
Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/484842.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Major_Character_Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
  Category:
      F/M
  Fandom:
      Noein
  Relationship:
      Kaminogi_Haruka/Karasu, Kaminogi_Haruka/Noein_(arguably?)
  Character:
      Karasu_(Noein), Kaminogi_Haruka, Noein_-_Character
  Additional Tags:
      Very_Dubious_Dubcon, mindrape, Serious_Injuries, Character_Death,
      Mistaken_Identity, Cross-Generation_Relationship, Wangst
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-08-13 Words: 3088
****** Reflex ******
by orphan_account
Summary
     Some dreams are best left forgotten.
Notes
     To be honest, I have no freaking idea how to to warn for or tag this
     thing. Suffice to say, the dream/vision/alternate dimension in this
     fic takes place concurrently with the main timeline in canon, which
     means Karasu is 27 and Haruka is 12. (I think Noein is also supposed
     to be 27?) So, yeah, there you go.
Haruka never sees the metal creature from Shangri-la. One moment she’s
strolling down her front walk on the way to the park, casting a wistful glance
over her shoulder at the window to the storeroom where Karasu is hiding, and
the next wires are whipping around her stomach and shoulders and face. Before
she can scream, the world bleeds away to white.
When Haruka opens her eyes, she’s standing in an endless sea of windswept grass
that rushes toward the blue horizon. The same soft wind that ruffles the grass
and caresses her skin drives clouds across the sky. Beyond that, there is no
change or movement.
At her side is the masked spirit, Noein.
“All of this is for you, Haruka,” he says. “It is a world where you will no
longer need to know pain or suffering or death -- only the endless beauty of
earth and sky, forever.”
“It’s pretty, but I don’t want to stay.” She gazes up at him imploringly.
“Please send me home.”
“Home?” Noein’s red eye glares out at her through his ornate golden mask. “What
does that imperfect world hold for you, in the end? No matter what you think
you have now, you cannot keep it. It will spill  through your fingers like
sand, and you will be left with the taste of ashes and dust.”
“I have my parents and friends,” she protests. “I have Yu and Karasu.” It’s
picturing the two of them on either side of her, holding her hands, that keeps
her standing now.
“Your Yu is a coward, a stupid boy with a selfish heart who will never be able
to keep you safe. There is no happy future for him.” It’s close enough to what
Karasu once snarled at Yu that she flinches inwardly, and the mist that forms
Noein’s body seems to roil and seethe. “And Karasu…” His voice deepens to a
growl. “He is a man of violence who deals death to his friends, and he will
meet the same end. Do you think that he will refrain from hurting you?”
“No, that’s not true!” she spits at him, angry now but panicked, too. “Yu is
brave, he just has to find it. And Karasu would never hurt me!”
Still roiling, the cloud that is Noein funnels toward her, the golden mask
homing in on her face until it’s only centimeters away, and misty hands prevent
her from recoiling.
“The dimensions are infinite,” he intones. “Each choice, each decision made by
each human being forges an entirely new reality. In one of the dimensions that
I have eaten, he has already hurt you, and you have both paid grievously.”
“No,” Haruka says, struggling to squirm away, but Noein has too many hands.
“I will show you what I have saved you from,” he says, and his multitude of
arms dissolve the world.
 
&&&&&&&&&
 
Haruka is lying blanket-swaddled in bed, a pile of borrowed manga on her
pillow, when she hears a scramble and a thud in the room next door. Karasu
always makes noise when he gets back, of course, but the character of the sound
strikes her with sudden dread. Volumes spill forgotten onto the floor as she
vaults out of bed and wrenches open the door to the storeroom, where she finds
him on his knees, gasping and clutching his side as blue sparks spill between
his fingers and onto the floorboards. Red eyes peer up at her through his
tangle of hair, wide and desperate.
“Haruka,” he gasps, and the arm propping him up trembles and gives way.
She drops so fast that the floor stings her hands, and when she reaches his
side they clench on open air, because she doesn’t know what to do. She begins
by rolling him onto his back; it’s easier than she’d expected. Even unconscious
he’s gasping, breath raspy in his throat as his chest heaves. Her fingers move
down the expanse of his chest, hesitating at the wound in his side, because she
doesn’t have the faintest idea how to bind it, close it, do anything to stop it
from spilling out everything he’s made of --
She crumples down onto him, whispers his name, but the only response she gets
is the heaving of his chest underneath her. He’s no closer to conscious when
she pulls herself together to get a better look, but the wound is smaller than
it had been, and she can breathe again.
At least she can make him comfortable. Haruka wrestles the futon out of the
hall closet and spreads it down as close to Karasu as she can. She heaves him
onto one side and yanks it up against his back, then rolls him back onto its
softness. Once she’s lifted his legs up he’s as much on the futon as he’s going
to be, and a glance tells her she hasn’t made his wound any worse, thank
goodness. But he’s still breathing shallowly, painfully, and it draws her lungs
up tight. If Tono was here he’d curl up next to him, so she takes Tono’s place
cuddled up against his side, and after a moment’s hesitation, her arm wraps as
far around his chest as it will go. Even in these circumstances, he feels so
solid, so strong, and her own breath has gone a little shallow, being this
close to him for this long. She’s had thoughts like this drift through her head
in the moments before sleep, almost indistinguishable from dreams. In those, he
wasn’t injured. He was…
She shakes it off -- he’s injured now. But he’s here and not fading into
glittering motes, and she holds him tightly, hoping that somewhere inside his
unconsciousness it will be a comfort. It’s a comfort for her, too, and the
pained but steady rhythm of his breathing lulls her to sleep.
When she wakes, Karasu is holding her.
“Haruka,” he rasps into her hair. “Haruka.”
His breath draws to a sharp point, and her hand wiggles free to find his face
streaked with wetness. Shaken, she strokes the tears away with her thumb. “Shh,
it’s all right,” she says, and his face turns into her hand, outlined by
moonlight and creased with grief.
“You were dead.” His voice seems forced past gravel, and she’s left with a
blank space where words should be.
“No, I’m right here.” It’s the first thing that comes to her lips, and he’s
holding her tightly, a hand molding itself to her back and rubbing up and down
in a deep, slow rhythm that seems familiar to him, but not at all to her.
Somehow, though, it sends ripples all through her, up her arms and down to her
toes. She holds him tighter to keep herself from squirming. His face, still
damp with tears, turns so that his lips brush hers, and her whole body jerks in
shock.
As his hand comes up to cup her face, fingerpads rough against her cheek, her
breath comes quickly. She’s dreamt of this, little fantasies to keep her
company at night, hidden down deep inside, sometimes even from herself until
she brings them out again to hold. Before Karasu, she’d never so much as
practiced kissing on her hand -- it seemed romantic and exciting but far away,
something grownups did. But maybe it’s also something that helps them feel
better, when they’re hurting and alone.
He’s always been a little guarded around her, with a contradictory tenderness
in his eyes. It’s only in moments of crisis that he seems to gain his full
range of motion, his arms a shelter close around her, no hesitation. That’s how
his body feels now -- unafraid, though there’s a different sort of tension in
it as it curves against hers and tips her back into the futon.
 Her lips reach for his, and his mouth returns to them again and again. Then
more lingeringly, until it’s a wet pressure that delves inside, and back when
she and her friends were giggling over movies they weren’t supposed to be
watching, she never would have thought it would feel this good. His hand is
cupping her cheek, sliding over the back of her head in a gliding caress, and
his lips break the kiss to whisper, “You cut your hair,” before capturing hers
again. The words penetrate far enough to baffle -- it’s been this way as long
as she’s known him -- but quickly disperse at the touch of his mouth, which is
traveling down her neck to her collarbone. Her hands come up to savor the rough
texture of his hair, clutching at it when his tongue laps at the base of her
neck. No, that might hurt him, she thinks, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
Little sounds are leaving her, high and helpless, as his hand sweeps her
nightgown up to bare the skin of her stomach, kneading slowly. It spans her
ribcage and palms one breast, and his mouth closes on the other. She cries out.
His lower body rubs against her thighs in the same rhythm his mouth makes over
her nipple, a hard knot pressing against her through the fabric of his uniform,
and she moves with it, her body full of something she can’t contain. This
moment exists in a bubble outside time, and Haruka is racing to catch up. She
tries to say his name, but nothing comes out. No words, anyway.
The rucked-up nightgown is bunched and confining under her armpits. Her fingers
fumble at the top buttons, and she pushes it over her head as Karasu’s hand
slides over her ribs, his mouth hot and wet and open on her stomach. The hand
parts her thighs to smooth up the insides, and then it’s just the thin fabric
of her panties between her and his hand. “Soft,” he gasps against her stomach.
“Oh, Haruka.” His palm rubs her slowly, as if it knows about the ache there and
wants to soothe it away. She’s hardly touched that place herself, and it’s
different now -- hot and swollen and painful and slick where his fingertips
probe through the cloth, tighter and more tender than her nipples have gone.
Haruka is twisting, panting, knees straining apart, and then it’s not his hand
between her legs but his thigh, and he’s rising on his hands and knees, his
whole body between her legs, over her, pushing her apart in that same rhythm,
but there’s so much more of it now. He lies heavily on her, but he’s keeping
his full weight up so it’s not too heavy--more like the most wonderful blanket
in the world.
His mouth is on hers, and she’s panting into it. Even through the fabric of her
panties, the fabric of his bodysuit, she can feel his--his penis, and it’s
rolling against the hot place between her legs as he moves and she moves and
oh! It’s too much, too much everything. She doesn’t know how she can keep
living through this moment, through this heat, through this feeling that’s
almost too sharp to be pleasant, but she needs it like the air that’s almost
another creature inside her, it’s working her lungs so hard. Her breath is
coming too fast even to kiss him properly, but that worry is lost under the
hugeness of what’s rising inside her. It rises, rises, swells, and breaks like
waterdrops spun into stars. At first she thinks it’s broken her, the
contractions hit so hard, and she’s jerking and crying out into his shoulder as
he whispers against her cheek, “Come for me. Come for me, Haruka.” She’s not
even really sure what he means by that, but she thinks maybe she has.
She lies boneless beneath him, twitching and panting, but his movements roll on
and carry her through it, and all the world is a pleasant haze. “You were
dead,” he had said, back at the beginning, which was kind of funny, because she
was the one who was afraid he might die. Then she remembers the words he spoke
that first time he held her in his arms, when he broke her out of the glass
tank in La’Cryma: “I don’t ever want to lose her again.”
Another her had been his lover, in that dimension. And that was why, now...
She could be that for him. Maybe that’s part of why he’s here, in this time and
place. She could be anything for him, after this.
His chest is heaving against hers, and her fingers clutch weakly at the cloth
covering it, at the sigil she can’t see because it’s too dark. Don’t people
usually undress to make love? “Karasu, your clothes.” There’s almost no air
behind her words, but he hears her, because her fingers are suddenly resting
against his bare chest, and it’s skin all the way down except between her legs,
and even there she can feel him more through the sopping wet fabric of her
panties.
His fingers fumble with the elastic waistband. He’s panting like she was, rough
and harsh, and finally he gives up and shoves the crotch of her underwear to
one side. The fabric over her hip tears and something is probing inward between
her legs, just skin now, just Karasu, and there’s a firm push as his abdomen
surges against hers.
Before, Haruka thought something had broken inside her. Now she knows it has,
but the shock of the pain leaves her without words, without even the breath to
speak them. Her fingers scrabble ineffectually at his back as he arches over
her, into her, frozen and panting with his eyes screwed shut. The pressure
stretches her tight, more with discomfort now than outright agony, and there’s
a suggestion of something beyond the pain, something that could grow if she has
a chance to adjust.
His hips buck, and the chance is gone. She’s splitting, flesh tearing like a
too-ripe fruit, and she can’t think past the pain. She screams -- not even
words, just high, strangled sounds, and her feet kick against his calves as his
weight pulls off her and he attempts to disentagle himself. The pressure drags
out of her inch by inch, but it still hurts like there’s a knife inside her
even once it’s finally gone. High-pitched, hiccupping sobs are escaping her,
and she thinks miserably, ashamedly, that she must not sound anything like the
Haruka he lost.
He rolls aside, still breathing hard, and she clings to him, kissing his chest,
almost drowning in shame and pain. “No, it’s okay, you can still try. I’m
sorry, I’m sorry,” she sobs. Her hand reaches down to grip his deflating
erection. It’s slick between her fingers and hardens momentarily before Karasu
grabs her wrist and pulls her hand away. The smell of blood is hot and heavy in
her nostrils. He catches her head as she falls, and everything is fading to
gray.
The next thing she’s aware of is Karasu cradling her in his arms like a broken
doll, whispering, “No, no, no...” Something is dripping down the crack of her
butt. She blacks out again.
The cool night air washes over her face, whistles past her ears. Karasu’s cloak
is wrapped tightly around her, and there is a far-off sound like someone
sobbing. Drowsily, Haruka turns her head. The trees and houses are laid out
below like a diorama, like she’s coming back on the plane from Tokyo, but
they’re getting bigger fast. Karasu connects, trips, falls, and she’s flung
across the lawn like a doll in truth before her body rolls to a stop. Her head
lolls back to see the geometric grid of windows rising high above. The
hospital.
The grass beneath her, the air above--everything is cold. So cold.
Karasu lies a few feet away, but he does not rise. He’s always looked older
than 27, and right now he looks older still. “I’m sorry, Haruka,” he says. It’s
a broken whisper. “I wanted to protect you. I didn’t want…”
“No, Karasu, please don’t feel bad.” She reaches for his hand, but it’s too
far. “Please don’t.” He’s breaking into pieces like Fukuro, and the wind is
already sifting what’s left of his body away, a thousand blue motes glittering
against the night sky.
 
&&&&&&&&&
 
“NO!” Haruka cries out, high and horrified, but her voice rings with authority,
and Noein is flung away. Wind batters back the grass around her in a wide
circle to echo the one that blazes around her throat.
“You say every new choice makes a new dimension. These aren’t the choices my
Karasu has made. I don’t want to be here. I want to go home. I want my Karasu!”
Her voice rises to a scream, and in the next moment, she’s standing on her
front walk. She teeters and almost falls before catching herself and running
inside.
“Haruka?” her mother asks quizzically as she thunders past her office and up
the stairs to the bathroom there.
Inside, she slams the sliding door shut and yanks down her shorts and panties.
No blood stains them, running out with her life, and her fingers probe between
her legs to confirm -- no pain, nothing torn, just a clear, slick wetness.
Lightheaded and sick, she sinks down, hanging onto the toilet. The worst of the
images are already fading like a terrible dream, but others seem to have lodged
in her heart, a tangible echo of the thoughts that make her flush as she drifts
off to sleep even as she tries not to look at them too closely.
She still feels cold. All over.
Haruka washes her hands, splashes water over her face, and makes for the
storeroom.
Karasu must have heard her running around, because he’s halfway to his feet,
and when he sees her, his already-serious face goes taut with concern. “What’s
wrong, Haruka?” he asks, then lets out a sound of protest as she plows into him
and knocks him back onto the floor. His hands rise up and hover in midair, not
touching her, and his body is rigid, shutting her out. Maybe she understands a
bit better, now.
Tears well up, and before she can stop them she’s sobbing into his shoulder,
hands knotted in his cloak.
His knuckles brush her hair, a bare grazing contact that’s still a comfort, and
as she cries and cries, his hands cup her shoulders with the delicacy he might
use to keep a leaf from falling.
He is the most wonderful blanket in the world. 
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