Part II

    * This outside story is a whole different thing than the original work Manga, TV Series, or the Anime Movies.

("Big Brother, Killfish."
 "Shun, I hate being in groups.")

    At that time, on top of a small hill where the sea can be seen, Shun meets his Big Brother Ikki. That hill is a resting place of the dead which holds the thoughts of various people.
 Shun's heart can't stop jumping because after all, Big Brother Ikki was once an enermy that they fought with and now he is standing by Shun's side in front of their dead mother's headstone, fully resurrected like his protection stars, like an immortal bird. This is like a dream to Shun.
    (Even before Big Brother was sent to the Hell Island, Death Queen Island in place of me, and I was sent to Andromeda Island, this has never happened....), Shun is filled with these heated thoughts.
    Suddenly, tears flow down Shun's face. His crying did not escape Ikki's attention, "Shun, don't cry. If you cry longing for our mother, she won't be able to rest easy."
    Shun shakes his head strongly, "No, Big brother....., I, I am happy that you came here.... From now on, we should always be together!"
    "Shun, I was a man who fought against all of you."
    "Big Brother."
    With no change of expression, Ikki changed the topic, "Shun, you can't remeber the face of our Mother, can you?"
    "Uhm."
    "It is not without reason. Mother died while you still were a baby."
    "Big Brother can remeber, yes?"
    "Ahh..."
    "What does she look like?"
    "She looks very much like you!"
    "Me...? No, Big Brother, it is not that she looks like me, but I look like her, yes?"
    "Ha...! That's right", rarely does Ikki show a smile.
    "Big Brother, you went instead of me to Death Queen Island. I'm sorry."
    "That's in the past."
    "But, you did it for me..."
    "Shun, Death Queen Island certainly was a hell. If I think about that place now, I probably would become frozen like a skeleton... But, any one of us can more or less recollect in those 6 years, days of enduring hell like biting sand. To become a Saint, each of us shoulders a bloody fate."
    "...."
    Ikki looks like he is staring far away, tracing back his memory and starts to tell, "If Esmeralda was not there, I probably couldn't have come back here and step on the soils of Japan again."
    "Esmeralda..."
    "Yes, My Master's daughter."
    "...."
    "At Hell Island, the people's hearts, the temperature, the climate, everything was desolate, but God probably dispatched for me, my one and only Saint Angel."[Sacred Angel]
    "Saint Angel."
    "Yes, I completely did not believe that she, that tender girl was the true daugther of my Master who was transformed into an incarnation of hate. Without Esmeralda's comforting smile, for sure, I won't be able to meet you back here like this."
    Emsmeralda's smiling face appears in Ikki's mind, "Besides, maybe it is a dispensation of heaven that you and Esmeralda look alike."
    "Just like me?"
    "Ignoring the fact she's female and her hair color, she was a carbon copy of you."
    "Re, really...."
    "The room that was given to me at Death Queen Island was a cellar made of stone, full of damp, moldy stink. It had skulls rolling here and there. Everyday I slept there, like I was dead... But I had Esmeralda's encouragment and everytime I saw her face, I remember you. I continued to fight until I came back to Japan with the Phoenix Cloth."
    Listening with his breath taken away, Shun couldn't wait to inquire, "Big Brother, Esmeralda, she...."
    Ikki's expression became gloom, "Dead.... It happened like I killed her."
    Ikki's face already is showing an expression that he doesn't want to talk about it anymore. Shun lets the matter pass.
    At that time, the western sky had a flash of lighting, and a distant thunder boomed a little.
    "Big Brother"
    "Uhm. It looks like it's going to rain...  Mother, if we Saints are to protect Athena, we are always prepared to risk our lives, so, we may not able to come back here again."
    "But, Big Brother, if that happens, we will be living together with Mother in that other world."
    "Ha...! That's why, Shun, you can't waste your life!"
    "I understand. I'm not that cry-baby Shun! I'm Andromeda Saint Shun!"
    "Fight like a man till the end!"
    "Big Brother, I promise in front of Mother!"
    "Okay.", nods Ikki, surely.

    In that moment, a distant thunder boomed again. Turning their backs to their Mother's headstone, the destined brothers does not know that the distant thunder creeping near them, are actually manifestations of the Cosmos of assassins.
    As they come down from the hill, and crosses over a bridge above a small river, Shun sees something in the surface of the river, "Big Brother, Killfish."
    Indeed toward the direction Shun is pointing, Killfish can be seen swimming in a group happily along the shore.
    Right then, Ikki spit out the words, "Shun, I hate being in groups."
    "Ehh?", when Shun looked back, Ikki is not there anymore.
    "Big Brother... Big Brother!!!!!!!"
    The voice of Shun trys to find Ikki, but as it disappears, thunder roars, following that, the sound of big drops of rain starts to come. The surface of the river is like been machine-gunned by the rain. The group of killfish, too, not losing to Ikki, disappeared in an instant.
    Left alone, the thunderstorm mercilessly hits his body hard. His high-spirited heart is frozen in an instant and his T-shirt is soaked turning into a wet piece of cloth.

Part III Click Here