Ficlets: Icon meme

[reikah]

Title: Tsubasa icon meme ficlets
Fandom: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Rating: PG-R.
Pairing: Gen, Kuro/Fai, Syao/Sakura, one Kuro/Fai/Yuui.

So I did the icon meme on my personal journal - the one that goes,

1. Pick one of my icons.
2. I will write you at least one sentence of something vaguely resembling fiction based on said icon (and possibly tie in the keywords/comments).
3. ???
4. Profit.

And people prompted, all right! It helps that, at the time of the meme, I had 130 userpics and thus a wide variety of choice. Most of my ficlets were Kurogane or Fai orientated, with a naturally high concentration of Kuro/Fai, but a few others sneaked in. I compiled them all together and posted them here. Enjoy!


The iconThe fic


Notes: World of Warcraft fusion, PG-13 rated, no pairings, TROLL WANG REED.

"I don't get it," Kurogane said, folding his arms over his chest. "What do these idiots get out of doing that?"

"Hmm?" Fai came to stand beside him, following his line of sight to the immense mammoth squatting right atop the mailbox, rendering it inaccessible to all else. The mammoth's rider had his face buried in a book and showed no signs of moving. "Oh dear," Fai said, and sighed.

"Oi!" Kurogane cupped his hands over his mouth to carry his voice all the way up. "Get the fuck off the mailbox, idiot!"

The mammoth rider ignored him.

"Tch. Got any baby spice?"

"Umm..." Fai paused, checking his bags, and then shook his head. "No. Sorry, I used it all up the last time he did this."

"So he's a repeat offender?" Kurogane asked, his brow furrowing. "What the hell does he get out of it?"

"He's a troll, Kuro-tan," Fai said, amused. "His whole role in life is to cause unnecessary grief to other people. It's what he gets off on."

Kurogane paused, digesting this, and then shrugged. "Whatever," he said. "There's another mailbox on the opposite end of town, let's go there."

In the neon lights of his mother's basement, Fei Wang Reed read the angry yells directed at his character and its mammoth on his expensive oversized monitor, and smirked. It was a good day to be a troll.


It's not that you have no concept of physical intimacy. You've fucked and been fucked before, back home; men and women. It's a good, efficient way to let off steam. They were all other ninja, though, hard-eyed folk not unlike yourself; they weren't clingy and they didn't stick around for the post-coital. It was something you just did.

But he, you don't get. He touches. He likes to throw his arms around you, rest against you, stand too close while he bats his eyelashes, and it takes you longer than it should to realize that this is flirting. It's something you've seen other people do but you've never done it and nobody has ever dared aim it at you, either, and you...

You don't know what to do.


In this world his mangayan comes in one vexingly large piece of paper, and in a language close enough to his own that he doesn't need Syaoran to read it aloud to him. The rest of the group leave him in peace, understanding (finally) that his mangayan time is sacred, although the idiot cannot resist chirping about how daddy needs his alone time~ as he shepherds Syaoran and the pork bun out the door.

He's kind of glad to see them go. Syaoran is unobtrusive company, but ever since Reed fell and he took Fai to bed with him the wizard has demanded they read his mangayan together, and he knows and appreciates Fai's sudden interest - the blond wants to be part of his life, and Kurogane is more than willing to share usually, but this is the last chapter and he has been following the story for years now and he wants to read it in peace.

It's all been leading up to this, the hero fighting the evil wizard who stole his best friend away from him. Kurogane pours over the panels intently, studying the heroic ninja's form and swordplay. Half the stuff he does would never work, but it's enjoyable nonetheless, and he's glad when the wizard dies and the ninja is finally reunited with his best friend, and they embrace and -

Wait. What?

Kurogane's eyes burn holes in that one panel, the ninja's head tilted to the side, his companion pressed close with his lighter hair, their mouths locked and fingers tangled, and then quietly turns the page over to check the cover. There it is, as always, the little sticker announcing that it is a 'boy love' manga. This is the kind of stuff boys are supposed to love?

Well. All right, then.


Notes: K/F/Y.

"Yuui~!" Fai whimpers, big tears welling up in his eyes. "Kuro-tan hit me."

"Yes," Yuui replies absently. "I'm sure he did. Did you do anything particularly stupid?"

Fai pauses, looking heavenward. "Ummmm.... I may have tried to tackle him while he was carrying that big cake you made for all the April 1st kids," he says. "But that's just me saying hello!"

"Do you have a bruise? Let me see." Yuui's hands pat gently over Fai's hair, two pairs of blue eyes locked as Yuui feels for any sign of swelling or tenderness. Fai doesn't so much as flinch, and Yuui leans back with a sigh. "Would you like me to scold him?"

An eager nod. Yuui rolls over and nudges the third person in bed with them; Kurogane grunts. "Kurogane," Yuui says, calmly. "Stop hitting my brother or neither of us will have sex with you again."

"... 'kay," Kurogane says into his pillow, and Fai launches himself at Yuui squealing his thanks, and all is right in the world of Holitsuba, or at least the small part of it that includes Yuui's apartment bedroom.


It's not often I get some time to myself, in a close-knit group like this one. I think the wizard actually makes a habit of never leaving me alone. It wouldn't surprise me.

The world we're in is kind of boring, just a big damn forest. I would say there's no sign of life, but the kid would screw up his nose and object in that polite but firm way he has and point out that what I mean is no sign of higher life because there's plenty of like, plants and shit, I don't know.

I sent him and the pork bun out to get firewood. We're in a damn forest, it's not like there's firewood all over the place anyway, but I think I managed to convey that it wasn't firewood we needed so much as firewood. His stammering made it seem like he worked out what I meant, anyway, and he left pretty quick. That was a few hours ago.

Astonishingly not every time me or the wizard send the kid out is 'cause we want to have sex. Sometimes it's just because we want to be together. We don't do it very often. I'm up off the ground, my arms folded behind me head, still wearing a fancy shirt from the last world; I can hear him fucking around setting up the campsite with my eyes closed.

It's kind of nice, you know. In a relaxing sort of way. To know that he's here and he's safe and he's happy, and the kid's happy enough and so is the princess, and we're in no hurry to do anything but just... be.

Tell anyone I said that and I'll cut your throat.


You are scarred. You feel them each time you move, you see them in the mirror; and although not all of them are on the outside, they have all shaped the man you are today. Your missing eye is only the latest in a long line of wounds (like the split in your heart where Fai used to fit, oh that one took so long to heal you thought it never would and it still hasn't) and merely the most physically obvious.

It hurts, of course; the damage to the eyelid where Syaoran's fingernails scrabbled and broke and split your skin, the severed optic nerve, the strange feeling of air whistling around your empty eye socket where no air was meant to be. You wear your patch and you do not look at it in a mirror or the bowl of water that you use, each morning, to clear out the accumulated substances weeping out of the wound during the night. You learn how to adjust for lack of depth perception, how to pay closer attention to your peripheral vision to compensate for the lack of wide screen, how to move and how to see and how to never think about this particular scar.

Your scars shape you and they define you, but you do not think about them. If you remember how you got them then you are lost (the wizard staring out of hole in the world, Fai's blood and brains on your bare skin; the warrior from Nihon whose life you will end because you must). It is safer by far not to think, not to remember, although this too has its own hardships: for too long you allowed yourself the role of careless dandy and you grew attached, and now you stand here in this harsh world of black and white with your scars on display and your mask broken.

Still, you are standing, and you must stand (Fai, Fai, Fai; I'll bring you back, Fai) for your work is not yet done and the warrior you were never supposed to care for will not let you do otherwise. You can pretend not to be so badly damaged.

After all, scar tissue is what knits wounds together, and oh, you have so very much of that.


"What are they doing?" Syaoran asks, wide eyes fixed on the television screen. Behind him Kurogane makes a choked sound.

"Well," says Fai helpfully, "When two pretty girls love each other very very much on an x-rated tv-channel -"

"STOP TALKING, WIZARD, AND FIND THE DAMN REMOTE!" Kurogane roars.


It's not quite what I was expecting, holding my father's sword after all these years. I hadn't ever planned to, to be honest; some part of me had always known that my father would not be proud of the depths to which I had sunk, my killing mindless and lethal. When Tomoyo told me she had put my family blade to rest with my mother I felt nothing but relief.

She's still as perfectly balanced as ever, better than her copy, better than Souhi. She sits across my palms like the masterwork she is, the gaping dragon with its fangs bared, and I know then that before I leave there is one more echo of my distant past that must return to me.

I think I'm finally ready to hear that name again, now. That too is something Fai taught me, and I see in Tomoyo's face her simple relief at it. She always wanted me to be this person, I realize suddenly; and she must have seen the terrible events in Ceres, understand the purpose of the wizard's evil designs, and sent me there anyway. She saw Fai and she saw how much he needed me, and how I too needed something to fight for.

Youou.

Maybe I'll tell the wizard that name, if he doesn't fail at the final fucking hurdle and die in the battle. It's not fair otherwise, me knowing his name and him not knowing mine. But now's not the time, and I bend my head as my Princess blesses my father's sword, and I vow to serve her in all worlds beyond this one, because she knew all along that I would be here today, and she's saved my life in more way than one.

I owe her so much. Maybe someday I'll be able to return here and repay her.

Maybe Fai will be with me then.



together with

"What is it?" Amy wants to know. "What's in the crack? What's the voice saying?"

"Hmmm," says the Doctor, and jumps away from the wall, wild untucked shirt and glass still in hand. He folds his arms over his chest and glares at it thoughtfully.

"Is that a good hmm or a bad hmm?" Amy demands.

"The crack in your wall is in more than just your wall. It's a crack, a crack in the universe itself, leading to another dimension."

"... Oh," Amy replies. She's not quite sure what a dimension is, but a crack in the universe is bad, right? "And what's the voice saying?"

The doctor pulls a face, like he's having to admit to something he doesn't want to. "You know when two animals love each other very much," he tries.

"You mean sex," Amy says. "I've had sex education. I'm not stupid, stupid."

"Yeah, alright!" he says, and gestures vaguely at the wall. "Well, there's a sort of crossroad between the dimensions, alright? It's not a crossroad, actually, that's an awful disclaimer, don't think of it as a crossroad at all. But it can get you to any dimension you want, alright?"

"So like a crossroad?"

"Yes. NO! It's a shop. A magical, er, shop."

"Crossroad was better."

"Oh, shut it. Anyway, the crack in the universe leads... directly... to one of its back rooms."

"Where people are having sex," Amy offers, and the Doctor pulls a face.

"I've met these two before, wandering dimensions. I don't think they do anything else."

"Oh," Amy says thoughtfully, and then looks down at the glass and marches out of the room. The Doctor stares after her.

"Hey! Where are you-?"

"Fixing the noises!" she calls back, and returns a moment later with the glass, full up again. She promptly tosses this at the crack, and the faint moans and gasps on the other side cut off abruptly. "My Aunt says, this is the best way to get the neighbour's cats to shut up," Amy informs him solemnly.


It is Kurogane's voice that rouses you, drowsy and post-coital, lying atop his chest and waiting for the world to reset. It is your second repeat in time-locked Clow, and you are curled together on the bed, sweaty and sated. The fingers of his flesh hand are playing through your hair.

"After this is over," Kurogane says quietly. "When we save the Princess and kill him. Would you come back to Nihon?"

You shift to look up at him, and the friction of your eyepatch against his chest pulls it away from your eye; you turn your face away, ashamed to show him the injury, but his hands are gentle as he smoothes it back into place. You keep your face angled away from him.

"Maybe," you say quietly.

"That's not a yes," he replies, and you smile, accepting the subtle rebuke.

"It's not a no, not really. I just... Kuro-sama, I'm not ready to..." you hesitate, wishing you knew what to say. This thing between you is still so fragile and new and precious, and you try to organise your thoughts, flashes of yes and i don't deserve you and you're all I have and prey and is this love you feel or obligation?

"I know," he says, and sighs, letting his head thump against the pillow. "Don't worry about it now. Just... think about it, maybe, someday when you are ready."

You think about what lies behind your eyepatch, your discomfort at him seeing it, and tilt your head forward to rest against him again, your cheek spread out fat across his chest. He's seen so much already; you trust him more than any man alive. The issue is you, and you know that. Perhaps a day will come when you can trust yourself to show him that last little piece of you. Perhaps there will be a day when you trust yourself enough to trust what lies between you now.

You turn your head and kiss his chest and his fingers return to your hair. There are no words, but both of you know the actions for what they are: apology and forgiveness.

Someday you'll be brave. Someday you'll be complete. But it isn't quite today.


"How are we supposed to get back to the damn cafe with your leg like this?"

"Big doggy could carry me~!"

"Tch, are you that lazy?"

"But my leg hurts! Look, see?"

"Don't pout at me. And don't act like you don't know pain, either. I hate liars."

"... Oh?"

"You know what I'm talking about. Whatever happened to you before, this doesn't match it."

"What makes Kuro-rin so sure, hmm?"

"... Are you really that unaware?"

"Apparently so~! Now, if Big Doggy could help me-"

"Don't change the subject!"

"But we still need to go home! I'm not changing the subject at all! Kuro-steed will have to help me up, won't he?"

"The fuck? Don't do that!"

"But Kuro-tall is so hard to climb!"

"Don't just grab at me, moron!"

"Kuro-pony is so meeeeeeeeeean! He's going to make me limp alllllll the waaaaaaay back to the cafe, all by myself~"

"Are you crying?"

"I'm just saddened by Big Doggy's callous, cold-hearted, mean -"

"Fucking hell, just stop it. Here -"

"Uwaaaaah!"

"There."

"I can see the cafe from up here!"

"Shut up, for the love of - what are you, six?"

"Heeeeeee! Let's go home, Kuro-distracted."

"Don't think I missed what you did there, mage. Just because I know better than to try pushing you doesn't mean I forgot."

"I know. And someday you'll find out, I'm sure. But it's not today, so hiyah! Giddy up!"

"I will drop you head first if you don't shut UP!"

"Kuro-angry is so fun."


Notes: this is set in the same universe as my kidfic, These days have shown.

"The thing is," Fai says. "Bollocks." He pauses, and then giggles quietly to himself. "Sorry, I mean. Bullocks. Bulls. Boy cows! They're evil."

"Uh-huh," Kurogane says dryly, pouring himself another cup. "And how did you arrive at this conclusion?"

"Logic!" Fai announces cheerfully, thrusting his arm out with the cup at the end of it. "More sake. More!"

"How long was he drinking before I got back?" Kurogane asks a rather flushed Sorata, who just shrugs.

"Since lunchtime," Ryuuichi answers for him. His son is sitting cross-legged on the other end of the porch, staring at Fai wide-eyed. "Is he going crazy?"

"No, kid. He's just being an idiot."

"No, no, listen," Fai insists. "Bulls can't stand the sight of each other, so all we need to do is. Um. What do we need to do?"

"No idea," Sorata replies, shaking his head, and Fai sighs deeply and grabs at Kurogane's sleeve.

"Kuro-stud-chan-sama-kun-cowboy-chii-pin-tan-rin..."

Kurogane raises an eyebrow at his mate, and Ryuuichi leans closer. Fai seems to have forgotten where he is going with the nickname in favour of spouting increasingly more ridiculous suffixes, and he has wound both his hands tightly into the fabric of Kurogane's sleeve; Kurogane sighs and shakes him free.

"I think maybe it's time I took you to bed," he sys, as his lover leans against him heavily, and Fai shakes his head.

"Nets," he says. "If we could put a bull in a net and suspend it over a cow, then we could... I don't know, make lots of little cowlets without accident! Right?"

"Right," Kurogane agrees dryly, attempting to get one of Fai's arms around his shoulders to help his lover to his feet. Eventually he abandons this and scoops Fai off the ground entirely, throwing him over one shoulder; Fai giggles and kicks his feet and then stills.

"Kuro-thing," he says. "... I don't feel well."

"Is he going to die?" Ryuuichi asks, wide-eyed.

"He's going to wish he had," says Sorata, and falls off the porch.

"He'll be fine," says Kurogane, which is when his partner starts making a supicious gagging sound, and Kurogane dumps him rather mercilessly in the garden in time for him to throw up in one of the damn acacia bushes.

"Nasty," Ryuuichi says, wrinkling his nose.

"Yup," says Kurogane. "At least we know our wine is potent, though."


It's not often that you catch him off guard, not any more. It has been years since you left with the real Syaoran for this journey, years enough that it is no longer a surprise to you when Syaoran joins you in front of the mirror most mornings to shave away his overnight stubble, and time has been slow touching you. You know this is down to the bond you share, predator and prey, and you do not mind. One way or another he is going to live a very long time, and you are secretly happy that he will not have to do it alone. Both of you know the pain of losing loved ones.

You are back in Nihon this particular day, during a festival of lights and firecrackers; you were talking with him down the streets, narrating the purpose of the festival. You are walking close enough that you might as well be holding hands, but you don't, not because you fear reaction but simply because you are so comfortable with him you do not need to touch him to tell him you love him. Not any more.

"It's so beautiful here," Fai says quietly, and you nod. "Did you come down here often for the festivals, Kuro-sama?"

"No," you say. "This is the first one I've seen since I was little. After my parents died I didn't feel in a festival kind of mood."

You have gone several steps forward before you realize he has stopped, and you turn, curious. He is standing in the middle of the street, just looking at you with that expression you know well, and you double back to him. "Don't," you say in a low voice. "Don't. It's old. Don't think about it."

"All the things you never did," he replies, and sighs. "Yes. You're right. I just..."

"When we stop here," you say, and his eyes flicker to meet yours. You mean when we stop here for good, and this is something you have begun discussing more often now, as time draws on. "When we stop here we can go to every damn festival, if that's what you want."

"Is it what you want?" he asks, tilting his face to one side, and you roll your eyes, because even after all these years he has not yet worked out that you are happy enough with him. He flushes as he catches your meaning, and turns away, and maybe any other day you would let him be evasive, but it is a festival day. You reach up and catch his chin, and turn him toward you for a kiss as comfortable and familiar as Ginryuu's hilt in your palm, but softer and less urgent.

"That's it," you say, and he smiles crookedly, firework light playing off his cheekbones. You've been to hell together, and sooner or later the two of you need to work out how to live together, but for now you are content with this: rich scents of food in the air and fireworks in the sky, smoke and incense and nihongo washing over you, and the taste of Fai's mouth echoed on your lips.

"C'mon," you say. "Let's go home."


You don't notice people's appearances, not usually. It's just not something you are interested in. People are people and they all come in the same basic shape; the rest is just details and irrelevant.

But when he turns to you and gives you that smile, the corners of his eyes crinkling and his whole face lighting up... yeah, you definitely notice, and your heart thuds quietly in your chest because this, this has nothing to do with his frequent fake smiles of oh so long ago. This is the real Fai, and you are the one he smiles at, and you don't know quite why the simple proof of his happiness should affect you so.

But it does.

You want to kiss him or touch him or do... something, anything, to let him know that you see him and you approve; instead, you tilt your head and you smile back, because he brings that out in you, and you remember, at the edge of your memory, your parents smiling at each other.

When you have sex that night, you take him on his back, so you can see his face. And he throws his arms around you, fingers curled around the back of your neck, and he tips his head back to expose his throat and belly, so naked and so obviously yours, and you realize you have never wanted anyone else the way you want him.

When your parents were intimate you were a child, and you thought it was gross and embarrassing at the time, but now, you think you kind of understand. You understand what it means to find joy in another person's happiness, and it is the best sensation you think you have ever experienced.


It's not that you don't like all chocolate. It's that you don't like sweet chocolate, and when Fai hands you a brick of rich dark chocolate your first impulse is to say 'no'.

"Come on, Kuro-irrational," he says chidingly, like you're the one using trite nicknames and ignoring personal boundaries here. Your hands are busy or you would push him away. "Give it a try!"

"A try, a try, a try~!" chimes the pork bun, and you open your mouth to tell them where to stuff it when he moves, fast as lightning, and your teeth close reflexively as he shoves something toward your mouth -

- except not fast enough and they close over the object, and suddenly bitterness paints itself over your tongue. You narrow your eyes at him, but for once he just smiles at you innocently (like you can believe THAT for an instant, doesn't he know how open his damn EYES are?) and just turns away.

"Whee~!" cries the obnoxious little furball, launching itself at the bar of chocolate in your mouth, and you whip your head from side to side to shake it off.

Well, it is your damn chocolate, after all.


Maybe it started back in Lecourt, I don't know. Maybe it started before then, in the foxholes of Yama or the cafe of Outo or even the rain in front of the Witch's house.

All my life I've trained as hard as I can to be the best. I was the best, and yeah, I kinda enjoyed it. I was safe. I was strong and I was dangerous and I was never gonna be some wimpy frightened kid sitting outside while a monster gutted my mom, not again.

And now he's dying, and he's not fighting it, and I am so unspeakably angry: at him, for being so fucking pitiful, and at me, for being so fucking trapped. I gave up my copy of Ginryuu, and I didn't really miss it, because it was just a copy. I think maybe if the witch asks I'll give up the real thing. I don't know what other price I have to pay. I just know that he's a fucking moron and that this is something I have to do, because he needs to find some of that fucking strength and maybe I'm the only one who can show him how.

Heh.

I wonder if Tomoyo can see me now.

I hope she's proud.


The first time you bare your talons is the first time you hurt Kurogane.

It's in the hotel room of Infinity, late night after you put your poor broken-hearted copycat Princess to bed; you catch him lugging the true Syaoran to his bed and for a moment you just stare at each other across the room, the scent of his blood tantalising. How thin skin is, you think. Such a precariously thin layer protecting all the wet red important things inside from the outside world. It's not something you had much cause to think about, before he stripped you of the only thing in the whole world that was yours: your ability to say enough is enough.

You will cause him heartbreak yet, and he is so stubborn and so stupid it makes you fume. He turns toward you, raises an eyebrow, his red eyes appraising and sharp, and you think you could kill him with as much glee as grief for what he took from you.

"Are you hungry?" he asks, and yes, of course you are, but you shake your head anyway, your eye cutting away from him. His boots make whispering noises as they crush the fibres of the carpet; he is approaching you and you let your lip peel back, baring your teeth. Your canines are sharp and inhuman, and you can smell his blood, hear the steady bass rhythm of his heart. Your stubborn unwilling body wants him, or at least the stuff flowing through his veins, under that thin layer of protection.

"Good night, Kurogane," you say, savagely emphasising the last two syllables of his name, and you inwardly rejoice at the way his scent changes at those words; but he doesn't stop approaching because he is stupid and stubborn, and he takes your wrist and forcibly turns you toward him.

"Drink," he orders, reaching for the knife in his back pocket, but your gaze hones in on the crosshatchery of scars over his wrist, thick and layered, and your fangs feel longer and you know your eye is gold and cat-slit and your claws roll out before you can think about it, their ends sliding against his skin.

For a moment you stare at them stupidly - of course you have the claws, you should have realised this - and then you look up and realise he is staring not at your talons but at your face, his red eyes narrowed and cold, and you think, he sees me. He always has and you tried so hard to deflect his gaze, so now instead of backing down you keep your eye on his as you flex your fingers and your claws tear stripes of scar tissue, blood welling to the surface.

It is different from all the other times, the times he cut and you drank, small shallow sips, a mouthful of blood per feed and no more. This time you are the one to hurt him, and his breath tightens even as his nose flares, and you let yourself grin at him, a cold grin with nothing behind it.

Inwardly, you hate yourself. But then, that's always been the case.

Hasn't it?


Notes: set in the same 'verse as Catch a dragon by the tail.

"This is a fucking stupid idea," Kurogane said flatly.

"It'll be fun!" Fai replied cheerfully. He was stretched out by the pool, his silver wings spread wide across the rocks to dry. "Besides, my people like Clow country. Getting rid of their bandit problem is a nice thing to do!"

"Yeah," said Kurogane, "One of you, against fifty odd bandits, with stolen siege weapons."

"Don't be silly, Kuro-tan," Fai said lazily. "It'll be you and me against them."

"You got yourself injured fighting demons!" Kurogane snapped, and Fai snorted lazily, his second eyelid rolling over the blue eye closest to him.

"That's because I was pre~tend~ing!" he chirruped. "I thought Kuro-grumpy wouldn't like me if he knew what I could do!"

"I don't like you anyway," Kurogane said petulantly, kicking a rock into the pool, and Fai made a sad noise, his wings drooping and his head lowering on its neck. His ruff looked flat and lifeless, and Kurogane gritted his teeth. "Don't act like an idiot," he said.

"But Kuro-squish has such a large definition of idiocy," said Fai. "How can poor little old me keep myself from it?"

"Yeah, I'm not falling for that for a fucking second," Kurogane said, and Fai snorted in amusement. His tail whipped around in an effort to knock Kurogane into the pool, but Kurogane was used to these shenanigans and ducked it, then kicked dirt at his wet scales; the dragon squeaked in indignation as the dirt clung.

"Now I have to bathe again!" he moaned.

"Serves you right," said Kurogane unrepentantly, grinning, and Fai sighed and then shoved him into the pool anyway with his muzzle, his shape shifting sinuously as he slid into the water too, and proceeded to use the lack of other dragons around and the hot spring water to demonstrate just why aiding Clow Country was a good thing.

Kurogane was still damp later, belting on his armour, but well, a fight was a fight, and a happy Fai was a less obnoxious Fai. Kurogane knew a good deal when he saw one.


It's remarkable how quickly Fai's difficulty with chopsticks ends when he's no longer trying to convince everyone that he's harmless and silly. Kurogane doesn't even notice at first - he has had other difficulties to think of, this short stopover in Nihon; difficulties and triumphs, too, and the circumstances in which they share this meal (naked, next to each other under the covers, so much warmth and hope) just hammers that in.

"That was good," Fai remarks, finishing up his bowl of udon, and Kurogane grunts agreement even though in his mind the food he has eaten in other worlds rivals it. Strange, to find his tastes so expanded. "Don't you think so, Kuro-sama?"

"It was good enough," he says. "It's better eaten properly, of course -"

And here he pauses, because Fai's bowl is sitting next to him on the mats, the chopsticks greasy at one end and placed precisely atop it. Fai follows his gaze and then laughs somewhat guiltily.

"Yes," he says. "I can eat with your chopsticks and I can whistle. Sorry."

Kurogane pauses for a moment, thinking about what to say; things are still new between them, not even (fantastic) make-up sex can smooth out the rough edges. His initial impulse is to berate Fai, call him idiot or moron, and Fai would probably laugh it off, but... "It's fine," he says instead, and Fai raises an eyebrow.

"Kuro-sama...?"

"Just don't try to do both at once," Kurogane says, and Fai smiles suddenly, a sweet thing just for him, and yeah, he thinks they're going to be okay.


"What is this thing?" Syaoran asks, rapping on it sharply with his knuckles. It doesn't feel like wood.

"Does it matter?" Kurogane snaps. "They're going to catch up with us, let's get a move on!"

"Wait," Fai says, frowning. "It's... it feels like..."

"Hello Miss Box," chirps Mokona.

Fai rests both his hands against the blue box's locked doors, and Kurogane lets out a frustrated growl but unsheathes Ginryuu and stands between them and the horde of pissed off locals. "We can't hide in there, idiot, we'll never fit in! And I don't want to kill all these people, so hurry it up -"

"Yes, yes, it's... it's alive, Kuro-sama, I..."

"Fai-san, I would love to know what a pole-ice call box is, but I really don't think now is the best time," Syaoran interjects anxiously, and Fai holds up a finger to hush him and then whistles, a long perfect note in a lower key than they are used to.

The doors click open.

"I was right," Fai says quietly.

"Huh," says Kurogane.

"Oh," Syaoran says.

"Hello, Miss Sexy!" Mokona chirps. "Can we come inside!"

"What? What? How did you lot open the doors?" demands the man standing inside the impossible box, staring at them as though they are the abnormalities, and then, well, the horde crest the hill and it's a bit of a rush to get them all in.


The next time they arrive in Clow, Mokona has a veritable mountain of gifts they have acquired during their travels for its princess, from coloured bands of minerals to jewelry to exquistively bound books and pens. Syaoran is the one who presents her with the handheld camera, and he waits until they are alone together on their favourite rooftop to do it.

"It's from Daidouji-san," he says earnestly. "From Piffle World. It runs off energy from the sun, see? We've been... Mokona and Fai and Kurogane, we've been taking a lot of pictures during our travels, and I thought you might like to see them..."

"Yes," she says, and smiles. "Show me, please?"

He shows her how to load its gallery, and then they scroll through the pictures together. They range from blurred photographs of thumbs to sweeping landscape shots, but the ones Sakura lingers on longest are of her friends - from Syaoran and Mokona posing together uncertainly in a busy marketplace to a candid image of Kurogane sitting at a cafe table, stroking Mokona's head absently while he reads a book; Fai asleep on a couch in some ratty apartment and Syaoran grinning at the lens with their friends from Outo; the vampire twins caught offguard (Subaru smiling, Kamui looking like a cat dumped unexpectedly in bathwater) and the children of Spirit, holding up flowers and grinning gap-toothed for the picture and so many more, seemingly endless pictures of faces old and new. Her friends.

When they run out of pictures Syaoran looks at her uncertainly, and she can see the question on his lips: does she like it? And she can't speak for the emotion blocking her throat, joy and affection and love for these people, for him.

So she pulls him down to kiss her, and hopes that is answer enough.


You wonder if your dreams are something you should be talking about, if maybe Fai or Kurogane could offer any insight. You wonder if you are going crazy, or if you have, somehow, gained the powers of a dreamseer. You worry that you are losing yourself, that every day a little piece of you slips away, and you are frightened because you cannot, you will not let that be taken.

Bad enough the Princess doesn't remember you; but you had your reasons for erasing yourself from her memories, and though you miss what you had (best friend and companion and ally; her smile eclipsed the sun and you know in your heart of hearts what you feel for her isn't just friendship) you are learning to forge something new. Something fumbling and precious with the girl Sakura is now, rather than the girl she was; you refuse to look back and though you feel sorrow you move beyond it, because she is alive and that is what matters.

But you don't talk about your dreams, because if you do, you feel like that would make them more true. And if they are true then what you fear - your memories, your emotions, your connection to the Princess fading away, lost to the other Syaoran - may be a step closer to happening and you, you cannot let that happen.

So you smile, and you say nothing, and you resolve to restore all the Princess' feathers, as fast as you can, because you must.

Because that is who you are.


Notes: bodyswap.

"Did you know you're longsighted?" Fai remarks, and Kurogane turns and glares at the mage in his body.

"What the hell does that mean," he says, scowling, and Fai leans forward and taps at his cheek with one finger.

"Smile, Kuro-tan, I don't want frown-lines~!" he says, and goddamnit Kurogane is not ever going to get used to hearing Fai's words in his own voice. "Longsighted means you see things better further away than up close. You're not very, but well, we might as well take advantage of being in a technical world!"

"What are you talking about," Kurogane asks calmly, focusing on keeping Fai's utterly blank. He hadn't realized how deeply frowning was built into him until this goddamn escapade.

"These," Fai replies, and he reached into the pocket of the long jacket he's taken to wearing and pulls out a leather rectangular case, and Kurogane scowls at him and then scowls deeper when he realizes he's scowling. Fai pulls a pair of spectacles, like Seishirou and Fuuma wore, out of the case and slides them on. "What do you think?"

"... I look ridiculous," Kurogane tells him, and Fai laughs brightly. "And they'll be stupid for fighting, and -"

"I think they make you look rather charming~!" Fai trills, and Kurogane pulls a face.

"Don't do that," he says. "Not in my voice."

"Kuro-me doesn't let me have any fun."


For Kurogane, love was always a wildfire thing: his parents, gone too soon; Tomoyo, too far away. It wasn't something he ever thought he'd want or desire, not for himself, not as long as he could inspire fear instead with his skill at the sword. What need had he for affection and romance when he had the terrible scything swings of Ginryuu and would-be assassins to cleave?

For Fai love was a cold thing, something that grew over time: Fai, his other half; Ashura, gone too far. It wasn't something he thought he deserved - had not the hatred of the Valerian court proved that? Was he not a cursed thing, had he not killed Fai, Fai who loved him without reservation? He didn't intend to live past resurrecting his twin, and so the attempts he made to court affection were for Fai's sake. Let the name Fai be associated with kindness and love. It would make it easier for Fai once he breathed again and his name was once again his, not stolen by his murderer.

Neither of them were looking for it, and neither of them knew what to do with it when they found it. Fai spent too much time pushing Kurogane away; Kurogane spent too much time falling, however subtlely, for the mage's layers and layers of lies and deception, seeing through as many as he missed.

Love is like hitsuzen, though. It's not something you can fight against. And in the end, neither could they.