Disclaimer: Yami no Matsuei is the property of Matsushita Yoko and I'm not making any money with this fic. All thought I would like to own Muraki and make him do censored with censored to Watari and get paid for it… But I can't. Crap…
A/N: This little fanfic is dedicated to my lovely friend Sepi, who just loves Terazuma, (Who wouldn't?) and has supported me with my lame attempts at writing fanfiction. Without her I'd never have posted my first fic here, so blame her. Ha! So, thanks for being a wonderful friend Sepi! Love ya.
About the fic itself… The characters may seem a bit OOC, but I'm trying really hard to keep them in character. Because I just hate it when people are OOC! But I needed to change them a little to get them do what I want…
Warnings: Language (for both cursing and bad grammar, English isn't my native language) and very, very mild spoilers for the sixth volume of the manga.
It was a beautiful day in Meifu. The sun was shining from a clear sky, birds were singing and sakura petals were dancing in a calm breeze. Everything seemed so peaceful.
It was difficult to imagine that half of the JuOhCho had been in danger to be burnt into ashes mere minutes ago. But if one spared a glance towards Tsuzuki, the possible destruction wasn't so hard to imagine after all.
Tsuzuki had fled to the library, much to the Gushoshin twin's caring, with his partner. And now they were sitting on one of the tables placed between the enormous rows of bookshelves.
"I. Hate. Him." Tsuzuki snarled between clenched teeth.
If Hisoka got five yens every time he heard that from his partner, he could have paid all Tsuzuki's debts away. But sadly that wasn't the case, so Tsuzuki still had to work a few hundred years for free. But the point trying to be made here is that Hisoka had heard this too many times during his short time as a shinigami, so he didn't even bother looking up from his book, and informed Tsuzuki that he had heard him with a simple "Hmm."
Not satisfied with his partner's response, Tsuzuki continued. "I really, really hate him!"
Hisoka sighed, he knew that tone, and witch meant that Tsuzuki would just keep bugging him, until Hisoka showed at least some kind of interest towards the subject. He closed the heavy book and placed it down on the table. Looking at his fuming partner, he tried not to sound too frustrated. "Yes, you do."
"Why does he have to be so mean to me all the time? Hasn't he learned how to respect his elders?" Tsuzuki's voice seemed to be having problems deciding if it should be snarling or whining.
"I don't know." Hisoka's right hand was playing with the cover of the book; he wanted to get this stupid thing over with so he could return to it.
"Like that last fight! He started it with no reason at all. I swear he gets his kicks from annoying me!" After waving his hands in frustrating anger in a rather windmill like manner, he folded them over his chest.
"It takes two to tango, Tsuzuki." Hisoka glared him from the opposite end of the table.
At that, Tsuzuki's voice got a tingle of hurt in it. "What? Are you on his side? Some partner you are!"
Hisoka sighed again, and had a hard time fighting against the urge to slap his partner on the head. "Idiot. I'm on nobody's side. I'm just stating the obvious. Like you said, you are the older one, so try acting like it and calm down your temper. You should be lucky that we were able to calm you two down before Tatsumi-san heard you."
"We didn't cause any property damage, so it wouldn't have mattered," Tsuzuki mumbled, his anger partly subdued by the fear of the secretary.
"You broke a coffee mug."
"It was his coffee mug! And he deserved it!"
If Hisoka were acting like the other people of his age, he would have rolled his eyes, but he was more mature that that, so he didn't, instead he sighed and rubbed his temple. "Do you think you could at least try to tolerate each other?"
"Like you said, it takes two to tango." It was amazing that even when so angry, Tsuzuki was able to twist his face in a goofy grin.
Hisoka pondered this for a while, even though so unbelievably childish, Tsuzuki had a point. And the constant fighting didn't only cause discomfort for Tsuzuki and high blood pressure to Tatsumi-san, it affected in the general working environment. Hisoka spared one last look at his book and sighed. He wasn't going to get back to it in a long time.
"Oi, Hisoka? Where are you going?"
Terazuma was sitting behind his desk, legs on top of it, counting backwards from one hundred, and when he was done he repeated it. He had heard that it was supposed to be calming, but he only became frustrated when he forgot where he had been before he got distracted with lighting another cigarette.
He was interrupted between 37 and 36 when he heard someone knocking on the office door. "Yes?" There was no way in any dimension of any world in any solar system to hear someone speak one word grumpier that he just had.
The door opened to reveal a boy in jeans with ash blond hair. "Terazuma-san." Hisoka bowed his head politely before closing the door.
"You better be here to pay for that coffee mug your dickhead of a partner broke."
Oh great. Hisoka thought, dealing with an angry Terazuma was probably even harder than dealing with angry Tsuzuki. The violet eyed man was easy to bribe with sweets, but Hisoka had nothing to make Terazuma listen to him. He could threaten to touch him, but decided against it, if he wanted their truce to be permanent he needed to make sure that both Tsuzuki and Terazuma were doing it for free will. And Terazuma chancing here, and being on that mood would definitely cause property damage.
So, he decided that being polite and calm was the best way to achieve what he wanted. "Unfortunately, no. But I'm sure he'll pay it later, Terazuma-san."
"He better have!" Terazuma mumbled something that most likely were the nastiest curse words that Hisoka had ever heard in his life, all relating to Tsuzuki, as he reached to the ashtray to dump his finished cigarette there. Then he turned his cold gaze to Hisoka. "Then what are you doing here, kid?"
Hisoka had to admit that he felt a little uneasy under that gaze, like he had when he had first seen Terazuma in the dojo, but he hid it well. "Actually, I'm here to discuss about the incident that led to the breaking of your mug."
The ex-detective let out a bitter laugh. "So, the old fart sent you to clean his mess." Then he reached inside his breast pocket to get a new cigarette.
"Actually, Tsuzuki knows nothing about this." Then Hisoka faced a problem, he had no idea how to continue, he hadn't prepared for this conversation at all. Well, it only took ten minutes to walk from the library to the office area, so no master plans could be created during that time. And he barely knew anything about Terazuma, except that for some weird reason he hated Tsuzuki.
But like he had decided acting polite and calm, he came to the conclusion that telling the truth would be the best. "The constant fighting between you and Tsuzuki is affecting the working environment."
When having his empathy under control, Hisoka wasn't the best at reading people. But it didn't take an empath to see the raw anger flashing in Terazuma's eyes. So, to avoid facing the man's wrath, he quickly continued "And Tsuzuki would be more than happy to make a truce with you." Well, a little white lie wouldn't hurt…
Terazuma seemed to be taking a calming draw of his cigarette, and when he exhaled, the smoke drifted lazily towards the ceiling. "But you said the lazy ass doesn't know about this."
Crap. Try to trick a detective and find yourself backed against a wall. …Damn those eyes, they're making me so nervous. Hisoka averted his gaze from the pointy eared shinigami, trying to hide his nervousness.
And then the question struck him. Why was he so nervous around Terazuma? Sure, the man was his senior, but so was Tatsumi-san, and he had no problems being around the secretary, or any of his co-workers. He wasn't nervous because Terazuma was angry. He had witnessed Tatsumi being angry at Tsuzuki countless times, and the secretary was the epitome of scary people when angry, so he had grown accustomed to anger. And then there were all those fights between Terazuma and his partner, so anger certainly wasn't the cause of his nervousness. Maybe he was nervous because Terazuma had caught his lie, but that shouldn't have been a surprise, the man was intelligent.
Shaking his head lightly to clear his thoughts, Hisoka lifted his gaze and continued "Well, he would be very happy to make a truce, when provided the chance."
Terazuma seemed to have calmed down his anger a degree during Hisoka's pondering, and now sounded more amused or frustrated than angry "Then tell that idiot to come and say that to my face, instead of sending a little peacemaker on my way."
Well, that was just great! All this time Hisoka had held Terazuma in some sort of respect after realizing his intelligence and interest in martial arts, and now he found out that the man was just as stubborn and childish as his partner. Hisoka mentally cursed himself for letting his calmness and politeness slip, but he had spent almost his whole day in the middle of Terazuma's and Tsuzuki's fighting and he was growing tired of it. "He didn't send me here! I have a free will of my own, damn it! And what is your problem with Tsuzuki anyway!"
Terazuma stared at the young shinigami for a while. He had seen his irritant's partner getting angry before, and when this was nothing near how Hisoka had acted in the library, it was still quite a shock seeing the quiet boy losing his temper. It showed that the kid had inner fire and wasn't such a wimp he seemed to be at first sight. But he still acted calm most of the time. Terazuma respected that.
Smirking, the man dumped his cigarette in the ashtray and stood up, walking next to Hisoka. He leaned his hip against his table, let out a small laugh and shook his head for Hisoka's question. "My problem with Tsuzuki is as complex as the man himself… Firs of all, I hate how he is wasting his power. I mean, he has twelve shikigami under his command, and yet he handles Kyushu where there isn't much work." He paused, turning to glare at Hisoka. "And don't you tell me that he can't change the position his working in, because he can. If that lazy son of a bitch just owned at least a little amount of ambition, who knows how far he could go. Second, he is the oldest of us all, but he is so damn childish that I can't stand it. Third, he takes nothing seriously and acts like a total idiot. Fourth, he is always so loud and when not working, which is like ninety per cent of his time, he is just goofing around, distracting everyone who is trying to get any work done. Fifth, he is putting all of his money in totally useless stuff. Sixth, he is not only irritating me, but Konoe-kacho and Tatsumi-san are getting tired of his stunts too. We are total opposites, and all that 'opposites attract' –thing is just bullshit."
When he stopped for breath, the irritated look in his face was replaced with somewhat uneasy frown, and he lowered his voice "And on top of all that, he has everyone drooling after him! It's a wonder that I haven't walked in a very intimate, embarrassing, disturbing, little act when going in Tatsumi-san's office." At the thought of that scene, the man seemed to shudder.
The last comment made Hisoka's cheeks burn with a deep blush. He didn't want to imagine his partner doing that with Tatsumi, although the two shared a strong bond.
So, even when everything Terazuma had said was more or less true, he had been exaggerating. Tsuzuki took everything seriously in his own way, and despite the few catastrophes he sometimes caused, he did his job well… And everyone was… attracted to him because he was a nice and caring person.
Hisoka wanted to inform the pointy eared shimigami about all these facts, but decided against it. It would seem that he was defending his partner, and being in the position he was in, he needed to stay as objective as possible.
Hisoka was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard Terazuma's voice. This time it was softer than before during the day. "And the list goes on… I can't understand how a smart kid like you has lasted with him over a year, Kurosaki-kun," Terazuma said pulling a hand trough his dark hair.
Hisoka wasn't used to compliments, unless they were the embarrassing "Hisoka, you're cute." comments coming from Tsuzuki, so he felt his cheeks heat up even more. But Hisoka felt that he should thank Terazuma verbally, not just by blushing. And dear Enma, he hoped that Terazuma hadn't noticed him blushing. He came to the conclusion that answering a compliment with a compliment was the best way, so he voiced the one thought that had been swirling in his head for a while. "I'm sure that an intelligent man like you can understand it in the end, Terazuma-san."
The two shinigami looked at each other for a while as they stood in silence.
When the silence was getting too long and the tension too strong, Hisoka turned his gaze away, Terazuma taking this as a sign to continue their conversation.
"Okay, tell Tsuzuki that I'm willing to give a thought about the two of us living peacefully ever after," Terazuma said, pushing away from the table taking a small step closer to Hisoka.
Hisoka felt the corners of his lips tug upwards. "Thank you, Terazuma-san," he said, bowing slightly.
Terazuma returned the small smile with a wider smile of his own, and placed a friendly hand on Hisoka's shoulder. "Any time, Kurosaki-kun."
When Hisoka looked up at Terazuma's dark eyes, something passed between them and the tension was back laying thick in the air.
Hisoka's rational mind was screaming for him to look away and walk out of the office, but he refused to listen. Something in those eyes was calling for him, and he leaned closer.
When he noticed Terazuma doing the same, they leaned closer… and closer. When Hisoka could feel the dark haired man's warm breath against his lips, he closed his eyes and leaned even closer.
And that was when the door opened.
"Hajime-chan!"
The two shinigami jumped away from each other when a cheerful Wakaba entered the room. "Oh, you're here too, Hisoka-kun. I just ran into Tsuzuki, he is looking for you."
"Oh… I… um…" Hisoka stuttered, praying for every god he had ever heard of for Wakaba not to notice his flushed face.
Terazuma was trying to hide his nervousness by coughing, as his partner turned to him. "Tatsumi-san wants to see us in Konoe-kacho's office. He said we have a case."
Then she turned to look at Hisoka, and then her partner. Noticing their unusual behaviour, she frowned. "Is something wrong?"
"No! Not a damn thing," Terazuma said, if not a little uncertainly, as he dragged his partner out of the office.
"I should go see Tsuzuki," Hisoka said in a rush as he dashed out of the door behind Terazuma and Wakaba, walking to the opposite direction of the corridor, not once looking over his shoulder.
Owari
A/N: So ended this little piece of fanfiction. I hope the characters weren't too OOC, review if you want. I'm off to kill Wakaba with a huge cleaver. Anyone want to join me?