Tatsuya Kaname, thirteen years old, had very vivid dreams. For as long as he could remember, which was over two years at this point, these dreams haunted him. It shouldn't be unusual to dream so intensely, and recall most (if not all) facets the next morning in such exquisite detail as if he had actually lived it. But somehow, Tatsuya knew, something felt off. These dreams plagued his mind every time he closed his eyes to rest. Everything seemed similar in these dreams, as if something deeply hidden within his subconscious, tried to explode into being, clawing its way out of the deep recesses of his mind into the forefronts of his vision.
These dreams were-and still are, although he's a touch too prideful to admit it quite yet, for he is on the verge of high school-too intense. Tatsuya can't explain how deeply these dreams affect him, because they are often too grotesque to talk about; saying anything out loud would warrant being thrown into an insane asylum for the rest of his young life. These frightening yet dazzling dreams are all consuming in their entire chilling glory. They don't leave his head; swatches of dreams swirl around his head, as if he's been punished for having an imagination.
Somehow, he always managed to awake from these dangerous in a cold sweat, breathing ragged, and with the feeling of disorientation. That was an astounding, terrifying feat.
His vision, somehow, was always blinded by the girl with the cascading pink hair who looks too much like him. Tatsuya knew he had no siblings, but it seemed like he didn't just know her: she was much too important to some random face he picked out from a crowd.
She smiled at him with a warmth he's never seen in a girl this age: this grin always, without fail, looked genuine, as if she cared for this boy on a different plane of existence than her. People who were always happy screamed suspicious to Tatsuya. However, her sincerity convinced him of the truth behind her emotions. The corners of her mouth were always positioned in a soft smile, as if her face is naturally positioned to smile like this; Tatsuya felt a pang of something in his heart, and he can't explain this feeling beyond an anxious desire for her approval, for her to open her mouth and say something of him that could tangibly prove why she's always been running in his mind. This smile always showed white teeth that gleamed with a vivid ivory sheen that seemed too intense to be realistic.
Tatsuya stood in awe of her, and it seemed repetitive to keep remembering the frightening intensity of her beauty. He keeps waiting for her to act like a monster ready to pounce. He expects the sinister because the inky blackness behind the girl transforms into an optical illusion: the sights were too aggressive in their already forceful existence and these designs are spiraling behind her in a cacophony of masterfully confusing, intricate knots and designs and clashing color schemes. She grows smaller as the designs grow bigger behind her in a dizzying manner, leaving Tatsuya with a feeling of nauseated vertigo.
The most comforting thing were her amber eyes. They glittered with the knowledge of a thousand years of living, a sense of tranquil maturity and rough yet kind worldliness settling into the depths of her eyes. They were deeply affected by the world or lack thereof, in this case. Tatsuya noticed that the world seemed to go blurry and out of focus behind her, as if nothing else mattered. These bright eyes lacked cynicism: her optimism seemed intact and pure, without any hint of spite or judgment. She didn't do much in his dreams, except float; sometimes, she reached out for him, her elegant fingers beckoning him toward her. He wanted to follow, and the temptation to follow her rang deep within his body. The sensation of the deepening desire to understand her hurt his very being.
At this point, she started to bleed yellow from her neck, the blood oozing down her throat at a slow, steady yet intense pace. Her body bled blue in a labyrinthine design, staining her pristine white dress. In horror, Tatsuya noticed that blue blood was an unnatural shade of cobalt. It was pooling at her feet, and Tatsuya swore he heard the sound of violins in the background as the blue blood kept dripping.
Her legs and arms bled red, but it kept the texture of chocolate. The red blood, mixing with the blue and yellow, created a nasty muck. It smelt faintly like rotting flesh and burnt hair, but more intensely, it smelt of sulfur.
He recoiled. The scent followed him, enveloping him. This was the most affection he'd get from her, because she watched blankly as he shook with what only could've been anxiety.
Although Tatsuya wouldn't have noticed it had he not been staring, he saw that the girl's heart bled pink. It seemed fitting.
From the edge of his peripheral vision, he swore he sees a flash of glasses and black braids billowing behind a flicker of purple and there's a flicker of something forlorn in the air that feels like unrequited love. Tatsuya isn't sure who this girl is, or why she's running toward Tatsuya and the beautiful girl.
The pink girl turned around and noticed the raven-colored girl; pink stiffened her posture. She pivoted on her heel to sprint away with long strides.
Baffled into speechlessness, Tatsuya wanted answers. Most importantly, he wanted to hear her voice, to know her name and her story and why she picked him of all people to bequeath these dreams.
He always ended up chasing her in his dreams, dwarfed by the inky indigo sky and the billions of stars gazing down upon Tatsuya. There's a kind of eerie, beautiful glimmering luminescence of these stars shining at him, trying to tell him a story. These stars, unnaturally and intensely bright stars, accentuated by the equally intense light of the moon, remind Tatsuya of his insignificance, that he was a blip on the radar of the ever expanding life.
She let herself disappear from his reach as soon as his fingers could reach out, her pristine white dress a phenomenon to behold as it billowed with grace behind her. She's ethereal, like a Goddess.
Did she even exist? Does she? Tatsuya asked himself whenever he awoke in a cold sweat. He spent more and more of his dreaming life dazed, the question repeating in his head. She felt real, even though he never could reach her.
Morning arrived. Tatsuya's heart raced as he awoke in a haze, his breath ragged. He looks around his room, and everything looks the same: all of the clutter still sat on his floor, and all the same posters lining the wall.
"Tatsuya, honey! Time for school!" In this moment, Tatsuya is grateful for his mother's voice interrupting his sleep. He got dressed and gathered his school items in record time, pushed by the curiosity of the pink haired goddess in his dream.
I'm going to learn about this girl, even if it kills me.
Tatsuya didn't find it difficult to participate in school despite his lack of sleep. In fact, he hasn't been more alert in his life. The manic energy of surviving that dream pushed him to succeed today, in every aspect of his life. Because of the pink girl's endless, ready kindness, her open smiles and warm eyes and her charitable, calm radiance, Tatsuya felt inspired to change his own behavior.
The positive changes to his personality came too easily, and Tatsuya was intoxicated by the energy of kindness. He stood atop of the world, drunk on the power of being innumerably compassionate without question. His good traits were emphasized, and all of his anxious energy was poured into radicalizing every part of his life.
The control he could exert over people pumped through his veins like flames. The response people had to him spread through Tatsuya. Teachers even pulled him aside to note that his good mood was infectious.
Maybe this dream had something beneficial to it…
These dreams aren't prophetic in any meaningful way that Tatsuya can understand so far. He had spent every waking free moment trying to understand. He couldn't tell anyone about this without sounding like a rambling maniac, and the weight of the secret sat in his heart, blooming in his chest, like a boulder. The memory of dream of the pink haired girl started to rev up in intensity; he seemed to get hit with memories of dreaming of her in the past like a ton of bricks.
After school, the first thing he did was rush to the school's library, a surprisingly spacious yet cozy place with high ceilings, large windows with golden light spilling through. The endless shelves full of books at his disposal felt daunting.
The motivation for camping out in the library was simple. A part of him, the stubborn and curious part, wanted to have some sense of closure. Tatsuya pushed forward, hoping he was one step closer to understanding his dreams by learning about them. He's still conflicted about the dreams themselves, though: despite curiosity gnawing at him until his nerves go numb or raw or a strange combination of both, he's not sure he wants to keep having these dreams. They've, despite curiosity, taken an instant emotional toll on him.
It's been twelve hours since he last slept, which wasn't bad but it was the middle of the night where it hit the hardest. He's pulled all-nighters in the past, and he was still able to function in the morning. He figured that this recurring nightmare would end yet the images he's seen haunt him despite hoping otherwise. Tatsuya feared that this image would stay imprinted in his mind, repeating endlessly like a broken record.
Although Tatsuya knew nightmares weren't real and never could be real (...could they?), he still saw her everywhere. Girls in class who had similar builds to the pink haired girl made Tatsuya curious. He followed them in desperate hopes to understand the girl in his dream. Girls with hair anywhere close to pink, dyed or natural, became Tatsuya's close friends, someone to study and take notes on.
The frenzy to gain closure ate him alive.
Tatsuya's eyes were bloodshot, as they were for the last few days. Mother worried once she noticed. It had been almost five full days since he'd had a full night's sleep. It took a toll on him physically: he struggled to keep his head up during school, and he could barely function otherwise. His once sharp memory began to deteriorate. The good mood that once pulsed through him ended about six hours ago.
"Honey," Mother said in that voice she only used when she wanted to confront him about something she cared about. He said nothing, only turning his head to face her.
"I'm worried about you," Mother's enunciated her words in a way that emphasize all the unspoken worry she had for him over the years. The wrinkles in her eyes were more prominent now that she let herself wear worry openly. Tatsuya's heart hurt.
"I'm-" Tatsuya can't lie to Mother, "having trouble sleeping. I keep having this...this recurring dream of a girl. She's pink and terrifying and gorgeous. There's something frightening about this dream. And, and I can't explain what makes it so terrifying. It just exists, full of blood and foreign scents-"
"Enough," Father said, cutting Tatsuya's babbling in a harsher tone than expected. Father's face softened.
"I love you, Tatsuya, but I can't hear the descriptions of your suffering. I-we, Mother and I, that is-love you too much to see you go through this, especially alone."
When Tatsuya revealed-accidentally, of course, given that his state of exhaustion had overpowered his desire to not worry his parents- that the nightmares had recurred for longer than a year, he was referred to a therapist. It was a costly yet necessary evil.
The therapist Tatsuya saw wore a neutral face, and Tatsuya supposed it could've been worse. At the back of his mind, he hoped for answers.
"So Tatsuya," the therapist stated, the calm tone of his voice sounded relaxing and the cadence of his voice was kind, "tell me about these dreams of yours." Before Tatsuya could guard his answers, they all spilled out. The therapist didn't flinch, and for that, Tatsuya was grateful.
The dreams, apparently, had a meaning deeper than utterly terrifying. The girl in his dream represented qualities Tatsuya wanted to incorporate in his own life: nothing more, nothing less. The loss of blood in his dreams meant he felt emotionally drained; it could've also meant a more positive aspect of life: life, love, passion. Those were three things he wanted in life.
Somehow, it seemed strange that these dreams haunting him could've been solved so easily. Disappointment of the knowledge he'd be coming back to this therapist with more questions than answers gnawed at him.
That was an anti-climatic session…
That night, Tatsuya dreamed of her again. This time, it wasn't terrifying and Tatsuya felt nauseous with the fear that he'd be in trouble for dreaming of her again, despite seeing a therapist.
"I'm Madoka Kaname," she finally said, and he gasped.
"How could you have the same last name as me?" Tatsuya asked. She smiled, and he awoke.
"Mother," Tatsuya asked that next morning.
"Yes, dear?"
"Do we have a relative named Madoka?" Mother and Father glanced at each other, confused.
"Not that we know of, honey. Why do you ask?" Tatsuya decided not to reveal the source; instead, he shrugged.
"Just curious."
Tatsuya decided that the world, when it lacked answers, was pretty damn unfair.
He'd given up on this girl in his dreams, and maybe it was for the better.
Tatsuya dreamed again that night. This time, he wasn't the main character of his dream. Instead, he felt like he was a spectator, watching a movie. He wasn't sure where he was located: most likely the living room of an apartment. For a living room, it wasn't very decorated , save for a warm blue couch, a television set, and a single succulent tree sitting on a golden window pane, gladly soaking up the sun. The limited view (at least, from Tatsuya's angle) outside of the lone window was of Tatsuya's hometown of Mitakihara; at least that was familiar.
"Homura?" The pink haired girl-Madoka, as she had introduced herself in his last dream- asked. A familiar black haired girl looked at Madoka with a face full of emotions Tatsuya couldn't decipher.
"Yes?" Homura didn't look at Madoka; instead, she focused on the succulent plant that had somehow multiplied into a dozen, and that change seemed The tension of Madoka and Homura's lack of eye contact held weight of emotions unsaid, but Tatsuya couldn't decipher them. He was a silent observer, and he hoped to stay that way.
"Have I failed as a guardian?" For the first time in all of Tatsuya's extensive experience dreaming of her, the overwhelming guilt and sadness Madoka drowned in was a new sight to observe. It wasn't all that noticeable on Madoka's face, but the way she wrung her hands and the way her eyes glittered with pain and the crack in her voice said it all.
Homura went still. The palpable silence pained Tatsuya. Madoka held her breath for Homura's answer.
"No," Homura said, pivoting on her heel to face Madoka. "You did your best. Tatsuya is a wonderful young boy. He will definitely grow up with your influence."
Tatsuya woke up lighter.