Title: Dire Consequences 11/??

Fandom: Viewfinder

Pairings: Asami/Fei, Mik/Fei overall

Disclaimer: I do not own Viewfinder or any of its characters. This is a fanfic and I'm not making any profit from it.

Rating: R

Part 11

Cold, he was so bitterly cold.

Feilong shivered all over. He was gagged and tied down to a chair; wet, sick and hurting. His head throbbed in monotonously steady intervals, the pain slowly increasing, until what had been a constant buzz of discomfort turned into white, screaming agony. His raw throat burned and the gag suffocated him. He thirsted and when he drifted off into uneasy unconsciousness, which lasted no more than seconds at a time, he dreamed of running water that he couldn't reach.

Footsteps echoed in the hall beyond the closed door and he perked up in attention as he recognized them, steady and intimidating, even with the lingering limp from a barely healed gunshot wound.

It could have been minutes since Asami had left him, bound and alone, or it could have been hours. Either way, it made no difference to Feilong, because in his miserable state, even seconds felt like an eternity. The dark, windowless room told him nothing, buried under the ground as it was.

A grave. This was to be his grave and suddenly, Feilong felt a deep, painful longing for clean, fresh air. He wanted to look upon daylight once more, to feel the warmth of the sun upon his skin and maybe for the first time, it occurred to him that perhaps the pain he had spent years clinging on to, was not worth dying for, after all.

The bitter irony of coming to that conclusion, of considering the possibility of letting go now that it was too late for him to do anything about it, made the taste of bile rise in his throat. He would die and he would die alone. In the darkness. In the cold.

Muffled sounds of men speaking on the other side of the side of the door seemed very loud in the otherwise dense silence, but he still could not make out what they were saying. The door creaked menacingly and a flood of sudden light blinded him, making him screw his eyes shut and cringe away. He blinked, trying to adjust to the change and Asami's face slowly came into focus. Impassive men shut the door behind him and Asami smoothly tapped his cigarettes, putting one in the corner of his generous, sensual mouth.

The lighter flicked and he drew in a long breath of smoke, before looking up and straight at his captive. He exhaled a cloud of grey, his face an unreadable mask of cool indifference, of arrogance, but his eyes were dark and alive… and rich with emotion. He was fully dressed once more, perfect in his custom made suit, impeccable with his neat hair slicked into obedience and brushed back from his face.

Feilong glared, his eyes wet and burning. He was very much aware of the contrast in their appearance, with his drying hair wild and escaping from its braid, his wet, dirty clothes, his pale face beaded with hot sweat from the rising fever which made him shiver, yet burned him inside, tormenting him, confusing him and making him dizzy when he needed all his presence of mind.

"It is ironic, isn't it," Asami said, "when the one you have hurt the most comes to your enemy and begs for your life."

Feilong stared, uncomprehending.

"He made me promise that I would not come after you," Asami continued. "My Akihito. He made me promise that I would not kill you on his behalf."

Feilong flinched from the name, his brows low over his narrow eyes.

"At the time," Asami went on, "I was so happy to have him back, alive against all odds and safe in my arms, that I would have promised him anything! Unfortunately, I had never counted on having to uphold it. I had never counted on you coming after me once again, or on how much I would want to see you dead and destroyed, if you ever did! You are lucky, Feilong, so very lucky that he was here to remind me of my word and to impress upon me just how seriously he takes the promise that I have given. And unbelievably fortunate that I am now so afraid of losing him and his affection, that I would rather walk all over my pride than risk him ever finding out that I lied."

His handsome mouth lifted in a bitter parody of a smile.

"Congratulations," he said. "You can be very proud of yourself, because you have taught me the meaning of true fear. Without you, I probably would not have realized just how much I now have to lose."

Feilong growled at him, wanting to scream his hatred for such an insult, but the gag was firm and it muffled all his words, his protests and cries. His throat ached and a dry, agonizing cough choked him, forcing him to settle down. Asami waited it out, smoking impassively and looking at him with cold, cold indifference.

"You nearly destroyed me, Feilong," he admitted simply, confident to say it now that he was so utterly victorious and in control of the situation. "Of all of those who had tried, and yes, there have been many of them, you were the only one who had actually come this close to achieving it! So, I guess that I am fortunate too. Who would have dared to foresee it? That the one man who would spot my weakness before I dared to acknowledge it myself, wouldn't know what to do with it when the time came? That the one man who obtained the power to bring me down, would fail to strike the deciding blow? But that has always been your problem, Feilong. You have always had the potential for great things, but always lacked the strength you needed to actually get them done."

Feilong thrashed his head in a vain attempt to dislodge the gag that was choking him, silencing him. Asami took one long drag on his cigarette, burning it out, and then throwing it down to press upon it with his heel. He took a step closer and crouched in front of the bound man, to be at eye level with him as he continued to speak.

"Yes, I will admit it," he said, "because there is really no use in pretending otherwise in front of you now. I love Takaba. He is the light in my darkness, the single beacon of meaning in my life that I had been hoping for in the midst of countless, identical days of no colour and purpose for a long, long time. As unlikely as the odds of that happening ever were, he became my great hope for happiness, for companionship after many years of loneliness. You cannot even begin to know what he means, because if you had known, you probably would not have let him live, now would you? You would not have given me the chance to get him back. So, you see, I am very grateful for your incompetence."

Feilong breathed hard, his nostrils flaring as he glared. Asami smirked.

"Yes, I know," he taunted. "I am such a despicable bastard. You hate me. Blah, blah. I have heard about it already. All your troubles are my fault, while you wallow in your self-pity. But this has got to stop. I refuse to take the blame for your misfortunes any more. You say that I wronged you and I probably did, but we are even now. You wanted me to suffer, and by gods, suffer I did! You wanted me to hurt and hurt I was! There is nothing that I owe you now.

"You wanted an explanation and I shall give you one. Yes, I seduced you. I wanted the route over Hong Kong and you were by far the easiest means that I had at my disposal for furthering my goals. From the moment I saw you, I knew you would do anything; betray anyone, just for the promise of acceptance and love! And don't you dare place the blame of what happened solely on me, because none of it would have ever worked, if you hadn't been so easy to manipulate! It was a perfect plan and it should have been effective, if only I could have made myself go through with it! It should not have been difficult to take you to my bed and keep you there, because gods know, you are pretty enough! It should have even been pleasurable for us both, but most of all, it should have been easy. Though I never loved you, I never intended to cause you this… pain. But I admit it; I underestimated you, your strength, your madness and your darkness. Yes, abandoned you, because after I got to know you, I couldn't bear to have you near me. You reminded me too much of myself and it was… nauseating."

Tears of anger, of denial welled in Feilong's eyes and he struggled to keep them from falling, even if it was obvious that they were there.

"You wanted closure?" Asami said. "I shall give you closure. Yes, I tricked you. Yes, I seduced you and yes, I betrayed your trust. But I saved your life when I should just have let you die and I did that out of guilt, because I knew that I should never have touched you in the first place. I gave you your life over the innocence that I had taken and I at least think that it was a fair compensation. As for the rest of the disaster your life turned out to be, I shall not be held accountable. I did not kill your father. The entire mess of his death is a consequence of something that predates me by a long, long time, but you cannot bring yourself to face the fact that the truth of the matter is something much closer to home, because it is so much easier to blame it all on me. You are an intelligent man, Feilong. I am sure you could easily get the details you need if only you tried, but frankly, I don't care what you do, as long as you leave me out of it in the future."

He got up, wincing slightly from the pain that the position must have caused his injured leg, and straightened his suit. Feilong was quiet, waiting for him to finish, eager to hear what else he had to say and hating him for every word.

"You may wonder why I am telling you this," Asami said, "but I realized that Takaba has a point. I don't want your blood on my hands. I do not want to carry you on my soul. I want you out of my life, so that I can have a fresh start, without having to think of you ever again, and since I do not want to go through all of this seven years down the line, it is essential that we set the record straight. You said that I owed you. Maybe I do. You said that I made you into what you are. Maybe I did. But all of that is irrelevant now, because I hurt you and you hurt me back. I took from you, so you took from me too. Remember what you did to me. Remember that on this day, I spared your life when I should have killed you, because if you ever come near me again, I shall not be this merciful. Next time, I shall destroy you, because I'll not have my word binding me twice!"

To Feilong's horror, he walked to the door and opened it, preparing to go. He wasn't going to leave him here alone… was he?

"This is good bye, Feilong," Asami said, his fingers lingering on the light switch. "Hopefully, somebody will find you soon, before it is too late. And hopefully, the wait will give you the chance to reflect on the merits of being alive over those of being dead. But if that doesn't work and you still decide that you want to end your unhappy existence, please do me a favour and leave me out of it!"

"No!" Feilong shook his head in desperate supplication and denial as Asami turned off the light and shut the door behind him. The lock clicked when he turned the key and panicking, Feilong screamed, all sounds muffled by the gag while he thrashed, struggling against his bonds. The heavy footsteps walked away in the midst of his despair, the scuffling sounds of people becoming fainter and fainter, until at last, all that was left was the silence and the thick, terrifying dark.