From Sailor Moon Flash!
| Featuring: | Daichi |
| IC Date: | March 2002 |
| Status: | Completed |
| Summary: | Chaos reemerging brings nightmares to the holders of dormant starseeds; Daichi is alone. |
It started with him in a crowd.
Familiar and strange faces both, milling around aimlessly. Daichi stood in the center, hands shoved in his pockets, and it didn't occur to him that he didn't know the reason for the gathering. He was content to simply stand there with the crowd around him.
People began wandering off, a few at a time, and Daichi glanced through the rows casually, trying to catch anything of interest. He spotted his aunt Yukari, but lost her quickly. The sight of Takeshi, who had been his best friend in elementary school, startled him, and he belatedly tried to weave through after him.. But the crowd had impeccable timing, and surged in front of him; he'd lost track of his old friend by the time they passed.
Disappointed, the teen realized the crowd was thinning out now, and he recognized a large number of the faces around him. With a smile and a wave, he started towards his classmate, Mokushi Oki, who was standing with her shadow, Maroe Mushio.
Daichi stopped short as Oki turned away without a glimmer of recognition, and Maroe followed silently after her. It struck him, but that was simply Oki's way sometimes, he told himself. She might not have even him; it was still a little crowded. The boy shook his head and turned to another small group.
It didn't occur to him to wonder until after he woke up who these people were; one looked strangely like Maroe's uncle, and he thought he recognized the other three... They clearly were a group in his mind, and he felt a feeling of cold dread as they stared at him flatly before also turning and walking deliberately away. One at a time, as though they were each denying him in their own turn, and his heart grew colder with each of them leaving.
The area was almost devoid of people now, and he turned, a little desperately, and his eyes fell with relief on his family. There was one group who would recognize him, accept him, he felt sure of that. He took a few steps towards them, eagerly, before slowing to a horrified shock.
They didn't want him.
Hiroshi's expression was almost malicious, while Akio was laughing at him. His mother's mouth was set with a grim look of disapproval, while his father... His father's eyes struggled to recall who he was. Daichi felt like crying as he saw his father give up the effort, and turned to his other sons, and clasped his wife's hand, leading her away. The teenager broke into a run, then, trying to keep up with his fading family... But they outdistanced him easily, just walking, and he fell back, feeling like a shell of himself.
He turned slowly this time, and he shuffled his feet. The crowd was gone now; they'd disappeared into the darkness. But hope reared again as he saw one shining figure. Bathed in silver light she was, and he knew this was one person who could never turn him away; she could never turn anyone away. Daichi took a few steps, his expression almost childish with hope, and he fell to his knees before the girl, reaching out to touch her hand. "Please," he whispered.
The girl recoiled from his touch, a look of pity and contempt her only expression. She said only a few words, but they stripped him of feeling, of life, of meaning. "You are not worthy," she told him, and she turned her back on him.
Daichi slumped, as the darkness overtook him, claiming him as one of their own, yet leaving him still utterly alone.
