A doctor's carriage made its way through the dark, rainy city, as it stopped in front of a large manor. The doctor comes out; wearing a wide brimmed hat, a white lab coat, and a face mask to prevent inhaling whatever contagions might be airborne (he really wears it to cover the lower half of his missing face). He enters the manor, and is greeted by a uniformed man.

"The King thanks you for showing up Doctor. He is in the room upstairs, I'll escort you there." The doctor shakes his long thin finger at him.

"That won't be necessary, I've been here countless times before" he replied with his cheerful smile. "I won't be long." The man nods, and shuts the door behind him. The doctor's metal tools clinked in the bag, as he made his way up the stairs. He turned the doorknob to the room of the patient and walked in silently. The warrior-king gave him a cold look, as he made his way to the bed. "How long has he been like this?"

"About three days…" he replied solemnly. "What's the matter with him?"

"I haven't even begun to examine the patient yet, Will. I doubt you'd want you son to perish due to somebodies hastiness. Now what symptoms has he experience?"

"He's been in a coma for three days! What else do you need to know?" boomed King Will.

"Ah, still trying to intimidate me? I believe you remember what happened last time" hissed the doctor, removing his face mask. King Will flinched at seeing Dr. Zane's face. His nose was missing, and everything below it was exposed bone. The doctor's smirk literally stretched ear to ear, as he took out a long needle from the medical bag. "This ought to do the trick! I'll just poke him here, and inject him with the medicine, aaaannnnd…there!" Just then, the patient began to cough.

"What did you do to him?" asked the King. "How'd you already know what to inject him with?"

"Well, let's see… I'm a doctor, and, well, you're not. Does that answer your question?" he asked sarcastically, placing his mask back on. Will furrowed his brow in anger, but remained silent for a moment.

"Thank you doctor, your services are no longer needed. Please see yourself out" He gritted through his teeth. He looked over to his son, and closed his eyes in thought. 'If there was anybody else in this world that could help my son, I'd have that bastard killed!' Little did he know that Zane could hear his every thought.

"How cute," he said aloud. "He thinks he could kill me. It seems somebody's status has gotten to his stupid bald head." He climbed in his carriage, and began small talk with the other person inside. "Sorry about that, if I don't keep his brat alive, he'd start a world war."

"It's fine, doctor," replied the woman. Her voice was timid, almost a whisper. "Shall we return to the lab?"

"Yes, we need to continue to try to find out the whereabouts of subject Erica. It's a matter of time before subject Elizabeth tells us where she has hidden her."

"Well, doctor, she doesn't seem to be cracking under the procedures I've run on her."

"I know that, she's been a tough nut to crack. But what we need right now, is a little incentive." The woman looked up at the doctor; her eyes wide and watery, and face scared and desperate. "I'm afraid that it's necessary. I know you've grown somewhat attached to our subject, but remember, she is the one responsible for the death of you friends, and, should I add, lover." Her eyes hardened as images began to flash through her head. Zane rubbed her back sympathetically, as she cried silently. They rode off, as the rain continued to fall heavily.

A few days later, in another city, two men run into an alley, with two bags on their backs. They ran through the streets, with amazing skills jumping over any and every obstacle they came across. Soon, the police fell far behind and they were home free. One removed his mask, and his messy red hair went all over the place.

"I don't know how you wear these all the time, Kira. How is my sexy face going to be seen if I have this on everywhere I go?"

"It's because my face is so divine that only people with pure hearts can look upon my gorgeous features without bursting into flames" replied Kira. He removed his mask as well, but had on another underneath it that covered everything save his eyes.

"Whatever. You know my face is sexier."

"Shut up Zero" he replied. "Let's just get back to the kids." The two brothers nodded, and rushed back to the warehouse the called home. They never used the doors, since they were welded shut, but used the skylight instead. As they silently landed, they heard a young boy's voice.

"Raven! They're home!" The two brothers were then flanked by a sixteen year old boy with snow white hair, and an evil look to his eyes, and a thirteen year old, jet black haired girl with a timid stance and facial expression. "What'd you get us?"

"Well first of all, food, so you don't die" replied Zero, as he messed up the teenager's hair.

"And we also brought you some more clothes," added Kira, "Since obviously you've outgrown what you already have."

"Really that's it?" asked Chaos ungratefully. "No weapons, no explosives?" The timid girl smiled, and walked over closer to the three boys.

"Thank you Kira and thank you Zero" she said in a soft voice. The two brothers glanced at her, and then back at Chaos.

"Why can't you be polite like your sister?" they asked in unison. Chaos groaned.

"I'm not her that's why. Besides, it's not like I cause any trouble like I used to. You guys shout be thanking me."

"Thanks, brat" said Zero sarcastically. Chaos rolled his eyes, and walked over to a crate.

"Well, when are we going to start our sparring sessions again? I really want to be able to fight like you Zero" he said to his idol. Chaos would never say it out loud, but he really looked up to the two brothers, and how strong they were. Everything they did, they did it in perfect synchronization and it simply amazed him. He and Raven work well together, but not like Zero and Kira did. They'd tell him that it comes with time and practice, so he's been trying to get in as much practice in as little time he could.

"We don't know when we could start again," admitted Kira. "We haven't found a new place to train."

"Why can't we train here?" asked Chaos. "This place is big enough."

"It is, but we live here," said Zero, "and we are in the middle of the city. If something goes out of range, we could hurt somebody." Chaos frowned, and looked over to Raven.

"Well, maybe we could go out and find another place" he suggested. Raven looked away, and stared at her new clothes.

"Not after what happened last time. You nearly got caught by some religious extremist and almost got killed!" reminded Zero.

"Well I didn't" retorted Chaos. "Besides that was a long time ago. I can take care of myself now."

"Then why do you need the training sessions?" asked Kira, smiling behind his mask.

"Because I want to be stronger! I want to be able to fight you two, and win!" he exclaimed. The two brothers looked at each other for a second.

"That's one hell of a goal," said Zero. Kira nodded in agreement. "But we aren't exactly the strongest people in the world; even together we're not even close. The people we have seen, and fought while working for Project IV, are much stronger than us two any day of the week." Raven's attention suddenly shot towards the conversation.

"Then how did you beat them?" she asked. Kira and Zero looked over to her, then back at Chaos, who was nodding his head for them to answer her.

"We had help," began Kira, "from some old friends."

"Who?" she asked again.

"From our old Squad," replied Zero. "We used to be in a group of five people with supernatural powers. I was the leader, followed by a woman code named One, then my brother here, Kira, then a woman code named Four and finally a beasty guy code named Five. We didn't use our real names at the time, but we've split up."

"What were their real names?" asked Chaos.

"Well, my brother's is Shini," replied Kira. "One's is Marilyn, Four's was Elizabeth, and Five's is Bruce."

"Oh…" replied Raven thoughtfully. She pondered for a second then asked, "Why did you say Four's was Elizabeth? What happened to her?"

"We don't know…" replied Zero solemnly. "She just disappeared after the war, before we found you two in that village." Raven flinched at the memory, as Chaos simply scowled. Though that was the first day of the lives they were currently living, they both resented the events of that day. "We lost contact with them after that." Chaos looked down at the ground briefly, but Kira caught it.

"What's the matter, kid?"

"It's my fault you guys split up…" he started, but Zero cut him off.

"No, don't ever say that. We split up because of my decision, not because you and your sister are vampires. Nobody should be treated differently for being seen as something they aren't. You two are amazing kids, and anybody who says differently just because of what you two are, will be killed right where they stand." Zero's voice was fierce, and it caused the two vampires to look at him slightly scared. Kira, however just put his hand on his brother's shoulder and calmed him down. "sorry, about that, I just hate those assholes who judge people so quickly." With that, he left off to his room, and Chaos to his.

"Why was he so touchy about what Chaos said?" asked Raven. Kira ran his hand through his hair, and sighed.

"It's a long story, Rave." She walked over to him, and sat next to him, hugging his arm. "Alright, fine" he said, starting many years ago.

The eternal red sky, with black clouds covered the Shadow Dimension. It would be terrifying to many, but for the two, who lived there, was called home. Though the trees were withered and dry, they would occasionally bear fruit. Granted they were normally tasteless, or even bitter. Across the meadow of this dark world, was a grand castle, where in it, resides Riku, the Shadow Mage and his beloved pupil and lover, Stacie the Dark Enchantress. Despite their titles, they were kind. Tonight Stacie wanted to visit Serikodo again, to see if anything new was going on. Stacie wore combat boots, black jeans, a light blue shirt, under a short black jacket. She also wore an old necklace she has had for more than twelve years. Riku wore a black cloak, which for the most part, didn't protect much, black boots, white cargo pants, and a white long sleeved shirt. Although Stacie didn't like it when Riku wore masks over his face, he insisted on it when they left the Shadow Palace, do to the scar on his face, and uncommonly piercing red eyes. The two walked through the front gates, and into a portal that was darker than a moonless midnight sky.

"Where did you want to go?" asked Riku.

"I don't know, let's just go somewhere love!" she said happily. Riku wasn't a huge fan of pet names, but Stacie called him whatever she felt like. She was cool like that, and it didn't bother him as much as he thought it would. By that, he means he's gotten used to it.

"Alright, lead the way." Stacie grabbed his hand, and dragged him down the road, as his mind began to wander.

"So I was thinking, that we could find a new toilet seat for the castle. Ooh, and maybe if we're lucky we'll find a store that sells those cool looking pencils that glow in the dark, and that paper where if you crumple it up, it sets on fire! What do you think?"

"Why do we need a new toilet seat exactly?" asked Riku completely baffled. "What's wrong with the one we have now?"

"It broke after you tried to stand on it to kill that spider a few weeks ago. I told you to stand on the lid, but nooo, you just have to do everything the hard way. Oh and don't forget, we need new clips for the shower curtain, we, heh, broke them, remember?" she said with a blush. Riku just smiled behind his mask.

"Yea, I remember. We should buy a bunch, since they always seem to be breaking. Or just not get any at all, nobody else lives in our castle." Stacie looked back with an arched eyebrow. "Fine, we'll buy a bunch." They decided to go to the city of Shigai, a densely populated city; or it was. When they arrived, it seemed that the streets have been deserted. They had been here a few years back, and it was busy, populated and hard to navigate through, but now it there were only a few people, who seemed to take everything as some sort of omen. One man was in his shop, but he looked shaken.

"What's wrong with this place?" asked Riku. Stacie shrugged and hugged his arm as they walked on. "It seems like there has been some kind of disaster around here." They looked around more, and noticed that they were being followed by a young boy. Stacie turned to him, as greeted him politely.

"Hello, Stacie, Riku" said the boy. The two of them glanced at each other, then back at the boy. "You two don't know me."

"Then how do you know us? We don't come here often enough to be remembered." The boy looked at Riku, as if his mask wasn't even there.

"You two have changed quite a bit" he said. Stacie was about to ask what he meant by that, but the boy suddenly took off, weaving through the alleys. The tried to chase him down, but they lost him in quickly. "What's wrong with this place? Everything is so strange."

"Shut up…" hissed Stacie, under her breath; her thoughts were suddenly filled with hateful images of Riku.

"What are you talking about?" asked Riku. He looked over to Stacie, whose head was arched down, and eyes staring through her hair. Riku walked over to her, and placed his hand on her shoulder. She grabbed his wrist, and flipped him to the ground.

"Don't touch me!" she shouted viciously. She then twisted him arm behind him, forcing him to stay on the ground.

"What's wrong with you?" shouted Riku, struggling to get free. Stacie twisted him arm even further, causing him to grunt in pain. "Stacie!"

"SHUT UP!" her voice boomed. Suddenly, a teenage girl tackled Stacie off of Riku. Caught off guard, Stacie fell to the ground easily. The other girl suddenly had her back to the ground, and Stacie grabbed her neck with a single hand, choking the life out of her. Riku then sprang into action, casting a dark spell that shot Stacie into the wall nearly making it crumble. "Why would you do this to me," she asked struggling to get up. Riku rushed to her side, to help her to her feet, but the other girl stopped him.

"Let me go!" he shouted at her, but she held on to Riku for dear life. Stacie looked up, and instantly was hurt at the sight. Riku noticed, and immediately shrouded the three of them in darkness, and were transported back home, where Stacie fell unconscious. "What the hell just happened?" he asked aloud. His thoughts were interrupted by the other girl's shriek of terror.

"WHERE DID YOU TAKE ME!?" she shouted, backing away on the ground as quickly as she could. Eventually she backed into the ruby red pool that resembled blood too closely to be anything else. Riku ran after her, and dived into the lake, trying to save her.

"Calm down! You're not in any danger here!" he shouted at her. She didn't listen, but kept resisting. Riku had enough of her struggling, and removed his mask, giving her a paralyzing stare, instantly freezing her in place. He swam back to shore, keeping eye contact so the spell didn't break.

"I'm sorry," she said, when he finally looked away. Riku placed both his hands together, and all the blood was expelled from his clothing, effectively drying him off. Unfortunately, the girl was still soaked. "What are you?" she asked timidly. Riku began walking over to his unconscious loved one, and picked her up bridal style.

"I guess I have to tell you now," he said. "Follow me inside; we can get you cleaned up in there. Before I tell you anything, you're going to tell me what happened back in Shigai."

"Nobody knows," she replied, slowly getting to her feet. She looked around for a moment, and figured that wherever they were going, couldn't be as frightening as the strange blood lakeside beach. "We think that were being cursed. What happened to that woman with you has happened to countless of our people throughout the years."

"Cursed for what exactly" he asked. "Stacie has never attacked me like this before, and we both know enough black arts to fight off any inflicted curse."

"I don't know…" she said. "I was only trying to help."

"How exactly would you go about doing that? How does your city get rid of the so-called curse?"

"We take them to the witch-doctor. If we get the victim to him, he is able to heal them. We don't know how he does it, but he has never failed to bring somebody back." They soon entered the palace, and Riku laid Stacie down on her bed. He left her inside, and walked back out to help out his guest, who was seated in the gothic couch inside of the living room.

"Has anybody fainted like Stacie has?" the girl shook her head. "Well then, whatever is inflicting whatever it is that it's inflicting, it has a limited radius."

"Why do you say that?" asked the girl.

"Because the second we left the dimension into this one, it was removed. Stacie should be fine, I'll check up on her later. Who are you, anyway? You seem a bit young to be saving anybody."

"My name is Jessica," she replied. "I've lived in Shigai my whole life, and everybody I love has been cursed. The doctor said once that my family has an anomaly in our blood, which makes us more vulnerable to being cursed." Riku began to think for a second. What was it that was cursing everybody in that city? He has been there before, and it was just fine.

"How long ago have people been getting cursed?" he asked Jessica.

"About four years ago; when I was ten." Her eyes looked down, and she sighed to herself. Riku stared at her for a moment. Whatever she just remembered was obviously a bad memory.

"Look, I'm going to go check up on Stacie, do what anything to eat or drink?" he asked.

"Do you have tea?" she asked shyly.

"Yes, I'll go make you a cup, I'll be right back." Jessica nodded, and hugged her knees. She tried and tried to stop letting her memories hurt her, but she knew that it was hopeless. She couldn't hear the sound of approaching footsteps through her sobs, and soon felt a soft hand on her shoulder.

"What's the matter?" asked Stacie. She had woken up a few minutes after Riku left her, and came down when she heard the girl crying. Jessica looked up, wide-eyed. She seemed vaguely familiar to Stacie, but she couldn't remember where she'd seen her.

"Nothing, I'll be fine, I'm sorry about what happened to you, you probably don't remember, but I tackled you earlier.

"No I remember," she answered. Riku then arrived with two cups of tea, and handed one to each girl. "Thanks Love."

"Wait, you remembered what happened earlier?" Jessica asked suddenly. "How?"

"I don't know. It's not like I was unconscious, but I felt strange, like my entire body was filling up with hatred and anger. It was scary, I almost hurt my baby." Riku blushed slightly, being called pet names in front of their guest, but kept on subject.

"You were aware when you attacked me?"

"Yes, I'm so sorry Love," she said, hugging him affectionately. Jessica felt out of place for a second, but Stacie's unusual case of the curse interested her.

"What else do you remember?" she asked. Stacie pondered for a bit, before she sat next to Jessica.

"Well, I don't know. All these bad feelings built up really fast, and then I just attacked. I didn't want to, but my mind told me to. Every second I felt like killing by Rike, but I can't explain why." The three of the, were stumped. "So why were you crying a few minutes ago?" asked Stacie.

"I-it's nothing. I just remembered my family."

"You said the witch-doctor said that your family had unique blood right? What did you mean by that?"

"Well when the curse first began, my brother was the first one to be cursed. My mother and father followed. After they got cursed, the witch-doctor told me that I should pay him regular visits, but I didn't want to. My family was never the same after the war."

"The war?" asked Riku suddenly. "But that was six years ago. You said it wasn't until four years the curses began."

"Well, a family changes a lot when they find out their daughter, my sister, had died in the war" she began to cry again, and her voice cracked. "A woman and a large man came to tell us that she was nowhere to be seen after the final battle, and that they weren't sure she was still alive. My parents were in denial, but my brother and I knew the truth. When the curses began, my mother and father said that it was her trying to reach us, but as time passed, it was nothing but hatred and anger. The three of them willingly got cursed, as if it would magically bring back my big sister… But they ended up dying too!" Stacie wrapped her arm around the fourteen year old girl, and tried to sooth her. "I've been trying to help people who've fallen victim of the curse that took my family away ever since."

"How long ago did all of this happen?" asked Riku.

"Last year, was when my brother finally was taken from me, my mother and father were taken two years ago" she wept. Stacie suddenly realized why this girl looked so familiar.

"You are Four's younger sister, aren't you?" asked Stacie suddenly.

"That was her code name, yes." Riku was lost, as he hadn't interacted with other squads much the short time he worked for Project IV. "Why does it matter?"

"I just wanted to know why you looked so familiar. You aren't nearly as shy as she was, but you two looked remarkably similar." Jessica smiled a little, knowing she was the image of the sister she idolized.

"Well, I don't know what else to tell you two, that's all I know about the curse in Shigai." Stacie and Riku both pondered for a moment.

"Well, all I know, is that I'm getting to the bottom of that curse," stated Riku. "Whatever it was, it made me hurt you, my love."

"What about Jessica?" asked Stacie, "She can't go back; she might get cursed like her family did. I think she should stay here in the castle until we figure things out."

"Alright, but both of you are staying. I don't want one of us getting possessed, and end up hurting you. We both know that if I were to be cursed you wouldn't be able to fight me off, or get to safety." Stacie wanted to disagree, but Riku was right.

"Alright, I'll stay here with Jessica" she said, looked back at her. She could feel Riku already leaving through a portal behind her. "Well, this place isn't as terrifying as it looks," she started, "but we need to get you out of those clothes!"

"W-what?!" shrieked Jessica, as she grabbed herself in defense. "W-what do y-you mean b-by that?"

"You're still covered in blood…" said Stacie, totally confused. "What did you think?"

"Umm, nothing…" she said. She was lucky that her face had a reddish tint from the blood, so her huge blush didn't show.

A/N

Made a few changes to this chapter, nothing too major. Yea, I'm writing again though.