"I'm sorry we're married." She'd said.

The ancient king shifted uncomfortably on his slab, mind dreading the looming ritual of his bandages. It had been so long since his leg felt right that it no longer ached if he didn't move. But the future pain did not matter, the dreaded peeling and washing could wait. Somewhere, deep within the castle grounds, he was fighting with her. His queen; the woman so close to death across the room that he had spent months, now, dreading the idea that it would actually claim her.

"Stop saying that, Serena!" his answer had been laced with cold hurt. The emergency lights flickered overhead in response. Their pristine future had lain around them in disarray, had left the two standing on shaky ground. Even as the lights above shuddered against the turmoil, even as the dying earth raged outside their fortress, the end grew more and more opaque. As the future lords of this world, it was only natural to have the elements answer, to have the earth fight back against the distortion, the break in purpose.

"Why shouldn't I be sorry? To have someone you love chained to you, even though they hate you." Her voice had been so hollow that night. The echo had seemed to come from every corner like an accusation. It scorched at his chest, even from so far in the past. The memories were boiling up now, listening to the fight he'd had so long ago. It ached, as if she were saying those things now, laying near dead in her coffin. All because he couldn't change.

"Does that look like hate to you, Meatball Head?"

Their wedding portrait hung above the bed like a crown. Even when she was called away on delegations, sometimes he would stare at that picture in awe, in reverence for his wife. That day had been so breathtaking, so life changing: the day she was finally all his. He had dreamed about it for so long that the reality had been almost more than he could bear. The look in her eye, so loving and fierce and sweet even now he felt his heart flutter in his chest with foreign hope.

"It looks like delusion." She'd whispered, wrapping both arms around herself. The golden hair turned away from the picture, blocked it out of her mind. To view himself would be to look at the face of complete adoration, longing, hope. That picture was chosen of the hundreds taken that day because the shield had fallen, because it was a stolen moment away from the lights and the family, where he could just be himself. Hell, it had even saved him a sound reaming from her father more than once in their early years. Mr. Tsukino just couldn't understand that Darien was not…emotional.

That had been the problem from the start.

"Don't, Serena. Please." He still remembered how hopeless it had felt. It was their first real fight; and secretly the hidden message in those dreams. Their first try had nearly buried their love even as the ink cooled on their wedding license, simply because he was incapable of true expression. He had been a little cruel, had been rough with his words. She had cried so much; had left for days.

The very idea that he would have to repeat those memories when Rini had opened such a convenient portal to the past…. It would have been easy enough to send a message of tenderness to himself; to show a young Darien that she needed openness and sweetness and caring. Would he have listened? Of course not, all those things he knew already. It was common sense and logic…and completely void of anything else. He had spent so much time trying to figure out exactly how to force the issue, bring it to the forefront. It had nearly destroyed her anyway.

"I promise I won't make you do this. I won't force you! I'm not Beryl!" she'd screamed it, so straightforward and scared. As if there could ever be a similarity between the two women. A dissatisfied scoff rumbled in his chest as the memories surfaced by the inch. It hurt, oh but it felt so good. Years in the future, she would draw the same conclusion. So set in her mind that his hand had been forced by the past; completely oblivious to how much he'd adored her- nearly stalked her on the streets of ancient Tokyo like a lovesick school boy. He had hoped for nearly 9 months…and the revelation of their past had made everything so easy.

There had never been a declaration of love. Not once. There wouldn't be for years, if he hadn't thrown a catalyst into the mix. Darien was as cold and removed as he had always been, so scared of his feelings for the vibrant school girl that he had buried them. And she was so conveniently his. There had never been a need for that talk, because Serena had just assumed that their past had made everything right again. That was why she'd stayed away so long, why he'd come home one night with nothing to greet him but her ring and a scribbled note.

It was easy for a fourteen year old to accept things as they were, but three years made all the difference when it was something you simply never spoke of. Something you simply assumed your lover knew. She should have; he'd died for her more than once. It should have counted for something, but with the mix of their past and his aloof behavior, she'd begun to doubt.

"You are nothing like her, Serena." He'd said, completely missing her point. Endymion rubbed tiredly at his face, wishing more than anything that he could switch places with his past self and make this whole fight easier. But it would negate everything he had worked so hard for in the past few weeks. Her face when she'd turned back to him, tear soaked and reddened, was a perfect clone of herself in the years to come. That fateful night rose glaringly from his memories, laced with confusion and doubt and loneliness. He could have lost her. He could have watched that golden woman walk out the door honestly believing there was no hope and no future between them. A stuttering sigh rippled past his mouth. Darien was nearing his breaking point on the floor below, his hands were shaking and clenching, and those buried emotions were charging to the surface.

"I'm just like her. Loving someone like you –knowing it was impossible from the start. I should have seen through it all the day Ann and Alan left. You made it quite clear the whole time they were here." Her vapid face had been devoid of the pain clawing through that tone. It had ripped from him the pretense, but not the fear. Oh, and there was so much to be scared of tonight. She could easily walk away, leave him standing in the ruins of a future they could have had. She had every right to leave, and slam the door shut behind her. Even now, in the future, his shoulders tensed unbearably, his frame shook.

"How was I supposed to know it was…!" the king jolted, wincing as the pain of his leg flared angrily. All hell brought up short because of one little word that he'd never before been able to say out loud. Their fight was a muffled din through the corridors, even yelling as they were, as they had been. Her accusation had been confusing, unfocused.

"Fate?" his blond angel had asked quietly, a bitter smile on her face. "There is nothing else to us, Darien." He had shifted, so long ago, as if her words sliced straight through him to the core. How could she have known he feared it, too? There was no world in which he could exist without her, no reality by which he could abide if she were not within reach. Even after so many centuries ruling in tandem with his wife, he would fear it: the day Fate finally fed them to the wolves.

Her love for him was so unfounded. This was perhaps the greatest fear of all. There was no logic to her feelings, there was no mathematical proof that would bring her unerringly to his side. Even in battle, more than a millennium in the past, she had never been drawn to him like true north. Many times, after that fight, that bitter separation, he had bemoaned the idea that she might never come back. After all, he was the mortal, the unworthy worshiper at her feet, and she the immortal goddess of a time long past. His excuse for being cold may perhaps hold some legitimacy, but her love could have disappeared in those days, could have shriveled like a snapped rose, lost it's delicate beauty, and frozen away.

Perhaps this had been the fuel by which he existed these past few months. Blinded by hatred for his enemy, worry and tortured horror for the cadaverous woman tucked away behind glass; he could feel the vestiges of that phobia clawing it's way to the surface. How aptly she'd read the deepest abyss of his mind that night, and how pristine her aim in delivering it.

"Damn it, Serena! You know what I was going to say!"

"Destiny? Life sentence, perhaps!" she had shrieked, her voice rattling the crystal floor. Surely the other Scouts must have noticed their return, but no, the odd group still adorned the war chambers, rushed in their plans to somehow evade a future too certain to shake. The palace had been engineered to perfection, and the argument rattling through his bones was not one heard, but remembered. Even as the couple yelled, even as that cold shell snapped beneath that accusatory scream, the halls remained silent. As if the most terrifying battle of all were not raging here in the quiet of this empty home.

"If I could be so lucky!" he had roared finally, and let the shadows slide from him. The black leather jacket had constrained him as he stalked toward her, as if fighting to keep him back from everything he truly wanted. The shaking hands had clenched, had reached for her shuddering form even as she backed away. The broken dam unleashed hell at the sight, the idea that perhaps fate was not strong enough to tie her to him. That word, so tiny and yet so hard to say, had tumbled from his mouth like a prayer, even laced in harshness. "I love you, you stupid girl!"

The tears had come. Not the loud, wailing kind, but empty and heartbroken. It was not the reaction he would have hoped for. Even in the face of her enemy, close to being raped, she had never sounded so hollow. The ribbons exploded around her, sent fire through every part of him as her form flickered half nude in the twilight briefly. His ice coated princess with the bruise at her neck couldn't even bear to look up. To see those angry marks on her, hear those ugly words had left him just as bereft, just as empty.

The beauty allowed herself finally to be held, though her arms wouldn't return the comfort he desperately longed for. The future was fading fast, their endless struggle and worry and sorrow beginning to melt like morning frost in the wake of the rising sun. Darien would never know. He would never understand why their breakup had been so necessary.

The words had begun to fall, the story to break from the cage. And she had listened, so perfectly quiet in his arms he'd thought she'd fallen asleep. Her pictures a few weeks before, drawn hastily in crayon, had been bazaar and strangely amusing; but with the advent of his memories, there was a much different story to tell. It was riddled with self hate, darkness and loneliness until a stupid test paper smacked him in the face. Like a single, beckoning ray of hope, she'd burst into that emptiness like a new star, and he'd followed almost instantly, never knowing the reason for her draw until it was too late.

And he'd pointed at that portrait.

"Someday, I'll be like that, Serena. I just…can't shout it from the rooftops. That's not me. You're too…sacred. You belong here, right next to me. Not out there, for everyone to stare and judge and comment on, damn it! You're mine!" The words, begun so softly and sweetly had snapped beneath the pressure of that love, had drowned out the common sense, the logic. Because he'd nearly seen her taken by another man, treated like a victim and struggling for each breath; there would be no more misunderstandings between them. There would be no more secrets.

That first kiss had been blinding, laced profusely with heartfelt apology and longing. And he had whispered it over and over as they spread from her mouth, begging for forgiveness he knew he had no right to. The separation had been hell for him; a time to truly wonder if he wanted his own life or not. As if growing up in isolation had not somehow forced the conversation earlier. As if to fuel that desperation, the whispered forgiveness was given. And he couldn't stand it; the idea that this compassionate, sweet woman could possibly feel the same as he did, and yet could find it in her heart to let it fall away.

He couldn't stand it. The king jerked upward, pain-filled eyes glued to the shimmering body of his wife trapped behind a crystal barrier. That same kindness had been shown to him more than he could possibly deserve, yet even with so many years between the two of them, he had responded to the situation with fear and defeat. It was pathetic; so much like that past he had been forcibly trying to change for the better. She was his, damn it! Her light-shattering diamond perfectly displayed against his black velvet; a polar opposite, in all ways but one.

Even as the smoldering memories of their first night together began to ghost through the back of his mind, Endymion reached forward and pressed his warm hands against the coffin. Even as her first whispering moans slurred through the floor at his feet, the pressure sledged within his two hands, cracking the outer shell of his beloved wife's prison.

Perhaps the dreams had been sent for more than a single purpose. The two hastily, awkwardly loving for the first time within the confines of this future palace had awaken the slumbering giant, had laid to rest the fears, the self loathing the King himself had never thought to fight. The sweet, soulful memories thrummed against his spirit, rocked his hands until even the crystal shattered.

The broken prisms splayed across the floor around him, decorating their tomb with their multifaceted rainbows as he reached for her. Months of being apart, damaged and wounded without the hope of ever touching again; it was more than time to claim what rightfully belonged to him. The silk of her dress hissed across his hands, her weight folded into his arms like a limp doll. Even wounded, his leg seemed strong enough to carry the precious treasure back to his own bench.

They had been too long in destitution, too long in despair. He shifted the glowing woman down carefully, arranging her familiar limbs as comfortably as possible before sliding down beside her. She remained silent, perhaps nearly dead as he did so, but the resolution remained. Her body was pulled close, tight against his form as the golden sparks began to flicker along the two of them. It didn't matter, it was only a measure of time before things were made right again.

There was perhaps one thing he could have complete faith in, and that was the perfect knowledge grown from the scene beneath them; that she would never doubt him again. She would never leave him alone in the darkness.

And so, neither would he.

.

.

…..

So….explanation time. This story was kind of intense, perhaps more so than I had originally planned. Just a few things to clear up some misunderstandings.

-The first two chapters are written in a different style, with almost all processing done exterior to the character. I did this because Serena's depressed and lost sight of reality, and all of her understanding comes from the things around her. I did decide on this particular style for a purpose, but it's been so long I can't remember what it was anymore. So there you go.

-The second two chapters are much easier to understand, though not nearly as well written. For this, I have only to blame my convenient scape-goat of a muse, who seems to have taken a vacation these past few years.

-That said, the second two chapters are almost all internal, as Darien's character assimilates information this way more often than not. I wanted to show the difference in thought process; it came out much more pronounced that I had planned, but well, what can you do?

- So a foil, as the story is called, is a perfect opposite. I wanted to show the difference between a bloodless, white prince, and an emotionally caged black prince, which I am actually really pleased with. The truth is, Diamond (in this story) has nothing but hunger and desire, while Darien (in every story) is just struggling to make sense of himself, and watching everything fall apart while he gets his act together. Gotta love him for that. I also wanted to show how Darien and Serena are a foil of each other. Yay storytelling!

-I also love the idea of a deeper meaning to everything. Shocking, right? After all, Endymion changed the course of history pretty drastically, and we never find out what it did for them. So here's my take on it –the experience makes him man up.

Also, what's with this whole 'no reviews' thing? Did I miss something? At this point, I'm only putting this up because I felt it needed a better ending.

E