Patching Her Up 5: Beginning

NOIR-fanfic. The end has come and gone, and the girls have some things to talk about.
(Mireille/Kirika)


And so we return to our regularly scheduled series. XD
This is the fifth installment in my series of short stories called "Patching Her Up".

Read Patching Her Up 5: Beginning

Disclaimer: All things Noir belong to Bee Train and probably others, perhaps even to Raimi/Tapert by now, but at any rate I’m just borrowing.

My “Patching Her Up” series is just a series of short stories unrelated to one another, from different fandoms, that have a certain theme in common. Each part is a stand-alone.






Patching Her Up 5: Beginning
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by Carola “Ryûchan” Eriksson







The room was small and sparsely furnished, not that anything more than the bed, a small table with two chairs and tiny, well-worn settee for two would have fit in there, but it was safe enough and had its own tiny bathroom. A far cry from their spacious Parisian studio loft it might have been, but it was good enough for now. If an emergency arose they could even, albeit with difficulty, access the roof through the window in front, not that Mireille expected trouble.

They weren’t even in Mireille’s beloved Paris now, but rather the first city they’d reached where there presence wouldn’t stick out of the crowd. Soldats probably knew where they were anyway, and for that reason the small space was packed with hidden weapons by now, yet after the events at the Manor... Soldats had not attempted to contact them. Not yet anyway.

It was time to heal wounds and gather strength.

The old apartment was lost to them, in fact there was precious little left of it. Mireille had, in that dark place she had been after losing her partner, remained there for a while, sleeping in the ruined shards of their bed, sitting at the broken table, and staring out the gaping holes that had once been windows. She hadn’t noticed the cold or the dark, overwhelmed as she was with the despair within.

There was nothing to go back to there. They had nothing in the way of personal belongings worth collecting, even if anything had managed to survive the onslaught. They would have to start anew someplace else, and thankfully had the funds to do so.

The important part was that they had each other.

Not even the watch, Mireille’s father’s watch, had meant a thing in the end, not compared to Kirika. Whatever she might have said, Mireille had known it the very moment she shook off the despair and set out towards the Manor, that she was going there to get her partner back. To get her Kirika back.

Nothing else mattered, not even vengeance.

The first-aid kit Mireille had stocked her car with before setting out had been used up patching mainly Kirika, but also Mireille herself, up enough that they didn’t simply bleed out on the road. As it were the seats of the car were ruined, and Mireille traded it in for a proper if shady treatment of Kirika’s wounds. They had another one by now, a shabby and easily overlooked one that would still last them across the country and then some if they needed it to.

So far though things had been quiet. The proprietor of the run-down hotel where Mireille and Kirika rented their tiny room was friendly and accommodating enough, and though she had been on careful lookout Mireille had yet to spot anyone spying on them on Soldats behalf. That of course didn’t mean that Soldats didn’t know where they were, only that they would leave them be for now.

Most likely Soldats had bigger problems right now than the famed Noir. The Manor had gone down in flames, taking Althena and the other leaders of her insane pseudo-religious phalange with it, and when Mireille and Kirika had left... ironically the remaining highest leaders of Soldats had turned on one another, and only one remained standing that either of them knew of. The man which had attempted to make a deal with Mireille.

Likely there were all sorts of struggles for power going on, and whatever factions there might be, none of them would have enough manpower to waste, should they even have the ambition to, by sending them after Noir. Unless Kirika and Mireille made a move against them, they would have little reason to.

So that was why it was time to rest up and heal, finally. Perhaps also make up some plans for their future.

The past, individual and shared, had been... delicately discussed.

The pain Mireille carried over the murder of her parents would not be so easily or quickly put behind her, but she understood at last that while Kirika’s hands might have been the ones holding the gun, the one that killed them had been Althena. She accepted and forgave Kirika, just as she acknowledged Kirika’s own pain and loss.

Sometimes Mireille wondered if Althena had personally seen to the assassination of Kirika’s parents, hoping that at least Kirika herself had not been made part of that act but afraid to ask and stir up even more pain. Kirika herself seemed not to have any memory of her parents, but her memories of her early years were fragmented at best.

Eventually though their conversation turned to Kirika’s days at the Manor, and to Chloe.

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“You kissed her?” After days of calm, this sudden explosion of Mireille’s temper seemed all the more loud, Mireille’s anger all the more intense. “You kissed her!”

Kirika blinked, as if she couldn’t quite understand why Mireille was angry. A small part of Mireille was aghast at herself for reacting this way, but powerless to stop it.

“No...” Kirika tilted her head as she explained. “Chloe kissed me. I did not...” She frowned a little as she tried to find a word that would fit. “...participate.”

“So you let her kiss you.” Mireille demanded. “Is that supposed to be any better? What else did she do?”

Taking a moment to order her thoughts, Kirika proceeded to tell Mireille about most of what had transpired at the Mansion. She told her about walking around the ruins with Chloe, of sparring with the taller girl, and of how Chloe had been hiding outside Kirika’s bedroom window at night.

She told Mireille of reading the book, and how she nearly shot Althena. She told her of the times she had bathed together with Chloe, and how Althena had sent the two of them off to cleanse and prepare for the ritual, which was how Chloe had come to kiss Kirika.

Mireille’s face had taken on a strangely red hue by the time Kirika got to that part.

“Naked? You let her kiss you, and hold you, while naked?” Unexpectedly she let out a strangled and frustrated cry. “And that, that... woman! ‘To strengthen your bond’...” Mireille growled. “She wanted you to sleep together!”

Kirika shook her head. “No, Chloe had her own bedroom at the Manor. I saw it.”

Staring hard at the younger woman sitting on the edge of their bed, looking completely sweet and innocent as ever, Mireille realized that she had to calm down. She was letting herself act insane with jealousy, and while it didn’t seem to frighten her, Kirika had not really deserved to be treated like this. The situation then had been different, and Kirika had been different.

In the end, her choice had been made abundantly clear. In the end, they had all said their vows of love in actions rather than words.

She by arriving there, not for the revenge she had lived for but to take back the one she loved. Kirika by the choice she made in the end, no matter how hard or heart-rending, when she had sacrificed someone she considered the other part of herself to save Mireille. And Chloe... Mireille had always known about Chloe, she had thought the girl wore her love for Kirika on her sleeve, but that moment on the battleground... the expression in Chloe’s eyes, her scream when she realized that Kirika was saying without words that Mireille was the one she really loved... it had stunned Mireille.

There was no point in being angry at Chloe anymore. The girl had received a dark and cruel fate she did not deserve, anymore than any of them, and Mireille should pity her. Maybe someday she would even actually be able to. But for now it was enough to know that Chloe was dead.

And Kirika was hers.

Not that they had in any way acted on it or even said so, it was entirely possible that Kirika was innocent enough not to realize what had really happened, what the Noir ritual really was. Two of the deadliest women in the world, fighting to the death... for the love of the third.

Her and Chloe, for Kirika’s love.

Not that Mireille harboured any illusions that she could actually have beaten Chloe on her own. She was skilled, one of the best perhaps, but she wasn’t in Chloe and Kirika’s league. No-one was.

But be that as it may, Chloe was gone and Mireille was the one that was here, right now, with Kirika. The one that was going to build a life and a future with Kirika.

She rubbed her face with one hand, briskly, as if to chase away old ghosts and thoughts. Then she glanced at Kirika and smirked. The brunette looked back questioningly, looking as if she was about to speak. She didn’t get the chance to.

Mireille pounced, pushing the other girl down on the bed that was just wide enough to fit them both with a bit of effort and no more, and pinned her down. Kirika made a startled little sound but did not object.

And then Mireille kissed her.

Despite the somewhat aggressive approach, the kiss itself was gentle, tender. It spoke of Mireille’s longing and her desperate need for Kirika in her life, by her side. It was their first, it was sweet, and it was brief.

Before Kirika had the chance to at all react it was over, Mireille withdrew to rest their heads together so that her lips were next to Kirika’s ear, without Kirika being able to see Mireille’s face.

“You are mine.” Mireille’s voice was deeper in pitch and soft as velvet, a touch possessive and dangerous but mostly suggestive of things that made Kirika shiver involuntarily. “You... are... mine.”

“I won’t share you, with anything or anyone. Remember that.”

From the heat where the side of Mireille’s face rested against her own Kirika could tell that the blonde was blushing as she spoke. Slowly, small hands reached up to embrace the body perched carefully over her own.

“And just so you know, I am yours and only yours.”

They remained still like that, simply breathing together, for a long moment.

“You know I have said it before, that you and I were always bound together by Fate’s thread. A black thread for certain, but Fate’s thread nonetheless.” Mireille leaned her face into Kirika’s slightly, turning the touch into a kind of caress. “I don’t know if you can understand it right now, but that ceremony, the fires of the ritual of Noir...”

“It married us. We are the heart of darkness, together. The two maidens of death that are one.”

She closed her eyes and breathed Kirika in. “Not because of the words of an ancient book or the machinations of a madwoman, but because of us. Because of what we are and what we became for one another. And for all that we are willing to do for each other.”

“I don’t ask that you understand it yet, if you need time you can have all you want. But I ask that you are aware of it, of what you are to me.” There was a touch of desperation in Mireille’s voice as she leaned back to look into Kirika’s eyes. “Is that alright with you?”

Her reply was a pair of delicate hands that reached up, cupped her face, and pulled her down for a kiss.

Kirika was an inexperienced kisser, having been kissed twice but not responded to either, and somewhat hesitant at what to do at first. But the emotion was genuine, and after the first initial moment of shock and marvel, Mireille was only too happy to give it her best as well. Kirika’s hands wound up in Mireille’s hair, and the kiss grew enthusiastic and animated.

They remained like that for as long as Mireille, propped up with her weight on her arms as she was, dared to. Once she feared she would topple over and risk putting weight on Kirika she drew back, gasping for air.

All that could be heard was their laboured breathing as they looked at one another for a long moment. Then Mireille, smiling, leaned their foreheads together and gently brushed a hand over Kirika’s bandages.

“We’d better get up. I have to change these for you.”

“I feel fine.” Kirika’s protest was as softly spoken as ever, but her voice had a slightly breathy quality to it that made Mireille’s heart beat harder.

“And to keep you ‘fine’, I have to change it for you.” She grinned at the adorably recalcitrant girl as she sat up. “You know that.”

With gentle hands Mireille changed Kirika’s bandages, relieved beyond words to find that her earlier actions had not caused any bleeding. Thankfully it seemed that they both possessed remarkable healing abilities, and of course as nearly life-long assassins they were resistant, or perhaps just very intimately familiar with, pain. It would not restrict or cripple them the way it would other people, but even so Mireille had to be careful with Kirika for a while. No roughhousing until Kirika was back to full strength.

The thought heated Mireille’s cheeks as she finished re-bandaging Kirika and helped the younger girl get ready for bed. It was a bit early still, but the emotional outpouring had been tiring, and they could both need all the rest they could get.

As Mireille double-checked her safeguards and turned off the lights she heard the cute little ‘yoisho’ sound Kirika made as she got into bed and crawled over towards the wall. Mireille quickly got herself ready for bed as well, and joined her partner.

Instead of positioning themselves back to back as they usually did, Mireille lay down and carefully urged Kirika into a comfortable position half draped over her. It was something she had longed to do for nearly as long as Kirika had shared her bed, and some nights of late Mireille had awakened to find herself spooning the younger girl in her sleep. Now though she could wrap her arms around Kirika like she had always wanted to, and feel the other girl come to rest on her shoulder with a contented sigh.

Placing a loving kiss into baby soft brown hair Mireille tucked the blanket a little higher on her lover. She closed her eyes and basked in the tranquillity of the moment.

Their breathing evened out, and sleep beckoned.

Then, in a whisper...

“Kirika? What do you think about getting another apartment in Paris?”