Fandom: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon: Sailor Stars (anime)
Date Finished:
Classification: Alternate Universe, Romance, Angst
Pairing: Seiya/Yaten, Taiki/Ami, Mamoru/Usagi, Haruka/Michiru  
Rating: NC-17

The Long Road
By Elsewhere
elsewherecw@shaw.ca

All other information in Part One.

Part Three: Someday

Glossary:
ano - um
doushita - what happened?/what’s wrong?
eto - um
itadakimasu - a ritual saying of thanks for the food
masaka - impossible; no way
oi - hey

*****
"Two more" the anthem for the know-it-all
You won’t be standing up for long
You better learn how to crawl
*****

By the way her eyes caressed his face lightly once and then fixed, peering curiously into his eyes, he could tell that she knew he was nervous. It was probably obvious that he hadn’t slept; his eyes were hollow and haunted.

She didn’t even bother with an introduction or any sort of prelude. Having taken in his condition, she seemed to want to get straight to business.

He was beginning to wonder if there wasn’t a certain subtle cruelty about her…a certain sadism to that intensity in her eyes as she watched him sit there, shaking slightly, suffering.

"What is this darkness in your mind?" she asked, brushing her hair behind her ear before she leaned forward, looking curiously into his eyes. Hers were soft, such a brilliant green…he felt seared.

He took a deep breath, trying to calm the ominous beat of his heart.

"I told you…it’s everything but the last year. It’s…my past. Everything that I used to be…everything that used to be important to me…everything before what I have now."

"So you admit that something exists within that nothingness?" she murmured, and he nodded, turning his eyes down to the tabletop, watching his hands shake against it.

"I know what’s there."

"Have you ever tried to rediscover the lost secrets within the darkness?" she asked, voice softening.

"Yes…I used to…want to know. About me. Who I am. About my past…what I’ve lost. But that kind of thing is…that…"

His breathing was becoming ragged as his hands started to shake more badly.

"That kind of thing is…?" she whispered. "What? Dangerous?"

"…It’s…if I…get near it…everything will be…I start to…"

It was getting harder to breathe now, and he could hardly see his hands through the sweat that was running into his eyes.

"Seiya."

He blinked, surprised by the sudden sensation of some kind of shock to his system, and glanced down at her hands where they were closed warmly around his, stilling their shaking.

"Seiya, look at me."

He did as commanded, looking up, and was instantly caught in the warmth of her green eyes, pulling him in, away from the blackness that had almost swallowed him.

"There," she murmured a moment later, leaning back slightly, although she didn’t let go of his hands.

Now that it was over though…now that he was coming back to himself…he felt like it was wrong somehow. It was too close. So he released her hands carefully, pulling his own away, and watched as she slowly folded her hands in front of herself again.

"Seiya…" she began slowly, her tone even, almost analytical. "You have…no idea what happened to you?"

"No," he said quietly, shaking his head, his eyes on the table again. He was silent for a moment before, reluctantly, he continued. "When I was still in the hospital, there were some…therapies. But…"

He closed his eyes.

"Nothing came of it," she surmised, leaning back and rubbing her forehead. "And they told you…"

"That someday I might remember…but I might never remember," he said, shaking his head again.

"I see," she said, in that familiar, quiet way.

They sat in silence for a moment, and then she lifted a hand towards him, fingers outstretched.

"May I?" she asked, and he glanced up at her and blinked.

"May you what…?"

"The wound," she said, getting to her feet and taking a step towards him. "Where is it?"

He couldn’t seem to answer, an empty sound escaping his mouth, but the way his hand flew defensively to the left side of his head was answer enough.

"So it’s there, is it?" she murmured, and the next thing he knew, she was standing next to him, leaning over him, and her fingers were in his hair again, this time pulling the strands apart, seeking the scar. He grimaced when she found it, feeling her fingers running over the rough tissue, and he let out a rough sigh, only to realize that he was breathing directly into the tops of her breasts, pressed almost into his face as she leaned over him.

"Does that hurt you, if I do that?" she asked softly as she ran her fingers over the scar once more.

"No…it’s just…" he said, now entirely tense, trying to keep from breathing on her and nervous about what she was doing to his head.

"It makes you uncomfortable," she said, and he didn’t reply; he knew she didn’t need a reply.

"Hm…the outward wound is actually remarkably small," she said in a tone of pondering. He tilted his eyes upward, trying to see her expression, only to see that she’d closed her eyes and furrowed her brow as though she was concentrating hard on something. "The inner wound, however, is a different matter…"

And then, something really strange happened. As he watched from his awkward position, her expression froze into one of intense anguish---a pain he briefly shared as her hands clenched against his head, fingernails digging into his skin---and then, after a few seconds had passed, she let out a soft breath and suddenly slumped forward. Even if he didn’t realize it, his body seemed to instinctually know that she was falling, and he got to his own feet and caught her within a second, his hands supporting her against his chest as she seemed to struggle to reorient herself, her breath soft and raspy.

"Oi…doushita?" he asked, concerned.

She was silent for another moment while she caught her breath, and then she finally shook her head and looked up, giving him a small smile. Even he could tell it was forced, though.

"Nothing…nothing. I just…haven’t eaten enough today, that’s all," she said, waving a hand as though to dismiss the whole matter and stepping away from him, shakily moving back to her seat at the booth.

"Then…then I’ll go get you something," he said, running a hand quickly through his hair as though setting the purpose in his mind before he took off for the bar.

"No, Seiya, you don’t have to…Seiya!" she called after him, but he ignored her.

He came back five minutes later and placed a plate loaded with food in front of her, then stood back to watch for her reaction.

She stared at the plate for a moment and then…her eyes started to tear up.

An expression of mild panic came to his face.

"Ah…don’t cry…ano…of course someone like you wouldn’t like something low-class like a hamburger…eto…I’ll find you something else, okay?" he said, reaching out to take the plate.

She shook her head quickly, pushing his hand away with one hand while the other wiped her eyes.

"No…I’ll eat it," she said, her voice a bit hoarse. "I was just thinking how much like you it was, that’s all. Always thinking a hamburger could solve any problem."

He stared at her. What a strange thing to say. He…did think that, actually. Delicious food always made him feel better, and hamburgers were his favorite, and he happened to know that a lot of the things that made him feel better worked for other people too. But how could she know…?

"Itadakimasu," she murmured before she picked up the hamburger and, with a soft smile and a shrug, bit into it. He sat down across from her slowly, silently watching her eat.

"Yaten…" he said quietly, a few minutes later, after she’d finished the hamburger---she’d actually eaten the whole thing, quite gratefully it seemed---and was picking her way through her fries.

"Mm?" she said, lifting her eyes questioningly.

"Why *did* you cry for me, that time?" he asked, genuinely curious.

She looked surprised by the question.

"Seiya…I cried because it was sad…your story is sad," she said, her tone expressing a certain sentiment of, ‘Isn’t it obvious?’

"Why? I live a good enough life here…" he began, but she shook her head, frowning slightly.

"It’s sad that they couldn’t find you…your friends, I mean."

"My…friends?"

She seemed to force the frown away.

"The other members of the band you talked about. It’s sad that they didn’t get there in time to find you. They must miss you…they may still be looking for you. It’s sad that you didn’t find each other."

He stared at her, totally stunned, for several minutes, while she stared off to one side, seemingly lost in thought.

"I…never thought of it that way," he whispered finally, glancing downward. "I always thought they just…never came for me. Or that they just didn’t exist."

"Masaka," she said a bit impatiently, and he glanced up. "They must have looked for you. They must have."

"You…think so?"

She nodded.

"I…just never thought of it that way. I guess if you think of it that way, it is sad, isn’t it?" he said thoughtfully, dropping his chin to rest against his hand as he thought about it.

"I think so," she said softly, and then she fell silent.

She didn’t speak again that night.

*****

The next night he approached her more hesitantly than usual. He had even debated pretending not to see her there. But he couldn’t back down from the challenge, after all. He couldn’t look that cowardly in front of her; he’d already done enough.

So he went to her table, but he didn’t look her in the eye.

"Sit down," she said quietly.

So he sat, and he folded his hands, and he waited.

"Don’t worry…I won’t ask you to talk about the darkness anymore," she said, her voice softening. She sounded sympathetic. "I don’t think you need to. I can do the talking now."

He lifted his head, meeting her eyes reluctantly and then finding, as usual, that he was instantly drawn into them.

"What do you mean…?" he asked, his own voice hushed.

"I mean that I think I understand," she said, offering him a slight smile. "But perhaps you can judge for yourself."

He stared at her for a moment before he nodded. He couldn’t help but admit to himself a certain eagerness to hear what she had to say.

"If…I understand correctly," she began, turning her head, her eyes focusing on something in the distance as she seemed to consider her words, "then time for you exists on a sort of ‘before’ and ‘after’ basis. There’s before the accident…or, more relevant to you, before you woke up in the hospital…and there’s after. There’s the past, which is nothing to you…and there’s now. You don’t think about the future and you don’t delve into the past."

He remained silent, attempting to understand her words, especially since they seemed to hold some particular weight for her.

"Because you’ve lost your past…because it has become something that does not exist in your present experience…you experience it now as this blackness, this nothingness in your mind," she continued, her tone just as thoughtful as he felt, trying to absorb her words and the sentiment behind them. "And that darkness is something that you hesitate to approach. It poses a danger to you."

He could feel his blood quickening just at the thought of approaching the darkness, but he tried to keep himself calm. Listening to her voice like this kept him calm, somehow. Looking at her kept him calm.

"You have…envisioned the darkness as the entity which has taken your past from you. Because you don’t know what happened to you…because you have no one and nothing else to blame…the emptiness you imagine in your mind has become the target of that blame." She finished the last part as a whisper, as she turned to look at him, her normally intense green eyes somehow softer now with a kind of deep sadness. "And because you see the darkness in your own mind as responsible for what you’ve gone through…the loss of your past…you fear approaching that darkness because…you’re afraid you’ll lose everything else. Your present…this moment, now; what you can remember. So you focus on patterns, on continuity…on ‘scenery’…to keep yourself from looking to the past…from looking into your own mind."

He sat there, not moving, just staring at the tabletop now---he figured he was breathing, but he wasn’t entirely sure.

"Is that it, Seiya?" she asked, her voice so soft, so gentle. "You’re afraid to lose everything that you’ve gained? If you touch the darkness, it will all be lost?"

He couldn’t answer her, but when she touched his shaking hand---when she slowly entwined her fingers with his and stroked his knuckles until the shaking slowed and then stopped---he knew that she knew the answer anyway.

His break was almost over before he found his voice again, and when it came out, he didn’t sound like himself at all. His voice was rough and raspy, as though he’d been crying, even though he’d just been sitting there doing nothing but breathing and trying not to think.

"You win."

"Hm?" He saw her eyebrow rise out of the corner of his eye.

"You win…you answered my challenge to you first," he said, glancing up and then feeling a bit regretful when he met her bright green eyes. They seemed painful to him right now, for some reason. "Now you know everything about me…and I still know nothing about you."

She laughed. It was a beautiful, really surprising sound, the sound of her laugh.

"You know me better than you think, Seiya," she said, and he stiffened slightly when she reached across to run a hand lightly through his hair. She got to her feet and got her purse, touching his shoulder as she came to stand next to him. "And there’s still so much to learn about you."

She started to leave, but he stopped her, this time by grabbing her hand. He surprised himself with his own boldness; he dropped her hand instantly, feeling a bit ashamed or bent out of shape somehow that he’d done something like that, but she just turned back towards him expectantly, as though it wasn’t odd at all.

"You’re leaving?" he asked bluntly, unable to get anything else out. He felt like his ability to communicate had collapsed.

"Yes…I have to get home early tonight," she said, and she provided no further explanation, not that she was obligated to. And then she left.

He tried not to think about her or what she’d said to him too much, but he was up for a few hours that night, wondering about it. Having it all explained in words felt really harsh, somehow. Like having his soul raked or aired out or something. She really had a talent for seeing inside him and understanding well; it made him nervous, but it also left him trembling a little bit, wanting to be close to her. He couldn’t help that.

He couldn’t help a lot of things…he’d come to accept that.

*****

She didn’t come to the bar the next day, or even the next after that. Lately she’d been coming every night, and talking to him every night. It had become part of the routine, so it felt strange for it not to happen. He thought of her even more than usual. He thought of an old phrase, about someone being conspicuous in their absence. He wondered why he could remember stupid things like that, but not the things that some people considered essential…like who he was, or at least who he’d been.

Not seeing her made him think these things, for some reason. Those two nights, going home after work, after not seeing her, he didn’t sleep at all. He was up all night, pacing in front of the TV, clutching his head, trying to keep the darkness at bay. Thoughts like that---about other people and what was normal and how he definitely wasn’t, because normal people didn’t just have a name and a job and a routine, they had a name that meant something to them and friends and family and memories of a life behind them---thoughts like that always made him like this. Sometimes he thought he would just fall into the abyss and never come back. Somehow he always seemed to crawl out just in time, before he lost too much of himself.

Strange that he had become so dependent, though. He wasn’t stupid enough not to recognize the cause of this. She really had become part of the routine. So much that it was dangerous. Losing her, not having her there, meant that the routine was broken, and thoughts spiraled out of control. She really had become necessary. He’d never had a person like that. He didn’t know what to do about it, especially since he had some vague idea that it wasn’t the sort of thing you told someone---‘You’re part of the routine that keeps me sane so I have to see you at least once a day from now on, and you have no choice in the matter.’ No, that was the thing about other humans. They had lives of their own, those kind of normal lives that gave him these tremors in the first place.

She probably had some kind of very normal life, he started thinking. She probably had some kind of expensive apartment or condominium somewhere in a really nice area of the city, and she probably had it professionally decorated and always kept it clean and orderly---maybe she even had a maid or something. And she probably had some kind of boyfriend or exotic lover or something, maybe an older man who would take care of her and buy her lots of expensive things, the kind of things a pretty girl like her would want. She probably did yoga, or one of those fancy things that upper-middle-class types liked. Maybe she had university education. Maybe she had some kind of high-paying job. Maybe she was famous and he totally didn’t know it.

She probably had absolutely no interest in a crackpot like him except the kind of interest girls these days had in bacterial specimens. Maybe he was her biology project. She’d watch him grow for a little while and it would teach her about the meaning of life and then she’d move on. Or maybe she really was just a sadist, and because he was an easy target, she’d picked him out of the crowd of waiting, slavering masochists, all dying to have even a moment at her feet.

Most of the time, he realized, when he’d been sitting and talking with her, he hadn’t even thought about her that way. But when he was alone like this, it became different. The desperation of being apart became something else, and he realized that if she was here right now, he probably wouldn’t be able to help touching her. He wanted to touch her…to run his hands through her hair, maybe, or to see whether her cheeks were as baby-soft as they looked. She’d been so warm when he’d held her against him that one time…he’d felt her through his clothes. And her smell…she always smelled incredible, some kind of exotic smell like some kind of flower he couldn’t possibly have named.

He’d never thought of himself as a possessive person at all. Someone who didn’t care about anything he owned or had couldn’t be possessive. But he didn’t own or have her, and he wanted her, and that was a kind of possessiveness, he supposed. It was a yearning at least. A hunger that hurt, deep in his stomach, as he sat there curled on his bed, trying not to think about it or about anything.

After all…it would all probably mean nothing to her at all.

*****

When he left work the next night, at about one in the morning, and stepped out into the dark street…she was there, standing under one of the streetlights, her hands in the pockets of her coat. She instantly lifted a hand, waving to him, and he only hesitated a few seconds before he jogged over towards her.

"Come on…let’s get out of here," she said, before he could say anything or ask her why she was standing out in the street at one in the morning, or comment that it was dangerous. And she started to walk away, and he couldn’t help but follow her; there was nothing else to do.

She led him to a tiny restaurant a couple of blocks away that was open for a couple more hours, a little Italian place. She muttered something about good pasta and pulled him into the restaurant, and he soon found himself seated and with a drink and a pasta dish he hadn’t ordered. She was so quick sometimes he couldn’t follow her motions or her words.

"You weren’t there, the last couple of nights," he commented idly as he sampled his pasta. Damn…it was good! But of course she would have the best taste.

"I had work," she said simply, taking a delicate sip of her wine. "What, did you miss me?"

He didn’t dare answer that, and he shifted nervously when he saw the somewhat sly smile that came to her lips.

"So you work," he said, still careful to sound non-interested.

"I do," she said, the smile becoming something of a smirk. "I have to live, after all. I just work in the day, unlike you."

"But every night you come to the bar," he said, finally lifting his eyes, showing some genuine interest. "When do you sleep?"

"When I can," she said, noncommittally. "I do what’s necessary in my life. Don’t you?"

"I…suppose," he said a bit hesitantly, frowning. He didn’t quite understand.

"Well, you do what’s necessary for you to survive in the present," she remarked, pausing for a moment to watch the wine swirling in her glass before she put it aside and turned back to her dinner. She seemed focused on that, but her words continued. "But I wonder if you couldn’t be doing more."

"What do you mean?" he asked, the frown still in place.

"Well…we’ve established what it is that you’re afraid of," she said, her tone perfectly even. "And we’ve established fairly certainly what exists within this ‘darkness’ in your mind."

He was silent, staring at his plate a bit stonily.

"But I feel that there comes a time in every person’s life when she must face her fears," she said, and he grimaced in time to the scrape of her knife against her plate.

"I’m a man," he said quietly, for some reason feeling mildly affronted by her words.

"His life, then," she said, glancing up briefly before turning back to her meal. "Just an expression. My point is that…don’t you ever consider that at some point you simply must find some way to overcome your fear and face your past? Find what exists within the darkness?"

"No!"

He blurted it out so loudly that not only did her head jerk up, but the heads of several people sitting around them turned towards them as well.

"No? You’ve never considered it?" she said, her voice still just as even and quiet.

"No," he said, forcing himself to be quieter, his voice muffled as it moved through his gritted teeth. "I told you…that’s…impossible. I can’t…"

"It’s difficult, of course. Facing powerful fear always is," she said, shaking her head a bit impatiently. "But it’s not something that *can’t* be done."

"Don’t patronize me!" he snapped, dropping his fork, causing several people to turn again. He could feel his anger rapidly spinning out of control, but this too felt like something he couldn’t help. What was she saying!? Had she truly misunderstood to this extent!? And he’d thought she knew so well…

"I’m not patronizing you, Seiya…I’m talking to you, rationally," she said, some of her impatience finally showing through in her tone as she turned her eyes up to meet his. He was surprised to see the determination blazing there. "I was hoping you would be capable of it. Are you telling me that you can’t see any reason why you should want to regain what you’ve lost? You never want to find out who you are; what you’ve done in the past; what happened to you?"

"No! I don’t care! My life is fine the way it is," he growled, shaking his head angrily.

"Oh, it’s fine the way it is, is it?" she said, and even as he watched, something seemed to change in her eyes. The rationality she had mentioned seemed to disappear behind the blaze, a wall of intense fire taking its place. She was angry, now…more angry than he’d ever imagined he’d see her. More angry than he’d imagined someone of her beauty could be capable of, though he knew now he should have seen that possibility in those brilliant, shimmering eyes.

"So you’re saying it’s fine that you sleep all day and go to your precious bar every night, always doing exactly the same thing? You’re saying it’s fine that you have to rely on ‘routine’ and ‘continuity’ and goddamned ‘scenery’ so you don’t tip over the edge? You’re saying it’s fine to leave it like that, every day the same, without ever knowing any other way?"

"What’s wrong with it? No one’s ever complained before," he hissed defensively. He could feel something burning in his chest now, something really painful.

"Oh, no one’s complained? And you think that since no one’s complained, everyone around you thinks it’s perfectly normal. Let me tell you, Seiya, everyone at that bar knows about your life, and they may sympathize and think it’s sad, but that’s not the same as *approval*." She almost spat the last word out.

He felt like he’d been kicked in the stomach, and he knew she could see it in his face by the way she paused, trying to catch her breath.

Okay…so he’d always known that. He’d always known that everyone there knew about him, and that they all watched him, and looked at him with pity in their eyes, and knew he wasn’t normal. But to say it just like that, to say it like it was…

People were even watching them now. One woman in particular seemed to be watching the whole conversation. He could see her out of the corner of his eye. He wanted to tell her to go away.

"So there’s no reason for you to find out who you are?" She spoke again, before he could pull any of his thoughts together. Her voice was still low, still just as harsh as before. "What about your friends, Seiya? The ones who’re looking for you? What if they’re still looking for you, and they can’t find you? Don’t you care about finding them? They could be worried sick…they could think you’re dead…"

"Why the hell should I care?" he snapped, the words coming out of him in a rush. "Why should I care? That’s nothing to me now. That was then. This is now. I have no obligation to them. I don’t care!"

He had expected to have to keep shouting. But with those words, something happened to her…she seemed to deflate a little, as though the fight was leaving her.

"You don’t care? You really don’t care?" she asked, her voice soft and hoarse, her eyes now somewhat dead.

"I really don’t care," he said, glaring at her for all he was worth.

"I see," she said, in that familiar, usually soothing, now really annoying way. She didn’t see at all…he knew that now. She’d never seen anything.

She dropped her eyes to her plate and took a deep breath…and when she lifted her eyes again, they seemed set once more, and her face was a mask of stone.

"I see," she said again, her voice deadly and rough, and he felt himself stiffen at her tone, so cold it froze his blood. "I see now. You’re not who I thought you were, Seiya. I took an interest in you because I thought you were…but it doesn’t matter. You can’t even be the person I first met. The kind of person who would put his own safety on the line---who wouldn’t care how badly he got wounded---to get in fights to help other people when it wasn’t even his business…that kind of person would never say he absolutely didn’t care about the people who loved him."

Each word felt like an ice-tipped arrow driven into his heart, but he couldn’t speak up or stop her.

"Instead, Seiya…you’re the saddest, most pathetic person I’ve ever met," she said, and as he listened, her tone changed until it was dripping with a kind of repulsion and contempt that made him tremble right down to his bones. Her eyes tore into him like claws, making him feel exposed, naked and abused. "Content to live in your rut the rest of your life, without ever changing…what kind of a life is that, Seiya? Have you ever even thought of that? Oh no, I forgot…you don’t *think*, do you? It interrupts the *routine*."

God…he couldn’t take that sarcasm from her anymore. It was tearing into him, taking him apart. He stumbled to his feet, not even noticing as he knocked things off the table, not noticing that he was clasping his head the way he would at home---not noticing that people were staring. He made it out into the street alone, but then she was there, right behind him, like the devil on his shoulder.

"I thought you had worth, Seiya…but you disgust me, you really do," she spat towards him. "Everything living on this planet has to change…everything that’s stagnant becomes death. You want to die? I have no interest in a dead man or the pathetic life of the half-dead."

He wanted to tell her to shut up, to leave him alone, but he couldn’t. All he could do was shut his eyes and clasp his head and stumble towards his home, hoping she would leave him alone. And she did, eventually, finally stopping and staying put while he continued on. But she called after him, her voice still piercing through the air and reaching him, as much as he didn’t want it to.

"Think about it, Seiya…think about what this life means to you," she shouted at him. "Think about what a life like yours could mean to *anyone*!!"

And then he couldn’t hear her anymore, even if she still was shouting after him. She was gone, but the nightmare continued…her words echoed on and on inside his head, never ending.

Gods…make it end…

*****

"Yaten."

She jumped slightly when she felt the hand fall on her shoulder, then relaxed at the familiar sound of the voice.

"Taiki…"

"Don’t you think that was…a bit too much?" the younger woman murmured, stepping closer so she could lower her voice. Their two shadows fell harshly on the cold street.

"Yes…it was," Yaten replied with a soft sigh, rubbing her forehead. "I’m sorry, Taiki."

"No…you do what you think is best, Yaten. Start again tomorrow, if need be."

"No…I think I’ll give him a few days to absorb the shock I’ve given him," Yaten answered, closing her eyes, trying to hold back her tears. "If he makes it through that, I’ll try a new tactic."

"A new…Yaten, are you thinking…?"

"Yes. I think it’s time to tell him the truth."

*****

END PART THREE