Chapter 10 Brothers

Hatori ran one trembling hand through his midnight hair; with the other he plugged a cigarette between his lips. He was exhausted. And in spite of his best efforts he was going to lose his patient. His heart broke at the thought and his knees wobbled, unable to stop his spent body he fell into the wall and then rested wearily as he took a long drag on his cigarette.

For the past several days he had struggled mightily to forestall deaths rapid approach to the honke. He cut into his patient's body with all the skill afforded to him from the privileged institution, which he had attended. His hands had been sure, his fingers swift as bone fragments were removed from the punctured lung. He'd stitched the torn organ with a light hand and sewn the wound closed with a finesse the finest surgeons in the land would have envied; but to no avail.

In the end it wasn't the broken rib or the torn lung, the fractured arm or large lurid bruises that would claim his patient. It wasn't the infection of old wounds left to fester and neglected for too long that seeped unnoticed by a worn doctor into his patient's bloodstream. It was the spirit, beaten too hard, driven too far that had retreated to a place Hatori could not reach. The spirit was broken. All that could be done by medical science had been done. The will to live was what was missing.

With Hatori was one other. Upon the floor at his patient's bedside, a form with sorrow and despair written in his long elegant lines draped two lean arms over the still and silent form beneath the bedclothes.

Aya's pale skin was white as snow, his face drawn and gaunt in grief. Eyes that normally sparkled with irrepressible mischief and delight were dead of all light. Aya just sat at the bedside. Tears ran from ducts that should have been long dry. He did not sob. He did not cry out. Tears simply fell. Hatori was helpless to aid his friend, especially when his own heart echoed the tragic sentiment evident in Ayame's pain.

A rattling breath, a simple exhalation of air pierced the tomblike silence, letting both doctor and brother know, Yuki still lived.

Akito was inconsolable in her grief. Shigure was locked up with her at that very moment attempting to calm her, as he had been since she discovered what her rage had done.

When Akito discovered Yuki had again ventured to the cat house against her orders she went crazy. Weeping hysterically she beat Yuki with a vengeance. As usual Yuki did not fight back.

She was his God.

He loved her beyond reason even as his heart stilled in terror thinking of her.

She struck his unguarded chest, already covered in bruises. He had fallen to his knees. She beat his back bloody until the cane she favored snapped in half. She then rained blow after blow upon his crumpled form, kicking him, crying out all the while at what she deemed his betrayal.

In her mad frenzy she stomped on his ribcage. There was an audible snap unlike anything Yuki had yet experienced. He found to his horror he was barely able to breathe and unable to move or speak so piercing was the pain. When he stopped moving Akito stormed out.

Hatori's heart ached as he imagined Yuki's terror, left alone, in the dark all night, lying in the blood that poured from his mouth with each tiny hiccupping wheeze. He was left there in his own blood and pain until Akito returned to him, calm after her rage, perhaps feeling somewhat guilty.

When Akito returned to Yuki the next day she turned white at the evidence of her brutality. Yuki lay comatose in a puddle of his own blood. He was unresponsive. Akito, panic-stricken ran the length of the Honke to get Hatori herself. When Akito felt such panic every member of the Juunishi felt it. Hatori was halfway to her side when she found him. Unable to speak clearly se merely said the name.

"Yuki!" Hatori immediately called a nurse to bring him his emergency medical supply bag even as he sprinted at his God's side to the place where Yuki lay. His face became a cool mask even as he cringed inside at what Akito had done. He gently turned the young man to his side and began inspecting the damage.

"Akito please, use your power to keep him in his human form." Hatori requested briskly. Akito nodded barely able to speak. Moments later Shigure and Ayame appeared. Shigure took one look at Yuki and immediately swept Akito into his embrace as if to shield her from the sight of the damage she had caused. Ayame saw his baby brother and cried out at the sight of his brutalized form.

"Yuki!" His name was a prayer and a requiem of shock and despair. He leapt to his brother's side ready to scoop his fragile, broken body into his arms and heal him with all the strength in him.

"Aya! No!" Hatori shouted. He thrust himself between the grief stricken brother and his patient. Ayame's arms flew past him as he struggled to move through Hatori.

"Let me go Tori! Yuki is in desperate need of my strength!" His eyes were glued to the still form of his brother. He shoved Hatori away, but the doctor easily wrestled him to the side. Enraged, eyes blinded with tears Ayame made a fist and attempted to strike the offending doctor out of the way. Hatsuharu who had just arrived stared numbly at Yuki from the doorway.

"Hatsuharu, help me restrain him! If he moves Yuki he may very well kill him!" Hatsuharu raised eyes glazed with panicked tears to Hatori before pulling Ayame aside as if he were no more than a rag doll. Ayame fell backwards into Hatsuharu's arms, his eyes never leaving his brother. Hatori grasped Ayame's head between his hands forcing the man to look up into his eyes and away from the copse-like stillness of his fallen sibling.

"Aya! Aya! Listen to me! Listen to me dammit. If you don't your brother is going to die!" Hatori didn't know the extent of Yuki's internal injuries, but he was fairly certain the damage was bad, he was not certain they were fatal, but unless Ayame calmed down enough to let him check, he wouldn't know.

Ayame looked into Hatori's eyes. His arms went slack so Hatsuharu released him. Ayame remained slumped on the floor, his head locked between the doctor's hands. He raised his arms slowly and grasped the doctor's wrists in his hands. He stared deep into Hatori's eyes.

"Tori! Tori please… save him! You must Tori, you must save my brother Yuki. For I love him so you see and…" Ayame's eyes slid away from Hatori to briefly look at his brother before returning to Hatori's gaze so sure and strong, "…he has not forgiven me yet. Please Tori, make him well!"

"I'll do what I can Aya, but you must stay calm and allow me to do my work." Ayame nodded mutely. Satisfied he had his cooperation Hatori rose to his feet and returned to Yuki's side. His nurse arrived and that was when it began. For twelve hours Hatori worked on Yuki. He gave him fluids, he sewed him up, he checked his injuries, and bathed him. But the antibiotics were not strong enough and Yuki was allergic to the stronger kind, which swelled his bronchial tubes causing him to asphyxiate.

That had been three days ago. If Yuki's will were just a little bit stronger he might be able to pull out of it but with all he had been through Hatori doubted Yuki had any desire to live left in him.

Now, they all merely waited for death.

Haru sat mute on the porch stoop, unable to look at Yuki, so swollen, and helpless, and dying, unable to leave. Rin sat at his side unable to console him, unwilling to leave. It was the most open about her feelings she had been since before Akito had shoved her out the second story window.

Aya had not spoken a word since his desperate plea to Hatori to save his little brother. Hatori finished his cigarette, flicking the bud carelessly into the grass. He slowly advanced toward Ayame's crumpled form.

"Aya," He began. Ayame's hands, which had been gently stroking the air above Yuki's porcelain cheek, stilled but otherwise he showed no reaction to Hatori's presence. "Aya, I'm sorry. I can't…" His voice stilled unable to move past the lump in his throat. He coughed, clearing his throat. He tried again "I can't… save him." Ayame remained motionless for a heartbeat, and then resumed his tender ministrations. "Aya, whatever you want to say to him… it would be best if you said it soon. He may not respond. But he may hear you." Ayame ignored him and finally Hatori turned and walked away unable to hold in his own sorrow any longer. He left the building and rounded the corner. He put his face into the side of the small house and opened his mouth wide in a silent scream, the force of his feelings nearly bringing him to his knees. Air blew from his mouth in a rush of raw sorrow.

The concrete, cool beneath his palms became washed in the warm brine of his despair. He heaved again, an expiation of air in that guttural quiet cry made by men unused to showing their emotions but unable to restrain them in such times. He pressed his cheek to the cool cement and wept like a child.

Ayame rested his cheek lightly on Yuki's cool hand. There were several monitors connected to his tiny brothers delicate form and wires criss crossed paths beneath his bedclothes and above his skin. The sound of soft beeps alerted him to Yuki's slow vitals. They were weak.

Aya smiled sadly. An expression never meant to alight upon his features.

His soul was dead.

When Yuki died he would take with him the light inside Ayame's own heart. Without Yuki's tentative smile, without his angry glances, without those fleeting instances of connection made and lost in the transition of one moment to the next when Aya felt so close to redemption that he teetered upon the brink of elation and wonder, Ayame would be empty. Color and light and hope. These were the embodiments of his baby brother. And now he was dying. Sadness was too trite a word for what Ayame felt.

"I will go with you, little brother." Ayame whispered tenderly. "I will follow you into darkness that you will no longer be alone." Ayame wept heated tears upon Yuki's hand as he spoke gently, staring intently at the brother he loved. "I made a mistake- that time, when I was young. You needed me and I walked away. You did not exist for me. I remember what I did to you. I watched in shame from the shadows, I even passed you by many times. You never reached for me again. I wanted to be the kind of brother who would love you. I wanted to be loved by you. I wanted…" Ayame paused lost in thought. His heart was so full of feelings he could not find the right words. " I wanted forgiveness." His hand reached out to push back a silver hair from his brother's face then he wrapped his arms around Yuki's arm and cried.

Aya had never been there for Yuki when he was small. He resolved that his brother would not be alone in death. It was the job of big brothers to take care of the little brothers that came after them. Ayame stood. He knew where Tori kept the narcotic pain medication. He always put it in the false bottom of the leather satchel he used for emergencies. Aya pulled out a bottle of what he needed. Mechanically he moved to pour himself a glass of water. He took half the contents of the bottle letting the rest fall to the floor. His hair trailed behind him a silver cloud as he returned to his brother's side. Aya smiled and as gently as he could, climbed into the bed beside his brother.

With the utmost reverence and tenderness he wrapped his slender arms around Yuki, lay his head next to his brother's so he could feel his hair soft against his cheek and waited for death to come.

"I love you Yuki." He whispered softly. He closed his eyes. "I will always be there for you. I'll never leave you again." Ayame hoped the others would understand. He felt a twinge of worry for Hatori but the weight of his brother resting in his arms soon dispelled that.

Time continued slipping by. One moment disappeared into the next. His thoughts were becoming blurry. Aya opened his eyes one last time, almost immediately they tried closing again. He kissed his brothers hair, squeezing him one final time.

"Yuki… I'm sorry…"