closed | safer waters

[inksplashes]

Who: Lavi & Kanda
Where: Leith/Noah (their ship).
When: W3D7
Summary: What happens when you add paranoid delusions and manic hallucinations to an already strained relationship?
Restrictions/Warnings: Craaaaaazy going on; Kanda has a foul mouth, will edit accordingly.

Continued from here.

[ He sleeps, though he does not rest. Bouts of gray slumber pass so dark and deep that time ceases to exist or function, his moments of wakefulness punctuated by confusion and haze. He tries, with each successive waking, to find his place in this world and gather his bearings, but all too quickly the ground beneath him crumbles, the cruel hands of disease dragging him back out to murky seas.

He pushes through the dark waters one final time, rising with the gasp of a man suffocated, his heart pounding, his hands shaking. Lashes flutter in tandem to blind movement, body shifting, upright and dizzy--

(He's in a place that's foreign, a bed that isn't his, and there's the sound of breath beside him, soft and shallow.)

In the space of a blink, he calms his body, wide-eyed gaze roving around the room, panic dissipating, tremors subsiding. He turns his head slowly, swallows back a second gasp at the sight of person warming the covers around him.

("Of course it would be Yu," a voice of reason says, "This is his room."

But that voice has no place in his mind just now, illness swiftly quieting and smothering it.)

Lavi draws a few more measured breaths to ease the frantic energy built within him, his lungs shuddering softly. The sight of his partner stirring from the sleep he so badly needs sends a wave of guilt over him, rebuking him.

There's something else too, beneath that guilt, something warm and anxious and--

(Long lashes like dark silk kissing pale skin, lips barely parted to allow the passage of breath, hair a frame of soft ink around chiseled features.)

One hand rises to cage the still shaky breath, an apology readying at his mouth, but his voice is drowned out as a second whisper enters his mind, sharper than the last, darker. So close and seemingly real he can feel the murmur of lips at his ear.

("He's breaking you," it says, "Making you look at him like that.")

No, he thinks in protest, hands lifting to shield his ears from the brush of teeth felt on his skin, it's not like that, he just--

("Fool," the whisper grows to an angry edge, a savage tenor, the teeth still sharp against his ears despite the hands caging them, "He wants you to fail. He's trying to make you forget what you are. Look at yourself--look where he's brought you.")

Lavi complies, taking a second look around the room and the bed he's in, fingers lowering to knot in the sheets before he throws them off.

The voice is right. He shouldn't be here. He shouldn't look at Yu like that. It isn't his place.

("You need to leave," the voice tells him, calmer now, pleased with his obedience. Lavi wants to obey it, trusts it. It's always been there for him, hasn't it? Telling him where to go, how to act--it knows best.)

Blue eyes meet green and his breath stalls out again, trapped in his chest.

Yes, he agrees, I have to leave. ]

Comments

[lotusmesenpai]

[Not as much sleep as he would have liked - but then, it's never really as much as he'd like, not anymore. Even so, it doesn't take much by way of movement beside him, to start pulling Kanda from the inky blackness of sleep, lids flickering slowly, his eyes dry as if he's blinking away sand.

So he misses the initial signs of distress, the way Lavi's hands press to hard against his own ears, as if to shut out an unwanted voice... but the feel of the sheet tugging away, then down, is enough to finally draw him fully into the present.

A present where, much to his consternation, his idiot partner is trying to get up and move around after days of sleeping and no real food to sustain him. And the way Lavi is looking at him... eye wide, pupil blown, something almost like panic in that verdant gaze...

Unease curls deep in his gut, weighs him down like swallowed lead.

Pushing up to sitting, Kanda's brow furrows with worry beneath sleep-mussed hair as he reaches out towards Lavi's forehead. As he does so, he clears his throat, but the voice that comes out is lower than usual, still a little rough with sleep.]

...Finally awake again, huh? How's the fever?

[inksplashes]

[ Find supplies. Erase, reset. Get a new assignment, if they'll accept him for failing this one.

It's all very practiced, this process of leaving.

(Like the wind, changing the world but unchanged by it in turn.)

The fatigue of fever is forgotten by the conscious mind, fractured as it is, thoughts racing faster than ever before. There's an energy beneath them that moves without pause, that burns with an unforgiving haste. He can't keep track of them as they move to and fro, the tail of one thought obscured by the stampede of another.

But that voice is steady, that person is constant, words curling inside his brain like they've always been there.

("He'll try to stop you," it whispers, and Lavi knows this to be true, "Don't let him close.")

An unseeing eye turns when movement stirs in the peripheral, battle-instincts setting his already tense form into action. It's not fluid--he's too weak, too tired to move with his usual measure of ease, but it's fast, hard, a quick withdrawal that has him moving out of range just as fingertips stir across his brow.

He stands, stumbles back, balance lost for a moment.

("Friendly and frivolous. Just like always.")

Lavi smiles, mechanical and doll-like, shaking his head. ]

It's--it's fine, I feel much better.

[ Won't turn his back on the enemy, the thing intent on destroying him. Back steps lead him, unsteady and wavering, gaze narrowing on his boots.

That's fine--there are supplies if he can get to Leith. Everything he needs to start over. ]

Noah? Where are we?

[ "We are en route to Leith, Lavi," the AI answers, "At current speeds, we will reach dock in one hour and thirteen minutes."

Lavi waits for that second voice in his ears to provide instruction, but it's quiet, too quiet. Something is wrong.

(Everything is wrong.)]

I'm gonna--I should go back to--sorry to wake you.

[lotusmesenpai]

[He can feel it, that sharp withdraw, as if a blade twisting slowly in his gut.

Watching Lavi stumble back from him, the usual confidence, the lazy grace normally present utterly spent in the wake of whatever sent him scrambling out of reach in such a stark contrast from their last conversation.

(Warm fingers pressing his hand against a warmer cheek, the hard line of this man's jaw softened by the gentle touch. You know, everyone thinks you're so mean, but I know better. You're just..)

No, now, there's no sign of that Lavi.

Instead, there's only this man - this seemingly panicked, fumbling man that's trying to make an ungraceful escape. Because that's what it feels like, doesn't it? A retreat, but not one to take him back to a line already smudged by their own actions. Something else.

He listens quietly to the question, watches his partner with a sharp gaze as Noah lets them know how far out they really are.

Those uneasy steps, the way Lavi keeps his body turned towards him - it's defensive, wary.

It's almost as if...

Throwing the sheet off, Kanda jumps out of the bed with a fair bit more grace, his expression darkening slightly with a concerned frown as he strides closer to Lavi.]

You're going to pass back out at this rate, and I'm not carrying you again. Just stand still, idiot rabbit.

[inksplashes]

Don't come any closer.

[ It's low, cold. Almost feral in its lack of pretense--a single warning through grit teeth and tensed muscles, the softness of sleep replaced by the sharpness of paranoia. His sight roams the room again, seeks weapon or defensive measure, finds nothing he can reach so easily--

(there's a sword there, and he remembers that blade, the silver kiss nearing his skin, the swift slide of hilt and rib tearing him open)

His fingers flex, curl, tightening into a fist before spreading again, an animal struggling against the fight or flight instincts. Part of him says to fight, to stem the tide of Yu's corruption with equally malevolent force, but there's contention, protest to that idea.

"He'll destroy you if you let him get close," the voice is more distant now, its return marked with depth and dimension. He turns his head down, taken aback by the warmth at his side, the small figure of an old man--Gramps, his name--sudden in its appearance.

--no, that's not right, Gramps has always been here. Always tells him where to go and what to do. he trusts him--

"You're being too emotional," Gramps warns, the old man's voice almost concerned, almost caring.

--but you left me, another thought rises, and you lied to me, I wasn't the first--

His head swims under the conflicting voices, his skull reverberates with each word, and it hurts, stabbing pain under his covered eye, throbbing. Lavi takes another stumbling step back, reaches out to brace himself on the door jamb. Calming breaths, in and out and out and in, slow the race of his heart enough to think. He needs to lie like he's never lied before, but the panic under his skin makes even the simplest falsehood shaky, difficult. ]

S-sorry. Go back to bed. I'm just..I need to be alone.

[ One more step, fingers hovering at the sensor by the door, a half-curved smile.]

Bye, Yu.

[lotusmesenpai]

[...This must have been what Kara had seen, when Kanda's own mind had been lost in delusion. A gaze clouded with something else - something or someone only Lavi could see.

But that tone...

Blue eyes narrow in at the way the red-head turns to look at something beside him, as if listening to someone Kanda could not hear. The realization hits him then. Whatever this is before him, whatever hell is burning through his partner's veins, before he tries a lighthearted save that falls abysmally flat.

it means only one thing. No, this isn't Lavi.

Two words. Two little words confirm it for him: This is the blank slate that remains beneath the facade. The 'Bookman Junior' that he's only been allowed to glimpse from time to time, lately.

No way in hells is he accepting that, hallucinations or not.

So if he's going to do this - it needs to be now, before Lavi can make good his escape. Better rested and certainly more healed, Kanda lunges quickly to stand on the other side of the door with Lavi, his hand darting over to curl around his partner's arm in an unyielding grip, the other snapping up to cover the man's mouth as a precaution.

His expression flat, gaze steady, he watches Lavi as he barks out an order.]

Noah - emergency protocol echo-victor-zero-one-three. Barriers on the bridge, all exits, and weapons access. Voice commands accept from me only.

[Every ship has them, regardless of AI programming - back door safety measure that lock a vessel in the event of hostile boarding. He'd just never thought that he'd have to enact them against this man, the one human he's learning to trust above all others...

Eyes narrowing, he adds flatly, just to ensure the AI doesn't side with Lavi.]

Lavi's infected, Noah. He's a danger to himself right now. We have to protect him.

[inksplashes]

[ He draws back, an animal thoroughly taken by the notion of flight, but he is much too slow, much too weak, and were it not for the hand bracing his arm in a bruising grip, he would surely fall with the effort. The fingers spread over his mouth beckon the edge of teeth, but he resists, taming the panic within for a semblance of normalcy.

This is a game now; a match of wits and wills, and while his mind is addled with murkiness of disease, his instincts are sharper for it, more ruthless.

If he has any hope of overriding the command protocol, he must appeal to the AI in a way that it can understand. His heart must be steady while Yu's rises, his blood pressure even.

So that narrowed gaze is met with a confused blink, muscles tense but not seeking further escape. He glances slightly to the side, seeking confirmation in the apparition that has served him so well in the past.

But the phantom fades out of view between one blink and the next, and it's his own damaged psyche that must provide guidance.

He decides to step forward then, not away. Long fingers rise gently to pull the hand from his smiling mouth, but rather than fling it away for the sake of freedom, he twines his own digits between the would-be captors and tugs to draw the other man closer.

(--this is what Yu wants, isn't it? To make Lavi look at him like that, to unfurl the scriptures of his learning so thoroughly that the words fall into nothingness and he's irrevocably tainted by the common world.)

Nervous laughter on his lips, false warmth in the lowered voice as he closes their proximity so that there's nary a whisper's space between them, the heat radiating off Kanda's skin permeating into his own. ]

Are you feeling okay, Yu?

[ His head cants, free hand rising to brush strands of sleep-mussed hair away from Yu's brow, touch trailing down his jaw before catching on the shorter man's chin, tilting it up ever so slightly. His expression is thoughtful, seemingly concerned, as he peers into that lovely face. ]

You're worrying me. You should really lie back down.

[lotusmesenpai]

[That instance of withdrawal, combined with a look to someone only one of them can see, serves to confirm Kanda’s suspicion all the more. Lavi – his partner – has ever been more inclined to draw arms to match Kanda’s mood or diffuse Kanda’s anger with a ready laugh and a light word.

But either way, he doesn’t look to someone or something else to decide for him.

And as much as he calls the other an ‘idiot rabbit’ here lately, his temper has never been something Lavi has retreated from.

But now?

…Now there’s a shift in the way Lavi looks at him, a flicker of something Kanda doesn’t recognize before the space between them disappears near completely, with something in that gaze that does nothing to ease the unsettled feeling Kanda has in this moment… before Lavi reaches up, pulls that hand down to reveal an old, familiar smile.

"Shutting off your thoughts, in front of Alma… just because it’s painful – what the hell are you running from? Kanda!"

Isn’t that what you’re doing, Lavi? Making my damned mistakes for us.

It, surprisingly, hurts to see, a dull ache to ring hollow in his chest.

Because Lavi’s hand is warm, the weight of their fingers entwined not lessened or let go by… either of them, actually.

And then a tug that throws him off balance in an instant, because his body had been tensed for a fight – he’d been prepared to subdue his partner, with force if necessary to protect the man from himself, and so he hadn’t anticipated the warm ghost of laughter across his lips. It’s more than enough to completes the shift, to throw the world around him on its side.

(Softer laughter, more melodic warms his ears – a woman’s gentle teasing, the rich tone honeyed with a playful promise echos behind that deeper whisper lost between the two men)

"I’ll be waiting… forever. "

Longing, sharp and relentless knifes through him at her confident words, causes his breath to catch and his eyes to widen.

"Yu, are you feeling okay? "

Lavi’s voice, grounding him in the chaos of his thoughts before his lids flicker, fall nearly shut as he looks down at the question, delivered in a soft tone that sounds unexpectedly inviting, disarmingly intimate.

Another voice, the tenor lighter than the man before him, heavier than the woman he can’t quite remember, caught somewhere in between slams into him, makes his breath catch at the raw anguish he can hear in the desperate words, "As long as he was bound by the promise he made with ‘that person’, he is hers forever. He’s the one person I didn’t want to lose! "

And then softer, resigned, "Just watch… until my soul is crushed by this dark matter."

The ache sharpens, carves out a piece of his own soul already given to someone else. He can feel the loss of it, marrow deep. The finality of something precious sinking into mud, forever beyond his reach, now.

"I know… I’ll see you off, to the very end." His own voice, low and rough with pain and tenderness, bittersweet understanding… and love.

The memory and the moment twist and intertwine, the ache of letting something so precious go threading with the something equally fragile before him now, just out of reach – a feeling magnified by a gentle touch capable of sending a faint shiver down the length of his spine, as a calloused finger trails along his jaw.

Rather than falling deeper into this confusion or paranoia induced despair, his lips part slightly as his chin is raised, breath catching at the intimacy of the moment before dark lashes finally lift. His gaze snaps up, meets that seemingly concerned look fearlessly, the depth and roil of his own emotions laid bare in what remains of the space between them.

Not this time. Not again.]

I’m the one worrying you?

[Some part of him knows it doesn’t make sense, this vehement rejection of repeating past mistakes (mistakes he doesn’t even fully remember or understand), and yet, he can’t stop himself from stepping onto that razor’s edge.

Dropping the hand from Lavi’s bicep, his fingers curl around his partner’s hip, closes what little distance remains by pulling their bodies flush in order to call Lavi’s bluff, this tease that feels all too real and has his pulse quickening with something so simple as a few barely there touches, yet enough to impart a lingering sense of tenderness between them, not for the first time.

And when he speaks, his voice is equally low, lips almost brushing lips with the harsh words.]

Don’t fucking patronize me like this - not when you’re the one running away.

[inksplashes]

[ He watches lips part like petals caressed by the sun, realizing all too late the grave mistake he's made. In his ruthless and panicked reactions, he forgot to account for the single most dangerous factor in this situation, the most arduous threat to his escape.

Himself.

His own reactions, his weakness to uphold the simple tenets of his scholastic faith. The sweeping storms of emotions over Yu's face summon a twisting, needling sense of anguish inside him, a sensation akin to the sharpest blade pressed into his gut. His lungs feel breathless, emptied, as if they've been shaken until every last bubble of air escapes, and his voice--

That's lost for the moment, trapped in indecision.

What have I done, he thinks, some semblance of sanity pulled free of the panicked haze. The parts of him that retain a tenuous grasp on reality condemn him for his rash decision, warn him of the consequences that are sure to follow. Retreat, they say, your damage is done.

Before he can take that saving step, Yu's hand drops from his arm, finds the pointed bone of his hip and draws him forward that last inch. When the other man speaks, his breath is hot against Lavi's skin, teases the hairs on the back of his neck to a stand. Like a spring compressed, he feels tension building, something as base and foolish as violence but different, heavier, harder to cast off.

It's desire, raw and unruly, just barely contained behind the dam of discipline, teased into a froth with the whispers of touch and proximity.

"Idiot," the old man croons into his mind again, "He's just trying to confuse you, didn't I teach you better than this? Foolish apprent--"

Shut up, Lavi commands, head turning down and away from the accusing glare leveled from blue eyes, unconsciously gripping the hand in his tighter, I know what I'm doing, this is just..

Pain throbs somewhere behind his masked eye again, condemns him further for his disobedience. He releases Yu's chin, hand softly collapsing at the man's chest, intent to push away and save himself and yet .. he can't make himself do it.

Something unvoiced and terrifyingly powerful within won't let him proceed.

Maybe it's too late for him to save himself at all. Maybe he's already broken. ]

Why?

[ The single word surprises him, hoarse and choked as it sounds, a question spurred without his conscious willing. It's only after he's spoken that he divines the nature of the curiosity, understands for himself what it is he wants to know.

Rather than pushing him away or summoning Noah's intervention, the hand at Yu's chest rises, curls into the curve of shoulder with desperation. There's something hot building in the pain behind his eyes, his voice reduced to a barely breathed whisper to hide the emotion of it-- ]

I know what you're trying to do. You're trying to ruin me, making me feel like this, making me look at you like that, but I don't.. I don't understand why.

[ A sharply sucked in breath, dizziness and fever darkening the edges of his world, blurring the colors temporarily. ]

Do you really hate me that much?

[lotusmesenpai]

[The 'why' startles them both, not just Lavi, and smothers the frustration that had tinged his own words with frightening ease - only to drop him once more into the realm of the uncertain. Because he'd thought he'd been dealing with that distant part of Lavi, the part that had reprimanded him with a chilly easy when they'd entered the monastery.

But this... this was much like the broken words whispered that morning as they'd sat on the cool floor of the medbay, only a few weeks earlier. Weariness and something almost vulnerable thread through the accusation, as if whatever this was, was Kanda's intent, a deliberate attacked on the first person since the annihilation of the research vessel that he'd begun to think of as 'friend'.

The first person since those broken days that had the ability to draw him out, lead him back towards the semblance of a person, instead of a weapon to be mastered.

So to hear Lavi say with such certainty that Kanda wants to ruin him, or make him look at him... how? How does 'like that' break someone so much, when that had never been his intent at all...

The dull ache that had settled like a hollow lodestone in his chest twists, cuts deep and leaves him feeling all to raw, unable to see where he's supposed to step.

Because there is no battle tactic, or plan of attack, that could have prepared him for this.

It feel like shrapnel in his chest, cutting his lungs to ribbons, the fine edges radiating down from the tight grip on his shoulder, threaded through the fingers of his hand.]

Idiot.

[The word slips out, breathed in the space between them to carry the dangerous weight of despair and affection all at once.

He feels wound too tight, coiled to the point of breaking, and yet he cannot bring himself to step back, to place the safety of distance between them in order to calm the mercurial shift of words, thoughts, visions, and deeds.

Because though some part of him fears that this, too, is an effect of a disease trying to kill them both, those broken words feel like cracks slowly shattering Lavi's facade, leaving behind shards trying to cut them both for the effort of reaching towards something to save them from the void.

Two seemingly simple questions are anything but, and have him letting go what semblance of self preservation he'd had left. Because anything less would, he fears in that instant, tear apart what they'd spent the last three years building on this ship, this unintentional semblance of home, and it'd kill him to lose that, now.

And so he leans in slowly, a barely there shift closer, chest pressing to chest enough to feel a heartbeat not his own, forehead resting against the other's temple as he loosens the grip at his partner's side. Another shallow breath shudders out of him as he slides that hand around to hold Lavi in place with a light touch low on his back.

And for all that each move was light, undemanding, he feels like he's breaking, like his voice itself is beaten as he lets out a soft, almost helpless laugh, his other hand returning that fierce grip around the one still caught in his own.]

...Do you really think I could go this far, for someone I hated? Do you think I'd give a damn about your games or your lies or your empty fucking smiles, if I knew how to hate you? You must really think me a bastard, to be able to do that.

[inksplashes]

[ Slowly, the grip burying into the soft meld of flesh and cloth loosens, slacks, fingers falling flat once more on the plane of Yu's chest. That single word resonates within his ears, overlaid by the tones of voices imagined and remembered at once, a cacophony of familiar and alien sounds twining into a haunting song of memory.

Lavi closes his eye, pushes at the illusory world with a battered will, breath suspended somewhere in his chest.

It's not real, not any of this. If only he could think past the pain in his head and the voices trembling inside his ears, he could see things with an empirical, critical eye, could see himself..

As the thing he's meant to be; the thing both present and absent, a ghost given fleshy form with an expiration date branded into his creation.

A soft touch slides from his side, finds purchase in the curve of his spine. His chest, tightened and impossibly heavy, is enveloped in a warmth that seems to gently ebb away at the crystals trapped in his throat. It hurts at first, it feels like glass is sliding around inside his ribs and opening the passage of breath with caresses of sharp edges, but that too begins to dull into an almost pleasant ache.

It's like we're dancing, he thinks idly, gaze returned to the world to settle on the interlocked hands, the unsteady rise and fall of both their lungs whispering around him.

But that's what we've always done, isn't it?

They've waltzed around and away from the underlying truth beneath them, crossing the cosmos in their makeshift home with careful steps and twists to never stray too close to the fragile, finite quality of their relationship. The inherent mortality of their time together.

He can't help but laugh at the absurdity of it, a pained, hollow sound that could as easily turn into a cry if only he'd let his lips stop smiling.

For a man trained to see into the truth of things, he really has been quite an idiot. Everyone else has seen it, telling him the truth he so fervently wants to deny, but he.. never wanted to listen. He could always find a reason why it was wrong, a misinterpretation.

But now Yu is telling him that same truth, even if he isn't quite aware, and the feeling of suffocating tightness returns to his chest.

If not hatred that drives him to twist Lavi's mind, then what?

Something that, even when outside the shadow of illness cast on them now, will hasten the end of this dance.

He cannot know the way that Yu feels, not when he is such a poor judge of himself, but in this moment, he sees into himself with a clarity that's startlingly bright. ]

Then... please hate me.

[ This precious warmth does not belong to him, is not among those gifts which he's been offered by the hands of circumstance in his life.. but for just a moment, he chooses to relish it. In all of its chaos and pain and confusion, Lavi lets himself sink, free hand lowering, sliding around ribs to mirror the embrace. His head drops down, aching and dizzy as it is, against the curve of Yu's neck, deep breaths gathering in as much memory scent as he can.

No, he can't have this, and he's sure the memory of this moment will haunt him for years to come. ]

If you don't, I might not be able to pretend I don't want this anymore. I might not..

I might not ever be able to leave you.

[ One more inhale, shaking and difficult, before he summons his will and lets the fingers within his grasp loosen, drops his other hand away from Yu. He steps back, forces himself to make eye-contact in spite of the pain of it, gently pulling his hand free.

A small smile, not of the jester's mania or pantomimes so common, touches his lips. There's gratitude in its wavering form--gratitude and heartbreak.

Again he speaks, though he can scarcely hear the sound of himself over the crashing inside his own head: ]

Bye, Yu.

[lotusmesenpai]

[Why is it that, in every life, every incarnation of his damned soul, he's given these little glimpses of something so exquisite it can only ever be impossible to grasp?

Like the warmth of a playful touch, the enticing curve of soft lips... the shared promises of a future taken long before it can be fulfilled.

Or the annoying voice that followed him, of childish tones raised in anger and frustration, of laughter shared through the agony of broken bodies mending, taken from him once by his own hand then again by fates too twisted to give them a respite.

And now...

Now it seemed to be by a will that might well be more stubborn than his own, by someone that has never had to live through several lifetimes of regret at having let a hand go, of not being able to grasp it again. Because some part of him can recognize it, this self-maiming pain newly reflected in a single eye.

How could he not?

He's seen it lingering, unabated despite time or faulty memories every time he saw or sees his reflection in the mirror, feels the relentless stabbing pain of it in memories forgotten -ones determined to force him to live though the agony of it, hour after hour, night after night in nightmares that refuse to let him rest.

It leaves him exhausted, absolutely weary to the bone... and, now, blindingly furious.

Because some part of him - some part that he doesn't fully understand, that knows the pain of loss repeated and compounded time and time again - is damned tired of never being good enough, strong enough, to catch something precious before circumstance shatters them against each other.

So maybe this time, just this once... he can be the one to choose the shatterpoint.]

Fuck that - and fuck you, bastard.

[Softly spoken words made all the harsher with the quiet roil of emotions too chaotic for him to separate out, to catch long enough to define - this, Lavi's only warning before Kanda simply moves.

Hands cutting up to catch the other man by the shoulders, he slams Lavi back against the corridor none-too-gently, his gaze hard, the lingering sense of longing mixed now with something not quite anger but far more than frustration.

Because, honestly, what had Lavi expected, saying something like that?

Did he really think he could give an admission like that and then simply walk away with nothing more than resigned acceptance from this particular man?

Kanda wasn't someone that could turn the tide with a well spoken word - he didn't have the ability to dispute such a claim with a quick rejoin that would wake the man before him the hell up. Oh, he knows, on some visceral level, that he could fight Lavi's demons if they were made manifest between them, but this isn't some ghost lingering in the widening space between.

So far as he can tell, it's not even some hallucination instructing to press a divide, now.

No, this is just Lavi, telling Kanda that 'Yu' has to be the one strong enough to save Lavi from himself. To protect a legacy that demanded Lavi let go his humanity and become even the kind of monster that Kanda could never be.

The only problem with that is that Kanda has no desire to do so.

Maybe I do want to ruin him, after all.

Stepping in quickly to press the advantage, he keeps his gaze locked on Lavi's as he spits out, the words an angry challenge.]

If you want hate, you'll have to be the one to fucking do it - I refuse. So fuck you for trying to make me.

[As if to prove this point, to drive the spike of them home between them, his fingers tighten further around the hard curve of shoulders as he closes the distance, bodies not quite touching beyond the sudden mesh of lips slanting over lips with a focused intent, purpose and desire in the firm press.]

[inksplashes]

[ Anger boils and it's almost comforting in its consistency, the repetition of fights between them like a well-practiced discipline. But this time, rather than firmly behind the walls imposed by order and discipline, he's bare and exposed to the cut of those words, and he feels their rage burning into his brain like a newly-formed scar.

But that's better, he knows, because this aspect of human interaction he can weather. The wounds imposed from those bitter words will lay open on his soul for as long as he can keep them, a staunch reminder of the perils that might arise if he forgets his place again.

The threat of violence, too, is a familiar friend, but rather than embrace that friend in like kind, he can hardly muster the energy to raise his hands in defensive greeting, palms exposed in a sign of surrender moments too late. The impact with the corridor wall isn't particularly pleasant, and in his still fever-burned and crumbling state, he thinks, just momentarily, that it might be sufficient to send his wayward mind back to the depths it never should have emerged from.

And wouldn't that be a charity if it did? A kindness, it seems, he will be denied, because the force of the move is not, he realizes, the source of his pain.

No, it's the way Kanda is looking at him that has his breath stalling and wishing to never return, it's the certain animosity in those words that makes his eye burn with the threat of drowning itself.

Please, he thinks pitifully, unable to hold the icy glare leveled his way for longer than a second, I never--

The world goes white and then gray, cycles through a dizzying array of confused colors as the long shadow casts against his face darkens under the approach. His thoughts, already mania riddled and dowsed in paranoia, swoop in and around him like carrion birds seeking their feast of flesh, whispering promises of something exquisitely painful and absolutely deserved.

None of their ghostly predictions ring true, for those facets of his broken mind never once entertain the idea that his apparent infatuation could be anything but one-sided. And perhaps it still is, perhaps this is just some cruel means of punishment to make the pain of departure that much deeper.

The raised hands find home inside the collar of Yu's shirt, their intent, as always, to push away.

But again, for all that he knows he should, no, that he must remember himself and the obligations set upon him, his own selfish fears and desires interfere.

Even if this is just a ploy to hurt him, if this kiss is a bite in the form of taunted desires, then why should he not let himself fall into the punishment of it, enjoy the momentary fruit of it?

After what feels like a small millennium, Lavi pulls at the lapels held at distance, melding his shaking, tired body into the firmer stature of his partner. Lips part faintly, a gentler answer of force than those posed against him, and the shudder throughout him is one of both heart-rend and heat, a heartbreaking desire laden with self-loathing but wanting nonetheless.

He closes his eyes, lets the watery wells there disperse against long lashes, soaking the darkened half-moons hidden beneath patch and ember-shaded fringe.

Then do it, he thinks, one hand rising to scrape along Yu's nape, gather in the dark forest of hair there as Lavi advances the second kiss, desperate hunger in the shaky press of lips, Ruin me until I can't bear to leave you ever again.

It's what he wants more than anything in this world, even if it's taken him this long to realize it. ]

[lotusmesenpai]

[He couldn't have said why, of all the reactions he could have had to those words from Lavi... why he'd stepped in to something so intimate, something undeniably real. But it had been a line crossed without hesitation or doubt.

And it had been a line crossed, in anger and frustration and fear of losing something that means so very much more.

But the shock of seeing that spark of desire in the other's eye before crimson lashes fell to hide it, of feeling his partner yield into the advance, the way slightly chapped lips parted beneath his own... of their bodies pressed flush once again, just before the shock of something warm, wet hitting his wrist...

The anger drains out of him with a shudder at those tears, leaving only a resonating sense of desperation in its wake, the realization that this is something neither of them can afford to lose.

Him, because Lavi makes him human - he brings color and chaos into the too regimented life he's clinging to - and Lavi, because without this, he'd all too easily cast aside the humanity Kanda can still see within him. He'd lose that degree of compassion, of decency, just to sit back and watch atrocities unfold with a removed gaze, stuck lifeless just beyond the edge of being alive.

It's enough to cause another shudder to chase itself down Kanda's spine before he shifts, one arm dropping to slide once more around Lavi's waist, both an offer of strength to hold the other man up and an apology for the forcefulness of the moment before while the other hand glides slowly over, palm a light caress as his hand traces along the curve of a shoulder, the warmth of the other man's neck, until the caress settles to cradle the sharp line of Lavi's jaw, his thumb absently catching the damp lines on pale cheeks as he delves deeper into the kiss.

It feels like there's demand and a plea in the way his partner's lips tremble against his, that normally fierce and playful mouth still firm and yet now yielding, letting him taste the demand in the way they crush and glide against his own.

It's chaotic, leaves him twisting, breathless against their mutual assault... and utterly unable to step away, now.

Not that he wants to, at all. Instead, he deliberately draws back just enough to gasp in a ragged breath, and then he's diving in once more, the crush of his lips sure, insistent as the tip of his tongue darts out to trace the seam between lips, an intentionally slow, slick glide, another barrier crosses in order to answer desperation with desire, want with need.]

[inksplashes]

[ Whispers of the deep linger yet at the periphery of his thoughts, twining cadences clashing with one another to coalesce into a ghostly trill of a past forgotten and a future feared. Always, that sharp, cold note of analytics and pessimistic expectations rises above the supporting ensemble, slithering along his vertebrae in an icy, serpentine path of you can't do this and this is all your fault.

But for the first time, that vicious logic finds contest in its climb, a second coil of fire and desire sweeping down its frozen paths, alighting the nerves in its wake in white embers.

It isn't real, the long-time companion of doubt murmurs, you aren't even real—

An arm winds around him like a spool, holding the threads of him together, giving shape to the tangled spirit within. No, this pantomime of a human called Lavi isn’t real, but for this moment, he is tangible, corporeal.

Maybe, he wishes desperately, I can be real, for just a little while, if I can stay here in these arms.

The tender hands obstructing tears leaving cold swaths on fevered skin, those hands might mold him into something real, something that can outlive the drying of ink.

—and he knows he should fear that more than any act of war or violence that could be laid upon him, but he can't. Not when his heart races with a newfound measure of frenzy, his skin quaking in the pulses of that beat, clamoring without abandon or the usual safeguard of logic.

Because when the kiss breaks, he feels it like a fracture in his very being, as if his soul has been plunged into icy waters that wash away the fragile constructs of his existence without mercy or pause.

His fingers grip tighter in the nest of cloth, urging, pleading voicelessly what his trembling lips can't summon.

Don’t—I’m not ready to fade away again—

But the fear has seldom a moment to build between desperate breaths before he's pulled right back into the warmth of Kanda's mouth, lips pliant and eager to welcome the slick tongue at their threshold. A groan emanates from somewhere low in his chest, vibrating against the coalescing heat of tongues meeting and exploring, twisting and winding.

He wants, above all else, to fall into this moment so far and fast that he can't remember the things that would haunt his waking world, that even those voices crowding the edge of his mind fall into grave silence.

His hands, the traitors that started this foolish escapade, move again without conscious thought, seeking the warmth of skin as they dance down from the sharp angle of nape and collar, tremulously sliding until they catch the hem of shirt and dive beneath. Smooth planes of muscle spark the fever in his mind to the transverse of flesh, his body achingly insatiably for more – more of that skin against him, those arms around him.

It leaves him breathless, and when his lungs demand the air stolen from them without leniency, he’s forced to tear himself apart and let the contact of lips break again. Struggling, shuddering with the effort to regain the lost oxygen in the heated atmosphere around him, he dares a glance up, green washed bright with the recent presence of tears.

Unguarded, uncertain. As much fear as there is entreaty in the fever-burned look. ]

I—

[ Where are the words the ordinarily serve him so well? A speechless soothsayer serves no one, least of all Lavi. ]

I didn’t think—you, I mean—

I didn’t know.

[ How either of them felt, if this is to be believed as more than the fancy of disease. ]

[lotusmesenpai]

[It's intoxicating and addicting, this slow slick glide of tongues, the way Lavi's lips feel as they tease over his own, the silent mantra of wanting more, to feel more, taste more pushing him to delve in deeper still, causes him to let out a low groan, a delicious shiver following in the wake of an exploring hand until he feels that first brush of fingertips against bare flesh.

He shudders softly at the warm glide of a hand, the hint of nails tracing flesh, utterly lost in the moment until the the need to breathe becomes too great, forces Lavi to break contact, leaves him breathless and staring, caught in a near unbearably open gaze.

It's enough, for the moment, to (mostly) alleviate his earlier fears - though he can still hear the way that 'bye' had echoed with a stark finality, still feel the mind-numbing panic that had pierced his heart that whatever Lavi had been seeing was enough to make the other man disappear.

It's selfish, he knows, but he's not ready to lose this - especially this, now - but more... having this man there by his side, fighting with and beside him, challenging him in ways Kanda had never thought possible. And there are so few things he's selfish on, but this...

Would this closeness, this new degree of intimacy really ruin his partner, or just stop the progression of personalities? Could he live with shattering that part of this man?

He's not entirely sure, because while there is some part of him feels like it's a degree of guilt that he can live with... there's another part that wonders if it would cause this desire to fester into hate, for taking something away from the man before him.

It's not something he can figure out now, nor does he have the capacity of clarity to try. Not when Lavi is looking at him like that. With no walls and no barriers between them, vulnerable in a way he's never been.

It's enough to have his breath catch, the hand at the other's back pulling them ever closer while the other slides back to card slowly through sleep-mussed locks. Slowly, he leans in, lips ghosting over a cheek, the corner of the too bright eye, down to trace lips in a featherlight caress once, twice, before they press at the corner of Lavi's mouth.]

Maybe... maybe we're both idiots then, for not realizing.

[It's almost calming, to say it - to admit it. Enough so that something else slithers in to catch his awareness... Lavi's hand feels like it's burning against his bare skin, warms his own hands a little too much. Impulsively, he traces his nose along a damp cheek, darts his tongue out to slowly catch the lingering evidence of tears along a jaw before he whispers beside his partner's ear.]

But you're still too warm. You need rest, and probably food... [Breath catching, his eyes fall shut, temple resting against temple, more care than he knows how to voice there in the way he's holding, supporting, Lavi.] Just don't push me away, not this time.

[inksplashes]

[ Eclipsed in the half-moon of Yu’s arms, he draws nearer, the hand at his back acting upon him like a tidal force. Here, between the cradle of slim shoulders and the steady, unwavering strength in the limbs braided around him, he feels so impossibly alive in spite of the weakness settled into his bones. It’s at once a sense of being adrift and anchored, of being lost to the undulating currents of the seas yet buoyant enough to stay afloat.

Being alive, he finds, is not a singular experience or emotion, and it’s not entirely pleasant and it’s not entirely perfect, but the edges of fear and the worries of reason only serve to make the moment more startlingly real.

Lavi loosens his grip, hands sliding away from taut muscle to find a new home along the tops of shoulders, his arms lifted weakly to thread around Kanda’s neck while delicate kisses feather against his face. The fire in him still burns for that which he is far too weak and far too broken to satiate in his current state, but more than the siren call of lust, it’s this tender intimacy that he craves most deeply.

This tender, strange, really quite absurd intimacy. Laughter, soft and subdued by stark comparison to his usual bright ring, rises at the wet glide of a tongue, a weak smile hugging his lips as he makes a show of trying to dry his cheek off on the cloth of his raised shoulders.

His mirth dies short at the whisper, at first out of sullen acknowledgment – he hasn’t eaten properly in days and he can feel the frenzy of his mind stirred beyond its normal limits with the continued fever, but even so…

Lavi opens his mouth to offer the ill-conceived and admittedly petulant arguments, the first whisper of interjection scarcely past his tongue when the last words strike a terrible, shrilling chord within him.

"…not this time."

Because there will be other times, won’t there? Just as he has done in the past, he will surely build those barriers again, pouring the walls around him as deep and stalwart as he can. Even burned and muddled out of his right mind, he knows this to be true, knows it as a student of historical patterns and with his own small, tremulous thread of self-awareness.

His eyes sting again, vision blurring with the fresh rise of unbidden tears held at bay by lashes.

Lavi can offer nothing by way of rejoinder for that, no oaths upon his tongue that would ring anything but false.

All that he can offer is this moment, this confusing, painful moment. Head dropping down in an effort to contain his unruly emotions, Lavi buries his nose under Yu’s ear, chin settled in the cushion of his own arm as he chokes back the urge to sob and wills his voice not to break. ]

I.. I won’t. Not right--not now.

[ Softer, swallowing hard against the lump settled in his throat— ]

Please don’t let me disappear, even if I beg you. I don’t want to lose this feeling.

[ But he will, though forgetfulness will smooth out the brunt of it, hollowing him out and imparting only the vague sense that there was a time, that there was this moment, where he knew what it was to be whole. ]

[lotusmesenpai]

[I don't want to lose this feeling.

It's a stark admission, and one Kanda knows he would not have received so openly had Lavi been wholly in his right mind.

That it takes the other man this much, to be this far gone with a disease that they cannot rid themselves of so easily, to gain such a naked measure of truth... it's a weight to carry, whether Kanda wants to accept it or not. Because this?

This isn't 'Lavi's' truth, and it's not 'Bookman Junior's'. No, this is the remnants of whatever remains of the original soul within this man, long since buried under a menagerie of personas. It's from that rare glimpse of someone else, mixed with the sweeping strokes of what comprises the parts of 'Lavi' that are slowly, painfully, becoming just as real as 'Yu'.

It's not something Kanda is willing to let go, not at any price.

A wager then, this thing Lavi's asking of him. To pit his own resolve against the mysteries of his partner's past, the stubbornness of someone attempting to abandon their soul and ground it all at once...

Only once before did he attempt such a promise. The memory of it is hazy, uncertain as it rings through his fevered mind, and yet he can feel the lingering loss of it all the same. The promise to look for 'that person', the longing for them... the loss of them.

And in this moment, he falters.

"He's the one person I didn't want to lose!"

"Just watch... until my soul is crushed..."

"Please don’t let me disappear"

Reflexively, Kanda's arms tighten around Lavi, fingers carding through ember shaded locks to cradle the back of his partner's head - the decision made before his conscious mind could fully grasp the depth of memory, the echo of loss a goad to quicken his determination, now, as he shifts back just enough to press his forehead to a fever-warmed one before him.

And this time, when he speaks, there's an unmistakable note of finality, of an unconquerable will behind the words being issued to tether his soul.]

Whether it's you or anyone else - I won't let this go to anyone. This is ours, and I'll be damned or dead before either of us lose it. That I can damn sure promise you.

[inksplashes]

[ Like an oath sworn beneath hallowed halls--and perhaps they are hallowed, for what else should be held in reverence if not a place of home--those words still the clanging noise inside his chest, settle the rattle of his breath. A wisp of air passes through his lips, not quite a sigh but certainly heavy with a sense of relief.

Of all that he's said and done in the last few moments, it's the sense of reprieve washing through him that speaks greatest of trust. He's startled by it, the realization that he's not only willing to put such a grave task in Yu's hands, but that he believes in the resolve of them.

That such a resolve should exist, for someone--no, something like him--

Lavi's efforts to hold back the building tears falls short, long lashes releasing their watery prisoners once more. He makes a pained, breathless sound in some semblance of laughter, wishing like hell he wasn't so afflicted with emotion.

No, that too is wrong. If he were any less dazed by the merciless progression of sickness, he wouldn't be where he is, and though that place may be like a trembling fool in his partner's arms, it's where he wants to be.

The place that he belongs.

Swallowing again, Lavi nods weakly, the ghost of a smile on his mouth as lips finds the edges of Yu's in a quivering kiss, softer than before. Not driven by lust or desperation but simple affection, gratitude given tangible form.

Whispered softly against skin, the shake of his voice is nearly imperceptible now, and while it's not the fierce declaration that Kanda so seamlessly delivered--it has a similar gravity for him-- ]

Okay. I believe you.

[ "I trust you."

Drawing back, his arms slip down, hand catching on the edge of a sharp jaw gently. He'd done this same movement just before Gramps had slid into the darkness of broken memory, but the texture and experience of it is different now. The skin feels softer, shines brighter, everything about Yu cast in a charmed light to him.

Emotions, he thinks, really are the most dangerous drugs for the mind.

Shifting his head away (he can feel the heat building between pressed brows, the growing fever trapped beneath the blend of black and orange hair), Lavi tries for a second smile, a second, slightly less shaky kiss chastely laid against the frame of a sharp cheekbone. ]

Sorry. 'M getting you all wet. We should--I should eat before I cry on you more.

[lotusmesenpai]

[Something Kanda’s never really known what to do with, is deal with a person crying. It’s ever been something that leaves him at a loss, and with anyone else, he would have recoiled at being subjected to it.

As it is, all he can really do is ignore the awkward helplessness of it and wait out the storm with a patience he’s rarely shown anyone – because in this, it’s certainly not just anyone.

Lavi is someone that Kanda knows is strong, steady, but human all the same – for all that he tries to be otherwise. So as many times as this man has tried to help him in recent months, has stood beside him, watched him struggle against fractures within his own mind… in this moment, Kanda can do no less than carry the weight of Lavi’s own guilt and release, the acknowledgement in those quiet words of faith.

One brush of lips, another to ghost over his own face, lips leaving a lingering warmth in their wake, before he answers that attempt at a smile with a smaller, quieter one of his own, head shaking lightly to negate the apology.]

…Don’t be stupid. I’ll dry.

[But then he cants his head to the side, brows furrowing slightly as he shifts back somewhat reluctantly, the arm slung low around his partner staying firm despite the shift.]

C’mon… I saved the soup from earlier. Think you’re steady enough to make it to the couch?

[inksplashes]

[ "You would let him destroy you, then?"

Yes.

"You would forsake your oaths for this man?"

I already have.

He is uncertain if the voice within the recesses of his brain is illusory or not, if it stems from some outer-source of judgment or from his own self-loathing, but he answers in good faith, safe to make such confessions within his own thoughts.

His answers, like all other rivulets of truth gleaned from kisses both hard and soft, from touches supportive and violent, add to the startling procession of the night. He is certain that he's given to a form of madness for such things to even be possible, but he is equally assured that it's a madness hastened by disease and not conceived by it.

Those answers have been within him for much longer than the sickness, and though they make themselves clear to him only now, he knows their shape and texture with time-worn familiarity, as of a friend whose face is erased by time but memory remains cherished.

And it is this same madness, certainly, that brings hesitation to his lips to answer Yu now. Turning to dry his face on a roughly-clothed shoulder, he laments to release his hold or have himself released in turn. Much of him wishes to lie, though it would only be a half lie, and return with a resounding denial of his abilities so that he might keep himself anchored in these arms that little bit longer.

But even in his broken, addled state, he is not without pride, and if only for this moment in time, Lavi is unwilling to offer needless lies. He nods, again a weak motion, gaze downcast, his hand leaving the warm cusp of Yu's face to finish brushing away the evidence of stalled-again tears. ]

Probably. The old geezer will yell at me even more if I don't try.

[ He steps away, gently pushing at the arm around him in spite of himself, minding the corridor now as his auxiliary support if need should arise. A thought occurs to him that's quite humorous, and in the low shadows of the hallway, his grin cuts through the otherwise frantic fever of his face as he begins steady but uncertain steps towards the rec room. ]

He'll probably take your hair tie again. S'okay though. I like your hair better when it's down.

[lotusmesenpai]

[They'd gotten so close to relaxing... so close to thinking the brunt of the storm had passed. But Lavi's casual statements elicits tension once more, deep in Kanda's gut. He's careful, this time, to hide that fissure of alarm deep within himself as he lets his hold on his partner get pushed aside, begins to walk at an unhurried pace alongside this man.

He can see the grin, warmed slightly as if recalling humorous memories, and it gives him pause.

Because he's had a similar moment - with Lapis, not too long ago, in fact.

And though the memory still isn't clear... he can recall a sense of the familiar, of someone or something so real, that carried the weight of a bond old and worn and cherished, that he isn't ready to poke at that for Lavi.

Instead...]

Can't have that - think I yell enough lately for all of us.

[Pausing, he slips his hands into his pockets, the perfect image of easy nonchalance as he cuts his partner a sidelong glance.]

It's not that easy to take my hairties. He might lose.

[inksplashes]

[ The rigidity of muscles, the faint twitch of a jaw as it clamps down on words of warning--all of these things he would normally see, should see, because what does Kanda know of subversion?

Even his best kept secrets are there because of Lavi's good graces, because of his willingness to avert his gaze.

Mired in the confusion and haze of his very human weakness, the restrained concern slips by unnoticed, the illusion maintained. Laughter, wheezing and painful in his ribs, flows softly from his lips, one hand posted against the wall as he draws to a pause.

I'm winded, he thinks, and I don't think it was just the kiss.

Not that it wasn't perfectly worthy of taking the breath out of his lungs--it was more than that, it was the kind of kiss he's read in literature and thought surely couldn't be real--

And it's definitely, unquestionably something he wants to do again--

But he's weak, too drained and muddled with sickness. What hope did he ever have of escaping?

Sighing, Lavi pushes off the wall, tries to mimic his own look of nonchalance. ]

Kinda like it when you yell too. Your face gets all..

[ Vague hand motions that are evidently meant to provide an illustration but mostly look like he's going to present prizes behind curtain number three. (Lavi White.) ]

..It's cute.

[ Did he just call Yu cute, aloud and without any sense of irony?

Yeah, he's not well. ]

[lotusmesenpai]

[Part of him wants to bring the conversation back to this 'old man' that Lavi seems to be familiar with and yet... it seems that same image had been the one to push Lavi into trying to leave in the first place.

It seems too much like tempting fate, to invite that vision back to stand between them.

Perhaps, then, he should keep Lavi focused on the here and now, rather than what only one can see. Something easy enough to do, if the hand waving and those words are any indication, enough to stir disbelief sharp and bright.

Because did Lavi really just call him...]

...Cute, huh?

[There's definitely more than a trace of amusement in Kanda's voice as he watches Lavi, head canted to the side, the hint of a smile teasing at the corners of his mouth before he finally steps closer. Without hesitation, he pulls one of Lavi's hands out of his pocket and slips an arm low around his partner's waist, fingers catching a beltloop and curling through.

This close he arches a brow as the trace of a smile curls into a teasing smirk, face mere inches from Lavi's.]

Is that why you seem to enjoy pissing me off? To watch me lose my temper?

[inksplashes]

[ Regret, sure and swift, chases after those words in the form of common sense, a grimace prepared and mind braced for the storm of expected reprise. One most certainly does not call Kanda Yu cute without anticipating and weathering an angry, and admittedly equally endearing, fount of curses sent their way.

At least, ordinarily.

But this situation is far from ordinary, he reminds himself, and when the answer is instead a twist of lips warmed with amusement, his own mouth replies with a mild grin. Tension, reflexive and long-conditioned by proximity, drains away just as quickly as it arrives, posture visibly relaxing into the warm cradle of a once-more encircling arm.

I could get used to this, Lavi thinks, leaning forward that incremental distance to bring them flush again. He could get used to the feeling of solid and sure weight against him, to the sweet comforts of a touch given without any trace of hesitation.

(How many people in this universe have reached for him without reserve or ulterior motive? Of them, how many knew him, not the persona or the scholar but the nebulous creature caught between them, and still offered their warmth freely?

None, save for this stubborn, impossibly kissable creature.) ]

Hn?

[ Distracted by the shape of pale lips curled in challenge, Lavi misses the initial question, too focused on the sound of the low tease to capture its meaning on the first pass. ]

Oh. Sure.

[ Shaking his head faintly (and remembering, sharply, not to do as much), the redhead lifts a hand again, palm turned to cradle Yu's cheek. His thumb slides softly, almost reverently, across that inviting smirk, attention now fine-tuned as if studying the way Yu’s mouth curves is the most important thing he's ever been tasked with.

(And to him, in this moment, it is.)

Tipping his head down, he leans forward to brush lips against lips, the touch a teasing phantom interspersed with a low hum of contentment. Softly, he presses a second kiss to the corner of the upturned mouth, thumb brushing a slow arc as his palm slides to frame the other man's jaw. ]

Mm. It's one of the perks, yeah. And it gets me kissed, so even better.

[lotusmesenpai]

[Yet another lesson swiftly learned this night - it is near impossible to keep one's thoughts on visions and hallucinations, or delusions meant to draw someone astray, when one's partner steps in to bring your bodies flush once more, when you can feel the heat of him in every press from thighs to chest, when he looks at you as if your own lips are the only thing staving off insanity.

There's want there, and a spark of desire that skitters down Kanda's spine, hits him low in the gut, as if Lavi intended to poke once more at a recently banked heat.

But then a feather-light brush of lips, so simple and surprisingly sweet and it's enough steal any attempts at drawing a breath.

Because that can only be tenderness. That is affection without reservation and from this particular man... he has no defense set against that.

I...I want to keep this, don't I?

Lashes flicker, fall, before Kanda turns slightly to brush kiss-swollen lips against a shifting palm, mind racing because he knows the answer, can feel it in the way the erratic thump in his chest quickens all the more. This intimacy, the comfort therein, the ease with which they've fallen into it - it's precious to him, in a way he could not have anticipated.

In a way that slides under his skin, shatters through any barriers he'd raised over the years, clarity through understanding slams into him now.

He wants this intimacy with this man, his trusted partner and closest friend.

He wants this person, this being caught somewhere between the bookman and the killjoy, with all his annoying habits and infuriating jibes, with his ill-concealed concern and the strength that resides within. He wants it all, no matter the cost.

I'm fucked.

It's the last thought, an honest thought, before he turns his head back, lips seeking out lips with surprising tenderness, light pressure, the drag and press slow in answer to Lavi's statement because yes, for now, it's definitely going to get him kissed.]

[inksplashes]

[ It is not enough, he thinks, to study just this kiss and the press of the curved mouth as it bestows tender sweetness on him. He wants for nothing more than to drag Yu from room to room in this ship so that he might experience it in all of its different colors and textures. So that he might experience Yu in the same way, because it's all different now, this warmth that lights the other man's presence like the perpetual cast of the sun.

It changes things, changes him.

Yet cloistered in the gentle slide of lips against his own, he cannot hold onto this desire or train of thought to carry it out. The hunger of earlier twists within him again, a hot, writhing pressure that drives him a little deeper into the kiss and a little further away from contemplation.

Instead of careful observation, he can think only--we're never going to make it to the rec-room at this rate--and he relents and relinquishes to as much willfully.

Because he is certain that he needs to eat, but the hunger is not one sated with food.

And he is certain that he needs to rest, but it's as if he's only just now been woken from a lifelong slumber.

Above all else, he is certain that these needs which deepen by the second can be granted by only this man.

(It is a frightful thing, to realize that another human has so much control over him, but this too slips away from him, because though it is something to be feared, he does not know how to feel it.)

It in this moment, crisp and sharp and alive, he understands the madness of the fall, grasps the why of the language used to describe it--

Because he is utterly, hopelessly, stupidly in love. He has been in love, not fiercely falling or immediately succumbing, but gently dissolving in the chaos of it, and he knows now what to call these confused and much too fierce emotions. He knows what terrible force had kept him from pushing Yu away, and to acknowledge it, even to himself, releases a weight he had no realized carried.

A fool from the start, Lavi thinks ruefully but smiles, whole and warm, I really was ruined long before now.

He draws back, mouth numb and tingling, forehead pressed against Yu's, the hand that had held to jaw now nestled in cloth over his partner's back, the other twining and threading fingers together like a delicate lattice. ]

I...

[ Softly he begins, and sharply he stops. He is not yet brave enough to say what he knows to be true, though the words gather at his mouth and crowd at his teeth. No, he's not ready for that, because acknowledging it for himself is already a feat beyond his normal, and he cannot say it aloud for fear of allowing to be rendered false later.

Still, at this moment, he says to himself: am so stupidly in love with you, and he smiles as he says these things mentally, you bastard.

To this he shakes his head again (reminded, again, not to do that by the slap of pain that results), exhaling out what he cannot say. ]

..don't think I'm gonna have the energy to get to the couch, at this rate.

[ Words meant to warn, though whether that warning is directed to Lavi or Yu isn't clear immediately. When he leans forward again, lips pressed to lips, tongue tapping lightly at the bow of them, the intended recipient of that cautioning is illuminated.

Himself. Most certainly himself, though he does as all men must with good advice and promptly ignores it. ]

[lotusmesenpai]

[The shift from slow and lingering, from a sweetly exploring tenderness to something with a little more heat - without losing that nearly reverent way with which they begin to understand each other - it's quite nearly overwhelming for Kanda.

And yet, he's unwilling to let this go, to lose even a moment of it, because this?

This moment with this man - it's making him feel alive in a way he never has. It's a gift of Lavi's, this ability to draw out the parts of Kanda that remind him of his own humanity, evokes an equal desire to do the same for this impossible person that seems so hell bent on throwing away this same innate nature within himself.

It's a spark that Kanda has seen in the depths of a too sharp gaze, that draws him in time and time again, relentlessly ever closer, until there's finally nothing left between them to hide behind.

And it's a spark that he wants to give back, to see ignite within Lavi so brightly that there's no way his stubborn partner can ever consider smothering it, to keep him from taking it away from either of them now or ever again...

The realization comes swift, of everything he's willing to sacrifice within himself, of how far he's willing to go, to break himself against the wall of his partner's past, shatter himself if he has to just to keep this.

To selfishly not lose 'Lavi', or the parts of him that make 'Bookman' or the fragments of the man left standing in between...

Because he is not 'Yu' without this man, doesn't even know how to be - not anymore.

So when Lavi finally draws back enough to smile, the vibrancy of it is enough to rob Kanda of the ability to catch his own breath, solidifies this conviction with a breathless resolve.

Because that, right there. He wants to capture that and hold it, that unfettered happiness, no matter what.

And it's only when Lavi rests their foreheads together again, when he can feel the way the other man leans into their touches, relaxes into the embrace that he can finally manage to breathe again - and even then, it's a softly shuddered breath that slips out past trembling lips.

It almost feel like too much, too acute, too hard, too enveloping, too fast - and no where near enough.

Not when every tease of breath, every shift of cloth against skin, every faint press of bodies as they brush past each other with each little movement - not when it all serves to pass the heat of the moment between their frames. It's more than enough to leave him hyper-aware, wanting in a way that is nearly enough to evoke fear were it not for the gentle press of a hand at his back, the caress of warm breath over his lips to soothe all at once.

It's chaos, but a chaos that only Lavi has ever been able to evoke within him, and so he lets it sweep him into it in this moment, lips parting with a whispered laugh just enough to grant entrance, a shiver sparking down his spine at the slow, slick glide as his own tongue slips forward to meet Lavi's, even as his hand presses more firmly against his partner's back.

Better to step back slowly into his room, careful to take Lavi with him, to draw the other man back to the safety of a bed, if the couch is to far.]

[inksplashes]

[ Senses gilded with the patina of adoration—that consuming power where everything about the other person is impossibly perfect and charming—Yu has never looked or felt so maddening to him. He recognizes the irrational air of it, the absolute failure to be objective, his eye the beholder of a beauty too captivating to possibly be real, but he doesn't care.

No, that's inaccurate. He doesn't mind. He cares so much that his body trembles under the gravity of it, that his heart feels raw with the effort to hold as much of it as he can. Over and over he repeats the words to himself, a mantra which begins uncertain and hardens into pieces of resolve with each revolution: I am in love.

They should be damning, those words. They should take the breath from him, but they’re much too late, much too slow for that. How could they take a thing from him when it’s already been claimed by Yu? When the air he breathes is the borrowed magic of the other man’s presence, of his touch and his whispered laughter?

So instead of spurring recoil, they spark drive and demand, ricocheting against the cascading waves of want sliding down his spine. When his steps fall a little too slowly over the threshold of the room and Yu gains more distance than he’d like, Lavi growls without reservation, the sound warning and low.

Don’t you dare, are the words he’d say if his lips were not otherwise occupied exploring the temple of Yu's mouth, tongues sliding against one another, sometimes delicately, sometimes with unabashed hunger. When the bed enters his periphery, he flicks his tongue against the cavern of Yu’s mouth like a motion of beckoning, drawing away with a ragged gasp and frustrated groan.

It shouldn’t be possible for the body to disagree on so many impulses. To yearn for the excitement of lust while demanding the reprieve of rest.

To hell with this fever, he thinks bitterly, clambering onto the bed and pulling Yu along with him without any opportunities for protest. From the moment they touch the mattress, he tangles himself in Yu’s limbs, his knee sliding between thighs, every surface of him pressed to every surface available.

It’s sweet torture, this agony of a desire he hasn’t the strength to satiate, and it is absolutely exquisite in its magnitude.

Kiss bruised lips pulled into a weak smile, he brushes the back of knuckles across Yu's cheek, lightly smoothing away bangs. Though he isn't willing to utter his mantra aloud, it's written on his face, in the affection of his whisper. ]

Stay with me until I fall asleep? I feel like I have so much to tell you but I don't know what to say. You're beautiful. I want you. I'm sleepy. I want you.

[ A pause before he laughs softly, leaning forward to place a tortuously chaste kiss against Yu's cheek. ]

Actually, that about covers it. I want a nap and you.

[lotusmesenpai]

[Between the two of them, there is definitely a large degree of cursing this damned plague, or cold, or whatever it is. Because the last thing he wants to do is to stop now.

The last thing he wants to do sleep.

But what he wanted and what Lavi needed just then were two very different things, and so despite the way fingers teased along skin, the feel of those knuckles, that kiss, brushing his cheek, despite the way Lavi was trying to drive him crazy with a damned knee - he groaned and slid to the side, tucked himself against Lavi.

Legs tangled, arm thrown with a lazy carelessness across his partner's chest, he lay there, propped on an elbow to look down at Lavi.]

You're an idiot, so sleep. You need it.

[He hesitates a moment before leaning back down, noses brushing and lips hovering over lips, a tease to both their senses, a small smile curving his lips.]

You're going to need it, because I want this. You. So take your damned nap - I'll be here when you wake.

/fin

[inksplashes]

[ Protest is there, an argument ready to be made that he can surely get the nap later and he didn't list his wants in a strict order--but it's pointless. Already he can feel the tethers of the conscious world beginning to unfurl around him, the call for rest resonating throughout his very marrow.

A lazy smile, part relaxed and part weak, quirks under the warmth of lips again, a teasing shiver whispering along his nerves in ready subservience to encroaching sleep.

He murmurs, lashes weighing heavy-- ]

Better be. You promised.

[ And I'm gonna hold you to it, he thinks, turning slightly to bury his face in the dark shroud of hair and breathe deep. Just a nap..

.. which will twist into hours upon hours, and when he wakes, he will be sure that he's missing something as critical to his heart as the blood that moves through it, but he won't be able to find it again.

Even if it's right beside him. ]