X/1999 - Sorata/Arashi

[parron]

author: parron
series: x/1999
pairing: sorata/arashi
spoilers: for all of the manga
notes: although i intended to touch on the anime, movie, and their cameos, time and word count limitations kept me from doing so. they aren't really important anyway; and i haven't seen the movie more than one time years ago, so consider this essay "purely manga." also this essay is quite late and quite long; i hope both can be forgiven. i got obsessive about this thing. there's a bit more that i might add over the next few days to pretty it up a bit, but the text part is complete.
thanks: to kayjay for frequent beta reading in various font colors.



series introduction

X/1999 is the story of the End of Days. A take on the Book of Revelations mixed with Japanese spirituality and religion, the series follows two groups, the Dragons of Heaven (Seven Seals) and the Dragons of Earth (Seven Harbingers/Angels), as they fight out an apocalyptic battle in Tokyo, Japan through the year 1999. If the Dragons of Heaven win, humanity will live on at the cost of the eventual death of the earth itself. If the Dragons of Earth win, the opposite happens; humanity will be killed off and the earth will slowly heal itself.

Each group is made up of seven people of great magical ability, and each group has a leader of sorts by the name of Kamui. The Kamui of the Dragons of Heaven is the main character in X; a sweet if somewhat short tempered boy who was initially given the choice of what side to take. He chose the Seals in order to protect his loved ones-his crush Monou Kotori and her older brother (and Kamui’s childhood friend) Fuuma. However, the siblings are deeply tangled in Kamui’s destiny, and the moment Kamui choses the side of the Dragons of Heaven, Fuuma becomes the second Kamui, undergoing a great change in personality and murdering Kotori before promising to do the same to Kamui himself. In order to save the world, Kamui finds himself tasked with killing his former closest friend-a job he takes with great difficulty and confusion.

However, this essay is not about Kamui, but about two of his fellow Dragons of Heaven, the Buddhist monk Arisugawa Sorata and the Shinto priestess (miko) Kishuu Arashi, and the romance between them.

arisugawa sorata


At a glance, Sorata is the side-kick character. Cheerful, extremely supportive, and outgoing, Sorata spends most of X helping others. He’s perceptive, sympathetic, good at giving advice and cheering people up. He’s also self-described as brainless, enthusiastic, constantly joking, and is prone to teasing others. With roughly three times the energy of anyone else around him and seemingly no concern for appearance or embarrassment, Sorata will cheerfully say or do whatever strikes him as amusing; sadly most of the people around him don’t share his sense of humor. He can be serious, but only when he can't get away with being otherwise. Although prone to acting the idiot, Sorata is definitely not one-in fact, when the series needs exposition for the sake of the reader, Sorata is nearly always the one who does the explaining, and it is established that Sorata is extremely knowledgeable about magic.

His most notable feature once you get past his loud weirdness is his loyalty: if Sorata likes someone, he will do absolutely everything in his ability to help and support them. Of course, he tends to show his affection in oddly motherly ways: by cooking for his friends, trying to set up play-dates from them, and so on. However, since Sorata's good personality traits are taken to such extremes, they can also flaws, and he can easily come off as annoying.

When Sorata was three years old, he was given by his parents to the monks of Kouya-san, a shingon Buddhist monastery in Wakayama prefecture, to be trained as a Dragon of Heaven. Despite the fact that his personality wasn't well suited to a monk's lifestyle, Sorata enjoyed it and has fond memories of the place; he grew especially close to the head monk, who he refers to as Grandpa. "Grandpa" was a seer, and when Sorata was thirteen years old, he was told of his destiny-that he would fight as one of the Seven Seals in the End Of Days, and that he would be killed for the sake of the woman he loved.

As one of the Seven Seals, Sorata has the power to create a magical barrier that allows battles to be fought without harming passerby or tearing up the city (a kekkai). He also has an elemental control over lightning, and a special talent for creating gouhodoji, "avatars" that can act as anything from messengers to shields, the catch being that any damage taken by them is transferred directly to Sorata. Although Sorata is stated to be very powerful, he seems to prefer not to fight, only doing so when the people he cares for are in immediate danger.

He is represented by the tarot card The Chariot, which is usually agreed to represent courage, willpower, self assertion, success, and conviction.

kishuu arashi


Arashi is a difficult character to sum up, because on the surface she appears to be the usual cold, dark haired pretty girl and on a deeper level she’s weak and uncertain; on describing her briefly, one is tempted to assume she’s the “shy, tough” type, but that doesn't fit either. Whereas Sorata is a simple character-he knows who he is and is fine with what that is-Arashi is the exact opposite.

Most of her issues come from her childhood. When her mother became pregnant with Arashi, she learned of Arashi's fate as a Dragon of Heaven. Not wanting her child to have such a destiny, she tried to change fate by fleeing and giving birth to Arashi in secret, then keeping her daughter hidden away. She worked from home and hardly ever left the apartment they lived in-and hardly ever let Arashi leave it, either, telling her that bad people would take her away if not for her mother's protection. When Arashi was six years old, her mother died of unknown causes. Rather than ending up in foster care, Arashi found herself living on the streets-perhaps her secluded life until then led to people simply not knowing she existed. She lived off garbage for several months before the people of the Ise Shrine found her and took her in.

This left her with trust issues, to say the least. Arashi in the present has difficulties opening up to people, and especially in trusting them enough to confide in. Many of her problems later in the series could have been solved if she had simply just talked to someone about them. These issues also translate to her being somewhat prickly when first meeting someone-it's very rare for Arashi to be friendly to anyone when she meets them, or even to talk to them, and even when she does get to know them she remains fairly aloof-if marginally more friendly.

She has issues with food-she is always shown to be concentrating on her food when she eats, and strongly links the act of eating with the will to live-and one of her strongest motivators is guilt. Rather than acknowledge her issues, Arashi suppresses and hides them, leading her to come off as much more confident and capable than she really is.

Arashi is one of the most active fighters of the Dragons of Heaven, using a katana in battle. She's also shown to have several minor psychic abilities-she can detect the presence of life, and see curses for what they are. In her cameos in Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, Arashi's powers are expanded, giving her a stronger sixth sense and minor precognitive abilities. It's uncertain if this is meant to reflect on her powers in X.

She is represented by the tarot card Temperance, which represents balance, moderation, the feeling of security, and unification.

evidence


Sorata and Arashi meet in volume three, although both are introduced in volume one. Up until this point, we don’t really know much about either character. We know that Arashi is a Seal, very serious, and not above fighting Kamui. We learn more about Sorata because he enjoys talking about himself and has been following Kamui for about a day straight, but even so, both characters get almost all of their development around one another. Even most what we learn of their back-stories are a result of their relationship.

They meet while several other things are going on; therefore, Sorata and Arashi don't even have a chance to introduce themselves. Sorata does comment on Arashi's looks, but the real point to their first meeting is one line in particular of Sorata’s; after seeing Arashi act cooly to Kamui, after finding out that she’s another Seal, and after of course noticing her looks, Sorata tells Arashi for the first of three times: “I pick you.” We don’t find out the context of this statement until a few volumes later.

Sorata treats Kamui and Arashi to lunch, during which he repeats this line to Arashi after she displays her knowledge of various magical families and events. The threesome go to visit the Seer, Hinoto, after eating. There they meet a fourth Seal, Yuzuriha, and the main plot in general starts to come together. After a lot of talking, there is an attack on the DIET building. The Seals and Kamui take the chance to show off their powers to one another; Arashi’s is a sword that comes from her hand, prompting Sorata to explain to Yuzuriha when she asks that no, he doesn’t know where she usually keeps it... yet, prompting Arashi to give him a dirty look. It’s a silly moment, but it’s worth mentioning in passing as Yuzuriha is also an extremely perceptive character, and often seems to know more about the status of Sorata and Arashi’s relationship than either of them.


The important part begins after Kamui dispels the attack on the DIET building. There is a tremor that causes everyone alarm, and while everyone ducks and takes cover, Sorata reaches out to Arashi and protects her physically, getting his arm hit by a piece of falling debris for his trouble. Arashi is worried when she sees him hurt in this manner, but he shakes the wound off as not serious (even thought it is both painful and bleeding all over the place), cracking a joke and annoying her out of her momentary concern. However, Arashi is stubborn, and she brings up his injury again a few hours later, while the two of them are following Kamui. Trying to apologize for his injury on her behalf, Arashi is quickly interrupted by Sorata, who tells her that she shouldn’t worry about it, because he’s already chosen her. For what? Why, to die for, of course. Sorata explains his destiny to Arashi (as it was outlined above); she is understandably confused and upset by the implication, pointing out that they barely know each other and haven’t even spoken much, but Sorata refuses to change his mind, following through with some cheerful flirting (which Arashi ignores).

It goes without saying that this is an important scene for the couple, not only because it puts upfront what will be the biggest problem and driving force between them: the fact that Sorata is determined to die for Arashi's sake. And the fact that he tells her this the very day they meet, and the fact that he finishes this off by asking her on a date. It also establishes the pattern to come-Sorata flirts, and Arashi puts him off. But there’s more to it.

The scene is also notable for Arashi’s reactions. In this scene, Arashi is worried, uncertain, and anything but annoyed. In fact, it’s only after Sorata stops speaking seriously that she in turn stops treating him seriously, and that becomes their routine. As long as Sorata refrains from teasing her, Arashi is perfectly friendly towards him. She is never rude or especially cold as long as he is serious. And Sorata is perfectly aware of this.

The conversation does comment on one other aspect of their relationship, one that will later come back in full force: Arashi’s guilt complex. Prior to this moment, Arashi clearly doesn’t think anything much of Sorata-she replied to him when he talked to her first, but generally ignored him, frowning at him, and being as prickly as possible. Then he gets hurt, and all of that is gone. She’s polite. She worries. She initiates a conversation-which is something Arashi hardly ever does. This is the direct opposite of her typical behavior, and it is triggered by Sorata’s injury. Since she doesn’t care about him at all at this point, I doubt it’s because she’s worried for him-especially because the first thing she does is apologize for causing his wound. It’s guilt, plain and simple-apparently the one emotion Arashi is unable to suppress or ignore.

This will come back later, stronger.



After a good deal of irrelevant-to-this-essay plot, a time skip finds us three months in the future. Sorata and Arashi-as well as the other two young Seals, Kamui and Yuzuriha-are now living in a small house together. However, Sorata is quick to point out that even though they share a house and sometimes come downstairs at the same time in the morning, the “couple” is still chaste and, indeed, nonexistent.


The next scene of any importance-other than silly flirting-comes in volume 12. Kamui, having been for various justified reasons somewhat depressed of late, is refusing to eat-Sorata volunteers to go cheer him up and talk him out of that, which he easily manages. A short time later, Arashi and Sorata are alone in the kitchen, preparing dinner.

Arashi initiates the conversation. Thinking back to her own past, and her similar food-related issues, she tells Sorata that she is impressed that he was able to convince Kamui to eat again. He shrugs it off, saying that it wasn’t really that impressive, but Arashi insists that it was.

Arashi isn’t one to praise others, at least from what we see. Especially not Sorata, who she spends about half her time annoyed with. And yet here she not only compliments him, but presses the point.

Sorata takes her seriously, and asks her if she would eat if he asked her to, placing his hand on hers. This is the first time that Arashi doesn’t flinch from physical contact with him (discounting a few spur of the moment grabs to shield her in battle); it’s also the first time that we see Sorata express a serious interest in her, not silly, jokey flirting. He knows nothing of her past and how loaded that question is for her, but Arashi is perfectly aware.

Of course, she doesn’t answer, and Sorata doesn’t seem to expect her to, quickly reverting back to cheerful and leaving the room. After this, however, Arashi begins taking him more and more seriously-they’ve known one another for three months, but it’s only at this point that Arashi herself starts making the moves towards returning his feelings. There’s still a while to go.

There’s a pattern that starts to develop. Sorata flirts with Arashi and she becomes annoyed; then Sorata will say something serious and treat


her seriously, and she’ll be surprised-and then treat him seriously in return. There’s a short moment in volume 13 that works towards this.

X-13 is basically one gigantic bad day. An ally, Saiki, is killed by Fuuma. Yuzuriha goes missing and is presumed dead for a few weeks.

Kamui is nearly killed by Fuuma after discovering Saiki’s body (and not finding Yuzuriha). Sorata and Arashi rush towards the battle in progress-Arashi expresses doubts that they’ll arrive in time to save anyone. Sorata, close to angry, tells her that that’s not true, they will be in time and Kamui and Yuzuriha are certainly fine. He grabs her hand (she doesn’t pull away, pinch him, or object it at all), and outright yells at her to have more faith in them. Arashi is startled, hesitates, and then agrees.

This is unusual not for the physical contact, but because it’s pretty much the only time we see Sorata stand against Arashi. He disagrees, he disagrees firmly, and he never once pretends to be cheerful or anything but angry from worry over Kamui. And although Sorata standing up to Arashi instead of just going along with her is notable enough, the scene is probably also the first time Arashi could have noticed that his default personality isn’t silly and stupid-that it’s an act to amuse himself with, and that when things are important, he doesn’t even bother. She starts taking him more and more seriously.

A note about the time-line. All of X spans roughly six months; the space between the last two scenes is no more than a day or two. And by the next scene, it’s only been about another week. As we’ll see, Arashi’s for Sorata feelings are definitely changing.

More of Tokyo has been destroyed by the time volume 14 rolls around. Yuzuriha is missing, Kamui is injured and out of commission for the time being, and Karen and Aoki-two of the other Seals-are on patrol. This leaves Sorata and Arashi to observe the city from CLAMP School’s control room. Of course Arashi is serious, but so is Sorata, and they discuss the situation briefly before turning the talk to Kamui. Sorata mentions that Kamui had looked upset following a conversation; Arashi hadn’t picked up on this, and expresses her surprise.

Sorata is amused and says that he finds Kamui easy to read even when Kamui thinks he’s being secretive. Arashi asks, “can you read me, too?”

Why would she ask this? There’s curiosity, of course, but Arashi looks worried, not curious-worried what he might be able to read from her? Sorata jokes lightly that she’s currently thinking “this person looks flighty, but he can be perceptive when he wants to;” when she reacts with mild surprise (it wasn’t a difficult assumption to make), Sorata turns serious again. Up until this point, he’s been sitting while Arashi leans over him; he stands, and now she’s the one being leaned over.


Her expression throughout the next few pages is confused, even worried. Sorata starts out looking worried, then turns slightly hopeful, but is always completely serious.

SORATA: There are things I don't know.

SORATA: ...Like Neechan's feelings for me.

SORATA: I love you. It's not a joke. From the first time we met, my feelings haven't changed. I want to spend my life with you.

SORATA: Is that annoying?

SORATA: To Neechan, am I only a fellow "Dragon of Heaven?"

SORATA: But lately, I wonder if maybe you're starting to think differently about me. Or is that a misunderstanding?

ARASHI: I...

As he speaks, he slowly touches, then picks up, a strand of her hair and, at the end of his speech, kisses it. Arashi starts to reply, looking worried but not offended or angry, but they are interrupted, and she immediately retreats (with a “pop” sound effect) to the other end of the room. When Imonoyama-CLAMP School's chairman-apologizes for intruding, Sorata laughs it off, saying that he was just persuading a one-sided courtship and that Arashi was no doubt thankful for the interruption. They change the subject back to Tokyo, and our perspective switches back to Arashi, who gives Sorata a look of something that could be called longing before smiling faintly and caressing the hair he had kissed.

Sorata can be taken at his word. He does love her, and he is serious. And he’s right in both of his statements about Arashi-he really is terrible at reading her a lot of the time, but she really is warming up to him. And fast. It's only been a week or two since volume 11, remember.

There's one quick moment in volume 15 that may seem not to have much significance at first, but it could be considered the culmination of Sorata’s crush on Arashi, and the proof that he has indeed fallen for her completely, not just liked her because she was fun to tease and good looking.

Yuzuriha is still missing (this is how we know all these events are taking place very quickly; she wasn’t gone for more than two weeks), and the other young Seals are taking the afternoon off. Sorata makes pastries, and entertains Kamui (and Arashi, who is listening) with a story about cooking contests on Kouya-san. Kamui wonders if it’s really actually fun to be a monk; Sorata cheerfully tells him that he had made the entire story up. While Sorata is teasing Kamui for his gullibility, Arashi gives away the fact that she had fallen for the joke, too. Looking delighted, Sorata teases her for it for a moment, before placing his hand on her head (again with the physical contact) and, grinning, says that although he’s always found her beautiful, lately he’s also starting to find her “cute.” Arashi turns away quickly and Sorata cheerfully tells Kamui that “she’s hating [him] again.” Of course, he doesn’t see how hard Arashi is blushing.

It’s clear that Sorata isn’t talking about two different ways of physically seeing Arashi; he’s referring to her personality. Before, he saw her as beautiful and-well, that was pretty much it. Now, he’s enjoying teasing her, finds her gullibility amusing-in short, Sorata likes Arashi for all of her, not just his first impression of her physical appearance. He’s evolved from a silly crush to real love.

There was no reason to doubt Sorata's confession to Arashi in volume 14-it's true, but not the whole story. After all, a few months ago, he wasn’t in love with her, merely deciding to fall in love with her. He found her pretty and liked his first impressions and went from there. He’s been flirting with her all along, but it’s only with these scenes that we can say he’s actually made the progression from a silly crush to actual love; it's not hard to suspect that this sort of seriousness from him is fairly new, which would also at least partially explain why Arashi seems to find it surprising each time. And why she's responding so quickly to it all.

Sorata claims to have fallen for Arashi at first sight; however, he makes that claim after several months of living with her and getting to know her. It’s worth noting that he never claims to be in love with her in volume 5, he only says that he has chosen Arashi, after witnessing her as capable, well informed, very pretty, and somewhat cold. Although he’s a silly character and prone to exaggeration and joking, Sorata approaches this very seriously, “deciding” on Arashi and “picking” her; there’s absolutely no spontaneity or love in there. He makes a decision based on his initial impressions (Arashi herself is very quick to point this out), and then decides to then fall in love with her based on that. It is not until now that Sorata’s feelings become apparent and sincere, rather than a crush mixed with stubbornness.

The next time we see them, at the end of X-16, a lot happens in the course of a day and a half. It’s a bit over a month later; Yuzuriha has returned. The young Seals are in the control room, and Kamui makes a dramatic comment about the world ending soon. Sorata, sliding up besides Arashi, says that that wouldn’t be good at all. She looks at him, and he elaborates with, “because we haven’t done anything good or anything ‘bad’ yet.” Then he jumps backwards, rightfully assuming she’s about to hit him in some way. He’s surprised when she doesn’t, and that she looks worried instead of annoyed. He points out that for a remark along those lines, he’d have expected her sword flying out at him; since she didn’t react, he wonders if she’s sick, and reaches out to feel her forehead. Although Sorata is always touching Arashi innocently, this time she flinches away, pushes off his hand, quickly tells him she’s fine, and turns her back on him.


Sorata is clearly a bit worried, but shrugs it off, seeming slightly confused or at a loss. He doesn’t see, but we do, that Arashi holds the hand she just touched his with close to her. This scene clearly establishes that yes, Arashi officially has it bad for Sorata; it also kicks off the start of what will essentially be an entire volume devoted to them, volume 17. But it also makes perfectly clear that Sorata is teasing Arashi intentionally, with a full expectation and knowledge of her getting annoyed and retaliating (and it seems that Arashi knows full well that he does it intentionally-she never is angry for long when he does tease her, and you’d think if she didn’t realize he was joking, she’d hold a grudge after a while).

There's something else to it, too. In almost every scene that Sorata and Arashi have together, Sorata is reaching out and touching her. And except for the times when Sorata does this while simultaneously teasing her, Arashi never seems to mind. She never reacts angrily, never flinches away. Arashi never hesitates to let her feelings known if those feelings are negative. If she did mind all this hair-touching and hand-holding, she would say so-at the least, she tolerates it.

And then, suddenly, at the end of volume 16, Sorata reaches out to feel her forehead, and she does mind. For the first time ever, she flinches away. No wonder Sorata was confused. And why is touching suddenly a big deal? My theory-especially considering the events to come-is that Arashi has just realized that she does like him. And even-considering her blush after the contact-might like him a little physically, too. Especially taking the next day's events into account.

Later, when he and Kamui go off to safeguard one part of Tokyo, Yuzuriha sees Arashi give Sorata a longing look as he leaves. When she and Arashi arrive in their section of Tokyo, she asks her directly if she likes Sorata-Arashi is at first silent, and then blushes wildly, able to retort only with a stammered “why do you ask?” A convincing denial indeed. Yuzuriha informs Arashi it was because she looked so “cute” when Sorata was leaving; Arashi repeats this, looking embarrassed and thoughtful. Flashing back to when Sorata called her cute, perhaps? Thankfully for Arashi, Yuzuriha quickly changes the subject. Less luckily, they are attacked by the Dragons of Earth soon after.

Volume 17 picks up directly where this scene left off: Arashi and Yuzuriha fight for a while, on even ground with Satsuki, the Dragon of Earth attacking them. Shortly, Sorata and Kamui become aware that the girls are fighting; Sorata wants to rush over to them, but he and Kamui are told to stay put by Hinoto. Clearly worried, Sorata swears loudly and takes out his frustration on a guardrail; Kamui then steers the conversation towards Hinoto, and they speak in private about her, realizing that she has changed sides and is in fact trying to get the Dragons of Heaven killed. They decide that in that case, it’ll be best to hurry over to the girls, but not before Sorata creates a small gohoudouji to spy on Hinoto with.

Arashi and Yuzuriha are doing well until Arashi is attacked from behind; Satsuki lifts up a bridge and tosses it at Arashi, who freezes at the sight. And the bridge comes crashing down. When the smoke clears, a creature-another gohoudouji-has appeared, and is keeping the bridge from falling and crushing Arashi, giving her time to get away. As soon as she’s safe, the creature lets the bridge fall down, vanishing as it is crushed. Almost immediately after, Kamui appears-supporting Sorata, who is covered in blood..

He’d cast the spell to protect Arashi a long time ago (the day he “chose” her), it turns out, just in case she was endangered and he wasn’t around to save her. Although it hadn’t been mentioned for twelve volumes, Sorata is still dead set on-well, dying. Arashi immediately flies into a panic and runs to him. He touches her face, barely conscious, and tells her that he wanted to see that she was okay (as opposed to going straight to the hospital), and that as long as she is, he thinks everything is fine. Arashi tries to protest, but she doesn’t get far before he coughs up quite a bit of blood and loses consciousness entirely. Arashi flashes back to his telling her of his destiny and really, really panics, before Kamui forces her away and tells her they need to get him to a hospital.

We flash forward to the next evening. Sorata, now bandaged and hospitalized, slowly wakes up to see Arashi sitting beside his bed, half crying and half glaring. He makes light of the situation, of course, even when he realizes that he can no longer move his right hand-in fact, his casual “I'll get used to it” only upsets Arashi more. He tells her not to cry, and that he had created that gohoudouji ages ago to protect her, because he intends to die for her sake. Arashi finally speaks:

ARASHI: You're disregarding my feelings... getting hurt like this.

ARASHI: My feelings for you...

SORATA: I understand.

SORATA: Neechan has no feelings for me.

ARASHI: ...Wrong.

SORATA: That's right.

SORATA: Your feelings are worse than that.

SORATA: I'm an annoyance.

ARASHI: That's wrong!

Arashi tries to protest that she does care about him and wouldn’t want him dead; Sorata again misinterprets, saying that of course she’d be upset if a fellow Dragon of Heaven was killed. It’s also notable that he seems to be trying to reassure her, prove that he knows what she means-not fish for a compliment or expect a denial. Instead of yelling again, Arashi takes a moment to compose herself before attempting to clearly state her feelings.

Sorata once again cuts in, but this time with a more positive assumption; he asks her if she’s trying to say she likes him, and sees him as a “man” instead of a “person”, and if it’s all right for him to assume all that. She doesn’t object or say anything at all, so he sits up and embraces her, telling her to please stop crying, because he’s never been happier in his life. Arashi complains that she doesn’t want to cry and never does, and she can’t seem to stop it. And Sorata, killer of romantic moods, says that he’s happy he got her “virgin tears.” Naturally, she shoves him and pulls away, blushing furiously. Sorata laughs, then asks her seriously if he can have “another first.” Arashi is surprised, but then moves towards him, and we see them kiss.

And on to volume 18, where we immediately see that they ended up doing a lot more than kiss; in a wordless scene, we see Arashi wake up the next morning, naked in his bed, kiss Sorata on the forehead and then look ominously at her left hand.

Surprisingly enough, this is one of the most controversial sections in the manga, especially amoung those that ship Sorata/Arashi. There’s a fair few people who believe that while the events of volumes 17 and 18 are fangirling-worthy, they’re also vastly OOC for Arashi; that she wouldn’t break down into hysterics and then sleep with Sorata the next day, she’s too strong and too tough for any of that, even if she had started to like him by that point. I disagree. I think it's fairly clear that Arashi was in love with him by that point, and was physically attracted to him as well. I also think, considering her background, that it makes perfect sense that she would fall apart like that. Her mother had always said she was protecting Arashi-then she died. Arashi has shown that guilt is the one emotion that always breaks through her shell. And she's also a girl that considered suicide at age seven, simply because the only person she loved was dead.

Even though she presents herself as tough, Arashi does have issues. Sorata nearly dying because of her is exactly the sort of thing that Arashi would be most affected by. We saw back in X-5 that Sorata getting a minor cut on his arm was enough to bring Arashi's stoic front down in favor of guilt and concern-and she'd known him for only a day, and wasn't in love with him (or even liking him very much) back then.

Whatever the reason for the act, however, the sex probably was-if not Arashi's idea-very much directed by her. Sorata was injured and on painkillers-and he has always, always backed down when Arashi is concerned. Even when he teases her, he flinches away. Sorata pressing Arashi into sex is far more out of character (and implausible given his wounds) than her pushing him into it. Was it a stupid decision? Possibly. Yes, it was stupid (or at least not thought out) to sleep with him when she needed her virginity for her sword-but there's always the possibility that she didn't know that would happen, or even didn't know it for sure. Or even just didn't care in the middle of all the other things happening. We don't know. But whether it was stupid or just reckless, it still happened.

Going back to volume 18, we see Kamui and Yuzuriha visit Sorata in the hospital that evening. When Yuzuriha knocks, Sorata charges at the door and flings it open fast enough to knock the other two to the ground, calling for Arashi as he does so; he apologizes only distractedly when he realizes that his visitors aren’t her. Although he doesn’t tell them directly what happened, it’s clear that Arashi left before he even woke up that morning, and he’s very worried. He then says that he’s worried this (Arashi’s running off) is his fault, the implication being that sleeping with him scared her away. In the entire scene, he’s deeply worried and somewhat distracted, not even pretending to be pleased to see Kamui and Yuzuriha (who are two of his closest friends/like younger siblings, normally).

The most notable things about this scene is first that Sorata does immediately blame himself for Arashi running off; perhaps he’s considered other reasons, perhaps he even realizes she’s lost her powers, but whatever it is, he never considers her at fault for leaving him as a result. And while it may seem somewhat “sweet” to take the blame like that, it’s really not a good thing, especially since Sorata is essentially suggesting that he’s at fault for having sex with her. It’s not a long jump to far less pleasant connotations-especially when you consider it was probably impossible for Sorata to force Arashi to do anything, both because of his injuries and because of Arashi's own strength.

The other significant thing is that Sorata is no longer calling Arashi “Neechan.” He uses her first name for the first time in the six months they have known one another. When meeting people, Sorata will almost always refer to them as either “neesan” (older sister) or “niisan" (older brother). However, once he gets to know them better, Sorata also switches to their name (usually with -san; -chan with Yuzuriha). It’s a pretty simple case of familiarity leading to informality; Sorata is a very casual speaker, but he’s generally polite enough. Arashi is the only person he doesn’t switch terms of address for.

Although he lives with her, although the two see one another every day, and although Sorata is less formal (in his way) with other people he is not nearly as close to-and although he is in love with Arashi-he retains his initial, more distant, way of referring to her. Up until now, in fact, when he abruptly switches to “Arashi” with no honorific, which suggests closeness and intimacy (platonic or otherwise). It’s only when he’s sure she cares about him in return that he changes his way of talking about her; from then on he never uses the word “neechan” to refer to Arashi again.

Right after this scene, we cut to Arashi, who confirms by talking to herself that she has indeed lost the ability to summon her sword; she retains all her other powers, however (jumping high and far, as well as the ability to generate some magical energy when she tries summoning the sword). She flashes back again to Sorata telling her he’ll die for her sake, shivers, and runs off into the night. As it turns out, Arashi headed straight to the recently turned traitor Hinoto.

speculation

To tell the truth, there's not a lot to write about their scenes in X "not-quite volume nineteen." It's true that Sorata and Arashi both appear, and that their corner of the plot is clearly coming to a head, but there's not a lot you can say about the couple from those scenes. Arashi going to Hinoto for advice isn't surprising (Hinoto is quite probably the person Arashi trusts most), and Sorata chasing after her to rescue her, electrocute Hinoto and her guards, and then probably die, isn't exactly a shock.

But while none of the partial volume is or should be very surprising as far as Sorata and Arashi are concerned, it does leave us with several possible endings and conclusions for the pairing. While we're told that it is Sorata's destiny to be killed for Arashi's sake, "sake" does not mean "in the protection of"-basically, so long as Sorata's death benefits Arashi in some way, anything goes. He assumes that he'll die protecting her, but he could just as easily-for example-be killed with Arashi nowhere in sight. If his death then triggered the release of Arashi from the brainwashing spell, that would fulfill the prophecy just as well as him jumping in front of an attack meant for her.

Not that I exactly think that's what's going to happen.

We know that Kamui is going to be the one to kill Hinoto-that's been prophesied for volumes and volumes; in fact, her fear of her impending death is what caused her to split personalities and turn evil in the first place (it apparently never dawned on Hinoto that killing Kamui's friends might make him, oh, want to kill her). While she's been trying to change the future her efforts don't appear to have worked. As such, we can assume that Sorata will not be successful-or at least not entirely successful-in rescuing Arashi. Since I doubt very much that he could save her while letting Hinoto off with a warning, we should assume that either he fails to break the brainwashing spell and Arashi remains Hinoto's evil servant-perhaps dying in the aforementioned "jumping in front of an attack"-or that he dies, the spell breaks, and for whatever reason Arashi doesn't decide to kill Hinoto herself (or simply fails to do so. Or, as in the X movie, dies herself immediately after Sorata does. A dramatic suicide, perhaps?).

The other alternative, and my personal favorite theory, is that Sorata does die-because Arashi kills him. The shock of doing such a thing-since being the cause of Sorata's death has been established to be just as much Arashi's fear as the death part-snaps Arashi out of the spell. Distraught, she doesn't think about killing Hinoto-just of getting out of the DIET-so she runs off and joins the Dragons of Earth.

Because Arashi will join the Dragons of Earth, either brainwashed or of her own free will. It's been foreshadowed since page one, just like Subaru's turn was.

Of course, I would be remiss as a Sorashi fan if I didn't casually bring up the last "possibility"-namely, that Sorata electrocutes everyone in the DIET building, rescues Arashi, runs off to Osaka with her to open a boarding house, and then dies at the age of ninety after saving his lovely wife from being hit by a bus.

why sorashi?

Let it be known that I hate this section. This is my fourth essay for this place, and it never gets any easier. How can I convert you to a pairing? How does anyone?

Allow me to start with a slightly easier question: Why do I ship Sorashi?

I lied. That's not easier at all.

To me, Sorashi is just a pairing that is so blindingly there that it's hard to explain the appeal to others. It's nearly impossible. All I can do is wave my hand at it and say-see? See this? How can you not? It doesn't help that I've been shipping Sorashi as long as I've been reading X-no, really. I had started the series and wasn't terribly interested, then I got spoiled somehow for Sorashi, and read the next 17 volumes just for that. I never had a chance.

But ultimately, I think the reason I love Sorashi is because of the simple fact of the characters. Sorata and Arashi are close to opposites in tone and the way the express themselves, but they love one another and try their hardest to be together. Many of X's other pairings have an element of one-sidedness, or of a not quite mutual expression of feelings-Sorata and Arashi want to be together. That's all. And in CLAMP'S AU fanfiction Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, we get to see them together, and how Arashi still finds Sorata annoying as all hell, and he still loves teasing her, and how they're happily married anyway. And that's why I love them.

It's not a matter of "opposites attract," exactly-it's about how badly they want to be together, but how they don't really change in the process, either. Sorata doesn't need to stop making fun of Arashi, Arashi doesn't have to grow a sense of humor and start finding him funny and cute, and they love one another anyway, and want to be together. There's no drama over feelings, over doubt, over forgiving one for killing the other's love interest/sister/etc. For all the crack and drama and bad circumstances surrounding them, Sorata and Arashi's romance is refreshingly straightforward.

Also, unlike certain other CLAMP pairings, Sorata and Arashi did sleep together in canon. Take that, S/S.

recs

This section took me about twice as long as the entire essay to pull together. I wish I had a good reason or excuse for that. Although Sorata/Arashi is a relatively - tiny - part of fandom, there's still a reasonable pile of fanfic to go through. In the end, I decided to simply point out a few of my personal favorite stories, rather than put together an all-encompassing list.

Ysabet | umadoshi 
umadoshiAs far as Sorashi goes, Ysabet is very, very much the best writer in the fandom. She knows what she's talking about when it comes to both Shinto and Buddhism, writes an excellent Arashi, and - dare I say? - writes it damn sexy. I've read all her X fic several times each, and love them more and more.

I pretty much could continue for another ten paragraphs, but basically, if you even sort of like this pairing, you need to go read her stories. Now.

Your Place in Heaven"

The Dead and Dreaming"

Playing Games

Sakanagi | sakanagisakanagi

Sakanagi is great, not only because I can demand Sorashi from her and occasionally get it. She does these beautiful little drabbles, and channels Sorata-on-crack so marvelously that I read it and snicker and feel sorry for poor Arashi.

Promises/Unexpected Travels" (two drabbles, one post)

Deer in the Headlights

Contemplation

Parron | parronparron

Parron, a person who is not me -

- Well, okay. I had mixed feelings about reccing myself, but the depressing fact is unless I manage to convert fifty people to Sorashi with this essay, and they then write Sorashi themselves (yes, please), I still write more of it than I think everyone else in fandom. This makes Parron sad.

ightning - for all my stories, except for the very old/bad ones.

Other Fanfic Recs:

The Sorata/Arashi section of fanfiction.net

A Rock 'n Roll Lifestyle, Pinkpuruu (really, all her Sorashi is good)

Shatter, galuxkitty

Untitled, mefiant

Ear, mefiant