Eck! Tea tastes horribly nasty, but I've always felt a fun part of adulthood involved drinking icky tasting things for the sake of being able to say so. -throws her mug of lemon tea at the wall- Damn you tea! I even put honey in you!!! -continues to sip the foul beverage even as she types- Hard to write a real lemon when all you can think about is how gross your mouth now tastes. - goes away to whine elsewhere-
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Stupid? Yeah, Youji was willing to call it that. Why? Because it was. Going back to Cobarde's ransacked, blood splattered home was a bad idea from the start. The man was fucking dangling above his kitchen table from meat hooks, the skin of his chest spread out like gory, leathery butterfly wings. Even looking at him for those few brief seconds had been enough to unnerve him and get the paranoia jumpstarted.
One had to wonder what the next step might be for the sort of person who would be willing to mutilate another human being that badly. Youji killed for a living, but he was an advocator of the merciful death. The thought of staying and wallowing in the excessive torture of another living thing seemed inexorably wrong.
Even as he stepped out of Ken and Omi's borrowed car, almost wishing Ken had a new motorbike he could have liberated instead, Youji could feel the wrongness of the air. Even a few minutes breezing along with nothing but rushing air to either side tended to make him easier with the world, carefree. How could he feel anything but invincible with nothing but a few thin layers of leather between his body and the unforgiving, rushing pavement. Flying.
The door still swung open to his touch, the gore within undiscovered by anyone willing to take action. The bad weather outside had blown papers all around the interior halls, knocked over delicate decorative fixtures and lamps alike. It felt deserted, empty and soulless. A thorough, careful search through the front rooms revealed nothing of interest. No important papers, no personal information, nada.
Back towards the kitchen, waiting every second for a reeking, stumbling form to barrel out of the kitchen rearing back and rending him limb from limb. The dead stay dead, Youji knew, but in situations like this, with all the wrongness coursing through the air, forbidden thoughts did tend to surface with a vengance. Improbable thoughts as well.
Holding his breath against the newly blooming stench of rot, Youji dashed past the kitchen, mind full of childhood monsters and bogeymen. None appeared, to his intense relief. On to the bedrooms now. Searching through the important bits of a dead man's life. It somehow felt dirtier picking over his physical memories than it would to slip up behind him in the dark and slide thread thin wire around his throat until it ran with blood. Pawing through the soulless husks final possessions, he found an odd keycard, tucked in the bottom of a drawer full of socks and happily patterned boxers. It made him think of the plastic rectangles used to open up hotel rooms.
"This looks important." He stated aloud, trying to fill the unearthly silence. It was one thing to have legitimate prey to stalk, another to creep around in unfriendly noiselessness. Entirely different. He found himself glancing over his shoulder on an increasingly frequent basis. No signs of anything important in the bedroom either. That left one more room; one he would certainly rather avoid.
"Do it for Aya then." A decent enough incentive as long as he didn't remind himself of their earlier conversation. Sort of demeaning, to do unsettling grunt work for someone who callously informed you that you were of no importance in their already lonely life. But Aya did need someone to be there for him. If his sister was missing, then that left Youji to play the sole center of Aya's destructive universe until the comatose body could once again lie in the sterilized shrine of a hospital, worshipped by her accompanying metallic companions whirring softly in the background.
"I hope you try and appreciate me more, you ungrateful son of a bitch." Youji spoke out loud again, steeling his nerves with fond images of Aya, those few rare smiles, one of those occasional days when both could do no wrong and things were idyllic and peaceful. He didn't want to go back into that kitchen, didn't want to creep around the suspended body, holding his breath out of fear. Even his feet dragged in protest as he headed down that suddenly impossibly long hallway, trying to stop the inevitable.
"I hope you appreciate this." He peeked around the doorframe, noting the exact location of all furniture, accounting for the angle of every dangling limb. He was the same. The room was the same. Even the blood puddles were the same size, though they'd gone from congealed glistening lakes to dried, crusty splotches.
Dead people don't move. Youji kept repeating that mental refrain to himself as he searched around the perimeter of the kitchen, looking for something that matched the odd key he'd found in the bedroom. There had to be something. One-Eye told him that Cobarde always worked from his home, no other properties were listed under any of his aliases. It had to be here. SOMETHING had to be here for him to find. He'd promised himself he wouldn't leave until he had something concrete to take back to Aya.
A white blur behind him, darting across the floor. Youji jumped back, shoulderblades against the cool front of the fridge, gun aimed at a harmless piece of paper being skittered across the floor from the breeze inviting itself in the front door. He had to stop being so goddamned jumpy. There was nothing to fear. The house was empty; the atrocity in the room with him well and truly dead.
A random thought fluttering across his mind. Check the fridge. If Youji had papers he wanted hidden and he knew he was being stalked and possibly faced his own death, the fridge would be the first place he'd put them, the last place anyone would look. Bated breath, the soft sound as the suction holding the door closed gave up.
He let the breath out, explosive with disappointment. Nothing but food. Plain, boring food. In a fit of brief, stress related rage, Youji swept an arm across the shelf, knocking jars and wrapped food packages to the floor.
"Oh fuck, jackpot!" He breathed, staring at the metal panel adorning the back wall of the fridge. Time for the moment of truth. He reached forward, pried up the panel with blunt fingernails. "Jackpot times a thousand." A single key slot, surrounded by odd symbols.
Youji barely managed to hang onto the keycard, the fridge sliding over on unseen tracks the second the mechanics spit the card back out. He sucked on sore fingers, watching the fridge continue it's bizarre movement. Within seconds, the true purpose of the hidden machinery was revealed. The faint outlines of a large rectangle was clearly seen against the wall-paper. A door. A door with a similar key-slot. Jackpot times infinity.
Dark stairs greeted him, the pastel flowered paper on the door contrasting horribly with the dank, filthy path leading downwards. The sneaky little bastard was smarter than previously assumed. A hidden underground office, perhaps?
As his feet touched the third step down, the door he'd left to swing shut behind him did so with an exuberance that could only have been planned, smashing into him from behind and knocking him head over heels down into darkness. Definitely a stupid idea to come here, Youji thought again, eyes shuttering against the image of his own blood running away from his face across dirty concrete.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"Mmm, 'lo there." Omi muttered sleepily, pulling Ken down under the body-warmed covers around him, tilting his chin up for a kiss.
Ken laughed and covered Omi's mouth. "I don't want to kiss you, sleep-breath."
Omi pouted. "I've only been asleep an hour, and I brushed my teeth before I went to bed." Ken relented and leaned down for a kiss, letting the baking heat of Omi's arms loop around his neck. It started gentle; soft lips brushing, the wet heat of velvet tongues languidly exploring familiar territory, ended with heaving chests and bitten lips.
"Shit." Ken panted, head lowered to rest forehead-to-forehead with Omi's.
"Wouldn't 'fuck' be the better expletive to insert at this point?" Omi teasingly ran the tip of his pink tongue across the glistening expanse of his lower lip. He smiled. "Though maybe you could insertions in some other pleasurable form?" Just a helpful little suggestion.
Time to give up and get out of here, Ken decided, closing his eyes. There was no refusing Omi when he started with that cute dirty talking. Not good to engage in sexual activity with someone recovering from a bad head wound. "You go back to sleep." He brushed a forcibly gentle kiss across Omi's forehead, trying to steady his breathing.
"Do I really look that horrible right now?" Omi self-consciously rubbed at his hair, "I know we've been busy and I haven't really been with it enough to get a shower in, I could get up right now and-"
"'Sokay. You don't look bad at all, a little unkempt yeah, but neither of us really has had much time for personal hygiene." To prove his point, he laced his fingers through Omi's hair, ignoring the stiff blood spikes beneath his fingertips. Omi tentatively smiled back. "You don't mind?"
"It's your blood, isn't it? I've had worse things on my skin." He kissed the silk fringes of blonde eyelashes, trailed down one side of a delicate jaw. Omi sighed in contentment, kneading the back of Ken's neck like a fatigued cat.
"That feels nice." Soft whispered encouragements, neither sure who was murmuring what. Ken turned the soft kisses into the gnawing of teeth, the rasp of two days worth of stubble framing smooth skin, framing well-received nibbles. Omi tilted his head to the side, nimble fingers sliding down to work the end of Ken's t-shirt out of his pants, pulling the fabric up to tangle around Ken's shoulders and bent arms.
"What's gotten into you?" Ken finished the job for him, pulling the dark shirt up and over his head, his hair a mess of tangles in its wake. "Not that I'm complaining..." he sighed as Omi homed in on his nipples. Ken's breath caught in his throat as pink lips trailed down his chest, traced the curves of his ribcage, the stretch of skin between hipbones.
Footsteps clattering down the hallway outside their locked door, the sound of the bathroom door creaking open further down.
"Fate?" Ken guessed, irked at the interruption.
"I don't think the powers that be are working to interrupt our sex." Omi looked up, startled.
Ken sighed. "The person, Fate." He flopped back down from his startled sitting position. "Though with her timing, who knows?"
Omi slithered back up the bared expanse of Ken's chest, seizing Ken's mouth with his own for a kiss that was everything wet and hot and then some. Yes, Omi certainly did have talents all his own. Caught up, muffled moans Ken didn't realize were coming from his mouth until Omi untangled their mouths to comment on it with a wicked little smile.
"I'll show you 'incredibly loud moaning', brat!" Ken ducked under the covers, keeping their shared warmth trapped, finding and removing Omi's boxers in the dark. Omi shivered, pulling the blankets up over his head, ensconcing them both in a soothing sea of dark sheets and soft, unseen skin.
Busy hands tried to canvas as many square inches of Omi's skin as possible while Ken occupied his own mouth with a more dexterous task, Omi's knuckles harshly kneading at the back of Ken's neck still. "Nn, more." Back arching slightly, Omi squirmed for more attention.
Ken slid his palms down until they encountered the firm curves of warm thighs, fingers pressing against that smooth, living flesh. Omi liked it rough sometimes, complained if things didn't elevate to his expectations, retaliated in kind if he found his full satisfaction to be lacking. Ken could never decide if he liked that, hated it or simply could not live without those pouting lips coming down to bite his shoulder when the hands on his body were too gentle, when the thrusts were too slow. It wasn't worth debating; not when Omi was wrapping slim legs around his waist, urging him to slide into perfect warmth, the blankets slowly falling away and winding up on the sanded wood floor, draping over the sides of the mattress.
Omi was making the most delightful sounds underneath him, hips lifting up into the harsh rhythm they created between their bodies. Distantly he heard someone pounding on the wall, heard Aya's irked shout for silence; ignored it.
"I want it harder." Omi breathed against his neck, hands turning to claws down Ken's back, chest heaving against his, sweat slicking everything. Ken readily obliged, teeth gritting together those last few seconds as he forced himself to hold out longer than Omi. "Ah." All the breath hissed out of that fragile body as Omi tightened like electricity beneath him, muscles shuddering around him. Ken pushed his forehead into the perfect space between Omi's neck and shoulder, surrendering his senses to the mind-rending climax Omi always managed to elicit from him.
Aya finally stopped pounding on the wall by their door as Ken and Omi quieted, the two now collapsed in a sated, tangled heap. Omi pressed a few sleepy kisses to Ken's collarbone before dropping immediately into the sleep Ken had interrupted a bare twenty minutes before. Ken tried to hook the blankets back up over them using only his free foot and his left arm, careful not to move Omi. He gave up when the top layer wouldn't go past his lower thigh, leaving them out of reach for his grasping hand.
Omi nuzzled closer, rubbing his cheek against the skin of Ken's chest. Ken kissed the top of his sleeping head, lying back with helpless smile on his lips.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
I am a big fan of the "four paragraph lemon". A bit of detail, a few things hinted at and then POOF, done. You guys were lucky enough to get a few more than four paragraphs, so be grateful. Now, for Youji? What has befallen poor bloody-head boy? -blinks- Is it me or are all my characters bleeding from the head. Maybe I'll give Fate some sort of stigmata so someone can bleed from a new location. -ducks the missiles discharged from the Bible Belt- Nyah! Anyway, give me e-mails and feedback! Darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com Woot, woot!, nine out of ten doctors recommend feedback as the best incentive for overworked fanfiction writers! So, hop to it!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Stupid? Yeah, Youji was willing to call it that. Why? Because it was. Going back to Cobarde's ransacked, blood splattered home was a bad idea from the start. The man was fucking dangling above his kitchen table from meat hooks, the skin of his chest spread out like gory, leathery butterfly wings. Even looking at him for those few brief seconds had been enough to unnerve him and get the paranoia jumpstarted.
One had to wonder what the next step might be for the sort of person who would be willing to mutilate another human being that badly. Youji killed for a living, but he was an advocator of the merciful death. The thought of staying and wallowing in the excessive torture of another living thing seemed inexorably wrong.
Even as he stepped out of Ken and Omi's borrowed car, almost wishing Ken had a new motorbike he could have liberated instead, Youji could feel the wrongness of the air. Even a few minutes breezing along with nothing but rushing air to either side tended to make him easier with the world, carefree. How could he feel anything but invincible with nothing but a few thin layers of leather between his body and the unforgiving, rushing pavement. Flying.
The door still swung open to his touch, the gore within undiscovered by anyone willing to take action. The bad weather outside had blown papers all around the interior halls, knocked over delicate decorative fixtures and lamps alike. It felt deserted, empty and soulless. A thorough, careful search through the front rooms revealed nothing of interest. No important papers, no personal information, nada.
Back towards the kitchen, waiting every second for a reeking, stumbling form to barrel out of the kitchen rearing back and rending him limb from limb. The dead stay dead, Youji knew, but in situations like this, with all the wrongness coursing through the air, forbidden thoughts did tend to surface with a vengance. Improbable thoughts as well.
Holding his breath against the newly blooming stench of rot, Youji dashed past the kitchen, mind full of childhood monsters and bogeymen. None appeared, to his intense relief. On to the bedrooms now. Searching through the important bits of a dead man's life. It somehow felt dirtier picking over his physical memories than it would to slip up behind him in the dark and slide thread thin wire around his throat until it ran with blood. Pawing through the soulless husks final possessions, he found an odd keycard, tucked in the bottom of a drawer full of socks and happily patterned boxers. It made him think of the plastic rectangles used to open up hotel rooms.
"This looks important." He stated aloud, trying to fill the unearthly silence. It was one thing to have legitimate prey to stalk, another to creep around in unfriendly noiselessness. Entirely different. He found himself glancing over his shoulder on an increasingly frequent basis. No signs of anything important in the bedroom either. That left one more room; one he would certainly rather avoid.
"Do it for Aya then." A decent enough incentive as long as he didn't remind himself of their earlier conversation. Sort of demeaning, to do unsettling grunt work for someone who callously informed you that you were of no importance in their already lonely life. But Aya did need someone to be there for him. If his sister was missing, then that left Youji to play the sole center of Aya's destructive universe until the comatose body could once again lie in the sterilized shrine of a hospital, worshipped by her accompanying metallic companions whirring softly in the background.
"I hope you try and appreciate me more, you ungrateful son of a bitch." Youji spoke out loud again, steeling his nerves with fond images of Aya, those few rare smiles, one of those occasional days when both could do no wrong and things were idyllic and peaceful. He didn't want to go back into that kitchen, didn't want to creep around the suspended body, holding his breath out of fear. Even his feet dragged in protest as he headed down that suddenly impossibly long hallway, trying to stop the inevitable.
"I hope you appreciate this." He peeked around the doorframe, noting the exact location of all furniture, accounting for the angle of every dangling limb. He was the same. The room was the same. Even the blood puddles were the same size, though they'd gone from congealed glistening lakes to dried, crusty splotches.
Dead people don't move. Youji kept repeating that mental refrain to himself as he searched around the perimeter of the kitchen, looking for something that matched the odd key he'd found in the bedroom. There had to be something. One-Eye told him that Cobarde always worked from his home, no other properties were listed under any of his aliases. It had to be here. SOMETHING had to be here for him to find. He'd promised himself he wouldn't leave until he had something concrete to take back to Aya.
A white blur behind him, darting across the floor. Youji jumped back, shoulderblades against the cool front of the fridge, gun aimed at a harmless piece of paper being skittered across the floor from the breeze inviting itself in the front door. He had to stop being so goddamned jumpy. There was nothing to fear. The house was empty; the atrocity in the room with him well and truly dead.
A random thought fluttering across his mind. Check the fridge. If Youji had papers he wanted hidden and he knew he was being stalked and possibly faced his own death, the fridge would be the first place he'd put them, the last place anyone would look. Bated breath, the soft sound as the suction holding the door closed gave up.
He let the breath out, explosive with disappointment. Nothing but food. Plain, boring food. In a fit of brief, stress related rage, Youji swept an arm across the shelf, knocking jars and wrapped food packages to the floor.
"Oh fuck, jackpot!" He breathed, staring at the metal panel adorning the back wall of the fridge. Time for the moment of truth. He reached forward, pried up the panel with blunt fingernails. "Jackpot times a thousand." A single key slot, surrounded by odd symbols.
Youji barely managed to hang onto the keycard, the fridge sliding over on unseen tracks the second the mechanics spit the card back out. He sucked on sore fingers, watching the fridge continue it's bizarre movement. Within seconds, the true purpose of the hidden machinery was revealed. The faint outlines of a large rectangle was clearly seen against the wall-paper. A door. A door with a similar key-slot. Jackpot times infinity.
Dark stairs greeted him, the pastel flowered paper on the door contrasting horribly with the dank, filthy path leading downwards. The sneaky little bastard was smarter than previously assumed. A hidden underground office, perhaps?
As his feet touched the third step down, the door he'd left to swing shut behind him did so with an exuberance that could only have been planned, smashing into him from behind and knocking him head over heels down into darkness. Definitely a stupid idea to come here, Youji thought again, eyes shuttering against the image of his own blood running away from his face across dirty concrete.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"Mmm, 'lo there." Omi muttered sleepily, pulling Ken down under the body-warmed covers around him, tilting his chin up for a kiss.
Ken laughed and covered Omi's mouth. "I don't want to kiss you, sleep-breath."
Omi pouted. "I've only been asleep an hour, and I brushed my teeth before I went to bed." Ken relented and leaned down for a kiss, letting the baking heat of Omi's arms loop around his neck. It started gentle; soft lips brushing, the wet heat of velvet tongues languidly exploring familiar territory, ended with heaving chests and bitten lips.
"Shit." Ken panted, head lowered to rest forehead-to-forehead with Omi's.
"Wouldn't 'fuck' be the better expletive to insert at this point?" Omi teasingly ran the tip of his pink tongue across the glistening expanse of his lower lip. He smiled. "Though maybe you could insertions in some other pleasurable form?" Just a helpful little suggestion.
Time to give up and get out of here, Ken decided, closing his eyes. There was no refusing Omi when he started with that cute dirty talking. Not good to engage in sexual activity with someone recovering from a bad head wound. "You go back to sleep." He brushed a forcibly gentle kiss across Omi's forehead, trying to steady his breathing.
"Do I really look that horrible right now?" Omi self-consciously rubbed at his hair, "I know we've been busy and I haven't really been with it enough to get a shower in, I could get up right now and-"
"'Sokay. You don't look bad at all, a little unkempt yeah, but neither of us really has had much time for personal hygiene." To prove his point, he laced his fingers through Omi's hair, ignoring the stiff blood spikes beneath his fingertips. Omi tentatively smiled back. "You don't mind?"
"It's your blood, isn't it? I've had worse things on my skin." He kissed the silk fringes of blonde eyelashes, trailed down one side of a delicate jaw. Omi sighed in contentment, kneading the back of Ken's neck like a fatigued cat.
"That feels nice." Soft whispered encouragements, neither sure who was murmuring what. Ken turned the soft kisses into the gnawing of teeth, the rasp of two days worth of stubble framing smooth skin, framing well-received nibbles. Omi tilted his head to the side, nimble fingers sliding down to work the end of Ken's t-shirt out of his pants, pulling the fabric up to tangle around Ken's shoulders and bent arms.
"What's gotten into you?" Ken finished the job for him, pulling the dark shirt up and over his head, his hair a mess of tangles in its wake. "Not that I'm complaining..." he sighed as Omi homed in on his nipples. Ken's breath caught in his throat as pink lips trailed down his chest, traced the curves of his ribcage, the stretch of skin between hipbones.
Footsteps clattering down the hallway outside their locked door, the sound of the bathroom door creaking open further down.
"Fate?" Ken guessed, irked at the interruption.
"I don't think the powers that be are working to interrupt our sex." Omi looked up, startled.
Ken sighed. "The person, Fate." He flopped back down from his startled sitting position. "Though with her timing, who knows?"
Omi slithered back up the bared expanse of Ken's chest, seizing Ken's mouth with his own for a kiss that was everything wet and hot and then some. Yes, Omi certainly did have talents all his own. Caught up, muffled moans Ken didn't realize were coming from his mouth until Omi untangled their mouths to comment on it with a wicked little smile.
"I'll show you 'incredibly loud moaning', brat!" Ken ducked under the covers, keeping their shared warmth trapped, finding and removing Omi's boxers in the dark. Omi shivered, pulling the blankets up over his head, ensconcing them both in a soothing sea of dark sheets and soft, unseen skin.
Busy hands tried to canvas as many square inches of Omi's skin as possible while Ken occupied his own mouth with a more dexterous task, Omi's knuckles harshly kneading at the back of Ken's neck still. "Nn, more." Back arching slightly, Omi squirmed for more attention.
Ken slid his palms down until they encountered the firm curves of warm thighs, fingers pressing against that smooth, living flesh. Omi liked it rough sometimes, complained if things didn't elevate to his expectations, retaliated in kind if he found his full satisfaction to be lacking. Ken could never decide if he liked that, hated it or simply could not live without those pouting lips coming down to bite his shoulder when the hands on his body were too gentle, when the thrusts were too slow. It wasn't worth debating; not when Omi was wrapping slim legs around his waist, urging him to slide into perfect warmth, the blankets slowly falling away and winding up on the sanded wood floor, draping over the sides of the mattress.
Omi was making the most delightful sounds underneath him, hips lifting up into the harsh rhythm they created between their bodies. Distantly he heard someone pounding on the wall, heard Aya's irked shout for silence; ignored it.
"I want it harder." Omi breathed against his neck, hands turning to claws down Ken's back, chest heaving against his, sweat slicking everything. Ken readily obliged, teeth gritting together those last few seconds as he forced himself to hold out longer than Omi. "Ah." All the breath hissed out of that fragile body as Omi tightened like electricity beneath him, muscles shuddering around him. Ken pushed his forehead into the perfect space between Omi's neck and shoulder, surrendering his senses to the mind-rending climax Omi always managed to elicit from him.
Aya finally stopped pounding on the wall by their door as Ken and Omi quieted, the two now collapsed in a sated, tangled heap. Omi pressed a few sleepy kisses to Ken's collarbone before dropping immediately into the sleep Ken had interrupted a bare twenty minutes before. Ken tried to hook the blankets back up over them using only his free foot and his left arm, careful not to move Omi. He gave up when the top layer wouldn't go past his lower thigh, leaving them out of reach for his grasping hand.
Omi nuzzled closer, rubbing his cheek against the skin of Ken's chest. Ken kissed the top of his sleeping head, lying back with helpless smile on his lips.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
I am a big fan of the "four paragraph lemon". A bit of detail, a few things hinted at and then POOF, done. You guys were lucky enough to get a few more than four paragraphs, so be grateful. Now, for Youji? What has befallen poor bloody-head boy? -blinks- Is it me or are all my characters bleeding from the head. Maybe I'll give Fate some sort of stigmata so someone can bleed from a new location. -ducks the missiles discharged from the Bible Belt- Nyah! Anyway, give me e-mails and feedback! Darkhunter@ijustdontcare.com or akainobaka@mchsi.com Woot, woot!, nine out of ten doctors recommend feedback as the best incentive for overworked fanfiction writers! So, hop to it!