Chapter 1: Count Down.
Shintaro curses under his breath and shoots yet another glare at his computer, intended for the little clock in the corner, even as it ticks away the seconds to his imminent doom.
Though in all honesty, he didn't even need to look at it.
He looks to his left arm for what seems like the nth time since this morning, when he was woken up 6 hours than he would have liked by a jolt of what felt like electricity along his arm, fingertips to elbow and centered around his wrist.
He plucks his glove, revealing for a millisecond the familiar red rim that he's known all his life and he wrenches his eyes away as his heart skips and his gut tightens.
He isn't fast enough.
4 minutes.
4 minutes until he meets them.
Well that was fine. Great. Wonderful.
Except for the small fact that his supposed soulmate had absolutely no concept of time whatsoever because he was 2 months too early.
He picks up the remaining clothes off the floor and dumps it in his cupboard on top of every other damn thing that he owns and closes the door shut before he causes yet another mini-landslide in there. Once done, he wanders back to the living room and fiddles around with the books on his shelf again, even though he's done it around 80,632 times and the rest of his house is still messy and oh god this was really happening, the moment that he'd been dreading, anticipating, waiting for ever since he knew the meaning of the little clock melded into his skin.
Was it really this simple?
His finger trails the spine of a book absentmindedly as he mind starts to wander.
What if he didn't like them?
What if...they never fell in love with him?
Hell, why would they in the first place? A virgin and a NEET at 18, his skin pale, eyes dark from failing to attain more than a handful of hours of a deep sleep for weeks on end, skinny and breakable like he'd fall to pieces at any moment.
No. Impossible.
And yet, he still feels that oddly sweet sensation; a hair-raising tingle along his arm a pulse in his skin that dances to his heartbeat, rapid and shaky from fear and excitement.
1 minute.
He steps away from the bookshelf and makes his way to the door.
27 seconds.
A scream fills the room as a stronger shock runs along his arm.
25 seconds.
It's not pleasant at all. Not like...it hurts. It hurts!
22 se?n?s
He barely registers the pain in his knees as they meet the floor, every scrap of his consciousness focused his wrist, and his breathing is harsh heartbeat pounding in his ears, this was wrong, horrifically wrong, this wasn't...they never mentioned, never once taught him anything like this...!
? s?d?
He moves, whether to get up or lie down, he doesn't know and the motion sends his sprawling on the floor and his wrist throbs and he can hear his own voice, as if from a deep, black well, his pathetic whimpers and the hard grip of his arms on his arm but it doesn't stop, doesn't stop, why, why won't it stop...?!
His eyes fly open when a sudden gust of air passes his cheek and another scream is trapped I bus throat, a strangled moan leaving his lips as his back meets something cold, something hard, wrung through a sudden, vice-like grip on his neck and the touch is cold, really cold, cold as death.
It's only then does he realize that his ears are picking up on something and it takes him a moment to realize that he's hearing words, spoken in a soft, soothing, unfamiliar voice.
"...quite skinny, aren't you?"
He moves his neck and yellow fills his vision, vibrantly bright, yellow eyes, framed by wisps of black hair that frame a pretty face and a cruel smile.
He manages to see all this before the stranger leans in and their lips meet, a clumsy kiss with shock-numbed lips. He shudders as a cold hand sneaks under his shirt and smears warmth on his skin, a shiver trailing his spine and leaving his lips in a hitch of breath.
It's only when he smudges his cheek and sneaks in his mouth, only then does the coppery taste strike up a memory in his mind, only then does he see the red dripping off the man's cheek and chin.
Only then does he look down and see a person at his feet, limbs akimbo, like a puppet with its strings snapped mid-performance and surrounded in more of the red, that hopelessly cruel red.
Pale pink eyes and a bleeding mouth is all he sees of the 'puppet's' face before he feels a hard yank on his arm, his aching arm and he looks back up to see his own arm, papery-white, lax.
His eyes are drawn back to the clock on his wrist that had been counting the seconds to the best and worst moment of his life, sees a screen with spiderweb cracks, the rim biting into his skin, dripping identical red.
The numbers on the screen are not at zero.
They're not even displaying anything. All he can see is the blank white of the screen.
"I wasn't pleased to hear that my brother had found his soulmate...ah, no", the stranger says with a chuckle that seems to freeze the blood in his veins and he learns that his fingers are shaking only when he laps at the blood from his wrist and they meet the cold of his skin.
"That's putting it mildly. I was livid. But you...I wasn't expecting to find a weak little thing like you here. You're lucky, you know. If I hadn't got to you first, that idiot would have choked you to death with just a hug of his. And I..." He licks his lips, touching upon the blood of his face and Shintaro sees the glint of a pointed fang as his mouth curls into an unnerving grin, "I would like to squeeze the life out of your sad, pathetic shell of a body but...I've changed my mind."
And the man's gloved hand is near his own, pushed up to reveal his own clock.
A row of zeroes flash back at him.
"Let's get to know each other better, shall we? Kisaragi Shintaro?"