It breaks my heart to think of you these days. Not because the love we once had has died, but because of the part of you that died with it. Everything about you is colder now, colder because you had to be, to face everything that you've been hit with. Even your name is colder now: Mamoru Takatori. It's harsh and commanding when placed next to who you used to be – bright, soft, Omi Tsukiyono. I can understand the change, understand why we had to go our separate ways when Weiss was disbanded, and in a way I'm happy that we're no longer together, but I think the pain of seeing you reject the boy you used to be will always linger.
You are stronger than me, however. You changed yourself in order to become who you felt you had to be, changed in order to give yourself a life after everything that we lived through as Weiss – everything that you lived through as Weiss: for you were Weiss before any of us, your own father – although you did not know he was such at the time – training you to become an assassin from childhood. No wonder you needed to leave scared, confused Omi Tsukiyono behind.
But I... I fell into the darkness that had always been a willing dance partner for all of us, were we only to stumble and accept that last dance. I can't pinpoint exactly the time when I began to enjoy the killing; I think the regrets slipped away gradually, fading over time as one dark beast's death turned into twenty, turned into two hundred, turned into more than I could ever wish to count. I remember saying to Yohji, after Weiss had disbanded, that it's not that I fell into darkness, but that I had always been there – but I know now that that was not true. I used to be just a normal guy, living the dream of being a professional footballer, and I was young and enthusiastic and happy. It's something I know I can find again, that feeling of bright life, of sunshine and the feel of the ball at my feet, the feel of the air rushing against my skin as I dive to make a save.
Save. Prison has saved me, of this I am sure. Starting that game, when that ball fell at my feet, as if it were an offer of redemption from fate, saved me. I had always had football, even if the J-League and professionalism had been forever stripped from me by Kase. I had always had football, and I will always have football. In my early Weiss days, I would coach youth teams, teach them to be the best they could be. I can't go back to those days, perhaps, but I can go back to the feeling. Everyone has something that keeps them holding onto life: an ambition, family, a lover, friendship... mine was, is, and always will be, football.
At present, however, I am just Ken Hidaka, the man who only days ago had been lost in a pit of death, unsure of his reason for living, knowing only that he felt alive when he took life away from others. That Ken Hidaka was no longer compatible with Omi Tsukiyono, and this Ken Hidaka will never be compatible with Mamoru Takatori, either. All that will be left behind, just warm memories, reminders that, for a while, Ken Hidaka and Omi Tsukiyono were more than just murderers. The original Weiss... it was a time when we needed to reaffirm our humanity, and what better way to do that than love another with everything we had? We needed our love, needed each other, and even after we outgrew it, the small shreds of sanity that had been preserved by it would keep us afloat in the stormy seas of coming to terms with a life that suddenly had no purpose. There was no purpose for me after Weiss disbanded once the mission concerning the American base was over.
I am Ken Hidaka, and I once loved Omi Tsukiyono.
