Kabuchi-cho, Shinjuku
December 1999 

Footfalls echoed behind him. The faint crunching of plaster fragments scraped over cracked concrete. Involuntarily, Subaru quickened his pace, walking through empty streets, deserted neighborhoods. He felt... threatened, exposed. For the first time since the Rainbow Bridge– no, since Seishiro had betrayed him? Betrayal, that was what the Sakurazukamori had called it. He hadn't cared enough about his safety to feel threatened since then. Now he was glancing over his shoulder, looking down a debris-strewn street, expecting to see faceless shadows darting into the dark.  
     The apartment house in the Sakura-dori was deserted. The plain plaster had cracked, parts of it had rained down onto the sidewalk and onto the once carefully tended sakura trees that had given the street its name. His apartment was on the top floor. From the roof of the house, you could see the Shinjuku Cho office in the Ayame-dori. Subaru vaguely recalled the light plays the neon advertisings had drawn on his plain white walls. The houses on the opposite side of the street had been plastered with them. Had been... 
     Shards covered the ground. Shards and rubble and...  
     The door to the house still hung in the frame, askew on its hinges. Nothing had kept this place safe. He wondered if he could have. 

The dust had piled up in his rooms. One of the windows was cracked, though the glass still protected the interior to some extent. Plaster from the ceiling had covered the excuse for furniture he had bothered to put in: a ghostly layer stretched over his narrow bedstead and the unused desk in the corner by the door. The result of one or more of the earthquakes that had rattled Japan's capital during the last year. 
     His wards sizzled faintly as he crossed into his room to sit down on his bed despite the dust and plaster crumbs. Expected warmth spread over his hands when the uncovered scars reacted to his wards. In its wake, burning pain shot through his gashed wrist; he gagged, clasping it. The implanted eye throbbed with the rhythm of his pulse. Slowly, the white-hot ache in his wrist subsided to a more bearable level as the sigil scars on his hands shone. 
     Sakurazukamori.  
     He trembled – and hated himself for it. Again and again, he saw in his mind's eye the spirit being torn to pieces, heard its last panicked scream in his head, saw its hopelessness in incorporeal eyes overlaying the physical ones that had broken only a moment before, ever more sprouts winding around the corpse, greedily sucking the spirit through countless veins into the Sakura's black core. 
     He had known that the Sakurazukamori bound the souls to the tree. But he had always assumed they were bound... whole. This... Sitting up on his plain, plaster-strewn bedstead in his deserted apartment in Kabuchi-cho, clasping his hands tightly around his elbows, Subaru admitted to himself that he didn't know. He didn't know if he was up to... being... 
     Sakurazukamori. 
     Hunting souls for the tree to tear apart. 
     He felt sick but his stomach was empty. Yet again, he hadn't been able to eat. 
     Torn apart. 
     He buried his face in his hands, pressed his palms against his eyes.  
     ...You are not up to it... 
Even in Seishiro's picture, the Sakura was unmistakable in its bloodied darkness. 1981. Seishiro had been sixteen when he'd made it. He'd been Sakurazukamori already. He had known what the tree did to its victims.  
     Yet... he had added a streak of white touching the tree's bloodied trunk. Moonlight? Artistic license taken because it looked good, or...? 
     Subaru shuddered. Emperor Sushun's Grave. The Sakurazuka, the slayers of emperors... if it was true, it took the whole affair among their clans to a completely new level. Sushun, the 32nd emperor since Jimmu descended from the Gods, ruled Yamato Japan at the end of the historical Kofun period. He was killed in the fifth year of his reign and there is no known grave... It could be. The Sakurazukamori didn't leave anything behind to bury. 
     Had the tree really sucked the ghost of one of Japan's spiritual leaders into its veins? 
     Then why had it been so irritated when he'd said as much?  
     Subaru pulled himself up, ignoring the pain still throbbing in his wounded wrist. Somehow, Sushun was important. Using his shirt sleeve, he brushed the thick layer of dust off the books that piled up on his long-abandoned desk in the corner of his bleak room. Now that he thought about it, he should have locked them away safely somewhere. There was dangerous magic, dangerous information to be found in the Sumeragi texts. But... 
     ...he just hadn't cared. The tremor returned to his body at the realization.  
     Determinedly, he opened the first chronicle. 

There were several accounts of Sushun's reign in later chronicles. He ignored them. Writing in the form of Chinese characters had come to Japan during the rule of Empress Suiko, who had claimed the throne after Sushun's demise. The first chronicle had been written in her time. It was difficult to read, even for someone with his intensive education.  
     The Sumeragi had been an obscure clan then; if one of the royal princes, Shotoku, hadn't taken an interest in their arts and expressed a wish to be taught, they'd have gone mostly unnoticed. But the prince soon became renowned for his predictions, including one of a violent death for Emperor Sushun. Although the art described in the book was a far cry from the onmyojutsu Subaru performed nowadays, he had to admit that Shotoku's predictions had been astonishingly precise.  
     A precision that seemed to have shocked the prince himself. He had tried to avert the Emperor's fate when a trail of events seemed to confirm his prophecy. However, his attempts to accommodate the Emperor's offended enemies with gifts taken from his own money case had failed, and Sushun had been slain. His actions had earned the prince an even deeper respect at court and his rise in favor had taken the Sumeragi along.  
     Many had expected "the Prince of Peace" to ascend the throne, but his aspirations had been thwarted by the head of the powerful Soga clan, Soga no Umako, who had put Empress Suiko on the throne instead. Subaru had found quite a few comments on the man, none of them favorable. It was said that Soga no Umako had had the Emperor assassinated by one Atai Goma, a courtier of a rivalling clan. But Sushun's body had never been found, and Soga no Umako had remained in power. He, followed by his son and grandson, had all but ruled Japan for more than two generations. 
     Sushun's reign had been the time when onmyojutsu as Subaru knew it had reached Japan, coming from China. The Sakurazuka performed dark onmyojutsu. Had they come to Japan on behest of the Soga Clan? Had they accommodated their host and protector by eliminating a perceived threat to him? There were a few rather unfavorable comments about the Chinese artists and priests the Soga clan had supported at court. But why had the Sakura been that angry then when he'd said as much? 
     ...because you are... Sumeragi?... 
     That didn't make sense... Subaru's head sank down onto the old book. He breathed the scent of ancient leather and dust and a hand long perished. The book had been copied manually. The script, its characters, were too old to have been reproduced artificially. The scent, the sweat... 
     A whiff of candle wax and fire smoke and whispering silk... ...a man in formal attire knelt in front of a priest – no, a practitioner – in what looked like a makeshift shikifuku. Prayer beads hung low over his chest, his nails were tinged with henna. A shallow earthen bowl with water stood between the two men. Ceremonial daggers stuck in the ground left and right of it. The dagger handles had been tied with tassels and ancient Chinese coins carefully polished to high gleam. Crane feathers dangled next to the tassels, feathers and ribbons... 
     Flickering light from a fire bowl on a high tripod behind the pair illuminated the scene. Yet the walls were filled with shadows. Shadows that seemed to swirl, to move on their own, independent from the glow of the fire. Dark hair curled down to the shikifuku's embroidered collar. Soot had been used to emphasize the practitioner's eyes, currently downcast. A bird fluttered on its perch... a shikigami? No... 
     "Prince..." The practitioner's gaze remained downcast. His voice was low, almost soft, as he addressed his client. "There is more to a successful prediction than merely a similar set of events–" 
     "Yet," the other interrupted, "he will see me sooner or later for my prediction." Dark eyes glared in an aristocratic face. 
     "Whatever prediction comes to your mind shall come to pass," the practitioner said with a decisive wave of a slim, white hand over the mirror-like surface of the water between them. Light danced over the pendant tied to the string of prayer beads adorning his narrow shoulders. Gold glittered in the firelight as he bowed to his client. A pentacle. "The onmyodo won't allow anything else." 
     The lights flickered more strongly. Sakura petals danced across the room, some of them turning to ash, sizzling faintly in the flames of the fire pot. The client cursed and reached for his sword. The magician laid a hand on his sleeve, calming him without even looking up.
     A shudder ran through the lean frame of the practitioner as he held his client back from baring his blade. The folds of his shikifuku whispered. Faint words were uttered.  
     The practitioner's head flew up. Emerald green eyes stared directly at him, bright and open, glowing with a light of their own and glaring with... 
     ...hatred. 
     Subaru jerked back. He couldn't wake, couldn't breathe. Pain shot through his head, culminating in bright white agony in his right eye. Sakura branches reached for the practitioner, for the client... Petals blinded him briefly. The client escaped. The practitioner, howling in his fury, was struggling, an iron twig curled tightly around his throat. The earthen bowl lay broken. The mirror of water had splintered. The band of prayer beads was torn, beads were bouncing all around the dirt floored room. The pentacle fell in slow motion. A greedy hand with henna-colored nails grasped it. Sakura branches curled around the wrist and arm, twisted, turned. The pentacle was thrown from broken fingers. The fire light shone through it. Its shadow on the dirt floor...  
     ...turned it upside down. 
     Inverted it. 
     Created its opposite. 
     A pentagram. 
     The shadow grew and swallowed the room, becoming deeper, darker, and tinged with crimson blood and sakura petals... 

...with a gasp, Subaru jerked awake– 
     –and fell off his chair. Pain shot through his spine as he landed on his bottom. His pulse was racing. He pressed his palm against his throbbing right eye and the burning gashes of the injured wrist against his chest. He– he hadn't had a nightmare since– since– at least not a nightmare not involving Seishiro and– 
     He'd looked into the past... 
     ...and his own eyes. 
     He'd looked into a mirror... 
     ...into his opposite. 
     Seishiro's embrace was dissipating as he... whispered against Subaru's chest. ...are now like a mirror image of the past... 
     Subaru trembled. They were mirrors within mirrors within mirrors... 
     ...and if he looked too hard they burst into shards. Like the picture; if he looked too long, too hard, it changed in front of his eyes to something else, something new that he wasn't sure was there in the energetic, slightly psychedelic mix of brilliant colors, of strikes and blotches. The picture was... no, it didn't show talent... but vitality, energy... curiosity? The wish– no, the desire to try and see what came of it. 
     He'd never done anything like that. His own walls had always been bare. Walls painted white around plain, dark brown, functional furniture. Color in here had come from his schoolbooks, neglected for the sake of duty, and... 
     Hokuto. 
     What had been alive in these walls had been hers. Plants, postcards, sticky notes, silly coffee cups, plush toys, bunny slippers... He didn't want to think about the clothes she'd stuck him in.  
     He hadn't had a life. His sister had had a life. And he had been watching it. His happiness hadn't been his, but hers. ...you have yet to find out what that is... 
     He stood. He couldn't stay here. This wasn't his place any more than Seishiro's house or his garden had been.  
     He tugged his stained, crumpled coat tightly around himself and–  
     The books. He couldn't leave them unsealed again. He searched his pockets for an unstained ofuda, concentrated, and placed it on the heap of volumes. It wasn't ideal, but it would have to do. He couldn't transport the tomes right now. The room was suffocating him. He studied the pattern of plaster dust on the tatami floor as he finally closed the door behind him, adding another spell to the lock, before turning around to leave– He stopped. His eyes rested on the open wardrobe, but they showed him his reflection in a mirror in someone else's house. He patted the grey dust off the charcoal coat he'd left behind when he'd moved over to the campus. A scarf of the same color stuck in one of its sleeves; matching leather gloves peeped out of a pocket. He wouldn't look like a beggar in it when he went to Imonoyama's house. 
     He closed the front door on his way down to the debris-strewn street. He hesitated, then put on the gloves. There was no longer a reason to keep the scars visible all the time, was there?  
     He forwent the scarf. 

He'd followed the Shinjuku-dori across the downtown area. Tokyo had become so much larger now that most of the transport systems were out of commission. Not that it mattered much. Again he was walking through deserted streets. Gusts of wind were blowing litter across the street in front of him. Tokyo had fallen deep under the assault of the Dragons of Earth. Just the area near Chiyoda with the palace was strangely untouched. Yet another shielded area disconnected from any supportive kekkai. It seemed that those additional, other structures only became visible in the kekkais' destruction. He was briefly tempted to enter the Hanzomon Gate and cross the imperial grounds. His rank as clan head of the Sumeragi was sufficient for that, yet... he was Sakurazukamori, a slayer? ...of an emperor? He shuddered. No. That kind of person was not to set foot on grounds. He followed the Uchibori-dori instead, which skirted the area.  
     He felt the kekkai going up while he was still crossing downtown. Ginza. After a moment, he crossed the street diagonally and entered one of the houses and climbed the stairs to the roof to sit on the edge and wait. The long, dark coat flapped in the wind. He'd folded his arms across his legs. It wouldn't take long. It never did... 

"What is your wish?" Three hours later, his own words echoed in Subaru's mind as he watched the sleek figure of the 'Kamui' leaping rooftops in the distance. The conversation had been strange, disconnected. Wishes. What kind of wishes? Had the other not known where he was heading now? Or had he just not cared? Was that all? Then... why...? 
     The questions were endless. The streets of Ginza still whole and gleaming in the afternoon sun. Yet... it was past Christmas now, wasn't it? The streets should be bursting with life, with glitter and jingle, the Namiki-dori he was crossing right now should be a sparkling Christmas scene with countless bulbs and neon figurines lining the skeletal trees. But it was bleak, empty. The energy of Ginza's preserved kekkai crackled faintly at the edge of his perception, probably aware of another Dragon of Earth crossing its perimeter. Subaru ignored it. 
     Nataku had died. 
     He felt nothing. Shouldn't he feel something? Seishiro had told him once that the Sakurazukamori didn't feel anything; did that mean that he–? Or was it merely that Subaru didn't bother to care about... his own wish? Other peoples wishes? 
     Had the 'Kamui' ignored Subaru's wish or had he failed to perceive it? 
     Did he even have a wish anymore? 
     "There's nothing left that I want to do." –  
     He certainly didn't want to go to the campus and run into one of the Seals. He certainly didn't want to– 
     But he would. He had a responsibility towards the tree, towards his... house, towards... Japan? He wasn't sure about that one after the last revelation. Did the Sakurazuka have a responsibility to Japan, to the emperor, like the Sumeragi? Then... how? 
     Seishiro was gone, and yet, he was there with him, now, touching him, seeing for... him. 
     Or... not? 
     "Such an egotist," 'Kamui' had said. Yet...  
     Legend had it that with your left eye, you gave half of your powers to someone else. "That's why you can't die... right?" Was that selfish? Wasn't that... something else?
     Cold crept over his once-again leather-encased hands. He increased his speed. 

Clamp Campus, Tokyo, 
December 1999 

The campus formed a strange contrast to the deserted city around it. The streets were brightly illuminated. Light shone from the windows. Slightly distorted dance music wavered out of an open basement door. Transit trams clattered along the streets in never-stopping rhythm. This was the third one that had passed Subaru on his way to Imonoyama's private mansion.  
     Paper stars were taped to the panes of a window. A girl was laughing in the distance. It was as if the students of Clamp Academy were asserting their vitality in the face of the destruction all around them. And in some weird, fragile way, it seemed to work.  
     Subaru's pace slowed when the mansion came within sight. The house given to the Seals was the next one. He had to be careful now, if he didn't want to run into one of them. Darting another glance across the brightly lit streets and the plaza with the gloomy park behind him, he headed up the wide, unlit stairs and pulled the knocker. 
     It took some time until the door was answered. It took even more time until his opposite said something. 
     Subaru hadn't counted on the master of the house answering the door in person. He also hadn't counted on the temperament of Clamp campus' headmaster. "Sumeragi-san! Where have you been? Kamui-kun's worried sick about you. You ought to call him immed–" 
     "Imonoyama-san." Subaru shook his head. He stepped closer to the other man, until Imonoyama retreated a little, allowing Subaru to slip inside. "It is better if I'm not here." 
     "But Kamui–" 
     Subaru sighed and finally looked the other straight in the eye, waiting, then watching the realization dawning in the other one's face. "I'm no longer a Dragon of Heaven, Imonoyama-san," he said calmly. "I cannot stand by his side any longer. It will be better if he doesn't know about me." 
     "Your eye..." A trembling hand came up briefly as if to touch, but Imonoyama let it fall back to his side. "I see..." he said slowly. "Yes." His expression changed slightly, became hesitant, wary. "So... what do you want then?" 
     Subaru blinked, taken aback at the chairman's unexpectedly fast acceptance of the changed situation. He had expected to argue, to– No. That wasn't necessary now. "I need to find information about a rather distant era of Japan's history. My... new position caused some... questions I don't want to leave unanswered as they may affect... the balance of powers involved in the battle. I don't think I have the time left to inquire in Kyoto." He waited. 
     Imonoyama nodded, slowly. "I see."