A Blossoming White Rose

She stared at the corpses forlornly as tears fell silently. Once again she had lost control and once again they lie fallow. "Why me....why couldn't you just stay away?!!" the young woman yelled at the dead bodies. Blood dripped from her mouth, forcing herself to stop with what little willpower she had left. Not that it accounted for much. Looking down, Chigetsu realized just how thin she was. How sickly and pale. Another sob wrenched itself from her throat as she realized her failings once more.

"You took what you needed just enough to survive. What are the reasons for your tears?" a voice asked from nearby. She turned sharply.

"Stay away...please...you call this enough to survive?? Use your eyes, THEY'RE DEAD. I killed them...it's pointless. Just go away..."

"I have quite the sharp eyes, thank you." He remarks, and continues, quite coldly. "All I see is a sickly lady fighting for her survival. Left alone, she will perish from this Earth too soon."

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe I want to perish? I'm not doing anyone any favors by existing...no one likes me anyway," she retorted, tears dripping slowly now.

"No, it did not." He emerged from the shadows, his presence remaining too faint to be noticeable. "You would be a great loss to this miserable world. At least, that is what my master believes."

The teen walked around the female, kneeling in front of her to face the woman directly. "The world is cruel and beautiful. Humans are odd beings, who often fail to see the value in the rarest beings."

Chigetsu flinches. "Why are you trying to flatter me? I'm not some spectacular being. I'm a monster pure and simple. You're better off not wasting your time on something despicable like me."

"Flattery? I don't flatter, I speak my mind and see no difference between you or any human I've met. All I see, as I've said before, is a woman that requires proper treatment or else she will die," came the sharp, blunt response.

He sighs. "My mentor has send me here for one purpose. To bring you back to our HQ. The reason being? She seeks people that she believes could help her create a better world... and then she learned about you. Look, I don't care what you do after you meet my master, nor will she force you to join her, but you need to get back on your feet properly at least."

She sighed as well, hope squashed by disappointment. Her only reliable companion in all of these years. "Look. I'm telling you to take your sights elsewhere. Where am I suppose to go? I'm hated, conspicious, and an eyesore," Chigetsu laughs bitterly, "get back on my feet? As if that will do me any favors."

The lack of sympathy was disorientating, instead, he laughs bitterly. “You think the world is after you? Did anyone ever attempt to kill you, by people you loved and trusted?” He reaches out his hand in order to firmly take her chin between his fingers, forcing her to look at him. His eyes weren’t the ocean vivid colour anymore, but replaced with an unique, slightly shimmering blank red (his natural eye colour). Unlike before, there was a tinge of readable annoyance in them: “Pathetic.”

“If you truly believe you should die, because of opinions of others, you are weak.” His voice felt cold, colder than before. “I guess my mentor misinterpreted her expectations for you. Oh, right, I forgot to tell you the name of my mentor… Kochi Uzumaki. If it was to me, I would let you have your desire to die, but Kochi-san wants to meet you.” Finally, he releases his grip on her and moves slightly back as he stands up. His eyes narrowly casted down at her, back to their colourful blue as he reaches out his hand for her to take. “Meet my mentor… she will understand you better. And, after that, you can decide whatever you want.”

"Pathetic? Maybe I am." She couldn't argue that point; her sorry state said otherwise. Suddenly, she was grabbed by the chin. Chi tried to dredge up shock, surprise, or something, but she felt nothing but sadness. He would see a deadness in her rose colored eyes, born from so many days of broken trust, being kicked down the road like a can until she snapped.

"One doesn't have to die physically to be extinguished," Chigetsu commented. Upon being released, she collapsed to her knees. "Fine....It's not I have anything left to live for anyway."

One could wonder: would their meeting had been different, had the woman met the boy a long time ago? The time when the young boy was full of life and his passionate spirit about the well-being of others. But, that would never happen… he was heartless. If it had been to him, the woman would not have a chance to redeem herself, because he sees a weakness in a world, soon, where only the strong will survive. Perhaps his partner had rubbed off on him a little, or it was purely his mindset. But, his mentor wanted this woman, meaning she should have some sort of value behind that weak demeanor of hers. And he respected Kochi enough to obey her orders.

It had been silent for a while, even after Chigetsu finally agreed to his demand. He exerts his hand, eventually, for her to take again. “Take my hand and I will bring you to my mentor.”

Chigetsu stared at his open palm. It didn't take a genius to realize if this enigma named Kochi hadn't intervened Chi would be no more. Everything from his words to his body language made that abundantly clear. Why would this Kochi person want her anyway? Sickly, weak, pathetic as this male was so fond of pointing out. She could barely pull back in the midst of feeding, taking the bare bones necessary for survival.

Not that it made any difference; a dead body was still a dead body. One she had hastened towards its expiration. Chigetsu took his hand, standing in wobbly fashion. Her stomach roared at her, not satisfied with the meager offering it had received when there was so much around them.

"I...." The young woman's hands dropped loosely to her sides as Chi struggled to the stem the tide that was rising: she was returning. "Not now not now, why does she have to return now??" Chi fretted as she began to shake.

He releases a deep sigh as Chigetsu stumbled backwards and free her hand from his grip. It slightly annoyed him, since he was about to actuate his dōjutsu’s space-time technique, allowing them to instantaneously teleport to Kumoyami’s headquarters. Not to mention, he usually has those mysterious eyes active behind his magnificent illusional appearance, aside of that time he revealed his true eye colour to her.

His eyes had narrowed at her movements, reading her body language and facial expression, something he was capable of understanding, despite unable to understand emotions and feelings in general. Eyes wandering from her visage to their surrounding and realising, with her poor and weak appearance, she had to feed.

“I don’t care if you feed from these corpses. As I said before, you need it to survive.” The teen spoke in a matter-of-fact tone, especially in his last retort. “Despite, I rather not have to deal with a regurgitating human after transporting us to the headquarters.”

It was too late. Years of staving off the more extreme ends of her hunger took its toll and the cost reared its head now. Chigetsu as she was sunk into a slumber.

Her form shifted, as her white locks extended beyond her waist. Red eyes blended into red sclera, with molten pupils the only change of color. Horns emerged from the top of her forehead as deathly sharp teeth arranged themselves in her mouth. Without a second thought to Kokutō's presence, she sank her fangs into the nearest corpse, draining it like water in the desert heat. Then she would go onto the next, and the next, her feeding more meticulous as the woman's hunger calmed. For the first time Chigetsu felt something akin to satisfaction, ripping through flesh as her belly filled with blood and organs.

The woman ran out of bodies. Licking her lips of the remaining blood, she smiled at Yawako as if just noticing his prescence. "Why hello there. Excuse the appearance, I wasn't expecting guests at this hour. A woman has to eat you know." Her tone was deeper, more sensual, a far cry from the Chigetsu earlier.

Standing, Chigetsu put her hands on her hips, stretching as new energy flowed through her body. "She's so annoying, trying to be honorable by starving herself to death. Doesn't she realize no one in this land cares about her being kind or holding herself back? They scorned her, tried to kill her, ostracized her, the whole nine yards. She might as well as accept it," the woman complained, visibly irritated.