[ Hopefully, Youko has prepared herself for the bundle of enthusiasm that just opened the door. Movies, pillow forts, and a pretty lady? Who could blame Bandou for baring an ear-to-ear grin as he excitedly grabs Youko's hand and pulls her into the apartment.
The scavenged pillows and blankets that he reported back to her with earlier have made their way into the main room. An impressive pile considering how sparce furniture is in the place. It's obvious Bandou raided his roommate's bedroom, on top of his own. Whether or not Shouhei will be okay with that is something that can be dealt with when the time comes. And Bandou's full on set to argue his way to a win, even if it means telling his friend to go sleep at the bar for the night.
For now, Bandou's giddiness over this evening's plans are taking precedence. There's no time to linger on what may or may not ruin the night for him when he's already leaning in for a kiss the moment the door closes behind Youko.
And, as she must have expected, he's still wearing those new red sunglasses she gifted him. ]
[There is a 'hello' on the tip of her tongue that just never makes it to open air as she is yanked into the apartment. She hadn't had long to parse it on the way in or out last time, distracted by Bandou on both counts, but it definitely didn't have an incredible pillow monument in the midst of the floor.
She gets the feeling they may owe his roommate a heartfelt apology for this, but she doesn't have the time to worry about that. Bandou, wearing her gift and leaning in for a kiss, takes precedence. Reaching up for him, letting her fingers find his shaggy hair, kissing him — it is all starting to feel familiar and it puts a smile firmly in place.
As nice as it feels, she keeps it brief. Just a greeting. Even if it puts a soft heat into her voice.]
Hi Saburouta.
[For Youko's part of the evening, she has a paper shopping bag held under her arm holding a rented copy of Kiki's Delivery Service, the promised pajamas to change into, the takeout menus that had made their way into her mail and looked promising, and some snacks and drinks she wasn't asked for but felt were necessary. Movies mean snacks, right?
She is also, for once, not wearing anything that could be mistaken for hanfu. Just a white t-shirt, jean shorts, and her hair in a braid.]
[ Forget any hostility he'd had when she first called him that name. It's all but forgotten. It's her name for him, it's said with fondness and care, and he's actually quite thankful for that. He'll sneak another quick kiss before finally letting her enter the room properly.
Then he's standing before the partially built, but still extra comfy looking fort, hands on his hips, looking as proud as ever. ]
It's not finished yet. I didn't wanna build it all without you. But we definitely have to give it an awesome name once it's done!
[ It's almost like something he'd been missing out on from his childhood is emerging. The gleefulness of his words as he points out the various items they have left to add on. Ideas for incorporating the tv better into its layout so they have the best viewing experience. Making sure his new blanket is saved for the final finishing touch. ]
Maybe we can combine our names somehow? And then what...should it be a castle, fort, manor, palace?
[For someone who never built a pillow fort before, whether as a child or as an adult, it had looked finished to Youko, but learning it was left unfinished, that she gets to do this with him makes her just want to pull him into another kiss. She holds back, choosing just to lean against him, and enjoy his energy and warmth for a minute longer. Then she's finding a temporary home for her bag, away from the pillow construction zone, and surveying what Bandou had done so far.]
Thank you for leaving some for me.
[Combining their names couldn't be easier or more compatible, but he doesn't seem to have realized it yet. She tilts her head up at him and bumps an elbow against him playfully, a delighted smile on her face.]
Taiyou — the last character of your name and the first of mine make the sun.
[ He stares past her for a moment, silently visualizing the characters in their names. Yeah, it would have taken him far too long to piece that together. ]
How did you figure that out so fast?
[ The usual pettiness lingers in his words, but it's more playful than actual jealousy. He thinks she might be the only one he may never get truly competitive with over trivial things. Thank goodness she's here to give her input before he's dubbed it something absurd. ]
It's perfect! Now, I'm gonna push the couch forward cause I think it's too far from the screen for us to drape Shouhei's sheets over the top. And then maybe move those to lean against the sides once I get it close enough?
[ pointing to the large couch cushions laying beside her, he indicates where he thinks they'll best support their masterpiece. ]
[Theories, theories she was trying to babble out and pass off as proper instructions, slip further and further out of her head with each of his steady, effective strokes. Particularly when he brushes a sweet spot, one that reduces her communication to a scattered few panted 'there's and a growing tremble to her thighs as she rocks against his hand, making headway to a cliff edge.
But the way Bandou closes his eyes doesn't escape her notice — not when he has been her entire hazy field of vision — even if the anxious sound that escapes him almost gets lost in the shroud of heat building over her thoughts. (Almost.) That, and the briefest of glances he takes just to reach out and touch her, to toy with her nipple, drives home a reminder even as her breath hitches at the sensation. Namely that taking, and taking, and taking is greedy.]
Saburouta—
[Even if arrogance is meant to be inherent in a ruler, Youko would much rather buck that trait, especially here and now. Even if it's just going to burn her to cinders with every coy syllable.]
[Even if that was the end goal he was hoping for from the moment Youko faltered in her choice over F, M or K, he can't keep his eyes from shooting open in surprise. More so at the amount of time that's passed than at her desire.]
Are you sure you're ready?
[Hell if he knows what amount of tightness his finger should be feeling if she is. She was so sensitive at the start, just from the full length of his middle finger that he'd hate to hurt her. Not that he has anything worth bragging over, but it's certainly larger than a single finger.
Working his mouth a bit in thought, he gets an idea. His hands leave her as he crawls over to the opposite end of the bed and starts to rummage through a box that's not even trying to be discreetly tucked away.]
This should help, right?
[Behold! A bottle of his favorite lube!
Bandou eagerly scoots back over to her, handing her the bottle to hold while he finally nods himself of his boxer briefs. Don't ask why it's flavored when he's only ever used it in seclusion.]
['Ready' might be pushing the truth. It isn't that she's in a rush to do something foolish and get herself hurt — even if she is far and away more resilient than she looks — it just feels greedy of her, uneven. And, as her eyes dart down to confirm the neglected tent in his boxers, looks pretty uneven. She gives him a guilty look from under her mussed bangs, the tops of her cheekbones darkening with a vengeance.]
It's just a bit... at least when I was touching your mark, you were feeling good too...?
[Youko jolts a little, toes pressing into the mattress in surprise, as Bandou withdraws and crawls away to dig through his completely conspicuous box of miscellany. She sits up on her elbows just enough to watch and try to puzzle out what he's doing before he returns with the offered bottle.
A bottle she takes and studies for an embarrassing number of seconds before it clicks in her head just what he's handed her. (Maybe if she had a point of comparison, she'd be asking Bandou why it was flavored, but this time he has lucked out.) Any longer reply she might have given gets drowned out by her attention zeroing in on him stripping out of the last of his clothing. He'll have to settle for the hushed, clipped affirmative of —]
[He pauses just as he's about to banish his underwear to the farthest corner of the room. Tilting his head to the side, he blinks a few times at her explanation, as quiet as it came out.]
All of it feels good. Even just touching you is awesome.
[A warm smile spreads across his face as he finally tosses the garment away and eagerly climbs back across the bed. He hovers above her, dark eyes alight with a sparkle of excitement.]
But it'll be even more awesome if you're sure you're ready.
[The bottle is swiped from her hand while he leans down to take her in a deep kiss.]
[There is the slightest wrinkle in the look she gives him in return, with her head tilting in mirror fashion, betraying the bit of doubt that hasn't been dispelled. Anxiety, her oldest friend, at the ready. Not that it is getting the breathing room to make inroads and ruin this. Not with Bandou crowding it away with his presence and a smile that has her stomach doing a pleasant little wobble.]
Ready to try.
[And that's the last, notably articulate word she has on the subject before letting her eyes close, surrendering her focus to the warmth of Bandou's lips and sweet feeling of kissing him again, letting her newly freed up hands find his arms and use them as guidelines up to his shoulders, the curve of his neck.]
[Wind batters her body, her hair caught up and whipped violently in the current, sickeningly reminding her of blood splattering down from a cut she inflicted. There are cold, grey cobblestones under her bare feet. Familiar ones. Ones she has lounged on while talking to friends, and sparred on with her comrades, and paced while frustrated by all she didn't understand. The rokushin of Kinpa Palace. Home. Her home. There's only cold comfort in that recognition though.
A grey pall is settled over it all, the color leeched from the flowers and plants, from the buildings dotting the horizon, from the sky and the sea themselves. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The monkey isn't cackling it, but she can all but feel his voice. Dread doesn't creep up on her so much as swallow her full when she looks down at her feet.
Keiki. Pale and still and laid in a pool of dark red blood, staining the white gold of his hair and blooming out from his body, heading for feet she cannot move. In the blink of an eye Kaiko, his nyokai, wraps around his body, a childless mother holding her motherless child in the last moments of both their duties. Like the floor is pulled away, they sink into the blood, bodies rapidly taken. She cannot look away. She cannot even scream. Just like watching Kourin's death, she hears his shirei — Hyouki, Hankyo, Juusaku, Jouyuu, Jakko, all of them — turn feral as their just reward leeches under her toes, hunger laced in every note of their discord. The bargain that should never have been fulfilled, the bargain she made him fail — their service until the end of his life. His meat for their payment and another empty grave.
Youko feels the impact of them lunging into the pool after Keiki, to tear him apart in a final feast, and shrieks, shooting upright with her heart thundering in her ears and her hands white-knuckle clutching her sheets. Her cries fill the apartment for a good while, leaving her desperately trying to catch her breath with cold sweat running down her spine, and her damp hair sticking to her skin.
It isn't until she shakily swings her legs out of bed that she notices the bruise purple cast to the morning sky outside or even hears the very real wind tearing through the city. Not a typhoon. A shoku. Heralded by nightmares.
Sometimes history rhymes instead of repeating itself.]
[It'd be a lie to say Bandou hasn't found himself feeling a bout of anxiety creep over him every time a thunderstorm forms over Shizume City. Ever since Youko had nervously explained who she really was, where she came from and how she'd gotten here, all while seated with him under a canopy of bedsheets, Bandou'd been fearful of the day she'd inevitably have to return home.
Rain would be heard pattering against the window of his apartment, or perhaps a customer to the bar would step in to shed their wet coat by the door before ordering a drink, and Bandou would quickly flip to his phone's weather app, sighing in relief when the forecast showed expected rain amounts for the day.
But today is different. It's wrong. The wind sounds fiercer. Sirens from passing emergency vehicles ring in his ears. And when he opens his news feed, countless streams flood in with reporters highlighting this strange, sudden, unprecedented change in weather patterns.
Bandou's up and sprinting out the door before he can think, shouhei shouting after him that it's not safe to go outside. But that doesn't matter to him now. Finding Youko, making certain she's still here with him, that's all he can think of.
By the time he's at her door, he's completely out of breath, soaked and shivering due to the cold rain and biting wind. There's no hat or shades, just whatever he frantically climbed out of bed in. If she's there, she'll hear each bang at her door accompanied by a desperate call of her name.]
[The nausea is overwhelming, the twisting, gnashing sick feeling digging through the marrow of her as she watches the sky in stock-still horror. Every noise — the wind buffeting the city, howling like a creature driven mad; the glass of her windows, rattling in riot, as like to break as hold; the frightened hitch of her own breath — drowns out again with the pound of her own heart, her own blood.
Like a thunderhead descending, the dread follows her from the dream, a pressure front blooming behind her eyes. A foreboding, sinking feeling of destiny. What should be joy overflowing, an impending homecoming, are ashes in her mouth. There are voices. Even if she can't make out the words, she can feel their meaning. The shirei are rejoicing. Their master found his master. They will go home.
Dimly, she knows she needs to find her phone. Her palm searches blindly on her bedsheets for it, eyes turning glassy as she watches the shoku rage. She needs— she has to tell— she promised him she would—
Like a roll of thunder, sound returns, cutting through the storm and her fear. The insistant banging of a fist against her door. The call of a name, her name, in a voice she loves, she loves so, so dearly. There's no stopping the tears.
Saburouta.
Forcing herself to her feet takes effort, her legs feeling weak and ready to give out with the next strike of lightning, but she gets up. Bandou is just beyond the door, just beyond the voice that feels buried beneath her starving lungs. She moves towards the door in mechanical steps, like dragging herself through a mire one measured pace at a time, hand out, searching. Seeking. Her fingers reach the door first, wrapping around the cold metal handle, twisting, unlatching. Close. Closer.
A wind more gentle than the storm outside sweeps over her shoulders, carrying the brine of the sea and the thin scent of incense. She doesn't need to turn to feel who stands at her back, eyes on the set of her shoulders.
The name is bitter on her tongue even as it drips off like honey.]
[Hourai, a world bent on taking from his meager stores. First, it took a brother, swept him away from the mountain of their birth before his first breath. His return had been hard-won, but it just stole him back, just as his kingdom rejoiced their good fortune and new emperor. Stole him back and scarred him in ways a kirin should never have been touched. But she had rescued him, stubbornly refusing the wisdom of those around her in the name of what she believed was right. A girl who stood on shaky legs and stared at him with suspicion and fear when he took her hand. A girl who the world changed like the tides change a shoreline while he was locked in silence. His second empress.
The hakuchi didn't cry out for her a second time, did not announce a death he could not have wished for less, so he did not despair. He held her nascent court together with her trusted retainers, a panicked baby bird in the palm of his hands, and he hunted in the only arena allowed by his nature. To the ends of the earth, he would chase her.
His shirei slipped through the folds of the world again and again, bridging him between Here and There, fanning out, seeking a sign of their master's master. It had been fruitless for so, so long. An empty ache set beneath the ribs, ever-present. An unspoken prayer for news, a single trace of her, the set of her eyes in a temper, the flare of red silk in a crowd.
It was Jakko — the least likely of all his shirei — that had caught her trail. A shard of glass in the sand, yet a face unmistakable in the overwhelming surge of the city. It was enough to slip through himself, not waiting to petition Ren for the regalia they retrieved Taiki with, not waiting a moment longer than he was forced to, his form shifting, liquid through the barrier.
It was impossible not to see her once he raced through the clouds above the city. The aura of his chosen. Hers a golden light in a sea of grey shadows, a beacon to chase down from the heavens. The only treasure worthy the discord he carried on his heels.
Like following the sun, he plunged down, down through the tumult, a tailwind carrying him to her, carrying him through the seams in her chambers, the kirin dissipating as his feet meet the floor. To leave him as she knew him best. To leave his voice thick with an uncountable feeling as she speaks his name.]
Your Majesty.
[The thousand thousands of things he has wanted to say these months abandon him at the jubilation he feels with his empress before his very eyes. The stiffness of his language could not be further from the emotion beneath his restrained exterior, only the dignities of her rank keeping him from going directly to her side.]
I am relieved to find you unstained by blood this time.
[With each pound of his fist against the door, his hope dwindles. She's gone, he missed his chance. He couldn't run fast enough to catch her. The wind scooped her up and carried her to a land he never had knowledge of, much less knew how to get to.]
You...ko...
[The call of her name softens, overcome by the tears that fall. Of course, of course this would happen to him. He finds someone who truly loves him for him, finds actual acceptance and happiness, and it's grabbed away from him before he can even give her an overly emotional goodbye.
But, then there's the rattle of locks, the shimmer of the fluorescent lights reflecting off the door knob as it slowly turns. Bandou's glassy, uncovered eyes widen, until a phase is heard spoken, just beyond the small crack the door had opened.
Your Majesty.
Not spoken the way Youko's sword wielding tiger had, gruff with an underlining malice. But, stoic with an air of relief. Someone was here to retrieve her.
Bandou steadies his breath as much as he can and reaches to slowly push the door open.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Pillow Fort Sleepover~!
[ Hopefully, Youko has prepared herself for the bundle of enthusiasm that just opened the door. Movies, pillow forts, and a pretty lady? Who could blame Bandou for baring an ear-to-ear grin as he excitedly grabs Youko's hand and pulls her into the apartment.
The scavenged pillows and blankets that he reported back to her with earlier have made their way into the main room. An impressive pile considering how sparce furniture is in the place. It's obvious Bandou raided his roommate's bedroom, on top of his own. Whether or not Shouhei will be okay with that is something that can be dealt with when the time comes. And Bandou's full on set to argue his way to a win, even if it means telling his friend to go sleep at the bar for the night.
For now, Bandou's giddiness over this evening's plans are taking precedence. There's no time to linger on what may or may not ruin the night for him when he's already leaning in for a kiss the moment the door closes behind Youko.
And, as she must have expected, he's still wearing those new red sunglasses she gifted him. ]
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She gets the feeling they may owe his roommate a heartfelt apology for this, but she doesn't have the time to worry about that. Bandou, wearing her gift and leaning in for a kiss, takes precedence. Reaching up for him, letting her fingers find his shaggy hair, kissing him — it is all starting to feel familiar and it puts a smile firmly in place.
As nice as it feels, she keeps it brief. Just a greeting. Even if it puts a soft heat into her voice.]
Hi Saburouta.
[For Youko's part of the evening, she has a paper shopping bag held under her arm holding a rented copy of Kiki's Delivery Service, the promised pajamas to change into, the takeout menus that had made their way into her mail and looked promising, and some snacks and drinks she wasn't asked for but felt were necessary. Movies mean snacks, right?
She is also, for once, not wearing anything that could be mistaken for hanfu. Just a white t-shirt, jean shorts, and her hair in a braid.]
What did you christen your masterpiece here?
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Then he's standing before the partially built, but still extra comfy looking fort, hands on his hips, looking as proud as ever. ]
It's not finished yet. I didn't wanna build it all without you. But we definitely have to give it an awesome name once it's done!
[ It's almost like something he'd been missing out on from his childhood is emerging. The gleefulness of his words as he points out the various items they have left to add on. Ideas for incorporating the tv better into its layout so they have the best viewing experience. Making sure his new blanket is saved for the final finishing touch. ]
Maybe we can combine our names somehow? And then what...should it be a castle, fort, manor, palace?
[ These are the important questions! ]
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Thank you for leaving some for me.
[Combining their names couldn't be easier or more compatible, but he doesn't seem to have realized it yet. She tilts her head up at him and bumps an elbow against him playfully, a delighted smile on her face.]
Taiyou — the last character of your name and the first of mine make the sun.
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How did you figure that out so fast?
[ The usual pettiness lingers in his words, but it's more playful than actual jealousy. He thinks she might be the only one he may never get truly competitive with over trivial things. Thank goodness she's here to give her input before he's dubbed it something absurd. ]
It's perfect! Now, I'm gonna push the couch forward cause I think it's too far from the screen for us to drape Shouhei's sheets over the top. And then maybe move those to lean against the sides once I get it close enough?
[ pointing to the large couch cushions laying beside her, he indicates where he thinks they'll best support their masterpiece. ]
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(fmk)
[Theories, theories she was trying to babble out and pass off as proper instructions, slip further and further out of her head with each of his steady, effective strokes. Particularly when he brushes a sweet spot, one that reduces her communication to a scattered few panted 'there's and a growing tremble to her thighs as she rocks against his hand, making headway to a cliff edge.
But the way Bandou closes his eyes doesn't escape her notice — not when he has been her entire hazy field of vision — even if the anxious sound that escapes him almost gets lost in the shroud of heat building over her thoughts. (Almost.) That, and the briefest of glances he takes just to reach out and touch her, to toy with her nipple, drives home a reminder even as her breath hitches at the sensation. Namely that taking, and taking, and taking is greedy.]
Saburouta—
[Even if arrogance is meant to be inherent in a ruler, Youko would much rather buck that trait, especially here and now. Even if it's just going to burn her to cinders with every coy syllable.]
Please... fuck me? Please.
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Are you sure you're ready?
[Hell if he knows what amount of tightness his finger should be feeling if she is. She was so sensitive at the start, just from the full length of his middle finger that he'd hate to hurt her. Not that he has anything worth bragging over, but it's certainly larger than a single finger.
Working his mouth a bit in thought, he gets an idea. His hands leave her as he crawls over to the opposite end of the bed and starts to rummage through a box that's not even trying to be discreetly tucked away.]
This should help, right?
[Behold! A bottle of his favorite lube!
Bandou eagerly scoots back over to her, handing her the bottle to hold while he finally nods himself of his boxer briefs. Don't ask why it's flavored when he's only ever used it in seclusion.]
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It's just a bit... at least when I was touching your mark, you were feeling good too...?
[Youko jolts a little, toes pressing into the mattress in surprise, as Bandou withdraws and crawls away to dig through his completely conspicuous box of miscellany. She sits up on her elbows just enough to watch and try to puzzle out what he's doing before he returns with the offered bottle.
A bottle she takes and studies for an embarrassing number of seconds before it clicks in her head just what he's handed her. (Maybe if she had a point of comparison, she'd be asking Bandou why it was flavored, but this time he has lucked out.) Any longer reply she might have given gets drowned out by her attention zeroing in on him stripping out of the last of his clothing. He'll have to settle for the hushed, clipped affirmative of —]
Uh huh.
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All of it feels good. Even just touching you is awesome.
[A warm smile spreads across his face as he finally tosses the garment away and eagerly climbs back across the bed. He hovers above her, dark eyes alight with a sparkle of excitement.]
But it'll be even more awesome if you're sure you're ready.
[The bottle is swiped from her hand while he leans down to take her in a deep kiss.]
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[There is the slightest wrinkle in the look she gives him in return, with her head tilting in mirror fashion, betraying the bit of doubt that hasn't been dispelled. Anxiety, her oldest friend, at the ready. Not that it is getting the breathing room to make inroads and ruin this. Not with Bandou crowding it away with his presence and a smile that has her stomach doing a pleasant little wobble.]
Ready to try.
[And that's the last, notably articulate word she has on the subject before letting her eyes close, surrendering her focus to the warmth of Bandou's lips and sweet feeling of kissing him again, letting her newly freed up hands find his arms and use them as guidelines up to his shoulders, the curve of his neck.]
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so youre saying i should bring more horror movies with me~?
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we can watch something silly next time
give me a few and ill head over ok?
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homeward bound suffering
A grey pall is settled over it all, the color leeched from the flowers and plants, from the buildings dotting the horizon, from the sky and the sea themselves. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The monkey isn't cackling it, but she can all but feel his voice. Dread doesn't creep up on her so much as swallow her full when she looks down at her feet.
Keiki. Pale and still and laid in a pool of dark red blood, staining the white gold of his hair and blooming out from his body, heading for feet she cannot move. In the blink of an eye Kaiko, his nyokai, wraps around his body, a childless mother holding her motherless child in the last moments of both their duties. Like the floor is pulled away, they sink into the blood, bodies rapidly taken. She cannot look away. She cannot even scream. Just like watching Kourin's death, she hears his shirei — Hyouki, Hankyo, Juusaku, Jouyuu, Jakko, all of them — turn feral as their just reward leeches under her toes, hunger laced in every note of their discord. The bargain that should never have been fulfilled, the bargain she made him fail — their service until the end of his life. His meat for their payment and another empty grave.
Youko feels the impact of them lunging into the pool after Keiki, to tear him apart in a final feast, and shrieks, shooting upright with her heart thundering in her ears and her hands white-knuckle clutching her sheets. Her cries fill the apartment for a good while, leaving her desperately trying to catch her breath with cold sweat running down her spine, and her damp hair sticking to her skin.
It isn't until she shakily swings her legs out of bed that she notices the bruise purple cast to the morning sky outside or even hears the very real wind tearing through the city. Not a typhoon. A shoku. Heralded by nightmares.
Sometimes history rhymes instead of repeating itself.]
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Rain would be heard pattering against the window of his apartment, or perhaps a customer to the bar would step in to shed their wet coat by the door before ordering a drink, and Bandou would quickly flip to his phone's weather app, sighing in relief when the forecast showed expected rain amounts for the day.
But today is different. It's wrong. The wind sounds fiercer. Sirens from passing emergency vehicles ring in his ears. And when he opens his news feed, countless streams flood in with reporters highlighting this strange, sudden, unprecedented change in weather patterns.
Bandou's up and sprinting out the door before he can think, shouhei shouting after him that it's not safe to go outside. But that doesn't matter to him now. Finding Youko, making certain she's still here with him, that's all he can think of.
By the time he's at her door, he's completely out of breath, soaked and shivering due to the cold rain and biting wind. There's no hat or shades, just whatever he frantically climbed out of bed in. If she's there, she'll hear each bang at her door accompanied by a desperate call of her name.]
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Like a thunderhead descending, the dread follows her from the dream, a pressure front blooming behind her eyes. A foreboding, sinking feeling of destiny. What should be joy overflowing, an impending homecoming, are ashes in her mouth. There are voices. Even if she can't make out the words, she can feel their meaning. The shirei are rejoicing. Their master found his master. They will go home.
Dimly, she knows she needs to find her phone. Her palm searches blindly on her bedsheets for it, eyes turning glassy as she watches the shoku rage. She needs— she has to tell— she promised him she would—
Like a roll of thunder, sound returns, cutting through the storm and her fear. The insistant banging of a fist against her door. The call of a name, her name, in a voice she loves, she loves so, so dearly. There's no stopping the tears.
Saburouta.
Forcing herself to her feet takes effort, her legs feeling weak and ready to give out with the next strike of lightning, but she gets up. Bandou is just beyond the door, just beyond the voice that feels buried beneath her starving lungs. She moves towards the door in mechanical steps, like dragging herself through a mire one measured pace at a time, hand out, searching. Seeking. Her fingers reach the door first, wrapping around the cold metal handle, twisting, unlatching. Close. Closer.
A wind more gentle than the storm outside sweeps over her shoulders, carrying the brine of the sea and the thin scent of incense. She doesn't need to turn to feel who stands at her back, eyes on the set of her shoulders.
The name is bitter on her tongue even as it drips off like honey.]
Keiki...
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The hakuchi didn't cry out for her a second time, did not announce a death he could not have wished for less, so he did not despair. He held her nascent court together with her trusted retainers, a panicked baby bird in the palm of his hands, and he hunted in the only arena allowed by his nature. To the ends of the earth, he would chase her.
His shirei slipped through the folds of the world again and again, bridging him between Here and There, fanning out, seeking a sign of their master's master. It had been fruitless for so, so long. An empty ache set beneath the ribs, ever-present. An unspoken prayer for news, a single trace of her, the set of her eyes in a temper, the flare of red silk in a crowd.
It was Jakko — the least likely of all his shirei — that had caught her trail. A shard of glass in the sand, yet a face unmistakable in the overwhelming surge of the city. It was enough to slip through himself, not waiting to petition Ren for the regalia they retrieved Taiki with, not waiting a moment longer than he was forced to, his form shifting, liquid through the barrier.
It was impossible not to see her once he raced through the clouds above the city. The aura of his chosen. Hers a golden light in a sea of grey shadows, a beacon to chase down from the heavens. The only treasure worthy the discord he carried on his heels.
Like following the sun, he plunged down, down through the tumult, a tailwind carrying him to her, carrying him through the seams in her chambers, the kirin dissipating as his feet meet the floor. To leave him as she knew him best. To leave his voice thick with an uncountable feeling as she speaks his name.]
Your Majesty.
[The thousand thousands of things he has wanted to say these months abandon him at the jubilation he feels with his empress before his very eyes. The stiffness of his language could not be further from the emotion beneath his restrained exterior, only the dignities of her rank keeping him from going directly to her side.]
I am relieved to find you unstained by blood this time.
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You...ko...
[The call of her name softens, overcome by the tears that fall. Of course, of course this would happen to him. He finds someone who truly loves him for him, finds actual acceptance and happiness, and it's grabbed away from him before he can even give her an overly emotional goodbye.
But, then there's the rattle of locks, the shimmer of the fluorescent lights reflecting off the door knob as it slowly turns. Bandou's glassy, uncovered eyes widen, until a phase is heard spoken, just beyond the small crack the door had opened.
Your Majesty.
Not spoken the way Youko's sword wielding tiger had, gruff with an underlining malice. But, stoic with an air of relief. Someone was here to retrieve her.
Bandou steadies his breath as much as he can and reaches to slowly push the door open.]
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Tfln prompt D-1
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but I threw a bunch of water in there too!
...so it kinda worked??
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it was still on fire?
you threw it out while it was still on fire?
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fast-forwarding a bit
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