Warnings: in this chapter, there is depiction of an unhealthy relationship, asphyxiation (via strangulation as well as submersion in water), rough sex, dub-con since Subaru is in a really funky head space, cigarette burns— and some really weird aftercare. Don't ask. It is what it is. There is also mentions of past imprisonment, and Setsuka, if that bothers you.
Once he figures out how to do it, it's relatively simple. The metal wire, he buys from a nearby hardware store. There's a power source conveniently built into the wall below the window, which he sticks one end of the wire into. The other end, he winds around the metal sill a few times.
That done, he slaps the ofuda on the metal sill with some vicious satisfaction. It'll amplify the charge pretty painfully, but he lives on the twenty-second floor— no one else comes up here. He settles down to complete the paperwork for the last police case he'd assisted in, and eventually falls asleep on the couch, papers strewn over the coffee table.
He is woken by the tingle of a familiar magic, and the even more familiar odor of cigarette smoke. It's twilight out, sky purpling and fading quickly into a deep indigo. The first thing he sees when he raises his head is the bleary outline of his ofuda, pointedly cleansed of the spell he'd imbued it with. A man sits smoking by the window, wire idly twirling itself into an unexpectedly realistic stag in his hand.
"That was a little rude," Seishirou says mildly, "One would almost feel unwelcome."
"Fuck you," Subaru spits.
"Patience, Subaru-kun," the end of the wire tucks itself away into the figurine as Seishirou sets it aside, standing, "We're getting there."
That had been the third time.
The first time had come as a bit of a shock. He had definitely not expected to see Seishirou again within a year of their last meeting, let alone within the week. Since then, though, Seishirou had come and gone semi-frequently, but without much pattern. Sometimes he'd come through the window in the middle of the night, and sometimes he'd appear out of a crowd in broad daylight. Sometimes he'd appear to Subaru several times within the week, and sometimes he'd disappear for months on end. Subaru had asked about the sporadic intervals once, not really expecting an answer, but Seishirou had unexpectedly indulged his question.
"I travel for work," he had said candidly, before his smile turned slightly cruel, "It's not always in Tokyo that a person offends a very important someone."
He remembered what Seishirou did, of course, remembered what he was. He could never forget. However, that didn't mean unwelcome reminders did not upset him still.
"Get out," he'd said.
The sex that time had been particularly violent.
Tokyo carries on as she always does, flawed and pitiless, but still possessing that strange element of degenerate beauty. The hatred, grief, and desolation of her occupants spill constantly over into ugly manifestations, spiritual disturbances that call for his attention. It often falls to him to clean up those messes, and so, perhaps more than anyone, he knows how bittersweet life here can be. Yet, the sight of Tokyo at night still fills him with a strange fondness.
He thinks it might be the same for Seishirou as well. Back then, before, he remembered the conversations they sometimes had after a particularly ugly job. He remembers that look on Seishirou's face as he'd said it, that look of bittersweet fondness— still, I really love this Tokyo. He knows now that nothing Seishirou had said in that year had been spoken with complete truthfulness, but those quiet conversations, those intimate moments,those had perhaps been the closest Seishirou had come to honesty during that year.
There are moments now, too, where he feels they approach something resembling understanding— in silence, bodies silhouetted against the neon lights and cigarette smoke. In those moments, it's like his whole body vibrates with the presence of this person beside him, this person that he has never had cause to love, but a person he is immeasurably fond of still.
"Why are you here?" he'd asked during one of those moments, "What changed?"
Seishirou had shrugged.
"You did," he'd said.
"And?"
"And I was curious," then, again with that cruel smile, "There are still so many ways left to break you, Subaru-kun. I had not previously realised that."
The truth is that Seishirou seldom lies in their current life. He is brutally frank, because he knows that the truth can sometimes be more painful than deception. Perhaps back then, there had been a need for lies to keep up his veneer of normalcy, but underneath that persona, Seishirou is a surprisingly truthful person— even if he's not particularly forthcoming regarding his motivations. He deflects when asked about himself, only answering when he knows the truth will hurt most.
Subaru has long confronted the fact that he sometimes prefers being lied to. He has learnt to be careful about what he asks.
A man stands in the shadow of the alley opposite him, smoke curling slowly from the end of his lit cigarette. He allows his client, the unfortunate developer of a haunted construction site, to wring his hand for just a moment longer, and only speaks to decline an invitation to dinner. When he finally manages to extricate himself from his grateful client, he goes to join the man in the alley.
"Thanks," he mumbles as the man reaches over with a lighter.
He is allowed to enjoy his first draw in silence.
"Graves under the construction site?" Seishirou asks disinterestedly.
"Earthquake," Subaru corrects, "A particularly bad one from last month. There were people inside when the building collapsed."
Tokyo had always been prone to earthquakes, but…
"The earthquakes have been getting stronger recently, don't you think?"
Subaru lets his eyes flick momentarily up towards Seishirou. So he had noticed it as well. The man in question leans back against the wall, cigarette balanced between his lips and his hands in the pockets of his black trench coat. He has his sunglasses on. Subaru briefly wonders if he'd come from, or is going to a job, but cuts off that thought before it can properly take root.
"Looks like the Final Day is drawing near."
Subaru shrugs noncommittally, saying nothing, but that doesn't seem to faze Seishirou.
"I find myself looking forward to our battle," the man continues, laughing shortly, "I can't imagine Subaru-kun being capable of killing someone— even me."
Subaru frowns.
"I'm not killing anyone," he says.
A pause. Seishirou turns to him, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh?"
Something about that rubs him the wrong way.
"I'm not like you, Seishirou-san," he bites out, "I don't take lives. In this fight, I'm supposed to protect them."
Seishirou just laughs.
"I don't much care about the fate of this world," he says, absently tapping the ash off the end of his cigarette, "But I wonder if you've realised what it means for me to destroy a kekkai. How many hundreds, perhaps thousands would perish in that single blow— have you thought of that?"
Subaru tenses, but says nothing. What could he say to that?
One broad palm against the wall, beside his ear. When Seishirou steps closer, he just closes his eyes helplessly and allows it to happen— allows Seishirou to tilt his chin up, allows Seishirou to part his lips with a gentle thumb, allows Seishirou to slide a hand into his hair and lean in close.
"You could try to save them from me," Seishirou murmurs against his lips, "But you can't save everyone. The only way you could do that is to kill me, so that I do not destroy any kekkai."
He turns his face aside, frowning.
"Stop it."
"Still, you refuse to kill. You'd rather let me take innocent lives than get your hands dirty. Why?"
He puts one hand against Seishirou's chest, as if to push him away, but the man resists the half-hearted gesture.
"Out of some misguided sense of moral uprightness?"
"I said stop it."
"Out of some deluded sense that you're better than that?"
He puts both hands on Seishirou's shoulders and shoves. This time, the man allows himself to be moved, stepping back with another one of his patronising laughs.
"But you're just lying to yourself, aren't you?" he chuckles derisively, "We both know why you won't kill me, and it's not because of something as noble as morality."
Something in him snaps.
The slap echoes in the empty alley.
There is a moment of stillness. Neither of them had expected that.
Then, suddenly, there's a hand in his collar, hauling him painfully around. He is backed into the wall with an elbow to the throat, head cracking against the concrete. He blinks hard as Seishirou leans in menacingly.
"Sei—"
Seishirou backhands him across the face. The elbow leaves briefly, only to be replaced with a strong hand, lifting him up a good two feet off the floor. His voice dies in his throat, suffocated.
"Shhh," Seishirou whispers dangerously, "Be quiet now."
Half-conscious, he tries to kick Seishirou in the crotch, but the man must have expected that. He is standing between Subaru's thighs. He beats weakly against Seishirou's arms and chest to no effect. The man is laughing disbelievingly.
"Oh, Subaru-kun," he says, "You have become so entertaining."
Seishirou-san, he tries to say, reaching up to grip the wrist at his throat, but he has no air with which to speak. His vision is darkening around the edges. He can vaguely feel sensation fading from his extremities. Seishirou had done this to him before on several occasions, but never this long. His fingers loosen, arm falling down to his side. He is going to die. Seishirou is going to kill him.
Seishirou-san, he thinks, before everything goes black.
He wakes on the floor of his living room. Seishirou is sitting on the couch in his shirtsleeves, reading one of the few books he keeps in his apartment. He looks up when Subaru makes an unsuccessful attempt to sit up.
"Ah," he says, putting the book down, "You're awake."
That's all the warning he gets before he is being dragged by the hair into the bathroom. The tub has been filled with water.
"Seishirou-san—"
"Be quiet."
He is brought down with a kick to the back of his knees, then Seishirou is shoving his head underwater. He tries to scream, but it only comes out as a muted gurgle, as an eruption of bubbles around his face. At this angle, he is completely helpless. He cannot even touch Seishirou. As his vision begins to darken once more, he instinctively begins to gulp down water. He can't— he's going to drown.
Just as he begins to lose consciousness for a second time, Seishirou yanks him up.
He retches. Water pours onto the floor, followed quickly by the remnants of his lunch. He is vaguely thankful that he's been under-eating. He draws in a sobbing breath, but before he can even finish that breath, he is being shoved underwater again. Water in his airways. Water in his lungs. His struggles slow. He is pulled up, he vomits it out.
Seishirou grips him tightly by the jaw, slapping him nonchalantly a few times on one cheek.
"Don't fall asleep now," he says casually, "That would be rude."
"Don't," he sobs, "Seishirou-san. Don't."
"Sorry," Seishirou apologises insincerely, and shoves his head under again.
He struggles weakly until he can no longer muster the strength to struggle, holds his breath until his body reflexively begins to breathe against his will. Water rushes into his body. Seishirou lets him up again just when he thinks it's over for him. The water comes back up the way it came.
A loud gasp, and then he's being pushed back down again. The cycle repeats.
He can't even think.
The third time, he only struggles for a moment before going limp, unresisting. It is only when everything begins to go blurry that his body takes over for him, fighting desperately against its apparent end. Seishirou brings him back up as his instinctual thrashing begins to die.
He retches one last time onto the tiles. This time, there is only water, bile, and tears.
He flops back into Seishirou's chest, sobbing wordlessly with a senseless, animal pain. His gasps for air come short and frantic, but somehow it isn't enough. He thinks he might be hyperventilating. He isn't sure. He isn't sure of anything.
"Shhh," Seishirou soothes, "Deep breaths. Don't cry, you're only making it worst."
Seishirou-san, he tries to sob, but he can't even speak. There is no breath left in him.
"Deep breaths," Seishirou says again, and shifts him to sit against his broad chest. A large, warm hand is rubbing soothingly at his back, a small comfort he can't help but respond to. With a final hiccup, his breathing begins to slow.
A towel wipes gently at his face, the unoccupied arm curling around his back. He lets his head fall against Seishirou's shoulder. His entire front is wet from his splashing, but the man doesn't seem to care. He closes his eyes as deft fingers divest him of his soaked shirt and reach for his pants, feeling strangely hot and trembly all over.
The hand pauses on the buckle of his pants.
"Oh, Subaru-kun," Seishirou chuckles, "You're hard."
His eyes snap open.
He is, oh, he is.
Seishirou reaches down, but he slaps the hand away and scrambles out of the man's lap. His back meets the side of the tub.
"Don't touch me," he snarls.
Seishirou moves away, hands up, eyebrow raised.
He tries to draw his thighs up protectively, but the movement only serves to remind him of the predicament between them. He needs. He needs so badly he's shaking, needs so badly that he doesn't even know what to do with himself. His body feels hot all over, hands trembling. He's going out of his mind. He can't— he needs—
Frantically, he begins to push his clothes out of the way. His hands are barely listening to him, his fingers clumsy and stiff. He can't— He fumbles for so long that when he finally grasps himself, he can't help but let out a long, high whine. He feels so hot, hot all over. He can't think. Arousal has never felt like this. He screws his eyes shut and tries to bring himself off but— his hands— he can't— he can't come. His hands are shaking too badly to be of any use. He throws his head back against the rim of the tub with a desperate keen.
Seishirou reaches for him again, and this time he doesn't resist. He lets Seishirou pull the rest of his clothes off, lets Seishirou arrange his uncooperative limbs. He sobs helplessly, bare thighs bent up on either side of Seishirou's waist, as strong fingers curl around him.
"You're beginning to hyperventilate again," Seishirou tells him calmly, "I'm going to need you to breathe, Subaru-kun. "
He tries, but he can't seem to draw enough breath. He begins to panic.
"Seishirou—" he sobs, "I can't— I don't— what's— happening?"
"Adrenaline. It's a normal response. Breathe."
"Sei—"
"Breathe with me."
He tries his best, which seems to be enough for Seishirou.
"That's it."
The hand grasping him begins to stroke. He shuts his eyes tight against the pleasure. It's almost too much. His hands fly up to fist in Seishirou's shirt.
"Seishirou-san," he gasps, "I can't— I'm gonna—"
"Come."
He tries to muffle his voice against Seishirou's shoulder as his climax crests upon him. It carries him high, higher than he thinks he can bear. At the peak, Seishirou presses a finger into him, dry, and the pain of it— he throws his head back, cries echoing high and desperate against the walls. He's— he's breaking apart.
The tears come fast and furious after that. He vaguely registers the damp washcloth over his belly and between his legs, vaguely registers being carried naked out the door, vaguely registers the creak as Seishirou sits on the bed with him cradled in his lap. There's a hand stroking through his hair, lips pressed to his temple.
The way Seishirou holds him, gently, tenderly, like he's something precious— it hurts. He doesn't understand. He can't understand that.
"Don't—" he manages through his gasps, "—treat me so kindly. If you're going to hurt me, then hurt me. I can't— I don't— I don't know what to do with this."
He loses himself in a fresh bout of slightly hysterical tears.
When it dies down, he feels abruptly exhausted. Everything seems so far away, as if he's staring out at the world through a long, dark tunnel, disconnected from his own body. He can't feel anything, can't bring himself to care about anything. He thinks that if he could, he would feel something about the fact that the fingers in his hair have stopped.
He dispassionately allows himself to be moved out of Seishirou's lap. He curls up numbly at the edge of the bed as Seishirou lights a cigarette, smoking it slowly, before standing it against the ash-tray on the bedside table.
Rough fingers fist suddenly in his hair. He allows Seishirou to move him, to arrange his body as he sees fit. When he's flipped onto his front, he goes with it. When his legs are spread, he doesn't resist. He hears, as if from a great distance, the click of a plastic cap. A cold gel is slicked around his entrance. Seishirou does not loosen him before lining himself up. He knows that it will hurt. He's still too tight.
Seishirou enters him in a single, brutal thrust. His mouth falls open, but he doesn't make a sound, not even when Seishirou begins to thrust violently in and out of him. He is vaguely aware that he's bleeding. The colors around him dull further.
The thrusts slow, and then stop. The fingers in his hair tighten, pulling his head back, but he remains limp.
A pause.
Seishirou reaches for something by the bed.
He hears the sizzle before he feels the pain, a pain so deep it seems to radiate through his bones, shocking him unceremoniously back from his muted headspace. He is screaming before he can control it, spasming and bucking under the press of cigarette to blistering skin. Seishirou keeps him pinned through it all. He continues to twitch even after the cigarette leaves his skin.
"Don't you know," Seishirou whispers, "That it's rude not to pay attention to the person you're with?"
The cigarette touches him briefly right above the first burn. He lets out a short scream, more out of fear and shock than actual pain. Seishirou goes on to burn a line of shallower blisters up his spine, each burn perfectly spaced apart. By the end, he is writhing helplessly away from the pain, choking on sobs.
When Seishirou leans down, sinking teeth into his nape above the last burn, he can feel the wicked curl of lips against his skin.
Seishirou is sitting on the couch when he wakes in the morning, reading the same book he'd been reading the day before. Upon closer inspection, he realises that it's a Japanese edition of Chicken Soup for the Soul. The book had been a strange and unsolicited present from a distant aunt, gifted to him when he'd been bedridden in Kyoto— bedridden, in fact, because of Seishirou. Chicken Soup for the Soul. He thinks he may cry.
The man looks up when he stumbles into the doorway, naked, pale, and limping. He can barely stand, and he hurts too much to put on clothes.
"You're awake," Seishirou notes, and runs a critical eye down his body, "You look terrible."
Ten upon ten for brutal honesty. He does not much appreciate it this morning.
"—your fault," he manages to whisper. His throat is as wrecked as the rest of him.
"That it is."
Seishirou puts down the book and stands. He puts up only a token protest when the man scoops him up into his arms, carries him into the bathroom, and sets him on the counter. He feels fragile, like he's going to shake right apart at any moment, and it probably says nothing good about him that instead of feeling angry at what's been done to him, he kind of just wants to be held by the man who hurt him.
"I'm not wearing anything," he does hoarsely protest, because that is a legitimate reason to resist being manhandled by a fully dressed man. His protest is ignored. Seishirou reaches up into the cabinets and locates a first-aid kit with a worrying ease. Subaru didn't even know that he had a first aid kit.
"This isn't yours," Seishirou tells him then, "I bought this from the convenience store while you were sleeping, because you didn't have one. That's very stupid of you." He washes his hands before opening the box and producing a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a packet of cotton balls, and a pair of forceps. He sets them down, then moves Subaru to sit on the floor by the drain. "Turn around please."
Subaru obeys, wincing as Seishirou gently washes his back with warm water. The burns down his back sting under the spray, even despite the gentle setting.
Seishirou pats him down carefully with a soft towel, before retrieving the forceps and the alcohol-soaked cotton. He can't help but remember the year of the Bet as Seishirou expertly sets about disinfecting the burns, applying a numbing antiseptic cream once he's done. If Subaru closes his eyes and ignores his own nakedness, he can almost imagine the kindly Seishirou of his teens in place of this cold, hard man.
He can hear Seishirou pouring alcohol onto a new cotton ball behind him.
"Lie back and spread your legs."
His eyes fly open. He turns around.
"Excuse me?" he demands.
Seishirou looks up, and raises a brow as he sets the bottle of rubbing alcohol down.
"You were bleeding yesterday," he says, like it's really that simple, "I need to disinfect you."
The look in his eye seems to say do as I say, or I will make you. It is a look that Subaru is familiar with, and unfortunately one that he knows Seishirou will follow up on— and so he shuts his eyes, humiliated, and does as he is told. He endures the spray of water, the clinical hand between his legs. He keeps his eyes closed and his face turned away from the metallic click of forceps, tries to ignore the wet dab of cotton at his entrance.
Seishirou stands briefly to dispose of the cotton ball. When he opens his eyes, he can see that it is pink with blood. He turns away again as Seishirou returns to sit between his legs.
"Your skin is always so white," Seishirou says absently, reaching for the antiseptic cream, "Like marble. You know most mammals synthesise the majority of their vitamin D from sunlight?"
Subaru does not reply, but that does nothing to stop Seishirou.
"Red does look so very pretty on you, though," he continues, "I think that's the best part about making you bleed."
The sound of a screw cap being undone.
"I still remember the sleeves of my mother's kimono."
He tenses against clinical fingers, covered in a cold cream.
"She had very small, very red lips, and skin as white as snow. She loved the red camellias that grew in the backyard. She loved the way they looked against the snow, but she didn't get to see that very often. That was why she always wore white to kills— because she loved the way that blood would stain her sleeves dark and crimson."
Subaru frowns.
"Your mother—" he begins hesitantly.
"Was the Sakurazukamori before my accession," Seishirou confirms.
There had been a conversation a long time ago, a conversation about broken glass and shattered pottery, about a woman he had thought of as slightly eccentric, creative, but above it all, warm— homely. Subaru cannot reconcile that image he'd had of Seishirou's mother with what he has just learnt.
He draws his legs shut as Seishirou pulls away.
"Why did she not get to see camellias often?" he asks instead.
Seishirou screws the cap of the antiseptic cream back on, and begins to put everything neatly into the first-aid box.
"I did not meet my mother until I was nine. I was born outside of Tokyo and raised by rotating roster of strangers in an old wooden house by the sea. I knew my mother was in Tokyo, but never really wondered about her, or particularly cared to meet her." He closes the box with a firm click, and stands to put it back in the cabinets. "She lived in a traditional Japanese mansion that was strangely empty whenever I visited, but I knew that there must have been people coming in and out when I was gone, because there was a single room inside the mansion that my mother was not allowed to leave. It was a small, dark room where no light shone, surrounded by iron bars— that was where she had been kept for the majority of her life."
Subaru's eyes widen in horror.
"She loved me like she'd never loved anything," Seishirou continues, dispassionate and unconcerned, as if commenting on the weather, "But I did not love her. I killed her with my bare hands and felt nothing. Her blood soaked the snow, the white silk of her kimono, the petals of the red camellia around her body. I still remember how her long black hair fanned out over the crimson snow. She was the prettiest woman I'd ever seen, but she was even prettier in death."
"Stop it," Subaru snaps shakily, sitting up, "What is wrong with you?"
Seishirou laughs outright— but he stops.
Subaru has long confronted the fact that he sometimes prefers being lied to, but there are times such as this that he remembers why that is so. Still, he takes Seishirou's hand when it is offered, and allows the man to hold him, just for awhile. They do not speak again of the argument they had in the alley. They do not speak of death.
Notes: When I initially outlined this thing, I assumed that all chapters would be around 3,000 to 5,000 words.
In retrospect, I must say that that was ill-planned.
It somehow did not occur to me that I would need significantly more words than planned to cover the some 5 years of continuous contact before the events of X. So here, have this 10,000 word monstrosity. I have split it into two chapters so that each one will be around 5,000 words. I am uploading the second part of this chapter along with this part.
