(Untitled)

[yourcurrysucks]

Characters: Ciel Phantomhive (other_sights) and Soma Asman Gandal (yourcurrysucks)
When: June 3rd, Late Evening
Where: The Phantomhive Estate
Rating: PG-13 for mild violence.
Summary: Soma's been feeling down lately. And Ciel looks like he's been in need of a hug. So, Soma takes it upon himself to fix this.

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[other_sights]

Sleep did not come peacefully. It rarely did for the young nobleman, and he stubbornly refused to take anything for it. The nightmares had started back up in full force, though exhaustion helped to curb them.

It was one thing to be who he was, sure of himself and his path, confident in his actions and his truths. He knew what he was, and what he could allow himself to be. However, being a child for the past week had changed that. It had taken away the memories, removed the smell of blood, and the weight of the eyepatch on his face. It had taken away the phantom feeling of self-inflicted chains around his heart and left it with the child's ability to become attached, to be close, to care.

Ciel had been, for the past three days, waging a war inside of his mind, slowly killing off every thought and hope and memory that had made him who he was before his tenth birthday. What he had accomplished only through years of self-conditioning had to be hastily rebuilt, and there were flaws, cracks in the surface, no matter how hard he worked to smooth them over. Allen had seen it. Hell, everyone had seen it... and on top of that, he had to deal with the endless questions about who he was, what had happened, and why, why, why.

There were moments he had been close to snapping, close to breaking, close to losing every shred of sanity that he had fought so hard to maintain.

Even in keeping himself together, he understood Soma's loneliness. As a child he had helped to fill that void, something he had sensed more than actually known was there. It was distressing... having to pull back, to abandon, and he was furious at himself for allowing Soma to depend on him in that way in the first place.

He barely felt the disturbance in the mattress, but when he did, both eyes shot open, and he stared into the velvet blackness filled with darker shapes. His fingers closed on the barrel of the pistol under his pillow. Wrong angle. There wasn't enough time to adjust.

As the sheets pulled up, Ciel realized that his back was to the person. Nightmares flashed through his mind, and despite all the conditioning against kidnappers, all the admonishments to remain still, he acted. In one lightning-quick movement he rolled, and brought the handle of the pistol down hard on the side of the dark figure's head. It was by no means hard enough to break the skull, but it would certainly hurt.

Ciel threw off the covers, flipping the gun in his hand, cocked it with his thumb. The snap was loud and threatening in the dim moonlight.

[yourcurry_sucks]

Soma was trained a little in hand-to-hand martial arts and swordfighting. It was required of a prince, something handed down generation after generation as part of the palace's schooling procedures. And even though he had been trained, his reflexes weren't good enough to dodge that sudden movement.

All Soma had in warning was the shift in the mattress, the sheets, and suddenly, pain was exploding in the side of his head. It blacked out his vision for a moment, lips parting to let out a sharp, pained noise. His hand quickly moved to his head, holding the injured area, his ear ringing, eyes pulled tightly shut.

But when he heard the click of the handgun, the prince went dead still.

[other_sights]

He thought he recognized that voice, that jolt of pain, but he couldn't be sure. In the moonlight, one couldn't make out his face or his eyes. The lamp was behind the person standing in the dark.

A tense few seconds passed as Ciel seemed to consider, and his eyes adjusted to the darkness. Finally, the answer clicked into place, and he lowered the gun, letting out a raspy sort of sigh as he raked his fingers back through his hair.

"You," he growled sleepily. "Honestly. You moron, I could have easily killed you." A flip of the gun in his hand, and Ciel slid it back under the pillow, leaning on his hand.

"Why are you in my room?"

[yourcurry_sucks]

His head was throbbing, blossoming from the location of the blow and spreading to the back and front of his head. Soma let his eyes crack up just a little, gleaming golden in the dim light.

Ciel had hit him. It was often that Ciel would snap at him, say something cruel, but it always had been teasing... right? He had always brushed it off, because deep down, Soma knew that Ciel didn't mean it. He knew Ciel was a good person under the surface.

But Ciel had hit him. And aimed a gun at him. And deep down... it scared him, a little. No one had ever hit him before.

All of Ciel's questions went ignored.

"You... hit me..."

[other_sights]

Ciel gave a soft snort, narrowing his eyes, but he felt sure he hadn't done permanent damage. He knew what it felt like to break something, and that hadn't done it. It hadn't been the right angle, for one. Soma would be fine, he was sure of it.

"I didn't know it was you." Ciel shifted, working the covers back over his legs. He didn't explain. He didn't feel like it... or want to, despite the fact that Soma was acting as though he might cry.

He took a moment to think about it. If he didn't salvage the situation somehow, Soma would likely go off on his own like a child, and in the meantime he could be harmed. With another sigh, Ciel shifted to lean back on his hands.

"The bed is one of the prime target areas for kidnapping and assassination," he explained. "I sleep lightly, with this gun. It's very effective. Unfortunately, it's created this troublesome reflex. Sebastian himself can attest to that. I mistook you for a kidnapper."

Shrug.

"Sorry."

Now,

"Why are you in here?"

[yourcurry_sucks]

Soma's eyes shifted down, staring at the bedsheets, his hand still holding the side of his head, fingers buried in his loose hair like the tight grip would stop the throbbing. It was already beginning to dull a little, but the feeling of being struck hung with him more than the actual pain.

Of course the bed was a prime target. He knew. But he hadn't realized. There had always been Agni, and before that, his father's palace guards. There had never been an attempt on his life, or any of his family, for that matter. It wasn't something that he was used to thinking about.

How was Ciel so well prepared for this possibility?

Soma shifted a little, sitting heavily on the edge of the bed, eyes still trained away at the sheets. "... it gets lonely sometimes, being by yourself, you know? Even in a house this small." His eyes turned up just for a second, and then turned to the far wall, above Ciel's head.

"... maybe I thought you needed some cheering up. Maybe I'm a little lonely, too."

[other_sights]

... in the middle of the night? Ciel shut his eyes, and then the rest of the confession spilled forth. Of course. The idiot Prince was always honest, and very much like a child... more a child than Ciel ever allowed himself to be. Of course he was lonely, in this unfamiliar world, without his butler around.

Ciel breathed out, slowly, audibly, and fought down the annoyance at the situation.

"So what do you want me to do about it?"

[yourcurry_sucks]

He gritted his teeth together, making a soft, annoyed groan at the ache in his head. This was only making it worse. Soma's hand slid down from the side of his head to the bridge of his nose, fingers pressing in, rubbing in slow circles.

"I thought that maybe I could... pretend, do things how Agni does sometimes. Stay with you until morning, just so it's not so lonely."

He stood, then, slowly, a smooth movement off the bed. His hand dropped to his side, his other reaching over to rub the bare arm. "But if you don't want to, that's fine." Golden eyes shifted to stare into Ciel's blue; thankfully, in the dim light, he couldn't notice the difference in the eye normally covered by the eyepatch. "I'm just trying to cheer you up."

[other_sights]

Such a selfish Prince. Something tugged at the corner of Ciel's mouth and he shifted, breathing out with a hum. Though Soma was most likely genuinely trying to cheer him up as well, this was primarily for his own benefit.

"I'll give you a tip," Ciel murmured. "When you are trying to get someone to give you something, don't phrase it as "trying to do a favor"." The smirk grew along the edge of his lips, light amusement. "Not unless you are very sure that they want that particular favor granted."

He paused, and without a word, threw down the covers on the opposite side of the bed.

[yourcurrysucks]

Nail on the head, Ciel. Although Soma honestly saw it as more of a mutually beneficial relationship. Cheering Ciel up would help cheer him up. Hey, it had worked so far.

He quirked his lips down into a frown, somewhat confused. His first try at not demanding or outright taking something for once, and he had done it wrong? He opened his mouth to speak, to ask if demanding it really was a better way of going about it, but the movement stopped the words in his throat.

"... you're going to let me?"