Step in the Same River (Vassalord, Cherry/Rayflo, R)
Title: Step in the Same River
Author: devikun
Prompt: Vassalord: onsen, in retrospect, it had been a bad idea
Words: 4000 approx
Rating: R
Warnings: horror, triggering issues abortion/miscarriage imagery/associations
Summary: When is a vampire hunt ever simple?
Massive thanks to smillaraaq for the very, very fine beta. Her insights into my story made me sound and feel a hell of a lot smarter than I actually am, so any remaining errors are definitely mine.
A little background about the creature. I was inspired not by vampire mythos, but by Japanese mythos associated with Ebisu, one of the Seven Gods of Fortune who was born deformed, possessing no skeleton, via an incorrectly-done ritual. For the first three years of his life, he is referred to as Hiruko, literally 'leech child'. As leeches - used in ancient medicine the world over - are also blood suckers and commonly found around water courses and in wet areas, the connection made sense in the context of the prompt for me. Ebisu, along with Daikoku in whose company he was apparently often found, was also thought to have stopped at one of Japan's onsens, but I forget which.
Something else that I didn't originally intend, but that my beta spotted immediately, is the connection to Japanese belief regarding the mizuko (lit. water child). The mizuko refers to any lost fetus or infant, and the connections I made here are entirely coincidental in both the loose similarities to Hiruko (deformation, rejection, abandonment) and Johnny's mother/father figure status with Cherry (as well as Cherry's own abandonment issues). Again, I'm really, really grateful to smillaraaq for pointing these things out and talking so honestly and intelligently about them, because I never consciously intended those particular connections, and also because, considering the potentially sensitive nature of the subject, I definitely needed to provide the appropriate warnings.
Also, I just need to say, wow, was writing for Vassalord hard! I started two completely different pieces before I set on this course, and I still have no idea why I had so much trouble. I think because, while I love Chrono's story and characters with a violent passion, I still have almost no real clue what's bloody well going on! All the questions I most want her to address seem to be the ones she least wants to answer and I found it made writing something with any real substance based in canon very, very hard...
Anyway, here ends my rambling notes. Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed the story.
"Where?" Johnny asks distractedly. Chris is pulling off his tie, pulling open the buttons at his throat and it's far more worthy of his attention then some new job Chris has been told to do. It'd piss him off, if Johnny was the type to be easily annoyed, that the Church treats Chris like its own personal attack dog. But far be it from him to point it out, unless of course he's trying to piss off Chris who is the type to be easily annoyed.
"Japan," Chris repeats patiently as he drops his tie over the back of the chair he's standing next to. Minea will be around to hang it up later. "Kobe, to be precise."
"Japan," Johnny repeats, and okay, now the Vatican has a little more of his attention. "What's in Japan?"
"Aside from the Japanese?" Chris asks with an arched eyebrow and an almost-smile as he undoes his cuff-links. "Apparently something that sucks the insides out of visitors, blood, bones and all."
"Just the visitors?"
Chris shrugs. "Others too."
"Nice. But you don't need me, Cherry darling. You're a big, strong boy now." Johnny makes sure to leer, just to see Chris scowl at him, which he does. "You can take care of this on your own. I have work to do."
Chris is silent for a while, and Johnny thinks that maybe that's the end of the conversation. Fine with him. Talking is usually overrated anyway, and Chris is getting naked.
"That's a shame," Chris sighs as he shrugs off his shirt and drops it onto the foot of the bed. "I thought after everything that's been happening lately, it'd be nice to take a little break. I was going to book us a stay in one of the nearby hot spring hotels. I guess I'll just have to stay on my own."
It sounds suspiciously like a peace offering, which is possible. It's not that they've been fighting, per se; at least, not to inflict grievous bodily harm, sadly, but things are still a little strained between them and maybe that's Johnny's fault. Chris asked to stay - well, not in so many words but he turned up some months ago, and just hasn't really left yet, except for work - and Johnny wants him around, like he can make up for all the time he lost or something, which is ironic, considering. But he just can't stop winding Cherry up and Cherry is so easy, easily aggravated, easily flustered. And cute; he's very, very cute. Johnny just can't resist.
Of course, that's all secondary to:
"Onsen?! When do we leave?!"
"Thought you'd see it my way," Chris says, and there's a smirk in his voice if not on his face. "Tomorrow afternoon. But right now, if you don't mind, it's been a long week, and I'd like to eat."
Johnny knows when he's being manipulated, but what does it matter when Chris wants him around? Things between them haven't been this way in a while, maybe even ever, except when Chris was small, and just the thought of it makes Johnny feel generous, suffuses him with warmth and fondness. Although, on second thought, that could very well be because Chris is unbuckling and dragging off his belt and watching Johnny like he's considering what to do with it. And oh, Johnny could give him a few fine ideas, most definitely.
"Then, come and get it, Cherry," he challenges, slouching back into the pillows he's propped up against and giving Chris his best lascivious grin.
"It's Charley," Chris corrects, like he hasn't already said it a hundred times or more, and climbs onto the bed between Johnny's spread legs. His belt is wrapped around one hand, and his other hand is high on Johnny's thigh, thumb pressing against the artery in the crease where Johnny's leg and groin meet. His eyes are on the vein in Johnny's neck like he's a three course meal, which is not far wrong. "You know, I think I liked it better when you used to run."
"Running," Johnny reminds him lowly, reaching for him, "is only for people who don't want to be caught." He doesn't mention, of course, that the only one here who ever ran isn't him.
++++++++
"'Let's take some time out'," Johnny repeats in a thin, petulant voice. "'Let's relax at a nearby hot spring'. 'Let's have kinky sex in one of those traditional Japanese rooms'. You're a lying liar who lies, Cherry, and you brought me here under false pretences!"
And it's times like this that Chris proves he is not and possibly never will be an actual son, because he doesn't even look remotely sorry as he crosses the generous tatami room over to the far wall to slide it open to look out onto the garden and private pool. Beyond the edge of the hewn stone deck, steam rises lazily over calm, dark water, and in the corners against the high bamboo fence, traditional lanterns throw a warm, eerie glow across the trees, outlining him momentarily in soft, fiery tones.
"Master, maybe your memory's going in your old age," he points out coolly, although there's amusement in his voice. "Because I didn't say that. And I wasn't lying; I just wasn't sure. But you feel something, don't you."
Johnny scowls in the direction of the floor. They've checked in unusually late, but this is an exclusive ryokan, and the staff member that showed them into their rooms a little while ago had spent another ten minutes explaining everything to them, and then had gotten out their bedding and yukatas and towels and made a discreet exit. And the hot spring is right there, and Johnny could be in it in what amounts to seconds, and Chris… Chris would be naked, or wrapped in one of those robes, and he's going to look so good, almost good enough to eat. Johnny scowls a little harder, because as delectable as that thought is, the likelihood he'll actually see Chris in one of those any time soon is clearly rather low.
"Yes," he admits huffily when Chris turns to look at him. "There's something. But not here."
"Well," Chris shrugs, and he seems to be expecting something. "At least it's not another Bulgarian vampire. I'd hate to ruin the spring trying to kill it."
Johnny just hmphs at that. "Fine," he sighs. "Let's go get this over with then. But you're making this up to me, Cherry! I expect a full body massage at the very least. And sake. Lots of sake. And later, you're taking me down into town."
Chris pushes his glasses up, probably to hide a smirk, Johnny thinks.
"Let's just kill this vampire," he suggests. "And then we'll see."
+++++++++++
"What is it?"
Johnny glances up only once, and drags a little harder on his cigarette. They've been climbing the mountain for hours, hunting down the sense of otherness he can scent on the air, and now that they're here, he's sure. The site has clearly been abandoned. Rocks loom out of the hillside, overgrown with moss and vines, and dark, swallowed places lurk beneath them, only just big enough to crawl into.
"A shrine," he shrugs, exhaling past the sour taste burning in the back of his throat that the nicotine does nothing to hide. "Shinto, probably. But I think it's gone bad. Not sure. Ancient Japanese vampires aren't exactly my speciality area, y'know." There's no mistaking that this was once a sacred place, though, even as unassuming as it is. The frayed, half-crumbling shi-me-nawa twisted around the central rock gives the whole arrangement the appearance of a smile, and the dirty, tattered paper shi-de attached to it look a little too much like teeth gleaming pale in the moonlight. In any other context, especially one involving Cherry, Johnny would be all over that, but this looks like an invitation that he's not stupid enough to walk into, at least not these days.
"Well," Chris says, staring at the opening under the boulder. "Either we try going down there now - and I don't particularly like the idea of combat in such a confined space without having a better idea of what we're up against - or we think of something else."
Johnny's more relieved than he can say about that, because there's nothing about this - not the long boring search of the area above the hot springs, nor the absence of any discernible presence - that he likes.
"So then, it's back to the ryokan for some of that kinky sex you promised me!" he enthuses, and he might be saying it because winding Chris up is a pleasure in and of itself, but it never hurts to put it out there either. "I'll race you."
Chris gives him a withering look. "If you're racing anything, it should be the sunrise," he points out tartly. "It took us three hours to get up here."
"Pft," Johnny says. "I can be back and in the bath before you're even half way down the mountain," he scoffs, and then grins. "So have a nice walk, Cherry!"
Chris' mouth gapes a little. "Master, you're not going to le-"
Johnny gives him a cheery wave and then promptly shifts form and flutters his way en masse back down the mountain side, chittering a sub-sonic laugh at the slightly less-than-holy language that follows him faintly back down.
+++++
The door slides back behind him, faint rattle of bamboo and paper screen, and Johnny smiles to himself as he lounges on his side on his futon. Chris must have run after all, because it's only been an hour, and Johnny's soaked in the bath, wrapped himself in a yukata and made sure he has somewhere safe to sleep later, all in the time it took Chris to get here. It's sooner than Johnny anticipated, but that's okay; more than okay, he thinks, when he feels Chris' slightly chilled hand come down on his bare ankle. He smiles again and rolls himself forward a little, languidly, to lean over and stub out his cigarette in the ashtray on the floor beside him.
"Well, well," he murmurs, throatily. "Somebody didn't get enough yesterday. What have I told you about dieting, Cherry? You don't need to. I like you just the way you are."
"Master," Chris says, roughly, and his grip on Johnny's ankle tightens.
"Honestly," Johnny sighs, because Chris might be on a job, but this is the first time since the thing with Kazan that Chris has actually wanted him along. And there's something about the intimacy and privacy their surroundings accord that makes Johnny hope that maybe, just maybe, Chris is starting to rethink his standpoint on a few things. "It doesn't have to be this hard all the time, does it? I'm your master; I want to give you what you need. You just have to learn to ask for it. We don't have to keep playing... these..."
Johnny trails off as Chris' hand lets go of his ankle and starts sliding up his calf, dipping into the back of his knee before sliding higher still, pushing the folds of the yukata back as it goes and Christ. Suddenly he forgets how to breathe, and it's all kinds of wanton but he rolls fully forward, lets his legs fall apart a little as the yukata hikes higher and Chris' fingers skim the back of his thigh. He can feel Chris leaning over him, can feel him kneeling either side of one of Johnny's legs and the yukata is all the way up now, exposing him to the air and Chris' hand palming one of his cheeks.
"God," Johnny shudders, and presses his forehead against the tatami mat and keeps absolutely still, because if he moves, if he tries to do anything but just lie here, Chris might stop.
"Master," Chris says again, and his weight comes down against Johnny's back, hips fitting flush to the curve of Johnny's bare arse. The hand not still slowly massaging one of Johnny's arse cheeks pulls at the collar of Johnny's robe and then his breath is gusting across the back of Johnny's neck, his lips ghosting across his skin. Johnny shudders again and presses himself back, backside rising into the embrace of Chris's groin, neck arching against his mouth.
"Yeah," he gasps. "Come on, Chris. Take it. Take me."
Chris' hand trembles on his shoulder, and his mouth presses open against the curve of his throat. His tongue licks out, a lewd slide of wet, dexterous muscle, and then he bites down.
And suddenly, it's all wrong.
Johnny's body bucks before he even has time to realise that whatever it is that's latched onto him in the guise of his Chris is something else entirely. Its fangs feel like they go in too far, like they're worming their way in, digging in and following the track of his vein and there's suddenly a rank smell in the air and a familiar, acid taste in the back of his mouth. In purely defensive reflex, Johnny brings his arm up and angles his elbow into the side of the thing's head hard enough that it tears off him with a decidedly un-Chris-like sound. It gives Johnny enough room, just enough, to twist himself around and get a hand on its throat and he’ll kill it; he'll drag it screaming into hell if it's done anything to Chris, anything at all.
It tries to break his hold, but Johnny's better, stronger, and always will be. He shoves, tosses it onto its back, following it and pinning it down and, "Master!" it gasps as his grip tightens.
Johnny's hand clenches involuntarily, its windpipe crushing a little in his hold, and he looks, looks properly, and God have mercy.
It's Chris. It's Chris. Chris' eyes begging him while something dark and foul and desperate lives inside his mouth.
"Chris!" Johnny says, the name torn from him like the thing's bite tore his flesh.
"Kill... it," Chris grates.
"Fuck," Johnny says harshly. "Damn it. Okay, buddy. Eviction time."
Johnny shifts form, just a little, holds Chris down with one solid hand and brings the other less solid one up and if this thing wanted to eat him, Johnny's going to force himself down its throat until it damn well gags. He forces Chris' panting mouth open and reaches in, reaches down, pushes and forces himself inside. Chris makes a choking, distressed sound, clawing at him. Johnny ignores him. He can almost feel it, almost reach it...
He touches something, something not Chris. This thing in him is old, old and mad from hunger and loneliness and putrid to its core. When Johnny grips it, it digs its claws in, like tiny little teeth, but Johnny's determination is bloody. Chris made him promise once; he's the only one allowed to be there when Johnny dies. But by the same token, Johnny gave him life and it's not anyone else's to steal.
Johnny takes hold of the thing, and pulls.
It fights him every step of the way, and under him Chris makes sounds no living creature should have to make, his body convulsing, fighting Johnny in purely instinctive reflex. Johnny ignores that too, and drags the thing kicking and screaming from Chris.
It holds on until the last, until Chris gives a shudder so violent it rolls them both over. He shoves at Johnny hard enough to push him off and then gets his arms under his body, hunches up and opens his mouth wider than seems entirely natural. He shudders again, makes a harsh retching sound, and the thing spews forth. It's a viscous, amorphous, vaguely human creature; arms, legs, a mouth, eyes, the size of a newborn or not much bigger and yet more like Kazan's final form than Johnny likes, like it's got no bones, is nothing but liquid, a black, oily stain, invertebrate.
"Leech child," Johnny names it and it moans and shivers and slides away, but Johnny's got its number now, can feel what it is even if he doesn't know where it sprang from. "That was a very naughty thing to do, worming your way into my little Cherry's good books. But he's mine and I'm taking him back now, if it's all the same to you."
"Master..."
Chris is hands and knees on the floor, pale and shaking and Johnny, relieved, more relieved than he can say, crouches down in front of him, lays a hand on the crown of his head.
"Okay?" he asks gently, and Chris shudders again.
"That was..." he starts, and then swallows like there's a bad taste in his mouth. "That was extremely unpleasant."
Johnny laughs at the level of understatement. "Seriously, Cherry, you let a little thing like this get to you? No wonder you're so uptight. Anyway, you'd better do your thing before it gets away."
Chris groans. "Not the water again."
"No, I'd say the traditional way will suffice this time."
"Right," Chris says, and Johnny watches as he pushes himself up off the floor and staggers over to the thing. It shivers at his feet, but it's not trying to escape. Johnny suddenly feels a little sorry for it.
"Its heart…" Chris starts.
Johnny shrugs. "In the usual place."
"Right."
"Chris?"
Chris glances over and Johnny leans back against the wall behind him and fixes him with a soft look. "Make it quick, yeah?"
Chris' frown eases, but he says, "Don't I always?"
+++++++++
"Ah, this is the life."
If only Chris could have more jobs like this, although perhaps leaving out the rogue vampires, regardless of whether they're horny, hungry or not. Still, it wasn't so bad in the end, he thinks. Or at least, it could have been worse. There'd been no true maliciousness on the creature's part; it was just lonely, starved, abandoned, lost. Somehow Johnny had gotten the impression it had wanted to die, and in the end and he couldn't help but feel for it, just a little.
That doesn't mean he's anyone else's free meal ticket, though, even Cherry's, and he plans on getting his money's worth starting with about a week soaking in the hot spring and drinking as much sake as Chris can afford to order.
"Well, Father Ellis is happy, as usual."
And there's Chris back from his making his report and he seriously better have brought more booze.
"That's nice," Johnny responds idly, as Chris slides the door shut again and pads across the mats to the landing.
"I think we were lucky," Chris indicates, his voice closer but Johnny's too busy refilling his cup to turn around. "The Church doesn't have any records of such a thing, but while I was in town, I spoke to some of the local shop owners. They weren't happy talking about it, but there have apparently been legends around this area for centuries."
"Oh?"
"Yes. And you don't want to know what those legends are about."
"A god," Johnny guesses mildly, placing the sake bottle back on the bamboo tray floating next to him. "Or, maybe just leftovers."
"Something like that." Chris comes out onto the landing, crouches down by Johnny's side where he leans back against the edge of the pool. "You knew. You couldn't have perhaps warned me?"
Johnny smirks and sips at his sake. "What difference would it have made? Although, in retrospect, it was probably a bad idea to leave you on your own up at that shrine. Really, Cherry, I thought I brought you up to look out for yourself better than that."
Sake splashes out of the cup as Chris grabs a fistful of Johnny's hair and pulls his head back roughly. "You never brought me up at all, Master," he reminds sharply. "And if I thought for a second that you knew that was going to happen..."
"Cherry, you hurt me! Of course I didn't!" Johnny gasps out, barely managing not to laugh, not because it's funny but because Chris is so, so easy to wind up. "You know me; I don't like to share."
Chris is silent for a second, and then hmphs, clearly somewhat mollified by that, and lets him go. Johnny grins and throws back what remains of his sake.
"Well, at any rate," Chris continues coolly. "We'll stay here the rest of the week. Then I have to go back to Sacramento, and then there's someone we have to go and see."
Johnny doesn't miss the inclusive pronoun in that sentence. "The rest of the week, huh?" He puts the cup back on the boat and pushes it away, then slides himself around on the submerged bench to look at Chris as sweetly and innocently as he can. "Oh, whatever will we do until then?"
"You know," Chris says distractedly, ignoring him as he glances back into their room. "I haven't been gone all that long. How exactly did you dispose of the vampire's remains?"
Johnny leers and deliberately licks his lips. "Do you really want to know, Cherry?"
Chris looks back at him again, mildly horrified. "No, actually."
"But you're avoiding my question," Johnny points out slyly, folding his arms on the landing next to Chris' feet. "What are we going to do?"
Chris gives him a look half way between exasperated and indulgent, and then stands up and walks back into the room. Johnny sighs to himself. Well, so much for his attempts at seduction. Again. He almost wants the leech child back.
"Well," Chris starts, and turns back and cocks his head, and Johnny gapes a little as he starts reaching for the buttons on his shirt. "There was some mention of a massage you were owed..."
Johnny is out of the pool so fast he leaves puddles of water all the way to the tatami mats. "Cherry, don't tease your old man! It'll make him cry."
Chris does smile this time, and his shirt is undone all the way when he reaches for Johnny. Johnny expects him to - and okay, yes, wants him to - grab hold and throw him on his back on the futon, but instead Chris just touches him for a moment, his hand against the side of Johnny's face, his thumb gently sweeping across to the corner of Johnny's mouth.
"Before," he starts quietly, seriously. "When that creature was...inside me, controlling me, I could feel it. It was so...empty. It wanted you. It wanted to devour you."
Johnny smiles at that, but only a little, and only gently. "And you didn't?"
Chris frowns. "Not like that. Master..."
"Shh, Cherry," Johnny hushes him, reaching up to lay his own hand against Chris' cheek. "I told you, you belong to me and I don't like to share. But you're the only one I'll let eat me, too, remember? Didn't we agree?"
Chris casts his eyes down for a moment, and this is why Johnny can't let him go, and wouldn't even if he wanted to, because Chris, for everything he is now, is still Johnny's light in the dark, and of all the things that Johnny's done in his lifetime, right and wrong, he will never give that up again.
"Master," Chris breathes, and uncharacteristically turns his head and presses a kiss into Johnny's palm. Johnny's insides melt like ice under a summer thaw.
"Chris," Johnny returns softly, and he could be wrong, but things could be shaping up for that kinky sex he wanted after all. "So, I got out of the bath, and I think I remember someone mentioning a massage?"
Chris looks at him, and then smiles, this time properly, wickedly, and Johnny's heart does a quick little stumble.
"Someone did, but maybe later."
"Later!?" Johnny objects. "Cherry, you tease! You promised me, and look, here I am, all ready and willing."
Chris glances down, deliberately and lingeringly, and then back up, and smirks again.
"So I see," he comments dryly. "But right now, I'm hungry again."
Surprised - because if he didn't know better, he'd say Chris was flirting with him - Johnny laughs, and steps forward to press himself, naked and damp, along the length of Chris' body.
"Well," he sighs resignedly, and wraps his arms around Chris' neck, and then squirms a little and sighs when Chris' hands come down to lightly grip his hips. "I guess it'd be no good for me if you passed out from a lack of sustenance half way through, wouldn't it."
Chris lowers his head and his lips mouth at the damp skin stretched fine and thin across Johnny's collar bone. Johnny can feel him smiling against him, can feel his hands gripping tighter and his thumbs rubbing lazy circles on Johnny's hip bones.
"Thought you'd see it my way, Master," he returns, laughter in his voice, and Johnny sighs again and presses himself closer.
"Don't I always, Chris?" he murmurs. "Isn't that the point?"
Chris doesn't answer, at least, not with words.
Author: devikun
Prompt: Vassalord: onsen, in retrospect, it had been a bad idea
Words: 4000 approx
Rating: R
Warnings: horror, triggering issues abortion/miscarriage imagery/associations
Summary: When is a vampire hunt ever simple?
Massive thanks to smillaraaq for the very, very fine beta. Her insights into my story made me sound and feel a hell of a lot smarter than I actually am, so any remaining errors are definitely mine.
A little background about the creature. I was inspired not by vampire mythos, but by Japanese mythos associated with Ebisu, one of the Seven Gods of Fortune who was born deformed, possessing no skeleton, via an incorrectly-done ritual. For the first three years of his life, he is referred to as Hiruko, literally 'leech child'. As leeches - used in ancient medicine the world over - are also blood suckers and commonly found around water courses and in wet areas, the connection made sense in the context of the prompt for me. Ebisu, along with Daikoku in whose company he was apparently often found, was also thought to have stopped at one of Japan's onsens, but I forget which.
Something else that I didn't originally intend, but that my beta spotted immediately, is the connection to Japanese belief regarding the mizuko (lit. water child). The mizuko refers to any lost fetus or infant, and the connections I made here are entirely coincidental in both the loose similarities to Hiruko (deformation, rejection, abandonment) and Johnny's mother/father figure status with Cherry (as well as Cherry's own abandonment issues). Again, I'm really, really grateful to smillaraaq for pointing these things out and talking so honestly and intelligently about them, because I never consciously intended those particular connections, and also because, considering the potentially sensitive nature of the subject, I definitely needed to provide the appropriate warnings.
Also, I just need to say, wow, was writing for Vassalord hard! I started two completely different pieces before I set on this course, and I still have no idea why I had so much trouble. I think because, while I love Chrono's story and characters with a violent passion, I still have almost no real clue what's bloody well going on! All the questions I most want her to address seem to be the ones she least wants to answer and I found it made writing something with any real substance based in canon very, very hard...
Anyway, here ends my rambling notes. Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed the story.
"Where?" Johnny asks distractedly. Chris is pulling off his tie, pulling open the buttons at his throat and it's far more worthy of his attention then some new job Chris has been told to do. It'd piss him off, if Johnny was the type to be easily annoyed, that the Church treats Chris like its own personal attack dog. But far be it from him to point it out, unless of course he's trying to piss off Chris who is the type to be easily annoyed.
"Japan," Chris repeats patiently as he drops his tie over the back of the chair he's standing next to. Minea will be around to hang it up later. "Kobe, to be precise."
"Japan," Johnny repeats, and okay, now the Vatican has a little more of his attention. "What's in Japan?"
"Aside from the Japanese?" Chris asks with an arched eyebrow and an almost-smile as he undoes his cuff-links. "Apparently something that sucks the insides out of visitors, blood, bones and all."
"Just the visitors?"
Chris shrugs. "Others too."
"Nice. But you don't need me, Cherry darling. You're a big, strong boy now." Johnny makes sure to leer, just to see Chris scowl at him, which he does. "You can take care of this on your own. I have work to do."
Chris is silent for a while, and Johnny thinks that maybe that's the end of the conversation. Fine with him. Talking is usually overrated anyway, and Chris is getting naked.
"That's a shame," Chris sighs as he shrugs off his shirt and drops it onto the foot of the bed. "I thought after everything that's been happening lately, it'd be nice to take a little break. I was going to book us a stay in one of the nearby hot spring hotels. I guess I'll just have to stay on my own."
It sounds suspiciously like a peace offering, which is possible. It's not that they've been fighting, per se; at least, not to inflict grievous bodily harm, sadly, but things are still a little strained between them and maybe that's Johnny's fault. Chris asked to stay - well, not in so many words but he turned up some months ago, and just hasn't really left yet, except for work - and Johnny wants him around, like he can make up for all the time he lost or something, which is ironic, considering. But he just can't stop winding Cherry up and Cherry is so easy, easily aggravated, easily flustered. And cute; he's very, very cute. Johnny just can't resist.
Of course, that's all secondary to:
"Onsen?! When do we leave?!"
"Thought you'd see it my way," Chris says, and there's a smirk in his voice if not on his face. "Tomorrow afternoon. But right now, if you don't mind, it's been a long week, and I'd like to eat."
Johnny knows when he's being manipulated, but what does it matter when Chris wants him around? Things between them haven't been this way in a while, maybe even ever, except when Chris was small, and just the thought of it makes Johnny feel generous, suffuses him with warmth and fondness. Although, on second thought, that could very well be because Chris is unbuckling and dragging off his belt and watching Johnny like he's considering what to do with it. And oh, Johnny could give him a few fine ideas, most definitely.
"Then, come and get it, Cherry," he challenges, slouching back into the pillows he's propped up against and giving Chris his best lascivious grin.
"It's Charley," Chris corrects, like he hasn't already said it a hundred times or more, and climbs onto the bed between Johnny's spread legs. His belt is wrapped around one hand, and his other hand is high on Johnny's thigh, thumb pressing against the artery in the crease where Johnny's leg and groin meet. His eyes are on the vein in Johnny's neck like he's a three course meal, which is not far wrong. "You know, I think I liked it better when you used to run."
"Running," Johnny reminds him lowly, reaching for him, "is only for people who don't want to be caught." He doesn't mention, of course, that the only one here who ever ran isn't him.
++++++++
"'Let's take some time out'," Johnny repeats in a thin, petulant voice. "'Let's relax at a nearby hot spring'. 'Let's have kinky sex in one of those traditional Japanese rooms'. You're a lying liar who lies, Cherry, and you brought me here under false pretences!"
And it's times like this that Chris proves he is not and possibly never will be an actual son, because he doesn't even look remotely sorry as he crosses the generous tatami room over to the far wall to slide it open to look out onto the garden and private pool. Beyond the edge of the hewn stone deck, steam rises lazily over calm, dark water, and in the corners against the high bamboo fence, traditional lanterns throw a warm, eerie glow across the trees, outlining him momentarily in soft, fiery tones.
"Master, maybe your memory's going in your old age," he points out coolly, although there's amusement in his voice. "Because I didn't say that. And I wasn't lying; I just wasn't sure. But you feel something, don't you."
Johnny scowls in the direction of the floor. They've checked in unusually late, but this is an exclusive ryokan, and the staff member that showed them into their rooms a little while ago had spent another ten minutes explaining everything to them, and then had gotten out their bedding and yukatas and towels and made a discreet exit. And the hot spring is right there, and Johnny could be in it in what amounts to seconds, and Chris… Chris would be naked, or wrapped in one of those robes, and he's going to look so good, almost good enough to eat. Johnny scowls a little harder, because as delectable as that thought is, the likelihood he'll actually see Chris in one of those any time soon is clearly rather low.
"Yes," he admits huffily when Chris turns to look at him. "There's something. But not here."
"Well," Chris shrugs, and he seems to be expecting something. "At least it's not another Bulgarian vampire. I'd hate to ruin the spring trying to kill it."
Johnny just hmphs at that. "Fine," he sighs. "Let's go get this over with then. But you're making this up to me, Cherry! I expect a full body massage at the very least. And sake. Lots of sake. And later, you're taking me down into town."
Chris pushes his glasses up, probably to hide a smirk, Johnny thinks.
"Let's just kill this vampire," he suggests. "And then we'll see."
+++++++++++
"What is it?"
Johnny glances up only once, and drags a little harder on his cigarette. They've been climbing the mountain for hours, hunting down the sense of otherness he can scent on the air, and now that they're here, he's sure. The site has clearly been abandoned. Rocks loom out of the hillside, overgrown with moss and vines, and dark, swallowed places lurk beneath them, only just big enough to crawl into.
"A shrine," he shrugs, exhaling past the sour taste burning in the back of his throat that the nicotine does nothing to hide. "Shinto, probably. But I think it's gone bad. Not sure. Ancient Japanese vampires aren't exactly my speciality area, y'know." There's no mistaking that this was once a sacred place, though, even as unassuming as it is. The frayed, half-crumbling shi-me-nawa twisted around the central rock gives the whole arrangement the appearance of a smile, and the dirty, tattered paper shi-de attached to it look a little too much like teeth gleaming pale in the moonlight. In any other context, especially one involving Cherry, Johnny would be all over that, but this looks like an invitation that he's not stupid enough to walk into, at least not these days.
"Well," Chris says, staring at the opening under the boulder. "Either we try going down there now - and I don't particularly like the idea of combat in such a confined space without having a better idea of what we're up against - or we think of something else."
Johnny's more relieved than he can say about that, because there's nothing about this - not the long boring search of the area above the hot springs, nor the absence of any discernible presence - that he likes.
"So then, it's back to the ryokan for some of that kinky sex you promised me!" he enthuses, and he might be saying it because winding Chris up is a pleasure in and of itself, but it never hurts to put it out there either. "I'll race you."
Chris gives him a withering look. "If you're racing anything, it should be the sunrise," he points out tartly. "It took us three hours to get up here."
"Pft," Johnny says. "I can be back and in the bath before you're even half way down the mountain," he scoffs, and then grins. "So have a nice walk, Cherry!"
Chris' mouth gapes a little. "Master, you're not going to le-"
Johnny gives him a cheery wave and then promptly shifts form and flutters his way en masse back down the mountain side, chittering a sub-sonic laugh at the slightly less-than-holy language that follows him faintly back down.
+++++
The door slides back behind him, faint rattle of bamboo and paper screen, and Johnny smiles to himself as he lounges on his side on his futon. Chris must have run after all, because it's only been an hour, and Johnny's soaked in the bath, wrapped himself in a yukata and made sure he has somewhere safe to sleep later, all in the time it took Chris to get here. It's sooner than Johnny anticipated, but that's okay; more than okay, he thinks, when he feels Chris' slightly chilled hand come down on his bare ankle. He smiles again and rolls himself forward a little, languidly, to lean over and stub out his cigarette in the ashtray on the floor beside him.
"Well, well," he murmurs, throatily. "Somebody didn't get enough yesterday. What have I told you about dieting, Cherry? You don't need to. I like you just the way you are."
"Master," Chris says, roughly, and his grip on Johnny's ankle tightens.
"Honestly," Johnny sighs, because Chris might be on a job, but this is the first time since the thing with Kazan that Chris has actually wanted him along. And there's something about the intimacy and privacy their surroundings accord that makes Johnny hope that maybe, just maybe, Chris is starting to rethink his standpoint on a few things. "It doesn't have to be this hard all the time, does it? I'm your master; I want to give you what you need. You just have to learn to ask for it. We don't have to keep playing... these..."
Johnny trails off as Chris' hand lets go of his ankle and starts sliding up his calf, dipping into the back of his knee before sliding higher still, pushing the folds of the yukata back as it goes and Christ. Suddenly he forgets how to breathe, and it's all kinds of wanton but he rolls fully forward, lets his legs fall apart a little as the yukata hikes higher and Chris' fingers skim the back of his thigh. He can feel Chris leaning over him, can feel him kneeling either side of one of Johnny's legs and the yukata is all the way up now, exposing him to the air and Chris' hand palming one of his cheeks.
"God," Johnny shudders, and presses his forehead against the tatami mat and keeps absolutely still, because if he moves, if he tries to do anything but just lie here, Chris might stop.
"Master," Chris says again, and his weight comes down against Johnny's back, hips fitting flush to the curve of Johnny's bare arse. The hand not still slowly massaging one of Johnny's arse cheeks pulls at the collar of Johnny's robe and then his breath is gusting across the back of Johnny's neck, his lips ghosting across his skin. Johnny shudders again and presses himself back, backside rising into the embrace of Chris's groin, neck arching against his mouth.
"Yeah," he gasps. "Come on, Chris. Take it. Take me."
Chris' hand trembles on his shoulder, and his mouth presses open against the curve of his throat. His tongue licks out, a lewd slide of wet, dexterous muscle, and then he bites down.
And suddenly, it's all wrong.
Johnny's body bucks before he even has time to realise that whatever it is that's latched onto him in the guise of his Chris is something else entirely. Its fangs feel like they go in too far, like they're worming their way in, digging in and following the track of his vein and there's suddenly a rank smell in the air and a familiar, acid taste in the back of his mouth. In purely defensive reflex, Johnny brings his arm up and angles his elbow into the side of the thing's head hard enough that it tears off him with a decidedly un-Chris-like sound. It gives Johnny enough room, just enough, to twist himself around and get a hand on its throat and he’ll kill it; he'll drag it screaming into hell if it's done anything to Chris, anything at all.
It tries to break his hold, but Johnny's better, stronger, and always will be. He shoves, tosses it onto its back, following it and pinning it down and, "Master!" it gasps as his grip tightens.
Johnny's hand clenches involuntarily, its windpipe crushing a little in his hold, and he looks, looks properly, and God have mercy.
It's Chris. It's Chris. Chris' eyes begging him while something dark and foul and desperate lives inside his mouth.
"Chris!" Johnny says, the name torn from him like the thing's bite tore his flesh.
"Kill... it," Chris grates.
"Fuck," Johnny says harshly. "Damn it. Okay, buddy. Eviction time."
Johnny shifts form, just a little, holds Chris down with one solid hand and brings the other less solid one up and if this thing wanted to eat him, Johnny's going to force himself down its throat until it damn well gags. He forces Chris' panting mouth open and reaches in, reaches down, pushes and forces himself inside. Chris makes a choking, distressed sound, clawing at him. Johnny ignores him. He can almost feel it, almost reach it...
He touches something, something not Chris. This thing in him is old, old and mad from hunger and loneliness and putrid to its core. When Johnny grips it, it digs its claws in, like tiny little teeth, but Johnny's determination is bloody. Chris made him promise once; he's the only one allowed to be there when Johnny dies. But by the same token, Johnny gave him life and it's not anyone else's to steal.
Johnny takes hold of the thing, and pulls.
It fights him every step of the way, and under him Chris makes sounds no living creature should have to make, his body convulsing, fighting Johnny in purely instinctive reflex. Johnny ignores that too, and drags the thing kicking and screaming from Chris.
It holds on until the last, until Chris gives a shudder so violent it rolls them both over. He shoves at Johnny hard enough to push him off and then gets his arms under his body, hunches up and opens his mouth wider than seems entirely natural. He shudders again, makes a harsh retching sound, and the thing spews forth. It's a viscous, amorphous, vaguely human creature; arms, legs, a mouth, eyes, the size of a newborn or not much bigger and yet more like Kazan's final form than Johnny likes, like it's got no bones, is nothing but liquid, a black, oily stain, invertebrate.
"Leech child," Johnny names it and it moans and shivers and slides away, but Johnny's got its number now, can feel what it is even if he doesn't know where it sprang from. "That was a very naughty thing to do, worming your way into my little Cherry's good books. But he's mine and I'm taking him back now, if it's all the same to you."
"Master..."
Chris is hands and knees on the floor, pale and shaking and Johnny, relieved, more relieved than he can say, crouches down in front of him, lays a hand on the crown of his head.
"Okay?" he asks gently, and Chris shudders again.
"That was..." he starts, and then swallows like there's a bad taste in his mouth. "That was extremely unpleasant."
Johnny laughs at the level of understatement. "Seriously, Cherry, you let a little thing like this get to you? No wonder you're so uptight. Anyway, you'd better do your thing before it gets away."
Chris groans. "Not the water again."
"No, I'd say the traditional way will suffice this time."
"Right," Chris says, and Johnny watches as he pushes himself up off the floor and staggers over to the thing. It shivers at his feet, but it's not trying to escape. Johnny suddenly feels a little sorry for it.
"Its heart…" Chris starts.
Johnny shrugs. "In the usual place."
"Right."
"Chris?"
Chris glances over and Johnny leans back against the wall behind him and fixes him with a soft look. "Make it quick, yeah?"
Chris' frown eases, but he says, "Don't I always?"
+++++++++
"Ah, this is the life."
If only Chris could have more jobs like this, although perhaps leaving out the rogue vampires, regardless of whether they're horny, hungry or not. Still, it wasn't so bad in the end, he thinks. Or at least, it could have been worse. There'd been no true maliciousness on the creature's part; it was just lonely, starved, abandoned, lost. Somehow Johnny had gotten the impression it had wanted to die, and in the end and he couldn't help but feel for it, just a little.
That doesn't mean he's anyone else's free meal ticket, though, even Cherry's, and he plans on getting his money's worth starting with about a week soaking in the hot spring and drinking as much sake as Chris can afford to order.
"Well, Father Ellis is happy, as usual."
And there's Chris back from his making his report and he seriously better have brought more booze.
"That's nice," Johnny responds idly, as Chris slides the door shut again and pads across the mats to the landing.
"I think we were lucky," Chris indicates, his voice closer but Johnny's too busy refilling his cup to turn around. "The Church doesn't have any records of such a thing, but while I was in town, I spoke to some of the local shop owners. They weren't happy talking about it, but there have apparently been legends around this area for centuries."
"Oh?"
"Yes. And you don't want to know what those legends are about."
"A god," Johnny guesses mildly, placing the sake bottle back on the bamboo tray floating next to him. "Or, maybe just leftovers."
"Something like that." Chris comes out onto the landing, crouches down by Johnny's side where he leans back against the edge of the pool. "You knew. You couldn't have perhaps warned me?"
Johnny smirks and sips at his sake. "What difference would it have made? Although, in retrospect, it was probably a bad idea to leave you on your own up at that shrine. Really, Cherry, I thought I brought you up to look out for yourself better than that."
Sake splashes out of the cup as Chris grabs a fistful of Johnny's hair and pulls his head back roughly. "You never brought me up at all, Master," he reminds sharply. "And if I thought for a second that you knew that was going to happen..."
"Cherry, you hurt me! Of course I didn't!" Johnny gasps out, barely managing not to laugh, not because it's funny but because Chris is so, so easy to wind up. "You know me; I don't like to share."
Chris is silent for a second, and then hmphs, clearly somewhat mollified by that, and lets him go. Johnny grins and throws back what remains of his sake.
"Well, at any rate," Chris continues coolly. "We'll stay here the rest of the week. Then I have to go back to Sacramento, and then there's someone we have to go and see."
Johnny doesn't miss the inclusive pronoun in that sentence. "The rest of the week, huh?" He puts the cup back on the boat and pushes it away, then slides himself around on the submerged bench to look at Chris as sweetly and innocently as he can. "Oh, whatever will we do until then?"
"You know," Chris says distractedly, ignoring him as he glances back into their room. "I haven't been gone all that long. How exactly did you dispose of the vampire's remains?"
Johnny leers and deliberately licks his lips. "Do you really want to know, Cherry?"
Chris looks back at him again, mildly horrified. "No, actually."
"But you're avoiding my question," Johnny points out slyly, folding his arms on the landing next to Chris' feet. "What are we going to do?"
Chris gives him a look half way between exasperated and indulgent, and then stands up and walks back into the room. Johnny sighs to himself. Well, so much for his attempts at seduction. Again. He almost wants the leech child back.
"Well," Chris starts, and turns back and cocks his head, and Johnny gapes a little as he starts reaching for the buttons on his shirt. "There was some mention of a massage you were owed..."
Johnny is out of the pool so fast he leaves puddles of water all the way to the tatami mats. "Cherry, don't tease your old man! It'll make him cry."
Chris does smile this time, and his shirt is undone all the way when he reaches for Johnny. Johnny expects him to - and okay, yes, wants him to - grab hold and throw him on his back on the futon, but instead Chris just touches him for a moment, his hand against the side of Johnny's face, his thumb gently sweeping across to the corner of Johnny's mouth.
"Before," he starts quietly, seriously. "When that creature was...inside me, controlling me, I could feel it. It was so...empty. It wanted you. It wanted to devour you."
Johnny smiles at that, but only a little, and only gently. "And you didn't?"
Chris frowns. "Not like that. Master..."
"Shh, Cherry," Johnny hushes him, reaching up to lay his own hand against Chris' cheek. "I told you, you belong to me and I don't like to share. But you're the only one I'll let eat me, too, remember? Didn't we agree?"
Chris casts his eyes down for a moment, and this is why Johnny can't let him go, and wouldn't even if he wanted to, because Chris, for everything he is now, is still Johnny's light in the dark, and of all the things that Johnny's done in his lifetime, right and wrong, he will never give that up again.
"Master," Chris breathes, and uncharacteristically turns his head and presses a kiss into Johnny's palm. Johnny's insides melt like ice under a summer thaw.
"Chris," Johnny returns softly, and he could be wrong, but things could be shaping up for that kinky sex he wanted after all. "So, I got out of the bath, and I think I remember someone mentioning a massage?"
Chris looks at him, and then smiles, this time properly, wickedly, and Johnny's heart does a quick little stumble.
"Someone did, but maybe later."
"Later!?" Johnny objects. "Cherry, you tease! You promised me, and look, here I am, all ready and willing."
Chris glances down, deliberately and lingeringly, and then back up, and smirks again.
"So I see," he comments dryly. "But right now, I'm hungry again."
Surprised - because if he didn't know better, he'd say Chris was flirting with him - Johnny laughs, and steps forward to press himself, naked and damp, along the length of Chris' body.
"Well," he sighs resignedly, and wraps his arms around Chris' neck, and then squirms a little and sighs when Chris' hands come down to lightly grip his hips. "I guess it'd be no good for me if you passed out from a lack of sustenance half way through, wouldn't it."
Chris lowers his head and his lips mouth at the damp skin stretched fine and thin across Johnny's collar bone. Johnny can feel him smiling against him, can feel his hands gripping tighter and his thumbs rubbing lazy circles on Johnny's hip bones.
"Thought you'd see it my way, Master," he returns, laughter in his voice, and Johnny sighs again and presses himself closer.
"Don't I always, Chris?" he murmurs. "Isn't that the point?"
Chris doesn't answer, at least, not with words.