[012; Audio: Japanese]

[hidesinhats]

K... Kamui-kun! Subaru-san... Fuuma-san... A-are you all okay?! The windows... If any of you are hurt...

And the kittens, are they--

[He stops speaking abruptly. There's a loud sound. Metal popping as the pipes in the room burst. Subaru was sitting right in the range of one that began squirting water, causing him to get drenched. The communicator

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[underthesakura]

[underthesakura]

[That is a very bad sound--that of rushing water more than anything. It only takes a few seconds for Seishirou to get into the bathroom, and once he's there it only take half a second for him to figure out what happened.]

[He grabs Subaru and hauls him out of the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind both of them, and then turns towards the walk-in closet and pulls the door open. He speaks in a brisk but firm tone as he pulls open the closet door.] Take off your clothes, Subaru-kun.

[And with that said he steps into the closet, making a bee-line for the towels.]

[hidesinhats]

[Of course, Subaru's face turns completely red from the thought of it. But he's shivering, and his other exposed skin is turning pink now, raw from being cold.]

I-I c-can ch-ch-change myself, S-Seishirou-s-san....

[His teeth are chattering, barely able to spit out a full sentence. He doesn't move either, overtaken by how cold he is.]

[underthesakura]

That isn't what I mean. [Seishirou emerges from the closet with four towels in hand. One of them is draped over Subaru's head.]

Take off your clothes and dry yourself off. The water is freezing and you need to warm back up. [The second towels is shaken until it unfolds and gets dropped on the floor, then crammed against the gap under the door. Seishirou starts to do the same with the third towel and gives Subaru a neutral look -- though his tone is firm.] Do it now.

[hidesinhats]

[Subaru understood what Seishirou had meant initially, but it was still embarrassing to have to do this with the elder man watching. But he couldn't really deny that the assassin was completely intimidating right then.]

R-R-Right. I-I'm s-s-sorry...! [Still shivering, he begins to undress. The cold air against his skin causes him to almost whimper, his shivering turning into more of a shake.]

[underthesakura]

[While Subaru starts to undress, Seishirou uses the towel he'd draped over Subaru to start toweling the boy's hair dry, but he starts to undo his coat buttons with his free hand. He doesn't make any remarks about his actions, simply takes Subaru's clothes as he removes them and hangs them up wherever is available.]

[Subaru will be stopped if he tries to go for the closet, though. -- again with no explanation.]

[hidesinhats]

[Really, Subaru is way too cold to even try to make a move. He's having a hard enough time undressing. It's plainly obvious how cold that water, in conjunction with the cold air really is. His skin is completely covered in goosebumps, and he's completely shuddering now from the cold. The boy's teeth were chattering like a pair of joke teeth.

It was enough so that he barely could focus on the embarrassment of being naked in front of Seishirou anymore.]

[underthesakura]

[Well at least he was shivering. If he was shivering his body still had enough energy to try to keep him warm. If he stopped shivering...]

[Seishirou could see that the boy was in no state to disrobe himself so he took it into his own hands, dropping the fourth towel onto the bed and moving to start removing Subaru's clothing. It was a bad sign that he was making no effort to tease the boy -- he just silently worked on undoing the assorted buttons and zippers and ignored everything else. Once Subaru's clothes were all off Seishirou grabbed the unused towel and started to dry his body off.]

[hidesinhats]

[Well, for the time being, at least.]

[It was strange for Subaru as well though. His body tensed up at the feeling of Seishirou's hands. He felt supremely uncomfortable with what was happening, but he was so cold that all he really wanted then was to be warm. Or at least, warmer. The elder man's flesh against his own felt like pins and needles. He flinched a bit at it.]

[His chest was getting tight, his entire panicking at the temperature shock. It was taking any remaining energy he had to try and hold back from bursting into tears.]

[underthesakura]

[It didn't take long for Subaru to dry off, and once he was Seishirou picked him up and carried him toward the bed, ignoring the way he'd flinched. Subaru was carefully tucked underneath the thick pile of blankets -- completely, not just up to his chin -- and Seishirou slipped under the pile after him, kicking off his shoes and sliding out of his coat as he went.]

[Once he was under he slipped one arm around Subaru's shoulders and used his free hand to start wiggling out of his sweater. Subaru needed skin-on-skin contact if he was going to get warm again.]

[hidesinhats]

[Even under the pile of blankets, Subaru was shivering furiously. The fear was building. Subaru could be naive and oblivious at times, but he knew what this could easily become, if it hadn't already.

His eyes squeezed shut, staying very still save for the violent shivers. He hadn't expected Seishirou to get under the blankets, much less take his shirt off. Things were taking a turn for the terrifyingly unexpected, and Subaru jumped at the touch.]

S-S-S-Sesh-shirou-s-san....!

[underthesakura]

Shhh, Subaru-kun. [Once the sweater was off, Seishirou got the button-up shirt underneath undone as well. He stubbornly hung on to Subaru despite the boy's protests.] Your body won't be able to warm itself back up on its own.

[Which did nothing to change the fact that Subaru was naked and Seishirou was topless while they were in the same bed, but it could have been worse. Subaru could have been dead, or Seishirou could have decided to take his pants off, too.]

[hidesinhats]

[He quietly complied, giving nothing more than a shiver in response to Seishirou. Awkward, cold, uncomfortable. Subaru was feeling a plethora of things.]

[Naked. In bed with Seishirou. There were so many thing that felt wrong about it. But the body heat was helping. A little.]

[underthesakura]

[Seishirou made an idle note to find more blankets when he could. The ones he had already should have been enough to trap all the heat in, but he wasn't willing to take chances if he didn't have to. He remained mostly silent as he held Subaru and focused on the sound of his breathing and the feel of his heartbeat, aside from a quiet:] Tell me when you start to feel warmer.

[hidesinhats]

[It was probably noticeable how Subaru's heart was racing. It wasn't just the anxiety of Seishirou being so close, or of the lack of clothes. It was racing, his blood pressure rapidly increasing as a means for the body to warm itself. He shuddered more, his body still just shaking from the intense feeling of cold.] R-r-right

[underthesakura]

[Seishirou's expression had gone neutral when Subaru couldn't see it, but he frowned very faintly as he considered his options. If it were almost anyone else Seishirou wouldn't have been as concerned, but Subaru was small and fairly thin, and it was hard enough in good conditions to keep the boy eating enough. He didn't trust Kamui to be as diligent as Hokuto had, but leaving to get any of their food meant letting the heat out from under their blanket pile, even if only a little of it.]

[He couldn't risk that right now. Food would have to wait.] Tell me if you get uncomfortable, too, or if part of you feels too cold. [Seishirou still sounded more blandly serious than anything, the cheeriness remaining absent from his tone.]