What's that lying in the leaves so still?
An empty shell of self
I'm all alone and dying
It's just a fatal beating of my heart
Another fatal beating of my heart
--Hybrid, "Fatal Beating"
In the past, both Enya Ayanami and Enya Midorikawa died from within after their Heart Chakras were destroyed more or less from love. They had failed, because their emotions overwhelmed them, and when they lost that feeling inside, they lost their will to exist. And I wanted more than anything to not be like them, to not relive the misery and suffering and downfall that they had. So I decided when I was very young how to keep this pain from befalling me -- I decided that I would not love, and locked up my Heart Chakra within myself. If only I had realized the consequences of that decision at that time...
I opened my eyes and looked around myself at the blackness, feeling comfortable with the weightlessness of my body. Being a spiritualist, I've always felt at home in the dreamscape -- watching regressions and progressions, viewing premonitions, or just connecting with other souls as they wander, attached but free from their bodies at the same time, through the spiritual realm of dreams. But tonight, something caught my attention -- a lone figure, standing out against the dead blackness, not far from myself.
At first glance, the figure looked genderless -- but as I got a better view, it appeared male, clothed in a transparent white robe that moved on an invisible wind. He was tall and had marble-looking skin that seemed to glow in the darkness, and long, straight ebony hair danced around him on the breeze, tangling occassionaly on the two small horns adorning his head. But it was his face that captured my stare -- his dark red eyes seemed to gaze at me with a look of longing and hunger behind them, like he had been waiting for me.
And then he moved over to me, the fire still burning in his eyes as he put his arms around me and looked down into my face. I felt a fear start to form inside me -- I could tell that my visitor was an oni spirit, and I knew from past experiance that oni are always trouble and a pain to deal with -- yet I also felt a sort of yearning for the embrace in which he held me, a comfort in his presense and closeness.
He then placed a finger under my chin and tilted my head up, never stopping his intent stare, as he said in ancient Oclloan, "�Finally, I've found you. For ages I have been searching through dreams in search of you, and finally I get to meet you once again... Enya.�"
I looked at him, confused. Once again? I was quite certain that I'd never run across such an oni before... but it didn't seem important compared to all the other questions I had running through my mind at that moment.
"�Who are you?�" I asked him.
"�I'm called 'Jounetsu,'�" he replied.
Jounetsu... I was familiar with the term, which was the old Oclloan word for "passion" -- and it was becoming apparent to me why the oni was called such when I felt his fingers move to my black robe and yank on it, tearing the clothing apart, which seemed to disintegrate into thin air in the dreamscape.
"�Iya yo!�" I screamed, trying to pull away from him, but he grabbed my wrists and held them firmly, not allowing me escape.
"�Shh, Enya-chan,�" he whispered in my ear as the dreamscape shifted around us, changing to a candle-lit room with a large canopy bed, which he pushed me down against. "�It's only a dream, Enya, a dream... give in to it...�"
"�Why? Why me?�" I choked, trembling slightly under his grip.
"�Because you think you've found everything you've ever wanted... a teacher that cares for you, your own home, spiritual work, and now a guild that gives you a place and a direction in your life. But... there is something more that you want, deep inside... and you just don't know it. You lock it away and deny it... but you yearn for love, Enya, don't you? It's only a dream... you can't be deflowered or hurt here... so why not just give into what you truly yearn?�"
At that moment, I couldn't find any words of argument -- I could feel the yearning he had talked about, longed for an end to the lonliness I'd felt within myself for so long -- and so I did.
It had been weeks since I had first met Jounetsu, but relentlessly he was always waiting for me when I fell asleep each night, to whisk me away into yet another sexual fantasy. And the worst part about it was that I didn't really mind all that much -- I actually enjoyed our meetings. Because it was all an illusion, a figment of a dream, it made it feel all right. And he could fill the void in my heart with his passions, so that when I woke I could still guard away my Heart Chakra without having to feel the painful hurt of being so alone.
But then I found myself drawing farther and farther away from that cold reality, opting instead to spend my days in bed, dreaming of Jounetsu, the proclaimed Oni of Lust. And he seemed to have changed -- he was becoming more demanding, and seemed obsessive about me... and I started to feel smothered by his attentions, and wanted more than anything to escape back to reality. But Jounetsu really had no intentions of letting me go.
I struggled against the bonds that held me suspended naked against the cold brick wall -- the dreamscape had taken the semblance of a dungeon cell this time. Seeing my efforts, he laughed -- or rather she, Jounetsu also having taken a different form, this time that of a female.
"�Why won't you let me wake?�" I demanded to know, staring at her with cold eyes. "�What have you done to me?�"
"�Now, now, En-chan,�" she chided, pressing her body against mine, "�I've only done what you did to me, all those years ago -- trapped you in the dreamscape.�"
"�What are you talking about, Jounetsu?�" I really had no idea what she meant.
Jounetsu's eyes turned cold, and she pulled away, slapping me across my cheek. "�Don't give me that! You have no idea what it has been like, being trapped here in dreams, only being able to feed off of the forbidden fantasies of some wandering soul during their sleep, and not feel true human forms that can be raped and loved! You brought this on... what, can't take a taste of your own medicine?�"
I pulled back, preparing myself for another blow. I shut my eyes, concentrating hard... I'd do anything to wake up at that moment...
I woke, a little hazy, and found Syndar-neesan at my door, inviting me to some order or another that the Conclave was involved in. I didn't know what was going on, but I would have done anything to have a reason to leave my house and find something to occupy myself with that I went along.
But the entire time I constantly found myself combating sleep... I'd been asleep for days, how could I possibly be tired? Somehow I knew that Jounetsu's hold over me in the dreamscape was still on me, even though I was now in the physical realm. Jounetsu had grown powerful over dreams, and was somehow powerful enough to try to force me back into sleep where he had power over me.
I tried to fight off the sleep the best I could, but finally, that evening at Syndar-neesan's house, I couldn't any longer, and fell back into a deep sleep, where he was waiting for me...
I felt another blow from the whip that Jounetsu held, and opening my eyes for a moment, saw a growing trail of red liquid beneath me.
"�How dare you try to break free?!�" he screamed at me, hitting my naked flesh once again. "�You'll never leave this place until you take me with you! As long as I am trapped here, I'm keeping you with me!�"
Again, I felt the blow, and this time I couldn't help but scream. Even if it were only a dream, the pain was too real.
"�You're only getting what you deserve now, Enya,�" he said, lashing me again. "�Perhaps next time you'll think twice before breaking out of your sleep...�"
I felt another flash of pain overwhelm me, and saw the blood dripping down my legs briefly before my eyes shut and my held fell to the side, loosing consciousness even in my unconsciousness.
"�You won't leave until you take me with you...�"
I didn't want to exist only in this nightmare any longer.
When I awoke, I swore that I would not let myself fall asleep again, no matter what. To sleep would only mean harsher cruelty from Jounetsu... and perhaps I would never wake again.
That is when I had to tell Syndar-neesan the whole story, as humiliating as it was. I knew that I could not face Jounetsu alone, and needed help.
She suggested that with Kyle's help, we hold a dreamwalk, to enter the dreamscape and combat Jounetsu where he was sealed away there directly. It was a good plan, but... the thought of it frightened me.
I didn't want the guild to see me like that... to see what he had done to me.
And I didn't want them to be at risk of his spiritual rape, either. They meant far too much to me to be put in that position.
But I had plenty of time to think... nights worth of time to think, as I stayed awake days on end under Morgan-san's potions.
It gave me the time to find out more about my enemy, and find some of the clarifications to his strange dialogues -- clarifications I was only to find in the deepest regressions of myself.
For a moment, as I stared deeply into the blackness of the Akashic records, I saw her once again -- Enya Ayanami, the first spiritualist incarnation of my soul. And for a moment, I almost felt that she felt my gaze looking back on her, like our eyes, the same eyes, were meeting each other.
She appeared as she has always appeared in my regressions -- a beautiful, frail Oclloan beauty, with long straight black hair reaching past her knees, and pale white skin that reflected the darkness. And her eyes, so deep and knowing, showed her inner voidness to me.
Ah. This was the Enya Ayanami after her inner-death, then... the inner-death that occured when she ended up inadvertantly killing her spirit love and an innocent human.
She was lying in a bed, looking ghastly pale against the white sheets in the moonlight. Her eyes stared upward, not really focused on anything, as if she were deeply lost in her own thoughts. I also noticed the shimmer of tears on her cheek in the glistening moonlight from the window.
And then I saw him walk in. It was unmistakenly Jounetsu, appearing similar to the first night I had seen him, only in the flesh. This Jounetsu was not an oni spirit, but a living oni.
Slightly, Enya turned to look at the form that was now standing next to her bed. Focusing her eyes, she took a better look, and suddenly sat straight up in the bed, immediately grabbing her ceremonial knife that sat on the nightstand.
"�Dare?�" she demanded, looking at the oni with cold eyes.
"�I'm called 'Jounetsu.'�"
"�I'm afraid you have the wrong room then, Oni. I may be a spiritualist, but I don't take to incubi or succubi.�"
"�Ah, but that's why I am in the right place. Simple incubi or succubi don't care who they prey on... I have a bit more dignity than them. You see...�" He reached forward, placing a hand on her chest, "�...It's your cold heart that has drawn me here. You've felt an immeasurable amount of pain in your heart, haven't you? And now, you've denied yourself of ever feeling pleasure, by locking your Heart Chakra away.�"
"�And you've come here to try to break it free, then?�"
"�Iie. I'm hear to give you the pleasure that your void heart so longs for... that /you/ long for. No danger, no consequences. Just pleasure, that simple, given and taken without disrupting your Heart Chakra. Pleasure without the risk of the pain of another failed love.�"
Tears welled up in her eyes. "�I'm not interested. I don't care what my heart yearns for... I will never love again. I don't deserve it.�"
Jounetsu grabbed her arms then, and bringing his body onto the bed, pinned her body beneath him.
"�I never said you had a choice.�"
"�Iya yo!�" she screamed, thrashing beneath him. Regaining herself to her obvious fear, she found a focus, and staring at his face intently, she began to chant quietly, her eyes taking on a cold gray stare.
"�You think your simple magic tricks can work against me?�" he asked, still holding her arms tight in his grasp.
Suddenly the chant stopped, and still clutching the ceremonial knife in her hand, she twisted her arm painfully against his grip, driving the end of the knife into his arm. It was just enough to make him lose his grip, and she used that split-second to her advantage to take her blessed blade deep into his chest. Jounetsu howled, clutching at the bleeding wound.
"�Baka, Jounetsu,�" Enya chided. "�Not smart to leave your body entirely open right over a person with a knife in their hand. And as for my stupid magic tricks... well, that spell is what is keeping you from healing that wound right now.�"
"�Omae wa...�" he hissed at her, half collapsing in a swoon from the wound.
"�I've no interest in you, Oni, preying on the virginity of those that have lost their only love and will never know how it feels. But perhaps your efforts would be better appreciated somewhere... a little less real... Nee?�"
She moved to the back of the room, and again she began to chant, her hair billowing around her on the aura of her power.
It didn't take long for her to grab the oni spirit as it left its dead body, and seal it away on the spiritual plane that she had opened -- the dreamscape.
It made so much more sense after I had experianced that regression... What Jounetsu had meant about how I had sealed him away in the dreamscape, and why he was preying on me once again... It all started to come together. And I explained these things to Ronoth-kun that next evening, while I was sitting up, still refusing sleep.
And it was then he mentioned something to me... that perhaps it was because of my closed off Heart Chakra that kept Jounetsu's hold on me, and that if it were opened, I could defeat him.
I wasn't sure what would be worse: dealing with Jounetsu, or opening my Heart Chakra and risking the inevitable pain that would come with it.
But what he said made sense. And a small part of my heart, even behind its icy walls, longed desperately for Ronoth-kun to be there the night of the dreamwalk ceremony to stop Jounetsu.
The awaited night finally came. I was extremely apprehensive... and still a bit indecisive about the whole endeavor. I was terrified of something happening to my guild brothers and sisters, or what impressions of me they may have after seeing me in Jounetsu's presense. But I didn't have any choice... ridding the oni spirit would be impossible for me to do alone.
We were all gathered upstairs in the ceremony room inside of the Twilight Center school. Syndar-neesan and Kyle were making all the preparations for those that would be going into the dreamscape and those that would stay awake in the present to make sure everything went smoothly. I started to feel more nervous every second.
I knew then that all these people I cared so much about were in too much danger, and that danger would be my fault, because of my closed Heart Chakra that Ronoth-kun had pointed out to me. Before anything happened to them, I knew I would have to take responsibility, and as much as I didn't want to do it, I would have to break that precious guard around my heart.
While everyone was busy and not inclined to notice, grabbing Ronoth-kun for support, I shut my eyes, and shut out all the noise around me, focusing inward. And falling through the darkness within myself, I stood in front of that icy shield within myself. So cold and so strong... I gritted my teeth and reached out, touching the glass-like barrier. Tears welling up within me, I shot my touch back and then through the glass, shattering the barrier around my Heart Chakra.
And there is was, my Heart Chakra open and exposed, and longing desperately for the love I'd always denied it. And it was Ronoth-kun, who had sworn to help me and protect me from Jounetsu, that my heart was searching for... it was he that it reached out and clung to, scared of being open and in desperate need for comfort and protection.
And I felt for his soul then, so strong beside me, so full of love and caring, and I reached out to him... my heart reached out to him... and found him waiting there, his Heart Chakra completely receptive of the invasion. Somehow I felt a doubt creep over me, but my heart wouldn't allow my mind to think about what was happening, and then I felt the bright red strings of fate moving, tying my Heart Chakra to his, tying our souls together.
My eyes shot open then, and I coughed up blood involuntarily, falling weakly and searching for support. It was enough to make the others stop their busying and notice that something was going on with me even before we had started. But I pushed off their inquiries, telling them only that I was fine and now everything else would be fine. Now, I knew I had a chance against this oni nightmare.
I awoke again, inside the dreamscape. Fear swept over me immediately. It was as pitch dark as it always is for me, and I was naked and exposed, and truly terrified. I sat down against the darkness, drawing my knees up in my arms, hiding my face, as if somehow I could disappear completely.
Of course, I wasn't so completely alone this time. I could hear voices in the distance... my brothers and sisters from the guild, that had come to help me put an end to Jounetsu. I wished I could've told them to leave then, I was so frightened of what was to happen. I knew Jounetsu was /not/ going to be very happy.
And then he came, his long black hair flaring around him, his red eyes hurting as they glared at the group of intruders on the dreamscape. He cursed in Oclloan, asking me what I had done, and if I thought it would make much difference, and I protected against him in a pure Oclloan tongue, the language only fully known to me in my dreams. I assumed the others probably had no idea what was being said. But I'm sure they understood Jounetsu's intentions when he teleported right to me and grabbed my trembling form, pressing my naked body against the cold black of the dreamscrape.
I was only partially aware of what was happening around me. I knew that the others were trying to fight against Jounetsu, trying to tear down the kekkai he had formed around the two of us. My mind was more focused on Jounetsu, on his intentions... He wanted escape from the dreamscape. He wanted back to the reality he once existed on.
I knew the others would never understand my decision in wanting to bring him to the real world and off the dreamscape... but he was just too powerful on the dreamscape. He would've ended up hurting them, and I couldn't let that happen.
And then I realized what was happening... the humiliation, the pain... but Jounetsu was entering me... not as a man, as he had before, but with his whole spiritual form, filling my frail body with his soul, pressing my own existance into the far spiritual recessions within myself.
I screamed. I couldn't help but do otherwise. And then I felt myself lost in the swirling blackness within myself, only somewhat aware of what was happening with Jounetsu in my body. But despite the pain, and the humilation, and the danger, he was where I wanted him. I could see a way of drawing him off the dreamscape now, the dreamscape where he was using my body and my spiritual powers, mixed with his own, against my very friends.
From within me, from within my Heart Chakra, I reached out against all of Jounetsu's will to speak to Ronoth-kun through that link, to tell him to wake up, and wake the others, to break the dream. It was the only way I could see of drawing Jounetsu out of the dreamscape, where he was so powerful.
Although reluctant, I knew that Ronoth-kun would help me and do as I asked. I only wished desperately that it would work.
I could tell that my physical body was stirring, even though I had no control over it -- all movement, all thoughts, all dialogue belonged to Jounetsu at that point. I could only hide in the recesses and focus all my power onto that Heart Chakra, trying to let Ronoth-kun know of my intentions, to tell the others that the Enya before them was truly the oni.
I couldn't see through my own eyes, his control was so strong, but I knew that the others must have woken, and were now moving the battle to the ceremonial room. I only had to hold on a bit longer, though... I knew that soon Jounetsu would be provoked into trying to pull all the power out of me, and that was when he would find my exposed heart.
And I was right. I was aware of my body coughing up blood again, keeled over on the ground, and I believe I could even make out in the recesses of my mind Jounetsu asking me what I had done, and even turning a cold stare on Ronoth, as if it were somehow his fault as well.
His soul could not inhabit my body with my heart open and loving, connected to the soul of another. He had no choice but to be pushed back out of my body, and I was able to fill it once again, and once again see through my own eyes and speak my own words.
The first thing I did was warn the others not to let the spirit leave, but the pentagram was charged and creating quite the barrier, and being such a loving group, there wasn't anyone present that the oni could easily inhabit, either. He only needed to be sealed away once again, and I knew the chant, I knew the way... but my body was too weak to ever perform it. Having been possessed, I had no power left in me.
It was Syndar-neesan that was able to harnass all the power of everyone in the guild that was gathered, and offering me her hands, transfer all the power to me. I knew it would be extremely draining for her, but I had no other choice -- Jounetsu had to be sealed, and quickly. So taking her hands, and drawing on all that gathered power, I began the chant that I had heard Enya Ayanami speak in my regression, and tearing the fabric of a long-lost spiritual realm, thrust Jounetsu into his new spiritual prison.
Although Jounetsu had been sealed, my heart had been unsealed in the process. I'm not sure if I'm going to find this to be a blessing or a curse, for though I'm spiritually connected to Ronoth-kun and love him very much, I also know that I pulled on his strings of fate, and changed them when he was already in love with another. That should never have been my decision... someone's fate should never be changed by anyone but them. Although Ronoth-kun said he was more than willing to make the choice he did, I still feel the darkest hint of doubt and fear at the back of my Heart Chakra.
I'm not so certain that I'm free of Enya Ayanami and Enya Midorikawa's fate yet, that I will be destroyed from love as well, now that my Heart Chakra has been released from its refines. But it is the path of fate that I decided to take, and it is too late to change that now. Now only time will be able to show me if I've made the correct decision by linking my life to another to rid myself of the Oni of Lust.
I can only dream that everything will work out all right... and hopefully that dream will be a good one.