Easy

"Touya, move back a bit."

Akira sighed. Shindou could get downright pushy about being able to see the board, even when Akira was just recreating games. "Fine." He scooted back on the smooth boards of the porch, eyes not leaving his book.

So he was startled to feel a sudden weight on his folded legs.

He looked down and, indeed, that was Shindou’s head in his lap.

"Shindou, what are you doing?"

"Studying." Shindou waved a handful of kifu, a wealth of what, are you going blind? in his voice.

Akira eyed him for a moment. Shindou looked perfectly comfortable. Finally his mouth quirked and he shook his head, looking back at his book and picking up the next stone.

After a while he shifted the book to his other hand so he could brush his fingers through Shindou’s hair while he thought.

 

End

Negative Space

Tsuzuki does all the things Muraki didn’t.

Tsuzuki undresses him slowly, carefully, and drapes Hisoka’s clothes messily over the nearest chair. Tsuzki’s hands stroke over and over his body, open and gentle, soothing his skin with body-heat. Tsuzuki kisses down his thighs lightly, lips brushing the inside of Hisoka’s knee.

Tsuzuki’s mouth is hot and eager when it closes over Hisoka’s cock, and he makes little humming sounds when Hisoka thrusts up. His fingers, stroking Hisoka’s back and the curve of his ass, encourage and coax Hisoka to let himself go into slick sensation, to brace his feet and flex his hips up hard.

Tsuzuki stretches out on his stomach, contented smile as good as a purr, and squirms with pleasure as Hisoka’s hands trace his body. He closes his eyes and moans, pushing his ass up in the air, when Hisoka’s fingers work into him, stroking and twisting. He whimpers low in his throat when Hisoka opens him up, and spreads his legs wider.

And that’s why, when Tsuzuki leans over him, Hisoka wraps his legs around Tsuzuki’s hips and rocks into the hard slide of Tsuzuki’s cock inside him. Why he fastens his mouth on Tsuzuki’s, breathing in every gasp. Why he holds Tsuzuki close and lets the man’s emotion soak into every inch of his skin. Why he whispers for Tsuzuki to fuck him harder and tosses his head back and moans openly with the pleasure of each thrust, each rush of sweet feeling.

Hisoka knows what sex is. He knows what love is. He knows what Muraki is, and he knows the difference.

And that’s why he smiles as they lie together in a sweaty tangle, and strokes Tsuzuki’s hair. Tsuzuki is different. Tsuzuki is his. He will never let Muraki have what’s his.

 

End

Reconstruction

At first he thought it was strange, playing tennis in teams, but he’s come to like the school club. It makes inside and outside clear.

People on the inside are the ones who see him smile, who hear him shout. People on the outside only see his calm.

His team makes him smile the same way his garden does, to see subtle and bright colors unfurling in harmony, to see the fierce, unrelenting desire all things have to grow. He loves that.

He thinks Akaya might have gotten a bit frost-nipped at the start, but he seems to be recovering, finally shedding dead leaves and putting his energy into new ones.

Then there are the ones like Yagyuu, his morning glory—charming and ruthless. Only trees are strong enough to bear up a morning glory and not be strangled.

He’s sure few people would imagine Niou anything as firm and solid as a tree, but he thinks it’s appropriate.

He thinks he will come to his art after he’s done with tennis. Mathematics, though, he keeps with him at all times. That isn’t a career; it’s the underpinning of his world.

Sometimes tennis and art tangle in his mind. Jackal reminds him of the Impressionists—solid and everyday, but always striking in the texture of his existence, in the way light falls on him.

Marui, on the other hand, reminds him irresistibly of Mondrian, all stark, strong lines and cheery, primary colors.

The time his class was assigned a self-portrait, he used dark outlines and intense colors for the background. His image looked at the sky, though, and he painted that a pale, clear blue.

All things have a pattern. All things can be described and understood. He shares that conviction with both Niou and Renji, though they show it in three very different ways.

His own technique is really quite simple. He fills the space that the game creates—whatever that is. Renji says he’s like water, pouring into different shaped containers. He likes the image.

The shape that his games with Sanada make is brutal and complex and fine as the edge of Sanada’s sword. Sanada makes him think of the stone and earth that plants grow out of.

For Sanada, muga no kyouchi is an extra step into concentration, discipline, purity. For Seiichi it’s like pulling muscles out that last bit into a full stretch.

When he stretches out on the court, no-self exists in the spaces between his breaths.

As an artist, he knows, a blank sheet is not empty; the moment eyes and intention touch it it holds color and line that the artist must find. His tennis is like that, too.

It was not his strongest opponents who named him Kami no Ko. The strongest can throw off his domination, keep their will to fight. It’s only the weak that he stuns simply by uncovering his spirit.

Renji teases, gently, that Seiichi’s spirit is the sun of this garden, his team. Seiichi says that, if so, Renji is the rain. He isn’t teasing; without rain, the sun would only scorch.

He knows he will stay with his club and his team through high school. He loves the competition that runs down the years, woven tight and intimate. And only here is there the devotion that saw him through months of slow terror and helped him stand at the end of it.

He knows the love and pride of these years will live on in his heart even after he leaves. But he’s never let go of anything he’s truly wanted. He sees no reason to start.

Bend Me, Stretch Me

Ritsuka

Ritsuka glared at the shop front.

"We really don’t have to—"

"Shut up," Ritsuka snapped. "We’re going in." He latched onto Soubi’s hand and towed him into the store and if he was holding on tighter than towing demanded, well, no one knew that but Soubi. And Soubi wasn’t actually laughing, so Ritsuka didn’t have to actually die of embarrassment.

The woman behind the counter greeted them cheerily and Ritsuka twitched a bit, hurrying Soubi past before the clerk could try to be helpful. Safely, sort of, among the shelves, he let go of Soubi and crossed his arms, trying not to look at anything. "Okay. So. What do you want?"

Soubi cleared his throat. "Well. Let me take a look around and see."

There were days Ritsuka wished he still had his ears just so he could pin them back to show how little he appreciated Soubi’s sense of humor.

Of course, if he still had his ears, he probably wouldn’t be allowed in here.

He trailed after Soubi as Soubi wandered through the shelves. He was not going to clutch the hem of his boyfriend’s coat like a freaked out little kid. He was not.

"Hmm. What about this?"

Ritsuka registered that Soubi had stopped in front of the rack of dildos, which wasn’t quite what he had expected, and let out a silent breath of relief. He’d said anything, but… And then Soubi turned around and Ritsuka’s sigh turned into a squeak.

"You… um…" Ritsuka swallowed, taking in just how big the brightly colored dildo Soubi was holding really was. "You sure?"

"If you don’t want to," Soubi started, and Ritsuka waved a hand as if to bat down the words.

"I said anything and I meant it! Just…" he took a breath. "You’re sure?"

"I’d like it," Soubi said softly.

Ritsuka nodded. "Okay." He turned for the register, Soubi close behind him. He hoped that smiley clerk didn’t say anything about this, because then he’d have to blush. And then he really would die of embarrassment.

Soubi

"Oh… oh god, Ritsuka, yes…"

Soubi sprawled, panting, over the bed and the couple of pillows that were lifting his ass up so Ritsuka could push an enormous dildo into it.

Life was very good, sometimes.

He moaned as Ritsuka pushed it in a little deeper. Ritsuka was going very slow, which Soubi had expected and didn’t object to. This was worth savoring, the ferocious stretch as slick glass forced him open. The faint ache as it held him open, sliding deeper and deeper a tiny bit at a time.

"Nnn… oh please… ahhh…"

The muscles of his legs trembled with reaction and his breath came in deep gasps. This was just as intense as he’d dreamed it might be.

"Aah, please…"

He groaned into the sheets as the dildo slid in all the way.

"Okay?" Ritsuka asked behind him, sounding a bit breathless himself.

"Wonderful," Soubi gasped. "Incredible. Please, Ritsuka, fuck me…" He moaned, hoarse, and shuddered as Ritsuka pulled the dildo back, all his muscles slack and watery in its wake.

When Ritsuka pushed it in again, a little harder this time, he could only whimper.

It was so perfect, so sweet to lie pliant under Ritsuka and have his ass worked hard until his whole body trembled, overloaded with sensation. He could barely move for it, could only make pleading sounds as Ritsuka drove the huge dildo into him over and over.

"Soubi," Ritsuka whispered.

The sound of his Sacrifice’s voice, that husky, pushed him over the edge.

"Ahh!" Soubi’s whole body shook as orgasm rocked through him and muscles stretched to their limit tried to clench. "Yes! Please, yes…"

It was like being in the heart of a fire and he was too wrung out to even twitch as Ritsuka pulled the dildo free, hesitant as he tugged against the grip of Soubi’s body. Ritsuka’s hands rubbed gently over his back.

"You sure you’re okay?" Ritsuka asked, anxious. "You’re sure I didn’t hurt you?"

Soubi smiled and flopped over on his side so he could tug Ritsuka down against him. "I’m very sure. That was perfect." He nuzzled Ritsuka’s hair and murmured. "And you?"

Color stole over Ritsuka’s cheekbones. "You’re…" His fingers traced over Soubi’s chest. "You look really amazing like that."

Soubi chuckled. "Mmm, so you like seeing me spread out under you and shaking while my ass stretches wide around something you’re fucking me with?"

"Sou-bi!" Ritsuka was still adorable when he turned red and glared. He made a small hmph and scrunched a bit further down into Soubi’s arms and muttered, "Yes."

Soubi softened in turn, the way Ritsuka always managed to make him. He kissed Ritsuka gently. "Thank you."

Ritsuka smiled, wry and sweet, and kissed him back. "Yeah, well.

"Happy Birthday, Soubi."

 

End

At Your Feet

Renji almost never gave his captain a full salute.

Other people almost never noticed.

Renji figured it was just Kuchiki-taichou’s attitude that kept them from seeing it, the same way everyone thought Kuchiki-taichou was taller than he really was. But he noticed. He watched the way the other vice-captains were with their captains. There were the casual ones like Rangiku and Yachiru who teased everyone, including their superiors. There were the punctilious ones like Iba and Hisagi who wouldn’t dream of reporting without a formal bow. There were resentful ones like Oomaeda and exasperated ones like Ise, not that he could blame her, but there didn’t seem to be any other vice-captains quite like him.

Ones who were always proper. Always respectful. But almost never knelt down in a full salute.

Renji knew no one had noticed because no one said anything. No one looked surprised when he and his captain met. No one ever mentioned how odd it was that Kuchiki-taichou didn’t seem to mind, when he was such a stickler for formality.

So Renji never had to decide whether or not to tell anyone that he thought Kuchiki-taichou knew the reason why he didn’t.

That he thought Kuchiki-taichou liked it.

Liked it that Renji wanted it to mean something.

Renji never bowed for the sake of formality. Only for rightness. Only when they were out on duty. Only when he chased something at Kuchiki-taichou’s side. When they hunted, it was right; his place was at his captain’s feet, waiting to be released.

Waiting for the light touch of fingers against his nape that made him bow his head and shiver, kneeling beside his captain. Waiting for his captain’s command.

Renji didn’t want to fritter this away in empty forms; this meant something.

Something he’d always kind of thought Kuchiki-taichou liked just as much as he did.

And now he had the proof of it. The proof of Kuchiki-taichou’s hands in his loose hair and Kuchiki-taichou’s cock sliding between his lips. The proof of Kuchiki-taichou’s hips flexing under his hands as he fucked Renji’s mouth slowly. The proof of Kuchiki-taichou’s faint smile at Renji’s moans and the heavy darkness of his eyes, looking down at Renji.

Renji spread his knees wider on the floor and Kuchiki-taichou stepped closer between them, thrusting deeper into Renji’s mouth, slow and deliberate. His hands in Renji’s hair held him still for it and Renji shuddered.

It meant something when he knelt for his captain.

 

End

If It’s One That You Can Keep

Seiichi tossed his head back under the spray of the shower and laughed softly just because he couldn’t help it.

He had won.

In spite of everything, and there had been a damn lot of everything, he had lived and recovered and won. He felt so light he might float if it weren’t for the weight of water on his skin. The sound of his team rummaging around and getting dressed beyond the tile wall was both immediate and distant, the way everything had been since the blinding moment he realized the last point was his.

He was glad for it when warm arms slid around him and pulled him back against a solid chest.

"You were incredible," Genichirou said against his shoulder, tongue stroking water drops off his skin.

Seiichi leaned his head back on Genichirou’s shoulder, smiling. "Mm, so were you, in case I hadn’t mentioned that yet." His laugh turned husky as Genichirou’s mouth slid up his neck. "So, was Tezuka good for you?"

Genichirou snorted at his teasing and Seiichi turned so he could pull Genichirou tight against him, pull him down for a hot kiss.

"Not as good as you," Genichirou murmured into his mouth, satisfaction heavy in his voice.

"Just the way it should be," Seiichi purred back. This might be the perfect ending for the day, pressed tight against each other, hands running over wet skin, feeling each other’s strength.

Perfection got better when Genichirou slid down his body to the floor and closed his mouth on Seiichi’s cock.

Seiichi leaned back against the cool tile, light-headed and breathless once again. "Oh. Yes." His fingers wove through Genichirou’s hair and he moaned low in his throat as wet heat stroked over him. "Genichirou."

Genichirou was going slow this afternoon, taking his time to be thorough. His tongue slid over and over Seiichi’s cock, slow and firm and Seiichi’s fingers flexed in his hair with every curl of hot pleasure. Seiichi watched Genichirou under his lashes, eyes following the breadth of his shoulders, wet and gleaming under the shower’s lights, the bend of his head as he ran his mouth down Seiichi’s cock. And Seiichi smiled as Genichirou’s hands slid up the back his thighs to curve around his ass, encouraging. He took the offer, letting his hips rock forward. Genichirou’s moan answered his as he thrust slowly in and out of Genichirou’s mouth.

"We did it." Seiichi tipped his head back against the wall, panting. "Our promise. We kept it."

Genichirou looked up at him, eyes dark, and a soft shudder ran through Seiichi. His hand slid around the back of Genichirou’s neck and he pushed into Genichirou’s mouth slow and deep. The low sound Genichirou made sent heat straight up his spine. When Genichirou’s hand ran down between his legs, closing on his own cock, the heat turned fierce and wild.

Seiichi moaned as pleasure wrung him out, letting his hips flex hard, eyes never leaving Genichirou’s as his cock slid between Genichirou’s lips in fast, short thrusts. When Genichirou’s eyes closed and his breath caught Seiichi smiled. They stilled slowly, touches lingering on each other.

Seiichi finally pulled Genichirou up against him and they stood under the spray of the shower, leaning together. After a moment, Seiichi sighed. "I’m not sure I believe it’s over."

"Nothing ever ends," Genichirou said, quietly, against his hair. "And nothing ever starts."

"Doesn’t it? Then we’ll go on," Seiichi answered, just as soft. "We’ll all go on."

He liked that thought.

They stood close until Renji tapped on the shower wall and Akaya called cheekily that the team would leave without them. Seiichi laughed.

"Let’s go."

 

End

Taste Your Salt Water Kisses

One: Soubi

"You can’t just move in!"

"Why not?"

"Well…" Ritsuka’s ears saddled. "I mean… It’s not the kind of thing…"

"Ritsuka." Soubi touched his cheek, eyes dark. "I can’t just leave you here unprotected. I can’t. Don’t ask me to, please." He was perfectly willing to beg for this, except that didn’t always work with Ritsuka. A tiny part of him didn’t think that was fair.

Ritsuka was frowning and chewing on his lip. "But… it might just upset Kaa-san more. And," he folded his arms tightly, "the only other bedroom used to be Seimei’s." He looked up, straight into Soubi’s eyes. "I don’t want to put you there."

The sweetness of his Sacrifice’s care for him stopped Soubi’s voice for a long moment.

"You’re both idiots," Kio put in from where he was rummaging in Soubi’s fridge. Ritsuka glowered and Kio grinned. "Who says a room has to be a bedroom? Go on a cleaning spree or something, move everything around. Make the old bedroom a closet or something."

"Oh." Ritsuka looked thoughtful. "Hm."

There were times Soubi was tempted to feed Kio his own paints, but he was useful every now and then.

Ritsuka was looking around Soubi’s apartment with a more measuring eye now. Finally he turned back to Soubi and wound his fingers in the bottom of Soubi’s shirt. "Okay, look. Let me pick the time, all right? I want to ask Kaa-san when she’s in," he paused and Soubi mentally inserted a sane phase, "a good mood."

"As you wish," Soubi said, voice low. He could only hope Ritsuka wouldn’t wait too long.

Two: Ritsuka

Ritsuka put his hands on his hips and looked around, pleased.

They hadn’t actually done anything with Seimei’s room; he’d known Kaa-san wouldn’t agree to that. But they had moved other things, and now the long upstairs room that had held some of Tou-san’s old stuff was cleaned out and turned into Soubi’s room and studio in one. Soubi was fingering the pale curtains Ritsuka had dug out of the bottom of Kaa-san’s old sewing basket and smiling.

"Perhaps you should think of a career as an interior decorator." He looked over his shoulder at Ritsuka, a faint teasing light in his eyes.

Ritsuka flicked his ears back but didn’t glare too hard. He was just happy that Soubi wasn’t as tense as he had been lately. He didn’t like the idea of a tense Soubi around his mother.

Soubi crossed the room in two long strides and caught Ritsuka’s face, delicately, in his hands. "Thank you, Ritsuka," he whispered.

Breathless, Ritsuka leaned into him. A little voice in the back of his head noted he was getting awfully used to doing that. "What for?"

Soubi smiled, dry and sweet. "For indulging your Fighter."

Ritsuka snorted a little. "Right. Come on, let’s go down to dinner." He tugged Soubi out of the room and down the stairs.

Dinner was… odd. He was pretty sure Soubi hadn’t had a chance to speak to Kaa-san when Ritsuka wasn’t there, and the only thing Soubi had said to her when Ritsuka was there was I am here to protect Ritsuka. He’d kind of expected Kaa-san to try to send him away, at that, the way she had Hawatari and Shinonome-sensei. But here she was, serving Soubi seconds and smiling. It was fragile, under bruised looking eyes, but she was smiling.

He wished he could believe it would last.

While it did last, though, he would enjoy it. "It’s really good fish, Kaa-san. Can I have some more?"

"Of course." She busied herself getting him another portion and some more pickled vegetables to go with it. "It’s good for you, Ritsuka. Eat as much as you like."

For this moment, with dishes clattering in the warm evening and three people around the table, he could believe everything would be all right, and, while his mother was turned away, he smiled softly up at Soubi.

Soubi’s rare open smile answered him.

Three: Ritsuka

Ritsuka flinched as a glass shattered against the wall over his head.

"You care more about some stray than your own mother?! Fine! Then get out, both of you get out!"

"Kaa-san…" Ritsuka reached out a hand only to jerk back as a plate followed the glass, and then Soubi was there, hand wrapped around Kaa-san’s wrist. His eyes were cold.

"That will be enough."

It scared Ritsuka a little to see Soubi look like that and he reached out again, pleading. "Soubi…"

Soubi’s eyes met Ritsuka’s, and his mouth tightened, but he finally bowed his head. When he spoke again his voice was quieter. "Come, Aoyagi-san. It’s time to sleep for a while."

Kaa-san was crying now, but she went along easily as Soubi led her away. Ritsuka just slid down the wall to the floor and rested his forehead on his knees. He was shaking a little. Not because of the sudden violence. Because of the sudden stop.

Because, deep down, he hadn’t really thought anyone but Seimei could stop Kaa-san when she got like this.

But there were no more screams or crashes. Just the faint murmur of voices and the click of a door being shut.

It really was just him that was the problem.

"Ritsuka." Soubi’s arms were around him and Ritsuka turned his face into Soubi’s chest, tired and hopeless. "Ritsuka, please." Soubi’s whisper was urgent. "Please, let me take you out of here."

Ritsuka laughed, one harsh breath. "Maybe I should. Maybe it really would make her better if I left."

Soubi’s arms tightened. "Ritsuka."

They were both silent for a while. Finally Soubi gathered Ritsuka up in his arms and stood. Ritsuka stirred. "I should clean up the pieces."

"I’ll do it tomorrow morning," Soubi stated, not pausing as he carried Ritsuka up the stairs.

Ritsuka let Soubi undress him and tuck him under the blankets and, when Soubi hesitated, sitting on the side of his bed, reached up silently to pull him down. Soubi promptly slipped under the covers and cradled Ritsuka close, stroking long fingers through his hair, hesitant and tender.

Finally Ritsuka managed to say, softly, "I am glad you’re here."

He could feel Soubi relax as he cuddled Ritsuka closer.

Four: Soubi

Soubi stood in the kitchen doorway, arms folded, watching Ritsuka’s mother. She started when he finally spoke.

"Do you understand what you’re doing to your son?"

She turned wide, dark eyes on him. "I.. I love Ritsuka. He’s all I have left."

"You’re hurting him," Soubi said flatly.

She folded her hands in front of her mouth, staring at him, silent and trembling. Soubi’s thin patience snapped.

"You are going to stop, Aoyagi-san, because you are going to go see that psychologist of his if I have to drag you, and you are going to talk to the woman if I have to force you." He stalked forward as he spoke to stand over her, perfectly willing to intimidate the woman into cooperating or drag her down the street, screaming, if that was what it took.

He stopped short in surprise when she smiled.

"Yes."

Soubi blinked.

"Take me." She held out one wrist as if offering to be dragged and strangeness wrapped around him for a moment, like deja vu turned inside out.

Maybe her smile just reminded him of Seimei’s. It was probably only that.

Taking no chances, he took her arm and led her to the door. She went easily, put on her coat when he handed it to her, didn’t rage or even protest.

But when he wasn’t directing her she didn’t move at all.

She gave the clinic receptionist all her information and agreed that she wanted to see the psychologist. She smiled. She cooperated. But when the doctor held open the office door for her she didn’t walk through it until Soubi grabbed her arm again and took her in.

He ignored the doctor’s raised brows and leaned in a corner, out of the way, with his arms crossed and tried to stifle that queasy feeling of recognition.

Whenever the woman hesitated in answering one of the doctor’s questions she looked at him. And then she answered, as if he had… Soubi stifled that thought and kept on trying not to really listen.

"Seimei isn’t here to make me stop anymore, you see."

Not succeeding very well, but trying.

He wasn’t surprised, when the doctor finally asked what Aoyagi was doing to Ritsuka and Aoyagi slowly turned to look at him, silent, eyes wide and waiting. Soubi swallowed behind clenched teeth and managed to grate out, "Tell her."

The woman obeyed immediately, and the doctor only had a moment to look at him with sharp eyes before she had to pull her professional mask back on. Soubi ignored them both. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t ever want to do this. He didn’t want to be the one who gave orders. For him to be the one in Seimei’s place…

He wondered, distantly, whether Seimei really was god, after all. The universe certainly seemed to have his vicious sense of humor.

By the time the first session was over he was shaking a little and the doctor stopped him on the way out to ask softly whether he was all right.

"I’ll be fine once I get back to Ritsuka," he answered, unstrung enough to give her the truth. He’d be fine once he had his Sacrifice to obey and the world was right side up again. He started a bit as the doctor’s eyes flashed.

"You can’t put all of this on a thirteen-year-old boy," she told him sharply. "If both you and his mother are doing that, then you’ll just both have to stop."

Soubi stood as if turned to stone for a long moment before his head bent and his fists clenched under the weight of those words. "I… understand what you say," he managed at last.

The doctor sighed and patted his shoulder more kindly. "Well. I imagine I’ll see you next time, too, then."

Soubi took Ritsuka’s mother home and went up to his studio and sat, staring at a blank canvas, for a very long time.

Five: Ritsuka

What used to scare Ritsuka was the anger on Soubi’s face when he stopped Kaa-san in one of her rages. Now there was something else there, and he didn’t know what and that scared him even more. Soubi still looked grim, those times, but his eyes creased like he was hurt, too.

And it wasn’t always rages Kaa-san had, now. Ritsuka was happy, glad that he could finally help Kaa-san, at least those times when she just put her head down on the table and cried. But that didn’t stop him getting worried.

Finally he cornered Soubi in his bedroom one evening, while he was drying off some brushes. "Soubi. Will you tell me what’s wrong?"

Soubi’s long hands hesitated. "I… don’t want to burden you," he said quietly, without turning around.

Ritsuka scowled. "Don’t be dumb." He came and wound his arms around Soubi’s waist firmly. "We’re a pair, right? Closer than anything else." He rested his cheek on Soubi’s chest. "Just tell me."

Soubi’s fingers settled softly on his hair. "Your mother," he said, after a long, silent moment. "I see Ritsu-sensei in her. Even Seimei in her. Yet, I see myself in her as well. And so I see them in myself, and I…" A shudder ran through Soubi. "I don’t know… what to do now."

Ritsuka wasn’t sure he understood, but… Seimei had protected him, and now Soubi protected him. Every now and then, Kaa-san’s eyes reminded him of Seimei’s. He could see that much. Maybe there were just too many reminders of other people, for Soubi. Slowly he asked, "Can you just be Soubi?"

Soubi stilled. Finally he leaned down to press his lips against Ritsuka’s hair. "Who do you want Soubi to be?" he asked, very softly.

"No, I mean…" Ritsuka looked up at Soubi, confused. "I mean, can you just be you?" He laid his hand on Soubi’s chest, over his heart. "Be whoever Soubi really is?" He glanced aside, tail curling shyly. "I’d… I’d like that."

He worried some more when Soubi sank down to his knees, but relaxed again when Soubi caught his hand and kissed the palm. Soubi was all right when he did that. Soubi’s eyes were dark when he raised his head, but his mouth twitched like he was about to laugh.

"I’ll try."

Hesitantly, because he really didn’t get Soubi sometimes, Ritsuka leaned into him and put his arms around Soubi’s neck. "I’d just like it if you were happy."

The laugh that escaped against his ear was soft and shaky and true.

"I’ll try that, too, then."

 

End

Ride Your Wild Horses

One: Ritsuka

"Just listen," Ritsuka said softly and pressed the replay button on the answering machine.

Ritsuka? Ritsuka, it’s me; Seimei.

The voice was gentle and cheerful and made Ritsuka’s guts twist. He wanted the days back when his memories were clean, before he had to remember his brother’s cold, crazy eyes matched to this soft voice.

Ritsuka, do you really not forgive me? Can you really not love me? Well, either way. I want you to come to me, Ritsuka. Come to me at Seven Moons.

A click ended the call and Ritsuka hit erase, hard.

"Will you go?" Soubi asked softly.

Ritsuka turned and leaned against the wall, head bent over his crossed arms. "Yeah." He had to try at least once more, to get his brother back.

To hope there was a brother to be gotten back.

One way or another, he had to be sure.

"Very well." Soubi’s hands clenched for a moment and Ritsuka frowned.

"Maybe you shouldn’t come." He looked up just in time to see the tension in Soubi’s face wipe away to bleakness.

"Of course not," Soubi stated, quiet and flat. "I betrayed you. You can’t trust me."

Ritsuka grabbed Soubi’s sleeve. "That wasn’t what I meant!" This didn’t make a dent in Soubi’s expression and Ritsuka nearly stamped his foot in frustration. "Soubi!" He pulled on Soubi’s sleeve until the man at least looked at him. "Seimei scares you," he said softly.

Soubi dropped to his knees and caught Ritsuka’s hand, bowing his head over it. "You are my master. I need to protect you. But I can’t disobey Seimei!" His voice was harsh and drawn. "I can’t even beg your forgiveness for that."

Ritsuka frowned, worried, and wound his arms around Soubi’s shoulders; Seimei really brought out the worst of this in Soubi, and any way he turned that thought he hated it. "Don’t be an idiot. If there’s nothing you can do about it, it isn’t your fault." Soubi said nothing and Ritsuka chewed his lip for a moment. Finally he ventured, "Do you want to try? To do something about it?"

"I can’t really imagine that." Soubi looked up and there were tight lines around his eyes, but the look in them was open and pleading. "But I don’t want to leave you."

Ritsuka nodded slowly and wound his arms tighter around Soubi’s neck, burying his face in Soubi’s shoulder. "You come too, then," he whispered.

Two: Soubi

Soubi didn’t want to leave Ritsuka, but, looking into the unforgiving chill of Seimei’s eyes, he was afraid he was about to.

"I killed the Loveless Fighter." Seimei smiled, bright and careless, and Soubi swallowed hard past familiarity. "What makes you think you’re different?" His smile turned hard. "Destroy yourself. And then Ritsuka will be all mine again."

Ritsuka’s voice broke as he yelled, "Stop!"

Soubi looked over at Ritsuka through the floating after-shreds of battle spells, shivering. "Ritsuka. I’m sorry…" At least he wouldn’t take Ritsuka with him—in the end his unbound nature was a mercy after all. He’d barely cleared his throat to do as Seimei ordered, though, when Ritsuka caught his wrists, staring up at him.

"No." His hands tightened.

The necessity of following Seimei’s order shook Soubi’s whole body, now, and he stumbled down to the floor in Ritsuka’s insistent grip. "I’m sorry," he repeated hoarsely. "I can’t—"

Ritsuka’s fingers touched his lips and Soubi started.

"I know."

Soubi stared at Ritsuka, wonder distracting him for a moment. Ritsuka had a tiny smile on his face and his ears were pitched ruefully. He watched Soubi with grave eyes, child’s eyes, heart-hurtingly clear. In that clarity, will flashed like links of a steel chain—will and determination.

"I didn’t understand," Ritsuka told him simply. "You surprised me. I didn’t understand any of this." His wave took in the building around them and the pair behind him. "But I think… I think maybe I do now." Ritsuka bit his lip and his voice turned small. "It scares me. But…"

Ritsuka flung his arms around Soubi’s neck and Soubi could feel him trembling.

"I understand, now. So. Your name… is Loveless." Ritsuka’s voice rang in Soubi’s head like a bell as he repeated, "Your name is Loveless."

Soubi felt the connection, a piercing shock through his solar plexus, or his heart, or his soul, whatever it truly was that anchored a bond, and he cried out, clutching Ritsuka against him, eyes wide and blind. Ritsuka held on just as tight, half laughing and half crying against Soubi’s neck.

"I am your Sacrifice. You are my Fighter," Ritsuka whispered. And even softer, "I love you."

"Yes." Soubi bowed his head to Ritsuka’s shoulder, breathless with passion and dazed with shock. "Yes, Ritsuka, I swear. I belong to you, body and heart and soul." He felt dizzy with how good it was to belong completely again. And then he twitched at the lazy lash of Seimei’s voice.

"He’s still mine first, though. And I gave you an order, Soubi."

"No." Ritsuka drew in a long breath and straightened, ignoring the two at his back, taking Soubi’s face in his hands. His chin firmed stubbornly and Soubi thought he might cheerfully drown in the fierceness of Ritsuka’s eyes. "Soubi, I order you. You will not obey Seimei."

Soubi jerked, locked suddenly between two orders neither of which he could disobey. His voice turned thready. "Ritsuka…" Compulsion and the fresh bond pulled at him, opposing, and he panted, trying to catch his breath, fighting to submit to Ritsuka’s will and only Ritsuka’s will. "I… I will… not… obey… S-Sei…"

Seimei laughed, bright and sharp, and Soubi flinched.

Ritsuka’s eyes blazed and he wrapped his arms around Soubi again, whispering in his ear. "This is my choice. And you are my Fighter. You and no one else."

As hard as the struggle had been to reach it, the change was just as simple as that. A Fighter must obey his Sacrifice without question or hesitation. That truth was engraved in Soubi deeper even than Seimei’s name.

And Ritsuka was now his Sacrifice.

Warmth flowed through Soubi, and he relaxed. Soft and serene, he answered, "I will not obey Seimei." He took one of Ritsuka’s hands in his and bowed his head to kiss the palm. "I am your Fighter. I obey only you." He rose and smiled down at Ritsuka. "Our name is Loveless."

Ritsuka smiled back, shaky. "All right, then." He turned, standing at Soubi’s side, and pointed at Beloved. His voice firmed, low with sadness and hard with determination. "Defeat them."

The bond wound around them both and Soubi clung to it, his shield against the frozen rage on Seimei’s face. "Yes, Ritsuka," he said, calmly, and raised his hand.

Three: Soubi

Kio looked up as Soubi stripped off his paint-spattered shirt and tossed it in the solvent-before-washing basket.

"You really did get rid of the bastard. Good."

Soubi stared over his shoulder, arrested. "What?" Kio wasn’t there, he couldn’t possibly know what had happened.

Kio snorted and nodded at Soubi’s neck. "Those cuts are finally scabbing over the way they should." He turned back to cleaning his brushes and sponges, scrubbing more viciously than even oils really warranted. "Makes me sick every time I think of what he must have been doing to keep them raw this long…"

Soubi didn’t bother correcting Kio; it would take far too much explaining. Instead he made for the mirror. They couldn’t really be…?

They were.

He stared, running his fingers over the knitting edges of the name. Even when Seimei had cut their bond, however he’d done that, these had stayed raw—one of the things that had made him truly wonder whether Seimei was still alive. But now…

Was it Ritsuka?

Warmth stole through his veins at the thought that Ritsuka held him tightly enough to make this happen, even if he didn’t see how it possibly could.

The teachers might be able to tell him, he supposed.

"Kio," he called, "I need to borrow your car again."

Four: Ritsuka

Ritsuka folded back his ears and hung onto his patience with both hands. He wanted to be sure Soubi was all right. And he wouldn’t kick an injured person in the shins.

Wouldn’t. Wouldn’t. Really wouldn’t….

"Hm." Ritsu-sensei ran his fingers over the old cuts on Soubi’s neck some more. "Well, I suppose we’ll see. I doubt it will ever actually heal. But for now, at least, you seem to have established a genuine bond with Ritsuka. It’s proper enough for him, at least, to take a blank Fighter, given the Loveless Fighter is dead." His hand rested on Soubi’s bare chest and Soubi twitched.

Ritsuka couldn’t take it any more. "Get away from Soubi," he snapped, glaring at Ritsu-sensei, tail lashing. He didn’t care if the man was blind, he was going to stop fingering Soubi right now!

Ritsu-sensei’s lips curled. "Quite a proper bond." He stepped back, feeling for his chair and lowering himself into it.

Ritsuka stomped forward and caught Soubi’s hand tight in his, not mollified. "And Soubi is the Loveless Fighter!" Soubi stepped closer to him and the singing line of their bond coiled around them both. Ritsuka switched his tail, vindicated.

Ritsu-sensei sniffed. "If you’d come and been taught when you should have, you’d know the difference—"

"Ritsu!" Nagisa-sensei broke in, staring at Ritsuka and Soubi. "They are!"

Ritsuka ignored them both, too busy noticing the warmth in his palm. Hesitantly, he unclasped Soubi’s hand and looked, eyes widening. Black letters faded up onto his skin. He looked over at Soubi, questioning, but Soubi was staring, transfixed at his own hand.

There were letters in his palm, too.

Nagisa-sensei seized their hands, examining them with growing disbelief, but Ritsuka was too busy looking up at Soubi to protest much. Soubi’s eyes were wide and shocked. "Does this mean…"

"It’s not possible," Nagisa-sensei interrupted again, letting them go and backing off. "Ritsu, they’re both Loveless! They both have the name on them!"

Ritsu-sensei seemed to be too stunned to say anything, which a corner of Ritsuka’s mind noted, rather nastily, was a nice change. Ritsuka reached out for Soubi’s hand again, pressing their palms together. Soubi’s eyes warmed, slow and wondering, looking down at Ritsuka for a long moment before looking up at the two teachers, cool again.

"Should it have been possible for Seimei to break his bond with me, once the name Beloved was written?" he asked, mildly. "He did, though."

"So much," Ritsuka put in, "for being taught properly." He tugged on Soubi’s hand. "Let’s go, okay?"

Soubi inclined his head, hiding a faint glint in his eye. "Whatever you wish." He held the door for Ritsuka without letting go of his hand and left the two adults still sputtering behind them.

Ritsuka drew a deep breath once they were out of the building. "I don’t think," he said firmly, "that I need to learn anything from them."

"I couldn’t agree more," Soubi murmured, thumb brushing Ritsuka’s wrist.

Ritsuka looked down at their joined hands and up at Soubi a bit shyly. "It’s… it’s where you kissed. When you agreed to be with me."

"That’s the strength of your heart and your will, Ritsuka," Soubi said softly. "To claim even me for your own, forever." He leaned down, fingers stroking the line of Ritsuka’s jaw, lifting his head, and kissed him gently. "I’m glad."

Ritsuka kissed back, light and soft, cheeks heating a bit. "Let’s go home," he murmured.

Five: Ritsuka

Ritsuka felt queasy. "Are you sure this will work?"

"Yes, I’m sure," Kio-san told him firmly. "Listen to the man with the body modifications." He paused to eye Soubi and added, "The healthy ones."

Soubi sniffed and leaned back in his chair to light a cigarette.

"You’re the one who wanted to know," Kio-san admonished. "So listen up. Keep picking off the scabs and cover the cuts with this," he tapped a bottle of greenish goo on the table. "It’ll take longer to heal, but it won’t scar."

Ritsuka swallowed hard and took a deep breath to settle his stomach. He was a little afraid of how Soubi might answer the next question, but the tiny smile on Soubi’s face when Kio-san mentioned not scarring made him ask it anyway. "Can I… Is there some way I can help?"

Soubi looked up to meet his eyes, faint smile softening. "You’ve already done it." He stood up and herded Kio-san out. "All right, I’ll do it. And be careful," he added as Kio-san raised a finger and opened his mouth. Closing the door behind his friend he came back to Ritsuka and bent to place a kiss in Ritsuka’s palm. "And I will belong only and completely to you."

That still made Ritsuka’s stomach flutter uncertainly, but Soubi was standing on his feet and his eyes were peaceful and that made Ritsuka happy. He turned his hand to curl around Soubi’s and smiled up at him.

"Okay."

 

End

Drown in your Blue Sea

Soubi was very confused. He had expected to be Sensei’s Fighter. What else had he been trained for?

This, apparently.

He listened as his Sacrifice spoke of butterflies, breath catching at the slow rip of the knife through his shirt. Reborn? Did his Sacrifice want him to become… something else?

He would do whatever his Sacrifice said, of course. That was the only way he could be a true Fighter. Sensei had taught him that. He figured it was even more important for a blank Fighter like him.

"Would you like it to hurt? Or would you rather it not hurt?"

Soubi groped for an answer. His Sacrifice’s eyes crinkled a bit, warmed.

"I think you would like it more if it hurt."

Was that what his Sacrifice wanted him to become? All right.

"Pain," Soubi murmured and tipped his head back for the point of Seimei’s knife to write his new name. "I want it to hurt. I like pain."

 

End

 

A/N: Raserei Hojo’s translation of this scene dialogue was used. Many thanks.

Sky in Shade

"What will you do after this?"

Kurogane glanced over as Fai settled on the balcony beside him, pale in the settling night. "I’ll return to my duties here, of course."

"Of course." Fai’s mouth curled but there was something darker at the back of his eyes.

Kurogane was silent for a long moment before finally sighing. He crossed his arms and leaned back against the door post, looking up at the dark sky. "If we can’t recover your magic, then I’ll still be your prey. Will you mind living here?" Given that Celes didn’t exist any more.

It looked like Fai was thinking the same thing.

"I suppose not. It will have to be somewhere." Fai looked around at the screened walls and swooping roofs as if seeing them for the first time. "It’s a lovely world," he said, quietly. Regathering himself he added, briskly, "Still, I expect not to trouble you with that."

Kurogane couldn’t help rolling his eyes. "What trouble?" he growled. "It was my own decision and it wasn’t like you asked for it." He looked aside for a moment. "It isn’t any kind of problem."

Fai eyed him with rare exasperation. "Kurogane, I’m drinking your blood."

"I noticed." Kurogane looked at Fai levelly. "And?"

Fai opened his mouth and closed it again with a sigh. "All right. Fine. I know I can’t out-stubborn you, by now."

Annoyed, Kurogane snorted. "The only time you haven’t, that I’ve noticed, you were dying. And I said it isn’t any kind of problem."

Fai’s mouth tightened. "I don’t like injuring you."

"It’s practically a scratch, it heals right away, it barely even hurts," Kurogane said flatly.

Fai blinked. "It… doesn’t?" His shoulders relaxed a shade.

"No, it doesn’t." Kurogane looked at Fai for a long, thoughtful moment before holding out his hand. "Come here. I’ll show you."

After a moment’s hesitation, Fai slid closer and wrapped his fingers gently around Kurogane’s wrist. Kurogane’s mouth twitched and he curved a hand around Fai’s waist, pulling him closer. "More than that, tonight. It’s about time you stopped worrying about doing this." He drew Fai against his shoulder and tipped his head back, watching Fai through his lashes.

He wasn’t surprised at all when Fai stiffened.

"Kurogane…" Fai’s hand braced against his chest, but Fai didn’t quite pull away and Kurogane snorted to himself. He’d figured Fai would be hungry by now.

"It doesn’t," he said distinctly, "hurt."

"But…" Fai’s breath was brushing his throat now, as he leaned in. "Are… are you sure about this?"

A chuckle rolled through Kurogane’s chest. "Yes, I’m sure." He lifted a hand, threading his fingers through the fineness of Fai’s hair, urging him closer.

Softly, hesitantly, Fai’s lips brushed his throat and parted. Fai’s tongue stroked his skin and Kurogane took a slow breath, waiting for what was next.

When Fai bit down it was too sharp to be pain, too hot to be pleasure, and a raw sound caught in Kurogane’s throat. Fai stilled against him and he whispered, "Don’t stop." Slowly Fai’s hands slipped over his shoulders and Fai sucked gently.

The slow movement of Fai’s mouth on his throat made him shudder and Kurogane gradually slid down until he was spread out on the floor, Fai stretched over him. He’d thought this offer would prove to Fai that it was all right, and maybe it had; Fai wasn’t pulling away. And right now neither could Kurogane.

He hadn’t expected it to be so intense. Hadn’t expected that baring his throat for Fai would fold him in the same ringing rightness he’d felt renewing his oath to Tomoyo. A corner of his mind wondered if that was wrong. He pledged everything he was to his master; a person couldn’t do that twice, could they? But Fai… Fai’s life depended on him even more surely than Tomoyo’s. He’d taken that on willingly.

Fai’s teeth grazed his throat again and the thoughts spun away. Kurogane’s body pulled taut, hands tightening on Fai’s back. "Nnn. Fai…"

Fai made an inquiring sound, distracted and lazy, and it came to Kurogane that Fai was taking longer to feed than he usually did. And that Fai was definitely more at ease than he had been, lying warm and relaxed over Kurogane’s chest.

He remembered the brief word Subaru had made time to have with him, in Tokyo.

"It depends on how much of our instinct he has when he recovers, but since you’re his only prey he may become…" Subaru’s mouth tilted wryly, "territorial. It, ah, affects some people. "

Kamui, had taken a moment from guarding Subaru’s back to glance at Kurogane and his nostrils had flared as if testing a scent. "I wouldn’t worry about it, if I was you," he’d stated.

Kurogane hadn’t pressed for more detail, but maybe he should have.

Or maybe he didn’t honestly need to.

He slid his hands down Fai’s back and Fai nearly purred. The sound went straight to Kurogane’s groin. "Fai…" he groaned softly.

Fai stretched out over him, tongue sliding against his neck, coaxing. Fai’s teeth closed again, delicately, not breaking skin this time but holding his throat firmly and Kurogane moaned, sliding a hand down his own body. He started when Fai’s fingers closed on his wrist in a steely grip. "Fai?"

Fai made another pleased sound and slid his own hand under Kurogane’s kimono and between his legs. Kurogane gasped as long fingers closed on his cock, stroking him slowly. Those twins had an interesting definition of "territorial", he thought distantly.

He couldn’t deny responding to it, though, and he spread his legs apart, hips rocking up into Fai’s hand, and stroked the slim, hard lines of Fai’s body. The confusion of sensations, the pleasure of Fai’s hand between his legs, the heat of Fai’s mouth on his throat, made him light-headed, but he certainly didn’t want it to stop.

Fai’s fingers tightened on his cock and the sound Fai made now was lower, husky. His mouth turned hard and demanding on Kurogane’s throat, and the pure shock of that made Kurogane cry out. Heat struck down his spine like lightning and he moaned as it spun out into slow washes of pleasure that wrung him out over and over. It took a long time for that heat to release him, under Fai’s hands and teeth.

He lay quietly as Fai lapped at his neck, running his hands slowly up and down Fai’s back until Fai stilled too. Finally he chuckled. "Told you it was all right, didn’t I?"

Fai stirred and murmured, "You did." He didn’t look up from where he lay against Kurogane’s shoulder and Kurogane lifted a brow.

"So?" He ran his fingers through Fai’s hair, gently.

"I… think I would like living here," Fai said, very softly. His hand stole up, fingers brushing lightly over the bite mark on Kurogane’s throat.

Kurogane’s breath shortened a little at the gesture and he smiled. "Good."

They lay together on the balcony, silent, watching the moon rise.

 

End

Directional Transformation

"You know," Ed said, thoughtfully, "I bet I could blackmail you with this."

Roy shifted against the bed as Ed’s metal fingers pressed deep into him. "But then we’d have to stop." He laughed, husky. "And you don’t want that any more than I do, right?" He moaned low in his throat as steel opened him up again, hard and cool, and he pushed his hips up and back.

"Oh, so you don’t enjoy it enough to keep doing it anyway?" Ed asked, elaborately innocent, and twisted his fingers deep in Roy’s ass.

"Ahh!" Roy pressed his forehead against the smooth sheets, panting with the rush of heat. "I would regret stopping a very great deal," he murmured, spreading his legs wider.

It was the truth. There was nothing quite as electrifying as the feeling of Ed’s steel fingers pushing into him, fucking him, sleek and hard and nothing like any other touch he’d ever felt.

"Hmmm. Well, that’s nice to hear anyway." Ed’s tone was edging back toward the thoughtful again and his other hand was wandering over the curve of Roy’s ass, stroking behind his balls. Roy grinned, wryly. He’d probably taught Ed how to tease and provoke a little too well for his own good. He answered silkily, breath hitching as Ed’s fingers shifted inside him.

"I should—nnnn—hope so…"

There was a small pat of sound and Roy’s eyes widened as a ferocious tingle rushed down Ed’s fingers and into him, and those fingers shifted.

"Ed!" Roy clutched the bed, panting, as the touch inside him turned smoother, longer, bigger.

Much bigger.

"Ed…" Roy groaned, sprawled limply over the sheets, unable to focus on anything but the feeling of Ed’s hand in his ass—only not quite a hand anymore.

"So?" There was a wicked laugh in Ed’s voice. "What do you think about stopping now?" He drew back the slick, hard shaft and thrust it back into Roy and Roy moaned helplessly. It felt incredible.

"Please don’t stop," he managed, rather hoarse.

"Mm, I won’t then." Ed’s weight shifted on the bed as he settled behind Roy, and Roy breathed a faint sigh of relief that Ed wasn’t going to tease him with this.

Instead Ed fucked him, slow and hard and steady, and Roy lost his breath on a moan with every stroke. The hardness of steel inside him, absolutely unyielding, had always been a strange kind of touchstone—a sort of integrity in bed if nowhere else. Now what he could only think of as a steel cock was filling him, stretching him, working his ass until he was gasping.

And then Ed leaned down and whispered in his ear. "Maybe we should do this in your office sometime. Over your desk. Would you still not want me to stop?"

Roy’s imagination filled in the picture handily—his staff turning to look at the door as his moans echoed through it. Maybe even coming to check what was going on and seeing him lying over his desk with his uniform disarrayed and Ed’s steel pumping deep into his ass. A rough, breathless sound tore out of his throat as pleasure spiked through him and his body wrung itself out around the hard metal inside him.

It took him a while to catch his breath, especially since Ed left his hand inside Roy. When he did, he turned his head to trade a dry look for Ed’s triumphant smirk. "You’ve gotten much too observant."

Ed snorted. "Not like that was a hard one." He leaned into Roy, pressing his mouth to the curve of Roy’s shoulder. "You spend so much time in control. Making sure things work out." He released the transmutation and the jolt of receding energy made Roy gasp. "I know I get tired of doing that, anyway."

Roy smiled lazily and turned, gather Ed closer. "Once I’m recovered from your experiment we’ll have to see what I can do about that, then."

Ed suffered himself to be held. "Still think you’re weird."

"No weirder than someone with a taste for, say, being tied down until he can’t move," Roy murmured.

Ed turned very red.

Roy buried a grin in Ed’s hair, fingers stroking through it. "As soon as I’m recovered a bit," he promised.

 

End

Walk Straight Down the Middle

Touda was the one who did the things others couldn’t or wouldn’t do. So on the nights when Tsuzuki felt like the air was too heavy on his shoulders and the dark edges of his own magic dragged over his soul, it was Touda he went to.

Touda could make the world go away for a while.

It was never something Tsuzuki asked for, but when he showed up and sat down silently on the side of Touda’s bed Touda always obliged. Tsuzuki would have worried about that, after, if it weren’t for the faint smile on Touda’s lips those nights.

These nights.

By now just the feel of thick silk rope sliding around his wrists, pulling them together over his head, around his thighs, spreading them wide open, was enough to make him start forgetting everything else. Enough to make him hard, too. He moaned a little, face down on Touda’s wide, firm bed, as a last tug on the ropes bound him in place. Touda’s large hand slid up his thigh to grip his rear and Tsuzuki jerked, or tried to, and moaned for real when he couldn’t. He couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything.

Knowing that made him harder.

Touda made a soft, approving sound, rubbing his thumb over Tsuzuki’s entrance. He pressed harder when Tsuzuki tried to squirm. Tsuzuki imagined what Touda looked like behind him, big and muscular and naked, one hand working calmly at Tsuzuki’s upturned ass as Touda watched him.

He could feel Touda’s eyes on him.

Tsuzuki made a pleading sound, face pressed into the sheets, at the press of Touda’s head nudging between his cheeks. This was what made the rest of the world go away, and the sound he made as Touda started pushing into him was hoarse and wordless. Touda’s cock was hard and huge, stretching him so wide he could only gasp, sliding into him endlessly. And then sliding out just as endlessly.

"Touda! Touda, please…!"

Touda didn’t answer, but his smile hung in the air. And Touda kept thrusting into him, slow and merciless, no matter how Tsuzuki begged for more, harder, please. This was the feeling Tsuzuki loved, as much as the ropes holding him spread out, as much as the thick hardness of Touda’s cock pushing deep into his body. He loved that Touda would ignore Tsuzuki’s power, the fact that Tsuzuki was his master, and just keep opening Tsuzuki’s ass slowly, relentlessly, until Tsuzuki was gasping and sobbing for breath. His whole body shuddered with pleasure.

There was nothing but this moment.

Tsuzuki was too incoherent to do anything but scream when he finally came. Touda’s hands closed tight on his thighs and Touda’s cock shoved deep into his ass, holding him open with short, hard thrusts as his body tried to wring tight. Tsuzuki loved it. He whimpered and moaned, hoarse and breathless, as Touda’s strokes turned long and fast, fucking the tightness of Tsuzuki’s body hard and ruthless, taking his own pleasure. The last thrust was so hard Tsuzuki could almost taste it. The feeling lingered in his body even when Touda pulled back. And Tsuzuki couldn’t do anything about any of it.

It was perfect.

Tsuzuki tensed a little as Touda released the ropes, but Touda caught both Tsuzuki’s wrists easily behind his back and drew him close.

"Sleep, Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki rested gratefully against Touda’s chest, trapped in his grip, relaxing again. The world wouldn’t come back quite yet.

"Yes, Touda."

Touda would hold him back from the world a little longer.

 

End

Scattered Beans, Year Passing

Touda walked the halls of Tenkou wearing only his leather leggings and armlets, the long fall of his hair, and a collar and pair of stiff cuffs buckled snugly around each wrist.

He knew there was no shame in what he did, and he felt none, but he still found himself glad that the palace was still and silent around him, everyone sleeping or preparing for sleep. He did not wish to have any interruptions. When he reached Tsuzuki’s door he slid it open and stepped inside quietly. As he had hoped, and rather expected, Tsuzuki was still awake, standing at the window. As he turned, in the moment before a welcoming smile covered it, Tsuzuki’s face was distant and a little sad.

Touda was privately pleased to see both the distance and the painted smile vanish when Tsuzuki saw him.

"Tou… da… ?" Tsuzuki’s eyes were wide and startled in the dusk and Touda’s mouth quirked for one moment.

He composed himself, though, and stepped forward until he could sink down to his knees at Tsuzuki’s feet, head bowed, hair coiling silkily on the floor around him. "You called me to come forth. I have come."

"Oh." It was barely a whisper, but Touda thought he could hear understanding in it, the echo of many years ago. Good. He was not surprised to feel Tsuzuki’s hands come to rest, light, on his bare shoulders.

"I meant to free you." These words were stronger, and softer, and Touda looked up at last, meeting Tsuzuki’s shadowed, twilight eyes.

"You did." He said only that, and waited.

Tsuzuki’s teeth closed on his lip, and he sank down himself until he could wrap his arms around Touda. "Oh, Touda."

Touda supposed he might as well be resigned to it, that Tsuzuki touched so much. If he were honest, it was something he had rather counted on, coming here tonight, and he let his hands curve around Tsuzuki’s back in return. "Do you want me?" he murmured.

"I… Touda…" The answer was yes, Touda could tell by the way Tsuzuki’s fingers stole up to stroke through the wild fall of his hair before being snatched back.

Touda bent his head again. "Then take me."

Tsuzuki stilled. "Touda. Are you sure this is what you want?"

Touda snorted against the curve of Tsuzuki’s shoulder; he couldn’t help it. "Tsuzuki, don’t you know how you really captured each of the others?" Exasperation wasn’t the most appropriate tone for this moment, but this was Tsuzuki, after all. It was likely inevitable. More formally, he repeated, "Take me."

After a long moment Tsuzuki whispered, "All right." His hands found Touda’s wrists and undid the cuffs, slid gently down Touda’s throat and undid the collar, throwing them aside.

Touda closed his eyes and stifled a shiver as he finally felt it. Tsuzuki wasn’t a kami; he had no river of dark, shining hair to show his power, to warn all who saw him of his might. But Touda could feel it nevertheless, flowing around him, the power to match Tsuzuki’s beauty, fit to captivate any kami alive.

He let Tsuzuki lead him to the bed and knelt there, spreading his knees wide, bending down; a thrill of heat slid through him as he remembered lying just like this at Tsuzuki’s feet, stunned, in the moment Tsuzuki had broken his chains. His lips curved, softly, hidden by the fall of his hair, remembering the kindness of Tsuzuki’s smile.

And then his breath caught as Tsuzuki’s hands touched him, bringing then into now. He shivered as those hands moved over his bare skin, stroking his arched back, caressing his raised rear. This was why he had come, to surrender himself, to take a master of his own will and no other, and he moaned, faint and husky, as Tsuzuki’s fingers opened him, setting things right at last.

"Touda." Tsuzuki’s voice was as gentle as his hands, and the contrast to the power that couldn’t help dancing around Tsuzuki’s every touch stole Touda’s breath. "I do want you," Tsuzuki told him, and heat ran through Touda, exultation that the poison between he and his master was purged after all. He moaned, clutching at the sheets, as Tsuzuki pushed into him, slow and hard.

Pleasure and triumph twined together. Triumph that he was the one to be mastered this way, the one, out of all the bound kami who yearned for it, that Tsuzuki gave this surety to. Pleasure at the power that penetrated him far more thoroughly and mercilessly than the slow, gentle strokes of Tsuzuki’s body inside his, pleasure that he surrendered himself only to one worthy of his pride.

"Tsuzuki," he panted, slowly losing his composure under Tsuzuki’s easy thrusts and wild, dark power. He could feel his own magic rising, answering Tsuzuki’s, and cried out as that shadowy, flickering strength locked down on him like a fist. Pleasure pierced through him, fierce and intense, and he finally, finally yielded to it completely, moaning as heat wrung him until he couldn’t see or think or breathe.

He lay sprawled over the bed, shaking as the heat settled, and gradually became aware of Tsuzuki’s hands stroking over his body, tugging off his leggings and armlets, smoothing his hair, warm and soothing. A faint chuckle escaped him; Tsuzuki was incurably caring.

"I remember," Tsuzuki said, quietly. "I remember how you looked at me, when I came to let you out. How amazed you seemed. How soft your eyes were. That was what I hated most about that visor, before I found out what it really was; that I couldn’t see your eyes any more."

Touda was rather glad his face was still hidden in the angle of his arm. "That was a moment of weakness."

"Was it?" He could hear the smile in Tsuzuki’s voice.

Touda hesitated for a long moment, but his reasons to hold back were gone, weren’t they? Perhaps the other eleven still didn’t deserve his honesty, but Tsuzuki had come for him, called him, given him the raw, naked truth he needed after the Yellow Emperor’s lies and schemes. "It isn’t only your power that masters me," he admitted at last.

He felt Tsuzuki’s lips brush the back of his neck and couldn’t help another shiver. "I’m glad you’re mine," Tsuzuki whispered. "Touda. Thank you."

Touda took a breath for steadiness and turned over, looking up at Tsuzuki without shield or mask, surrendering this, too. Tsuzuki smiled down at him, soft and brilliant, hands closing around Touda’s face, and Touda breathed out again. He felt clumsy and uncertain, trying to answer his master’s open heart; it was a relief to get it right. He had to close his eyes, though, when Tsuzuki leaned down to kiss him, sweet and tender.

This, he would admit to himself, was what mastered him, as much as Tsuzuki’s world-shaking strength—Tsuzuki’s gentleness, the compassion that had saved him twice over. A tiny voice deep inside him whispered that this might have conquered him even without that strength.

So he didn’t protest when Tsuzuki settled against him, arms wrapped around him, fingers twining delicately into the flow of his hair, clearly not letting go any time soon. Instead he rested one hand, lightly, at the small of Tsuzuki’s back and lay quietly as the moon set outside the window and Tsuzuki drifted into sleep.

 

End

Lignin


Seed (Attraction)

Seiichi ran his eye over Rikkai Dai middle school’s tennis courts, judging them. The other first years clustered together, most chattering and excited. The knots of older members were more aloof, a few of them already rallying on the far courts. He noted the calm ones, the ones who knew enough to watch quietly, and his lips quirked at the few senpai who knew enough to watch him.

Ah. There.

He moved over to the wall and let his bag drop beside another’s. "Sanada. It’s good to see you here."

"Yukimura." Sanada nodded a greeting, turning from his own contemplation of their new club to focus on Seiichi. "You chose Rikkai also, then."

"It’s the best." And that was all that really needed saying. Seiichi nodded toward the rest of the club. "What do you think?"

Sanada crossed his arms, gazing across the courts again. "I’m glad you’re here."

Seiichi threw back his head, laughing. "Yes. They’re good, but we’re better." He tipped his head, glancing sidelong at Sanada. "Shall we warm up?" And perhaps show the club who they were and save having to argue about it.

The gleam in Sanada’s eyes answered him. "Yes."

Seiichi ignored the muttering as they took a court. He knew it would stop soon enough. Right now, he had one of his two best opponents from the entire Elementary circuit across the net from him and nothing mattered but the brilliance of the game.

When it ended, and they came to the net to clasp hands in the middle of the silent courts, they held on for a moment longer than usual. Satisfaction melted into agreement where their hands and eyes met, and Seiichi showed his teeth for a moment before they turned to face the club captain.

He and Sanada together would make this team something that had never been seen before.

 

Sprout (Romance)

Seiichi liked watching Sanada play, especially in tournament matches. The way he drove his opponents was artistry.

"You can’t win with your strength!"

The next ball tore past the opponent’s racquet, inches beyond the other boy’s flustered reach.

Seiichi leaned on the rail next to Renji, smiling, eyes fixed on the proud straightness of Sanada’s back. "Sanada’s confidence makes such a strong weapon."

Renji’s mouth curled. "Intimidation is most frightening when it’s only the truth."

Seiichi laughed, stretching upright slowly, careless and relaxed. "It is, isn’t it?"

Renji’s eyes slid past his shoulder, measuring the reaction of the Shitenhouji players. "Not to mention it’s a weapon you and Genichirou both enjoy using."

"As if you have any room to talk." Seiichi met Renji’s eyes for a moment, dark and pleased.

"Well, perhaps," Renji allowed with a tiny smile.

Seiichi turned back to the court to see Sanada’s last play, taking in the way he set himself, the clarity of his voice as he called the shot, the fierce focus in his eyes as he hit it. A frisson danced down Seiichi’s spine at the beauty of that drive, pure and untouchable.

"Game and set!"

Seiichi drew in a slow breath, savoring the taste of their victory; he could already feel the weight of it in his chest, though there was still his match to go before the rest of the world knew it.

Sanada strode off the court and nodded to their captain before his eyes turned to Seiichi, questioning, challenging. Seiichi paused beside him, racquet in hand, and murmured, "You should be harder with them next time. Shall I show you?"

Sanada’s even expression didn’t flicker but the ferocity flared again in his eyes. "If you can."

Seiichi stepped out onto the court, head high, thrill singing in his blood, and prepared to do so.

 

Root (Intimacy)

Seiichi waved good night as Renji turned off onto his street. "So," he said, as he and Sanada continued on, "the club is ours now."

"Mm." Sanada glanced at him. "Are you going to bring in Kirihara?"

"Oh yes." Seiichi eyed his friend back, curiously, though. "You’re that sure it will be me?" He had expected Sanada to hold out to the last.

Sanada was silent for a moment. "You will make a good captain for Rikkai."

Seiichi breathed out, slowly, and rested a hand on Sanada’s arm. "Thank you." Sanada’s fighting spirit commanded his respect the way few things did. Sanada’s support would be priceless.

Sanada smiled a little and repeated, quieter. "You will be a good captain." His words said that only practicality made him accept it, but his tone said something more.

They were at Seiichi’s turning and he let his fingers slide down Genichirou’s arm as he stepped away. "I’ll see you tomorrow, then."

"And we’ll start making our third National win," Sanada agreed, nodding goodby.

When Seiichi looked back, halfway down his street, Genichirou was still standing at the turn, watching him.

 

Leaf (Passion)

Seiichi stood in the door of Sanada’s practice room, looking out into the summer dark, listening to the snick and rustle behind him as Sanada put away his sword and started gathering up the dismemberd straw bundles. "You know we won’t be able to play like that tomorrow," he said quietly.

There was silence behind him.

"Power is only a part of strength." Seiichi’s voice sharpened. "You will not lose sight of that, Sanada."

"Not with you to remind me, I suppose."

Seiichi’s mouth tightened with some exasperation as Sanada came to stand in the door beside him. "Stubborn."

Sanada chuckled, leaning against the frame. "Of course."

A corner of Seiichi’s mouth twitched up; of course Sanada would take it as a compliment. "We will win," he stated, soft and dangerous.

Sanada’s eyes glinted in the low lights as he turned to look at Seiichi. "Yes." The heavy, dark heat of the night curled around them. "We will."

Seiichi relaxed, letting go some of the fierce control that had kept him standing upright these weeks of retraining and planning. Sanada agreed with him; he didn’t have to force this part to happen.

Sanada’s mouth curled in answer. "Of course we’ll win," he said quietly, words floating on the darkness. "It’s what we are."

Seiichi felt the words catch fire inside him, the fire they shared to forge the team they had. The victories they had. It had always called to him. He tipped his head, considering the winter and the summer and the matches they would play tomorrow, and slowly reached out to close his fingers in Sanada’s kendo gi.

Sanada laughed and stepped forward to meet him. They kissed in the doorway, mouths open against each other. Seiichi ran his fingers into Sanada’s hair, eyes sliding half closed at the tightness of Sanada’s hands on his hips, and growled low in his throat. Tomorrow he would have to be controlled, remember their strategies, not be swept away in the heat of the match.

Tonight, though, he could forget all of that and drink the fire down straight.

He pushed Sanada back against the door frame and they laughed, hot and husky as the night air around them.

 

Flower (Committment)

"So, what now?"

"Now?" Seiichi leaned back on his hands, watching the setting sun glimmer on the pool in his back yard and gild the long, slim leaves of the irises. He felt a bit like those plants, relaxing from the heat and busyness of summer into the cooler flowering of fall. "Now I suppose we take our exams and start over." He chuckled. "I wonder if our senpai will be pleased to see us again."

Sanada snorted, leaning against the porch rail, arms crossed. "They’d better. We’ve held up Rikkai’s name against harder competition then any they’ve faced." He waved a dismissive hand. "They won’t hold out this time any longer than the last."

"Quite likely. Will you be there for it?"

Sanada’s head turned, brows lifting. "Why wouldn’t I be?"

Seiichi’s mouth tilted and he kept his eyes on the water. "I know your grandfather would like you to pay more attention to your kendo. I’ve been wondering which you would choose to follow, during high school."

Sanada was silent beside him for a long moment before he finally said, quietly, "It isn’t a matter of which. It’s a matter of who."

It was Seiichi’s turn to look up. Sanada’s eyes, on him, were level and calm, and the curve of Seiichi’s lips softened into real amusement. "Would you really follow me that far?" he murmured. Warmth curled through his blood at the thought and flared into heat as Sanada smiled, showing his teeth.

"All the way."

Seiichi laughed out loud in the slanting sunlight, and reached out and pulled Genichirou down to a kiss. "Then that’s how far we’ll go," he whispered into Genichirou’s mouth.

 

End

Braid Your Hair With Wind

Treize watched with some amusement as Zechs paced back and forth through his office, scowling at thin air, long hair fanning out at every turn. "I’d say you should check in on how her training is going and set your mind at ease," he offered, "but somehow, knowing you lovely sister, I feel sure she’s threatened you with a dire fate if you do."

"She told me she’d get a training suit and step on me if she saw me," Zechs confirmed, glumly. "I really don’t know where she got her temper from."

Treize manfully stifled the hoot of laughter that tried to break free. "Zechs," he said with great restraint, "your father was a pacifist, but he was not noted for his reserve, that I recall. And you must admit, you yourself have quite a passionate streak." Since this probably wasn’t the moment to call it a stubborn streak.

"But she’s my sister!" Zechs flung out both hands as if entreating the universe to witness the justice of his cause.

"Precisely," Treize said, dryly. He raised a soothing hand when Zechs turned to glower at him. "Look at what direct terms you’re thinking in right now, my friend. Surely there are other ways to find out how she’s doing than going and asking her yourself."

Zechs opened his mouth and then closed it, crossed his arms and hmphed. "Well. Perhaps." He gathered himself and gave Treize a dignified nod of farewell.

Treize chuckled as the door closed behind Zechs, and pulled Relena’s file out from under the others on his desk. Her results so far were extremely encouraging, as was her choice to enter OZ in the first place. With both Peacecraft siblings in his hand, he might genuinely be able to recall the world to honor.

"Paul!" Relena flew light-footed down the hall to catch her fellow Cadet by the arm and steady him before he wandered into the wall again. "Are you sure you’re all right?" She bit her lip. "I’m so sorry; I didn’t mean to spin your unit that hard when I hit you!"

Paul grinned ruefully, bracing himself between her and the wall. "You should have; it’s what we’re training for right?" He shook his head and stopped quickly, wincing. "You’ve got the touch all right, Relena." He laughed. "Maybe we should just start calling you the Lightning Countess now, save time."

She rolled her eyes; she was starting to wonder whether she should have assumed a different name and tried to pretend she didn’t have a brother.

"Need some help there?"

Relena looked up with relief into familiar, warm indigo eyes. "Zia-neesan!" And then she nearly died of mortification on the spot. "I mean! Pilot Noin." She came to attention, only slightly impeded by her grip on her listing classmate, trying to ignore the heat in her cheeks.

Zia-neesan chuckled. "That’s right, Cadet Merquise." She was smiling, though, as she slung one of Paul’s arms over her shoulder. "Let’s get him down to the infirmary, shall we?"

"Yes ma’am," Relena said in a small voice.

There were times it really wasn’t an advantage to have an older brother who had always brought his friends home to meet his little sister.

"How’s training going?" Zia-neesan asked, kindly changing the subject as they steered Paul down the hall.

"Very well, ma’am." Relena eyed Paul, whose eyes were crossed. "Barring a few minor accidents now and then."

"Were you guys in the drop-shaft today?" Zia-neesan looked reminiscent when Relena nodded. "I remember that. Well, better to get the accidents out of the way there than once you’re in suits."

Relena relaxed as they talked. It was good to talk to someone senior who wasn’t a trainer, and someone who knew what she was going through who wasn’t her brother.

"…so the entire rank went down like dominos except for Zechs, he hopped out of the way handily." Zia-neesan grinned. "Except he stepped on the Colonel’s jeep coming down!"

Relena giggled helplessly, closing the infirmary door and leaning against it. "Oh! Poor Onii-san." Both of them hated to be awkward.

Zia-neesan ruffled her hair. "Anyway, you’ve probably got drill in a little while, right? Off you go. I’ll see you around."

"Yes ma’am! Thank you ma’am." Relena trotted off, in a better mood than she’d been in all week. Zia-neesan was so nice; Onii-san was lucky to have her as a friend. Maybe more than a friend, if Relena was guessing right; she thought that might be good, too.

Maybe Zia-neesan would even be able to get Onii-san to take off that silly mask.

Zechs looked up as a tray clattered down beside his and half rose when he saw who had carried it. "Noin! How is she?"

Noin shook her head at him as she sat down. "She’s doing just fine, Zechs. Knocked one of her classmates for such a loop, today, I had to help drag the boy down to the infirmary. I think you’re worried for nothing."

"She did?" Zechs blinked. He was still having a hard time reconciling the idea of his sweet little sister with the idea of a mobile suit pilot.

"She did." Noin stabbed her meatloaf, possibly to make sure it was really dead. "And I stopped by Sergeant Froud’s office on my way back. He thinks she’s going to be a natural. Says she keeps a very cool head in all the exercises. Went on about how it must be in the blood."

Zechs winced.

Noin bumped his shoulder with hers. "Relax, all right? If she’s good she’s that much more likely to stay alive."

Noin had, Zechs reflected ruefully, a very hard practical streak. "Thank you for looking in on her," he murmured.

"My pleasure. I always wanted a little sister." Noin smiled brightly.

Zechs decided he’d better just let that one lie, and took another forkful of green beans.

"Have you seen this?" Quinze waved a report at Dekim. "There’s apparently more than one where Merquise came from!"

"So?" Dekim frowned; sometimes he thought Quinze was far too excitable for their line of business.

"So, what if the second one is as good as the first? Should we be thinking about pushing up the timing, here?"

"We will continue as planned. If there are two, we’ll kill both of them."

"Yes, but…"

"And if that doesn’t work," Dekim continued firmly, "we’ll find another way until something does. I’m not going to let those Alliance bastards strangle the lifeblood of the Colonies forever. And neither will anyone else among us."

Though he did seem to be the only one who truly understood contingency planning. Or the fact that the life of the Colonies was, and always would be, money. Ah well.

"Well… I suppose so."

"Don’t worry, Quinze," Dekim sighed. "You’ve seen the quality of our weapon. Do you think he’s going to hesitate to kill anyone in his way?"

Quinze relaxed at that. "Of course not."

"Of course not," Dekim agreed with a smile.

The plans were all good, and the primary plan was going better than well. Their weapon would do exactly as he was told, and everything would fall neatly into place.

Right where Dekim Barton wanted it.

 

End

Irrigation

Soi sank to the floor by her writing desk with more of a thump than she would
have permitted herself anywhere but her own rooms. Her eyes slid wearily
over the report that she had left half-written, there; she should finish
it tonight. Well, perhaps another paragraph, at least. She rubbed the back
of her hand over eyes that insisted on drooping.

Perhaps she’d feel better after she got out of uniform.

She managed to knot the ties of her yukata decently and got about half way
through undoing one of her braids before she ran out of energy again.

"Look who’s wilted! Will it help if we put your feet in water?"

Soi jumped half out of her skin, but didn’t make it more than a few inches
around before her visitor wrapped an arm around her shoulders from behind,
laughing in her ear. Soi slumped. "Yoruichi-sama," she murmured.
Strike one more set of intruder tell-tales that obviously didn’t work well enough.

"Your hair will snarl if you leave it like that," Yoruichi-sama
told her, plucking the half-unraveled braid out of Soi’s fingers. Soi
blushed a little, but sat meekly while Yoruichi-sama undid her hair with
swift, warm hands. "What’s
going on that’s got you so worn out?"

"What isn’t?" Soi sighed, brushing her fingers over the pages of
her report. "It
almost seems like…" she bit her lip.

Yoruichi-sama reached past her for her comb. "Hm?"

"Like the Captain-General is losing control," Soi finished, softly.
She didn’t like the thought; it meant that she must have failed in her duty.
But… "Some of the Captains are getting very involved in politics,"
she admitted. "And nothing has stopped them. Not warnings, not lectures,
not keeping them busy with assignments. I haven’t been ordered to act against
them directly, but…" She twisted her fingers together in her lap.

"If you’re ordered to do that, it will mean war within Soul Society,
worse than last time." The flat tone in Yoruichi-sama’s voice contradicted
the gentle stroke of the comb through Soi’s hair. "And the Captain-General
has no right to give you such an order without the decision of the Forty-Six.
The Onmitsukidou are not under him."

"Does it count if it’s the decision of the Sixteen?" Soi asked, bitterly.
And then bit her lip again; that wasn’t becoming to her position…

Yoruichi-sama chuckled, and patted her shoulder. "Exactly. You’re learning,
girl."

Soi ignored the tug of the comb to turn and give her superior a scolding
look. "Yoruichi-sama…"
But Yoruichi-sama only grinned, teeth gleaming in the dusk, and Soi sighed. "And
then there’s Kuchiki,"
she added, one exasperation reminding her of another.

"Which one?" Yoruichi-sama pushed her back around and resumed combing,
separating Soi’s hair to make a single braid.

"Both of them!" Soi glared at the wall, aggravated. "But
Rukia mostly. I just don’t know what she’s doing."

"Getting pregnant?" Yoruichi-sama suggested. Soi could hear the smirk.
"Has to happen sooner or later, with those two."

Soi sniffed. "Everything but that, it seems."
She ticked off on her fingers. "She’s been confirmed as the vice-captain
of Thirteenth Division, and is still training hard, though at least half
of it is in private. She goes for tea, or sake more likely, with Shiba Kuukaku
every few weeks, and that’s where she met the Commander of the Kidoushuu;
they seem to be getting along famously. She’s studying our law, of all things,
with her brother, though I can’t get anyone close enough to tell how far
she’s gotten in it. And she still makes time to go out with the other vice-captains,
and sometimes captains too, and for some reason she’s trying to coax
Nemu to join in."
Soi threw up her hands. "It’s like she decided she wants to do over
her time in the Academy!"

"The advanced course, maybe," Yoruichi-sama murmured, plaiting Soi’s
hair snugly. "What’s Byakuya doing to annoy you?"

Soi rubbed her eyes again. Yoruichi-sama’s hands were soothing, and her eyes
were starting to get heavy. "He’s… just waiting. He must know,
by now, that he’s the most likely choice for Captain-General, when Yamamoto-san
retires. That’s the part that really makes me wonder what his sister is
doing; and what he’s thinking." She tried to stifle a yawn.

"There, now." Yoruichi-sama rested a hand on Soi’s shoulder. "I
said you were learning, didn’t I?" The hand guided her firmly down,
and Soi was sufficiently tired not to wonder too much about the odd lap-like
shape her pillow seemed to have transformed into. Yoruichi-sama’s hand,
stroking her hair, lulled her into sleep even as she mumbled a protest
about finishing her report…

Soi woke up when the sun from her open window started to shine in her eyes.
Leaning up on her elbow she found that she’d been tucked up on her futon.
And that Yoruichi-sama was gone again. And, as the breeze fluttered pages
on her desk, that her report was completed.

At the end, in her own handwriting, was a suggestion that Hitsugaya Toushirou
be considered for the position of Captain-General.

The new note, tucked under her inkstone, was in Yoruichi-sama’s hand.

"That should confuse them all enough to slow them down. Hurry and
catch up!"

Soi pressed the note to her cheek and smiled.

 

End

Waiting For Dragonflies

Hiruma takes entertainment from life however it comes.

He thinks it’s funny that Monta calls his rivals “senpai”. Personally, he marks it as the moment when Monta falls in love with a player. Hiruma doesn’t mind; the people Monta most wants to beat are the ones he’s in love with.

He bares his teeth when he hears Sena using honorifics for Agon. He knows it probably bugs the shit out of that bastard, especially since Deimon beat him. Serves him right.

He looks forward to seeing the look on Juumonji’s face when Hiruma gets around to telling him he’s the next captain. He has a camera just for the occasion.

And he’s going to come see every single one of their games, next year, and drag Yukimitsu with him, exams be damned. If he has to shoot the guy’s mother, well, one act of charity won’t completely ruin his rep.

Actually, he’s lying to himself. He’s going to be right back here, next year. Somehow. He can’t imagine being anywhere else. He’ll let the others think this is the last year, because he’ll take motivation anywhere he can find it. But he knows. He can’t let go.

That’s his strength.

It’s gotten him in a lot of trouble, too.

He tightens his arm around Mamori’s waist and kisses her again and decides he’ll figure out which side this falls under later.

End

Rain Falls Hard

Hiruma had to bend his head back and pull Takami down to kiss him. That was all right. It was the ferocity of Takami’s grip on his hips that mattered.

“Deimon won’t lose,” he panted against Takami’s ear, fucking Takami with the words as his hand slid up and down Takami’s cock. “We’ll never lose. You’ll only ever have been defeated by the very best in the fucking country. Everyone will know. You could only have lost to us; because we’ll never lose to anyone.”

Takami made a hoarse sound and his arm tightened like steel around Hiruma.

Hiruma slid long fingers into Takami’s hair, hips bucking into the hand between his legs, where they were spread over Takami’s thighs. “If I were like the fucking monkey,” he whispered, husky, letting the words slide into Takami deeper, slower, “you’d be the only one I’d ever have called Senpai.”

“Damn it, Hiruma!”

Hiruma bared his teeth in a smile as Takami came undone, and thrust wantonly into Takami’s fist as it tightened around him. By the time he came, Takami was laughing. He didn’t let go, even after Hiruma stilled, and they leaned against each other, sweaty and breathless and snickering.

“You know how to flatter someone,” Takami gasped.

Hiruma snorted and didn’t mention that it was true.

Takami’s hands tightened for a moment. “You’re all of Kantou’s champion now; you’d better not lose,” he said, quietly.

Hiruma caught Takami’s mouth and kissed him again, hot and wild and definite. “I won’t.” He showed his teeth when he smiled. “I’ve already beaten the best.”

They both knew that was pure bravado. Big talk. Hiruma’s specialty, after all.

Neither of them said so.

End

Patience and Concentration

Yuuta lay, quite relaxed, with his ass in the air and Hajime-san’s cock sliding in and out of it. He’d come already, under Hajime-san’s mouth, before Hajime-san nudged him over the piled pillows; the pleasure now was slow and warm, not urgent, letting him appreciate the slick thickness of Hajime-san moving inside him.

Hajime-san’s hands kneaded Yuuta’s ass slow and hard, in time with his thrusts; Yuuta thought he might have marks there for a little. It felt good, though, the strength of Hajime-san’s hands squeezing those muscles and turning them loose. “Mmm, wouldn’t mind if you did this forever,” he murmured, resting his cheek on his folded arms.

Hajime-san laughed, husky. “Even I don’t have that kind of self-control, Yuuta.” A harder thrust made Yuuta moan with the tight flicker of heat. “You feel too good.”

“Mm, I sure as hell do,” Yuuta agreed, grinning.

The sound Hajime-san made was a little too velvety to be a growl, but only a little; it made shivers run down Yuuta’s spine. Or maybe that was just the way Hajime-san’s fingertips were following the curve of his back, delicate and purposeful. “Perhaps I should make you feel too good for a little longer, then, after all,” Hajime-san suggested.

Yuuta made a rather disappointed sound as Hajime-san’s cock slid all the way out of him. “And how is that supposed to—ahh!” His breath froze as something touched his entrance, hot and slick and incredibly soft.

Hajime-san’s tongue, he realized, a little shocked by how good it felt.

“Sounds like it worked fairly well,” Hajime-san murmured and nipped the curve of Yuuta’s ass, sending Yuuta jerking against the pillows at the contrast of sharp with soft. And then Hajime-san’s tongue was sliding over him again and the softness made Yuuta just about melt in a puddle.

Except for his cock, which was getting really hard again as Hajime-san’s tongue teased and stroked and circled.

“Hajime-san,” Yuuta moaned, draped over the pillows in a boneless sprawl, panting with the not-quite-enough pleasure coiling in every muscle. “More…”

Hajime-san made a thoughtful sound that tightened Yuuta’s stomach with anticipation; that was the sound that meant Hajime-san had thought of a new way to tease him.

Sure enough, a slim hand ran slowly up the back of Yuuta’s thigh and Hajime-san’s thumb came to rest just behind Yuuta’s balls. It moved in slow, firm little circles and Yuuta groaned into the sheets at the tingling surges of heat it sent up and down his spine to throb between his legs.

“You need… firmer pillows…” he gasped, discovering all over again that Hajime-san’s pillows were too soft to rub himself against to get off. That didn’t stop his hips from bucking, looking for something to focus all the hot sensation.

Hajime-san laughed, low and wicked. “But Yuuta, I like my pillows the way they are.”

Yuuta just bet he did.

“Hajime-san, fuck me,” he growled, and shuddered, moaning, as Hajime-san’s thumb pressed a little harder and his tongue flicked Yuuta’s entrance in answer. “You are the most evil—ahhh!”

Yuuta arched then, pushing his ass further up, because Hajime-san’s cock was back, thrusting into him deep and hard and it felt so incredible after being teased that Yuuta could only groan as Hajime-san took his hips and lifted him higher and fucked him hard and fast.

“Yes, yes, fuck yes!” Yuuta’s throat was raw with the sound that left it when the pleasure all finally spilled over and tore through him in a flash flood of heat.

By the time he could pick out individual sensations again, Hajime was finishing too and Yuuta made a small, satisfied noise as Hajime-san’s weight settled against his back.

“So, I’m evil?” Hajime-san murmured against Yuuta’s shoulder, after a moment.

Yuuta laughed. “Yep. I like it that you are.” He tangled his fingers with Hajime-san’s and pulled his hand close to kiss the knuckles. “It’s fun.”

“I’m glad you agree.” Yuuta could hear the smile in Hajime-san’s voice. The soft kisses Hajime-san brushed over the nape of his neck made him smile, too.

“So. Feel more relaxed about the Regional matches tomorrow?” Yuuta asked casually.

Hajime-san rested his cheek against Yuuta’s shoulder, thumb rubbing over Yuuta’s fingers. “I would say you know me too well, except that most of the time I’m glad you do.” He sighed. “Yes, I am. I suppose there’s no point in fretting.”

“Nope. And, hey, maybe we’ll get lucky and Tezuka-san will be put in early and I’ll get him,” Yuuta added cheerfully.

After a moment, Hajime snorted. “Only you, Yuuta.”

Yuuta could feel Hajime-san relax against his back, though, and smiled, satisfied.

He was pretty sure Hajime-san and Aniki would have a better game this time.

End

The Evening and the Morning

Hajime’s shoulder brushed Yuuta’s, every now and then, as they walked in the suspended light of dusk. Yuuta walked silently, watching his feet on the pavement, and Hajime glanced at him every now and then, waiting for the right moment to speak, himself.

Finally, he decided there wasn’t going to be one if he didn’t make it and discreetly nudged Yuuta left at the next corner. “So, who’s taking over the team now?” he asked.

Yuuta twitched, half a flinch, and Hajime stifled a sigh.

“Ogata,” Yuuta finally answered, voice lower than usual. “I thought maybe Kimura, but Ogata is better at long-term thinking.” A faint smile. “And he can growl and snap with the best; he just doesn’t do it very often. It’ll be a good change of pace for the club.”

Hajime turned them north again and nodded. “It’s good that you think of these things, as you leave them.” Glancing over at Yuuta, he could see Yuuta’s jaw clench for a moment. One more push, he decided; but it would have to be the right one. “It was a good team this year. You brought each other further than anyone else could have.” He paused for a measured, contemplative moment. “With the possible exception of Mori-kun.”

A snort of laughter broke through Yuuta’s increasing gloom. “Mori is a pain in the ass.”

“Well, all things can be useful. Mori-kun is good leadership practice. Think of him as a variety of resistance weight,” Hajime advised.

This time, Yuuta’s laugh was quicker, brighter. “Tell me I never gave you and Akazawa-san that much trouble?”

“You were your very own brand of trouble,” Hajime informed him serenely. And then he smiled, taking Yuuta’s arm to steer him though a green fence of cypress trees. “But one I’ll be very pleased to have back.”

Yuuta stopped short, looking out over St. Christopher’s courts, which they had come out at the back of. “Oh,” he said, very quietly, eyes wide.

Hajime nodded to himself, pleased with this change of expression. And luck favored him today, because Yanagisawa was out alone, practicing against the wall of the club offices, and noticed them.

“Yuuta!” Yanagisawa batted the ball down and caught it and waved. “Look who’s eager! Here to start with your new team already?”

“I, um…” Yuuta’s eyes were still wide, and Hajime’s fingers itched to stroke his arm, to make some kind of contact and soothe Yuuta. But the point of this exercise was to for Yuuta to let this season go on his own. “I guess so,” Yuuta finally said, softly, and Hajime smiled.

Yanagisawa trotted over and rumpled Yuuta’s hair vigorously. “Good!” He leaned back, hands on his hips. “And you know,” he added, abruptly serious, “that was really good, taking your team that far in Nationals. Really good.”

Yuuta looked down at his feet again for a moment, but finally nodded. “I guess so.” When he looked up his eyes were fierce and bright again. “We’ll do better next year.”

Yanagisawa grinned. “Of course we will.” And then he grinned wider, and Yuuta braced himself, on pure reflex as far as Hajime could see. “So, you guys doing a double date or something? I saw Akazawa and Kaneda going by just a little while ago…”

Yanagisawa ducked and laughed as Yuuta dove for him, red-faced and growling, and Hajime shook his head ruefully. Things were definitely getting back to normal. A new kind of normal, perhaps. He caught Yuuta on his way past and twined their fingers together, smiling.

They would most definitely do better, this time.

End

Shreds of Cinnamon

Yuuta moaned softly as Hajime-san’s hands moved up his legs and warm palms slid over his inner thighs, pressing them apart. It always made his stomach flutter, the way Hajime-san lingered over his body at the start, fingers tracing his ribs and smoothing over his stomach. The look in Hajime-san’s eyes, hot and pleased, made his breath come faster.

When Hajime-san’s mouth closed over his cock Yuuta had to reach up, hands grabbing for his headboard, his pillow, anything he could grip hard enough, because the silky, hot slide of Hajime-san’s tongue was enough to make him need to hold on. Hajime-san downright purred around him and Yuuta’s whole body flexed with the thrill of pleasure. “Hajime-san!”

“Mmmm.” Hajime-san’s lips brushed Yuuta’s head as he spoke, husky and intimate. “You’re so magnificent, Yuuta. Especially when I can see all of you.” His hands slid down Yuuta’s raised arms, down his body, over his hips. “When you’re bare for me to touch.” Long fingers traced delicate circles behind Yuuta’s balls and Yuuta’s hips lifted helplessly into it. He moaned as heat shook him.

Yuuta had figured out fast that Hajime-san liked teasing him, liked to be in control. But Hajime-san always made it good for him, and the way he talked…

Hajime-san’s mouth stroked his cock again, and then it was slick fingers, a little chilly, sliding up and down him. Yuuta looked up at Hajime-san, a bit dazed. Usually that slick touch went somewhere else. “What…?”

Hajime-san laughed, the soft, throaty sound that he only ever made in bed, the one that made Yuuta hard just hearing it. “I thought perhaps you’d like to try something different tonight.” His fingers slid away and he moved up to straddle Yuuta’s hips, kneeling over him. His other hand, the one Yuuta suddenly realized he hadn’t seen or felt for a little while, guided Yuuta’s cock against him, and Yuuta’s eyes widened.

“You… ” That was all he had time for before Hajime-san pressed slowly, slowly down onto his cock, and he couldn’t speak because it was hot again and incredibly tight, and everything was gone but the electric pleasure sliding down him and through his body.

Hajime-san’s eyes were closed and he panted, one hand braced hard on Yuuta’s chest. “Yuuta,” he whispered.

Yuuta reached out to stroke Hajime-san’s thighs, just as breathless, hands shaking a little. The little breath he had left him as Hajime-san rocked up and back down on him and heat spilled over him again. “Fuck,” he gasped with absolute reverence.

Hajime-san was smiling again, eyes half lidded. “You feel good, Yuuta.” He rocked up further and slid back slowly.

Yuuta moaned, hips lifting to meet Hajime-san, heat wrapping around every nerve. His hands wandered over Hajime-san’s body, stroking the lean, hard lines of him, asking for more in a way that didn’t need the words he couldn’t string together right now. Hajime-san laughed, arching in his hands, and the tightening of his body around Yuuta as he did made Yuuta groan, bucking up.

Hajime-san made a husky sound low in his throat, grinding down to meet Yuuta and it was too much. Pleasure fired up into something else, something fierce that raked through his body over and over as he came.

As he stilled, Hajime-san eased away and settled to lie beside him. “Well, that was rather nice.”

“Yeah,” Yuuta agreed, a bit dazed. “That was… wow.”

Hajime-san leaned into his shoulder, laughing.

Yuuta blinked and looked down and almost blushed again. And here Hajime-san was so careful about that, with him! He turned and wound an arm around Hajime-san, kissing his shoulder softly, and slid a hand down Hajime-san’s hip to close on his still-hard cock.

Hajime-san gasped and shivered. “Yuuta!” The curve of his body as his hips pressed up into Yuuta’s hand was sleek and gorgeous, and Yuuta just had to be stunned all over again that Hajime-san wanted him. He stroked slow and hard until Hajime-san’s arms tightened sharply around him and Hajime-san moaned against his neck, hips jerking quickly. Slowly the shudders in Hajime-san’s body stilled.

“Mmmmmm.”

Yuuta grinned. That was the sound Hajime-san made when he was satisfied with the world; there were times he thought Hajime-san should have been a cat. “Sometimes I’m glad no one else ever sees you like this,” he said softly.

Hajime-san sniffed. “I should hope not. Vulnerability is nothing to wave around in people’s faces.”

Yuuta shook his head, rueful; of course that was the way Hajime-san thought of it. “Only sometimes, you know? Other times I think more people should see how amazing you are. Well, at least you show it when you play, now.”

Hajime-san lifted his head. “Yuuta, what are you talking about?”

“All of you,” Yuuta said, searching for the right words. “The… the depth of you.”

The way Hajime-san’s eyes softened made Yuuta’s arms tighten around him. Hajime-san didn’t answer, and letting Yuuta have the last word was all the agreement they needed, between the two of them.

Yuuta smiled and carefully held Hajime-san closer.

End

See and Raise

Hajime nodded to himself thoughtfully as St. Rudolph’s match with Rikkai was called. In a way it was a compliment, that Kirihara had seen the threat Yuuta was early on and played his best to defeat Yuuta. He doubted Yuuta wanted to hear that yet, but he filed the thought away for later, when they planned out St. Rudolph’s next training push. He had little doubt, after all, that Yuuta’s team would still be going to Nationals, once the consolation matches were played.

For now he just waited under the trees as the spectators wandered off and the players clustered around their captains. He couldn’t hear what Yuuta was saying, but the energetic gestures told him it was probably encouraging. And emphatic. He smiled, leaning against the smooth trunk behind him. He’d never really taught Yuuta anything about managing people; he’d never had to. The only person Yuuta couldn’t seem to manage on instinct was…

Hajime’s brows rose as Fuji came down the stands to speak to Yuuta. Apparently he wasn’t the only one who had left off observing the high school Regionals to come watch this match.

Yuuta waved his team off to get on with packing their equipment and ran a hand through his hair as he turned to his brother. Hajime watched narrowly, poised to move forward; this was a delicate moment for team morale and Fuji had better not upset Yuuta in front of his players.

He watched as Yuuta made a tight, frustrated gesture, turned away from his team so they wouldn’t see it. Fuji moved closer; it looked like he was trying to calm Yuuta down, and Hajime snorted. He wished Fuji all the luck in the word with that. Yuuta wasn’t a calm sort of person. Sure enough, Yuuta’s mouth went tight; Hajime could see it from where he stood.

He could also see the wry tilt to Fuji’s mouth and the cock of his head, as he laid a hand on Yuuta’s shoulder and said something serious. Whatever it was, it worked. Yuuta’s shoulders settled a bit and he folded his arms loosely, not tight the way he did when he was upset.

Hajime snorted and pushed away from his tree and started down the stands himself. Fuji had had his family togetherness moment, and now he could just leave Yuuta to Hajime to get on with things.

Fuji saw him coming first, over Yuuta’s shoulder, and his eyes flashed for a moment. Hajime let his own narrow; he wasn’t the interloper, here. “Yuuta,” he murmured as he came level with them.

Yuuta turned with a sudden smile. “Hajime-san! I didn’t think you’d be here.”

“For your Semifinal match? Of course I came.” Hajime smiled back, lightly, watching Fuji stiffen just a bit on hearing the way Yuuta spoke the familiar form of Hajime’s name. Hajime shifted a step closer to Yuuta, close enough to feel the heat of Yuuta’s bare arm against his. Fuji now looked rather frozen.

That was gratifying, but not nearly as gratifying as it was when Yuuta turned toward him, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to be standing so close for everyone to see. Hajime’s smile softened as the brightness of Yuuta’s eyes wrapped around him. “I wanted to be ready for what your team might need after this. Of course I had to see you play.” And if those two statements weren’t quite as connected as he made them sound, no one but the two of them had to know.

He started a little when Fuji spoke; for a moment he’d actually forgetten anyone else was present.

“Well, it looks like you have things to take care of, Yuuta. Are you still coming home next weekend?”

“Oh, yeah.” Yuuta waved. “Tell everyone I’ll see them then, okay?”

“Of course.” Fuji gave Hajime a hard look. “Mizuki.”

“I’m sure I’ll see you later, Fuji-kun,” Mizuki purred and smiled smoothly as Fuji stalked back up the stands.

It was so good to win.

“Hajime-san?” Yuuta was looking at him curiously.

Especially when he’d won someone as frankly astonishing as Yuuta. Hajime brushed discreet fingers down Yuuta’s arm as he turned back. “We can discuss my notes later; I imagine you’ll want to take your team home.”

Yuuta’s mouth quirked. “Yeah. I want to make sure no one gets too off track while we’ve still got another match to go.”

As was only right. “Perhaps I’ll visit later this evening, then,” Hajime suggested, and had to supress a shiver at the way Yuuta’s eyes warmed.

“I’d like that.”

Hajime watched for a moment as Yuuta moved back to his team, marshalling them to depart. Yuuta had chosen him. And whenever he remembered that he wondered if he would ever have a better victory.

End

Breadcrumb Trail

Her earliest memory was of fire.

Sometimes she thought she truly remembered the words that came after it, and sometimes she thought she must have imagined them later, knowing that something like them must have been said. She was really to young to remember or understand, then. But they were always the same, when they echoed in her mind.

“It will be safer if I take the Princess.”

“No! She stays with me.”

“But sir, they’ll be looking for two children—”

“I will protect my sister.”

She was sure that the memory of her brother’s arms tight around her, refusing to let go, was a true one. Onii-san wasn’t good at letting go. She was old enough to remember most of the arguments he’d had with their guardian. Especially the last one, when she was eight.

“What would your father and mother think?”

“It doesn’t matter what they would think, they’re dead! And I will bring down the ones who killed them, no matter what!”

“But a pilot… OZ only trains pilots, you must know that.”

“Of course I know it, that’s why I need to be there. Mobile Suit pilots go everywhere. Besides, OZ accepts cadets younger than anyone else.”

Yes, Onii-san was very good at not letting go. Of course, sometimes Onii-san wasn’t very good at logic.

“You did it. Why shouldn’t I?” Relena glared at her brother across the table.

“Because you’re my sister!” he said, as though that was any kind of argument. “I did this to protect you, Relena. I don’t want you being involved in fighting!”

She set her cup of tea down onto the table with a definite clink, just about out of patience. “I was involved when I was two, Onii-san! I’ve been involved all my life.” She bit her lip, trying not to cry. “I don’t want to be helpless anymore, can’t you understand that?”

“Oh, Relena. I’ll keep you safe, I promise.” He came around the table and knelt by her chair, strong arms folding around her. It was comfort and safety and home… and it wasn’t enough anymore. She threw her arms around him and squeezed him as tight as she could, and pushed him a little away.

“Onii-san. I’m going to join OZ too. I’ve already applied and been accepted.” She wiped her eyes and firmed her mouth, looking straight on into wide eyes one shade lighter than her own.

He sat down on the floor with a thump. “…accepted?”

“Yes.” She crossed her arms and frowned a bit. Did he think she wasn’t good enough to have been accepted?

Milliardo rubbed a hand over his face, muttering. All she could make out was “…going to talk to Treize…” At last he looked back up at her, frowning in turn. “I’d hoped that—” he bit his lip. “Well, that you might be the one to keep our parents’ ideals alive.”

Onii-san really, really wasn’t good at logic sometimes.

“Peace would be nice, but we haven’t got it, have we?” she asked. And then she looked down at her laced hands. “Besides, I’m not Relena Peacecraft. I’m Relena Merquise. I’m the Lightning Baron’s sister.” He flushed and she snorted. “Thought I wouldn’t hear that one? Onii-san,” she leaned forward and grabbed his hands urgently, “I want more than just me to be safe. I want to help. Isn’t that what our parents would want too?”

“I…” He didn’t look like he’d really thought of that. After a long moment he said, softly, “I can hope so.”

She nodded firmly. “Right. So I’m going to be a pilot and I’m going to do something.”

Her brother sighed, laughing a little helplessly. “I think you got all of Chichiue’s stubbornness genes.”

Relena smiled impishly. She could live with that.

They had a quiet dinner together that night, and didn’t argue any more, and Relena held her brother’s hand all the way to the gates of the training base the next morning.

End

Cotton Sheets

Hajime had to admit, despite the embarrassment of various preparations and the general awkwardness of their first few tries, there was something very nice about being in bed with Yuuta. Once he made up his mind to something, Yuuta had no self-consciousness Hajime had been able to discover, and he seemed perfectly content to lie in bed naked and discuss tennis while Hajime’s hands wandered over him.

“…so if we manage to take Hyoutei in Semifinals, we’ll be dealing with Fudoumine in Finals after lunch. It’ll be a hard day on everyone. Mmm.” Yuuta wriggled a little as Hajime stroked his stomach, muscles tightening under Hajime’s palm.

“You’ve trained hard for endurance, yes?” Hajime traced his fingers down the hollow of Yuuta’s hip; he thought he might never stop being fascinated with the texture of Yuuta. “It is a disadvantageous order, though. Fudoumine will be the greater threat, this year.” Especially since, from his information, Tachibana had chosen to coach his proteges in favor of actually playing this year.

“Then we’ll just have to see if we can beat them all,” Yuuta said, suddenly steely tone in direct contrast to his lazy stretch and return to fold his arms around Hajime, fingers smoothing over Hajime’s ribs.

Yuuta’s willingness to touch back was the other really nice thing, even if Hajime was still getting used to the whole idea. “I have confidence in you,” he murmured into the curve of Yuuta’s shoulder.

A quiet laugh brushed past his ear. “That’s one of the reasons I believe we can win, Mizuki-san.”

“Hmmm.” Hajime propped himself up on an elbow and looked down at Yuuta thoughtfully. “You know, all things considered, I think you might use my given name.” He leaned down again to stroke Yuuta’s lips apart with his tongue and demonstrate one of the things to be considered.

Apparently it was a good demonstration, because when he drew back, heat still curling through him, it took Yuuta a few breathless moments to murmur back, “Hajime-san…”

Hajime smiled; he liked the way his name sounded in Yuuta’s mouth. The way Yuuta’s tone made everything between them perfectly clear to anyone who might listen was a warm, satisfying weight in Hajime’s chest.

The brilliant smile that followed took him by surprise, though, and so did the way Yuuta’s arms tightened around him, drawing him down snugly against Yuuta’s body.

“Hajime-san,” Yuuta repeated against his neck, mouth soft.

Hajime shivered and swallowed. “Yuuta,” he answered, husky, before he got enough of a grip to laugh and spread a hand against the small of Yuuta’s back. “Ready again so soon?” he teased.

The low, pleased sound Yuuta made in answer, the flash of white teeth in a grin as he spread his legs against the white sheets, sent such a jolt of heat up Hajime’s spine he couldn’t breathe at all for a moment. Only pull Yuuta tighter against him and kiss him slow and deep.

He supposed, in the back of his mind, that the way he looked at Yuuta, turned towards Yuuta, would also make things perfectly clear to anyone with eyes. He was more or less resigned to that, if it made Yuuta answer him so powerfully, so purely.

If old fears still nagged at him to keep his face smooth and impenetrable, to seek the perfection that was cool and sure and safe, Yuuta’s wild, spendthrift excellence had tempted him not to mind the danger. To reach for fire and chance instead, to ride them the way he rode Yuuta’s body and savor their sharp pleasures.

Fear was his past. Yuuta was his future now.

End

Polarization – Part Three

Watari left the offices at quarter to twelve the next day and walked steadily out the door, looking straight ahead.

Tatsumi lasted perhaps five minutes.

And then he left, too, holding his bento prominently to stave off questions about why, and locked himself in one of the soundproof library viewing rooms. He gathered into his palm the tiniest thread of shadow he could weave and sent it sliding down halls and walls and under the door of Enma-daiou’s audience room.

He suspected he’d get a lot worse than a docked paycheck if he was found out, but the tightness around Watari’s eyes and the tension of her mouth were more than he could ignore. He liked most of his co-workers, even when they were being idiots or breaking expensive things, but Watari…

Watari was the only one who laughed at him.

He heard the thud of heavy doors swinging shut and then nothing for so long he wondered if Enma’s power had somehow closed out his shadow.

“So,” Enma’s voice finally rumbled.

“You wanted to see me,” Watari stated. “Here I am.”

Tatsumi could imagine Watari spreading her hands demonstratively, and probably turning around just to show off everything.

“You have unfitted yourself for your purpose.” Enma’s voice was clipped. “This does not speak well for your dedication to your work, Golden Bird.”

“It wasn’t my work, or my purpose,” Watari shot back, fearless as if she merely faced Konoe.

Now Enma sounded surprised. “Of course it was your work! The entire project is based on your discoveries and calculations.” A sly, coaxing edge slipped into his tone, one that made Tatsumi bristle to hear. “Surely you want to see if you were right? To carry the experiment through to the end and see the final culmination of Mother? To have your brilliance vindicated before all?”

Watari was silent for long enough to alarm Tatsumi. He knew how Watari was about his damn experiments…

“No,” Watari whispered, at last. “Because I wouldn’t see. I wouldn’t know. If the Golden Bird of the Sun and the Jade Hare of the Moon combine the way you want, to make Mother complete… I will be gone.”

“You agreed to that once already.”

The simple, factual tone of Enma’s statement horrified Tatsumi more than anything ever had before, bar seeing Tsuzuki bleeding out in the midst of black flame.

“I agreed to give my mind, and my body.” He could imagine Watari standing straight, chin lifted. “Not my soul.”

“Is there a difference in our world?”

Oddly, the next thing Tatsumi heard was a sigh and a rustle. When Watari spoke, her tone made Tatsumi think of her running a hand through her hair. “Enma-daiou. I’m sorry. I know you want to escape. To give your throne and history to another and finally pass on.”

“You know.” Enma’s voice was suddenly contemptuous. “You can’t know, Golden Bird. I have been here since the beginning! The first human who died, caught in this… trap of the gods! Everyone passes on. Everyone but me.”

“I know.” Watari’s voice was soft. “Mother contains your mind, and it was me they poured all that through in the first attempt. And yes, my calculations are almost certainly right; Mother could replace you, if it incorporated pure representations of Yang and Yin to give it eternal balance. But I will not be Yang to take your place.” Her voice turned wry. “As you see, I am not a suitable representative anymore.”

Enma’s voice rumbled deeper than ever, heavy with anger and threat. “So, are you any use to me anymore?”

“Less use,” Watari returned agreeably, just as if utter destruction wasn’t hanging over her head. “But still some. As any other employee.” A small sniff. “Any other employee who’s a genius inventor, anyway. The only inventor,” she added, “who might find another way.”

A snort that could only be Enma. “Begone.”

As the doors’ thud echoed down his shadow again, Tatsumi exhaled and realized that his shirt was soaked with sweat and he was shaking with tension.

No wonder Watari had been tense last night, gambling for her soul’s integrity on one roll of the dice!

Or, perhaps, on one roll, at any rate.

And her damn sense of humor was rubbing off on him, too.

Tatsumi translocated home to get a fresh shirt and a drink of water, and put his lunch in the refrigerator. He was certainly in no shape to eat anything now.

He was not entirely surprised to see that Watari, when she got back to the offices, gobbled her own lunch and half of Tsuzuki’s in exchange for Watari’s cupcakes. It was coming to him that Watari was in all ways astonishing.

It was the end of the day before Tatsumi managed to casually stop at Watari’s desk. “So, you’ve succeeded with your transformation, the way you needed to,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “Is it reversible?”

Watari’s head jerked up to look at him with warm eyes startled blank. “Tatsumi…” Slowly she answered, “I expect the change can be made back. The experience will be with me forever, though.”

“Ah. That’s good,” Tatsumi murmured. And then her wording caught up with him. “You expect? You don’t know?”

“Well, I mean,” she waved her hands as if to shape an answer out of the air. “It might reverse. Or it might not. That part isn’t vital to the experiment!”

Tatsumi covered his face with a weary hand, trying not to laugh. It would be bad for his image, and it was only his image that preserved discipline in this mad office.

“Did you, um. Eat lunch, Tatsumi?” Watari asked. The undertone of her voice was a touch husky, and when Tatsumi looked up, she was watching him with a tangle of amusement and surprise and gratitude and… something he couldn’t really name.

“No,” he admitted.

“I could make you some dinner,” she offered, properly off-hand if one wasn’t looking at her eyes.

“Not in your lab,” Tatsumi specified, on a last gasp of self-preservation.

She laughed, and it was altogether Watari’s laugh, bright and guarded. But perhaps inviting the hearer to see if he could find his way past it.

And shadows, Tatsumi was reminded, went everywhere there was light.

End

Polarization – Part Two

Watari—and he rather liked Yuma’s suggestion of Yutako, it was cute—was charmed by how courtly Tatsumi was suddenly being. He held her hand to balance her while she slid off her shoes—honestly, something would have to be arranged about that, surely they didn’t have to be so uncomfortable—and slipped the lab coat off her shoulders and hung it up for her. If they hadn’t translocated directly in, he’d probably have held the door for her, too.

But she did hope he’d get on with things; it wasn’t inconceivable that Enma would send someone to fetch and quarantine him early.

She relaxed a bit when Tatsumi took her hand and led her to the bedroom, pointing out a chair-back she could hang her clothes over. She wriggled out of the snug, linen suit Wakaba had found for her—definitely needed to take Saya and Yuma up on the offer to shop for underthings—taking the opportunity to grin over her victory. Her well proportioned victory, at that.

A soft snort made her look up to see Tatsumi smiling faintly. “You and your experiments,” he said. “You’re like Tsuzuki with a whole box of pastry all to himself.”

Watari shrugged. Since he couldn’t stop grinning, he couldn’t really deny it.

Tatsumi set his hands lightly on her waist and drew her close and kissed her; it was soft and a bit hesitant, and very nice. The way her nipples felt, brushing against the skin of his chest was even nicer—warm and tingly. “Mmmmm.” Watari snuggled closer and laughed when Tatsumi started. “No need to be shy, you know.”

“I see,” Tatsumi murmured. He led her over to the bed and settled them both on it, leaning a little over her. Watari thought the concentration on his face was endearing, as he stroked a gentle hand down her body. The softness of her new curves felt good, when touched. Voluptuous—he tasted the word in his head; yes, that was it. Tatsumi’s hand brushed lightly over her thighs and she spread them apart, nearly wriggling with anticipation. Insurance and research all in one, what could possibly beat it?

“Hm.” Tatsumi gave her a thoughtful look, and she was going to ask why, but he bent his head and left a path of soft kisses between her breasts and down her stomach and that was rather distracting.

“Mm. Ooo, that’s nice.” It got a lot moreso when his fingers brushed gently between her legs, parting soft folds of skin.

She was busy cataloguing the way that touch made shivery feelings swirl low in her stomach, and almost missed what it meant that she could feel the heat of his breath against her down there.

Her eyes widened and her breath caught and for a moment she couldn’t even sort out what the sensation was that was rolling over her like a tide. A quick gasp, hands catching at the sheets, and she remembered that these feelings were “wet” and “soft” and “hot” and “sliding”, only those parts added up to a whole that was something else entirely.

Pleasure.

Pleasure, surging out from that one point, out to her toes and fingertips. Pleasure making her feel that her whole body must be glowing with it. Pleasure drawing little sounds out of her throat, making her body move, leaving her with no thoughts but “hot” and “wet” and “sliding” and “soft”.

And “more”.

Heat condensed down to something molten and surged out again, long, wild ripples of it that left Watari blinking at the ceiling, rather dazed.

Tatsumi was stroking his body again, holding him close. “Now will you relax a little? However your body is arranged, you aren’t going to enjoy this if you don’t relax, and I have objections to hurting my partner.”

“I’m plenty relaxed,” Watari pointed out, and added, “The difference may not actually be quantifiable. How curious.”

It took him a moment to figure out why Tatsumi had buried his head in the pillow.

“No, no, really I am relaxed!” She waved her hands. “It’s just…” She laughed. “I’m still me, Tatsumi.”

Tatsumi lifted his head again and looked down at her, mouth curling. “Yes. You certainly are.”

“And I don’t actually think I’m a virgin,” she added, helpfully. “The equations indicate there has to have been some conservation of age and time’s effects on the body.”

Tatsumi cleared his throat, and she was fascinated to see actual color rising in his face. That deserved a data point all to itself—making Tatsumi blush.

“I’m glad to hear that.”

She figured he probably started stroking her again to distract her, but that was okay; it certainly felt good. He wriggled a bit , pressing into Tatsumi’s hands, and wound her arms around his neck to pull him down to a kiss. “Mmmm, more.”

“You’re normally more patient when it comes to your experiments,” Tatsumi noted, dourly, and Watari grinned; he liked it when Tatsumi loosened up enough to tease him.

“I am; but timing is everything, you know.”

Tatsumi snorted, but he did kiss her back, and his fingers slid down between her legs again. Watari’s eyes unfocused as those fingers eased into her and she tried to mark the sensations spilling past. “Mmm. Ooo, shivers. Mm, oh that’s nice—kind of tingly…”

The slight vibration against her arm, she catalogued as Tatsumi trying to stifle a chuckle.

And actually maybe it was a good thing he was going slowly, because while Watari was sure she wasn’t a virgin, she was turning out to be very tight. An equation describing the interference function of experiential conservation in muscles that had been configured differently danced across her mind and dropped into the Examine Later memory-box. “Ahh, a little deeper… yes, there…” Watari’s hips tilted, back arching, as the sharp stretch eased into glowing heat. “Mmmm, Tatsumi, now.”

Tatsumi was wearing a faint smile as he settled between her legs, and Watari smiled back. When Tatsumi had asked why him, it had really been a silly question. Who else was this kind? Besides, Tatsumi was confident enough to help her without repercussions to himself, and he… he…

He felt smooth and thick inside her, and the slide as he moved was so slick and wet it took her breath right away, and she could feel the bones of his shoulders under her hands as they closed tight, and he was all the way in and it made her moan.

Her hips pressed up to meet him as he thrust again, and Watari sighed with pleasure. “Yeah.” She slid her hands down the length of Tatsumi’s back and pulled him in tighter, moaning as their hips ground together and a bolt of heat zinged up her spine.

The rhythm was familiar. The sound of her partner gasping wasn’t any different. The pleasure itself was deliciously familiar. But the pattern of the hot sensations was so different—did distribution have anything to do with quality?—and it felt so good she couldn’t concentrate, only wind her legs around Tatsumi’s and rock up into him hard and fast.

Clearly they’d have to experiment a lot more…

That shivery drawing-down feeling welled up in her again, and she gasped as pleasure tightened and the world crystallized. And then it surged out like something exploding and she gasped wildly for breath, riding the fierce sensation until it ebbed back and she could pick out individual parts and realize that Tatsumi was moaning, hips jerking against her.

She stroked his chest, smiling as he slowly relaxed too. “Mmm. That was nice.”

Tatsumi laughed, husky, rolling over to lie beside her. “It was.” He picked up her hand and dropped a light kiss on her fingers. “Thank you.”

“No, no, thank you!” Watari couldn’t quite manage a laugh, though, as she remembered all of why she was doing this. She hoped it would be enough.

It had to be enough.

When Tatsumi slid an arm around her and held her against his shoulder, she let him, and even cuddled closer.

TBC

The Bees and the Bees

In the end, Yuuta decided Kaneda was the best person to ask. Kaneda was the one who most deserved to be asked. Of course, then he had to actually ask.

“So,” he tried, as they climbed the steps to their floor of the dorm. “You and Akazawa-senpai are, um… right?”

“We’re right?” Kaneda stared at him for a moment before his eyes widened. “Oh.” The corners of his mouth curled up. “We’re ‘um’? Yeah.”

“Ah. That’s, um, good. I was just. Um.” Yuuta shoved his hands in his pockets and glowered at his feet. How did you ask these things?

“Curiosity?” Kaneda asked casually. “Have a bet on with the second years?”

Kaneda was having way too much fun with this.

“Um. Mizuki-san. Well, maybe, I mean… ” Yuuta muttered, finally.

“So?” Kaneda was definitely grinning. “You wanted to celebrate or something?”

“No.” Yuuta kicked the door shut behind him, because he really didn’t want the whole dorm hearing this. “I just… well I wondered… what it’s like. I mean what happens. When you… um.”

Kaneda sat down on his bed with a thump, amusement disappearing in shock. “Are you, um, sure you don’t want to go find a website for this?” he asked, a bit weakly.

Yuuta folded his arms. “Mizuki-san says never to trust anything on the web.” Besides, Kaneda damn well owed him this, after laughing so much.

“Oh.” After a moment, Kaneda sighed. “If it wasn’t you… All right, look.” He ran a hand through his hair and flopped back on the bed. “Tell me you already know what a blow-job is?”

Yuuta could feel his face getting hot. “Yeah.”

“The rest… well, a lot of it’s mostly just… touching. Like you do yourself, only… each other.”

Yuuta managed to make a ‘keep going’ noise.

“And you want to know about the part that isn’t,” Kaneda muttered. “Well it’s… Okay, look.” He took a deep breath. “He might also want to be, um, inside you.”

Okay, Yuuta really had understood that bit right. He frowned. “I gotta tell you, that still sounds weird. Are you sure?”

Kaneda gave him a flat, exasperated look, and finally said, “He might want to put his fingers or cock up your ass. Yes it’s kind of weird. It’s also kind of nice.”

Yuuta always managed to forget how blunt Kaneda could be if you pushed him far enough. He hoped his face wasn’t about to catch fire. “Ah. So. You’re sure about the nice part?” he said, strangled.

Kaneda laughed, though he was pretty red in the face, too, by now. “Yeah, I’m sure.” His eyes got a little distant as he stared up at the ceiling. “It’s really… close. As close as you can get, to do things like that.” He glanced back at Yuuta, and smiled just a little evilly. “And even if it’s Mizuki-senpai, he’ll probably be gentle when he’s getting you ready.”

Yuuta wrestled with himself; he knew Kaneda was setting him up. He knew it. But he had to ask. “Getting me ready?”

Kaneda downright grinned and leaned over to fish a tube out of his desk drawer and toss it to Yuuta.

Yuuta turned it over a few times, frowning, and read the label. “…for silky smooth sensation…

“KANEDA!”

“So, what was it you wanted to talk about?” Akazawa looked over his shoulder at Hajime as he dumped his bag beside his desk.

Hajime sighed. This was going to be uncomfortable, he just knew it. “Well. I suppose it may sound like a strange question, or, perhaps, too personal, but you and Kaneda-kun…”

End

Strawberry Season

Yuuta didn’t really mind Kaneda’s amused look, when he practically floated into morning practice on Monday. He didn’t even mind the quiet murmur of, “Someone had a good weekend.”

It was true, after all.

And he had figured out, by now, that most of the world could probably tell by the grin he couldn’t stop that something very nice indeed had happened to one Fuji Yuuta. Strangers had smiled at him indulgently on the walk home last night. That was all right, too. Everything in the whole world was all right, because he could still remember how Mizuki-san’s desk chair felt under him, and the warmth of Mizuki-san’s hand on his shoulder, and the way Mizuki-san’s eyes turned softer as he leaned over Yuuta, and the slide of Mizuki-san’s lips moving against his.

He guessed it probably was distracting him, though, because it took him a while to pay attention to the whispering behind him.

“…just happy for Fuji-buchou that Mizuki-senpai finally made a move,” Miyamoto said.

“Yes, but his timing could have been a bit better,” Ogata murmured back, dryly.

A snort that sounded like Mori. “What, his timing was great. Now maybe Yuuta will chill out on us, a little.”

The silence that followed that made Yuuta glance over his shoulder, curious. He found all three of the now-second years giving Mori the look of (mostly) dutiful kouhai who thought they had the world’s greatest idiot for a senpai.

“Fuji-buchou? Chill out?” Kimura scoffed. “Just because he got… well, whatever he got last night? Not a chance.”

“I think I have to agree, Senpai,” Ogata put in. “It’s less than a month to the start of tournament season. I bet he’ll be himself by afternoon practice.”

“Two onigiri says it’s by the end of morning practice,” Miyamoto came back, promptly.

Kimura looked thoughtful. “Kind of depends on just what happened last night, doesn’t it?”

Yuuta took a few moments to will the heat out of his face before he spun around and barked, “Okay, twenty laps and then pinpointing practice, everybody!”

Everyone stretched and groaned and started running, and Yuuta might have escaped the morning with at least a little dignity. Except that he heard Miyamoto whisper to the other two, as the second years passed him, “Told you.”

It didn’t help that Kaneda was trying not to snicker while he jogged beside Yuuta.

“Kaneda,” Yuuta growled, knowing he was more flushed than exercise could excuse, “they are betting on my personal life.”

“Yeah.” Kaneda caught his breath, though the corners of his mouth still twitched. “They have been for months.”

“WHAT?”

Kaneda lost his stride for laughing and Yuuta could only take a little comfort in the fact that his second years looked back at them and decided it would be a good idea to run faster.

“Yuuta,” Mizuki-san said, closing Yuuta’s door behind him, “is there any reason why Ogata-kun gave me an extremely knowing smile on my way up the stairs?”

Yuuta groaned and pulled his pillow over his head.

A moment of silence. “I see.” Mizuki-san sighed and the bed dipped as he sat on the edge beside Yuuta. “Well, I suppose gossip gets around sooner or later.”

“I am going,” Yuuta gritted out, “to make them run laps until they don’t have any breath left to gossip with.”

Mizuki-san laughed. “That will do well all around, I’m sure.” He tugged on Yuuta’s pillow. “In the meantime, they’re not here. And I am.”

Yuuta let the pillow slide away and looked up ruefully. “You are.” He reached up to run a hand down Mizuki-san’s arm, just because he could. “How is your club going?”

“We have ten members, three of whom may conceivably be useful.” Mizuki-san slipped his fingers around Yuuta’s, looking thoughtful. “One of them might even make a new partner for Yanagisawa, who is still complaining of having lost Kisarazu. I have my doubts whether we will be able to move beyond Prefecturals this year; too many of the strong teams have too much continuity.” He smiled, looking satisfied in a catlike way. “But a loss at that stage, this year, will spur them on for next.”

Yuuta hesitated a moment before saying, “You’re going to try, though, right?”

Mizuki-san lifted a brow at him. “Of course.” His eyes glinted. “I have never taken a loss willingly, Yuuta-kun.”

Yuuta relaxed, smiling. That was true; it would be all right.

Mizuki-san’s eyes narrowed and he leaned over Yuuta, one hand slipping up to cup Yuuta’s face. “I’ve spent a great deal of effort on catching something of drive and passion. I have no intention of letting it go again.”

Yuuta was pretty sure Mizuki-san wasn’t just talking about tennis, and that made him feel warm and tingly all over. Which probably meant he was blushing again. He didn’t care. “Mizuki-san.” He reached up to touch the curve of Mizuki-san’s lips.

Mizuki-san leaned down to him, and this kiss was a lot more involved than the last one. He’d probably remember this one for days. But while Mizuki-san’s tongue was stroking his Yuuta couldn’t remember why that might not be a completely fantastic thing.

He’d worry about it later.

End

A/N: Ogata and Miyamoto were created by Lys ap Adin, for St. Rudolph’s next generation, and are used by permission.

Heart Shaped Petals

Yuuta supposed it was all sorts of good omens and stuff like that for the third years to graduate just as the sakura were blooming, but this year he felt just a little lost, watching the petals fall over everyone’s carefully pressed uniforms.

Mizuki-san was leaving.

He walked beside Yuuta, under the trees, hands tucked into his pockets. “So, Yuuta-kun. What are your plans for the next year?”

Yuuta blinked. “You know what my plans are. We’ve talked about it. You’re the one who wrote my training menu for the next two months.”

“Not your tennis plans, your academic ones.” Mizuki-san gave him a sharp look. “You’ll need to keep your grades up to the mark, to join me again a year from now.”

Yuuta stopped and looked at Mizuki-san with a certain exasperation. “Yes, Mizuki-san. I know that,” he pointed out, as patiently as he could. “But my grades have always done just fine, here. You know that.”

Mizuki-san shrugged, as if tossing something off his shoulders. “Well, I suppose so.”

Yuuta’s mouth tugged up at one corner. Maybe he wasn’t the only one who was feeling jittery about this graduation. “I’ll be fine.”

Mizuki-san turned to face him, silent and inscrutable for a long moment. “Yes. I believe you will.” And then his lips curled just a bit, the way they did when some plan of his was about to succeed, and he lifted a hand to cup Yuuta’s cheek. “You always have so far. It’s one of the things I like about you, Yuuta-kun.”

Yuuta had to swallow hard as Mizuki-san’s thumb brushed over his cheekbone. It was hard to catch his breath all of a sudden. “Oh… Good…” This was not the place he’d expected Mizuki-san to do something like this. He was glad Mizuki-san had, because damn it was nice to be sure, finally, but…

Mizuki-san took one light step toward him, and Yuuta’s heart started going faster, and—

“Mizuki!”

Mizuki-san stepped back again, hand slipping away with a last brush of fingertips as Akazawa-senpai came around the curve of the path.

“Mizuki, are you coming with—” Akazawa-senpai broke off, brows rising slowly as he eyed the two of them.

“Ah, are we leaving already? Yes, I’ll be right there,” Mizuki-san said, as collected as if Yuuta wasn’t standing beside him turning red.

“Sure,” Akazawa-senpai agreed in a tone knowing enough to make Yuuta squirm. As he turned back down the path, Mizuki-san huffed and looked at Yuuta out of the corner of his eye.

“Perhaps we can continue our discussion later, Yuuta-kun.”

“Yeah. Sure,” Yuuta managed. He nearly lost his breath again at the way Mizuki-san smiled, rueful and genuinely amused for one unguarded moment.

“Perhaps you’ll visit me at St. Christopher’s dorms; I’ll send you my room number.” His fingers stroked the back of Yuuta’s hand. “Until then.”

Yuuta thought, watching Mizuki-san walk down the path, that that almost-promise might just have been worth the entire past year.

End

Cold Fingers and Hot Drinks

Hajime’s hands were cold.

He didn’t bother telling himself it was because they were playing outside in the dead of winter. He knew better, and he did try not to lie to himself, at least.

He flexed his fingers around the handle of his racquet, breathing deeply, feeling the chilly air tingle in his lungs.

“Ready whenever you are, Mizuki-san!” Yuuta called cheerfully across the court. Hajime snorted.

“You’re always ready,” he called back. Before Yuuta could answer, before he could wind himself any tighter than he already was, he threw the ball up and served, hard and fast.

He watched Yuuta catch it, watched Yuuta like a hawk and stooped on the ball as it came back again. And again. And again. The ball would not get away from him; today he would not let it, no matter what. He heard Yuuta laugh, bright and exhilarated, across the net, felt the heaviness of the return straining at his arms and threw it back anyway.

This was terrifying.

Yuuta was a better player than he was. Not a better strategist or athlete or planner. But a better player; he had been for almost a year, now. And today, in defiance of all common sense and logic, Hajime was going to try to win an all-out match from him.

Again.

This was senseless. His hands would be shaking if the racquet wasn’t keeping them busy and the ball keeping them steady. He watched and dashed and dove for the ball and always, always sent it back, and felt like he’d taken hold of a live wire and now electricity was running through him, snapping and spitting. He was drenched with sweat, even in the cold, and wondered with every breath if he could keep going.

When they reached six all he wondered if he could stop.

And today whatever fire or fate ruled games like these favored him. The last point was his. Yuuta met him at the net, grinning, nearly glowing. He didn’t seem to mind Hajime’s victory; he never seemed to.

Hajime was just grateful to get inside and sit down and breathe air that didn’t seem to sparkle in his blood.

A clank, and the warmth of a can against his hand, brought him back to the world and he took the coffee Yuuta had brought him. “Thank you.”

Yuuta sprawled on the bench beside him, opening his juice. After a moment he said, “You’re getting better at that.”

Hajime sniffed. “I can read a scoreboard.” He knew he was getting better; that was half of what alarmed him. What if he let this passion, this openness, slip out at some other time and knock some delicate calculation or other awry? What if it ran away with him?

Yuuta smiled down at his drink. “I know. I just mean… it’s really great to play against you like this.”

Hajime regarded Yuuta ruefully. He sometimes wished he wasn’t starting to understand that. “I know.”

Yuuta traced a finger around the top of the can. “Mizuki-san…” Finally, softly, he said, “Thank you.”

Hajime tried to breathe slowly past a sudden tightness in his chest. “For what?” he asked, lightly. All right, so he was, in significant part, doing this for Yuuta—Yuuta didn’t know that.

Yuuta raised his head and looked back with such clear eyes that Hajime suddenly doubted his own thought. “For everything,” he said, quiet and sure. “For all of this.”

Hajime couldn’t quite look away, and thought for one crazy moment that he would drown in that living grey. When he spoke, his voice was huskier than he had thought it would be. “Perhaps I should be thanking you.”

Yuuta’s eyes widened and red stole over his high cheekbones. “Mizuki-san.”

One of them was going to have to look away, Hajime decided distantly. Otherwise they’d be here until full darkness fell to separate them. He traded one contact for another and reached out to rest his fingers on the back of Yuuta’s hand as he closed his eyes and drew a breath and told himself to be sane.

Yuuta started. “Mizuki-san, your hands are freezing!”

“That,” Hajime informed him with dignity, “is because I react like a normal person to winter: by getting cold.” Unlike Yuuta, who just seemed to get more bounce in his step the chillier it got outside.

It was his turn to start as Yuuta took his fingers and chafed them between his hands. “You should have said.” Yuuta wrapped Hajime’s hand back around his still-warm can of coffee.

Hajime hauled his breath back under his control and laughed softly. “Well, there was something outdoors I wanted.” He was secretly delighted to see Yuuta color again. Yuuta was so transparently sincere; it was enough to enchant a person, really.

Yuuta resettled his shoulders and lifted his chin. “So. You wanted another game, then?”

Hajime blinked at the riposte and finally laughed out loud.

“Yes, Yuuta. Perhaps I do.”

End

Percentage by Volume

When Mori looked at the new training menu and growled, “This is Mizuki’s!” and the three first year Regulars actually looked alarmed, Yuuta knew he was going to have to do something drastic. He couldn’t very well show up, year after next, at St. Christopher with these jokers in tow, still thinking Mizuki-san was demon-spawn. He and Kaneda might not be the only players the team needed.

“Wherever the exercises came from, the menu is mine,” he said flatly, still hoping to head things off.

“He’s screwed this club up badly enough already,” Mori shot back, ploughing right over Yuuta’s attempt. “Look how low our ranking was this year!”

Yuuta’s eyes narrowed. “So, you think that was because of Mizuki-san’s training?”

Behind the other two second years, Kaneda suddenly grinned and then tucked it away and looked sober. Yuuta caught his eye and winked, very quickly. Kaneda didn’t lose it, but he did look like he was biting his tongue not to.

Mori, on the other hand, walked right into it. “Yeah, that’s what I think!”

“Well, he’s still training me, so why don’t we see about that?” Yuuta pointed to all his Regulars, one after another. “Mori, Toriume, Arima, Miyamoto, Kimura, Ogata. You’re all playing me, today.” He showed his teeth as they all stared at him. “And I guess I’ll finish up with Kaneda.” Or else Kaneda would finish up him, if this went badly.

“Sure thing,” Kaneda agreed, cheerfully.

Yuuta strolled out onto the nearest court, turning to look over his shoulder at Mori. “Well? Let’s go! One set match, Mori. Your serve.”

“You’ll never be able to do it.” Mori stalked back to serve.

“Guess we’ll see,” Yuuta murmured, setting himself.

Yuuta ordered his knees not to give out and gave his team a glare, hands on his hips. They stared back, most of them in shock, though Kaneda looked wry and Ogata had a speculative gleam in his eye. Yuuta had won all seven sets, though just barely from Ogata and Kaneda, and he really hoped he didn’t die before he made it back to the dorms.

After all, he had to tell Mizuki-san how well training multiple sets had paid off.

“I didn’t do that with any special skill or talent,” he said, flatly. “I could do it because I’ve been working my ass off, according to a training schedule Mizuki-san made.” He paused to let that sink in, and to catch his breath. “Now. Do you want to be able to do that?”

Ogata pushed away from the fence and stepped forward. “Yes.”

Kimura grinned and joined him. “Yeah.”

Arima chuckled and clapped a hand on Miyamoto’s shoulder, and they stepped forward together.

“Sure looks like it paid off,” Toriume allowed, and stepped up.

Mori growled. “Oh fine, all right.” He frowned at Yuuta. “You’re crazy, you know that?”

Yuuta leaned on a bench, laughing. “I think I’ve heard it said.”

Kaneda took a long look at him and turned to the team. “All right, then, let’s get on with practice proper. First the weights…”

Yuuta cautiously stretched his legs as Kaneda took the team in hand, and made a note to do something nice for his vice-captain. If he’d tried to actually lead practice today, he’d have fallen on his face for sure, and that wasn’t quite the lesson he was trying to teach.

“That was foolish, Yuuta-kun,” Mizuki-san told him that evening. “Surely there was another way to make your point.” He tested the shaking of Yuuta’s wrists with light fingers, looking disapproving.

“It worked,” Yuuta defended himself.

“There was no need for it.”

“I couldn’t just let them spread it to the rest of the club,” Yuuta insisted. “What would that mean two years on? Besides—” he broke off, biting his lip.

Mizuki-san raised his brows. “Besides?”

Yuuta swore at himself for slipping like that; he really did need to learn to watch his mouth one of these days. He looked down and muttered, “I don’t like them talking about you that way.”

“Yuuta…” Mizuki-san sounded startled. He looked startled, when Yuuta glanced up. Slowly startlement melted into a smile and his hand on Yuuta’s wrist closed gently for a moment. “Thank you.” And as quick as that he was brisk again. “But it won’t do for you to strain yourself like this.”

Grateful to get off without embarrassment, Yuuta nodded. “Yes, Mizuki-san.”

He took the rest of the lecture fairly meekly, and folded the memory of Mizuki-san’s smile away to take out and look at later.

End

A/N: Ogata and Miyamoto were created by Lys ap Adin, for St. Rudolph’s next generation, and are used by permission.

Steel and Cypress

Hajime lay on his bed with his arms crossed behind his head. To the absent Yuuta, he repeated, “Your brother really, really irritates me.”

Fuji’s match against Shiraishi had been magnificent. It had been a good match, unlike the one he’d had with Hajime. Fuji had found, not only determination, but passion. Passion that made him truly look like Yuuta’s brother for the first time Hajime could recall.

Passion Hajime had never played with.

The understanding twisted at him, made him turn on his side and curl in on himself, trying to escape his own thoughts.

Did he need it? Was that really one of the pieces he’d been missing? Did he have to… to expose himself that way, to play at the top?

Yuuta did.

Fuji had.

He would be damned before he’d be less than Fuji Shuusuke.

A quick rap on the door interrupted his brooding, followed by Yuuta’s voice. “Mizuki-san, did you see… Oops.” Yuuta’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Sorry.”

Hajime turned over in time to see Yuuta tiptoeing back out the door and his mouth twitched up at one corner. “I’m not asleep,” he said dryly.

Yuuta looked over his shoulder. “Ah? Oh, good then.” He turned around again and came to bounce down in Hajime’s desk chair. “Did you see the tape Akazawa-senpai got of some of the other matches?” Yuuta’s eyes were a little wide. “Are all Nationals games really like that?”

Hajime turned over the various Nationals matches he had seen, in his head, marking the texture and intensity of them all. “Yes, I’m afraid so,” he murmured.

“Wow.” Yuuta sat back, eyes fixed on something besides the room around them. “That’s amazing,” he said softly. And then his focus snapped back to Hajime. “We can do it, though. Right, Mizuki-san?”

Hajime felt breathless, pinned by the burning-glass of that fierce, grey gaze. He had, in fact, little doubt that Yuuta could do it.

Could he?

Could he refuse?

“Yes.” He closed his eyes. “Yes, Yuuta-kun. We will.”

When he opened his eyes again Yuuta was smiling, brilliant and… somehow already triumphant. Hajime’s mouth quirked. What a spot to put himself in, a sensible, logical person agreeing to go forward alongside this firebrand and push both of them to the edge and beyond.

All because he wanted Yuuta to look only at him, the way he was right now.

He sighed and leaned back on his elbows as Yuuta enthused about some of the shots he’d seen, mind already racing ahead in time, tracing the curve of his conditioning, mapping it steeper. He would climb that curve, and win. That was the important thing.

He would keep Yuuta beside him.

End

Heat Imaging

Yuuta swung and missed again. “Damn!”

“As your opponent, I appreciate that, but you’d better not let Kaa-san hear you saying it,” Aniki called across the net.

“I don’t see Kaa-san here right now,” Yuuta pointed out, swinging his racquet onto his shoulder. In fact, no one at all was here right now; they had found the most out of the way court at the least lively tennis school they could. Aniki obviously didn’t want his new move scooped, and Yuuta really, really didn’t want anyone to see them playing.

If anyone said anything about the genius, and, oh, his little brother too, he didn’t think he’d be able to do anything but blow up at Aniki. Again.

Aniki chuckled and fished their water bottles off the bench, tossing Yuuta his. “You’ve improved since Prefecturals.”

Yuuta grinned, pleased. “Yeah? Good.” He took a long drink. “Mizuki-san’s been helping me with my training schedule, but it’s hard to be sure sometimes.”

Aniki coughed and sputtered. “Mizuki? Yuuta you can’t tell me you’re still training with him!”

“Why not?” Yuuta blinked at his brother.

“Yuuta! He nearly crippled you!”

Yuuta snorted. “Oh, he did not. One hard match with that shot wouldn’t have hurt me.” He examined at his water bottle while Aniki stared at him. “A whole season might have. But it didn’t happen.”

“But it could have!” Aniki caught his shoulder, frowning. “Yuuta, please.”

Yuuta squirmed. He’d kind of hoped not to have to discuss this with Aniki. “Mizuki-san is good at what he does, Aniki. And it’s different now.”

“Different how?”

Yuuta lifted his chin. “Different because I know what I’m doing, and he knows I do. And he has plans that need all his players in good shape.” And Mizuki-san looked at him differently, too, which Yuuta wasn’t going to say because he didn’t know how to describe the difference. At least not so that Aniki wouldn’t have a heart attack.

Aniki was quiet for a moment. “Do you really think he can teach you what you need, to play at the level you want to?”

Yuuta was quiet for even longer, struggling to find the right words. Finally he said, “I think determination and working hard enough can take us to the top. And you must think so too, Aniki, or you wouldn’t be out here, coming up with new moves and trying them out on me. Mizuki-san makes everyone work harder than they ever thought they could. Including himself, now.”

“There’s working hard, and then there’s destroying yourself.” Aniki’s eyes flickered, at that, though, and he looked away. “If you’re sure,” he said, finally.

Yuuta smiled a little, finger tracing around the cap of his water bottle. He’d admit, to himself, that sometimes he’d like it if Mizuki-san let go a little more, ran a little hotter. He couldn’t help thinking that getting to the top needed some of that, too. But he was very sure that Mizuki-san wanted to win and was looking everywhere for ways. Maybe… maybe he could get Mizuki-san to see this one. And that way they could help each other. “Yeah. I’m sure.”

Aniki sighed. “All right. I guess we already know you’re more stubborn than I am.” He lifted his racquet. “Once more?”

Yuuta grinned. “You bet! I’ll catch that ball before we leave.” Yuuta set himself, ready to throw everything into the game, the way he always did. It was just about his specialty—kind of the way calculation was Mizuki-san’s.

Mizuki-san had showed him the way to grow and stand on his own; maybe now it was his turn.

End

Approaching Fineness

“…didn’t think that doubles pair would hold out nearly that long!”

“I didn’t think Aniki would hold out that long! I never thought you could play tennis blind like that.”

“Or like that Echizen did. Did you see that jump?” Yanagisawa shook his head in amazement.

Yuuta snorted. “Since I’m not blind, yeah.”

Hajime leaned back in his bus seat and half listened to them, eyes closed, letting numbers dance behind his lids. The rate of progress among Seigaku’s second years was indeed very unusual. Fuji’s breakthrough was a little less so, perhaps; if his new model was correct, then Fuji was just mining skills he’d already had.

Echizen, of course, broke all the curves he’d predicted, but that was, itself, starting to be predictable.

“Echizen is still in motion,” he murmured. “He will not be entirely predictable until he stops, as Tezuka has.”

After a moment of silence, Yuuta asked, slowly, “Does that mean Tezuka-san is actually the easier one to beat?”

Hajime smiled; observing the tournaments seemed to be doing good things for Yuuta’s awareness of the mental game. That would be useful. “Indeed. In strategic terms, at least.” He glanced over his shoulder at them. “You need the basic strength to carry out any plan to defeat him, but he is less likely to break the parameters than someone like Echizen.”

“Yeah, but who’s got the strength to beat Tezuka?” Yanagisawa asked, skeptical.

Hajime’s mouth tightened. “Possibly no one,” he admitted, grudgingly. “Yet.” Any stable variable could be solved for.

“Yeah, but I’m not going to have a chance for another two years.” Yuuta sighed, rather wistfully Hajime thought. “You guys will get him next year.”

Hajime pursed his lips and said, reluctantly, “With a brand new team, perhaps not. Unless of course we can catch Seigaku again at Prefecturals.” He might get lucky and find strong players who just happened not to have formed a club yet, but he’d be foolish to count on such a thing.

“So there you go, no one from our side will be taking Tezuka on before you catch up.” Yanagisawa grinned at Yuuta. “If you do, I mean. You could go back to Seigaku for high school after all.”

Hajime stiffened. He hadn’t even thought of that. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of that. Yuuta might… !

Yuuta growled. “Shut up, senpai.”

Hajime tried to swallow sudden panic down out of his throat, as Yanagisawa snickered. “Do you… think you’ll go on to St. Christopher, then?” He tried to sound careless; from the startled way Yuuta looked around at him he didn’t think he quite succeeded.

“I’d pretty much planned to, yeah,” Yuuta answered, a little tentative.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Hajime said with generous understatement. “I shall plan for your arrival.”

Yuuta smiled, relaxing again. “I thought you already were, Mizuki-san.”

Hajime blinked. Yuuta had seen that, and he… didn’t seem to mind. “I had hoped,” he murmured, while he turned the thought over.

Yuuta nodded, looking satisfied. “So this year and next I’ll concentrate on the team, and taking us just as far as I can, and the year after I’ll meet up with my senpai again.”

The way that knot in his chest eased, on hearing that Yuuta would follow him, made Hajime tense up in a different way. Yuuta was his ace player; Yuuta’s game was excellent, and growing better; Yuuta’s passion cast light around him, on the court.

And Hajime didn’t want that passion to go away.

This… this was not what he had expected, when he’d found Yuuta at that tennis school and dangled St. Rudolph in front of him.

Was it a problem, though? He worried at the question as Yuuta and Yanagisawa discussed the new Regulars behind him. Perhaps he and Yuuta could just… balance each other nicely. That could work, on the courts as well as off. So perhaps it was all right to want.

To care.

He would try to make it be all right; because he didn’t want to stop, now.

End

Ace, King

Yuuta worked through his last set of repetitions and let the bar clank back down to rest, sprawling over the bench as he caught his breath. He grinned up at the ceiling, satisfied with the feeling of burning muscles and heaving lungs. This was the feeling he remembered, the feeling of driving right up to the edge of his strength and endurance and staring the limit down. The feeling of advancing.

The feeling Mizuki-san gave him.

He sighed a little and reached for his towel, levering himself up. He wished Mizuki-san had had a better match with Aniki. Not that it hadn’t been an amazing match, of course, but… neither of them seemed nearly as happy with it as he and Echizen had been with their match. He didn’t like thinking that maybe Mizuki-san didn’t know what it was like to just play. Play all out, play your best, and feel satisfied that you had. It had been so fantastic! Did Mizuki-san never feel like that? If he didn’t, it made the way he played seem really cold. Cold and distant.

And, yeah, losing sucked, but that was what training was for, right? So you could win next time. Only it seemed like Mizuki-san didn’t think so.

Or hadn’t thought so. Mizuki-san said things had changed.

Yuuta really hated not knowing whether he could trust that.

He leaned over the sink in the changing room, splashing water on his face more vigorously than necessary. Mizuki-san was the one who showed him a way to stand on his own—a way to respect himself. And, yeah, he’d order people to run until they dropped, and practice moves until you did them in your sleep, and dissect mistakes in chilly and excruciating detail. Mizuki-san had always been three times as demanding as the coaches, and pretty damn merciless. But Yuuta liked that. He didn’t want mercy; he wanted to be the best.

Of course, he also wanted to keep being the best for more than one season. Hard to do that with a busted shoulder.

Mizuki-san said it wasn’t like that anymore. He had told Yuuta to stop with that shot.

Yuuta leaned his elbows on the counter, staring down at the trails of water running down white porcelain. He’d trusted Mizuki-san. Was it stupid that he still really wanted to?

“Ah, there you are. What was your lap time this afternoon?”

Yuuta started at the sound of Mizuki-san’s voice behind him, and turned to find Mizuki-san standing in the door, brows lifted, foot tapping as Yuuta tried to remember the question. “Oh. Yeah, um, fifty-eight seconds.”

“Hm.” Mizuki-san folded his arms, dark eyes turning distant. “That should do. Increase the speed two notches, next time you practice with the ball machines.” He paused in the act of turning away and looked more sharply at Yuuta. “How is the team doing?”

Yuuta blinked. “It’s doing fine. We have a handful of good players already sorted out to work on.”

“Hmm.” Mizuki-san frowned. “Are your classes going well?”

“Yeah,” Yuuta said, slowly, starting to wonder what the inquisition was for.

“Well then try eating better,” Mizuki-san ordered. “You don’t look well. It won’t do either of us any good if you fall ill enough to affect your training.”

Either of us.

Yuuta relaxed all at once. Mizuki-san was looking annoyed, not considering or sleek; he hadn’t thought before saying that. He really did see Yuuta and Yuuta’s plans, and not just himself and his own. “Yes, Mizuki-san.”

Mizuki-san looked at him, unreadable, for a long moment before nodding. “Very well. Protein and then bed, Yuuta-kun.” As he slid the door closed behind him he murmured, “Sleep well.”

Yuuta smiled down at his hand-towel for no reason at all. “You too, Mizuki-san,” he said, quietly.

End

Palm to Palm

Evening brought cooler air and fewer people, which suited Hajime just fine at the moment. He wanted to get his practice in without being questioned about why a third year was so concerned with such things. Only a few lights were on around the courts, not quite drowning out the clear, deep indigo of the sky. It was a lovely evening and he was in a good mood.

At least he was in a good mood up until the moment he saw that Yuuta was on the court before him, and lined up for the Twist Spin shot.

The ball sang off Yuuta’s racquet, tore past an invisible opponent and climbed the fence. It was an excellent shot, and it made Hajime grit his teeth.

Using a shot that wore so hard on his body, Yuuta would never last three more years at this rate! What was the boy thinking? How was Hajime supposed to draw Yuuta back, year after next, if he went on like this?

Hajime stalked onto the court and snapped. “Yuuta-kun!”

Yuuta tried to stand up and spin around at the same time, and wobbled. “Mizuki-san!”

“What are you doing, using that shot during practice?” Hajime lectured. “There’s more than just this season to think about, now. And why are you out here, anyway, you should be training weights at this hour.”

“I was hoping to see you.”

Hajime’s brows rose. “… why?” Surely Yuuta had enough to keep him busy, taking over the club. And, unlike Hajime, Yuuta was the sort to throw himself headlong and absolutely into everything he did.

All right, maybe it wasn’t so surprising he was still using that shot.

Yuuta scuffed a toe against the clay. “The coaches are good; their suggestions for exercises help a lot, with the club. But I feel like my personal training is really falling off.” He looked up, eyes clear. “I was hoping you’d be willing to help me.”

The corner of Hajime’s mind that hadn’t been entirely sure Yuuta wouldn’t hold a grudge breathed out a sigh of relief. He buried that under his week-old sense of annoyance, though, and folded his arms, raking Yuuta up and down with a long look. “And how am I supposed to train someone who won’t do as I say?”

“I do!” Yuuta protested. “Well, I mean… it wasn’t…”

Hajime sighed and waved a hand to quiet him, mouth quirking. “Yes, yes, all right.” Honestly, he knew perfectly well there was a difference between disobeying a tactical order and not sticking to a training regimen. Yuuta had never once slacked on his training.

He also knew it would take Yuuta several more minutes to articulate that. If Hajime’s weapon was forethought, Yuuta’s was intensity, and subtlety was generally a bonus for him.

This was a good opportunity to set his hand on Yuuta’s training again, though. “Come along, then.” He pulled out his racquet. “Play a set with me so I can see how it’s affected your game.”

He watched, as they played. Yuuta had judged correctly; there was a starting spring missing from his footwork, an edge of power missing from his shots. He was still magnificent—the best Hajime had ever trained. But he could be better, and, knowing that, Fuji Yuuta would never rest.

They’d agreed on that from the beginning.

He nodded to himself, at the last point, and came to extend his hand over the net, as usual. “All right. Double your running time to start with.” He paused, less for real thought than to get more of his breath back; even off his peak, Yuuta was strong. “I’ll stop by tomorrow evening to adjust your weights.”

Yuuta nodded, still sharp despite the sweat sticking his shirt to him, and shook Hajime’s hand once, quick and firm. “Yes, Mizuki-san.” He tucked his chin down for a moment before glancing up and adding. “Thank you.”

“Just focus on getting stronger,” Hajime directed. And then he frowned, remembering. “And stop using the Twist Spin during practice. Really, you shouldn’t use it even in official matches until after your next growth spurt.”

Yuuta looked down, and Hajime felt the hand in his tense. “I know,” Yuuta said, quietly. “I was listening to everything, last weekend. Tonight I was testing to make sure I’d recognize that kind of strain.” He opened his mouth to add something and then closed it again, chewing on his lip.

In the back of his mind, where the truth lived, Hajime thought that he really didn’t understand Yuuta. Yuuta’s forthright passion was something he didn’t think he’d ever felt. He didn’t understand why it wasn’t driving Yuuta away from him, now that the harshness of Hajime’s calculation was out in the open.

And yet, he was glad it wasn’t. For one thing, it was surely good for Yuuta to temper that enthusiasm with at least a little considered judgment, which he was clearly starting to do. For another…

Well, never mind that.

“I have longer term plans in mind, now, than I have this past year,” he said at last.

Yuuta’s hand relaxed and he looked up with a faint smile. “Okay.”

The clarity of those grey eyes stole Hajime’s thoughts for a moment, before he shook himself and fished out another ball. “Well, come on, then. One more set, since you’re out here.”

As Yuuta fell back to the baseline, Hajime told himself not to think foolish things. Personal interest, even in someone with Yuuta’s brightness, had absolutely no place in his search for perfection. None at all.

Surely not.

End

Foundations and Extensions

Hajime now spent his afternoons in a library carrel, watching the video take from Prefecturals, making notes, assembling his observations like a hand of cards. He was starting to think that it wasn’t his facts that had been wrong, exactly. They just hadn’t been enough, and he’d been missing some pieces.

Especially some of those strange pieces that changed every time he looked at them.

Akazawa stopped by now and then, bringing him a bottle of water or offering a handful of chips from his bag, leaning on the back of Hajime’s chair to watch the best clips.

“There.” Hajime tapped the end of his pen against the screen, freezing it on a moment of Fuji Shuusuke pushing off sideways. “I thought so, when I had time to actually think again. He wasn’t telling the truth about that being his strongest side. He is consistently slower to respond on that side; I had the pattern right.”

“He was playing head games with you?” Akazawa bit down on another chip, thoughtfully. “I suppose that does seem like him.”

“Psychological games, definitely.” Hajime leaned back, crossing his arms. “He wasn’t entirely lying, though, either. That side got stronger, as he needed it to.” He frowned, twining a lock of hair around his finger while he turned over his handful of facts, trying to fit them together. “I think…” He gritted his teeth and finished. “I think no one has ever truly pushed him. The close games he’s had… they were close the way the one with me was. Because he let them be.” And he was going to turn that result around if it was the last thing he ever did. If Fuji thought it was safe to toy with him like that, Hajime would show him differently. Surely Fuji’s penchant for holding back and his arrogant assurance could be a weakness in and of themselves.

They had to be.

Akazawa grunted. “That’s a hard kind of player to predict.”

Hajime sniffed. “The only thing about that entire team that’s predictable, so far, is that they will all pull out something no one has ever seen before when they are pushed.” Which was an odd kind of variable, but once he saw it he could work with it. “My new team will have to focus very intensely on strength and endurance training in order to keep up.”

“Well, I guess we’ll have to hope St. Christopher has people willing to work.”

Hajime paused in reaching for the next tape, not looking around. “You’ve decided?”

Akazawa chuckled. “If I didn’t approve of what a ruthless bastard you are, I wouldn’t have run the team for you this year. Let’s do it.”

Kisarazu was going back to Chiba; Yanagisawa wasn’t sure he was going to go on in tennis; but that was all right. Two of them would be enough to start it. Hajime smiled. “We have three years.”

And in that time he would find what he had missed, and they would win.

End

The King is Dead

“All right, everyone shut up already! Second years, break up in pairs and volley, six to a court, don’t hit each other! First years, twenty laps to warm up!” Yuuta heaved in a breath as the chaos of the club divided itself in half.

“You really think they need more warming up today?” Kaneda murmured.

“Of course not,” Yuuta muttered back. “But this gets them out of our hair while we figure out what to do next.”

Kaneda laughed and Yuuta scowled at him. This captain thing wasn’t nearly as easy as Akazawa-senpai had made it look.

Of course, Akazawa-senpai had had Mizuki-san to help. Yuuta stifled a sigh. He hadn’t seen Mizuki-san at all today. Akazawa-senpai had come to say his good-byes and wish Yuuta and his team luck, but Mizuki-san had spent most of his time since they got off the bus from Prefecturals in his room or the library.

Yuuta had kind of hoped he wouldn’t stay angry for this long.

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, turning back to Kaneda. “Okay, I guess we’d better start with skills tests for everyone, and then we can get going with playoffs to choose the new Regulars.”

Kaneda smiled and handed him a sheet of paper. “You’ll probably want to revise this, if we’re testing them first, but I thought this might make a good order for the matches.”

Yuuta blinked at it and then burst out in a relieved grin. “Kaneda, have I told you you’re a lifesaver? ‘Cause you are.”

“Hey, I’ll do whatever I have to to make sure you’re the team captain and not me.” Kaneda’s smile tilted. “I’m not good at shouting at people.”

“Unless they’re Akazawa-senpai?” Yuuta laughed as Kaneda turned red and sputtered. “Seriously, though, thanks.” He ducked his head for a moment. “I think some of the others would have been happier with an original member as captain.”

Kaneda snorted. “Those would be the ones who haven’t seen you play.” He looked considering for a moment. “Or train. I don’t think there’s anyone in this whole club who’s put in more work than you, Yuuta. If that isn’t good values for this club, I don’t know what is.”

Yuuta was quiet for a couple minutes, watching the club work. “I agree with Mizuki-san, though,” he said, at last, voice low. “He knows what he’s doing. He knows what we need to do. Maybe I don’t always like the tactics he chooses. But I like how hard he was on us.” He liked that Mizuki-san would never dream of protecting him, from life or tennis or anything else.

“Kind of figured that, yeah.” Kaneda cocked his head at Yuuta. “You went your own way, in the match against Echizen, though, didn’t you?”

“Well of course.” Yuuta crossed his arms. “If I was going to win, I was going to win my way.”

Why was Kaneda grinning?

His vice-captain clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll do fine. Quit worrying.”

As they went to start the second years on precision tests, Yuuta figured he’d just have to do his best.

And maybe see if he could catch Mizuki-san in his room one of these evenings.

End

Architect

Hajime leaned back in his seat on the bus, staring into the vanishing point of space, deaf to the murmurs of the St. Rudolph team around him.

They had lost.

He wasn’t quite sure what to do with that. That maniac from Fudoumine could say what he liked about starting over again, but Hajime had known from about the age of six that failure was failure; it meant you weren’t good enough, and that was all. Your inadequacy was laid out in action for all to see and remember. And besides, Hajime wasn’t sure there was anything to start over with. He felt much as though he had spent a long time building a fortress, balancing the weight and load of each stone against the others, making a marvelous flying sweep of interlocking tension that would stand against any pressure.

And Seigaku had come along and kicked a few blocks out of it and the whole thing had collapsed in a rattling heap and he couldn’t even tell whether any of the blocks were unbroken.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Akazawa and Kaneda had both come through the match well; he was even, a bit grudgingly, impressed with the way Kaneda-kun had gotten Akazawa to play actual doubles. Well enough to take a match from Hyoutei, no less. Hajime hadn’t thought it would be necessary, or he’d never have put Akazawa there in the lineup. He hadn’t thought a lot of things would be necessary.

Clearly he’d been indulging in unforgivably wishful thinking.

Most of the club looked as angry and depressed as he felt, after being beaten down twice in a row. Yuuta, though… Yuuta seemed downright cheerful, despite having lost even worse to Akutagawa than he had to Echizen.

Hajime wasn’t sure he understood Yuuta any more.

Of course, Yuuta had, by today’s work, inherited the team. He had another year to train, and, if his brother would be gone from the next tournament, it seemed Yuuta had found other players to interest him. Whereas Hajime would be retiring from the club, now, and studying for exams, and going to St. Christopher high school, the best of St. Rudolph’s affiliates, where there was no tennis club. If he wanted to keep playing at all he’d have to—

Hajime’s eyes widened, and his lips almost moved with the force of the realization.

He’d have to start over.

He could, if he wanted, start completely over.

The sudden thought felt like a door being unlocked, like walls falling out around him and opening on empty horizons. Hajime took a slow breath in and let it out, eyes fixed on the possibility of nothing. “Akazawa,” he murmured, barely noticing how the conversation around him quieted at the sound of his voice. “It was St. Sebastian you were thinking of attending for high school, correct?”

His classmate turned in his seat, elbow resting over the back, to look at Hajime. “You know I am; we’ve talked about it. They have good athletics programs.” His brows lifted as Hajime met his gaze.

“Think about St. Christopher.”

Akazawa frowned, though his eyes were suddenly sharp and steady on Hajime. “They don’t have a tennis club, do they?”

Mizuki smiled slowly. “No. They don’t.”

After a moment Akazawa smiled. “All over again, huh?” He looked out the bus window. “I’ll think about it.”

“Do that.” Hajime crossed his legs and leaned back, sorting through fallen blocks in his mind. He didn’t know, yet, which he might keep. But the ground had been cleared for something new; surely it would be a shame not to use it.

End

Spiral of Time

Lui was waiting for him at the station.

“Is this all you brought?” he asked, casting an eye over the trunks Liechtenstein servants were efficiently strapping to a single trolley.

“There are a few more things that will be shipped later,” Naoji murmured, looking around. He remembered the scent of this air; it struck him far more deeply than the clothes or colors or sound of the language. The scent of large, fallen leaves and cool, slow water—he remembered this.

“You travel lightly. Or, should I say, you live lightly.”

Naoji turned back to Lui with a smile. He remembered this, too, Lui’s fine touch with a sharp phrase, all while looking quite disinterested. “It’s a virtue of my people.”

Lui paused at the edge of the platform, voluminous coat falling in still folds around him as he studied Naoji. “Are you sure about this?” he asked quietly.

“My family is gone and my land is changing. And it does not wish for my aid while it does so.” Naoji knew his smile was sad; how could it be otherwise?

“So?” One of Lui’s brows tilted up. “Kuchen is the refuge you have chosen?”

Naoji shook his head at Lui. “We had this out in the letters, Lui. Kuchen is the work I have chosen.”

Even more strongly than the air here, he recognized the small easing at the corners of Lui’s mouth, the slight settling of those straight shoulders. The familiarity, across so many years, caught at his heart.

He had been right to come back.

Though he was glad not to be a confused and sorrowful boy any longer. It should make dealing with Lui a good deal easier. Naoji’s mouth curled a bit as he said, “Tadaima,” teasing just a little with his own language.

This was Lui, though. Naoji knew he should have expected it when Lui looked down his nose and returned, in flawless accents, “Okaeri.”

Naoji laughed out loud and stepped off the platform at Lui’s side.

It was good to be home again.

End

A/N: Tadaima and okaeri (loosely, “I’m home” and “welcome home”) are customary phrases for homecoming.

Highlights on Black

Lui was out of sorts lately.

Naoji knew he’d get a glacial sniff for putting it that way, but it was true nonetheless. Even tea, almost always guaranteed to make Lui sit down and relax, hadn’t called him away from contemplating the gray, drizzling view out the window.

Naoji sighed and set down the teapot with a click and went to stand at the long window beside Lui. They were both quiet for a while, watching the trees droop with wetness and the drops of water trickle erratically down the glass.

“I will go back,” Naoji said softly. “I don’t know exactly when; I only know that I will. But until then,” he turned to face Lui. “Until then, I will go with you.”

Lui turned at last, mouth quirking faintly. “You can’t make two choices at once.”

Trust Lui to put everything in the starkest black-or-white terms he could find. Naoji huffed a little, ruefully. Lui was as bad about that as Orphe, really. “Nor can you act on a decision until its time comes,” he returned. He lifted a hand and laid it gently against Lui’s chest. “Until I go, I will walk beside you and calm your heart.”

Lui wouldn’t show startlement if the stars fell from the sky, but Naoji felt a slight catch of breath under his hand. Lui’s fingers lifted, closed on his chin. “Will you?”

“Yes.” Naoji’s lips were already open for Lui as Lui swept him closer and kissed him slowly, possessive and thorough. It was enough to turn Naoji’s bones to water, but then… Lui always had been.

And then Lui let him go.

Naoji took a moment to recover his breath before he laughed softly. Lui had a talent for making his points; it would undoubtedly serve him well in diplomacy. “So. Now will you come drink your tea?”

Amusement lightened Lui’s eyes and he turned away from the window. “Of course.”

Naoji smiled.

End

Polarization – Part One

Shrieks of joy coming out of Watari Yutaka’s lab caused wise Ministry employees to take swift cover. The Shokan Division, though, had no such hope of easy escape and when they heard the sound of glee approaching the office, they simply braced themselves, waiting for fate to descend upon them.

Fate, today, took the form of Watari himself flinging the office door open and standing in it, panting and disheveled, face alight. “I did it! I did it!“

“Ah. What did you do, Watari?” Tsuzuki asked, looking around cautiously for lurking inventions.

Watari burst into delighted laughter, and Tatsumi just stared. Specifically, he stared at the sole remaining button holding closed the front of Watari’s lab coat over a chest that was suddenly a distinctly different shape. As far as he could tell, not that he was looking very closely of course, the lab coat was all Watari was wearing. “Everyone be quiet,” he commanded, adding, “Watari, try not to breathe.”

“Huh?”

“What?”

“Tatsumi-san what are you talking about?”

Fate being what it was around this Division, the button chose that moment to give up its battle with a pop, spilling Watari’s breasts into full view.

Tatsumi put a hand over his face. It was only the polite thing to do, and besides he felt a headache coming on. Fast.

“Wow, they’re so big and soft! I’m jealous!”

“Now, Yuma, you know he… um, she’s going to have to deal with the Bra Problem because of that, try to have some sympathy too.”

“But Waka-chan, Yutako’s got such good proportions, I mean, look, isn’t this nice and firm just the way it should be?”

“Isn’t it? It’s so wonderful that I got everything right this time!”

“Isn’t it?”

A cascade of giggles.

“Now, um, how do you do this again?”

“Well, first you sit down. Now, um… well… just try to relax okay?”

“… oh! Oh wow!”

Tatsumi turned up the water as high as it would go while he washed his hands and resolved to get double insulation installed between the men’s and women’s restrooms that very afternoon. There were some things that weighed more heavily than money, and his sanity was one of them.

“So… he’s a woman?” Terazuma sat and stared while his partner tried to show Watari how to walk in heels and a snug skirt.

“Seems to be,” Kurosaki-kun said, signing off on another sheet and adding it to his Out box. “He’s awfully happy about it, too.”

Tsuzuki, of course, was doing nothing so productive. “Hey, how about this one?” He held up a glossy magazine, showing a full-page spread of a woman with her hair carefully drawn into a loose braid that draped over one bare shoulder.

Wakaba shook her head with the air of a connoisseur. “No, no; it might not look like it, but that would take way too long to do every morning.” She frowned. “Um. How many mornings, do you think, Yutako-san?”

Watari leaned against a desk and scratched—Tatsumi adjusted his pronouns—her nose. “Well…” Her eyes lit up. “Oh, I know a test I haven’t tried yet!” She tottered across the office and threw her arms enthusiastically around Terazuma.

Terazuma’s eyes barely had time to widen before a rush of magic filled the room and a howling, black beast stood on the wreckage of his desk.

“Watari-san!” Wakaba put her hands on her hips and glared.

“Sorry.” Watari didn’t look very sorry, beaming from the floor where he… she’d been dumped.

Tatsumi was starting to think he’d need something a good deal stronger than aspirin to get through this day.

Watari had finally calmed down enough to do a little of… her paperwork, everyone else had gone home, and Tatsumi was daring to hope the worst was past when the Chief poked his head in, cautiously. “Watari-kun. A memo came for you.” He frowned, looking worried. “You’re summoned before Enma-daiou tomorrow at noon.”

Watari was very still for a moment before she went and took the paper from the Chief’s hand. “Okay. Thank you.”

Tatsumi didn’t think he was supposed to hear the Chief ask, very softly, “Are you going to… be all right?”

Expressions flickered across Watari’s face, bleak and then thoughtful and then wry. “I hope so.”

Konoe-san patted Watari on the shoulder and left them alone again.

“Is there anything wrong I should know about?” Tatsumi murmured after a few minutes of silence, because he didn’t pry into employee’s lives, but there was a time for everything. A silent Watari hinted that this might be a time for asking.

Watari’s back, slimmer than it had been, straightened. “Yes.” She sounded resolute, and the gleam in her eyes as she turned and stalked back to stand in front of Tatsumi was familiarly disturbing. “I need you to take me to bed, Tatsumi-san.”

It took a few moments for Tatsumi to get his voice to work. “You what?”

Watari slid her arms around his shoulders and pressed close, and Tatsumi suddenly had no trouble at all recalling that Watari was currently she. “I need you to take me to bed right now, please.” Her tone was firm, but that was desperation he heard making the words quick instead of the usual rather manic enthusiasm.

Tatsumi frowned and took Watari’s shoulders, setting her a little away. “If you want me to do this, I think you need to tell me why,” he said quietly.

Watari opened her mouth and then shut it, and bit her lip. “Look,” she said finally, voice low, “some of it I can’t tell you, you don’t have the clearance, and some of it would put you in a lot more danger to know, but…” Her eyes met his, dark and determined. “I need the experience of being a woman. All of it, or as much as I can get. I need the physical, emotional, spiritual memory, and this is the most immediate way I can think of.” She pursed her lips and added, “Short of getting pregnant, and I don’t think I could manage that fast enough.”

Tatsumi adjusted his glasses. “I am not getting you pregnant, Watari. We’re much too short-staffed to be able to afford maternity leave for you.”

To his relief, she laughed, some of the ragged edge easing out of her voice.

“Why me?” he asked, more gently.

Watari blinked at him and then smiled. “Because I like you, Tatsumi.”

And there really wasn’t anything he could say to that. So instead he carefully put an arm around her waist, drawing her close again, and translocated them both to his residence.

TBC

After Frost

Between his own need to decide on a career within the next year and the fuss of Sakura’s first year of high school, Touya really didn’t think the family needed to deal with a Portentous Letter from Hiiragizawa. But that was, unfortunately, what was sitting on the table when he and Yuki arrived, on Saturday.

He scowled at it.

Sakura tore open the outer envelope that it had come in. “…Mizuki-sensei writes a lot, of course, but I haven’t heard from Eriol-kun in so long. I hope everything’s going well.” She shook the inner envelope out onto the table and reached for it.

Touya’s nerves twanged and he was grabbing Sakura’s hand before he could think.

She started and stared up at him. “Onii-chan?”

“He did something to it,” Touya stated. He didn’t know what, but he was very sure that something was odd about the letter. And he didn’t trust Hiiragizawa any further than he could throw his own motorcycle.

Sakura’s brows wrinkled. “But…”

“Check it, Sakura,” Li put in, holding a hand over the letter. “I think he’s right.”

Sakura held out her own fingers to it, eyes drifting closed. After a moment they flashed open again. “It is!” She frowned. “But it doesn’t feel…” She picked the envelope up and Touya had to stifle a yelp of protest.

With a bang, tiny confetti-like sparks of light fluttered around them. Sakura and Tou-san laughed, while Touya tried to get his heart started again. Yuki patted him on the back, though he was grinning a bit, too.

Kero-chan snorted. “That’s him all over.” Then he turned over in midair to try to catch the sparks between his paws.

Sakura paused. “But… Onii-chan, how did you know?” She looked at him with wide eyes. “You don’t have… I mean you gave…” she ran down to a flustered halt, nibbling her lip.

Touya rolled his eyes and ruffled her hair. “Don’t have any magic. You can say it, Monster.” She growled at him, at that, and he laughed. Some things never changed. “I just knew. Well-trained nerves, probably.”

“You’ve known that kind of thing a lot more often lately,” Yukito said, softly.

Sakura’s hands clasped on each other. “I thought it was for good.” Her whole face was brightening like sunrise. “You mean it’s coming back?”

Touya frowned. He hadn’t expected it, so he hadn’t actually thought about it. “I don’t know.”

“I wondered about that,” Li said quietly. The entire room turned to look at him and he lifted a hand palm up. “Magic usually works a lot like chi. It can be depleted. It can get blocked. But to affect the source of it… that takes an incredible amount of power.” He smiled at Sakura. “Power like yours, after all your trials taught you to find it.” He tipped his head, looking back at Yukito. “Yue was starved for magic when he took Touya-san’s. I thought that might have been why it all seemed to go away. But I couldn’t imagine where Yue had found the power to affect the root of Touya’s magic that way.”

“Huh.” Touya rubbed a hand over the back of his head, surprised by how calm he felt about all this; losing his magic had been a serious shock. Shouldn’t regaining it be at least a little strange? “Well, I guess we’ll see.”

“Hm.”

They looked at Tou-san, who was reading the letter with a faint smile.

“I think we can assume that it’s true.” Tou-san chuckled and read out loud. “‘We will be returning to Japan soon; Kaho has had an excellent job offer there. Incidentally Kaho says that congratulations are likely in order for Touya-kun. I’m pleased to hear that my speculations were correct. Sincerely, Eriol.'”

Sakura clapped her hands and flung her arms around Touya’s neck. “That’s wonderful!”

“Ack!” Touya fielded his sister, catching the corner of the table for balance. She was still short, but a lot bigger than she had been a few years ago.

He also spared a moment to be thankful that Tou-san didn’t have any memories of being such a close-mouthed bastard to influence him.

“Okay, great, good news, now how about if we get started on lunch?” he suggested, putting Sakura down firmly.

Kero-chan perked up instantly. “There’s going to be tamago-yaki, right? Sakura said there would be! Tamago-yaki!”

Yeah, he could always count on the bath sponge.

In the bustle of getting ingredients out and deciding who would chop and who would stir and who got to set the table, Yuki touched Touya’s arm and leaned close. “I’m glad. So is Yue, I think.”

“You’re sure both of you are all right?” Touya murmured.

Yuki smiled. “I’m sure. I asked, a few months back. I think he thinks we’re drawing on Sakura-chan’s magic, now, so yours can build back up.”

Touya eyed that smile and sighed, ruefully. It was hard to tell when Yuki was being clueless and when he was just enjoying being a step ahead; they looked a lot the same. He brushed Yuki’s cheek gently with the backs of his fingers. “If you’re all right, then that’s all that matters.”

He thought twice about that, he had to admit, when Kaa-san appeared after lunch, laughing, saying she’d have to be more careful about hovering over him now that he could catch her doing it again.

But even then, he thought it was still pretty much true.

End

Six Examples

“I would not have lost.”

“Yes you would. Perfection is your weakness.” Yukimura stowed his racquet away and held out his hand, eyeing its steadiness critically. “That’s why you lost last time, too.”

Sanada snorted. “That was chance. A chance no sane player would have counted on. It won’t happen twice.”

Yukimura shook his head and smiled, though his eyes still glinted sharp and cool. “You know your own strength. And, unlike nearly every other player in the middle school or high school circuit, your confidence in it is fully justified. And that,” he added, pointedly, “is what slows you down in face of the unexpected.”

Sanada frowned, leaning back against the low wall around their courts. He wanted to say he didn’t need to develop new responses, because his tennis already had perfected responses to any situation. If that had been true, though, Atobe would not have taken so many points from him this afternoon. “Perhaps.”

Yukimura tossed his bag up onto the grass and leaned beside Sanada, sighing. “I hadn’t thought it would matter. Until now it’s really only been Tezuka we had to think of. You know his strength, too; I knew you wouldn’t underestimate him. But this Echizen…”

“Mm.” Sanada’s mouth tightened. “Our margin of superiority against Seigaku is going to be lower than we had planned for,” he admitted.

Yukimura looked over the emptying courts, distant and thoughtful. “Tezuka. Echizen. Perhaps even Fuji.” He was quiet for a moment. “We’re going to have to push Akaya harder. If we can bring out his true strength by the time we face Seigaku, we’ll have the advantage again.”

Sanada nodded; he’d actually quite like to see what form Akaya’s real game would take, before they had to leave their kouhai to his own devices.

Yukimura thumped him lightly on the shoulder. “And you have to take care of your own problem.” He pushed up to his feet and slung his bag over his shoulder. “I don’t care how you do it. But we can’t afford to have you paralyzed whenever someone besides Tezuka actually manages to push you.” He looked back over his shoulder, laughter bright and wicked and cutting in his eyes, the way it hadn’t been for too long. “Hurry up, too, or I’ll do it for you.”

Sanada gave his friend and captain a rather dour look. Yukimura’s notions about how to help out teammates who were stuck in their training were… strenuous.

Yukimura laughed.

Sanada spend the evening feeling mildly out of sorts. Restless. He fidgeted through his chores. He couldn’t focus on his science homework, and finally set it aside, resolving to get up early and do it in the morning.

At last, he pulled on his hakama and gi and made for his practice room, determined to regain his focus one way or another.

Kata calmed him, as he’d know they would. The rough weave of the tatami mats against the soles of his feet was familiar, soothing. The constant chase after perfection in each breath, each step, eased his tension into something smooth and poised. At the end, he sank down to the mats to rest, eyes closed, feeling his spine loosen and straighten. Slowly, his thoughts took up their spiral again, more controlled this time.

This fierce peace was what he always returned to. It balanced the wild thrill of matches, whether with shinai or racquet.

In the fresh silence of his mind, the thought rang false.

Sanada opened his eyes and frowned. How could this have changed? Against the surprises of competition with opponents, he held the steady striving with himself that kata involved. Today was the perfect example. He had come to this pointed serenity to balance the uncertainty of his match with Atobe.

The uncertainty… that it had taken Yukimura’s interference to point out to him.

Sanada sucked in a slow breath, taking a firmer grip on this idea. How long had it been since he’d felt the rush of uncertainty during a tennis match? Had it really been since… Tezuka?

And yet, it had been there in his matches with Echizen and Atobe as well. He’d just discounted it. Had he really let himself think that only Tezuka could bring that thrill to a match? Had he let his mental discipline slip that badly?

Sanada snorted. Pitiful!

He surged to his feet and stalked back to his room. There was one sure way to get a grip on his game again. He fished out his phone and dialed one handed while he changed his clothes.

“Yukimura,” the laconic answer came.

“Are you free for a game right now?” Sanada asked without preamble.

After a moment of silence, Yukimura answered. “Sure. Meet you on the little court down by the river?”

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

Yukimura rested his racquet over his shoulder, regarding Sanada’s expression as they finished warming up. “That was quick. Good.”

“I’m not done yet,” Sanada said grimly. Indeed, thinking he was done, that any part of his game was completed, was the problem.

“Of course not.” Yukimura’s smile cooled with the chill of a game. He set his racquet down with precision and spun it. “Which?”

“Rough. You can do this?”

Yukimura’s mouth quirked as the spin ended on rough. “Yes.”

Sanada nodded and walked back to serve. He spared nothing, and Yukimura sent the ball singing back, slicing through the air like a knife.

It was hard and fast because that was how Sanada needed it to be. He needed the driving, brutal precision of Yukimura’s game to take into himself and answer.

The ring of the ball against clay and the harsh panting of their breath drowned out the cicadas. This was the thrill he remembered seeking, the dripping exhaustion he remembered pursuing. The uncertainty that needed the peace of kata to balance it.

Fire vanished without a ripple into Yukimura’s return. Sanada had to reach for the steady measured strokes of Forest to break Yukimura’s rhythm and keep himself from being caught up in it, and as he did he wondered. When had his balance fallen? When had his game become so stiff, so closed?

Move like the Wind.

Stately as the Forest.

Raid like Fire.

Immoveable as the Mountain.

They were powerful because they could shift and move. Even the stillness of no-self moved!

As the last ball flashed by to strike behind him, the purity of the moment shuddered up his spine. Yukimura’s game broke his open, stretched him as far as he could go. That openness called to be filled with the all the force and brilliance both of them could wring from each other.

That was a match.

What he had been playing this year was… kata.

Sanada braced himself against the light pole to catch his breath. He frowned when he saw Yukimura had collapsed on the bench beside the court. “You said you could do this.”

Yukimura’s teeth glinted in the streetlights. “I won, didn’t I?”

There was that, Sanada had to admit.

“You weren’t the only one who needed this,” Yukimura added, more quietly.

Sanada smiled and held out a hand to pull Yukimura up again. “Let’s walk to cool down, then.”

The dark river water glimmered with occasional lights up the embankment. The soft lap of it rippling against the shore filled the cooling evening air.

“I don’t think you need to actually rework any of your techniques,” Yukimura said, finally. “Just wake up some more.”

“Mmm.” Sanada turned that thought over a few times. It was true enough, but… “There’s something. I could tell as we played. There’s more I can do.”

Yukimura smiled. “There’s always more you can do. Especially you.”

“That means something, coming from you,” Sanada said dryly.

Yukimura laughed, low and bright. “Once you remind me of my courage, yes.” He turned and climbed a few steps up the embankment, stretching out in the grass. “It would be hard to integrate anything else into FuuRinKaZan, though, wouldn’t it?”

Sanada joined him and leaned back into the cool, green-smelling hill. “The techniques do come as a complete set,” he agreed.

And then his breath stopped as a thought seized and shook him.

Not complete.

Wind, Forest, Fire, Mountain, Shadow, Lightning. There were six in the original.

“Invisible as Shadow,” he whispered. “Strike like Lightning.”

Yukimura watched him, head cocked.

Sanada took a long breath, already testing possibilities in his head. “Yes. Yes, there is something more. It will work.” It would work, and he would move forward the way a player should, and crush his opponents the way Rikkai should.

“I never doubted it,” Yukimura said quietly, lying back in the dusk.

End

A/N: Sanada’s technique names echo those Takeda Shingen took from Sun Tzu’s dictates on the movement of armies. Takeda, though, only used four of the original set of six. For Nationals, Sanada seems to be calling on the remaining two.

Drink Deep

“The Master is home aga—”

Touya looked up with a smile for the news that Sakura was back home safe. He lifted a brow at the expression on Yue’s face, though. He wouldn’t have thought there was anything alarming about sitting in the shade of a tree and reading, but Yue stood like he’d been turned to stone, staring.

After a few moments, Touya wondered if he should poke him or something.

Finally, though, Yue shook himself and cleared his throat. “She’s home again and well.”

“Good to know. Well, if you’re off duty, quit standing at attention.” Touya patted the ground. “Sit down and take a breath.”

Yue actually took a step back, and that made Touya pay attention. Yue wasn’t often that skittish any more. “Come on,” he half-coaxed and half-ordered, holding out a hand. “You can tell me how she liked Hong Kong.”

Yue wavered, and for a moment Touya thought he would bolt and return to Yukito, but slowly he did step toward Touya. “She enjoyed it,” he said, voice low. “The Li family approved of her, of course.”

“Of course,” Touya agreed, dryly. If it wasn’t enough for them that their son was head over heels in love, Sakura was the Master of the Cards. He kept his hand out. Yue stood beside him, looking at it like it might be dangerous. “Did the Brat come back, too, or did he stay to visit longer?” Touya took Yue’s hand, lightly, tugging down.

“He…” Yue sank to his knees. “He returned as well.” His eyes were wide, but he didn’t pull away.

Touya huffed a short laugh and pulled sideways. “So, did you have fun too?” Yue wavered forward, and Touya kept tugging until Yue half tumbled down to sit beside him against the tree.

“I don’t… that is…”

Touya let Yue’s hand go and settled back against the tree, looking at his book again. “Or you can complain, if you want, you know,” he prompted. “People do that, when they get back from trips.”

“…Keroberos was rather loud.” And Yue sounded oddly breathless.

Touya smiled. “I bet you didn’t get much sleep.” After a moment he added, “This is a nice spot for a nap.”

“I…” Abruptly, Yue vanished in a flurry of light and feathers and Yukito was sitting next to him instead.

Touya sighed.

“Ah. I thought we might be home.” Yuki slipped an arm around Touya and leaned into him. “I’m back,” he announced, laughing.

Touya smiled and pulled him closer. “Welcome home. So, did you have a good trip?”

“Of course. It’s nice to travel, and Sakura-chan was having so much fun, seeing a new place.”

Touya nodded. He’d figured Yuki would enjoy himself; Yuki got along with people wherever he went. Before they got out the vacation pictures, though, he had another question. “I don’t suppose you know what would have bugged Yue about me sitting here reading a book?”

Yuki started to shake his head and then paused, frowning. “Hm.” He was quiet for a long moment. “I’m not sure,” he murmured, at last. “It’s like remembering a dream, long after you wake up. But… I think it might have reminded him of something to do with Clow.”

“Ah. Of course.” Touya made a face. Yue only ever got that flustered when something touched on his past, and catch him talking about it to anyone. He was a little surprised when Yuki kept speaking.

“It was sunny.” Yuki’s voice was distant. “With cool shadows under a tree. And he wondered about the book, but Clow-san just laughed and told him to take a nap while it was still warm enough out.”

Touya winced. Right. So, no telling Yue he should take naps; he’d have to add that to the list. The really long list. He was incredibly glad Yuki had gotten the sweet, outgoing, warm side of those two; if both of them had been prickly and wounded and neurotic, he’d have gone crazy. “That sounds like the opening of a book,” he said, leaning down to drop a kiss under Yuki’s ear and distract him.

Yuki laughed and turned to catch Touya for a proper kiss, and Touya decided he could think more about Yue later.

It was later the same week that he happened across some loose pages on Yuki’s desk, describing the sun and shade and a magician enjoying a lazy afternoon with his familiars. At the top of the first page were the words “Chapter One”.

Touya grinned. Who knew? Maybe Yuki wasn’t going to wind up in architecture after all.

End

Degrees of Silver

The doors to the porch were open, and the sound of heavy, steady rain came through.

Along with sprays of water. Touya shook his head and went to close the doors, wondering who had forgotten to latch them firmly. He paused with his hand on the doorknob, though, because Yue was standing outside.

Yue perched at the very edge of the porch, almost in the downpour, face tipped up. His eyes were closed. “You can close the door if you like,” he murmured.

Touya’s mouth quirked. “Won’t your feathers get wet in all this?”

Yue shrugged. “It’s a fair price for peace.”

“Peace?” Touya stepped out onto the porch and held a hand off the side. The weight of the rain nearly drove his arm back down.

Yue opened his eyes and Touya was surprised to see that they were, indeed, at peace—even a little dreamy. “This is the best season of summer, for me. The rains. The influence of the sun isn’t as harsh.” His eyes drifted closed again and he let out a slow breath. “When the rains are all around me they soften the world. The sound closes in and gives me solitude.”

Touya smiled, a bit rueful; he could take a hint. “I’ll let you enjoy it, then.”

As he turned away, though, Yue said, softly, “I don’t mind you.”

Touya stood still for a long moment before turning back. He came to lean against the rail beside Yue, and closed his eyes, and listened to the curtains of rain closing them in together.

End

From Old Wood

Yukito did not perceive magic, as his other self did. That this often meant he did not perceive his other self was something he put down as one of life’s little ironies.

That did not stop him from observing the results of magic.

When shimmers of heat danced around the Kinomotos’ clothesline on a cool, cloudy day, he didn’t need anyone to tell him that Sakura-chan was experimenting with Fiery to dry the clothes before the rain came. He figured that out even before he helped patch the scorch on Touya’s jeans.

When time flickered and he suddenly found himself elsewhere, he could guess that Yue had decided Sakura-chan needed him, even without the clue of Sakura herself, looking anxious and asking if she’d interrupted anything.

And although he’d never seen spirits or ghosts himself, he knew what it looked like when Touya was seeing them.

He thought perhaps that was why he was the first one to notice.

Touya’s head lifted from his notebook a second before the doorbell rang. “I’ll get it.”

The click of the door opening was followed by the bright sound of Sakura-chan’s voice. The progression was so familiar from two years ago that Yukito didn’t actually notice until the third time it happened.

A classmate dashed through crowded halls to catch Touya’s shoulder urgently. “Kinomoto-kun! The last lecture, can I borrow your notes?”

Yukito paused as Touya fished out his notes and handed them to Suiko-san. She had come from directly behind them, but Touya hadn’t seemed at all surprised when she grabbed him.

“I need them back by Friday,” Touya called after Suiko-san as she sprinted off again.

After that, Yukito watched more closely.

Touya paused with his hand on the gate.

“To-ya?” Yukito cocked his head. They’d gone home this way so that they could stop into see Touya’s father.

“Mm, I was just wondering if Kaa-san was visiting today.” Touya’s mouth tilted a little wryly. “You know he always feels a little weird about talking to her when I can’t see her any more.”

That was true enough, but Yukito was starting to wonder whether Oji-san would keep needing to worry about that.

Yukito paid some careful attention to how he felt, after that. If Touya’s magic was returning, did that mean something had gone wrong? Was Yue going to starve, and Yukito with him, again?

He didn’t feel any more than usually tired or hungry, though. Neither Sakura nor Kero-chan gave him any strange or concerned looks.

Finally he chose a day when Touya had an evening lab and went out into their yard to lie back in the grass and look up at the moon. After a while he closed his eyes and just listened to his own breath.

This didn’t always work. He was fairly sure Yue had to be willing to make an effort too.

For a long time there was only the rush of his breath in and out, and the cool darkness behind his eyelids. Finally, though, he felt the odd echo in his heart that he’d been waiting for. When Touya asked, Yukito had told him it was like listening to music and not being quite sure whether there was one violin or two playing. He wondered, sometimes, whether it was as disconcerting for Yue as it was for him.

Touya, he thought. Magic. He let the thoughts go like dandelion puff from an open hand.

What came back was stronger than usual, like a thread of cool water in a warm pool. Security. Surety.

He also thought Yue might be puzzled, but since he was puzzled too it was harder to tell.

An image of Sakura-chan floated through his head.

Ah. Perhaps Yue had started to draw on his Master’s magic, then? Yukito felt a bit wistful at that thought. That was foolish, though; he shouldn’t be so selfish as to grudge the return of Touya’s magic just so that he could keep that particular connection. It wasn’t like there weren’t others, between them.

Abruptly enough to make him gasp, the echo was gone and he was staring up at the moon, small and high in the sky. He huffed a soft laugh. Perhaps he hadn’t been the only one feeling wistful. Or feeling embarrassed about it.

Yukito levered himself up, brushing grass off. Whatever was happening, Yue didn’t think it was any problem for them. That was all he needed to know. If Touya’s magic really was returning, they could reassure him that it was entirely a good thing.

A fugitive twinge caught his heart.

Or someone’s heart, anyway.

Yukito looked up at the moon, frowning. Perhaps he would have to try Yue again later, on the subject of Touya.

A second of chill annoyance brushed over him, and he smiled. Fortunately, he’d gotten more of the stubbornness than Yue had.

End

A/N: The total erasure of Touya’s magic is one of those little things that bugs me. It runs against the general flow of how magic is shown to work in the CCS-verse, with nary a scrap of explanation why. (Besides the basic CLAMP-logic that angst > plot.) This being the case, I choose to believe that Sakura, the one who tells the readers that Touya’s magic is gone for good, was mistaken.

Size Matters

They’d barely been at this school two hours and already Heero was regretting it.

“Mmm, strength, grip, yeah you’re perfect.” The blond weird guy with the sharp teeth grinned at them, which made the teeth a lot more obvious. “Welcome to the American Football club!”

“I’m not in any clubs,” Heero answered as evenly as he could when Duo was stifling snickers behind him.

The grin got impossibly wider. “You are now.” Hiruma pulled out a small black book and started paging delicately through it. “Let’s see now. Hm. Oh yeah.” He cackled. “Where do I fucking start? You guys are a blackmailer’s dream!”

At the word “blackmail” spinal reflex got Heero’s gun out and pointed. But then he had to stop and reprocess the whole thing, because there was an assault rifle aimed dead center at him and another at Duo.

And Hiruma was still grinning. “You’ll love football, trust me.”

Heero was having a little trouble with the combination of “blackmail” and “ball game club”. They didn’t seem like they should go together

“If you don’t mind my asking,” Duo put in, “where did you just get these from?” He tapped the muzzle, not at all put out by being held at gunpoint. Heero supposed he was used to it by now.

Hiruma lifted a brow and nodded at Heero’s skimpy tank top and shorts. “Same place he got his, probably.”

“Mysterious extra space in the spandex, gotcha.” Duo eyed the black book thoughtfully and shrugged. “Ever thought of piloting a Mobile Suit?”

Hiruma scratched his chin. “Hmm. You’d need a really big football.”

Duo shot Heero a helpless look, corners of his mouth twitching up. Heero shrugged back. They could play football for a while. It would give him a chance to find a better opening to get the drop on this guy.

Hiruma’s eyes gleamed. “I knew you’d see it my way.”

… or possibly not.

“Hey,” Duo whispered, as they followed Hiruma toward the playing fields, “what do you think would happen if we told him that Treize Kushurenada plans to shut down all football leagues around the world?”

Heero’s eyes narrowed and he smiled.

Six Months Later…

“… and the new Alliance leader has declared that his, er, Mobile Suit Football teams are available at a modest rental fee to any government, to settle political and territorial disputes. Supreme Captain Hiruma added ‘Football rules the world, ke ke ke.'” The news announcer sounded like she didn’t quite believe what she was saying, and who could blame her? But there was no arguing with facts.

Five dazed Gundam pilots stared at the screen.

“Okay,” Duo said, slowly. “Maybe that was a miscalculation.”

“It’s peace,” Heero declared. “I’ll take it.”

The door disintegrated in a storm of bullets. Hiruma appeared in it, grinning. “Found you! Get in those suits and get moving; practice starts in half an hour!”

“We resigned from that club!”

“We were never in that club!”

“I was never in that school!”

Hiruma rubbed his chin, looking elaborately innocent. It was the most unconvincing thing any of them had ever seen. “Really? Then, I wonder where these sign-up papers came from?” He fanned five forms in one hand, and everyone leaned in to look.

Their signatures were all perfectly forged.

Heero growled and went for his gun. Hiruma’s hands were full, and Heero had no intention of playing football for the rest of his life.

Only Hiruma’s hands were suddenly full of metal instead of paper, and half an arsenal was pointed at them. Quatre grabbed Heero’s wrist.

“I don’t want to die just as the war’s ended,” he said firmly.

Hiruma’s grin now showed enough teeth for any two demons. “Practice in half an hour,” he repeated.

End

Bitter and Salt

September

“Kero-chan!!”

Touya never regretted spending his weekends at home; it was nice to see family so often, his first year living away. But it sure got loud sometimes. He shook his head as Keroberos galloped out of the kitchen with Sakura hot on his heels, cheerfully swiping the last bits of frosting off his muzzle.

It was a good thing Tou-san had hidden the second cake well back in the pantry.

There went both his tasters, though. He eyed Yue, still standing by the window, aloof from his counterpart’s dessert-stealing tricks. Of course. Normally he’d ask for Yukito back, when it came to food, but Yue hadn’t been out much, lately. Besides, Touya had gotten suspicious of why, exactly, Yue never ate or drank, and this seemed like a good chance to test it.

“Yue,” he said casually, holding out a spoonful of apple pie filling. “Taste this and tell me if it’s good.”

Yue blinked at him. “I don’t eat,” he said, as if he thought Touya might have forgotten.

“I’ve noticed. There’s nothing to stop you from it, if Keroberos is any indication, though. You taste things, right?” Yue’s nose wrinkled just slightly and Touya nodded to himself. He’d bet he was right. “So taste this.”

Yue stared at him for a long moment before, with manifest unwillingness, taking the spoon. He maneuvered it into his mouth as if trying not to actually touch it and bit down with a stoic expression.

When the expression changed it was mostly in his eyes: a slight widening, a small relaxation of tight brows. Touya made a satisfied little hm.

“It’s… good,” Yue said, finally.

“You don’t like sweets,” Touya stated. He started spooning his mostly unsweetened filling into the crust. “I’ll remember that.”

Yue was back to looking at him with bafflement. “Why?”

Touya rolled his eyes. Sometimes he really wondered about Yue. “So we can have things you’ll like, too,” he explained with pointed patience.

“Oh.” Yue said it so softly that Touya looked over at him and caught the moment of confusion and hesitance on his face. And then it was gone and Yue was cool and withdrawn again.

Touya snorted. Yue was stuck with the family, now; he might as well get used to it.

November

Sakura flopped down on Touya’s couch like she was still ten years old. “Why do magic creatures keep coming to me? I have homework!”

“You’re not the only one,” Touya noted, though he was sneakingly pleased that his sister and her retinue had stopped at his place to rest on her way home instead of just dropping Yue off. He had brotherly duties to keep up with, of course, so he didn’t say that; instead he smirked at her. “The monsters all just want to visit their relative, probably.”

Sakura revived instantly to scowl at him. Touya smirked wider and set a cup of tea down in front of her, careful to keep his feet out of reach. She sniffed and wrapped her hands around it.

“They’re drawn to strong magic,” Li said, matter of fact enough that Touya suspected he’d had to deal with this too. He sipped his tea quietly, sitting close by Sakura. Hovering, really.

Touya grudgingly supposed he approved of that.

He pushed the sugar dish toward Keroberos, who had already reverted to small, probably to get the most out of his sweets. Touya snorted and set a cup of black coffee down in front of Yue.

Yue looked up at him inquiringly.

“Coffee. Try it.” Touya settled on the floor beside their table, pouring his own tea.

Yue picked up the cup and then paused. Quiet as their exchange had been, it had drawn the wide-eyed attention of the rest of the room. Touya didn’t look back at Yue, but he reached out swiftly to rest two fingers under Yue’s cup, stopping him from setting it back down.

“Touya…” Yue’s voice was barely audible, and he was trying not to look anyone in the eye. A faint flush snuck over his cheeks.

“Try it,” Touya repeated calmly, in direct contrast to the dark look he was giving the rest of the room. There was a sudden clatter of spoons and saucers from the other three.

Yue kept his eyes fixed on his cup as he tasted the coffee, delicately. Touya, watching for it from the corner of his eye, caught Yue’s slow breath out and the faint relaxation of his shoulders, and smiled.

A momentary flicker of a smile answered him before Yue recalled himself and sobered again.

Yue finished his coffee quietly before wrapping his wings around himself. The brightness parted to show Yukito, who stretched and smiled. “Are we all done?”

“Yes! Thank you, Yukito-san!” Sakura chattered to Yuki, filling him in on the afternoon while Touya poured tea into the extra cup he’d brought out and handed it over.

His sister’s boyfriend was watching him thoughtfully.

Two days later a package of books on Chinese medicine and health arrived, full of charts, and lists, and diagrams of elements and tastes and heat versus cold. Touya hated it when That Boy was helpful; it made it a lot harder to stay properly mad at him for stealing Sakura.

He sighed and settled down on the couch to read about the elemental alignment of the Moon, and the food associated with it.

February

Touya tossed a package of salted seaweed snacks into the shopping basket. Yuki’s brows rose. “I didn’t know you liked those, To-ya.”

“I don’t, much. But I think Yue will.”

“Ah.” Yuki nodded, satisfied. After a moment though, he cocked his head at Touya. “How do you figure out what he’ll like? We don’t seem to like the same things.”

Touya’s mouth quirked. “Well, at first it was just giving him stuff that wasn’t sweet. But those books the Brat sent me…” He frowned, running his finger down the row of noodle packages. “They don’t have your favorite brand. Is Shirayuki okay?”

“Sure.”

“It seems that Chinese medicine has a lot in common with Chinese magic systems,” Touya said quietly. “Yue and that bath sponge both seem to like tastes that match their alignment.” He frowned some more. “Which is… Well, maybe it’s all right. Maybe magic creatures don’t need to be balanced the way humans do.” He looked at Yuki, frown softening because Yuki was good at doing that to him, even when he was worried. “But you and Yue are the same; and you like eating all kinds of things, the way a human would. So I think it might be better for him, too.”

Yuki chuckled softly, with that inward look that meant he was paying attention to his other self. “I think he’s going to tell you to mind your own business, next time he sees you.”

Touya snorted. As if that was going to stop him; besides, Yuki’s health might be at stake, here, too. You never knew. “Anyway,” he tossed a packet of Thai curry powder into their basket, “next time we make curry, we should see if he likes spicy food.”

Yuki’s hand lingered on Touya’s arm for a moment. “Thank you. For worrying about both of us.”

Touya took a moment before they came out of the aisle to ruffle Yuki’s hair. “Always.”

For a moment Yuki had a very odd expression on his face. And then he smiled. “Yes,” he agreed softly, definitely. “Always.”

Touya declined to comment on that and made for the case of fish and meat instead. He did sometimes wonder whether a day would come when the things Yuki and Yue communicated to each other would become his business. He kind of hoped so.

But not today.

End

Property Values

Some things didn’t change, and Touya found that comforting. Years ran on, but Sakura still overslept, Yuki still loved stuffed breads for lunch, and he and Yuki still did their homework together in the evenings.

Yuki pushed back from the low table and sprawled on the floor with a sigh.

“You done?” Touya chewed on the end of his pen for a moment before filling in the last valence on his worksheet. So far, college Chemistry was mostly review; it was nice to have a bit of a break but he did find himself wondering when they were going to get on with things.

“Not yet. I can’t concentrate tonight.”

At that Touya looked up. He still twitched that kind of statement from Yuki, even a year after the last big trouble ended. “You all right?”

“Hm? Oh.” Yuki laughed. “It’s nothing like that, To-ya. Calm down.”

Touya settled back. “What is it, then?”

Yuki stared up at the high ceiling, fingers tracing over the tatami under him. “I think… I want to move out of this place,” he said softly. He gave Touya a quick smile. “I know it’s true, what you said about my memories that are real.” He looked back up, eyes shadowed again. “But there are so many that aren’t real attached to this place.”

Touya dropped his pen and scooted around the table until he could brush light fingers through Yuki’s hair. “Do you know where you want to move yet?”

Yuki smiled, small and rueful. “Not really. Just that I want to go.” A small laugh escaped him. “Besides, it doesn’t feel quite right, anymore, living in one of Eriol-kun’s properties on money that he set up for me.”

Touya could understand that; sometimes he thought it would have been better if Yuki had never wondered about his grocery bills. Of course, that would probably have taken yet more of Eriol and/or Clow messing with Yuki’s head, and then Touya would have really had to kill the man. “Hm.” He toyed with a soft lock of Yuki’s hair as he thought. “I’d say you should move in with us, except I have this feeling Li is going to be doing that before too long.” He growled at the mere thought. “Tou-san won’t let the kid live alone once he finds out about that. He had just better make both of them finish high school before they do… anything.”

Yuki laughed at him. Touya glowered. The idea of Li living in the same house as his sister did not make him happy, not even with Tou-san as chaperone, not even if though would be nice to have extra hands for chores.

Actually…

Touya’s fingers slowed, running through Yuki’s hair as he turned his new thought over. It could work. “We could get a place together,” he finally said, looking at the pale, feathery fall of Yuki’s hair instead of his eyes. “If you want.”

“Touya.” Yuki’s eyes caught him after all; it took Touya a moment to shake himself free from the brightness in them.

“Well. We can look around this weekend, then.” Honestly. You’d think he’d just offered a year ticket to an all-you-can-eat buffet. His mouth curled as he looked down at Yuki.

Yuki laughed, sudden mischief gleaming behind his innocent smile. “And Sakura-chan can have Li-kun and Kero-chan for her chore-team, to take care of your father, right?”

“Yep.” Having seen the way his sister ordered the bath sponge around, the thought pleased Touya about as much as any thought involving Li could.

“To-ya, you’re mean!” Yuki didn’t sound like he minded that, though. His hands were gentle as he reached up to bury them in Touya’s hair and draw Touya down to him.

“She’s my sister,” Touya muttered before he lost track of anything but the warmth of Yuki’s mouth under his.

Come to that, he could think of other reasons having their own place would be a good thing…

End