Fic: Housekeeping (Get Backers, Ban/Akabane, R)
Title: Housekeeping
Author: Amethyst Hunter
Fandom/pairing: Get Backers, Ban/Akabane
Rating: R (blood, cutting, Ban's penchant for swearing)
Warnings/Spoilers: See above.
Word count: 1575
Notes: Based on a fic prompt for the springkink LJ community. Prompt: Unusual object penetration - “I think you just voided the warranty.”
- Ginsu is a type of popular cooking knife.
Disclaimer: I don’t own GB; all fic is strictly for nonprofit amusement.
Summary: Domestic partnerships take their toll on everything AND the kitchen sink!
--
Weekends at home were mercifully quiet, unless one or the both of them happened to be slated for a job. This particular weekend found Ban lounging on the couch with a good book and an even better beer, waiting for Akabane to finish his chores so that they could go harass Paul for a fresh pizza.
Akabane was a fastidious creature when it came to cleanliness. Ban didn't mind - spared him the effort - as long as his lover didn't attempt to extend that organization to Ban's personal effects. Admittedly, there weren't much of those to begin with, but Ban had his own filing system and disturbing this was tantamount to death in his eyes. Akabane wouldn't have minded that, of course, but Ban wasn't inclined to make it fun for him, and so the transporter had learned to let it go whenever he found the stray shirt or notebook out of place.
He did, however, make a point of giving Ban the requisite raised eyebrow and silent glare when presenting him with the dirty ashtrays - ashtrays that in this case included a few paper cups and used Chinese food takeout boxes. Ban wasn't picky about where he extinguished his cigarettes.
On this day Akabane was making several trips back and forth from the kitchen to the storage closet. Ban thought nothing of it; his lover's other favorite motto was “a place for everything and everything in its place” after all. When Akabane passed by him carrying a very large sledgehammer, however, Ban looked up with a slightly curious frown. But the transporter calmly continued on his way, humming softly under his breath, so he decided no Js were imminent and went back to reading.
A piece of metal abruptly shrieked its dying throes, making his teeth clench and the hair on his nape shoot to attention. “The hell!?”
More screeches of distress, punctuated by the bitter cracks of fracturing parts.
Ban tossed his book to the floor and jumped from the couch. He was just in time to enter the kitchen and see Akabane, brow furrowed in concentration, hoist the sledgehammer high and slam it down onto a pile of mangled metal on top of the counter.
His lover looked up at him and smiled as though it were perfectly normal to go around smashing up household items with a giant hammer. “Hello, Ban-kun.” Akabane turned back to the thing unfortunate enough to have incited his wrath and studied it with pursed lips. “Hmm...one more ought to do it...”
Up went the hammer, swinging down doom upon the object - Ban couldn't tell what it had once been, and he wasn't about to risk pulverizing something important by getting too close for inspection - and Akabane dealt the last pulverizing blow with a satisfying crunch.
Ban watched him pull back the hammer from the mess and stand it against the lower cupboards before taking his scalpels to the pile as he dissected some of the larger bits. “I think it's dead, Kuroudo.”
Akabane just smiled at him and put his scalpels away. He began to take off his gloves and roll up his shirtsleeves.
“May I ask what that bugfuckery was all about?”
“You may.” No other information was immediately forthcoming, and the little smile curling at the edges of Akabane's lips made plain that he would answer Ban's questions in such a way that amused him.
Ban held back a hiss of annoyance. Getting answers from a prickly and playful transporter required oft-careful methods. “What'd it do to you to piss you off that much?”
“Nothing.” Akabane picked through the pieces of scattered metal and selected several mid-size scraps, laying these aside.
“Then why'd you kill it?”
“Because I needed it.”
“What was it?”
“A cheese grater.”
Ban scowled. “My cheese grater? The good one that I just bought with my retrieval fee from my job that Hevn nearly shaved six years of my prime life off of with her batshit itinerary?”
Akabane came to him and kissed his cheek. “I'll buy you a new one.”
Ban was not appeased. “That was top-of-the-line stainless steel, mister!”
“I know. That's why I chose it.” Akabane flashed him a sweet smile and flicked out a scalpel. He held out his forearm and made a cut into one of the veins. While a disbelieving Ban watched blood spill over pale skin, Akabane picked up one of the shards of metal he'd reserved and pushed it as deep as he could into the wound. Then another one. And another.
“For the love of - what the hell are you doing, you idiot!” Ban grabbed Akabane's free hand in one fist and clamped his other over the bloody incision, dragging the transporter away from his macabre hobby. “Quit that! Jeez, put a bandage on already!” He yanked one of the dishtowels off its bar and wound it tightly around Akabane's bleeding arm, then went to rinse his bloodstained hand in the sink. When he turned around his lover was watching him in utter confusion.
“I thought we agreed that bloodplay was strictly confined to our fights,” Ban growled.
“This isn't play, Ban-kun.” Akabane unwound the towel and stuck out his arm. Even now the lines of the cut were sealing, the angry redness around the flesh fading to a dulled pink, and then that receded into normal pale tones. Only the smears of drying blood around it served as proof of the transporter's self-injury.
Ban would never admit it, but there were a lot of times he envied his lover's unique healing powers.
Akabane dampened the unstained portion of the towel with water from the faucet, and wiped his arm clean. “I assure you, this is very serious. Remember the mission I had the other day? Oh - “ he paused, his eyes lighting up. “Natsuhiko-kun says hello, by the way. He also said something else for you, but I shan't repeat it.” Akabane's lips thinned. “It was most profane.”
“I can guess,” Ban said grimly. “Back to the mission. What happened?”
“Well, as you know I returned home after quite an invigorating battle. I'm afraid I lost quite a bit of blood in the process, so now I need to replenish my base sources. I'm fortunate that I still have these two - “ a pair of scalpels shot up from between Akabane's index and middle fingers - “to work with.”
“And you need metal for your base this time.”
“Precisely.” Akabane smiled at him. “Now, would you be a dear and pass me another shard, please? I'd like to have these inserted before dinner so that my body has the rest of the night to process the fragments - “
“No. No. No no no no no no no!” Ban captured Akabane's wrists in his hands before his lover could try opening a fresh wound. “You need new sharpies, I'll buy you a nice set of Ginsus or something. You're not tearing up our good cooking utensils and yourself to do it!”
“I only needed the one instrument,” Akabane whined. “It doesn't take very long for me to do this, Ban-kun. You're overreacting. Look, there's hardly any mess to it - “ He tried again to dig the scalpel into his skin, but Ban yanked the blade from his nimble fingers and flung it into the wall.
“Knock it off! Why can't you just eat some zinc pills if you're so hard up for metals?!”
“Do you have any idea how many of those I would have to take to produce just one serviceable knife?” Akabane pouted once he'd been declawed and released. “Besides, zinc upsets my stomach. My way is faster and the most efficient. Once the pieces contact with my bloodstream they'll break down into the particles I require for formation. I'll be done before you know it.”
“You may as well stick a fork in yourself while you're at it, because I say you're done now,” Ban told him. “My way is the least expensive and the least bloodiest. Go get your black bag with the syringes in it while I break out the blender. I'll make you a nice iron-filing milkshake instead.”
“Oh, Midou-kun.” Akabane sighed. “I thought you enjoyed seeing my blood.”
“That's different. It's expected when we have our battles.”
Akabane put both arms around Ban and nuzzled him. “Well, think of this as a minor skirmish in the greater scheme of things. The cheese grater and I had a little disagreement as to its future service, and I won.”
That smile was so maddening in its endearment. Ban wanted to kiss his Jackal and kill him at the same time - small wonder his blood pressure anymore was always bouncing between extremes.
“Fuel-efficient, huh?”
“And environmentally-friendly.”
Ban couldn't help it; the snicker popped from his mouth. “Well, that's one way to completely void the warranty, I guess.” He shook his head and ruffled his lover's hair. “Look. Just promise me you won't try to liquidate the TV the next time you need extra weapons, okay?”
Akabane laughed softly and kissed him. “Ban-kun, how silly! Of course I would never do such a thing.”
“Good boy.” Ban started to help him clean up the remains of the destroyed cheese grater. Right when he had just dumped a cautious handful of sharp metal bits into the trashcan Akabane spoke again.
“I already did that with the toaster last month.”
--
Author: Amethyst Hunter
Fandom/pairing: Get Backers, Ban/Akabane
Rating: R (blood, cutting, Ban's penchant for swearing)
Warnings/Spoilers: See above.
Word count: 1575
Notes: Based on a fic prompt for the springkink LJ community. Prompt: Unusual object penetration - “I think you just voided the warranty.”
- Ginsu is a type of popular cooking knife.
Disclaimer: I don’t own GB; all fic is strictly for nonprofit amusement.
Summary: Domestic partnerships take their toll on everything AND the kitchen sink!
--
Weekends at home were mercifully quiet, unless one or the both of them happened to be slated for a job. This particular weekend found Ban lounging on the couch with a good book and an even better beer, waiting for Akabane to finish his chores so that they could go harass Paul for a fresh pizza.
Akabane was a fastidious creature when it came to cleanliness. Ban didn't mind - spared him the effort - as long as his lover didn't attempt to extend that organization to Ban's personal effects. Admittedly, there weren't much of those to begin with, but Ban had his own filing system and disturbing this was tantamount to death in his eyes. Akabane wouldn't have minded that, of course, but Ban wasn't inclined to make it fun for him, and so the transporter had learned to let it go whenever he found the stray shirt or notebook out of place.
He did, however, make a point of giving Ban the requisite raised eyebrow and silent glare when presenting him with the dirty ashtrays - ashtrays that in this case included a few paper cups and used Chinese food takeout boxes. Ban wasn't picky about where he extinguished his cigarettes.
On this day Akabane was making several trips back and forth from the kitchen to the storage closet. Ban thought nothing of it; his lover's other favorite motto was “a place for everything and everything in its place” after all. When Akabane passed by him carrying a very large sledgehammer, however, Ban looked up with a slightly curious frown. But the transporter calmly continued on his way, humming softly under his breath, so he decided no Js were imminent and went back to reading.
A piece of metal abruptly shrieked its dying throes, making his teeth clench and the hair on his nape shoot to attention. “The hell!?”
More screeches of distress, punctuated by the bitter cracks of fracturing parts.
Ban tossed his book to the floor and jumped from the couch. He was just in time to enter the kitchen and see Akabane, brow furrowed in concentration, hoist the sledgehammer high and slam it down onto a pile of mangled metal on top of the counter.
His lover looked up at him and smiled as though it were perfectly normal to go around smashing up household items with a giant hammer. “Hello, Ban-kun.” Akabane turned back to the thing unfortunate enough to have incited his wrath and studied it with pursed lips. “Hmm...one more ought to do it...”
Up went the hammer, swinging down doom upon the object - Ban couldn't tell what it had once been, and he wasn't about to risk pulverizing something important by getting too close for inspection - and Akabane dealt the last pulverizing blow with a satisfying crunch.
Ban watched him pull back the hammer from the mess and stand it against the lower cupboards before taking his scalpels to the pile as he dissected some of the larger bits. “I think it's dead, Kuroudo.”
Akabane just smiled at him and put his scalpels away. He began to take off his gloves and roll up his shirtsleeves.
“May I ask what that bugfuckery was all about?”
“You may.” No other information was immediately forthcoming, and the little smile curling at the edges of Akabane's lips made plain that he would answer Ban's questions in such a way that amused him.
Ban held back a hiss of annoyance. Getting answers from a prickly and playful transporter required oft-careful methods. “What'd it do to you to piss you off that much?”
“Nothing.” Akabane picked through the pieces of scattered metal and selected several mid-size scraps, laying these aside.
“Then why'd you kill it?”
“Because I needed it.”
“What was it?”
“A cheese grater.”
Ban scowled. “My cheese grater? The good one that I just bought with my retrieval fee from my job that Hevn nearly shaved six years of my prime life off of with her batshit itinerary?”
Akabane came to him and kissed his cheek. “I'll buy you a new one.”
Ban was not appeased. “That was top-of-the-line stainless steel, mister!”
“I know. That's why I chose it.” Akabane flashed him a sweet smile and flicked out a scalpel. He held out his forearm and made a cut into one of the veins. While a disbelieving Ban watched blood spill over pale skin, Akabane picked up one of the shards of metal he'd reserved and pushed it as deep as he could into the wound. Then another one. And another.
“For the love of - what the hell are you doing, you idiot!” Ban grabbed Akabane's free hand in one fist and clamped his other over the bloody incision, dragging the transporter away from his macabre hobby. “Quit that! Jeez, put a bandage on already!” He yanked one of the dishtowels off its bar and wound it tightly around Akabane's bleeding arm, then went to rinse his bloodstained hand in the sink. When he turned around his lover was watching him in utter confusion.
“I thought we agreed that bloodplay was strictly confined to our fights,” Ban growled.
“This isn't play, Ban-kun.” Akabane unwound the towel and stuck out his arm. Even now the lines of the cut were sealing, the angry redness around the flesh fading to a dulled pink, and then that receded into normal pale tones. Only the smears of drying blood around it served as proof of the transporter's self-injury.
Ban would never admit it, but there were a lot of times he envied his lover's unique healing powers.
Akabane dampened the unstained portion of the towel with water from the faucet, and wiped his arm clean. “I assure you, this is very serious. Remember the mission I had the other day? Oh - “ he paused, his eyes lighting up. “Natsuhiko-kun says hello, by the way. He also said something else for you, but I shan't repeat it.” Akabane's lips thinned. “It was most profane.”
“I can guess,” Ban said grimly. “Back to the mission. What happened?”
“Well, as you know I returned home after quite an invigorating battle. I'm afraid I lost quite a bit of blood in the process, so now I need to replenish my base sources. I'm fortunate that I still have these two - “ a pair of scalpels shot up from between Akabane's index and middle fingers - “to work with.”
“And you need metal for your base this time.”
“Precisely.” Akabane smiled at him. “Now, would you be a dear and pass me another shard, please? I'd like to have these inserted before dinner so that my body has the rest of the night to process the fragments - “
“No. No. No no no no no no no!” Ban captured Akabane's wrists in his hands before his lover could try opening a fresh wound. “You need new sharpies, I'll buy you a nice set of Ginsus or something. You're not tearing up our good cooking utensils and yourself to do it!”
“I only needed the one instrument,” Akabane whined. “It doesn't take very long for me to do this, Ban-kun. You're overreacting. Look, there's hardly any mess to it - “ He tried again to dig the scalpel into his skin, but Ban yanked the blade from his nimble fingers and flung it into the wall.
“Knock it off! Why can't you just eat some zinc pills if you're so hard up for metals?!”
“Do you have any idea how many of those I would have to take to produce just one serviceable knife?” Akabane pouted once he'd been declawed and released. “Besides, zinc upsets my stomach. My way is faster and the most efficient. Once the pieces contact with my bloodstream they'll break down into the particles I require for formation. I'll be done before you know it.”
“You may as well stick a fork in yourself while you're at it, because I say you're done now,” Ban told him. “My way is the least expensive and the least bloodiest. Go get your black bag with the syringes in it while I break out the blender. I'll make you a nice iron-filing milkshake instead.”
“Oh, Midou-kun.” Akabane sighed. “I thought you enjoyed seeing my blood.”
“That's different. It's expected when we have our battles.”
Akabane put both arms around Ban and nuzzled him. “Well, think of this as a minor skirmish in the greater scheme of things. The cheese grater and I had a little disagreement as to its future service, and I won.”
That smile was so maddening in its endearment. Ban wanted to kiss his Jackal and kill him at the same time - small wonder his blood pressure anymore was always bouncing between extremes.
“Fuel-efficient, huh?”
“And environmentally-friendly.”
Ban couldn't help it; the snicker popped from his mouth. “Well, that's one way to completely void the warranty, I guess.” He shook his head and ruffled his lover's hair. “Look. Just promise me you won't try to liquidate the TV the next time you need extra weapons, okay?”
Akabane laughed softly and kissed him. “Ban-kun, how silly! Of course I would never do such a thing.”
“Good boy.” Ban started to help him clean up the remains of the destroyed cheese grater. Right when he had just dumped a cautious handful of sharp metal bits into the trashcan Akabane spoke again.
“I already did that with the toaster last month.”
--