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Zanne's Fanfiction (plotbunnyattack) wrote in chaotic_library, @ 2008-01-10 12:11:00

[xellos/filia; pg] Judas Kiss
Title: Judas Kiss
Author: emilie_burns
Fandom: The Slayers
Pairing: Xellos/Filia
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 1434
Warnings: Character death
Disclaimer: The Slayers are owned by Hajime Kanzaka; Rui Araizumi; Kadokawa Shoten; TV TOKYO; SOFTX; Marubeni. "Last Exit to Eden" is owned by Amanda Marshall.
Notes: This is set hundreds of years after the events in Slayers TRY
Summary: I think about her sometimes. Not all the time, of course. Just...every once in a while.

Judas Kiss

I think about her sometimes. Not all the time, of course. Just...every once in a while. Sometimes I'll hear a voice that sounds a bit like hers, or catch a glimpse of someone from the back who has a certain way of walking, a certain tilt to the head, a certain sway to the hair.

And I remember.

Sometimes it's in a shade of blue that would have matched her eyes so nicely. Sometimes it's in a cup of tea that reminds me of her favorite blend.

It's always the little things, you know?

Garters always remind me of her. Pink bows. Maces and teacups. There was a time, how long ago was it? Perhaps seventy-five years now, I passed by a restaurant. Or rather, the back of it.

There was a pile there, raw kitchen garbage.

I never thought I'd actually miss-- no, I don't miss being called that. I do miss hearing her say it, though.

I never thought I would, but here I am.

How long has it been? Seven hundred twenty one years, five months, two hours.

But really, who's counting?

It only took her two hundred years. Somewhere along the line, she got used to me, I suppose. It was after Lina died that she changed.

I think we both did. Funny what the end of an era does to anyone, even Mazoku. I was the one who delivered the news to her. I didn't know what kind of reaction to expect from her then. She just became very quiet, and made us both some tea without a word.

I remember the blend she served that day too. It was the first time she didn't scream at me to leave.

Funny how silence can say far more than words, sometimes. We held an entire conversation that day without making a sound.

I thought it would go back to the old ways once the shock wore off, but she never again attacked me as she once did. It was somewhere around my fifth visit after that when I realized she was lonely.

We never said much of anything. Just drinking tea at her little table by the window, the silence sometimes interrupted by the little dragon she had adopted. Valgaav, although she didn't call him that. It was just 'Val'.

After a while, she began to talk to me. It was never over anything significant. Just weak attempts at polite conversation. Silence spoke volumes. After another fifty years, the attempts at polite conversation had given way to more meaningful things. Questions about herself, about life in general, about the Golden dragons.

I surprised myself, answering her questions honestly. Oh, I'm always honest. Just not completely or clearly honest. But the way she didn't flinch even when she heard a truth that gave such a pleasant, tangy flavor when it would hit deep, I decided she at least had deserved that much.

I'm still not sure when she fell in love with me. I asked her once. She didn't really give me an answer. Either she'd learned too much from me about being evasive, or she didn't know herself. I would wager more upon the latter.

I didn't want to hurt her. I stopped enjoying hurting her a long time ago. Oh, to tease and rile her was always great fun, but not hurting her. No, there had been no sport in that, none at all. So, I tried to get her to see the folly in the situation. I didn't love her. I still don't. I never will. I cannot love, and that is that.

She wondered why I wouldn't even pretend. I'll admit I'm good at pretending to be so many things, so it was a reasonable enough question. But she earned more from me than mere half-truths and devious honesty. She earned my respect, so I wouldn't play the part.

She was my most prized possession, my favorite pet. I cared for her condition and welfare. I tended to her where I could. But love? I could never come to feel it, and I refused to feed her illusions. The least I could do was give her who I was, what I was, up front, no shadows.

We fell into a comfortable sort of routine over the years. Well, comfortable for me, at any rate. She still tried now and again to...'win' me, I suppose one could call it. I don't think it was ever a conscious effort.

Time passed. Val grew up, with no memory of what he had once been, no trace of the Mazoku blood he once possessed. He came of age, and left, as young, normal dragons are wont to do.

I suppose that was when I made...an error in judgment. She was more alone than ever, so I, not wishing to see my favorite pet suffer, spent more of my time there.

I hadn't counted on earning my master's ire.

I didn't think I would ever receive the orders I was ultimately given.

But I did. I also carried them out, naturally. It wasn't as though I had much of a choice.

Funny how she seemed to realize something changed when I showed up.

I remember that day clearly. It was rather like today. The temperature, the color of the sky, the way there were a few clouds scattered about. It wasn't quite the same time of the year. It's autumn now. Back then, it was spring.

Ironically fitting, I suppose. She always did love that time of year the best, when the flowers were in bloom.

She merely looked at me when I appeared. We stayed like that for several long minutes.

You know why I'm here, don't you?

Yes. I knew it would come, sooner or later.

I have no choice.

I know.

You're not going to fight me?

Don't look so surprised, Xellos.

Very well.

But wait.

Yes?

There is one thing you can do. One last request, if you would.

What is that, Miss Filia?

Pretend.

I had known what she meant. It was there in her eyes, behind the tears she refused to let fall. It was painful for me, but, who was I to deny a last request from one such as her? I held her then. I kissed her, and told her I loved her.

I'll never forget that taste, such a delicate, bittersweet sadness. I've tasted it before, but never with such a richness. It was rather like the most excellent year of a finely aged wine, I suppose. Beyond compare, and never duplicated.

I buried her out back, in the garden she had planted, amid the flowers she had loved. What Val thought when he returned, I wouldn't know. I wasn't there, and had no care to encounter him. He wasn't my concern.

Seven hundred twenty one years, five months, three hours and ten minutes have passed. The village is no longer recognizable to what it had been. Now, it is something of a city. Sprawling and filthy.

Where her house had stood are now clusters of squalid shacks pressed together, huddled around rancid, dark alleyways. Prostitutes, thieves, and murderers come here, hiding in the gloom, rather like the rats which are carrying the source of death. Bodies are stacked high on the cobblestones, rotting and turgid.

But the changes which have settled over the land in the last near-millennium pose no obstacle for me. I know exactly where her grave is, even though it has long since been covered with streets of brick and stone. Over there, where the shadow curves a bit into the light down that alley.

I wonder sometimes. I wonder what would have happened if I had not killed her that day, and then I laugh at my own foolishness. What would have happened is simple. I would have been punished, perhaps wiped from existence, and more likely than not, she would have been killed. I would have helped no one by refusing. At the very least, she...I like to imagine she took some measure of comfort in knowing it was I who was doing it. Someone who did care for her welfare.

It's foolish to wonder what might have been.

But every once in a while, there's no fool like an old fool. And that is why, every once in a while, the dregs of society see a violet-haired stranger in a black cloak appear in a certain alleyway, where the shadows curve into the light.

And why twelve pink roses, tied with a golden bow, are always left behind.


Did I just miss the last exit to Eden?
Is this the only love I'll know?
Like a Judas kiss, did my heart betray me
Back on the road I never chose?

- end