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Title: Unchanged

Author: DnKS – giRLs

Rating: G

Pairing: KuroFai

Disclaimers: Let's go for simplicity here. Not ours. There.

Warning: None, we guess…

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They said that time changed everything.

Maybe it was true. Maybe, indeed, it was true. For he knew he had changed. He knew several other things had also changed. Things insubstantial as well as things essential had changed. And things that he did not know belong to the previous category or the latter one had also changed.

His eyes, for example.

Fai did not quite remember what shade of blue his eyes had once been. But he was sure it was nothing near that deep shade of black he now possessed. He knew for perfect certainty that he once had had a pair of eyes while at the current time, there was only one of them remained. Yes, his eyes had changed, though he did not know if it should be considered as an insubstantial thing or if he should take that as an essential thing instead.

And he also knew that the light in his eyes had changed as well. At least it was what he was being told of. And at least he knew, from what they told him, that it was an essential thing, how that light in his eyes had changed.

His body, too, was another aspect of him that had changed. Because surely, he had transformed from a mere human to a magician and now a vampire, and that would certainly also change his body throughout the passage of time. Maybe it was an essential thing, since one could not say that getting his body turned from something decidedly human into something not quite so was an easy matter. Or maybe it was an insubstantial thing since people said that no matter how one's body changed, inside, he was still the very same person.

Fai frowned at that thought. He raised his hand a bit to the air as he inspected his fingers. Was it true, what the people said, that inside, he was still the very same person?

And when he stared at his fingers, another thought entered his consciousness. His fingers, he thought as he inspected them. In the past he had used those fingers to draw his magic from empty air. Now the only thing he drew using those very same fingers were probably some doodles, he thought with a chuckle. And his hands, once so often found themselves working in some potion he carefully constructed, were now...

Fai darted his eyes from his hand to the bowl on the table before him, an innocent yellow bowl holding some kind of brownish concoction inside. He smiled. Sure, there was only a slight difference between a magic potion and the mixture for chocolate cookies. They looked equally distasteful when only half done and they both could do wonder to people. But the contrast between the phrase 'potion making' and 'cookies baking' was not lost to him.

He did not complain, though. Baking cookies was more pleasurable.

The gentle sound of ping' emitted from the oven ended his contemplation. With practiced ease, he opened the oven and took out yet another batch of chocolate cookies. Putting another tray inside the hot oven, he began to reconsider, for the first time, if he was making too many. After all, it was not like there would be many people to eat those cookies. Maybe he should share with the others.

And with that thought, he realized yet another thing that had changed. His life had changed. The concept of 'others', the concept of sharing, the concept of merely living, those things were nearly unimaginable in the past. He realized, then, just how much exactly his life had changed. He realized just how many things had changed in his life.

But then again...

The door to the kitchen was harshly yanked open. Turning his attention to that direction, he came to see a man staring at him with a very sharp glare. Judging from the glare and the scowl and the general expression that the one standing on the door made, he could say that the newcomer was really annoyed.

Fai smiled amusedly. Kurogane was always so grumpy in the morning.

"Your stupid blond hair is clogging the plumbing again!"

He chuckled, "What Kuro-puu, you can slay monsters and destroy evil but you cannot do some plumbing work?"

He saw Kurogane opened his mouth, no doubt about to retort to his comment, but he would not let him. And besides, that open mouth really tempted him to put a piece of his cookies there.

Which he did, and he put the cookie.

Which Kurogane chewed, seemingly unperturbed, as if such thing was a daily occurrence for him.

Which, he thought in retrospect as he saw the man eating his cookie, was probably the truth after all.

"Too sweet?" he asked.

"No, it's nice," Kurogane answered, and swallowed, and resumed his glaring. "But that doesn't mean I already forgot the whole hair and plumbing issue."

"Just call a plumber if you're too old for a mildly taxing activity like that, Kuro-daddy."

Kurogane grumbled. Kurogane took more cookies from the tray he just took from the oven. Kurogane kissed his cheek chastely as he walked past him.

And Kurogane said as he exited the kitchen. "It will be on your tab."

Fai only chuckled. It seemed there were still things remained unchanged by time. And no, he was not talking about how his hair still managed to clog the plumbing until now.

- end -

(A/N: er… so… another attempt at KuroFai. We have built our walls so go ahead and throw us anything. Reviews will be accepted, gladly, but you my also throw some trash. There is a reason why we built those walls, you see…)