New chapter! Yay! :3 This took forever to get right... and even now I'm not entirely sure I achieved the effect I meant to convey...

Oh well, give it a whirl and decide for yourself.

DISCLAIMER:

The characters and all related material herein are the property of their creators and/or copyright holders, who may be too numerous to name here. Team Hydro and all affiliated parties do not claim ownership of said characters and/or material. Team Hydro does not seek to infringe upon any trademarks, copyright, or any other existing legal document that may be connected to any of the above.

DearScon! – Chapter 4

The suite was quiet when Khi unlocked the door and entered the room. The silent journey of the elevator's ascent had proven most calming; the hotel had disabled the background noise normally considered 'elevator music' for the convention, as it tended to irritate younger DearS, upsetting them; personally, Khi found it mildly annoying, but ultimately tolerable. The ride to their floor had also been very useful for refocusing himself on the task at hand; better to be cool-headed than panicking.

"Natsuki-san?" he called out as he looked around the suite, but no answer came, and as he scanned the room he noticed it was mostly untouched since they'd left earlier. Natsuki's things were strewn on the floor at the foot of the fold-out couch in a strange, organised kind of chaos that was uniquely Natsuki-like; it gave him the impression that she'd risen quickly from her seat and scattered them in her haste. She… ran away?

There were other signs too, that the room had recently been vacated before, or perhaps upon, his arrival; there was a half-glass of water next to where Natsuki had obviously been sitting, miraculously un-spilled, and a large jug resting on a footstool nearby that was almost empty. The space she'd been occupying, surrounded by the possessions she'd brought with her, was tiny, cramped, as though she had been curled on the floor, rather than sitting…

Something's not right…Khi thought, and briefly dipped into the bathroom before checking the bedroom; both were empty. So, where had she gone? Khi shook his head and sighed in exasperation. She can make things so difficult sometimes, he thought, feeling a sense of mild amusement tinged by worry, and closed his eyes.

It had been a long time since he'd tried this technique last, having been forced to use it once to find Nia's hiding place onboard the ship, after she'd fled from a particularly-harsh beating from Rubi-sama, and it had proven difficult to do at the time. But his earlier conversation with Rai-san had proven inspirational at the very least, and he was confident that it would work if the link between himself and Natsuki was indeed strengthening.

He settled into a slow, rhythmic pattern of breathing that quickly fell in-step with the beat of his heart, in with one set of twin beats and out with the next, rinse-and-repeat, before he breathed out once, heavily, and waited in silence. The tiny, returning sound he was searching for came to him slowly – another heartbeat, and as it grew louder in his ears, it occurred to him that it was no mere pitter-patter but thundering like a bullet train, badump-badump-badump-badump…

It was the thrumming of a heart whose owner was silently panicking. The source was very near, a few arms' lengths perhaps, but he stood and waited nonetheless; she knew he was here, and he was waiting to see if she would appear of her own accord.

She wouldn't of course, Natsuki was far too stubborn to give up so easily, he knew this from experience, but he did wonder; was this a game of some kind, perhaps, or was she genuinely hiding from him, and if she was hiding, why? What had she done to be so ashamed of—

Shame, he realised suddenly, the feeling blazing ever-stronger across the link once he recognised it, she feels ashamed… and embarrassed. By the Watcher, why does she feel so ashamed? …What did I do?

It was his first instinct to question his actions, as it was for every DearS; he knew he hadn't doneanything, but it was a gut reaction, nigh-on irrepressible, and perhaps moreso for himself than most. His position in the community demanded as such, and under normal circumstances it was most helpful to check himself when his instinct suggested he do so.

This time he ignored it, though, and grasped mentally for the sound of the heartbeat like a guideline with his heart-sense, and stepped toward it. Opening his eyes, he found himself standing before the closet door, and as he reached for the handle, he heard a tiny, stifled catching of breath inside. Top shelf, his heart-sense told him, curled up in the back corner. So that's where she's hiding. But, why?

His own heart rate suddenly accelerated to match hers, his brow becoming damp as he gently slid back the door on its track, and he said softly, "Natsuki-san… why are you hiding from me?" His question was met by silence, except for the pounding of their hearts in his ears, beating in synchrony now. He could just see her, over the top of her suitcase, laying still on her side with her back to him; she had placed the case between herself and the door of the closet, like some sort of makeshift wall behind which she could hide away. He tried his luck again, hoping for a response.

"If I did something to upset you, then I'm sorry…"

"Go away…" came her hoarse, sharply-whispered reply, "Leave me alone."

"Natsuki-san, if you tell me what is wrong, I'm sure I can help you. Please, let me help—"

"Go away, Khi. I mean it." she snapped at him this time, irritation and embarrassment evident in her voice. She was struggling with something beneath the cloud of anger, he decided, and he wasn't sure he liked the flavour of it as it flowed across their link.

"I'm afraid I must insist, Natsuki-san. I can't help you if you won't tell me what's--AHH!!!" He cried out, startled by her kicking the suitcase at him, and he tumbled to the floor as she bowled him over while making her escape.

"Leave me alone, dammit!!" she yelled, and flew straight into the bathroom as Khi picked himself up to move after her; alas, just as he reached the door, she drew the bolt and locked herself in. He heard himself let slip a mild curse in his native tongue under his breath, and straightened himself up indignantly. Cornering her in the closet had been, in retrospect, a step entirely too far in the wrong direction, and he berated himself for being so foolish as to not see it.

It would be a fair while before she would come out now, he realised, but in the meantime, he could keep trying; there was little else to do at this point, and he certainly wasn't going to leave her in this distraught state to go back down to the convention by himself. Whatever had been troubling her beforehand, he had only exacerbated it, made the situation worse, and so he resolved now to wait it out as best he could. She would speak to him eventually, he was sure; she always did, and he need only wait.

"Natsuki-san… something is troubling you and I want to help you, but I need you to let me. Please, tell me what is wrong…" he implored her, but to no avail; his plea was met only with silence. Quietly he resigned to wait, stepped to the side of the door and seated himself next to the frame, back against the wall and knees drawn up to his chest. She would have to come out eventually, he reasoned, and she would find him waiting; perhaps by that time she would have calmed herself enough to explain it all to him.

--

Inside the bathroom, behind the locked door, Natsuki sat against the glass door of the shower unit, knees drawn up, head laid against them, wrapped in the relative protection of her arms. Slowly she clenched and unclenched a fist and clenched it again, and stomped hard on the urge to punch something. Dammit, why wouldn't he leave her alone?!

How could she have let him see her like that, cowering in the closet like a pathetic child?And now she was doing it again… in the bathroom of all places… what would Amida think of her now, with all her smiling and advice…? Fine advice too, when the first thing to come out of her mouth in response to his offer of help was a thinly-veiled threat…

Now he probably hates me, she thought… but no… no, he didn't, a part of her whispered, with an air of such certainty that she was reluctant to ignore it. Wishful thinking perhaps, but she found it strangely-reassuring…

Natsuki-san…

She could almost hear his voice, like he was whispering ever-so-softly in her ear, and she shuddered with a small, sweet chill at the thought him being so close, his breath tickling her neck…

Sharply she shook her head, and the feeling went away, briefly. Not yet, not yet… she wasn't ready for that yet, not even remotely, but she needed it all the same, to feel the sensations of his hands gliding on her skin, whispering her name… Stop-stop-STOP IT, she thought, just stop! But it wouldn't, of course, because now the freight train was rumbling along in her mind again, picking up speed and barrelling unstoppably toward a new destination …

And he would be there, waiting, in her mind's eye, at the end of the line. Because Khi was the destination, and so help her, the damn brakes were broken and the throttle was jammed on 'full' and it was entirely her own doing. This is it, she thought to herself desperately, this is where you've been headed all along, can't stop now, and dammit-all he's waiting outside that stupid door and he's not gonna go away, nuh-uh, not on your damn life… She knew that suddenly, that he was waiting outside, just to the left of the door, and if she were to get up and open that door she would practically fall over him…

Fall for him… her mind muttered, reinventing the words into something she hadn't intended, and she slapped it down, stamped it flat and kicked it clean to the other side of the planet but it'd be back again in no-time, creeping up on her and whispering those traitorous thoughts to her and sooner or later she'd start believing them, because in-truth she already did and she just didn't want to admit it yet.

Can't admit it to yourself then who can you admit it to, it whispered again, 'cause you like him, dammit, and you want him so bad it hurts to think about it so you don't, but eventually… eventually you're gonna have to face it, 'cause it'll die if you don't and god-dammit, you are not gonna let that happen!

Entirely on autopilot she rose to her feet and stepped in the direction of the door; what she'd do when she opened it, exactly, her raging hormones still hadn't quite decided, but she'd cross that bridge when she—

What if he doesn't want me? The doubting half, the half of her that usually made the most logical sense that had momentarily been shoved to the wayside, roared back to the forefront of her mind, screaming like a banshee, and it put an imaginary shotgun to her libido with the threat of pulling the trigger. The effect was instantaneous, and her burst of resolve fizzled erratically, beginning to sag.

What if I'm doing something stupid… he'll think I'm an idiot… a bigger idiot than he probably already thinks I am… Steadily, one shuffling step backward at a time, she retreated from the door. Her hand had been mere millimetres from the thumb lock, fingertips still all atingle in waylaid anticipation…

Slowly she placed her hands on the edge of the basin, her resolve crumbling as she reached for the cold tap and twisted softly. Her rational side was reasserting itself, and it insisted that a face-full of icy water would force her to resume the process of generating clear thought – the first poignant product of which was that she did not,in any capacity, desire Khi to be her slave. The very word was synonymous with images she considered vile and inhumane, and her sense of morality went utterly berserk at the thought of her turning her best friend into a prisoner of her will – her slave.

Twisting back on itself, the same part of her dredged up the flood of information that had become public knowledge in the wake of her brother's departure: the DearS were, on the most fundamental level, a slave race; they were psychologically and biologically tuned to serve the needs of others as a species.

In terms of their survival, the point was moot: they bound themselves, both individually and as a species, to others in servitude in order to live and thrive. Their entire species, from the Sheep-types like Ren and Miu and Khi to the Dog-types like Fina and Xaki and even that lunatic Rubi, could not survive, couldn't live without the constant presence of someone to provide for, to give to, regardless of exactly what they were asked to give. They were genetically conditioned to serve the needs of a master.

And why? Because their kind, put simply, thrived on their ability to make that master happy. The DearS were a symbiotic race that willingly enslaved themselves to others in return for the stream of positive emotional feedback – positive emotions that, when directed at them, made them healthy and strong and allowed them to keep on living.

She remembered back to what was now referred to universally as 'the photographer incident', when a press photographer had caused outrage with his mistaken claim that he'd witnessed a DearS – Miu – attempting to 'murder' her homestay host in his hospital bed. The national outrage that resulted, the outpouring of negative emotion directed at them almost proved genocidal for the entirety of the DearS population on the face of the planet.

When the truth came out, of course, everyone felt verystupid for a very long time, but that had been quickly overwhelmed by the sense of relief that not one single DearS had been lost, despite the bout of chronic illness that had struck every DearS nationwide like a bullet. The aliens themselves recovered with amazing speed once the flow of positive emotions returned, like their very lifeblood had been turned back on.

…Am I poisoning him right now, thinking like this? Am I…hurting him?she wondered, and resisted the urge to press her ear to the door, to listen for the erratic, heavy breathing that Nia's condition during that time had etched into her memories – breathing that still gave her nightmares, knowing what it meant. God, please don't let me hurt him… I couldn't live with myself if I did…

Slowly she reached down into the water with her uninjured hand and brought the cold liquid to her face, let it slip over her skin, and began to think, clearly and concisely, about what she wanted. Pulling the plug and turning off the faucet, she dried her face with the fluffy white towel next to the basin and stepped over to the door – not to open it, but to sit next to it. She wasn't ready to open it yet.

He was still sitting out there, she knew; how she knew was something she couldn't quite fathom yet, but she knew nonetheless, and she felt the sudden urge to sit with him in spirit, back-to-back in the way they'd often done at school in the summer months of the year before, out on the little patch of grass beside the running track. The thought brought pleasant memories to mind; sunshine, white clouds, blue sky that she'd happily spend hours with him staring at.

She'd sat with him once at night, too, on the roof of the apartment, where he'd spent the better part of an hour explaining to her how different the stars looked when you were out among them, how there were so many countless more than could be seen from the surface of the Earth. She treasured that memory along with a hundred others, a thousand others of time well-spent in his company, and realised that, at this moment, she wanted nothing more in the whole damn world than to be with him.

It occurred to her that achieving that would mean enslaving him, that from his perspective she would become his Master, and he her slave, and all would be right with his world – and she didn't care what her sense of 'morality' felt about that, because she wanted to be with him, and if that's what it took…

Like Onii-chan and Ren… and Amida and her master… she thought, and found herself vaguely surprised that the idea didn't trouble her nearly half as much as she thought it would, which was to say, it didn't trouble her at all.

Her brother had never wanted a slave either, and had refused to consider Ren as such regardless of the way others, including herself, had reacted toward him when Ren became ditzy enough in front of other people to remind everyone of her self-proclaimed status, often to Takaya's chagrin.

Ren was proud of the fact, because it meant she was fulfilling the role she'd been born for - or attempting to fulfil it, when Onii-chan became too flustered by her clumsy advances to know what to do with her. In the end, it was his acceptance of their master-slave relationship, and of her love for him, that had given the DearS a chance at a future, and humanity a second chance to prove itself a host capable of aiding their rejuvenation.

She was so proud… would Khi be proud, too? She found herself hoping so, but ultimately it seemed inconsequential to whether or not he would want her.

And that was the question: would he accept her? What if he refused her?

But he won't… the feeling that had been urging her toward him all along assured her, insistent that he would accept her; that he would be happy to be with her, to serve her… that he would do anything to please her and all she had to do was ask. And as much as she had been reluctant to admit it for as long as she had felt this weird sensation pulling her toward him, it nonetheless felt so right to accept that that was what she wanted.

I want him,she said to herself flatly, matter-of-factly, like it was the simplest decision in the world to make, and it's time that I faced that—

A sudden shuffling noise behind her shook her from her reverie; it shocked her to realise that Khi had gotten up, and was… going… to bed? Yes, he was going to bed. How she arrived at that conclusion baffled her once again, but she knew it to be a fact all the same. What it meant, though, was just as shocking to her: in all the time they had been friends, she had never known Khi to leave a problem half dealt-with.

She knew him to sit up all night tackling the same set of math equations over and over until he utterly shattered them and could run through them off the top of his head – he did not ever walk away from a problem. So… why was he leaving her to her own devices in the bathroom? How come?

Outside the bathroom, Khi slowly rose up from his seat next to the door and stretched his aching joints, aiding his movements with just a flicker of gravity manipulation, gently relieving the pressure of his own weight until the blood circulation returned to his numbed limbs, so he could avoid the unpleasant tingling sensation he would experience otherwise. He had noticed how dark it had gotten outside without him realising, the brightly-lit night of Tokyo Bay rolling in thickly.

He had worn himself down, so much so that Natsuki might say he was 'running on fumes', and now his tightly-wound body clock was demanding that it was time for sleep. So focused had he been on the empathic link, steadily growing ever-stronger between himself and Natsuki, that now he was only just barely conscious, enough to be falling asleep for scant moments before snapping awake again.

Solemnly, and with great reluctance he resolved to leave his post for a few hours' rest, and check back later to make sure that Natsuki had left her makeshift panic room for some rest of her own.

If he awoke in a while and found that she had not come out, had fallen asleep hiding in the bathroom, he would simply displace the door lock, retrieve her, and put her to bed – but not before she had been given a chance to come out of there on her own. She had some issues to resolve, whatever they were, and hiding herself away in solitude was simply her way of getting the job done to a degree she deemed satisfactory.

Knowing that any words he spoke would fall on deaf ears, he had done his silent best to coax her out, pulsing their link every so often in an effort to let her know that he was still there for her, and now he did so one last time, telling her that he was going to get some rest but would not be far away; he could only hope that she would hear him on some subconscious level and would come out by herself, because she would be very displeased with him to find herself waking up in a futon she did not remember getting into.

Lightly, Khi moved off into the living room, turning on the lights as he went. He rearranged the closet to the state it had been in before Natsuki had taken refuge there, and removed the two futons from the bottom shelf; after depositing one on the sofa, he gathered together Natsuki's scattered possessions and put them in her backpack for safekeeping, and set out the sofa-bed. He hoped that when she saw it, it would encourage her to rest; to say her day had been stressful would be something of an understatement, and she would certainly need some sleep.

Picking up the remaining futon for himself, he closed the closet door on his way to the bedroom, and cast one last, long gaze at the bathroom door, willing her one last time to open it; stubborn as always, she did not, and the door remained firmly locked. He expected nothing less, and smiled sadly, wishing that, perhaps one day she would open herself to him, and he would truly understand her.

Futon under one arm, Khi slowly closed the bedroom door for the night, and shut it as loudly as he dared to without upsetting the guests in the rooms around theirs, hoping Natsuki would hear it, and understand that it was safe to come out…

Notice to all readers: The rating of this story will be stepped up to 'M' upon posting of the next chapter, for sexual content. 'M' was the original story rating, and we always intended it to go back up eventually.

The time's a-coming, peoples... Guess you could say it's all kicking off now, or rather, it's about to. Chapter 5 is in the works right now, and I'll try to have it finished ASAP.

Peace-out, folks!