Well, this one is kinda weird because I didn't really want this much real-world this early in, but I decided to write it in because it's based on my experiences. We were learning First Nation (kinda like Native American except more Canadian-like) dances, and we just HAD to learn the Owl Dance, which is a pairs dance, so I was paired with this guy who was like a foot shorter than I am, and I'm on the short side, so it was weird, and he was like doing this weird galloping thing and I was like "It's a shuffle! A SHUFFLE, you motherfucker dumbass!" and then after we finished the dance, he wouldn't let go of my hand, and I was like jerking it like a dead fish, and he still wouldn't let go, and I was like How less subtle can you get? so then I bitch-slapped him and he let go.

One song glory...

"Mrlph," Kyo's shoulder vibrated from the sound being spoken into it, a result of the fact that his cousin had just stumbled into the cat, who was still seated at the table and trying to eat breakfast after his early start. Kyo twitched, somehow unwilling to move away and let poor sleepy-head Yuki fall and smash his nose in, but he wanted him off all the same.

Or did he…?

"Get off me!" Kyo scooted backwards, moving outside Yuki's base of support. As if in slow-motion, Kyo watched in horror as Yuki's head slipped forward without Kyo's sturdy shoulder to lift it, one of his bare feet shuffled as though to stop his fall, as though to stop gravity, but it skidded instead, throwing the gray-haired adolescent lightly across Kyo's lap. A moment of silence. Kyo, frozen with shock, was half-expecting a puff of smoke.

"If you all would please bow your heads for the soon-to-be-deceased Sohma Yuki," Shigure said, in a thoroughly serious voice.

Kyo grabbed Yuki's shoulders roughly, as the rat was still face-down across his lap, and pulled him upright. More upright. Yuki's eyes were still closed, but now at least he was on his knees, albeit supported by Kyo's hands on his arm, and not sprawled out on Kyo. Kyo gave thanks for that. His hands slowly loosened their grip on Yuki's upper arm, where they had been steadying the other boy, and withdrew with relief back to his chopsticks.

Yuki's heavy-lidded eyes were now half-closed with the weight of morning, but what Kyo could see between the two curtains of eyelashes was a hazy, dulled violet so unlike the usual sparkling, if slightly sleepy, look they usually held. If Kyo were someone else, say, Haru, he would be giving thanks to the fact that no one else (other than Tohru and Shigure) got to see this endearing, sleepy side of the Prince. Perhaps Kyo, somewhere in the back of his mind, unrealized, was giving thanks anyway.

Yuki swayed for a moment, before gravity got the better of him. One minute there was drunken-looking teenager attempting to get his balance next to Kyo, next moment Kyo was pressed – hard – against the wooden floor, his ear was stinging, and there was a warm, vaguely familiar, body on top of him. Yuki had toppled over, it was bound to happen, but no, he couldn't crash his nose in on the table, or fracture his spine, he had to fall on Kyo. Disturbingly enough, one of Yuki's legs was wrapped, almost seductively, around one of Kyo's – most disturbingly of all, Kyo thought he felt Yuki's mouth brush lightly, gently, lovingly against his jaw – but then Yuki went limp, and Kyo was sure he had imagined it. Be that as it may, whether it happened or not, what he was definitely not imagining was the fact that Yuki had grabbed Kyo's hand as they went down, and he hadn't let go, that being the reason Kyo had hit the floor so hard.

"Kyo-kun, Yuki-kun!" Tohru screeched, leaping from her seat and scurrying around the table to make sure they were both okay and unharmed by the fall – Kyo decided he was unharmed by the fall, but definitely not okay. Fortunately, by the time Tohru had made it all the way around the table, Kyo had slid out from underneath Yuki's warm, unmoving body – the rat hadn't even made any recognizable sign that Kyo had left him. In fact, he was asleep again, zonked out on the floor, and snoring lightly. How the hell can that lazy-ass rat be ASLEEP?! I mean, the way his arm's all twisted around, that'd have to wake him up…

Wait a minute…

Yuki. Hadn't. Let. Go. Of. His. Hand.

"Holy shit, LET GO, damn rat!" Kyo yelled – nice move, moving the attention of anyone who hasn't already noticed to the fact that the person usually having his ass kicked was HOLDING HANDS with his tormentor. Kyo jerked his arm, arching his hand as far away from Yuki's as humanly possible, feeling a little guilty when the sweet little curled-up body jolted with the after-effect of his attempt to get away. The cat guilty feeling dissipated instantly when Yuki still didn't let go.

"He has a very firm grip," Shigure told Kyo obnoxiously, who merely growled and muttered something very obscene and very offensive, while still trying in vain to pry Yuki's hand off, unlace their fingers, but as annoying as Shigure was, he was also very right. Yuki did have a freakishly strong grip. No matter how much he tried, Kyo couldn't get the other boy to let go, and so he wound up eating breakfast with one hand while ignoring the fact that Yuki was sprawled out next to him, the fact that his hand was still held practically in a vice grip, the fact that Yuki actually looked kind of majestically pretty when he didn't speak, move, or glare at Kyo.

I wish he would just stay like this, the slightly-perverted thought crossed Kyo's mind, unwanted. Then he wouldn't piss me off so much, the motherfucking perfect little pansy…hey, what if he didn't wake up…? What then? What would I do if I was alone with Yuki when he was asleep – that already happened once, and believe me, I would not try to attack him again. But what if I was alone with him again… An image of Yuki, head lolling, breathing in the soft rhythm of a person dreaming sweet dreams, wearing handcuffs (and little else), duct-taped to a chair crossed Kyo's mind. Kyo blamed the economy.

"Mrlph," Yuki said again, cracking a misty eye open, yawning a little, and half-rolling to face Kyo. His eyes shot open in shock. Kyo used the pause while Yuki's brain caught up to the rest of him to mentally prepare the rant he would rave when Yuki finally made the connection between what he was seeing the knowledge stored in his mind. Yuki seemed to have made the transition between dead-to-the-world-but-functioning-normally and alive, because he spoke again. "Shigure…why is the stupid cat holding my hand?"

Kyo jerked his hand back as though it had been burned by a hot branding iron – he felt like he had been. Yuki was so maddening – he was blaming Kyo for something he had initiated, yet again. And he was sitting there with that little smirk on his face, the one that made Kyo want to grab him and wipe that smile off with the floor. "Eat floor, damn rat!" Kyo screeched, throwing himself at Yuki, claws sharp and battle ki flaming.

"In your dreams, stupid cat," Yuki replied coolly, effortlessly dodging the throw Kyo had put his entire strength into as though it were a punch a flailing child had put out in helpless anger devoid of a point. He darted forward, looming in Kyo's vision – oh, Kyo just had to be thinking about breakfast at a time like this - before all Kyo could see was a blur of color – all shades of brown, gray, Tohru's blurred face for a brief second, then suddenly a blue expanse misted with white, dappled green, and then the spinning stopped and Kyo came face-to-face with a rock.

"Meet your great-grandparents, rat shit!" Kyo screamed, springing back up to his feet and dashing back up to the house - he'd floor quite far, and taken down the front door - to confront Yuki again. But Yuki just yawned, sitting down to eat, something Kyo had been trying to do before Yuki had managed to ruin his entire morning. Yuki yawned, seemingly to spite him.

"My great-grandparents are dead, Einstein," Yuki said, stifling another yawn.

That's the point, Kyo silently fumed, very pissed off. They all claimed he was stupid, but who was the one who wasn't getting his insults?

All the way to school, and indeed all during school, Kyo wasn't thinking about how soft Yuki's hand had been, despite all of the rat's garden work. He wasn't thinking about how warm it had been. In fact, Kyo had almost forgotten that morning's episode, too wrapped up in the fight afterwards, too wrapped up in anger and his own destructive nature to, for one second, ponder the concept of peace, or even to notice that Yuki was distracted. The rat's paw - er, hand - kept drifting down to his bookbag, as though he had been looking for something, only to remember he'd lost it. If Kyo had even been mildly receptive, he also would have noticed that Yuki was writing something, something he kept scratching out and erasing, something he seemed to be dissatisfied with. He made several drafts, but Kyo was just sitting there, hating him, not even bothering to try to read over his shoulder.

Kyo would make a very bad spy.

You're trying to climb

But the ivy's slick with grime

You can't reach that square of sky

You can kiss freedom goodbye

It's hopeless; you can't win

Your chances are thin

But she's helping you

She's your pit stop crew

She's sending you a lifeline

She's your Lady So Devine

She's saving your life

She'll help you through the strife

All I can do is watch it

Don't botch it!

All I can do is annoy you

I want to help you, too

But all I can do is be a bitch

I don't want to get you out of this ditch

I want you to survive

Your eyes burn; keep that flame alive

On the other side of this huge wall

An endless, eternal fall

It's pure torture

A real scorcher

Better shut out and in pain

Than inside and insane

There was an illustration - a tear-blurred view down into a well, and way down at the bottom was a man, hidden in shadow, gazing up. The thing that really struck Kyo about this picture was the man's eyes, a little flame echoed in each one, although there was no evidence of a candle in sight. Also, at the rim of the picture, a woman's hands (they were delicate and had painted fingernails) gripped a rope, and another hand was resting on the edge of the well - the second hand Kyo supposed was a woman's also, by the elongated, uncallused shape they had, although Kyo spend more time studying what appeared to be razor scars on the second hand's wrist. Kyo admired the artist, for he/she had effortlessly made it look as though whoever was gazing down into the well was crying by the blurred view.

He flipped to the front of the book, to check if the artist and the poet were the same person, but the artist's name was nowhere to be seen. Come to think of it, neither was the author's. Hm...that's odd...a prefessional poet really should sign all her work... Kyo had started referring to the poet as "her", rather than using a genderless referrence, which would have been more appropriate considering that he had no idea who the hell this person was.

Please read the poems! Actually, I hate reading poetry. I just write it. But they're relevent. So...yeah. And PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!! By the way, DarkIrony, I thank you for putting the story on Story Alert about five minutes after I uploaded it. Even if you didn't review...-sigh- NO ONE HAS READ MY BODYGUARD FIC!

I'm going to go depart to the lovely little land of angst I call my room. It's not that late, but I'm an early riser, early sleeper. Like Osaka. Only she just sleeps as often as she can.

Hey...I'm gonna give you guys a red herring. -hands cheering crowd a crimson fish-