Thank you very much to all my reviewers! Especially all of those who reviewed me multiple times!

Yamatoforever: what you say about rape is definitely true but I have to speed up things a bit. I guess my point is that Tsuzuki would wait and it is really all up to Hisoka.

Siisy: I think this fatechanger thing is original… but please let me now if I have taken it from somewhere.

Rinoa Redcloak: Thank you for liking my characters!

Italics= thoughts, /italics/= words of two songs by Avril Lavigne, "Naked" and "Things I'll never tell".

%=memories

I have read so many fics lately that I hope I have not unwittingly plagiarized someone... please let me now if you feel otherwise.

Disclaimer: I don't own YnM or any of the characters. I hopefully have invented Sacha and Anya though

I wake up in the morning/ Put on my face /The one that's gonna get me /Through another day /Doesn't really matter/How I feel inside /'Cause life is like a game sometimes /But then you came around me /The walls just disappeared /Nothing to surround me /And keep me from my fears /I'm unprotected /See how I've opened up /Oh, you've made me trust /
Because I've never felt like this before /I'm naked /Around you /Does it show? /You see right through me /And I can't hide /I'm naked/ Around you /And it feels so right /I'm tyring to remember /Why I was afraid /To be myself and let the /Covers fall away /I guess I never had someone like you /To help me, to help me fit /In my skin

(Naked by Avril Lavigne)

Hisoka and Tsuzuki had made little progress lately.

Tsuzuki had retreated into the won't-try-my-luck mode. He had all to lose and little to gain. He hummed as he had taken to while cooking. He could hear his partner diligently reciting his report to a tape recorder in the living room. The sound of the boy's voice voice was somehow soothing. Hisoka. The name evoked a warmth he had never known he could feel. Cut the onion. Hisoka. Fry the onions. Hisoka. Boil the noodles. Hisoka. The thought of him punctuated the most normal of routines. Hisoka. The beginning and end of everything.

Hisoka had retreated into too-fearful-to-say-anything mode. He had all to gain, but wasn't sure he wanted to gain it yet. He diligently dictated the report. Then listened to the soothing sounds coming form the kitchen. At times like this the memory of the kiss that night came back to his lips and he felt like asking for more… Damn.  Hisoka recognized the song Tsuzuki was humming. The words were oddly appropriate, he thought with a dry smile…

I'm tugging at my hair /I'm pulling at my clothes /I'm trying to keep my cool /I know it shows /I'm staring at my feet /My cheeks are turning red /I'm searching for the words inside my head /I'm feeling nervous /Trying to be so perfect /Cause I know you're worth it

Hisoka pondered how he was letting things slip out of his hands. Fear again. It was no longer fear of what Tsuzuki might "do" to him. It was rather fear that Tsuzuki may find him… inadequate. That he may decide to leave him. But Tsuzuki wouldn't do that. Tsuzuki had come for him even when he had been rejected. He should know better than to fear that.


If I could say what I want to say/I'd say I wanna blow you... away /Be with you every night /Am I squeezing you too tight /If I could say what I want to see /I want to see you go down /On one knee /Marry me today/Yes, I'm wishing my life away /With these things /'ll never say


Why could he just…Damn! He should really get out of this cage Muraki had made around him.


It don't do me any good /It's just a waste of time /What use is it to you /What's on my mind /If it ain't coming out /We're not going anywhere /So why can't I just tell you that I care

It was then that Hisoka resolved. If anybody had been there to see it, they would have thought it was something amazing. He willed himself up and willed himself to the kitchen, trying to shut up the scared voices in his head. Because this nonsense had to stop. Now.

Tsuzuki hadn't heard him come into the kitchen. When the boy's arms wrapped around him from behind, his mind stalled. Hisoka, Hisoka, Hisoka… no other thought could possibly receive any attention. Not even the food. He managed to turn around in the boy's arms. "Are you Ok?"
"Sure I am. Thank you. For always making sure that I am." Hisoka said. There was an emotion in his voice... could it be…

The neon signs were back with BAD IDEA on them. But Tsuzuki brushed them aside again. He bent down his head and started kissing the top of Hisoka's. It didn't take a minute before the boy looked up and he got a chance to kiss his lips again. When he felt Hisoka's response, the neon signs finally switched off.

The fearful voices in Hisoka's mind did the same.

And Tsuzuki turned off the stove. Even food could wait now.

Not so long after, piles of clothes littered the way between the kitchen and Hisoka's room. The two shinigami softly moaned their ways towards their peak. Neither of them could any longer concentrate on the enormity of what was happening. Their moans grew louder as the peak was reached.

But the joy was short lived. Hisoka felt searing pain, and Tsuzuki saw the curse marks lit up. As Hisoka screamed, Tsuzuki cursed Muraki once more under his breath.

The next morning Hisoka prepared himself to go to work. His spirits were pretty low. The memory of the pain was strong. It hadn't lasted but a moment, yet… But strangely enough he felt fine. He wanted to repeat it again, but he feared the pain. Damn Muraki. But  now he felt fine. The thought kept hitting his head. Like he was missing out something, overlooking something important that his unconscious self was trying to get him to notice.

 %The are more important ways you can defeat Muraki.% This sentence also popped out in his head on the way to work.

It wasn't until he started training with Anya that he noticed how much more powerful he had got.

Anya already knew the answer when she took the boy and Tsuzuki to Watari's lab. She watched in silence while the scientist and her old partner checked this and that. More for scene sake than other.

She doesn't seem to care. We had a huge row and she doesn't care. She avoids me and doesn't look at me and hasn't said a word since last night, yet it doesn't look like she cares.

"The curse is gone." Watari summed up. Hisoka and Tsuzuki looked really puzzled and sought confirmation from Sacha.

"Muraki is dead?"

"No. I think…" Watari started, but the embarrassment got the more of him and he started blushing.

What's going on? Thought Hisoka.

Sacha continued for him. Watari mentally cursed her for being seemingly emotionless. "We think something may have happened… you may have done something, which caused the curse to lift..."

"I felt searing pain and the marks lit up last night..." Hisoka's brain was racing to the answer, as he was putting the pieces of the jigsaw together.

"That would have been the curse lifting, yeah."

"Ok, guys, why don't you cut the crap." Anya blurted out in her usual no-nonsense way. " We all know what happened, because we know what would lift the curse and Sacha is not usually wrong. You made love, whoopee. We didn't really think it would happen, so congratulations."

Hisoka and Tsuzuki had no time to let their jaw drop. They were too busy turning as red as can be. Both of them looked alternatively at Sacha and Watari for clarification.

All this time, they thought we should… didn't tell us…

The silence was getting awkward, so Watari went through the usual curse explanation. Tsuzuki also started adding up the numbers.

 "In brief, the rape was the seal of your curse and making love, you reversed it. We wish we could have told you earlier, but you had to get there on your own." Finished Sacha.

 "Didn't I tell you there were other ways to beat Muraki?" added Anya. "You showed that you were stronger, that you were not going to let your life be shaped by him for eternity. You win and he loses."

Tsuzuki had never felt so proud of Hisoka. And Hisoka could feel it.

Hisoka smiled at him because he too thought the same. He was really beaming, but nobody seemed stunned that he was anymore. I am really free now, he thought. This was a new beginning.

Hisoka and Tsuzuki had taken the rest of the day free. Watari was making potions. Anya was training herself. Tatsumi and Konoe were at a meeting and the rest of the shinigami were out of the office too. So nobody noticed when Sacha slipped out. She knew she didn't have much time.

By the time everybody came back and the report of a new gruesome death came by, Sacha was nowhere to be found.

Many miles away, Sacha was being showed in one of the most popular brothel of Kyoto. She looked around herself with curiosity. A brothel, eh? You were never the academic one, Oriya-kun.

A man entered behind her silently. He looked at her with surprise. She was the last person he would ever have expected to see. He could not believe his eyes. Kathy?!? "Long time no see, Kathy-chan. What do you I owe the pleasure to?"

She turned to look at her old love with sad eyes. "Pleasure? I just came to tell you to run away. We are fated to die in two hours. The three of us. If you don't, you will be dead soon. Run away, Oriya. I would hate to see you dead."