Well, I'm back with the second and final chapter. I was really discouraged there for a moment, because I didn't get a single review. (Until lately). Yeah, I know it really hasn't been long, and reviews take time, but it was still terrible. lol
so lots and lots of thanks to susan, who was the only person to review! This update is dedicated to you! (gives cookies)
I don't own Tsubasa, by the way! If I did, then there would be way more KuroFai moments! lol!
"We all have to make a choice. For example, what would you do if we reached your world before the journey is over?"
What would I do? Kurogane wondered. I want to go home, but to leave before the journey was even finished?
"Who knows what bad things could happen if you were gone."
What would happen? What if the group landed in a particularly dangerous world, and Kurogane wasn't there to help them? He didn't want to feel responsible…feel guilty…for their deaths. He would never allow it. The kid protected the princess, and Kurogane felt the need to protect the kid. Syaoran didn't know everything—he definitely wasn't ready to fight off the most formable foes, not until Kurogane taught him how. He'd protect the kid and the princess whenever the time arose.
And Fai?
The guy could probably take care of himself in battle, Kurogane was sure of that. But what he really had to protect Fai from…was Fai himself.
So the question was, would he return to his own world when he was responsible for protecting all these people? He couldn't just leave them unprotected, could he?
Kurogane growled to himself. Now Fai was making him worry about this too.
"Hello, Kuro-wanwan!" Fai greeted him cheerfully.
Kurogane's eyes shot up to see the mage, soaked, standing over him. Due to this fact, the blonde was also dripping all over him.
Kurogane maneuvered off the couch and out of the way of the dripping. "Get out of here! You're dripping all over the place!"
"Hmph! First Kuro-bin says 'come inside before you get sick' and now Kuronpi says 'get out!' How indecisive of you!" He smiled mischievously and shook his head wildly, flinging his hair around and whipping Kurogane with more drops of cold water.
"GAH!" Kurogane couldn't help but yell. "Get dry, you dumb bastard!"
"Tsk, Kuro-sama, you have such a dirty mouth! It's a bad example for the children!" Fai scolded before finally trotting off to his room.
Kurogane growled something rather impolite under his breath, but didn't give an audible response.
The next morning, Kurogane watched as Fai greeted them, but walked past them all, heading for the door. The ninja frowned.
He either has a lot to think about, Kurogane thought, or he's just really attached to those birdies.
He then shook his head roughly. Birds! Not birdies! God, I swear if I spend too much longer with that damn mage, I'll…
"Kurogane-san, are you okay?" Sakura asked worriedly.
Kurogane stared at her. "Uh, yeah, I'm fine."
"Oh…sorry… It's just…you looked really…disgusted…a second ago."
"Ha! Probably because I was thinking about that damn mage!"
"Oooooooh!" Mokona cooed from Sakura's shoulder. "Kurogane thinks about Fai all the time! He must be in loooooove!"
"SHUT UP!"
"And Kurogane doesn't deny it!" Mokona cried excitedly. "Kurogane and Fai, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!"
Kurogane took a second to figure out what Mokona had spelled. "K-I-S…—WHAT?!"
Mokona giggled. "First comes love, then comes marriage…"
"I DO NOT LOVE THAT STUPID, MORONIC, IDIOTIC WIZARD!" Kurogane roared, grabbing the manjuu. "I WILL SEND YOU STRAIGHT TO HELL, WHERE YOU BELONG!"
"Wai! Kurogane is being mean to Mokona! Mokona is scared! Just because Mokona said the truth!"
"IT IS NOT THE TRUTH, YOU DAMN MANJUU!"
"Don't worry, Kurogane, no one will blame you if you want to kiss Fai!"
"WHA?! GAK!" Kurogane dropped Mokona on the floor. "I THINK I AM SERIOUSLY GOING TO THROW UP!"
"Don't deny it, Kurogane! Mokona knows that Kurogane's heart goes doki doki whenever Fai is around!"
Kurogane grabbed the first sharp object he saw—a knife from the kitchen. "I…am…going…to…EAT YOU!"
Mokona began to giggle wildly, running away as Kurogane stormed after him.
Fai happily bounced back to the tree. "Ohh, Takara-kun, Yumi-chan, Akira-kun, Hiroshi-kun! I'm back!" He stopped short of the tree, realizing out of the corner of his eyes that he had almost stepped on something. Looking down, his eyes widened.
"Oh no…," he breathed, kneeling down and picking up the dead baby bird. "Takara-kun…"
The little bird's body was almost completely crushed, twisted in a grotesque frenzy of half-grown feathers and pink skin. What could have happened? Did he fall from the nest?
Fai looked up to the nest. It wasn't directly above them, so… He then noticed that he heard no cheeping from the nest. That was weird. The babies were never silent.
Almost as if they had heard his thoughts, birds began to peep. But the peeping was not coming from the nest. Fai looked to the sky, seeing three tiny violet birds zooming about. So they had finally learned to fly.
Fai frowned down at Takara. "You weren't ready for that yet," he said sadly. "But you didn't want to be left alone, did you?" He set the body down carefully. "I understand, I don't really like being alone either. He sighed and watched the other flying birds. "Just because you have wings doesn't mean you can fly."
Kurogane strode outside, satisfied. Once he had finally gotten his hands on Mokona, he had stretched the manjuu bun a good few times, all the while telling him that he was damn lucky that he didn't really want to eat him. Mokona would probably only give him indigestion, after all…
He walked over to what he now referred to as "That Damn Mage's Tree". He was about to call up, but stopped when he notice something near the base of the tree. It was a mound of dirt covered in flowers. One of the birds must have died, Kurogane realized. Suddenly, as he was staring at the mound, he was reminded of something.
-Flashback-
"Mother, I don't get it. What's wrong with the birdy? Why won't it move?" a three-year-old Kurogane asked, poking at the unmoving bird. "Aren't birdies supposed to fly away when I come near them?"
His mother frowned down at the bird. "That bird is dead, Kurogane. It means that the bird is gone forever."
"That sounds really horrible," Kurogane said. "But I don't get it… How can he be gone forever? He's right here."
His mother sighed, wondering how she should explain this. "Well, honey, when someone dies, it just means that they move to heaven. Their bodies stay here, but their souls go to heaven."
"What's heaven?" Kurogane asked. "Can I visit the birdy there?"
"No, Kurogane, heaven is a place where only dead people can go. When someone goes there, you can never see them again. But heaven is a wonderful place where everyone is happy. So when someone dies, you have to remember that they went to a much better place, and that they're happy now."
Kurogane frowned. "I don't like that. I don't want to never ever see someone again." He clung to his mother's skirt and gazed up to her face. "Don't ever die, Mother. I'd miss you lots."
His mother smiled at him. "Your mother will be around for many more years to come." She didn't bother telling him that even she would die eventually. He was too young for that. "And so will you, Kurogane."
Kurogane huffed. "Good."
"Why don't you help me bury the bird? When someone dies, we bury then and put flowers on the top."
Kurogane didn't really understand this, but since his mother knew everything, he nodded. "Okay."
-End Flashback-
"Takara-kun tried to fly, but he fell."
Kurogane looked up to see Fai perched on a branch, watching a now empty nest. "Are you okay?" he found himself asking.
"I feel sad for him," Fai answered, smiling at him.
Kurogane glared. "That's what you get for naming them."
Fai's gaze drifted. "I suppose you're right."
Kurogane grabbed the branch nearest to him and pulled himself up. He climbed up a few branches so he'd be able to face the mage. "…That thing is in a better place now, you know."
Fai stared at him quizzically for a long time.
"You know. Heaven."
Fai's eyebrows creased. "Hummmm…"
Kurogane glared at him again. "Don't you tell me that you don't know about heaven."
Fai looked introspective for a long moment as he thought about it. His eyebrows shot up in realization. "Oh! Right! Heaven. I nearly forgot."
"Forgot? How the hell do you forget about something like that?"
"Well now, I had heard about it a really long time ago… And I hadn't really heard about it since. But, yes, I remember now…" He pointed to the sky and made a circular motion with his finger. "Angels and such, right?"
Kurogane nodded slowly. "Yeah, I guess."
Fai nodded to himself. "I thought so." He glanced back at Kurogane, who was staring at him as if he had just sprouted another head. "Kuro-pyu? What's wrong?"
"You seriously haven't heard much about heaven," Kurogane stated, shaking his head.
Fai smiled. "You'll have to forgive me, Kuro-chi, but I don't really believe in it all that much. And about me not hearing much about it? Well, all I've really heard about was hell."
Kurogane chewed on this for a moment. "You don't believe in heaven…"
"Well, for Takara-kun, sure."
Kurogane frowned. Now he understood. "But not for yourself."
Fai closed his eyes and smiled brightly. "What about you, Kuro-muu? Do you think you'll end up in heaven?"
"How am I supposed to know?" Kurogane growled. "But at least I believe that there's another choice other than hell."
Fai shrugged. "Who knows?"
Kurogane leaned up against the trunk of the tree.
"But that would be nice, ne? If the journey ended, we could all meet again in heaven," Fai said wistfully. "If we all made it that far."
Kurogane sensed something ominous in his words. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Fai paused, slightly frowning. "It just means that you and the others might just have to have a happy reunion in heaven without me."
"Why? Because you're sure that you're going straight to hell when you die?" Kurogane asked angrily.
Fai shook his head vaguely. "No, not necessarily. But if…if the person in my world ever wakes up…and…and ever catches me… He'll make sure I never make it to heaven."
Kurogane shot him a confused look. "How the hell—?"
Fai smiled at him once again. "He has his ways, Kuro-pin. If it were his will, I would not go heaven or hell. Though I also would not be able to stay among the living. He'd force me to spend the rest of eternity alone."
Kurogane glared to himself. The more he heard about this Ashura guy, the more he was sure that he would hate him. "That's why you're not going to let him catch you."
"Yes, being caught would put me in a rather precarious position," Fai replied with a laugh. "But I suppose I can still have…" He trailed off, not sure how to finish his sentence.
"Hope," Kurogane finished for him.
Fai smiled at him. "Yes. We do have that."
END
Thank you for reading. I'd really LOVE it if I got some reviews! I'll be posting something else I wrote (not sure what yet) sometime this week. Now, what to post...
