13. Circus Charlie (End)
13. Circus Charlie (End)
Charlie couldn't tell where the current was sweeping him. He couldn't even tell which way was up. Water kept flooding into his lungs, but the concepts of drowning or suffocation couldn't break through to his mind. His consciousness was sinking just as deep as his body.
In the absolute darkness, he saw a night sky ablaze with countless stars. His brain was misinterpreting the pain signals from his optic nerves as light. Every time his cells screamed from oxygen deprivation, a flash seared across his vision. He felt himself hurtling toward a sea of stars.
Swimming through that void, he crash-landed on a solitary planet. A dull *thud* jolted through his body. A few fragmented words surfaced in his groggy mind.
Acrobat, demon, space, death... They converged into a single thought.
...Wonderland?
He forced his eyes open and looked around. But there were no masked residents, no fireworks and kites filling the sky, no jubilant music. He was still adrift in a wet darkness. The only difference was the color and number of the starlight. The golden flashes were gone, replaced by two jewel-red stars gazing down at him. He realized they were a pair of human eyes just before consciousness left him.
The owner of those eyes stared down at his unconscious body and licked her blood-red lips.
"Came here on business, and I stumble across something entertaining."
A massive underground waterfall thundered down. They were at the bottom of a colossal cylindrical cavity dozens of meters across.
If Charlie had been lucid, he would have recognized the place instantly. He knew every hidden space beneath the school. The underground current had swept him to the lowest level of the reservoir that collected Yeterinpurk's rainwater. A few dozen meters straight up was the very spot where Reina and Viola had just dueled on the tightrope.
"What makes someone hate him that badly? Jealousy? Hm, I think we'll get along."
The woman looking down at Charlie had skin white as theatrical powder. Her lips, by contrast, were red as fresh blood. The most striking feature was the pair of wings rising from her back—each as large as a human torso, jet-black like a crow's.
After studying him for a long moment, she made a startled face and hurriedly hauled him out of the water. He wasn't breathing. He'd swallowed far too much water.
"Damn it, this one's stopped breathing. Hoo... Well, I've got no choice. Mouth-to-mouth it is."
She caught his limp body and pressed her lips to his. Blowing breath into his mouth was unmistakably a lifesaving act, but the thick sensuality running through her every motion made it look indecently carnal. Her red tongue explored every corner of his mouth like a serpent.
"Cough, hack—gahk—hurgh."
Not long after her kiss, Charlie convulsed, vomiting up the water that had blocked his airway. But his awareness hadn't yet returned.
The winged woman stroked his hair with her fingers, as if handling a cute puppy. Her name was Latena Rasen, known in the underworld as the Crow Witch. She was also the vice president of Comprachicos, a merchant company that manufactured and sold children. She had come to this city for one reason: to track down the Starlight.
Her subordinates should have acquired all five bottles of Starlight that had gone up for auction in Vegas weeks ago. But someone had bid several times the market price for one of them.
The private auction house was meticulous about guarding client information, so tracing the bidder hadn't been easy. Only weeks after the gavel fell had they finally identified the buyer as an imperial duke.
Starlight, a byproduct of the Trill manufacturing process, granted non-BioMancers the power to manipulate Devolut. To Comprachicos, it was the single most critical asset. They needed Devolut to shape children to their clients' specifications. For something that precious, the vice president herself taking the field was hardly an overreaction. But upon arriving in Yeterinpurk, she'd discovered it had fallen into unexpected hands.
Frank Wonderstein.
Ratena hadn't seen him in a long time. Though she now ran Comprachicos, he remained its owner on paper. The organization itself had originally been his creation—founded to supply test subjects for mastering Devolut manipulation. It was like how shaping clay to someone else's specifications built pottery skill faster than idly kneading it for no purpose. Over the decade-plus he'd been with the organization, Wonderstein had molded many children into products.
Once she reached Yeterinpurk, Ratena spent some time lurking near him, observing. They had been colleagues once, but facing him directly was uncomfortable. He had wanted to leave her once he'd achieved his goal of mastering Devolut. Worse, he'd even intended to dismantle the organization they'd built together.
She had refused, of course. The Rabbit Bitch was now leading a massive organization called the Voodoo Cult, and the Snake Bitch had wormed her way into the heart of the Imperial Palace. She wasn't about to be the only one who surrendered her power. The three of them were loving sisters, yes—but they were also rivals, each competing to be the little brother's most respected big sister. For that, you needed power.
Not that her insistence on keeping Comprachicos had been purely practical. Resentment at being abandoned by her little brother had its share. So they'd fought bitterly and parted ways, and to this day, not a single letter had passed between them.
Even apart, news of him kept reaching her. The other two sisters sent her boastful letters every month. The subtly preening tone of those letters was, of course, nearly unbearable.
But even those two had stopped sending word six months ago. The man had apparently gone underground the moment he entered the Circus Grand Prix. That had been rather satisfying—until the silence began to gnaw at her.
Wonderstein had been created after the three sisters. The Creator had called him the worst failure and left him to rot, not even bothering to name him. So the three sisters had taken pity on him. He had no sense for reading people, no tact for dealing with them—frustrating to the point of exasperation—and that only made them worry more.
Then, in the midst of all that, she'd run into him here. Truth be told, when the Starlight had been traced to Yeterinpurk, part of why she'd volunteered was a private hope that she might see him.
But watching the way he lived now, Ratena didn't feel glad. She felt fury. Surrounded by women, laughing and carrying on like that. Every tail-wagging fox sidling up to her little brother was transparent.
"Guhk... wh-where am I?"
The moment she saw Charlie's eyes open, Ratena yanked the goggles that had been resting on her forehead back down over her eyes. The red he'd seen hadn't been her real eyes—only the reflection in her lenses. She'd worked a gem-shaped magic tool into the goggles, one that could scramble a target's mind. With them, she could manipulate the psyche of anyone she made eye contact with.
"Now then, who are you?"
She started with an easy question. From the looks of it, this one had some connection to that woman who was the Deputy Leader. Depending on the situation, he might make a useful piece for driving a wedge between the two of them.
Charlie's mind was a wreck. The self-loathing of having finally lost the girl he loved had driven him to reject his own name. In that state, he seized on the description that suited him best.
'A man who is trying to kill me.'
'I called this man Mysterious.'
Eyes unfocused, Charlie glared at Ratena and answered through clenched teeth.
"I... am the one who kills Wonderstein..."
"My name... is Mysterious..."
Ratena burst into a hearty laugh. The audacity of him—daring to speak of killing Wonderstein. Ridiculous, of course, but maybe giving him a little push wouldn't hurt. She could see talent there. A bit of help, and he could menace those foxes skulking around her brother. A perfect surprise gift for her heartless little brother.
She rapped a fist against her crow-headed helmet and glanced behind her. She'd been aware of the presence watching her from the corner for a while now.
"And who are you?"
"Nngh."
The moment their eyes met, Viola froze. The power radiating from those jewel-red lenses stripped away control of her body. Her mouth moved in faithful obedience to the other woman's command.
"My name is Viola. I'm Charlie's... friend."
"That 'friend' came a beat too late. You like him, don't you?"
"...Yes."
Viola was stunned at herself, spilling a truth she'd never told anyone. The woman clearly had the power to dominate people.
"How did you get all the way down here?"
"The animals Charlie raises can find their master."
"Ook-kah-kah!"
The monkey clinging to Viola's back poked its head out and bared its teeth at Ratena. But it didn't dare make a move toward her.
Ratena looked at the monkey and grinned.
"You and I used the same method."
She spread one of the wings on her back. A snow-white owl burst out from within it. Not long ago, while observing Wonderstein, she'd found this owl falling under a hawk's attack, picked it up, and nursed it back to health. Then she'd placed it under hypnosis to follow her commands. This creature was how she'd found Charlie.
Charlie thought he'd been swept into this place shortly after the underground current swallowed him. In truth, he'd been drifting through the reservoir unconscious for hours—until the upper sluice gates opened, the current had kept forcing water into his lungs, and Ratena had finally pulled him out.
Viola fixed her glare on Ratena. Winged, wielding sinister magic—a dangerous woman. But when Viola recalled the sight of her stealing Charlie's lips, courage surged through her.
"Wh-what are you planning to do to Charlie?"
"Hm, so his name's Charlie? Good I found someone who knows him. When you're brainwashing a person, painting over an existing picture works better than starting with a blank canvas. Especially with a grown one like this. You're coming with me. You'll tell me everything about him."
Viola looked at Charlie's battered body. To save him, to get out of this place in one piece, she had no choice but to rely on this woman's power. Even if she refused, the woman could simply force her compliance. Since it would come to that anyway, Viola decided to press her luck.
"I have a condition."
"A condition?"
"This brainwashing of yours... can you paint over it with something I want too?"
"Oho."
Catching her meaning, Ratena studied her with an amused expression and then nodded.
"Of course."
With the still-hypnotized, dazed Charlie between them, the two women exchanged smiles.
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Circus Charlie (End)