Tokyo Babylon Fan Fiction / X/1999 Fan Fiction ❯ Eternity in an Instant ❯ Past ( Chapter 1 )

Summary: History as told through the eyes of one of the unique characters in X/TB. It's a love story, kinda.

Disclaimer: CLAMP owns X and Tokyo Babylon. I hope they will forgive me for borrowing them. No profit is being made from this story.

Spoilers: If you don't know Subaru killed Seishirou in X then what are you doing reading this story? None of this would make any sense to you. If you already know, then it's not a spoiler. As for the history of the Sakurazukamori, well I don't really know any of it. I don't even have Tokyo Babylon beyond the 2 anime OVAs. So I'm pretty much making it all up as I go along. Please forgive if your sense of what's accurate is outraged.

Chapter 1: Past

I don't remember when I became aware. It was as if one day I realised that I was different from those around me. But there was no particular occurrence, no special event to mark that date. I simply just knew. And since there was nothing much I could do about it, I simply. stood there and time passed. At that time the land was wide and the sky stretched overhead and one could see from horizon to horizon. And as far as I reached, I felt nothing but the awareness of myself. I think it was then that I understood loneliness.

Then everything changed. One day when the sun rose as usual and I stood singing my own non-thoughts to myself, a creature appeared. Now it takes a lot to have me notice anything about my surroundings and since I had been so alone for so long, I never imagined that there would be others who were also aware. But there could be no mistaking it, the greeting that came from the creature. The similar sense of self that marked it as an individual. The astonishment that I sent out must have amused him because he produced a strange sound, which I later learnt was laughter.

He spoke to me, mind to mind. "I have felt you," he said. "You sing beautifully."

The compliment produced a surge of warmth through my consciousness. Was it joy? I was certainly delighted by the newness of the discovery that there were other sentients in existence. I sent a question, What are you?

The creature was all too willing to explain to me. "I am a man."

You are different, I thought to him. You are aware of self?

"Yes," he answered. "Where I live, there are many men, all aware."

I was awestruck by the thought that there were more like him.

Then he laughed again. "But not everyone will be able to speak with you. Only a few who are able to see beyond the ordinary will be aware of you."

Strange, I told him.

"That is how this world works. My name by the way, is Subaru." He said.

Do I have a name? I wondered.

"I suppose you do. You are a Sakura tree." Subaru informed me.

Sakura... that's... nice. This naming business was interesting. It highlighted even more to me the sense of my individuality. And while before I might have minded the feeling as it only emphasized my loneliness, now I was happy that I could share with someone the knowledge of my existence.

"Will you be my friend?" He asked.

Friend? I did not know what he meant.

"Yes a friend. Another being who understands, helps and support. Someone to share things with." He explained.

Gladly, I answered.

The days that followed were some of the most interesting times I ever had. Subaru came by often. And we would converse about anything and everything. I understood that as a man, he could move about and was not rooted to a spot. He also explained to me that he had needs, like sleeping. In fact, I rather enjoyed singing to him as he fell asleep by the base of my body. He told me many times that I had a beautiful song.

As I sang to him, he also told me that he loved the beautiful flowers that crowned me. And to please him, I made myself bloom and bloom; pure, soft, white blooms, fragrant with scent. So prolific was I that the ground all around was always carpeted with the petals of my white blooms. I remember how he delighted in laying on that velvety bed whenever he came to visit.

I did not realise his fondness for my company was drawing the attention of other people. One day while he sat beneath the canopy of my branches, another appeared. I remember that we were holding converse on the nature of the stars. Subaru had told me he was named after a constellation in the heavens. I was contemplating how the light of his soul reflected the light that I observed in the night sky above.

The other had come up and spoke suddenly to Subaru. "Subaru, who are you talking to?"

Subaru, whose heart was pure and innocent of any deceit, simply pointed to me and said, "The Sakura."

The other though appeared agitated by the answer. "Come away from there, Subaru. It's not right for you to be thinking you're talking to a tree."

Subaru was justifiably unhappy not to be believed but merely said sweetly, "I'm not thinking that I'm talking to a tree. I AM talking to Sakura."

Greetings, I tried to send the thought to this new man. But it seemed he was one of the ones Subaru mentioned who wouldn't be able to hear me.

"Subaru, your family is concerned that you spend all your time here. It is unhealthy for you to be lazing about here with a tree. You should be occupied with some other more useful matters..." The other man took Subaru's hand and tried to drag him away as if he were an errant child.

That's when a new feeling washed over me. I learnt later that it was anger. At that moment, this feeling caused me to shake my limbs and extend my power to push the man away from Subaru. I had acted without knowing the consequences. But even knowing now, I don't think I would have done anything different.

The effect of my push was electrifying. The man jumped literally two feet into the air. He gave a loud yell and let go of Subaru. Then he continued making more screaming noises as he ran away.

Subaru was again laughing. "I didn't know you could do that, Sakura." He said.

I didn't know either, I replied. Was it all right?

"I don't think you hurt him if that's what you were worried about. But I wonder if that was the best thing you could have done." He said with some concern.

I didn't understand and Subaru didn't explain further. He soon left me to return home and I put all thought of the day's incident from my mind.

That night as I stood under the starlight, singing quietly to myself, I became aware of the presence of many others. A group of men was marching towards me, led by the Other who had come this afternoon. They held lights and made much noise, scaring away the woodland critters who lived under my shade. At that time, I did not realise the danger I was in.

Greetings, I sang the thought to these new ones. I was perhaps childishly hoping for more to make friends with.

But there was no answer.

The men had stopped beneath my shade. One of them spoke up, "Are you sure this is the tree where Subaru spends all his time?"

"It's this one all right. It's a demon tree. It attacked me!" The Other from this afternoon insisted.

The men muttered among themselves. I did not understand what the Other had meant by the word "demon." But I was concerned that perhaps I had injured him this afternoon. So I sent one of my limbs down to stroke him gently.

The effect was far from what I'd planned. The Other shrieked in terror. The other men also made sounds of distress. One of them swung a torch at my limb. Now living in those innocent days, I had no concept of the danger of fire. I had never seen nor felt the all consuming heat that was such a danger to my kind. So it went without saying that the pain from my burning limb caught me totally off guard.

Rooted as I was to the spot, all I could do was thrash my branches about in agony. And with the pain, came the feeling of anger again. I pushed with all my power at everything around me. All the men who were gathered there flew backwards away from me, pushed by the invisible force of my will.

"Stop! What are you doing here?" A voice cried out. It was a moment before I identified it as Subaru. I was at that point frightened and in pain, my normally serene song had changed into cacophonic chords.

Subaru whipped his cloak off and began beating the flames away from my branches. Soon the fire was put out, but my limb was left charred and injured. I stood there, wondering why, why would these others hurt me so?

The men whom I had pushed away began regrouping. As they advanced on Subaru and I, one of them said, "We're doing this for you, Subaru. This is an evil demon tree. It's ensnared you and got you all confused. We have to kill it before it's too late!"

"No you're wrong. This is my friend. She means no harm. She is merely aware and so lonely." Subaru did his best to explain to them.

But they would not listen and continued coming closer, all the while waving their flames at me.

I grew even more frightened. I did not want the fire to come any more closer to me. In my fear, I screamed at Subaru. The sound caused him to clap his hands to his head. The men took the opportunity of his distraction to surround him and try to burn me again. He cried to me, "Help me, Sakura!"

I did not really know what he meant but in that instant, I instinctively sent my power out to him, for him to use. The result was immediate. Everyone, including myself was pulled into a maboroshi. There Subaru controlled everything and he was able to extinguish the torches. But that wasn't enough for my fear or my anger. With my power, I extended my limbs to grow into sharp pointed ends and with quick stabs I ran all the men through.

When Subaru released his illusion, the men remained impaled on the ends of my branches. Red blood flowed down onto the ground. Subaru was kneeling by my immense trunk, his hands covering his eyes, his shoulders shaking.

What's wrong? I sent the query to him.

That only made him sob harder. My roots absorbed the sodium rich content of his tears, but I did not understand why he was leaking salty water.

"We have done a bad thing, an unforgivable thing!" He cried.

I do not understand. I wanted him to explain to me. In a sense I understood that the idyllic tranquil from this morning was lost forever more.

"This is death," he said brokenly.

Death? What was the idea of death to me, who had lived since the dawn of time.

"Yes, death. We have killed people. These people will never return to their loved ones. They will never be able to continue their lives. We have taken away their awareness from them!" Subaru was still crying. In a way he was angry with me for having taken away his innocence.

I understood at last. So this was death, the loss of self, of awareness of other individuals. My limbs trembled and the corpses slid from them. The blood from their bodies continue to seep into the ground of my roots.

Subaru was growing more and more hysterical. Suddenly from the ground where one of the corpses lay, he snatched up a sharp knife. He was crying out something about never being able to cleanse this stain. Then he plunged the knife right into his stomach.

As my consciousness registered the import of what he had done, I heard another cry. Running up to Subaru was a small human.

"Papa! Papa!" The child had reached Subaru and was crying over him.

Subaru raised his eyes and saw the child. "My son, I'm sorry."

"Don't leave me, Papa. You're all I have!" The child exclaimed.

Subaru sighed as his lifeblood flowed from him. "Destiny has set that we must part. Be strong, Akito."

Akito though was too occupied sobbing his heart out. As for me, I was keening at the realisation of Subaru's impending death. All I could do was send out, Don't leave me alone!

Subaru appeared to have heard my distress and understood the fear in my mind of being alone again. "Sakura, I'm going to give you a gift." He gasped breathlessly.

Holding onto Akito he said, "My son, know that I am proud of you. But I now leave you with an onerous charge. This is my friend Sakura. I want you to protect her. This is my wish." At Akito's wide-eyed nod, Subaru gathered the last of his power and bound his son's destiny to mine.

Then he died.

There on the mound by my roots, Akito buried his father and the men who died trying to harm me.

And so Akito became the first Sakurazukamori. But it was Subaru who was my first guardian, though I loved him for having been my friend first and foremost.

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Chapter 2 is coming up soon. Please feedback?