Title: Dash
Author: Kay-chan15
Pairing: SouKazu
Fandom: Soukyuu no Fafner
Theme: #9 dash
Disclaimer: Don't own any of it. Why else would I be writing fanfics? I will own a copy of the first dvd come July, though!
Notes/Warnings: Not much romance at all this time, except for maybe the last couple lines (but even those are only about as canon as the series. ... And we all know how that is). I'm sorry about that, and I promise the next one will have more romance (I already have it written, so this isn't just an empty promise that I may or may not fulfill). Slight spoilers for the end of episode 23 in the end of this fic. Set sometime before episiode 23, but other than that I have no clue where it goes in the timeline. Also...maybe kind of a bit weird, but I wanted to explore Kazuki's mind a bit, and endless fighting and war is bound to make any soldier a bit messed up.

Dash

Dash. Jump. Thrust. Stab.

Another Festum dead, another battle done.

"Good job, Kazuki. You can come back now."

The voice in his head, always there to back him up.

"Thanks, Soushi." He's not even out of breath.

The next day, the same thing again, just as it happened the day before the previous, and a few days before that one. Stab one through the head, one through the eye, one through the heart.

Occasionally he wonders if they feel any pain. Are Festums even able to feel pain? No one has ever talked to him about these things, and he doesn't know whom to ask. Would Soushi know? He seems to know everything else. And yet he doesn't want to ask him, is worried the questions will show some weakness in him that Soushi will disapprove of. And if there's one thing he doesn't want, it's Soushi's disapproval.

Battle becomes monotonous, and on the easier ones, the ones with only one or two Festums against the three or four Fafners, he finds his mind wandering. He doesn't need to focus as he listens to the shouts of the others, the alternating happiness and fear, doesn't need to focus as he kills. It's become second nature to him, and he knows the weaknesses of each type. Soushi has gone over them with him more times than he can count.

Instead, he notices how pretty the golden Festums look when the sun strikes them just right, how their purple and black attacks seem to sparkle right before disappearing.

Leap. Grab. Slice.

He wonders if it should be considered wrong to be killing these mysterious beings, just as it is considered wrong to kill humans. What and who decides if it is wrong to kill something or not?

Shoot. Catch. Kill.

"That's the last one, its over. No casualties this time either. Good job, Kazuki."

He smiles, letting the thoughts disappear to the back of his mind once again.

But that night as he lies in bed, wind coming in from the open window gently kissing his face and making his brown bangs sway, the next battle as he again protects his home by killing, he wonders.

It is only after the Festums kidnap Soushi that he decides he doesn't care.

He will kill them all. Every last one that opposes him.