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31_days2005-10-01 05:40 pm
spinshadow.livejournal.com) wrote in 31_days2005-10-01 05:40 pm
[Oct 1] [j-rock: Diru] It's the Knowing That Kills
Title: It's the Knowing That Kills
Day/Theme: October 1: A screaming across the sky
Fandom: J-rock -- Dir en Grey
Character/Pairing: implications of Shinya+Toshiya
Rating: PG
Summary: A cry in the night marks the end of all things.
Comments: October being AU month means my Eien AU muses have decided this is just the sort of exercise I need to keep things on track in the main novel. Identity spoilers for Chapter 2 of Eien ~Bound~ (which kinda sucks, since I don't have that chapter posted yet, but.... ^^;)
~*~*~
Shinya stepped out the back door, completely silent in a way his apprentice had not yet mastered; Toshiya's pajama pants rustled when the younger elfmage joined him a heartbeat later. He didn't bother turning around, reaching unerringly into Toshiya's back pocket for the pack of cigarettes and lighter his apprentice kept there. In silence - and well aware of the other man's shock, he tapped out a smoke for himself, lighting it and taking a long drag before handing pack and lighter back to him.
“Shin....”
“He'll be furious in the morning,” Shinya murmured, watching the smoke from his lungs whisk away into the night air. “Absolutely livid.”
“Sensei....”
“You heard it, didn't you? The scream of anguish?”
“N-no. I didn't hear anything.”
“Then why did you come down here?” Shinya asked, turning on his student with a bland expression. Toshiya shifted his weight from one foot to the other, avoiding his eyes as his face darkened, though he was barely visible at all in the moonless night.
“I thought you didn't smoke,” the mage murmured, changing the subject with no more grace than a charging rhinoceros. “You're always complaining to the others about it.”
“Only for ... special occasions,” the Adept replied with a grimace, gesturing vaguely with his purloined cigarette. “You're avoiding my question.”
“Fifty years and you've never ... must be some occasion.”
“You ... really didn't hear it?” he asked, cigarette changing hands as he reached up to cup the other's cheek. Toshiya closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly before leaning into Shinya's touch.
“I only knew that you ... you were gone....”
“He really was something, wasn't he?” Shinya sighed, turning around to trace the sky with his eyes. He knew the stars as well as the back of his hand, but their patterns were cold comfort, the motions of the heavens offering him no insights to soothe the discontented ache in his chest.
“Who?” his apprentice replied, equally subdued if confused.
“Gackt.”
“I ... I suppose,” Toshiya said, uncertainty coloring his voice even as the man wrapped him up in his arms, pulled him close. Shinya welcomed the warm contact, the reassurance that he wasn't alone. “But that's ... kind of a funny thing to say, isn't it?”
“Is it? I was so certain he was wrong. Even with the proof in front of me, I didn't want to believe it. Have I really grown so old and foolish?”
“I have thought of you as many things, Shin-chan. Brilliant, master, wicked, patient, precious ... but never foolish.”
“Such things you say....”
Shinya took another long drag, surprised when the cigarette was plucked from his fingers. He could feel Toshiya following his example, smoke ringing his head. He would need an extra long shower in the morning, but he had known as much when he'd taken the pack from his apprentice in the first place.
“You said something about a scream....”
“Yes ... a cry of anguish in the night. Another two months and that land would have been ours, as much as I had poured of myself into it,” Shinya sighed. “Still, I do not know why She mourned him.”
“Who?”
“Gackt.”
“Are you...?”
“I am certain.”
“But...?”
“I know, I do not understand it either. But it was his heart rune that burst - the rest of the house remains undisturbed.”
Toshiya said nothing for several long moments - what was there to say? It was hardly as if either of them truly cared about Gackt on any personal level. If not for an oath of service made long ago, they would not have been having this conversation at all. Such as it was.
“Come back to bed? He'll be hell to live with tomorrow and we'll have little enough rest once he finds out about this.”
Shinya nodded, taking back his cigarette and finishing it. The whole of his comfortable little world would fall apart tomorrow, dashed in a warrior's blind rage. Such was the destruction of the sun. But while night still reigned, things were not yet cast asunder. Shinya murmured a silent prayer that She might forgive him his failings, then followed Toshiya back inside. One last night in the taller man's arms. He could be that selfish, this once.
Day/Theme: October 1: A screaming across the sky
Fandom: J-rock -- Dir en Grey
Character/Pairing: implications of Shinya+Toshiya
Rating: PG
Summary: A cry in the night marks the end of all things.
Comments: October being AU month means my Eien AU muses have decided this is just the sort of exercise I need to keep things on track in the main novel. Identity spoilers for Chapter 2 of Eien ~Bound~ (which kinda sucks, since I don't have that chapter posted yet, but.... ^^;)
~*~*~
Shinya stepped out the back door, completely silent in a way his apprentice had not yet mastered; Toshiya's pajama pants rustled when the younger elfmage joined him a heartbeat later. He didn't bother turning around, reaching unerringly into Toshiya's back pocket for the pack of cigarettes and lighter his apprentice kept there. In silence - and well aware of the other man's shock, he tapped out a smoke for himself, lighting it and taking a long drag before handing pack and lighter back to him.
“Shin....”
“He'll be furious in the morning,” Shinya murmured, watching the smoke from his lungs whisk away into the night air. “Absolutely livid.”
“Sensei....”
“You heard it, didn't you? The scream of anguish?”
“N-no. I didn't hear anything.”
“Then why did you come down here?” Shinya asked, turning on his student with a bland expression. Toshiya shifted his weight from one foot to the other, avoiding his eyes as his face darkened, though he was barely visible at all in the moonless night.
“I thought you didn't smoke,” the mage murmured, changing the subject with no more grace than a charging rhinoceros. “You're always complaining to the others about it.”
“Only for ... special occasions,” the Adept replied with a grimace, gesturing vaguely with his purloined cigarette. “You're avoiding my question.”
“Fifty years and you've never ... must be some occasion.”
“You ... really didn't hear it?” he asked, cigarette changing hands as he reached up to cup the other's cheek. Toshiya closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly before leaning into Shinya's touch.
“I only knew that you ... you were gone....”
“He really was something, wasn't he?” Shinya sighed, turning around to trace the sky with his eyes. He knew the stars as well as the back of his hand, but their patterns were cold comfort, the motions of the heavens offering him no insights to soothe the discontented ache in his chest.
“Who?” his apprentice replied, equally subdued if confused.
“Gackt.”
“I ... I suppose,” Toshiya said, uncertainty coloring his voice even as the man wrapped him up in his arms, pulled him close. Shinya welcomed the warm contact, the reassurance that he wasn't alone. “But that's ... kind of a funny thing to say, isn't it?”
“Is it? I was so certain he was wrong. Even with the proof in front of me, I didn't want to believe it. Have I really grown so old and foolish?”
“I have thought of you as many things, Shin-chan. Brilliant, master, wicked, patient, precious ... but never foolish.”
“Such things you say....”
Shinya took another long drag, surprised when the cigarette was plucked from his fingers. He could feel Toshiya following his example, smoke ringing his head. He would need an extra long shower in the morning, but he had known as much when he'd taken the pack from his apprentice in the first place.
“You said something about a scream....”
“Yes ... a cry of anguish in the night. Another two months and that land would have been ours, as much as I had poured of myself into it,” Shinya sighed. “Still, I do not know why She mourned him.”
“Who?”
“Gackt.”
“Are you...?”
“I am certain.”
“But...?”
“I know, I do not understand it either. But it was his heart rune that burst - the rest of the house remains undisturbed.”
Toshiya said nothing for several long moments - what was there to say? It was hardly as if either of them truly cared about Gackt on any personal level. If not for an oath of service made long ago, they would not have been having this conversation at all. Such as it was.
“Come back to bed? He'll be hell to live with tomorrow and we'll have little enough rest once he finds out about this.”
Shinya nodded, taking back his cigarette and finishing it. The whole of his comfortable little world would fall apart tomorrow, dashed in a warrior's blind rage. Such was the destruction of the sun. But while night still reigned, things were not yet cast asunder. Shinya murmured a silent prayer that She might forgive him his failings, then followed Toshiya back inside. One last night in the taller man's arms. He could be that selfish, this once.