Mornings
By Cassandra Sisenta
A/N: Believe it? Haha, two chapters in one day!! I guess it made up for the chapterless day yesterday. ^^ I finally got around to writing Rui and Satsu's chapter. Well, it turned out tamer than I thought and I hadn't really thought that love would find its place in Rui's part. Rui's such a tortured character. I love him. ^^
DISCLAIMER: I only own both Rui and Satsu. Kinmoku and other Sailor Moon stuff belong to Naoko Takeuchi.
Chapter VI
Rui and Satsu
His indigo eyes gleamed with his thoughts as he sat in the dark, gaze riveted on the still sleeping figure beside him on the large mahogany bed. Shiny, pale violet hair fell in a waterfall against the contrasting night sky quality of the blankets. A pale shoulder beckoned to him, enticing him further as it smoothed up to a graceful neck then down once more to a silky plane of a sinuous back.
He sighed and pulled his stare away, focusing on the sight beyond his open walkthrough doors to the balcony. The sun was slowly rising and it was still mostly dark, the horizon glowing with different pastel colors. With the silent grace of a warrior, he rose from the bed without disturbing his nightly companion. He picked up a mauve sleeping robe that had been discarded so carelessly the night before and shrugged it on, clothing his naked body. His gaze turned to the sleeping figure on the bed once more, but he quickly turned away before he dissuaded himself from his purpose. He needed to stay away from her temptation for now.
He had to think and he could not do it properly with her so close enough to touch.
With his feet bare, he walked off towards the balcony to watch the sunrise. As the sun rose higher, its golden beams touched his aquamarine hair and highlighted his indigo eyes and effeminate features. The sun's glow betrayed his sober face. This thoughtful, tortured man was Rui Akari.
One wouldn't have recognized this man as one of the Queen's advisers and once the Vice-Captain of the Imperial Knights. The Rui Akari everyone knew was a man with a friendly nature and a perpetual smile on his face. He had always been polite and at the most pleasant with everyone he met and everyone liked him for being so disarming.
Apparently, not everyone looked beyond the mask of his smile.
If they did, would they even like him as they did before they knew?
Did they have an inkling of who he was before he was an adviser and even before he was a Knight?
Of course they didn't.
They didn't know that he had grown up serving in a brothel as a common plaything and a silent killer. His mother had been a whore, his father a man who promised her a world beyond her nights of perversions and lust. His father had been killed for not paying his debts. He grew up in a world where you survived either because you were beautiful and devious or because you were rich and powerful.
His effeminate beauty had made him a favorite among the highest paying customers. He lost his virginity at the age of twelve and his innocence even before that. His deadly skill on the glaive had kept him alive when someone as much as touched him out of line.
Many had desired him, lusted after him, and yet owned by no one, despite what they thought.
He had wanted more from the world, more than what passing pleasure and promised riches the underworld offered him. Thus he had escaped, but barely with his life.
He had thought that he had escaped that world of myriad vices and dark intrigue.
Apparently he had been wrong.
Oh, surely Satsu Kou was definitely a lesser, lesser evil compared to what he had experienced in his youth. In truth she was actually heaven compared to the hell he had grown up in. At least with her he was sure that he wouldn't have to worry about getting killed. Also, with her he knew he had company during the nights when he didn't want to fall asleep in fear of the memories that haunted him behind his closed eyes. With her he didn't have to feel so disgusted with himself, so impure. With her, he always felt he was in ecstasy.
She had been the perfect distraction and nighttime companion for him. She was beautiful, a classical, alluring beauty that called to his eyes and to his blood. With her, he never got bored because she was smart and strong. They could talk about anything all night or they could move on to more sensual activities to pass the time. She was never clingy, never possessive. It almost seemed like they were nothing more but acquaintances outside their private rooms even if he had helped to train her become a Starlight senshi. For all her cool and aloofness around others, she was fire and passion with him.
No one knew about their little affair. She hadn't wanted anyone to know and he was fine with the arrangement. He didn't want all the fuss anyway. Akai would probably praise all the heavens that his good friend Rui-chan had finally gotten a girl to call his own after an infinity of being celibate. Then he would probably go worse on Satsu, something about her losing her Ice Queen demeanor and actually being a woman under all that scary frost.
Really, he was very fond of Akai, but he didn't know if he could hold off killing him if he started raving about the state of his intimate life.
He had only been curious once about Satsu's secrecy and when he had asked her about it, she had answered rather bluntly, as was her custom,
"You are but a body for my pleasure, Rui-san. I hope you understand."
He hadn't really cared back when she had said it then. He was pretty much used to impersonal and yet intimate relationships and he hadn't really cared for someone special during those times.
And how he wished he felt the same way now.
In the world he had grown up in, the world he despised and yet shaped who he was, there was a golden rule. You must never, ever fall in love.
Love was like a drug that had no cure. It made you see the world in a distorted light that could either break you or kill you and this he knew very well. But then, in that world there hadn't been a Satsu Kou.
And if there had been, he somehow knew he would not have survived.
She would have killed him or else he would have killed himself for her instead.
She had consumed him completely and she had no clue.
He suddenly smiled bitterly at the sun that had risen before him.
He was but a body for her relief and pleasure, funny how Fate played such games.
It was as if he hadn't left the place he had once called home.
Is this really love? I sure hope it isn't…"Rui-san."
He turned to find her standing by the walkthrough doors. She looked immaculate with her hair up in a high ponytail and in the clothes she had had on the night before.
"Ohayou." He greeted her, smiling in his usual way as he turned.
She nodded back. "Ohayou."
They stood there looking at each other for a while, her ice blue eyes drinking up the sight of him against the morning sunlight like fine wine. He knew she liked it when the sun's light fell on his hair. She said the sun made him look like an angel with a halo.
"I'm leaving now. I'll see you at the council room later." She told him.
He nodded. "See you then."
She walked to him and pressed herself against his chest as she closed the small distance between their half-open lips. He resisted the urge to pull her closer and hold her in place.
Satsu looked into his eyes when she was done and she whispered, "You're beautiful."
He smiled. "Arigato."
Another morning of lies have begun.