Writing this next story from the distant island of Japan, I'm amazed at how many subtle intricacies I have found to enhance the realism of this story! It's incredible how the strangest things are different here, and yet, same... Of course, the biggest issue has been finding time to write! I don't think I can be blamed.. Umm... There are sort of other things on my mind (read: shopping) and I have personal issues (read: need more money for more shopping). You wouldn't believe the stores they have here (read: isles of Shonen-ai comics)... It's pretty great (read: can I stay forever?). Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter, as always, blah blah blah, it's nearly over... and, I'm so sad about it! For the past year I keep thinking of this story as I've written it and now it's nearly ending? Well, maybe there will be a one-shot sequel. googly eyes

Rating: Pg-13. Slash - sensuality - violence - light incest.
Category: Angst/Romance
Pairing: Kyou/Yuki
Length: 17/18

Ache
by Lanie Kay-Aleese

Chapter Seventeen: Gardens for Growing and Forests for Fighting

- - - -

The scent of dew and earth woke up the remembering, feeling part of him; urging him to run after Yuki. It stirred when his bare feet tore into the clumpy earth and pushed up the soft dirt inbetween his toes. The thick air of late afternoon stretched across the tangles of forest before him. He felt caught in it. The clutching shrubs and lilypads and ivies. It felt significant, somehow, whe he could break free from them and run unhindered by them.

It didn't take long for him to find his cousin on the trodden path to the secret base. Kyou skidded to a stop, and watched as Yuki made his way down the hardened earth, walking steadily with a pair of coarse, pilled gloves swinging in his left hand. An irrelevant thought struck him. He walks like... Kyou squinted as his cousin walked into a patch of sunlight. Like he's a prince... Like I can't even touch him. When he cleared his thoughts, Kyou couldn't be sure of which part of his thought made Yuki the true or figurative.

Kyou swallowed and he was struck with the absurd notion that for a moment, he'd forgotten how to breathe. He leaned back and steadied himself against a gnarly tree trunk. It grounded him; the bark was rough and flaked off in crumbling chunks onto his back. The sharpness of the observation stuck out vividly in comparison to his true focus, the boy who was all soft lines in the sunlight and shadow, in the forest further away. It was this distance that reminded Kyou that he was still far enough away that if he left, Yuki wouldn't know that he'd been watching him. He could still leave, without saying anything. He could - But he couldn't--

Kyou's eyelids came down, tightly sealing his eyes. He slumped.

It's too much, the thought was punctuated by the furious thumping of his heart. It's too much hurt.

Always, in these times, he found himself placating to a war inside of himself. He hated how brash he was at moments and how he couldn't decide at all at other moments.Tohru's voice rose into the forefront of his thoughts. "Sometimes... It can hurt, trying to find a person who will make you happy. But it's worth it in the end." He shook his head and felt the retort thick in his mouth. The inner battle tore at some heartstring he hated to have plucked. Yeah, but how am I supposed to know if going after him is even worth it? Even before... he didn't say it, after I said it. He didn't say that he loved me.

But he did remember Yuki saying other things. Like, just a few days ago, he had said, "You're the cat"... But before that, on that one night, he knew that his lover's voice had whispered, 'Not just the 'cat' for much longer'.

So what was it? What did Yuki feel - and with everything that had happened - how could there be happiness in any of it?

Kyou didn't know and he was becoming increasingly familiar in dealing with situations he couldn't explain at all.

- - - -

Kyou arrived at the clearing shortly after Yuki. The prince was still putting on his gloves when Kyou approached the edge of the secret base. The dappled rays of light rested on his bent shoulders, highlighting the white of his shirt to a nearly incredible, blinding hue. Kyou found that his jaw had given way, and his mouth was open just enough for a hiss of air to escape.

Slowly, Yuki turned around. Kyou's eyes refound themselves in the purple gaze of his cousin. Yuki obviously was taken aback by his appearance in his nearly sacred place. His lips parted slightly and he ran his tongue over his bottom lip as he searched for words. He began to furrow his brow when Kyou spoke first, desperate to distract himself from that nubile attachment and how woozy it made him feel in his stomach, how it was just as sharp as when he spoke and when he-

"Wait!" Kyou moved forward, "Wait, I don't wanna fight right now."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"I had to come..." his voice trailed off. "I need to know what it was that made us lose our memories. I don't want it to happen again."

"I told you, I don't remember," Yuki bent down to set up his gardening tools. Unimpressed, Kyou placed his hands on his hips and continued vigorously.

"You had that book, I know that book has the answers. I remember seeing it before, and you told me -"

"You don't need to know what it says," Yuki cut in, removing a shovel from his pile. "The less you know about the curse, the better off you'll be."

"What are you saying?"

"If Akito is responsible for erasing our memories, then the reason for it had something to do with the curse. With that book. Why should we open up the book? Why should we do something that will just cause us to lose our memories again?"

"How do you know that we'll lose our memories?" Kyou pressed.

The prince shrugged. "I don't. But the chances aren't in favor of keeping our memories, so I'm leaving the curse alone."

"You damn rat, I don't want to lose my memories either! That's stupid-"

Yuki looked at him pointedly. "Stupid cat," he said.

"Damnit! Shut up!" Kyou looked away, hurting more than he wanted to admit. "Look, even you have to know what I'm feeling. I -- I don't want the curse! I'm tired of being a freak, okay? I'd do anything to make the curse go away. I'm just -- I just think if it goes on much longer, I won't be able to fight anymore..."

The fist came out of nowhere, slamming into Kyou's chin.

Damnit...! Kyou felt himself fall backwards, pain shooting across his face and all he could think of was how did he get caught with his guard down again- and then Yuki looked down him. Kyou scowled. "Don't give up," Yuki threatened, his voice a low whisper. "Don't you - dare-"

"But you just said --!"

"I said to protect your memory, and don't you ever give it up to them!"

Kyou rose his chin. He had to squint his eyes to see the prince's face, shadowed by a thin halo of sunlight. And here he was, the cat, flat on his back in the crusty dirt. It made him sick, but it made him feel ill in a way that he recognized and clung to. It was anger...

He wiped off his mouth with the edge of his hand, dimly aware that Yuki had tried to command him to do something that he didn't know the first thing about.

Then, the wind rushed in his ears, and a familiar thrumming in his chest shot through his veins, and all the hate, all the desire, all the ache set him aflame. Set him against Yuki. It was all his fault, and it was everything, and Kyou shot up from the ground - a yell surging from inside him -

"You just don't get it," Kyou snarled, and lunged towards his prey.

It was a fight that would be over before it began. That's the way it always was. Yuki exposed his neck to the sun as he leaned over to shout and Kyou chose that patch of skin as the most desperately pale spot of his body and exploded his rage into it with a rough shove of his forearm. Yuki stumbled backwards and Kyou carried in the motion, letting it propel him forward as he rushed towards Yuki, who had already put up guard. He had barely attacked before something hit him as 'wrong'.

Kyou strained to stretch his lips thin as he could, shouting, "Goddamnit, is that all you ever do?"

Yuki caught himslf before Kyou's two punches made it to his stomach and he scuffled to the left.

"If by that you mean 'winning', then, obviously yes," Yuki answered smoothly, following the comment with a preventative block that Kyou just barely got caught by, and he grimaced as he taunted his cousin, swatting away the counter with a renewed onslaught of punches.

"You're just blocking! You're not really fighting me! Fight me, damnit!" growled Kyou, and to his rushing excitement, Yuki complied. And there was a fury of motion and Yuki still complied. And then something strange began to grow in Kyou... something he could explain.

It was a sort of impatience with the whole thing. It was a different anger because he knew that this physical contact wasn't good enough to satisfy him. It was an impatience because he knew that he couldn't win, and for some reason, Yuki didn't seem so impatient to end the damn thing and Kyou just wanted to leave and deal with his wounds already.

He taunted Yuki with a right punch and a fake backwards, hoping to bring the rat close enough to hear him over the sound of the fight. Kyou was taken aback when it worked, letting Yuki get close enough for him to upset the rat's balance- mentally, at least -

The words hastily rolled off his tongue. "Well, aren't you going to finish this--?"

Kyou dodged a blow to the face and looked at Yuki... apparently indifferent. He couldn't help being jealous of such a damn good guard for bewitching the aggressor, who shouldn't be looking at the face of the opponent anyway, because it was distracting and -- oh, right --

Side-step, double punch to the face, met and countered without counter-attack or anything --

"--aren't you going to humiliate me, like you always do--"

Kyou pulled his left arm across his body, then shoved his elbow out towards Yuki, hoping to catch him by surprise enough to sweep him --

"-- by knocking me over with--"

but Yuki caught his striking arm by the wrist and Kyou twisted, to break free, suddenly,

"-- a kiss?"

Kyou barely recovered his footing, shocked by the fact that Yuki had failed - for the first time - to follow through.

And then his mind caught up to him with the deafening roar of a train and Kyou found himself ground to the spot where he stood. His mind whirled with voices of adamant denial,I just said...I didn't just say that. NO, I couldn't have - NO!

"What did you just..." the voice trailed off.

Yuki began turning himself towards Kyou, his pupils..dilating? Or was that a trick of the light? Kyou couldn't even tell if his cheeks were flushed from blush or from exertion, or from sunburn, or maybe he was just hallucinating. He'd be so damn happy if he was hallucinating all of this, but Yuki smelled too much like fresh mint for it to be unreal.

"I said, Kick me--" Kyou cut himself off, his eyes suddenly re-focusing and widening in shock, for once not looking at Yuki's face and concentrating on his collarbone. This wasn't happening. This wasn't happening. He had to make Yuki believe that nothing had happened. He summoned his voice again, and it came out in a way that made him feel desperate - "C'mon... Kick me... Kick me!"

And Yuki didn't.

For some reason, the only thing that Kyou could even comprehend over the sound of his heart beating too quickly was that Yuki's hand was still wrapped around his wrist.

It was trembling.

- - - -

The Authoress Puts on Her Native Accent.
If y'all dun revioowoo, it ull taykuh a laoong tahm ta uhpdayte. Haw dou y'all thank I mekka prah-oar-itty uv et uhnless y'all gimme a Howdy, o-ah sum bon-ah-fahd sau-sa an' toutiya chi-eps?