Chapter 7: Here, At the End of Everything
(Haha! Here's yet another for you, Lovise Polaris! I couldn't get the events of this chapter out of my head so I couldn't work on anything else until I got it down. Thanks to Picklez80 (Hmmm, good instincts!), Kittykins (Thanks so much! I like for action scenes to feel as real as possible, so I write and rewrite until they make my heart pound. Now, this chappie will make your heart pound in a different way. I will have to put the unedited copy on AO3 later today. Had to leave out a little bit...), Lovise Polaris (Not to worry, things will heat up nicely now!), Kyuumihaira (Yes, Orochi is too prideful to admit he is in love, but he says it without meaning to sometimes!), Kirenuchiha1 (Ah, he did impregnate Tetsuya in this one, but the prison master ordered the pregnancy aborted. There's more to what happened, as will be seen in this chapter.) Enjoy! Love, Spunky)
I am...still breathing?
How can that be?
I was sinking down into darkness, a place blacker than my heart.
But I felt your hand tighten on mine, Tetsuya.
Did you save me, yet again?
Why?
Orochi heard a very soft sound of deep, soulful regret and tried to move. At first, all he could do was to open his eyes and let them adjust to the dark interior of the place he found himself in. A gentle kido light illuminated the place enough that he could see that the walls were made of some kind of porous stone. And he still smelled water.
Where am I?
What is this place?
And you are still here with me, Tetsuya?
He heard another soft sound of despair and was taken back in time.
"The baby is gone, Tetsuya," he told the youth, his voice flat and toneless...tired, "There is nothing you can do. Crying and starving yourself isn't going to bring him back."
Tetsuya didn't answer, but only continued his soft, muted sounds of misery.
"You have to let this go or you will kill yourself with grief. And what sense is there in that? We all have unfulfilled wishes. And it isn't the wishes that die that should hold power over us. If you can wish for a child, then you can wish for another."
"N-no!" Tetsuya sobbed, his slender hands clenching painfully, "No, I could never feel this again...never! It is too much...to cruel to have my heart teased with fullness, only to return to so much emptiness! My body is weak and empty, and my heart is just as much so!"
He sat near Tetsuya, watching him clutch at the bedding and cry, trying to tell himself, as he had been told once by his own father, that such a thing was disgraceful. A strong man wouldn't carry on so. And in truth, though he recognized the inescapable fact that Tetsuya's body was weak, the youth's heart had always radiated strength...a fact which made him pleasant to possess. Yes, even when Tetsuya's body was bound, restrained and at its weakest and most vulnerable, his heart beat like a demon's. There was fire there, deep beneath the surface that only emerged when everything else was held back. It was the reason why he liked to bind the younger man so much. He found the mingling of those two things intoxicating. But when Tetsuya's heart fell into despair and became vulnerable too, Orochi felt pain. And before Tetsuya's heart could become strong again, that pain had to be dealt with.
He moved closer to Tetsuya, and slipped a bracing arm around him, pulling him up so that he knelt on the bed, then shocking the youth by binding his hands in leather restraints.
"Wh-what are doing? Don't! I will get...! I will become...! I cannot do that again!"
"Be quiet," Orochi answered in a low voice, "I won't get you pregnant again, Tetsuya. No one will."
"What?" Tetsuya asked, blinking and sending another tear rolling down his face, "What do you mean?"
He loosed the tie on the fine, blue yukata, baring the younger man and watching his body shiver in expectation. Tetsuya gave him a surprised look as he traced a shape over the prisoner's pale breast, over his heart.
"You don't want to feel that kind of pain again, ne?" Orochi said, looking into Tetsuya's wide, devastated eyes, "As your master, I will not allow that kind of pain to reach you again."
"But...Orochi-sama likes to cause me pain, does he not? Orochi-sama feels my pain and it arouses him."
"You really don't understand, do you?" Orochi sighed, caressing the leather bonds with his fingertips and resting his head on Tetsuya's shoulder from behind, "I don't care how weak your body is and your pain isn't what arouses me."
"It...it is not?" Tetsuya asked, looking confused.
"No, you fool," Orochi went on, reaching around to caress the snake shaped marking he had made over Tetsuya's heart, "This is what arouses me."
Tetsuya turned his head slightly, gazing at his cousin silently.
"Your heart. Even though your body is weak, your heart keeps beating. As much as I tie you down and cause you pain, it only beats harder and grows stronger. Anything that strengthens it, I will accept. But anything that weakens it," he breathed into the youth's blushing ear, "I will destroy!"
It was as much of an admission as he would ever allow himself.
"That marking is a seal," Orochi told Tetsuya, "Until I remove it, you are in no danger of having your heart broken that way."
Tetsuya stared at him as if he had gone mad. His fingers trembled slightly as he touched the marking questioningly.
"Now, then, I have relieved you of the need for worry. It is your turn to show me your gratitude, Tetsuya," he said, sliding his fingers into the younger man's hair and curling a hand around the back of his neck.
Tetsuya hesitated, still looking into Orochi's depthless black eyes wonderingly. Finally, a slow, tremulous smile touched his lips, and he lowered himself between his cousin's parted thighs.
"Thank you, Orochi-sama," he whispered, his breath tickling the sensitive skin of Orochi's nether region and causing an instant, powerful reaction.
The words continued to echo in Orochi's piqued mind as Tetsuya pleasured him
This is what I love about you.
Tetsuya, I...
His eyes closed and his mind went blank as Tetsuya's warm ministrations brought him to completion.
This is dangerous.
"Orochi-sama?"
"What is it?"
"You look...unhappy. Did I not please you?"
"Take off that yukata and go, Tetsuya."
"O-orochi-sama?"
"Go back to your cell. Let Naoki comfort you. Go now, Tetsuya."
"Y-yes, Orochi-sama."
There was a long, silent pause, then Tetsuya's voice sounded again.
"Erm, Orochi-sama?"
"What is it?"
"I cannot leave until you unbind me."
"Hmmm," Orochi mumbled, pulling the younger man down and wrapping his body around him, "Then, I suppose there is no choice but to let you stay a bit longer."
"Tetsuya."
His cousin acted as though he hadn't heard. Orochi breathed in more deeply and managed, despite the pain, to turn his head slightly. His eyes found Tetsuya's battered and disheveled body leaning up against the stone wall, partially facing him. He could see tears streaming down the curves of the younger man's face, and that he was shivering. His sword arm rested in a makeshift sling, and his top was opened, revealing his bruised chest and torso.
"Tetsuya," he said again, trying to turn onto his side.
Pain rocketed through his abused body and he went still for a moment, closing his eyes.
It felt like we crashed into stone instead of water, though I know it was just the water.
"You shouldn't move," Tetsuya said, turning his head aside so that his tears weren't so obvious, "You suffered several cracked ribs and a concussion. I healed them, but you should rest."
"Where are we?"
"Under the water."
"Under?"
"I regained consciousness and found that we were beneath the surface of the water. I used my power so that we could breathe and searched until I found this place. There is air that comes down from the surface, but there are no openings to pass through. No one without an ability like mine will be able to reach us. We will be safe here while we heal."
Orochi took several more steadying breaths, then lifted his complaining body so that he could sit, rested against the wall and facing the younger shinigami. Tetsuya gazed at him quietly in the half light.
"The Gotei 13 has been defeated," he said solemnly, "The Seireitei is in ruins. Our homes have been completely destroyed."
"How do you...?"
"I keep several escape waterforms in different places. Some of them survived and I was able to..."
"You left me here?" Orochi hissed, his eyes darkening, "What if you hadn't been able to return? You fool!"
"I didn't leave," Tetsuya corrected him, "I only used the waterforms to look. The battles seem to have ended, for now. As soon as we are recovered enough, we should be able to move safely to the evacuation site."
"Were you able to 'see' that place too?"
"Yes, I had placed a waterform there. The family looks to be safe."
"Why do we not use your waterform, then, to go there?"
"I cannot connect with Arashi," Tetsuya explained.
"Why does that matter?" Orochi asked, frowning, "What is that beast, anyway, Tetsuya? He has never left your side since he appeared that day, when Byakuya's forces stormed the prison."
"I am not sure how to explain that," Tetsuya confessed, "Except to say that Arashi seems to bear that part of my power that my weakened body could not contain. Perhaps it is best to say that he is a manifestation of my will to fight, which outstrips my body's ability to manage the extremes of power."
"So, he is a part of you," Orochi said dryly, "I knew there was a reason he was so ornery and pig headed."
"Neither of us will willingly let another control our fate," Tetsuya said firmly, "But, I cannot connect with his mind. I cannot tell whether he is merely unconscious or...worse."
"And this makes you unable to use your powers?" Orochi mused, "Why?"
"I am able to use healing kido and the like, but losing our connection so suddenly shocked my systems. I feel burning pain inside when I try to use my waterforms. I can manage to look through them, but I cannot move through them like I usually do. But, I am sure that, as I heal, I will be able to manage that, and we can reach the encampment."
"But, in the meantime, we are trapped here," Orochi concluded.
"We are not trapped," Tetsuya said, blinking slowly, "I can still breathe under the water. We can leave that way, at any time, but until we are healed, it would be inadvisable. We don't know what forces are still in the area, though the battles seems to have ended, and we are in poor shape for fighting."
"You have that right," Orochi agreed, "We took a beating when Arashi was brought down over the water. It was like crashing into solid rock."
"But it gave us cover so that we could escape our enemies. And here, we are safe to conduct our healing."
Orochi nodded.
"Come here, then, Tetsuya."
Tetsuya gave him a look of warning and did not move from where he knelt.
"You are not going to touch me."
Orochi let out an impatient sigh.
"Your sword arm is obviously broken, and you probably have a few cracked ribs, yourself," he said, frowning, "Do you really want to just sit there and hurt? And besides, your healing will take longer without intervention. You can't heal yourself. Just don't be a nuisance and let me see to your wounds."
Orochi held his eyes for a long moment, then shot forward, ignoring the sharp pain that flashed in his body. He brought the younger man down onto the rock floor, glaring into his shocked eyes as Tetsuya loosed a pained cry.
"What are you doing?" he demanded furiously, "Orochi, stop!"
"You stop, baka! You're going to hurt yourself!"
"Orochi, let go of me!" Tetsuya shouted, struggling, then wincing and screaming in pain as he moved his injured arm the wrong way.
Orochi swiftly invoked a strong kido spell that bound Tetsuya's uninjured wrist to the rock wall.
"What are you doing?" Tetsuya demanded furiously.
He went still as a shock of kido paralyzed him, then could only stare up at his elder cousin in surprise and dismay.
"I am making sure you don't injure yourself any worse, you stupid fool! I know you think you hate me. You've worked very hard to convince yourself of that. You despise me so much that you would leave yourself in this condition, even though you know I could heal you. And I wouldn't put it past you to leave me trapped down here, while you swam away!"
Orochi leaned over his younger cousin, gathering green, healing reiatsu around his hands. He sent the gathered energy into Tetsuya's injured arm, cradling the broken section in his hand to keep it still as he worked. Unable to put up any more resistance, Tetsuya gazed up into Orochi's glittering black eyes, watching the flickers of emotion on his cousin's face.
"I...w-wouldn't have left you."
Orochi gave him a skeptical look.
"Tetsuya, I didn't stay alive as long as I have with as many enemies as I have made by being stupid and trusting. You may be able to put your complete faith in our cousin, Byakuya, and trust him with everything, but I will never be fool enough to do that. I am not weak. I do not need to lean on someone else to make myself stronger. And I am no man's fool. As wicked as another might be, I am more so still."
He went silent as tears rose in Tetsuya's eyes at the mention of Byakuya's name. A few leaked onto his face, and Orochi frowned and wiped them away.
"Stop that. You don't know that he died, and even if he did, you don't need him to survive."
"B-but..!"
"You didn't survive the prison because of him. He only opened the doors. You fought to stay alive while you were there. And someone else stood between you and death, Tetsuya. Someone else wouldn't let you die."
Tetsuya flinched as memories of torment, horrid illness, shattering loss and the looming threat of execution returned to him in full force.
"Orochi..."
"I protected you by making sure the other guards wouldn't touch you. I placed you with Naoki and let him be gentle with you."
"N-no!"
"I brought medicine when you were dying."
"S-stop!"
"I rescued you from the pit, and I made you stop crying when they killed our baby."
"Orochi, stop it!"
"And when they were going to execute you, I took you to a safe place and went back to kill the man who ordered our baby's death and your execution. I won't be untruthful. I did all of those things for my own reasons, some of them very selfish. But I did protect you, Tetsuya. You can make all of the excuses you want to try to vilify me, and I've always made it easy for you to do that. I let you hide behind Byakuya for a hundred years, watching you avoid love and saying it was because you lost that other boy. But Naoki is gone. Byakuya is gone. Outside this place, everything has fallen apart. There is no one else here for you, but me. Why don't you listen to the sounds of fate and realize the truth? You belong to only me. You always have, and you always will, Tetsuya."
Orochi closed the distance, lying down on top of his cousin's incapacitated body and burning his lips and mouth with a long, penetrating and scorching, open-mouthed kiss. Tetsuya's eyes blazed with rage and he turned his head away forcefully.
"Stop it! Don't do that! You bastard! That is not love. It's only poison!"
Orochi smiled wickedly and loosed a soft, mocking laugh.
"It may be poison, Tetsuya, but then, it is a poison you can't help but crave," he hissed softly, sinking into the younger man's angry mouth again.
