Cure Narrative 57: Breath

Season: Healin'Good

Character: Daruizen, Nodoka H. (didn't use her name but heavily insinuated)

Summary: Just another breath, still alive.

A/N: Since they didn't show us Daruizen's point of view in episode 41 and 42, fine! I will show myself hmph! =3=

Gasping, grasping, for another breath, onto another moment of living. Screams clawed at his throat, begging to be released, but he gulped them down. His energy was hardly so ample to be squandered on fear.

"Daruizen!" the furious bellow of his king echoed throughout the dimension, ricocheting off mighty stone pillars and blasting at his ears like stray bullets, inducing yet another concussion in his signature indifferent demeanour.

The putrid red odor in his kingdom, for once, felt foreign to his system, like slithering snakes crawling beneath his skin to eat away at his insides, at his time and at his will.

This was not what he was promised, not the destination his suave struts were supposed to lead him to.

Unlike that love-blinded wretch or that power-hungry moron, he had always chosen the least risky path to traverse, the cosiest location to laze around in.

Everything he did was for himself. He only ever lived for himself. To give up his ego and his consciousness at this point? Absolute nonsense!

A sudden twinge on his right shank set the scream he had been suppressing free. The King's magic sank its fangs into his leg viciously, attempting to drag him back to his demise.

Gasping, grasping, for another moment of living, onto the barren ground with one hand and tearing the blood-red beast off of him with the another.

It continued to lunge at him, sharp canines digging into his palm when he just barely blocked it an inch away from his neck. Another scream. Another breath, with which the pain reverberated through all his veins.

And abruptly, his mind was clear.

I want to live!

A voice that seemed familiar yet alien shouted within him. A second later, he found himself stomping on the magic beast, his heel crushing its jaw as he exterminated it with his own powers.

He had given away his position, he realised when more beasts swarmed around him. They squirmed onto his limbs, pressing him down and gnawing at his flesh.

Breaths. Inhales in the form of gasps and exhales that of screams. So unnaturally loud, each one stirring a storm in his eardrums. Accelerating, then slowing down. Deep, then shallow. Irregular, as if fearing its own finale.

Just like her breaths.

Just like what he had heard when he was still inside of her, still feeding on her life to cultivate his own. Her breaths sometimes strong, sometimes fragile; sometimes relaxed, sometimes strained, like a dramatic symphony telling the story of her unfortunate life.

And with every note, every breath, every moment, her body and her soul spat at him a declaration, or perhaps a condemnation:

"I want to live!"

Now he understood. Now he was truly all ears for that symphony. He was close enough to the auditorium named Death to hear it.

But he refused to enter, it was not the performance he'd wanted to attend, a few stations too soon to leap off his vehicle. Yet he could not stay here either, not as his so-called home is collapsing on him.

Then there was but one choice — to return to his very own flower garden.

Certainly that place would heal him, and deliver him from his current predicament. That place, a sanctuary from a cursed destiny.

In a last-ditch effort, he wrenched his hand out from the maw of a ravening beast. He snapped his fingers, his powers barely enough for him to teleport to Sukoyaka City.

Gasping, for another breath, for tenacity to move his broken wings and aching legs to find her.

Grasping, onto the one chance at being bestowed the grace of salvation, onto the open hands of his benevolent saviour—

And she turned him down.

This was his misjudgement. She was no saviour, she was just a living human. And had the self-preserving human race ever exceeded his expectations?

Never. After all, humans were just the same as his race, bringing yet another creature to its knees before the coda of its symphony every so often.

I want to live...!

Then pay the price.

He glanced at the Mega Parts in his possession, resigned. To trade the remainder of his life for a glimmer of hope to create a future, for an encore before the curtain call, a fair bargain, isn't it?

It's a deal then. He had nothing left to lose.

Gasping, for another breath. Laboured and pained, but a breath nonetheless.

Grasping, onto the doorknob of the auditorium. And he begins to turn it.

End of Chapter 57

A/N: There are countless potentials between Daruizen and Nodoka that could not be used in canon, this fic attempted to subtly address a fraction of it. Although this fic was quite self-indulgent (look at that one super obvious callback to my previous Nodoka AU just because I love my price/trade metaphor and no one will ever notice... see? Self-indulgence! 😌) as this is just how I interpret why Daruizen is the way he is.

I think Daruizen's personality derived from Nodoka. His selfishness and laziness is a direct mirrored image of Nodoka's kindness and vitality. But when I see his will to live, even went as far as to throw away his dignity and beg his enemy for sanctuary, I think his determination to live an ideal life derived from Nodoka's desire to live a healthy life back then as well.

Oh and um... 'deliver', 'sanctuary', 'bestow the grace (haha get it?) of salvation' etc, yes I used a few religious vocabularies in there and yes I intended this. But I'm an atheist and I really didn't pay enough attention in Religious Studies classes so I'm not 100% sure if I used them right. Please tell me if I didn't, I'll see how I can revise them.