It was only four thirty, but it was so dark the street lamps had been turned on and it was getting harder and harder for Kurogane to continue looking for Fai. Kurogane was getting desperate.
"Fai!" He screamed running down the emptying streets, "Fai! Excuse me Sir, have you seen Fai?" He grabbed at a passerby who shook his head, alarmed and not understanding the irate teen.
"Dammit!" Kurogane leaned against a wall breathing heavily and receiving some odd looks from people on the street.
He felt his eyes prickle and a headache was forming. Where was Fai? Kurogane knew his friend wouldn't just run off and leave him there like that
Feeling increasingly at a loss, Kurogane ran to Fai's home.
Chi opened her door quickly, frightened by the vicious banging lain upon it.
"Kurogane?" she cried on opening it and seeing the teen. "Where is Fai?"
"I don't know! I thought he might be here."
"Come in, come in and tell me everything."
Kurogane did as he was told. After he told Chi, she called the police. Being a sleepy little town, there was only one police station and the only officer who worked full time was the sergeant. The small police force were concerned and set out a search squad, but Kurogane knew that being only a few people, they would not cover much land.
Fai was missing all night.
Kurogane lay in bed tossing and turning. Had someone taken Fai? But why? Their community was small and everyone knew everyone else, if not by name then at least by sight. There was no danger in their little town.
Kurogane got up and dressed, unable to sleep while his best friend was out somewhere in the cold, maybe injured and unconscious.
Kurogane looked all night. He walked out of the village and called all around their wilderness, but Fai was not found.
When the pale sun finally peeked over the horizon bathing the valley in light, Kurogane was sitting alone and freezing in the snow, tear tracts on his face.
His was exhausted and cold and frightened.
"Fai is gone," he whispered, "Fai is gone!"
He watched the sun as it peeped through the mountains and suddenly a thought occurred to him; what of Fai had been taken beyond the mountains? What if, in the first time of the town's history, the safety of the village had been compromised?
Kurogane stood, feeling stronger, his eyes narrowed suspiciously.
No one could walk through the mountains, it was too dangerous.
They would need a sled, and a sled would be noticed or at least leave marks. Kurogane looked around, trying to spot a weakness in the mountains and that's when he saw it.
To the east, as the sun rose slowly, a stream of light ran across the clear snow, its track not hindered by any rock of mountain piece.
"There is a path," he thought staring at the unbroken stream of light, "it is small and slim and in our safety we have become idle and not noticed it. Maybe the little path has been slowly growing more over the years as the weather has eroded away at the rocks. If anyone was going to enter, or leave, with relative ease, that would be the way."
Without thinking of food or clothing, only of Fai, Kurogane ran to the stream of light of the east.
His chest rattled from being out all night, and his body hurt, but he would not let that slow him down. When he arrived at the stream of light he stepped into it; the warmth of the sun was weak but definitely there much like his feeling of hope. Getting down on one knee he brushed away at the new, soft snow that had fallen through his night of fear and anguish. Sure enough, underneath the fresh layer old snow had hardened, and within that hardened snow were the tell-tale tracks of a sled, one track going in, and another to show that it also must have left.
Someone had snuck into their valley, and it could not be coincidence that now Fai was missing. Then something confirmed his fears, in the distance, Kurogane saw something glinting in the sunlight. Running towards it, he saw that it was a piece of gold caught onto the rocks at the base of the first great mountain, or rather not a piece of gold, but a lock of golden hair. As he plucked it from its trap he pulled off his gloves and felt it with his fingers before bringing it to his nose; it was soft and fine and smelt vaguely of primrose. He had felt that texture and taken in that scent many times over the years when he had Fai sitting in his lap and brushing his head against Kurogane's face. It was Fai's hair.
Kurogane pocketed the hair and with a brief look back at the village, began to follow the direction of the sled tracks.
As he walked into the shadow of the mountain he felt a sense of dread. Never before had he left the confines of his valley, but Fai was more important than his safety.
Inside the mountains was very dark. The snow was much harder and ice was everywhere. Where the snow in his town was pretty and gentle, this ice and snow seemed deadly and sneaking and wicked. Even worse was the fact that while his path was lit by the soft sun, it was still very tight and extremely claustrophobic.
Gulping, Kurogane turned to his side and began to carefully ease his way through it, careful die to the ice on the ground and the harsh pointed rocks that where all about him. All it would take was one false step, one little slip, and he would be dead and likely, no one would ever find him. Even worse would be that Fai would then be all alone.
He frowned in determination and pressed on. He would make it for Fai.
Kurogane thought about Fai during that dark time, he remembered Fai's face, how slim Fai felt in his arms, how he could feel the boy's bones. It was a bit annoying at times and Kurogane would gripe and say that he needed to gain weight. Of course, Fai would always laugh in response and call him some stupid nickname, distorting his noble name into something cute and cuddly, suited only for a little girl or teddy bear or a fluffy pet.
"I feel like I'm his pet," he thought, "like a faithful dog perhaps."
A sudden wind blew through the mountain, making him gasp in shock and shiver terribly. The mountains seemed to trap the wind within them, every gust was cold and hard and painful, picking up bits of ice and dust and blowing it harshly into his face and eyes.
"I can get through this, and I will get through this! I just need to keep following the sun." He looked down and saw the sled tracks. He wondered at it. How did the sled get through? Surely it was too tight? Just walking through the mountains was making him feel ill, as if it were difficult to breath. It was so dark he could barely see and the ground was very dangerous. Surely some kind of magic had to be involved in getting the sled in and out. But of course that raised the question of why. Why would someone go through all the effort of sneaking into their unknown valley and stealing away a beautiful and talented, but relatively ordinary boy?
"Something is going on here," he thought, "but as long as Fai is safe and I get him home, everything else can go to hell."
Kurogane trudged through the snow, squeezing himself through tight corners, for two hours, before he finally made it to the other side.
The sun was high in the sky now; it was noon. He had been travelling since the night before, and after his terrible time in the mountains, he collapsed onto the snow, almost weeping, but not quite, because Kurogane never cried.
He stood breathing for a few moments. The sun was out and the snow was gone, but he knew that it wouldn't be long until it returned. So with a heavy sigh he ignored his screaming bones and red hot muscles and continued to walk, pressing Fai's image into his mind.
He was doing this for Fai.
And Fai was worth it and so much more.
The landscape was completely white, so much so that he actually felt at times that he was going blind. So he focused his gaze on the horizon, where deep blue met the stark whiteness. The unreachable horizon became his goal, the thing his weary mind singled all its concentration on. The sled marks were very faint, the previous snow having almost wiped them out. They would no doubt vanish completely should the snow return again. He had to press on, he had to follow now, before it was too late. The kidnappers had hours, possibly at least a day ahead of him. He was a single man walking, they had a sled. He would have to keep going if he wanted any chance of catching up with them.
His breath was raspy and his lungs were burning. He kept coughing. His ears ached terribly, even though they were wrapped up in his hat and the hood of his large coat, and sound seemed strange, almost as if his ears were clogged up with water. As he walked he could feel that he was swaying slightly, through exhaustion and the bullying wind which whipped him about mercilessly as it did the flakes of snow on the ground. The weather was so cold, he felt like he was being bitten all over, nipped by some malicious force or atmosphere from which he couldn't escape.
It was then that the sun vanished, covered by a thick white cloud that had sneakily taken over the entire expanse of the sky, making the sky and the ground a uniform white.
Kurogane closed his eyes for a moment, trying not to be horrified or frightened or overcome by misery.
And then the snow began to fall.
There were no more sled tracks thanks to it, so he had no clue as to whether he was going in the correct direction or not. However, he couldn't go back, not now, not without Fai.
"If I have to," his exhausted but defiant thoughts bit out, "if I have to, I will walk to the ends of the earth, turn around come back to the foot of the mountains outside my valley, and walk again in a new direction. If I am walking till I die, then that's what I'll do. I will not let someone take away Fai. I will not. If there is no Fai..." he blinked, his eyes arid and sore, "then my life is over anyway."
Pulling his scarf over his mouth and nose, he could feel the material becoming wet, both from his breath and from the snow. In irritation he pulled the scarf away, sucking in deeply from the pain of the cold slicing at his jaw and pouring down his mouth and up into his nose.
He had forgotten in his content life with his best friend and sisters back home, that the cold can hurt.
He was walking blind now. The snow and the uniform white was affecting his sense of space and time. He felt like he couldn't see. He raised one of his hands to look at his dark blue glove, to give himself the feeling that he was real, he wasn't just an entity feeling agony and solitude, that he was simply a man lost in a snow storm. Kurogane felt his leaden arm being lifted to his face. With the heavy snow fall, he could barely see it.
"Oh goddess," he thought, "am I really going blind? This will make looking for Fai harder! And if I do find him, would he want to be friends with me? I'm nothing but a blind man, he would feel indebted to me...he will feel guilty..." A small part of him knew the panicked thoughts were nonsense, that of course Fai would love him no matter what, but that logical side of him was too deeply buried in his panic and misery.
The sides of his vision began to go black, the whiteness slowly dimming.
Somewhere he realised that he was dying, and though he screamed and cursed himself for not finding his best friend, for failing once again, another part of him was secretly relieved when the world tilted sideways and he collapsed into the snow.
Kurogane was dead.