15: Final Promises.
T: It's the last chapter…sob…never mind! Once I've got the last chapter of my Gravitation fic out of the way I'll be working on the next big (I hope) serious fic and until then you can go and have a look at my poor attempt at a humour fic…anyway shameless plugging out of the way…not mine and warnings fairly well the same, a little upping of the violence quota but as this is the Final Day battle I hope you expected such a thing!
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I do not think I wish to know what my sister put in that punch, especially when it managed to get even Seishiro drunk.
Stumbling into the kitchen I am greeted by the excessively cheery figure of my sister baring two cups of thick black coffee.
"There you are! I was just about to attempt to rouse both Sei-chan and yourself with the traditional hang over cure."
"Thank you, Hokuto-chan." I remark as I snatch the cup from her and drink the liquid inside.
"Kamui wants a word with you once you've got yourself together."
"Okay…Hokuto-chan, thank you for staying with me even when I was abrasive and uncaring."
She smiles and hugging me hard remarks,
"That's what sisters are for." Before she disappears down the hallway in search of Seishiro.
I take a shower and once I am dressed I take a moment to regard the blurred outline of my face in the mirror.
The last that I had taken the time to truly look at my appearance had been five years ago on what had proved to be my last visit to Babylon with Hokuto at my side.
So much had changed to the man in the reflection since then.
The distance in his eyes had burned away under the bright fire of love…
He had grown into something more than his Obbasan's tool…had become his own man….
He had suffered an almost debilitating injury, the scarring beneath his eyes as testament to that fact.
Sighing I brush a hand through my damp hair and placing my glasses back on go in search of Kamui.
I find him sat on the porch, his eyes fixated on the movement of the clouds.
The click of my lighter seems to stir him from whatever reverie he has fallen into and turning to face me he enquires,
"Why did you start smoking, Subaru?"
"I do not really know, to be honest…I believe that at first it was to blend into the atmosphere at Babylon, to become as a part of the illusion of that place.
"After Obaasan banned me from that place I smoked as a sign of rebellion and so that I could recall the comfort the illusion of Babylon had given me."
"What about now?"
"Until recently I have had no real reason to stop…nobody to care enough for that I would wish to live for as long as I can."
He turns to watch the clouds again and enquires,
"If I win, Subaru, will you give up?"
"Yes."
"Thank you."
"How are you today?" I enquire after a moment.
"I feel numb…I have been contemplating this day for so long now and yet always before I have been thinking about setting Fuuma free…about how I could even hope to draw sword against my best friend.
"Now I have simply to think of how to find the strength to kill…for even Kazuki does not deserve death."
"One life for the sake of thousands, Kamui…I know that murder is a terrible thing and yet for that logic is it not justified?"
"Perhaps…" A beet and turning again to me he enquires,
"Subaru, today I asked you to give up something that had become as part of yourself, because it was hurting not only yourself but those that cared for you also.
"Perhaps today is the day to make a similar request to Seishiro-san?"
He stands and placing a hand to my shoulder remarks,
"Thank you." Before he crosses back into the house.
The one request I would make of Seishiro was, unlike Kamui's request, a selfish thing.
I wished only for Seishiro to stop killing…for him to lease the last ties that made him a stranger to me…the ties that made him Sakurazukamori.
Yet if he were no longer that being then the tree's great power would wither, taking with it one of Tokyo's last remaining pillars of strength.
Would be as destroying this world.
Why should my selfish wants be considered more important than assuring Tokyo remained forever stable and balanced?
A pair of warm arms wrap about my middle and I press further into the comfort and shelter that Seishiro always provides me.
"You seem awfully reflective today, Subaru. What is on your mind?"
"Seishiro, when Rainbow Bridge fell you acted through the cold hearted logic of the Sakurazukamori and though I have forgiven you that action I do not believe I shall always be able to do as such…
Yet though I wish to, I can not ask you to lease the bond between yourself and the tree…"
"Because if I let the tree free then Tokyo would become even more unstable than it is now?"
"Yes."
"Subaru, I love you and I have no more want to hurt you simply because of darkness deep inside of me. Thus once the war is over I shall let the tree go."
"Yet the strength of the tree shall be needed even after the ending of the war."
"I know and I believe that there is a solution to this riddle." He smiles and I know that he is speaking the truth…know that he will indeed sever a bond he has had since childhood simply to appease my selfish want.
I feel my heart swell for love of him and bending a little backwards I pull him down into a fierce kiss.
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Kazuki retains a great deal of Fuuma's appearance about him and yet he is no longer a precise replica of the boy Kamui loves.
For he is older and taller now in this new form…perhaps so as to appear menacing and perhaps just simply to break free of his previously childlike form.
"Kamui." His voice too has changed, its pitch deepening enough so it is almost as an earthquake.
"Kazuki.
Kamui is nervous and yet he betrays this fact only by gripping a fraction tighter to the Shinken.
"The Kekkai above the Government building has shattered and now this, the Kekkai within Tokyo tower, stands alone.
"Once it is destroyed …once you are destroyed…the world shall crumble into ruin."
"I give you one more chance to cease in this desire for destruction. One chance for the sake of Fuuma whom you returned to me and for the sake of Nataku who gave himself to you."
"I shall not relent…the earth shall have its Wish!"
The Shinken clash in a shower of sparks.
The final Kekkai…Kamui's Kekkai…forms about the pair as a bright golden sunrise.
As the light of hope.
From inside it seems as the light of a sunset.
As the fading of hope.
Again the Shinken clash.
Perhaps if this battle had come to pass as it should…if Kamui had been fighting against the boy he loved…there would have been words.
Senseless, angry words, that would have served only to deepen the emotions contained with this battle.
Now…in the reality formed by a Wish…it was silent.
Silent but for the sound of their breathing and the clash of the Shinken as they strike continually against one another.
The sound of footsteps as Kazuki settles to the floor again, his breath as heaving gasps for the exertion of this day.
Kamui too has stopped and yet his breath is still as a regular rhythm despite the exertion.
He regards his opponents fatigue cautiously, watching for a trick or an illusion.
When it becomes clear that the other is not tricking him he grips again his sword and leaps.
There is the sound of metal tearing muscle and bone and then slowly the Kekkai fades into nothing.
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I itch for a cigarette.
I know that it is foolish, that as the head of the Sumeragi clan I should have control enough to get past this addiction…
Yet still I desire just one more inhalation of nicotine.
It does not help that Seishiro has happily lit his own cigarette and is making pains to blow as much of the smoke as he can in my direction.
"You know that you are being unfair, do you not, Seishiro?"
His smile says everything for him and I allow myself a little breath of frustration.
"I should have stayed with Kamui."
"You know as well as I do that Kamui-kun will want some time alone with Fuuma and anyway I wanted you to be here to witness this."
He leans forwards and setting a hand against the vast trunk of the tree he enquires,
"Yuki, might I have a moment?"
'What can I do for you, Seishiro-sama?" the spirit of the tree enquires as he appears almost directly behind his master.
I resist the urge to snicker at Seishiro's obvious fright, choosing instead to listen to whatever the man has to say to the tree.
"I wish to make you your own master."
'Seishrio-sama, I am sure that I do not need to remind you that I am simply illusionary and thus unable to touch…let alone kill…anything."
"I can use my power to ground you Yuki and then you can simply place a block on our bond."
'Yet the moment the connection is severed you will not be able to regenerate your magic so quickly and with such a careless use of your gift you could well end out killing yourself.'
"But it would not simply be my magic that I would use. I am sure that you know by now that I have tied Subaru to me and thus if he will permit me I will use a little of his gift as well."
He turns to me and despite my worries and my gut instinct to refuse him my aid I reply,
"Of course you may use my gift."
Seishiro is doing this for my sake, after all.
Once Seishiro has finished the spell he looks almost as tired as I feel and yet whatever he has done seems to have worked for the tree ruffles his former masters hair once before announcing,
"I live!" And vanishing into a swirl of sakura.
"I may learn to regret that choice." Seishrio grumbles to himself before he crosses the space between us to lean his head on my shoulder.
"Thank you for doing this for me." I remark before I lean down and capture him into a kiss.
He deepens it after a moment and as I clench harder to the warmth of his body I find myself smiling.
For at last I have found the clarity I have yearned always for.
At last I have found my destiny.
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T: Mwhahahaha! There is now a rampant tree out in the world with a bottomless stomach and a whole crime network to pop off as it desires…beware world, beware! Anyway that's it I'm afraid…please feel free to steal characters or write a sequel or something…just let me know before hand! R+R it'll make you feel good!
