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Abyss is never a pleasant concept, nor is it one that is readily contemplated.
His eyes flutter, open and closed, closed and...op...en...?
... Had he been stabbed? No. No, that wasn't it. That wasn't it, but he can't remember what did - or didn't - happen. He might be lying down, or floating in space, or falling, or on an entirely solid surface; none of it mattered, not really. Nothing mattered very much to the dead, after all.
Burning...yes. He does remember something sharp, something piercing and tearing and agonizing, but it was not a knife. Booming; he can remember that, too, vaguely. A boom, or two, or more. Did it matter? No, no; that didn't matter either. Just one thing mattered, one thing only; one fragile, frail voice; one timid, gentle smile; one sharp - yet playful all the same - yell; one set of soft, rosy ponytails, hoisted high behind fluffy headphones; one poofy jacket and one tiny pair of hands; one person out of nine.
Had she been in pain for long, he wondered? He doesn't want to wonder that, of course; the mere idea of his sister's pain stirs something within him - if he is even any more than a concept, a fleeting thought, an echo of existence - and it sits there, deep within his very core, and burns brighter and hotter and harsher than any flame ever could. He doesn't want to wonder, but all he could possibly do - all he has been able to do - is picture the softest of grins, framed behind the softest of locks, behind teased bangs that he would, with the utmost care, brush away from her face when they were left to grow unrestrained, wild. He hardly remembers any visuals - has, for years, not had the option of using them, not since the accident - and has hardly wanted to; blindness is an inconvenience, certainly, but for him, it was hardly a vice. The one thing he will never forget, however - the one image that he will always cherish, hold close to his chest, as an invisible safety blanket or, perhaps, a shield of armor, or a warm embrace of sorts - is that face of hers, the vibrancy of it, the courage and force behind gentle looks, the courage of curling palms, the color of lips, cheeks, and dyed strands; that was - is - the Clover he knew, the fighter, the truest light within his darkness.
"Big brother?" He's not sure where the sound comes from, but it's without presence, feeling; it's faded, muddled, behind water or glass. Is it to the...right? The left?
No, no... This happened already.
He was in the hospital, wasn't he? Certainly, he had to have been; only hospitals could have such uncomfortable cots, such irritating noises; the heart rate monitor, from somewhere to the side of his face, drones on and on, beeping incessantly, reminding him that he - unfortunately - lives to see another day.
See...another day. It's ironic, he thinks, or at least, he would, but all the morphine in the world crashing through his veins at once could not possibly dull this pain; his arm - his lack thereof that he can still vaguely sense, he swears - throbs, burns, stabs, over and over again, and - naturally - his damaged eyes are in no better condition at present. They patched him up, or at least, they might have; he can't think, can't think, can't think...
"Big brother... Light... Wake up, already! You can't just stay like that forever...! Come on!" That voice - soft, yet harsh all the same - chides him, and he is reminded, vaguely, of a text he once read, a study on childhood development. Ten pairs of toddlers and parents were divided into two groups; the families were instructed to place the toddlers into a scenario with a ball, a hoop, and a race against the clock, with the goal being to score as much as possible within a period of ten minutes. The parents in the first group were told that - in the event their child should fall - they should run to comfort that child, ask if they were alright, offer solace and cuddles and care; the parents in the second group were told the opposite. That group - quite simply - was told to tell their child four firm, forceful words: "Get up. You're fine." Children in the first group were reported as being more given to crying, screaming, and tantrums in reaction to their fall; children in the second, however, bounced right back to their feet, beginning to chase the hoop with the ball once more. The score, in reality, was never part of the experiment; scoring was - is - irrelevant.
He thinks that, in retrospect - as the memory, or voice, or whatever it is fades, and he his alone once more, - what truly sped his recovery along, truly shaped his outlook from that moment on, may very well have been her voice. That voice, always, has kept darkness at bay. Sight does not yield perspective; vision never truly guided his path, though he does admit that eyesight is a useful tool. What truly guides in this world - he knows, from the bottom of his heart, cliche as it may be - is, probably, love, and if he has ever loved anyone in this world, it is, with certainty, his sister.
Pain. Pain, too, is never something that one easily draws into their consciousness; pain is a subject that one only conjures when left alone with their thoughts, their inner voice, or mantra, or conscience, perhaps, if one were to suppose morality truly takes on some solidified, omnipresent form within their mind; demanding to be felt, it rips through all other defenses, observation, and sense. In the face of pain, hunger fades; sounds silence; all else is darkness, emptiness, void.
What kept him going then - what pushed him through the most primitive of instincts - could only have been love.
Boom. Boom...
Yes...there was a gun. And it hardly registered. Powerfully ripping through his body, he was pierced over and over, bullet from barrel, again and again; mere adrenaline cannot account for such speed, such force. No; what happened was beyond instinct, beyond all human capability, all comprehension.
"WAKE UP! Light...! Light!"
Closer. That voice - her voice - is closer now. He senses it, feels it, more than he hears it; she is pure emotion, raw energy, force; this is not new information to him. This is hardly shocking; there is no surprise to be found in the warmth that envelops him, engulfs his spirit. To doubt Clover's ferocity would be to doubt the rising of the sun, indefinitely permanent, yet entirely dependable, cyclical, present always, always; that would never change, never in his lifetime, never in one million.
Pressing against something far more tangible - a surface which shifts, shifts, shifts, over and over again - his palms hesitantly grasp, sand shifting haphazardly and spilling forth from his hands as he - tentatively - opens them, relaxing. He hears the water before he sees it, hears it crash and wash away the shore, lazily lapping in the distance; he hears the gulls before he sees them, before he views gulls with wings spread wide, as if to hug the sun; one cannot hear the sunset, unfortunately, but one can imagine it, can imagine oranges and reds and soft hues of mellow lilac and mild magenta, mixing and fading in a harmonious gradient against the ocean's edge, and Snake - in this moment - could, potentially, view the sunset in all of its radiance and kind, forgiving beauty, offering respite - hope - to those who faithfully and fearlessly continue to pursue the next day, no matter what the present or past have wrought.
Potentially, Light could gaze anywhere he wishes, but there - in this endless chasm, this abyss, this place between all - is the only one he has ever so restlessly yearned to see, with heels against the waves, head tilted in expectation, hands on delicate hips, fragile features blazing with an impatience, an anger, an unbroken wish, an unspoken promise, a demand that no one on this earth could ever deny.
Pink never felt as serene before the accident; beautiful, certainly, and comforting, but the peace he experiences in the instant their eyes lock for the first time in years could not be simplified, expressed, or condensed were he given the aggregate of all infinities to convey his comprehension of it. As he lies there on his back, gaze wide - in either shock, awe, or the beginnings of tears, though none of these register, not really - her impatience only grows, lips twisting as she scowls, hand reaching forth, foot tapping impatiently. "Don't you know how long I've been waiting for you?! Come on, dummy!" And there it is, unspoken, floating in the air, an unseen mist, a hardly extant voice, a feeling rather than a sight or sound: 'Get up. You're fine.'
One large hand grips one tiny, curled set of fingers, lacing; one tall, lanky body rises from one vast, grainy expanse of sand; one second passes, or perhaps one half of that, and she's gathered up in his embrace; one pair of siblings interlocks, and there is only one reason that he pulls away, hand still fiercely gripping hers, tears rolling to the tune of the waves at their feet, to the motions of time itself.
"That face..." His voice is filled with tremors and breaks, and his free hand nearly falters as one index finger ghosts around her features, the softness of her nose and highness of her cheeks, the cup of her jaw and expanse of her forehead underneath slightly-too-long bangs; his own face intermingles with rosy locks, resting atop her head, and there is no fear as his eyes close, palm pulling her closer by the small of her back, allowing his typical field of vision to return as eyelids lower, crashing down the usual curtain of nothingness. No, he's hardly afraid of what has been for so many years; he has never been afraid of his blindness, has never seen it as an inconvenience or any reason for his own perspective to be lesser than that of others. Closing his eyes, his lips twitch, and he thinks that - perhaps - a chuckle escapes his chest, broken and meshed into a sob. "I have missed it, you realize. Truly, it is a sight to behold, though I shall ask... Must you diminish your own field of vision with those bangs of yours?" His hand drifts up again, lifting up the locks that softly lap at her forehead, teased and puffed and everything he's always known them to be, and this time, he's certain of his laughter; dopamine, after all, inspires such reactions; love, after all, is precisely such a feeling of happiness, of joy in its purest sense, for the sake of nothing but.
Through her own tears - tears that she must have been holding back to the best of her ability - she manages a smile, hand gripping his even tighter, palm craning up to ghost at his cheek, comforting, caressing. "I don't know about that. I think my bangs are cute! What would you know about fashion, anyway?" She tries, truly, but her voice still waivers at the edges, still breaks, dies off. There's a tiredness to her, to both of them, and - slowly, but with momentum - the light of the sun drifts downward, melting into nothing; the waves cease their simple, back and forth motions, fading into stillness; the sandy surface they stand on, too, becomes darkness again, and on instinct, Light clings tighter to her, closer, refusing to let go, terrified to do so; never again, never again, not again, no; he can't do something like that, cannot even remotely fathom losing her again, but...the more he tries to hold on, to cling to her for dear life, the more he feels her...fade.
"Ah. I see." Even now, he does his absolute best to put on a brave face, to be the calm, firm voice of the situation, but the hurt - the pain - claws holes through his stomach, and he feels that, were there the possibility, he may - truly - vomit, or scream, or worse, far worse. "Leaving so soon?"
Her smile is unbroken as she offers it to him, like an incidental gift placed in his palm for no other reason than whim. "Aren't you coming with me?"
A simple question. The answer should, then, be equally sophomoric. Momentarily, he feels a faltering to his breath, a shakiness, a pang of fear, of doubt, of worry that no one could ever hope to possess immunity to, but...
'Get up. You're fine.'
... all the same, he smiles, vice grip relaxing into a loose hug around her waist. "Do you even have to ask?" Her expression catches light, dances, incites steady rhythm within his chest, and - in that instant - he feels his own senses dull, too, form fading to silhouette, sight slowly retreating, regressing into nothing.
"Good... because I was gonna make you, anyway!" There is nothing more enchanting than her laugh; there is nothing more fearless than the fact that, even now, even here - with absolutely nothing left - she could bear such energy, such effort toward continuing, on and on and on, seeking her way, her will.
"Of course you would." They meld together, consciousness humming, warping, blurring around them, swirling and bending and breaking, boundaries undefined; existence, after all, is merely bound by human understanding, but the static of human soul is such a perplexing, confounding phenomenon that no body of science can truly quantify or define it. "I don't suppose you have some inkling of a plan, then...?" He can't find his voice; he can't locate his heart, or where it beats; the place where he starts and she stops, and vice versa, is indefinite, undefined; their time is up, and he's certain she can feel it, too, and the thought would make him panic, truly, but if this is it - if this is the path that she has chosen, that they both have journeyed down - then he can accept that, and be at peace.
"... Not really." Her tone is low, silent, drowning once more, yet tangible all the same; his forehead - or the sensation of what very well may be that - brushes against her scalp one last time, letting the sensation of nuzzling hair tickle his cheeks, and then he kisses each of hers, feeling her tears and lamenting them thoroughly. "I just wanted to be with you again, I guess."
"As did I." Sensation fades further, further away; are they standing? Are they lying down, or sitting up, or falling, or floating, or...? "The feeling is undoubtedly mutual."
For awhile, there is nothing; no sound; no feeling in the lacking expense of death, no guiding force, no rhyme nor reason.
Of course there would be fear; any rational human being would fear the resignation of their own conscience. But, in doing that...in letting go...a voice in the back of his mind, distant and garbled and perhaps fictional, a muse of his own design, tells him that he will meet his sister again, will see her smile, will feel her embrace, and if that's what it takes - remission of his anger, his hurt, his desires and will - he'll do that for her. There has never been a single thing he would not do for his sister.
Glowing, the expanse flashes; brightness consumes void, darkness dissolving, white migrating through the abyss, painting it, filling it, and two siblings - one pair of souls - dissipate; absence rings out, emptiness and faint light in its wake, but not before she whispers, "I love you," and he chokes out, "Always."
No one wants to contemplate void; no one wants to contemplate nothingness; no one yearns for abyss, or the crippling unknown it brings, but sometimes - under the right or wrong circumstances - human beings are drawn to make a stand under such conditions. As their light fades, passes on, wanders off to another horizon, the expanse of life and death smiles, laughs, pokes fun at herself as she takes shape; her hair cascades in brown waves down her back, sweater clinging to her skin as it forms from nothingness, and she knows - without even an inkling of doubt - that they're alright now; it'll be okay. Again and again, she tells herself that, and - again and again - she plunges forward against the wind.
His voice echoes from down below. "Geez. What a bunch of saps."
Her voice echoes from up above. "Oh, don't say things like that! Are you saying you're any better, Aoi-kun?"
He pauses, because, quite frankly, he can't even argue with that. "Got me there."
Pushing with all her strength, Akane Kurashiki thrusts forth her will, but it isn't only hers; it's Light's and Clover's and Aoi's, too, all pressing, praying, yielding one singular, collective will.
"Here's to not fucking up this time, I guess." If he could, he'd run his fingers through his hair, nervously threading them through, trying to seem calm all the same.
"Isn't that what you always say?" There's a tiny huff to her voice, an imaginary puff to imaginary cheeks, a wide, wry grin that she can't even hide, not even if she wants to, and she won't say it, but he knows she's thinking that the last thing they need in this situation is more repetition, more reruns and rehashes of the same old gig, but...
"Always isn't such a bad thing, is it?" His question is oddly philosophical, partly because of the space where their existences reside, and partly because of the question itself; to question that concept would be to apply a relative concept to a logical one, but, of course, he always did that when attempting to be deep.
And, of course, she only laughs as they, too, head off; his conscience always fades before hers, leaving her alone, and then - with unmatched, unrivaled determination, stronger than any storm - she finds him, again and again, over and over and over, hoping that - one day - she won't have to anymore.
Still, despite that... "Nope. Always isn't a bad thing at all!" Her voice is too chipper to be that of someone feeling her own brother fizzle out of existence, truly, but he's used to it by now.
"Why....not...?" His voice grows weaker, more labored by the second, and there's a low, irate hiss, followed by, "Can't feel my goddamned face." He hates this, he really does, but since he'll love her for, well, always, he's stuck with it.
"'Cause I'll love you for that long!"
Her laugh is too, too cute, so he supposes he can't be too annoyed by it in that moment. "Right... Whatever..." is all he manages in way of reply.
... Is there a hand on his shoulder? Her forehead, perhaps? He's not sure; he can't materialize here like she does. It never seems to work; he can feel, though, vaguely, and right now, he's almost positive she's touching him, comforting him softly. "Goodnight, Aoi-nii." Trembling, he holds back a rush of tears. That's his job; he's supposed to comfort her, and not the other way around, but he can't bring himself to bat her away, either.
"Good...night." More than anything, it's a gasp, defeated and exhausted and empty, and that is the last she senses of him before he is gone, gone, gone.
But, being alone isn't so bad. No, not really.
Being alone gives one time to pause and reflect, and while no one likes to dwell on the negative, sometimes - with just a bit of effort - solutions may be found, closure, clarity.
With one brave step forward - riding on the bravery of all the others, and for her sake as much as theirs - she begins again; before she can quite get going, however, something tugs at her ear, gently nudging, whispering.
'I love you.'
... Oh. He hadn't gotten to say it this time, had he?
"I love you, too!" she chirps, and she waves him goodbye, and it's not until she is truly alone that her own broken gasps begin.
This always happens, doesn't it?
Still...
'Get up. You're fine.'
... something tugs her forward, all the same. She won't be alone for much longer.
"Let's try this again...!" she whispers, determined, and - in an even more brilliant flash - she is simultaneously gone, lost in the eternity of existence.
Eternity is not, however, a bad thing; she tells herself that, at least.
Always isn't so bad.