I realised a big ol' gaping plothole in here. Touya should have been the one feeling groggy after the power transfer, and I forgot to insert the weird explanation I came up with for Yuki's unimproved health. 0_0 Apologies. I've fixed the plot and made other changes as required. Please bear in mind that this story (and TnY/R) does not adhere to the manga/anime, although there *is* reference to events that happened somewhere around tankoubon 9 and 10. Alternate timeline, yesh? Sakura's in the dark about the power transfer, Eriol's nowhere in sight, and those might be loopholes but I started out with a Touya-Yuki/Yue story and I *intend* to end with a Touya-Yuki/Yue story. -_-;; Yurushite.
And this is _still_ Thea's fault. *niko*
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Moonlight I: Facing
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was 3 in the morning, and he couldn't sleep. He turned onto his left side, then onto his right, and flopped over on his stomach, but he still couldn't sleep.
He didn't know why. It just didn't make sense--why couldn't he get to sleep if he was tired? Sakura had been horrified when a classmate had towed him home only half-conscious earlier that day. He was still feeling a little light-headed from the power transfer; there was an odd sensation of loss that clung to his senses and seemed to drag him down.
Sighing, he threw a hand across his eyes, and yawned. And blinked in annoyance. Shades of his childhood--when Okaa-san had died, he had been insomniac for over a month. Back then, Tou-san had told him it was because there was too much on his mind, and advised him not to think about anything except blankness, or anything that was calming.
Back then, it had worked. Now, it didn't. No matter how hard he tried to empty his mind, it would always return to the same thing. Feathers. Long wings, snowy arches sweeping above a head of similarly tinted hair that fell to the floor. Icy slit-pupiled amethyst globes, hard and bright and penetrating.
Too perfect, too beautiful to be human. So unlike, and yet so like Yuki. A part of the other boy, and yet wholly separate. There were paradoxes enough to drive anyone crazy, and yet neither of the two concerned seemed all that bothered about it. Of course, Yuki wasn't even aware of the whole mess right now, and Yue's problem had already been taken care of, for the moment at any rate.
But
But.
He closed his eyes, and remembered sensation washed over him. Yue taking his power, lips pressed against his collarbone. They had been soft. Warm. It was something he hadn't been expecting. He stroked the base of his neck almost hesitantly, and wondered. It had beenstrange, looking into cold amethyst so radically different from the warm hazel he knew so well, and yet seeing traces of what the second contained in the first. He had woken up beside an unconscious Yuki on the floor of the room, and it had been even stranger that something deep inside him had cried out, protesting the loss of something it had just found. Except that he had no idea what that something was.
Strange, and more than a little unsettling. He knew what he felt for Yuki. Yue shouldn't have been any concern of his other than the fact that he *was* part of Yuki and vice versa.
So?
If he loved Yuki, did that mean he also loved Yue?
But they were *different*. Regardless of the fact that they shared the same body, they were still two souls apart, with their own hearts and minds. That much he was sure of.
And he couldn't be in love with two people
There was a knocking at his window. Startled, he sat up and glanced in its direction. Moonlight shone on silver-grey hair and reflected off the large glasses of the boy perched on the tree branch just outside.
He got up and opened the window, eyeing Yukito in bemusement. "What are you doing here?"
"Don't welcome me?" his friend sighed in feigned hurt. "I'll just have to go home, then."
He glared at him. "Oi. You *should* be home resting. What if you'd conked out when you were climbing the tree? Don't make me worry, all right?"
Smiling, Yukito climbed into the room. "I'll try not to."
He shut the window. "At any rate, would you mind telling me why you're here in the middle of the--" A blinding flash of light behind him cut him off, and he jumped.
There was a soft, rustling sound that was oddly familiar. Likefeathers.
Like wings, unfolding in all their pristine glory. His throat suddenly dry, he slowly turned around.
"Night?" Yue quietly finished, eyes glowing a soft lavender in the pale light. He folded his wings into non-existence and drifted over until he was directly in front of him.
He couldn't say anything.
Yue gazed intently at him. "I'm sorry for the disturbance. But Yukito wanted to see you."
He was still unable to speak, to do anything except stare at the palely ethereal creature facing him.
"As did I."
He blinked, speech suddenly returning to him. "Why?"
The other sighed. "I thought you should knoweven though you've given me your power, Yukito won't be feeling any better just yet."
One dark brow furrowed slightly. "How come? I thought you two were directly linked to each other."
"He's being badly affected by the breaking of the seals I set on his memory. Call it backlash, if you will. His soul is lost in a maze, and in one sense his body is separated from me so that my energy is unable to restore his health."
"_What_?"
"More seriously is that his mind is holding him back from physical recovery. His subconscious is being deeply disturbed by what it sees as the seals crack, but I can't place new seals on him - his reiki is fighting the present ones so strongly it would only cause him further harm." Yue shut his eyes. Almost mechanically, he brought his arms up and wrapped them around himself, lowering his head. Right then, Touya thought, he appeared strangely vulnerable, with no hostile defences, no coldness that walled off emotions.
Fragile, like a beam of frozen moonlight that might shatter with one fall.
Purple eyes opened, but they avoided meeting his gaze. "I don't really comprehend what he's thinking right now, because he's not even sure himself about what he's feeling. All I can make out is--he wants you. But he doesn't realise it." Yue looked at him sombrely. "I think I should say that he *needs* you. He's going to break soon. And he won't be able to heal himself this time, not without your help."
His head was spinning. "I don't get you," he said slowly. "All this talk about Yuki's memories and seals breakingwhat do you mean?"
Yue moved a few steps closer, reaching up to take his face in his hands. "Understand now."
~~~~
The plane exploded. There was fire everywhere. I hurt. Is Meiko-obasan all right?
I'm scared.
Going tocan't hang oncan't make it
NO! I promised I wouldn'tgive up
Won'tso tired
Can't feelnot outside or inside
White.
Ihaven't died?
Wings. Beautiful. Not human. Frozen eyes.
Dare?
It saved mebut only temporarily?
It doesn't matter. I'll keep my own promises.
If we become one, I'll be saved.
I don't want to forget, but I have no choice.
Arigatou, Yue-san.
~~~~
Yue had taken his hands away. He opened his eyes - he hadn't realised they had been closed. Jumbled images and words, of an orphaned child struggling to live on the strength of a promise to his mother. Sacrificing his identity for life, memories wiped off like a clean slate.
Yuki?
"He made a very big impression on me," Yue said softly. "A mere child, and yet so determined, so strong. That was why I saved him. But now I wonder if it was cruel to have forced him into the kind of existence he has now."
He shook his head, his daze clearing. "No."
Hard amethyst eyes pinned his gaze. "Why?"
"He got to live. He got to keep his promise. I'd say that was the most important thing to him at that time. And you gave that chance to him."
"That doesn't stand for anything. He would have been better off dying with his identity intact. How much pain has he gone through just by being unable to remember his true self? And knowing the truth now will hurt him even more...*has* already hurt him both mentally and physically."
He looked at Yue thoughtfully. "I'd say a person's true identity is only defined by their heart. You erased his memories, but you didn't change who he was inside, did you?" Taking Yue's face into his own hands, he continued, "I'm selfish, but I couldn't be more thankful that you saved Yuki. If you hadn't, I wouldn't have met him. I don't even want to think about that."
"But"
"You _weren't wrong_," he said firmly.
They stood like that for a while, bright amethyst locked onto midnight blue. And he realised, with a jolt of surprise, that it felt perfectly natural.
Almost as if it was
Yue sighed, turning his face into his left palm. "Thank you."
"You're welcome." He smiled, and very hesitantly, Yue smiled back, though it was nothing more than a slight upward turn of the corners of his mouth.
"You're so different from him," Yue quietly remarked. "Yet in certain ways the resemblance is uncanny. It'sstrange."
"Same and different from who?"
Yue half-smiled. "Someone I knew in the past."
He started to chuckle. "You know, I was thinking exactly the same thing about you and Yuki just before he showed up."
"Perhaps." He reached up and gently removed his hands. "I'm going to revert now."
"So soon?" he asked, feeling a curious sense of regret.
Before he could react, Yue had leaned forward until soft, warm lips grazed his own. In such close proximity, he could smell the other's scent, a light fragrance that somehow reminded him of spilled moonlight and vanilla snow.
"I'll be back." Cool air brushed his ear in a husky whisper; there was another flash of light and he was left supporting an extremely groggy Yukito.
"Whathappened? Did I fall asleep again?"
He hesitated. "Yes."
"I'm sorry for disturbing you, but I just wanted to see you for a whileI'm not even sure why."
"I know," he said gently. "It's all right, Yuki. You can stay for the night."
A weak smile. "To-yaarigatou ne."
"Don't mention it," he murmured as he covered up the precious intruder on his bed. "It'll always be all right."
But as he lay on the floor and prepared to try and catch some sleep, it suddenly hit him that Yue had never said why _he_ had wanted to see him.
He couldn't be in love with two people.
Could he?
~*~ tbc ~*~
I'd *still* like C&C, just in case anyone was wondering*meaningful look*
--Shi Lin