X/1999 fanfiction. My standard disclaimers apply.

Facets

by Lady Aria (writersblock@edsamail.com.ph)

Disquieting.

That was the only way to describe it.

Brown eyes opened slowly to take in the sight of a room draped in white chiffon. The material was everywhere, much like the way cobwebs would hang from the eaves of houses that have been neglected over a long period of time. Unyielding, it seemed, for no wind entered the room to gently play upon the delicate folds of the fabric, making it look more like sculpted marble than the delicate material which it really was. Oddly enough, it had not been the physical room itself that had awakened him from sleep.

It was the silence.

The absolute lack of sound.

Fuuma blinked once again as he regarded his surroundings. He had awakened in this room with absolutely no recollection of how he'd gotten there, only that there was something decidedly unnatural about his surroundings. Reaching out with all of his senses, he tried to find any sign of movement, life, anything that could be there besides him and the endless white.

Nothing.

He wrapped his arms around himself as he got up from the white marble floor. It was as though he was in a movie where someone had pressed the mute button. The first of his steps echoed, making him start. The sound was almost like walking inside a steel tunnel. Fuuma tried to ignore the echoes as he walked closer to the fabric. Taking it into his hands, he was much relieved to find that, at least, it was soft, the way it was supposed to be. Gathering up handfuls of the material, he walked along the perimeter, looking for a gap. Finding none, he began pulling up the fabric in hopes of just passing under it. True to the room's defiance of natural law, he saw that the bottom of the fabric fused flawlessly with the marble floor, imprisoning him. By then, the silence had taken on a deafening quality, threatening to drive him mad.

Taking some of it in both hands, he pulled until it began to give and a hole appeared. Sliding his hands inside the gap, he felt the cloth stinging him as he began ripping the material until the hole was big enough for him to pass through. As he released the chiffon, he found that his hands had been cut and his blood stained the once-pristine cloth. The wounds looked almost as though they'd been made by a knife.

To his dismay, the rest of the structure was similarly draped, though, this time, he could discern smooth gaps in the material, almost like arches, forming a series of passageways. As he walked, he found that the cloth changed in a dangerously whimsical manner - soft, one moment, razor-sharp, the next. Like a vampire, the cloth took from him his blood whenever he touched it, staining, but his passage became smoother, less dangerous as more of his blood was sacrificed.

Through it all, his footsteps echoed ominously, like a tolling bell. There was just no way that what he was experiencing could be possible. His senses have become his worst enemy, his mind, unable to process the conflicting situation he was in.

After what seemed to be an eternity, his stopped at what looked to be a dead end. There were no more gaps in the cloth, and by then, the wounds on his hands were running freely, creating splotches of blood on the floor. He stared at the barrier, trying to decide what to do next, when he noticed that there was something beyond the cloth.

Something... black.

Once again, he gripped the chiffon in tight fists and pulled. He could almost hear the fabric moaning as it resisted him, all the while greedily absorbing the blood that ran out of his wounded palms. Suddenly, the fabric's texture changed and it ripped open like paper and Fuuma stumbled into the room, dazed.

Blinking his eyes at the room's harsh lighting, he saw that the vampiric chiffon had given way to a circular room, much larger than the one he'd woken up in. Looking up, he saw what the black shape was.

Kamui.

Fuuma's breath came in shaky gasps as he rose to his feet, his steps no longer echoing impossibly in the cloth-laden room. Kamui was lying on a raised marble altar. Whether the young man was alive or dead, he did not know, nor did he care. The fact that something familiar had emerged from this madness was enough to make him grateful.

When he was close enough, he noticed that Kamui's chest did not rise and fall, but his skin was warm to the touch.

He was dead, yet alive.

Another contradiction.

Fuuma reached out to brush a several strands of hair from Kamui's face and he watched as his hand left a bloody mark upon his cheek. Memories came to him in flashes - finding Kamui injured, taking him home, caring for him.

A single tear rolled down his cheek in anger as he contemplated Kamui's state of un-death. It was unnatural, totally unfitting for the same vibrant young man whom he and Kotori had grown up with, played with....

Been friends with.

Friends.

Yes, he and Kamui had been friends. The best of friends, until he and his mother moved away without an explanation... and Kamui returned much later, changed.

Yet, at the same time, still the same Kamui.

Beautiful Kamui.

Fuuma leaned over him and kissed his lips. Warm, but like those of a corpse, unyielding. In fairy tales, awakening from a curse of slumber called for a prince to kiss the sleeping princess... or for a kiss given out of true love.

And Fuuma knew that he loved this young man. So much that he'd promised to care for him as Kamui cared for Kotori. There was no question as to the truth of that love, but more on its nature. Is his love for Kamui the same as the love he'd felt for him when they were only children? Or was it something more? Something bordering on being forbidden?

Fuuma's concentration was shattered as he saw the young man's form begin to fade. He tried desperately to hold onto him, yet his bloody hands passed through leaving two stains upon the marble. It was all he could do as he watched Kamui fade from view. The room's lights began to dim and the walls closed upon him, suffocating him, drowning him.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

"Fuuma."

He opened his eyes at the sound of his name. Looking up, he saw Kanoe standing beside him, 'dressed' in another one of her disintegrating outfits. He gave her a cold look in acknowledgement and she leaned over to run her fingers through his hair.

"The time draws near," she whispered as she cupped his face between her hands. "Judgment by war."

Fuuma closed his eyes as Kanoe's face came close and licked something off his cheek. He opened them once again as she stood.

"Your tears are bitter," Kanoe whispered. "I wonder...!"

In a flash, Fuuma was on his feet and had grabbed a fist full of Kanoe's hair, tugging it back, almost to the point of breaking her neck, until she looked up into his wintry, brown eyes.

"I shed tears for no one."

********** The End **********

original © May 2001 by Lady Aria