February 6th: Bickering - 200 words - What says love more than a heaping helping of belligerent sexual tension?
Shockingly enough, I did cut out the sexual tension bit. Doesn't really fit when your main characters are so little...
Chiaotzu only managed to stare up at the dark ceiling for an hour before the unsettled pit of his stomach forced him up out of bed. Tien was still snoring quietly, curled up in a tight ball on his side. His hands were covering his eyes even in the darkness, his crossed fingertips keeping his third eye safe while his palms cupped around his other two.
Chiaotzu pulled the blanket up, tucked it around the triclops' shoulders. A gentle smile briefly surfaced from beneath his worried frown, but was gone before he turned and exited the room.
As he walked towards Shen's room the unsettled feeling in his stomach solidified into something more concrete. Anger. Fury. A rage so deep and hot that it scared him to consider it.
He had never been so angry before.
The door was already open. As though he was expected. When he entered Shen was sitting at his desk, his chair angled so the deep lines of his face were obscured by shadow.
"Can I help you, Chiaotzu?"
"You sent us to train. You knew that monster was out there. How could you?"
His anger made his voice shake. Tears burned in his eyes and blood rushed to fill his cheeks. He cursed the feeling, the powerlessness that it portrayed. He needed to be strong.
Shen shifted in his chair, but not out of discomfort. He leaned forward, his features thrown into sharp relief as he did, and Chiaotzu's stomach clenched at the cold sneer that twisted them.
"You mean InoShikaCho? He's hardly a monster, boy. He's my pet and lives in the forest around here. You were in his domain."
"You sent us there." Chiaotzu's hands trembled and he curled them into tight fists. "That monster tried to kill Tien!"
"And you saved him, I take it." Shen's eyes flashed. Chiaotzu had never seen his eyes before. The Crane Hermit was never without his dark glasses, and it was clear now why. His eyes were dark, small and shrewd. As they fixed on Chiaotzu's face a terror so deep and vast that the telepath could hardly contain it immediately seized his stomach.
"Of course I saved him. I…" Chiaotzu faltered to a halt. The rage was subsiding, overtaken with fear. He had almost admitted aloud how important the toddler was to him. How much he loved the boy.
Shen sneered. Ice traced Chiaotzu's spine, settling at the base of his skull. "Did you begin his training yet? Have you taught him any telepathy?"
Chiaotzu flushed, shrank into himself. "No, Master," he said stiffly. "I haven't found the right time."
"Pity." Shen leaned back into the shadows. Hands lifted and long, thin fingers steepled together. "Perhaps I need to take a more active hand in his training. He seems to be wasted under you."
The anger flared again. And this time it was dry. Made his voice soft and deadly still, a cold centre of steel in his words.
"Don't you fucking touch him."