Summary: "Stat Rosa Pristina, crystal, azure, blue." A dual story-poem, Kaitou KID's confrontation with the jewel he's been searching for and the girl he loves. /AoKai/
GA: I wrote this poem a while back for Kaito, but I hadn't done anything with it until now. It's extremely short, extremely vague and extremely not my best work, admittedly. Still, I hope you enjoy!
STAT ROSA PRISTINA (THIS ANCIENT ROSE)
Stat rosa pristina,
Crystal, azure, blue
A name is all that I can give
But I can't give it to you
"Who are you?" The question is more out of reflex than curiosity, knowing that the white-clad phantom won't answer it either way. Or even if he did, he wouldn't tell the truth - he never did, as she had fooled herself into believing.
He doesn't speak at all, actually, just stares long and hard at her, what little of his face she can see void of any expression. The crystal in her hand is trembling as much as she is, a tanzanite rose carved into delicate petals and leaves. However, it isn't the immaculate beauty of the jewel that catches his attention, but the red glow that emanates from its core, a bloody light provided by the moonbeams filtering through the window behind him.
"Give me the jewel," he says, voice still lacking any lilt indicative of emotion. She's never seen him like this, the usually light-hearted thief now speaking to her sternly - no, not sternly, blankly.
She almost listens to him, almost for some petty reason wants to believe that he knows what he's doing, but she doesn't and clutches the rose tighter to her chest. "Who are you?" She repeats it louder this time, words spat between gritted teeth. What she gets in return is not a scoff, but a sigh.
"You know I can't tell you that until you give me the rose, oujo-san."
Stat rosa pristina,
Naked, wicked, snow
I know everything but your name;
My name is all you know
She holds the gem in her hands, and he can't believe that it's all ended here. The girl he loves, the gem he despises, no snipers - not in a while, a suspiciously long while.
She asks for his name again, but he's too stubborn to give it to her, not when she's still holding Pandora and he's still scared that she'll hate him - of course she'll hate him, she doesn't have a reason not to - and that he'll never be able to explain, to tell her that he's not all that bad, that he loves her, he really does-
His monocle glints red in the darkness, the only light illuminating his face coming from the jewelled rose several feet away. He's red glow and white suit and darkness rolled into one, and he wonders if she's scared of him or mad at him, because her trembling is indicative of either, and he's all too aware that both of his personas evoke both in her.
"Tell me who you are, and I'll give it to you." Yes, it's fear - her voice doesn't tremble like that when she's angry. He wants to laugh, because she's afraid of somebody who would never hurt her, but suddenly the red emanating from her hands isn't the only red he sees and there's a dot right above her heart-
"Aoko!"
Stat rosa pristina,
I bare my name at last,
To let the red rose bloom once more
And shatter what once was past.
The shot rings out, and it's as though time has stopped for her, the stoic face in front of her dissolving into panic and terror and guilt all at once. There's pain, pain that she oddly enough can't feel, but the sense of dying is pronounced. A bullet lodges itself through her aorta, even if she doesn't know it herself, and she's on the ground, still and barely breathing and more than barely bleeding.
"Aoko," his panicked voice floats towards her, and she realizes he's leaning over her, his ungloved hands pressed against her chest to try and stop the bleeding even though they both know it's useless. His monocle and hat are still set in place, but the warmth of his palms are all she needs to know that it's him, and damnit, why didn't he tell her sooner-
Well, she decides that it's useless to know anyways, since she's dying and all, but his curses of, "Damnit, Aoko," and "I love you, don't die on me, I love you," tell her that he believes otherwise.
The blue flower is ripped out of her loosened grip, and suddenly it's in her field of vision, held over her as though an offering. Bakaito, she barely remembers thinking, watching as his hands squeeze against sapphire, cutting into his palms and blooming red instead of blue, red that's seeping into the gem and through that mysterious light, red that's dripping down through the stem and onto her person and suddenly there's relief and she can breathe and nothing hurts-
-and he pulls her into the most desperate hug he's ever given, almost crying into her shoulder, almost but not quite because she's still alive and he has Pandora and he'll save his real tears for much later after the adrenaline has worn off. "Aoko," he mumbles over and over, her name falling off of his lips as she sits limply in his arms.
It isn't until she pushes him away that he panics, but her voice isn't filled with anger, or hatred, just need. The need to know what, and why, and how- but all that can wait until later. Right now, she just wants him to be there, so she can look at him and know that it's all worth it in the end, because it's him. "Who are you?"
And this time, with a relieved smile and wet cheeks, he tells her.
Stat rosa pristina,
Crystal, azure, blue
This lie I make, I'll bend and break
This name, I'll give to you-
"I'm Kuroba Kaito. It's nice to meet you."
GA: Well that was...extremely short, but it was just a small scene I had in my head while I wrote the poem. Aoko being at the heist where Pandora is found is one of my guilty pleasures, haha. Put her straight in the line of fire, and all that.
Truth be told, I just wanted to write the poem, and then kind of threw in a fic around it...haha...
'Til next time!
~G. Annihilator.