They are rushing forward to the unreachable finish line in a race between life and death.
Down the road, into the woods—anywhere where they don't have to breathe in fear that this is might be their last time. And Gintoki feels a push on his back before the first bullet whisks past his ear, and the second hits her in the back of her chest, driving her forward into the snowy ground, about three steps ahead of him.
His eyes widen in shock, the piercing sound of gun firing throbbing inside of his ears and a few strands of her hair is dancing in the air, lightly, brushes his skin.
Unthinkingly (there is no time to think), he steps on her glasses on his way to her, lifting her up in his arms and continues to run away from the aggressive Amanto as fast as his tired legs can afford.
Bushes and branches flash before his eyes, scratching his face. He hides Sacchan steadily into his body, shielding her from all the impacts, as if she would break from the slightest fluttering of a hibernating ladybug in the winter. She is saying—whispering, breathing—something against his chest. Her words can't reach him over the blowing wind, but oddly, he knows by heart what she's trying to say.
(Gin-san, Gin-san, it's okay. I'm okay. Just leave me here and go. I'm only slowing you down. Please—)
"They're running this way! Just follow the blood!" The Amanto shout behind them and Gintoki curses while pushing himself harder. She doesn't stop bleeding, and the feeling of her blood touching him through layers of clothes is conversant, so conversant he almost wants it to drown him, to suck him in its twisted delight. But her cold skin urges him to run faster, using every drop of energy last. He runs, facing the tearing wind, breaks through all the closing doors of lifetime grief, of memories and faces that he believes are just hallucinations due to lack of sleep and hypoglycemia.
He hears people's voices, dearest people, calling him over the edge, over the other side and his mind is occupied with the desire to lie down, to give up, to yield to his aching body and not care about anything anymore. But another voice—his voice, he realizes desperately—reminds him from the back of his throat that she, nobody but her, will be the first to suffer if he falls. And he doesn't want that, he doesn't want that to happen because you're going to win, Gin-san, she had stated, not long ago. I believe in you. And I love you was what he assumed she was going to say. However, her next words surprised him.
But if you're tired, then it's okay to lose. Sometimes, it's okay to just run and hide all your life without feeling guilty. No one is going to blame you.
No one, no one, no one, he had screamed back at her, and made a crack on the wall. Because everyone is dead everyone is fucking dead don't you remember?
Of course she remembered, he knew that. And he knew because he was there, witnessed every time she cried herself to sleep when she thought he was unconscious, and then smiled, told him her good morning the day after like nothing ever happened.
She was so strong, is trong—the strongest, to the point of breaking him inside. And the last thing he wants to see is that strength gets shattered just because he's not fast enough.
.
.
He stops running after what feels like a decade, almost throws up. Every fiber of muscles is burning inside of his legs, and behind them is nothing but the dark and leafless trees and bushes that are covered in the bleak, cold light of snow. The sign of enemies is long gone.
Gintoki lowers his pace, breathless, dragging himself to the ground beneath an oak tree and sits down, yelps as he does so. Rough tree trunk against his back. Her slim frame balled up in his lap and her face is buried in the part between his neck and shoulder. The cold from her body and from the hardened blood that glues them together seeping through his skin all the way to his bone.
(He must do something. He can fix this. There is still time.)
Despite the knowledge that snow makes everything quiet, he's still amazed at how quiet it can be. The only things he hears is his own breathing and the beating of his heart.
(Maybe he could use some snow on her wound or something, to stop the bleeding even though he's not sure if she's even bleeding anymore, then hope for a doctor, or a fucking wizard.)
Gintoki shivers, tightens his grip around her. She is so thin, not even as real as the smoke from his mouth when he speaks to her while looking upon the ground, wishing there is a fire so he could feel something warm and alive.
"I'm sorry I broke your glasses, again," he mumbles breathlessly, shifting his numbing legs all the while making sure that not an inch of her body touches the cold, hard ground. There is this resignation in the way he says it, accepting the fact that he will never be able to fix it up to her.
It's kind of a good thing though, Gintoki thinks. He even wishes that she was blind from the start so she wouldn't have had to see all the wrongs that have happened. He definitely should have been more ruthless when it came to poking her eyes.
Letting out a small chuckle, he places his chin on the top of her head, allowing himself to remember of a late quiet summer night, when the weather just got calmer and the seemingly endless rain had finally come to an end. Back then, her eyes still had its color, although the light inside had broken.
"Have you ever thought about future and children—your children?" Sacchan asked lazily beside him, looking sleepy; half closed eyes behind the glasses. Her hands were busily making shadow puppets on the wall, her voice echoing along the sound of leaking water from a pipe somewhere in the underground base they used for hiding.
Gintoki looked at the dirty floor, did not answer her question. He had never thought about it, and was never going to.
The only thought in his head, the only thing haunted him day after day was the blank, empty eyes of friends, family—whom he loved, stared at him when they lain down at his feet, asked him about the reason had made him lose his fight. So he took his time, hiding in his dying forest to think and think (and think and think and think), but not once did he found an answer.
Said the children—innocent and breakable—unfortunately, were going to be a burden at the end of the day. The children he used to know, the child he used to be, with their source, their blood, could never live a normal life in this chaotic world. Not when the war has never really stopped.
And how could he tell her that his children, his and hers, born by two of the most broken pieces, will be the most broken pieces.
But he still turned aside to kiss her, left his frustration all over her soft skin.
.
.
Whenever they would do it, she'd always keep silent. Harshly breathing and biting her lip, her hands usually had bite marks here and there. He would always know when she was about to come, because the pain of her teeth sinking deep into his flesh would come together with pleasure.
He never asked her why, and she never told. Gintoki just knew for himself that somewhere along the way, she had stopped pretending that she wasn't so broken, stopped trying to ignore her own wounds to heal him, to cheer him up, to tell him was-not-so-funny stories, bad puns; sing him to sleep because there was a season when he couldn't close his eyes for once.
And he knew it was totally his fault because of the time—the first time he leaned on her, put the weight of his head—the weight of everything he had been bearing before his karma decided to come and destroyed all of them—on her shoulder. Let his shoulders to rest, finally. And he had uttered those words without even thinking when he moved to meet her uncertain lips.
"I like you more when you shut up."
Which was true. He has never enjoyed her talkativeness in the first place.
Most of the time—when he pretended to forget who he was and where they were, when he pretended to forget what had happened and who was gone; when he tried to convince himself, once again, that the world was not just blood and pains and secrets were always beautiful—her silence was kind of relaxing. They were just simply sitting there, avoiding looking at one another, breathing and almost at peace.
He liked her more when she shut up. That was he said, and he meant it. But at this moment in time, when her hair spills all the way over his shoulder, her unmoved hand in his cold hand and he has been counting, time and time again, the faintest heartbeats have just vanished. Gintoki realizes that those might not have been true, all the things he had said to her. He never liked it when she shut up, when she chose to sit silently looking afar instead of repeating his name and searching for his attention. Or when she forced out a smile that never quite reached her eyes just to assure him that she was okay, that they were okay in any ways.
He releases his embrace around her, loosens his hold on her nape a little and feels the weight of her head leaving his chest to roll onto his raising arm. Slowly, really slowly (as if he doesn't want to but has to because there is an invisible force controlling his body), he shifts his gaze down from a random snow covered-branch, then stops midway before snapping it back up, takes one sharp breath or two. He does it a few more times, each time lower than the last until eventually he's looking right at her to find her staring back at him.
With a quick movement, he instinctively pulls her back to his chest, enfolding her tightly while rocking back and fort rapidly (God, oh God).
There is something explodes beside him, within him or somewhere he can't even tell, and he squeezes his eyes shut to block out the image of her empty ones.
(oh God, oh fucking God.)
Just as quickly as it began, the explosion stops, so does the monsters inside his head.
There has never been such a silence, as if her last breath has devoured this moment, this life, space and time—except for him, remains with collapsing heaven and earth. The only sound he can seek out belongs to something inside his rib cage, something he thought he had lost but right now, right now he knows he was wrong all along because he can feel it, truly feel it.
It is not beating like he has always imagined it to be.
It is breaking apart.
.
.
And he tells her.
The first thing he does when he finally settles down is telling her those words. Those simple, and often too late words. He tells her, repeats it, slowly, ragged, like a broken machine. Even so, his voice is as calm as his expression, because he also remembers she had told him she adored his bored face once upon a time, and he thinks about those times when he has had the chance but missed it, to tell her, to carve forcefully into her mind that he liked (loved, craved for because he knew it was the only thing that stayed, the last thing he could protect) her smile as well.
"Did you hear that? Did you hear what I just said? Are you happy now? Oi, Sacchan. Sacchan..."
The world surrounding him suddenly becomes evident, as if he has just come up from the under water and for the first time after a really long time, the rain finally comes by, falling hard over his dying forest. Warmth blood is flowing inside his body and he goes back in time, when he was just a boy, when his hands have not yet stained blood and his heart still in one piece and flawless. He decides to give that heart to this woman, giving her the most beautiful part of his life.
His eyes are sparkling, reflecting the stars of above.
And he keeps telling her.
"What do you think of Ginpachi? I think it's a great name. I'll let you name the girl if you want to. But I suggest Kagura, even though she is going to pig out on our wallets, or Shinpachi, just as much girly of a name, and—and we don't have to fight anymore. We can live a shameful life you know, hiding and capitulating, it doesn't matter if it means we could live forever..."
How dare anything disturb them in this moment, even the wind nor the smallest snowflake.
Sleeping universe embraces its creatures. The darkness reduces the whole world into a tiny dot of light. There is nothing left, just a man with his awkward, sweet love confession to a star he can't even see.
The man keeps murmuring into the woman's ear the happy endings of all those illusive fairy tales, childlike eyes, hoarse voice, broken heart. Until his voice completely disappears, and life is nothing but a sigh of sadness.