Chapter 6~
Chapter 6 - Synchronicity
Rating - T
Characters/Pairings - KuroFai, Yuui, Yuuko, TRC!gang, a little TRC!KuroFai, Chii
Words - 2744
Stolen
Chapter Six - Synchronicity
Kimi wa hitori de doko e yuku no?
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Last Time:
Kurogane gave a rumbling sigh, Fay’s faraway babbling squeezing his heart. He knew what Yuuko meant, he noted dully, as he looked around, ignoring the inquisitive glances from his companions and studying the scenery that was so very different yet so very nostalgic to him.
He truly was alone now.
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Kurogane stared emotionlessly at the scene in front of him, experience making it easier to ignore the pangs of nostalgia that beat dully in his chest, fully aware that seeing everyone collapsed drunk on random surfaces, floors and other people was a strange thing to experience homesickness over.
They were in the world called Piffle, and after a series of things called “dragonfly races” had finally acquired the princess’s feather as the prize. They had been at an after party, during which the Fay-copy and white thing had pranced around, begging the other Kurogane and the other Syaoran to lift their apparent “drinking ban” on him, even though the willowy blonde already looked drunk. One thing lead to another, and with the strange charisma that Fay possessed, it wasn’t long before everyone in the room was utterly splifficated too. Kurogane had forced himself to leave the room and go upstairs to sleep when thoughts such as ‘you could fuck him and he wouldn’t remember’ surfaced in his mind.
He didn’t know how long they’d been in Piffle; all the days were starting to blend together after a while, and he’d stopped paying any real attention to them. He knew it had been weeks since he’d last seen Fai, his Fai, and it seemed like neither the longing ache of his body or the sensual vividness of his dreams were going to let him forget it, and he was really beginning to get desperate.
Across the room, Sakura blinked herself awake, promptly screaming at seeing the “dead bodies” of all of her friends, and running over to wake Syaoran. Kurogane grimaced and backtracked out of the room, not wanting to be around when everyone was moaning of a communal hangover.
X o X o X
Fay hummed cheerily to himself as he took up his self-appointed-motherly duties such as, in this case, the laundry. He couldn’t help but remember those carefree days in Ruval Castle where laundry was taken care of by the maids and cooking was done by the kitchen staff and other mundane household tasks were most definitely not his problem.
Ah well. It was probably for the best, in the end. After all, if he wouldn’t use his magic, he wasn’t useful for much more than the life of a servant.
A soft voice in his head knocked him away from his thoughts.
‘Fay, please, there isn’t much time.’
Fay’s eyes widened.
‘Chii?’ he replied, ‘Are you alright? Is Ashura-‘
‘There isn’t time! It won’t be long before Ashura-ou realises Chii has broken away from his magic, so please, listen!’
Fay hummed in confirmation, clattering around in the small laundry room so that nobody would walk in and see him in the state he knew he was in.
‘Ashura-ou has kidnapped someone, and at first Chii thought it was you, Fay.’
‘You thought he was me?’
‘Un! Chii could sense that he had the same soul as Fay, and Chii thought she saw he had blonde hair too!”
Fay frowned. Why would Ashura-ou kidnap someone like him? Surely Ashura-ou was fully capable of hunting him down, no matter how much Fay recoiled at the thought, so why would his king take someone who was only similar to him?
Then again, it might not have been another Fay at all. Blonde hair wasn’t uncommon in Celes and in surrounding countries, what with natural selection, and Chii wasn’t really what Fay would call his smartest creation ever.
‘Chii, did you catch any conversation? Anything at all?’
‘No…’ she replied sadly, ‘Chii is under a spell, so Chii cannot hear things, and can only see some thi-…‘
‘Chii?’
No good. He recognised the spell she described, and the fact that she wasn’t talking anymore meant she was back under its influence.
Fay growled in frustration, pulling a large jacket out of the dirty washing basket with such ferocity that everything in one of the pockets spilled out onto the floor. Fay bit back a loud, angry curse and dropped down to his knees, collecting strange coins and hard boiled sweets and… something he remembered was called a ‘whistle’, which he thought was stupid, as his incessant ‘hyuu’ing sounded more like whistling than this annoying tinny thing did.
He left the trinkets on the counter and thrust his hand back into the pocket. He recoiled with a hiss, sucking the small amount of blood drawn from his fingertip. He tried again, this time reaching in carefully, and pulling out something round and shiny, with ‘kanji’ written on one of the sides in black ink. He remembered Mokona had called it a DVD.
Fay blinked with curiosity, putting it on the side. After he had put all of the washing on, he took the DVD and hopped into the lounge, wondering briefly why everyone else seemed to have gone feather-searching without him, before his curiosity for the shiny object overtook his sudden loneliness. He put it into a ‘DVD player’ in the same way he remembered the people on this world had shown them.
Fay blinked. He saw himself on a pale couch with brown cushions dotted around upon it, a blanket draped over his legs which were propped on a coffee table lazily. Past the sofa he saw a kitchen, and on the right of the other Fai was a darker alcove of wall, which he supposed was a hallway. He was smiling and nodding along to some jingle that was playing, probably from a “television”, which wasn’t on screen. Other-Fai seemed to notice the person with the camera, and laughed amusedly.
“Yuui, put it down! Kuro-sama’ll throw you out!”
“For videoing you?” came the bemused response. The off-screen Fai smiled bitterly as his heart tugged.
“For videoing, Full stop. He hates ‘the damn thing’” Fai giggled, air quotes coming into use.
Yuui turned the camera onto him and made a goofy face, complete with weird sounds and crossing his eyes, causing his Fai to burst out laughing off-shot.
“You better be resting, Flourite!”
“Which one?” they replied, giggling, in perfect unison, as Kurogane appeared from the hallway, pulling a jumper on.
Kurogane rolled his eyes, obviously used to such behaviour, before leaning over Fai.
“You sure you’ll be okay?”
Fai dipped his head back to answer, before Yuui beat him to it.
“Worry not, brave sir Daidouji! I shall protect your beautiful maiden from the horrors of the Tummy Bug!”
Fai snerked at the ‘maiden’ comment, grinning back at the camera.
“You,” Kurogane growled, pointing at Yuui, “Camera, off. You,” He looked back down at Fai, forcibly tilting the other’s head back to meet his eye, “Sleep. Now.”
Fai smiled innocently, replying with a cute “Yes, daddy!” before the PE teacher gave him a quick kiss, Yuui instantly starting to make gag noises.
Fai laughed and Kurogane threw a pillow in his direction, grumbling for him to get a girlfriend.
“Bit rich coming from you, Kurogane-sensei!” Yuui quipped.
Kurogane ignored him and left, uttering a quick “I won’t be back late”.
Fai hummed, standing and stretching, heading for the hallway.
“I better do as daddy says,” he chirped, “I don’t wanna be punished.” His grin widened.
Yuui snorted. “You perv!”
“Night!” Fai laughed, disappearing into the hallway.
The screen buzzed. Fay reached forward and switched it off, removing the disk.
He’d suspected as much, really. Between the nostalgic glances and the odd tension between them, it made sense that Kurogane-sensei had a Fai-sensei, and it made more sense for them to be dating, no, living together for the man to be so bent on retrieving him. Remembering the conversation with Chii, Fay’s stomach dropped.
He guessed he wouldn’t be allowed to never to return to Celes after all.
X o X o X
Fai shivered and drew his arms tighter around himself. He was exhausted, scared and hungry.
But worst of all, alone.
For some reason, he was more afraid of being alone as opposed to being afraid of his captor; Ashura-ou. He knew that, whoever the man was and whatever he wanted, he (Fai) wasn’t going to be hurt in the process, so he saw no need to worry terribly over it.
Instead, his heart was gripped with loneliness and fear as to what had happened, if anything, to Kurogane. He didn’t know how long he’d spent in the dank, dark cell, but however long it was had given him so much idle time to ponder what-ifs and maybes, and he had periodically stopped thinking rationally; for he now ate so little of his meals for fear of poison that he was certain he was losing weight and it was hard to move into a sitting position, should he ever decide to lie down.
The only break he had from searing loneliness was when Ashura-ou graced him with his presence, which was, admittedly, rather often considering he was just bait. There was also that cat-girl, Chii.
Chii usually bore no facial expression, and her movements were slightly stiff, as if she had not exercised her limbs in a while. If it were not for the lack of recognition or emotion in her honey-brown eyes, Fai would believe this was so. However, the science teacher was now fairly sure she was being possessed in some way, which was a bit of a long shot considering he had no history of studying or even believing in the existence of magic.
Five minutes in the same room as Ashura, though, and he was now positive such a thing existed, for his very spine and the hairs on the back of his neck tingled, not with fear, but with a deep adrenaline that was unlike anything he’d experienced previously.
This did not mean it was necessarily a pleasant sensation; it was quite the opposite. For it made him feel so utterly outcast, even against these two strange people, that the loneliness just intensified and he found himself waking from warm dreams, whimpering softly and his heart aching for some warm tea… and his warm bed… the sun streaming through gaps in the curtains, falling across the room. The sheets were rumpled and soft and a strong, tan arm was around his waist, cuddling his back into the stomach of his lover, warmth radiating between them.
His eyelashes fluttered closed again and he sighed happily, covering the larger hand with his own, stroking the knuckles absently and hugging them both closer together. He could feel Kurogane’s face was buried in his tousled, silky blonde hair and he smiled as he felt the man breathe a deep sigh in contentment, the sound not breaking the calm peace that blanketed them both.
Kurogane suddenly reached up and put his hand on Fai’s shoulder, shaking him gently.
“Mmmr” Fai mumbled; Kurogane’s jostling getting rougher.
“Stop it, Kuro-pon…”
A harsh slap across his face and Fai’s eyes shot open, the returning chill in his bones making him gasp and shudder before drawing in on himself, looking up at whoever it was with fear in his eyes.
The small amount of light there was allowed him to see enough to realise he was looking at that cat-girl, Chii. Her hands were clapped over her mouth and she was gushing apologies at him, her eyes full of worry.
She helped him sit upright and he groaned; his head spinning.
“Eat this,” Chii held a spoonful of broth to his lips, “It isn’t poisoned, and you need your strength.” Too tired to protest, Fai let the boiling, thin liquid run down his throat. True to her word, the soup wasn’t poisoned, and Fai was glad to realise his head felt the slightest bit clearer on a full stomach. He decided now was as good a time as any to voice some of his curiosities.
“This land is called Celes,” Chii informed him, brushing his matted, dirty hair and pulling it back into a loose ponytail. He’d obviously been here a while for his hair to have grown so long, “it used to be full with nice people who taught Chii lots of things, but recently it’s only been Ashura-ou and Chii here.”
“What happened?”
Chii paused, her cute face blank. “Chii… doesn’t remember…” she replied, downcast. Fai gave a friendly smile and reassured her that it was fine for her not to remember if she truly couldn’t. She smiled prettily in return and made a comment along the lines of him being ‘exactly the same’.
“The same as wh-“
“Chii has to go now,” she gasped, her voice filled with urgency, “Ashura-ou cannot know about this, he does not realise Chii can resist the spell.” she gathered up the empty bowls, her words decreasing in volume.
“What do you-“
“Please!” Chii interrupted, desperately, “Ashura-ou cannot know about this!”
Fai closed his mouth and nodded once. Satisfied, Chii left.
He was alone again.
X o X o X
Kurogane had settled into his role within the group easily. While his sword skills were nowhere near the level the other Kurogane had attained, he was still a competent fighter, and the other two adults seemed perfectly alright with leaving the kids in his care, should the need arise.
He and the other Kurogane were very alike; scarily so. During moments where he saw no need for his input, he watched the interaction between the blonde and the ninja. He was able to tell right from the start how close the two were, even though they weren’t as close as he himself was to his Fai, and sometimes it pained him to see the small exchanges between the other two.
It wasn’t jealousy. That he was sure of. It was more like… longing. Like when you’re a teenager and everyone’s at someone’s party and you weren’t invited, and even though you sure as hell didn’t want to go, you still felt left out of the loop.
He shook his head vigorously. Meditation was not synonymous to daydreaming. It was a time for self-disciplined quiet reflection; and with the hectic lifestyle Kurogane had (he wasn’t sure if Horitsuba was more stressful than his current circumstance); these precious minutes of calm thought and relaxation were nothing short of a blessing.
They had moved on from Piffle and were in a small, peaceful country, which meant he had enough time in the evenings to sit on the porch and listen calmly to the song of the cicadas and think of nothing at all, the slow clunk of the bamboo sculpture matching the slow beat of his heart.
He had been bothered more recently with how long it had been since this crazy adventure began. Sometimes he still didn’t believe it was all happening, but the addition of new scars and lonely memories served as more than enough proof, and was positive it had been at least three months, if not more, and he missed his love terribly. Piffle and the worlds after had plagued him with dreams of passion and lust, his body aching in anticipation of the delicious, pale skin flush against his, fleeting kisses and teasing touches and the wild, unique adrenaline of sex pumping through his bloodstream, only to wake up unsatisfied and frustrated.
The dreams had now disappeared, though to him this was more worrying than anything. He could no longer remember those small things about Fai that drove him absolutely insane with desire and love. Pointless little things like how Fai would always know exactly what to say to him. How his blue eyes sparkled with emotion when the science teacher saw him after a tiring day at work. How his pale skin dusted a beautiful pink during their most intimate moments, lasting for hours after.
While now he no longer had the pulse of sexual frustration, he now had the heartache and longing for Fai to be back with him, back by his side.
Kurogane sighed and angrily ran a hand through his hair. He may have been travelling for months, but in all that time, he and Fai had never felt so far apart.
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