When the rain was pouring, Yugo slowed his travels and stopped at an Inn. I had been following his trail for a little under a week, and I wasn't sure if he knew. But he hadn't ever stopped anywhere I dared go. The thought of surprising him made my heart flutter a little, and I wondered if he would actually be surprised to see me.
I followed him through the door, at my own pace, not checking in, but heading straight for the bar. When I stepped through the doorway I wiped the sticking strands of wet violet hair away from my forehead with a gloved hand. I could hear the drumming of the rain outside the window. It made a cold and gray world; the early summer rains. My red eyes crossed the bar, from table to table.
Yugo sat at the bar counter. I smiled to myself, musing that it hadn't taken him much time at all to find a seat and order. Perhaps it was even hurried. I took dainty, caressing steps towards the figure at the bar, my eyes checking my surroundings. My heart beat in anticipation of seeing him. When I reached him, he hadn't moved, and I took a seat next to him, feeling slightly droopy and wet. He didn't turn to look at me, but I smiled warmly at him. I couldn't hide the feeling of relief of his company. He was always serene in some sense. He seemed the same on these gray, rainy days as any sunny day.
He chucked some liquor down his throat, keeping his eyes ahead. "Yugo." I couldn't tell if he was at all surprised, but he might have been peeved. Still, I wondered how long he could ignore me. Surely if I directly addressed him, instead of smiling happily, he would be obliged to at least acknowledge my existence, no matter how peeved he might be. He smiled, looking down, his head hanging ever so slightly. His eyes closed. Serenity. The drumming of the rain. "One of two things is your problem." He said in a dark voice, raspy from the alcohol. He signaled for another shot. He waited several seconds before beginning again. "One of them could be that you simply don't understand my goals..." He let what he had said hang in the air. I heard the rain where the silence should have been. I dared a smile.
"Or that I like you too much." I took a step forward in the conversation, unsure of my footing. The feeling was magnified when he didn't begin again right away. "Can we talk, Yugo?" I leaned on the bar, my eyes shifting from him to the bartender.
"We are talking, Alice." It was quiet after he said my name. Perhaps it was my imagination that he lingered on it, that he didn't get to say it as often as he would like to. "No.." I said in a little voice. "Do you have a room?" The quiet nature of our conversation, the pauses, unsaid things where killing me, and making me nervous, and I was smiling sweetly too much. He let a decision pass behind his eyes, and a mask of stone. But he accepted something. He left the bar silently, leaving his money on the counter. I looked after the money, but it wasn't there for long. Perhaps bartenders have a lot of practice with money retrieval. I nearly pranced after him to keep up with his long legged pace and head start on the stairs. I felt bouncy, shaky. I followed him silently up the stairs and down the corridor, the yellow lights buzzing above us. When we got to a room he unlocked the door with a card, pushing the door open, leaving me to step into the darkness of the room.
I walked into the unfamiliar, cold-aired room, looking around. It was dark, my vision buzzing from the change of atmosphere, and the streets lights of the city were shining in through the curtains. It was strange and blue. The sky had become black. Wet and black
I looked back at him, as he shut the door and reached for the light switch.
"I think it's pretty like this...Yugo." I stammered abruptly. It was pretty, just the dark; without the light. I might have smiled to myself in the dark.
If he smiled, I never knew it. He just let his hand fall away from the light switch walking forward, tossing some keys and his bag on a chair, brushing against my back as he went past me. I stood there for a little while, unsure of whether or not to move forward in his room. The dark air felt close, and it made me want to do crazy things, like touch his face...whisper. I shivered, looking around as my eyes adjusted.
"Are you cold?" He asked in a quiet voice, a little far away.
"Yes." I said it more humbly; quickly than I meant to. I felt like a doll in front of him then, with his serene coolness and removed softness. And I had legs that could break ribs and skulls like your hand could crush paper. That is, the ribs of someone non-zoanthrope, like Yugo or me.
He walked towards me like a shadow, outlined by the blue of streetlights. I couldn't hide the breaths that came with the way he walked. He stopped when he was so close to me I could feel his presence in the shadows, but it seemed far away, too. He removed his leather jacket, handing it to me, an arm's length away.
As soon as I reached for it, he let it drop into my hand, retreating to a corner of the room, never touching me. But he had touched me and he didn't know it. I took the jacket, wrapping it around my torso. My legs were still cold, but I saw no remedy.
I couldn't think clearly about the time I had spent following him, and if he knew, or if I should care. But I had sought him out, as a beacon in all zoanthropes I had encountered.
"Did you know I have been...following you?" I held my breath. "Do you know why?"
"I can't claim to know the latter. I can only guess..."
He knew, but that didn't surprise me. What made me bristle was the language he used, it was the way he answered me. In the dark. It was still raining.
I didn't know what to say for a minute...watching the dark float around me, alluring and passing. "I understand why you left...I understand...pain."
"It seems to be inherent of the 'fated' zoanthrope gene...To feel so much pain." He leaned against the wall. I could see his faraway posture, telling; lonely. "We all find pain in our beasts...or we were abused in the hands of Tylon...now we find pain in the rejections of humans. We find pain in the destruction that lies in our wake."
I shivered at his words. I couldn't settle on them, and the thoughts and emotions that were so jumbled. But I could see a reflection of my own loneliness with him. Or maybe I only desired to see it. But why did you leave home, Yugo? Where is your home? Of course I knew. The XGC. "We find pain in the marks on our bodies." I added very quietly. Then I wondered if he had heard me, in the quiet that followed. "You don't have to be alone..."
"Who do I have?"
"You...you have..." me. I thought. "Kenji." I finished.
"But...not only." I waited in the quiet again, glad for the dark.
"What does that mean?" The way he said it, he was encouraging me to speak, in a calm, knowing way, like he was waiting for something behind all my answers. It made me nervous. So I danced on the edge of my tongue with longing.
"...Are you happy to see me?" I blurted out. My heart was pounding after I said it, me wondering if I should have. I think he chuckled quietly from the shadows of the room. He was regarding me with the haunted eyes I could feel rather than see in the dark. I bit my lip, glad for the protection of the darkness.
I knew that my feelings weren't as innocent as I had pretended before. However I had felt about him before, however I wanted to hide anything that would challenge my well earned stability, there was nothing I could do. I had followed him because I wanted him. I wanted him in a way that wasn't as casual as I had pretended. Pretending. I allowed myself to realize the crazy thing. It wasn't the time or place, but I wanted him, badly. I even wanted his pain.
"Yugo..." I began before giving him too much time to reply. I found the courage to move, almost pacing, then sat down on the bed. I hung my head in my hands, mumbling, running my words together, but I raised my voice. "What are you thinking? I feel like I'm chasing after a shadow...I'm chasing you, Yugo. You are chasing the XGC..." I raised my head, exhaling. The world was closing in. I couldn't hide so casually...I was halfway exposed. I began again, more quietly; slowly. "You have Kenji, I, Uriko. We have sacrifices to make, and causes to fight for, and..." You left me, alone, Yugo. "We..." I let the world hang in the dark, stressed. "We have the mark of the X-Genome Code to fight." I wanted him to save me from babbling. But he was leaving me, stranded, alone in the dark, wanton for his shadow. I couldn't think of how to finish. The words were sticking to my brain, all jumbled still. So I had ripped something open, and exposed it. I made myself vulnerable, to anyone but him. I let him know that he wasn't alone in fighting the XGC. But I don't know if it made a difference.
My patience was willing me to come to a verbal conclusion for everything I wanted to be and say. For all the explanations I might never need. "I..." There was a long pause. "I want you." My heart began to beat in the dark. Fast, like a real rabbits, nervous, afraid. I felt so fragile, and I knew I wasn't. I could take beating after beating to my body and jump up again for more. But I felt like anything he said, even if he chose to say nothing, would hurt me more. I let my head drop into my hands and I closed my eyes. Every little breath was executed in fear.
I jumped when he was sitting next to me on the bed, swift and quiet, with the blue city street light drifting across us.
"I didn't mean to say that," I said softly, struggling to hide myself again. "I've lost sight of so many things. There's a future out there...and I want...to say things...that I can't seem to find--" I found tears amassing at my eyes. There were threatening to drown me.
I was surprised when he lay his hand on mine, taking my hand away from my eyes. He was so still, removed, and then I was lying back, his hands over each of my wrists, pinning me down.
I was so calm, but shaking too, and I didn't know why. "Yugo..." His body was pressed against mine, but he had pinned me while I was sitting so from the waist down I was hanging off the bed. He pushed himself off of me, taking my thighs and lifting them up, to push me further up on the bed, so my feet didn't hang off. Then he climbed on top of me in one fluid movement, holding himself above me. He was a serene creature. But he was raging, and ugly, and beautiful, and blood-thirsty. He was marked by his fighting. I met all of these things with my red rabbit's eyes, smiling softly. I reached up to touch the side of his cheek, to trace the scars on his face with my gloved hand. He leaned into my hand. I wondered if I could almost see something fragile in him, like I felt inside. But what was fragile in Yugo, was also incredibly strong. My eyes never left his as I removed my gloves and tossed them aside so I could feel his face with my fingertips. The vision of his face softened though the salty tears, finally meandering down my cheeks.
I was writhing in my mind; in the tension. I was shaking; feeling so strange in the tension between us. I took my hands from his face, feeling more steady. Almost sedated. I reached up again in the dark, to touch him in a more forbidden way. I traced his chest around to his back, taking his torso in my arms. I pulled him down; closer to me, so that we were pressed against each other. So that our heads were next to each other, ear to ear. So that our bodies rested against each other, all the way down. He tilted his head to sniff my neck, not unlike a wolf would, nuzzling my neck. He licked my neck, in one swift tongue movement. And then he lowered his mouth to that place on my neck, letting it rest there. He lunged at my neck. It was a small movement, but he used teeth, the teeth of a wolf, and he sucked on my neck with those sharp, sharp teeth. I gasped at first, spreading my fingers into nails on his back, and I began to breath quicker. It was twisting and painful and warm. I moaned, turning my neck, digging my nails into his back. I breathed quicker, releived and awakened and longing all at once. His mouth traveled, from one side of my neck to the other, chin to collarbone, my head turning, nearly stifled high pitched moans escaping my throat. They were the ghosts of loneliness, running from my throat, driven away. And he was growling, savage...or...gentle; pressing his body still closer to mine, quickening the pace and hardness with my response. He moved downward, just to where my blouse began and he let go of my skin, licking his jowls in a wolf like way. His eyes flashed to mine, nearly predatory, but not without thought or sensibility. He blinked. "Don't stop.." I said breathlessly. He lowered his head to find the patch of untouched skin where he had left. There was a hesitation. "Do you like your dress?" He said, in a low, quiet voice.
"What? Oh do anything..." He licked the last place where the collar of my dress began, at my cleavage. There was a growl and my dress split. The cold air touched my breasts and stomach. I gasped at the impact of my dress ripping, reaching to cover myself. Maybe 'anything' is bad advice for a wolf. I was feeling exposed, and hungry. I felt so hungry. For Yugo. He latched his mouth, in a gentler grip to the middle of my cleavage, his body crouched, his hands guiding; lifting my torso off the bed, my back into an arch. I let my hands fall to the sides, feeling thoroughly exposed to a wild animal. He snarled, jarring me. I think he had a wicked smile. And he licked the places where he had been so cruel, guiding his hand over my breast. I could feel the tingle of hardened nipples, but his hand rested only on the side of my breast, gentle, barely there. I wanted him to rip the lingerie away from it and take me. "Go ahead..." I said, gulping, as I breathed rapidly.
It struck me that he was so careful with each boundary down to my breast, and how he was so rough in some ways. He became very still at that point. I was unsure of what he was doing and so I froze, waiting. But he fell back against my body, close to my ear. He whispered, in the dark after he had turned me on severely, practically seduced me, after he began to satiate me: "Damnit...I'm sorry." It wasn't what I expected to hear. But he said "I'm sorry I ripped your dress...Ally." He sniffed my neck again, as if to savor my scent before he lifted himself away from me, to stand facing the window. "I am very glad to see you. But I can't show you how glad I am right now..."
He turned his head towards the window, a deep growl of anger ripping from his throat. He looked pissed. Really pissed. "Look out." He said quietly. I flung myself up, confused, missing the arms I'd had around me, feeling cold, all down the front, and bitten, possibly bleeding. I held my shirt shut eying him. He looked incensed, as if his beast would burst from him. I looked to the window to see a flashing silhouette. And then the window shattered as the man flew inward, landing a kick in Yugo's face, sending him flying.