Title: Uncertainty Principle
Characters: Uni considers the possibilities.
Summary: Perhaps it's better to be uncertain.
Notes: For Cliché Bingo, prompt: "Character Study." Spoilers for ch. 255 of the manga; manga canon only. 578 words.
Uncertainty Principle
As she faces Byakuran down, Uni looks at the possibilities unfolding before her, myriad and mostly grim. This talent, this ability to know all the possible permutations of a choice, of her choices, is both blessing and curse. There is no good way of knowing which possibilities will lead to good futures (for varying values of "good" that range from "not everyone on our side dies" to "more of their guys than our guys die" to "well, at least the world didn't end") and which will not.
Perhaps it's just as well. She might run as mad as Byakuran has, if she were able to see the bright threads among the dark ones, and had to know it when those hopeful paths were foreclosed by chance or necessity. Better, she thinks, to be uncertain.
And now, as she stands between the Vongola and Byakuran, he throws the Black Spell in her face--and she stops, and corrects herself at the thought. No, she thinks, privately, they are not the Black Spell, they are the Giglio Nero, her Family, and they always have been. She will reclaim her Family's name, when this is all over, and then she will go to each and every member of her Family and ask them to forgive her for having forgotten herself for so long.
Assuming they all survive that long, of course. Assuming there are any of them left when this is all over.
Across the many branching possibilities there are, she can feel versions of herself waver, hesitating over the thought of sacrificing her Family to protect the trust of the Arcobaleno. Some versions of herself have already given in to Byakuran's poison-sugar smile. Others are thinking of the faces of her people--thinking of dear Gamma, of all the men and women who are loyal to her and who have followed her this far, even of poor lost Genkishi--and the thought of their loss twists at her heart till she wants to scream with the ache of it.
Paradoxically enough, that's a strengthening thought, for all the pain of it. The Giglio Nero have always been a proud Family, and this past little while, they have looked at her with puzzled, betrayed eyes as she has drifted among them, dreaming and disconnected. They have swallowed their pride, because she has asked it of them, but there has been enough of that, and she will not ask such things of them again.
No, she tells Byakuran, though not without regret for the lives of her people. No, she will not surrender the trinisette to him, not even if it costs here every last member of her Family. They will understand, all of them, and they will accept this last sacrifice with pride, because that is the quality of their spirits and hers.
It is the right choice; she knows it in her heart, even those other selves who were not strong enough to say no to Byakuran. She knows it, too, in the flash of rage in Byakuran's eyes as her decision stymies him, however briefly, and she knows it when it throws young Sawada into motion at last, because that was the true gamble.
Uni still doesn't know why Sawada Tsunayoshi should be the pivot around which the future turns, but he is Reborn's student and Reborn's choice, and she is willing to trust in the both of them, and hope that they will bring her a better future.
- end -
Comments are lovely!