sm_monthly September Theme 05: Glamorous Boko by ~alvinokey
Based on the picture: Glamorous Boko
Ruins
Ruins, Hotaru thought with a bit of sad amusement. People didn't seem to tire of seeing the wreckage of past lives, past civilizations. They took none of the lessons that the ruins stood for, but they beheld the majesty at least, and some appreciated the linger of doom impressed upon the remains. She could not dredge up the same awe or admiration or even fear (for she had created so many herself, after all). She only felt regret when she saw them. Yet, she still went yearly, touring the world of the ruins that remained and remembering the ones that left no traces at all. It made her sad to realize how effective she had been in her duties, that she had erased their memories so thoroughly and so easily that not even mementos were left behind in their wake.
When she had been old enough to travel by herself, she would often ask Michiru or Haruka for tickets to ancient places when they inquired what she wanted for birthdays and holidays. She thought it might be a bit masochistic of her to desire it, no good memories came from these outings after all, but the desire to see drove her. To remember, it was all she could do for the past, even though she never had good memories. There was always a terrible fall, she concluded, in her vague and abstract thoughts of the past. There was always a crisis to be faced, strangers with eyes lined with agitation and worry, stress and despair. It was, perhaps a sense of nostalgia, a prayer for the dead that so often goes unsaid at their passing or in the wake of their memories that kept her longing to see more. She may never have this chance again, she reasoned, and despite the discomfort of remembering she continued her travels when she could.
Hotaru was long aquainted with disasters, with destruction and despair. She was not used to living and waking to a world so peaceful. Of building relationships with people whose very lives she may one day have to take, and if not theirs then their children's or their children's children. Queen Selenity, for all who must have thought her cruel to banish the one Senshi who only knew of destruction, was in her own way very kind. Loneliness caused pain in its own way, life that was made only to destroy was but an empty one, yet she was not made to become like an empty glass in her previous ignorance. She did not know that she could contain anything but emptiness, and in its own numbness, in its own way, it was the less painful choice. She had not been so naively filled with emotions she had never confronted before, had never been threatened with the possibility of shattering, had never realized that shattering was not as terrifying as being emptied - of losing everything she had built with hands that never knew they could build anything at all. In the end though, she was made to destroy, and it was a fate she could not escape.
She can sometimes feel those same feelings resonating in the stones she visited, in the star that held her heart and her soul. The powers within those stones had faded with time, as all things fades with time. But their memories allowed Hotaru a companion in this world that perhaps only Setsuna could understand, and even the other could only do so to a degree. Even if Setsuna could understand, Hotaru did not wish to speak of these things with the Guardian of Time. Setsuna, after all, was not just Sailor Pluto to her anymore. She was almost a mother, almost a sister, almost a teacher, and almost a friend. Still, Hotaru dared not name the other out-loud by any of the other labels that would make Setsuna more precious and more real to Tomoe Hotaru. It was always Setsuna-mama or Michiru-mama or Haruka-papa. Never Okaa-chan, never Onee-san. Not when she knew better, when she grew older and remembered more often of a past that was forgotten by everyone else. Her nature, she could not forget even if all the world remembered her only as Hotaru.
In another life, she remembered her companions' faces as she drove the glaive (and all her latent, slumbering powers) into the earth. She knows well that she had sent their worlds and their dreams into oblivion, time and time again. Had crumpled their hopes into dust, and whittled their sacrifices to nothing. It had been the planet Uranus first, then the despairing Neptune world followed, and long, too long ago to remember, before even Setsuna took post, she had decimated Pluto. They do not know this, or at least, not all of them remembered. In another world, she had killed one of them or both of them to fulfill her duties when they could not stand by to fulfill their own. In another life she didn't understand their feelings, didn't understand their desperate, tear-stained faces as they betrayed their post. And now? Now she wished she never did, and for penance for these thoughts, she visited what ruins she could find. She solemnly remembered what others could not, and took it upon herself to understand when others would fail to understand the gravity of remembering (despite the price of remembering).
It was her only penance for duties she had never questioned until now.
One day, she thought, the Neo-Queen, or her daughter - who was Hotaru's most precious friend - would ask of her the same thing Queen Selenity had. If not them, then their line or another line that lived and loved and was good and kind, or was terrible and human and desperate to survive. And in their terrible kindness, in their encompassing compassion, they would realize too late the price they will ask Hotaru to pay. Hotaru hoped the House of the Moon would be too ignorant to realize this, but whatever kindness Queens held in themselves, Selenity's line had always been keen (even when it was too late to change what was). Kindness dulls the edges of brilliance, and sometimes in its place is a terrible price to be paid. Sailor Saturn opened her hands and looked at the opened palms, Tomoe Hotaru's hands. They were unobstructed by those belying white gloves of her Senshi fuku. She had killed so many, had put away despair to reborn hope anew at the cost of lives unimaginable. She had restarted history, and in a sense, reality and time. She had rewound progress, and in the process, the civilizations she had laid waste were forgotten, erased from memory as new ones were born in their shadows.
People today, she faced them, sometimes wondering: 'In another life, did I destroy your world once before?' But their blank, vacant faces were empty houses to pasts that only she recalled. That half-finished picture of a world about to implode, she wished she had happier memories to testify their existence, and yet was glad she never knew how happy it had been.
The ruins lay before her and beneath her feet, like a welcoming lover. Hotaru saw herself in its skeletal remains, tattered by time. Time, the thief, who had took her apart, layer by layer, but still left the bones to remain. Bones that were too strong to crumble altogether. She wished then that she knew herself only as Saturn, like she once did. She wished that she had not been filled, had not become more than a shell with another name but a container of other countless hopes. She wished that she did not have to learn to pity or remember the dead so well (for it was one burden she had never bore until now and feared she may not be able to in the future).
Sometimes, Saturn wondered, if it was better never to have found a heart at all.
end.
How like me to write something so melancholy.
Ruins
Ruins, Hotaru thought with a bit of sad amusement. People didn't seem to tire of seeing the wreckage of past lives, past civilizations. They took none of the lessons that the ruins stood for, but they beheld the majesty at least, and some appreciated the linger of doom impressed upon the remains. She could not dredge up the same awe or admiration or even fear (for she had created so many herself, after all). She only felt regret when she saw them. Yet, she still went yearly, touring the world of the ruins that remained and remembering the ones that left no traces at all. It made her sad to realize how effective she had been in her duties, that she had erased their memories so thoroughly and so easily that not even mementos were left behind in their wake.
When she had been old enough to travel by herself, she would often ask Michiru or Haruka for tickets to ancient places when they inquired what she wanted for birthdays and holidays. She thought it might be a bit masochistic of her to desire it, no good memories came from these outings after all, but the desire to see drove her. To remember, it was all she could do for the past, even though she never had good memories. There was always a terrible fall, she concluded, in her vague and abstract thoughts of the past. There was always a crisis to be faced, strangers with eyes lined with agitation and worry, stress and despair. It was, perhaps a sense of nostalgia, a prayer for the dead that so often goes unsaid at their passing or in the wake of their memories that kept her longing to see more. She may never have this chance again, she reasoned, and despite the discomfort of remembering she continued her travels when she could.
Hotaru was long aquainted with disasters, with destruction and despair. She was not used to living and waking to a world so peaceful. Of building relationships with people whose very lives she may one day have to take, and if not theirs then their children's or their children's children. Queen Selenity, for all who must have thought her cruel to banish the one Senshi who only knew of destruction, was in her own way very kind. Loneliness caused pain in its own way, life that was made only to destroy was but an empty one, yet she was not made to become like an empty glass in her previous ignorance. She did not know that she could contain anything but emptiness, and in its own numbness, in its own way, it was the less painful choice. She had not been so naively filled with emotions she had never confronted before, had never been threatened with the possibility of shattering, had never realized that shattering was not as terrifying as being emptied - of losing everything she had built with hands that never knew they could build anything at all. In the end though, she was made to destroy, and it was a fate she could not escape.
She can sometimes feel those same feelings resonating in the stones she visited, in the star that held her heart and her soul. The powers within those stones had faded with time, as all things fades with time. But their memories allowed Hotaru a companion in this world that perhaps only Setsuna could understand, and even the other could only do so to a degree. Even if Setsuna could understand, Hotaru did not wish to speak of these things with the Guardian of Time. Setsuna, after all, was not just Sailor Pluto to her anymore. She was almost a mother, almost a sister, almost a teacher, and almost a friend. Still, Hotaru dared not name the other out-loud by any of the other labels that would make Setsuna more precious and more real to Tomoe Hotaru. It was always Setsuna-mama or Michiru-mama or Haruka-papa. Never Okaa-chan, never Onee-san. Not when she knew better, when she grew older and remembered more often of a past that was forgotten by everyone else. Her nature, she could not forget even if all the world remembered her only as Hotaru.
In another life, she remembered her companions' faces as she drove the glaive (and all her latent, slumbering powers) into the earth. She knows well that she had sent their worlds and their dreams into oblivion, time and time again. Had crumpled their hopes into dust, and whittled their sacrifices to nothing. It had been the planet Uranus first, then the despairing Neptune world followed, and long, too long ago to remember, before even Setsuna took post, she had decimated Pluto. They do not know this, or at least, not all of them remembered. In another world, she had killed one of them or both of them to fulfill her duties when they could not stand by to fulfill their own. In another life she didn't understand their feelings, didn't understand their desperate, tear-stained faces as they betrayed their post. And now? Now she wished she never did, and for penance for these thoughts, she visited what ruins she could find. She solemnly remembered what others could not, and took it upon herself to understand when others would fail to understand the gravity of remembering (despite the price of remembering).
It was her only penance for duties she had never questioned until now.
One day, she thought, the Neo-Queen, or her daughter - who was Hotaru's most precious friend - would ask of her the same thing Queen Selenity had. If not them, then their line or another line that lived and loved and was good and kind, or was terrible and human and desperate to survive. And in their terrible kindness, in their encompassing compassion, they would realize too late the price they will ask Hotaru to pay. Hotaru hoped the House of the Moon would be too ignorant to realize this, but whatever kindness Queens held in themselves, Selenity's line had always been keen (even when it was too late to change what was). Kindness dulls the edges of brilliance, and sometimes in its place is a terrible price to be paid. Sailor Saturn opened her hands and looked at the opened palms, Tomoe Hotaru's hands. They were unobstructed by those belying white gloves of her Senshi fuku. She had killed so many, had put away despair to reborn hope anew at the cost of lives unimaginable. She had restarted history, and in a sense, reality and time. She had rewound progress, and in the process, the civilizations she had laid waste were forgotten, erased from memory as new ones were born in their shadows.
People today, she faced them, sometimes wondering: 'In another life, did I destroy your world once before?' But their blank, vacant faces were empty houses to pasts that only she recalled. That half-finished picture of a world about to implode, she wished she had happier memories to testify their existence, and yet was glad she never knew how happy it had been.
The ruins lay before her and beneath her feet, like a welcoming lover. Hotaru saw herself in its skeletal remains, tattered by time. Time, the thief, who had took her apart, layer by layer, but still left the bones to remain. Bones that were too strong to crumble altogether. She wished then that she knew herself only as Saturn, like she once did. She wished that she had not been filled, had not become more than a shell with another name but a container of other countless hopes. She wished that she did not have to learn to pity or remember the dead so well (for it was one burden she had never bore until now and feared she may not be able to in the future).
Sometimes, Saturn wondered, if it was better never to have found a heart at all.
end.
How like me to write something so melancholy.