Disclaimer: I don't own Megami Kouhosei, I only dream of owning it.

    Rating: PG

    Genre: Angst (as pure as it can get)

    Summary: Hiead reflects on his life. It is also my point of view of how things could have been.

    Author's notes: see then at the bottom of the story.

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                                  (Dedicated to Chevira Lowe – my dear newfound friend.)                                  

                                                       Through the Pink Glasses

                                                                    By Olya

    I can sense you standing there, in the shadows, watching me.

    I pretend I do not notice your quiet breath in the darkness; yet you know that I'm aware of your presence.

    Fine; let's play this little game.

        Anger. Determination. Desire to destroy something. That is all that's left in my soul, mind, and heart. But you think otherwise. You believe I'm better than that. You believe that I can feel things other than hatred. You think I might find the redemption within myself someday.

       Well, you are wrong.

       Let me tell something about people like you. They have always believed in me, pitied me, and of course – always brought me to misery in the end. The misery I had began with. All of them, including you are seeing this universe through the pink glasses. Everything is always perfect, when seen through those. And sometimes, I just wish to wave my hand in front of all of those stupid people; and perhaps I would succeed knocking those glasses off their faces, like I do it with Enna. He will change someday, you know…I'll take his innocence and smash it away like an annoying fly. And then he will see that the world is not so perfect, not as it seems to be. He will know the things I know…but I shall tell him all the truths I've known when he is ready. And for now…let him be innocent, happy, and thinking that the universe is built to be ideal.

      It isn't.

      How can it?

      Are all of you blind or something? Human race is on the verge of being torn to pieces by the forces unknown, yet all of you are preaching that life is wonderful!

     I hope all of you die from your stupidity.

     But I guess being stupid, happy, and ignorant is the matter of the very human being. I am human too…but not like any of you, for I know the truth of my existence. You can call me a human machine; I guess it would be the right term to describe my subsistence. I was generated to protect all of you from the harm to be. From the death I now wish for all of you…it's for the best, really. It is time to make all of you understand how existence works.

    I'm still thinking on it though. One mere concentration of my special ability and the station will explode into pieces, frozen by the vacuum of infinity. But every time I decide upon doing this…I think of you. Don't get me wrong; I couldn't care less about yours or mine existence in this time and space…

    It's just that…I can't quite explain it. Seeing the way you look at me each time, I can't help but think what would happen if you would just…vanish.

   Would the space feel any different without you in it?

     I hear you stir on the spot. You have been standing there like a statue for the half an hour that has passed. You don't dare to move more though. You are scared…I can feel it all over your far away body.

    I partially smile to myself at your shyness. You are so weak, so helpless…so fragile. I wonder how come you haven't died yet from all you have been through. You have been through a lot; don't ask how I know…I just know; it's in your eyes, hidden deep inside, behind those thin yet firm spectacles; the glass walls which protect you from everything that surrounds you. Someday I'll break them too.

     I never had parents, you know. Well…actually I did, but I am not sure if you can call a tank of simulated birthing liquid your mother and a chemically formed spawn – your father.

     One day, when I was allowed to think on my own, I thought that it would be much more fun to go to different places (wherever I was) rather than be a lab rat to some idiots who created me. And so I ran, killing all of them, trying to escape the prison worse than any you could have ever seen. It didn't take me a second thought to destroy the entire unit of their sins…because I know it is all *them*, who made this happen. The Victim are attacking because of them, more and more pilots are dying because of them, and planets are shattered to pieces because of them.

     My special ability is so powerful, there is only two more of this kind; and the reasons are also familiar to me, but not entirely. It just took some deep, but at the same time simple concentration for all of them to blow up like a giant hydrogen bomb. It didn't hurt me though… my abilities never hurt me; but you should know it hurt them a lot. I still remember that day; the day which turned into night.

    Then everything goes black in my reminiscences.

   I woke up later…or perhaps I didn't even go to sleep in the first place. I was at another place…a place that is bound to reside in my memory forever...I killed people there…for food, just like animals do.

   My first victim was a girl, about your age. She apparently had some money in her purse from selling herself to men with a different kind of hunger from which I had. I remember how starved I was back then. First I thought of turning back, maybe I would find some breathless bodies of people with money in their jackets. My stomach growled angrily, for it hasn't been fed over some time. All it took was a slight focus, and when I opened my eyes the girl was lying breathlessly on the ground, rain pouring onto her already wet hair. I came up closer, slowly bending down to look at her face. Her eyes were opened sincerely and stared into mine with no expression. I will never forget those eyes; for it was then that I felt something die within me…something that was alive before.

    Without much hesitation I reached for her small bag and hung it over my shoulder protectively, grasping my petite hands tightly about the fake leather. I doubt anyone saw me leave the dark alley.

    Later on, as I got more used to living like a predator in the jungle, some problems have arose with my special ability. It began to hurt me. And I continued to use it, because it was the only way for me to survive in this place. Then it began to hurt even more. The pain got so awful that at times I would spend an entire day in some dark abandoned place, clinging desperately onto my head and trying my best not to cry. But then I would become hungry again.

    I must tell you that hunger is a very powerful thing.

    I took anyone I saw in my way; women, children, men, old people. It didn't matter to me much whom I would hurt at that time. The hunger was incredible. It drove me nuts, and it always won in the end.

    But then, one day…I found it; something that would become my one and only friend for the next several years. I took it from a nasty looking man with a face of a killer, just like me…only he was different. The rumor had it that he would murder people for money, even though he already had plenty of his own food. That was strange for me…why would he leave anyone breathless if he doesn't have to? I will never know. After I used my EX ability on that man, I found it – I found the gun, the soulless thing that would become my friend from that moment on.

    I've been lucky that day – for some people found me and gave me a good bag of bullets for nothing. They said that I was very special, because of my gift; and that the latest prey I took appeared to be their loathsome enemy. Those people asked me if I could do it again – if I could use my power to take lives of some men I didn't even know. I asked why they would wish for the death of someone, if it wasn't for food. And they said I was too young to understand; they also noted that I wouldn't be hungry ever again after I would do this job.

    My answer was 'no'.  

   Those men got angry, but not for too long: in the next several moments they were all sprawled on the ground, bleeding. It didn't hurt for me this time, I used my gun.

    And so I lived like this, all alone; killing for food. My main law of life was: 'let them die, or be dead yourself'. I am still not exactly sure of why I didn't give up and let myself be killed in that place. Maybe it was the hunger…the horrible need that pierced me throughout my body until I would do something about it.

    Later on someone found me, fed me, and cleaned my hands from all the blood. They also took me out of that place. I can remember it scarcely, but maybe it's a good thing. The woman who took the liberty of calling herself my mother had died from some illness, I think. The man who proclaimed to be my father was dead already; he was killed in the war a long time ago. I was alone again…all by myself, just like you are right now.

      I decide that it is time to turn around; no more games for today.

      You flinch soundly as I gaze at you; expressionless and empty, I wait for you to response. Your tongue is caught in your throat out of fear of being in the same room with me. You probably regret following me all the way here, to the observatory. I want to smile at your shyness, mostly to myself, but I cannot do even that – for I am not able to smile when living in the world like this. You must understand me: I do not look at the world through the pink glasses any longer. 

     You were afraid of me from the day one, when we met. You tried to help me – I rejected you. I have reason for doing that. You fear me greatly, yet you feel something else every time I look at you, every time our gazes meet (like now for instance), and every time I grab your shoulders trying to shake off your weakness. I cannot simply understand how come you feel that way.

    I know what you've been hiding behind your thin glass walls. You use them as your shield from everything, you don't see the things you don't wish to see; but you can't hide yourself.

    You love me, yet you fear me.

     I can see it in your eyes, everything is as clear as Zion sky.

     I don't love you.

     I can never love you.

     I don't even want to love you. And besides, I don't know what love is, how it feels inside. How can I know what this feeling means, if I've never experienced it before? Or perhaps I had…to those lifeless bodies of the people I killed. Did I love killing them?

      "Um…Hiead…I…I didn't mean to…" You don't even have anything descent to say for yourself. You look down, bringing your arms around you. You are shuddering from the cold of space outside.

      So fragile. I feel nothing but sympathy toward you.

     If there's such as thing as hell, then I am off to it after my death. You, however, will go to heaven. Not that you are a pure angel or anything; I know you are just as much sinner as I am; only your sin is a pure one, not like mine.

     I was born to hunt, born to kill, and to die hunting and killing. You had other reasons for your transgressions. I am one of those reasons, and of course your past is the other one.

     Don't you see? I was meant to rot in hell, and you were meant to bloom in heaven. And even if we will end up together, the fate will pull us apart because you are a pure sinner and I'm not…but if I will give up myself to you now – I would have nothing good to give you anyway. So you see…it's all useless.

    You shift your entire body, shaking from the fear you cannot stop. I don't blame you, for you should fear me. I am your hell, but you won't allow yourself to think that. You accept me as your dream, and I'll let you believe in this delusion…for now.

    "H-hiead," you try again, but fail miserably under my expressionless glance. You want to say something, and you know somehow that I am very aware of the situation between us. "I just-"

    "Don't." Still standing there and watching you, I sense your knees go weak. And so you fall down, right in front of me, sobbing quietly for some unspoken reason. You want me to hug you and comfort your frail feelings, but I won't; we both know it.

    While walking away soundlessly, I hear your whimpers get more intense; but I won't turn around.

    Comforting you right now would mean that I would have to take away those pink glasses you wear (just like everybody else does). And I cannot do that. You still have your innocent view on the world, believing in all the best there is out there, and I wouldn't want to take it away just yet. Being close to you means that I would have to tell you everything I ever went through, shattering your naïveté away and making you understand that the universe isn't as perfect as you think it is.

    You're not ready yet Ikhny and neither am I; but when we are – you'll be the first one to know,

                                                              I promise.

                                                             THE END                             

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    Olya's notes: Okay, before anyone of you starts ranting on why the hell I wrote this annoying fic (because some people start getting annoyed with these kinds of fics about Hiead), I want to say I am sorry, but I just had to write it. I worked hard on this story, and actually put my brain into, trying to capture Hiead's character as best as I could.

     Could this be the real him? I don't hope, I know he was in character here more or less. Please tell me what you think about my writing skills in this and I promise that I won't write anymore of 'Hiead tales'.

     Oh yeah…about paragraphing. I know that some of the paragraphs were too long and the topics in them had barely the same subjects, but I thought it would be too annoying if I put every new sentence as a separate paragraph.

    I wish to thank Chevira Lowe (who was silly enough to remove her wonderful story from ff.net) for supporting me at all times and becoming my good friend during all of this. I hope you liked it.

    And I hope I won't have to remind you people what a review is; I already told you once that you have to write at least three full sentences of your opinion on my creation (thank goodness most of you did that already(^_^)). Reasonable flames are highly welcome.

                                                                  All yours, Olya