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Kurogane believes that love is a choice.
As Kurogane grew up, he saw his parents choose each other every day. He would see the look of utter awe in each of their faces—the unbridled gratefulness and joy for knowing one another. The all too eager decision to support and cherish the other every second of their lives. The rise of his mother’s hair to his father’s lips was an oath, one that they could not swear often enough.
Kurogane believes that love is a form of loyalty.
The way Kurogane sees it, true loyalty arises not from following blindly, but from active dedication. When Princess Tomoyo laid Kurogane’s mother to rest and gave him the ounce of peace he needed to let go—to halt his metamorphosis into a monster—the fealty he swore to her was a conscious act of devoted love. Kurogane could never do enough to repay her or to express how deeply her salvation honors him. So, he chooses her every day. He will choose her to the ends of the earth—to his last breath.
Love and loyalty are not choices that Kurogane makes easily.
Lately, however, one might mistake it for an easy choice, because of the sudden influx of occupied space in Kurogane’s heart.
Kurogane recalls an oddly peaceful world that mostly involved traversing a large field to get to the princess’ lost memory. The feather sat alone among the windswept daisies and clovers, the expanse of land between it and their landing point serving as its only trial. They had just come off the tails of an arduous adventure, so it wasn’t long before the princess needed to sleep. Almost as quickly, the kid needed to rest from carrying her. And of course, the mage and the manjuu bun were immediately keen on joining in on a day nap under the clear blue sky.
Kurogane remained wary for a long while, finding this space far too quiet to be trusted. Eventually, his tense muscles screamed for a quick lie down. So, he found himself flat on his back, grass tickling his bare arms and neck, the sun bright enough to bask the behinds of his eyelids in a faint orange glow.
Kurogane felt warm pressure against either side of his waist, and cracked his eyes open to glance down. The kids had rolled over in their sleep to cradle up against him. Kurogane heaved a sigh, contemplating the consequences of shoving them off, when a pale elbow unceremoniously smacked into his face.
“What the hell?” he meant to shout, but found his voice muffled by a hesitance to rouse the kids. Of course the arm that had all but pummeled in his nose belonged to the mage, who then chased the injury with a loud snore and draped said sweaty pale arm over Kurogane’s chest. The manjuu bun rolled off the skinny bastard’s shoulder, and tucked themself neatly between his snoozing face and Kurogane’s neck.
Rage bubbled up inside Kurogane, and he fully expected himself to immediately let loose with a string of yells and curses as he mercilessly threw these nuisances off of him. But the first shout petered into a huff, gently tossing the sparse fringe of hair against his forehead. He resigned himself to this… cuddle pile, as the manjuu bun would call it.
No, actually. He did not resign. He made a choice.
Kurogane chose to let these idiots use him as some kind of hot water bottle, tucked comfortably against their bodies to help them rest. Kurogane likes being useful—however undesirable the application of said usefulness is.
The unbearable itch to return to Tomoyo never leaves him, never quiets. All the same, Kurogane has found a new kind of peace in the company of… well, those who he could hardly call strangers anymore.
They are Syaoran, Sakura, Fai, and Mokona. They piss him off to no end, and were it not for the curse etched into his forehead, he would kill for them without a moment’s hesitation. For now, a good knock out seems to do just fine. This is an acceptable role, and he intends to choose it for as long as he’s here with them.
Syaoran was the first, and Kurogane was shocked by how quickly the kid had earned and sealed his loyalty. One determined stare, and the steady earnestness in the kid’s voice was all it took when he stated, “I won’t give you any trouble. This is my problem.”
Kurogane could already feel an incredulous twist in his gut that screamed like hell it is.
Within one day, Kurogane was already brandishing a sword for Syaoran. The words “Stay the hell away from my friend,” were foreign, yet proudly fitting on the warrior’s tongue.
A kid like Syaoran is too good to be fighting alone. The choice to fight beside him is an honorable one.
Sakura took a little longer, mostly because there wasn’t much of her to know, at first. This certainly had to do with her memory loss, but...
Kurogane soon discovered that the ways she grew had nothing to do with how many feathers she regained. It had everything to do with the way she absorbed the new worlds around her, adapted to them. Sakura pulled herself up on her own, and her unyielding spirit ignited and burned before Kurogane’s eyes.
Sakura could have lost the race in Piffle, and Kurogane would have chosen her anyway. It was clear to him now, that once Sakura was fully realized, she never did anything without giving it her all. It was a stubbornness he recognized. A refusal to give up that perhaps even rivaled his own.
There wasn’t a particular moment that stood out to him, with Mokona. It simply became natural to rely on them, and thus, protect them in return. He’d never say it out loud, but there is a certain joy in humoring their ridiculous antics. Getting purposefully wound up until he snaps is a familiar sensation—it reminds him of how Tomoyo and Amaterasu had a tendency to push his buttons back in Japan. It’s aggravating of course, but the loss of it would be worse. Pleasant or not, it’s a feeling of being home.
Fai does it, too, but it’s different with him. Mokona is admirable in that they wear their heart on their sleeve above all else, despite any pain it may bring them to be so willingly vulnerable. Fai is the opposite. The teasing is a tactic for him. A magician’s deflection, guiding the audience’s gaze away from something hidden in plain sight.
Kurogane sees it. A contradiction that enrages him to no end.
Fai, every day, falls more and more in love with the people around him—yet refuses to choose them.
Worst of all, is Fai’s refusal to ever choose himself.
Everything about Fai spits directly in the face of what Kurogane believes in.
What Kurogane cannot figure out, for the life of him, is why the hell he keeps choosing Fai anyway.
Kurogane watches skeptically as Fai tucks a jacket over Syaoran’s sleeping form, and gently cards his fingers through Sakura’s hair. Fai fusses like a mother hen over Sakura’s potential exposure to untold horrors, and wishes a fever away as he presses his palm tenderly to Syaoran’s forehead. The moment Fai notices Kurogane staring, however, he plasters on a smile, and his pitch rises quickly from a low tenderness to a high sing-song cadence.
Kurogane thinks he’s starting to get it. It’s a roller coaster, with this man. One moment, the overwhelming potential of Fai’s love takes Kurogane aback in its damning evidence. The next, Fai curb-stomps Kurogane with his brick wall of an empty grin.
Kurogane isn’t one to meddle, but he cannot allow this man’s antithetical heart to remain unchallenged.
So, he says his peace, and finds himself hoping even a single word of it got through to Fai.
That hope is a choice. A choice akin to nose diving off a cliff, and praying your bones do not break upon impact with the rushing water below.
Kurogane may have chosen Fai—but that does not mean he thinks it was a smart decision.
Then, there Fai is, broken in his arms, pleading to let him die with shattered breath. Growing colder by the moment, edging dangerously close to getting his wish. Finally freeing them of him.
Kurogane never questions his choice again, after that.
No thoughts nor hesitations cross Kurogane’s mind, but he remains fully aware of himself all the same. To pay with his own flesh and blood costs him nothing if it keeps Fai breathing.
Fai, this man who loves despite himself—this man who chooses to run every day, but cannot stop his big stupid heart from loving anyhow. Could never stop loving no matter how hard he tries, and by all that is holy does he try. He fights it with everything that he has.
Fai believes that he can only love by protecting others from himself.
It is the need to be loved that plagues him, and undoes him.
Kurogane doesn’t intend to fight this battle for him, has no desire to. He knows that Fai needs to figure this shit out for himself. But he never will, if he is dead. So, Kurogane will keep him alive. That will be his dedication. That will be how he loves him, even if Fai hates him for it.
And Fai does hate him. Kurogane is sure of that.
Why else would Fai say the one thing that he knew would hurt Kurogane the most?
Fai hates Kurogane as much as he loves him. Hates Kurogane enough to drop any pretense that he will ever forgive him for keeping him alive against his will. Loves Kurogane enough to dedicate himself to pushing him away, as Fai truly believes that Kurogane is better off without him.
Fai had said that he didn’t want to cause anyone any trouble for involving themselves with him, but Kurogane was already wrapped around his finger by the time he said it. Fai was already loving and being loved back, any denial of it be damned. Now Kurogane is making the choice to keep a fast plummeting anchor afloat.
The anchor’s chain is slipping from Kurogane’s hands, one night when he cuts his arm for Fai to feed, and Fai doesn’t respond.
“I’m sure you think you’re clever,” Fai says after a minute of watching thick drops of blood fall to the kitchen floor in a steady trickle. “But I’ve thought about it, and I’ve determined that your little trick makes no difference.”
Fai leans in closer, one blue eye staring coldly into red. “It’s a waste either way,” he says, cutting each syllable with ice. “Whether your blood goes to me, or the floor.”
So this is Fai’s gambit, then. To pretend Kurogane doesn’t notice the dryness in Fai’s throat as he speaks, the slightest twitch of a frantic glance to Kurogane’s open wound. The faintest waver in Fai’s mask of indifference.
Without a word, Kurogane raises the knife to his own neck.
The next thing Kurogane knows, his wrists are pinned to the counter with impossible strength, sending a crack into the marble surface. The knife slips from his grasp, clattering to the ground somewhere in the distance. The hiss of you fucking bastard sounds mere inches from his face.
With an indignant snarl of defeat, Fai—finally—wrenches Kurogane’s arm from the counter, and crushes it against his open mouth.
Fai glares daggers into Kurogane as he drinks, his breath seething in enraged pants through his nose as he does so. There’s a low growl, and Kurogane can’t tell if it comes from Fai’s hunger, or if a barely restrained part of Fai just wants to fucking kill him for what he’s done.
When Fai finishes, he throws Kurogane’s arm aside like a rag doll, and spits, “Hypocrite.”
He turns to storm off, wiping blood from his chin, and Kurogane can’t stop himself.
“You’ve only proven why it wasn’t a risk.”
Kurogane hears the bitter scoff he was looking for, sees the wry gleam in Fai’s eye when he whips back around.
Fai surges forward until they collide chest to chest, Kurogane’s back nearly bent over the counter as Fai looks wild eyed up at him.
“And what if I let you?” Fai cuts back. “What if every time you pull a stunt like this, another part of me stops caring if you die?”
Kurogane doesn’t move, doesn’t blink. He is still as a statue, refusing to let a single word falter his stance.
“I’ll only hate you more, the longer you try to keep this shit up,” Fai doesn’t stop, lets the venom in his words flow. “What will you do? When I’ve decided I’d rather you die with me, than live another second like this?”
That blue eye flickers yellow, the beast clawing a shout into Fai’s throat when he repeats, “What will you do?”
“I said I’d kill you myself!” Kurogane yells back, timing Fai’s involuntary flinch with a heavy shove and escaping from his hold.
Kurogane tries fleeing the room, before his anger takes over and more hurt cruelties fight their way out of his chest.
“Do it then!” Fai all but shrieks behind him, voice echoing against the kitchen walls.
Kurogane knows he shouldn’t look, but he has already turned back, and sees the broken, desperate expression on Fai’s face.
“Kill me!” Fai says, and those two words are not weapons, they are an honest plea. Kurogane sees it in the desolate shake of his shoulders, the wince of tears prickling from his eye, the twitch of his hands reaching out—a reflexive need for affection that still persists undying, despite everything.
This. This is what breaks Kurogane.
Kurogane wonders for a moment if Fai can see the swelling of tears in his eyes before he leaves. It doesn’t matter. Kurogane needs to go. Needs to be anywhere but here. Ice and fire burn in his veins, rapidly pushing air out of his lungs. His body moves on its own, throwing open the door to the hallway. Kurogane is grateful that the blood pumping loud in his ears drowns out whatever Fai shouts after him. The chasing voice silences completely by the time the door bounces shut. Breathing only becomes harder as he races away, the heat in his face stings at his eyes and rips at his throat. Kurogane feels like a rabid animal, instinct driving him to a dark crevice to bury himself into. The pressure is building, but he cannot allow himself to snap. Not here. Not here. Not here.
Kurogane knows that crying is not a weakness. The tears that Tomoyo had allowed him were what saved his life.
That doesn’t mean he’s fond of doing it in front of others.
The bedroom isn’t enough, the door between Kurogane and the hallway feels too thin, too vulnerable. But there’s a bathroom deeper inside of said bedroom, and it will have to do.
The moment the door slams shut, Kurogane’s fist connects to a wall. He punches a hole in its surface, another victim to his inability to control his anger. He doesn’t feel the sting that should travel up his fist from the impact, his arms are already numb from hyperventilating. A needle-like sensation pricks at his knuckles and shoulders. The weight of his body suddenly feels too much for his legs, and he drops to the floor.
The shock of the cold linoleum does nothing to steady him, dry rasps for breath continue to heave soundly in and out of his chest. The numbness in his arms crawls slowly to his torso, up his neck. He feels dizzy, like he might throw up or pass out. His jerking gulps for air can’t slow enough to allow a sob, so the tears keep steaming red hot, unable to boil over.
Incapable of doing anything else, Kurogane’s mind races. He wants it to stop. He does not want to think about Fai begging for his life to end, mercy hurting him deeper than anger. Or to think about the sickly cold smile carved into his mind with the words Good morning, Kurogane on inhuman white lips. Syaoran blinking vacantly at him with uprooted magic searing in one blue eye, Fai’s blood spilling into his mouth from a dripping palm. The unearthly crunch. A pale frame growing colder in his arms, voice a death rattle. Sakura limping home, blood caked in her hair, blood coating ruined fingers. The tears Mokona has shed for them all. Blood flying from his mother’s mouth in a hoarse cough he can do nothing to stop. His father’s arm dangling—displaced—
“Kurogane-san?” Sakura’s voice reverberates against the wooden door, with a soft knock.
Kurogane freezes. He may as well be underwater, her muffled voice calling to him from beyond the surface. Each breath that heaves in and out of his chest still feels like ice scraping against his lungs. His ears ring, his head grows lighter, floating away—
“Kurogane-san!” Sakura cries out, and a pounding fist replaces her lightly tapping knuckles.
A new fear reels Kurogane back—Sakura can’t see him like this. His burdens are his own, and Sakura is already carrying far too much. Kurogane knows if he lets her in, she won’t back down. Her stubbornness will overpower his own, and she will try to fight his battle until she is satisfied. Far into the night, if she has to. Kurogane cannot allow that to happen.
“Go,” he manages to rasp, but even that pitiful utterance requires a violent gasp that echoes against the bathroom walls, exposing his desperate state even further.
“I’m coming in,” Sakura asserts, quickly turning the knob. Kurogane curses himself for not remembering to lock in his panic, and shoves his boot securely against the door in a final effort to keep Sakura away.
“Kurogane-san, please,” she reprimands him. Kurogane is surprised by Sakura’s strength, as she begins gradually shoving his foot back with a sturdy shoulder against the door. If not for the numbness overtaking his limbs, he could still stop her, regardless of how strong she has become. But Kurogane was right, it was inevitable that her obstinacy would defeat him, one way or another.
What is it with princesses, always coming to his rescue?
When Sakura finally makes her way in, she initially takes a moment to observe the scene. She gives no hint of surprise at the sight of the hole in the wall; its formation had likely alerted her to come here, in the first place.
Sakura’s eyes drift to Kurogane, and he defensively cages his arms around his face.
“Get out!” he grates through a sandpaper throat, but makes no move to push her away. His body is completely locked up, as if hiding in a turtle’s shell.
Sakura doesn’t leave. She closes the door, and Kurogane can hear the lock click, this time. He can sense her shadow as she bends over him, then feels the tips of her fingers feather light on his arm. Kurogane flinches, drawing further into himself, tensing up even more.
“Don’t—”
“I won’t look at your face,” Sakura assures, reading his fear. “I’ll only look at your wound, okay?”
Kurogane had completely forgotten about the gash on his arm. The bleeding had stopped when Fai fed, but it was still very much an open cut.
Kurogane can’t bring himself to treat it on his own at this point, so he concedes to Sakura’s offer. He gradually lets go of the tension in his injured arm, lowering it to give Sakura access. He draws a knee up to prop his other arm, and tucks his face into the bend of his elbow.
Sakura moves away for a moment to wash her hands, then rifles through the bathroom cabinet. Kurogane can hear her set a plastic first aid kit on the ground when she returns.
She begins by pressing a warm, damp cloth to the cut—a substitute for rinsing it in the sink, as she likely guesses that getting Kurogane to stand right now is a non-starter. She sets the cloth to the side when she finishes, then rips open a small package from the first aid kit.
“This is going to sting,” Sakura warns, pauses, then applies a disinfectant wipe to the wound.
The tingling in his arm turns sharper, rapidly prickling feeling back into the limb. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s grounding. Kurogane’s other limbs follow suit, but at a much slower pace.
Sakura wraps his arm in gauze, and Kurogane wonders if Fai would let any of them do this for him, with the way things are now. Perhaps Fai would concede to Sakura tending him, but only to appease her.
He’d probably try to find some barren alley to bleed out in, first.
It’s with this thought, that Kurogane finally finds his voice.
“One of these days, he’s going to outsmart me, and find a way to die,” the confession peels out of Kurogane’s throat, like a scab falling off of a lesion.
Sakura finishes tying off the gauze, then simply holds his wrist and looks up at him patiently.
“He’s constantly on the lookout for it. I can tell. Hell, he just fucking begged me to kill him,” Kurogane chokes, a sob finally letting out, and feels hot tears spill over onto his cheeks. He moves his head from his elbow to his hand, shielding his eyes.
“He’s—he’s such—”
“An idiot?” Sakura finishes.
Worlds ago, Kurogane would have laughed at that. Given Sakura a hearty ruffle to her hair, a proud that’s my girl on his lips. Now, he can only nod, pressing his fingers to his tightened brow.
They stay silent for a bit, and Kurogane finally allows himself to properly cry. Sakura’s hand moves from his wrist to his palm, squeezing it tightly. Kurogane finds himself squeezing back. He gives up. Sakura wins. She loves as she lives, giving her all, and there was never any hope of getting past her.
“I’m scared for him, too,” Sakura admits, breaking the silence.
Kurogane wipes tears from his face, and lowers his hand to stare back at her, puffy eyes and all. It’s been so long since she’s shown any vulnerability to him, so it’s only fair to return the gesture.
“I’m not fond of it. The way he’s been… swearing fealty to me. I know he means to support me, but,” Sakura furrows her brow. “I’m not dense. It’s a deflection, I can tell.”
“Yeah, he’s not fooling anyone with that ‘my princess’ bullshit,” Kurogane scoffs. He pulls his hand away from her palm, having hit his limit with her soothing him. He crosses his arms over drawn up knees, instead.
“I keep asking him over and over if he’s doing what he truly wants, but,” Sakura sighs. “I don’t think he knows how to want anything, and he won’t let anyone help him figure it out.”
Sakura starts picking at the lace on the end of her dress, her face knitted in frustration. Kurogane is suddenly aware that he may not have another chance like this, to get through his own frustrations with her.
“You’re not off the hook, either,” Kurogane says, red eyes narrowing.
Sakura looks up at him, and her mouth hardens into a thin line. She steels over with a poker face, as Kurogane had expected her to do so.
“I know you’re keeping secrets,” Kurogane presses on. Sakura tenses up, and Kurogane waves a pacifying hand. “That’s fine, you’re entitled to that. I’m just—”
Kurogane flattens his hand against his forehead, squeezing his eyes shut. He can feel his throat choking up again, shaking his shoulders. Damn it all, he thought he was done with this shit.
“I’m just sick of feeling like the two of you are about to do something stupid, and—” Kurogane has to stop to breath. He knows he’s about to start hyperventilating again, can feel the numb chill return to his shoulders. The filter in his mind shuts off, the cage in his chest releasing. “There isn’t a damn thing I can do about it. There’s nothing I hate more than that. When I can’t do a damn thing for—”
For the people I love.
Kurogane blanks out. He doesn’t realize he’s been rapidly alternating between sobs and gasps for breath until he comes back to the feel of Sakura’s arms circling his shoulders. He doesn’t know how much time has passed, with him convulsing in Sakura’s embrace. He hates this. She shouldn’t have to be strong for him. He is the one who protects. How dare he let himself fall down this far, needing her to pull him back up, when she herself is already falling apart.
Kurogane tries shoving Sakura away, panic edging his tone, “I need to—I need—”
I need this to stop. I need to do something. I need to fight something, to make this go away.
Sakura plants her hands on either side of Kurogane’s head, and turns him toward her unrelenting gaze. She has the eyes of a warrior, he thinks. Indomitable.
“You need to breathe,” Sakura commands, then releases Kurogane from her iron grip.
Kurogane is no longer sitting upon this linoleum ground, with Sakura’s caring presence bearing down on him. He is in the ruins of Suwa, a ravaged wasteland drenched in blood and flame. His mother’s corpse hangs limply in one hand, his father’s sword is clutched in the other.
The sword is replaced with a blinding pain stabbing through his palm, pinning him to an unforgiving rock wall. His rage is halted in its tracks, leaving only numbness in its wake.
There is another princess who greets him, at the bottom. Far too young to be coddling a man like him. She lays his mother to rest, and returns gentleness to his destroyed world.
Tomoyo pulls the tears from him, and reminds him to breathe.
Under florescent light, Kurogane looks to the scar at the center of his palm. Sees how it lines up with the bandages Sakura has wrapped his arm in.
Kurogane breathes.
Sakura moves back, giving him the space to do so. She waits the entire time, until the heaving subsides, and the rise and fall of his chest evens to a calm pace. The tears on Kurogane’s cheeks have dried, and he’s stopped shaking. He feels like he can move his body, again.
So, Kurogane slowly stands, and Sakura follows suit.
Kurogane glances to the hole in the wall.
“Think they’re gonna make me fix that?”
Sakura shrugs.
“What more could they do to us, if we don’t?” she replies with a wry twitch to her lips.
Kurogane snorts. It’s not a funny joke, and he certainly isn’t happy that Sakura has taken to this kind of bitter humor. He wants to acknowledge her, all the same. He’s been giving her far too much space, as of late.
“Hey,” Kurogane calls after her, as Sakura unlocks the door to leave.
She turns back to him. Her stare is steady and patient, but Kurogane can see her fingers twitching at the doorknob to escape any more potential scrutiny.
Still, Kurogane needs to finish saying his peace.
“Just… don’t do anything stupid,” he asks, his voice a soft plea.
Sakura nods, and fits a smile to her face. It doesn’t reach her eyes, and that hurts more than anything else.
“Stop worrying, Kurogane-san. Everything will be alright.”
They both know it’s a lie. (She’s been spending far too much time with the mage.)
Sakura opens the door, and exits.
Thus ends the last conversation Kurogane and Sakura would have for a long, long time.
Kurogane wishes he had saved his tears for this day.
If there is ever a moment to give up on Fai, this is it. The blood of their daughter is still fresh on his hands.
A familiar rage erupts inside of Kurogane, driving him to his target. The need to take a blade to those who hurt the ones he loves. Like a beaten down dog, thinking nothing of tenderness, only the instinct to bite back.
Fai looks up at Kurogane, a face that Sakura has already forgiven, in her fading moments.
Kurogane sees Fai’s utterly lost expression, and recognizes the same inexplicable grief that is destroying his own heart.
Kurogane has lost his mother, his father, in a way his son, and now his daughter.
Kurogane has made it in time to save Fai before, and he can do it again.
So, Kurogane makes a choice.
“Don’t hurt anyone else with that sword,” he says, taking Fai’s bloodstained hand in his own.
“That includes yourself.”