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Ashford, Personal Log; January 27, 0357
Topic Started: Apr 2 2010, 06:39 PM (161 Views)
Daniel Ashford
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I can't sleep. It's not hard to catch a full breath anymore, thanks to Katana, but my ribs are sore and my shoulder is stiff. My mind continues to wander, it's harder and harder to focus my thoughts. If it wasn't for my Udina's routines, I think I would be insane at this point.

....

0357.
I don't know what to do with myself. It's been a week since the mission in the square. Nobody new has showed up yet. I hope they do. If people are alive, they should group together. They'll have better odds in groups, since they're not trained to avoid drawing attention. Some of the shadows will run from small groups, and others will hesitate long enough to provide escape. Strength in numbers.

My arm's almost healed. I've got a bruise the size of a small cantaloupe on my arm, but it's better than the bone still sticking out. My shoulder's stiff from all the jarring and the splint I had on for 2 days. My chest is better, I can breathe again. My ribs hurt, and if I sprint too long it gets really bad, but I'm in working condition. 90% capacity, I'd say. Pretty good, a week after the fact. If it hadn't been for Spike, I would have bled to death.

If not for her, I might have wanted to.

I haven't spoken to Spike about Yori yet. She doesn't know much about Katana, we never had a chance to catch up without the threat of disclosure agreements and government officials showing up. She doesn't know much about Yori, either, except what I've mentioned in passing. I'm sure she caught on to the attraction when Katana was on retired tour, but only because she's so perceptive. Hell, I didn't even realize how strong the bond was between us then. It took me years to figure it out. And before I could do anything about it, before I could hold Yoruichi in my arms and let her know just how much I cared about her, she was taken from me. Taken in the most brutal fashion I can imagine. Right before my eyes.


When...when she was on the wall, she looked at me. I'll never forget her face. She was so afraid, so alone. She would have screamed, but she didn't have lungs anymore. She told me to run. I never knew why she said that. The propane didn't go off until later, after she...she couldn't have known that would happen. Maybe she just wanted me safe...I don't know. She was so beautiful. Blood was running down her lip, across her chin. Her green eyes were haunting, they were so intense. It almost seemed like...

Run. That's what she mouthed. I got knocked away, then, and didn't see what happened to her. I watched the rest of my squad get annihilated by steel and flame and fear, the things we had trained so long to be immune to. Why did that happen? Why did the building come down? I don't think I saw a single other building come down around it, just the warehouse. And sure there's wreckage now, but most of it happened long after that first night. I didn't see a single shadow for months after that. But I suppose I didn't see much of anything.

The corpse of that building was monstrous, it had been an aircraft assembly hangar before it was repossessed and rented out. It had been mostly empty for years when we got it. It was a great space, lots of room, lots of rooms. The pile of rubble left in its place took months to dig through. I spent a lot of time searching the wreckage. I found the bodies of the team, all of them. I had hoped that maybe one or two had gotten out, but no. All accounted for. Katana doesn't use dog tags, so there was nothing to collect. I buried them on a rise in the outskirts of the city, one of the few places that wasn't turned to wasted disgusting ash by whatever force wiped the city clean of human life. Every one, I buried. Every one, I found. Except her.

I never found her body. I never found anything of hers, no hair, no remnants of clothing, nothing. I dug through that flotsam for months, and I got down to the bottom of it. I never found a trace of her. The beam that hit her was covered in dust, but under the dust was only a few drops of blood. There were no viscera anywhere. I still can't make sense of it. I haven't told anyone...that's laughable. Who would I tell? No one even knows that I had a soul mate. Except Vivienne. And she's north, how far, I have no idea. I know she's alive, and that she's north, that's it. And I don't know how I know.

I...
I was going to give Yori the pendant Cadence made for me for my birthday. It's the only thing I have left of any of my family, except memories. But Yoruichi reminded me so much of Cadence, her kindness, her innocence, her passion. Her devotion to her principles, her intelligence. Those green eyes of hers were so full of intelligence. I'm sure she was smarter than I'll ever be, and I loved that about her along with everything else. I wanted her to know how much...how much she meant to me, by letting her have the only possession I have that I care about. Cadence helped me stay strong, and I wanted Yori to have that protection, that inspiration, too. But now... now...

A small tear stain blurs the last few words of the sentence on the page, written in green ink in a small leather-bound notebook the size of Daniel's sizable hand. The next few sentences are shaky, but soon they steady again.


Yori was everything to me. She is everything to me. She's cared for me while I was more than lost, more than alone. She didn't have to, no one ever asked her. She could have let Katana leave me there on that Korean ridge. She didn't. I could never thank her enough, never repay her enough, for that. She was my world.
She is my world.

I hear her voice every day, and I see her face every time I close my eyes. I don't know if grief is driving me insane or if something else is going on, but I have to know.

I never wanted my last memory of her beautiful green eyes to be one of terror. Or pain. Or grief. Her beautiful green eyes, so bright they might have been glowing.

Glowing.

My eyes glowed green when I helped Spike! Hers were so bright that night, despite the terror...they were alight, from within! Maybe...maybe there was so little blood on the beam because... maybe...

Listen to me! Am I really that far gone? Can I really not cope with reality that badly?




It sounds like we're going to be holding the final meeting in prep for the assault on precinct 34 later today. I need sleep. Hopefully I can get some. I certainly won't mind the dreams. It's the ones I have when I'm awake that I'm worried about. I'll talk to Spike about it, when this is over. It's just words, and the occasional flash of hair. Probably hallucinations. Maybe Spike can talk some sense into me. But then, her ears still move to the sounds... I'll figure it out after this mission. I hope I have the strength to wait that long.
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