Title: The Fox, The Monk And The Mikado Of All Night's Dreaming 8/9

Author: Seraphim Grace

Feedback: Always appreciated and replied to.

Series: Gundam Wing

Rating: R

Pairings: 1x2, suggested 13x6

Chang met him at the gazebo with a scowl that looked as if it might be etched into his face. "You were meant to visit me at Saint Gabriel's." He said bluntly. He wore a heavy wool coat and muffler against the cold but underneath it he wore white. "Yuy told me that he had told you of my displeasure but again you did not visit me. I was not to be the one who spoke to you today, to tell you the next part of the story, but I asked if I could. It is disgusting that a boy of your age be without schooling."

The boy prepared to lie, to tell the old half-truth, that he was home schooled but Chang cut him off.

"I tried to speak to your parents, so imagine my horror to discover that they were dead. You will come with me." There was no argument in his voice; he spoke in crisp orders. "Now, there is room for you to board at Saint Gabriel's, it will look after you till you reach majority."

"It's a private school." The boy protested as Chang led him to a waiting car, "I can't afford it."

"Money is of no matter, you have befriended the erstwhile Queen of Sanc," his tone suggested that although she might not have kept the title it was how that he thought of her, and it was how he would always think of her. "The patron and owner of the school, we can waive the fees, or Barton, Yuy, and Winner, Maxwell and I could easily afford them. We have no children of our own, but once we too were without family."

Despite the Chinese man's gruff nature it was clear that he had a heart to match his scowl.

"Maxwell was orphaned at an early age," he continued, opening the door to the black sedan, "and he was taken in by Saint Gabriel's and despite a questionable beginning he is now one of the shining lights of both our civilisation and our little family."

Chang directed the driver to take them to the school. "Now, Yuy informed me that he left the story with the monk taking the token from the old man on his journey to the kingdom of dreams in search of the fox."

The monk found his futon after a long wait of sleeplessness in which he filled the inactivity with cleaning. He laid the fox down in the hollow between his head and shoulder and clutching the notched coin in his hand he began to sleep.

He found himself floating in a great blackness and now and then was a shining white snowfly. They swirled and converged in great swarms that was like the river of stars where the gods lived, and he let the snow flies curl around him and ask him questions to which the answers were always the same, the image of the fox's human face as he slept, or the bow of his lips, swollen from where he was kissed. He remembered kissing the fox and lying with him, rubbing and touching in a way that he had sworn to Buddha against. But the fox was sleeping, trapped in this place amongst the dreams.

The snowflies drank down his love like ambrosia, they swallowed his passion until they were fat and lazy and they formed a great bridge across the blackness that he could step across, and at the last, a small snowfly, smaller than the others touched his lips with it's soft wings and the world changed.

He found himself upon a great plain of ice and crystal and glass. He wore a white haori that fitted tight about his frame and came down to his thighs. He wore a slip of sleeveless green fabric that had no obvious fastening and his fundoshi were black and skintight. He wore thick wool tabi and his sandals were heavy yellow leather with steel toes and thick soles.

The snowfly hovered above him, slightly ahead and he followed it.

He walked until he was so warm on the field of crystal and ice and glass that he removed the white haori and left it where it lay. The sun beat down on him like a drum.

He walked on the field of snow and crystal and glass until the thick soles of the sandals were worn away.

He walked on the field of glass and crystal and ice until the tabi were mere fragments of knitted wool about his ankles.

He walked on the field of crystal and glass and ice until his feet bled and he left red footprints behind him, but still he followed the little snowfly.

He followed the little snowfly through a great valley where he was surrounded by the empty bones of long dead beasts as big as palaces.

He followed the little snowfly into a swamp where the gnats were as thick as paper and he had to wipe them from his face and eyes.

He followed the snowfly into a corridor of metal with klaxons and running men in black uniforms.

He followed the snowfly to a great grassy hill where the sun shone warmly, there was a girl on the hill with her puppy, she wore a straw hat to shield her hair from the sun, and the puppy was jumping and frolicking about her. When she saw the monk she smiled. "Are you lost?" She asked.

He knew then the answer that he had to give her. "I have always been lost." He told her.

She smiled and offered him a single yellow flower that she had taken from the field. "You could stay here," she said, "with me, and then you wouldn't be lost anymore, would you? You'd know where you are, with me."

But the golden coin with the notch shone brighter than the sun and the snowfly, for a moment, looked like the fox in it's light.

"I cannot stay here," the monk said, "I have a mission."

"Well good luck," the girl said and slipped the flower into the blousy piece of green fabric that he wore.

The monk continued on his path following the snowfly.

He came to a great house where two metal men were playing cards. One was white and one was black. "Excuse me," he asked, "is this the path to the Palace of the Mikado of All Night's Dreaming?"

The metal men laughed but the white one spoke eventually, "all paths lead to him, eventually. Why do you search for him?"

The monk pulled out the gold coin with the notch, and to his surprise saw that it was covered in writing that he had not seen before, which described one who shapes and creates, the master of stories, "I search for him because he alone can help my friend who is trapped in dreams."

The black man looked sad but he answered. "People become trapped in dreams only because they want to be, are you sure your friend wants to be rescued?"

The monk stopped then and thought of the fox, and how alive he was and how beautiful, he asked himself if he sought to rescue the fox because he himself wanted his company, but the forest was quieter without the fox and the monk would not be missed at all. "I would give my life f or him." The monk said honestly.

The white metal man laid down his cards and pointed with a giant metal fist, "that way," he said, "leads to the House of the King of Dreams. Do not step off the path, for in that way lies madness. That is the danger in dreaming."

The monk thanked them and abandoning the snowfly he followed the path that they had shown him.

He walked for what he knew to be an eternity before he came upon a great palace that was at once a small house and a cave in a hill. He saw great pagodas, gazebos, a run down garden and a fire-pit all at the same time with the terrible clarity of dreams, and he knew that this was the palace of the king of dreams.

To his left there was a clay gong with a ringer hanging to its side, he struck the gong which was soundless.

A great warrior with his hair obscuring his face approached him. "Begone dreamer, only madness and death lie this way."

The monk saw the great warrior with his sword, which could easily cut the monk in twain, and said "I seek the King of All Night's Dreaming."

"He has no time for dreamers or for fools, be-gone." The knight said and raised his sword.

The monk showed him the golden coin with the notch and the monk laid down his sword. "I thought that you were a dreamer who had found his way here by mistake. You may pass." He threw open the door which was at once heavy metal, latched bamboo and cured animal skins.

Inside a boy in silk awaited him. He had eyes like a desert pool and hair like liquid sunshine. He was smiling. "Come in, come in." The boy said, "he will await you in his chamber and I am to lead the way."

He followed the boy through long corridors, past nightmares and dreams, beautiful maidens and great feasts, monsters and dark shadows until they came to a great hall where the end was split by a great circular window.

"I can go no further," the boy said, "you may wait for him there."

But when the monk turned to thank the boy he was gone.

The monk entered the great hall with its black and white floor. At the end, under the great circular window was a throne of finest jade and sat beside it was a golden cage in which a canary lived.

"Come to see the Dream king then?" The Canary asked in his deep voice, and he was at once a golden fox and a man with hair the colour of spring wine. He wore a grey coat, a great fur and a red jacket all at the same time as his golden feathers. "Do you think he'll listen to your plea?"

"I can but ask." The monk said, and knelt there to wait for the king of dreams.

It was both an eternity and an instant in the way dreams can be before a shadow formed upon the throne of finest jade and a man with reddish brown hair sat there with a great ruby in his hands. Like the canary he was also a great eagle, a fox, a lion and a million other things and the monk was awed for he knew that this was the King of Dreams and in all his imaginings he had not seen even the beginning of this man.

"Majesty," the monk said, bowing low with his forehead pressed to the floor, "I am but a poor monk with nothing to my name but my begging bowl, but I was blessed with the friendship of a young fox and now that fox is trapped in dreams and I would save him."

"Why?" the king of dreams asked. "You are a young man with your entire life before you, why come here, why risk my displeasure for a fox?"

The monk was quiet and then remembered what he had told the old man on the path. " Because I love him, because I was alone and he showed me what it meant to have a friend who loved me for being me."

"The fox may not care to be rescued." The king of dreams said, "you know nothing but still you came here."

"Would it save my friend I would storm the thousand hells." The monk said and it was no boast.

"And if I told you that the fox had taken your dream, that the dream that trapped him was his to refuse because he took it in your place because if he had not then you would be the one trapped here in the dreaming."

The monk thought about it for a while. "If it was my destiny that I be trapped here then I would take his place because the forest lacks his presence and the days are darker without him, but I am a simple mountain monk and no one would mourn my passing."

The king of dreams frowned and then reached into the pocket of his robe. "He was with you when you dreamed the first dream, the dream of this box," he held out a small lacquered box, "and he was with you when you dreamt the second dream, the dream of this key," he held it aloft, "but he took the third dream from you, would you now dream it?"

The monk thought of the fox, asleep in the little temple on the side of the mountain apart from the lands of man, and he nodded.

The king of dreams opened the box with the key.

Inside the box was a room and the fox stepped into it, it was lush with great fabrics festooned from roof to floor and thick cushions and lamps, but in the centre, the focal piece was a great mirror and pinned to the back of it was a piece of silk upon which there was a ruined painting of a monk that appeared to have been soaked in water, but a perfect picture of an onmyoji in a great black hat. The monk turned the mirror and stared into it.

Inside the mirror was the fox; he lay upon a great cushion in robes of silk with a crown of gold upon his hair of burnished oak.

He stepped into the glass, and it rippled about him like water.

"Why have you come here?" the fox asked. "I am here for you."

"Because this was my dream." The monk said, "and you sleep in my little temple because you have taken this for me, and more than anything I would have you live."

"It was my choice," the fox said, standing and cupping his hands around the cheeks of the monk, their faces so close that they almost kissed, "to give my life for you. I am just a fox with nothing to my credit other than my love for you." The monk knew that he cried but he said nothing as he pressed his forehead against the fox's. "I went among the baku and dreamt your dreams with you until this last one that I dreamt in your stead knowing that it would be my death. I heard the oni that the onmyoji sent to lay the curse upon you and could not tell you lest my heart explode in my chest. Go back," the fox said, "this is all I have to give you."

"But it is my death," the monk said, "and it is my dream that you took as your own. And I would take it back, your life is more precious to me than mine own." And then he kissed the fox softly upon the lips as his fingers reached up and pulled down the crown, "I would give you the world, but I cannot, but live, live for me, live with me in your heart, but promise me one thing."

The fox's eyes were full of tears as he nodded.

"Do not avenge me, enough people have died in my name." And with no choice the fox nodded.

The Mikado of all night's dreaming turned to his canary, who was sometimes a man and sometimes a great wolf, and smiled, "we shall leave them alone now," he said.

The canary, who was sometimes a man and sometimes a great wolf, just smiled back.

"Is that how the story ends?" The boy asked Chang where he sat in the cushioned chair by the window. The day was slipping from the sky into nightfall.

"No," Chang replied, "not quite, but it is late and Maxwell has asked that he finish the tale of the Fox, the Monk and the Mikado of All Night's dreaming and I owe him more than that. Now shall we talk a walk to the refectory and find something to eat."