vow, rated pg-13. ruka-centric (garbage challenge). series-set. 428 words.

(i came around to tear your little world apart)

You tasted of sweat and of tears, when I kissed you that balmy afternoon. It was sweeter than any taste I could have imagined before I knew the flavour of your lips. I have wondered for far too long what it would be like to kiss you at last, and even though…even though my fantasies always had you reacting in much a different way to the way in which you did, it was still enough for me.

You don't understand what it is that I wish to do, but then it is perhaps better that way. You would be able to mount a better defence if you could see the way in which your enemy is coming at you, after all…because I always taught you to fight that way. To read your opponent's moves before making your own, to be the hunter rather than the hunted.

You are the hunted this time, however, much as I am loathe to paint you in such an unflattering light. You should never be at the mercy of anyone, after all. You should be the one to give your mercy as you please, as your strong heart dictates…the way you do with everybody else except for that slip of a girl. That girl who dangles above your heart a sword of Damocles that you must surely know will fall and skewer that heart like a fallen duellist's rose.

I am turning my own sights on you simply because you should never be between anybody's crosshairs. You are strong, you are beautiful, there should be nothing in this world capable of pulling you down to drown in the mud beneath your feet. And yet you've somehow convinced yourself that you are dirty, shameful, that your beauty and strength are but strong masks over a weak face. It's not true, not true at all…and I vow that I will show you that.

I will release you, for creatures like you are not made to be caged, kept in a petting zoo by creatures too weak to realise that true beauty exists only in perfect freedom.

I've hurt you already, and I am going to hurt you again. I am going to break your heart…but I'll give you mine in return. You can have my heart, Juri, because I believe that after this I simply won't have much use for it anymore. Still, it doesn't matter, not at all – because I have made my vow, and now I will do what I am here to do.

Don't worry, Juri. Don't worry about anything at all.