A.N. – Holy crap… to the dear, dear sadist bastard of a friend who asked me to write this: it's only because I love you that much. And I really can't back down from one of your challenges- they tend to be awesome.
And to the rest… yeah. This piece was the most awkward, technically difficult thing to write to date. I really don't know if you can make this qualify as anything, but I tried my best and… well, here's to hoping at least someone liked it enough!
That said- semi-AU wouldn't even begin to cover it, and OoC might as well be included. Characters copyrighted to Square-Enix as always… and part of the extended-and-riffed quote go to whoever coined it first (Stare deep enough into the abyss, and the abyss will stare back to you, or however it went. I've seen mostly the abridged, edited versions of that somewhere or something like that… whoa, how's that for inconsistent…)
Ventus has been seeing an odd reflection in the darkened mirror since forever.
It really isn't that odd- just a boy who looks mildly like him. Like in most mirrors- same height. Same corded muscles. Wearing the same clothes in layers or black-and-black for him, even when Ventus stares down and down at his bright shirts and shiny armor and they never are that dark.
But there the similarity ends.
The boy in the mirror is all smirks, petulant and eye-catching. He has black hair that seeps into the background and lamplight yellow eyes that jolt.
Shock.
Awe.
Astound and just generally stun Ventus out of his course of action.
There's the reason for his bird's nest hair. Ventus never looks at mirrors.
It had to be from when he saw the boy moving behind the glass pane.
-Gaze deep enough into the abyss…-
He's seen the blonde boy for long enough. He's faint sunlight and shared laughter, all bound together by a weird key and the pretty green glass star.
He'd like to break it into pieces, just to see if Ventus would snap and shatter as well.
The boy on the other side of the reflection is bland.
Alive.
Idiotic.
Electrifying- because even in the most diminished of hallucinations, he feels and sees the boy-half-empty. Halfway there, and halfway elsewhere.
In the dark.
In radiant, useless light that bounces off the elongated mirror and somehow keeps the half-him safe and sound behind the intangible wall.
-And the abyss…-
Ventus doesn't really notice when his shadow beings to act up. It's slow doing- the strides will grow longer.
The stance will change.
Little sunlit eyes will open, and the smile will rip across the flat face. Then it will fade back into normalcy and only then will Ventus take a look at what just happened.
The shadow will just meekly look back at him, as all shadows do, and slink around behind its bigger cousins.
And the boy behind the mirror will enjoy the change as well.
Suddenly, there will be a ray of light warping the algid depths. It will sink futile, beam and waver in the space above.
-The abyss will stare back.-
And the boy, the boy from the fathoms, he'll reach up to the maverick yellow glare.
Sink a long finger into it.
Gouge and gauge and-
Reject.
-But fear not the abyss.-
The deep-black boy can't tolerate the ghostly light. Not even ensconced in his domain-
Full might? Certainly- no light can suffer the tenebrous powers. No one can, but him.
The boy-in-black. Nothingness-black and living-black and negative-black and force-of-nature-black and-
-Fear those entombed in it-
He'll find a way to make the wind suffer- to make light perish at his hands.
And wouldn't that be
Everything
Radiant
Magnetic
Because deep down- even for him, Vanitas of the Dark Realm-
(He adds the moniker for a laugh, for validation even when it's obvious that he-)
-Those who dwell there only seek-
(-he exists.)
Ventus will feel a disturbance here or there- a shivering of the light on windowpanes.
A vanished smirk from the boy in the mirror, the awkward longing for that foreign expression that-
(Ventus has never worn such a thing but-)
-feels so familiar. It's him and-
(It's me-)
-What they can never have-
Ventus has begun to blurrily speak to the mirror. It isn't much. Not even verbal even-
It's smiles (smirks-)
Comments (remarks of the snide variety-)
Pouts (and here, the mirror-boy only rolls his eyes and strikes a pose to imitate at Ventus's own risk, although neither of them has figured out how will the mirror-boy make him pay.)
And once, a held piece of paper.
Ventus.
Blank.
(Although it should've said all- he is Vanitas, after all. Nothing incarnate, a living paradox)
Which was promptly answered by a groan and the most hilarious expression of-
(what exactly is it)
-emotions. Or something- it just causes the boy in the mirror to smile and laugh mute.
"Quit that!"
-Something else.-
He's plotted and schemed and cajoled the old man to not pester when he accompanies him to Ventus's home-
(A pathetic excuse for one anyways)
Vanitas expected something more from the boy. Less surprise at his helmed face, less anger at his companion…
(It's so useful, lashing out)
Or even, although this is just a caprice born of boredom and being rigidly bound by those pesky orders that he doesn't want to break just yet…
Vanitas wanted a damn nice smile.
-More like anything.-
(Like the ones from when he was mirror-warp-boy)
Maybe just to see would it would dawn on the sky-eyed face.
Maybe just to set a contrast between that and the devious smirks he himself wears so freely.
Maybe just to see how best to burst it into deadly shrapnel along with the wind and Ventus himself.
But really…
(For someone so deep in the abyss…)
Would it have been too hard
(to see the small details anyways)
… to smile?