Note: This excerpt takes place in Keith Anyan's final moments in the anime series.
Warnings/Tags: Character Death, Spoilers, Implied BL, Canon-Compliant, Angst, Tragedy, Sudden Fiction, キーシロ, 腐向け
Disclaimer: Toward the Terra (地球へ) belongs to their respective owners. I own nothing except this derivative fanwork which I do not profit from.
"This Feeling Called Sadness"
In many ways deep space was like his heart… vast, empty and cold.
Many stars twinkled brightly; a brightness he longed to touch but could never reach. Though he was surrounded by life, he could never hold anything in his hands. Everything felt too delicate… too fragile. Anything he tried to grasp slipped away, too fast, too soon. And though he did nothing to hold on, he still felt everything.
Not knowing what feelings were didn't mean he didn't feel all the same. He was like a newborn without knowledge of the world. And it was because of this that he felt all of it, too much.
There was an image of a boy in his mind, and it was the brightest star of all, always burning so fiercely, so much unlike him. This boy felt, and fought, for things and concepts that made no sense to him. He held on to his stubborn emotions until the very end, to a force that fueled his undoing; not ceasing to burn as brightly until his own death.
And Keith Anyan didn't know why or how- but he was moved in ways he didn't yet have the capacity to understand. All he knew as he watched the light explode and fade into a trillion tiny particles, forever to be lost in the darkness of endless space- was that now…
The brightest, most beautiful star in his mind was gone.
Why…?
Why hang on to those feelings even if it meant to embrace the very thing that will cost you your life? Wasn't life more important than feelings? What would it matter to believe in something? To love- if all will be lost…? What did it all mean?
"I don't understand anything… I thought you would be the one to help me see. I wanted so much to see what you could see—feel what you could feel… And hold, with these hands, what you held so precious… Whatever that was which you valued far more than life itself…"
That life-force so powerful, and yet so fragile and self-destructive…
Love is nothing but chaos, its sole purpose to defy order and established norm. The heart, a perfect metronomic machine, it disrupts and gradually breaks down. It brings nothing to the world but confusion and downfall… But still, he was—to Keith Anyan—the boy with the effervescent blue eyes and brightest smile…
The loveliest chaos of all. The boy named Shiroe Seki Rei.
"Why, Shiroe…? Tell me. Answer me…!"
He reached out to the brightness beyond his blurry failing vision. His hands grasped nothing as always, his heart sinking fast, he knew he did what must be done, but could not stop the feelings from pouring in and drowning him, the feeling that he has lost all that was worth living for. And for the first time he understood…
A single tear, became a rainstorm and then a flood.
…
Is this the feeling called sadness?
…
It was so intensely painful and crushing. But it filled him where there was once nothing.
Finally, he could hold something in his heart… And somehow it made him feel so alive. And then, a smile found its way to bruised and bloody lips…
As he took his final breath.
The End.
Notes:
Something I wrote a long time ago, when I was inconsolably immersed in the soul-consuming, hopelessness that was "Terra E".
(2009/06/03-2015/12/23)