Work Text:
The First Day Of Their Forever
A blurry image gradually came into focus, at first nothing more than formless mounds of color. As they took shape, the details became clearer, revealing long stretches of grassy knolls and rocky mountains in the distance.
The boy blinked, then blinked again. Until everything came into focus.
Before his eyes, there it was, the world he had worked so hard, and sacrificed so much to create…
“...This is Xanadu?”, a voice beside him said softly.
Realizing her hand was still clutching his own, he breathed a deep sigh of relief.
Though she had made such a big deal about coming with him, there was that part of him that had worried they might have been separated in the journey. Yet another one of his many anxieties lifted from his shoulders.
If he had arrived alone after all that… what a cruel joke that would’ve been.
“Not that I expected it too but… it really doesn’t feel any different”, the voice said with an almost displeased tone.
“It’s not supposed to”, he remarked, “That was the point”.
“I k-know that! It’s just… after everything that happened, it’s just a little anticlimactic is all”, the voice said.
“I don’t know about you but I’ve had my fill of climaxes… enough for a lifetime”, he said with an exasperated sigh.
That was when the girl entered his field of view… that long red hair… those big eyes.
“This is as good a place as any for a rest, don’t you think?”, was the question she posed.
“I’m not in much of a hurry to do anything so… Yes, I think I agree”, he admitted, taking a seat on the crisp grass as the wind blew past his shoulders.
The girl sat beside him, her blazing red hair transitioning to black as she calmed herself.
The boy glanced at her… still in disbelief that she was there, with him, at that moment.
She had forced herself into his life once again… not that he was complaining.
It was all he ever wanted after all… even if he still had doubts that he deserved it.
The girl noticed his stare and blinked with curiosity.
“What is it, Yuji?”, she asked innocently.
“N-Nothing… Or rather, everything, I guess. I’m just… adjusting”.
“O-Oh… Okay, me too”.
It was the first time in awhile that they had been so close without their swords drawn.
Yuji let slip a faint smile.
“Mhm… That was very you of you back there”, he said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”.
“Maybe I’d forgotten just how… Shana you can be, Shana”.
“That’s right. And I’m not going to let you forget it”, she replied with an eager grin.
“If I ever do, you can always just headbutt me again”, Yuji replied, attempting a joke.
Shana leaned over and fell against him, lightly tapping her forehead against his.
“I’ll headbutt you every day until it sinks in”, she declared with a bit too much excitement.
“L-Let’s not get too crazy… Though I suppose I wouldn’t have any right to complain”.
She had gotten so close to him.
“...Do you really forgive me, Shana?”.
“I k-kissed you, didn’t I? Isn’t that obvious enough?”.
“I’m sorry but… I’m not satisfied with that. If this whole ordeal has taught me anything… it’s that we need to communicate more with our words”.
Shana slowly nodded in understanding.
“I see… You want words, huh…”, she murmured before continuing, “I think you’re a big idiot, Yuji. You’re a stupid idiot… for leaving me, for not trusting me… for going as far as you did… for wanting to leave me all over again…”.
She took a deep breath, “But… I understand why you felt you had to do those things… and in the end, I think you were right…”.
“...Maybe I wouldn’t have listened. Maybe I was too fixated on being a Flame Haze to consider what you had to say…”, she admitted with a slight blush, “B-But that’s no excuse for not atleast trying…”.
“You’re right… If I could do it over again… Well, I guess it’s too late for that”, Yuji said, leaning back.
“But yes, I do forgive you… Of course I forgive you”, she said with a warm smile.
His body clenched slightly. He really didn’t deserve her… but he was so glad she was there.
“The whole time when we were fighting… All I could think was that I wanted… I wanted m-my Yuji back”, Shana sheepishly admitted.
“Well, I’ll try my best to live up to your expectations”.
“Please! It hasn’t been that long! You can’t have forgotten how to be yourself”.
“...You’d be surprised”, Yuji said, gazing downward, “Those days with you feel like a lifetime ago,,, Hopefully it all comes back to me soon”.
He felt Shana gently brush the back of his neck.
“Well you’re already looking the part atleast”, she told him.
Although a darker shade, his hair had returned to its normal length and shape.
“The hair wasn’t my idea… Honestly, I don’t know how you manage, Shana”.
“Ngh… It takes awhile to wash myself… Sometimes I just have Alastor cleanse me out of habit”, she said with some annoyance.
Yuji glanced down at the pendant around her neck.
“Speaking of, he’s being awfully quiet”.
Shana smiled, “Don’t mind him, he’s just letting us have our moment”.
“I see, how kind of him”, Yuji replied, the normal boy part of his brain starting to wonder exactly how intimate they could get with the deity around. He chastised himself for that train of thought at first… but welcomed it as a sign that he was starting to return to his ordinary self.
“A-Anyway, you’re not allowed to grow it out”, she ordered.
“That’s fine by me…”, Yuji told her, “Besides… I wouldn’t want to become an uncomfortable reminder”.
“And get some new clothes! I feel like there’s still a wall between us with that outfit!”, Shana insisted.
“Eh? But I kinda like these…”, Yuji whimpered.
“Overruled!”, she proclaimed.
He sighed, “Very well… I’ll get some new digs as soon as possible”.
“Give them to me when you do, I’ll burn them for good measure”.
“T-That’s a little much…”, Yuji expressed, scratching his cheek.
But he understood… it was a distasteful reminder of his tenure as the Snake of the Festival’s host. A time where he had been her greatest enemy… it only made sense that she wouldn’t want to be constantly reminded of that. He felt a little ashamed that he hadn’t already thought of it.
‘ I need to take Shana’s feelings into account from now on ’, he told himself.
His failure to do so was the cause of everything, after all.
Shana looked around the grassy plains, “Is there where Misaki City would have been?”.
“That seems likely”, he answered, “I had wondered how the God of Creation was going to account for that. Since it couldn’t be copied, I guess he just defaulted to this unassuming scenery”.
“It just keeps going… crazy how much space a city takes up”, Shana said, the grass waving with the wind around them.
Indeed, the entire space where a city stood in another world was nothing more than a massive field of grassy hills surrounded by nearby mountains.
“Maybe someday the humans of this world will build a new city here. Why let perfectly good land go to waste?”, Yuji suggested.
“I almost wish they wouldn’t but that’s probably selfish of me”, Shana said wistfully.
A moment of silence passed as they both gazed up at the blue sky, pillowy clouds soaring overhead.
“Where will we live, Yuji?”.
“I had planned to wander, to teach the denizens how to co-exist with humanity”.
“Right… But a home would be nice too, at some point”.
“Well, think of it this way. Traveling the world might help us decide where we’d want to live”, Yuji proposed thoughtfully.
“Yeah! You’re right… There’s so much of it I haven’t seen after all”.
“I might have agreed with walk with you, but I still have a duty”, he said solemnly.
“I’ll help you however I can, Yuji… Maybe I need to learn how to co-exist with the denizens too…”.
“I imagine many will be apprehensive to co-exist with their hunters”, Yuji told her.
“There’s no need for Flame Hazes anymore…”, Shana said, a sorrowful look in her eyes.
Sensing this, Yuji put a hand to her shoulder, “Or maybe it’s a new era for Flame Hazes. To become something other than hunters”, he said reassuringly.
“Yeah… a world where we don’t have to fight…”, Shana muttered, pulling out her sword and holding it gingerly in her hands.
“If I’m not a hunter… what am I?”, Shana wondered aloud.
“You can be whatever you want, Shana. You’re free. Relieved of duty”, Yuji told her supportively. He saw the confusion in her eyes… fighting was all she ever knew.
But that was exactly why he did what he did.
“I am grateful, Yuji… It’s just not an easy thing to accept”.
“I understand… Give it time. We have all the time in the world now, after all”.
Shana looked at him compassionately.
“Yuji… How does it feel? To not be a torch anymore?”.
The boy let out a small chuckle, “I know you might expect me to say that a weight’s been taken off my shoulders… but truthfully, it’s almost the opposite. If I felt empty before, now I feel… full, if that makes sense”.
“It does… I never considered how a torch must feel before I met you. But ever since I… I could never stop thinking about how you felt, being a hollow shell”, Shana admitted.
Yuji clenched his fists.
“When we fought the Statue of Pride… when I nearly faded away… I realized how fragile it all was. Both you and me… that it was just going to keep happening over and over. Us, beating another denizen and narrowly avoiding the end…”, he began to explain.
Shana listened intently.
“How long could we keep doing that? At some point, our luck had to run out… And even if it somehow never did, even if we managed to survive time and time again… what kind of life is that? An existence riddled with the anxiety and strife of endless combat…”, he continued, tears starting to well in his eyes.
“Yuji…”.
“I made mistakes along the way… did terrible things. But now that we’re here, I want you to understand what I was feeling… Understand why I felt I had no other choice”, he finished, letting out a deep breath.
Shana leaned against him.
“I do… I get it… If I were the torch and you were the Flame Haze… I think, no, I know… I’d feel the same way”, she told him empathetically.
“But what’s done is done… We have all eternity before us now”, Yuji said, gazing at the mountain peaks in the distance.
“I’m still a young Flame Haze… I don’t think the word ‘forever’ has really sunk in yet”.
“I can hardly imagine it either. How will we change in all that time? Will we even be the same people thousands of years from now?”, Yuji pondered.
“I think we’ll be fine… Instead of thinking about some far-off point, why don’t we just focus on tomorrow?”, Shana suggested.
“Tomorrow? What do you want to do tomorrow?”.
“...I’d like to find some melon bread”, she told him, wrapping her arm around his.
Yuji chuckled, “Why am I not surprised… But you know, that does sound nice actually”.
“Just make sure you remember the right way to eat it”.
“Yeah yeah, like you’d ever let me forget”.
As he looked at her, he noticed something peculiar.
“W-What?”.
“Nothing, I was just thinking that you’re wearing a uniform from a school that doesn’t exist”.
“Huh… I’ll treasure it as a memento”.
“It’ll probably confuse people when we find another city”.
“Oto shouldn’t be too far, right?”.
“You want to head to Oto? I figured we’d go for Tokyo, we can get anywhere in the world from there”.
“Yuji, we don’t have any money”.
“Well we better figure that out soon or we won’t be having melon bread tomorrow”.
“Let’s head for Oto right away!”.
“Shana, it’s not like you actually need to eat… Wait, do Flame Hazes need to eat?”.
“I-I won’t die but it isn’t a pleasant feeling”.
“Well that settles that. Can’t let my girlfriend feel unpleasant”, Yuji said, standing to his feet and brushing himself off.
“...!”, Shana blushed as she leapt off the ground.
“That’s right! W-We’re together now! F-Forever!”, she affirmed as if it were new information.
“Yeah so--”, Yuji began before Shana took him by the hand and started running.
“H-Hey! Shana! Slow down! Are we going to run all the way to Oto!?”, he remarked with surprise.
“It’s the first day of our forever, Yuji! Let’s not waste it!”, Shana boldly proclaimed.
Yuji’s eyes widened as he stared ahead at the girl dragging him by the hand. Her lithe frame moving with the grace of a skilled warrior, her long hair flowing in the breeze, that signature pendant dangling from her neck.
What had he been thinking, trying to come to Xanadu alone.
There was no way he could have ever done this without Shana.
He understood that now.
Picking up the pace, he ran ahead of her, still holding her hand tightly.
“Aah! Y-Yuji!”.
“C’mon! Let’s get you that melon bread!”, he said with complete sincerity.
Shana nodded eagerly as she pulled back ahead.
At a certain point, they stopped trying to compete with one another and simple ran side-by-side, hand-in-hand. Their faces awash with excitement and love, their worries left behind in another world.
It was the first day of their forever.
And they couldn’t wait to see what tomorrow would bring.
The future they’d face… together.
END
