Beginning Notes:  This idea came into my head and would not go away.  Unfortunately, and predictably, Erts is horribly, horribly OOC.  Ah, the sacrifices one must make.

She sees the man inside the child

--U2's Mysterious Ways

We Move Through Miracle Days

               They say eyes are the entrances to one's soul and I suppose that is true.  But, for me, I find it's one's driving force that often defines one's character.  Maybe it's just me.  I notice things like that—driving forces and such—in all their subtleties, just as a normal person can see the varied hues highlighting the eyes of another.

When I first met Hikura Yu-san, however, the part of my brain that tells me immediately what kind of person I'm seeing did not activate – that is to say, looking at him made me feel blank and empty.  It was strange, yet at the same time, undeniably captivating.

My older brother had died in battle long ago, and as the top candidate out of all the seniors, I was chosen to replace him in all meanings of the word.  I inherited his room, his repairer, his Ingrid.  Irony amuses God, it seems.

But Hikura-san, too, is a pilot, and so we were to work together from that day on.

There is a God after all.

Hikura-san, whom I had not formally met prior to my brother's death, was quite rude to me under the accepted societal norms.  When introducing myself, I had bowed to all the other pilots.  I didn't expect any of them to return it (actually, none of them did, although both Gareas and Rioroute had put their arms around my shoulders), but I certainly was surprised by Hikura-san's lack of audibility.  He merely looked at me with his dark eyes and refused to say a word.  There was a long silence, the kind that almost breached into awkwardness, but Rioroute salvaged the situation by introducing Hikura-san himself.  Truthfully, I didn't know what to think, and when I looked up and saw Hikura-san staring at me, I don't believe my mind was even capable of doing so.  Our eyes met and the outside surroundings seemed to melt, but in those eyes, I could infer nothing.  Usually, the feelings and emotions of others are laid out in my mind like cards on a table, easily visible and accessible to me.  But for him, this was not the case.  I couldn't tell if he was a warm (though the analytical side of my mind could clearly rule that out) or a cold person solely based on the mental reactions I received from looking at him.  And the way he looked at me…unabashed, unafraid, unambitious, unanything.    Why is he a pilot?  Why is someone like that a pilot?

Every person has something that drives him, right?

Jokingly, I later asked Gareas if Hikura-san was mute.  Rioroute had laughed heartily at my comment, but Gareas frowned at the mentioning of his name, saying that he thought Hikura-san was a freak and that he did not appreciate how he had acted towards me.

I'm quite sensitive, but even so, what Hikura-san did—or didn't do, actually—had not bothered me.    My skills as an empathete and telepath are not unknown, so I felt that it was quite possible he was intimidated by me (although Hikura-san doesn't seem the type…).  It's true that even though I hadn't even touched him, he might have been trying to block me from reading him.  Still, one does not look directly into the eyes of the one he is trying to block.  The romantic in me likes to believe that it was his own special way of saying hello.

Nevertheless, it was a few days before Hikura-san would actually physically talk to me. 

Everyone was sleeping the night that he did.  I was lonely.  All the rooms of the Goddess pilots are all on the same floor, but each individual is given the luxury to room alone, so I had no one to talk to, not that I had wanted to talk.  I just wanted to be next to someone who understood me and what I was feeling, but the only person who had ever was now gone and when I dwelled on that fact, it hurt.  Even then, so many months after his death, I found it difficult to stop thinking about him.  What I sometimes did (still do…) was to go to the hangar late at night and sit by Reneighd-Klein, not necessarily engaging in any sort of meaningful conversation, but just sitting beside her.  Apart from the memories, she was the only thing he had left me with.  So that night, with my heart hurting, I ventured to the area where our Ingrid was.  I seated myself on the ground and lifted my head to the Goddess' huge looming form, and stroked its smooth exterior with my hand.   I sang, whispering broken pieces of a lullaby he used to sing to me when we were younger.  I could almost feel him there, watching over me, smiling.  I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I remember was Hikura-san's hand on my shoulder, shaking me and waking me from my slumber. 

Wearily, I opened my eyes.  Things were a bit fuzzy at first, but then I saw him.  There he was, sitting right next to me in black and red robes.  It was the first time I had ever seen him in such proximity.  His hair and eyes were colored with a brown so rich it could almost pass for a warm black and contrasted with his soft pale skin…although my brother had always been more artistic and interested in aesthetics, I could not help thinking how nice he looked.  Long ago, I heard about God, how He had created angels to fill the heavenly spaces with grace and beauty, and just looking at Hikura-san had me convinced that he was a child of one.  He possessed a quiet radiance, so that as I looked at him, I didn't feel like running away, I didn't feel ugly.  His face seemed to glow, unmarked and unmarred even by emotion. 

I think many minutes passed, and for the entire time, he was looking at me.  I felt myself start to blush faintly.  "Why…why are you here," I asked, since he apparently wasn't going to initiate anything.  My whisper had momentarily sliced through the silence, but now it was gathering itself up again, growing thicker.  For a while, I believed he had no intention of ever answering me.   

"I had a dream."

I could not believe my ears.  His voice sounded like the silver waves of an ocean washing over a moonlit shore.   The tone was definitely detached, but there was something oddly soothing about it at the same time.  I can't…exactly explain.  I just knew that I wanted to hear more.

               "It told me to come here."  His words, despite their cryptic meaning, flowed like cello music.  There was a long pause.  He was still looking at me, and I grew so embarrassed that I cast my eyes downward.  Finally, he spoke again.

"You miss him, don't you?"

Now it was my turn to assume the role of silence.  No one had ever asked me that question before.  Not that I blame them.  Death, second to Love, is the hardest thing to explain, and when putting the two together, the most painful.  Hot tears rushed to my eyes, piling up behind my lashes and blurring my vision.  I tried so hard to stop them, but I couldn't.  A lump caught in my throat, and the next thing I knew, I was sobbing.  My shoulders shook uncontrollably.  Hikura-san merely enfolded me into an embrace.  I cried even harder.

"If I ever lost my sister, my life would have no meaning.  In that respect, we are alike."

My head nestled beneath his chin.  I desperately tried to hold my breath so as to stifle the sobs, but that resulted in me hiccupping.  Hikura-san did not laugh at me, though.

"You are what I once was – someone who could cry when their beloved ones died, someone whose love for others is so clear it is as though a bright light is being emitted from their soul.  You are like a child."

I wanted to say something, but it came out as half a hiccup.

"Wh—hic—are you a pi—hiccup—lot?"

I looked up at him.  Hikura-san blinked a couple of times, and although his facial expression did not waver, I still think he was somewhat amused. 

"It was a choice.  I do feel, but ever since that choice it has not been for myself.  I never will and I would never want to.  For my sister, for my mother, my father, my friends, for all those who died and suffered because of the Victim, and for all those who will, I'll empty myself completely if that's what it takes, so that I may carry them all.  I'm a pilot because I want to carry them."             

                 Ambition is a strange creature – it has the head of pride, the wings of dreams, and the body of desire, but its blood is selfishness.  Everyone is selfish and it is the one emotion from which all other emotions thrive.  Happiness, sadness, jealousy, I realized, were all stemmed from the individual self.  For this reason, I could not see into—nor understand—Hikura-san…until that moment.  My hiccupping ceased.

               "Everyone has burdens!" I spoke into his chest.  "No one…should ever have to do what you do.  Let me help you…even if it's just one, small thing, I'll…I'll carry it for you."

               Hikura-san unraveled his arms from me and stood up.  My heart almost broke, and I thought I would cry again, for I feared I had said something wrong that had made him want to leave. 

"Erts Virny Cocteau."

We looked at each other.  His face still held that same distant expression, as I suspected it always would, for he was an angel, watching from far away and wanting only to guard us all.  He gently took my hand—holding it in the same way his gaze held mine—lifted it towards his mouth, and placed a light kiss on the skin.  Then he left.

And that was when I knew why he didn't need to talk.  I wouldn't have traded that kiss for all the spoken words of the world. 

Ending Notes:  FAQ: will you ever write something that doesn't involve a song?  Answer: probably not.  FAQ:  will you at least have the title of your stories not be taken from phrase of a song?  Answer: probably not.  Props to U2 and Mysterious Ways.  Now excuse me as I go run away to hide in my heated shame at having written this.