Disclaimer:I own nothing.

Warnings of a Madwoman: This story was originally my portion of the AMGReboot. I recently stumbled across it while cleaning out a hard drive and decided to post it for kicks and giggles. This will be a three-shot stand alone fic that will not be continued and holds mature themes. It takes place after Keiichi has met Urd, who's been living a good chunk of her life on the mortal realm by choice. Urd is running a large multinational company that is not always legal and has issues containing her more demonic half do to an inherited addiction to chaos. Belldandy and Keiichi are still trying to adapt to their forced living conditions with each other and have only just finished refurbishing the shrine at this time. For all the fact that the duo are slowly starting to understand one another, they still don't get along as well as they could. Do to an unknown event in the past, Belldandy is a second-category goddess similar to Urd and Skuld. Keiichi, in turn, was raised in an abusive/neglectful household with Megumi, one of the few people he cherishes in his life. Megumi has moved to Nekomi in an effort to follow her brother in escaping their parents as well as staying close to her older brother. She's suspicious of the relationship between Bell and Keiichi, believing Keiichi is sheltering Belldandy from some 'trouble' the woman has gotten herself into.

This is Marller's introduction chapter.

Near the border of the Czech Republic

Life sucks. Then you die.

It was a constant truth; one Winola Färber had heard her father utter time and time again throughout her childhood and well into adulthood, where she found herself in one failed relationship after another, leading to her latest disaster with a man who was a better swindler than a lover. The man had stolen more than just her bank account. Winola had not only been evicted from her house, but also thrown into debt, her mailbox filled with purchases she'd never made.

She'd done the best she could, given the circumstances; contact the police and call the card companies and the bank. Yet it was no easy task baring through the harassment about car purchases and fancy restaurants, hotels and fur coats.

It will work out. It will get better. She'd thought to herself. Bare through it and it will pass.

Those were her mother's words, spoken just as many times as Winola's father's during times when the money grew tight and her stomach grew cramped and it looked like they wouldn't make it to the next paycheck. Yet the words always proved true in the end, and so Winola found herself repeating those words as well, hoping perhaps a little of her mother's old magic might resurface in her own hard times.

It didn't pass.

…Or perhaps it did, only in a manner she'd not expected.

The woman had been homeless at the time, living with a friend who'd found her a job working as a secretary for one of the local white collar businesses in the city. It had been on her lunch break where a stranger had approached her, a man with kind eyes and a gentle face. A priest, he'd claimed to be, of a religion she'd never heard of nor cared to learn. The man had asked to share her bench with him for lunch, and against her better judgment, she'd allowed it.

Winola remembered that day well; a beautiful cloudless day, the first scents of flowers blossoming making the air sweet and dream-like. She remembered how they'd gotten to talking; about life, tragedy, success, and above all, religion. She couldn't remember what words were said, only that somewhere in their conversation he'd convinced her to visit his church. She'd promised she would, having left the little bench outside her work office feeling lightheaded and peaceful.

It never even occurred to her that she'd never even learned his name.

Yet sure enough the days passed and come the weekend, Winola found herself wandering out and about the town, walking without direction until her feet came to a halt outside a grand cathedral. It bore no name, tucked away on the outskirts of the city and away from the more local streets and walks. Yet despite that fact, somehow Winola knew that the grand church in front of her was that of the priest. One who held no name and who's face was a clouded mystery in her memory's eye.

The woman entered, walking past great portraits of saints and patrons, none of whom she recognized. It was almost as though there was something off about them, yet Winola could not tell what it was. The blonde walked pass worshipers who nodded politely to her and priests who smiled kindly to her before entering the worship hall and finding her priest, recognized not so much for his face as it was a simple knowing.

The room was filled with dark pews the color of a rich mahogany, cool and smooth to the touch as her fingers grazed across their surface. Glass murals of men and women shown light into the center, providing all the light needed for worship. And so it was she found the priest from before, his back to her as he kneeled before an altar resting in the center of a podium.

He rose as she called out a greeting to him, blocking the odd altar from her eyes-there was something off about that one too-and approaching her with open arms.

There was conversation, filled with laughter and pleasantries, an ease to the air that made Winola relax as the nameless priest toured the church with her, pointing out a saint here, a worshiper there, all of which, while pleasant, held names that alluded her mind regardless of how she tried to memorize them. The woman left the church that day with a sense of peace and belonging, filled with a sense of pleasant surrealism that stayed with her throughout the day and well into the night. When her head finally hit the pillow and sleep slowly seeped into the recesses of her mind, her final thoughts were of the church and its patrons, and how nice it would be to return there some time in the not-so-distant future.

It would be her final thought before she disappeared that night, naught to be seen again until she was discovered mad and screaming by the local authorities.

It was hot inside the church. Blistering hot, almost. Outside a small snowdrift had started, yet inside it remained as hot and dry as a desert. Torches flickered in the darkness and imps danced to the cackles of the flames in the shadows they produced, providing an audience to all those present within the worship hall. Torchlight flickered off glass portraits of men with too many limbs and animalistic qualities to them, of monsters with horns and long tongues, and of demons with dragon wings and scales. Glass skin glistened and shined while glossy eyes glowing from inside the creatures' snarling faces. The stained-glass monsters watched as men entered, moving the many pews to the edge of the room from where the rested. Grunting and sweating, one by one the intruders moved the dark wood around the great hall, forming a wooden perimeter that shown red in the flickering light.

Dressed in robes the black of night, cowls of an equal shade masking their faces from view, the men gathered and formed a loose circle in the center of the hall. A hollow gong echoed throughout the chamber and from the entrance three people appeared: two of their fellows, dressed and sweating in their thick black robes, guiding a woman as nude as the night was cold, her step uncertain and her brown eyes holding the glazed look of one not wholly present in mind.

The cult had been created fifty years ago after a local archeologist had stumbled across an old catacomb deep within the surrounding mountains. The man had discovered a book filled with archaic writings and arcane images depicting creatures that did not often grace the world. After a full translation of the text, he'd discovered the grimoire contained a listing on how to summon the images depicted. Further research of the catacombs revealed several artifacts mentioned in the old writings claiming to act as a gate for some of those very demons.

He'd learned the spells and out of a morbid sense of curiosity had made an attempt at casting one. The old cow he'd attempted to light on fire had smelled very little like the roasting slabs of meat he'd often found himself consuming-more like a mixture of badly burned skin, acid, feces, and a bitter scent he would later associate with the raw emotion that was fear.

He'd stopped eating beef after that.

But he'd only begun to master the spells in his new book.

And now, after many a year creating a cult and watching his influence soar, tonight was to be the first attempt to see if one of the ancient artifacts worked.

The air was heavy with the scent of smoke and flame, incense and sweat, and below those, a lingering scent of fear and piss and blood and an unusual odor that one could not identify without first meeting it's source. The combination combined into an almost sickly sweet and smoky smell, one that infiltrated the mind and let loose haunting shadows of creatures from long ago, nipping at the old reptile brain and sending an instinctive feeling of 'danger' running down the back of the spine.

The cult members had grown used to the feeling long ago.

The woman was too drugged to even notice its existence.

The circle of worshipers opened to allow the trio inside their circle, forming a 'u' that quickly closed as the newcomers centered themselves within the ring. The new trio nestled safely inside the circle, as one the worshipers turned to face the podium, looking to the lone figure who stood in its center, observing the group from beneath a cowl the color of freshly-drawn blood. Their leader, a man who'd discovered an old catacomb once upon a lifetime ago, smiled. Dressed in a robe as red as his cowl, the man approached the front of the small uprising, his walk the slow and deliberate gate of a man who owned the world. Dark eyes observed the woman, recalling how they'd met and his fortune in discovering a person filled with a misery that suited one of the demons in his book. Tonight would be the night.

Tonight would be the demon's night.

In front of him, resting before the steps leading down to his followers, an altar stood. It was here he paused, the altar just reaching his waist and resting on a small table covered in a rich satin cloth. The structure consisted of a mirror raised vertically, its reflective surface decorated with ruins and sigils of all shapes and sizes. It rested within a bronze inlay that dully reflected the light of the many torches in the hall.

Beneath the mirror a skull rested, bleached white with age and holding the elongated snout and various canines of a predator from long ago. At some point in its existence, perhaps in life, perhaps in its afterlife, someone had drilled a hole in the top of its head. Smoke trickled out of it, the light of the flame resting inside the skull visible only from the reflection in the mirror, covered so heavily in arcane symbols one had to squint to see the yellow of the flame. Light from within caused old eye sockets to flow and flicker with an unholy sight, and angrily smoke seethed from its jaws and nose canal-an angry dragon resting inside the skull of a long departed animal. The smoke rose and swirled from the beast, creating a miasma of demons and monstrosities whose eyes glowed like and whose jaws hung gaping and hungry as they leered down at their audience. Beasts that may or may not exist, they glared down at the people gathered before them from their smoky residence, held back only by the sheer will of the non-existent. It would take only one person to will them all into being, and should they become corporeal...

The red priest's hands flew through the smoke, banishing the monsters and demons that so wished to take form and causing the smoke to twirl and dance around his fingers. In one hand he held a long string of bones: claws and fangs and little bones with holes drilled into their sides, threaded together by a golden string and made into a rosary of an arcane ancestry. In the other he held a book-his book-that had become his bible the day he'd discovered it, and whose words still filled him with a sense of otherworldly wonder and desire. The man led the chant, reading words from his Book and speaking a language that should have died many a century ago. His voice rose and fell in song, and with each peak, with each fall, the bones in his hand shook and rattled, joining him in song and laughter that only he could hear.

And as he did, as one the ring moved forward, moving to the first step before breaking into a 'u' once more and allowing the trio-the woman still supported on either side by her two guides- to continue up the stairs, gently guiding her up steps on legs that had forgotten how to climb with all the kindness of a newborn.

A soft murmur had risen around them, around her, as the others joined their leader in his song-chant, muttering words they didn't know and following a tune that alluded them, their eyes trailing after the woman as step by step, she drew closer to the altar.

It was here, on this final step, the duo lowered her to her knees, easing her down and into the center of a pentagram drawn in salt. Here she was eye-level with the skull, and as the duo released her arms the woman swayed to and fro, back and forth. Yet unsteady though she was, the woman did not fall, instead easing into a balance she did not have as she joined her peers, mouthing words that her sane mind did not know.

Her companions stepped out of the pentagram's circle, and as they did a hush fell upon those that watched from below, leaving only the woman and the red priest to chant and sing, until it was only the woman, spurred on by the rattle and shake of bones and claws. The smoke was blowing in her face now, smelling of fires that could scald the soul and stone that burned the flesh, and she inhaled it as though it were the purest of air. Taking breath after deep breath, voices whispered in her ears as she stared into those flickering red sockets, where flashes of a world not her own danced behind her eyes.

Something loose and cool fell across her shoulders and in between her breasts as she muttered and stared, and the priest slowly stepped away from the altar, his hands empty of the bone-rosary that now hung from the woman's neck. The room had become silent save for the soft song-chant of the woman at the altar-not even the torches of the room daring to make sound lest they break the enchantment.

And than, from either side of her, where her two guides still stood posed and ready, came a sudden burst of motion. As one, two great and terrible daggers appeared in their hands, etched in runes identical to those of the mirror, and as one they drove them straight into the woman's body. One dove into her back whilst the other thrust itself into the victim's chest. And embedded they left them, even as the woman left fourth a gurgled gasp. Yet the woman remained where she kneeled, neither flailing about in screams and howls or collapsing on top of herself to die. Rather she stayed as she was, staring into the skull, staring through the skull and to the mirror behind it.

The red eyes of her reflection, awe-struck and filled with pain, stared back.

And then, to her amazement, her reflection spoke. You're not going to let them do this to you, are you? She could feel her own lips mouthing the words of her reflection, masked and bound by the many glyphs and runes that covered its surface. After everything that has happened to you? Is this how it will end? In a meaningless death for a cause that was never your own? She felt tears swell at the corner of her eyes and watched her reflection shed them, two streaks of moisture that glistened in the torchlight. And then she watched those red eyes-burning, heated eyes, like bright coals from the pits of hell itself-narrow in rage. You cannot allow this to go unchallenged! A snarl spread across her reflections delicate features, and for all she could feel her face twisted into the very expression, she could not suppress the sudden fear in her breast that arose from the look.

Blood for blood, I say! They wish for a sacrifice? Let us give them what they so desperately desire!" From the reflection, a hand reached out to her, long and elegant with nails that ended in points like claws, and with a strength of the possessed, so too did she, reaching past the skull, whose breath was warm and moist against her bare skin, and touching the surface of the mirror and feeling the warm flesh of another person as two hands met.

A sound too awful to be laughter echoed throughout the worship room.

And Winola Färber's last conscious thoughts of that night were those of her father, his old, tired voice echoing back to a time where the demons of life were little more than money in a bank and food on a table.

"Life sucks. Then you die."

It was dark.

Or maybe he was just blindfolded, Keiichi didn't know.

What he did know was that he was stumbling around in his blindness, searching for walls that might give his hands some sort of guidance on where to go. Yet nothing came; his fingers brushed no walls nor did his body crash into any. He might as well have been walking through a void.

Somewhere, off to his left perhaps, or maybe right in front of his nose, a woman's laughter echoed throughout the darkness. Yet though he searched, eyes straining against the encompassing darkness, there was nothing to note the woman's presence. The mechanic called out to her, hoping the owner of the laughter might seek him out and act as a guide, only to discover his voice was soft and muffled, as though he were calling out to her with a mouth covered by a pillow. More laughter came, harder, harsher, as though the woman was laughing at him, and then that too faded away.

And with the oncoming silence, something else took the place of the laughter.

It was a howling sort of screech, one he knew, as only those dreaming knew, was not from any creature from his world. No, these were Hunters, creatures from a much darker, deadlier place. He needed to be careful, be quiet, lest the Hunters notice him. For if they noticed him, they would hunt him down and kill him. And there was no coming back from the dead.

And so the college student continued his walk, his pace slow, steps silent, and his heart ramming in his throat; for now the young man could see, and what he saw were shadows in the darkness: shadows that left after-images and were darker than the darkness that hid him. Shadows with long snouts and gaping maws lined with sharp, blinding white teeth, their canines as long as his hands. Shadows that walked on two legs at times, shadows that walked on four legs at others, and all of them sightless as they hunted. They ran past the youth in the dark, some of them far, some so close he touch them, knowing that if he did they would be upon him, they would devour him, and then he would be a Hunter too; racing along on two legs and on four, seeking out the prey his master scented him on, and-

And they were gone.

No more passed him, and frozen as he was, Keiichi watched as the final shadows dissolved into the surrounding darkness, leaving the man alone once more.

Then came the scream, and Keiichi was running towards it, chasing after the very monsters he'd hidden from, now racing after them with a fear and rage that came unbidden. For he knew the owner of that scream, knew the owner's voice better than anyone as one of the few people he cared for more than life itself.

"Megumi!" Keiichi shouted into the blackness, his heart in his throat and his gasps making his voice raw. Somewhere ahead of him, the mechanic heard his sister call out to him, and with it came the ravenous snarls of hungry beasts. The screams grew louder, filled with the mind-numbing terror of one who knew their life was about to end.

Keiichi ran faster.

His progress was slow. His legs burned and the air felt like thick molasses. Megumi's screams grew louder and more desperate, her voice a desperate cry that tightened Keiichi's chest painfully. "Megumi! Stop! Leave her alone!" Keiichi's voice was a shriek, one as desperate as Megumi's own, rising and cracking above the vicious howls and snarls of the Hunters.

And then, abruptly, the screams were cut off.

"No!" Keiichi's voice was a long and mournful wail. The air grew light, and he ran faster then he'd ever thought possible, free of the bonds that once limited him. Yet despite the new-found freedom he knew already he was too late. Knew already his little sister Megumi was dead and beyond his help. Still he ran on; his sibling's name a scream in his throat that would not leave, mindless of Hunters who'd taken her from him, careless of the attention he might or might not draw.

He saw her.

Her body was laid out in front of him, as illuminated as if the high-noon sun itself bathed the woman in its light. And as he grew closer, Keiichi began to see the extent of the damage. Her torso had been cleaved up by the long furrows of claws. Bloody remains he recognized as her lungs, her intestines, glistened in a light that had no source. The heart was missing; devoured by the Hunters, he knew, just as they'd consumed her liver.

They hadn't touched her face. And now those dark eyes-those same dark eyes he saw whenever he looked in a mirror-those eyes that once held such a spark of life were empty, dark and glazed over with death.

"No..."

Keiichi fell to his knees, feeling something constrict his heart, his chest, his throat, as a broken mew escaped his mouth and his eyes burned with moisture. Gently, a hand reached out to stroke Megumi's cheek, speckled with droplets of blood that had dried and crumbled at his touch, coating his fingers in red.

The tears came, and a broken sob choked its way into the air, and the man let loose a howl. One filled with rage and sorrow, grief and despair.

The howl of a broken man.

And as it died, so too did the sobs return, and in the darkness, surrounded by Hunters ready to devour his heart, his liver, Keiichi wept for his sister.

"You were too late for her." A voice, thick and rough and strangely feminine, teased in the darkness. "I wonder though...if you cannot even save one so close to you...would you even bother to save one forced into your company?" The voice mocked, and when Keiichi closed his eyes, rubbing away the moisture, he saw a pair of red feline eyes glaring at him from behind his eyelids. When he opened them, the eyes didn't disappear.

This. This was the source of the Hunters. The master, the one who sent them after his sister. Keiichi knew this only with the logic of dreams, and so he returned the glare full force, his face twisting into the angry snarl of a man seeking vengeance. He would attack the eyes if he could. Yet he also knew that from where they watched was a place the man could not touch, and so he glared up defiantly into those red orbs. "I'll protect even the ones I hate, if it means hurting you." His voice was low and haunting, and Keiichi was surprised at the amount of hate in it.

Yet the eyes seemed undaunted by his tone. Or perhaps he just could not read the emotion in the angry orbs. "Very well then." The voice growled. "Let us see how well you hold your promises."

Another voice rose from the darkness now, one he did not recognize at first, before slowly dawning on him as the voice of Verthandi, calling out to him from the darkness. Dark eyes widened as the goddess called out to him once more, closer this time but still too far to see, and once more his eyes narrowed in rage and hate to the glaring orbs that filled his vision. He pointed to them, pointed through them. "I'll fucking kill you." His voice was tight with rage, and his heart leaped with exhilaration as the words left his throat. "Mark my words. If something happens to her, I'll find you and I'll kill you without a second thought."

"You're running out of time if you want to save her, boy."

And the eyes were gone and Keiichi was running, his own voice screaming a warning that tore painfully from his throat as around him once more, the Hunters appeared; fine miasmas of dark mist that raced with him, snarling and snapping at each other now, at him, yet none coming so close as to attack him. They howled, and he screamed with them, uncaring now if they noticed him or not, hoping only to distract them so that woman might escape, where he'd failed his sister.

"Not this time!" He ran at one, even as long silver dagger-teeth snapped viciously at him. Grabbing the wisps drifting from the beast's head, he tugged, jumped, and the man rode atop its back, where the Hunter left him. It galloped forward on four legs before switching to two, and in the midst of the pack of monsters, Keiichi came upon their next prey; a woman who burned with a light so bright it blinded, her face an expression of trepidation that seared an after-image behind closed eyes.

He called out to her once more, not in the name his conscious body had dubbed her as, but by her true name, the ones gifted by the Powers That Be, in a land where there were no limits on what could be done. And she looked to him, blue meeting brown, and riding on an avalanche of beasts and monsters, he told her to run.

She did not.

Instead she narrowed her blue eyes at him, in that same manner he saw daily when he did something displeasing to the goddess, and she held her ground, a great golden staff in one hand that Verthandi swooped down in front of her. The Hunters descended on her, Keiichi an unwilling accomplice upon their backs. One by one Verthandi thrust the pole out, striking beast after beast and watching them dissolve into the ghostly white specters of men and women; souls unfortunate enough to have fallen prey to the Hunters' master.

"Tell me, what is a god to a man?" The master's voice rang through the air once more as Verthandi lashed out again and again, her movements growing slow with fatigue and the monsters slowly overwhelming her. "Would not a man rather place his faith in something solid? Something he can hold and feel and know will give him power, will give him his riches, rather than something he cannot see and who would ignore his prayers?"

A beast, the one in front of Keiichi and his mount, sunk its fangs into the goddess' arm. The woman screamed in pain, and with a shout of his own, Keiichi kicked his Hunter in the neck, driving it into the brunette's assailant.

"Man would sooner forget a god, just as he believes that the Gods have forgotten him. Is it not better to forsake, then to be forsaken? Just as these children have?"

The beast tossed him from where Keiichi rested on its back, and the man fell to the ground, landing on his shoulder and feeling no pain on impact. Rolling to his stomach, Keiichi pushed himself up only to feel large paws shove him to the ground. They were going to trample him, the man realized with a panic.

And they did, rushing to the goddess in a wave, overwhelming her fatiguing body and hiding her in a wave of darkness.

Keiichi cried out to her once more, crawling, stumbling, reaching for her.

Yet it was all for naught; the many Hunter bodies kept him pressed to the ground, and he watched as the light that was a goddess was extinguished before his very eyes.

"Now tell me this boy. What is a man to a god?"

He could not answer the voice's question.

With no more prey to sustain them, the Hunters turned their non-gaze inwards, to the very man who lay beneath their feet.

"Or perhaps the real question is, what is a man to a woman?"

And Keiichi's only response was a scream as the Hunters descended upon him.

It was a scream that woke him up.

And it took Keiichi approximately five seconds to realize, drenched in sweat and tangled in damp sheets that felt close to strangling him, that the screams were coming from him.

Immediately his hands flew to his mouth, muffling the screams before they had the chance to wake Belldandy up, if she'd not already been awoken by his initial cries. However, as he halted his vocal cords and the shrine grew silent once more, no other sounds of life graced the student's ears. Nothing but the beat of his heart, which pounded in his head and throbbed in his neck, and the sound of his labored breathing.

Somewhere to his left his alarm clock shone 04:30 in bright neon green lights, and carefully Keiichi eased himself from the tangled mess of his futon, looking over his shoulder at one point when one shadow flickered oddly, pausing at another point when another displayed a monstrous figure that twitched every now and then.

At one point Keiichi could have sworn he caught the white flash of fangs from it.

Yet both were illusions of his own mind, and so telling himself that and ignoring the fact that the college student felt like he was five years old once more, Keiichi finally was able to escape the binds of his blankets and stand once more. His clothes felt unpleasantly cool against his skin, yet the mechanic made no move to change, the sensation as real as it was uncomfortable.

The man ran a hand through his hair. "Calm down Keiichi, it was a dream, that's all. Go to the bathroom, get some water, and go back to sleep. It wasn't real." The sound of his own voice didn't reassure him as he'd hoped it would. His voice trembled when he spoke.

Yet none the less Keiichi moved to follow his own advice, spending a good long while in the bathroom relieving a bladder that had taken that moment to burn with a need that hurt. The man had been reluctant to turn off the bathroom light after that, looking into the hallway that led to the kitchen and seeing monsters with sharp teeth and sharper claws and red glowing cat eyes.

"You know what? Fuck it."

He drank his water from the bathroom faucet.

The water tasted stale and metallic, but it woke the dark-haired man further, and as he turned off the water Keiichi felt more like his old self. "Four thirty in the morning." He muttered to himself, wiping off the remaining water on his chin with a hand towel. "And on a Sunday too. There's no justice in the world, I swear." The man was fully awake now, and he knew already that there was little to no chance of him getting any more rest that morning.

You should check on her. A voice whispered in the back of his mind, and had it been an actual person Keiichi would have turned around and smacked it. "I don't need to check on her. It was a damned dream. It's not like it was real or anything." Yet the voice was insistent, and irritatingly rational, leaving Keiichi to wonder if it was the voice of reason that spoke to him or that little piece of his mind that had started to grow since meeting Belldandy, leaving him to seriously question his own sanity. Ah, but Gods are real. It whispered. So who's to say monsters aren't? Who's to say demons aren't? Belldandy has opened up a great big door for you Keiichi, and there's a whole 'nother world filled with nothing but those very things you always claimed never existed.

Keiichi narrowed his eyes in annoyance at the revelation, grumbling to himself as he strode out into the hallway. I fucking hate you. He thought to the voice.

He wasn't sure whether to snort in amusement or scowl angrily when the voice laughed and disappeared.

The man was outside Belldandy's door now, and slowly he rapped a knuckle on the outside frame. "Belldandy? Are you awake? I need to-" make sure your alive "-talk to you for a sec."

Nothing but silence was his response, and Keiichi grimaced. "Shit." The hand that knocked fell to the slide in the door, sinking into the little dip and readying to pull it open. Either one of two things is going to happen. He thought grimly to himself. Either I'm going to walk into a woman's quarters uninvited and get slapped or I'm going to open Belldandy's room and find a goddamned chainsaw massacre. Neither option seemed like much fun in his mind, and even while another little voice was telling him to turn around and walk away Keiichi was sliding open the door to Belldandy's room.

What he found inside was neither an angry woman ready to redden his cheek nor the bloody remains of a homicide, but rather Belldandy, resting peacefully in her futon with blankets piled high. The man released a breath he'd not known he held, and hesitantly he knocked on the inside wall in a vain effort to try and wake the goddess once more. No response, and Keiichi felt his heart thrum uneasily in his chest once more.

What if she was really dead? What if she'd suffocated in her sleep, strangled by her blankets? Maybe there was some internal wound he could not see beneath the blankets, or perhaps some terrifying monster had burst from her chest, left to run amok in the shrine.

From somewhere behind him Keiichi thought he heard the sound of a woman's laughter, and he wheeled around to find nothing but shadows and darkness. "Ignore it Keiichi, you're hearing things. There's nothing out there. You and Belldandy are the only ones here." He whispered, the hair on the back of his neck standing on edge as he tried in a vain to reassure himself.

Something large brushed against his back and the hot breath of a beast tickled his flesh.

And with a scream Keiichi ran into Belldandy's room, tripping over the woman's futon and falling on top the resting goddess.

That seemed to wake the woman from her sleep, and as Keiichi's body pressed against hers, Belldandy's eyes shot open, finding a shadowy figure screaming on top of her and responding in turn with a shriek of her own. The brunette squirmed and wriggled, fighting to free herself from the covers that bound her and escape from under the yowling man that she was only dimly aware was Keiichi. Finally, after enough struggling, the woman freed a foot from beneath her covers of her futon, and Keiichi Morisato learned two things that morning.

First was that Belldandy kicked hard.

Second was that the goddess, for all the purity she seemed so content to preach to the world on a daily basis, fought as dirty as a street fighter trapped and cornered in an alleyway.

A squeal-grunt somehow squeezed its way from Keiichi's throat as the man wheezed, and with an enraged snarl, Belldandy shoved the man off to one side. The mechanic collapsed on his side in a whimper, and Belldandy scrambled to her feet, panting harshly as she fought to catch her breath.

"You...you..." The woman's voice trembled as she glared down at the man, words failing her as she seethed. "...Why...what were you...Have you gone insane? What's wrong with you? Barging into a woman's room screaming and hollering like a madman, and then...and then..."

She was shaking as her mind flashed back to that first instance of awakening; a voice screaming in her ear, a large weight on top her body, dark eyes leering down at her from a dark face...

The goddess shivered, swallowing uncomfortably as unbidden memories rose with it, and quickly Belldandy vanished them from her mind. The brunette glared down at Keiichi, whose moan had ceased and left the man in a panting silence. "And here I thought you were better than that." She hissed.

A single dark eye from Keiichi looked up at the woman with a grimace, and the mechanic mouthed words she could not hear. A small part of her wondered if he was trying to explain himself, and as the man gaped like a fish out of water Belldandy approached him, expression wary and distrustful. Keiichi rolled to his knees, one hand wrapped securely around his stomach, and when again he tried to speak and his voice still refused to work, the student instead motioned Belldandy towards him.

Cautiously, Belldandy stooped near Keiichi, wondering what explanation he was trying so hard to vocalize, and finally, in a whisper-sigh, Keiichi spoke one word that said it all.

"Bitch."

And very calmly, very slowly, Belldandy moved away from Keiichi, rising to tower over his hunched form. Just as calmly, just as slowly, a hand rose in the air. A resounding smack echoed throughout the temple and into the surrounding trees, causing birds to take flight and squirrels to run to their dens.

And then, at a crawl even slower than the calm storm that was the goddess whose room he'd decided to invade, Keiichi slunk out. His cheek was blooming into a bright red that stung and throbbed and his stomach felt cramped and left him with a feeling of wanting to vomit. The door slid shut behind him with a hard slam, and Keiichi paused in the hallway to turn and flip the wood off. "Fucking...bitch..." He wheezed, before turning and storming as best a kicked man could storm, down the hallway and to the living room area.

He was too angry to give a damn about the shadowy beasts that watched him go. In fact, when his gaze fell onto one of the creatures that he was certain was still a hallucination from some morbid nightmare, he flipped it off too, warned it not to fuck with him because he was not in the mood, and then proceeded to storm right through it. The thing vanished like so many other monsters from his childhood, and Keiichi ventured onwards.

There were no more monsters after that.

"God damn it. God damn it!" He snarled as the pain eased. "I'm trying to make sure she's fucking alive, that she's fucking safe, and she nails me in the goddamned stomach! What. The. Fuck!"

A small voice in the back of his mind told him Belldandy's response was reasonable, that he'd scared her when he fell on top of the woman in her sleep, and Keiichi promptly told the voice to go fuck itself. The man grabbed his jacket from where it rested on a hanger before moving to the front of the house. He continued muttering to himself as he put his shoes on, and the door slammed loudly in his wake as Keiichi stormed outside.

His breath came out in a white mist in the morning air, and the chill hit his hands and face, biting uncomfortably as Keiichi zipped up his jacket. Above his head, the sky was only just starting to lighten with the dawning sun, and again Keiichi found himself muttering obscurities to the morning air. He passed his bike, pausing only for a brief moment to stare at it in contemplation before the voice of common sense told him to keep walking, reminding the man that he was angry and the morning was still dark, and to ride with such a combination was liable to get him killed.

"Fucking hell." He cursed, this time to the morning sky.

The sky responded with a happy twitter of birds.

Sighing wistfully and wishing he had a BB gun on him, Keiichi made his way down the to the road at the foot of the shrine, deciding that he needed to walk and that he needed to smoke to allow the anger to fade and his head to clear.

That and maybe punch something. He was in a very punchy kind of mood.

The man withdrew a carton of cigarettes from one of the pockets in his jacket and popped the top open with a stressed sigh.

The carton was empty.

Keiichi stared long and hard at the empty box, wondering if it was going to be another 'fuck with Keiichi' kind of day and decided it probably would be. He crushed the box in his hand and threw it as far as he could, watching as the trashed container flew over the railing and down the cliff. Scowling, he shoved his hands in his pockets once more and started to walk again. "It would be on a day like this, wouldn't it?"

And to his surprise, someone responded. "Bad day, da?"

The voice was rough and deep and scared the shit out him, and Keiichi twirled to face the stranger like a figure skater on ice.

A man was there.

Keiichi was pretty sure he hadn't been 'there' before.

The man was tall. Taller then Keiichi, which wasn't saying much, but not as tall as Tamiya. He was probably around Urd's height, and like Urd, the stranger was about as Japanese as Keiichi was Norwegian. His skin was pale and his hair a bright and curly blonde. The stranger was dressed in a black trench coat that showed dark stains and a baggy black shirt, with cargo pants that looked to have seen better days and combat boots whose leather looked old and frayed.

Two thoughts entered Keiichi's head as he examined the stranger. The first was gaijin. The second was hobo. Neither really struck his fancy as someone he wanted to converse with, and so with a grunt Keiichi turned and started walking once more.

A hand grabbed his shoulder. "What is in rush?" His accent was thick and heavy. "Look you like has the problems of woman." The voice was cheery and annoying, and a dark scowl fell upon Keiichi's face.

I won't hit a woman. He thought to himself. She can beat me, curse me, whatever the fuck she wants, but I will not lay a finger on her. Brown eyes darted to the hand on his shoulder, small and delicate, without so much as a speck of dirt beneath the nails. But so help me, I will punch a hobo.

Keiichi grabbed the hand by the wrist, turning and bringing his other up in a fist at the stranger's face and...

The man had a cigarette in his mouth.

In his other hand was a fresh carton of the sticks, the plastic still covering a majority of the paper and covered with foreign characters Keiichi dimly recognized as German. Smiling in-between his cancer stick, the hobo offered the pack to him, and Keiichi felt the fight die in his body.

Gingerly, he pulled out a cigarette of his own, releasing the foreigner from his grasp. "...Thanks." He muttered, putting the cigarette to his lips and digging around in his pocket for the set of matches he kept on him. There was a snap, and Keiichi looked up to see a lighter, its flame a bright yellow, once more held out in offering. Giving up on his matches the student leaned over and lit the cigarette. This close, the man got a good view of the lighter, and as the smell of tobacco and something sweet filled the air, Keiichi jumped back with a start.

The blonde laughed raucously at his behavior and Keiichi almost dropped the cigarette from his mouth. "You like?" He asked, snapping the lighter shut with a flick of his wrist. "Is good trick. Sleight hand."

And as the shock faded, so too did Keiichi allow himself a chuckle. It was nervous and fake, yet the man across from him didn't seem to notice. "Sleight of hand...Yeah...Cool trick." Sleight of hand his ass. The man's fucking hand had been on fire.

"You want I show? Is much popular with ladies." The foreigner wagged his eyebrows suggestively to Keiichi, and this time when the student laughed it was honest.

"Nah, you can keep your tricks, Magic Man. I have enough problems in my life already with women. I don't need something else they can harp on my ass for." The youth took a long drag on his cigarette and smirked as the stranger laughed again.

"So is right!" The blonde proclaimed. "Troubles with the womans!" And with a resigned sigh Keiichi nodded. The foreigner nodded knowingly and slapped Keiichi on the back. "Come." He said as the youth sent him a dirty look. "Walk with me and we's talk of womans and ill wills."

Despite his initial dislike for the man upon five minutes ago, Keiichi allowed himself to be guided down the dark road. The cigarette tasted of tobacco and something sweet he didn't recognize, and as a feeling of fuzziness fluttered in his skull Keiichi wondered just what that sweet stuff was. A part of him was willing to bet it was illegal, but a larger portion of his mind was enjoying the feeling too much to care.

So what if he was catching glimpses of shadows that weren't shadows out of the corner of his eye? So what if he thought he saw a camcorder with shiny, fleshy legs standing on a pole, watching them with its huge camera lens? None of it was real-just the last dying phantoms of a bad dream, and Keiichi gave the odd electronic-with-legs a two-fingered salute before watching it hop away towards the shrine.

Snorting in amusement at the illusion's actions, the man took a long drag of his cigarette before glancing to his comrade. "What brand is this? These are pretty good."

"Take another for later." Blondie offered the box to Keiichi and the man grabbed a fresh stick and stuck it behind his ear. The foreigner then grinned his crazy grin before sprouting out a title that held a good many syllables with an accent so thick Keiichi couldn't make hide nor hair of the words. It certainly didn't sound German. The youth raised an eyebrow. "And in Japanese that translates to..."

He trailed off and Blondie shrugged, his grin never once showing signs of fading. "No translation." He said. "Is too good for that. Hard to fine. Is pricey, found only in one place."

"And that place is...?"

This time Blondie didn't respond, simply smiled and shrugged and laughed, and his smile infectious, Keiichi grinned too. "You're a strange one, buddy."

"Da." Blondie nodded in agreement, and Keiichi wondered just how much of what he'd said the man understood. "The problems of the womans now..." He trailed off and Keiichi found himself all too happy to pick up the piece.

The man took another long drag of his cigarette before releasing the smoke in a sigh. "I don't understand her." He muttered, his expression darkening for a brief moment. "I try and check to make sure she's okay, and she nails me for it. It doesn't make any sense."

"Da?"

"Yeah. And just when I start to think that things might be improving between us, like we're making some sort of progress in this fucking crazy-ass relationship we're stuck in, some stupid shit like this will happen and we're back at square one, at each other's throats like a couple of fucking wolves." The words came easily now that he vocalized them, and the old anger from before rose in his chest like a raging fire.

"It's just so fucking stupid!" He snapped, a fist clenching in rage. "Neither one of us want to be in this situation, but for whatever reason we're stuck together and nothing we do is going to end that fact! And no matter how much we smile and nod and play nice, we can still only barely tolerate each other."

Blondie actually seemed surprised by his confession, and at his expression Keiichi barked a noise that might have been a laugh, but just as easily could have been mistaken for a growl. "Yeah, hate to burst your bubble pal, but the two of us aren't like that. We never were and we never will be. I'd sooner date a ghost." He spat on the ground in emphasis. "The very idea of us being together is just..."

The man shuddered, igniting a laugh from his companion, who patted him on the back sympathetically. "That's a damned shame, Boy." The accent had faded somewhat, and Keiichi stared blinking at his comrade. "And here I thought I could use you against that wench."

"What?" Something about the words seemed wrong somehow, and he stared long and hard at the gaijin, and Blondie looked back with a large, toothy grin. The grin held long fangs and red eyes, very, very familiar red eyes, stared into brown.

"Oh...shit..."

"Looks like I'll have to find another use for you than simply as a weak point for Verthandi." The voice was rough and husky, and Keiichi wondered how he could have ever mistaken the woman in the fresh fatigues and new trench coat for a man. She didn't even look like a hobo when he took the time to think about it.

She sighed before removing her arm from his shoulders. "Oh well." The blonde snapped her fingers, and Keiichi heard a sharp ring pierce his mind, one that resounded in a white flash of pain, and Keiichi screamed as he fell to his knees. His hands went to his head and the cigarette fell from his mouth, and the woman stared down at him. She moved closer, crushing the fallen cigarette beneath a shiny black boot and dropping to one knee. A hand, the nails long and pointed and sharp, reached under Keiichi's chin and lifted it up, forcing the man to meet the woman's gaze.

Red markings reminiscent to the blue of Belldandy's, to those of Urd's, marred the blonde's face, and Keiichi felt himself break into a cold sweat. "I suppose I can still find a use for you though." She said, and as Keiichi looked into slit red eyes, he fought to ignore what his mind was telling him. Because his mind saw more than his eyes, and if he listened to what his mind was telling him was in front of him, Keiichi was certain he'd go mad.

"Well then, shall we begin?"

She leaned in and kissed him, and Keiichi knew no more.

Belldandy had returned to her bed after seeing Keiichi out of her room, his presence a negative vibe that she could follow too easily and watching in her mind's eye as he departed the house for the world beyond. Content to know she'd not have to deal with the heathen for at least a couple more hours, the goddess returned to her blankets with a sigh, closing her eyes and waiting for sleep to sweep her away once more.

It didn't.

She waited. Waited for a yawn to escape her lips or her eyes to flutter, yet neither of the sort came.

Instead Keiichi's face, enraged, pained, and terrified, flashed across her mind's eyes. The goddess grunted in irritation and rolled over, banishing the image from her mind and seeking out the dream-world she'd once been a part of only to fail miserably. Rather, Keiichi's face returned to her, and with a groan Belldandy tossed and turned, hoping to rid herself of the image and silently cursing the man for his presence in her mind.

It was guilt, she knew, that kept her from sleep, and after several minutes of no progress, with a frustrated growl Belldandy finally surrendered to her subconscious, rising with an aggravated mutter and making her way to the door.

So perhaps I was a little harsh with him when he entered my room. The brunette thought as she entered the hallway. But he'd scared me. He was not behaving as was the norm...The goddess paused in her thoughts. It was true. Keiichi hadn't been acting as was normal for him. In fact, if she thought back to it...

He'd been screaming. Something had scared him, for whatever other reason would he scream? The goddess frowned at the revelation, and the guilt that had swelled at the pit of her stomach grew uncomfortably. "I should apologize to him." She said to the darkness. "Surely there was a reason behind his fear."

Purposely she strode down the hall, dressed in little 'sides a nightgown she'd bought with Megumi on a shopping trip. The air was still and the house was silent so early in the morning, and Belldandy was reminded of the fact that Urd had left earlier in the week due to her business. Something had happened to one of her employees, Belldandy recalled, something that had left the elder sibling departing very quickly and with little warning. The darker woman had left an envelope with a thousand yen bill inside for any emergency funds and a phone number in case they needed to get in contact with the goddess, but otherwise had vanished without a trace.

Belldandy hoped whatever had happened, it wasn't too bad.

Something ran across her bare foot and with a start Belldandy looked down, catching sight of something small and dark scampering away from her. "A rat?" Belldandy murmured, brows furrowing together in confusion as she stared at the dark silhouette. "Since when did we have rats?" She could remember the mouse infestation from when she and Keiichi had first started fixing the shrine up. Around the same time she could remember hearing from someone, possibly Megumi or one of the students at the college, mentioning something of rats and mice never inhabiting the same territory. At the time, she'd figured the bit of information must have had some truth to it, for she'd never seen hide nor hair of the larger rodents so long as their mouse problem was present. Now though, with the sight of a rather large, raggedly rat hiding in the shadows of the morning, Belldandy began to wonder at the validity of that fact.

The creature turned to look up at her with beady red eyes, and Belldandy kneeled to better examine the creature. A corner of her lips tugged downward as she brought a hand out in front of her, offering it to the rodent. "Come here please." She ordered, using her Command Voice to ensure the creature's obedience. It had worked rather well on the residential mouse population to convince a majority of the little beasts to leave the shrine's territory and save Keiichi and the rodents the pain of mouse traps and rat poison, (something Keiichi had never learned of-he'd thought he'd gotten rid of them with a can of rodent repellent) yet while her Voice had worked on the mice, it did not work on the rat.

The rat stood still, continuing to stare at her with angry red eyes, and Belldandy frowned as a feeling of wrongness rose in her belly. "What is wrong?" She asked it. "Come here. I cannot have you in the shrine. Keiichi may try to go on a murderous rat rampage should he see you in our home. And I've no wish to see you dead any more than you wish to be killed, I'm certain." This time she beckoned to the rat as well, increasing the pressure on its mind minutely to encourage its obedience.

Not so much as a twitch.

Belldandy scowled, near-cursing the small rodent in her head while vocalizing, "Now what is this nonsense? For what reason do you disobey me?" Surely as a third-dimensional creature, the rat would obey her. She could think of no other reason why it would not, unless perhaps it was being directed under an entity that was higher-ranking than herself.

You are not our master.

The words came from the rat, not so much in the typical images, scents, and sounds that were so often used when communicating with a lesser-intelligence species, but with a full and complete sentence that only a creature of a rather high intelligence, such as a human, was capable of creating.

For a brief and comical two seconds, Belldandy gaped at the rat like a fish out of water, opening and closing her mouth as she sought out a proper response to the rat-that-was-not before finally finding her voice once more. "What is that supposed to mean?" Surely, she'd come across sentient rodents before-even rats had gods-but not in her times on the Assiah realm, and certainly not from one of the locals.

It means we do not listen to your words, Deity. This voice was different; used in the same sense of the rat before her, yet coming from above her head rather than in front of her. Belldandy looked up, and from the rafters hundreds of beady red eyes glared back. There were too many to count, the rats, sitting on wooden beams and peaking down from holes in the ceiling that did not exist the day prior.

A raging, hateful audience, they watched Belldandy in silence, their mad red eyes almost seeming to glow in the darkness. Only one moved, leaping-or was it falling?-from the rafters and landing on the wooden floor with a squishy plop. The goddess watched it warily as it rose easily to its feet, shaking itself before regarding the brunette with one red eye. The other held a yellow-white film over it that shown sickly in the darkness, and as the voice from above it addressed her.

We listen to none but our master. It said with a hiss. There is no reason to listen to one weaker than her.

The woman's gaze heavily focused on the one-eyed rat before her and its brethren above it, Belldandy never noticed the rat that had first gained her attention approach from behind. It crept up silently to the kneeling woman, and with a screech it sank its teeth into the woman's heel. The goddess shrieked in pain, leaping to her feet and lashing the assaulted limb out and against a wall. Both heel and rat struck the wood with a heavy thud, and the rat squealed before releasing its grip on Belldandy's flesh.

Its body crumpled to the floor, and as if it were some sort of signal the others followed, engulfing Belldandy in a wave of rat-flesh; a living wall of screeching, scratching, biting fur and teeth. They fell in her hair, covered her arms and fell into her nightgown, wriggling and squirming, biting and scratching at her bare flesh and screeching in her ears, and Belldandy screamed with them. The woman grabbed a handful of rats and threw them down the hall. More replaced them, and in the darkness of the hallway Belldandy could see those she'd thrown racing back towards her, doubled in size to that of a pack of small dogs, their claws growing long and sharp like talons and their gnawing teeth elongated and jagged like broken glass.

They leaped at her as one body, the large rats colliding with Belldandy and knocking her to the ground. The goddess hit the floor with a cry, and the rats swarmed on top of her. The woman twisted and squirmed beneath the creatures. One foot lashed out and kicked a rat into a wall, while a hand clawed at the eyes of one snapping its glass-teeth in front of her face.

There were too many of them. Too much noise, too many bodies, too much pain as they swarmed. She couldn't think, and it scared her, for if she couldn't think she couldn't concentrate, and if she couldn't concentrate then she couldn't call upon her magic.

Calm down. A voice that was not her own whispered in her mind. You're alright. You're okay Look, they aren't even hurting you-not really. Holy Bell's voice was a calm light that eased the panic bubbling in Belldandy's throat, and the goddess listened to her angel's words, looking to her body and noting for the first time that for all the bites and scratches, Belldandy did not bleed.

The rats are weak, Belldandy. Holy Bell continued. For all their numbers, they are still rodents, and you are still a god. On the fringes of her mind, Belldandy saw a pale hand reach out to her. Now come, lets rid the shrine of these pests. And in her mind the woman reached for the hand and grabbed it.

A wave of calm swept through her like a warm breeze, causing the fear and panic to vanished. In their place magic flowed, magic that Belldandy called to and that responded like an old friend.

With a shout and a sweep of the hand, a wave of magic-induced wind slammed into a portion of the rats, sending the creatures flying off the goddess's body in a chorus of screeches. Some hit the walls, others the ceiling while more still flew far off into the darkness of the shrine hallway. Another slash, followed by more screeches, and Belldandy found enough of the creatures off her body that she could pick herself up from the ground once more.

She stood, and as she did the woman felt the warmth of another from her back, and together Belldandy and Holy Bell fought, throwing wave after magic wave across the goddess's body until not a single rat remained on her person.

Here she watched the rats retreat, screeching and swarming across each other like a black, living stream into the darkness of the shrine once more. Goddess and angel watched them depart, Belldandy taking a moment to gather her breath and feeling Holy Bell sink into her back with a relieved sigh. Thank-you. She thought silently, heart still ramming in her ears, and now she could feel her body trembling from the unprovoked attack.

Her nightgown was in tatters yet the flesh beneath was unmarred, and the goddess took long and steady breaths in the hopes of calming her nerves. "Change." She spoke aloud, hearing a voice that quivered nervously. "I need to change." Yes...That was a good idea. Change into a fresh set of clothes not lined with holes. Go out and make certain Keiichi was okay. Then return and maybe set out some mouse traps and rat poison.

"Yes...I think maybe Keiichi would like that. We'll make it the project for the shrine today-rid the house of the new rat infestation." The goddess laughed, but the sound was dry and fake in her ears, so she stopped.

The woman turned around to venture back to her room only to pause, once more finding herself under the scrutiny of the one-eyed rat from before. It shivered and twitched before her, and the Norn took a step back, sensing something abnormal swirling around the small creature. Itts body suddenly spasmed violently, sending the beast into a writhing shriek in front of her. Bones popped and snapped, springing from the furry hide of the rat like great white spears as muscle twitched and rippled underneath.

It was growing, mutating, into what Belldandy had no idea other than the fact that it was bad. Fur bristled and hardened into black and jagged spires. A hard shell enveloped the area where its eyes once were, and it faced her with an elongated maw, the jaw parting and revealing curved teeth the size of knives.

"Oh...fu-dear..." Belldandy near-cursed, and the creature that had once been a rat bellowed at her. It reared up on its hind legs, its monstrous black head scraping the ceiling as it swiped at her with a large, taloned hand. Belldandy stumbled back, the claws slashing through the air where her head had been a second ago. The beast snarled and lunged at the goddess, and the brunette let out a shriek as what must have been over two-hundred pounds of monster-flesh descended upon her smaller form.

A sharp clang rang through the air, followed by a noise that couldn't decide if it was a whimper or a scream as Belldandy held the staff above her head. Arms trembling with exertion, Belldandy thrust the golden object further against the monster, and the rings connected to the hoop at the end jingled happily.

Thank-you Almighty. Thank-you thank-you THANK-YOU! There had been times in the past, when the Goddess Hotline had still been new, where unarmed deities had been attacked by demons or some malevolent spirit once descended, and after a rather nasty incident where a goddess had almost been crippled, the Almighty had made a rule stating it mandatory for all deities working the hotline to be armed before a descent.

Initially, Belldandy had been quite dissatisfied with the idea; a goddess with little love for weapons in general, the idea of carrying one near her at the office, on her should she descend, had left a nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach. The Nornd believed she'd never need to use such an object, especially as, with the passing of time, the attacks came less and less often to the point where it was rare for any entity to be attacked no matter the dimension.

Yet now, with the jaws of a monstrous beast snapping inches from her face and held back by little 'sides a golden staff shoved into its chest, Belldandy found herself counting her blessings. It wasn't much of a weapon, true, having chosen what looked to have been the least threatening in the inventory, but it met her needs, and now Belldandy slowly forced the monster back, even as it shrieked and pushed against the staff in defiance.

Belldandy found herself capable of little speech aside from a grunt as she struggled against it, her arms buckling threateningly even as her mind raced to find a way out of the stalemate. Magic amplifier, magic amplifier, how did those Valkyries say it worked again? Her heart was thrumming heavily in her ears and she could feel her arms bend as slowly, the beast gained the advantage.

No time to panic Love, ignore the monster and think. You know how to use it-Sigrun said it was like riding a bike-do it once and you'll never forget. Holy Bell whispered, and Belldandy sent a mental glare to the angel.

That's not helping!

There was a brief moment of silence from her other-half, and Belldandy feared the angel had decided to abandon the goddess in her panic. ...Have you tried just casting a spell?

The brunette's mouth formed in an 'oh' of realization, and where once a rat-monster-thing had been ready to gnaw on her head like a piece of cheese, now a large and gaping hole in the roof remained, with bits and pieces of broken wood and plaster falling to the ground in front of the goddess.

As the last bit of her magic faded from the staff, Belldandy lowered the weapon in front of her, staring at it fondly. "You know, at first I didn't really like you." She told it, a giggle that sounded hysteric rising from her throat. "Now I think I've changed my mind. It's rather nice having you around." She rubbed her cheek against the cool metal affectionately before turning her gaze to the new sun roof she'd just made. The woman's expression darkened. "And just when we'd finally moved out of the trailer too." She said mournfully. "Keiichi isn't going to like this..."

From behind her, the chatter and screech of hundreds of rats met her ears, and once more Belldandy turned, making out dark silhouettes and sparkling red eyes against the dim light that now filled the hallway. She saw several move towards her, and heard a recognizable snap, crackle, pop as those dark shapes began to grow.

Several near-curses rose from Belldandy's throat once more, and the goddess found herself backing away from the encroaching creatures. Please no. Not here, not in the shrine, not after we've nearly restored it...The goddess was in the light of the morning day now, and as the first weak rays of light draped across her body the woman looked up, pausing only long enough to glance from the hole and to the monsters, larger now to the point of walking in pairs, shoulders scraping each other and either side of the hallway as they approached and only seeming to grow larger by the second.

And then the goddess was gone, bounding out of the building through the hole in the roof and to the world beyond. The woman landed in the stone courtyard beyond, and she glanced warily behind her, maneuvering her staff to face the hole in the roof, the first words of a spell on her tongue as she waited for that first black head to pop out.

Yet nothing of the sort happened, and after five minutes of tense anticipation Belldandy cautiously lowered the staff to her side with a sigh. "They aren't going to leave the shrine, are they?" She asked no one in particular, and likewise, no one responded, leaving the goddess to shake her head in disapproval. "Mouse traps." She decided, turning and taking a step to the stairs of the shrine. "Lots and lots of mouse traps." The goddess stumbled, she was trembling so bad, and quickly Belldandy used her staff to catch herself before she fell.

For a long moment the brunette remained motionless, both hands gripping tight the staff in front of her as she took big gulps of air. "Almighty Bless it!" She cried, sliding to her knees and covering her face with one hand. "That...that was too much!" the woman's voice rose and cracked in her agitation, yet Belldandy couldn't bring herself to care. "What were...what are those...those things doing in the shrine?"

It doesn't matter. A flash of a memory, one that now felt like it happened a lifetime ago, slid across her vision. Keiichi's cries, the fear in his eyes, filled her mind's eye for long moment. "He saw them..." Belldandy whispered, and as the vision parted a feeling of resolve filled her being. Now's not the time to fall apart. Come. You've been through worse. Save the breakdown until after you know Keiichi is safe.

With a grunt the goddess carefully picked herself back up, ragged nightgown and all. Leaning against her staff for support, she looked over her shoulder and back at the shrine. From the darker crevices of the shrine and resting in the shadows where no light shone through, Belldandy saw them; the creatures disguised as rats, some small and rat-like with their beady mad eyes, others large and lumbering black giants, little more than giant gaping mouths smiling hungrily at her.

"Been through worse, you say?" She murmured. "I wonder at that..."

They aren't coming after you. It looks like they're restricted to the shadows.

"I'll need to come up with a way to get rid of those creatures before nightfall then."

Laughter, rough and feminine, erupted from above her head. "Good luck with that, Girlie." Belldandy turned to the owner of the source, meeting the inquisitive red gaze of the woman whom it belonged to. She sat on the red tori that stood above the steps leading down to the road below, and when Belldandy's eyes met her own she smiled, revealing elongated canines. "You haven't been paying attention to the weather forecast, have you?" The stranger pointed to the sky above, and Belldandy followed the finger up, seeing a red-tinged sunrise sky with thick,billowing clouds painted orange in the morning light. "You've got a heavy chance of rain today, Verthandi...or is it Belldandy now?"

"Marller..." The name came out a whisper, and suddenly the goddess was cold.

It had nothing to do with her outfit.

"You...What are you doing here?" The woman's gaze darted over her shoulder to the beasts in the shades and shadows, than back to Marller. "What do you want from me?"

The blonde chuckled, lightly kicking the air with a fatigue-dressed leg that dangled from the tori. "Ah...that was one thing I always liked about you, Belldandy. You may not be the brightest bulb in the pack, but you catch on quick." The intruder snapped her fingers, the sound loud enough that Belldandy could easily hear it despite the distance separating the two. With it came a hush, and suddenly Keiichi appeared in front of the goddess, falling to the ground without so much as a grunt.

"Keiichi!" Eyes wide with alarm the goddess rushed to the fallen mortal, kneeling beside the man and resting a hand on his shoulder. Keiichi flinched away at her touch, and a low, pained groan escaped his throat. Immediately the woman removed her hands from the man, and she sent a withering glare to the one regarding them from the tori. "What have you done to him?" She demanded. "What did you do to Keiichi?"

The woman shrugged her shoulders. "Oh just a little this and a little that." She replied lightly. "Really, your man's fine...at least for the moment."

"Marller..." There was a warning tone in Belldandy's voice, and the blonde chuckled.

"Don't you talk to your higher-ups like that, Belldandy." The fanged woman wagged a finger at the goddess in disapproval. "Don't you have any respect for higher authorities?"

"Not when they're demons like you, Marller."

Another bought of laughter escaped the demon's throat. "Ah, touche little goddess. I suppose I'll have to let it pass then."

Belldandy clenched her fists, biting her lower lip as she fought back a scream. "Stop toying with me Marller." She hissed. "What did you do to Keiichi and what are you after that will undo it?"

The demon sighed loudly. "Aww...you're no fun." She pouted. "But then, you never had your sister's sense of humor, did you?" Something that might have almost passed for a growl rose in Belldandy's throat. The demon grinned at the goddess's frustration. "If you want to know what I did to him, all you have to do is look behind you."

Belldandy paled at the demon's words, and slowly she looked behind her. One of the many beasts that had attacked her snapped its large jaws at her, and what sounded eerily similar to human laughter escaped the throat of another. "Now, I can't say much about my little pets over there other than the fact that the metamorphosis from human to Rakshasa is...painful, to say the least..." The demon continued, even as Belldandy turned her gaze to the pained form of the man before her. "...however it is preventable...for a price."

The goddess grit her teeth. "And what would that price be, Marller?"

The smile faded from the demon's face and the laughter died from her cat red-eyes. "I want your access code." The amusement had died, replaced with a certain characteristic reminiscent of a cat. One that had grown bored playing with its food and was moving in for the kill. "And I want Yggdrasil's access code, Verthandi. Not the access code to your room. Not the access code to your locker. Yggdrasil's."

Belldandy swallowed. Her mouth felt dry and her heart was in her ears. "I can't do that, Marller." She said, feeling her heartbeat quicken as the demon above her narrowed her eyes. "That's one thing I can't-I won't let you bully me into, even with what you did to Keiichi."

Marller's eyes flashed dangerously and Belldandy tensed, certain the demon was going to attack. And then the anger vanished, and the blonde leaned back with a smile. "Alright." She said with a shrug. "Fine. Have it your way. I'll let you and your little boy toy think it over for a while." The woman crawled onto her feet, standing atop the tori and crossing her arms over her chest. "Just remember Belldandy. I'll not be leaving this realm until I get what I want."

With that the woman leaped off her platform, back flipping and vanishing into the air, leaving Belldandy alone with a fallen mortal and the large pack of evil spirits watching her from the shadows. The goddess looked around, watching as one of the large lumbering beasts took a step out of the shadow of the shrine. When nothing happened and the Rakshasa dared another step, Belldandys' eyes drifted to the heavens, where the sun, free from it's climb across the mountains, found itself instead obscured by clouds.

"Oh no." Light blue eyes darted back to the monster. It was approaching her slowly, and behind it more of the beast's brethren joined it; and army of hard black flesh and glistening white fangs creeping towards Belldandy and Keiichi. "No no no no."

The leader broke into a run.

The others followed.

And as a stampede of evil spirits charged a goddess close to hysteria and a mortal in the process of becoming a Rakshasa, Belldandy wrapped her arms around Keiichi and closed her eyes.