Pairing: Soubi/Ritsuka
Rate: R
Disclaimer: Don't own. -bows-
Summary: The two young men laughed in synch. Same cute Ritsuka. Same cute, jaded, broken Ritsuka whose heart had stopped beating like a normal human being many years ago.

After the first encounter, both Soubi and Ritsuka go back to their usual lives, with their usual companions and their usual fears.
But life and situations are not happy with keeping them separated. Not anymore.

Notes:

Inspired to continue this after reading Manga Vol 9 Ep. 3. Please check it to fully understand the references being made.

I should inform you that when I started this fic, such chapter had not been released, and thus I had no idea that my fiction would contain spoilers. Therefore, this is a warning: SPOILERS FOR VOL 9.

I am rather pleased to see that my own perspective/prediction regarding Soubi's behavior when forced to choose between Seimei and Ritsuka has been confirmed by canon scenes (though it is a bit sad, Soubi's situation is very difficult).

Part One: It does not please

Soubi kept vigil over that particular subway entrance for three days in a row, without ever daring to walk down the stairs, less to ride that route.

There was a 54 chance that he would bump into Ritsuka if he took such measures daily. There was a 19.6 chance that by instinct alone he would deduce which other stops Ritsuka used along that route. And there was a healthy 14 chance that someone riding the subway at a rush hour could remember -among the sea of strangers' faces- the pale, jaded, capturing, beautiful cold features of the former Loveless Sacrifice. Soubi could practically hear a faceless person confiding in him...

"Oh yes, now I remember, a pretty child-no, teenager with black ears and tail..."

But Soubi's optimistic daydream -since when did Soubi daydream anyway? - was interrupted by a cup of steaming coffee thrust in front of his face.

"Latte? Cappuccino? Mocaccino? Fairy dust in a crystal cup for the prince waiting for his lost Cinderella?" -Kyo's voice asked solicitously, with the vaguest hint of amusement as well as reproach in his words.

Soubi looked up. Trust Kyo to join him in his crusade.

"Although your Cinderella is quite the surprising ice princess himself, eh?" - the piercing fan and almost-graduated-from-art-school continued conversationally as he sat down, handing one cup of coffee (strong, black, no sugar, of course) to Soubi and sipping from the other cup (cream and two spoonfuls of sugar)- "Spirited away into nothingness and then coalesced back into your life to wreck chaos once more. Of course Sou-chan has to throw everything away for his sake. And of course he should ignore the fact that the gracious Cinderella boy went his merry way without a second glance for Sou-chan! That's how fairy tales go, after all. The plot where the little princess and the wicked little witch are one and the same is already known, though, what with the Swan Lake and all-"

"Jealousness doesn't look well on you, Kyo. When you puff your cheeks like that your face seems somehow fat" -Soubi deadpanned as he took a sip of his own.

"N-nanda?!" -Kyo almost spit the hot liquid, instantly prodding his face with his free hand, making sure to poke his cheekbones as he stole a quick and reproachful glance to the former Fighter- "You know I hate it when you do that, Sou-chan. I was just trying to lighten up the mood. You've been awfully serious since you told me about your magical reencounter with Rit-chan"

"You have adopted some kind of theme related to magic and tales, I see" -Soubi spoke with his eyes still trained on the subway entrance- "Does that make you the reliable ally or the wise adviser?" - a small smile crossed the long-haired man's face at his own words.

"I was going to elaborate on how that made me your true love ignored by your bewitched self all these years" -Kyo grinned- "But that is a worn cliché anyway. In a more realistic plane of existence, I am the one who's ready to smack your head silly until you decide whether you're going to set up camp here permanently or do something about Rit-chan. Even though you well know that I think he's acting like a spoiled brat showing up like that"

Soubi finally returned his tired glance towards Kyo at his left.

His silence spoke volumes.

Kyo sighed.

"I know you think you hurt him-"

"I did hurt him"

"But you couldn't help yourself-"

"I kept telling him over and over that I was ready to be his only fighter"

A frown.

"You're no one's possession-"

"I chose to be his"

"You know I hate that bullshit"

"But I was his and hurt him anyway"

"You couldn't help yourself!"

"I should have"

"He should have been less of a little bastard and gave you a second opportunity!"

"There was no room for second opportunities that night"

"The hell! There is always room for second chances! It's a matter of faith!"

"Abused by his mother and targeted by his brother? What faith?"

"You were different! You were-!!"

"I was not. Not that night when it mattered"

Silence for some minutes.

"No one, not even you, Sou-chan, can be perfect all the time"

"Certainly. I only needed to hold his hand while Seimei took free shots at his heart, and failed"

A pause.

"You didn't fa-"

"Don't lie to my face"

The coffee had grown lukewarm in both their cups, but they both drank it anyway, averting gazes and regrouping.

Kyo stretched his arms and legs on his place on the street's bench.

"I hate it when you win these arguments" -he said, his eyes calm but still hurting on Soubi's behalf.

Soubi returned the calm glance.

"I always win anyway. Besides, you are horrible at pretending to hate Ritsuka"

"Don't start again Sou-chan!!"

o-o-o-o-o-

Ritsuka balanced a thick book on his right hand while with the left he kept hold of one of the roof rings of the subway wagon. His eyes took note of the page number and the specific paragraph he was reading, and stored it away in order to resume his studies back at his—their apartment. The subway was approaching his stop and thus he needed to put away the book inside his draping black bag.

He waited as the rest of the people got off the train and then he exited. He disliked the feeling of being scrunched and surrounded by crowds.

"Almost dinner time" -he mused as he looked up at the darkening skies- "Maybe it'll start snowing soon"

Autumn was falling away and the air only got cooler with each passing day.

This winter marked a new year (the fourth) of his living in solitude.

Relative solitude, to say the truth, since he did have roommates. An arrangement that had been born out of convenience (on his part anyway) and was maintained out of habit now (on his part anyway).

Ritsuka entered the building with a polite if distracted nod to the front man, then went for the staircase instead of the elevator (he was neutral to it) and climbed up to the sixth floor.

With the corner of his right eye he noticed a well-dressed man (early thirties perhaps) exiting the last apartment on the east wing, while the door to the apartment that he was just walking by clicked locked (surely they had forgotten and at hearing sounds the couple living there locked in for the night- it was an European man and probably Chinese lady). The light bulb closest to the west window was new, the light was a touch whiter than before.

And why did he keep on taking in so many details? He huffed in slight annoyance as he shook a cigarette out of its pack and lit it up while he fished for the keys on the left pocket of his gabardine.

Ritsuka entered the apartment with quiet steps, and closed the door in an equally quiet fashion.

The others were loud enough for all of them.

"Aha! Ritsuka's back!" -one voice came from the dinning room table, where books, cups, papers and dishes were scattered messily. The young man in the dinning room tilted back his chair precariously to get a look at the newly arrived Ritsuka, taking out the tip of the ball pen from his mouth to wave it in greeting.

Ritsuka looked back blankly.

"Mou, Ritsuka! Ta-da-i-ma! Ta-da-i-ma! How many times must I remind you to enter properly?" -another voice rose in mocking scold, as other young man walked into the hallway entrance from the kitchen door, brandishing a cooking fork.

Ritsuka shrugged - "As many as you'd like. But you know I won't call up, since you don't need me to announce myself anyway. You can pick up footsteps approaching from the elevator doors after all"

"Ding dong! Right again!" -the young man with the long straight hair occupying the dinning room giggled good naturally, as he got up to step closer to the other two.

Ritsuka regarded his two roommates with neutral expression as he took off his coat and hung it, careful of the burning cigarette being transferred from hand to lips to hand again.

"Cram school okay?" -the young man sporting the apron and holding the cooking instrument inquired as the three of them walked into the kitchen area.

"Uh" -Ritsuka nodded as he opened the fridge and took a bottle of water out.

It seemed ridiculous for Ritsuka that he was already in midterm of his first year at cram school. Many years before he was a bubbly silly kid with silly friends and low grades. Years later he was a somber kid with few close classmates and good grades. Now he was a fairly popular loner who -without meaning it- kept getting top grades in every subject he went through. The fact that he was almost two years advanced in the regular education system was proof enough.

"What about that conference they were planning to let you mod?" -the long-haired young man nibbling the ball pen continued the survey, eyeing the frying pan's contents at the same time.

"Uh" -Ritsuka took the time to take a last drag out of the joint, crush it and then put it away- "I won't mod it. They changed their minds after one of the lecturers canceled"

"No conference then? I was planning to attend it, maybe it could help me with my damn assignment" -the one with the long light brown hair complained, thinking about the many books he had left behind on the dinner table.

The other roommate with the dark medium-length hair released the cooking fork to pat the shoulder of the whining one.

Both of them were earless.

"Oh, no, the conference still stands" -Ritsuka clarified without much interest as he gulped down some water. The liquid acquired a smoky taste down his throat- "I'll be substituting for the missing lecturer instead of modding. Might as well re-read the paper I did on that subject last month. It's not like I want to write another one"

"Sugoi Ritsuka!" -the dark-haired one clapped once- "Make sure they pay you well for helping them in their time of need eh! Not every school can brandish geniuses like us with such normalcy! It's a good deal, anonymous credit in exchange of good payment"

"This calls for a celebration" -the other one with the brown hair nodded sagely as he smiled deviously at Ritsuka- "And it calls for a prize for our jaded Ritsuka-doll!" -he exclaimed as he swiftly took hold of Ritsuka's face in both hands, and then pressed a quick but deep kiss to the younger teen's lips, tongue included for a couple of seconds.

Ritsuka tasted of smoke and tea, and apathy.

The long haired one disengaged with a cute pop sound, eyes growing sultry -"Will you be losing your ears tonight?"

The one with the dark, wavy, medium-length hair was also smiling mischievously at the pair, expectantly waiting for a response.

Both earless young men pretended not to know the answer time and time again.

"Not tonight" -Ritsuka answered with the same tone of voice he had spoken with the entire day, with the same bored eyes, but with slightly reddened lips- "And will you stop randomly kissing me every couple of days? That's what you have each other for and a private bedroom for yourselves"

The two young men laughed in synch. Same cute Ritsuka.

Same cute, jaded, broken Ritsuka whose heart had stopped beating like a normal human being many years ago.

But then again, neither of these other two young men were normal human beings for anyone's standards, so they were almost fine with this whole situation. Their best quality was their ability to accept at face value pretty much everything and everyone. And they both shared their total acceptance of Ritsuka (the old one, the new one, the sad one, the cold one, the one who dreamt and the one who forgot he had dreamt the following day).

But something had changed in their own little world this time. This week.

And both of them kept taking turns into reminding Ritsuka about it.

"Ah well, maybe we'll help you lose your ears other night then" -the long haired one mock-sighed- "Or do you have in mind someone else?"

The one with the wavy dark hair jumped at the prospect.

"Hey! Maybe Soubi can help him with this little predicament! It's so convenient that they happened to run into each other the other day!"

"You're right!" -the brown-haired one practically threw the pen in excitement as they both turned to the former Sacrifice- " Remember you told us Ritsuka, that he looked 'the same as always' in that cute emotionless voice of yours? If Soubi was interested in you back then, surely he still is! Should we call him? Shall we?"

All the while Ritsuka had kept busy checking the food on the stove and putting away the water bottle, expression rather...expressionless. No blush and no denial and no acceptance.

"Whatever for? I already told you I am not interested in losing my ears to you, and that's pretty much general. You, Soubi, Ayako-san or Nagata-sensei are the same. I'm not interested for the moment"

The Loveless Sacrifice turned his steps out of the kitchen and towards his bedroom.

"The noodles are burning by the way"

Natsuo and Youji yelped and scrambled and tangled into each other, attempting to save some of their dinner.

o-o-o-o-o-

Dark. A flash of light.

Red and blue. A book lying on the ground. A shard of glass.

A tattooed hand. An invisible line pulling forward. The smell of blood on the wall.

Constant buzzing instead of sound and moving moving moving images.

A tall shadow in front of him: Seimei requesting Ritsuka's death like he requested Soubi to walk a step behind him.

A small shadow standing proud (if fragile) at his side: Ritsuka exuding love and sadness and broken illusions in the form of a brother's betrayal.

A large, overpowering shadow all around him: terror terror terror and mixed signals.

Soubi once again felt one of his arms wrapped around himself, trying to calm the shudders wracking his body, while the other hand he used to hide his face, wisps of long smoky blond hair falling forth.

Somewhere between the word exchange of the Aoyagi brothers (the cruelty and the tears and the spilt blood) Soubi knew he was useless. A blank fighter with a crisis was nothing but an absolute waste.

But when he complied to Seimei's request of shattering a window in order to help the cruel Beloved to escape, Soubi knew he was worse than useless: he was a liar and a tool and a murderer. And while he had been all those things before, he didn't want to be any of those things to Ritsuka, not anymore.

Not anymore! Not anymore! No more! No more!

No no no no no. The word became a mantra for Soubi that night.

And now Ritsuka's amethyst eyes were trained on him with such obvious pain and confusion, and his voice was drowned by the sound of a door opening with a low but maddening shrill noise—

"No!" -Soubi chocked on the sound as he awoke, not really jumping but with breath labored and hands splayed onto the mattress of his bed in a blatant manifestation of panic.

It took Soubi only a second to place himself in his room in the middle of the night. It took him another second to reason that he was having another unpleasant dream -only this one was worse because the metallic smell of the blood was so persistent that he could almost taste it on the back of his tongue, and because the memory of Ritsuka's eyes had never been so vivid and so fire-branded on his own pupils before.

"Sou-chan" - a timid call came from the bedroom's door.

Soubi realized that the door of his dream was the actual door of his bedroom being opened by a pajamas-clad Kyo. The comical appearance of the young man was in clear mismatch with his serious countenance.

"This has to stop, Sou-chan. It doesn't matter if the idea terrifies you, but tomorrow we're tracking down Rit-chan, got it?"

o-o-o-o-

Lightening claws breaking upon trees and land and everything. A violent silence only accentuated by the mute rhythmical flashing.

A brother who was dead. A dead man who was his brother. A caricature of a grand ghost and pretender.

A tragic hero on his own, with a twisted love for a child who should have worshipped him in return.

And Ritsuka almost did. He was on the brink of it, but a bandaged hand had literally yanked him back into reality one day when he was leaving school in a rush, and now the image of said hand was what kept him grounded.

'I need you now'

His own small hand searched blindly for the hand of his Fighter.

'You are not Beloved's anymore'

His eyes found Soubi, and he saw Soubi taking small steps backwards. Away from him.

'Soubi. I am scared. I am confused. Take my hand'

He saw -because there was no sound only shadows and mortal flashing of lights- Seimei speaking and with his words pulling and tensing and snapping broken the chain that linked him and Soubi together.

'I think...I think maybe I...I think maybe I love...Soub— '

Ritsuka couldn't finish his thought, because he was blinded and ensnared by the memory of his mother -beloved mother I could disappear and give you back the old sweet Ritsuka if that pleased you and if I could- slapping him and throwing crystal cups and holding him down into the cold water of the bathtub.

'I loved her but she wanted me to die. And I ended up losing her love'

And his mind was filled with the memory of a younger version of Seimei -beloved brother I wanted to be like you and be with you and learn everything from you and wanted to be saved by you- confessing his real name as Beloved, while his dark dark eyes were fixed on child Ritsuka with a mad urge to posses and savage.

'I loved him but he wanted me to die. And I ended up losing his love'

Ritsuka fell to his knees, gaping, struggling to get some air to his lungs, some sense of direction and some light to his blinded eyes. His hand crept up to his chest -where the pain was the worst of all- but the only thing he found was a hole the size of his fist, sickeningly wet with dripping blood.

He was sightless and breathless.

And loveless.

Ritsuka strangled a scream, and jolted awake.

The table clock read 03:46 on neon green numbers.

'What...what was I...what was I dreaming...' -Ritsuka mused, yawning and shaking his hands, which were ice cold and numb, as if they had been gripping tight onto something.

He felt dizzy and heavy, low pressure problems making themselves known.

When the young man felt his fingertips tingling with recuperated tactile sense, he laid down again, intent on catching at least one more hour of sleep.

In his disoriented state, he missed the two figures standing silent on the threshold of his room, watching him through the slight crack of the open door.

The former Zero pair exchanged glances, for once devoid of sarcasm and amusement.

And while unpleasant dreams and worried thoughts continue, dawn insinuated itself timidly over the horizon.

o-o-o-

End of Part One