whose name is Afterwards (Saiyuki/Sandman, Nii/Death, G)

[incandescens]

Title: whose name is Afterwards
Author/Artist: incandescens
Rating: G
Warnings: None.
Word count: 506
Prompt: February 9 - Saiyuki/Sandman, Nii/Death: Mirrors - "I thought you'd be taller."


There is something behind other people's eyes that he sees at the moment of their deaths. It's nothing he can put his finger on, nothing that he can capture through science or magic, but it's there, and it irritates him that he can't get any closer to it. He has always been able to do everything else that he wanted. This should be no different.

An old legend reminds him of the tale of a man who trapped his own death in a cage of mirrors when it came to claim him, and how he spent the rest of his life holding it there until he was prepared to let it go. Black wings and claws. The images appeal to him.

As his plans progress, as he draws closer to that moment when he will be able to pull everything apart and scatter it all like a child's castle, he finds himself watching mirrors as he passes them.

Is he waiting for someone to reach out and stop him? For his own personal black bird to come in a storm of crow-wings and drag him into the shadows?

You never stopped me, Koumyou. Nobody ever stopped me. Even that time when you caught my wrist, you let me go again --

The only things that have ever truly intrigued Ukoku are the ones that he doesn't understand, or can't have, or can't master. The path behind him is littered with broken toys. This new shadow that he looks for in the eyes of everyone around him is just another thing that he intends to comprehend and then throw away.

He can't see it in his own eyes, of course. He took off his glasses and squinted into the mirror, but all that was there was flesh and blood and spirit. Nothing more. No personal death. No stranger.

It would be interesting, he thinks casually, to be able to communicate with death; to understand it; to break its spirit.

But when he passes the mirror one day and sees a girl watching him from the other side of the pane, her eyes are as black and impassive as a crow's eyes, her face as closed as a coin and as uninterested as a statue's.

"I thought you'd be taller," he murmurs, leaning against the mirror and fondling the glass with dirty fingers.

She shrugs. Her shoulders are as white as chalk. "I thought you'd be more interesting."

"And am I?"

"No. Just another nihilist looking for a challenge."

He lets his eyebrows quirk; he is, though he would not admit it, somewhat hurt by this dismissal. "You sound as if you meet a lot of us."

"I meet everyone," she says, and is gone without sparing him another moment of her time.

That day in the laboratory, he toys with the rabbit until it begins to come apart in his hands, and when he is forced to leave it be, he kills experimental subject after experimental subject; but still he doesn't see her in their eyes.


---

There is a lady, whose name is Afterwards - http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/1629.html

Comments

[nekokoban]

Oh, wow. This was a prompt that I looked at and hoped someone else would pick up because I wanted to read it more than write it -- and I'm glad you did. *g* She really wouldn't care for him much on a personal level, would she?

Thank you for writing this!

[incandescens]

Thank you! I'm glad you feel that it works.

[avierra.livejournal.com]

That was very cool. I love your icily dismissive Death, especially since she's really the most loving and kind out of all the Endless.

I wonder if there's a bit of a parallel here with how Morpheus was captured and imprisoned, since you mention the legend of Death being captured. That would be an interesting bit of symmetry. And Nii would be just arrogant and full of hubris enough to do it.

[incandescens]

Thank you very much: I'm glad you liked it.

The legend of death being captured as a bird is from a different source, a short story I once read, though unfortunately I can't remember more of it than fragments. Very irritating.

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

this was not my prompt but have been waiting for someone to pick up. ...and Wow! This is absolutely wonderful.

I recall the story too but also have no idea where or whence I chanced upon it. (It could be from reading those Andrew Lang's coloured Fairytales series, when I was a child but I dunno.)

Death is cool that way, out of all the endless she seems to have the least ummm 'hangups' about life in general. and she would abhor Nii and the reasons why he does things.

Thank you for sharing with us this lovely, sharp and insightful piece!

[incandescens]

A pleasure: I'm very glad you liked it. (And I don't think that story was in those Fairy Books -- yes, I read them too. ;))

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

No, I think you're right. It isn't from those books I just think it may have been from something like those books though...and now it's driving me insane trying to recall it! Aaarggghhh!!!

and cool... I loved those books. They were in the library and they're so much more than the Disney things than what the children get today.

I have a nice hubby who has acquired me over the years the set. (not the originals...of course, reprints). Hopefully my children will come to love them too!

[incandescens]

There was a word coined for the story. Thanatopsis? And the man who caught his own personal death sat there in the cage of mirrors holding its clawed feet in his hands till he died, so it wasn't exactly a happy story either.

We had those books in my library too, and I read all the way through them as well. ;) And while I think they were a bit edited, they were _much_ better than Disney. I totally agree. I've given a few to a friend's daughter when I ran across them secondhand.

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

Wow! That's so sweet, and awesome... it would be hard for me to let go of something like that!

I don't regret many things but I was in a second book shop ( a lovely little old one with some wonderful things in it) in Hebden Bridge when I was a poor student at Hudds (Poly at the time) and I actually picked up to browse a coloured print of one of those books. But sadly being a poor student I had to put it down and move on along...it was very hard to do!

[incandescens]

Well, I did read them before handing them over . . .

You poor thing. That must have been very hard indeed to do!

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

What a nice contrast-- Nii isn't death, he's nothing.

[incandescens]

No great figure of ultimate grandeur and destruction, just a nasty little nihilist.

[chomiji]

Yes! Guys like Nii always think they're unique, and that everyone else is nothing - you really nailed it (and him!).

[incandescens]

Thank you!

[giving-ground.livejournal.com]

Oh, this works really well. Wonderful. :)

[incandescens]

Thank you very much.

[katmaxwell.livejournal.com]

Oh crap, this was awesome. I love your take on this, and on Death's opinion of Nii and. Ahh, great fic. ♥

[incandescens]

Thank you!

[lillypuff.livejournal.com]

Wow...just wow. I love this!

[incandescens]

Thank you. ;)

[freeradical9.livejournal.com]

This is a really striking story. I like that when Nii imagines Death, the image is of something like himself, but when he meets the reality, he's faced with the fact that she's nothing like him at all. I also thought the ending was very appropriate. Thanks for sharing this.

[incandescens]

A pleasure. Glad you liked it!

[shirogiku.livejournal.com]

Death of the Endless is a perfect litmus to measure Nii against - 0ther antropomorphised Deaths (like, e.g., Pratchett's) woudn't have made such a impact - so I'm very happy you wrote this.

I'm in love with your works ♥

The following exchange is my favourite part - the best descriptor of Nii I've seen, even if the harshest one:

"I thought you'd be taller," he murmurs, leaning against the mirror and fondling the glass with dirty fingers.

She shrugs. Her shoulders are as white as chalk. "I thought you'd be more interesting."

"And am I?"

"No. Just another nihilist looking for a challenge."

Nii is a really unlikeable person, but I'm drawn to him as a character.

If you're updated on the manga's most recent developments, do you think Nii's story is over or will we see him again?

Have you ever found out about the origins of that story about a man trapping his death?

I hope it's not too much of a bother replying to my comments ^^;;

[incandescens]

I'm afraid I'm a bit out of touch with the manga, so I'm not quite sure where it stands, but I'm sure that the author won't let a good villain like Nii go without a very thorough endgame/climax.

I'm glad you like this piece. I'm afraid that I still haven't found the reference about a man trapping his own death. One of these days...