Title: Two Motives

Author: Arisprite

Summary: Fai is terribly wounded, and as luck or fate would have it, they land in Clow Country only just in time to save his life. Kurogane doesn't react well to Fai's close brush with death, but Fai is distracted by the strange noises in the hospital hallways, and the presence of someone unseen in his room at night.

A/N: This fic is entirely the fault of username-goes-here (aka, my roommate Rémy), who not only got me completely shipping Fai and Kurogane before I even watched the anime, let alone read the manga, but also acts out scenarios, including Fai's reaction to certain events in this story. Let's just say that a. she's ridiculous, and b. she's got a good handle on Fai's character, because the story just flowed. So romance/ghost story? Anyone down?

Also, this makes certain assumptions. Firstly, that Fai's vampirism has indeed been purged completely, and he's a regular human wizard person with no healing magic. Second, that Clow Country is actually somewhat advanced technologically and especially magically. We didn't really get to see all the medical facilities, for example, but I'm going to assume they exist, since they had to spend some time there for Kurogane at least to recover, and also that they for some reason look like the Houses of Healing in Minas Tirith. There may be other things, and I'll try to write them out at the end of the chapters.

I will be updating this sporadically, but I'm mostly done, and it WILL be all the way up and complete by Halloween.

"There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance." ― John Lennon

Prologue

It's not like they were asking for a fight when they landed. But, surprise, surprise, here they were, fighting for their lives. Again. Mokona's earring was glowing, and they were literally about to leave, and the people of this backwards world were attacking them and each other, knife, sword and spear in hand.

Kurogane grumbled as he swung his own sword, pushing the mass of fighters back, and attempting not to kill them. What a pain. Glancing around, he could see Syaoran a ways off (taller now, but still not over the heads of this world's men) fighting with his sword and occasional bursts of magic. Fai was as far in the opposite direction, dancing between weapons, with purple runes swirling around him. Mokona squeaked inside his cowl, and Kurogane growled at it.

"C'mon bun, just grab us all and get us out of here!"

He dodged a sword jab, slashing at the legs of the attacker. The man fell to the ground, moaning, and Kurogane stepped over him.

"It's too hard to hold on to them!" Mokona said in his ear, voice wobbling around as Kurogane fought.

"You've done it before!" Kurogane snapped, slashing downwards. He remembered the distance between the group members when they'd been sent to Yama.

"No one was doing magic before! It's makes Fai and Syaoran too slippery!" It chirped, getting jostled by Kurogane ducking under a particularly exuberant warrior's attack. "You have to get closer!"

Kurogane snarled, and began to wade through the mêlée towards Syaoran. The kid kicked and sliced as well as he always did, but he looked grateful to see Kurogane coming towards him. He grabbed Syaoran's cloak, and dragged him out of the middle of the fighting, and towards Fai.

Fai was grinning as he ducked and dodged, spinning around, his cloak and ponytail swinging merrily. The people were pressing in around them, and Kurogane elbowed two fighters out of the way as he moved forward. He was close to Fai, but the idiot was still using magic, so Kurogane didn't think Mokona could grab him quite yet. Kurogane reached out to snag the wizard himself, only to see Fai's body jerk strangely.

The purple magic faltered, flickering out of sight. Fai, eyes wide but confused, stared at his attacker. He grinned with dirty teeth, and pulled jagged knife out of Fai's stomach.

Mokona shrieked in horror, and Kurogane stretched out his hand again-

-magic started flowing around them all, swirling and spinning the way it always did. Kurogane felt it begin, the press and roar of inter-dimensional travel. It was hard to move, but he was still trying to surge forward, his body reacting while his brain was still processing. Fai was only feet away, still standing, nothing at all to indicate anything had happened, but Kurogane had seen the knife. He reached-

-and grabbed hold of Fai's shoulder as the magic dissipated around them. Syaoran stumbled into his back, and Mokona was crying out, but Fai was still upright, Fai was alright, until he lowered a hand to the left side of his stomach. The light fabric he was wearing was blossoming with red.

"Oh," He said, and his hand was bright with blood. His knees buckled. The sound around them seemed to restart.

"Fai!" Kurogane snapped, jumping forward to catch Fai before he fell completely. The man was light and tense in his arms, scrabbling a little at his clothing. Kurogane pressed his hand against where most of the blood seemed to be coming from, and Fai's body tensed even more, but he made no sound, save a tiny grunt as Kurogane pressed on the wound.

Then Syaoran grabbed his arm, pointing.

"Look, we're here! We're safe!"

Kurogane didn't want to pull his eyes away from the rapidly paling mage, but Syaoran sounded happy, and dammit why was he happy, while Fai was bleeding out? But he raised his gaze enough to see the familiar shapes of the Clow Country ruins. The city was behind them, and he remembered that they had hospitals. The realization that they could have landed anywhere was taking his breath away, but here, here Fai could be taken care of.

Fai was holding his arm in a weak grip, panting, and Kurogane held on to the wound, knowing that the kid was bringing help. Fai would be alright. He had to be.