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Worth	By : Valisilwen Category: +S to Z > Saint Beast Views: 1336 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Saint Beast, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Worth
- 2-Confrontation
- 3-Attack
- 4-Almost Escape
- 5-Pain
- 6-Return
- 7-Explanation
- 8-Truth
- 9-Comfort
- 10-Love
- 11-End?
- 6
- 7
- 8
The next morning, the Saint Beasts had all gathered in the garden as usual to have breakfast together. All except one.

"Has Rei still not come out of his room at all?" Shin asked worriedly.

Ruka sighed and shook his head. "No. I didn't even go knock on his door this morning. I thought he could use some rest."

"What's up with Rei, anyway?" Gai asked, his mouth full of food. "I mean, no errand of his could have taken nine hours yesterday, and when he came back, he seemed so..." Gai trailed off, not sure how to finish.

"I understand what you mean, Gai," Yuda said, swirling his wine around in his glass. "Rei seemed...different when he returned last night. He was not his usual self."

Ruka listened to their conversation while staring at the food on his plate, having no appetite of his own. He could not help but remember all the feelings he had gotten from Rei when he had touched him last night. Yes, Rei had certainly been different from his usual self last night, and that scared Ruka much more than he cared to admit.

"Oi! Kira! Maya!" Gai's shouting startled Ruka from his thoughts. He looked up and saw that Kira and Maya were indeed walking down the path wound through the gardens towards them, though something seemed off about the way they were walking...

Gai ran up ahead of the other Saint Beasts to meet them, excited by the unexpected visit. However, when he was only a few feet away from them, he stopped, a confused look on his face.

"Maya, what's wrong? Why are you leaning on Kira like that?" Gai asked, confusion with more than a hint of concern coloring his tone.

As the other Saint Beasts approached them, Maya smiled, albeit a bit weakly. "I hurt my leg yesterday, Gai. Don't worry! It's not serious!"

Yuda looked at him, concerned by how pale he was, "Come inside and let me take a look at it. I'll heal it for you."

Maya grimaced, not really wanting Yuda to see his wound, but nonetheless followed the other Saint Beasts back to Heaven's Palace. If Yuda saw the wound, he'd ask questions, and Maya wasn't sure just how much Rei had told them about yesterday.

Maya knew that Rei's injuries yesterday had been his fault, no matter how much the purple haired angel insisted it wasn't. And to top it all off, he and Kira had left Rei behind! Maya didn't want the other Saint Beasts to hate him, which is why he had not wanted to come back to Heaven's Palace in the first place! But in the end, his desire to make sure Rei was ok outweighed his fear.

When they got to one of the many unused bed chambers in Heaven's Palace, Kira gently removed Maya's arm from his shoulder and helped him lie on his stomach on the bed. He looked up at Yuda and motioned towards the bloody patch of bandages on his left thigh.

Yuda bent down and carefully removed the bandages. His gasp of surprise and horror was quickly followed by similar reactions from the other Saint Beasts when the wound was exposed. Deeply buried in the small angel's leg was what looked like a metal star, though they couldn't be sure as most of its shape was buried in Maya's flesh.

After a few more minutes of stunned silence, Yuda snapped himself back into reality and began lightly touching and examining the wound with experienced hands.

"Maya, I have to remove the star in order to heal the wound, and there will be a lot of pain, but please, try not to move." Yuda said slowly.

Maya nodded, closing his eyes and preparing himself. Gai sat down beside his head on the bed and took his hand. "Maya, if it hurts too much, just squeeze my hand really hard, ok?" said Gai, sounding like a scared little child. Maya smiled up at him, grateful for his presence.

"Ready?" Yuda asked. Maya nodded. Yuda gripped the star tightly in both hands, and in one fluid motion, jerked the weapon out of Maya's leg.

Maya couldn't hold back the blood-curdling scream that escaped his lips when Yuda pulled the star out. He squeezed Gai's hand with enough force that he probably hurt the blonde angel, but Gai didn't say anything and just gave Maya's hand a comforting squeeze right back.

As soon as the star was out, Yuda softly kissed the bleeding wound, feeling it slowly close up beneath his lips. As soon as he felt the wound heal completely, Yuda sat up, wiping some of Maya's blood from his lips.

"Maya, are you alright?" Kira asked, kneeling on the floor next to his brother's head. The concern in his voice nearly bordered on panic.

Maya was was panting heavily and his face was pale and was covered in the sheen of sweat, but he still managed to turn around so he was lying on his back and sat up, propping himself up against the headboard. He gave his brother a weak smile. "Yes, Kira-nii-san...I'm fine."

"Kira. Maya." Gou said sternly, walking forward to stand next to Yuda at the foot of the bed. "I believe you owe us an explanation."

"Yeah, Maya," Gai put in, all traces of fear gone from his voice and replaced by a fierce protectiveness, "What happened to you? Did someone bully you again?"

Maya winced, not wanting to answer, but knew he had to. Fortunately for him, however, Kira answered for him. "Maya was hurt during the...incident yesterday."

The Saint Beasts all looked at each other in confusion. "Incident? What incident are you referring to?" Shin inquired curiously.

Now it was Kira and Maya's turn to look at one another in confusion. "Didn't Rei tell you anything about what happened yesterday?" Kira asked irritably.

Ruka's snapped to attention at the mention of Rei. Speaking up for the first time, he asked, "Rei? What does Rei have to do with any of this?"

Realization dawned on both Kira and Maya, and they both wore identical looks of dread. "He really didn't tell you anything, did he?" Kira asked softly.

"Tell us anything about what?" Ruka snapped, his patience wearing thin. Did Kira and Maya know the reason Rei came home so late last night? Or why he was acting so strangely? Ruka felt his anticipation growing along with his sense of dread. He had a bad feeling that whatever Kira and Maya had to tell them, he wasn't going to like it.

Kira heaved a sigh, knowing that he'd have to tell them everything now. "Yesterday, when Maya and I were getting ready to return to Earth, we were ambushed by a gang of middle-rank angels." Kira felt his fists clench in anger at the memory. "We thought it was just going to be some of the usual harassment, some cruel taunts, and then they'd leave us alone..." Kira paused, taking a deep breath before he continued. "But we were wrong. They all out attacked us, some just using hand-to-hand combat techniques, others used weapons, and some of them..." Kira paused again, too angry to continue.

Maya finished his brother's statement. "Some of them used their angelic powers against us," he said softly.

Shin gasped, is eyes widening in shock; Gai looked surprised and visibly shaken; and Yuda, Gou, and Ruka all wore identical masks of horror and anger.

Yuda was the first to recover from his shock, his voice ice cold as he spoke, "Using one's powers on a fellow angel...it's just too terrible. How? How could they?" Yuda's whole frame shook with anger, and he was visibly fighting for control. When he regained his composure, he looked over at Kira and Maya. "Did you recognize any of them? Do you know any of there names?"

Kira and Maya both just shook their heads. "No, we didn't recognize any of them. Although..." Maya paused, thinking back, "Rei-san seemed to know the leader, I think he called him...Stheno? Yes, I think that was it," Maya looked over to Kira for confirmation.

Kira nodded, "Yes, that was what Rei called him, right after he..." Kira trailed off, hesitant to continue.

"Right after he...what? What happened? And how does Rei fit into all this?" Ruka asked quickly, his agitation growing.

Kira hesitated again before continuing, "Well, Stheno and his gang had separated Maya and me, and one of them tackled me to the ground. Maya tried to get to me to help, but Stheno..." Kira was once again shaking in anger, and he couldn't continue.

Maya again picked up where his brother had left off, though his voice was barely above a whisper. "Stheno used his angelic powers over plants to...to create whip...it was made out of vines and...and covered in sharp, curved thorns..."

The others could see that Maya was starting to become hysterical, and tried to calm him. "Maya! Maya, calm down!" Yuda said, sitting in front of him on the bed and pulling the child-like angel into his arms. "It's alright. You're safe now."

"No! No, it's not alright!" Maya practically shouted, trying to shove Yuda away. "It was my fault! It was supposed to be me! Stheno was aiming for me! And Rei-san...Rei-san..." Maya broke off, sobs racking his small body as he allowed Yuda to pull him back against his chest.

"Kira, what happened to Rei?" Yuda asked, voicing the question that Ruka both wanted and dreaded to know the answer to. He wanted to know what had happened to his beautiful, fragile angel, but after hearing what Maya just said...he knew the answer would be anything but good.

Kira looked away from the Saint Beasts, unwilling to meet any of their gazes. "Rei took the blow from Stheno's whip that was meant for Maya," he paused, then said softly, more to himself than anyone else, "He didn't even cry out, even though the pain must have been excruciating...and his back..." Kira trailed off, trying not to remember how torn apart Rei's back had looked.

Kira shook his head to bring himself back to the present before he continued. "Despite his injury, Rei managed to fly both Maya and me out of there. We thought we were home free, but one of those angels...had those metal stars." Kira gestured to the bloody weapon on the bedside table, "I don't know how many times Rei was hit, but I do know one of them was buried fairly deep in his ribs. Soon after Maya got hit, Rei was hit again and we started to fall towards the trees. Rei managed to slow our descent at the last minute, but we still hit the trees pretty fast. Maya and I got away with only a few bruises, but Rei...Rei's ankle was broken."

Kira paused, and then finally looked up at the others. "We knew Stheno and the others with him would hear where we had crashed. I grabbed Maya and tried to help Rei too, but...but he wouldn't let me. He knew he couldn't walk without help and he also knew that Maya couldn't either, so...he told us to leave him behind."

There was a long silence before Ruka spoke, "And you did? You just left him there?" His voice was practically dead, devoid of all emotion. And it was more terrifying than any amount of anger.

Ruka strode over to Kira and grabbed him by the front of his shirt, yanking him to his feet. "He was injured and completely defenseless, and you just left him there? How? How could you do that? You already knew what Stheno was capable of, so how could you leave him!"

"You think I wanted to leave him?" Kira shouted, yanking himself out of Ruka's grip and shoving him away. "You think I don't regret leaving him! I had no choice! I tried to get him to come, but he wouldn't! He knew we wouldn't get away if he came too!" Kira's anger started to cool, and he looked away from Ruka, saying softly to himself, "Dammit, Rei! You're too noble for your own damn good."

"Why didn't you come get us? Why didn't you come to us immediately!" Ruka shouted, his anger now clearly showing through his voice.

Kira looked at him, confused. "But, Rei said you guys left on a mission shortly after Maya and I left. He said no one was at Heaven's Palace."
- 6
- 7
- 8
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Worth