Title: Heartbeat
Characters:
Nittle Grasper
Genre: Gen
Rating: K
Notes: Noriko's
POV, because as the glue that holds Grasper together, she has the
most to lose when it falls apart…
Word count: 189
Music is alive. It has a heartbeat; Noriko feels it pulsing through her sometimes, quick and excited, slow and lazy, erratic and breathless under their caressing hands. It is in Tohma's rare, surprising boyish smile as he brings it into existence, letting it out into the light from where it has been sleeping in the back of his mind. Then Ryuichi gives it breath, and on the wings of his voice, it is allowed to fly free.
There is something that builds between the three of them that she has never experienced before. Music has always been alive, but only with them is it hers. They will always be together, Ryuichi says, but when Tohma comes back to them broken, the music's heartbeat is labored and uneven, the shine dull, and she realizes it is hurting. She holds desperately to both of them, because she knows that there will never be magic without them, that the music's heartbeat will slow and stop, and it will die. She smiles because she doesn't want to cry, and begins smoking to calm her nerves, and by then, it is probably too late.