Like Ships at Sea... (5/5)

[leen1707]

Title: Like Ships at Sea... (5/5)

Pairing: Akame

Word count: ~35000

Rating: NC-17

Genre/Warnings: AU, angst, fluff, smut (and everything in between).

Disclaimer: This story is a product of my imagination. Any parallels with real persons or events are pure coincidence.

Notes:Initially written for green_feelings on kizuna_exchange.
Many thanks to my wonderful, wonderful beta, who not only corrected my mistakes but generally was everything an author may need in the process of writing - the first audience, the steady hand that lead me through a series of inevitable panic attacks and generally made it possible for my fic to be finally completed. ladyc2, my dear, my gratitude goes beyond any simple thanks, I only hope that the whole process was not only a hard labor but also somewhat enjoyable to you too!.

Summary: Leaving on a cruise Jin hoped for a light holiday romance to inspire him in his song-writing.

Previous

Jin wants to make it perfect for Kame.

Part of it is nothing but a selfish wish to somehow engrave himself into the turtle's memory for times to come. But part of it is also because when Kame is happy, Jin feels happy as well. And he doesn't pause to think that it is something of “a first” too - not that he is an insensitive lover, but his own pleasure tends to take a definite precedence usually. Then, well, if he derives his pleasure from pleasuring the turtle, there is no real contradiction at all... Oh wow, his thoughts are a mess...

They both didn't have any patience for the usual exploration during their first go, but his task is not hard, for Kame is extremely sensitive as Jin discovers, his body one giant erogenous zone, and Jin aims for innovative and subtle, for slow and prolonged - when he starts with feather-light closemouthed pecks around the upper edge of the turtle's armpit hair, provoking a ticklish giggle at first that soon enough dies into a shaky sigh, as he continues down and forward, not going anywhere near the nipple, not yet - just a series of gentle lip-bites along the side of his pectoral.

Jin likes Kame's body, likes how his muscles are hidden, non-protruding, not bulging with the in-your-face masculinity of a gym-addict... but they are there for when they are needed - as he well knows, the turtle is much stronger than his look suggests.

Jin likes Kame's body and now he makes it his objective to shower it with love that it deserves.

He is keeping away from the major score-points for now, tracing his fingers across the collar-bones and then down the central line of the turtle's body but only as far as the navel, watching intently how Kame's nipples harden into even smaller nubs even without his touch, how his hips twitch up, reaching after his hand that is already not there, is already elsewhere, going along just as elaborately teasing a path.

Kame's hands try to reach for him, to retaliate. But every time, Jin gives him another strategically located kiss, another maddeningly elusive touch that robs the turtle of any concentration whatsoever, and they fall helplessly back to clutch at the bed-linen, and Jin is glad - because that is the whole purpose of this endeavor - to teach the turtle to just let go and feel.

Passivity is a strange notion for someone who is normally dominant and assertive, but Jin asked “let me” and he agreed, and Jin translates it correctly as an enormous act of trust from someone who's learned to protect himself with his assertiveness, with the accentuated enactment of passion, from the somewhat lukewarm nature of convenience sex.

So Jin is hell-bent on showing him that sex is not all convenience; is not all about “scratching the itch”, and yes, he knows that he too has indulged in a lot of exactly this kind of liaison - impersonal and unbinding. And that's part of the reason why Jin is keeping from the well-trodden paths, paying the most attention to places that are unique for the turtle, the places he's sure that no one who is only a fuck-buddy would ever care to explore.

But Jin cares and that's why he alternates the arousing touches with those that are meant to soothe and calm and prolong the sweet agony that Kame is almost unable to bear - he's wound up too tight, falling to ashes, coming to pieces - to the point where he half-pleads, half-orders Jin to “just fuck him already”, and his whole midsection rises in search of friction that is simply not there, because Jin makes it a point to stay off...

Even when Jin pulls him up into a languid, soothing kiss, uses the heel of his hand rather than the fingers to rub calming circles into the stiff shoulder-blades; palms his hipbones softly, calmly to prevent them from bucking, lets him painfully grip his hands while fighting desperately for steadier breathing, as Jin beseeches him to be just a bit more patient, promises him that soon, very soon he will get his release.

***

It ends unexpectedly in Kame taking Jin instead of Jin taking Kame.

Because Jin plain refuses to listen to the turtle's claims that Jin can fuck him “right now!” when he is perfectly aware that he has just barely inserted the second finger and not even gotten into the scissoring, and Kame is still entirely too tight.

And when the turtle in his desperation goes from words to actions, grabbing for Jin's hand to pull it out, for Jin's cock to push it in - un-condomed and un-lubed - that's when he comes to a decision that isn't all that light and easy and on-the-surface, because it is ages since Jin has last tried it this way; ages since he even felt the slightest inclination to do so - but this way at least one of them gets prepared properly, and he says as much, and sits tightly on Kame's thighs to prevent any more partisan actions on the latter's part, and inserts a finger inside himself.

It is entirely rewarding though how dumbstruck, unprepared, unguarded Kame looks at such a turn of events; how badly his hand shakes as he stretches it forward uncertainly...

“But... w-why? Well, let me t-then...”

Oh, no, no-no-no, dear, not with your hand that unsteady... Jin doesn't say it though, goes with a teasing comment about Kame's fingers being too short, and then proceeds to unwittingly demonstrate how much longer his own are, when he brushes over his own prostate by chance, and - ah, shiiiiiit, he has almost forgotten how that feels.

It takes him a moment to resume the scissoring, and Kame doesn't move, leans back on his elbows without tearing his eyes from the show, his breast heaving and lips bitten almost until they bleed.

***

“Jin... slow down... Jin, slow…slow, slower! I… I can't... I-I will... Ah, wait... wait!” Kame's back arches, the veins in his neck stand out so much they are ready to burst, and his face is almost gaunt with a desperate effort to not come, while Jin lowers himself onto him with excruciating slowness.

And then they are sitting still, completely still, and the turtle's eyes are right before him - eyelids fluttering over nothing but the dilated pupils, and his lips are bruised and near... and then they descend on Jin's in a burning kiss, as Kame finally, finally snatches back the control that Jin has denied him for so long, bending Jin backwards (so far that it's almost painful, so far that he has to catch himself on his elbows), and rising up on his knees to just ram into him without rhythm or care - beautiful, beautiful, beautiful in his single-minded abandon, all inhibitions, all thoughts, all whatever - forgotten for one entirely overwhelming need.

It is also only his fingers that are short, because he hits Jin just so - not out of any conscious effort, Jin's sure, but who fucking cares at a moment like this, when he feels himself being driven to the very same edge, so close, just so close, just so...closer!.. But Kame is closer still, so very much closer than Jin - and it is Jin's own fault... doesn't help... but it is his own fault when he feels Kame shudder and whine, and just fall on him momentarily... and he is not there yet...

***

Jin really doesn't expect the turtle to move, not immediately after a release like that, but he somehow scrambles off Jin, still unsteady and totally without breath, and Jin doesn't have time to even make sense of his intention, before he lowers himself on all fours right in front of him ('Really looks like a turtle in such a position', Jin has but a second to think) - and takes him inside his mouth.

It's sloppy and weak, and it's more the pained puffs that Kame exhales all around his shaft than any actual suction that send Jin finally over his own edge. But it's also impossibly hot and... and something else altogether...

And his come drips out of the turtle's mouth, and some of it must have gone down wrong (that's what happens when someone tries to suck and breathe simultaneously) for Kame coughs, and coughs, and Jin has just about enough strength left to pull him up and just hold him and pat his back until it finally passes.

'Kazu...' Jin thinks tenderly, when he lifts Kame's face by the chin - and it looks so open and bewildered and so, so young - and places a grateful kiss on the lips smudged with his own come.

He doesn't dare to speak it out, doesn't know if Kame would appreciate such familiarity or not, but Jin is tired of “turtles”, both English or Japanese - it is somehow a “first name” moment - and this is Kazuya, Kazu, and right now, right here - he is Jin's.

They sit like that - too spent to even lie down, clutching for support as much as supporting each other, their sweaty foreheads touching...

And somehow - this moment is perfect, and Jin wants to remember it till eternity. And right here, right now, he doesn't care if it makes him a sap.

***

When it happens they are lazing away on the bed, watching “Titanic” on Jin's laptop - because back in London Jin decided it sort of suitable for re-watching on board and because Kame just loves the movie.

Jin, personally, finds the first half or so of it boring and too long, but he's learned his lesson and doesn't try to pause it every five minutes for a scathing comment or to mimic the characters anymore (Kame promised to strangle him if he does it 'just one more time'), and entertains himself now with watching Kame and the change of expressions on his face as he follows the plot.

Neither of them wanted to go to the upper decks even for dinner, and the ways in which two persons can entertain themselves while staying inside a cabin are pretty limited. Well, there is, well... the obvious... but they sort of seriously dug into their staminas in this regard already, so... maybe later, and for now being cozy together feels just as novel and good. Hence - the “Titanic”...

When Jin hears a long screeching scrape and then sort of a crunch of tearing metal he thinks it's the movie, and it takes him a moment to understand that they are nowhere near that part of the film, and his initial theory doesn't explain the sudden lurch that accompanies the sound at all. Nor is it a reason for Kazu to suddenly sit very straight beside him, his face intent.

“Jin,” he says carefully, “I don't want to sound too panicky, but I think we should dress.”

Jin stares at him with incredulity - surely he doesn't think? Surely they aren't? Duh, that would be ironic - watching “Titanic” of all things!

He stands up though, because it can't hurt to try and look out of the window at least, and that's when the soles of his feet, or his cerebellum or wherever the inner gyroscope of a human body is supposed to be located, informs him that they are indeed listing. Not much, but it's sort of disturbing that the ship doesn't seem to make any motion to right itself - as it does, say, when meeting a wave.

But surely there should be some kind of signal, some alarm - if they are experiencing a shipwreck?

The ship lurches some more, settles a little further to starboard, and Jin bites his lip, because - it cannot be happening, not to him, not to Kazu; he is no bloody Leonardo di Caprio to die tragically in the bowels of the ship...

“Jin,” Kazu says, and shakes him a little, and it snaps Jin back into awareness, even if his mind is still running circles around the whole concept of a... shipwreck! And Kazu is already in his robe, and looks seriously in his eyes and speaks to him clearly and slowly, as he would to a child. “I'll go to my cabin now, since all my things are there. But I will come back here after that... Jin! Are you listening?”

Jin nods, because he is. And Kame sounding so... Kame, so in control, helps a lot. He is already calm, see? Calm enough to hear a few deep beeps sounding over the ship radio, and that would be the alarm, wouldn't it? He wishes they would say something in words.

“That's the alarm for the crew,” Kame explains. “They should make some announcement for the public soon to prevent panic... So, right, you do not panic either, o'kay? It might be nothing major. But you still need to dress for the outside and prepare the most important things: passport, return tickets, credit cards, your wallet, those kind of things, right?”

Jin nods again. Does Kazu think he's as stupid as a child too? It's almost offensive.

“Good then. I'm going to my cabin, but I will be right back.”

And then the door closes behind him, and Jin sits heavily on the edge of his bed - just for a moment.

The cabin seems much smaller all of a sudden, closing in on Jin, suffocating. It was so much easier to stay calm when Kazu was here.

But he will be back. And he will be angry at Jin, if Jin doesn't do what he told him. So Jin does.

He dresses without really looking at what he puts on: socks - check, jeans - check, boots - check... some t-shirt, some hoody. He puts the parka on the bed for now, it's too hot inside.

Now, the most important things, what did the turtle say? His passport and credit cards are inside the parka pocket to begin with, and he takes out his wallet and the ticket for his return flight.

Just how important is it, he wonders? The ticket is from Barcelona to London, and they are... he wishes he knew where they are...

And then it hits him - maybe because the activity has helped him to calm a bit - not the things that he has prepared to take with him, but the things that he's going to abandon, if they are to leave the ship: his laptop, his guitar...

It's simpler with the laptop, it's dated and slow, and he can just insert the memory stick and copy, what is important - the address book and the folder marked unoriginally “My songs”. The rest is trash anyway. He cleans it out regularly when he runs out of storage space.

It is more difficult with guitar. He can't even imagine carrying it along during the possible chaos of their rescue, but it damn hurts. Sure, he can buy another - he doesn't even need to buy another, for he has enough different guitars at home to fill a small music shop - but this is his comfort guitar, the oldest, the one he dragged all the way from Japan. He had specifically taken this one with him to help him write again. And now it's going to die. Yeah, it hurts...

He wonders if Kazu has something that he might have difficulty abandoning. Some signed baseball that he carries around as a talisman for good luck, something like that... Well, lucky turtle, a ball would fit easily in a pocket... unlike a guitar...

And then there is the announcement, asking passengers to “Please, collect your Lifejackets, warm clothes, head covering and proceed to the Muster Stations as indicated in the safety notice on the back of the cabin door.”

There is something more, but it is at this moment that Kame knocks on his door, and surely the turtle is also listening and will remember it all much better than Jin ever can.

***

Kame is fully dressed and carrying his lifejacket under his arm. He pays a cursory glance to Jin and his cabin and then goes to retrieve Jin's jacket as well, and Jin didn't even know where it was stocked, what a baby the turtle must think him to be...

“Documents, money, you have them?”

Jin indicates the small pile on the bed, and Kame takes a clear file from his pocket to put them inside. At the last moment Jin remembers about the memory stick, and - there is this sole sheet of paper with his new song jotted down, he takes it as well. The turtle doesn't object to these additions, just wraps the file around everything tightly and secures it with a... hair-ribbon of all things.

“Didn't have the plain ribbons, so took those,” he comments with a shrug, “now put it into the breast pocket of your parka once you put it on, should be safe like that.”

Jin does as he's told and tries not to think about the necessity of a file around the papers and what it implies.

They go out into the corridor that was deserted only a few moments before, but now there are people going in and out of cabin doors, and hushed conversations and some children crying further back, and in the foyer there is even more passengers, almost a little crowd, swarming around the few crew-members in yellow vests, questioning loudly, and on the stairs - people trying to push their way downstairs through all those going up, more crew-members stopping them calmly to direct them back upwards...

Not a full-blown panic, but the general mood is panic-y, and Jin feels the growing urge to just take Kazu by the hand and drag him all the way up to the boat deck, or at least somewhere where there is open air and less noise.

And then the tilt of the ship increases and the whole crowd goes quiet for a moment and dissipates considerably as more and more of the tourists turn to the stairs in the most dignified they can keep themselves from a mad rush.

And Jin is almost there with them, if not for Kame taking his hand and dragging him in the other direction, and... right, well, right... the stairs are jammed anyway, and here they are approaching one of the abandoned crew-members and the turtle asks, very politely and in his best barely accented English, “Excuse me, sir. We would like to help. What can we do?”

The crew-member looks at them like they have grown two extra-heads each. He is young, maybe even younger than Jin, and his eyes are a little wild and scared as well, especially when faced with something so out of the general picture - people panicking he can deal with, however poorly, but two people actually willing to stay downstairs and help? There is nothing in his instructions on how to deal with that.

To tell the truth, Jin is there with him. His first reaction was to quickly look at the turtle - just to check if he's lost his marbles. But Kame is composed, purposeful, sure of his intent. Even though he has clearly run out of any prepared sentences, and looks helplessly at Jin, urging him to help the turtle explain.

“Tell him that we are young and strong, and two pairs of extra-hands can't be unneeded.”

Jin does, but the problem is not the lack of understanding, and they would just stay there in a stale-mate... forever (the first unfortunate phrase that comes to Jin's mind is 'until the ship sinks'), if not for an older crew-member passing them by and stopping briefly to assess the problem.

“Alright,” he tells them, “you come with me, and you, Leon, go join the stair-controllers they could use some help.”

He strides away at that with Jin and Kame following after him, informing someone through a radio on his vest that he's got “two volunteers”, and “no, they are reliable”, and they can use Stefano somewhere else, because they'll “manage just fine”.

His name is Paolo, he's a steward and they are going to search the cabins for anyone, who might be still left inside. They also learn that he is from Brindisi, a little town on the very heel of the Italian boot, and they are near Sardinia now, which is also Italy, did they know?

Actually, he talks non-stop all the time he leads them down the secret passageways and steep stairs only reserved for crew, until they emerge into a similar foyer two decks below from where they started, and there are bits and pieces of really important information - like that they are pretty close to shore, and that they've already informed the coast-guards, and there are a few ships nearby that may be able to help as well, or that it can be that the ship won't go down at all, not significantly because the captain is trying to even now maneuver her to the shallowest part of Sardinia shelf, - all mixed up with his personal details and good-natured jokes, and it strangely takes the edge from Jin's nervousness. Well, that and the steadfast presence of Kame right by his side.

The procedure is simple, Paolo opens the door, they go in, look everywhere where a person can hide: bathrooms, closets, even below the bed, because, Paolo says, “people react to panic in the strangest ways” (he doesn't know it firsthand, has never been in a shipwreck before, but he was told so during the briefings the crew-members were given). Then they close the door and mark it as already searched.

It would've been quicker if each of them went into a separate cabin, but “you see, I can tell you are good guys, but if she doesn't sink and someone claims something missing...” it's Paolo who is going to be held responsible, right. And though it's sort of absurd under the circumstances, they comply.

Kame is moving like an automaton: open, close, bend, look, shake your head “no”, go out and repeat, - and Jin thinks that Kame is made for situations like this, for dire straits where a cool head and effectiveness are all that matters, and Jin secretly wishes that people back home, all those who abandoned him as soon as his good name was compromised, could see him now, as the true hero that he is.

Jin personally thinks that their task is futile, who in their right mind would hide in a cabin below-decks in a ship that is in danger of sinking? But no sooner than he thinks so, they find an elderly lady, who has been sleeping soundly with earplugs in her ears, and is more scandalized by the presence of three unknown men in her cabin than by the news of the ship having crashed.

When sufficiently roused, she shoos them firmly out and emerges barely five minutes later fully dressed (even up to the Lifejacket) and utterly calm. Jin notices that Kame follows her small figure bravely marching in the direction of stairs with something akin to admiration. Yeah, yeah, Kazu, another one after your own mold.

They've covered about three fourths of the corridor when the ship makes another lurch, and the list becomes more pronounced, already a little uncomfortable. “Around fifteen degrees,” Paolo says. And Jin almost expects the water to come sloshing down the corridor at any moment (they are after all two decks lower than Jin's own) but time passes and nothing happens, and they are almost ready to go on, when...

Well, the flooding still doesn't start, but the lights overhead flicker and die. And even though Paolo turns his flashlight on immediately and there are luminescent strips showing the direction to the stairs along the bottom part of the walls, Jin feels that the panic he has temporarily forgotten is ready to claim him worse than before.

It is pretty bad, if the lights go off, isn't it? It means that something, somewhere has broken down, been flooded, whatever... And it doesn't help that Jin doesn't like dark places, even more so the small enclosed dark place the corridor ultimately is.

He feels cold sweat washing over him as the fear takes grip of his insides and twists. God, oh God, they should have gone up, not down... And then he feels a small, warm, steady and callused hand slide down his sleeve to firmly wrap itself over his own sweaty palm, and suddenly he can breathe again.

Because... Kame. It's Kame. The same Kazu who sulked and later made endless fun of him because of his inability to go inside some musty Neapolitan catacombs, something that the turtle has obviously remembered as well. Only he doesn't make fun of Jin anymore. Instead there is a brush of a strong shoulder and a whispered: “We are alright. Everything's going to be alright,” and Jin believes him instantly.

Mind you, Jin doesn't have any trust whatsoever in the ability of the crew to take care of them (though Paolo seems a capable guy), just as he doesn't trust in the ability of his agency to take care of its artists, or in fact - in the ability of any official body to truly perform its assigned task. But Kame is Kame, and Jin trusts Kame with his very life. And if Kame thinks that they are going to be alright, then Jin can also believe this by proxy.

Just as he's finished with this inner justification Paolo's radio bursts in a string of rapid Italian, that neither of them understands, so they have to just stand and wait for a clarification, Kame's hand never once leaving Jin's.

“They say there is a little girl in one of the cabins,” Paolo finally explains, “The mother's upstairs, and they won't let her come down and she is frantic. The problem is it is one of the cabins we've searched already. I told them as much, but they are positive that the girl is there.”

“Wait,” Jin says, “wait, can you keep quiet?”

They do, and he finally can clearly hear the sound that has disturbed him ever since the lights went out and there wasn't their constant buzz anymore. A distant and muffled keening sound of a child crying.

“Yes,” Jin says, “She is there. Which cabin do we need?”

He almost runs down the corridor - key in hand, not waiting for Kame or Paolo with his flashlight, counting the doors with his fingertips, one, two... five. There. And the sound is louder.

The other two reach him even as he throws the door open, and there she is - in a closet inside a huge case that makes even Kame's seem small in comparison. And they have looked into the closet, off course, but none of them was clever enough to open the case, where she has been obviously hiding all this time. She probably got in there to give her parents a fright and kept quiet when she heard strangers entering instead of her mother.

But the mother never came, and they turned the lights off on their way out, and the child must have been scared to death.

“Hush,” Jin croons, squatting down beside her, “hush, it's alright, we are going to take you to your mother... You want to go to your mother, right?” And the girl finally nods shakily and wraps her little arms around Jin's neck with all the strength that her tiny body possesses. And he really has no choice but to continue talking to her quietly, while Kame brings her coat, and boots and the two of them together equip her completely for the trip up.

Paolo has been talking on his radio again, informing someone about their success in finding the girl, and now he firmly directs them both upstairs.

“You go, guys, get this little lady to her parents. There are only a few cabins left and I can finish them myself.”

***

Going upstairs with this kind of list and only the barest emergency lighting is not an easy endeavor, especially since Jin is carrying the girl in his arms, and the rare crew-members placed along the stairwell look at them with some sort of bewilderment, like they totally thought everybody should be on the upper decks already, and do not help much. Kame tries, but he is carrying both his and Jin's lifejackets and has his own hands pretty full.

In the end they stop somewhere midway up and put their lifejackets on, and after that the turtle serves as a sort of a human tug-boat and anchor in one, helping Jin to maintain a precarious balance on their climb.

Jin only realizes just how calm and business-like their downstairs search was when they finally reach the muster station and it's chaos.

It's the main lounge, and he remembers it being spacious and big, but it's the main lounge tilted at twenty degrees and filled with a totally panicked and wild crowd, everyone trying to push to the open deck on its downside - from where apparently the people are getting evacuated - with everybody crying and shouting at once.

Whatever crew-members are there are totally busy with trying to control the mob, and there is no way they can find the girl's mother by themselves, so the two of them have to go one flight of stairs back to a relatively free crew-member with walkie-talkie, and after a while an absolutely hysterical young woman somehow pushes her way to where they wait and regains the child she has probably thought that she's lost forever, showering Jin and Kame with profuse thanks.

Somehow having the girl in their charge gave Jin a purpose and a kind of grounding reason to be calm himself, but now that this reason is gone he is starting to feel a sort of angry panic again, because he just cannot see how all these people just blindly pushing towards the exits can ever be safely evacuated before it's too late. He looks at Kame, but for once the turtle seems just as shaken and unsure as Jin himself.

The crew-members around the exits are shouting for women with children to be allowed to go first, but the crowd seems to have a mind of its own, and from where the two of them are still standing a little aside - it is a mess of men and women, children and elderly, and no one, just no one intends to give way to others. Well, maybe some would, Jin is prepared to give them the benefit of a doubt, but those are interspersed with the ones who wouldn't, pressed into one humongous writhing mass guided by survival instinct in its most primitive form. And it is painfully clear that the crew is totally failing to somehow control it all.

It's mostly anger, just plain old anger both on the crowd and the lousy organization and the situation itself that makes him do what he does, an unconscious reaction of organism overloaded with all kinds of emotion, the peculiar vestiges of “fan-management” advice his sempais had been giving him over a beer or two way, way back... but Jin just opens his mouth and shouts at the top of his lungs: “Everybody just fucking stop and be quiet!”

And it is Jin's “best voice” - something he thought he could never summon again (and he is sure he'll pay for it later, but it is beside the point), something that is too large for the tiny main lounge but that could, as they claimed once, carry all through the Tokyo Dome if he really tried for it. Too loud and too sing-song clear and high - that for a moment it is the only thing everybody can hear over the cries of the crowd and even over the loudspeakers used by the crew.

It is the only thing that everybody can hear, and everybody turns involuntarily to look at Jin, where he stands at the other side of the lounge, and hence somewhat above the crowd, really almost like he is back on stage, and the words pour out of his mouth graphic and potent, like they do sometimes when he is writing lyrics, not all jumbled and messed as they come when he just speaks ordinarily.

“Don't you see you are only holding yourself up!” He shouts, while he has their attention. “Can't you be human?! Men, do you want to live knowing you've abandoned children and women to die?! Children, then women and elderly, and then we will all get off this ship safely - only this way!”

It is a good thing he did it instinctively, without thinking, because if he'd stopped to think about it he would've never believed it could work. But miraculously - it does. He can see it in how their eyes gain reason, look clearer and ashamed; in how the men in the crowd actually look around themselves for women and children that are behind them... It's a precarious moment that can shift both ways, he only hopes it doesn't revert back to panic before the crowd is given some orders clear enough to follow.

But it will have to be someone else, not Jin, because he coughs (and coughs and coughs and coughs), doubles over with coughing, can't breathe... And it takes Kazu to help him sit down on the floor, when he nearly passes out from sheer lack of oxygen... And when he finally can breathe again, “You were magnificent, you idiot!” the turtle says, his face at once concerned and relieved.

And the crew is leading women with children towards the deck, and the men are actually helping them along, and there is hope after all.

***

They rejoin everybody when Jin is able to stand again, and soon enough they are out on the deck, and Jin can see the water, much closer than he has expected, but still too far below so that the people have to climb down the ladders into the life-rafts lowered from their own ship and the boats that arrive from those ships that have answered their call for help.

It is a good thing they came, because due to the heavy listing only the boats on the starboard side of their own ship could be lowered, and there is still a lot of people left to fill quite a few.

Everybody is working together, now that safety is in immediate reach, and Jin does too: tugging on ropes and helping the elderly down the steeply tilted deck, and doing whatever other task needs doing, so he doesn't even notice when or how he gets separated from Kazu, only that when he notices him the next time - the turtle is tied to the rope and being lowered to the boat with a child in his arms, then pulled up again to take another and so on and so forth, and Jin thinks that it makes sense, since Kazu is as light as any woman on board, but much, much stronger - an ideal candidate for a task like this.

And from where Jin stands half a deck away, he can still see a radiant, encouraging smile on his turtle's lips, when he accepts yet another child from its anxious mother, and the wind is whipping his longish strands in a light-brown halo around his head, and Jin thinks that he looks beautiful, beautiful and happy, doing the best that he can as per usual.

And then Jin has two elderly ladies to help over the railing and onto a ladder, and he doesn't have time to look again.

***

The coast-guards arrive with helicopters and tall, military-trained and ruthlessly effective rescuers that drop from the skies, and everyone, including the crew, gives a loud, collective sigh of relief. They provide loud, concise and clear orders, shooing people from one place to another in organized groups, and somehow the action transfers from starboard to port side in no time at all. And from there the people are being whisked into the low-hanging copters that go back and forth between the ship and the nearest town ashore.

It's none too soon either, that they have changed sides, for the second helicopter has barely taken off when the ship shudders and seems to both list and fall from under Jin's feet, and he is thrown back and sideways, landing painfully on his elbow on the surface that previously was a wall, but is closer to horizontal now than the sharply tilted deck that he has fallen off.

There are cries and moans everywhere around him, and the coast guards are scrambling among the fallen bodies, helping people up and checking for injuries.

“Are you alright, kid?” Asks the one that tugs Jin up by his undamaged arm, “Don't worry, she is settled now. Resting safely on the shelf. So it's only a matter of lifting you all up and to the shore from now on. We'll start with those who are injured, but your turn should come soon enough.”

Jin nods, and the coast guard moves on to some other person.

So. It's almost finished. The ship has sunk as much as it is going to sink. They didn't drown. They are alive.

He should feel relief, but it feels more like a stone in his gut. He needs to find Kazu. Maybe then, beside the turtle he can properly feel that they are saved.

Jin holds his aching elbow and trudges along the ship, looking into the faces of those in orange passenger-jackets. Most of those left to evacuate are crew, but there are a few passengers scattered here and there, and if Jin's sure of something it is that there is no way that the stubborn turtle would leave without him.

“Hey, Jin!” Someone calls and he turns sharply, but it is just Paolo, his cheek scraped and a slight limp to his step when he comes to Jin's side. “Good to know you are safe! And where is your friend?”

“I don't know,” Jin answers simply, and the kind steward's face falls.

“Well, don't worry,” he still tries to reassure either Jin or himself, “He is a very capable young man. He can take care of himself.”

“Yeah,” Jin says, “I'll go look for him then...” And he hastens to leave, because truly, he wasn't really worried for Kazu previously, but now he is.

***

He is pretty much beyond himself with worry, when he has searched all the way to the nose and more than halfway aft, and there is still not a sign of the turtle. There are only a few orange-jacketed figures left further back, and none of them looks remotely like Kame from afar. And he couldn't have been already airlifted by the rescuers either, because they are still lifting the injured and those are whom Jin searched among first.

There was another deck above them, and there could be people there as well, but when Jin clambers heavily up through the now terribly tilted gangway, they are all crew-members - without a single exception. He wants to cry, as in - dissolve in tears, but also - to just start crying the turtle's name out hysterically - in hopes that Kazu would just materialize out of thin air, and call him 'idiot' for being so stupidly scared on his behalf.

Jin goes back to the deck he was initially on, that all the passengers were on, and searches from nose back again to the very aft, looking into all those strangers' faces. He does miss Paolo somehow, which is a good thing, because if he were asked about the turtle again, he'd truly become hysterical.

He even comes to the coast guard in charge of airlifting and asks whether they have lifted (or seen) “a young man, Japanese, with light-brown hair, this high”. They haven't. Jin trudges further aft, to the very point, where the wall, that he's currently walking on, ends. And there is a narrow rift between the two decks with water sloshing heavily inside it, dark and ominous, out of reach of the searchlights shining on them from helicopters and ships.

A coast guard stands on the edge of the rift, intent on not letting Jin get any nearer to it. But Jin thinks he sees something... the very edge of an orange jacket, protruding from under the floating plastic shield that has fallen off deck.

“See, there!” He shows it to the guard, and the guard squints but doesn't see anything.

Yet Jin is sure he sees it - the edge of a jacket, a blue clad leg, and on the other side of the shield, part of a head. He can't be sure in the darkness, but the hair don't seem like it is totally dark.

“I'm sure there is a person there!” he pleads, because he totally, totally can see him (is sure that it is Kame - somewhere deep inside)...

“I do not see anything,” is all that the guard answers.

And Jin dives.

Day 7 - Cagliari (epilogue)

Jin wakes up in hospital. At least it smells and sounds like hospital before he even opens his eyes, and when he does - it looks so as well, the naked walls painted in that peculiarly bland light-something (the actual color doesn't really matter, it's green in this particular case) with the obligatory framed reproductions on them intended to make the room homier.

There is an IV in his arm, and he feels a vague ache brewing inside his head that is bandaged for whatever reason he can't remember at all.

But as he shifts his eyes to the side, there on the straight backed chair that also seems a part of hospital regulation worldwide (probably so that the visitors aren't tempted to linger after the official hours) is Kazu, eyes closed and head fallen to his shoulder as he naps. And the sight is enough to curb the initial panic that Jin has been feeling ever since he fully recalled the goings on of last night.

Kazu looks good. Gray with fatigue and probably running a fever if the bright spots in his cheeks are something to judge by - but he looks good, looks alive - and anything else can be cured (apart from cancer or aids, but these are not something one acquires because of a shipwreck).

Kazu is alive.

“You're alive,” Jin croacks. Oh, well, right, he knew it would end like this... That's how his voice will sound for the next couple of months at least, (un)happy re-acquaintance to you too!

“You're alive,” Jin croacks and the turtle's eyes fly open in an instant, and gaze on Jin, unblinking and serious.

“Yeah,” Kame says slowly. “I am alive. And so are you. And so is the man that you saved, you stupid ass!” He almost flies up from his chair, and Jin has never seen the turtle so angry, so truly, completely, undeniably mad.

“Damn it, Jin,” he rages, “haven't they taught you when you were a child that you don't dive, where you aren't sure what awaits you under the water! Lucky for you, you only have a medium hard contusion, but what if you'd broken your neck? What,” and he shakes all over with the strength of his emotion, “what if you'd fucking died?”

“I thought it was you,” Jin says simply as if that explains it all. And maybe, it does, for Kame falls down on to the chair and buries his face in his hands.

“I know,” comes muffled from between the hands, “I know... I figured as much, and I'm... really sorry I left the ship before you... It wasn't my choice...”

“I'd never think that it was,” Jin says calmly, because now that he knows his Kazu is not dead yesterday seems like a distant nightmare, and well, this is the truth - he never would. “I was just worried about you...”

“Me too,” the turtle admits, “You can't imagine how much... The choppers, they brought you directly to Cagliari but we, those who were brought onto the other ships, only arrived here in the morning, and they wouldn't tell me about you, because I'm not your direct family...” He chuckles but it sounds flat, an echo of still fresh agony evident in his voice. “It's lucky that they diagnosed me with bronchitis, and I was admitted here as well... But, well, then I learned that you were in the intensive care...”

“Bronchitis?” Jin asks right back, “Shouldn't you be in bed yourself?”

Kame sighs, lifts himself from his chair (and he really looks like he should be - in bed, that is).

“It's o'key, I'm just too susceptible to colds...”

He circles the foot of Jin's bed and sits on the very edge of it, lowering his forehead to somewhere on Jin's shoulder carefully.

“Can I stay here - just for a short while?” His voice sounds thick, raw with emotion. “I'm sorry, Jin, I'm so sorry. I should've somehow returned on board, even if the people who had been pulling me up had left to the port side... I shouldn't have left...”

His forehead is burning where it presses into Jin's collarbone - the turtle is running a fever, and Jin should probably call a nurse - for Kame, not for himself. But maybe not now.

“Come here,” he tugs him gently, “put your legs up as well, the bed is wide.” And when Kazu does so tiredly, he pulls him as close as he can with one hand only. “Idiot,” he whispers into his hair, “what an idiot! Does it even matter if we are both alive? Then again,” he adds with a soft chuckle, “think of that person that I saved, he would have died if I wasn't searching for you...”

“Well,” Kame chuckles in answer, a watery, feeble chuckle but the chocolate is returning gradually, “technically it was a coast guard, who saved you both. But it's true that he wouldn't have gotten into the water if you hadn't jumped in there first...”

“See,” Jin confirms, “and that was because I wanted to find you so badly... So, hush now, rest, there will be time for us to talk more later.”

And there indeed will be time for everything and anything now.

There will be time for Kame to receive a call from his work-mates, and to learn that the news of the shipwreck had been transmitted world-wide, and that their channel made a point to do an in-depth report, adding proudly that one of its casters had been present there and according to crew and passengers alike showed bravery and perseverance in the course of rescue.

There will be time for Jin to tell the turtle about something that he has only remembered while searching for him on board: how all those years ago, at the day when he had auditioned for the jimusho he saw that boy, who was standing aside from everyone else, like he was feeling out of place there, but at the same time a little defiantly, like he thought it was the place that was wrong and not him. And how Jin thought the boy looked cute - all prickles and those huge eyebrows - so he came to him and offered to be his friend. Time to tell Kazu how disappointed Jin felt when on the next day he couldn't find him among the ones who were accepted.

There will be time for Jin to finish writing his song, though it won't be until March that his voice will return enough to be able to sing it.

There will be time for promises and hopes and just life.

For now - the nurse that comes to check on Jin's IV half an hour later, finds them fast asleep together in the bed intended for one.

But they both look so much in need of that sleep and their hands are clutching so tightly on each others clothes, that she turns off the light and goes out quietly, leaving the two of them right where they are.

End.