Yami No Matsuei Fan Fiction ❯ Sins of the Father ❯ Reaper ( Chapter 1 )

Title: Reaper

Authoress: Sarrasi

Disclaimer: I do not own Yami no Matsuei, credit goes where it's due.

Challenge/Theme: #89 Fallen Angel

Fandom: Yami no Matsuei (Manga/Anime)

Pairing: Saki + Kazutaka

Rating: PG. Lots of morbid-ness.

Summary: Muraki is sick again, and his brother sits by his bed. What happens when death decides it's not yet time to visit?

~

Often, it was thought that death came to visit you in the early hours of the morning, when you were all alone, and shrouded in the heedless innocence of sleep. Maybe it would wrap you in one final, fatal embrace, and you could pinpoint that moment when your senses accelerated and the soul fled from your body…Maybe you'd spend eternity living in that moment, remaining lost long past the time your body returned to the earth, watching the world slowly forget your existence and spiral onward until everything ended.

 

At the age of twelve, Saki had seen too much death, he'd been told, but such things could not be helped when one very nearly lived in a hospital. He didn't mind though; death excited him and he hungered after it. Maybe he thought too much about these things, but, to each his own unhealthy obsession.

 

He settled next to a bed, looking in on the pale form curled around a ratty pillow. He was nearly invisible against the sheets, fever-streaked skin gently glowing in the muted light that streamed through the little square window; false dawn. Saki smiled; his hair was splayed in the messy farce of a broken halo.

 

He stroked the boy's chest gently, and his labored breathing slowed.

 

“Good morning, little brother.”

 

No response.

 

It was well into the evening when a fit of violent coughing finally wracked the shivering form. His eyes were rimmed dark with fatigue, but reflected the bright feverishness in his brother's. Saki felt his heart begin to beat faster; maybe the child would die this time or both their hearts would explode and death would take them together.

 

Kazutaka's hand clenched in the sheets, the livid blue tracery of veins that stretched beneath his skin mimicking some obscene flower. Saki watched in rapt fascination as the coughing dissolved once again into shuddering, desperate breaths. The hand slowly unclenched, its fragile strength beginning to ebb away. Then, everything became still.

 

Swiftly, he replaced the damp cloth because, for a heartbreaking eternity, he felt nothing at all. It was like death had disappointed him, and passed this child in favor of some other lowly wretch, or that his fervor was replaced with something heavy like cold stones.

 

He kissed the boy then, to stifle the panic rising in his throat; perhaps just to know what death tasted like on one's lips. Perhaps, to know that it was still waiting for him.

 

Some time later, Kazutaka would tell him; it was feather soft but harsh…Like a fallen angel's wing.

 

END

 

A/N: This is a series of related one-shots; they are written in no particular order for now but, once I've finished, I will order them chronologically.