A/N: I got home from school at 2 today, and so I thought to myself, "Wow! I have so much extra time for doing homework! Better write angsty fanfiction all day and start my homework at 5!"
But as for this fic in particular, we're doing this thing in school where we can write a tribute to our favorite character in a book, and I reaaaaallly wanted to do one on Vincent. So I wrote this. That's why I left out the eyeball-removing small-intestine-pulling face-stabbing part and changed the dialogue a bit. Had to be school appropriate after all! But reading back through this, maybe I won't actually submit it for school...so I'm submitting it here instead. Might as well.
I...didn't actually double check anything with the canon when writing this (I wrote it one sitting! That never happens!) so I'll just cross my fingers and hope for accuracy~
DISCLAIMER: Pandora Hearts isn't mine.
It wasn't fair.
I rubbed furiously at my eyes, and my hands came away wet. Through the smoke and my sobbing fit, I could barely breathe. There was fire everywhere. People, too, but they just lay there, leaving me alone in the crowd. Crouched on my hands and knees I continued to cry.
I couldn't understand the scene around me. This morning all these people had been walking around, happy, talking to each other. One had even smiled at me.
Why were they all dead?
Everything was red; red with fire, red with blood, red like my eye. Yeah, my eye - it brought misfortune. This was misfortunate, wasn't it?
Was this my fault?
I choked on my tears. It wasn't fair. I was just trying to help Gil. They were going to kill him! Alice had said so! He didn't do anything wrong and they were going to kill him. Why him? I thought, once again rubbing at my eyes. I ignored the sting of my ash-coated hands. Why him, why not me? I was the bad one. I was the one with the red eye. I tried to save him, I did what the lady told me to do, I opened the door, and now everyone was dead. I saved Gil, and killed everyone else. I had been a bad boy.
"It's...not my fault..."
Shaking all over, weak from crying and the heat of the fire, I stood up. Was that my voice talking? I said again: "It's not my fault."
I looked around me. The face of an aristocrat, clothes bloodied and burnt, stared up at me with blank eyes. I stared back, and a slow smile spread across my face. "It's not my fault. It's not my fault!"
I began to laugh. That was right! I turned around and looked at another empty noblemen. I leaned in close and grinned, not even knowing what I was doing. "Hey mister...who did this to you?" I grabbed at his torn waistcoat and smiled wider. "It wasn't me. I didn't do anything wrong." I stood straighter, looked all around, and began to spin. An aimless dance, not even noticing the flames, I spun and spun and threw my arms out and laughed. "It's not my fault! It's HIS fault! I tried to save him, and this happened! Gil - It's because of him!"
I ran down the hallway past more bodies. They all stared at me, accusing me. But that wasn't right. That wasn't fair. It wasn't me! I laughed some more, louder, drowning out my tears.
It wasn't fair.
A sharp pain brought me out of my daydream. I glanced down at my hands; the scissors held in one hand had cut through my plush bear entirely, making a long gash in my glove.
Ah. I had gotten carried away again.
I chuckled and sat back against the couch cushions, all but one of them tattered. Uncaring, I stabbed my scissors into the last good one and left them there, standing upright like a sword in a pathetic stone. I laid down, face nestled in the crook of my arm.
A hundred years. A hundred years, it had been, but it felt like yesterday. I couldn't stop thinking about that night. Why couldn't I forget like everyone else had?
It was sad, really. Misfortune was a sad thing, and I thought vaguely that I should be crying, but the tears didn't come. I had cried enough a hundred years ago - enough for me and Gilbert alike. There weren't any tears left.
Maybe if I could just forget, I could be normal. I could cry for sad things and smile for happy things like everyone else. I could get lost in frivolous pleasures and make small talk and whisper secrets that were none of my business and blend in like everyone else...if I could forget. Wouldn't it be better just to forget?
No, I thought, smiling ruefully. I couldn't forget. Not now that I had caused so much misfortune. Forgetting was for Gil and for Oz and for everyone else. I had to make it right. Make it so that it never happened, so I wouldn't have had to save my brother.
I covered my red eye with the torn glove. Everything would be alright. Gil would be alright. And I wouldn't exist.
As it should be.