Work Text:
There is a moment when the thoughtless immortality of youth transforms into the cold certainty of death. If you asked Utena when, she wouldn’t be able to place it. Somewhere between cold steel thrust in her back and the breaking of bones in her fist against the stone coffin door.
She walks: stumbling step after stumbling step. Every step burns. Overhead, flying steel roars in her ears. How can Anthy take it, a thousand swords piercing, when Utena can barely walk from one?
She knows she will die, but she still reaches out with broken fingers for one last goodbye.