My name is Reisen.

For years I have struggled with this pain, gnawing away at the four corners of my soul, drifting me closer and closer to the darkness.

I have cried.

I have shivered.

I have tried a plethora of medication.

Nothing's worked.

Now, I turn to my last resort.

I write this in the hopes that I might absolve myself of my sins, and finally rid this torturous self-loathing once and for all.

I was no different than any of my brothers and sisters. Long ears, masculine and feminine features, the standard fare for a moon rabbit. I was born to a family of six, the last moon rabbit to fall from my mother before her untimely passing. I was too young to remember her death, but old enough to process the tear stricken, pained faces around me. I held the casket upon my shoulder, and every second that weight pressed down on me was another second that reassured me my mother was not going to open her eyes. She looked so peaceful in her final resting place, so gentle... She had always been that way, you know. It doesn't surprise me what aspect hooked my father in the first place.

I want to say that things improved from here, that our family assisted one another in overcoming this insurmountable pain. I want to write in joy that my father learned just how precious life is after my mother's passing and clung to us for dear life. I want to say that my brothers and sisters stayed home and around one another, not wishing to be let out of each other's sight out of fear of losing them. There are many things I want to write, but life isn't so gentle. This isn't one of the fairy tales my father read to me at night. This is real life, cold and unyielding. My father became a violent drunk, and with it came retaliation from my older brothers and sisters protecting the young ones. Pretty soon, one by one, they left our broken home. The only one not old enough to leave was myself. Can you imagine what the back of your own father's hand must feel like? To know you're suffering five times over, all because you were abandoned by the ones you thought you could trust?

I didn't let this get to me. I didn't want the weight of the world to break me. I had to be strong. I knew my mother was looking down on me and I couldn't imagine letting her face scrunch up in sadness over her daughter's suffering. So, I smiled. I smiled through the beatings, the verbal abuse, the insults and shattered bottles. I smiled even when his hands touched me in places I did not want him to touch. I never allowed myself to frown, even as he pierced right through me. I never imagined losing one's virginity to be so painful. My brothers and sisters told me sex felt good, so why was it so fierce? Maybe it was the alcohol. To this day, I do not understand my father's intentions. I'd like to think he was using me as a substitute for his deceased wife, but even this is a pretty lie. Can I not acknowledge my father as the monster he became, even now? Life is cruel, isn't it?

He didn't live for much longer after I left the home to join up with the Lunarian Defense Corps. I had nowhere else to go and money was an issue. He threatened me not to go, you know. Begged when threats didn't work. Turning my back on my tear soaked father was a struggle, but by this point I was used to struggling. When the psych evaluation occurred, I was read back that I claimed life was, to me, constantly teetering between being above and below the water. Sometimes, I was drowning without a line to save my life. Other times, I drifted calmly and carefully among the waves. Sometimes those waves crashed, sometimes they didn't. The therapist that treated each and every soldier was the first person I disclosed my past to. I said awful, terrible things about him. Said that I wished he could feel every single ounce of pain he forced me to feel. They say to be careful what you wish for, and it wasn't long after I said this that my father passed away.

Slowly, eaten away by a disease. When I saw him on his deathbed, he apologized for everything wrong he had done to me. Guilt swarmed my body like a pack of locusts. This couldn't be real, right? I couldn't lose another parent. Not again. Surrounded by the brothers and sisters who abandoned me, I wept openly for my father. We all did. My brothers and sisters must have needed to cry, but I didn't. It didn't help anything. The therapist told me that feeling empty was a dangerous sign, but my drill instructor had other plans. She said it was perfect, that I could be the perfect soldier if I set my mind to it. She was right. My work with a rifle, sidearm, explosives, everything was calculated and aggressive. I was going to join the division that took the frontlines during war time. ...War time. When had we ever seen a war? We had a military whose purpose was dubious at best, radical at worst. The first day that I met the Watatsuki sisters was the first day I was unable to smile in the face of fear.

Though they smiled themselves, I could tell immediately it wasn't genuine. There was a dark presence deep inside of both of them, and I felt it the strongest when they stood by me. Maybe it was the reputation that preceded them: According to our instructors, the Watatsuki sisters had stopped an invasion of the moon many years ago. To think only two women had more power than an entire combat force combined. It was unheard of. The sisters walked over to me, singled me out, and called me cute. Could they sense the dread inside my body? One touch from either of their hands and I flew into a frenzy. My eyes burned brighter than the sun itself and I had to be restrained. I'd pointed my rifle at them, even tried to stick them with the bayonet. I was lucky they didn't throw me out of the Lunar Corps at that very moment. The Watatsukis held no grudge, and instead accepted me into their home. They wished to make me their pet, to save me from the life of duty. To keep me alive. How could I refuse the offer? Something changed about them at this point.

They felt warm, inviting, just like my mother before her death. The years spent with the Watatsuki sisters warmed my heart, melted the ice around it that had formed due to my father and siblings' abandonment. I wanted these years to last forever, but it's like I said before. Life isn't a fairy tale. Just as the broken pieces that made up my soul were repaired, a siren went off across the Lunar Capital. All soldiers, including myself and the Watatsuki sisters, were to report to the battlefield at once. An invasion was taking place. I clung to Yorihime, begged her not to go. To not make me go. I was met with the fiercest glare possible and was called a traitor. It stung worse than it should have. I cried. I cried the entire time I ran out the door and changed into my combat fatigues. The tears only settled when I came across my brothers and sisters, drafted into the Defense Corps due to our low numbers. Despite this, the invaders' numbers were smaller. It was an easy win for the Lunarian Defense Corps.

That's what we thought, anyways.

The technology and weaponry the invaders had upon them was too much. Our outdated rifles and sidearms were no match for their improved artillery. One by one, I watched my friends, my family, get cut down. Blood filled my eyes every time I looked across the battlefield, and the sights of body parts being strewn out made me lose whatever was within my stomach onto the floor. When I regained my vision, I saw my own blood mixed in. I was sick, I couldn't stay here. But my drill instructor shoved my rifle back into my hands. The Watatsuki sisters barked at me to fight, to die if necessary in holding them back. All of the courage within my body was gone, I couldn't move another step. Something tapped against my foot. I should have never looked down. When I realized it was the decapitated head of my elder sister, I did the one thing I could think to do.

I screamed.

I shrieked, I shouted, I threw my weapons to the ground and held my head. This was Hell. I was no longer on the moon. I must have died a long time ago and I was paying the price for not saving either of my parents or stopping my siblings from leaving. When I gained a hole in the Watatsuki's gazes, I ran. I grasped the closest thing I could find without thinking and I kept running. Before I knew it, I ended up within a forest surrounded by bamboo trees. My combat fatigues were torn and ruined, covered in tears, bile, and blood. When I lost consciousness, the last thing my eyes saw were a figure with raven colored hair and another with a red and blue hat.

Eirin Yagokoro and Kaguya Houraisan. Outlaws from the moon. That's what I was now, a deserter. Someone who had escaped the warring going on upon the moon out of fear. I turned my back on everyone, on everything, just to save my own life. Just so that I didn't have to deal with what I was seeing. I was reassured time and time again after telling my full story to the aforementioned women that none of it was my fault and I did the right thing, but I never felt as if I had. No retelling of my story ever made me feel better. No hugs or kisses stopped the constant, violent night terrors that plagued me. The nights I awoke, shivering and covered in tears and saliva. Trying to clutch onto my head and make the memories go away.

All I can hope now is that, somehow, this writing brings peace to my mind. It's a long shot, but it's all I've got left.

Whether or not my sins can be absolved is up to the Gods to decide.

I'm so tired. I just want to sleep...

- Reisen Udongein Inaba

I look out among the crowd, standing at the altar. Faces have a mix of shock, depression, and rage upon them. As soon as I finish speaking, Tewi leaps up from her seat and rushes the casket. No one is able to stop her in time before her small hands clutch onto the corpse within's suit jacket. "No! This isn't happening!" She screams. Tears and mucus pour from her face as if from a faucet. "You were supposed to confide in me, Reisen! You were supposed to confide in us all! How could you do this to us, to yourself?! Come back, damn it! I'll never forgive you for this!" No one can work up the courage to stop her, but as soon as I move to my best friend steps up. The doctor wraps her arms around the shuddering, crying Tewi, trying to console her.

It isn't fair. That's what Tewi continues repeating. It just isn't fair. I share her sentiment but I do not allow it to show on my face. The moon rabbit within the casket cannot respond, nor can she explain her motives beyond the letter in my hands. Later, the patrons will tell me I moved as swiftly as a ghost from the altar, heading outside. When Eirin lets go of Tewi, she rushes to her fellow Earth rabbits and they all begin sobbing. I take one look back at the picture of Reisen, the picture of my rabbit, smiling alongside the others. For how long had she been faking that smile? The pain in my heart makes me turn away, and I can feel someone flanking me as I head outside. The air is cold, and each breath huffs out a cloud of vapor. Though I hear Eirin speaking, I can't process what she's saying. All I can do is stare upward at the moon. Finally, I'm unable to ignore her any longer and I turn to face her.

"It's not your fault, Kaguya."

"Don't tell me what is and isn't my fault, Yagokoro. My pet rabbit is dead. I could not reach her. I cared for her, I loved her, I did everything I possibly could..."

My fists clench without me realizing it. Eirin notices it, but just nods solemnly. I can see her face when I look over my shoulder. It's the same as mine. Steeled, disallowing itself to show any emotion. To let everything pour forth.

"We all did, Kaguya. We loved her, and tried to heal the scars within her heart with that love."

"Then why didn't it work?!"

I whirl around violently. Eirin can see that I'm beginning to cry, and begins to cry herself. Neither of us can keep up the charade any longer.

"Why were we unable to save her?! She's dead because none of us were paying attention! If we had hidden that fucking rope-"

"Nobody could have expected that!"

Eirin's voice rises in rage and I back down. I have never heard this rage before. It's a dark, pained tone of voice. It's a hoarse voice, in fact... How long has she been choking up?

"You didn't see her, Kaguya. See her hanging there like a doll, swaying from side to side. That image... I'll never get it out of my head. I keep going over it again and again and again..."

Eirin sways from side to side and moves her hands over her face. All I can do is float to her, due to our height difference, and clasp her head against my chest. Streams of tears paint our faces, and rain drips once, twice, thrice against the ground. Even the sky weeps for her. Or perhaps she is weeping from the heavens themselves?

"Udonge... Udonge... my beloved Udonge..."

My eyes close as I slowly stroke the doctor's hair. Thunder claps above, but neither of us care. Neither of us care if we get drenched. The dark clouds cover the beautiful stars in the sky, a perfect metaphor for the events that had transpired the past couple of days... No, the past many years. This was not a wound either of us could have healed. We were arrogant to try.

As my eyes reopen once more, I swear I am able to see the faintest hint of my rabbit's figure. Even if it is an illusion caused by the rain, or my own subconscious, I desperately wish for it to be real.

As the shimmering moon rabbit wraps it's arms around us, I close my eyes once more and silently beg to have my pet rabbit in my arms again...