I don't own KKJ -- it's Tanemura-sensei's. I can't claim it in any way:
I can't even draw properly. ^_^
Update 4/3/03: Minor grammatical tweaks
This was my first fic, back just as the KKJ manga ended (has it been
that long? Dear gods, it has!), and still holds a huge place in my
heart. A 4am fic, it doesn't /quite/ follow the manga, as Natsuki in
here does remember who she was, but artistic license and all, no? Enjoy.
****
It was perfect.
The slightest bit of wind touched the tops of the trees even as the sun
trickled through their leaves, landing upon a person curled up
underneath it. Green haired, tiny, and clad in a local school uniform,
Shinji couldn't believe his luck. He slipped to another branch, the
beginnings of a grin tickling at the corners of his mouth as he paused,
poised over that oh-so-interesting person... and he pounced.
Except that that person wasn't there anymore. With an incoherent yelp
and a painful thud, Minazuki Shinji found himself eating dirt with a
giggling Natsuki standing over him, her eyes dancing. At least she
wasn't yelling at him. Yet. "Damn. It was so much easier when we had
wings, ne?"
Her giggling stopped and her eyes darkened. He winced inwardly, mentally
slapping his forehead as he sprawled inelegantly in the dirt. She never
did like being reminded of what she'd lost, even though what she'd
gained in the end was more than she'd ever hoped, he knew. "Sorry,
Natsuki-chan. I forgot."
"You always do." She'd become withdrawn now, her voice more flat and her
expression even more closed to him than it had been before. A small gust
of wind tugged at her hair, lifting a couple pale green strands and
toying with them gently. A smile was the response to such. "God's
sighing at us again," she said lightly, pushing her hair back behind her
ears.
Shinji relaxed a bit, then peered up at her through his bangs. Four
years younger than he was, not even out of middle school, and he already
knew that he loved her. He had for eternity, it seemed, and he knew that
Access - himself, in a sense - had loved Fin for as long as he'd known her.
Tossing off the brief moment of solemnity, he pulled himself to his
feet, tossing his trademark grin at Natsuki. "I want some hotcakes, and
I /know/ that Mother won't make them for me..." He allowed the sentence
to trail off, arching one brow as Natsuki's face turned red. His grin,
if possible, grew wider.
"You never give up! Never ever!" Her voice had risen to an outraged
shriek that, over the years, had become far too familiar to Shinji.
"Just because you helped Papa before doesn't mean that he has to help
you now! And you know that Mama won't say no to whatever you want,
either! Ugh!" The sound of long-held disgust was evident in her voice,
but it only served to make Shinji smirk.
He moved in closer to her, leaning over her with his hands in his
pockets. "And what are you going to do about it, Natsuki-chan?" he
drawled, his expression altering to pure Access Time mischief. "Going to
tell Marron that she shouldn't make hotcakes for me because I hinted to
you that I wanted them?" He continued to lean over
her as she gradually turned redder and her eyes widened angrily. Any
minute now...
"You're... you're... /impossible/!" Thoroughly angry now, Natsuki
clenched her hand into a fist, drew back, and, not pausing to even think
about it, let the idiot have it, right on his insufferable smirk. And
then she stormed off towards home, having entirely forgotten to chew him
out for trying to pounce on her. Hotcakes, indeed!
****************
Marron hummed quietly under her breath as she spooned milk into the
batter she was preparing. Hotcakes, since Access was likely to tag along
with Natsuki when she got out of school. A door slammed behind her, and
she turned to confront a thoroughly annoyed daughter. She tapped her
spoon against her lips, looking over Natsuki with a thoroughly amused
smile. "Did Shinji-kun do something again?"
She was always careful to refer to Access as Shinji in Natsuki's
presence these days. It prevented any of those silences, or worse,
tears, from her daughter and friend.
"Hotcakes! He /always/ wants hotcakes! And he tried to /pounce/ on me!
He might as well have thrown an apple or two at me like he used to with
how loud he was, moving around in that tree, but still!" Natsuki said,
dumping her school case in the hall and removing her shoes quickly
before storming into the apartment.
It was a measure, Marron mused, of how angry Natsuki was that she
referred to Fin's memories. Returning to the kitchen and picking up the
bowl of batter, she continued to mix the ingredients in. "Hmm. I
remember that when he was little, he always used to have Miyako make
hotcakes for him and then he'd come over here and eat them. Chiaki
always had to steal them from him because they were dessert rather than
breakfast." she said, adding another pinch of flour to the mixture.
Natsuki turned an interesting shade of red before sighing in defeat and
settling into one of the kitchen chairs. "He hasn't changed a bit
since... forever." She folded her arms and rested her head upon them,
staring up at Marron. "Always hungry, always trying to play a joke on me
or someone else - I'm surprised he hasn't gotten caught at school
already, with some of the pranks he's pulled."
The griddle was hot. With a hiss, the first hotcake was poured, then
another. Marron stopped at three, catching the loose drops with her
spoon and setting the bowl aside for the moment. Dusting her hands off,
she pulled out a chair across from her daughter, leaning back. "I've
heard plenty about that from Miyako. She can't understand that it's not
only Shinji-kun's nature, but also that /she/ used to do such things. I
used to get gymnastics balls dumped on my head regularly." Marron bit
off the final part of that sentence: '... whenever she failed to catch
Jeanne.'
"Yes, I know. Whenever you had sealed off another demon and she couldn't
catch you." Natsuki pushed out her chair and walked towards her room.
"Tell me when the hotcakes are done, Mama? I'll be in my room." Both
statements left Marron staring blankly after the girl.
*****************
Natsuki was studying. Or trying to do so. Tears kept making the page in
front of her blur and waver. Finally, she abandoned her angry attempts
at brushing them off on her sleeve and just buried her head in her
pillow, crying.
She'd always known, from the point where she could formulate sentences,
that she was not only Nagoya Natsuki, but was, or had been, Fin Fish.
Memories that weren't really hers kept appearing, and most were memories
she didn't want; destroying a shrine in Tokyo; being banished from
Heaven; betraying Marron - her /mother/, she reminded herself - and even
dying. There were the happier memories, too; bathing in a teacup, her
hair bundled up under a miniature showercap while Marron - /Mama/! -
blew bubbles from a tube in the human-sized bathtub beside her; Celcia
and Toki and Access - Shinji! - sharing power and making her a True
Angel again... and those were her barrier against the others.
"I don't understand it," she said, one hand resting across her teary
eyes. "and I never will. How I was reincarnated, and how... how Fin Fish
could ever be me." She had to keep her selves separate, treading that
thin line between then and now. If she didn't, Natsuki thought she'd
lose herself, the one whose parents were Nagoya Chiaki and Marron, who
went to school and had nothing to do with Jeanne D'Arc. "I'm not her! I
can't be!"
The worst thing of all, that part of her that was Fin Fish mused, was
that there was no way for the wind to reach her.
******************
A knock at the door caught Marron's attention, and, flipping the last
hotcake to the other side, she glanced into the hall, smiling at the
sight of Access pulling off his shoes and donning his pair of slippers.
"Did you smell the hotcakes, or did you come for something else?"
He glanced up and Marron was struck by the odd expression upon his face.
It wasn't the normal Access grin; in fact, he looked downright worried.
"Is everything all right?" she asked.
"Natsuki-chan came home already." It wasn't a question. Marron nodded
and smiled, gesturing towards the kitchen.
"Hotcakes. I thought you'd come home with her today, but you didn't...
instead, she came home and was absolutely furious with you. Not," Marron
added wryly, "that that's anything unusual these days." Even as she
spoke, she was setting out a plate of hotcakes liberally spread with
butter and syrup, along with a knife and fork. "I'll just pour some
more, as you're probably hungry and I doubt if Miyako'll be back until
she's finished her shopping, and Chiaki won't be home until six."
Access - Shinji, Marron reminded herself - nodded and sat down, slicing
the hotcakes and taking a big bite. "Thank you. I /am/ hungry." he said,
swallowing quickly. "Is Natsuki okay? She seemed a bit... worried about
something." Even his tone was worried.
Marron frowned, pouring another hotcake. "Natsuki-chan seemed worried,
yes. And she actually said something about Fin-chan, which is unusual
for her nowadays. She's in her room if you want to talk to her... tell
her that there'll be a fresh batch of hotcakes ready in five minutes."
He nodded and abandoned his hotcakes, heading for Natsuki's room. Marron
stared at the full plate, with only the one bite taken out of it, then
was jerked back to reality by the hiss of an over-full griddle. "Oh no!"
***************
She was curled up on her bed, a pillow being choked to death in her arms
and her back to the door. Shinji entered, closing the door behind him
and pausing. "Natsuki-chan..." he said, taking a couple slow steps
towards her. "Your mother said that there'll be hotcakes ready in five
minutes, if you want them." She remained as she was, tightly curled
around her pillow.
Shinji pulled her desk's chair up to the side of her bed and sat, hands
in his lap. "I'm sorry for reminding you of Fin-chan. I didn't mean to.
I guess that it was something I didn't think about saying... I do that
too much, I know." He sighed. Again, no response from the quiet figure
upon the bed. "Ne, Natsuki-chan?" he said, reaching out hesitantly, then
withdrew his hand.
He, as Access, never quite believed that Fin was his. He'd chased her
for so long, been turned away so often, and had, in general, never
thought he'd had a chance to capture his Fin-chan's heart. And he, as
Shinji, wasn't quite sure of Natsuki's feelings. Access hadn't been,
either, and it was one of the many things that made it easier to accept
that he, a normal teenager, was actually the reincarnation of an angel.
They were so similar that it didn't really make any difference who he
was, save their situations and names.
He reached out to Natsuki once again, touching her shoulder lightly,
then more tightly as she didn't respond. "Natsuki-chan?" Blankly, he
stared at his hand upon her shoulder, then stood and peered over her.
"Asleep." he said wryly, shaking his head. "How ironic."
There were tear-tracks down her cheeks, and a few stray hairs were
plastered to her skin. Lifting his hand from her shoulder, he tenderly
brushed them back behind her ears - odd, he'd never noticed that even in
this life the tips were slightly pointed - and then drew the coverlet
that was folded at the bottom of the bed over the sleeping girl. "I wish
I knew what you were dreaming."
He never even noticed the black earring clenched in one of her hands as
he left the room.
***********************
She awoke to warmth and a feeling of happiness that she'd missed since
childhood. Sun was streaming through her window, and a breeze - who had
opened the window? - was making her curtains billow inwards. The
coverlet was just so nice and warm, and her pillow so soft...
Natsuki bolted upright, ignoring a bit of dizziness at the rapid
movement. There was something she'd been missing for years... slowly,
she unclenched her hand, staring at the contents within. A black
earring, or maybe an ear cuff, and one that she'd had since her birth.
She smiled down at it, rolling it around in her palm.
A sudden whiff of hotcakes made her swing her legs over the side of the
bed, her feet immediately finding the comforting warmth of her slippers.
She stood and stared into the mirror across from her bed.
It wasn't her.
It was a woman with cat-slit eyes and pointed ears, her long green hair
falling between a pair of wings. Part of her recognized the reflection
and greeted it as an old friend, but another part of her, that new part
that she considered to be 'Natsuki', just stared at it as though it were
a stranger. "That's not /ME/!"
Her hands were trembling so much that the earring fell out of them,
rolling under her desk and out of sight. The reflection shimmered and
melted away into her own reflection, and Natsuki sank to her knees in
relief. Relief at not being someone else, someone who wasn't what she
wanted to be.
Her door burst open, and Shinji bolted into the room, eyes wide.
"Natsuki! I heard something... is everything all right? Did something
happen?" He was frantic, Natsuki noted with a note of detachment. She
couldn't quite focus on anything clearly, and there was something...
something that was fluttering to get out of her chest.
"No. Nothing happened. I'm fine." She could hear her own voice saying
the words, and she could see Shinji's skepticism in his suddenly arched
eyebrows, but she wasn't the one really experiencing it. "A-access..."
There. There it was again, that odd fluttering in her chest.
"Not Access. Shinji." His expression was odd, a mixture of surprise and
worry that made his eyes look almost black instead of their normal
purple color. "Natsuki... what's wrong?"
She reached for him, eyes beginning to fill with tears. "I'm scared.
She's not me, but she /is/ me, and I don't want to be like her. She hurt
you, she hurt Mama, she hurt /everyone/. She even hurt God." she said,
almost babbling in her desperation to actually /say/ it and not caring
that it might reveal more than she intended. "And I don't want to do that."
He wrapped his arms around her awkwardly, one hand rubbing her back in
slow circles as she cried. "Natsuki..." he began, unsure of himself.
Natsuki simply clung to him. He was warm, he was solid, and he'd always
been there, in past and present. "Natsuki, you know that you weren't
evil. Fin wasn't evil." She glanced up, staring at him through tears.
His face was hard, almost harsh. "She - you - loved everyone too much.
That's why she was so strong, and that's why she hurt people... she was
trying to make too many people happy and never thought of herself,
except when she wanted to continue living. And even then, she tried to
make even the Devil happy."
Natsuki continued to stare upwards, eyes widening. He continued
doggedly, his arms tightening around her to an almost painful pressure.
"She even tried to make that /man/ happy. And he caused her to become a
Fallen Angel." Shinji stared outwards, eyes unfocused. "It wasn't Fin's
fault. It never was." He smiled down at her, relaxing his grip
unconsciously. "And that's why Access always loved her, no matter how
evil she seemed. That's why he left his most important part with you."
As though swimming up through murky water, Natsuki came to herself. "The
earring." she said, realization hitting her. "That's why she was me...
in the mirror. And that's why I was so happy when I woke up." Breaking
out of Shinji's grasp, she fumbled around under her desk, frantically
looking for the cuff. "I can't find it. It's gone again. And I only just
found it again..." Desolate, she sat back on her heels.
A hint of Shinji's usual smile - and Natsuki finally accepted, Access's
smile - began to light up his face. "I can find it." he said, reaching
for a particularly dark corner of the shadows under her desk. "I always
know where it is. It's something that's always going to be important to
me." He reached for her hand, cradling it tenderly in both of his and
then placing the cuff in it and closing her fingers securely about it.
"Don't lose it again."
She smiled at him, hugging the ear cuff to her chest. "I won't. Never
again." Moving her hair out of the way, Natsuki clipped the piece from
her past - from both Fin and Access - to her ear, and glanced in the
mirror. She was Natsuki, and she was Fin Fish. It was no longer a
shattered reflection.
*****************
Marron watched from the doorway, her smile contrasting with the tears in
her eyes as she saw her daughter clip Access's ear cuff on. She had no
warning as an arm slipped around her waist, drawing her back from her
vantage point. "Spying on our daughter?" asked a softly teasing voice,
and Marron smiled up at her husband.
"What sort of a mother would I be if I didn't?" she said, leaning into
his arms. "I think that everything will be fine now. Unless..."
Amusement trickled into her voice, and Nagoya Chiaki arched a brow. "...
Access winds up being foiled by a jealous father."
Chiaki stared at her for a moment, then, a mischievous grin upon his
face, lifted her into his arms. "Jealous father? I'm a jealous
/husband/." Carrying her towards their bedroom, he proceeded to
demonstrate his husbandly abilities.
The curtains billowed in a soft breeze; God was in his Heaven, and all
was right with the world.
I can't even draw properly. ^_^
Update 4/3/03: Minor grammatical tweaks
This was my first fic, back just as the KKJ manga ended (has it been
that long? Dear gods, it has!), and still holds a huge place in my
heart. A 4am fic, it doesn't /quite/ follow the manga, as Natsuki in
here does remember who she was, but artistic license and all, no? Enjoy.
****
It was perfect.
The slightest bit of wind touched the tops of the trees even as the sun
trickled through their leaves, landing upon a person curled up
underneath it. Green haired, tiny, and clad in a local school uniform,
Shinji couldn't believe his luck. He slipped to another branch, the
beginnings of a grin tickling at the corners of his mouth as he paused,
poised over that oh-so-interesting person... and he pounced.
Except that that person wasn't there anymore. With an incoherent yelp
and a painful thud, Minazuki Shinji found himself eating dirt with a
giggling Natsuki standing over him, her eyes dancing. At least she
wasn't yelling at him. Yet. "Damn. It was so much easier when we had
wings, ne?"
Her giggling stopped and her eyes darkened. He winced inwardly, mentally
slapping his forehead as he sprawled inelegantly in the dirt. She never
did like being reminded of what she'd lost, even though what she'd
gained in the end was more than she'd ever hoped, he knew. "Sorry,
Natsuki-chan. I forgot."
"You always do." She'd become withdrawn now, her voice more flat and her
expression even more closed to him than it had been before. A small gust
of wind tugged at her hair, lifting a couple pale green strands and
toying with them gently. A smile was the response to such. "God's
sighing at us again," she said lightly, pushing her hair back behind her
ears.
Shinji relaxed a bit, then peered up at her through his bangs. Four
years younger than he was, not even out of middle school, and he already
knew that he loved her. He had for eternity, it seemed, and he knew that
Access - himself, in a sense - had loved Fin for as long as he'd known her.
Tossing off the brief moment of solemnity, he pulled himself to his
feet, tossing his trademark grin at Natsuki. "I want some hotcakes, and
I /know/ that Mother won't make them for me..." He allowed the sentence
to trail off, arching one brow as Natsuki's face turned red. His grin,
if possible, grew wider.
"You never give up! Never ever!" Her voice had risen to an outraged
shriek that, over the years, had become far too familiar to Shinji.
"Just because you helped Papa before doesn't mean that he has to help
you now! And you know that Mama won't say no to whatever you want,
either! Ugh!" The sound of long-held disgust was evident in her voice,
but it only served to make Shinji smirk.
He moved in closer to her, leaning over her with his hands in his
pockets. "And what are you going to do about it, Natsuki-chan?" he
drawled, his expression altering to pure Access Time mischief. "Going to
tell Marron that she shouldn't make hotcakes for me because I hinted to
you that I wanted them?" He continued to lean over
her as she gradually turned redder and her eyes widened angrily. Any
minute now...
"You're... you're... /impossible/!" Thoroughly angry now, Natsuki
clenched her hand into a fist, drew back, and, not pausing to even think
about it, let the idiot have it, right on his insufferable smirk. And
then she stormed off towards home, having entirely forgotten to chew him
out for trying to pounce on her. Hotcakes, indeed!
****************
Marron hummed quietly under her breath as she spooned milk into the
batter she was preparing. Hotcakes, since Access was likely to tag along
with Natsuki when she got out of school. A door slammed behind her, and
she turned to confront a thoroughly annoyed daughter. She tapped her
spoon against her lips, looking over Natsuki with a thoroughly amused
smile. "Did Shinji-kun do something again?"
She was always careful to refer to Access as Shinji in Natsuki's
presence these days. It prevented any of those silences, or worse,
tears, from her daughter and friend.
"Hotcakes! He /always/ wants hotcakes! And he tried to /pounce/ on me!
He might as well have thrown an apple or two at me like he used to with
how loud he was, moving around in that tree, but still!" Natsuki said,
dumping her school case in the hall and removing her shoes quickly
before storming into the apartment.
It was a measure, Marron mused, of how angry Natsuki was that she
referred to Fin's memories. Returning to the kitchen and picking up the
bowl of batter, she continued to mix the ingredients in. "Hmm. I
remember that when he was little, he always used to have Miyako make
hotcakes for him and then he'd come over here and eat them. Chiaki
always had to steal them from him because they were dessert rather than
breakfast." she said, adding another pinch of flour to the mixture.
Natsuki turned an interesting shade of red before sighing in defeat and
settling into one of the kitchen chairs. "He hasn't changed a bit
since... forever." She folded her arms and rested her head upon them,
staring up at Marron. "Always hungry, always trying to play a joke on me
or someone else - I'm surprised he hasn't gotten caught at school
already, with some of the pranks he's pulled."
The griddle was hot. With a hiss, the first hotcake was poured, then
another. Marron stopped at three, catching the loose drops with her
spoon and setting the bowl aside for the moment. Dusting her hands off,
she pulled out a chair across from her daughter, leaning back. "I've
heard plenty about that from Miyako. She can't understand that it's not
only Shinji-kun's nature, but also that /she/ used to do such things. I
used to get gymnastics balls dumped on my head regularly." Marron bit
off the final part of that sentence: '... whenever she failed to catch
Jeanne.'
"Yes, I know. Whenever you had sealed off another demon and she couldn't
catch you." Natsuki pushed out her chair and walked towards her room.
"Tell me when the hotcakes are done, Mama? I'll be in my room." Both
statements left Marron staring blankly after the girl.
*****************
Natsuki was studying. Or trying to do so. Tears kept making the page in
front of her blur and waver. Finally, she abandoned her angry attempts
at brushing them off on her sleeve and just buried her head in her
pillow, crying.
She'd always known, from the point where she could formulate sentences,
that she was not only Nagoya Natsuki, but was, or had been, Fin Fish.
Memories that weren't really hers kept appearing, and most were memories
she didn't want; destroying a shrine in Tokyo; being banished from
Heaven; betraying Marron - her /mother/, she reminded herself - and even
dying. There were the happier memories, too; bathing in a teacup, her
hair bundled up under a miniature showercap while Marron - /Mama/! -
blew bubbles from a tube in the human-sized bathtub beside her; Celcia
and Toki and Access - Shinji! - sharing power and making her a True
Angel again... and those were her barrier against the others.
"I don't understand it," she said, one hand resting across her teary
eyes. "and I never will. How I was reincarnated, and how... how Fin Fish
could ever be me." She had to keep her selves separate, treading that
thin line between then and now. If she didn't, Natsuki thought she'd
lose herself, the one whose parents were Nagoya Chiaki and Marron, who
went to school and had nothing to do with Jeanne D'Arc. "I'm not her! I
can't be!"
The worst thing of all, that part of her that was Fin Fish mused, was
that there was no way for the wind to reach her.
******************
A knock at the door caught Marron's attention, and, flipping the last
hotcake to the other side, she glanced into the hall, smiling at the
sight of Access pulling off his shoes and donning his pair of slippers.
"Did you smell the hotcakes, or did you come for something else?"
He glanced up and Marron was struck by the odd expression upon his face.
It wasn't the normal Access grin; in fact, he looked downright worried.
"Is everything all right?" she asked.
"Natsuki-chan came home already." It wasn't a question. Marron nodded
and smiled, gesturing towards the kitchen.
"Hotcakes. I thought you'd come home with her today, but you didn't...
instead, she came home and was absolutely furious with you. Not," Marron
added wryly, "that that's anything unusual these days." Even as she
spoke, she was setting out a plate of hotcakes liberally spread with
butter and syrup, along with a knife and fork. "I'll just pour some
more, as you're probably hungry and I doubt if Miyako'll be back until
she's finished her shopping, and Chiaki won't be home until six."
Access - Shinji, Marron reminded herself - nodded and sat down, slicing
the hotcakes and taking a big bite. "Thank you. I /am/ hungry." he said,
swallowing quickly. "Is Natsuki okay? She seemed a bit... worried about
something." Even his tone was worried.
Marron frowned, pouring another hotcake. "Natsuki-chan seemed worried,
yes. And she actually said something about Fin-chan, which is unusual
for her nowadays. She's in her room if you want to talk to her... tell
her that there'll be a fresh batch of hotcakes ready in five minutes."
He nodded and abandoned his hotcakes, heading for Natsuki's room. Marron
stared at the full plate, with only the one bite taken out of it, then
was jerked back to reality by the hiss of an over-full griddle. "Oh no!"
***************
She was curled up on her bed, a pillow being choked to death in her arms
and her back to the door. Shinji entered, closing the door behind him
and pausing. "Natsuki-chan..." he said, taking a couple slow steps
towards her. "Your mother said that there'll be hotcakes ready in five
minutes, if you want them." She remained as she was, tightly curled
around her pillow.
Shinji pulled her desk's chair up to the side of her bed and sat, hands
in his lap. "I'm sorry for reminding you of Fin-chan. I didn't mean to.
I guess that it was something I didn't think about saying... I do that
too much, I know." He sighed. Again, no response from the quiet figure
upon the bed. "Ne, Natsuki-chan?" he said, reaching out hesitantly, then
withdrew his hand.
He, as Access, never quite believed that Fin was his. He'd chased her
for so long, been turned away so often, and had, in general, never
thought he'd had a chance to capture his Fin-chan's heart. And he, as
Shinji, wasn't quite sure of Natsuki's feelings. Access hadn't been,
either, and it was one of the many things that made it easier to accept
that he, a normal teenager, was actually the reincarnation of an angel.
They were so similar that it didn't really make any difference who he
was, save their situations and names.
He reached out to Natsuki once again, touching her shoulder lightly,
then more tightly as she didn't respond. "Natsuki-chan?" Blankly, he
stared at his hand upon her shoulder, then stood and peered over her.
"Asleep." he said wryly, shaking his head. "How ironic."
There were tear-tracks down her cheeks, and a few stray hairs were
plastered to her skin. Lifting his hand from her shoulder, he tenderly
brushed them back behind her ears - odd, he'd never noticed that even in
this life the tips were slightly pointed - and then drew the coverlet
that was folded at the bottom of the bed over the sleeping girl. "I wish
I knew what you were dreaming."
He never even noticed the black earring clenched in one of her hands as
he left the room.
***********************
She awoke to warmth and a feeling of happiness that she'd missed since
childhood. Sun was streaming through her window, and a breeze - who had
opened the window? - was making her curtains billow inwards. The
coverlet was just so nice and warm, and her pillow so soft...
Natsuki bolted upright, ignoring a bit of dizziness at the rapid
movement. There was something she'd been missing for years... slowly,
she unclenched her hand, staring at the contents within. A black
earring, or maybe an ear cuff, and one that she'd had since her birth.
She smiled down at it, rolling it around in her palm.
A sudden whiff of hotcakes made her swing her legs over the side of the
bed, her feet immediately finding the comforting warmth of her slippers.
She stood and stared into the mirror across from her bed.
It wasn't her.
It was a woman with cat-slit eyes and pointed ears, her long green hair
falling between a pair of wings. Part of her recognized the reflection
and greeted it as an old friend, but another part of her, that new part
that she considered to be 'Natsuki', just stared at it as though it were
a stranger. "That's not /ME/!"
Her hands were trembling so much that the earring fell out of them,
rolling under her desk and out of sight. The reflection shimmered and
melted away into her own reflection, and Natsuki sank to her knees in
relief. Relief at not being someone else, someone who wasn't what she
wanted to be.
Her door burst open, and Shinji bolted into the room, eyes wide.
"Natsuki! I heard something... is everything all right? Did something
happen?" He was frantic, Natsuki noted with a note of detachment. She
couldn't quite focus on anything clearly, and there was something...
something that was fluttering to get out of her chest.
"No. Nothing happened. I'm fine." She could hear her own voice saying
the words, and she could see Shinji's skepticism in his suddenly arched
eyebrows, but she wasn't the one really experiencing it. "A-access..."
There. There it was again, that odd fluttering in her chest.
"Not Access. Shinji." His expression was odd, a mixture of surprise and
worry that made his eyes look almost black instead of their normal
purple color. "Natsuki... what's wrong?"
She reached for him, eyes beginning to fill with tears. "I'm scared.
She's not me, but she /is/ me, and I don't want to be like her. She hurt
you, she hurt Mama, she hurt /everyone/. She even hurt God." she said,
almost babbling in her desperation to actually /say/ it and not caring
that it might reveal more than she intended. "And I don't want to do that."
He wrapped his arms around her awkwardly, one hand rubbing her back in
slow circles as she cried. "Natsuki..." he began, unsure of himself.
Natsuki simply clung to him. He was warm, he was solid, and he'd always
been there, in past and present. "Natsuki, you know that you weren't
evil. Fin wasn't evil." She glanced up, staring at him through tears.
His face was hard, almost harsh. "She - you - loved everyone too much.
That's why she was so strong, and that's why she hurt people... she was
trying to make too many people happy and never thought of herself,
except when she wanted to continue living. And even then, she tried to
make even the Devil happy."
Natsuki continued to stare upwards, eyes widening. He continued
doggedly, his arms tightening around her to an almost painful pressure.
"She even tried to make that /man/ happy. And he caused her to become a
Fallen Angel." Shinji stared outwards, eyes unfocused. "It wasn't Fin's
fault. It never was." He smiled down at her, relaxing his grip
unconsciously. "And that's why Access always loved her, no matter how
evil she seemed. That's why he left his most important part with you."
As though swimming up through murky water, Natsuki came to herself. "The
earring." she said, realization hitting her. "That's why she was me...
in the mirror. And that's why I was so happy when I woke up." Breaking
out of Shinji's grasp, she fumbled around under her desk, frantically
looking for the cuff. "I can't find it. It's gone again. And I only just
found it again..." Desolate, she sat back on her heels.
A hint of Shinji's usual smile - and Natsuki finally accepted, Access's
smile - began to light up his face. "I can find it." he said, reaching
for a particularly dark corner of the shadows under her desk. "I always
know where it is. It's something that's always going to be important to
me." He reached for her hand, cradling it tenderly in both of his and
then placing the cuff in it and closing her fingers securely about it.
"Don't lose it again."
She smiled at him, hugging the ear cuff to her chest. "I won't. Never
again." Moving her hair out of the way, Natsuki clipped the piece from
her past - from both Fin and Access - to her ear, and glanced in the
mirror. She was Natsuki, and she was Fin Fish. It was no longer a
shattered reflection.
*****************
Marron watched from the doorway, her smile contrasting with the tears in
her eyes as she saw her daughter clip Access's ear cuff on. She had no
warning as an arm slipped around her waist, drawing her back from her
vantage point. "Spying on our daughter?" asked a softly teasing voice,
and Marron smiled up at her husband.
"What sort of a mother would I be if I didn't?" she said, leaning into
his arms. "I think that everything will be fine now. Unless..."
Amusement trickled into her voice, and Nagoya Chiaki arched a brow. "...
Access winds up being foiled by a jealous father."
Chiaki stared at her for a moment, then, a mischievous grin upon his
face, lifted her into his arms. "Jealous father? I'm a jealous
/husband/." Carrying her towards their bedroom, he proceeded to
demonstrate his husbandly abilities.
The curtains billowed in a soft breeze; God was in his Heaven, and all
was right with the world.