Close your eyes

Summary: In the middle of a storm, she whispers a name. One night. OneShot- Souichi, Shuna.

Warning: -

Set: Story-unrelated.

Disclaimer: Standards apply.

A/N: Dear guest who commented on my last two Shuna/Souichi stories: thank you very much! You're right, they are my favorite couple in the series, though I also love Keidei and Mii a lot. And Keidei's parents. And – actually, all the characters. I haven't enjoyed reading a series as much as I enjoyed reading NG Life for quite some time. I also did not mean to write another story for the series but this somehow grew on me. I can't say for sure that I'll never write for this fandom again but I won't promise anything, either. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading the last three one shots. Thanks for your feedback!

And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
Grey clouds rolled over the hills bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes does it almost feel like nothing changed at all?
And if you close your eyes does it almost feel like you've been here before?
Bastille, "Pompeii"

…

Souichi wasn't quite sure what woke him exactly.

The room was dark. Everything was plunged into the unreal darkness of an oncoming storm: grey shapes and dark shadows, edges and corners. Lifeless and familiar. The window stood open a crack. Outside, the moon disappeared behind a veil of grey and black clouds as the wind tore at the curtains. Fresh gusts of air streamed through the window – he could smell the scent of summer and rain. A promise perhaps, or a memory. A deep growl rolled through the night, still far but approaching quickly. He thought he had heard the faint sound of a door opening and closing, but there was no sign that it had been the bedroom door. The wind billowed out the curtains. For a second he toyed with the thought of closing the window and then groaned, letting his eyes fall shut again. His hand reached out instinctively but met nothing but cool sheets. Suddenly awake, Souichi opened his eyes again and turned his head.

Maybe it was the absence of a heartbeat that had woken him; maybe it had been the approaching storm. Whatever it was, Shuna's side of the bed was empty. For a few seconds he just stared at the pillow on her side. There still were the marks in it where her head had been. He could even detect her faint scent in the bed sheets; feel her body heat close to his. A jolt went through him when his brain finally caught up with the implications of what he was seeing. Shuna wasn't there. Anxiety rose like mercury in an old thermometer and he quenched it, hard. He wasn't her bodyguard anymore, nor was she someone who needed constant supervision. In fact, she had told him in no unclear terms that he did not need to get all protective of her (who would have thought she'd have to tell him to back down) but after two lives he was quite sensitive to the fact how much could get lost due to simple carelessness. His breath hitched, Souichi waited for a few minutes. The wind increased to a howling, insistent and demanding, and the rolling thunder moved closer, but Shuna did not return. Finally, he slipped out from underneath the covers and carefully opened the door.

A gust of wind greeted him. The window above the staircase was open, dust and night air streaming through it. Treading softly as to avoid the few squeaking tiles, Souichi closed it and then sized up his opportunities: downstairs, or up? He decided to head for the kitchen. Maybe she'd just wanted to get a glass of water. But he didn't find her there. Shuna wasn't in the library, either. Feeling something close to panic, he headed towards the dark living room. Nobody. Souichi fisted his hands at his side and decided to go back upstairs to find his mobile and call her when he noticed a flash of white on the other side of the wide terrace windows. The garden. He hadn't thought of it but he should have, he guessed: On the terrace, her white nightgown billowing out in the wind, stood Shuna, her hands on the terrace railing in front of her. Something deep inside him snapped back into place almost physically.

"Shuna."

There had been a time he had needed to think of how he was supposed to address her. Aglaia still dropped from his lips when he did not watch it. He knew she did not like it but years and years of guilt had engraved her name into his heart: he woke with it, fell asleep with it. Shuna was Aglaia, no matter how much or little she remembered. But Shuna was Shuna, too. Now, as she turned, he saw her face briefly as the first lightning bolt flashed over the sky. It lit up the world for a second and then plunged it into darkness again, leaving burning after-images on the back of his eyelids. He did not realize how afraid he had been until Shuna smiled.

"I couldn't sleep," she said. Souichi stepped next to her and pushed a strand of hair that had fallen into her face back behind her ear. His fingers lingered. Years of forbidding himself to get closed to her were being counteracted by the fact that she was his now, that he actually was allowed to touch her when he wanted to. The process seemed as hard to get used to as his name-issue.

"I'm sorry if I woke you."

Finally dropping his hand, he shrugged. She didn't let herself be deterred by his wordless answer.

"Can you smell the rain?" Her eyes fluttering closed; she lifted her head towards the sky. "I love this scent."

His entire body ached to touch her again.

"Yes," he agreed. To emphasize her point, the thunder rolled. A gust of wind blew straight through his T-Shirt. Shuna, at least, wore a sweatshirt over her night gown. It made her look even smaller.

"Did the storm wake you?" Her entire body seemed to still at his question. Souichi frowned.

"No," Shuna said finally, not looking at him. "I just couldn't sleep. And you? Worrying again?"

He didn't answer, just wrapped his arms around himself. Protection – against the wind, against the feeling of vulnerability he still fought when facing her like this. Aglaia always had had a way to make him feel small, insignificant and utterly vulnerable.

For a while they stood there, Shuna looking into the sky, Souichi watching the way her hair danced in the wind. The first droplets fell. The scent of rain hung so heavy it was like breathing cotton. Sudden lightning, a rolling thunder – and the rain started to fall, cool and heavy.

"Shuna." Souichi stretched out his hand, touched her shoulder. "Let's go back inside."

"No." Her eyes still closed, she stood there, soaking in the rain. The memory came with the next thunder, painfully ripping open one of so many age-old scars.

Summer was hot and dry in Pompeii. The cloudless sky had been like glass all the last days, empty and clear. Today, the dogs had barked relentlessly, the air stood like a palpable mass and the silence was unnerving. When the clouds had darkened the day to a dim twilight and the first lightning bolts flashed across the sky, quickly followed by rumbling thunder, it was an almost physical relief.

"Hurry up."

Delos did not like storms. They were a force of nature, something he could not control: usually he avoided them as one avoids particularly unpleasant occurrences, hoping they would pass by quickly as long as one did not think of them too closely. But his latest assignment – Aglaia Felix, daughter of a wealthy senator, arch enemy of the House of Britius – seemed to enjoy annoying him. She stood in the alley of olive trees, her golden hair open and wind-swept, and pretended not to hear him. If it was a come-back at him because he refused to treat her with the sickening respect all her men showed towards her or simply her way of handling people he was unable to say.

So many things in her he did not understand.

"Lady, the storm is too close already."

"It is fine, Delos," she told him. "Go ahead. I will follow soon."

"You wish."

One day she would die. But it would be his hand that led the blow and nobody else's. He refused to leave her here for anyone to find and dispose of. As much as she liked to think it wasn't true, the House of Felix had enough enemies.

"Hurry up; they are waiting for us-"

He grabbed her wrist. Aglaia stilled, rooted to the spot. When he turned around she was glaring at him with the non-descript expression she wore so well that he dropped her hand like hot bread.

"I will stay here, Delos, and you will not make me leave."

With that, she stepped away. The soft pitter-patter of the beginning rain had grown into a full-blown downpour. The second Aglaia stepped out from the protecting roof of the olive grove, her white toga was drenched.

She just stood there, her arms at her sides, her face turned towards the sky. The thunder rolled, lightning flashed – and she stood there, in the face of danger, underneath the bent, gnarled olive trees, as if she knew nothing would harm her. Delos, watching, was stuck speechless.

Shuna's nightgown was completely soaked, sticking to her legs wetly. Her sweatshirt clung to her body, outlining her forms, her hair was wet and dripped rain water, and still Souichi thought he had never seen anyone as beautiful as her. He looked at her and opened his mouth to tell her when he realized with a jolt that the drops of water that were running down her face weren't just from the rain.

"Shuna."

He turned her towards him, gently, and wiped away the water from her cheeks with his own wet palms.

"Hey. What's wrong?"

"Nothing." She attempted a smile, failing pitifully. "Why?"

"You're crying," he informed her.

"I'm not."

"You are. Hey." He drew her closer, cupping her shoulders with his hands, running them down her arms until her hands were in his. "Tell me what's wrong. Did I do something? I'm sorry, Shuna."

Shuna shook her head as a strangled sound left her mouth. It sounded half like a sob, half like a laugh. Just shaking her head she stood there, her hands trembling in his. Souichi's heart did a painful jolt, slamming against his ribcage: she had never cried like this. Not when he had betrayed her, not when they had met again. Not ever.

"Shuna." His fingers caressed hers, carefully. "What is it?"

"Everybody thinks you're not. But you are. Always so gentle, Delos."

Souichi's brain needed five seconds to process her words. Then the world stopped. Suddenly his fingers were trembling, too.

"What…" His voice almost was lost in the rain. "What- Shuna, I-"

"I'm not sorry, you know," she whispered. "I really wanted to forget. I wanted to live this life as Shuna, not as Aglaia. But…" Swallowing, she closed her eyes and opened them again. "But forgetting is an easy way out. There were good times, too. I always… I always dreamed of you, Delos." Her hands came up to cup his face. Despite the rain, they were warm. Warm, small and familiar and so very, very like her.

"Souichi. Delos. I love you."

And she smiled – a brilliant, beautiful smile that cleared away any other thought he had. When Souichi kissed Shuna in the pouring rain he could almost feel the hot winds of Pompeii, could smell the scent of the olive grove, of the city beyond and of the clear mountain air that came after the storm.