betweenrealities | [Fic][Marchen Awakens Romance] In Between Realities

Title: In Between Realities

Summary: Nanashi keeps hearing someone calling out to him in his dreams. The voice sounds so familiar. Could it be… one-sided NanashixAlviss, implied PhantomxAlviss.

A/N: This story taken place after the curse on Alviss’s body had fully took control of his body. It also doesn’t have any connection with the recent MÄR manga or anime. So, please don’t compare this fic with Anzai Nobuyuki Sensei’s excellent work.

Disclaimer: If I own MÄR, Alviss will have his tattoo all over his body in anime and we can see a lot of shirtless Alviss walking around throughout the anime. But since there aren’t any, so it is safe to say that I don’t own it, ‘kay?

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‘Nanashi…’

Nanashi woke up from his sleep rather shockingly. His body was soaked in sweat due to the dream that had been disturbing his sleep for some time already.

In his dreams, there was a person calling out to him from the depth of darkness. He didn’t see the person’s face, but he recognized the voice clearly. One thing for sure, it didn’t belong to anyone around him then. Ginta and Jack always called his name with a playful tone, Dorothy with a bit of anger in her voice, Babbo with a bit of arrogance, and Alan with his tone of authority. This meant that the young male’s voice belonged to only one other person…

Alviss always called his name with a little bit of softness in his voice. He calls everyone with that same tone, especially Bell, Alan and Gaira. It was quite hard to detect that softness in his voice, but him being a thief, could easily hear the undertone.

Remembering the true owner of the voice in his dreams only making Nanashi felt more anxious and worried. Alviss had been separated from them for almost two weeks now, for the tattoo that had been haunting the black-haired male for 6 years had took control of his body. Alviss was now in the hands of Chess no Koma, and none of them know what happened to him.

“Al-chan, what have they done to you?”

o-o-Flashback-o-o

“Woo hoo! We won another battle!”

“And of course, thanks to my incredible power, Babbo-sama!”

“Huh? It’s not you who make us win. Without me, you’re nothing!”

“Why you...!”

Alviss just watched the commotion caused by Ginta and Babbo with a sigh. ‘Those two, no matter how you trained them, how much bloody scenes they have seen, they just can’t mature…’

“Al-chan…?”

Alviss turned around to see the blonde thief walking towards him with his usual smirk plastered on his face. He blushed when he realized why Nanashi had that smirk. Despite his saying that he didn’t like being called with the nickname given by Nanashi, he kept responding whenever anyone called him like that - especially Nanashi.

“What do you want? And how many times have I told you not to call me that?”

“Because it’s fun to see the way your face changes when I call you that,” Nanashi replied, before his expression became serious. “But what I really want to know now is how bad your wounds are.”

Alviss looked at the wounds he got during the last battle. They didn’t hurt that much, but something had made his body quite weak. And the other male realized that.

“It’s nothing, probably because the Sealing Skull effect I used during the battle,” Alviss answered, not telling the truth about his condition. He used the Darkness Arm quite a few times, but this was the first time the effects still lingered in his body even after the battle.

“But it never affects your body after the battle, right? Are you really sure It’s because of that and not something else?”

Trust Nanashi to notice that.

“It’s nothing, really. You don’t have to…”

“Maybe it’s nothing for you, Alviss, but it’s affecting your health, right?”

The two males turned to look at Dorothy, who apparently has the concerned look on her face. The young witch looked at Alviss with worry etched on her face.

“Maybe it is best for you to take a good a rest for today, and don’t go for tomorrow’s battle, okay?”

Alviss was shocked at Dorothy’s words. This was the first time the pink-haired witch had showed concern towards him openly. But that didn’t mean that he would do as she said.

“What do you mean by that? I’m totally capable of battling tomorrow!”

“But, Alviss, if you keep on battling, who knows what effects you’ll get. And besides, tomorrow is only a three-on-three battle. Ginta, Nanashi and I will go for it. What is important right now is that you must take a good rest.”

“But you don’t have the right to…Ahhhh!”

Alviss’s outburst was cut off by a sudden pain throughout his whole body so painful that he couldn’t help but scream. And of course, his scream attracted other people’s attention.

“Alviss, are you okay?”

“Al, what happened?”

The people quickly gathered around the trio to see what had happened. Alan and Gaira, shocked at Alviss’s sudden scream, hurriedly came to the youth’s aid.

“Alviss, what happened? Are you sure you’re fine?” Alan asked, while Gaira took a good look at Alviss’s body and injuries, trying to detect if they were the causing Alviss’s pain.

Seeing that the male youth was unable to answer him, he turned to look at Dorothy and Nanashi, who were standing beside him, shocked of what had happened. “What happened? I have noticed that both of you have been talking to him before he started screaming all of a sudden.”

“I…don’t know. I was the one who approached him, asking him about the injuries that he got during today’s battle. He has been acting weird, especially after he used the Sealing Skull,” Nanashi answered, telling Alan about his curiosity with Alviss’s weird expression after he won his match.

Dorothy added, “I approached them after that, saying that I also noticed the same thing. I suggested him to take a rest tomorrow, and he was quite angry with it. That’s when Alviss started to scream.”

Alan was just starting to say something when Gaira suddenly exclaimed, “Alan, you have to take a look at this!”

Alan, Nanashi, Dorothy and the rest of the MÄR team quickly ran to Gaira’s side, looking at Alviss, who was unconscious.

Ginta and Jack gasped in horror when they saw Alviss’s body. “What…what the heck are THOSE?” Ginta asked, shocked to see the weird patterns on Alviss’s body.

Alviss’s shirt had been opened by Gaira, revealing trails of cursed tattoo all over his body, glowing in eerie, angry red. Not only that, apparently that all of the trails met at a fire-like symbol at the middle of the cursed youth’s chest.

“W…wait! That symbol! Isn’t it the same one on Phantom’s hand?” Jack asked, bewildered with the idea that Alviss and Phantom have the same symbol on their body.

Even Nanashi, who was calm before, was also shocked to see the tattoo glowing. “Could this symbol signify that Al-chan has been cursed by Zombie Tattoo?”

Looking at Alan’s sorrow face, he can take that his assumption has been right. Usually he would feel proud if his guess were right. ‘But who wants to be proud with this kind of guessing?’

“Alviss got this symbol when he received the Tattoo 6 years ago. We told him that with his own will power he might be able to stop the Tattoo from taking control of his body sooner than usual, not totally overcome its power. But, we don’t know the exact time when the Tattoo will start to react…”

Gaira hadn’t even finished explaining when all of a sudden Alviss sat up and started to throw up blood. The scene was so horrifying that some of the women there started to scream with horror.

“A…Al!” Bell shrieked, terrified with her best friend’s abrupt throwing up. “Al!” she started screaming, while the rest of the group; Alan, Gaira, Dorothy and Nanashi, tried to stop Alviss. Ginta, Babbo and Jack just stood there, too stunned to do anything to help.

“W…what are y…you doing h…here?” Edward’s shaking voice made the group turned their heads around to where his short finger pointed at. To their worst shock, a group of Knights was walking up to them, led by Phantom. A devious smirk on his face clearly showed the others that he was satisfied with something. And Alan and Gaira knew what that something was.

Both of them quickly blocked Phantom’s view from Alviss, who was still vomiting blood.

Phantom, noticing this, said, “It appeared that you know why I’m here now. So, if you please, move away so that I can take a look at Alviss-kun.”

“We also know that you’re here not only to take a look at him. Unfortunately, we won’t let you take him away from us,” Alan replied, not letting Phantom did whatever he wanted to Alviss. Even until now, he didn’t know why Phantom put the curse on Alviss 6 years ago. But now was not the time to think about it. “We made a promise to ourselves and Danna-san that we won’t let you touch ever again him no matter what happen, and we don’t intend to break it now.”

Hearing what Alan said, the rest of the MÄR team gathered around them, shielding Alviss from Phantom, while Dorothy was still trying to stop him from vomiting.

As he looked at them, Phantom’s smirk widened. If they already cared about Alviss this much, they were going to lose their confidence if the black-haired teen were really taken from them. Alviss was one of the strongest in the team, losing him will cause a lot of problems.

“What make you think any of you are capable enough of stopping me from taking what is mine? You must very well know about my abilities, right?” the leader of the Knights said, knowing that, by saying that, some of them will lose their courage to confront him, making it easier for him to get Alviss.

As soon as he finished, Jack and Edward quickly showed signs of nervousness, while Ginta and Nanashi’s could be detected in their eyes. As for the rest, Alan and Gaira remained unfazed, and Dorothy tried to ignore him by tending to Alviss, who had finished vomiting, and was lying there, weak from blood loss.

In just mere seconds, everything changed abruptly. The sounds that they heard were a swish of moving cloth followed by Dorothy’s scream. They turned around only to see Dorothy lying lifeless on the ground, and Alviss in Phantom’s arm - apparently still in haze to notice anything around him.

“What are you trying to do to Al-chan?” Nanashi demanded, only to realize that he had called Alviss by his nickname.

“Al-chan, eh? That is quite a cute name for him,” Phantom said, “Unfortunately, I don’t think he’ll be able to hear you right now.”

And only with that, Phantom and the rest of the Knights, who were there to make sure nothing happened to their leader, left the ground - leaving the group speechless. Deep inside their hearts, they regretted that their abilities were not good enough to protect their comrade.

o-o-End of Flashback-o-o

Remembering what had happened almost two weeks ago made the blonde thief almost cry out of frustration. The group had been plunged into a more serious atmosphere, unlike when Snow was taken from them. And this time, he felt more despair perhaps because his feelings towards the youth.

Yes, he had to admit; he had fallen for the dark-haired teen. Hard. But stupid of him, to realize it only when Alviss was gone. And he practically hated himself for that.

And now, he couldn’t do anything, except for keeping on dreaming about his love.

Words couldn’t describe how helpless he felt for not being able to save Alviss.

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