Promise to Sirius (An Utapri / Uta no Prince-sama Fanfiction)

Ai Mikaze

For the next 4 days, Ai and Reiji took care of Natsuki, who was in the process of recovering from the excruciating ordeal that had occurred at the mansion. Natsuki suffered from nightmares and cold flashes of the painful memories, as well as a severe headache and fever. Ai had created a schedule for Reiji regarding what to do which included taking their kouhai's temperature and the times to give him medicine, which Reiji had exclaimed was "insanely precise" - not that Ai had heard anyone say that for the 1st time - and gotten the necessary prescribed medicine from a reliable clinic. He would take note of Natsuki's temperature throughout the days and, along with Reiji, stay by their friend's side, assuring him that they were with him no matter what, as well as that Shining Saotome had given them both the permission to take leaves from idol work when Natsuki worriedly asked about that.

"Don't worry, Nattsun," Reiji assured with a laugh on the first day back from the mansion, wrapping his arm around Natsuki's shoulders. "No harm's done in taking a week off idol work. We idols have our breaks here and there anyway."

"Reiji's right," Ai agreed, nodding as he placed his hand against Natsuki's forehead, mentally noting that the latter's temperature had decreased by 0.3 degrees Celsius. "Not to mention, there is no harm in being by a friend's side and knowing you," he smiled slightly, "you'd be doing the same thing for us if the roles were reversed."

"Yeap!" Reiji chimed in with a bright smile.

And Ai and Reiji had smiled again when Natsuki gave them both a genuine, grateful smile. Even though the blond kouhai was sick, Natsuki was still putting them before himself. Even though Natsuki never said it out loud, Ai knew that the blond male was trying his best to recover, obediently following Ai's advice and making sure that he drank his medicine on time even when Reiji forgot, not only for his own sake, but theirs.

"I know that you guys are worried about me," Natsuki said on Wednesday when the three of them were drinking tea together in his bedroom, "because I still haven't fully recovered. I really hope I recover soon so that we can all smile together without any worries or pain again."

He placed his hands over his chest as he smiled gently at them.

"The thought of seeing you smile like that really warms my heart and makes me want to recover even more."

Ai remembered how he and Reiji had stared at Natsuki in surprise at his sincere, innocent words, moved by his feelings towards them, and how Natsuki simply smiled at them, oblivious as to how much his words had moved them. Both of them knew that neither of them had truly been freed of their guilt towards Natsuki. They could hear it in their words, see it in their eyes, feel it within them, even though Ai did not have a heart. Throughout the entire week, Natsuki had been recovering and smiling more as the days passed, but Ai could not stop thinking of the days in which Natsuki concealed the pain of his afflicted wounds behind his smiles, in which Ai, Reiji, Ranmaru and Camus had failed to truly be there for him even when he had always been there for them, in which he had been living in the exact same room with him and Syo who had been the main cause of Natsuki's pain. The days in which Natsuki gave joy and warmth to everyone around him with a kind and open heart, but was given cruel pain in return.

You gave me so much, more than this artificial life was meant to understand, and yet...

A pang of anguish lanced through Ai's chest as he looked out of his window at the nightscape.

I hardly gave anything back to you, even when you needed it the most.

Leaning against the wall next to the tall glass window that was barely covered by blue curtains, Ai quietly observed as the white glow of the streetlamps faintly illuminated the Prussian blue sky like stars that could hardly brighten an endless blackness. Their lights ironically accentuated the night's coldness rather than dissolving it into an illusion of something warmer, just like how Natsuki's smiles and words would intensify the pain that Ai had classified as "guilt" in his chest even amidst their warmth, bringing with them the memories of how the blond male had smiled with pain in his gentle eyes as Ai let him turn and walk away with pain in his green eyes back in the Master Course. Ai knew that he and Reiji were reasons why Natsuki was able to genuinely smile, but he still could not help the guilt piercing him at the thought of how long Natsuki hadn't been capable of smiling the way he was now because of Ai's indifference and apathy. Ai knew that it was thanks to him and Reiji that Natsuki was sleeping more properly and recovering from his fever and headache, but he doubted that he was giving nearly as much to Natsuki as the latter had given him.