Chap. 1: Stalk (Part 1)
Kaoru gets out from her slumber when she heard a noise. Kouga has returned. And about time too, it's almost five in the morning.
She waits for him for a while. Nothing. Intrigued, she gets up from the bed and goes downstairs. He has settled in the sofa, fully clothed, shoes and coat as well.
She turns on the light. He tightens his eyelids as a protest, before to open his eyes. Those dark circles under there... He has spent the whole day and night chasing horrors, and there are already ten days. He needs a break, but it is a taboo subject, and she chooses to say nothing about. She approaches the sofa and he sits to make room to her.
“Why don’t you come to bed?” she says.
“Why?” Kouga answers dully.
“Even if only for an hour, you should to try relaxing. Come on, go upstairs”. She puts her hands on her hips. “And, I won’t take a NO for an answer”.
A hint of a smile of his, followed of he to his feet, get Kaoru satisfied. A nice change. The last few days he had a very bad mood, and apparently, now he is too tired even for that.
Upstairs, she aims to help him to undress, but he rejects her. She makes him to lie on bed face down, and then she massages his back. Kouga purrs gently, before becoming deeply asleep. It is a good sign, he is again comfortable before her, his thoughts do not worry about her. But for he does not like at all the horrors feed themselves from her... But Kaoru gives no option to choose. No, if the Makai Knights no longer are enough to keep them at bay.
She lies beside him, covers both bodies with the quilt and watches his face, which would be beautiful if it was not so uptight. She places her finger between his eyebrows and keeps it there until it relaxes. Then she strokes his head, very slowly, as if unwilling ofdishevelled, but she somehow wants to show how much she needs him, how much she suffers in seeing him so exhausted, and with so little hope that things will change.
Before she can go back to sleep, his well trained biological clock wakes up Kouga, just in time for his morning training session. She wonders if he could finish it, especially if he will have time to have breakfast. He can remain some days without sleepping, but he can not spare many meals, and lately he has been forced to avoid six ones.
As Kouga walks determined to the training room, she goes to the kitchen, where she learns from Gonza how to prepare some decent and nutritious breakfast. The butler remains still, with the old coffee pot half-closed between his hands, watching the television.
“What is it?” she asks.
“A man has been teared off an arm by a bite”. His voice does not hide his concern. “Too long ago we had no evidence of the Bariri horrors... aside the experiences you notify to us, ma'am. Why they shows themselves now?”
Kaoru makes a slight sigh.
“Opposite to the usual horrors, the Bariri doesn’t like much human flesh. Usually they only make some small attacks: a puncture, cut, to sink a fang as maximum, just to get some few drops of blood and to copy the fellow. They realized that if they call our attention they can be located. I think that specific horror hasn’t found another way of feeding itself”.
As Gonza returns to the task of closing the coffee pot, Kaoru's heart contracts. That horror only has eaten one arm. When survival needs make Bariri to change their diet, the world will become a battleground between species. Only she is still able to perceive disguised Bariris as she feels a magnetic pull, but they have to find a less personal way to identify them.
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