[Fic] The One Prophecy - Chapter 1
Nakamaru rustled through the guidebook for information on the ones that were open to the public, leaving his best friend tugging out the luggage from the taxi and paid the fare. “So any luck?” Tatsuya asked, squishing nearer to his best friend and looking at the opened page.
“I think we better sneak up to the hotel first. After lunch, we can explore the town the whole day.” The short haired guy suggested. Tatsuya nodded in agreement and followed behind.
Nakamaru won a ticket to fly to Paris a week ago after participating in the Save-The-Earth Day drawing competition under his company’s event. Thinking it was sadden to have fun alone, he persuaded Tatsuya Ueda, his five years college best friend where they together studied at WasedaUniversity, who happened to spend his 7-days accumulated holidays that was due until the end of the year over the week. Though Tatsuya was reluctant to go at first, wondering the expenses he was going to pay, Nakamaru assured him that all the expenses including the hotel, travel expense and breakfast treat were enclosed inside the special package he won. Instead of rejecting the offer, Tatsuya had a little thoughts of himself wondering if he should go with his friend. Perhaps, it was a worth decision for him to spend the holidays in Paris. Maybe he needed a fresh air in a new environment to relax his mind. After all, he just wanted to get away from his busy days.
Tatsuya breathed in the sweet fragrance of the hotel’s flower garden downstairs from the balcony, looking at the children running around the small playground made for them, with their parents watched over them carefully. On the north up hill side, he could see a few young couples holding hands, blowing sweet kisses to one another and walking through the garden path happily. There was so much warmth wrapped around the ambience when everyone was smiling, forgetting their troubled hard days for a while. He huffed a disappointed sigh. Why did he feel so restless when he is supposed to have fun on his vacation!
“Hey…” he could feel a hand grabbing firmly on his shoulder and he knew his best friend was making a worried face.
“Are you okay? Feeling tired?” Nakamaru asked, concerned about his dear friend.
“I’m not tired. It’s just-“ he paused.
Nakamaru narrowed his eyes because he knew the reason his friend was so uptight. “He’s no good for you. Just forget him. We’re in France now. There are a lot of eligible bachelors who want to date you! You have the pretty look, very kind hearted, such a caring person and sometimes stubborn…” he strengthened at the last word clearly and one punch hit his right arm. And the atmosphere turned into chuckling and giggling moments.
“Oh yes! You’ll meet The One on our vacation! Just relax and watch what’s coming. Perhaps you’ll meet a gorgeous handsome man alive!” Nakamaru grinned at his friend but the other guy was only glaring in return.
“Can you stop with this ridiculous prophecy? I’m tired of hearing it since we boarded the plane a few hours ago. You’re so delusional and obsessed about an inexistent creature that so happened to cross my path and be my fated lover? Can you narrate any more fictional than that?” Tatsuya grabbed his jacket and walked to the door.
“W-well… Vampire is such an interesting creature. They have beautiful skins, good looking, nice smell wrapped around them, and-“
“-scary dark eyes with sharp fangs enough to suck my blood in the middle of the night? What a terrifying life to live in!” Tatsuya made a notification on the fact that vampire won’t do any good to human if they kept killing and sucking human’s blood every day and night.
“Yes you’re right. They don’t normally live like human does.” Tatsuya heaved a relief. At last, his friend finally agreed on the fact that vampire should stay the way they were.
“I think you just need to live as a vampire way of life to live your life normally.” His friend went on, causing him to flare his anger up to the red zone.
“Nakamaru Yuichi! Are you done? Because I need to lock up our room or should I lock you up inside instead?” He smiled wickedly at the other guy and flashing the keys around his fingers.
“Uh, y-yes… I think we better get going.” Nakamaru stuttered and quickly made his way out of the room. They took the lift down and exited at the hotel entrance before taking the public transport for sightseeing.
Referring the guidebook they bought at the airport didn’t help them any further as the language used was French. Both of them only remembered a few chapters they learnt in the French class and couldn’t follow the ascent the citizen spoke when they tried to gather more information about the place they wanted to visit. Night was approaching and soon they needed to sit down and collected their breathing back to normal. Feeling tired hustling around the place; they stopped at the nearby fancy bar and sat for a drink.
Tatsuya watched his friend skipping down the stairs, hoping he won’t break any leg or neck as he went along. He peeked around the bars as he didn’t quite know what place he had taken a picture of as the bar’s owner greeted them proudly saying that his bar was one of the famous bar in the city, but the sight that met his eyes wasn’t fit in. He would imagine people wearing simple clothing such as sweater and jeans, but the people here were more into stunning, out glowing image with their best tuxedo and hat, giving an outstanding atmosphere of rich elite parties.
As he went inside the big room, there were two dancers dancing by the pole while some of the men watching. He saw cabaret style of bar setting, disco light was everywhere on the ceiling but some parts of the area were set in darkness. A vigorous wave caught his attention when Nakamaru actually found a free seating but there was one guy drinking on the table alone. “Don’t tell me we’re going to sit with a stranger,” he complained, making his way to the table fast as Nakamaru started to create others attention by shouting his name.
“Come on! Let’s have a seat here.” Nakamaru pushed the red haired guy down and turned to his left to face the stranger who was comfortably sitting in front them.
“Hi, I’m Nakamaru! This is Tatsuya, my friend. Nice to meet you.” Tatsuya shook his head in disbelief when Nakamaru tried to introduce themselves to the stranger ,who seemed to look more feminine than he was, with pretty face, thin soft lips, small eyes, steep eyebrows, brown curly hair with edgy cut, quietly looking at them and mopping up the vodka.
“Call me, Kazuya. Nice to meet you too!” The stranger formed a friendly smile as he ended his self introduction.
“So, what brings you here?” Nakamaru began.
“Nothing, just drinking alone and have fun.” He spoke in a language their ancestors often used.
“Are you Japanese?” Tatsuya doubted.
“Yes, I am. But I was raised outside the country. People often say, I have the Japanese face but my upbringing doesn’t look like I was coming from my origin country.” Kazuya made a small laugh but Tatsuya didn’t find it funny.
“So… do you always come here?” Tatsuya asked again.
The young man twirled his fingers inside the glass, gulped the vodka before replying, “No. I prefer the east side better than this bar. But like I said, I want to drink and have fun. So here I am.”
“I bet you must be so rich for travelling here often!” Nakamaru remarked but the other guy couldn’t stop chuckling when he heard it.
“Nakamaru! It’s not right to dig information on other people’s well being!” Tatsuya smacked his friend head, causing the latter to moan in pain.
“No, don’t get me wrong. First of all, I am on a vacation same like you guys. The difference is, I already travelled to a lot of countries including France. But, I’m just an ordinary guy living a normal life by working as a dance choreographer at the private institute in New York.” Kazuya put a halt to his explanation when he saw both of his new found friends dropping their jaw wide as he went on.
“Oh man! I seriously thought you’re someone from here! I didn’t know you’re American!” Nakamaru rubbed his back head and laughed.
“You just need to ask the right question; not digging into someone else’s self secret.” Kazuya threw a wicked grin and continued to savour his vodka more. Feeling a little embarrassed, Nakamaru raised his hand to call the waiter, while Tatsuya was being all quiet and hiding. After they made an order, Nakamaru excused himself to go to the toilet and both gentlemen nodded.
Kazuya noticed an awkward position between him and the red haired guy. Finishing the vodka in the glass, he cleared his throat and nervously started the conversation to loosen up the tension between them.
“Do you hate me?” Tatsuya widened his gaze when the other guy threw the question at him straight to the point.
Instead of being silent, he shook his head weak and replied, “You did nothing wrong. I’m just not used to meet and talk freely to strangers. No offence.”
Kazuya hiked his chin up and down, understanding the other guy’s awkwardness and sent him a pleasant smile. “Hmm, you must be the hard type to get close to…” He heartily guessed.
Tatsuya met his eyes, narrowed a little bit but somehow he felt the man sitting in front him wasn’t that stranger to him though it was the first time they met. He couldn’t put quite a finger into it, but he felt the other guy evidently reading what remained to his mind. Their conversation was interrupted by a waiter who came to send their drinks and flew away to another table to send the remained glasses.
“How do you know we’re on a vacation? Did we ring you any obviousness?” Tatsuya asked, ever curious.
The young man cackled and sipped another glass he ordered earlier. “Since you walked down the stairs, looking at how both of you behave, I’m pretty sure you guys were lost from touring a place and decided for a break. Furthermore, both of you don’t look like someone from here too.” He told.
“You eyed on us?” Tatsuya shrieked, sounded uncomfortable at the statement.
“When you’re inside this bar, everyone watches everyone else. It’s just a fascinating view to peek around and doing nothing about it.” The young man added.
Soon after, Nakamaru was back on his seat. The three of them kept talking about their lives and Tatsuya began to know the other guy, who seemed mysterious to him more. Later, a moment of laughter broke the awkward atmosphere and they were enjoying their drinks even more with further stories.
Tatsuya ignored both of them who kept telling jokes as he couldn’t stop laughing as well, his eyes darting around the room glancing frequently near the window.
He is coming! A voice whispered in his head. He blinked at the image in his mind turned mist and evaporated. He looked between Nakamaru and Kazuya. Suddenly, his head kept spinning around and the voice didn’t stop whispering to him.
He will come to you tonight. The voice spoke between his unconscious states.
“Who’s coming?” He yelled to himself but his two friends heard him and shouting as a group of men was walking to the stage, “The band is going to perform soon!”
He winced to the right and palmed his forehead. Something in the air seemed strange to him as if something was flying above the mountain as he directed his gaze over the window. Then he saw a refined man sauntered firmly among the crowd and flicked a screening eye before grabbing his guitar at the corner of the stage. Tatsuya heard a group of band performed on the stage while his two friends jumped up from their seat to enjoy the atmosphere, but he stayed behind, muttering in pain. Perhaps he drank too much for the night. He looked up and saw the man and suddenly their gazes were glued for a moment. His dark eyes never left his.
Beloved… Are you alright? This time, the voice seemed vividly to his deaf ears as the music kept playing louder and louder. He grabbed a glass of water and choked back a swallow.
The room become hot and noisy as the handsome dark haired guitarist stepped out from the stage and grabbed the bar’s attention. Some of them were screaming madly, dancing at the front stage while others remained seated and cheering from their seat tired enough to stand among those fanatic people.
Tatsuya excused himself to go to the toilet, leaving his two friends dancing and he made a fast move until he realized the guitarist was crossing his way and they bumped into each other. Feeling a bit embarrassed, he muttered ‘Sorry’ and went on but his body did otherwise. He stood still and frozen like a piece of meat as the guitarist leaned closer to get his attention. The sharp gaze beneath his dark eyes was enough to drug him into fantasy world, an electric wave rushed through his adrenalin making his heartbeat racing vigorously, shaking his body to melt.
Vampire… The voice whispered again in his head. Tatsuya jumped back he knocked the pole less three steps behind him and grabbing a few chairs near him. One last thing he knew, he was already lying on the floor and the blackness overpowered him as he slowly fainted into sleep.
“Tat-chan!” came a shrieked scream but he couldn’t hear it.
Previous: Prologue | Next: Chapter 2 a
“I think we better sneak up to the hotel first. After lunch, we can explore the town the whole day.” The short haired guy suggested. Tatsuya nodded in agreement and followed behind.
Nakamaru won a ticket to fly to Paris a week ago after participating in the Save-The-Earth Day drawing competition under his company’s event. Thinking it was sadden to have fun alone, he persuaded Tatsuya Ueda, his five years college best friend where they together studied at WasedaUniversity, who happened to spend his 7-days accumulated holidays that was due until the end of the year over the week. Though Tatsuya was reluctant to go at first, wondering the expenses he was going to pay, Nakamaru assured him that all the expenses including the hotel, travel expense and breakfast treat were enclosed inside the special package he won. Instead of rejecting the offer, Tatsuya had a little thoughts of himself wondering if he should go with his friend. Perhaps, it was a worth decision for him to spend the holidays in Paris. Maybe he needed a fresh air in a new environment to relax his mind. After all, he just wanted to get away from his busy days.
Tatsuya breathed in the sweet fragrance of the hotel’s flower garden downstairs from the balcony, looking at the children running around the small playground made for them, with their parents watched over them carefully. On the north up hill side, he could see a few young couples holding hands, blowing sweet kisses to one another and walking through the garden path happily. There was so much warmth wrapped around the ambience when everyone was smiling, forgetting their troubled hard days for a while. He huffed a disappointed sigh. Why did he feel so restless when he is supposed to have fun on his vacation!
“Hey…” he could feel a hand grabbing firmly on his shoulder and he knew his best friend was making a worried face.
“Are you okay? Feeling tired?” Nakamaru asked, concerned about his dear friend.
“I’m not tired. It’s just-“ he paused.
Nakamaru narrowed his eyes because he knew the reason his friend was so uptight. “He’s no good for you. Just forget him. We’re in France now. There are a lot of eligible bachelors who want to date you! You have the pretty look, very kind hearted, such a caring person and sometimes stubborn…” he strengthened at the last word clearly and one punch hit his right arm. And the atmosphere turned into chuckling and giggling moments.
“Oh yes! You’ll meet The One on our vacation! Just relax and watch what’s coming. Perhaps you’ll meet a gorgeous handsome man alive!” Nakamaru grinned at his friend but the other guy was only glaring in return.
“Can you stop with this ridiculous prophecy? I’m tired of hearing it since we boarded the plane a few hours ago. You’re so delusional and obsessed about an inexistent creature that so happened to cross my path and be my fated lover? Can you narrate any more fictional than that?” Tatsuya grabbed his jacket and walked to the door.
“W-well… Vampire is such an interesting creature. They have beautiful skins, good looking, nice smell wrapped around them, and-“
“-scary dark eyes with sharp fangs enough to suck my blood in the middle of the night? What a terrifying life to live in!” Tatsuya made a notification on the fact that vampire won’t do any good to human if they kept killing and sucking human’s blood every day and night.
“Yes you’re right. They don’t normally live like human does.” Tatsuya heaved a relief. At last, his friend finally agreed on the fact that vampire should stay the way they were.
“I think you just need to live as a vampire way of life to live your life normally.” His friend went on, causing him to flare his anger up to the red zone.
“Nakamaru Yuichi! Are you done? Because I need to lock up our room or should I lock you up inside instead?” He smiled wickedly at the other guy and flashing the keys around his fingers.
“Uh, y-yes… I think we better get going.” Nakamaru stuttered and quickly made his way out of the room. They took the lift down and exited at the hotel entrance before taking the public transport for sightseeing.
Referring the guidebook they bought at the airport didn’t help them any further as the language used was French. Both of them only remembered a few chapters they learnt in the French class and couldn’t follow the ascent the citizen spoke when they tried to gather more information about the place they wanted to visit. Night was approaching and soon they needed to sit down and collected their breathing back to normal. Feeling tired hustling around the place; they stopped at the nearby fancy bar and sat for a drink.
Tatsuya watched his friend skipping down the stairs, hoping he won’t break any leg or neck as he went along. He peeked around the bars as he didn’t quite know what place he had taken a picture of as the bar’s owner greeted them proudly saying that his bar was one of the famous bar in the city, but the sight that met his eyes wasn’t fit in. He would imagine people wearing simple clothing such as sweater and jeans, but the people here were more into stunning, out glowing image with their best tuxedo and hat, giving an outstanding atmosphere of rich elite parties.
As he went inside the big room, there were two dancers dancing by the pole while some of the men watching. He saw cabaret style of bar setting, disco light was everywhere on the ceiling but some parts of the area were set in darkness. A vigorous wave caught his attention when Nakamaru actually found a free seating but there was one guy drinking on the table alone. “Don’t tell me we’re going to sit with a stranger,” he complained, making his way to the table fast as Nakamaru started to create others attention by shouting his name.
“Come on! Let’s have a seat here.” Nakamaru pushed the red haired guy down and turned to his left to face the stranger who was comfortably sitting in front them.
“Hi, I’m Nakamaru! This is Tatsuya, my friend. Nice to meet you.” Tatsuya shook his head in disbelief when Nakamaru tried to introduce themselves to the stranger ,who seemed to look more feminine than he was, with pretty face, thin soft lips, small eyes, steep eyebrows, brown curly hair with edgy cut, quietly looking at them and mopping up the vodka.
“Call me, Kazuya. Nice to meet you too!” The stranger formed a friendly smile as he ended his self introduction.
“So, what brings you here?” Nakamaru began.
“Nothing, just drinking alone and have fun.” He spoke in a language their ancestors often used.
“Are you Japanese?” Tatsuya doubted.
“Yes, I am. But I was raised outside the country. People often say, I have the Japanese face but my upbringing doesn’t look like I was coming from my origin country.” Kazuya made a small laugh but Tatsuya didn’t find it funny.
“So… do you always come here?” Tatsuya asked again.
The young man twirled his fingers inside the glass, gulped the vodka before replying, “No. I prefer the east side better than this bar. But like I said, I want to drink and have fun. So here I am.”
“I bet you must be so rich for travelling here often!” Nakamaru remarked but the other guy couldn’t stop chuckling when he heard it.
“Nakamaru! It’s not right to dig information on other people’s well being!” Tatsuya smacked his friend head, causing the latter to moan in pain.
“No, don’t get me wrong. First of all, I am on a vacation same like you guys. The difference is, I already travelled to a lot of countries including France. But, I’m just an ordinary guy living a normal life by working as a dance choreographer at the private institute in New York.” Kazuya put a halt to his explanation when he saw both of his new found friends dropping their jaw wide as he went on.
“Oh man! I seriously thought you’re someone from here! I didn’t know you’re American!” Nakamaru rubbed his back head and laughed.
“You just need to ask the right question; not digging into someone else’s self secret.” Kazuya threw a wicked grin and continued to savour his vodka more. Feeling a little embarrassed, Nakamaru raised his hand to call the waiter, while Tatsuya was being all quiet and hiding. After they made an order, Nakamaru excused himself to go to the toilet and both gentlemen nodded.
Kazuya noticed an awkward position between him and the red haired guy. Finishing the vodka in the glass, he cleared his throat and nervously started the conversation to loosen up the tension between them.
“Do you hate me?” Tatsuya widened his gaze when the other guy threw the question at him straight to the point.
Instead of being silent, he shook his head weak and replied, “You did nothing wrong. I’m just not used to meet and talk freely to strangers. No offence.”
Kazuya hiked his chin up and down, understanding the other guy’s awkwardness and sent him a pleasant smile. “Hmm, you must be the hard type to get close to…” He heartily guessed.
Tatsuya met his eyes, narrowed a little bit but somehow he felt the man sitting in front him wasn’t that stranger to him though it was the first time they met. He couldn’t put quite a finger into it, but he felt the other guy evidently reading what remained to his mind. Their conversation was interrupted by a waiter who came to send their drinks and flew away to another table to send the remained glasses.
“How do you know we’re on a vacation? Did we ring you any obviousness?” Tatsuya asked, ever curious.
The young man cackled and sipped another glass he ordered earlier. “Since you walked down the stairs, looking at how both of you behave, I’m pretty sure you guys were lost from touring a place and decided for a break. Furthermore, both of you don’t look like someone from here too.” He told.
“You eyed on us?” Tatsuya shrieked, sounded uncomfortable at the statement.
“When you’re inside this bar, everyone watches everyone else. It’s just a fascinating view to peek around and doing nothing about it.” The young man added.
Soon after, Nakamaru was back on his seat. The three of them kept talking about their lives and Tatsuya began to know the other guy, who seemed mysterious to him more. Later, a moment of laughter broke the awkward atmosphere and they were enjoying their drinks even more with further stories.
Tatsuya ignored both of them who kept telling jokes as he couldn’t stop laughing as well, his eyes darting around the room glancing frequently near the window.
He is coming! A voice whispered in his head. He blinked at the image in his mind turned mist and evaporated. He looked between Nakamaru and Kazuya. Suddenly, his head kept spinning around and the voice didn’t stop whispering to him.
He will come to you tonight. The voice spoke between his unconscious states.
“Who’s coming?” He yelled to himself but his two friends heard him and shouting as a group of men was walking to the stage, “The band is going to perform soon!”
He winced to the right and palmed his forehead. Something in the air seemed strange to him as if something was flying above the mountain as he directed his gaze over the window. Then he saw a refined man sauntered firmly among the crowd and flicked a screening eye before grabbing his guitar at the corner of the stage. Tatsuya heard a group of band performed on the stage while his two friends jumped up from their seat to enjoy the atmosphere, but he stayed behind, muttering in pain. Perhaps he drank too much for the night. He looked up and saw the man and suddenly their gazes were glued for a moment. His dark eyes never left his.
Beloved… Are you alright? This time, the voice seemed vividly to his deaf ears as the music kept playing louder and louder. He grabbed a glass of water and choked back a swallow.
The room become hot and noisy as the handsome dark haired guitarist stepped out from the stage and grabbed the bar’s attention. Some of them were screaming madly, dancing at the front stage while others remained seated and cheering from their seat tired enough to stand among those fanatic people.
Tatsuya excused himself to go to the toilet, leaving his two friends dancing and he made a fast move until he realized the guitarist was crossing his way and they bumped into each other. Feeling a bit embarrassed, he muttered ‘Sorry’ and went on but his body did otherwise. He stood still and frozen like a piece of meat as the guitarist leaned closer to get his attention. The sharp gaze beneath his dark eyes was enough to drug him into fantasy world, an electric wave rushed through his adrenalin making his heartbeat racing vigorously, shaking his body to melt.
Vampire… The voice whispered again in his head. Tatsuya jumped back he knocked the pole less three steps behind him and grabbing a few chairs near him. One last thing he knew, he was already lying on the floor and the blackness overpowered him as he slowly fainted into sleep.
“Tat-chan!” came a shrieked scream but he couldn’t hear it.
Previous: Prologue | Next: Chapter 2 a