Tsubasa Prequel:

Just Another Day

by Eternal SailorM/Angel B. Maxwell

He set a small bouquet of flowers down in his lap, sitting back on his heels to stare into the other's visage.

The face that stared back at him unblinkingly was a near mirror-match for his own. The lines that were so smooth on this face were more sharply drawn on his. Staring through him unfocusedly, the violet eyes that he knew matched his own seemed much darker. Someone had been letting the other boy's hair grow out again; the lavender tresses looked better tumbling around his shoulders like this, he decided.

Finally he sat back in the chair that had been brought into a otherwise barren room for this purpose, deliberately placing it before the direction his companion faced. His eyes still stared through and past him.

"Still no closer yet," he reported grimly. "I'm still looking." He stared down at his hands clenched in his lap, unable to meet those eyes as he whispered harshly, "Damn it, it seems like I've looked everywhere, and I'm still no closer to finding the bastard who hurt you."

The other boy didn't even so much as blink; his face was a study of neutrality. He sighed softly, looking up at him. He was slipping farther and farther away from him every day that went by. One day, there would be a time when he'd no longer acknowledge him at all, when he'd lose him for good.

Hesitantly, he reached out and touched his hand. He started, blinking sharply then smiled at him. "Kaoru," he greeted him, "how long have you been there?"

It took no effort for him to return the cheerful expression, though his was a bit less enthusiastic. "Just sat down, bishounen. So, how have you been?"

Small talk... small talk he was good at. Anything to keep the topic off what he'd been doing when he wasn't around him... Until the sky began to darken outside and he had to leave.

Just another day.

Just outside the church where he always left him, he turned back to stare at his mirror reflection, his twin, smiling and talking animatedly to the human priest cleaning the alter. "I swear to you," he breathed out, "I'll find the bastard, Kaori. He'll rue the day he laid a hand on you."

Promise repeated again, he turned to head back towards the battlefields that lay beyond the dying forest. Just another day...

Original version: 24 August 2002
Revision: 25 August 2002

Whee~! A Kaoru/Kaori prequel completed! I'm thinking I may even bring them into Butterfly Wings! I'm getting rather attached to them!