Work Text:
{E se il piloto ti drizzò l’antenna
Oltre l’isole Egee, d’antichi fatti
Certo udisti suonar dell’Ellesponto
I liti, e la marea mugghiar portando
Alle prode Retee l’armi d’Achille
Sovra l’ossa di Aiace}
Void.
That's what he feels. A thumping void. Echoing void. The loud ricochet of his despair - his own stubborn heartbeat refusing to sink under the freezing, rippling waters of sudden realization.
He hopes until the end that this is just a bad dream. A lie concocted by the gunslinger's split tongue, if only to make war less ugly by a well - played trap, a lure to a duel. Something meaningful. Hope, however, doesn't suffice. Right from the start, he knows.
This is it.
This for real.
And when he meets the demon's gaze, those eyes so alien and crimson, he finds his own desolated conclusion.
He's gone.
Humans die, that's what they do all the time. Death comes and she has your eyes. And you follow her because there's nothing else to do.
Never has Shinpachi thought that Death would have come to rip Sanosuke from his grasp, to carry him adrift.
Shiranui keeps quiet, a silent sentry. He chose to be the rising tide, he's just a messenger - yet there's an unrest pricking under his skin that radiates pain. He wasn't enough. He should have dragged back the man, not the spear. He should have taken Harada Sanosuke to Aizu alive, not make himself bearer of the splinters of his weapons. He hands them over choking on a scream that never takes flight from his mouth. Never bares his teeth. Never howls his grief.
Never. Sano is never coming back.
A never ending longing.
Sano is gone, but this pain carved raw is going to stay.
For the first time in his life, Shinpachi truly doesn't know what to say.
He wasn't there.
And that made the difference.
{Thus they mourn alone, togheter.
Discovering that, in the end, there are no words that can fill this empty cup}.