oubliette;
[ˌuːblɪˈɛt]- a dungeon, the only entrance to which is through the top.
it's too bad i won't hear the end of my song.
a shiver runs down byakuran's spine; everything is dark, save for the colours dancing in front of his eyes, alternating between black and crimson, and the silence rings in his ears.
are his eyes open? is his heart still beating?
he tries to say something, anything, but all he can manage is a twitch of his lips, and then the colours fade into nothingness. cold seeps into his skin, into his bloodstream, into his bones, until they're frozen like ice and already, he can feel it starting to crack.
the cold crawls under his skin, up to his face and to his head and to his mind and now, it's hard for him to think.
it's hard for him to feel, but then again, it always has been.
there's a lump in his throat that he tries to swallow down but his muscles aren't moving. he can't breathe, he can't scream for help, he can't see. he can't stay alive.
it's cold. too cold, so cold that it burns. he's drifting away. the cold burns his fingers and it only takes a second for reality to slip from his grasp and—
thump. thump. silence.
his hands sink into something soft and grainy and he scrabbles at the ground frantically. he's going to fall, sink, disappear—
he's not dead.
the rise and fall of his chest slows as he forces himself to calm down and he holds his hands flat, rigid, resisting the urge to scratch at the floor. his breathing becomes regular soon enough and he stops shaking. he almost convinces himself that it wasn't from fear. almost.
he opens his eyes and almost immediately, his arm flies up to his forehead, shielding himself from the sunlight. he props himself up and strangely, he doesn't feel tired at all. he doesn't feel dead. giving his arm an experimental stretch, he finds that it doesn't hurt and he stands, stretching out all his long, gangly limbs and relief washes through his body. it's refreshing.
he'd always thought that when people died, they didn't just un-die again. they didn't just come back to life. that was weird. that was the rule.
but apparently, that rule didn't apply to byakuran. not a lot of rules did.
he shakes his head, rids his mind of the trivial, useless thoughts, and surveys the scene before him. it reminds him of the beach. soft pale sand that snakes its way between his toes, foamy waves that lap at the coast and a cool breeze that tousles his hair.
he remembers the promise he made with bluebell once. that he'd take her to the beach and they'd bury zakuro in the sand and eat vanilla ice-cream(because bluebell used to absolutely detested chocolate, or so she said, but byakuran had seen her stuffing her face with nutella from the jar nearly every midnight) by the harbour. from what he can tell, he's the only human there.
close enough.
then, there are footsteps, almost inaudible, but his sharp ears catch them, the quiet tap tap tap of heels crushing the grains of sand beneath them.
"byak—"
"cervello," he greets, turning to face them. his tone is cheerful, his lips quirked upwards in a smile that doesn't reach his eyes.
the pink-haired twins remain blank. "byakuran-sama," they say, "the mare ring—"
byakuran wags his finger at them playfully. "i told you!" he chastises teasingly, although there is no humour behind his voice, "i told you what would happen! you're silly."
they repeat themselves, their voices in perfect unison. "byakuran-sama, the mare ring. we know we made the right decision entrusting you with it, however, it was meant to be this way for you. we cannot change fate."
byakuran thinks that it's complete and utter bull, but his voice gives nothing away. "i know," he says softly, "but is that a hero's fate?"
byakuran knows he's a hero. he knows he should've been a hero. he knows how disgusting the world was and he knows that he should've been the one to save it. he was going to tear this filthy world apart and rebuild it, into his own, perfect world.
he knows he was going to be a saviour.
the cervello stay silent.
he crouches down and draws shapes with his finger in the sand. a circle, a star and a flower. "hey, cervello."
they look down at his hunched body, yet such a pose was not befitting for a hero.
"why am i," he continues, tracing the outline of his hand, "not dead? you saw tsunayoshi kill me, didn't you? you saw yuni and the other one—gamma, wasn't it? didn't they sacrifice their lives to end mine?"
"yes," the cervello reply obediently.
"then," he says, "listen carefully, okay? why am i alive?"
"i don't know," is their answer. byakuran sighs, rubs the doodles on the ground with his bare foot and stands again. he ignores their outstretched hand to help him up.
he's lonely.
they're not really good company, the cervello, byakuran thinks, so he finds solace under the palm trees where he bides his time by tracing shapes in the sand.
it's lonely on the island. the kind of loneliness that crawls into your skin and settles itself into your body so your heart feels heavy and your mind feels empty.
day in, day out, he sits and draws and stares. he stares at nothing, he feels nothing, he thinks of nothing.
although, there's one thing that he's absolutely certain of—he's sure that this is punishment.
on the one-hundredth day, he confronts the cervello. the breeze is travelling southwards and the waves are unusually calm as the sun beats down on them. the cervello are standing in the same spot as the first day, next to the smudged drawings of the circle, the star and the flower and they stand, unmoving.
"is this a prison," asks byakuran, more a statement than a question.
"no," says the cervello.
byakuran raises his eyebrows. "okay," he says.
day in, day out, he sits and draws and stares. he stares at nothing, he thinks of nothing but he feels like a prisoner.
there is no justice in the world.
it is the one-hundredth and fifty-first day.
byakuran's learnt that on this island, he doesn't need food, he doesn't need water. he doesn't need anything except for patience.
the only way he can tell the time is when the sun falls and the moon rises and the stars laugh at him from the sky. the horizon is purple, orange, red—
the horizon is broken.
he runs, faster than he's ever run before, to the crashing waves and gawks at the horizon. the water laps at his feet and the wind is blowing northwards, blowing the tiny specks of sand into the sea, where they are carried up by the waves to the sky. he's practically trembling with excitement.
he can see it. the crack. the crack at the top, the curved roof of the earth, and there's a huge gaping crack in the clouds and the violet sky.
maybe, just maybe—
he runs, he jumps and brilliant white wings burst from his back. they fight against the breeze as they flutter and beat in the air and he flies, stretches his arms as far as he can, reaching for the sky so he can rip it open and then, the world will get their hero back.
the waves rise and brush against the soles of his feet, beckoning him to return but he doesn't look behind him.
his eyes flicker open and the overpowering smell ofantiseptic fills his lungs. sounds of conversations buzz and overlap each other, echoing in his eardrums.
an urgent, familiar, "byakuran-sama!" cuts through the noise and byakuran shifts his head to the side to the waiting figures of kikyo and zakuro whose faces are painted with worry and they look younger, so much younger than before, but their eyes show more maturity than their features.
byakuran smiles and squeezes the hands that he didn't know he was holding.
the hero has returned.