Himura Kenshin | 緋村 剣心 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
crosstobear) wrote2012-09-12 10:37 pm
crosstobear) wrote2012-09-12 10:37 pm
(no subject)
You can barely feel anything. You can barely hear anything. You can barely see anything.
It’s snowing, the first snow of the year. Flakes land on the exposed skin of your chest, melting immediately; it adds to your own sweat, but you don’t notice it at all. You can’t feel it or see it clearly anyway. Flakes land in your open wounds, the coolness undoubtedly causing some relief to the angry, hot, torn flesh oozing blood, but even if you could feel it, it would be unimportant in this moment.
You must protect, even if you will die in the process. You must ensure her happiness in the era you’ve helped bring about. Numb hands grip the hilt of your katana and you’re ready. You’re ready.
Live on in the new era, and be happy...
You’ve come to this place to bring her back, even if she is your eminent downfall.
...Perhaps love is sharper and more dangerous than a blade after all.
But it doesn’t matter. The last barrier is this old soldier before you, keeping you from her. You raise your blade, blood of those you’ve already killed running down the steel in little rivers of crimson, and rush him. Your eyes are closed since you can’t see anyway; all that matters is your will to finish this. It must be stronger than anything else. Even if you die, you must succeed.
The sword swings down, ripping past fabric, tearing into skin-
That scent...white plum...
-sluicing so easily through muscle, crunching, cracking bones, a horrible cacophony of death as the steel, sharpened even more by your intention, continues to drive through that mass of flesh and fat and everything that keeps a body together, you cleave it all as a butcher does the animal-
But it’s not white plum, no...no it’s different now...
-and blood gushes out, so hot and thick as it hits your face and your clothing and the snow on the ground where it sizzles and still you press down on your blade, you must finish the job, and finally, finally, at the end of your swing, the sword pulls free of your kill moving faster and feeling so much lighter now that there is no resistance.
You’ve done it. You’ve ended it. You’ve killed. You’ve murdered.
But this time it’s wrong. This isn’t the same nightmare you’ve relived over and over and over again since the day it happened.
You tear your eyes open, regardless of the blood dripping down into them (is it your blood? is it theirs?) and stare at your gruesome work.
The old soldier is dead. That is good.
...But so is-
-no this isn’t right, this isn’t what happened-
Blood soaks into the snow around her body, rapidly dying it such a rich, deep red, steam rising from it all.
-I can’t have killed the second woman I ever loved-
It’s still so cold and you’re still numb, though most of it is no longer from just the cold, and you can’t hold back the tears that drop onto her face. But you have to pull her into your lap (when you fell to your knees and abandoned your sword, you don’t know) and you start to, but oh gods your blade was so sharp and she’s...
...there’s so much that isn’t attached anymore, her shoulder...
...she’s falling apart-
KAORU WHY
-and you scream because what else can you do? You’ve ruined everything. Your hands can’t protect, they can only destroy. You’ve killed her.
Once a murderer, always a murderer.
She bleeds and bleeds and you cry and cry.
It’s snowing, the first snow of the year. Flakes land on the exposed skin of your chest, melting immediately; it adds to your own sweat, but you don’t notice it at all. You can’t feel it or see it clearly anyway. Flakes land in your open wounds, the coolness undoubtedly causing some relief to the angry, hot, torn flesh oozing blood, but even if you could feel it, it would be unimportant in this moment.
You must protect, even if you will die in the process. You must ensure her happiness in the era you’ve helped bring about. Numb hands grip the hilt of your katana and you’re ready. You’re ready.
Live on in the new era, and be happy...
You’ve come to this place to bring her back, even if she is your eminent downfall.
...Perhaps love is sharper and more dangerous than a blade after all.
But it doesn’t matter. The last barrier is this old soldier before you, keeping you from her. You raise your blade, blood of those you’ve already killed running down the steel in little rivers of crimson, and rush him. Your eyes are closed since you can’t see anyway; all that matters is your will to finish this. It must be stronger than anything else. Even if you die, you must succeed.
The sword swings down, ripping past fabric, tearing into skin-
That scent...white plum...
-sluicing so easily through muscle, crunching, cracking bones, a horrible cacophony of death as the steel, sharpened even more by your intention, continues to drive through that mass of flesh and fat and everything that keeps a body together, you cleave it all as a butcher does the animal-
But it’s not white plum, no...no it’s different now...
-and blood gushes out, so hot and thick as it hits your face and your clothing and the snow on the ground where it sizzles and still you press down on your blade, you must finish the job, and finally, finally, at the end of your swing, the sword pulls free of your kill moving faster and feeling so much lighter now that there is no resistance.
You’ve done it. You’ve ended it. You’ve killed. You’ve murdered.
But this time it’s wrong. This isn’t the same nightmare you’ve relived over and over and over again since the day it happened.
You tear your eyes open, regardless of the blood dripping down into them (is it your blood? is it theirs?) and stare at your gruesome work.
The old soldier is dead. That is good.
...But so is-
-no this isn’t right, this isn’t what happened-
Blood soaks into the snow around her body, rapidly dying it such a rich, deep red, steam rising from it all.
-I can’t have killed the second woman I ever loved-
It’s still so cold and you’re still numb, though most of it is no longer from just the cold, and you can’t hold back the tears that drop onto her face. But you have to pull her into your lap (when you fell to your knees and abandoned your sword, you don’t know) and you start to, but oh gods your blade was so sharp and she’s...
...there’s so much that isn’t attached anymore, her shoulder...
...she’s falling apart-
KAORU WHY
-and you scream because what else can you do? You’ve ruined everything. Your hands can’t protect, they can only destroy. You’ve killed her.
Once a murderer, always a murderer.
She bleeds and bleeds and you cry and cry.