Disclaimer : All characters and places belong to Konami.

A/N: To anyone who's reading this, let me start off by saying I'm quite proud of how this turned out and that I hope I conveyed the message as thorough as possible. While I doubt this will garner any reviews, feedback is much appreciated.

What Goes Unheard

"I tend to live in the past because most of my life is there."
-- Herb Caen

When Kaori Yae cuts herself off from society, time comes to a grinding halt. It waits for no one, but in this world -- her world -- time is non-existent. There is no such law that bounds time to universal theorems or philosophical conundrums.

Here, she is free. Here, she is one with nature.

It is her world and hers alone. She, Kaori Yae, the sole inhabitant. She, the synchronous device of thoughtful quiet. She, and no one else.

Only peace.

(Ah, but peace is a fragile thing. An idea wishful and whimsical, irregularly structured and founded on obselete, utopian principles. You can never hope for a true state of mind or absolute Zen when you know pure, unadulterated, global peace is unobtainable.

(Kaori knows this. She knows this because it is an inevitable equation from adolescence long past, that period in time when innocence was at its most beautiful, a most unique etiquette adults tend to shed like a second skin. Business, pleasure, fame, fortune; the pieces of a dream lost to a hard-working, fast-paced reality.

(But this is not the reality she wants to escape from. This is not the reality she wants to avoid.)

She breathes in: The damp grass. The still lake. The tree bark. The cherry blossoms. The air. Fresh, crisp, nurturing, life giving--

(It runs much deeper than that.)

--breathe out.

She lays spreadeagle among the greenery, viridian portals framed by pink tresses staring beyond the blue ether of the sky, beyond the shapeless mass of clouds and midday sunshine.

She stares, and is swept away by nature's sonata. The tender whisper of rustling leaves. The blunt croak of frogs. The rising pitch of mating cicadas. The sigh of rolling grass.

A flock of birds wing across the sun, their shadows phantom shapes passing along the hill. It takes but a second for her vision to be obscured and another for light to return. Blinding, golden light. Beautiful dust motes floating to eternity.

Sakura petals fall around her, their journey coming to an end.

The sun is warm on her face.

'But I do not wish to see the light.'

A lone petal drifts lazily in the air.

'I can't bring myself to face it.'

It draws closer, closer, ever closer.

'Because there is no tomorrow.'

It spins. Once, twice, thrice.

'And even if there was, what would become of it?'

The wind picks up, but the petal refuses to be swayed.

'They will only hurt me.'

It settles over her heart. She is not surprised it doesn't break.

'I don't want that to happen again.'

(But it already is.)

This is her world. Her world and hers alone. No one is allowed. They are not welcome here. It is her sanctuary, her haven, her home, her secret. No one will ever know.

Because she is safe.

Because she is distant.

And it will save her.

'I don't want it to happen again.'

It will save her.

'But it won't,' murmurs a voice; familiar, unfamiliar, dissimilar, same, and different. A voice when innocence was at its most beautiful, a most unique etiquette shed like a second skin. A voice that is her own. 'It won't save you.'

'I am safe. I am free. I am one with nature.'

I'm safe here.

Kaori doesn't acknowledge the tears sliding sideways down her face.