Disclaimer:Nope.

Author's Note:Wow, it's been a while… I'm almost afraid to post anything, haha. XD; I admit, this probably isn't all that great… but it was a fun way to scrape the rust off of my writing. I hope you find it at least a bit enjoyable~ :D

Warnings:SebaCiel. Inspired by chapter 63 of the manga, as well as by my crazy roommate. Who, I should mention, has taken to calling "Hallucination" Sebastian's "We gonn' make love 'til you wake up" song. So… yeah. XD; Lemon-flavoring and sorta non-con? (But not really, I don't think. I mean, Sebastian doesn't ignore an order to stop, so…)

XXX

Heartbeat

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Ba-dum.

He wakes to the sensation of spiders. (Like maggots and earthworms, I feast upon flesh.) And for a single, muddled moment, his delirious mind cannot decide if he is trapped by cage or coffin, bones or bedroom. (I nibble on nipples, I suckle a sternum.) A sacrificial lamb, in any event; is it better to be eaten by the dregs of society, or gobbled up by the demons in Hell? (He is a snack, a supper, and a sweet all in one. I will pick my teeth with his still-twitching fingers.) Which would he wish for, had he the power to choose? (The dinner bell is imminent; inevitable... it will serenade us with the same sonorous song as a fallen crown of gold.) But no, wait—that power is his, and he did choose, and he needn't die for the latter to come to pass. (Dead is the boy with the sunshine stare and rose-patch knees; in his place, an earl with clouded eyes and a façade of thorns wriggles and writhes and blossoms. Beautiful and foolish: an obstinate flower in an arid desert.) Memories and fantasies merge and mix, and it takes a minute to realize that the feathery antennae of insects are not what poke, prod, and tease the pliant flesh of his no-longer-secret place. (Beneath the transparent porcelain of his skin, blue-blooded veins thrum with liquid existence. I will write the tale of our time together with that staining ink—inscribe our story into the parchment of his flayed and tanned hide.) Rather, it is the proffered thread that dangles from talons as thin as spindled legs which goad him back to reality. (But for now, I cocoon my noble prey in esthetic silks and elegant seduction.)

Ba-dum. Ba-dum.

"No," he rasps into the embrace of the dark, into nighttime air as cloyingly, clingingly black as molasses. (Saccharine and sticky, like any small child.) His stomach feels sticky. (Already coated in dollops of cream, like the cake on which he'd earlier indulged.) And as he speaks, he can taste a lingering sweetness curdling on the back of his tongue, its flavor both familiar and foreign. (Me, of course. For we are alone in the manor, young master, just as I'd promised...) "No," he whispers again, as if chastising a naughty dog. (A bad pet, a wayward pet, a greedy-hungry-insistent pet, having crept through the shadows to join its master in his bed…)

Ba-dum ba-dum.

There is the sound of shifting eiderdown, shifting limbs, shifting thoughts… but he, as always, lies perfectly still beneath downy coverlets, gazing steadily into nothingness. (Or what would have been nothingness, if monsters like myself did not exist.) The remnants of sleep cleaves to trembling moonstone lashes, gumming them with yawn-tears; the residue of kisses cling to gaunt cheeks—crusting veneers of salt and digestive acids crackling like desiccated bath foam. (A leisurely meal, relished and unrushed. Like his company's candies, I will consume him oh-so slowly… one lick at a time, a suck and a nip.) His skin fizzles, almost pleasantly, as beneath the linen sheets dispelled spiders begin to creep once more… (I offered a strand of salvation only to weave him into my web.)

Ba-dumbadum.

"Yes," the red-eyed gloom counters softly, the white abyss of a toothy maw stretching wide, wide, wide against a slender throat. (I can feel my prize.) His heart is beating there, having leapt up and lodged itself. (Has he yet realized...?) The very sound makes the nightmare purr, every inch of its midnight body shuddering with delight. (A second organ throbs in time to the fluttering pulse; the rub-rub of mismatched kindling ignites a lilac fire, both in my loins and in his eye.) "Yes…"

Badumbadum.

(He turns his head. Consent.)

Badumbadumbadum.

Velveteen lips skim the scars that decorate pale knuckles, as if in mocking apology. (But it does not matter if I hurt you, abuse you, hate you, kill you… you will want me all the same.) He wonders—amidst a flurry of shallow gasps and the curling of bitty toes— if the other can taste the leather of the riding crop, the perfume of the palace, the rot of his once-prison. (You promised me thus, vows wafting on winds of decay and despair.) Perhaps his soul is in his skin, oozing from his pores like stuffing from a tattered toy. (And one day, you will be nothing but a pound of flesh, my lord—eviscerated organs and the empty husk of a broken china doll.) Or maybe he tastes simply of soap and sweat and stale semen. (For I will take from you that which is most precious: the gift that God has given humans, but has stolen from all those like me.)

Badumbadumbastian…

He doesn't care enough to ask. (What is it, you say?)

Badumbadumsebastian—

He doesn't care. (You will give me your love.)

BadumbadumSebastian—!

Or so he tells himself. (Resistance is futile.) Pointedly. Repeatedly. (Expected, but in vain; you will fight, and deny, and refuse.) For the truth is far more painful to swallow. (But it will be for naught.) Viscous saliva is clogging-congesting-cementing his airways; each wheezed pant claws its way from brittle lungs, flavoring his mouth with traces of copper. (What you have offered will never be returned.) Lest he wish to suffocate, he has no other option. (Now—) He opens up wide…

Sebastian—!

(Your soul is mine.)

Sebadumbadumbadum—!

And he may as well have pared himself in half, what with how he is now being split: licentious legs lionized by hands that knead and need, tongues tangling as teeth clatter and hips bounce-buckle-buck beneath brutish, blanketing blackness. (All of your thoughts and feelings, your desires and longings, your hopes and dreams and that little spark of life that brings you joy.) Wrists still chafed from iron shackles are bounded once again, by fingers far stronger than any metal cuff. (Your all.) In a token display of retribution, he binds the devil in kind: like tea in turn for rod, looped legs repay locked arms. (Your everything.)Trapped in the vice of sinewy thighs, the creature growls in amusement—thrusts and moans. (That is a soul, my master.) He is rewarded by a whimper. (It is the heart that you swear no longer exists.)

BaDumBaDumBaDumBaDum—!

His heart is ringing in his ears, throbbing in his throat, pulsating in parts that he'd rather not think about, let alone name. (When will you remember, little boy?) Hammering against the cage of his chest, he almost feels as if the organ is trying to physically break free, to literally escape. (It was in your outstretched hand when we two met.) Like the mysterious muscle no longer wanted to reside within him. (Voluntarily gifted. Your ransom; my price.) Instead, it reaches out, just as its owner had: strains for whatever deliverance lies beyond the depths of the lonely void. (Now, it is mine.) Reaching, reaching out… (Like it or not—and like it you will— you will someday succumb.) Reaching out to— (And on that day…)

BADUMBADUMBADUMBADUM—!

"Seba— hng…! A-ah—! Sebas—!" (My delectable young master…)

BADUM—

"Sebast—!"

(On that day, I will break it into pieces.)

"AH—!"

(And I will savor your bittersweet fragments for all of eternity.)

Ba-dum.

XXX