Summer quarter is done! Have a chapter!

Junjou romantica is mine. I've been lying to you all. Now give me your money

The forest burned and from his gyropter Doctor Cornell watched. The heat from the flames pushed his air ship upwards without the usual waste of fuel and for a second that was all they did until one if the high-altitude currents picked them up, filled the sails, and set them on their way.

Doctor Cornell was a man of science. His faith lay in the power of the number and what they told him. And yet…for the next few seconds he allowed himself to go beyond. For a few seconds he allowed himself to believe in a power beyond equations and data. Surely though not the god his father had forced him to find between the ordered symmetry of pews and high vaulted ceilings. For half a minute he wondered about the lost gods of the pagans, those who had been burned so long ago. Was his life really given purpose through woven thread? For something had made him leave his laboratory, the first time in days, to go inspect the performance of the crew on his private ship. Something had delivered him from a sudden end brought through flames. Perhaps the Moirai. Or Wagner's Norns.

He stopped himself there. Such thoughts belonged between the pages of musty books in his father's library. So instead he cast his gaze at the horizon. They would have to leave this current soon, and recalibrate to a more southerly degree, but for now the east wind would save them time and fuel.

He shivered, thinking about the toxins and bacterium carried in winds such as this, not to mention what the smoke from the fires were doing to his repertory system. He turned and retreated below deck. He cursed the fates just as he cursed his father's God. The parts were lost now, the heat of those fires would render them useless. They would need to go back.

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Papers were spread over the galley tables as he walked in. Peering over his captain's shoulder on the way to the percolator Ritsu took in the designs for what almost looked like a mechanical arm. He snorted.

"And you just expect your nerves to connect with the copper wires." Even he had enough mechanical knowledge to know that wouldn't work.

Masamune just craned his neck back and gave him a sloppy kiss on the chin. He had already delivered the official good morning kiss an hour earlier in bed, no one was judging him for quality now. Still Ritsu made a face. If anything the man's morning breath had gotten worse since their undercover escapade. Just then Misaki walked into the galley, looking entirely like he didn't belong and he was perfectly aware of the fact, although with a bit more colour on his cheeks. One night's sleep, if he hadn't gotten that, was not going to erase the deep sunken eyes though.

"Misaki! So good to see you! Good night's sleep I trust?" Every person in the room turned and stared as their captain as the cheery tone escaped lips that had never spoken so happily in their life. Green eyes shot up from looking at the floor to stare in confusion at Takano.

"G-good morning…?" No one blamed him for having it come out as a question.

"Be a good lad and come over here for a second, hm?" The confused looked was replaced with one of suspicion, eyes narrowed, but regardless he made his way over, chin held high in a show of bravado. He was after all, older than Masamune.

"Now," The captain leaned forward as he gazed up as Misaki stopped beside him, his chin on his remaining hand and his elbow on the aluminium tabletop. "You show me yours and I'll show you mine?"

The comment resulted in an immediate rap on the head couresy of Ritsu. He looked up at his lover, eyes suspiciously wet.

"It's wasn't like that Riichan! I just wanted to examine his wings." His whiny tone was too much for the lighter brunet who returned to his quest for Kisa's tar black coffee. He was feeling the need particularly potently that morning.

"Why do you want to examine my wings?"

The voice was barely there, a hoarse whisper, almost impossible to make out. Masamune returned it with a Cheshire cat grin.

"Because I don't really fancy living the rest of my life with only one arm." For a while Misaki only looked at him, the dull green gazing into the fire that was Takano's own amber eyes. Eventually he nodded.

"I will meet you in your workshop in an hour." And with that Misaki turned away to salvage himself some breakfast from what was left over from the crews earlier on the food stores. Masamune and Ritsu traded a glance.

"You don't have a workshop."

"I'm sure I can find something."

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Sure enough a little over an hour later Masamune was seated on a stool behind a shirtless Misaki, the boy's back to him as he sketched the intricate working with a silver pencil onto a notebook he had perched between his knees. Hatori too stood behind; screw in hand as he replaced the covering on the portion Masamune had just finished examining. They were in a sectioned off portion of the ship's hull, the storage rooms they'd found not big enough for Misaki to display his full wingspan. As the ship was a small one, designed for at most a pilot and assistant to act as chauffer for whatever rich gentleman had owned the ship, there was really nothing for Ritsu to do, so he too was there, leaning against the wall, watching the lamplight cast defined shadows over his lover's back.

It was quiet, the rumble of the engine designed to be almost nonexistent in a luxury cruiser such as this. They were going full power, worried more about time than wasted fuel or the longevity of the engine, and this was not a dirigible built for speed. Occasionally a comment from Takano would tell Misaki the next angle he wanted to sketch from, but otherwise a comfortable silence seemed to fill the space, even Misaki finding himself relaxing his eternally tense muscles. This was why the sudden crash and cry from the automaton as he jerked away from the probing fingers was so startling.

With only one arm, Masamune had to give himself an extra second to steady himself on the stool before leveling a glare at his subject. Misaki was a good ten feet away now, his back hidden against the wall and his hands clamped over his metal heart. Ritsu had also moved significantly, though it was hard to tell who he was going to, his lover or his uncle.

"S-sorry."

"What the blazes was that!" Takano's hiss was perfectly conveyed annoyance.

"Sorry…he…uh…"

"Savery's steam, spit it out! I'm not here to accommodate your virgin sensibilities." Even in the light of the gas lamp they could see Misaki's face explode in a scarlet blush.

"I'm not a…you should learn to bloody well…look, you can't touch me there. Only Usamisan can do that." Hatori stared hard at the boy, his gaze unfocused and Misaki could tell he was trying to figure out the exact thing that he had done wrong. Ritsu was looking at him, bewildered at this uncharacteristic show of modesty. Takano on the other hand just looked exasperated and more than a tad pissed.

"Look, if you think anything in this room is somehow sexual then you can just—"

"Who bloomin' said anything about sex?!" Misaki glared at the captain, looking thoroughly affronted. "I'm saying that only Akihiko can touch there, he has the key. Anyone else touches me there I explode. Understand." Now they just stared.

"I'm afraid…not really, no." It seemed Ritsu was the only one who could find it in themselves to return such a ridiculous question with an answer. Misaki ran a hand through his hair and barely resisted rolling his eyes.

"Look, who has your key?"

"Masamune obviously. If I'm captured I don't want to make it easy for anyone."

"Exactly. My brother, despite what those bastards said, didn't want us as killing machine, he just wanted to be able to returned loved ones to their families alive rather than in compact little boxes." For a second the elder automaton paused to cough, his voice better after Yukina had forced the medicine down his throat, but by no means was it up to this much work. "But if we were forced, beyond our will to become nothing but killing machines, then he gave us the option to turn ourselves off. Cease functioning the part of our brain that made us self-aware. Life is defined by self-awareness, so he made it so that we have a switch that turns that off."

Another pause and the dreadful cough filled the silence, the other's unwilling to interrupt. "But it's a last resort and the functions of our machinery are only accessible through the door on our chests, which can only be unlocked with a key that someone would have a bugger of a time replicating. But what's to stop the lock being picked, or the door being removed, or our machinery being accessed from the back instead of the chest?" He stopped to catch his breath and Ritsu took the chance to voice his shock as the dawning realization.

"So you're saying…we explode?"

"That's what I'm saying. We have a device in us strong enough to utterly demolish a good twenty square miles." The matter of fact tone did not help Ritsu at all as he felt all the blood leave his face and the world begin to spin around him. Then Takano's arm was around him and he couldn't tell if they were to keep him upright or if the man was reassuring himself of his lover's life now that they knew just how close they had come to ending it. Multiple times. Strangely it was Hatori who dismissed himself first.

"I need a drink." And with that he marched off. Ritsu watched him go without seeing him. Rallying his forces he straightened his back and grabbed Masamune's left hand.

"Excuse us Uncle. Thank you for your time."

Misaki stood where he was as they retreated, eyes a soft mossy green of understanding. Of what, Ritsu didn't know, but he supposed there was only one course of action to take. At least for Masamune and himself. By now said captain had taken the lead and was dragging him along as they headed to their designated bedroom. For such was their life, that when one or both of them was threatened, they would seek out the nearest flat surface, vertical or horizontal, they weren't picky, and remind each other that they were in fact one, and that nothing could separate them.

Upon "liberating" the ship, Masamune had claimed the master cabin as his own, and by extent Ritsu's. The bed was wide with Egyptian cotton sheets and stately carvings at the head and foot. They did not notice these. For all thoughts were consumed with each other, along with the frustrating overabundance of clothing. But they had been together for too many long years to be thwarted, and without knowing who had undressed who, they were together, skin against skin and hands desperate to bring them closer. They were one soul in two bodies, and though they couldn't understand why their god had allowed them to be parted as such, they could rectify it, as so they did, their passion not diminished by Masamune's injury.

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Sometimes the world was too much for them. They didn't speak of this, to do so was pointless and would change nothing, but it was fact. So sometimes, without speaking, they would work together to not let the covers slip from over their heads. Like children, hiding beneath the covers in some naive belief that they would be kept safe from the monsters, they used the sheets as a shield from the world, and beneath they would create their own.

Sunlight glared through the French windows of their new room, its harshness turned soft as it filtered through the cream of the sheets and turned the tips of Ritsu's hair a shining gold. He gazed at Masamune from his bed of glowing white with peridot eyes half lidded through sleep, a faint flush dusting his cheeks from their activities a few hours before. Masamune felt his heart stop then skip along at double time as something in his throat stuck as the sight of the pure and absolute adoration that shown from those eyes. The look made him want to puff out his chest and take on the world, to pull the moon from the skies and lay it at this man's feet in gratitude that he, before any other man, had been given Ritsu. His to worship, his to hold. The automaton's skin was softer than a ladies glove beneath his callused fingertips as he brushed a stray eyelash from his cheek. Lips, still just the tiniest bit swollen, turned into a quiet smile that spoke of absolute contentment. Masamune didn't think it was possible to find happiness greater than that which they had created in their world beneath the sheets. Slowly he leaned forward until his forehead rested against his other half's and their noses touched. Ritsu scrunched his own at the contact causing Masamune to release a few quiet chuckles. It was impossible to look at the other without going cross eyed when this close, so instead they relaxed and closed their eyes as together they dropped back into slumber, warm and satisfied in a world made for only them.

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The wax cylinder was obviously worn, the chorus of soldiers expressing their invincibility against the world in cracked voices, half obscured through scratch and age. It did not matter to Akihiko, he knew perfectly the libretto of his father's favorite opera. His passion for it sometimes made Akihiko wonder if he had forgotten the ending. Even after condemning his soul to Hell, Faust was still unable to capture and corrupt Margarite. But his father saw it differently he knew. Faust song of seduction had echoed through his childhood, filling the empty hallways and piercing through the walls as he had scribbled in notebooks between lessons. Perhaps the man saw himself as greater than Faust. Had not he managed to seize what he desired. Had not his own son corrupted Misaki?

Akihiko had seen the look in Misaki's eyes after their escape from the airship. At first he had not known the travesty Haruhiko had committed, but he known, after his angel had remembered, that something was different. There had been a new darkness behind those emerald eyes. A new twist to a smile that, though still given to him freely, had lost its softness.

He was not mourning the loss of the Heart's flag ship and all that had gone down with it, as his father was. The loss of his brother meant nothing to him, the news not bringing the joy he had expected.

In fact he didn't feel much of anything besides knowing that he was drowning, his lungs filled with a stagnant mud as the rest of him lay hollow. Hadn't losing him once been enough? Was this some punishment for some unremembered crime. He felt he should feel angry at the thought, but the anger did not come. Instead came the first word of Faust as he held the poisoned chalice, unable to face the coming dawn.

Rien!

Nothing!

The gramophone became white noise in his mind as instead he felt within him the swell of the orchestra. The blast of the horn suddenly silence as the violins began to swell in haunting waves. The violins…

En vain j'interroge, en mon ardente veille,
La nature et le Créateur;

In vain do I question, through this zealous vigil,
Both Nature and our Maker;

Pas une voix ne glisse à mon oreille
Un mot consolateur!

No voice comes to murmur in my ear
Some words of comfort!

J'ai langui, triste et solitaire,
Sans pouvoir briser le lien

I have pined, sad and lonely,
Unable to break the fetters

Oui m'attache encore à la terre!
Je ne vois rien!

Which still bind me to this world!
I see nothing! I know nothing!

Je ne sais rien!

The mournful notes of the obo, the deep notes of the French horn that resounded in your chest, the violin….With unprecedented sweetness it dominated the orchestra in his mind, rising above the whole assembly till it was all he heard, rising and falling, leading to the appearance of a devil he knew would not come for him.

His father had found his own devil. He hadn't needed the supernatural to find his own contract to sign.

The world mocked him. In this room too dawn broke through the heavy velvet of the curtains, lighting their edges, dust motes like gold dust dancing in the air. He closed his eyes, pain piecing them after spending so many days and nights in the shadows in his arm chair in the corner. It was the only thing still standing in the room, bookshelves, lamps, and even the bed frame upturned and cracked from the blind fury that had seized him when his father had sent a servant to inform him of the death of his brother. He had collapsed in the chair, the book he had been reading still fallen open of the floor next to him. No tears came this time. He was beyond them. He had spent a few sluggish second contemplating joining Misaki in whatever world went beyond but he hadn't. He would have felt immobile if he had had the energy to contemplate movement.

He felt nothing, nor did he possess the energy to recognize this.

And so he sat where the shadows could embrace him as one their own, and the crash of cymbals and blasts of horns filled his ears from the walls around him.

I cannot tell you how many times I've wished I could say, "Don't touch me there, I'll explode!"

End of chapter but before I go on, I would like to make some things clear. I do not encourage the idea that one has to be skinny to be pretty. Often in my writing I will emphasize how skinny Misaki is. According to my doctor's I am myself overweight but do not really care because I am strong. Instead, I consider being skinny as a weakness but that is just the way I see it. Some people are born with high metabolisms, indeed I have a friend who has to eat an outrageous amount to stop her breast bone from making itself known. I see skinny as a weakness because I have a really low metabolism, and though I haven't eaten anything like fast/junk food in years I balance my weight through intense exercise or I balloon out. I like my body, so the only times I lose weight are when I have no money and can't eat or incredibly sick. This is why I think skinniness is weakness. Personally. Not on other people. I didn't realize what I was doing till it was pointed out. So just to make it clear, I do not make Misaki really skinny to make him more attractive, I make his skinny to showcase his weakness. And then I make him be awesome because just because your body is weak doesn't mean you are weak.

Savery's steam-Savery is the one who invented the first steam engine in 1698. Unless you think Rosencrantz did it. Or was it Guildenstern? Anyways, the one who came up with this is my friend and mentor and is known on the internet as Kinshan. She makes AWESOME coats and steampunk clothes. They aren't like wild exciting, and mostly are solid colours. This means the clothing won't interfere with your gears and gizmos. She's at kinshan . com. All her stuff in hand made and she goes to steampunk events around the Pacific Northwest. The quality is amazing. I cannot stress this. Go and at least look. If you can't buy, then recommend to other people. She doesn't make clothes for just to wear to events. She makes clothes so that you can have a little bit of steampunk with your wherever you go. Sizing wise, I am a size small and have to turn up the sleeves. Let's see…at forever twenty one I am a size large to extra large, so that should give y'all an idea, right?

About the opera. I love opera but it's such an engaging study that I can only really devote myself to it during the summer. And low and behold, it's summer. Anyways, what I put are the official French and English libretto. Yes, I know it's not the direct translation but hey, it's the official one. So there.