Title: Creation (Part I of II).

Type: It's mostly a character piece about Fai, although there is a little puppy love between Fai and an original character. It's not a "pairing" piece, though. Kurogane, sadly, does not appear in this story. Basically, I'm trying to work out Fai's motivations for creating Chi.
Disclaimer: Fai, Ashura, Celes, etc. were hatched from the collective brain of CLAMP. Not mine.
Spoilers: No, this is a Fai backstory. Spoiler-free, I believe.
Rating: 16 and up. Violence, mild sensuality.
Word Count: 5500 or so.
Note: this story refers to events that happen in Child of Celes (it's one of the other stories I've posted here.) But it's not necessary to read that story to understand this one, I think.

The current High Magician, people whispered in awe, was possibly the strongest Celes had ever birthed.

Whenever Fai overheard those whispers, he smiled even more brightly and emptily and prettily than usual because he knew the pathetic truth. The High Magician would gladly trade all that magic for even the hope of a single friend.

Eleven, Fragment I

When Fai was eleven, he leveled his village.

It was of little consolation to him to realize that it wasn't entirely his fault (his sleepy village had the misfortune of getting stuck in the middle of a battle for the throne and really, what could you do when magic-forged demons descended on your town?) The trees were still charred, the beautiful buildings still demolished, and all the people still buried.

He'd deserved death, but his king had other plans for him.

Later, Fai would wonder if perhaps death would have been more merciful.

Eleven, Fragment II

When Fai was eleven, he received the best gift he'd ever gotten.

He beamed at the king and the seer as tears of agony streamed down his face, and tried vainly to stop his limbs from trembling. The skin on his back and arms still burned as if the king had carved into his skin with fire instead of spells and needles (the seer's role had been to hold him down so he couldn't flail about.) But the pain was a small price to pay for being allowed the privilege of human company again.

Fai had spent two months, five days, and three hours (he'd counted) in a little house on the outskirts of the sprawling city below the castle, alone except for when the king's seer journeyed down from the castle to check on him or one of the servants brought him more food. He was just biding his time while the king and the seer researched a special spell that would allow him to live in the castle – which was full of wild magic - safely.

The waiting wasn't so bad because he'd been provided books to read, so he memorized entire passages so they would know that he really was a very good and smart boy and worth all their effort. The waiting had been tolerable, except when he'd heard the voices of children as they ran down the streets and screamed and laughed and got into all sorts of mischief. Then he'd hide under his bed because he'd been so very, very afraid that they would ask him to join their play if they spotted him. And what if he couldn't say "no"? (He'd never been very good at that and he really did want to play.) Sometimes Fai had shivered as he hid under his bed, imagining small bodies sprawled on the ground, limbs bent like broken dolls. He'd never wanted to hurt anyone, but maybe his magic just didn't care.

But now, his magic would have to listen to him. Fai twisted and turned, craning his neck so he could admire the tattoo in the mirror the seer held. He smiled, tracing his fingers over the brilliant blue lines that formed a phoenix with outstretched wings. In its magnificent loops and curves, Fai saw his salvation.

Maybe the next time the village children raced by, he would join them.

Twelve, Fragment I

When Fai was twelve, he created his first permanent work of magic.

One of the assistant cooks discovered it very early the next morning and promptly let out a shriek, which of course brought half the palace running into the kitchen, half-dressed and bleary eyed. They scratched their heads in collective confusion and tried to deduce who had done it and why that person had done in it secret. To create a permanent spell was extremely difficult; Ashura had a number of accomplished wizards who had yet to create even one (but if they did, they certainly wouldn't hide it; modesty was not a virtue most magic users esteemed.)

They were still chattering when Ashura himself strode into the kitchen (notable since he was the only person neither bleary-eyed nor disheveled), pulled one of his voluminous sleeves back, and dipped a graceful hand into the well. He frowned and put his hand into the trough that fed the well. That water was icy cold, as it should be since its source was an enormous chunk of ice that was stored in the room adjacent to the kitchen. Ashura put his hand back into the well and confirmed that the water was indeed heated, to a degree pleasant enough for a relaxing bath.

Then Ashura smiled and asked that someone fetch Fai.

When the boy arrived in the kitchen, wiping at his eyes tiredly, he froze at the sight of all the people gathered in the room.

Why had he not told anyone?

Well, Fai said quietly, his soft eyes fixed on the stone floor, he hadn't said anything since it was really quite late when he finished and he wasn't entirely certain if he'd done everything right anyway and didn't want to cause a bother. But he apologized for causing everyone an inconvenience.

If this, Ashura replied wryly, were an "inconvenience," then he gave Fai the permission to cause inconveniences whenever and wherever he liked. Then the king patted his newest wizard on the shoulder as he swept out of the room.

Fai did not see the thoughtful, calculating look that flickered in the king's golden eyes. His wizards had been trying for some time to create a permanent water-heating spell because the castle spent an enormous amount of energy heating water. And here, this child of miners – with an incomplete education in the magical arts - had managed in months what they could not in years. His seer had told him the boy was powerful, but Ashura was beginning to suspect that neither of them understood the extent of it.

Ashura paused in the corridor, his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Then he called to his personal assistant and ordered that the number of guards assigned to the boy be increased, effective immediately.

Twelve, Fragment II

Fai let out a small whistle of relief after Ashura-ou left the kitchen. The king wasn't angry; he'd been pleased He'd tinkered around the well for days and it hadn't occurred to him to ask for permission. Sometimes he just got caught up in thinking about what he could do and he didn't always remember the proper protocol to follow. He'd wanted very badly to succeed, however, in order to repay the staff for the kindnesses they'd shown him: slipping him sweets between meals, tailoring his robes so they fit just right, looking the other way when he forgot he was in a castle and raced through the halls and slid down the banisters. (Sometimes, when he felt a stab of loneliness, Fai would let himself pretend that the staff were actually the people from his village; they'd just gotten bored one day, taken a vote, and decided to move to the castle on a whimsy. But he could never imagine his family there, no matter how hard he tried.)

One of the maids threw her arms around him and covered him with kisses, and the butler clapped a hand on his shoulder. The assistant cook who'd found the spell giggled that she'd shrieked so loudly because she'd been grumpy about pulling the early shift and had wished in anger that she'd never have to heat the water again, and then she realized the water was already hot and thought maybe she'd suddenly developed magical abilities.

"You're definitely our favorite wizard," said the head cook, pinching his cheek. "The other ones are too important to use their magic to help lowly sorts like us." The head cook pointed his nose towards the ceiling and began to strut about mincingly, and everyone roared with appreciative laughter.

Fai smiled but did not say anything. He was frankly relieved that the other wizards and witches seemed to categorize him as one of "lowly sorts" (whenever he walked by, they stopped talking and glowered down at him as if personally insulted that a child was allowed to live in the castle and study magic.) Besides the staff, the only person who usually talked with him was the king's seer, Dedumil, who was responsible for tutoring him, although once he'd complained that the other wizards thought they were "too good" to teach a child, not that he'd let those bastards do it anyway. Something about the seer's tone had made Fai shudder, and he was glad that they seemed content just to glower at him for now; even back in his village Fai had heard whispers about the sorts of experiments they "conducted" and the things they did on the battlefield.

"Hey," said one of the male servants, "maybe the king'll let him just keep working on useful stuff like this around the castle, you know, inventions n'stuff. Hell knows he's already got enough people working on war shit and he's just a little boy anyway."

The head cook froze mid-mince. "You shut your mouth. What have I told you about your drinking?"

"But it's the morning! I haven't had a ---"

"You're drunk so shut up. Only a drunk," the head cook hissed, pressing his red face close to the male servant, "would be dumb enough to think he has any place to speculate on what the king will do or should do."

The man bowed his head and mumbled an apology for drinking. The mood broken, everyone began to trickle away from the well to attend to their duties.

The head cook let out a growl. "Don't you worry yourself about that, Fai. Just keep doing as Dedumil tells you. He's grumpy, but don't let that fool you: he's a good man." He ruffled a meaty hand through Fai's hair. "Now get to back to bed, silly boy. You need your rest after doing something this great."

Twelve, Fragment III

"Something this great."

Fai sat in his bed, turning those words over in his mind and decided that if perhaps the head cook could see all magic in the castle, then the cook wouldn't be so impressed with the well. Really, how could he not succeed when he was allowed to live in such a wondrous castle? From the moment Fai had first been ushered through the palace gates, the tattoo still fresh on his back, he'd known that there was little he wouldn't be able to do. Magic was everywhere: in the air, in the ground, in the buildings, in the people, even in the food. And there were all sorts of magic too: little tendrils dancing like fairies in the sitting room, big lazy pools of magic floating in the banquet hall, and electric pulses racing through the throne room. There was even magic in his bedroom, a rather playful sort that always knocked his covers onto the ground. Sometimes Fai simply closed his eyes and breathed in deeply, letting it fill his lungs and enter his bloodstream, caress his skin and ruffle his hair. The magic here liked him and he liked its company too.

Except... every now and then, he couldn't help thinking of his village. The houses destroyed, the people dead, his family gone. Then his heart started to beat slowly and painfully, as if it were being squeezed by a cold, giant hand and his head pounded with all sorts of terrible thoughts he didn't want to have: (whatifhelostcontrolgotscaredcouldn'tstopdidaspellwrongdemonsattackedhurtpeopleandtheyweregoneanditwasallhisfault?) Then he hated the magic and there was too much of it and it was everywhere and in his lungs and he just couldn't breathe and it was pressing against his body too hard and he just wanted it to go away.

The thought of those bad times caused Fai to squirm uncomfortably in his bed, and he placed a hand on his back to remind himself that he had already learned how to deal with those feelings. He would run to his room and strip off his robe and stare into his mirror. The phoenix was always there on his back, proud and beautiful and strong, everything he wasn't but needed to be. He'd run his fingers over its blue lines again and again until his heart unclenched and his breathing eased. The king himself had made the phoenix, and there was nothing he couldn't do.

With a frown, Fai recalled the male servant's words. The head cook was right; the servant shouldn't have said those things about the king. Ashura-ou was the one he owed everything to, the reason he could live with other people again, the reason he could live. When Ashura had rescued him, he'd sworn to serve Ashura, even to kill for him. Whatever Ashura wanted, he knew he would do it.

He didn't have a choice.

Fourteen, Fragment I

When Fai was fourteen, he had his heart broken.

It had started innocently enough. He had continued to make good progress on his studies, by his own reckoning: he was now earning a grudging "not bad" from Dedumil at least twice a week. He'd also succeeded in designing more effective spell for transporting the huge blocks of ice from the lakes to the castle, and also a spell to reinforce the protections on the castle gates. This only caused the other wizards to continue to shun him, but some of them had been shooting him particularly venomous glares lately. More than once Fai had been very relieved that there was often a burly servant lurking around when this happened. Not that Fai suffered any delusions that brute strength was a fair match against magic, but a witness was extremely valuable. If Fai suffered a magic-related mishap by himself, some people might decide that his own "crazy" experimenting had finally caught up to him, but if two people were injured, then it would be obvious he'd been attacked.

Still, being relieved that he was not yet a frog or a stain on a luxurious carpet did little to alleviate his loneliness, so he had been spending a lot of time watching the staff carry out their duties. The duties involved in maintaining a floating castle were quite varied and some of them rather interesting (apparently, you had to use a mixture of three parts water to two parts ground pearl to get the crystal gates to shine just so in the moonlight.) Sometimes, Fai was even able to cajole the staff into letting him help, although they always protested that it wasn't proper work for someone of his status. Fai personally had little regard for status: in his old village, if there was a job to do and your hands were free, the job was yours. Status here, anyway, seemed to have something to do with whom you were qualified to look down your nose at, and who was qualified to look down his nose at you. Boring.

Fai's favorite haunt, naturally, was the kitchen. The castle's kitchen was actually a web of several large cavern-like halls, all orbiting around the massive block of ice that provided the water needed for cooking and cleaning. The kitchen was usually hectic since there were many mouths to feed, but during the slow hours, the head cook would let him play around with the equipment and use the pantry to make his own recipes.

The baking kitchen was almost deserted when he poked his head in late in the afternoon, so Fai quickly pulled out the ingredients to whip together some herbal bread. The bakers at the castle knew how to make many great breads, but their recipes tended to involve a lot of fancy frills designed to thrill the taste buds of nobles who always wanted something "different." Sometimes, Fai just wanted something simple.

After he'd stuck the dough into the oven, Fai plopped himself onto the counter and swung his legs back and forth idly. He knew he should be cleaning up, but he always delayed that part as long as possible (sometimes, if he waited long enough, a staff member would wander by and offer to help him clean up, especially if he pulled a pitiful face – there were advantages to being cute and small and having the favor of the staff.)

"You've got flour on your face."

A black-haired boy Fai didn't recognize stood at the edge of the counter, a sack of unpeeled potatoes in his hand and something like amusement in his eyes.

Automatically, Fai touched his face and managed to streak more flour on his face. He'd forgotten there was flour on his hands.

The boy grinned, definitely amused now, and Fai suddenly felt awkward. The only children he'd seen who were his age in the castle were noble born; the staff's families lived in the city below the castle. Fai was not allowed to leave the castle.

"You're kinda messy, aren't you? You're lucky you work here in the bakery and not for Le Grande Chef Jean Pierre. He'd skin you for dinner and stuff you with apples if you messed up his prech-shious kit-shun."

"You work in meats? I haven't seen you here before," Fai managed to ask.

The boy nodded and moved closer, slinging the bag of potatoes onto the counter. "Yeah, I'm new. I'm not a half bad cook, so I've been apprenticed to Le Grande Chef, or sacrificed as an offering, however you want to look at it." He laughed and Fai smiled, reassured.

The boy peered at the oven. "Cooking bread?" Fai nodded. "Smells good." The boy plopped himself onto the counter besides Fai and leaned back, watching the dough slowly rise. "So, how do you make it?"

Fai was pleased at the question and began to detail how he'd mixed several flours together and added in brown eggs for taste and substituted ingredients (there were several from Northern Celes that just weren't stocked here) and kneaded the dough just so.

The boy had never met anyone from the North before and asked him several questions about his village, which Fai didn't mind answering: he just neglected to mention that his village didn't technically exist anymore and why exactly he'd been brought to the castle. In turn, Fai learned the boy's name was O'ksandr and he was an orphan as well – "the war" was all he'd mumbled – and Fai was grateful he provided no more details. O'ksandr had discovered his knack for cooking out of necessity; he'd been living by himself for several years and became rather good at it and that was more or less how he ended up in the castle. Fai also learned that O'ksandr liked to laugh loudly and brag about his skills at marbles, and that his eyes were bright green and that his teeth looked very white against his dark skin when he smiled.

"You're not really a baker's apprentice, are you?" O'ksandr said suddenly.

Fai looked at his feet dejectedly, his hopes for a friend dashed. With his luck, O'ksandr's family had been killed by wizards and O'ksandr hated all wizards passionately. "No... if you knew, why say I worked in the bakery?"

O'ksandr shrugged as if it were unimportant. "I wanted to see if you'd correct me. I figured if you were a snob like all the other wizards, you'd be really pissed to be called a baker's assistant. But you aren't a snob, so I don't care what you do." Then O'ksandr grinned and poked him in the shoulder. "Really, Fai, why would you think I wouldn't know who you are? There really aren't that many blond-haired brats running around the castle and getting into trouble, you know. And I do work in the kitchen: half the kitchen staff practically prays to you every morning; they'll probably build you a mini-shrine at your well or something."

"Oh shut up," Fai grinned, glad to be on familiar territory: he'd had five brothers, he knew bantering. "And since I'm a god, why don't you be a good little human and clean up my mess?"

"Who said I was good? But I'll cut a deal with god: if he helps me peel these potatoes, I'll help him clean up his mess," O'ksandr replied jauntily as he jumped off the counter.

Fai snorted and rolled his eyes. Peeling potatoes was the absolute worst task in the kitchen, except for scrubbing the floors. But he'd do that too if O'ksandr asked him to help. "Yeah, okay."

"Hey god, I'm sure you already know since you're god and all, but you've still got flour on your face." Then Fai felt a warm thumb brush across his cheek, and O'ksandr's face was really quite close, his smile soft and knowing. Then the boy pulled his hand away and grabbed the potatoes. "C'mon, hurry up," he called, walking towards the door.

Fai stared at O'ksandr's back, wondering at the electric shock the touch had sent running down his spine. He'd just touched his face, honestly. It didn't mean anything, Fai scolded himself.

Fai scampered to catch up with the other boy.

Fourteen, Fragment II

It wasn't the last time they touched.

After they'd finished peeling potatoes that day they'd met, O'ksandr had extracted a promise from Fai to visit him in the kitchens often, a promise Fai happily made. Over the next several months, they spent many enjoyable and messy hours combining the cooking styles of Northern Celes and Southern Celes (O'ksandr proudly proclaimed it to be "fusion" cooking and himself to be a visionary cook; Fai proclaimed him to be well on his way to developing a complex as big as Le Grande Chef himself.)

On clear, sunny days, they snuck onto the topmost turret of the castle where they wasted hours stretched out on their backs as they watched lazy clouds drift by, or flat on their stomachs as they leaned over the edge of the turret and spied on the city below with a pair of magically-enhanced binoculars Fai had filched from the magical storehouse.

"They're not that interesting," O'ksandr said one such day. Fai ignored him, so O'ksandr apparently felt justified in taking advantage of Fai's exposed position - half-dangling over the railing, hands full of binoculars - to poke Fai in the ribcage.

Fai twitched reflexively. "You're making them shake," he grumbled, steadying the binoculars so he wouldn't lose his fix on the couple sitting on the bench below. He wanted to see exactly how long the two would stay in their lip lock: so far, they were beating all the previous couples who had used that very same bench for the same purpose. Fai was impressed; maybe they'd come up with a spell so they didn't need oxygen.

O'ksandr lazily flicked a marble at Fai's leg. It bounced off and clattered noisily across the sun-warmed bricks. "You're god. Why do you want to mingle with the earth-bound mortals anyway? They're grumpy, don't like magic, and can't tell the difference between fine pastries and cheap chocolate bread," his tone suggesting that this last grievance was particularly offensive. "Let's play marbles instead."

Fai sighed. He knew that O'ksandr appreciated the intrinsic enjoyment of spying on the unsuspecting, but his friend couldn't understand his obsession with it lately, and he didn't feel particularly inclined to try explaining.

The couple finally broke apart. "Two minutes, thirty-five seconds," Fai announced as he pulled away from the turret's railing reluctantly. He tucked the binoculars back into their fur-lined case with a snap, and then scratched out the previous record of one minute, fifty seconds and wrote in the new time.

"Why does it matter to you so much?" O'ksandr repeated, pinning Fai with a steady gaze. His green eyes glinted and Fai knew that he wouldn't get away without giving him an answer. O'ksandr could be as stubborn as a pit bull with its teeth sunk into a piece of meat when he wanted something.

"You wouldn't understand. You can just stroll down there whenever you like." Fai's tongue felt heavy, and the words tripped out his mouth clumsily. "You can do what you want. I have to stay in this stupid castle and do whatever they tell me. All I can do is watch while everybody else gets to have a life."

"Yeah, I can do what I want - when I'm on break. What do you want to do there that you can't do here?"

Fai's cheeks grew hot and he pretended to be preoccupied with checking the binocular snaps so he had an excuse to break away from O'ksandr's stare. A few heartbeats later, he felt O'ksandr start to grin like a madman as realization set in. "I know what Fai wants," the other boy sang tauntingly, and Fai was about to tell him to shut the hell up when his chin was abruptly tipped upwards. The smoky look in O'ksandr's eyes sent a shiver of anticipation racing down Fai's spine. "You don't need to visit the surface. I'll give you what you want."

Then warm lips covered his. The contact felt so very, very good even when they bumped noses painfully and he was pushed into the railing which was cold against his back and saliva was trickling down his chin.

With a heady rush, Fai understood that all those enjoyable little brushes and bumps he'd received from O'ksandr during their cook-offs weren't accidental, as he'd told himself in an effort to ward off disappointment for when O'ksandr inevitably noticed some pretty serving maid. Except O'ksandr's tongue was now in his mouth and not some girl's, so that cleared that matter up rather nicely for Fai.

Fai dug his fingers into the other boy's shirt possessively. Maybe, just maybe, he had someone he could hold onto this time.

Fourteen, Fragment III

O'ksandr was missing, and no one would tell him why.

Fai stormed out of Le Grande Chef Jean Pierre's kitchen, his fingers twitching with barely-controlled anger, his blue eyes snapping dangerously. The staff tried to stay out of his line of vision, ducking behind counters and baskets as he passed by; they'd heard him actually raise his voice at Le Grande Chef when the chef had refused to give him any answers about his absent apprentice. Fai had never been seen in a bad mood before so no one was quite sure what to expect, but the boy was a wizard and even kind wizards could do terrible things while in a fit.

Fai chewed on his bottom lip fiercely as he pondered his next move. He was aware of the fearful glances he was receiving and knew he would feel guilty about it later, but right now he was too angry to try to hide it. O'ksandr had been gone for three weeks and no one would give him a straight answer about it. Patience and politeness had gotten him nowhere, and he certainly wasn't going to go sit up in his room like a good little boy when his friend – his only friend - could be in serious trouble. Fai's scowl deepened. He knew who would know. He always knew about everything.

The seer lifted his eyes briefly as Fai marched into his sitting room, then took a long, noisy sip from his cup of tea. Dedumil did not offer Fai a seat or a cup of tea, presumably because Dedumil already knew that he would refuse. Skipping the pleasantries was fine with Fai; he wanted to get to the point. Still, it wouldn't do to irritate his tutor, so Fai collected himself with a deep breath and clasped his hands behind his back. "Sir? Please tell me where he is." There. That sounded passably respectful.

Dedumil gave him a measuring glance over the steam wafting from his cup of tea. "I won't tell you. But since I am occasionally a generous man – it's one of my bad traits that I find myself unable to shake – I'll tell you that your friend is safe, and is undoubtedly even now contentedly causing problems in his new home. I managed to find him another position as a cook's apprentice. You were both fortunate that I'm the one who picked up on your little trysts first. You're lucky that truly dangerous asses in this castle have been too preoccupied with some other juicy gossip to have noticed the way you brats have been carrying on these past months."

Hot blood pounded in Fai's temples, and his nails dug into his palms. The old crank-bat had mouthed "trysts" as if he and O'ksandr had been doing something wrong, something dirty. Sure, they'd kissed and done some other stuff, but it was okay to do that with people you cared about, and it certainly wasn't any stuffy nobles or noisy old seer's business. "Sir," Fai said, his voice now sounding quite strained, even to his own ears, "Isn't what we do in our free time our business?"

The seer made a "tsking" noise of disapproval with his tongue and shook his head. "Silly child. It's perfectly fine for your little friend to do as he wishes in his free time, including screwing whomever he likes and causing a nuisance with his noisy marbles – but for you, it's more complicated. You don't have the excuse of having no brains like most of the idiots here, Fai, I thought you'd be more considerate of your friend's safety."

Fai blinked slowly as Dedumil and the cup and room blurred before his eyes, and Fai was dimly aware that he was very, very angry and he knew on some level that he really should calm himself down. "You're saying that I put him in... danger? From whom?"

"Fai... no one will ever truly be safe around you. If you really care about your friend, you ought to be glad he's in a better situation now."

It's not fair, it's not fair, it's not fair! Later, Fai would wonder if he had actually yelled that, or if it just felt like he had because the words had been pounding through his head like bursts of lightning.

But the exploded teacup in Dedumil's hands was all too real. Dedumil arched a white eyebrow up, managing to look nonplussed despite the tea dribbling down his wrinkled face and onto his robes. "From whom, indeed, child," he said quietly.

"I... I didn't mean to," Fai whispered, eyes widening with horror. Little droplets of blood oozed on the seer's face where tiny bits of glass had embedded themselves.

"I know you didn't, and that's what makes it even more worrisome." Dedumil dabbed at his face with handkerchief. "That was one of my favorite cups, but better an antique than my head, I suppose."

"But the tattoo! I thought it was supposed to prevent this!" Panic stirred in Fai's stomach and his palms sweated, his breaths coming fast and frightened.

"Calm down, child." There was steel in Dedumil's voice. He crossed the room and placed a strong, wizened hand on Fai's head, and Fai closed his eyes, anchoring himself to that strength. "Now, listen to me. The tattoo was given to you several years ago. Set spells do not increase in power, but it's obvious that you have. Perhaps we'll have to reinforce it. And the tattoo is designed to keep you from accidentally tapping into your power, not from willfully using it."

Fai shuddered. "You mean..."

"Didn't you want to hurt me, even a little bit? I did separate you from your friend."

Tears sprang to Fai's eyes at the question and he wanted desperately to bury his head into the seer's chest, but the lesson still burned hot and painful in his mind: he wasn't allowed to get close. He broke people.

Fai stepped back, distancing himself from that comforting hand gently. He bowed low, his head dipping towards the floor. "I apologize for my behavior today, sir. I thank you for your advice."

When Fai straightened up, there was a lovely smile on his face, empty and rigid as a porcelain doll's.

It was easier to be a doll than a boy.

-End Part I.

Okay, I hoped you enjoyed it! Praise, constructive criticism, suggestions, etc. are all appreciated. We'll see a lot more of Ashura in the next piece (and Chi, of course.)