Title: Intelligent Direction
Characters: Lust, Anger, Mutt-Love's-dog-as-an-actual-character
Pairing: KuroFay
Series: Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: General/Humour :crosses fingers and weeps:
Rating: PG-13-ish (language)
Summary: This is a fic about Fate, how you cannot ignore/avoid/kill Fate, and the ultimate power of Temptation over everything.
Warning: Devious interventions? Of the homosexual?
Notes: Well, see, I cave under peer pressure. Everyone was just so delighted with the first chapter. What else could I have possibly done? I am a slave to the whims of the tickled.
Disclaimer: I do not own TRC. I don't own anythng really mentioned in this fic, thoughI have throw away many a toothbrush before it's time.
Ch. 2
7:35a.m., Chicago, Illinois. The alarm snoozed for nine minutes and began again, heralding to the world that the lifeless lump in the bed beside it ought to have been up forty-five minutes ago. It was the fifth time the alarm had sounded that morning, and someone very touchy was going to miss their train.
"Meh. Stupid alarm…" the lump murmured and reached blindly towards the nightstand for an extra nine minutes. Sometimes the hardest thing about the day was merely getting up at the appropriate time to face it, especially since the appropriate time had a nasty habit of being far too early for reason.
"Wake up," another voice said briskly. The door was slammed open and the lights switched on. Somewhere in the far corner of the bedroom, a radio began playing loudly. "Getting up early doesn't kill people, but it makes them irritable. You've always seemed the irritable type to me, but then, I'm not as excellent a judge of character as Love or Temptation. With someone as irritating as you, I assumed it was a facet of your personality. What do I know?"
The lump, Anger, grumbled and pulled a pillow over its face. "Leave me alone, dumbass. So, I decided to cancel our coffee. Just beat me over the fucking head with it, why don't you?"
"Before you cancel," Lust said, yanking the pillow out of Anger's hands, "it's customary to call instead of standing me up."
Anger sneered, feeling smug. The question was hopeful: "Were you angry?"
"How do you feel right now?" Lust retorted.
"Like I want to punch your ugly face off."
"Well, you get what you give," said Lust. It was the classic rejoinder when putting up with Anger. Anger's sole purpose in life was to get a rise out of all those around it. Thus, Anger was more annoying than Love because it was a victory for Anger if you became annoyed.
"Who do you think you are, barging in here at the crack of dawn, rousing me from my slumber, and then making your prissy little comebacks and demands? To believe that I used to think highly of you, Lust. It's ridiculous."
"Oh, shut up. When I say we need to talk, meet me over coffee, I mean it. I even settled on Starbucks because I hate that place, and it would make you happy. Now, get dressed. I've suffered chai latte waiting for you, and I'm not letting you get away with it."
Anger chuckled gleefully to itself as it relented and tumbled out of bed. Lust, Anger saw, was looking dapper as usual. It instantly pissed Anger off. Since Addiction had introduced Anger to the intoxicating fury of the caffeine habit, Anger began to long for the missed coffee and hated Lust for not bringing something. It was just like Lust to be so insensitive, wasn't it?
"Oh, and when you've cleaned up," Lust said, knocking its thumb towards the door, "I've got your caramel-mocha cappuccino ready for zapping in the microwave."
Anger bristled. Why would anyone want Lust's damn microwave coffee? And was Lust insinuating Anger had some form of caffeine problem which, if there was such a problem, Anger was perfectly capable of quitting, so Lust was simply assuming far worse than reality. Everyone also knew that Anger loathed caramel-mocha cappuccino, but mostly if it was bought by someone named Lust who wore really nice clothes all the time.
Just who the hell did Lust think Lust was?
Anger stormed to the bathroom and slammed the door. Lust sighed and shook its head. From the bathroom there could be heard Anger's frustration in discovering there was no toilet paper, finding the hot water was out, realising there was no towel, and dropping the only toothbrush in the garbage. For Anger every morning was a traumatic memory.
"Hey, Lust. Get me a towel, would you?" Anger yelled through the door. Lust roused itself from television and checked the linen closet.
"Urm. It doesn't look like you've been keeping up on the laundry. How about a pillowcase?"
Anger swore and hit the door. "Fine!"
Lust wasn't sure what to do to resolve Anger's natural tendency to be angry, but only shrugged and grabbed pillowcases and bed sheets. He knocked. "Here you go. Sheets."
"You're a moron," Anger snapped, opening to door enough to take the linen from Lust. Five minutes later Anger was in the kitchen, looking like a little defeated Caesar sipping a cappuccino. "So, what the hell did you want to talk about? If you're here to tell me that the lawn festival war in Picket Garden Realm is your fault, I don't want to hear it, and I'm not going to help you."
"Oh, this has nothing to do with Mr. Stubb's petunias. I've been letting Guilt deal with him for now. He wasn't as interesting as I though he'd be in the end."
"I'm so sorry for you," Anger said with the sincerity of a Ebenezer Scrooge donating to an orphanage to improve his PR sometime before his December epiphany. Not only did Anger lie, but lied of something it would never feel for anyone but itself in a bad mood.
"Has Love told you about what I want to talk about?"
"Do I look like the sort of frilly-minded, skippity little moron who goes cavorting in the company of such a disgusting emotion?" Lust had to admit, Anger looked stressed and ugly, a slumped figure with a permanently blotched face. Nothing was skippity or frilly-minded about that. "Hell, no. First you wake me up at an unholy hour, and then you want to dress me in my bedding and insult me. Don't be stupid, Lust," Anger paused a moment, "Well, if you can help it, that is."
Lust calculated the damage of a sudden impact of the toaster and Anger's sour face. Lust decided against it out of fear that it may improve Anger's overall appearance.
"Remember the fax I sent you yesterday? I was wondering if you could help me some in what I was telling you about," Lust said. "Not out of the goodness of your heart or any desire to help me, certainly, but because if you don't, then I'm going to have to ask Love to intervene and make my request a bit more clear. Do you want to have to deal with Love and Mutt?"
Anger didn't believe what Lust was threatening. It was ridiculous. "How they Hell does a half-assed emotion like you get Love and the damn Mutt on your side? You're bluffing."
"I was hoping I wouldn't have to demonstrate."
"You're an idiot to hope that."
Lust only shrugged and pulled from it's breast pocket a small metal instrument, into which it blew three sharp breaths. In the distance there was thunder and disembodied screams. A wind picked up, and Anger could recognise the situation it'd been in only three times before.
Mutt was coming.
Anger didn't right away accept what was happening--didn't think it would ever be possible. It was Lust. Lust was weak and stupid and totally incapable; almost as unreliably as Insanity and Deception, who for the past fifty years had been trying to advocate a new emotion, Insaception, for the lies of the mentally insane. It was too stupid. Lust, meanwhile, was frantically wondering what the whistle sequence for "heel" was.
"Behold," Lust said triumphantly, playing off his inner doubt with confidence. This was broken when Lust yelped as something large and highly combustible exploded down the block outside the window. Somewhere far off, there was an chorus of ambulance sirens. The Earth trembled and so did Anger and Lust.
Mutt was getting closer.
"Send him away, you moron!" Anger shouted, running to the window and trying to lock it down. "You're gonna destroy Chicago." A wind rose in the same moment with unexpected strength and knocked the latch from Anger's grasp by binding Anger in a tangle of curtains. Anger swore and turned back to Lust, who was looking outside in a strange mixture of victorious and a little sick, the wind blowing through its hair with dramatic and attractive intensity. Anger was confident Lust was going insane from the power trip and terror. There was a confused but undoubtedly vicious sneer and closer to the building a baby began to scream and cry.
Mutt had arrived.
Fifteen stories below, Anger could hear the thunderous click of Mutt's claws on the lobby floor. The odour of Mutt filled the building, a horrid, rancid breath and wet-dog smell. The toilet began to gurgle and flood. Anger could only watch and wonder frantically what to do. An elevator dinged and slide open. Mutt stepped inside because it beat the time and effort of the stairs. Anger swallowed.
"What do you say?" Lust asked pleasantly, smiling now and having lost complete control of itself. The tone did not fit the aura of dread that surrounded the city. Faintly, Anger perceived a waver in the words, but Lust held the whistle. Obviously, Lust was the only one who stood a chance, and Lust knew it.
Anger hesitated. Lust wasn't in complete control but depended on the whistle. Anger played with the idea of somehow relinquishing Lust of this authority, and again the elevator dinged. Outside in the hall, several sharp claws snagged along the carpet towards the apartment. Anger's heartbeat synchronised with the sour breathing. The door shook and there was a scratch at the corner.
Mutt was waiting to be let in.
"Fine!" Anger said, "I'll do whatever you want. Don't let the damn Mutt in here, you fucking psycho."
Lust smiled brightly and blew again into the whistle. As the skies cleared and the wind abated, Lust turned to Anger and helped him up and out of the curtains. "It's so good we can come to an understanding," he said, shaking Anger's arm warmly. "I'm looking forward to your cooperation."
Anger could only glare angrily and wait for the doomsday that was clearly at hand.
Endnote: Well, my friend Waffle and I have this joke that Anger is really the PMS entity. Those are some major mood swings. I argue against Waffle, however. Anger is actually based on my dear sister when she is PMSing, not my dear sister or PMSing themselves. More, them working together. Nifty?
