I did not plan on ever writing for this fandom but look sometimes bad things happen to good people and here we all are. I am singlehandedly going to make quadrants/caliginous romance as big of a fanfic meme as a/b/o if I keep this up.

soft warning for dubcon-there is no actual dubcon, but if that sort of thing squicks you then you may not have fun here

I.

"Holy crap, Hiei," Kuwabara said, clutching at the fabric approximately over his heart. "Where did you come from?"

The through-breeze on the window sill was bright with the potential of a wide sunlit world, and Hiei dangled one leg over the edge of it. To a stranger he would have looked like a sunning cat, lethargic and content. Countless creatures had learned over the years not to trust his appearance. Underneath the languid façade there was a growing tension of energy, a white burn of adrenaline in his throat. Hiei was sitting in the window of Kazuma Kuwabara, and this was not a coincidence.

"I've been here for a while," Hiei said. With small, careful movements, he began to stretch sets of muscles that had been forced still.

He'd arrived before that prison of a human school had release its denizens into the streets, giving himself ample time to reconsider without anyone being the wiser. He had watched Kuwabara on the sidewalk, bag over his shoulder, and he'd made the final decision to stay put. There it was, laid out on the line regardless of the outcome. Not that he was terribly anxious about the outcome; Hiei rarely began fights he didn't expect to win. The difficulty had mostly been in juggling cost to benefit, and desire against his continued sanity. He listened to the faint rustle of Kuwabara setting down his bag, breathing deeply the crisp onset of autumn.

"Uh, somethin' you want?"

Hiei snapped his attention across the room. "Yes," he said, "yes, you might say there is."

He unfolded himself with a careless grace, feeling the expectation of things to come like the sweet burn of a deep stretch. He was very good at this. He was also not particularly modest.

Kuwabara looked across at him uncertainly, in a stance that could shift into defense at any moment. Hiei cast an appreciative glance over it—the human knew he was a threat, felt the charge in the air as well. Hiei ticked a smug mental box for chemistry. Bodies were mutable and impermanent, even satisfyingly powerful bodies like Kuwabara's. The chemistry was more important.

"So?" Kuwabara said. "You just gonna stand there?"

Hiei bared his teeth in a grin, and flashed across the room. He halted with his hands on either of the human's arms, considering the view. "No, this won't do. Why don't you get on my level?"

With a single burst of force, Hiei yanked Kuwabara down to his knees. The human fell—more from surprise than actual weakness—and Hiei grabbed his face in one hand.

"I could do so many things to you," he said, one part threat and one part promise. His thumb squeezed the flesh below the high cheekbones.

"Hiei," Kuwabara said, "what're you—"

"What does it look like I'm doing, imbecile?" He flicked open the buttons of the human's shirt one at a time in a deliberate procession down the length of his chest. "This," he said, running his free hand down the side of Kuwabara's thick chest, "is my favorite part of you. It's such a shame the body so far outstrips the mind."

Hiei pushed him, a heavy blow to the sternum that sent him topping backwards, broad shoulders rebounding up off the carpet. Hiei settled on his chest, pulled him up from the ground by the loose ends of his collar.

"I can take you," he said, layering deliberate ambiguity over the words, pressing in closer. "I'm stronger than you."

Kuwabara only stared at him, disheveled from the rough handling and paler than usual, mouth in a tight silent line. He said nothing. He did nothing. His expression—Hiei realized a moment too late that it wasn't challenge he was looking at, it was disdain. Cold, passionless scorn. A frigid wave of uncertainty crashed through Hiei.

Was he seeing someone else? Hiei stared down at the human, scanning for some telltale sign. No, Hiei would have felt it. Moreover, Kurama would have mentioned it. They had discussed this to the point of nauseum.

Hiei dropped him suddenly, threw him at the floor more really, and drew back. "Why are you sitting there like a lump when I'm trying to get caliginous with you?" he demanded. "Am I not good enough for you? I suppose you think you could do better, hmm, you overgrown buffoon. Is a demonic felon too vulgar for your stupid little code?"

Kuwabara stared at him, mouth opening and closing a few times in perfect silence. Finally he surged up on his elbows, the color coming back into his face. "What the heck, Hiei?" he said. "I was getting sexually friggin assaulted, whadaya want from me?"

Hiei blinked a couple times, turning the phrase over in his mind. "Well yes," he said, condescendingly, "that's precisely why you're supposed to fight back."

"Oh," Kuwabara said, slapping a flat palm across his chest, "so it's my fault, that's real friggin typical. Guys like you give men a bad name!"

"If you weren't interested you could have just said so!" Hiei snapped. "There's no need to string me along like some pubescent fool, like some laughing stock, I've been with creatures more terrifying than your potato of a brain could even comprehend. If you don't want to go black with me—"

"Go black?" Kuwabara interrupted.

"Yes, black," Hiei said, "what did you think this was, a red overture?"

Kuwabara sat up fully, making a time out symbol with both his hands. He was breathing unusually hard, Hiei noticed belatedly, and that struck him as peculiarly out of place. He had a sinking feeling that things had spiraled out of his control very quickly.

"I don't know what either of those things are," Kuwabara said, dropping his hands. "But it seems like maybe you think I do."

"Red romance? Black romance? Are you actually this dumb?"

"Okay so like—" Kuwabara ran a thumb over the line of his jaw, "—there's only one romance I ever heard of, and I don't think it's any kinda color."

Hiei stared at him for a long moment. Then he turned on his heel and stalked out of the bedroom, crackling with a furious seethe of energy.

"Wha—wait!" Kuwabara shouted after him. "Where you goin'?"

"I'm going to borrow your telephone," Hiei replied, icily calm. "Someone has some explaining to do."

Hiei stalked through the house, ignoring the narrow searching looks the Kuwabara sister gave him, and snatched the telephone from its hook. He'd only operated one of these once before, but it was only a fragile little human toy. He'd mastered more complex tasks in his sleep. He dialed the number and waited, tapping his sword against the wall as it rang through.

"Hello, this is the Minamino residence."

"Hiei," said Hiei, forgoing all other pleasantries and auxiliary verbs.

"Oh, hello Hiei," came the older woman's voice. "How are you, sweetie?"

"Give the phone to Shuuichi," Hiei ground out.

"Sure thing. You know you're welcome to come over any time, you don't have to ask us! Shuuichi hardly ever seems to leave him room these days."

Hiei fumed in silence while Kurama's human mother took her sweet time handing the phone over. When the poor excuse for an ally answered at last, it was with a faint sigh.

"This is a disaster," Hiei snarled into the receiver, before the smug fox could drag him into some time-wasting side conversation. "I should have never listened to you."

"Come now," Kurama said, "it can't have gone that badly."

"I knew I should have just gone black for Yusuke," Hiei muttered, closing his eyes. "Who else can I fight without holding back?"

"Hiei," Kurama said in that awful pedantic way of his, "you know you don't feel an ounce of animosity towards Yusuke. Please, just go with your gut on this one."

"Well that's what I was trying to do," Hiei said, "until the oaf nearly had a panic attack. You could have seen fit to mention to me at some point that humans apparently don't know what black romance is."

He could hear the frown in Kurama's voice. "I thought you knew."

"At what point could I possibly have learned that?"

"You're usually quite observant. I appear to have underestimated your tendency to charge bullheaded into more delicate matters."

Hiei snorted. "It's not supposed to be delicate, that's the point."

"Just," Kurama said, "tell him you want to be his rival. Monogamously." There was a faint sound of muffled laughter. "Tell him you want to make sweet sweet hatred to him."

"Oh, so you're making fun of me now? I'll have you know this entire debacle is entirely your fault."

"Don't blame me for your failure to read the mood," Kurama warned him.

"I will blame you all I like!"

"Hiei."

"Do not 'Hiei' me, you overcooked has-been!"

"Wow," Kuwabara said, from somewhere behind him. "And here I was thinkin' you were actually kinda smooth for a second."

Hiei froze up entirely.

"Hiei," Kurama's voice buzzed, "is that Kuwabara? Are you in his house?"

"Naturally," Hiei said through gritted teeth.

The human was leaned up against the wall behind him, hands tucked into pockets. His shirt was still undone, the tail of it pooling and falling around his wrists. There was something like a twist of a smile on his lips and Hiei—well, when Hiei had said that physical forms were not important he might have been exaggerating his own maturity in such matters.

The human held out his hand, expectant. Hiei scowled and slapped the receiver into the waiting palm.

"Hey," Kuwabara said, tucking the thing into the crook of his shoulder. "Nah, I'm fine. Takes more'n that to shake up the old maestro. Nah. Nah, I got worse from some grade school punks on my way to the duck pond."

Kuwabara was quiet for a few moments, nodding along vaguely to the insistent buzz of Kurama's voice. Hiei hunched himself into a crumple of displeasure against the corner of the room, shooting murderous glares at the sister as she passed by the doorway with a curious glance inside. He could just leave. He'd look like a coward and a complete embarrassment, sure, but he could just leave. Go on a destructive rampage. Kill some law enforcement goons.

He was shaken from his reverie to the sound of the phone clicking down on the stand. Kuwabara stood there, in front of it, looking contemplative. He was still ridiculously attractive, even when he was confused, which was fortunate because he spent a fair amount of his life in that state.

"So this is a normal thing for you guys," he said.

Hiei nodded, once.

"What do you…" Kuwabara started, "whaddaya want from me?"

"There's no point in explaining it to you now," Hiei said, looking away. "Your awful washed-out culture doesn't have any equivalent."

"Look, maybe you think I'm not worth it now," Kuwabara said, "but I never took you for the kinda guy who couldn't finish what he started."

Hiei looked up, looked back at him. No wonder he'd taken the human's caliginous intentions for a given. Kuwabara must have been the most innocently flirtatious creature ever born. He sighed. "You know your pathetic little crush on Yukina?" he said. "That's red. This—" he gestured at the space between them, "—is black."

"Is it like a dating thing?"

"What?" Hiei snorted. "A candle lit hate date? Please."

"So what is it?" Kuwabara asked, crossing his arms. "Is this just an excuse to beat up on me with your weird dragon powers?"

Hiei was across the floor in a breath, grabbed Kuwabara by the collar and dragged him down to eye level. "It means I want to fight you," he snarled, "it means I want to kill with you, I want to drag you down and force you up and consume you whole."

"Um. Literally?"

"No not literally you buffoon."

"'Cause I heard about some bugs that do that."

"I'm not a bug," Hiei said. "And I promise anything of yours I were to put my mouth on, you would get back. Eventually."

Kuwabara's ears literally went pink, and it was so. Goddamn. Annoying. This creature was made to be loathed, surely the gods had created him to test the limits of Hiei's sanity. He let go of the collar in a flush of disgust with his own preposterous urges and Kuwabara's horrible attractiveness.

"So we'd be like equals," the human said, rubbing the back of his neck.

Hiei sniffed. "If you think you can keep up," he said.

That seemed to be the cincher. Kuwabara pressed his hand to his mouth, barely hiding a smirk. "Hey," he sniggered, "this mean you wanna kiss me, Hiei?"

Hiei stared at him. Hiei considered the sweet embrace of death. "Well that's about all the stupidity I can take for today," he said, marching determinedly towards the window. "Come find me when your brain is done leaking out of your skull."

"You wanna goodbye kiss?" Kuwabara called after him, giving into full gales of laughter. "Hey, hey, Hiei!"

Hiei stopped, standing on the sill of the window, and turned back. Kuwabara had followed him across the room, probably expecting him to launch into the world outside without any further response. The glee on the kid's face was so—so puerile, so obnoxious, he absolutely could not leave that in place. Not and retain his already frazzled sanity.

His hand snapped outward. He dragged Kuwabara the last foot of distance closer, practically catching him in a dip as he bowed backwards in surprise. Kuwabara sucked in a breath, reaching reflexively for Hiei's shoulder.

"Why not," Hiei said.

He dove down, lips covering lips like the crash of a bird of prey. Kuwabara let out a faint noise of dismay as Hiei drew back just enough to catch bottom lip in his teeth and tugged, a tiny motion with a visceral implication. Kuwabara groaned as if he had been punched. Hiei let go, licked once at the dented skin.

Then he dropped the boy entirely and launched himself into the wide daylight.

He was, after all, very good at this.