Author's note: Eh, another stress-induced idea. I was feeling melodramatic and sappy while agonizing over my term paper. I need to stop doing that. This can stand on it's own, but if you really want to understand where Misao and Aoshi are coming from, go read the whole thing.
Set during unwritten part of their wandering Japan and China while Misao finds a new self, and Aoshi watches over her.
Taking Over Me
Another Half
The fall wind stole the blood-red maple leaves from the trees around them. It danced along the dying grasses and tugged at their cloths. One bright red leaf caught in the liquid black of Misao's hair. Aoshi reached a hesitant hand to untangle the bit of color and at his touch, she turned to look up at him. He froze, hand extended as her eyes trapped him. The blues and greens swirled together in chaos until she looked down at her hands, worn and scarred over the past ten months.
"Aoshi," her voice was hollow, "I've become someone I do not know. I have done everything I intended to do - but I feel like I lost something I never knew was precious to me."
Aoshi frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I have made myself stronger. I found you again. I made myself into an Okashira that everyone can be proud of. Yet I feel like I'm still searching, that there is something still undone." She turned and looked over the countryside in the late afternoon light. "I need something."
Her lonely figure cut his breath in two. She was standing only three feet away, but it could have been miles. For the first time in a decade, he felt a panic that took over his senses. She was slipping - he could feel it. Even as he took the one step forward to wrap his arms around her, he could feel her heart falling away into darkness.
"No!" He hissed. "No! Don't go - everything you need is here."
She shuddered in his grasp, face pressed into his shoulder. "Aoshi... help me! I'm lost."
He wasn't going to lose her now - not after she had saved him from his own demons. How could he have hoped that she would survive her own quest for strength without developing her own shadows? Could he still be so foolish?
"Misao, growing means shedding some things along the way. Innocence is one of the first to be forgotten. We lose our hopes that the world is made of nothing by opportunities. We learn that there are things like hate, deception... death. But we cannot let it overwhelm us." He pulled back a little to see if she was understanding him. Tears were streaming down her face from closed eyes. He shook her gently. "Misao! You are still who you want to be - but can you be happy with that? Are you satisfied with everything you have achieved?"
"I don't know... There is this hole in my heart and I don't know why, or what to fill it with." She abruptly reached up to wrap her arms around his neck and press her mouth to his. Her desperation startled him and he pulled away catching her face between his hands. She let out a strange cry.
"Misao-love," Aoshi pressed his forehead to hers. "There is nothing left to do."
She was silent for a long time. The wind still shed leaves around them, but there was no other movement. Aoshi watched her face and felt her emotions tip to and fro. He let his fingers trace over her eyebrow and down to her cheek. Trailing them over her bottom lip, he whispered, "Come home."
Her eyes slowly opened, the darkness fading away. Any creature eavesdropping on the two would have thought that 'Come home' meant for them to stop their self-searching quest. Misao smiled. What was really said was Come home to this - to Aoshi - to love. The uncertainty and doubt calmed.
Aoshi felt the tension lift from her shoulders. Cautiously he bent and let his lips linger over hers, just resting. In reply, she just barely turned her head to press against him more firmly. Opening his eyes, he withdrew and just simply looked at her. When she frowned in confusion, he smiled and drew her into a tight embrace.
"Misao, will you marry me?"
When she didn't answer, he continued, "You saved me from insanity by nearly becoming so yourself. I have followed you for nearly a year now, and I cannot see myself ever doing anything else." He kissed her neck. "We need each other - we are the only ones who can balance our chaos."
"We are, and I say yes."