Chapter 9: Consumed by the Shadow of the Past! There Is No Escape

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NEXT: Chapter 10

As Hinagiku was taken to the city jail, Yashiro kept a firm grip. The men accompanying him followed Yashiro until he reached a cell. Yashiro dumped Hina onto a ratty, smelly cushion on the floor. Hina winced from the awful aroma.

"What's gonna happen to me?" Hina asked.

"If it were up to me, you'd still be at my house while I made you my bitch. But you're more valuable here unfucked. Better hope for your sake that the Gaikyo people stay honest," Yashiro said. He left the cell and slammed the bars shut. Hina's bonds were not released.

These people are awful. I hope my father finds me soon, Hina thought as she twisted on the uncomfortable cushion. She hoped that Ryuji had the right idea when it came to this plan to win Haiirosen over. Guess I'll have to make myself comfortable. Who knows how long I'll be here?

"Hey miss lower witch, they take you in a raid or something?" a female voice said.

Hina twisted her body to face the bars, careful not to roll off the cushion. Across from her was a middle-aged woman in a plain gray kimono. Her face was sunken and her hair was a mess.

"Something like that," Hina answered. "Name's Hinagiku, by the way."

"Sara," the middle-aged woman answered.

"Have any idea what they're gonna do with us?" Hina asked.

"Hard to tell. They've been keeping me here for the past year and a half because I wouldn't give up my little boy. Got him as far as Iwamori, believe it or not," Sara answered.

"Yeah, don't count on them freeing you. They're gonna keep you here as long as they like," another woman chimed in.

"If you're here, they're probably attacking Gaikyo right now. You know this city's been fixing to do it for a few years now, and I'll be real with you - I kinda want it. What right does that Abbess have to keep our ancestors' bounty from us?" Sara said.

"But they got that bounty from killing children!" Hina said, recalling the stories of how the Abbess's old coven sacrificed children back on Earth.

"So what? For us to live, things have to die. Do you get bent out of shape when you kill a pig or a stalk of rice for food?" Sara asked.

"That's different!"

"It's not. Death is death, whether it's a cow or a potato or a child."

"Then why did you save your son?"

"Because I had no more to give! I respect Lady Isesaki, but she's taken my older son and my daughter. Sacrifices have to be made to bring us back to what our ancestors had, but going after my final child was just too much. Maybe I should've given him up."

Hina put her foot down -- as much as she could while tied up. "You did the right thing by protecting your son. You don't need to feel guilty."

But Sara only scowled. "Let me make one thing clear, little girl: I don't need your pity. I support Lady Isesaki in everything she does -- all of us do. We made some errors, but we're sacrifices as much as the children are."

"Sara's right -- if you're talking to us about killing children whil you chow down on pork and rice, you're nothing but a dumbass hypocrite," another inmate added.

But Hina only got more perturbed.

"Listen to yourselves! You're talking about innocent children like they're mere animals! Don't you realize how awful you sound?" Hina said.

"Will you pipe down? You kill whatever you have to kill to get where you need to be. How do you think the pigs feel about you?" Sara asked.

"It's just their nature -- that's what they do. But like I said, we're not talking about animals here," Hina answered.

"What do raptors and tyrannosaurs and pterodactyls do to survive?" Sara asked.

"Yeah, she got you there, sunshine," another inmate added.

"They eat meat," Hina said, wondering where this was going.

"And why do they eat meat?" Sara asked.

"It's what they do. It's what they have to do," Hina answered.

"And do the smaller animals they go after want to be eaten?"

"They don't."

"And yet it must happen for those creatures to live and thrive. It is no different with us -- we merely prefer to face the reality that life must destroy life, instead of pretending that we are these great creatures who protect life while we consume it. You Gaikyo people need to stop lying to yourselves."

"And you need to mind your own business, too. You can live in the mud if you want -- we're gonna have what our ancestors had," another inmate added.

"You all are monsters," Hina said.

"Shut the fuck up. You wanna be a scummy little hypocrite? I'm done talking to you."

"All of you are horrible. I hope you all suffer!" Hina shrieked.

"And yet, you're right here suffering with us," Sara said back with a smirk.

Hina had given up at this point. She had to stay and endure the madness of the inmates and the total capture of their mind by Akane Isesaki.

Then someone came walking down the hall. Since Hina was still tied, she didn't even try to push herself against the bars. Instead, she waited.

Two men showed up. One was Yashiro, and the other was a somewhat larger man in a gray-striped bandana and yellow gi.

"This is her," Yashiro said, pointing to Hina.

The man in the yellow gi looked at Hina. "Cute," he said.

A sharp pain ran through Hina.

"What are you gonna do to me?" Hina asked, apprehensive.

"We're gonna take a walk, spend a little time together. I'm Kei, by the way -- your father," the man in the yellow gi said.

Yashiro opened the cell door, and Kei walked in with a knife. He cut Hina's bonds, then Hina got up and stretched to loosen up her limbs. She then embraced Kei.

"I never thought I'd get to see you," Hina said.

Kei ruffled Hina's hair, "Same here. You know, you look a lot like your mother."

"I get that a lot, and Mom does want you to come back and make things right," Hina answered.

"By tying the knot, huh? No chance -- I've already got a life here. Let me show you what Haiirosen's about," Kei said.

As Hina walked out by Kei's side, she tensed up, thinking about what Sara told her. This city was not a nice place, and Hina wondered what she might see.

Kei sensed this tension. "What's wrong?"

"It's just...a lot to think about. Our cities are supposed to work together, right?" Hina asked.

"So they say. But believe me, great things are happening here," Kei answered.

"Let's see them, then," Hina said.

The two exited the jail.

Haiirosen's narrow streets were alive with activity. Judging from the chatter, it seemed that not one heard of what transpired in Gaikyo or Jiyumura. Hina could only think of the ferocious backlash that would erupt once the bad news reached them.

Kei showed Hina a lamppost. "Our street lamps don't require fire. The lightkeeper just says a few words, and we have light all through the dark months. We even have some lamps we can carry in our hands."

"That's pretty amazing. We could use something like that back in Gaikyo," Hina said.

"Nah, I don't think anyone would be too happy with how we get them," Kei said, giving Hina a chill. Hina wasn't sure she wanted to know.

Kei guided her through a crowd of people to a shopping district lined with hanging cuts of beef.

"This is the Ishigami Beef Market. Did you know that we have chambers within our butcher shops that keep the meat so cold that it doesn't spoil?" Kei said.

"We have that back home. It's what the blue lower witches do," Hina answered.

"But did you also know that we have those boxes inside our homes?" Kei said.

"That's amazing!" Hina said.

"Whether here or at home, no one has to rotate out, either. Just like with the lamps, we have special stones that do the function all day," Kei answered.

Hina and Kei walked through the meat market as people purchased large cuts to take home.

Any meat purchased like this in Gaikyo would have to be eaten right away, Hina thought.

But things other than meat occupied Hina's mind, and when she shook herself out of her reverie, she was surprised about where she ended up.

Before her was a huge castle, with sloped roofs and festooned in gray-striped cloth. A huge staircase led to a grand entrance. Men in conical hats and gray-striped gi tops stood guard, spears at the ready like they were about to take down some unseen enemy. A vertical sign on the front of the roof read 'ISESAKI' in characters.

"Here it is: Isesaki Castle. The future of the Republic is being decided right here," Kei said with pride. Kei just guided Hina up the stairs until he reached one of the guards near the entrance.

"Tell Lady Isesaki that I brought the girl that I saw in my vision," Kei said.

The guard nodded at him, "Right away." He entered the huge gate, then after a short while came back with a petite dark-haired woman behind him. Her mouth had ugly scars held together by X-shaped stitches.

A brief gray-striped shirt with a cape exposed her midsection, which had an X-shaped scar on it. Tiny white shorts showed her legs, but she wore no footwear as she was indoors. Indeed, Hina and Kei discarded their sandals before they entered.

The guard stood aside, and the woman stepped forth. She observed Hina and smiled.

"Greetings, lower witch of VENOM. I am Akane Isesaki, chieftain of this city. It is a great pleasure to meet you," the woman said, her voice high-pitched, almost like birdsong.

"And it's a pleasure to meet you too, I'm Hinagiku Kaneshiro," Hina answered with a bow.

"Please. Come in," Akane said.

Hina followed Akane into the castle, and Kei followed. The hallways had the usual wood and paper construction of a typical home, but everything was just grander. There was a surprising chill in the air, offering relief from the sun's heat.

Portraits of the various heads of the Isesaki family hung in one hallway, each one labeled with that person's name. Hina looked at them with curiosity; she really only knew of Takuo; after all, that man was respected even in Gaikyo.

"You like those? I have something better," Akane said.

"Agreed. It's really something to see," Kei added.

Hina followed Akane into a large central chamber lit by a bright lantern in the center. Apart from the lantern, there were no furnishings of any kind, just a polished wooden floor, smooth and shiny as fresh glass.

The real attraction was the walls. A huge painting was on it, filled with all sorts of chaotic and crowded scenes; Hina had no idea where to start.

"It's beautiful," Hina said, taking in the bold figures and vivid colors.

"It is, but there's more to it than that; it tells a story. Let me show you," Akane said.

Akane took Hina to one corner of the vast chamber while Kei waited near the entrance. The corner showed long-haired people in flowing robes, in wooden buildings that looked both familiar and strange. The landscape surrounding it looked nothing like their Republic.

"It's beautiful," Hina said.

Akane pointed to the image, "This is the story of our forebears on Earth."

"You mean like before the Abbess's time?" Hina asked.

"No, before even that. Way before. We are but a tiny offshoot of a people with a long and storied history," Akane said.

"So...our Republic existed over there too?" Hina asked.

"No, they were something else entirely," Akane answered. "Now look and listen."

Akane showed Hina that the painting covered all four walls, and that she spent a year on it, guided by a vivid vision.

The beginning portion, Akane noted, showed the earliest part of their ancestors' history that she got visions of.

"The land was called Nihon, and it's where the common tongue came from," Akane explained.

"Where'd the writing come from?" Hina asked.

"Other places on Earth; it's too much to get into here," Akane answered.

She pointed out to Hina the shift in the conditions of their land, when men in armored clothing appeared and took over the society. At one point barbaric invaders tried to conquer the land, but these armored warriors, together with a divine wind, scattered the enemy.

"Then they turned their blades on one another," Akane said. A huge portion of the painting was taken up by these armored men fighting each other, though near the end of it strange, hairy men showed up bearing tube-shaped weapons that breathed fire. Then, after a single battle that took up a huge section of the wall, the scenes became a lot more peaceful. But all except the earliest of these peaceful scenes had a chain along the outer edge.

"What's the chain for?" Hina asked.

"They cut themselves off from the outside world. It's similar to our situation now. Perhaps it's our nature to behave in this manner," Akane said.

"That's interesting," Hina answered.

"What's even more interesting is how it ended," Akane said.

Where the chains ended, there were black ships with a strange flag on them—red stripes alternating with white with a blue square in the top-left corner marked with stars.

"See the men from those ships? They spoke the magical language," Akane said.

"They must've been very powerful," Hina said.

"They were. Believe me, they were," Akane said.

Another spasm of violence followed, then the landscape changed yet again, with brick buildings replacing wood and paper, more and more, and machines overtaking everything. The machines of war get ever more powerful until they overwhelmed the image, culminating in a massacre in a large city, as a white flag with red rays on it flew over it.

"Is that the One-Hour Massacre?" Hina asked.

"No, a different one entirely, and not in Nihon. You know how you asked about where our writing came from? It was that place," Akane said.

"Oh," Hina answered.

But that wasn't the worst of it; Now, the country itself was on fire after several battles between huge warships, and then, a big fiery mushroom took up a huge section of the wall.

"Remember how I said that those men from the black ships were powerful? Well, their descendants did that. World-destroying weapons," Akane said, pointing to the fiery mushroom.

Now the most interesting part of the tableau came. Large cities grew out of the rubble, and the landscape became crowded with people and color, unlike anything Hina had ever seen.

But it was here where Hina saw a familiar figure: the Abbess. She was marked with a red cloak, and she had a prominent presence throughout these sections, living a happy life.

"This is the era that formed the Abbess, an era of peace and prosperity," Akane said. "It's what we should be working toward, for that world had passed away. Just so you know, she didn't wear any kind of cloak in that time; I just painted her that way to make her stand out more."

Hina looked a little closer. "Wow, they had lower witches too!" she said, pointing at a group of girls in outfits oddly reminiscent of her own.

Akane laughed. "I assure you, they were not witches."

"Then why are they dressed like that?"

"You have it backwards. You're dressed like them."

"Weird."

"Remember, the Abbess grew up in this period."

"Right."

Then Hina was shown the ones who killed the peaceful Nihon.

Mechanical monstrosities ripped the vibrant cities to pieces. Witches in resplendent dresses, minimal in the earlier sections, now came to prominence wielding staffs and wands while fighting alongside men in brown uniforms and white masks, and the Abbess was always somewhere in the image. A purple flag with a gold star and an eye in the center made several appearances.

"Witches saved not just Nihon, but the whole Earth," Akane said.

The period that followed resembled the period before the mechanical monsters, but now, there were large, onion-shaped buildings that spat out children. One of the children isn shown growing up, and wears gray stripes on his lose and baggy shirt while smoking a cigarette; he was marked ‘Mutsu Isesaki’ and Akane pointed him out as the earliest known ancestor, way before Takuo or even Gozo, the Isesaki who came to Venus as one of the initial settlers.

Then Hina looked ahead, going far past where Akane was.

"Wait, something's missing here," Hina asked.

"What's missing?" Akane answered.

"The reason the witches were massacred," Hina said, looking at a section where a fox-man and several beastlike creatures were shooting the witches from the earlier section to death.

Akane glared at the young witch, "It wasn't necessary."

"Not necessary? All of this" -- she gestured at the mural -- "and you leave out something as crucial to our history as the Slaughter of the Innocents?" she said, referencing the witches' practice of child sacrifice back on Earth.

"You don't GET to disrespect me in my own home," Akane said as she crept closer to Hina.

"Respect? You people slaughter your own children!" Hina spat.

"And you people want us to sweat and scratch dirt forever! Shut your mouth, VENOM bitch," Akane said, now inches away from Hina.

"Tell me the truth: who gave you the vision?" Hina asked.

"Lord Moloch did. And you're about to meet him," Akane said.

Two guards rushed in and pinned Hina to the ground. Try as she might, she couldn't escape the men's hold as they tied her wrists together.

"What? Why? Dad, help!" Hina shouted.

Kei walked up to his daughter.

"Help you? I'm the one who set this up!" Kei said.

Hina was speechless, and Akane took this opportunity to explain things to the lower witch. She went over to the part before the mechanical monstrosities, the part with the peaceful cities.

"Do you see this? This was a golden age. This is what I want for all Venus. The people here had food whenever they wanted it. They could travel great distances in under an hour. There were no raptors or wild hogs or anything like that. It was a world of dreams," Akane said, gesturing at the painting.

"You got all that from some vision?" Hina asked.

"Vision? It was far more than that, little girl. It was like I was there -- dressing as they did, eating as they did, enjoying themselves as they did -- it defies words. Compared to them, we live in a disease-ridden rathole. But Lord Moloch will break us out. What he has given us here in Haiirosen is a tiny fraction of what old Nihon had. But I want it all. I want Haiirosen -- all of Venus -- to live in the abundance that our ancestors enjoyed," Akane said.

"Is that why you want to kill me?" Hina asked, tearful.

"It is. Compared to all of Venus, your life matters little."

But now Kei spoke.

"Lady Akane, let's finish this at once," he said.

"Patience. I have to speak with my brother first. I want him to see the birth of a new Venus firsthand," Akane answered.

"Where should we keep the girl?" Kei asked.

"In the dungeon here. Make sure you're her only point of contact," Akane answered.

The guards dragged away a struggling and screaming Hina. Kei could only smile as he prepared to fulfill the dark god's sinister directive.

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NEXT: Chapter 10