Fandom : Sailor Moon / Sandman
Pairing : Kunzite / Zoisite implied.
Rating : G
Author's comment : Err... So, I can't tell you where this is coming from. Except, colliding fandoms, and it just struck me as an evidence.
Copyright : Zoisite, Kunzite and Sailor Moon are the property of Naoko Takeuchi. Sandman and the Endless belong to Neil Gaiman and DC.
bSPOILERS for Sandman book 9 and next/b
"Oshitaishite... Orimashita".
He drifted into darkness.
Then drifted out of it, still hearing his own weakened voice saying the words.
Another voice, a girl's, lively yet annoyed, said "Argh, not now! Okay, look over him, little sister, would you? I'm coming back for you both!" and a wooshing sound indicated some kind of teleportation.
Zoisite opened up his eyes on a blank ceiling, tentatively moved a hand, and found out his body didn't ache as much from Queen Beryl's blast.
His ears were pierced by a squeal.
"Oooohhhh, you're awakened! He's awakened, fishie! Uh, are you a he or a she?"
He growled and sat on the floor, snarking.
"I'm Zoisite, from the Shitennou. And I am a he."
Then he saw the girl who had talked and felt quietened instantly. Not that she was such a sweet sight.
She had orange hair unevenly trimmed with splashes of blue and yellow in, mismatched eyes, and fishnets covering her body being torn in places. She looked like she had just slept in a trash, and she smelled sour vine and old leather.
Also, she had a fish floating in the air above her head, held to a leash tied to her wrist.
She was kneeling by his side, gently poking his chest to check his assertion, then beamed a radiant smile.
"You ARE a he! You look very pretty for a he."
Zoisite had never been immune to flattery. And the girl amused him.
He had never been fond of the cute - possibly because he wanted to be the only cute thing around -, but she exhibited an endearing mix of clumsiness and spontaneity that even he couldn't resist.
"Thank you. It's very kind of you."
She wrinkled her nose with a smile and blushed at the compliment.
"So, uh, do you, uh, like me a bit? Because I think I like you. Would you help me find my doggy?"
"Your doggy?"
"I had a doggy and I lost him and I took a long road to find him and my brother gave me a fishie to guide me that is the Borghal Rantipole, only it's not really a fish but I made it one because I'm clever, and it is it here on the leash, say hello to the mister Zoisite, Borghal Rantipole, and I walked a looooong way and I saw people and I ate ice-cream and I found him with that nice funny man who is mine and he said I could come back aaaany time but then I had to go and the doggy have gone again and I can't ask my brother anymore because he's gone, too, so I came here but..."
At that point the girl started to look upset and her voice died into sobs.
Zoisite marvelled that she could even breathe after such a speech, and hesitantly patted her shoulder. For some reason he felt compelled to be nice with her.
"There there. Maybe we can look for your doggy together? I need to find someone, too."
The girl looked up to him through her tears and sniffled.
"Reaaally? You would do that?"
The joy in her voice made him feel warm and he smiled. He got up, and helped her standing too. She was shorter than he was. He couldn't tell if she was a young teen or older than that. Something about her screamed that she was older than she looked, but she was as flat-chested as a boy.
"Yes, sure, if you help me find my Kunzite."
"Is that a doggy too?"
Zoisite imagined Kunzite with puppy ears flailing a dog's tail and chuckled.
"No, it's a man. Tall, white long hair, pale blue eyes, beautiful."
The girl clung to his jacket, looked inquisitively at him from below her hair, getting so close that their noses nearly touched and he got confused by the proximity of her mismatched eyes.
Then she said thoughtfully.
"Aaaah, I thought you were mine, but my brother/sister has a part of you too..."
He gently released her grip, ignoring what sounded like non-sense to him. To anyone else he would have protested at the thought of belonging to someone - except maybe Kunzite -, but he did feel a kinship to the eerie girl.
He looked around, at what seemed to be a very classic, small but comfy apartment, remembering the other voice he'd heard, and asked :
"Your, uh, brother/sister owns this place?"
For obviously it was too tidy to belong to her, despite the two goldfishes in the aquarium.
"Another of my sisters. She wanted me to watch after you because... uh..."
She didn't remember, but Zoisite shivered. He heard in his mind a distant sound of feathers rustling, and he had the feeling that he shouldn't stay around and wait for the girl's sister, no matter how welcoming her voice had sounded.
"Well you will watch after me, if we're looking for your doggy and for Kunzite together, right?"
The girl giggled and clapped her hands.
"Ooooh, that is true! You think of everything! You're as clever as my brother! The one who is gone. Not the one who is gone and who I found with my brother who is gone gone, but the one who is gone gone. Are we going now?"
"Yes please.", said Zoisite, catching himself from adding "before my head starts to explode out of all these 'gone'".
"Do you know where to look first?"
She put a finger to her lips, pouted and tweaked a foot.
"Uh, no... That's why my brother who is gone had given me his doggy. To guide me because I tend to get lost and to forget... stuff. Like, where I am..."
"Can't your fishie, I mean, your fish guide you to the doggy?"
"What fishie?"
Zoisite gaped, then he suppressed a smile and pointed at the animal floating at the end of the leash.
"Oh. No, it doesn't seem to know where doggy is. He's just floating around in circle now."
Zoisite decided he had to take charge. He felt quite protective of the girl. Besides, if she could keep him away from her sister, the longer the quest would last the better. He rather needed to find Kunzite.
"Listen, Kunzite knows very powerful spells. I'm sure he could help us finding your doggy. So, do you mind if we try to find him first? I know where he's likely to appear."
"Okay!"
The girl offered her hand for him to take. He squeezed it gently in his gloved hand in return.
The world around them dissolved into waves of colors, and they stepped into it.
Zoisite stared at the changing kaleidoscop, and uttered in an amused tone.
"You know... I always thought death was the gate to another dimension, but I had no idea that it was such a weird one..."
"Okay, the mess is cleared for now, now on to... Zoisite? Delirium, where is?..."
The pale goth girl looked in every room of her apartment, though she felt there was no one else but her. Then she sighed, ran her hand through her spunky black hair.
"Oh good. Just what I needed when the Universe is still shaking in the aftermath of Dream's departing. A pretty psycho on the loose with my crazy sister. Ah well. He will have to wait some more, too many people need me for now. And I know he'll turn back up here soon anyway."
In gloomy caves, a red-haired woman with pointed ears ran her fingers along a stone coffin, in which laid a young man. She showed her fangs in a feral smile.
Hidden in a nearby passage, immaterial, a handsome silhouette in white suit lighted a cigarette and took a drag on it. The stranger looked as a tall man with long silver hair, walked cold and indifferent out of the room. The stranger followed him, golden eyes reduced to slits in annoyance.
As the fair-haired man reached his apartments, his composure slackened, as if something weighed on his shoulders. He gazed at the empty rooms, listening to the silence.
He reached out and carefully grabbed a small golden frame, enclosing a picture of him with Zoisite.
"Zoisite..."
From the shadows, Desire took another drag and smiled. He/she/it couldn't stand to let anyone escape him/her/it, and even the so-called Ice King had succumbed, after all. All was good.
A few weeks later, after many weird trips and experiences...
Delirium was playing with pop-corn in the streets of Tokyo, when she started to blink and waver.
"Uuuhhhhoooh..."
"Are you all right?", asked Zoisite, getting worried as he could suddenly see the wall behind her through her silhouette.
"My sister has my siggie thingy and wants to see me. She says she want to see you, too."
He stepped back.
"Uh, I don't think I want to see her."
Delirium gave him a sorry look.
"I know, she scares me too sometimes. She took my brother, you know? He wasn't always nice to me and I was afraid of him a bit but I liked him and we did well when we looked for our brother."
For all the pity he felt for her and her non-sense, Zoisite didn't want to listen to her any more. He turned away and started running, in case her sister would come to them.
In his back, Delirium shouted, to him and then to her sister.
"Awwww! Won't you come with me? She says she's got your Kunzite! Ooooh, you found him sister? We were looking for him too!"
It stopped him right in his track, blood deserting his face. Not that it mattered, since he was nothing but a ghost any more, as he had found out, so it was just an idea of blood deserting an idea of face.
He turned to her.
"She has him?"
"She says so. He's like you'd said. Tall, white haired, handsome. Oooooh, and he's scary too. He looks all chilly... Are you sure you want to see him?"
He was striving to see him. He walked back to Delirium, reluctantly.
"Can you bring us back there?"
"I don't know... He doesn't look very funny."
"No, he's not, but... I have to be with him."
She looked at him for a while, frowning, then smiling shyly, then pouting.
"... okay then. Sometimes my brother/sister is stronger than me."
She took his hand and they dissolved into air.
They appeared into a blank room holding 7 frames on the walls. One was all black. Delirium hugged herself as if caught in guilt.
As Zoisite watched, a girl in black punk-ish outfit put back a swirling patch of multi-colored fog into another one.
She smiled to him like to an endearing but disobeying child.
"Here you are. I thought you'd like to be reunited with him."
She waved at someone in his back. He turned and inevitably, Kunzite was standing there, looking puzzled. He walked to him defeated and silently begged for an embrace. Kunzite held him close and asked.
"Zoisite? Aren't you dead?"
"You're both dead. And now is the time to leave."
"And to find my doggie. Do you know where is my doggie, mister white hair? Pretty said you would."
Kunzite blinked at the sight of the girl whose hair was changing color and cut within minutes, and her fish turning around her tied to its leash, poking her head repeatedly.
There was something weird about the fish. Apart from the fact that he was swimming into air with a leash, that is.
"What is that?" Kunzite asked and pointed at the fish.
Delirium stared at his finger, hesitantly putting her own at its tip, then when Kunzite irritatedly showed back the fish, she gaped at it.
"Oh. Fishie? Borghal Rantipole?"
She frowned. The fish turned upside down and poked her forehead again.
"But... but, you can't be the Borghal Rantipole, because you vanished when my brother went away... I had the string left and all..."
Then suddenly she squealed.
"Doggy!"
The fish puffed into a brown and black dog that pushed her down the floor enthusiastically, wagging his tail and gently lecturing her. Yes, talking.
"Finally! I like you, my lady, but don't ever do that to me again. I couldn't even speak any more."
"I did that to you, Barnabas? Oh yes, when I changed into fishes and I wanted you to follow me and I swimmed muchly and I couldn't go back to my realm and I forgot you were following..."
Zoisite giggled weakly, while Kunzite was giving her odd looks.
She grinned to them.
"Thank you mister silver hair. That was very bright of you!"
"You're... welcome", said Kunzite.
Politeness was not his strong point, but Zoisite seemed to be fond of the little girl, and it was rare enough to deserve some respect.
"Yes, I love happy endings, too, thank you. Can you please pay attention, gentlemen?"
They turned to the punk girl with the Ankh necklace. Delirium crouched on the floor with her arms tightly around Barnabas, gazing at the couple.
"Who are you?" asked Kunzite.
Zoisite clung to him and whispered, disheartened.
"I think she is Death. Kind of. If that can be a person."
Kunzite mentally weighed the spirited form. She didn't look the part. Yet she winked and added.
"He's right. And I'm not a person. I just look like one to you. So, are you ready to go now?"
"Go where?"
"Just go. The rest belongs to you. And even I don't know what's after."
Kunzite straightened and tightened his hold on Zoisite.
"So we're not going anywhere."
Death's smile notably cooled down. Delirium looked to her and chewed on her lower lip nervously, covering her head with an arm.
"You don't actually have a choice."
Kunzite chuckled coldly.
"Well, I guess we do. Zoisite has been killed weeks ago. And he's still here, right?"
The younger Tennou looked up to him with a new hope in his eyes, then turned his eyes to Death to hear her reply. She repeated.
"You are dead. Both. Already. What would you have to do around here now?"
"Don't worry about that. We'll take care of each other."
Kunzite wrapped his cape around him and his lover and they both teleported away.
Death pouted.
"... Empowered freaks. I hate it when they do that kind of things."
Delirium looked from between her fingers.
"uh, but they are cute together, don't they?"
Her sister came around and sat by her side, cuddling her.
"You think so? Yes, I suppose."
"And they were nice to me. Pretty helped me to look for my doggy. And white hair found it."
Death hardly seemed impressed. Delirium shivered and sniffled.
"Are you... mad at me or something?"
"Why would I be?"
"Uh, I was to guard the pretty one. I think. Didn't you say that? Or was it someone else?"
Death rubbed Barnabas' head and shook her head, comforting her sister with a sweet smile.
"It's all right. I didn't really expect you to guard him. And since they were nice to you and he guarded you, I figure I can give them some time." and that would be an end, of sort.