Disclaimer: Nope, don't own. Not creative enough.
Also, combat moves are entirely made up and performed by expert verbs and adjectives. DO NOT RE-ENACT. Author is not liable for any injuries incurred.
It was the moon that gave away Claire's resting place as Deneve trudged through her rounds at the forest edge. The glint of lunar light on her sword gave Deneve a beacon to home in on. When she came around to face Claire, she discovered her fellow warrior's gaze open and level, staring straight back.
No words were exchanged; at the moment, none needed to be. Deneve stabbed her own swordpoint into the ground and joined her comrade in silent contemplation.
The sun was peeking over the hills when Claire rose from her spot. Deneve slipped in front of her, leading the way back to camp.
Only once did they exchange words.
As they were walking, Deneve gave Claire a sidelong glance. "One would think," she commented, "that you and the boy would have a lot to discuss."
To which Claire replied, "there was very little that needed discussing."
The rest of the journey passed in silence.
Though they entered the camp without fanfare, everyone noticed their arrival; Miria looked up from her resting place. "Oh, you're back. It's just as well; Yuma should be back shortly. In fact," Miria added with a frown, "she's later than expected…"
Just then, Yuma crashed into the clearing, gasping. "I know I'm late… but it's not my fault, really…"
Miria nodded sympathetically and held her hand out, giving Yuma a chance to recover. As the younger claymore calmed, Miria leaned forward intently. "What news, Yuma?""Our orders are to march north into the mountains, to join the assault team attacking Isley."
Miria nodded in quiet reflection. "I see. What news, Yuma?"
Said with the exact same cadence and tone as her previous request, a casual listener would assume that Miria had suffered from some short-term memory loss. However, the others understood what this second request meant. Silently, they huddled around Yuma, who drew her sword and uncorked the hilt, where the Black Card was supposed to be. From there she withdrew a tightly-bound scroll and handed it to Miria, who scanned the message and handed it to the others.
"Do not fault Yuma for the delay in message – the blame is mine, and partly Rimuto's secrecy over the matter.
He knows of your deception – that any force sent to Isley will be confronted with Priscilla as well. Moreover, he knows of Priscilla's kin, and deems them bounties without peer. He is therefore sending a force that cannot be reckoned with – twenty hand-picked warriors, including Alicia, Beth, and six of his…favored projects. to the last, I cannot begin to speculate. Those projects are kept to the utmost secrecy. But I fear of the possible results of such a gathering.
For what has been suspected in the past has now been revealed as truth: he shares an alliance with Riful and Duph. Their prize in the aftermath is that which has eluded them for so long – your heads.
Though you may heed the words at your discretion, my advice is this – hide yourselves well. Your strength is but a pebble against this tide."
To everyone's surprise, it was Claire and not Helen who could not maintain control. "Impossible," she hissed, "Riful herself said that she couldn't join hands with the Organization. After being at odds with the Council for centuries? Why ally now? The source is lyin –"
"The source is valid," Miria said, cutting her off. She walked back to where her sword stood upright in the ground. "Impossible as the situation may seem, the source would not lie, nor be compromised so easily. We must assume that the situation has progressed to a point where Riful is desperate to win… or stands to gain immeasurable holdings." With a ching She sheathed her sword.
Tabitha locked eyes with her commander. "The word, Miria?"
"We flee." Miria looked at each of them in turn. "Riful or no, Rimuto does not gamble. He would send no force unless he was absolutely certain that he could kill or cripple Priscilla. We can't stand against such a force – we will clear all traces that we were ever here, and scatter. If he is smart, Isley will do the same, and if we are lucky, he will be wounded while fleeing. Whatever his condition, we will exact revenge for our comrades."
The other warriors parted, walking towards the respective swords to pull them from the ground. Only one refused to move: Claire.
"And what of Raki," she protested, "With all the yoma energy in the area, how are they to tell that he's human? They could kill him, even though he has no place in the battle. We need to –"
"Leave him."
Helen's words stabbed through Claire like an icicle to the chest. "What?"
Helen's face betrayed no humor, and no malice. "You heard me the first time, Claire. Leave him. You got too close to him, and now he's hurting you worse than a killing blow. He's made his choice and went with awakened beings, even settled down with one. It's for the best that he die like o-"
It was faster than anyone could see, let alone protest. One moment the two were a dozen paces apart, the next instant Claire's fist careened on Helen's cheek.
Helen's head snapped back, but to her credit, she did not stumble. When she looked up all could see the blood dribbling from one side of her mouth.
Silence fell from around the camp so that even the farthest witness could hear Helen declare in a frosty whisper, "You know I'm right."
Claire's gloved hand twisted upward, as if making to reach for her sword. Everyone froze, the air crackling with tension.
But then she lowered her hand, and turned to leave. The tension followed her.
Over her shoulder she said, "I'm going to tell him. I'm going to save him,"
"You go to die," was Helen's parting response.
A moment passed as Claire dissolved back into the shadows before Helen swiped at the trickle of blood with her thumb. "Permission to get cleaned up, Commander."
It was the most formal sentence anyone – including Deneve – had heard out of Helen, and it just compounded the anxiety in the air.
Still, Miria followed in the same vein. "Permission granted. Take as much time as you need. When you're through, seek me out for your duties."
After dismissing Helen, Miria turned to the others. "Tabitha, Cynthia, find and eliminate all our tracks, keeping a look out for the Organization's movements. Deneve, Yuma, clean up the campsite and pack our things for travel. I'll be scouting up ahead."
Their orders given, the Spirits of Pieta wasted no time in implementing them. Three shot off, leaving two behind.
It wasn't long before Yuma nervously tried to make small talk with her taciturn partner. "W-w-wow. I know Helen's cranky about getting beaten up by Priscilla, but did she have to be so mean to Claire?"
Deneve stopped collecting their things and stared at the under-confident warrior, having no patience to treat Yuma with velvet gloves like Miria. "Eight years alongside her, and you still don't understand her."
"What? This Raki person is obviously special to Claire, and Helen had to go and say all that – "
"Helen said all that because it's true," Deneve countered, "And she took no joy in saying it. She understands Claire's position, otherwise Claire wouldn't have lived to blink after she threw that punch."
Realization slowly crossed Yuma's face. "O-oh…"
Deneve sighed. "Let's finish up here. The quicker we can leave this behind us, the better."
The wind whipped past Claire as she dashed through the forest.
Too fast… All of it is happening too fast…
The revelation of Priscilla and Raki, the Organization, the decay of the Spirits of Pieta, a week's worth of events happening within forty-eight hours – it battered away at Claire's sanity, leaving her confused and frightened and angry. Only one thought kept her from succumbing to the torrent of emotions:
I need to protect Raki. Even if it's from himself.
She cherished that cause above all else, even her life.
She found him in short order by the creek where the deer fell, staking out another hunting position. He rose and turned toward her, eyes flickering past her as if expecting the other warriors to have followed her to this place. "You're still here, Claire? Priscilla said you left."
"Raki, the Organization is sending an army of warriors here. They're going to kill Priscilla and Isley, and take your children to be trained as warriors."
Raki's eyes widened and he turned to run, but Claire caught his wrist in a viselike grip before he could take another step.
He squirmed in her grasp. "Claire, let me go! I need to warn them!"
"Raki, wait."
She could feel his pulse under her fingertips as he turned back to her. "My family's in danger and you're asking me to wait?"
"But they were never your family in the first place, were they?"
Raki stiffened. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You know exactly what I'm talking about, Raki. They're monsters. They always have been, and always will be. No matter how much you try and raise them to be as human as you are, they will still have that hunger for human flesh in their hearts."
She took a breath, looked him straight in the eye, and said, "The Organization will kill them, and if you go, you'll be killed too. Come with me."
To Claire's astonishment, Raki slapped her arm away with surprising strength, a look of betrayal on his face. "Maybe nothing's changed for you, but it did for me. I grew, married, and raised a family. I'm a father, Claire. And as a father, my responsibility is to my children." He turned to head up the creek. "I'm going to warn them."
"You're going to die," Claire said, trying not to wince at the echo of Helen's phrase. "The Organization knows that if they kill you, they break Priscilla's will to live. You can't hope to stand against one warrior, much less twenty."
There was no response save for the shrinking image of Raki's back.
He's addled. He has lived too long among Isley and Priscilla to be convinced. I will knock him out and make him see reason later. After the Organization's done with Priscilla, he'll thank me.
With a whisper-quiet move, she charged, aiming her elbow at the back of Raki's head –
Except Raki's head wasn't there anymore, it ducked under the swinging arm and Claire felt herself careening to the ground, having tangled in Raki's outstretched leg. Tumbling end over end, she stopped at the edge of the creek.
Scrambling to her feet she saw Raki's accusatory glare in the creek's crystalline reflection. He was watching my movements in the water? She whirled around and saw the determination etched in his face.
"So it comes to this." With a flourish he drew the sword of Rabona from his back. It was surreal – the two close ones, reunited after eight years, now coming to blows. Raki spoke again, a grim edge in his voice. "Yes, I was weak once. I couldn't protect anything. Not anymore. Come, Claire; I'll show you just how strong I've become." With that declaration, he held the sword with the point at eye-level, handle in a double-handed grip tucked near his stomach.
For the first time in a long time, fear filled Claire's heart – fear of a protracted battle, fear of killing the one that she had been searching for. This shouldn't have happened. This should have been simpler, better. Her eyes narrowed. But if I can prove to him that he's not strong enough – if it gets Raki away from Priscilla, so be it!
She charged head on, the flat of her sword seeking Raki's temple.
But the blow that that should have knocked Raki off his feet glanced off the flat of the longsword, blade supported by one hand while the other still gripped the hilt.
Claire grit her teeth as the swords ground together, but Raki's sword guard wouldn't cave. She stepped back and unleashed a flurry of strikes to no avail. Raki parried against them effortlessly, blade pinwheeling to turn away the blows as he used the hilt as a fulcrum.
I can't get through his defense from the front… but maybe I can hit him from the back!
She circled him, trying to get into his blind spot, lashing out with her blade all the while. He matched her speed by pivoting in place, always keeping his front to her and always redirecting her blows with the flat of his blade.
But Claire kept circling, kept striking. He's only human – he can't keep this up forever –
Just as Claire brought her sword down on Raki's, he charged, sliding his blade along hers until they were practically nose to nose and hilt was locked to hilt.
I can't use my sword this close in!
Claire tried to leap back but found Raki's leading foot pinning her own. Raki broke the sword lock, sending the Claymore blade flying and landing a hilt-blow on Claire's face in one fluid movement, which sent Claire sprawling.
She sat up, panting more with frustration than fatigue. Conversely, Raki was a picture of calm, having not broken a sweat, with eyes and sword leveled at Claire.
The silence lasted only a moment before Raki spoke, bitterness laced in his tone. "You insult me, Claire. Were you expecting me to be as weak as I once was? I'm not. But how can I prove to you that I'm stronger if you won't give me the chance to match against a Claymore's strength?"
He lifted the point of the blade up and away from Claire's face. "Next time you take up your sword against me, don't hold back. If you do," he said as his eyes narrowed, "you will die. Plain and simple."
Claire picked herself up from the ground, head spinning in disbelief. Granted, she had been going easy on him, hoping to knock him out, but she was still fighting at twice the strength and speed of a footman.
She made her way around Raki to where her sword lay. It's impossible! No human can fight a warrior of the organization and expect to come out alive, much less win. To fight at full strength could kill him.
She picked up the sword and in the reflection of the blade saw the indignation in his expression… and his waning respect for her. But would it be better for him to die by my hand than to live with Priscilla?
In a fluid motion she sheathed the sword, but didn't take her hand off the hilt. "All right, I'll show you what 'full strength' means."
Raki smiled tightly. "That's more like it," he said as he raised his sword yet again.
Claire leapt into the air and swooped down upon him. In the heartbeat before she unleashed the Windcutter, she felt something unusual pulse from within Raki, but it was faint and dwindling rapidly and it wouldn't matter as Flora's move homed in with deadly force –
And skittered against the sword of Rabona, harmlessly whistling through air.
Claire was numb with shock, but training kept her going. Time and again she battered at Raki's defenses with the Windcutter until
Shing
In a single move Raki turned aside her sword and swung up and around, levering it out of her hand and disarming her yet again.
Claire's legs gave out and she crumpled to the ground, the will to fight drained from her spirit.
How? How can a human win against a warrior? She replayed the fight in her mind. Every move, every slash Raki made.
And then it came to her.
Raki loomed over her; she lifted her head to meet his gaze. "It's efficiency, isn't it. Your fighting style depends on how efficiently you use your strength."
"I prefer to call it the will to win," he said with an unreadable expression. "If one's will is devoted to destroying the enemy, then the enemy will be destroyed one way or another. Similarly, if every ounce of strength, every fiber of muscle is devoted to a blow against an enemy, then there's no way the enemy can defend himself.
"That is the way of Qi – the sword techniques that Isley learned from the continent across the seas. The people there adhere to the philosophy that whoever has the strongest will wins.
"With these techniques, a human can take down even an awakened being."
He held his sword aloft; the blade gleamed in the sunlight. "This strength… it was meant to protect you, to fight alongside you. Now the strength I've gained will protect my family."
Claire tried to bore a hole through his head with a glare. "I don't care how much strength you have. You're still fighting against twenty warriors, all better than me. Even if they lose this time, they'll be back, stronger and in greater numbers! The only way out is if you come with me, away from here. Raki, please…" She pleaded with him as angry tears trickled down her face, "I don't want to lose you again."
Raki cast a sympathetic glance down at her. "I loved you once, Claire… Gods know, I still do. But I cast my lot the moment Zaki and Melissa were born, and to turn my back on them would be to betray myself. This family is more important than me… and more important than you. And if I die, at least my death will be for the ones I gave life to."
He turned away, walking to the outskirts of the trees. Just before he vanished back into the forest he spared her one last, somber look. "Goodbye, Claire."
And he was gone.
Her fingers gouged the ground, clenching and unclenching wads of dirt. That fool! Doesn't he see? He has no chance. He'll just get himself killed. I'm meant to protect him! He'll definitely come with me, when I kill off Priscilla and her spawn, and then –
And then will Raki be happy with you?
The voice that asked was like a cold shock to Claire. It was a voice she didn't hear, yet somehow she knew that she had been listening to it in her darkest times. A voice that resonated with her soul…
But it wasn't the voice of anyone living.
Teresa?
You know the answer.
Claire rallied. He's suicidal, confused. I need to protect him –
He has shown that he can protect himself just as well, and will turn that strength against you without hesitation. He has grown, and is capable of making his own decisions.
Even if those decisions involve protecting your killer?
Were you protected simply so that you could slaughter children?
Without a ready answer, all Claire could do was rock back and forth, arms wrapped around herself, sobbing Teresa's name…
Raki strode through the forest as smoothly as he was able. He was heading home – toward his wife, towards his kids.
Why, then, did each step away from Claire hurt his heart more than the last…?
He fell to his knees, the strain of battle finally overcoming his mental defenses. Despite the nonchalant air that he presented to Claire, he did not come away uninjured. The throbbing in his shoulder spoke of his dislocated arm, sharp pains in his limbs and abdomen spoke of muscles strained to the breaking point. But he could not show weakness, not in front of her.
I guess I haven't mastered the style completely. I was lucky to come out of that alive. He chuckled inwardly, ending with a coughing fit. Sorry to disappoint you, Isley…
The pain in his chest hurt worst of all. Physically, it was bruised ribs and tendons, making it hard to breathe. Emotionally, it felt like his heart was on the verge of collapse.
He dragged himself up and hobbled to a nearby tree. Taking a moment to brace himself, he slammed his shoulder into it, biting down on his lip until it bled to keep himself from screaming.
He leaned against the tree, vision swimming in and out of focus. Just a little farther, and I'll be back home… Priscilla can fix me that drink of hers, and I'll be able to tell her what's coming. I need to get home… I want to get home… I'm going to protect my family… It's the right thing to do, so why does it hurt to leave Claire?
You know why, a scornful voice – his own – replied. It's your guilt – your guilt of abandoning her. She pledged to find you no matter what it took, but you were weak and lost faith in her. After all the trouble she went through to find you, this is how you repay her – by refusing her help and fighting her for your pride.
Raki grit his teeth, rallying against the voice. I chose my course long ago; I will stay with it. It's not for me anymore. Or…for Claire. It's for my family too.
But does that make this choice any less wrong? The other voice asked.
Something tickled Raki's cheek. He swiped at it; his fingers came away moist. He looked down at his fingertips, but couldn't see through the blur of tears.
He caved.
He slumped against the tree heavily, limp as a ragdoll. Like a plea for help, his whispers cut through the forest.
"Stop crying, goddamnit… stop crying…"
But no one was there to offer sympathy.
To Be Concluded.
Author's Postscript: There are times when the planets align, the words flow directly from the mind to the paper, and all is right with the world.
That's the Helen/Claire confrontation of this chapter.
Then there are times when it becomes a quagmire.
That's the Raki/Claire fight.
No joke, that was the hardest segment by far. Prereaders have advised against this fight, because the logistics of it are impossible. They say that in order to beat Claire, Raki would have to be as strong and as fast (or stronger and faster), which means that Isley would have to outfit him with some serious yoma flesh. If he remained human, he'd lose. Plain and simple.
Yet, this goes against the plot of the story. Raki needs to be human or else Claire would sense the energy and beat him. It's also my interpretation, take it as you will, that Raki would want to be stronger than Claire under his own power, i.e. not use the power of the yoma.
Thus, when logic and plot conflict, the writing pace for the story slows to a pace somewhat akin to molasses crawling uphill.
You the reader may factor every condition possible – Claire's psychological barriers to harm Raki, her refusal to use yoma energy, Raki's exceptional skill – and still find the outcome dubious. To this end I have one more factor that not even Raki is aware of, which will be revealed in the final chapter.
In any case, I hope you still enjoy reading this. Look forward to a conclusion soon.
Much obliged to Ikarus Onesun and Wanderer for prereading.
Author's Addendum, version 2: So Avalas gets back to me literally milliseconds after I submit this chapter. He tells me of some stylistic problems as he reads, and then gets to the Raki/Claire fight.
That's when he calls Raki a Gary Stu. And he's right. Anyone who fights without breaking a sweat, anyone who can still wield a sword even after one arm's dislocated, basically any human who can achieve the impossible is a Gary Stu in this world.
I've struggled with altering the storyline to make it more valid. But the muse won't let me - there are alternatives that I see, but their outcomes I can't create without destroying the vision and ultimate conclusion of the story.
And with the advent of Claymore scanlation 74, I realize I can't wait any longer. Norihiro is catching up, and if I wait too long he'll invalidate my version of events with canon.
As much as I respect Avalas, I'm submitting this version of events until I reach the conclusion. Afterwards I'll start from the ground up.
I apologize to you the reader. I've failed, both as a Claymore fan and as a writer. Please forgive me.