouth. It was a bit unnerving to watch the water disappear into D's palm, little gulping sounds coming from somewhere around his wrist.

“How the hell do you hold all of that?” she asked.

“That's my own little secret, and I'll never tell,” the hand chuckled. “I could use more water, but I think I've got enough to do what I need to do.”

Nida stood back and watched as the hand reached up and took the tip of the stinger in his mouth. With a jerk of D's wrist and a wet tearing sound, the barb tore free. It spat the barb to the ground, and the girl was impressed with how far it arced before sticking into the grass several feet away. The wound on D's chest began to close.

Within moments, D's body was devoid of damage. All that remained was the hole in his breast plate and cape. Left Hand gave D's chest a couple of sound thumps. Air rasped into D's lungs, and the dhampir suddenly stood in such a fluid moment, Nida jumped back a step in surprise.

“Hey, you're alive!” she cheered. “Your hand was telling me some great stories about a Puerto Rican whore. He wouldn't tell me shit about the sex, so I checked you for genital warts while you were unconscious.”

D turned his head and stared at her.

“Last time I saw a barbed penis like that, it was on a mountain lion!” she said with a smile, and walked over to her horse. She patted its neck and looked at him.

“Now that you've wasted our precious time with dying and all, why don't we get going?” Nida's boyish grin was wasted on D however. He calmly retrieved his hat and readied his horse, settling into the saddle with a graceful mounting technique Nida envied.

The two set off across the plains toward yet another forest in the distance. Once they found the carriage's tracks, half the day was gone – they hoped to catch up before nightfall.

The two rode off, leaving the desert behind.

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Author's Note: A huge thank you to the REAL Nida for helping me with the section where D enters her mind through Left Hand. I was having trouble capturing her essence there.

I acknowledge that Nida used the word “gank” (in MMORPG or online game terms, to kill dishonorably or as a large group versus smaller group or one person) incorrectly, but if you consider how overpowered D is, then yes, yes, they totally ganked the Barbarois.

If the reference to Puerto Rican whores offends you, replace “Puerto Rican” with any nationality that you're okay with, such as American, Canadian, Cambodian, or North Polish :3

If you were expecting a Steve Irwin death reference, NONE FOR YOU. Remember, this story was begun before that happened, so Steve Irwin was still alive in Nida's timeline.

Okay... as a warning.

For those of you who liked the lighthearted feel of the first chapters, I'm presenting to you the following, and you... well.. you may not want to keep reading.

Vampire Hunter D: Unsettling Futures

Chapter 0

“The Way It Could Have Ended”

As D and Nida were riding down the road, a huge rainbow appeared! At one end was Lilium, and at the other were Meier and Charlotte (it was a really short rainbow). In the middle were the Brothers Markus and Nida's other friends, Tsukai and Kaiou. Grove was miraculously healed and no longer skeletal. Leila wore a blue sun dress and a ribbon on her head.

Kyle bent over and rainbows shot from his ass. Everyone cheered. Charlotte and Meier ran away together and lived a happy life, having many babies. Nida and Lilium hooked up and also made many babies, though no one knows how because they don't have the equipment. Caroline and D got together and won an award for Most Unlikely Couple. Tsukai and Grove got married in Canada and also had many physically impossible babies. There is speculation that all the babies they and Nida and Lilium had were the result of sperm donations from Greg Kinnear and that a giant panda gave birth to them, resulting in odd skin coloring.

Everyone lived happily ever after!

The End.

...

Okay, now for those of you who aren't as attached to the fluff, please keep reading.

Only a few chapters left before this story draws to a close.

Please stay with us.

It's been such a long ride... and I hope you're enjoying it.

I know we are. : )