The transition from the bright lights of the meeting halls and upper floors to the deep, night-darkness of the room down, down, down below the earth always startled him ever so slightly, but Mikage had never startled much. The public life was upstairs, in the light, where he'd meet with others or focus on his computer in his office, or hang pictures that hinted of the other world, the private world. This world was the downstairs world, the dark world, where his bedroom was, where the aquarium was, where a room lined with coffins and empty shoes was. Mamiya never ventured out of the dark world any more. The rain depressed him. The sunlight burned him. The air choked him. The people bothered him. So he stayed below, in the rooms where they grew black roses and plotted and talked for hours and made love.
The elevator stopped and Mikage stepped out, glancing around the coffin-room briefly before passing a door to the darkest room of them all, the room illuminated only by an aquarium in which spun a single rose, not yet blackened. Mamiya stood beside it, watching water drip on the rose.
Mamiya had once, upon request, explained it to him. "Everyone has a soul," he had said, husky voice whisper-soft. "A soul, and a sword, and a rose, and all three must go together. I have the rose, the people who care for them the most have the sword, and they have the soul."
It was as much of an explanation as Mikage needed, or at least desired. He never asked where his rose was, nor his sword.
"Mamiya," he said, moving over to the aquarium, resting his arms on the ledge.
"Sempai." Mamiya didn't look up. "It's not black yet."
Once, long ago, Mamiya's method of making black roses was different. His sister would tend the dark roses and dry them and they would be black, but Mamiya had never much liked that. This way, the way of taking the blackest part of a person and letting it soak through to the outer layer and colour it was much purer, and the roses never regretted being forced to live past death, for they never stopped living.
"It will get there. Mamiya?"
"Sempai?"
"Do you miss it?"
Mamiya finally looked up, green eyes questioning, head tilting. "Miss what, Sempai?"
"The scent of dried roses at noon." There was no need to clarify. He could remember, back then, before the sacrifice, sitting at a table with a sick young man who would stroke dried flowers while talking. He knew Mamiya remembered as well. Mikage leaned across and took Mamiya's hand, stroking it lightly.
"No, Sempai. These roses have their own appealing scent and the noon's never beyond midnight."
"I see."
Silence. The drip of water.
"Mamiya?"
"Sempai?"
They were both suddenly on the same side of the aquarium, Mamiya's hand in Mikage's, Mikage's long learned fingers brushing lightly over the darker boy's palm. "Do you miss it?"
"Miss what, Sempai?"
"The light, Mamiya."
Silence. The drip of water.
"No, Sempai. The dark has its own appeal and in this dark, we'll never grow old and we'll never ever die. This is the darkness of eternity."
"I see."
The darkness closed around them and Mikage could feel Mamiya lead him away with sure steps, though Mikage himself was blind in this darkness. Ah. The bedroom. Mamiya pulled Mikage's head down and whispered in his ear.
"Sempai?"
A brush of lips across collarbone. "Mamiya?"
"Do you miss me while you're up there?"
Hands stroking across the uniform jacket, undoing fastenings. "Yes."
"Really, truly miss me?"
"Yes."
Lips met, melded, parted. "Then you don't need the light, Sempai." He took Mikage's hand again and led him to the bed with it's dark coverlet and white pillowslips and the bedside table with the red and yellow roses. "Sempai?"
"Mamiya?"
"Do you believe in eternity?"
In this darkness, Mikage couldn't see much but the muted colours of the roses, the paleness under the dark coverlet, the gleam of Mamiya's ghostly green eyes. "Yes." He could see more now, the darkness not so much hindering his gaze as covering it like a lover's delicate kisses. He could see Mamiya's lips turn upwards into that smile. "Yes, I believe in eternity." He moved closer, pulling Mamiya into an embrace, the scent of black roses enclosing him the way they always did.
Smiling, Mamiya drew him down.
"This is eternity."