Author Notes: I apologize in advance for any mistakes in this chapter. Hotaru talked my ears off though the entire hour I spent working on it. She was too hyper about Go! Princess Precure to respect my quiet time and then it was her bedtime, so I couldn't proof read it either. T_T Being an adult, responsible father is easier said than done, even with a model child like my little firefly.
"URANUS!" Neptune yelled, her voice pregnant with desperation and worry.
Yet another dream, I figured.
I heard your familiar voice as if through a thick glass or a body of water. My body felt too heavy and tired to move and why would I when my softly swaying bed was soft and comfortable?
Perhaps I should skip school, spend the rest of the day in bed. I would be of no use to the track and field team this state anyway. There was still another week or so before exams. Yes, I would just sleep off the extenuating influenza and revisit the idea of resuming normal life in the morning, if I felt better. Moving was such a bother… if only my body would stop aching…
I woke up in an unfamiliar bed, in an equally unfamiliar room. Even from my spot in the futon, it was obvious the place was big, sunny and luxurious; nothing like my own apartment at the Tenoh sky crapper at the Mugen complex. How did I get there? I wondered.
A wonderful smell, faint, fresh and oddly familiar, brought me the answer: I was at your place… but why!? I had only seen you for a couple of minutes in this lifetime, exchanged a few awkward phrases. You had made it abundantly clear that someone like me had nothing to offer to someone like you, that we lived in separated worlds.
It took me a while to recollect what had happened. My encounter with the youma was foggy to say the least, but it explained why every inch of my body was sore. What I mistook for a bout of influenza was in fact the result of a close encounter with an outwardly creature that, up to that date, had existed only in my craziest nightmares… the recurrent one… the kind that also contained you.
So it was true, then. That we shared a destiny and there were monsters we needed to defeat in order to save the world from The Silence. It wasn't just my mind going crazy after pushing my limits too hard with my running, piano rehearsals and all those F1 competitions.
Well, I could say that I understood your reticence to get involved with either me or those youma things, if the monster I had fought was anything to go by. To be perfectly honest, I myself didn't want to have anything to do with them either. The near death experience at the park had been absolutely terrifying and I saw no way of changing the result of such encounters no matter how much I trained. Not even our joined forces felt enough to overpower those creatures.
I had bandages all over my body, but it didn't feel as heavy and excruciatingly beaten up as it had before. Had you relieved me of my shredded sailor clothes and tended to my wounds? The thought was too much to bear. Embarrassment and the thrill that only came with racing at full speed washed over me at the same time, equally powerful and demanding. I didn't have a mirror at hand, but I could have sworn my face had turned all shades of red.
All that thinking was extenuating and I soon dozed back to sleep, lulled by the false yet absolutely delightful sense of security that more often than not accompanied those recurrent dreams of you, of our past together. Even if we never got to exchange another word after I was out of your place, I would have died happy for having been able to convalesce in your soft bed.
The sun was already beginning to set by the time I woke up again. Its wonderfully warm rays dyed the sky a million colors and your white curtains framing the open window danced slowly in the afternoon breeze. The air currents that reached me from the outside every now and then were mildly brine. They reminded me of your beautiful mermaid hair blowing in the breeze on a summer morning by the sea, gorgeous sapphire eyes locked on me while a smile you had reserved just for me danced on your lips.
Once again, never-land claimed me and I allowed my consciousness to drift away, hoping to see you in my dreams. For the very first time in months, I was willing to forget the heartache of our two previous real life encounters and actively wish for those flashback to come. I would have gladly endured any nightmares about the end of the world if it brought me back to you.
I was surrounded by you in every possible sense except for the obvious, physical one. From the classy Japanese décor of the room, to the faint aroma of your shampoo in my pillow, sleeping in your bed for almost a day was the sweetest torture; the next best thing to having you around. The downside? It made me miss you so much it hurt.
A sound brought me to but I couldn't identify it in the pitch black darkness of your room. The window was closed, its white curtains veiled the delights of the night sky from my eyes. They got used to the dark a moment later. Then it dawned on me: you must have been there earlier to close the window!
The idea of being in the same room with you made my heart beat wildly inside my chest. My body still pained me greatly, but it still tensed at the perspective of catching a glimpse of you in the room. What else could have caused that noise I had heard a moment earlier?
It took all of my strength to will my neck to move around. When it did, my eyes desperately scanned the room for your sylph body. They eventually zeroed on the door, which had just opened to let you in. Your graceful movements told you apart from any other person in the world, but I would have recognized you all the same. Even from afar, in a room full of equally graceful people.
You knelt by my side, gently rested your hand on my forehead and smiled the saddest smile I had seen on you yet. In broke my heart to see you like that but knowing that you were there, by my side, worrying and looking after me, warmed it more than I ever thought it possible.
"You're awake?" You whispered as if to yourself.
I nodded. It hurt in a hundred million places, but I couldn't have cared less.
"That youma got you bad." You went on, still not entirely talking to me. "It was like nothing I've seen before."
"You saved me…" I muttered, my voice hoarser than usual.
You shook your head, that sadness in your eyes growing even stronger.
"I…" you began. Then your voice broke. Were you crying? I couldn't tell in the dark. "I didn't intervene... Saw it all from afar." You confessed full of remorse, biting your lower lip in a gesture I had loved since forever.
I lost sight of your face for a moment, as you bowed as deep as the futon would allow in an apology that wrenched my heart. Why didn't you come and help me? I wondered, not daring to voice my question, as it would only make you feel worse. You had always been more serious than me about our mission. It would have taken a very good reason to keep you from your duty. I was sure of that much.
"I'm the reason you ended up like this." You said in a trembling voice after the bow, bringing me out of my introspection. "I'm so, so sorry!" The level of angst and desperation in your voice rose yet another level and I used all my remaining strength to cover your hand with mine.
"It's all right." I lied, with a weak smile. "Did you stop it… in the end?"
All those poor people; I just couldn't bear the thought of that youma getting to them.
You shook your head once again, causing a few droplets of hot wet tears to splash over my hand.
"It was too strong." I whispered in your defense, but it must have been the wrong answer, for it made you cry harder.
"I… I was wrong. I should have transformed." You cried between sobs that I had seldom heard from you in several millennia. "I allowed it to go away! All those civilians!"
I wanted to say something else, to stop your crying, but I was too spent by my earlier movements and sleep claimed me once again.
The first rays of dawn coming through the window curtains woke me up, as one of them landed directly on my eyes. I was as lost as the first time waking up in your bed. My body felt less spent, though, and most of the pain had subsided, at least momentarily. It took me a few moments to recall our latest conversation and convince myself that it hadn't been just another of our shared dreams.
That had been real, I concluded. And I was feeling much better, so I decided to get up and explore a bit. It only took me a failed attempt to get rid of the covers to realize my pain had just been asleep, giving me a break because I was being a good child laying still.
Stubborn as only I was, I refused to accept defeat and willed myself to get up. It was a slow, excruciating business, but I succeeded after a few attempts. Curiosity got the best of me, as always. There was so much I needed to ask you about, so many questions piled up during those long months looking for you; about your reasons for ignoring me at the rehearsal and your decision to not get involved with the youma.
The need to get answers was so strong, my usual curiosity, that would have begged me to inspect your room and draw conclusions on your personality and way of life based on your house, was easy to ignore. If I was deliberately made to endure that torture then I sure as hell wanted to know the answer. Not that I would dream of demanding it as I would everyone else, especially after how tortured you have looked over the whole incident, but I was still going to inquire until I got some answers.
What I saw upon sitting up made me forget my faint resentment and millions of questions.
You were lying on the floor by the door, the upper part of your body inside the room, the lower half out of sight. Still, what was visible shocked me enough to get out of the futon immediately and crawl to you.
There, on the bloody tatami mat that covered the room, your body lay turned into the same kind of sieve that monstrous youma had beaten me into the day before.