(please excuse any random switching of Pein and Pain in these drabbles O_o; I have friends who use both or either)
disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, and I make no profit from fanficcin'.
drabble #2 -- rating: (T) for implied sexuality
all the king's men; forever and never together again
It's after the apocalypse, and there are flowers in the air.
Bits of flowers, specifically; ash lilies and ash dandelions that drift in the upwelling currents of heat.
The world is on fire.
The dust is in Konan's hair.
Grey and black sprinkle her, as she walks through the forests, where the trees are tall and the leaves are green, and it's nothing like Amegakure; nothing like home. But now, everywhere is home.
She finds Pain waiting for her, with his eyes lowered.
And she tries to speak, but fails to know what to say.
"It's almost over," he says.
Time is short.
Almost over. Beginning, ending. Everywhere and nowhere. Life and death. All these absolutes. It is after the apocalypse – the second apocalypse, that is. She remembers the first. Hanzou. Red flames licking up the black sky; blurry white stars tinted.
"It's almost over," he says, but she knows how it really ends.
"Your body," she says.
Your lifespan. Your health.
She reaches up to wipe the death from her hair, and he turns to look at her. Your body: her phrasing. It truly is, now.
They are going to the heart of the inferno; to hell itself. They will self-immolate, if they cannot stand the blaze.
All the sadness of Nagato's life on his face, stone still – drips down, fades away, the shadow and the ghost. His eyes are hard, rippling madly, like that day. Like ever. And she thinks, with a pang, to see those eyes, and to know what he goes through, but.
They do not talk about these things. They do not talk about the deaths. Or the fires. Pain extends his hand. Konan crosses the distance in one stride, two, four.
The beginning of the end could be the paradox or the truth. She isn't sure.
He isn't sure. Even though he's bringing the world down with assurances, and with power. He isn't sure.
And the orphans in the woods; his fingers, spread, and she takes his hand: grazes his ring with her thumbnail.
"I'm not done," he tells her. "Not until all the strong countries have been brought down to their knees."
"I know," she says.
"Not until I control the war."
Control the world; peace through suffering, rule all. She's heard, and the concentric circles seem to ripple outward. She watches him breathe out. He pretends, sometimes, not to breathe, or bleed.
They make love in the open, because no one will see them, and this is their world.
Anxious, tinged with desperation that he will not speak of; they shed their cloaks and make a bed of them on the forest floor. She kisses inside his thighs while he lies back.
"It will never be over," he says, just as her mouth hovers over him.
And she is surprised to hear it.
"I've known that for a long time, Nagato," she admits, quietly, relaxes her throat, and takes him between her lips.
She's on top for this round, so her back curves sharply and her toes curl, and her rhythm is graceful; a languid up and down that quickens with their need. There's something of an apology to it, but she won't have that. "I chose this," she reminds him, in as much as she can speak.
It will never be over. The beginning and the ending; not until Pain tears himself to pieces to exhaust all his hatred, but Konan will go with him. She fears nothing: she has always been in pieces.
Afterwards, he pulls her down, grounds the angel, and they lie together, wide-eyed, in the forest at the end of the earth, where the last birds sing in the last trees.
The world quietens as they quieten, in the realization that it's not enough. It's still not enough.
"There isn't the peace I wanted, yet," he says, and when she kisses him, she tastes how dry his mouth is.
Sees the blankness in his eyes, and knows.
There is no peace.
There never was.
There never will be.
He rises first. Dresses again, and prepares to go – to seek further destruction and retaliation. She looks on and knows she will be joining him soon. They will go together.
Some kind of peace, she thinks, with a shaking fist; some kind of peace, in between the spaces of moments, in the more fragile corners of their lives, in their memories, but it will be over soon. And it will never be over. Paradox, maybe.
The angel finds her wings, lifts beyond the last birds in the last trees. It's only a matter of time before the fires do to her paper flower what they have done to the real ones.
It is their world. Together, they will go to pieces.