Saber Marionette Fan Fiction ❯ Severing the Tangled Wires ❯ Chapter 2 ( Chapter 2 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: Lady Aoi 
Hanagata remembers his adolescence, and the day his heart was broken.
Anime/Manga: Saber Marionette Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Drama | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 09.14.2002 | Pages: 1 | Words: 1.7K | Visits: 354 | Status: Completed
Hanagata remembers his adolescence, and the day his heart was broken.
Anime/Manga: Saber Marionette Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Drama | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 09.14.2002 | Pages: 1 | Words: 1.7K | Visits: 354 | Status: Completed
Severing the Tangled Wires
A Saber Marionette Fan Fic
by
Lady Aoi
Summary: Hanagata explains the reason behind his amazing vitality, knowing full well that nobody will hear. (It's basically a monologue)
Rating: PG-13 for dark themes, child abuse, shounen-ai.
Spoiler Warnings: Pretty far into the J series.
Disclaimer: Hanagata isn't mine. And not in that sense, either.
Lady Aoi's Notes: This fic is a bit of a tangent off a longer series I'm writing. theCarlinist gave me the idea during an AIM session a few months ago. Basically, he misunderstood something about the longer series and that misunderstanding generated a new plot bunny.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The afternoon is wearing on, Otaru-kun, and still you and your marionettes are ignoring me. Despite my self-learned fondness for food (I was programmed only to eat, not to relish my food as I so do), I am hesitant to open this picnic basket. If I did, I know Cherry would surely pounce on me like some fierce tiger. And as hungry as I am becoming, I do not enjoy the thought of being torn to shreds by your precious she-devil.
Or of hearing you scold and chide me for my greediness.
Do you know the real reason why I hate your marionettes so much, Otaru-kun? It is because they remind me of the only mortality I could ever have: exposure. So far I have been lucky. They have never broken anything in me that I have not been programmed by circuitry and pragmatism to repair myself. And both you an they have never cared enough for me to truly question why I recover so quickly from abuse that would fatally injure Kamatarou himself.
If someday Bloodberry were to tear me open and expose my circuits and wires, what would you do? Sometimes I drive my circuits to the brink of exhaustion at the thought of you scowling disapprovingly at my mangled limbs. At the cruel edge in your voice as you chide her for breaking your toy. And then the feeling of the damp and rust of the nearest junk pile as I lay there in a perpetual state of death.
How lucky you humans are to die. It happens so relatively quickly. A few seconds in battle, a few hours of panting for breath as your heart squeezes out... what's a few years, even? Even then you are surrounded by your loved ones. When you die, Otaru-kun, Lime and the others will hold your hands and cry for you. But I won't be there.
I will be dying a slow, lonely and painful death because you will have forgotten me long before that day.
You are already forgetting me now. I see it in your eyes. In the way you look at Lime when you think the others aren't watching. Do you know the real reason Cherry and Bloodberry fight so much, Otaru-kun? Despite your rather half-assed egalitarianism, they know, as well as I do, that they are only second best. They hate themselves for never being looked at with the same adoration you reserve for her simple-minded antics.
Once I thought I loved you enough to kill anyone who attempted to take you from me. Now I know better. If I raised a fist to defend myself from these harridans, you would defend them by striking out at me. And I would much rather be beaten by superior machines than suffer beneath your fists, Otaru-kun. To have you hit me would...
I need to continue with my story.
"Do you see that boy, Mitsurugi?" Kamatarou asked.
"Yes, Daddy." There was no need to ask him which boy he meant. We were the only people in the room.
"That's the prince, Mitsurugi," Kamatarou's breath was hot against my hear and his hand heavy upon my shoulder. "That is Mamiya Otaru-sama. And from this day forth, you will remain at his side and serve him. You belong to him, Mitsurugi."
"Yes, Daddy." Did I ever say anything else to that narcissistic animal?
"Good." the heavy hands pushed me forward with surprising gentleness. "Go to him now, Mitsurugi."
For your part, you were so engrossed in the picture that you and the Shogun's bodyguard who had brought you to the museum never heard me until I was almost on top of you. Your dear little eyes were so wide as you looked me over, as if you couldn't imagine another human being entering this sacred space! You seemed intrigued by my offer to play with you, and had such fun chasing me around the museum's garden you never thought about the reasons behind your new friend's returning to school with you. For that matter, you never even asked why he was suddenly sharing your room, the desk next to you in class, or your table at lunch time, either.
Otaru-kun, I'm afraid you have never been very smart. And, to be fair, neither have I. If I were, I would have known something had gone wrong with my program and immediately informed Kamatarou of the situation. After all, I was supposed to protect you, not love you.
Did I love you, even then? That is a difficult question. For me, love was nothing but a vocabulary word, a command that, when uttered, would trigger one of several facial expressions and responses, depending on the speaker's tone of voice and the situation. And being made incapable of emotions (or at least believed to be) I was never taught how to connect these vocabulary words to concrete feelings. And yet, somewhere within my deepest core, I believe I must have known. The trembling surge that possessed my body upon our first meeting was simply too beautiful, too transcendent to go unnamed even by a machine.
But to you I was never a machine. Unlike the contemptuous scientists and my obsessive, distant 'father', you were completely taken in by the illusion. As far as you were concerned I was just another little boy, albeit an annoying one. Hah. If I had two mon for every annoyed look you shot me during our childhood and adolescence I might be able to buy myself a soul! And yet, for all my begging and following, you never ceased to terrify me. Whether it was leaping from the top of the school to see if you could fly (thank god your kenpo mentor caught you in time!) or scaling piles of stinking garbage in the Japoness dump, you always seemed to be one step ahead of all my protective measures. My failure to keep you from experiencing childhood's regular slings and arrows drew fierce criticism from your distant father and fierce efforts on my 'team's' part to determine what was wrong with me. Let me elaborate. Under normal conditions, I was scheduled to visit the lab of my birth on a monthly basis for maintenance and program upgrades. After all, my body and mind had to grow and change in order to keep up the illusion of my humanity! But due to the beatings I received during our boyish misadventures and to my inability to keep you from having them, I was torn open two, three, even four times a week for these 'repairs'.
And yet, for all their tinkering, the scientists never discovered my secret. Kamatarou, on the other hand, was a wise man and began to notice that his little marionette was developing a personality. It was about this time that he began to obsess over me. He began buying me things. Toys, clothing and, as I grew older, motor palanquins. And whereas he had treated me upon my creation with the mild curiosity one might display upon receiving a useful but unwanted birthday gift, he now began to regard me, I think, as his little boy reincarnated. His second chance. On the many occasions you were asked to spend a night at a friend's house, or work a simple job after school, he would take me to his mansion for training in the ways of the family business. And when it became apparent that factories and finances were the least of my young concerns, he began resenting me. And then, he began beating me. Do you remember the week I was absent from school? I spent that week in the laboratory being fitted with a more durable skeleton and tougher cables after my dear Daddy had decided to throw me out a window for refusing to study currency conversion rates. The Shogun was displeased with this treatment of his son's bodyguard, and Kamatarou was reprimanded. And yet, he continued to berate and hit me, albeit never hard enough to snap my head from my body again. Such a repeat would have been a very ugly thing for him to live down.
And yet, you never questioned my absences and always welcomed me back. But as we grew older, your welcomes became cooler and cooler. By now, you were an attractive and fascinating young man of fourteen, and nearly everyone at school loved you. I, on the other hand, was perceived as nothing more than a clingy nobody fighting against hundreds of other boys for a place in your sunlight. I suspect you began thinking of me this way, too, because eventually you did nothing to stop the bigger boys from hurting me or calling me names. And you even petitioned to be moved to another dormitory so you could be with your newfound friends. Oh, you have no idea how I wept that night. Being separated from you by abuse or circumstance was one thing, but to be cast aside like an unfit toy...
I should not have been surprised when your absentee father fully supported your decision to leave me. He was greatly disappointed in his investment inability to adequately serve and protect, and was happy enough to hand me over to my 'father'. And for his part, my 'father' was happy to have me all to himself.
The next part is... difficult, Otaru-kun....
I think I'm going to need a moment.
A Saber Marionette Fan Fic
by
Lady Aoi
Summary: Hanagata explains the reason behind his amazing vitality, knowing full well that nobody will hear. (It's basically a monologue)
Rating: PG-13 for dark themes, child abuse, shounen-ai.
Spoiler Warnings: Pretty far into the J series.
Disclaimer: Hanagata isn't mine. And not in that sense, either.
Lady Aoi's Notes: This fic is a bit of a tangent off a longer series I'm writing. theCarlinist gave me the idea during an AIM session a few months ago. Basically, he misunderstood something about the longer series and that misunderstanding generated a new plot bunny.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The afternoon is wearing on, Otaru-kun, and still you and your marionettes are ignoring me. Despite my self-learned fondness for food (I was programmed only to eat, not to relish my food as I so do), I am hesitant to open this picnic basket. If I did, I know Cherry would surely pounce on me like some fierce tiger. And as hungry as I am becoming, I do not enjoy the thought of being torn to shreds by your precious she-devil.
Or of hearing you scold and chide me for my greediness.
Do you know the real reason why I hate your marionettes so much, Otaru-kun? It is because they remind me of the only mortality I could ever have: exposure. So far I have been lucky. They have never broken anything in me that I have not been programmed by circuitry and pragmatism to repair myself. And both you an they have never cared enough for me to truly question why I recover so quickly from abuse that would fatally injure Kamatarou himself.
If someday Bloodberry were to tear me open and expose my circuits and wires, what would you do? Sometimes I drive my circuits to the brink of exhaustion at the thought of you scowling disapprovingly at my mangled limbs. At the cruel edge in your voice as you chide her for breaking your toy. And then the feeling of the damp and rust of the nearest junk pile as I lay there in a perpetual state of death.
How lucky you humans are to die. It happens so relatively quickly. A few seconds in battle, a few hours of panting for breath as your heart squeezes out... what's a few years, even? Even then you are surrounded by your loved ones. When you die, Otaru-kun, Lime and the others will hold your hands and cry for you. But I won't be there.
I will be dying a slow, lonely and painful death because you will have forgotten me long before that day.
You are already forgetting me now. I see it in your eyes. In the way you look at Lime when you think the others aren't watching. Do you know the real reason Cherry and Bloodberry fight so much, Otaru-kun? Despite your rather half-assed egalitarianism, they know, as well as I do, that they are only second best. They hate themselves for never being looked at with the same adoration you reserve for her simple-minded antics.
Once I thought I loved you enough to kill anyone who attempted to take you from me. Now I know better. If I raised a fist to defend myself from these harridans, you would defend them by striking out at me. And I would much rather be beaten by superior machines than suffer beneath your fists, Otaru-kun. To have you hit me would...
I need to continue with my story.
"Do you see that boy, Mitsurugi?" Kamatarou asked.
"Yes, Daddy." There was no need to ask him which boy he meant. We were the only people in the room.
"That's the prince, Mitsurugi," Kamatarou's breath was hot against my hear and his hand heavy upon my shoulder. "That is Mamiya Otaru-sama. And from this day forth, you will remain at his side and serve him. You belong to him, Mitsurugi."
"Yes, Daddy." Did I ever say anything else to that narcissistic animal?
"Good." the heavy hands pushed me forward with surprising gentleness. "Go to him now, Mitsurugi."
For your part, you were so engrossed in the picture that you and the Shogun's bodyguard who had brought you to the museum never heard me until I was almost on top of you. Your dear little eyes were so wide as you looked me over, as if you couldn't imagine another human being entering this sacred space! You seemed intrigued by my offer to play with you, and had such fun chasing me around the museum's garden you never thought about the reasons behind your new friend's returning to school with you. For that matter, you never even asked why he was suddenly sharing your room, the desk next to you in class, or your table at lunch time, either.
Otaru-kun, I'm afraid you have never been very smart. And, to be fair, neither have I. If I were, I would have known something had gone wrong with my program and immediately informed Kamatarou of the situation. After all, I was supposed to protect you, not love you.
Did I love you, even then? That is a difficult question. For me, love was nothing but a vocabulary word, a command that, when uttered, would trigger one of several facial expressions and responses, depending on the speaker's tone of voice and the situation. And being made incapable of emotions (or at least believed to be) I was never taught how to connect these vocabulary words to concrete feelings. And yet, somewhere within my deepest core, I believe I must have known. The trembling surge that possessed my body upon our first meeting was simply too beautiful, too transcendent to go unnamed even by a machine.
But to you I was never a machine. Unlike the contemptuous scientists and my obsessive, distant 'father', you were completely taken in by the illusion. As far as you were concerned I was just another little boy, albeit an annoying one. Hah. If I had two mon for every annoyed look you shot me during our childhood and adolescence I might be able to buy myself a soul! And yet, for all my begging and following, you never ceased to terrify me. Whether it was leaping from the top of the school to see if you could fly (thank god your kenpo mentor caught you in time!) or scaling piles of stinking garbage in the Japoness dump, you always seemed to be one step ahead of all my protective measures. My failure to keep you from experiencing childhood's regular slings and arrows drew fierce criticism from your distant father and fierce efforts on my 'team's' part to determine what was wrong with me. Let me elaborate. Under normal conditions, I was scheduled to visit the lab of my birth on a monthly basis for maintenance and program upgrades. After all, my body and mind had to grow and change in order to keep up the illusion of my humanity! But due to the beatings I received during our boyish misadventures and to my inability to keep you from having them, I was torn open two, three, even four times a week for these 'repairs'.
And yet, for all their tinkering, the scientists never discovered my secret. Kamatarou, on the other hand, was a wise man and began to notice that his little marionette was developing a personality. It was about this time that he began to obsess over me. He began buying me things. Toys, clothing and, as I grew older, motor palanquins. And whereas he had treated me upon my creation with the mild curiosity one might display upon receiving a useful but unwanted birthday gift, he now began to regard me, I think, as his little boy reincarnated. His second chance. On the many occasions you were asked to spend a night at a friend's house, or work a simple job after school, he would take me to his mansion for training in the ways of the family business. And when it became apparent that factories and finances were the least of my young concerns, he began resenting me. And then, he began beating me. Do you remember the week I was absent from school? I spent that week in the laboratory being fitted with a more durable skeleton and tougher cables after my dear Daddy had decided to throw me out a window for refusing to study currency conversion rates. The Shogun was displeased with this treatment of his son's bodyguard, and Kamatarou was reprimanded. And yet, he continued to berate and hit me, albeit never hard enough to snap my head from my body again. Such a repeat would have been a very ugly thing for him to live down.
And yet, you never questioned my absences and always welcomed me back. But as we grew older, your welcomes became cooler and cooler. By now, you were an attractive and fascinating young man of fourteen, and nearly everyone at school loved you. I, on the other hand, was perceived as nothing more than a clingy nobody fighting against hundreds of other boys for a place in your sunlight. I suspect you began thinking of me this way, too, because eventually you did nothing to stop the bigger boys from hurting me or calling me names. And you even petitioned to be moved to another dormitory so you could be with your newfound friends. Oh, you have no idea how I wept that night. Being separated from you by abuse or circumstance was one thing, but to be cast aside like an unfit toy...
I should not have been surprised when your absentee father fully supported your decision to leave me. He was greatly disappointed in his investment inability to adequately serve and protect, and was happy enough to hand me over to my 'father'. And for his part, my 'father' was happy to have me all to himself.
The next part is... difficult, Otaru-kun....
I think I'm going to need a moment.