I wrote this after seeing the last episode of Video Girl Ai. The inspiration was the scene where Yota climbs the glass staircase up towards Ai. It's sort of strange, but I like it. I don't own Video Girl Ai or Nobody Loves You by Garbage or the poem Yota quotes (title escapes me presently). * and italics designate song lyrics. Yota's POV. Spoilers for Episode 6.

Broken Glass

            "Yota the loser is right!" I hear Ai tease in my head. I quickly push the thought out of my mind, hating myself for bringing it up. I love Ai. I know now that I will, even if she's gone.

            The glass steps keep shattering beneath my feet; it's fragile, metaphoric pain. Ai's creator, his image is constantly before me, mocking every step I take, each move to the top of the staircase, towards Ai.

*Watching the days slip by so fast

Knowing our fate has long been cast

Working our fingers to the bone

Cause nobody loves you when you're gone*

            I was sure there was more time left on the tape, more time with Ai. How could it be over so fast? She was wonderful, perfect. She never really let on that she loved me, kept supporting me while I dreamed of Moemi. How had I missed everything?

            As I climbed the staircase, hearing each crunch beneath my feet, everything she ever did for me flashed in my mind, repeating like short, silent films. Each was a vignette, but all together, it made a long movie, totaled, it proved she loved me.

            "Video girls can't fall in love,"

            Ai, I think you're wrong.

*Coughing up feeling just for you

To find something real to hold on to*

            I stepped on the next stair a bit too hard, and I fell through.

            "Yota!" I heard Ai scream. I grabbed the edge of the staircase, the glass cutting my hands. My whole body was covered in wounds, cuts from the glass, but I kept going. I had to pull myself up, to get myself to Ai. I still needed her, and, more, she needed me.

*But there is a hole inside my heart

Where all the love comes pouring out*

            How wretched of that man, the one who had the nerve to say he created Ai, how could he pose as Takashi and Moemi, just so I would stray and forget about Ai? How could he?

            At first, I wanted to believe that Moemi really was there, really was in love with me, but there was something about the way she was acting that tipped me off. Moemi wasn't like that.

            I felt my hands start to slip, so I strengthened my grip, trying yet again to pull myself onto the stairs, so I could keep climbing.

*You know you'll always be my man

But grab yourself sweetness where you can

Cause sooner or later we're going to die

Left to the dogs under the sky*

            I pulled myself up, resting for a second. Above me I could hear Ai, crying. Behind, was that man, but there were still so many steps.

*I cracked a piece of broken glass

I cracked a piece of broken glass*

            I took the step, then another. I didn't look behind me, because I knew what I'd see. Shattered glass, pools of blood. I remembered hearing a line from a poem. "Shattered mirror shows shattered truth." I had forgotten where I'd heard it though.

*Coughing up feeling just for you

To find something real to hold on to

But there is a hole inside my heart

Where waves of my love come tumbling out*

            The staircase seemed to shorten, not looking infinitely long, as it did before. Ai was within reach. Just a few more steps, I told myself. Just a few more steps.

*You say that all the good is gone

That I have forgotten who I am*

            I ignore the man, who is yelling endlessly. I focus on Ai. I feel my foot land on solid ground, not glass, not air. It's the ground beneath where Ai is being held, on the crucifix, bound with wires. I want to rip the wires apart.

            "Yota…" she whispers, a tear falling from her eye.

*Free as a bird

Wild as the wind

But somehow I cannot let you in*

            It was only a moment, and that was fine. Life might just be able to go on without Ai.