edit: 23/11/2013. Added disclaimer, formatting.
Disclaimer: This being fan-fiction, I do not own X/1999 by CLAMP.
Warnings: um, Seishirou? With a guest appearance from his mother.
Dream
Seishirou doesn't usually dream. Dreams mean many things to him; a dream is an illusion, a glimpse into the future. A wish or a desire: 'I dream of being happy, and safe, and loved'. A dream is what the mind does to sort itself out, to see without the conscious effort – and safety – of denial.
She sits on the floor, clothes and black hair trailing out behind her. They swirl on the wooden floor, a delicate, beautiful mess; she's looking at him, stretches out her hand towards him. Urging him towards her.
Her nails are long and sharp and painted a pristine crimson, and they dig into his hand. It's not surprising. Her body is small but her arm is strong, and she pulls him towards her; he lands on top of her, though he leans on his hands and knees, at arm's length away. Hold yourself up; don't rely on her to be your ground. Don't get too close. Have some pride in yourself; it's all you have left.
It's his mother, and that is not surprising either. Things rarely are in a dream, and she smiles at him a sickly smile and he wants her. She looks like a child and is his mother and he wants her, and that should probably worry him but it doesn't. That's not surprising. He's practiced irrelevance all of his life.
She's so delicate and soft and sweet and a fool would think she was helpless, but he is no fool. He has always feared sweetness. It terrifies him, and terror itself is terrifying all over again; it is the deviation from apathy that distorts his balance, what makes his mind threaten to crumple.
So, naturally, his instinct is to corrupt and break and destroy that which threatens him: because his instinct is also to play with her, and wanting her is a desire, and desire kills Sakurazukamori. Thoughts chase each other, fear and lust and sweetness, but that's not surprising. They would be connected; he associates all with death. He is no fool. His mother looks up at him, still. And still, she is smiling.
She never changes. Nothing ever does change, not for him. Other people don't change; people are so basically the same in the end. They have their slight differences, admittedly, but they are easy enough to understand and manipulate. People are static, and he has that in common with them at least. Not changing: certainly not himself. She whispers words to him, words that make no sense. Words in another language, meaning 'love' and 'flower blossom' and 'destiny'. Romantic things. Things, and things are things that can be done to. Fixed. Not a worry.
He tries not to remember that people can do as they can be done to. To him people are but things, and that makes them safe.
She's closer now. His mother is whispering into his ear, her back supported by his hand. He hasn't moved any closer. Maybe she has something important to say; maybe she has something worthwhile hearing. He bends down closer to her, tries to listen.
Before he can though, the scene's already gone. He is nothing and nowhere in particular: not in darkness, but somewhere he doesn't care to know about. He's still on his hands and knees. The emptiness is familiar and overwhelming; he tries not to be distracted by fate's strings, pulled by people he considers children. Boys that are too pretty and kind and young and sweet to have such power. And dense.
(He smiles, and at least he knows he's not the only man dictated by such oblivious youth; but he is the only man he knows that does so willingly, though unconsciously. The man he knows had no choice, but he would if he did, so that doesn't matter either. All that is simply is, and that's all there is to it.)
He hasn't noticed the world around him take form; he was trying to pretend it didn't exist. It seems, however, that even dreams are out of control of the dreamer. Pay attention, his training tells him. Do not fade away from reality, or your surroundings will hurt you.
Outside of this dream, he thinks to himself, he seems to be more and more disassociated with the world – withdrawing into himself. That is bad. There is no time to reconsider what he already knows to be true, from decade after decade of experience. Do not hesitate. Introspection will be the death of him.
He is still ignoring his surroundings in this dream. He doesn't want to look at the young man in front of him, covered in blood and cherry blossoms. He doesn't want to consider how happy he looks there, how peaceful, relaxed. He would rather think only of himself. The surroundings cause him pain, pain he had never thought he would experience. He hurts. Shouldn't he, Sakurazukamori, be invincible?
He tenses momentarily. The world is not made up of what 'should' be; he knows this, right? Right. He walks over the body, careless to know whether it is alive or dead, avoiding it's expression. The world is made up of what will be; reality can't be changed. Fate, some might call it. This he knows to be true.
He considers stomping on that smiling face as he passes over it. Violence might sooth his growing anxiety, and releasing some tension would be good for him; he can't repress all of his desires. Best to indulge in the primal urges of ice-cream and blood. Besides, stomping on it would stop that horribly beautiful smile that haunts him sometimes, on the edge of his perception, like a ghost, in the darkest parts of the night.
Another part of him wants to preserve that happiness. Wouldn't it be nice to give for once, to try to engage with someone, help them? Let there exist a two-way relationship?
In the end he decides not to, to do nothing. It has always been easier to run away. But still, the implication stands: to let the other man stay happy in a pool of cherry blossoms and his own blood. He can't help but finally acknowledge to himself that the man hasn't moved at all, in all this time. Even now, he looks sweet.
Maybe the younger man really is dead. He doesn't like that, so he moves on. Once dead always dead; what else can he do?
He keeps walking, nowhere in particular. There's nowhere for him to go; it's a barren darkness anyway. And still, he travels onwards, never deviating in his imagined path.
How boring. No wonder he doesn't often dream.
.
Seishirou opens his eyes and no longer dreams. As he lights a cigarette, he thinks about how uncomfortable connections to people really are to Sakurazukamori.
It's time to burn some bridges.