Destiny

Diviana Foresman

September 26, 2002

I had left the Venetian blinds open for a reason : the moon shone little beams onto the blanket that covered my partner's naked body. I loved doing this - waking in the night after a beautiful nap to watch my mate sleep, dressed in only the light of the moon.

The cherry blossom tree outside the before-mentioned window was shedding its leaves and blooms. Some of the tiny pink petals had floated through the open window to flutter down onto the blanket. As the breeze blew by gently, the branches of the sakura tree moved, making the shadows in the room dance. They danced the way we danced, my lover and I, across the walls and floors, never giving up until the very end.

I look down longingly at the sleeping figure, and smile. I reach out to stroke their arm, that gloriously soft skin, before touching my own arm, imagining it was them who was tickling my flesh with gentle fingertips. As hard as I try to keep in the present, my mind wanders back to the first time I had ever really spoken to the person who holds my heart in clasped hands.

/I step up to the cherry blossom tree, blood dripping from even year-old scars. I fall to sit between the roots, my back pressed carefully to the trunk. The branching limbs of the tree hide my figure mostly from the road, giving me temporary shelter.\

/As I one-handedly tie my handkerchief around my left arm, blood pooling in the cupped hand, the branches shake, letting loose petals and leaves in a cascade of pink and green. I know someone was there, coming towards me. But I am too tired and anguished to get up and leave or fight, so I stay where I am and hope whoever had come from behind would kill me quickly.\

/But it was not a soldier, not in the traditional sense. They did not fight to kill or war, but to bring peace and unity. But then, I did not know that. Instead, I only saw the person who is now engaged to me. They say nothing as they sit beside me, looking up into the many branches of the tree.\

/"I know why the flowers are pink."\

/I look at them, confusion not so clearly written on my face. "The cherry blossoms?"\

/Nod. Blink. "Ever notice how they are always pink or white?" I begin to say no but they continue. "The flowers are pink because the tree, it sucks up the blood of the fallen warriors buried beneath it. They are white because the tree has been lucky enough to not be its own grave." At this point, my wonderful soul-mate turns to look at me for the first time. "Don't give the tree one more life to mourn for, do not burden it anymore with your blood."\

I could only nod dumbly, faint from fatigue, loss of blood. I remember, faintly, standing with their arm around my waist and walking to a small cottage nearby. Blackness intervals with my love's face, hovering over me as they tended to my multiple wounds. I recall more clearly the way my courter would kiss every scar, every injury, in the most passionate way possible.

A soft sound gains my attention and I watch as the object of my affection stirs from their sleep. Eyes half-lidded, they smile and reach for me. I lay back down, our hands on each other's faces. For the longest time, we hold each other, doing fantastic things with our mouths and hands. Then I am on the bottom, with my angel so light ontop of me, and we stay so very close, moving so gently to a rhythm only we heard.

I say, "I love you," and they say it back, whispering in my ear, and it is so good I feel like crying. I don't know how many years it is later that our waves of passion clash together, a deafening silence we enjoy as much as we do each other. We are so content in staying that way, intertwined together, like the branches of the sakura tree, but our world is rocked, so violently and earth-shattering, we look up to see what had interrupted us.

And that was the last time I saw my soldier of peace.

I cry, they do too, and we clutch each other tightly as our world is torn apart. Darkness swarms in front of me, and I remember three things before falling into that void.

The first was my keeper of the stars, the one who hung my moon and sun, their soft whisper in my ear. "I love you,"

The second - cherry blossom petals, almost red in their colour, floating down to land on the blanket again. The tree was mourning us, holding the burden of our deaths in its branches.

And the last thing I remember before dying is vowing to kill the Gundam pilots in my next life.

owari

A/N: The Gundam universe does not belong to me, even if I live in it and own bits and pieces of it