It had been five years since the destruction of the Wall surrounding the Paradise City. Relations were still tense between those who lived inside and those who had lived outside, persecuted and murdered by the former leaders of the city called simply "No. 6", but the young leader of the slum once known as West Block, Nishigakure, had heard that the new leader of No. 6, having taken a stand and made a proactive effort to re-organize the city that had been turned nearly overnight into a confused and shambling mess, was making an effort to change that.
A leader, he had heard, who the people simply referred to as 'Shiro'. None of his vast network of information contacts, spawned in the days when No. 6 had merely been an enemy to destroy, could seem to figure out exactly why he was called that. Reports differed – some said it was due to his pale complexion, some said he was an old man with white hair, even others said that he simply favored white things or white shirts. Either way, the young man who'd become nearly a savior to his people was determined to find out. No. 6 had once, in his youth, stolen something very precious to him. Five years ago, he had left something else precious there while he searched for his own answers.
Now, it was finally time to return to No. 6, to return with those answers. Once he had known someone who'd dreamed of a world without walls, where No. 6 and Nishigakure no longer existed, blended into one entity. While they were still far from united, he hoped that his efforts, and those of this mysterious 'Shiro', could be united to make them allies and friends, just as he and a boy from No. 6 had once been allies and friends.
To that end, he stood beneath the massive mansion that belonged to the leader of No. 6 and looked up, his mind taking him far away to another time when he had looked up at a mansion – but there was no urgency today, no running, no pain. It was raining, today, but not storming – raining lightly, a welcoming rain that almost seemed to sing to him, urging him to step forward, and so he did.
His feet carried him as far as the door, but the reverie of the rain left him there. The enormity of his duties seemed to weigh him down and freeze him in place. He'd never been one to shirk his responsibilities, never been one afraid to act, but action was something he had always been good at. Diplomacy was a skill he had had to learn the hard way, and it didn't hurt that Nishigakure had been a rough town, where intimidation had gone as far as diplomacy in those early days. Now, he could not bully, he could not press, he could not fight – No. 6 had always been a place where those in power were as immovable as their walls.
But the wind wouldn't let him stand. Ever since that day, five years ago, he'd been more in touch with the whispers of nature, and the wind pressed on his back and urged him forward, pushed him to oen the door and walk through it, and so it seemed that he blew through the door like the wind itself, striding confidently on its whispered words into the foyer of that impressive mansion. He didn't even need to close the door behind him; though it hardly seemed strong enough, the wind teased it shut, leaving him nearly-alone in that expansive room.
It didn't take long for him to announce to the receptionist (for the mansion was also Shiro's place of business and thus, had a reception desk – it almost made him laugh at the absurdity of the elite) his title and wish for an audience with Shiro. She seemed startled, but a few quick messages and she was urging him up the stairs – "Shiro has evidently been expecting your visit for quite some time, now; he did say to tell you he expected you to contact him ahead of time, however."
He chuckled to himself – he supposed that more notice should probably have been given, but old habits died hard. He wanted the representative of No. 6 to be on edge for this meeting, to offset the advantage he had by his very anonymity.
"Unfortunately," the receptionist continued, "he's in another meeting right now and has asked you to wait until he may see you; you may wait here, in this room; I will let you know when he is ready to be seen."
The room she led him to was full of books, a library almost double the size of the one he had left behind at his own home in Nishigakure, and as he looked around, his eyes widened. He stood slowly and walked over to a shelf, pulling a title at random and opening to a random page.
"There's one did laugh in's sleep, and one cried "Murder!"
That they did wake each other. I stood and heard them.
But they did say their prayers and addressed them
Again to sleep."
MacBeth; he replaced it and moved down the line. All of his favorites – Hamlet, Othello, Romeo & Juliet – and all well-thumbed, Shakespeare and others, stretching towards the ceiling, a seemingly-endless number of books. The master of No. 6 had good taste, he thought, though there was something aching about seeing them all here, despite the fact that he'd thought he was done with this feeling, done with the sound of his voice echoing out words well-read by another into an empty room.
He pulled them each from their place, all the Shakespeare, and read a passage aloud, trying to fill his time and heart with words now that he suddenly felt that emptiness one more time, but he had made his choice. Now he was trying to fix it, so why was he being haunted?
It wasn't long before a small cough interrupted his reading of Hamlet's dramatic monologue on the subject of death, and he closed the book and slid it almost instinctively back into its place.
"Shiro is free now; he asked me to come for you," the receptionist said with a soft smile. Her eyes were amused, as if at some sort of private joke.
He didn't ask, only followed. It wasn't until his hand was reaching for the door when he froze with realization.
They were the same.
That library had nearly twice the number of books as were in his collection, but the small section hear the door, the first several shelves, were exactly the same, organized the exact same way. His collection had changed over the years, but this was the collection he had started with, five years ago, grown and expanded along a different path. His breath caught in his throat as the door opened from under his fingers.
It wasn't the person behind that door who first caught his attention – indeed, they seemed to be staying out of sight – but another familiar face, another familiar voice, the squeak of a mouse that drew his attention down to the floor. The familiar feeling of tiny, scrabbling claws running up his pants and then his back to sit on his shoulder, a small white mouse whose name came easily to his lips.
But no, it couldn't be. None of this could be happening; none of it could be true.
"Hamlet?" he asked quietly, reaching up to stroke the mouse, softly, gently, as though it couldn't be true, as though it would shatter into dreaming fragments the moment he touched the dream.
"He missed you," said another voice from inside the door as another person stepped out to meet him, another voice that was so familiar it ached in the most painful of ways, ached more than the sound of his voice echoing in an empty library.
"Shi…on…?"
He hated the way his voice cracked as he spoke a word, a name, that hadn't fallen from his tongue in too long, far, far too long, five years of endless moments of too long stretching one after another.
"I guess…. I have a lot to explain, don't I, Nezumi?" asked the other. Both of them had grown, gotten older, but the voice and the face, he would recognize anywhere, pale skin, snow-white hair, the red, angry welt of a scar that showed on his cheek and neck and which the young leader named Nezumi knew traveled down his whole body, testament to the suffering that had changed both their lives an age, an eon, a lifetime ago.
He glanced over to the large, open window, the wind flapping the curtains, the rain blowing in.
"I was watching the storm," he said sheepishly. "And before that, Mother was here. I'm sorry I couldn't see you sooner."
He shook his head and stepped into the large study, and for the first time in five years, he felt himself smile that familiar old smile, as he turned to his friend.
"So you're Shiro of No. 6?" he asked.
"And you're the Rat of Nishigakure," he affirmed with the smile that made Nezumi's heart melt. He felt the hole slowly filling.
"Safu tore down the wall for me," he continued, "but some things even she couldn't fix. So I took it on myself to tear down the invisible wall. The wall of hatred, the wall of prejudice. Look at how far we've come, Nezumi… working by ourselves."
He nodded. "Yeah. You've grown up quite a bit, I can see."
"So have you."
Nezumi snorted, not bothering to deny.
"I figured," he said, looking at Shion, "that it was time for No. 6 and Nishigakure to stop being enemies."
Shion nodded. "I decided that it was time for us to stop working separately," he replied.
For a moment, there was an odd and awkward distance between them. A separation that was more than just physical.
Then Shion walked over to him, and smiled that pure, honest smile of his, and said, "I've missed you, Nezumi."
For a moment, both young men could only look at each other, and Nezumi could feel the stinging feeling of tears welling up in his eyes. He didn't cry often, but now, he felt like his heart was about to burst. "Idiot!" he growled. "Why didn't you tell me, why didn't you send word?"
Shion laughed, but he was crying too. "You were the one who left… I thought maybe, I should give you time to find your way back. I knew you would, eventually."
He growled. "You're such an optimistic dumbass. How could you know I'd come back?"
"Because," he said with a grin. "You wouldn't be able to let yourself be a hypocrite. I knew you would never give me a goodbye kiss."
Nezumi's eyes went wide, and it felt like his world shook. Unbelievably, the sound that came out of him was a laugh, a small one at first, that slowly built and built until he was shaking with laughs that were half-laugh and half-sob. After a moment, they were laughing together, huge, wracking, uncontrollable laughter that found them clinging to each other until the laughter and the tears both fell away.
"I missed you too, Shion," Nezumi said.
This time, when they kissed, it didn't mean goodbye.