Series: X/1999
Title: Time
Rating: PG
Pairing/ Characters: Hokuto, Subaru/Seishiro
Word Count: 465
Warning/s: None.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Never mine, really.


The case was not one that could be put away to the side, carelessly, like paperwork. This was Subaru, and when it came to his well being, time was of the utmost essence. Every moment she wasted was an unending abyss for Subaru, and she would not let him drown, even if he wanted to.

This was Seishiro's fault, true, but it was hers as well. She was, after all, so much less naïve than her brother, and saw al of the warning signs. She should have known what eyes cold as ice and steel could do, and would do, when the time was right.

Hokuto had known, and ignored her own knowledge.

It was easy to track him down, even if she had no magical power to speak of. Intuition was all she needed. There was one place he could not avoid, after all.

He killed her underneath the sakura tree, and with her dying breath, she tried to fix all of the mistakes she had done. Her life was nothing compared to Subaru and Seishiro's happiness, she thought. Maybe her spell would do some good, and at least they would both still be alive.

She was more naïve than she herself knew.


The case was a painful one, drawn out slowly like a tortuous death. He had quit school, abandoned his dreams, ignored his own health, and estranged his remaining family to hunt down the man who had killed his sister. After all, her memory was the only thing he still held dear; he remembered her smiles and laughter and frivolous soul.

Seishiro was without a doubt the one to blame, but Subaru was not faultless either. Maybe if he had realized what she had intended sooner, he could have found her and stopped her. Nothing was worth her life.

He knew that she had gone to avenge him, and that he should not have needed to be avenged.

Seishiro was elusive, impossible to track down, although spiritually they were equals. There was one place he could have gone, but he never went to the sakura. Because if he had gone, and Seishiro had been there as well…

That man had killed his sister under that tree, and it had been where they first met. A sakura tree, always in bloom. There would be nothing less fitting than to kill Seishiro there, as he had killed Hokuto.

But if they met, then they would fight. And Subaru… Subaru…

Subaru would kill Seishiro. But the harm had already been done, so he would do so in his own time.


Seishiro noted how Subaru avoided the obvious place to look, and thought the boy too sentimental. But Seishiro was, as he had proved before, a patient man, and knew to wait until it was time.