Title: Reaching the End: The Forward
Rating: PG
Light Shoujo-ai content
Revolutionary Girl Utena does not below to me. I am just borrowing.
Note: This was the very first Utena fic I ever wrote. So here it is again after eight years slightly re-edited. I hope it's still enjoyable.

"Honestly," the woman said in a huff. "Such stories."

The woman ushered her son over to a park bench and sat him down.

"You stay right here while I do a little shopping," she commanded softly. "Don't move."

The boy nodded and then muttered, "A prince really did save me."

The woman huffed again and retorted, "Listen hon', It's a lovely thought, but there are no such things as princes on white horses who save people."

"But she didn't have a horse," he pleaded.

His mother looked at him a bit sternly and said, "Girls can not be princes. It's just your over active imagination. Fairy tales are not true, and they can not come true. Now…" Her tone became a bit cheery. "Stay here, I'll be back in a sec."

The boy watched with some contempt as his mother slipped into a boutique. He wished she would believe him.

"I did see a prince," he muttered again. "She was real, and she did save me. How come no one believes me?" He pouted.

The boy began to swing his legs back and forth on the bench, and he slouched low in his seat. His brown eyes stared off into the distance not quite focusing on any one thing. He didn't even notice the woman standing next to him. He merely sighed and repeated his lament, "No one ever believes me."

"I believe you." A soft, gentle voice broke in suddenly.

The child sat up immediately and looked up. Next to him was a rather pretty lady. Her deep violet hair nearly touched the ground and her eyes sparkled like emeralds. Her smile was polite and the boy felt at perfect ease with the stranger.

"May I sit here for a while with you," she asked.

The lad shook his head and the young woman sat lightly on the empty space next to him. She reminded him of someone he had just met, or at least he thought she did. The woman had the same kind of overwhelming presence as the prince who had saved him, but she seemed a bit more…He couldn't describe it really.

"Why," he asked sheepishly. "Why do you believe me?"

Her smile grew a bit when he asked her. She looked at him kindly and replied, "Well, I'm looking for a prince. Not just any prince, but a very special one." She paused for a moment and wiped a straying lock of hair from her face. She continued with an almost light chuckle, "Didn't you say a prince saved you?"

The boy's eyes were wide with excitement. "Oh yes," he said nearly shouting. He calmed himself down some and went on at a rapid pace. "She was cool. She had soft pink hair, and she told me not to cry, eyes bright as the sky and- Wow! She said I shouldn't cry or worry, that my mom would find me and everything would be fine. She was just so- so-brilliant!"

"I see." The young woman's smile was wider, and she seemed to be just as brilliant as any prince.

The boy suddenly looked a little lost. "But…"

"But?"

"But, my mom says that things like that just can't be true. It's just my imagination." He looked up at the lady sitting next to him sadly and sighed, "Isn't it?"

Her deep green eyes shut for a moment and then opened with sudden reassurance. "Do you believe that I am here talking to you?"

The lad nodded.

"Do you believe that this conversation is real?"

Another nod.

"Well, if I'm real and you believe that, what's to keep you from believing that you really did meet a prince who saved you? Why should you doubt what you know is in your heart," she asked gently. "If you believe it, then it can be so."

The boy seemed happier after that. There was a long silence and then the woman stood up as if she were going to leave.

"You going," he asked.

She shrugged her shoulders and replied, "I do have to find the prince you know. Which way did she go anyway?"

"That way," the boy said, and he pointed east. "So, are you the princess then?"

That same wondrous smile slid across the young woman's lips as she replied, "What makes you say that?"

"Well, every prince has to have a princess, right?"

"I suppose so," she replied. She seemed a bit distant at that moment, as if she were thinking of something she had lost.

"So, are you the princess?"

"Yes. Yes I am," she said.

He watched her as she left. She walked at a steady pace never looking back. He was sad to see her go, but he felt relieved to know that he wasn't just imagining things. He wondered though, if she would ever find her prince. They would be great together, he really believed that. Separate they were unimaginably charming and full of light. Together he was sure they would outshine the stars.

His mother stepped out of the store and took his hand. As they walked the little boy decided he wouldn't tell his mother about the princess. He knew it was real and that was enough for him.

To be continued...