From The Ashes Chapter 10: 10: Trade Your Heroes for Ghosts, a sakura wars fanfic

Author's Note: There is much debate over what sort of relationship existed between Maria and Yuri, why she wears his photo in a locket, etc. Either she holds him in extremely high respect, or she felt he was like a brother to her, or they were lovers. Based upon hints from the OVAs and TV series, the lyrics to Maria's "Only Man" in the live performances (in which she quotes Yuri as saying "I was serious about that.") where Urara Takano spends her whole first scene heavily drunk and collapsing over this and that chair, weeping about "my only love" -- and several hints that of the "maidens" of the TKD, only Maria does not fit that term – I have decided that, for the purposes of my story, it is most likely that they were lovers. Besides, a recent official comic has confirmed that there was more between Maria and Yuri than sibling-like affection.

Author's Legality Note: This may seem overly cautious, but I... am squeamish about writing about Yuri and Maria with Maria being only 14. In the U.S., the age of consent is generally 16. In the state I live in, it's 17. In Japan, it's 18. In Russia, it's FOURTEEN. So, in the official story, technically, Maria was of the age of consent in 1917 in Russia. Regardless, I have pushed the date of Yuri's death up a couple of years, because I am not comfortable writing a twenty year old man kissing a fourteen year old girl. So she's sixteen instead. Just for my own comfort.

Author's Continuity Note: As a wise fanfic writer recently told to me, firstly, my background for Maria is incorrect – and secondly, if everyone stuck completely to the background stories, no one would write fan fiction. So, I continue - unrepentant! Okay, just a little repentant – me sowwy.

Rating: PG-13, violence, mild adult situations

"FROM THE ASHES" – Trade Your Heroes for Ghosts

So. So you think you can tell Heaven from Hell? Blue skies from pain?

Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil? Do you think you can tell?

Did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts? Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze? Cold comfort for change?

Did you exchange a walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?

How I wish… how I wish you were here.

Maria moaned and turned her head. It was nearly dark and she was in pain.

"…Captain?" she whispered brokenly.

"Shhh, I am right here," Yuri replied, kneeling down beside her cot and pressing a damp cloth to her head.

Slowly, she opened her eyes against the pressure of pain that made her eyelids feel thick. She winced once against the dim lamplight, causing a flash of sharp pain across her forehead. They were in the town meeting hall that had been set up as a barracks for the Revolutionaries. And they were alone.

It was November, the onset of a deep winter in 1919. She knew the brigade was wintering here, but for some reason it seemed to surprise her, as if, while she slept, she'd forgotten where she was. What else had the fever caused her to imagine? Surely not what the Captain had said to her?

"Is Russia free yet, Captain?"

Yuri sadly shook his head. She saw a flash of something recognizable in his eyes. Their conversation of two nights ago had begun this same way. Had it been real? She closed her eyes and turned her face away from him, as if she feared perhaps it might have been, and it caused her some embarrassment.

Yuri must have noticed. "Maria…" He seemed almost contrite, as if he'd caused her grief. "I… I was serious about it. What I said the other night."

Maria's heart lurched in her chest. She turned back to look at him, her green eyes bright with her breaking fever and with hopefulness.

Two nights ago, she was falling ill. She knew it, her comrades knew it, the Captain knew it – but she was proud and stubborn and refused to let it slow her down, much less stop her.

Finally, Captain Nikolayevich took her aside. "Maria, why are you doing this to yourself?"

"I am only doing my duty, Capt—"

"I did not address you as Second Lieutenant; you do not need to address me as Captain right now. You are ill, and you need to rest. Instead, you are working even harder."

"We have been wintered here for two weeks, there is a lot of work to be done to get us on the move again before w—"

"Maria, we can prepare the army without your help for a couple of days. You are important, so do not think that I mean you are not - but we can cover for you."

"Then I am no more than luggage, Yuri – another burden and responsibility for the revolutionaries."

"I would rather tend to you for a few days than make a grave for you in a few days."

Maria muttered under her breath and turned back to strike the ice on the firewood tarp with a long stick, the task of freeing it one she'd assigned to herself. "Well, if I've outlived my usefuln—Nn!"

She was silenced by a kiss. Yuri had seized her by the arms, quickly spun her around and kissed her before he could second guess himself or change his mind. Maria's stick fell to the frozen cobblestones with a clatter, her eyes wide with stun.

Then he pulled her into a strong embrace, protectively. "Please do not say such things, Maria… Please. I do not know what I would do if I lost you…"

For a long moment he paused, holding her, gathering his courage. She returned his embrace, closed her eyes and buried her face in his shoulder. And then she heard him say something she'd wished so often that she had to replay the moment many times in her mind to convince herself that it had been real, and not her imagining.

"I love you."

I love you so much…

"Please, Maria…" a soft voice penetrated the haze of darkness and pain, a soft and gentle voice whispered to her in Russian.

Maria moaned and lifted a hand. A cool, damp cloth was held lightly against her cheek, and she laid her hand over his.

"Yuri…" she whispered through the disorientation of unconsciousness.

Abruptly, the man sitting beside her rose and stalked away. She could hear sharp footsteps cross a wooden floor. She opened her eyes.

The electric light in her New York apartment was harsh, pain stabbed at the backs of her eyes. Valentinov was pacing slowly, angrily, like a defeated lion.

Slowly, Maria assembled in her mind what had been going on. She recalled the memory that came to her in her dream. The last thing she remembered before that was encountering Patrick in the stairwell. She must have lost consciousness. She was fairly certain she'd said "Yuri" aloud. How much else had she murmured to Valentinov in her sleep?

Judging by his reactions, quite a bit. She inwardly cringed. This would not be easy. She decided that the best course of action would be to pretend that she recalled nothing at all after fainting.

"Major…?" her low whisper prompted him to stop pacing and turn toward her. Maria could almost feel his anger dissipating. She knew what he must be thinking. It was not her fault that she had called him by another name. One cannot control one's dreams any more than one can control with whom one's heart lays.

Valentinov remained silent, so Maria struggled to sit up, gripping her throbbing head. "How long have I been… like this?"

"Three hours," he answered ambivalently, drawing his pocket watch out and winding it to give his hands and eyes something upon which to focus, besides upon Maria.

She was relieved that it had not been longer. But her relief did not last long as Valentinov began the questions she did not want to answer.

"Was it Silvio?"

"Yes."

"Did he recognize you?"

"…yes and no."

"Explain."

Maria stood and walked past Valentinov to her bathroom mirror to assess the damage. She closed over the door to change back into her pinstriped suit and to clean up a bit. "He recognized that I am not a boy. He did not recognize who I am."

"But he knows someone has been following him now."

Maria closed her eyes and braced herself against the countertop. "Yes." Her voice was soft in contrition. "He does."

Valentinov launched into a fresh tirade of Russian expletives and Maria cringed, squeezing her eyes closed tightly. "Do you have any idea how much danger you have placed us all in? Who would Lupo suspect was trying to kill his bodyguard? Who else would dare besides Ignazio?"

"Major, I know…"

"And now we will all be watching our backs!"

"Major—"

"Lupo could become proactive and launch a counter attack before we even move, Second Lieutenant, I thought you were smarter than this!"

"I know!" Maria shouted and yanked open the bathroom door, glaring at him. "Do you think I wouldn't have prevented it if I could have? Do you think me that stupid?"

"I think you that impetuous! Inexperienced! Hesitant! You are too young, too naïve – and you always were!"

Stricken to the core, Maria was rendered speechless. She fell back a pace, her jaw open, her fist gripped in her shirt over her heart, nearly as if Valentinov had shot her. And her fingers closed around her locket under her shirt. She shook her head to clear it of the pain, like a kicked dog, and turned away from him.

Valentinov exhaled some of his rage, realizing what he'd said. He gave himself a moment to let go of the anger and then spoke softly. "Come downstairs to Luna's with me. I will buy you a drink and we can think of what to do from here."

It was as close to an apology as Maria had ever heard Valentinov make. But she, on the contrary, did not let go of her anger so easily. She stood at her window with her arms folded, and she stiffened when Valentinov put a hand on her shoulder.

"Maria. Please."

After a moment, silently, she turned and followed him downstairs, certain this time to have her long woolen black coat, her gloves, and her gun. Just in case.

Maria remembered nearly nothing of the content of the conversation between herself and Valentinov in Luna's Restaurant. Valentinov had borne most of the burden of speaking anyway. Maria was only a little disoriented from drink. Not enough to kill the pain, but as much as she would allow herself in Valentinov's company.

Valentinov lead the way back upstairs with Maria trailing morosely behind like a chastened child.

"Bozhe moy…" Valentinov whispered as they reached the third floor. Maria choked back a sob of horror.

Her door stood open, kicked half off its hinges. Her apartment had been completely ransacked. Slowly, Maria and Valentinov stepped inside. Maria's meagre belongings were not strewn around, as one might expect – they were gone. All of her belongings were gone: her money, her clothing, her makeup kit, even her hairbrush.

…even the framed photograph of Yuri.

She sank to her knees, dumbfounded.

Ineffectually, Valentinov attempted to close her unhinged door. For a long moment, he simply watched her in silence as she knelt in the middle of her empty apartment.

"Valentinov—" she whispered, voicelessly.

He knelt down beside her. There was nothing he could think of to say.

"What have I become?"

Valentinov blinked. "I don't understand." He had to lean closer and strain to hear her.

"Look at me." She was sitting back on her heels, her red gloved hands clutching her coat closed over her heart. "I am a monster."

Gently, almost hesitantly, he laid a hand on her shoulder. "No, Maria. You are just grown up."

"I am a killer."

"You are a soldier. It is no different, Maria. Someone tells you who the bad people are and you shoot them."

Ah, if only it were all that simple. Both of them knew that it was not. "Remember two months ago when I reported Bianni dead? I didn't shoot him, Major. My gun wasn't even loaded at the time."

Valentinov flinched in shock. "Are you mad? What kind of assassin doesn't load her weapon?"

"The kind who does not want to be an assassin."

For several tense moments, Valentinov considered the implications of what she'd just said. "Are you saying Bianni isn't dead?"

Maria shook her head. "He is very dead." She stood up and looked around her empty apartment, stopping at the bed. They'd even stripped her bed.

"Then you weren't the one who killed him?" Valentinov stood, too, but stayed where he was, his hands thrust deep into his pants pockets.

"Yes. I was the one who killed him."

Valentinov did not understand. He glanced down, his brows furrowed . "You regret assassinating him?"

"I did not assassinate him. I killed him – barely – because he was trying to kill me. He was trying to throw me into the Hudson." Maria's voice softened. "I simply beat him to it."

"But you fired a round… after you killed him? I remember you said you'd fired a round… you said you could smell gunpowder in your coat."

Maria laid a hand down on the countertop where Yuri's framed photo had once been. She nodded.

"At whom?"

"A boy," Maria said with the utmost regret in her voice. "A few years younger than me. Bianni's messenger."

"But he lives still…"

"For the love of God, Major! Of course he lives! Did you think me so evil and dreadful as to shoot a young child? In the BACK? As he fled from me?"

Valentinov flinched, remembering that the ambushing army that gunned down Captain Nikolayevich had done exactly that – killed dozens of young men, wounded others, as they fled. Maria herself had been shot three times while she ran away, helping another wounded man.

"I fired far over his head – just as a threat, to frighten him…" And that alone seemed to haunt the Kazuar.

Carefully, Valentinov continued, "Maria… you do realize how dangerous it is to leave witnesses, no matter how old? You cannot be sentimental. You are just doing your job."

Maria gave a mirthless, sardonic laugh. "You would make an excellent assassin, Major." She turned back to the empty countertop and but both her hands on it.

Valentinov approached. "Maria… you cannot live your entire life in regret of the past…" She closed her eyes and straightened up, her hands at her sides and her back to him.

"Captain Nikolayevich was a good man and a good soldier. He served under my command for over a year – you both did."

Maria's head bowed and Valentinov placed his hands on her shoulders. Gently, he slipped her coat off and laid it on the bed. For a moment, there he remained.

"I cannot imagine how difficult it must have been. Your family gone, your country in revolution, then to lose Yuri…" Valentinov turned to look at her again. Her back was still turned. He continued his thinly veiled torture, stepping up to her side and whispering, "And I do not believe myself mistaken to presume that Yuri was more to you than a captain…"

Maria covered her eyes with her left hand as Valentinov became relentless, his voice ever gently, ever sympathetic, ever emotional.

"He was all you had in the world. After your parents died… And then to be involved in battle after battle – you never had the chance to be young."

Valentinov delicately swept back Maria's hair from her eyes, and it promptly slipped forward again. Maria remained frozen where she was, half turned away from him, her gloved hands tightening into fists.

"Now everything you had of your former life is gone – everything. And yet you remain strong. From where I stand beside you," he lightly slipped an arm around her shoulders, "I can feel how much it aches, how much of a terrible burden it must be for one solitary girl to bear…"

Maria choked and hid her face in her hands. Valentinov swept her into an embrace which was both protective and possessive.

"Shhh, it's all right, Maria… it will be all right. I promise you." He stroked her hair gently, soothing her silent tears. "It is time to forget the past, to say farewell to your memories. Forget about hopes to change the world, to save Russia's destitute and poor – there will always be poor people, Maria, but you are one girl, you cannot save them all. Save yourself, Maria – for the sake of those who lov—who care about you. And if you cannot… let me save you."

Surprised, Maria lifted her tear-stained face to him, as if suddenly realizing the game Valentinov was playing, and how completely she'd fallen for it.

Valentinov didn't give up, though. "Let me make the future over again for you, Maria. Forget Russia. Forget Yuri—"

"No," she whispered, looking away from him and attempting to disentangle herself from his clingy embrace.

Valentinov gripped her by the upper arms in renewed urgency. "Maria, I love you!"

"No!" she cried, wrenching free from his grip and turning to run out her door. Valentinov spun her back around by the shoulders and kissed her, holding her close to him. Maria tried to push him away to no avail. She drew her gun from her shoulder holster and struck him a glancing blow to the temple. He yelped in surprise and pain, releasing her.

Disregarding her winter coat, she turned and ran out the door.