Cruel
Everyone dreams of their soul-mate, but only a few find them. Miyu has always been sure she was one who didn't even have the chance to look for it, but in this very moment all her certainties are falling apart.
It's eleven in the evening and the thousand of lights in the saloon, at the thirteenth floor of the most luxurious and expensive hotel in Kyoto, seem to be creating an illusion of a day without sunset. On the black marble pavement, Miyu's been twirling in her pink kimono for so long that some pitchy strands slipped from the chignon on her head and are currently gently caressing her cheeks. She doesn't even think about moving her hands from her partner to put them back in their place; the one that stands before her is much too perfect for her to move her gaze away.
He's over a hundred and sixty centimetres tall – and for a hundred and fifty centimetres tall fifteen-year old girl that's just perfect – and he's made of subtle rippling muscles, honed under the marmoreal white skin that contrasted beautifully with the occidental suit, complete with a necktie, all black with the exception of a scarlet red camellia in his buttonhole. He has long, strong fingers, with a firm yet gentle grip, but it was mostly his face that attracted the girl - and even now her attention still remains on that feature. Cornflower blue irises surrounded by black long and thick cilia that made those big eyes look even more mysterious and caress his cheekbones at every movement of his eyelids; bright azure hair, the colour of a winter sky when not even the smallest of clouds dares to touch it, are brushed back to show the modelled, thin and just a tad sharp face, with a soft chin and a fine nose. The man, Kuroko-san, is so handsome that it hurts - and Miyu has been his prisoner since the beginning of the evening.
She wishes she had at least the courage to try to talk - to say something -, but she's been close-mouthed for the whole time without finding her voice and he, despite being her dance partner, has not said a single word. He's only stared at her for the longest time, barely blinking. From time to time, Miyu has had some strange sensations; she'd thought her knight had been vanishing before her eyes, but it was probably just the chaos that were her thoughts.
"May I interrupt?"
Miyu jerks and turns and burns. She burns to her very bones under the intese stare of a pair of ruby eyes, blinded by equally ruby strands barely tamed with hair gel. He, too, wears only black, but his suit has a blue rose in its buttonhole and he's slightly taller than the other despite having almost the same built - although he's much more terrifying.
"Akashi-kun." the teal-head greets, tone politely but with an unbelievably cold and atone undertone, while he lets his hand slip from her waist but keeps on holding her hand, "You're late."
Miyu recognizes the name and a shiver of pure fear runs down her back. She barely knows the young heir of the Akashi Household despite the connection between their families, but simply seeing him always intimidates her - it makes her want to run, even.
And yet the guy smiles to her that night, sweetly and with affability. She's sure she's never seen him with another expression other than apathy or that little smirk.
He's, however, handsome - handsome might actually be an understatement, even - though not as much as Kuroko-san. That very same Kuroko-san who must be incredibly brave to talk like that to such a dangerous person.
"I apologize." Akashi laughs gently, apparently not bothered by the reprimanding, "Sadly enough one of my father's work-related appointments turned out longer than expected, and I opted for waiting for him."
"Obviously." Kuroko assented, always apathetically, and Miyu suddenly realizes.
"Do you two know each other?" she asks, and she immediately wants to bite her own tongue for having been so meddlesome, but the both gentlemen simply exchange a look and then turn kindly to her.
"Kuroko and I have some business in common." Akashi explains before bowing politely in her direction, "Indeed, if you'll indulge me, I'd like to steal him from you for a moment. There's an issue I hoped to clarify before the beginning of the party, but as you see I didn't have the chance to."
Miyu blinks a couple of times, confused, then she jumps realizing both the men are waiting for her answer.
"Of course!" she answers, hurriedly, "Please, don't mind me."
Akashi smiles at her before turning his back and starting to walk away. Kuroko lifts her hand – he never smiles, but the way he watches her, so intensely… - and leaves a butterfly kiss on her knuckles. His lips are like a wind's breath and never really touch her skin, but Miyu blushes all the same.
"If you'll excuse me…" the teal-haired murmurs and he has a low and warm voice when, for the first time, he addresses her.
The girl watches him turn his back and leave, making his path within the crowd by simply walking a step behind Akashi-san, and when both guys have vanished from view, she brings a hand instinctively to her heart and feels her own mad beating. Slowly, she closes her eyes, and behind the locked eyelids she observes reason sharpening its blades for the war against her soul's wincing.
Miyu already knows it will be a massacre.
"…I-I'm in love with you…!"
Akashi enters the toilet and a single glance from him is enough to make all the present immediately leave. Kuroko takes care of locking the door behind them to avoid unwanted intrusions.
"I'm surprised." Seijuro begins, turning toward the teal-haired one and slipping a single hand in his pocket, in a natural yet sensual pose that is ruined by the clear threat in his irises, "Where does this sudden desire of ignoring me come from?"
"Do you have a guilty conscience, Akashi-kun?" Tetsuya retorts apathetically. The single proof of the life in his veins is a blink of his eyes. "Did you do something to deserve being ignored?"
The usual amazed smirk of the red-head lifts only a corner of his mouth, a clear sign that his amusement for the answer didn't have any effect into mitigating his mood.
"Not recently." he answered all the same, sarcastically, but then his half-smile vanishes completely. "You made her fall for you. How cruel."
Kuroko answers his gaze with a blank face, untouched by the accusation, then he rests his back against the toilet's door behind him.
"Do you know who she is?" he asks, motionless with his hands in his pockets.
Akashi raises an eyebrow because, no, that's not the answer he wanted and, no, he doesn't care, but he shrugs.
"Does it matter?" he asks back, "She's probably the daughter of some businessman, there are so many thisevening…"
"She's Sugawara Miyu."
Akashi falls silent. Whatever he wanted to say is immediately forgotten in favour of a new memory from that name.
-Father…
-I don't want to hear excuses nor objections, Seijuro. You're eighteen, it's time to think of a marriage that can be useful for the family. You're bride-to-be has been attentively selectioned, you have nothing to worry about: the third-born of the Sugawara family, Miyu-san, turned out to be the best between the candidates, with her unstained reputation and all the virtues to become a great wife for the absolute heir of the Akashi's House. Obviously, I expect your complete collaboration. If I ever come to know you've been less than perfect with her, there will be consequences.
-Obviously, Father.
-Well, then. You're dismissed.
Seijuro blinks once and although his expression doesn't change, the light in his irises clearly shows his surprise; he's certain he has never mentioned his arranged marriage with anyone.
Kuroko shrugs, apparently indifferent.
"Your father shouldn't have told me anything." he murmurs, "His need to brag about his seemingly undoubtable success will be the death of him."
And Seijuro knows that in the room behind Kuroko there is his betrothed, seated on the edge of her chair for another man who's perhaps not playing with her, per se, but who's definitely manipulating her mind without being noticed; he knows there is his father looking for him, who wants to introduce him to the man he really thinks will be his father-in-law and who is probably already thinking about a punishment for him being less than perfect; he knows there are thousands of people from the richest and most powerful families of Japan. He knows all of that.
He overcomes the distance between him and the teal-haired one with merely two steps and grips Kuroko's hips. He pushes a knee between the other's slightly spread tights, clashes his mouth against the other male's; it's wet and warm and violent - just like a tsunami wave.
Because Akashi, as Daiki would say, doesn't give a fuck about anything or anyone that's not Tetsuya moaning in his arms.
"Oh."
They get out in different moments.
Akashi leaves first, letting everybody's attention lay on him as he leaves the party apparently furious. He overcomes his father throwing him the bait in a murmur he's almost sorry to pronounce. Almost.
"Here's your selected bitch."
Akashi-san will understand, at least what his son wants him to understand. Seijuro's sure of this so he doesn't stop walking - not even for a second, but takes advantage of the time his father needs to investigate the situation and gets into the elevator. He pushes the '12' button, the penultimate floor, and in a few seconds the red head arrives at his destination.
The door opens and Kuroko's irises give his, red and hungry, an apathetic look.
At the ground floor, they're both without their necktie.
They get out of the spinning door and Akashi grabs the phantom's hand right when they're out of the security cameras range. He drags him just for a little before a familiar limousine pulls over the sidewalk and Takeda – the family's driver since the very birth of Seijuro – doesn't say anything, doesn't react at all when his young master pushes the teal-haired guy into the car. Simply, he turns off the four-way emergency flashers and gets into the traffic, heading toward the Second Mansion, the smaller house where the younger Akashi goes to 'relax'.
Seijuro checks Kuroko from head to toe, then turns toward Takeda.
"Remind me to double your salary." he says, a small smirk on his voice.
"Takeda-san has good taste." Tetsuya nods, even if apathetically, before turning looking at the red head through the reflection of the window. "I'd like to say I'll return the suit clean, but I suppose a normal laundry wouldn't be able to take care of it, isn't that right?"
Seijuro smirks.
"Keep it." he orders grabbing the teal-haired guy's chin with one hand, forcing him to look at him, "Just in case my father finds some other 'perfect candidate'…"
"I'll have to find another way next time, Akashi-kun." Kuroko reprimanded him, completely ignoring the fact said person's burying his face in the crook of his neck and focusing on a well defined spot there. "It would be suspicious if all your betrothed were suddenly seduced by a mysterious man right at the announcement eve."
Akashi's answer is an irritated mutter against Tetsuya's flesh.
"Young master's ancestors have a lot of honour in their hands and high expectation for the future mistress of the House." Takeda comments in that moment, surprising the two men enough to stop their preliminaries, "It wouldn't be astonishing if they sent some kind of spirit – a phantom as the occidental say – to express their dissent for a candidate who doesn't suit their tastes."
Kuroko blinks, impassive, but his eyes show a flash of admiration and appreciation for the idea. Akashi simply smirks.
"Correction: remind me to triple you salary."
"May ask how does bocchan think about justifying this generousness toward me in front of the master, sir?"
"He'll find a way, Takeda-san." Kuroko intervenes, for the first time with his voice full of something – exasperation, probably –, "He always does."
Akashi laughs lowly, briefly, before he turns his attention back to his partner's neck.
Takeda turns on the signal to turn right and raises the obscured glass between the driving and the posterior seats.
"I'm really sorry, but I already have someone."
Akashi bites.
It's not like he does it often, but when it happens, it is no joke. He devours and savages the skin - makes blood pour out and does not listen to begging nor excuses.
Kuroko lets him do as he pleases. He stands on all fours like a dog, on the occidental two-sized bed which occupies the centre of Akashi's bedroom, and buries his face in the soft mattress as he grits his teeth and his clenched fists drown in the bed. There are no lights apart from the stars' rays that enter from the rice-paper, traditional doors. It isn't cold, and even if it were winter, it wouldn't matter; the heat from their naked bodies that touch, brush, collide violently with one another is more than enough to keep them warm.
Seijuro's filling him; hot and pulsing - he stands on his knees behind him while holding him by the hips, his nails harshly tucked in his flesh, keeping him still to prevent him from moving even an inch. Seijuro then reaches his neck, giving him a mark that calling hickey would be reductive; he's giving him a bruise, a wound shaped like his incisors.
The red eyed man pulls out the teeth from his lover's flesh, pulling back slightly so that his member comes out of the other's entrance and then he penetrates him again, harsh and fast and Kuroko's arms give in, his shoulders fall on his hands backs, but his spine arches and his mouth falls open while his face jerks upward, his closed eyes toward stars they can't see.
The young Akashi takes advantage of it, and like a hungry beast pounces on the man laying beneath him, coming back to his previously interrupted banquet; his teeth sink in the bruised flesh again and Tetsuya moans.
He knows this pain, he can read Akashi and his actions better than anyone else in the world, after all; Tetsuya knows this small punishment is just an admonition, a 'don't you dare do it again' which refers to Miyu, but not to her suffering. The red-head is not angry for the way he treated the girl – he's furious because he has touched her, danced with her, held her for so long that his suit jacket smells like her.
Seijuro is jealous, and couldn't care less about that poor soul's feelings.
And Kuroko, as much as he doesn't like it, has to admit that he doesn't really care either.
"I wish you all the best, Sugawara-san."
The dawn paints the sky in the same shade of pink of that girl's kimono and Kuroko grunts, but doesn't move. He stays curled up under the sheets with Akashi's body pressed against his from behind and his lover's breath against his nape. They're both naked and the room is a mess, their suits are on the floor like unimportant pieces of cloth and he briefly remembers his boyfriend tearing his shirt the evening before, but he's not entirely sure of that. Tetsuya adjusts himself in the embrace that is now his nest and closes his eyes again, determined to come back to dreamland because he really, really, needs some sleep after last night.
Akashi's hand brushes the skin of his arm and he's barely startled by the way Seijuro's fingertips suddenly caress him, making him shiver. Right when the teal-head is going to turn around, however, the red one brings his mouth closer to his ear.
"When the devil caresses you" he whispers, and his breath slips like honey on the marmoreal skin making it stretching almost to spasms, "he's aiming for the soul."
Kuroko gulps, and his throat feels dry. He doesn't know if Akashi's talking about the two of them or about him and Miyu, but he doesn't care. Honestly, he's tired of always thinking about that girl, of having her between him and the red-head after all the things he's done and everything he's stepped on – moral, virtues, education that have always been his –, just to keep his boyfriend to himself, to avoid having him taken away.
The thought of Seijuro marrying a woman and of himself being left behind, the idea of being forcibly separated from someone he loves so much - it still bothers him terribly, despite the fact the immediate danger's passed, and makes him shiver a bit. He turns in Akashi's hug and buries his pale face in his lover's firm chest, smells his strong and masculine scent until his head spins – he's here –, then he wets his lips once before moving to playfully biting his lover's nipple, a hand playing with the other one.
Seijuro's shoulders stiffen, and not only them, and Kuroko – his initial idea of sleeping completely forgotten – smiles a bit when the red-head finally rolls over and pins him to the mattress, locking him into a cage of flesh and bones he, honesly, never wanted and never will want to escape from. He lets himself be kissed and hugs his partner's shoulders as this one bends for the umpteenth time on his neck; he arches his back when he feels teeth again on the mark from the night before and tucks his nails into the other's shoulder-blades' flesh with a moan, finally stealing one from the red-head as an answer and leaving his own signature on his lover's body.
They go on like this, with bites and scratches and licks and hugs, and leave marks for hours and hours again, for the simple pleasure of marking what is theirs, and when they finish they observe each other, satisfied by the respective results.
It's almost better than sex.
It is their masterpiece, their silent shout against a world that doesn't even listen to them and their poster for a fight they're determined to keep up; it is pain and it is pleasure; it is blood and bruises and scratches, but it is even that same love they kept protecting for years. It is the duality they represent – the fire of power and the rain of obedience, the red flame and the azure ice, the beginning and the end, the talking and the listening, the absolute perfection and the stubborn imperfection – and it is the whole they can become – the one –.
Akashi bites and Kuroko scratches, then they kiss and they wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world.
"Sayonara."
*"When the devil caresses you, he's aiming for the soul" (or "Quando il diavolo ti accarezza, vuole l'anima") is an Italian figure of speech. I wanted to use it because I find it very befitting of the environment Akashi and Kuroko are in, and of Kuroko himself right here. The meaning is "An ill-intentioned person acting all kind and gentle has surely a second meaning", which is what Tetsuya is here XD
Authoress' notes:
Hi!
Okay, don't worry, I'm here just for a little detail: the parts
"like this"
are from a dialogue between Miyu and Kuroko that takes place after the rest of the story. Miyu confesses but Tetsuya obviously rejects her.
Yes, Tecchan is a bit of a cold-hearted person here. BUT! There's a reason for it.
I know Kurokocchi is an angel and I fully agree, but I'm more than sure that, if the situation asks for it, he could be far crueler and more calculator than Akashi himself. We have seen it in every single match he has played: he never gives up and does everything that needed to reach is goal, be it sacrificing his own only weapon (second match with Touou) or ruthlessly straining his enemies (Murasakibara or the second match against Kise) forcing them to make mistakes, studying them to find their weakness and then use it against them (wanna talk about how he used Mayuzumi's pride against him?, or how he used Kagami to beat Akashi with his Quite Emperor Eye?). Kise said it after their very first match in Middle School: these's nobody else who craves victory like Tetsuya, he's "thirsty" for it, if he deems it worthy. This applies for basket and I wanted to show it in normal life too.
Beware of the phantom, guys. He can be a very dangerous person. ;)
See you!
Agap