Title: Futility
Author: Winter Ashby (rosweldrmr)
Disclaimer: Rorouni Kenshin © Nobuhiro Watsuki
Rating: M - I just barely made it too.
Summary: He's spent years pretending he didn't want this, but now that he's faced with the prospect he never thought he'd have... what will he choose? (Sanosuke & Kenshin)
Authors Notes: This is my first yaoi... so be gentle.

The wood panels on his back left splinters in his skin, but the rough, callused hands on his wrists ignited a fire that outshone the pain of useless wooden fragments. Kenshin stood in the shadow of Sanosuke under a full moon. Sanosuke's eyes glistened with a repressed kind of desperation that Kenshin recognized only too well.

"Why, why won't you fight me?" Sanosuke's voice was horse and ragged as he held firmly to Kenshin's wrists and pinned him to the wall of some building. It didn't matter anymore where they were. Sanosuke lost track of where he was whenever Kenshin was close by.

"I've already told you, I don't want to fight you." Kenshin's usual light voice was thick and dark. It left stains on Sanosuke's face and dribbled down his quivering arms. Kenshin's eyes were slim, and dangerous. But it wasn't helping, because this just made Sanosuke press him farther into the splintering wood.

"I can't do this anymore." His head hung low and his proud, spiky brown hair fell to cover his defeated eyes. He sighed, and breathed in the familiar sent of the former killer. He towered over the smaller man, but it didn't matter anymore who was taller, or stronger, or more desperate because the subtle dance they'd done through the shadow for years now was drawing to a close.

Kenshin let Sanosuke's words drift by his face on the cool breeze. His eyes close, for just a second. But in that moment, he is free, and un-tethered to the ghosts of his past. "Then leave, I won't stop you." But even as he said it, he could feel his chest tighten at the idea of traveling without Sanosuke's brazen, unabashed presence at his side.

"I know you won't stop me." And he couldn't help himself anymore. He was sick of seeing that same despondent look in his eyes when they met for a fleeting moment over a simmer stew or crackling fire. He couldn't stand that clueless look he gives Kaoru or the way she can touch Kenshin when he has been banished to the shadows to watch.

So he pushes him harder, and presses his chest against him. He hates that purple kimono and the way his red hair stands out against it. His fighter's hands rip and tear the fabric from his pale skin and light purple eyes. "Sano…" Kenshin pulls in air, but it's only full of heated space and everything he pretends he doesn't want.

"Don't call me that anymore. After tonight, I'll leave and become Zanzo again." There is a quiver in his voice that he hates and a wandering look in Kenshin's eyes that he is almost too happy to see. So he blocks it out and does the one thing he's waited too long to do. He leans down, like it's a natural action and draw's the smaller man's lips into a searing, forceful kiss.

Sanosuke's waited too long to taste him, to feel those soft, sad lips on his own. He's imagined what it would be like to touch him like this – the way Kaoru does so often. But Kenshin doesn't fight, but allows himself to melt into the kiss.

Sanosuke hates him then, for letting him get what he wants so easily. He wanted a fight, he wanted to struggle. He wanted to know that all the years he spent waking with cold sweats and taking freezing bathes was worth it. He wants to imagine that he's the only one who's wanted this. But Kenshin leans into him and runs his tongue over Sanosuke's lips, like he has all the right in the world to do so.

Sanosuke's pulls away, panting and closer to losing control that he ever has been before. Kenshin is bitter and metallic, like all the blood he tasted in the revolution. Sanosuke wonders what Kenshin would feel like, under his hands and sliding against him. "Eya." The temptation is too much now, the yearning and desperation is mounting in his cracked heart and lonely dreams.

But as he turns to pull away, and fade into the dissipating night, his collar his caught in pale, slender hands. Kenshin still leans against the wall Sanosuke rammed him into out of pure frustration. "Stay, just for tonight. You can leave in the morning, and become Zanzo once again – I won't even try to stop you."

There is a moment of panic where Sanosuke is overcome with the absurd urge to run. With Kenshin's hands balled in the fabric of his collar and looking at him like he's always dreamed of, it's almost frightening. "I can't stop… I can't stop myself."

And then the words are drifting once more past the heated space that's melted into two strong, muscled bodies caught in each other. Their lips meet, and Sanosuke tears the wall apart and lays Kenshin out on the rough floor of an abandoned home. The dust spreads as their bodies join and all that's left is the muffled sounds of grunting and flesh meeting.

Sanosuke, true to his word, dons his "Wicked" character with renewed sense of past and presence once again. And with the rising sun, he leaves the rehabilitated killer, vibrant red hair reflecting in the daylight to wake alone with just the bruises and the memory of one night that never should have been.

But he can still taste Kenshin in his mouth and if he closes his eyes as the rough winter wind whips his face, he can imagine that he can feel the calluses of a legendary swordsman's hand on his pointed face.

Perhaps they will meet again, in another life, when they aren't bound by the duty to protect and relive all the horrors of a past they were too swept up in to escape. But then again, maybe one night is good enough to last a life time, not matter how short or long that may be.