The first time is out of necessity; sometimes it really does all come down to "kill or be killed."
It will become something of a hazy -yet solid- memory, something between a foggy, ghost-like thought and a thing never to be forgotten: The room, full of thick acrid smoke. One of the targets, lurking like an overgrown rat, skulking through the darkness -- He's got a gun! And Aya, busy getting information from another target, enshrouded in his own darkness and completely unaware. There's nothing else to do, but! The arc of the blade, slicing, blood spatter, and then!
They say the first time is the hardest.
For Yuki, it is just another step down the road to Hell.
And after that, it gets easier and easier each time.
-
After the first time, he feels like every one will be able to tell.
How could they not? He has, after all, bathed in the blood of another human being. He knows he will never be clean again; never wash the blood from his hands. He's taken so many showers and he knows, logically, he's clean, but he will never really be clean; not again. No one can see it, but at the same time, he's certain every one can see it.
And yet…
No one looks at him any different.
No one but Aya and that's undoubtedly the worst of all.
-
Aya never wanted Yuki involved in all of this.
In Yuki, he had seen something of himself: A boy, no parents. He's on his own, trying to protect what's precious to him, but he just can't do it. Aya-chan nearly died. Alison did die.
And therein lies the difference.
Yuki is -was- a pacifist. Aya knows this and, now, when he looks at the boy who has somehow grown into a solemn young man without Aya even noticing, he's wondering what happened to the passionate Yuki who swore never to take a life.
And then there is Chloe's voice, filling his thoughts. Unwanted. Chloe has a way of saying things Aya would rather not hear and making him hear them anyway: "We all make our choices, Aya. Yuki's made his. And he did it for you."
Aya looks at Yuki again and wonders how he could have let this happen. How he could have kept it from happening.
"Yuki's choice has always been you."
Somehow, the boy who was nearly blinded because of him has now become blinded by him.
-
Aya does not speak freely with others.
Neither does Yuki, and this is part of the problem.
Instead of discussing it, Aya watches -as if he's helpless- as Yuki sinks further and further into the very same darkness he's created for himself. Aya has the power to stop this descent, but is unaware of this fact.
It is Chloe's words that haunt him, painful and true. "We all make our choices" -Chloe's choice has red hair and a smile a bit too wide and is somehow both more and less wrong than Yuki's choice- "and Yuki's is you. He does this for you, so that you'll have need of him still."
Aya tries not to think about these words; tries not to think of the reasons why Yuki might have decided to begin taking lives.
And in the end, he's left to wonder who's life Yuki is really taking, if not his own.
-
They really are quite similar.
Yuki understands it. They were both boys who lost everything to violence. There was no reason for either of their families to die, yet they did. They were children torn from their normal existence and thrust into this life, not entirely unwillingly, but because they had no other choice.
They are boys who go by not-their-real-names. Aya's choice was simple: He did it for his sister. Yuki didn't have a choice; he simply doesn't know who he was before Akagawa found him. But still…They are both living as some one they are not, simply because they do not know how to be who they Iare./I
And the most important reason; the one Yuki keeps tucked in on of the few bright places left in his heart…
They both began killing to protect some one they love.
-
Aya watches the world around him carefully, as he always does.
He watches as Michel grows up and gets on with his life; as -surprisingly- Free allows the boy to slip further and further away, making his own mistakes and choices, as nature has always intended. Michel is happy and that is more than enough to make Free happy as well.
He watches as Ken smiles, eyes bright and clear, and takes Kurumi's hand in his own, leading her out into the sunshine. Ken, brought back from the brink of insanity, is a step closer to white.
He watches as Chloe slips out into the night, off for another clandestine rendez-vous. No one speaks of it, but no one has to. Aya knows what -who- he's doing and he hates it, but…Somehow, Chloe has seemed more alive than ever before and Aya cannot begrudge him that.
Time has a funny way of changing us all, if we let it. Aya doesn't know how to allow that change to happen; he's been stagnating in darkness too long.
So instead, he watches them all -happy- and wonders when he and Yuki had become ghosts.
-
It is a hard life and because of that, Aya doesn't question Yuki's tears after a particularly brutal mission. As the others disappear into the worlds they have crafted for themselves -their way of dealing with the darkness in their lives- Aya slips into Yuki's room, needing to know for himself that the younger man is okay.
Yuki doesn't often cry -but there were little children involved and that usually haunts him- and Aya worries this may push him over the edge.
They sit in darkness long into the night, keeping a silent vigil, until Yuki, too exhausted to stay awake, slumps over on Aya, fingers fisted in the fabric of his shirt as if he were a small child afraid of losing his parent.
Aya sits up longer and wonders at this feeling of warmth slowly curling through his body. It has been a long time, but perhaps…Perhaps tonight instead of just taking, he was giving as well. He hasn't felt it in a long time, but he knows this feeling.
With Yuki -his Yuki, who he saved; who has always been his; his responsibility, his friend, his brother, his--Stop!- nestled at his side…
For the first time, he feels alive.
-
When the day breaks, Aya carefully slips away from Yuki and crosses the room to the window. He spreads the curtains, looks out and turns his face towards the sun. Behind him, Yuki mumbles something incoherent and disappears back into sleep.
Aya smiles a ghost of a smile and wonders if he will ever know just who saved who's life last night.