Warning: sexual content. I know not all of you are here for the Sebastian/Ciel, so I'll put an asterisk next to the pagebreak before the section with it in so you can skim over it. You may still want to read the dialogue though or you'll miss important stuff.
Chapter Nineteen
A light sheen of sweat glistening on his skin, Claude stood up straight and took in a job well done. Every sheet of paper that had been discarded was now returned to its proper file, all the drawers that had been yanked out and upturned now back in place, a new leather chair to replace the old savaged one. Single-handedly, he had returned his decimated office to its usual immaculate state, everyone else none the wiser.
It had taken some work to avoid Angela coming across the mess, as inclined as she was to dropping in uninvited with yet more work that he wasn't contracted to do, though he had decided on the Dagger boy as Ciel's scapegoat anyway. However, he'd managed it, luckily for Dagger, and it really was just between he and Ciel.
There was an indescribable thrill at the very thought. Nothing bound two people together closer than a secret, and this secret was entirely theirs. Theirs. There were few things he could refer to as that just yet, so he thought it again, again, again. The evidence gone, a memory lay between he and Ciel, a shared moment in time where the boy had been completely at his mercy and Claude had granted him that mercy.
Still, he wondered as he settled into the plush new chair to catch his breath, perhaps he had taken it a little too far. The frantic look on Ciel's face had been both exhilarating but also pitiful, and pity was not something he wanted for them. It was the pride he craved, which the boy had felt the need to smother down – it hadn't been necessary. One could apologize without sacrificing the self-worth within them. Claude wondered whether it was simply because Ciel was apologizing to him that he had felt the need to abandon his dignity, and the thought stung a little. But at the same time... that thrill once more.
It was him who had broken through the icy veneer Ciel wore, no-one else. It was him alone that had seen the spark of fear in that single blue eye, and that fear had been caused by his words. It had taken longer than he had expected, yes, but he had dragged forth a response from the boy of stone.
Although it was something of nonsensical romance stories, Claude imagined that he could still feel a tingle of the warmth upon his palm from where his hand had touched Ciel's cheek. How many, he thought, could claim to have felt that warmth? The skin wasn't as smooth and soft as he had imagined so many times, but the slight bumps of adolescent spots and the beginnings of roughness that may have been stubble only served to thrill him more; this touch was not fantasy. This touch was real.
It was enough, Claude decided. He had gotten the reaction he had been yearning for. Perhaps more of a reaction than he had anticipated even. Shifting forward in the chair, Claude pulled out the middle drawer of his desk, one of the several that had not been excluded from Ciel's rampage. The boy had been close, a little too close. It was not the drawer he should have been searching, however, but the roof of the desk inside it. With a good, hard yank, Claude pulled free the small black rectangle.
It had taken a while to accustom himself to the white noise. It was truly a horrible sound – loud enough that it cancelled out thoughts, robbed you of your sleep, stripped you of your appetite, then followed you closer than your shadow. It was a favourite technique of his, subtle enough that sometimes the patients didn't even realise they were undergoing treatment, but it really did wear on him too. Still, he was trained for these things, had mastered the art of not reacting in a way Ciel could only dream of.
But it had served his purpose now, so Claude pocketed the nasty little device, wondering just what his next session with the boy would hold.
Claude too busy cleaning up the remnants of Ciel's outburst, Sebastian was left alone on Ward V for the first time since the sick initiation had begun. It was nothing if not a relief. The man's company was even more smothering than the smells or screams. No idea what he was supposed to be doing anyway, Sebastian found himself sitting on the ground with his back against the door, eyes resting anywhere but on the patients. If only to phase out the screams, he let his mind wander.
As it was wont to do these days, it wandered in the direction of Ciel Phantomhive.
Sebastian was worried, not that he was about to let the recipient of that worry know. Ciel had seemed better in himself after having gotten some sleep but the sleep itself had been enough cause for concern. Restless didn't begin to cover it – writhing as though deeply pained, his face contorted in discomfort, thrashing out of the sheets as though entrapped by them. It was a sleep plagued by something Sebastian couldn't even witness, but his imagination was more than happy to conjure up nightmares. More than that, however, was the fact that Sebastian had even been present to see him sleep.
Trust? A shred of the trust Sebastian had given over to Ciel, finally returned. It was true that there were simply some things two people couldn't go through without coming out the other end trusting one another, and surely staging a rescue mission in an insane asylum had to qualify. Though he wasn't about to start jumping to conclusions. Yes, in a normal situation – not that anything about that situation was normal – the people involved would have to trust each other, or at least come to trust each other in the process.
Well, Sebastian was more than aware at that point that Ciel was not most people, and the normal rules did not apply to them. For whatever reasons, the boy was jaded, too jaded to be handing out trust willy-nilly.
It was not only the fact that Ciel had asked Sebastian to stay while he had slept that had the man thinking.
Lately, Ciel had been... well, clingy. It was hard to say really, since that was one word that he had never thought could apply to the generally aloof and stand-offish boy, but there it was. Sebastian had dealt with clingy people before. In fact, he seemed to attract nothing but. Calling every other hour, demanding to know where he had been and who he had been with, constantly seeking some sort of validation, be it in appearance or attraction. It was all very exhausting and he made a rule to get the hell out of dodge as soon as why didn't you text me back became the most common conversation topic. Ciel was not clingy in the way past lovers and even the more needy friends had been, and by normal people's standards, his behaviour wouldn't be considered clingy at all. But this was Ciel, and his behaviour had never fit into the category of normal.
It was little things.
Before that day, it had been anyone's guess what mood Ciel would be in and that always had a direct impact on Sebastian's day. If the boy was in his version of a good mood – the normal people equivalent of annoyed and a little pissy – then Sebastian would probably spend his shift in Ciel's room, talking about whatever came to mind, exchanging barbed banter and getting his arse handed to him in any game they played. If Ciel had been in a bad mood – imagine the love child of Ash and Angela. Then shoot him in the foot. You're half-way there – then Sebastian wouldn't get through the door before being assaulted by the palpable tension. Sometimes he'd stay and try to diffuse it, most of the time he could tell he really wasn't wanted and beat a hasty retreat without having to be told. That was their pattern, not planned but one that had fallen in to place at some point, and it worked for them, as far as he could see. Not any more, though. Now, whether rain or shine, Ciel didn't so much request as he did demand that Sebastian stay in his company.
It wasn't just that, however. Outside of his bedroom, it was the same, if not worse. Sebastian always made a point of making his rounds with the other patients too, if only to show whatever other member of staff was working with him that not all his time was spent with Ciel. That was becoming increasingly difficult by Ciel making those rounds with him. Kind of defeating the object there. It wasn't that he was even more social with the other patients, he just tagged along and waited for Sebastian to be done.
It was getting a little weird.
Now that he thought about it, had it begun only after the whole trashing Claude's office incident? Or had it been sooner, like after Sebastian had told him about Ward V? He hadn't missed it, the inscrutable look that had crept across the boy's face, the wariness that had descended upon them that had never really been there before, at least not so heavy.
There was a conclusion that he could jump to – Ciel was worried about him, in the exact same way that Sebastian was worrying over Ciel – and he leapt to it. Unfortunately, Ward V was not a place for serious contemplation, the inhabitants not even recognising the word 'think' any more, and Sebastian was not so much pulled as he was yanked from his thoughts by the relentless squealing of Patient V9.
All the sounds in that room were horrible but Peter was managing to take it up to the next level. That noise was not human. Never mind a pig to slaughter, it was the sound of a pig being slaughtered. Squealing at such a pitch it was a wonder his throat didn't just tear like tissue paper, the sound was setting Sebastian on edge more and more. It wasn't the same nervousness or even anxiety that he usually felt on the ward. It was... annoyance. The noise grated at his nerves and if it would have done any good, he'd have demanded that V9 shut up.
Sebastian pushed off the wall and rose to his feet, stepping across the scuffed and worn linoleum. Despite not being a particularly large room, Ward V managed to make every step feel like a mile, the small distance to V9's enclosure like running a marathon. Sebastian was learning to keep directly in the centre of the walkway between the cages now, the patients having the nasty habit of waiting for the worst moment then launching themselves against their walls.
Outside of V9's – no, Peter's enclosure, Sebastian dropped into a crouch. Through the somewhat distorted plastic, he could see Peter sprawled on his stomach. He was still wearing the old patient's garb that he had worn upstairs; too large sweatshirt, white drawstring pants, the most impersonal clothing imaginable. Expect now they were torn in places, crusted with things that made Sebastian's skin itch for a shower, dirtied beyond any washing machine's ability. The boy's skin wasn't any better, possibly even filthier than his clothes. His neck was twisted at an unhealthy angle, his blood-encrusted cheek pressed against the uneven floor, facing away from Sebastian. At regular intervals, almost like clockwork, the boy would open his cracked lips and let out a long, keening cry. He looked so much smaller than Sebastian remembered, and he had never been especially big to begin with.
Wetting his own dry lips, Sebastian crept a bit closer to the plastic and softly said, "Peter?"
There was nothing. Not a glance in his direction, not a tensing of the shoulders, not even the slightest waver in the unrelenting whine. There was no recognition in the boy that his name had been called, nor that a noise had even been made at all.
Again, a little louder now, Sebastian tried, "Peter."
Anything. Anything would do. A twitch, a shiver, a growl, even the smallest silence from that crying. Just something to show that he had heard, that he had understood at least a fraction. That even if the boy no longer recognised the name as belonging to him, it still held something, a shred of familiarity that would give him pause.
"Peter!"
Nothing. There was nothing of Peter left in V9 at all.
"Tell me about Vincent."
It was times like these that Ciel missed his other eye. The exasperated eye rolling really lost its effect when it was on its own.
"We've talked about him a lot. I have nothing new to say," he instead replied, guarded. It was ten minutes into their session and he couldn't relax. Well, as much as he ever relaxed in Faustus' presence, that was. The room was immaculate once more, all evidence of Ciel's little outburst completely gone. He'd expected that, though. What was more unnerving was the calm silence. The noise was conspicuous in its absence, as though Ciel had gotten used to there being three people in the room and now there was only two.
So it hadn't been just in his head. It was equal parts a relief and a concern. On the bright side, he wasn't any crazier than usual, office-smashing aside. On the other hand, now that Claude had abandoned the noise to get to him, there was no doubt something new up the man's sleeves.
"You lied those times. I want you to tell me the truth now."
No prizes for guessing what exactly it was up Claude's sleeves. The man was so determined for him to have Daddy issues, it was ridiculous.
The accusation that he was a liar got the anger rising but Ciel choked it down. He had already lost his head once and it had been such a disastrous loss of control. He couldn't allow it to happen again. He had escaped The Room that time but he knew Claude wouldn't let such a blatant show of disrespect pass unpunished again.
Rather than the multitude of colourful responses racing to his lips, one featuring explicit instructions on just where Claude could stick his truth, Ciel replied, "Why don't you tell me about him, since you're apparently such an expert."
"How about a compromise; I'll tell you what I know and then you can tell me what you think. Agreed?" Claude proposed, indulgently.
Ciel didn't miss the implication of Claude's words, the facetious little – reluctantly, if only to move things along and get the session over with as soon as possible, he relented, "Fine. Agreed."
And so it began.
"Vincent was twenty-seven years old at the time of his death," Claude stated, then looked to Ciel for his opinion on the matter. Honestly, the boy could hardly remember. As a child, you never considered age important, apart from your own. Adults were adults, old. So, unable to give an opposing answer, Ciel merely nodded his head and gestured for the doctor to go on.
"He had grey eyes," Claude continued. Ciel nodded more emphatically this time. He remembered those eyes only too well.
"As a person, he was generally amiable. A very open man."
"Hmm. He was very warm. Very immature too, though. Sentimental to a fault," Ciel snickered. He found himself speaking despite his promise to himself that he wouldn't. He could feel it coming, the next question, the growing feeling of dread of just what Claude was going to do to Vincent's name, to his memory. With it came the irrational determination to defend that name. Not with lies because he had never lied about Vincent and lies were not necessary – the truth was enough.
"His relationship with your Mother, Rachel, was strained at best," Claude remarked, no particular tone to his voice, an empty stating of a fact. Ciel's anger spiked but he reigned it in, his careful control not escaping him this time.
As steadily as he could, Ciel replied, "They had a very good relationship, actually. They loved each other."
Claude paused, tapping his pen against the open file on his desk, not looking up at Ciel right away. When he did, there was a somewhat tired look about him, as he corrected, "My understanding is that they married young, the both of them only seventeen, the same age you are now, because Rachel fell pregnant with you. It was not a marriage of love; it was a shotgun marriage." Ciel could feel the scowl on his face but did nothing to wipe it away, all attention focused on keeping silent in the face of the poison spilling from those lips. No answer from the boy, argument or otherwise, so Claude continued, "Their relationship only further dissolved once they moved to Renbon."
The sense of dread hovering over Ciel descended completely at that word, the name of that place. He didn't want to listen to any more of this.
"Concerning the things that happened in Renbon... Rachel was entirely uninvolved and verbal in her disagreement. However, Vincent was an active participant-"
"Enough," Ciel hissed, just relieved that he'd managed not to shout. Sure that he could go on in the same semi-calm vein, he allowed himself to continue, "Don't you dare. My Father never laid a hand on me. He did nothing but try to protect me."
Claude stopped tapping the pen, placing it down on top of the papers. The look in his eyes as he glanced over at Ciel held nothing but pity, and it seethed. There was hesitation in his voice as he softly asked, "If that's true, why did Vincent never simply take you away from Renbon?"
Ciel faltered. It was only brief, couldn't have been for more than a second, but the moment he hesitated in answering, fumbled over his words, Claude had won.
"It wasn't as simple as that..."
He didn't hear Claude rise from his chair or walk around the desk to stand beside him. Placing a hand gently upon Ciel's shoulder, Claude said, "We'll leave it there for today. Just, think about it, alright?"
Steam billowed in the air of the ensuite bathroom, as thick and warm as the water in which Ciel lay. Condensation had completely fogged up the fake mirror – just plastic with some kind of reflective foil pasted on top, a cheap replacement – and it was the kind of heavy heat that lulled a person to sleep.
The air was nowhere near as heated as Ciel's temper, however. Lately it seemed all he felt was varying degrees of pissed off, and that thought in itself only pissed him off all the more. It was a vicious cycle.
The levels of his anger may have varied but the source remained the same; Claude goddamn Faustus. Where the scumbag got off acting as thought he had ever known Vincent, Ciel didn't know, but he acknowledged that his Father had had a life before a son. They may have met, may have even known each other. But it was downright insulting for Faustus to be acting as though he knew Vincent better than him. Claude didn't know a fucking thing – but, and it made him uncomfortable even entertaining the thought, the man had a point.
Ciel hated it. He really, truly hated it. Claude's talent for being able to get under his skin, just like that, because Ciel had thought about it. In fact, he'd thought about it an awful lot.
In his mind, Vincent was a larger than life presence. When he remembered his Father, Ciel remembered his hero. The man was the living epitome of the word 'protector'. If there was a fall, he caught you. If there was a monster in the closet, he scared it away. If there was a cut or bruise, he kissed it better. But... that image didn't even synchronise with Ciel's own recollection of events, never mind what Claude was trying to convince him had happened.
Vincent was his protector. So why had he never tried to take Ciel away from the very things he needed protecting from? He had told Claude that things hadn't been that simple, but really, how complicated could it be to run for the sake of your child's safety. He couldn't help but think that... Claude's version of events made so much more sense than his own did.
The realisation of what he had just thought hit Ciel and he snarled, letting himself slide below the surface of the water as though to clean away the evidence of having agreed with Faustus. That was the kind of shit Claude wanted him to think! To start to doubt, to start to waver, to make it all the easier for Claude to get inside his head and shatter whatever remained of Ciel. No. No, he wouldn't let him. Six years, six years Ciel had held firm in his own perceptions – ah, but hadn't those same perceptions told him that Finny wasn't real? These days, that was what it always came back to. His mind, his sole constant companion, had betrayed him. The only thing he truly trusted had been so very wrong. If it hadn't been for Sebastian, he would have carried on his life believing that lie – there is no Finny – to be fact and would have been none the wiser. If his mind had been wrong about Finny, there was no telling just how many other things it had been and was still wrong about. Renbon, The Fire, Vincent?
He couldn't ignore it any more; he could no longer trust his own mind.
Panic flared at the very thought and Ciel had to sit back up in the bathtub, needed to breathe. The heat on the air seemed to choke.
If there was one thing Ciel Phantomhive had never been, it was an idiot. In fact, he was probably the furthest thing from it. He'd realised a long time ago that he was just not going to survive in St. Victoria's alone. That was the reason he had given in to Joker's endless attempts at friendship, allowed Soma in to his world, opened himself at least marginally to Freckles, even extended the hand of camaraderie to Alois. After all, the world was against them, the very walls they lived in the enemy. The last thing he needed to do was antagonise his fellow victims. That fact was now more true than ever, and just like he had forced himself to make bonds with the other patients, part of the Us rather than one of the Them, he now had to find another mind to depend on.
If Ciel could no longer trust himself then he had to find someone else to trust in. The options were not promising and, really, there was only one true candidate. It could never have been one of his fellow patients. They were no better off than him, if not worse. Out of the lot of them, he was probably the most stable, even considering his recent problematic behaviour.
Without a shadow of a doubt, it had to be Sebastian. The man who had resisted The Change, who had proven his worth and his loyalty time and time again. The man was his, Ciel knew, because he had sunken his claws in before the Institute had even had a chance. However, that did not mean security. That fact could change in an instant. Sebastian could change in an instant, and god only knows the staff were working on it, Ward V and the experimental patients alone. The Change had always been both sudden and irrevocable, and that was why it was so terrifying. Sebastian could walk on to the ward that day a monster, not so much as a shadow of the man he used to be, the man Ciel was willing to hand over his closely guarded trust to.
But, no. Trust was a flimsy concept at best. The stuff of after-school specials and cheesy teen novels. Trust would not tie Sebastian to him in the unbreakable way Ciel needed, in the irrefutable way Sebastian would need to continue to resist The Change.
They needed something stronger. Something deeper. Something that would tie Sebastian down to him completely. And Ciel had a fairly good idea of just what that something could be.
When Sebastian was finally relieved of his shift on Ward V, he made a beeline to Ciel's bedroom. It wasn't as though he had really gained any knowledge that they hadn't already had, but he still felt obligated to share his fruitless attempts at communication with the boy.
Crossing the threshold into Ciel's room, it was like walking head first into a wall of heat. The door to the ensuite was wide open and although he could see that the bath was empty, condensation still hung on the air, the room virtually a sauna. Not in there for more than a minute, Sebastian's skin was already dampening, either from sweat or just the moisture hanging around them.
Unsurprisingly, Ciel was sprawled unceremoniously across his mattress, the sheets kicked into a pile at his feet. He was completely out of it, eyelid fluttering in an unseen dream. It was clear that he'd just had a bath, even more clear that he hadn't even bothered to properly dry himself after. The unflattering patient uniform clung to his body, the white fabric sodden and showing a hint of the pink skin below. They were showing the lithe if not frail body to an almost indecent degree and it struck Sebastian a little odd that Ciel would allow such a blatant display of vulnerability, especially knowing perfectly well that his door was unlocked. His damp cobalt hair was softly curling at the tips, leaving a wet patch on his pillow, and little trails of water still ran down his neck.
"Mmf-"
"You'll catch another cold like that," Sebastian warned, completely unaffected by the vicious glare he was being dealt by the newly awoken boy, taking his usual seat by the desk.
Ciel dragged the towel off his face, not looking as groggy as someone who had just woken up should have, and bit out a very insincere thanks. Just like the glare, Sebastian didn't pay much mind to the tone, more than a little used to Ciel's moods these days.
"You're welcome. So I was alone on the ward today," Sebastian began, "And Peter was kicking up a fuss."
Ciel nodded absently, reaching down off the bed to grab a discarded rubix cube. He always solved it but ended up muddling the colours around again for the next time he got bored.
"He was as much a mess as usual so I couldn't tell just what was wrong with him. I think his eye – well, lack of – was probably hurting him. God knows you can see the infection from the other side of the room."
As he spoke, Ciel was clearly paying more attention to the toy in his hands than Sebastian's words, twisting the different columns as though aligning the colours was the most important thing he could possibly do. His fingers fumbled clumsily and the toy went scuttling across the floor. Automatically, Sebastian stepped forward and bent down to pick it up, and – and Ciel's eye was most certainly not on the rubix cube in his hand.
Oh for fuck's sake.
It probably said something about Sebastian's opinion on Ciel that when he noticed the boy's not at all subtle staring at his backside, his first thought was, What has Grell done to my pants now?
With a smirk, he tossed the rubix cube back over to Ciel and asked, "See something you like?"
He expected a derisive snort or a disdainful eye roll. Probably a crack at his hair, just to be safe. What he got instead was a raised eyebrow and a curling of the lips that could only be described as... suggestive.
If Sebastian hadn't known better, he'd have thought that Ciel was attempting to flirt with him.Luckily, he did know better, so the words 'Ciel' and 'flirt' couldn't possibly be in the same sentence, not even only in his head. It just didn't compute. For one, he was fairly sure the boy had nothing remotely resembling a sex drive, a key factor in the whole attraction thing. Ciel was far too... cold for that.
"...Anyway," Sebastian continued, taking his seat once again, "Since I was on my own there, I thought it couldn't hurt to try and talk to him. Emphasis being on try. He didn't even recognise his own..."
The colours not yet aligned, Ciel gave a small shrug to himself and tossed the toy aside, leaving it discarded at the far end of his bed. At least feigning attention this time, he briefly met Sebastian's eyes and nodded, then started rifling through one of his drawers. It was anyone's guess where exactly the boy got the supplies for his stash, but the drawer was not short on sweets, each little wrapper as diabetes-concealing as the last. Pulling out one of the multitude of lollipops, Ciel set to work on it, the lacklustre attempt at pretending to listen now all but abandoned.
"...Mother. I got in touch with her, convinced her to come see Peter. Horrendous women, more rolls than a bakery, temperament of a bear, I can see how the kid ended up here."
Definitely not listening then. Ciel just gave another absent nod, licking languidly at the lollipop, his tongue quickly becoming stained a cherry red. Now Sebastian had seen Ciel eat before. It wasn't something he particularly memorized, that would have been a little odd, but when you were around someone as often as they were around each other, you picked up on their little mannerisms and habits. As such, Sebastian knew that Ciel had never made a habit of giving his food the amateur porn treatment – long, exaggerated trails of the tongue, rolling the top across those soft pink lips, sucking in a way that was wasted on anything but, well, you get the picture – it was simply not what the boy did, and yet...
Unable to help it, Sebastian burst into laughter. He just had to. Staring at his ass was one thing but deep throating a lollipop?
"Shall I give you and the sweet some alone time, Ciel?"
That was apparently the last straw for Ciel. At the snickered question, his ears flushed a crimson red, the rest of his face soon to follow. Wrenching the sweet from his mouth, he scowled and demanded, "Why are you making this so bloody difficult?"
Sebastian couldn't have been more baffled if the boy had been speaking a foreign language. "And what exactly is this?"
There could have been a thousand different answers to that question, each as bizarre as the one before it, but the very last thing he ever expected to hear Ciel say was the one that was barked at him.
"I'm seducing you, you berk!"
There was an odd moment of silence after that. Ciel, scowling over at him, nose wrinkled in distaste and the embarrassed blush seeping away, seemed to think that was a perfectly acceptable answer, as he said nothing more and just looked at Sebastian expectantly. Part of the man wanted to laugh again, though was painfully aware of just how hard Ciel could launch that rubix cube laying thankfully forgotten, for the time being, at his feet. The rest of him was just wondering what exactly in Ciel's actions had constituted seduction. Perhaps seeing a damp Ciel Phantomhive would get some people's bells ringing, but having had to take care of him when he was flu-ridden, Sebastian was more concerned about having to play nurse to the worst sick patient around. He wasn't too keen on getting lashed across the face with a cold compress again any time soon. Okay, the flirtatious smirk maybe counted, but the kid smirked a lot so was it really surprising that the first conclusion Sebastian had jumped to was that he was being mocked? But... the lollipop? Seriously? Where the hell had he gotten that from, a bad porno?
Rather than laugh in Ciel's face, Sebastian's lips twisted into a sly smirk, and he sniggered, "If that's the case, you really need to work on your pillow talk."
Tossing the failed lollipop aside, Ciel sat up straight on the bed, somehow managing to regain an air of dignity despite the red still lingering about the tips of his ears. He took a deep breath and just took the bull by the horns, "Look, it's obvious I'm not into that flirting nonsense, so let's just be frank, shall we? You're attracted to me."
"Well, someone thinks mighty highly of themselves."
"So you're denying it then?" There was a certainty to his voice, a confidence that Sebastian couldn't quite understand. Try as he might, he couldn't remember an instance of displaying any sort of attachment outside of the boundaries of their bizarre little friendship. Of course, it couldn't be denied, Ciel Phantomhive was an attractive person. He had a porcelain beauty; powder white skin, the one eye he still possessed a deep blue that only grew deeper in the flurry of his temperament, physical features that any model would have killed for. Even outside of the physical, there was something compelling about him. The way he held himself, that way he had of owning the room and everyone in it without needing to utter a single word, it couldn't be denied that such a strong sense of self was a very alluring quality. Even the aloofness he displayed worked only to pull you in further, the rare instances of warmth like a devil's trap – he remembered them best, as few as they were, the small pockets of time with the broken Joker and Finny when Ciel had shed his careful indifference, and Sebastian had certainly found himself fascinated by those moments.
Oh yes, Ciel was an attractive person, Sebastian acknowledged, but that was not to mean he was personally attracted to him, did it?
He found himself bristling with no idea why.
"You... have a certain charm, I suppose," Sebastian relented, "Where exactly are you going with this?"
Ciel's face was overwhelmed with the same exasperation a person would get when trying to convince a child, no, just because it's a picture of food doesn't mean you can eat it.
"You're attracted to me. I'm attracted to you. Where the hell do you think I'm going with this?"
Sebastian blanched.
"You cannot be serious."
"As a heart attack."
The conversation had taken an almost surreal turn. Sebastian had to wonder if he had fallen asleep at some point – he had developed something of a habit of doing that in Ciel's room after particularly gruelling shifts on Ward V – and this was an exhaustion-induced dream. It had to be; there was no conceivable way that Sebastian was being propositioned by Ciel, the boy who had almost succeeded in throttling a fully grown man for the crime of daring to touch him.
Uncomfortable beyond belief and more than a little confused at the turn the day had taken, Sebastian scrambled for a response, managing to come up with, "You're a little young for me, don't you think?"
Ciel just rolled his eye.
"I'm legal."
"You're a twink."
"I'm sure if I knew what that meant, I'd be offended. Look," the boy shook his head, trying to get back on topic, "You've been here for a while now, right? Well over six months. You're a healthy young man. You have urges."
It was all Sebastian could do not to wince. As though being propositioned by someone half his age out of the blue wasn't awkward enough, Ciel had suddenly taken on the role of a school marm. It reminded him dreadfully of sex education lessons back at high school, being told his urges were completely normal, practising putting a condom on a banana, the sheer clinicalness of it all. He half expected Ciel to break out into a speech about safe sex.
"And let's face it, unless you wave your self-respect goodbye and bend over for Grell, you're not getting laid any time soon. I'm a hormonal teenage, I'm hard-wired to be horny as fuck, whether I like it or not. The way I see it, we can help each other out here," Ciel finished with a dainty shrug, as though he were suggesting nothing more than going out for a meal or buying new shoes.
As much as he resented even thinking it, Sebastian had to admit the kid had a point. It really had been forever since he'd last had sex. It had never been a problem before. It wasn't even cockiness when he said that he could find partners without breaking a sweat. He had reached the age when one begins to notice the opposite, or in some cases the same, sex, at the same time that he'd finally grown into his gangly body and lost that oversized puppyish look. As such, he had never been without opportunities. Women, men, it was a rare case when he didn't get who he wanted and rather than making him want them more, he found it too troublesome to chase someone uninterested and himself lost interest.
Had it really been over six months? Good god. With the unexpected turn his life had taken once he had moved to St. Victoria's, everything else had fallen to the wayside, libido included apparently. He wasn't even comfortable with the idea of touching himself any more, the very few times he had begun to slip his hand beneath the waistband of his pants seemingly some sort of cue for his psychotic neighbours to come a-knocking. Just like Ciel had said, the last thing he wanted was Grell to see him doing that and to take it as invitation. He quite liked his self-respect, thank you very much.
"I won't argue... it has been a while," Sebastian admitted hesitantly, though quick to continue, "But regardless, it's plainly obvious that you don't like being touched, Ciel. And I don't mean a minor dislike, I mean raw revulsion. It doesn't matter how long it's been since I last had sex, I'm not gagging for it to the point that I'd sleep with someone who would be repulsed the entire time, willing or not."
Ciel fell silent, contemplative. As he opened his mouth to speak, he turned his whole body around to face Sebastian, making sure that Sebastian was meeting his eye. What he was going to say was important. What he was going to say had to be heard.
"I'm not about to lie to you, I do have a touch phobia, and you've seen how extreme it can get. But that's not to say I'm completely frigid, you know. And it varies from person to person. Soma and Alois are always grabby with me, I don't feel sick every time they touch me. Freckles can get a little physical too. I'm not about to scream at her for it. I'm a big boy, Sebastian, I can handle myself. Besides," Ciel scoffed, a little bit of that sneer coming back to his voice, "There'll be rules, of course."
"...Rules?" Sebastian asked hesitantly, curious despite himself.
"Three, to be precise," Ciel responded promptly.
He couldn't help the derisive smirk, "Go on."
"Rule number one," Ciel held up his index finger, "No kissing. I've never seen the appeal and it just seems plain unhygienic. Rule number two," his middle finger joined the first, "No full on fucking. Again, I don't see the appeal, and there are plenty of ways to get off without resorting to rutting. And rule three," his ring finger joined the others in their upwards salute, "I stay partially if not fully dressed. Self-explanatory."
It really wasn't but Sebastian didn't bother to point that out. He was still riddled with disbelief. That morning, all he had been worried about was his hours on Ward V and just what they would try to coerce him into doing. Now, here he was, being propositioned for sex by Ciel Phantomhive. He could say, with the utmost honesty, that he had not seen that coming.
Sebastian frowned deeply.
"Did something happen in your session with Faustus?"
Ciel blinked owlishly, "What? Why?"
"This... It just seems to be coming out of nowhere, Ciel. One day, we're talking about Peter, or – or how likely it is that Ash and Angela are really amoebic clones. Hell, we were talking about the zombie apocalypse yesterday! And now you're coming on to me? Clearly something has happened to get you thinking about me in that way in the first place. So either you had a spontaneous wet dream, or something has happened in your session. I'm more likely to believe the latter."
Ciel donned a frown to match Sebastian's. Jesus, did the man have to analyse this to death? He was being offered no strings sex and he was questioning it. Couldn't he just get his end away like anyone else would have done? Apparently not, as Sebastian was still sat waiting for an answer to his asinine question. Fine. If he wanted some deep, psychological meaning behind it, Ciel could come up with some Freud nonsense to placate him.
"After the whole Finny thing, I... I have to wonder just what else they've done, Sebastian. To my head, my thoughts, my memories. They clearly have the ability to fuck with them. I'm... I'm not sure of things any more. I can't stop thinking about it and it's driving me mad. I need something. Something I can be sure of, something physical, something to ground me. You're the only one I can trust to be that something."
Ciel surprised himself with the admission. That had been a little closer to the truth than he had intended, after all. There was no time to regret it, though. Truth or lie, intentional or not, it had done the trick.
Sebastian approached him slowly, as though giving him a chance to take it all back, to chicken out and renege the offer. He did no such thing, just watched Sebastian's slow prowl towards him. He did not climb on to the bed with Ciel like the boy had expected him to, instead dropping into a crouch in front of him. Placing his hands gingerly on Ciel's knees, Sebastian allowed himself another small grin, and quipped, "Just for future reference; when attempting the subtle art of seduction, try to make it sound less like a business transaction."
Ciel wasn't allowed the luxury of replying to the aggravating statement before he was pulled forward by the knees, off the bed and flush against Sebastian's chest. He allowed himself to slide down to the ground, his back resting against the side of his mattress.
The dark-haired man swooped forward, as though to kiss the boy settled between his legs. Before Ciel could scold him for breaking the very first rule not even five minutes after it had been established, Sebastian changed direction, pressing his lips against the boy's neck instead. Rather than a playful tongue, it was teeth that latched on to the skin there, nibbling just shy of painfully. Good. Just like kissing and fucking, Ciel could not see the appeal of being licked, having someone slobbering all over you simply wasn't sexy to him.
A creeping began to work its way across Ciel's skin, a fine coat of disgust settling over him and crawling across his flesh like tiny little insects with too many legs. Sebastian wasn't even using his hands (yet) just his teeth teasing at his neck but already the revulsion was kicking at the door, determined to find a way into him.
Breathe.
Battling with the disgust was the suddenly choking urge to flee. His hands itched to be pressed against Sebastian's chest – not to touch, not to feel, but to push, push the man and his touches away from him and to open up the path to his bedroom door and freedom. It was a suffocation, having Sebastian's chest touching his, and he tried to reason with himself, he's barely even touched you. There's breathing space between us.
When reasoning didn't work, didn't welcome the air into his narrowing lungs, he resorted to discipline.
Stop this right now. You asked for this, you will accept it. It's okay, Ciel, okay? He's not hurting, he's not even trying to, and if you said stop, he would.
That helped. He repeated again and again in his head – if you said stop, he would – and the frightening suffocation lifted. A touch wasn't so daunting when it was a touch you could control, and Ciel was the one in control of this.
He needed to test the control, though. Needed to make sure he really was the one who decided what happened and when it stopped, so he grabbed a fistful of Sebastian's hair and yanked the man away from his neck.
"Stop pussyfooting around and bite me already." He hoped Sebastian mistook his breathlessness for excitement rather than the panic that was beginning to pass, and if the hazy-eyed and lascivious smirk was any indication, his hope wasn't for nothing.
Sebastian's hands came to rest lightly on his hips as he breathed, "Yes, sir," and leant forward once more to sink his teeth sharply into Ciel's collarbone. It wasn't a teasing bite like the other barely-there nibbles had been, a stinging bite that Ciel didn't entirely dislike. This wasn't about romance and it was a relief that Sebastian wasn't pretending it was.
The initial disgust was beginning to seep away and his body was reacting to Sebastian regardless. One of the man's hands had slipped between their bodies, his palm kneading against the growing bulge in Ciel's sweatpants. The other hand crept along the hem of his shirt, the pads of his fingers tracing along his stomach lightly, a touch that would usually tickle but now, as the heat in the pit of his stomach grew, served only to burn him more.
Even as Ciel's arousal increased, the little voice at the back of his head made its presence known, demanding that he run before things get worse. The disgust had almost entirely ebbed away by that point, however, and it was easier to smother down.
I'll get used to it, because I have to get used to it, for both our sakes.
The hand stroking his stomach made to take off his shirt and Ciel gave his first response of touch, grasping the wandering hand tightly. Sebastian looked at him in question, the other hand not ceasing in its teasing rubs, the layer of fabric in between the skin only making the friction worse – well, better.
"My shirt stays on," Ciel instructed, his voice thankfully not as breathy as he feared it would be.
Sebastian did not argue, giving Ciel's neck one last bite before dropping low in his crouch and getting rid of that frustrating bit of fabric between them. The man did not use his hands now, though, lowering himself further and bringing Ciel undone beneath him with his tongue alone.
Ciel did not moan like a wanton schoolgirl, something Sebastian found more than a little satisfying. That was not to say that he was completely silent under Sebastian's ministrations. With every trail his tongue made over the heated flesh, small and barely audible groans would spill past Ciel's tightly pressed together lips, breathing becoming heavier with each drawn out moment. When he came, it was with a strained grunt, the boy trying to keep himself silent but in the end unable to.
His face flushed a delightful red, Ciel caught his breath. For a while it seemed he was unable to meet Sebastian's eyes, the boy looking anywhere but at the man between his legs, but once his breath had returned to him, the bashfulness was gone too.
Their eyes met in a strong gaze and Ciel merely said, "I'm not doing that. It's undignified."
The boy did not make a show of it like Sebastian's past lovers had, no theatrics to the actions, no intentional attempts to look sultry. Yet when Ciel dragged his tongue along the palm of his hand, leaving behind a glistening trail, Sebastian's pants grew that little bit tighter, and he had to admit that, at least in that moment, there was something very attractive about Ciel to him.
Ciel kept that strong gaze up as he unfastened the button of Sebastian's pants and pulled the zipper down, sliding his hand into the man's boxers. The saliva on his palm was both soothing and maddening when it touched Sebastian's heated flesh, and it was all he could do to stop himself bucking into the boy's hand. Ciel was merciless with his strokes, purposefully slow and drawn out, and the tiny grin, barely there but undeniably impish, made it clear that the unfair pace was entirely intentional.
Despite having done the very same thing to himself that Ciel was doing now so many times before, there was something much more exciting just from the knowledge that it was not his hand bringing forth that blinding exhilaration. Ciel's palm was smooth, untouched by the manual labour that had toughened Sebastian's own palm and left rough calluses upon his fingers, and Sebastian was very much aware of that smoothness as it ran over him with a maddening slowness.
When Ciel finally took mercy and quickened his pace, giving Sebastian the same dizzying moment of euphoria that he had granted the boy not long before, it was not with the same determined restraint that Ciel had had. Ciel had been able to muffle himself with the desire to be quiet alone. Sebastian had to press his face into the curve of Ciel's neck to even try to quiet himself.
As Sebastian caught his breath, coming down from the moment of pleasure, Ciel squirmed free of his position caught between the man and the bed and disappeared into the bathroom. He returned just as soon as he left, wiping his hand with a damp cloth, tossing it over to Sebastian when he was done.
"It must be near the end of your shift by now," the boy said, retying the string of his pants.
Sebastian had never been one for being speechless, some sort of response always hiding behind his lips no matter what the situation, so it was all the more frustrating when he could gather no words to say as he wiped himself down with the cloth. Still, he was also never one to let someone else have the last word, so as he finished arranging himself and made to leave the room, he tossed back, "If we're really going to do... this, then I have a rule of my own."
Sceptical, Ciel hesitantly replied, "Go on."
"You're going to have to start brushing your hair. I do have standards, you know."