"I'm charmed by the pale moon
So I don't even see my feet in the darkness
The stars in the far night sky turn blurry
Before I know I stumbled and fell down"
After the death of his sister, Gisara was largely unable to move on, unable to move past the nostalgia of those days filled with the golden dawn and glittering fireflies. She, like a pale moon, was gone now, and in being so fixated on her, he found himself stumbling and falling.
Likewise, while Eiko's adoration of the stars, of his mother have indeed provided a pillar by which he lives, he has never really been able to have time to move on and grieve for her, and for him, the blurriness of the stars is akin to losing his sense of direction, as he always adored the constellations even back then, and has always relied on them for direction.
For Kebechet, she used the moon and the stars as a way to distract herself from the horrid deaths that plagued the Sessenanian underbelly, and in doing so, crafted her psychopomp persona to "take upon" those losses and give herself some power in her own powerless existence.
"I can't find what I want to do
So I hang my head down low and pretend to be in a hurry
They laugh at me when I fell down
But I pretend not to notice the laughter"
Although everyone adored Gisara, his loss still permeated every part of his life, and though he tried his hardest to work, he could rarely concentrate, and even his music lost its sense. While adored by his friends, he largely felt like a burden to them, and try as he did to have them find some enjoyment away from him, those two friends were undyingly loyal.
Eiko chose to be an actor because of his mother, and in doing so, devoted himself to the point of frequently breaking Ezharan child labor laws in order to continue acting; while he has certainly found his passion, one has to wonder how much of it is his own, and how much is his mother's specter still haunting him, still pushing him on. In his career, he has also tried to turn all of his emotions — every tear, every laugh, every smile — into acting, and has for that reason refused to express his own emotions, regarding it as unworthy when he could instead be acting.
Kebechet's persona, again, was used as a coping mechanism, since she really didn't know what to do herself. Nonetheless, if other people were happy with her, the performer, she would keep going with it, even if she was shunned as the odd one out at her school until she sang. Furthermore, we do see some allusion to AARU member Shai, whose love of pranks and restless altruism stems from a deep-seated fear of abandonment.
"I draw a morning with a formless song
And I'll go beyond the shallow, shallow summer days
I see your palms, they are not cold to me,
In the dawn sky and the dawn fireflies"
Here, we see the culmination of Gisara's decision: the night before, he had made his choice, and was now waiting for his chance, his morning pointless, meaningless. For him, the summer days hardly existed; they were memories, while his sister's adoration, her love, would be there for him in a dawn that he would look forward to encountering. Fortunately, he would be saved by his friends soon after, rescued back to life.
For Eiko Michori, while many consider his acting career impressive, he has always considered it the only meaningful part of him — while others regard it as beautiful, he regards it as necessary as breathing. Yet, having lost his mother in the summer, and with his acting career always taking off even more in the season, the summer has always felt like a pain to him, a time where forgotten mistakes would come up and when he'd have to push them back down with his acting. While he has never caught fireflies, their association with the idyllic Jae-Syu childhood resembles his own desire for a normal childhood, one that he never had.
Kebechet, even as a child, always adored singing and performing, but even so, it seemed that her songs were not taken seriously because of her personality. Frequently, she would claim to see the dead, to see them in the wavering summer light or in the dawn fireflies and golden rays.
"I've come to hate so many things
And I feel as if I were a mere dirty spot
So I want to fly to the other side of the earth,
To an unmanned station,
To meet the me of yesterday"
Gisara's incident divided his life into a beautiful yesterday, and a miserable today. For him, why live when his sister was not alive? Why live when he could no longer hear her voice? Even music just didn't cut it out anymore, and overwhelmed by these feelings, he truly felt like he was a burden on his therapist, his friends, his family, as much as they were willing to support him. His pain, temporary as it was, made him want to take such a drastic decision as traveling through time and space, if only he could go back...
[from ppc]"...which relates to Erika's analogy, about how local tactical breakthroughs translated to operational and strategic success the same way relatively 'minor' problems interact and combine in the same fashion as the mutuallly-supporting arms of a combined-arms force to overwhelm and make resistance, or in this case coping mechanisms and support, ineffective."
As Eiko's adoptive mother has said, he really is nothing more than the "worthless child of an impulsive brat who ran away from home." While he has little conscious hatred, there is no doubt some pent-up rage that he wishes he could have better, could do better, and perhaps given the choice to be a vengeful villain in the story, he would adore it, as his fateful appearance so long ago. Yet, so too does he wish to embrace the child that he once was, the child in the space station, all alone, watching the stars.
[from ppc]"Such bitterness is paralleled somewhat by Erika's circumstances, as the daughter of an impoverished cadet who returned to Prussia-Poland after a falling out with her then-boyfriend, the current King Aceus of Danceria. While Erika bears little open animosity towards her father and, indeed, loves him, she still maintains a quiet annoyance and bitterness that he wasn't there. Really, the only difference is that Erika knew her mother and her father and could hear from both, and clings to those memories, much like Gisara's difficulties in moving on after his sister's death and his division of his life into a golden yesterday and a dystopian today."
While Kebechet had some hate in her heart, and may have felt that she were a misunderstood filth, she used her performance as escapism, imagining herself as someone more formidable, someone able to fly through space and time to find someone she had lost. Perhaps they would see her, as a starry psychopomp, soaring through the sky.
"Every time my chest aches and I hang my head down
You go far ahead of me
Let me ruin us, the dreamers; goodbye
To the flower of fire blooming in the night sky of yesterday"
Gisara and his sister were forever separated, and he would forever remember the immediate clammy despair as he felt his death coming, the immediate sense that he wanted to live. Yet, in doing so, he would be left behind, left to live, but he would certainly live with a great regret in his heart for his mistake. He had ruined the two of them, hadn't he? Ruined their beloved song "Marigold" when he gave it to that serial killer, and now nearly ruined his life — her legacy. But indeed, he would have to say goodbye to the blooming firework flower of that beloved night.
Eiko remembered the day his mother left, when he had been brought to sleep in that temple, when she had gone so far ahead of him and left him behind. In a way, had he ruined her, or had he brought something better to her? He would never know why she was murdered; he could only assume it was for himself, by a mother's love, a mother's sacrifice. And, like a firework fizzling out, he would have to say goodbye, curled up in her lap like she were still there, like she were still alive to adore him, the stars, the fireworks.
Kebechect felt terribly alone after the deaths of so many she had loved, and each time it hurt, each time she stayed behind, she felt that she was failing the dead she had sworn to ferry to the great beyond. Later on, after being found by Renenūtet, there was regret in Kebechet, for she felt that her personality would someday bring failure if nobody could understand her. Yet, she would bid goodbye to that childish, youthful firework. Now, she was that blooming flower.
"I look at the flowers, flowers reflected on the water
I look at the moon, moon swaying on the water"
A memory. Gisara could remember the way the gentle Jae-Syu waves lapped at the shore, sloshed here and there, the reflections of fireworks and the moon. He could remember that night with his sister, then the next with his best friend, the one where he had an argument and was left behind. Resigning himself to that fate, he collapsed in the tide, watching as the night decor continued without him, still blooming, still going, still living, as he rotted away, perhaps hoping to be carried out.
Flowers, water, and the moon are no doubt frequent symbols in Suzurai, and Eiko's life was no exception. There was a koi pond at that temple, with lotus and tea growing on its shores. He could remember all of that reflected in the moonlight, on that pond as he was carried up for one last time to the temple bedroom.
No doubt other Sessenanians wouldn't even notice such reflections, but Kebechet's personality was hardly a common one. Watching those reflections were mesmerizing for her; perhaps, she thought they were some other world, for if she touched them with her hand, they would disappear.
"If I draw the sky where summer never comes,
I'm afraid you'll laugh at me
I saw the moon and the sky in my dream at the break of dawn"
Gisara's summers were always the best part of his life. They meant fireflies on the beach, firework in the sky, friends at his side. Yet, without his sister, it all felt meaningless, like there was no more summer, no more sky, no more celebration — and how ridiculous would that be? Sitting in his hospital bed, the regret gnawed at him, regret at his mistaken choice, yet, watching the moon outside, he could feel that it was similar to the moon of his dreams, to that childhood nostalgia. He would have to live on, wouldn't he?
For Eiko, that childhood summer never once came. Life was filled with servitude, but if he told his mother, she would no doubt laugh. She always found enjoyment in everything; even injury, even punishment, she made a story out of, not willing to make her son see life as something meaningless. She had pursued that mistaken path, and look where that ended her. She only wanted him to persist, but the memory of the moon and sky of that dreamlike finale, of the rising dawn as Feng Qiu found him, would always haunt him. His sister Ayame would ultimately mimic such; he would vow to protect her, this new dawn.
For Kebechet, death was always closer rather than the vitality of summer, and she was always mocked for this; it was not until she formed AARU that she would find a like-minded group of regretting youths. Yet, gazing up at the stars from the gutter, she had found a new dawnbreak, a repeat in AARU.
"If I could breathe my breath without seeing the coming of the morning,
I'll go beyond the far, far summer days
I see your palms, they are not cold to me
In the faint morning glow"
For Gisara, it was that long evening, night, dawn that he would always remember. Watching the eventide fireworks, catching the nighttime fireflies, drinking the midnight soda, eating the late kimchi, mourning the setting moon as dawn rays dissipated the fireworks like a thousand ephemeral golden sparkles fading into the mist, then being carried back to the car, half-asleep and still insisting otherwise, as his sister smiled. Wouldn't it be wonderful to continue living, breathing, without ever ending that memory? Away from the brief summer, away to a blissful eternity with his sister? Yet, the morning was too faint, too unreal.
For Eiko, morning was the time he found his mother's body. He wanted nothing more than to curl up next to her, but she was gone, gone that dreadful summer day, that now felt so distant. He could see her again, feel her warmth, desire it all over again as the lost child he was, but it was a faint morning and a cold corpse. The warmth was only an illusion.
Kebechet felt that, even if she were to never awaken, she would still persist and lead the dead beyond. That was her duty, wasn't it? That was the vow she had made to those bygone, to those who she had seen die, to those who had once been alive, their life slowly leaking as the morning came.
"Now I'm in the town where summer is yet to come
Ah, the dark blue night sky and the fireflies"
And they would keep living.
That beautiful summer might not come, and the fireflies might be the only thing illuminating the night sky.
But they would keep living, 'till summer came, whenever that might be. Morning had yet to come; it was not their time to depart.