Immortality

By: CrystallicSky

Disclaimer: I don't own Xiaolin Showdown or any of its characters, nor do I make any profit or attempt to with the writing of this or any of my other pieces.

Warnings: Slight language, homsexuality, fluff, etc.

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In the all-consuming blackness of Chase Young's bedroom, two hushed voices began to speak.

"Are you serious?" one asked, the tone youthful and almost naïve, obviously not the dragonlord's.

"Of course I am," the other assured. This voice was stern with decades upon decades of wisdom; deep, dark, strong, and jaded to whatever sense of goodness that yet lurked in the world. It was Chase's without question. "I would not ask it in the first place if I were not entirely serious about it."

There was a silence before the warm blankets shifted, the bed's inhabitant sitting up. "How?" the young man asked, for though the voice was young, it was nowhere near young enough to confuse genders over, and the one who shared Chase's bed was undoubtedly another male.

Another shift of blankets followed the question, the everlord rising to sit with his lover. "I do not yet know," he admitted. "I simply know that you are mine and that I wish for you to be mine for quite some time." Sheets and comforter rustled against one another as Chase reached out and caught the youth he bedded with a warm embrace; kissing his neck fondly. "I doubt I shall ever be ready to surrender what we have," he murmured hotly against that smooth column of throat, feeling his lover's pulse quicken beneath his lips.

The young man shuddered at the wave of passion that flooded through him, fueled by his intense love for the wicked beast that handled him so gently.

"Me, either," he assured, "but…we'd have to figure something out if you…want me forever. I get the feeling you wouldn't like it if I sold my soul to someone."

Chase frowned and gripped his lover tighter, possessively. "No," the dragonlord agreed, "I would not be amenable to that. Your heart and soul belong to me, and I should like to keep it that way."

The youth snuggled close, hoping to dispel any unwarranted worries the elder man might have. "Then…maybe nanites?" he suggested. "I'd have to build a lot of them for it to work, but…it could work if I programmed them to make consistent repairs and keep my body working at peak efficiency all the time. I'd never get old or die."

"And what if they should malfunction?" Chase demanded quietly, pushing his bedmate to the mattress to mouth affectionately at his collarbone, not out of lust; simply a desire to touch and taste. "You could begin aging if they stopped functioning properly and you might not even realize until it was too late. I do want you as long as I can have you and I would keep you even if you were an old man, but I would prefer you young and healthy…" He spooned the young man, nuzzling the back of his neck with fondness and emphasizing the warm and wonderful fit of their bodies. "It is best for both of our interests."

"Mmm," the youth hummed, reveling in the pleasant feel of the attentions lavished upon him. "I guess you're right, but…what else is there?"

"Many things," the everlord promised. "Put your mind to use outside of the scientific. What else can you think of?"

There was a long pause. "Mermaid?" the younger male inquired. "I don't know if it's true, but…there's at least the legend that if you eat a mermaid's flesh, you'll live forever."

"That is, indeed, true," Chase confirmed, "but I would prefer that be saved as a last resort. While there are no consequences to the soul, devouring a mermaid will addict you to the taste. You will be driven to eat them as often as you can and, like myself, end up in a position where there are very few left of what you need. Preventing you from eating mermaid's flesh after you have eaten it once would not work, either, as you would desire it with every last inch of your being and pine away over it until the end of days."

"I don't know" the man's lover replied irritably. "What else…I mean, I don't suppose the Fountain of Youth is real."

"You're quite right, it isn't."

"Then what am I missing, Chase?"

The warlord remained silent, refusing to answer the question. His lover was smart: he would begin heading in the right direction soon.

"A robot body?" the youth tried. "Maybe a clone? I could transfer my consciousness to them in either case and just have an endless supply to move into once the current body breaks down or gets old."

"No," Chase denied. "How painfully ordinary would your marvelous body become if there were thousands of them to spare? You would be reckless with yourself; do dangerous things you wouldn't normally do for fear of death, and I would have to endure the pain of watching you die perhaps every day until I grew numb to it and failed to care for your pain and well-being."

His bedmate had nothing to say to that.

"And in the case of a robotic form, would you truly be able to live with yourself knowing that you were a machine? That everything you know is merely an amalgamation of data that can be hacked and changed on someone's whim? That when I touch you," a large, warm hand slid alongside a slim waist, coming to rest upon a bony hip, "you aren't feeling it; only being relayed the feeling by receptors that could never truly simulate what skin-to-skin contact feels like?"

"Okay," the boy stopped him, "nix those ideas. But help me out here: what do you want me to suggest?"

"I'm sure you can guess," Chase assured. "Unless your claims of genius are entirely fabricated, you will understand what I mean eventually."

The young man made a sound of obvious frustration. "I really don't know what to say, Chase," he begged, "just tell me! I mean, it's not like I can just share your immortality."

"Or can you?" the dragonlord challenged.

"…what?"

"There is a spell," Chase began. "I have had my eye on it for quite some time. In effect, it would do precisely what you just said: allow you to share in my eternal youth."

"Really?" his lover inquired, sounding almost disbelieving. "Why didn't you just say that in the beginning?"

The elder man was quiet for a long, long time, the only indication that he had not dozed off because of the late hour of the night being his hand which caught hold of his bedmate's; stroking lovingly.

"There is a catch," he eventually said.

"Well…how bad is it?"

"It is far more suited to Xiaolin lovers than for those of us that are Heylin," Chase admitted. "It would bind us together indefinitely, joining us on so deeply a level as to allow us to feel the strongest of one another's emotions. Straying too far from my side or vice versa would induce an irresistible desire to return immediately and the very thought, much less the act of sexually enjoying another being but myself would cause you to become physically ill. Moreover, it is permanent and once it has been done, nothing can take it back."

"What's wrong with that?" the youth wondered, honestly curious.

"Even should you decide at some point that you no longer have feelings for me, you will find yourself unable to leave me or have a relationship with another," the warlord informed. "You will be chained to my side and you will hate me deeply for it."

The body he spooned turned abruptly, two pale hands reaching out to catch his face and force his eyes to meet the beautiful garnet irises he so adored.

"Chase," his lover said firmly, "I won't stop having feelings for you. I've been down that road a couple of times already. Don't you think I know how much easier my life would be if I weren't head-over-heels for a drop-dead gorgeous, centuries old, immortal dragonlord who's clearly out of my league? I've tried to make myself stop loving you before, Chase, and it didn't work; not once." The youth pressed a sweet, saccharine kiss to the elder man's cheek. "I can't see how I'd make it work by not trying."

"You say that now," Chase frowned, still unconvinced, "but what of ten years later? Twenty years later? A hundred years later? Things will change. I will upset you eventually; will make you furious at me to the point of considering murder and there will be nothing you can do about it but hate me in silence."

The younger man snorted, as if amused. "That's already happened," he said. "You're not the easiest guy to get along with and when you want something, you're unbearably stubborn about it no matter what I have to say. A lot of the time I do get so mad at you that I feel like killing you, but I can't, and not because of some spell, either. I couldn't kill you because I know I wouldn't be able to live with myself afterwards knowing I'd killed someone I'm so damn in love with."

"Then, if not that, I will leave you discontent," the warlord asserted. "Now that you have me, I won't live up to what you thought I would be and you will be forced into an eternity of feeling unsatisfied."

"Chase, how many times do I have to say it?" his bedmate wondered. "I love you. You've already turned out a lot different than I thought you would be before all this happened, but I don't care. I like the way you are, and I wouldn't want you to be any different. You're you and I'm me and that's that."

Chase simply sighed, pressing the youth closer to him. "Evil that I am, the very last thing I would wish for you is life as a slave, even as my slave. I would much rather you be happy elsewhere than miserable with me."

"And I'd rather I be happy here than miserable elsewhere. I'm okay with this thing if you're okay with it. If you want me with you forever-"

"I do," Chase promised immediately.

"-then, that's totally awesome," his lover finished. "Do you have any idea how bad I wanted this? I've had dreams about it. I've day-dreamed about it. I've done the prepubescent schoolgirl thing and written in my diary about it! I'm…well, I'm glad that you apparently want it, too."

The everlord looked deeply into his beloved's eyes for any trace of doubt. He saw love; desire; perhaps a pinch of fear, but no doubt.

Only a strong and obvious determination.

"Then, that is what we shall do," he conceded. "We shall bind ourselves to one another, and as for the consequences-"

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," the young man finished for him.

Chase smiled warmly, the kind of smile only very few people living or dead had seen upon his lips.

He was utterly content as he lie here in bed, made cozy outside by another living being's warmth beside him and inside by that being's honest willingness to share his eternity with him.

The dragonlord never believed that Jack Spicer could make him feel in such a way.

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A/N: Just an idea I came up with at school one day trying to force myself to write something in my free time. Thanks for reading, and I hope you liked it! :D