The Gift
A 'Weiss Kreuz' drabble
Sephy

"Listen to me. Listen. I love you. I will *always* love you. But this is the work I have to do…I figured it out and --and I'm okay. Give my love to my friends. You have to take care of them now. You have to take care of each other. You have to be strong…the hardest thing in this world--is to live in it. Be brave. Live. For me."
-- Buffy Summers, The Gift (Episode 5x22, Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

They move, quickened with desperation and tears not shed and time unspent, now frittering away. He can feel it, slipping through his grasp, away from him, just as Omi will soon be away from him. Lost. Gone. But not forgotten. Never forgotten. He can't forget. Aya remembers everything, every word, every opportunity that passed, the road not taken until now. Now when it was about to be swept away from him.

Omi's skin is soft beneath his hands, muscles rippling as the teenager moves above him, clutching his shoulders pushing backward against each thrust. His fingers are digging into his lover's hips, holding him in place, pushing harder into the sea of warmth surrounding him, keeping the ice of loss away but making it all the sharper, a bitter aftertaste left with each kiss. Bruised lips seek and find, anguished and needy, forgoing air and speech, the dialogue between them silent, imagined but they heard it, as much a part of their lovemaking as the inevitable ghost of their parting. All the things that he wanted to say but couldn't, for pride, for fear of hurting his lover, and ultimately because he knew it would do no good.

He's leaving tomorrow, going away from them, from the Weiss. Bombay no more. Persia now. Drawing further into the shadows nipping at their heels, soon to be submerged until he is that shadow. Will it change him? Make him like his Uncle, cold and embittered, following an endless quest for justice because he had nothing else? No, no, Aya can't believe that of him. Not Omi. Omi who of all of them doesn't deserve this burden on his shoulders. He should be there, with them or rather, Aya should be with him, watching his back, protecting him as partners do. Instead he's being left behind, to fill in the void left by the boy squirming against him, wounded sounds escaping pursued lips, blue eyes hidden behind a veil of pinched lids.

"Omi--" He tries to speak, to break the endless conversation between them with something real, some thing he can give but a hand clamps around the back of his head, pulling him back in, his tongue sliding outward to meet Omi's.

He understands his lover's reluctance, respects it even as it hurts him. When he told Aya he would be leaving the Weiss, he hadn't believed it. He still doesn't want to. But it makes sense in an odd way, the circle complete. Omi has always done his best to look out for all of them, to protect them, and Abyssinian is sure that this is what he thinks he's doing. But he's wrong. Without Omi, there is no Weiss. They are just three then and one more, but he or she will not be /him./ And that makes all the difference to Aya.

He curses himself for every delay, for every hesitation, and uncertainty that held him back until now, that stole so much from them. And he curses himself for taking this plunge, for tasting what was and now ever will be forbidden. But he has to, he can't not because after tonight, he might never meet Omi face to face again. And if he did… 'He won't be Omi anymore,' Aya thinks bleakly. 'He'll be Persia.'

No time. No time left at all. He doesn't need the clock to know how close to daybreak it is, burning away the old and ushering in the new life, a new era. In a few hours, they will get up and Omi will carefully get dressed and he will kiss him good-bye, carefully fixing in place a cheerful smile. And Aya will follow him down, pretending that nothing had happened even though everyone in the house knew it had, pretending that he had never for an instant touched and tasted of the other, that he had never acted on long held desires. That he hadn't lost the war with himself and just given up, knowing how much this was hurting them both but unable to stop, needing this night, this memory, to cling to forever after.

"A~aya," The name tore out of Omi's mouth, their lips separated by a hair's breadth, tormented and afraid. "Aya. Aya."

It hurt, to hear that, to hear the fear and the doubt that lay hidden so much of the time beneath Omi's surety, released in this one instant, pain edging completion but he knows too, that it was a sign of his lover's regard that he would let him this close. That he would let on at all, that he was anything but sure about his decision. Omi trusts him, trusts him with the watching of his back, the taking of his body, and now this…

"Omi," he growls through the crumbling he feels beginning, a smattering of earthquakes shaking his body, climax approaching and his heart turning to dust in its wake.

And Omi smiles down at him, tears now glittering at him in the dimness as he shakes his head, touching his face. "Mamoru," he whispers. And he seems to still, without breath, waiting.

Aya understands and he too, shakes his head, catching the hand and dropping a kiss there. "No, Omi. You are Tsukiyono Omi. Always. Here and now--"

"Here and now," Omi's face splits, caught in light and dark, a chiaroscuro of contrast and conflict, suddenly old and young beyond his years. "Here and now," he agrees.

Aya isn't sure he can ever leave the here and now. Yes, he would close the door on this, kept carefully locked and guarded, but Omi would always be here, waiting for him in this room, smiling at him. And some part of Fujimiya Ran would remain, lost in his embrace, waiting for him to return. Ghosts of times long gone and he thinks perhaps that when he dies, this is the moment he will come back to because this is the happiest he has ever been. It's the sweetest heaven and the deepest hell, but he welcomes it, welcomes the world as it whitens around the edges of his consciousness because he understands what is and what will never be again.

Omi is his.

*** End

 

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