The next morning when Tao was still asleep, I snuck out to go and find Mei. Maybe she would listen to one on one rather than being surrounded by people.
I kissed Tao on the cheek and he mumbled and turned over.
'I love you so much' I whispered 'I'm going to make this right, I swear'
I got dressed and headed out.
...
Mei wasn't that hard to find, she was careless and a messy eater.
Why wasn't Kris teaching her?
I guess he didn't care as much as he had her believe.
I had to find and save her quickly.
...
She was in an alley way feeding when I found her.
'What are you doing here?' she hissed at me.
'I'm not here to fight you Mei' I said 'I'm here to take you home, your brother misses you and he's worried about you'
'Did he send you here to get me?' I shook my head.
'He has no idea I'm here. I'm completely alone, I swear' she stood up, her kagune still on full show ready for a fight.
'Why should I come back? All Tao will do is try and hide me, force me to act like I'm not the way I am, to control me. Kris lets me be myself, I'm allowed to do what I want'
'But that's dangerous Mei, don't you see? If you keep this up then you'll be caught and killed'
'You're lying! you're trying to trick me. Why would Kris do that to me, he loves me, he made me'
'He only cares about himself. You're just a play thing to him'
'STOP LYING!' she yelled as one part of her kagune shot out at me and pierced my shoulder.
I screamed out. The pain was unlike anything I'd felt before and it hurt even more when she removed it.
I fell to my knees. She walked over to me and looked down.
'Why don't you fight back?' she asked 'Kris said you were like me'
'I told you, I'm not here to fight you' I said through gritted teeth.
'Well that's no fun' she frowned and stabbed me again but this time blood splattered from my mouth from the impact. 'Fight back!' she shouted in my face.
I felt as though I was about to pass out. I couldn;t give up now, I'd promised Tao that I'd bring Mei home. If I fought her then one of us would defineatly end up dead, at least if I did it this way and kept healing, she might get bored.
'If you don't fight back, I'll just kill you instead' she dropped me 'Kris said out kagunes are the same, so it should be a fun time' she grinned. She looked more like a child then than I'd ever seen her.

I realised then that I had no idea how old Mei was, but looking at her now, she couldn't be more than sixteen.
'Okay Mei, if that's what you want' I released my own kagune and struck out at her but she managed to block my attack easily.
'Is that the best you can do? That's rubbish!' she laughed and sent out a counter attack.
She was super fast but that was probably becasuse she had been living like a ghoul should, where as I wanted to keep my humanity.
I still managed to counter most of her attacks which was the main thing I guess.
...
'What's going on here?' said a sickenly familiar voice. I could practially hear the smile in Kris' voice 'couldn't you wait until I got back before starting the fun huh?'
'Go to hell' I spat at him.
'Already there sweetheart' he winked and looked over to Mei.
'Want me to take over?' she shook her head 'it wasn't a question that needed an answer' he said 'this kids been on my case too long and if I kill her myself it'll stop the other idiot from bothering me as well'
'Leave Tao out of this' I growled.
'Oh trust me, I wish I could but no doubt he'll come here to try and save you eventually so I need to get rid of you quickly' his eyes changed. His kagune reminded me of a tail 'I actually kinda liked you at the start' he sighed before stabbing me in the gut.
I didn't scream out, I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me react to him.
'Let's see you heal from that' he laughed but then stopped 'oh finally, I wondered when you's turn up...'