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damned_lounge2008-10-30 11:06 am
tadity.livejournal.com) wrote in damned_lounge2008-10-30 11:06 am
Entry tags:
Oktoberfest '08 Entry, He Thinks by Tad
Title: He Thinks (Three Ficlets)
Author: Tad
Beta (if applicable): Kaze, Tiassa, Sra, Re ♥
Word Count: 854 + 527 + 891 for 2,272 total
Rating: PG-13 to R? There's violence and cursing, and a tiny tiny bit of badtouch.
Character(s): Homura and Okita, Sagara Sanosuke and Badou, Grell and Ururu
Pairing(s) (if applicable): Homura/Okita, spoken of Sano/Yuffie
Summary: Three random situations that conceivably could happen in one night.
Promise for Morning: Okita tries to stop SC!Homura, which doesn't go over very well.
Answer to Everything: Sano and Badou get stuck in a room. What happens when yaoi doesn't.
Sweet Child of Mine: Ururu meets the strangest person she likely ever will.
Notes (if applicable): Any mistakes are totally my fault, and I hope that the characters are right. Yes.
I. Promise for Morning
It’s dirty, he thinks, so dirty he can’t stand it: the red slowly trailing down from his wrist, staining the skin, staining him inside and out. It’s filthy, diseased, eating away at his lungs and making him cough more than the smoke. Oh, and he has been coughing, and every time tasting fresh blood on his tongue, as if that flavor has to renew itself for him to remember that it’s there. He doesn’t need a reminder. He can’t forget that he’s dying, can’t spit out the reminder even if he tries hard enough to make his throat raw.
He’s helpless. Stuck in a room where he can’t do anything but watch, and cough, and wait.
He’s known, of course, from the moment he stepped inside M13 and saw it empty. Each time they make a little progress, get a key or a clue, they suffer for the nights after. The first time happened forever ago, long enough for the cough to become regular, impossible to hide. Long enough for them to try the clinic and the healers, and everyone else they can think of. Long enough for everything to fail. Now it’s a different night, and a different game. No one is going to walk away with an unthinkable mess seeped into his clothes, or a hole in his head where they took the memories out. Just with burns and broken bones and blood. Oh, and everything tonight promises for the morning, of course.
He remembers when Homura told him about being half-god, and his skepticism in those early days. And along the way there’s been proof here and there: a spark of fire, a touch of strength. But nothing like tonight, when a dragon of flame lights up the sky, and the ground trembles where the man walks. Nothing even close.
Screams fade into the distance when the others retreat, and he’s glad for it. It’s not for their sakes, however. He knows Homura, and how this will eat away at him, to be used in such a manner. For a man who respects choice above all, the loss of his own is the ultimate insult, a slap across the face that’ll ache just like filthy lungs before a cough. Certainly, their prison is a master of torture.
“Now where were we?” Chains clink against each other, manacles that are certainly appropriate for the situation. There’s so much fire around, yet the metal is cold against his skin when Homura reaches up to touch a wrist. He’s careful though, so cautious not to press too hard, to cause more pain than the pens driven though already have.
“You should leave.” Homura says it, wants it to be, but they both know it won’t happen. That’s why he’s pinned to the tree in the first place, because he’s a tricky person who can’t be allowed to run freely while Homura carries out his task. Tricky, and stubborn. Too much of each, or so he’s been told.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Homura-san.” He’s helpless this way, but he smiles as if he weren’t. Between each attempt at trespass the man’s come back to him, begging with an amused grin for the decision that will end the pain he never wanted to inflict at all. He can read between the lines enough to see it, how Homura hates leaving him this way. He hates it too, but his hopes leave him no option. He has to believe, after all, that the men he follows are somehow stronger than this place. So strong that they can be saved before the coughing becomes too much, before his lungs have been completely devoured and they’re all left to rot here in made-up lives and equally shallow graves. “Not until you’re yourself again.”
Homura laughs at that. “Do you truly think that I’m somehow not myself now, when I have my power?” A step closer, and he’s left to wonder why his personal space is being invaded now, why the other’s forehead is suddenly resting against his. A thumb brushes over his wrist, considering something besides his release. “My purpose has changed, but every other choice is my own, Okita.”
His name lands on his skin in a warm breath, one that makes his heart suddenly pound. He hates this closeness, this intimacy brought on by Landel’s no matter what Homura says. And what’s coming, oh, he knows what’s next, but not how to stop it. He can come up with a thousand things to say, things like no and it’s dirty, and not like this, not when you’re like this.
“I’ve been coughing. There’s blood in my mouth,” is what he says instead.
“Is there?” Softer, quieter. Closer. Homura’s smile brushes against his lips, and he wants to retreat even when he can’t, even when he doesn’t. His breath has stopped and his heart is racing, and its rhythm is all he can hear until someone steps on a branch, trying to take advantage of the distraction.
He says nothing then. Simply steps back with a look that is a promise, and vanishes into the air.
II. Answer to Everything
One day, he thinks, they’ll both look back on this whole fucking experience and laugh their asses off. About grabbing boobs and throwing tomatoes, and how about smoking a fog so thick it clouds the entire fucking hall really isn’t the greatest way to spend a Sunday afternoon, because he actually enjoys breathing, thank you very much. One day, some day, that definitely isn’t today. No, today is when they have their backs pressed against a door while something only hell could conceive pounding on the other side. He knows it has teeth, at the very least. Too many fucking teeth to count in places where teeth shouldn’t be, and that was enough reason for him not to stand around and try.
Then next thing he knows, the door isn’t holding quite as well as it was a second ago. There’s a tiny flicker of light next to him, and wouldn’t it figure, he’s left to do all the work while his so-called partner indulges in a cigarette.
“Damn it! You really think now’s the best time for that?” It's a stupid question, one that is completely pointless. That fact he knows even before he gets all the words out. The guy thinks it’s blasphemy to complain about Mother Nicotine, something that’s been made clear on more than one occasion.
“Silence infidel.” And here it comes. Preach on, oh faithful disciple, ignoring the eyes rolling in response. “Just because your girlfriend has invisible boobs is no reason to begrudge other men their pleasures.”
Well, that one’s new. The guy might be a lazy nicotine-addicted tomato-hogging ass, but he never failed to be creative. “What the hell does her breast size have to do with anything?!” It’s another stupid question, except for the part where it isn’t, because it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with the fact that something is trying to break through a flimsy door and eat them alive comes second to his next fix, five minutes after the last.
“It’s the answer to everything.” Such sage wisdom delivered with all the seriousness it deserves, followed by a long blow of smoke in his face. “Everything not answered by cigarettes, anyway.” So there.
He’d like to continue the argument. He really would, except now there’s a claw that’s broken through the wood too close to his side, and it’s a bit distracting. But something about what the other guy said actually makes sense for once, and before there’s a chance to protect the precious baby, he snatches it away.
Maybe it’s the sharp, heart-felt string of curses that makes the monster retreat, but he’s more willing to bet on the burn from the hot end of the cigarette against its skin that did it. He tosses the crumpled nub back, and come to find out, it’s the last one. Of course, that doesn’t exactly do anything to erase the shit-eating grin on his face. Oh no, it probably caused it in the first place
“Answer to everything, right?”
“Fuck you, man. You hear me?" He pushes past into the empty hall, pathetic little stump of a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. "Fuck. You.”
III. Sweet Child of Mine
This person, she thinks, is the weirdest person I've ever seen. And he really is very weird, more than weird enough for Jinta-kun to ask him why he was so creepy. Maybe even weird enough for Tessai-san to ask that. But he isn't quite weird enough for her to ask, at least not yet. She doesn't want to be rude.
He's dressed in red, all the way from his hair to his shoes, with higher heels than she's ever seen anyone wear. He must be very talented to walk on them, she decides. None of the red he wears is blood though, and she thinks that's a good thing. He doesn't think so, though, and when the chainsaw stops, she hears him sigh.
"This place…I HATE THIS PLACE!" He yells very loudly, then slumps over against a wall. "Oh, baby. I'm so sorry I have to use this cheap substitute for you. I'll find you soon, and then I'll give you all the love a good mother should shower on her child."
Then suddenly he starts the chainsaw's motor again, but he's still screaming loud enough for her to hear.
"HOLD ON, MY DARLING!" She can't hear his heels clicking as he runs down the hall though, but she's sure they probably are. "I'll save you, and then together we'll cut through the bastard who dared to separate us at all! Mother and child reunited! Our sorrowful sweet parting will end soon, my sweet baby~!"
Yes, she decides as he turns a corner, gleeful nfufus trailing off behind him. This person is very weird. She starts to follow him, not because she wants to see more, but because she has to go that way too. It's the only way out of the women's block. When she turns the same corner, though, she realizes he hasn't gone very far.
Mostly because he's standing right there, looking down at her.
"Well, hello there. Aren't you an utterly adorable little girl?" The chainsaw is off again, which is good, because it might cut into his shoulder the way he's holding it if it wasn't. He bends at the waist and peers into her face, which she finds a little bit creepy, but she tries to give everyone a chance. At least he's not trying to eat her? Though with what she's seen, she's not sure he won't.
"Yes, you're perfect!" He stands up again, his hand waving about as he keeps talking. He talks a lot. "That adorable little pout, that jet black hair, your face, your eyes! Why, you're the cute little girl I would have had with my sweet, sweet Sebas-chan, if only God hadn't cursed us both to a horrible fate like that of Romeo and Juliet! Oh, Sebas-chan, beautiful Sebas-chan! Wherefore art thou, my love? Deny thy father and refuse thy name, and STOP BEING LATE SO I CAN FINALLY KILL YOU FOR KICKING ME IN THE FACE, YOU BASTARD! Oh, what's your name, sweet child?"
"Ururu?"
"Ururu?! Who named you that?" He crinkles his nose like he's eating a vegetable he doesn't like, which she doesn't get so much, because she likes her name. Before she can answer, however, he's started talking. Again. She wonders if maybe he's like Jinta-kun, who can also talk for a very long time without having to breathe. "No, no dear, your name was obviously meant to be Rosalin. Do you know why?"
"Um, no?"
"Because that's exactly what a perfect little child should be named! Rosalin Sutcliffe Michaelis. When you introduce yourself to people, you'll remember to mention that Sutcliffe is your mother's name, won't you?"
"But I—"
"WON"T YOU?!" He looks a little crazy then—well, more than a little, really. But she's afraid that he if he keeps talking this way, he'll run out of air and pass out. So she nods, even though her name is Ururu. It's just a little lie, like the ones Jinta-kun says are okay, because if they lie, no one will find out who broke the really expensive item Kisuke-san was going to sell to a customer because someone was playing baseball inside the store again.
Except those lies never work. But this person isn't Tessai-san, so maybe it will.
He's still talking though, about frilly dresses the color of blood, and how nothing bleeds right in this place, don't they know that blood isn't to be blue or green, and don't the bastards in charge here know that blood is supposed to be red, the absolute pinnacle of color, and other things that she doesn't really have time to listen to. Fai-san and the others are waiting for her, so while this weird person is still screaming a lot, she sneaks ahead. Or she tries to.
"…how I fear to think what I'd see if I risked by angel's life by cutting any of these monsters with its perfect blade, and JUST WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING WITHOUT TELLING YOUR MOTHER, YOUNG LADY?!"
She freezes in her tracks, and now she's a bit scared. It's impossible to tell what this weird person will do, but she's gotten a bit of distance between them. Maybe she can run.
"Um, I have to meet my friends, Mister."
"Mister. MISTER?!"
Yes, she decides, hearing the chainsaw being cranked. Running would be a very good thing.
Author: Tad
Beta (if applicable): Kaze, Tiassa, Sra, Re ♥
Word Count: 854 + 527 + 891 for 2,272 total
Rating: PG-13 to R? There's violence and cursing, and a tiny tiny bit of badtouch.
Character(s): Homura and Okita, Sagara Sanosuke and Badou, Grell and Ururu
Pairing(s) (if applicable): Homura/Okita, spoken of Sano/Yuffie
Summary: Three random situations that conceivably could happen in one night.
Promise for Morning: Okita tries to stop SC!Homura, which doesn't go over very well.
Answer to Everything: Sano and Badou get stuck in a room. What happens when yaoi doesn't.
Sweet Child of Mine: Ururu meets the strangest person she likely ever will.
Notes (if applicable): Any mistakes are totally my fault, and I hope that the characters are right. Yes.
I. Promise for Morning
It’s dirty, he thinks, so dirty he can’t stand it: the red slowly trailing down from his wrist, staining the skin, staining him inside and out. It’s filthy, diseased, eating away at his lungs and making him cough more than the smoke. Oh, and he has been coughing, and every time tasting fresh blood on his tongue, as if that flavor has to renew itself for him to remember that it’s there. He doesn’t need a reminder. He can’t forget that he’s dying, can’t spit out the reminder even if he tries hard enough to make his throat raw.
He’s helpless. Stuck in a room where he can’t do anything but watch, and cough, and wait.
He’s known, of course, from the moment he stepped inside M13 and saw it empty. Each time they make a little progress, get a key or a clue, they suffer for the nights after. The first time happened forever ago, long enough for the cough to become regular, impossible to hide. Long enough for them to try the clinic and the healers, and everyone else they can think of. Long enough for everything to fail. Now it’s a different night, and a different game. No one is going to walk away with an unthinkable mess seeped into his clothes, or a hole in his head where they took the memories out. Just with burns and broken bones and blood. Oh, and everything tonight promises for the morning, of course.
He remembers when Homura told him about being half-god, and his skepticism in those early days. And along the way there’s been proof here and there: a spark of fire, a touch of strength. But nothing like tonight, when a dragon of flame lights up the sky, and the ground trembles where the man walks. Nothing even close.
Screams fade into the distance when the others retreat, and he’s glad for it. It’s not for their sakes, however. He knows Homura, and how this will eat away at him, to be used in such a manner. For a man who respects choice above all, the loss of his own is the ultimate insult, a slap across the face that’ll ache just like filthy lungs before a cough. Certainly, their prison is a master of torture.
“Now where were we?” Chains clink against each other, manacles that are certainly appropriate for the situation. There’s so much fire around, yet the metal is cold against his skin when Homura reaches up to touch a wrist. He’s careful though, so cautious not to press too hard, to cause more pain than the pens driven though already have.
“You should leave.” Homura says it, wants it to be, but they both know it won’t happen. That’s why he’s pinned to the tree in the first place, because he’s a tricky person who can’t be allowed to run freely while Homura carries out his task. Tricky, and stubborn. Too much of each, or so he’s been told.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Homura-san.” He’s helpless this way, but he smiles as if he weren’t. Between each attempt at trespass the man’s come back to him, begging with an amused grin for the decision that will end the pain he never wanted to inflict at all. He can read between the lines enough to see it, how Homura hates leaving him this way. He hates it too, but his hopes leave him no option. He has to believe, after all, that the men he follows are somehow stronger than this place. So strong that they can be saved before the coughing becomes too much, before his lungs have been completely devoured and they’re all left to rot here in made-up lives and equally shallow graves. “Not until you’re yourself again.”
Homura laughs at that. “Do you truly think that I’m somehow not myself now, when I have my power?” A step closer, and he’s left to wonder why his personal space is being invaded now, why the other’s forehead is suddenly resting against his. A thumb brushes over his wrist, considering something besides his release. “My purpose has changed, but every other choice is my own, Okita.”
His name lands on his skin in a warm breath, one that makes his heart suddenly pound. He hates this closeness, this intimacy brought on by Landel’s no matter what Homura says. And what’s coming, oh, he knows what’s next, but not how to stop it. He can come up with a thousand things to say, things like no and it’s dirty, and not like this, not when you’re like this.
“I’ve been coughing. There’s blood in my mouth,” is what he says instead.
“Is there?” Softer, quieter. Closer. Homura’s smile brushes against his lips, and he wants to retreat even when he can’t, even when he doesn’t. His breath has stopped and his heart is racing, and its rhythm is all he can hear until someone steps on a branch, trying to take advantage of the distraction.
He says nothing then. Simply steps back with a look that is a promise, and vanishes into the air.
II. Answer to Everything
One day, he thinks, they’ll both look back on this whole fucking experience and laugh their asses off. About grabbing boobs and throwing tomatoes, and how about smoking a fog so thick it clouds the entire fucking hall really isn’t the greatest way to spend a Sunday afternoon, because he actually enjoys breathing, thank you very much. One day, some day, that definitely isn’t today. No, today is when they have their backs pressed against a door while something only hell could conceive pounding on the other side. He knows it has teeth, at the very least. Too many fucking teeth to count in places where teeth shouldn’t be, and that was enough reason for him not to stand around and try.
Then next thing he knows, the door isn’t holding quite as well as it was a second ago. There’s a tiny flicker of light next to him, and wouldn’t it figure, he’s left to do all the work while his so-called partner indulges in a cigarette.
“Damn it! You really think now’s the best time for that?” It's a stupid question, one that is completely pointless. That fact he knows even before he gets all the words out. The guy thinks it’s blasphemy to complain about Mother Nicotine, something that’s been made clear on more than one occasion.
“Silence infidel.” And here it comes. Preach on, oh faithful disciple, ignoring the eyes rolling in response. “Just because your girlfriend has invisible boobs is no reason to begrudge other men their pleasures.”
Well, that one’s new. The guy might be a lazy nicotine-addicted tomato-hogging ass, but he never failed to be creative. “What the hell does her breast size have to do with anything?!” It’s another stupid question, except for the part where it isn’t, because it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with the fact that something is trying to break through a flimsy door and eat them alive comes second to his next fix, five minutes after the last.
“It’s the answer to everything.” Such sage wisdom delivered with all the seriousness it deserves, followed by a long blow of smoke in his face. “Everything not answered by cigarettes, anyway.” So there.
He’d like to continue the argument. He really would, except now there’s a claw that’s broken through the wood too close to his side, and it’s a bit distracting. But something about what the other guy said actually makes sense for once, and before there’s a chance to protect the precious baby, he snatches it away.
Maybe it’s the sharp, heart-felt string of curses that makes the monster retreat, but he’s more willing to bet on the burn from the hot end of the cigarette against its skin that did it. He tosses the crumpled nub back, and come to find out, it’s the last one. Of course, that doesn’t exactly do anything to erase the shit-eating grin on his face. Oh no, it probably caused it in the first place
“Answer to everything, right?”
“Fuck you, man. You hear me?" He pushes past into the empty hall, pathetic little stump of a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. "Fuck. You.”
III. Sweet Child of Mine
This person, she thinks, is the weirdest person I've ever seen. And he really is very weird, more than weird enough for Jinta-kun to ask him why he was so creepy. Maybe even weird enough for Tessai-san to ask that. But he isn't quite weird enough for her to ask, at least not yet. She doesn't want to be rude.
He's dressed in red, all the way from his hair to his shoes, with higher heels than she's ever seen anyone wear. He must be very talented to walk on them, she decides. None of the red he wears is blood though, and she thinks that's a good thing. He doesn't think so, though, and when the chainsaw stops, she hears him sigh.
"This place…I HATE THIS PLACE!" He yells very loudly, then slumps over against a wall. "Oh, baby. I'm so sorry I have to use this cheap substitute for you. I'll find you soon, and then I'll give you all the love a good mother should shower on her child."
Then suddenly he starts the chainsaw's motor again, but he's still screaming loud enough for her to hear.
"HOLD ON, MY DARLING!" She can't hear his heels clicking as he runs down the hall though, but she's sure they probably are. "I'll save you, and then together we'll cut through the bastard who dared to separate us at all! Mother and child reunited! Our sorrowful sweet parting will end soon, my sweet baby~!"
Yes, she decides as he turns a corner, gleeful nfufus trailing off behind him. This person is very weird. She starts to follow him, not because she wants to see more, but because she has to go that way too. It's the only way out of the women's block. When she turns the same corner, though, she realizes he hasn't gone very far.
Mostly because he's standing right there, looking down at her.
"Well, hello there. Aren't you an utterly adorable little girl?" The chainsaw is off again, which is good, because it might cut into his shoulder the way he's holding it if it wasn't. He bends at the waist and peers into her face, which she finds a little bit creepy, but she tries to give everyone a chance. At least he's not trying to eat her? Though with what she's seen, she's not sure he won't.
"Yes, you're perfect!" He stands up again, his hand waving about as he keeps talking. He talks a lot. "That adorable little pout, that jet black hair, your face, your eyes! Why, you're the cute little girl I would have had with my sweet, sweet Sebas-chan, if only God hadn't cursed us both to a horrible fate like that of Romeo and Juliet! Oh, Sebas-chan, beautiful Sebas-chan! Wherefore art thou, my love? Deny thy father and refuse thy name, and STOP BEING LATE SO I CAN FINALLY KILL YOU FOR KICKING ME IN THE FACE, YOU BASTARD! Oh, what's your name, sweet child?"
"Ururu?"
"Ururu?! Who named you that?" He crinkles his nose like he's eating a vegetable he doesn't like, which she doesn't get so much, because she likes her name. Before she can answer, however, he's started talking. Again. She wonders if maybe he's like Jinta-kun, who can also talk for a very long time without having to breathe. "No, no dear, your name was obviously meant to be Rosalin. Do you know why?"
"Um, no?"
"Because that's exactly what a perfect little child should be named! Rosalin Sutcliffe Michaelis. When you introduce yourself to people, you'll remember to mention that Sutcliffe is your mother's name, won't you?"
"But I—"
"WON"T YOU?!" He looks a little crazy then—well, more than a little, really. But she's afraid that he if he keeps talking this way, he'll run out of air and pass out. So she nods, even though her name is Ururu. It's just a little lie, like the ones Jinta-kun says are okay, because if they lie, no one will find out who broke the really expensive item Kisuke-san was going to sell to a customer because someone was playing baseball inside the store again.
Except those lies never work. But this person isn't Tessai-san, so maybe it will.
He's still talking though, about frilly dresses the color of blood, and how nothing bleeds right in this place, don't they know that blood isn't to be blue or green, and don't the bastards in charge here know that blood is supposed to be red, the absolute pinnacle of color, and other things that she doesn't really have time to listen to. Fai-san and the others are waiting for her, so while this weird person is still screaming a lot, she sneaks ahead. Or she tries to.
"…how I fear to think what I'd see if I risked by angel's life by cutting any of these monsters with its perfect blade, and JUST WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING WITHOUT TELLING YOUR MOTHER, YOUNG LADY?!"
She freezes in her tracks, and now she's a bit scared. It's impossible to tell what this weird person will do, but she's gotten a bit of distance between them. Maybe she can run.
"Um, I have to meet my friends, Mister."
"Mister. MISTER?!"
Yes, she decides, hearing the chainsaw being cranked. Running would be a very good thing.