Neither man nor God is going to tell me what to write. --James T. Farrell

Hearts of Ice - 6/8 - Hiei x Yukina / Kurama x Botan

2009-12-21T18:45:10Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own YuYu Hakusho, or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Hearts of Ice

FANDOM: YuYu Hakusho anime-verse.

RATED: R

WARNING: Strong adult content, sexual situations, and language.

PAIRINGS: Hiei x Yukina, Kurama x Botan, Koenma x Kurama, (one-sided) Kuwabara x Yukina.

SUMMARY: Two very different women must face the cold truth, and confront the fact that their realities are not at all what they seem to be.

Chapter Four: Standards of Behavior

Yukina sat, feet tucked daintily beneath her, on the tatami, her mother’s two Tear Gems in her lap. Kurama sat across from her, sipping the tea Genkai had provided despite the late hour. Hiei crouched to her right, sword sheethed and resting against his shoulder.

The slight slurping noises Kurama was making filled the room, along with the musky scent of incense burning in another room somewhere. No doubt the tea was but a convenient excuse to put off responding to the extraordinary tale the Ice Maiden had just finished, and provide more time to process the information and formulate an appropriate reply.

At length, Kurama set down the tea and spoke, “Well, you’ve had quite the day.”

Yukina ran a finger over the jewels resting in the crevice of material between her knees. “You do not appear very shocked that Hiei and I are siblings,” she remarked, and felt oddly satisfied as the males in the room shifted uncomfortably. She couldn’t seem to help the small part of herself that was still quite upset by having been played for a fool by everyone. She pushed the feeling aside, however, as what she really wanted was for someone to explain why Kuwabara had reacted in such a violent manner. The shock and the tears could wait; understanding took precedence.

Hiei had almost completely shut down since the incident, and Genkai wasn’t talking either. She needed someone to help her comprehend something that was clearly out of her depth, as so much with humans seemed to be.

Why had Kazuma looked at her like that? Like she had ripped his heart out, and eaten it in front of him.

Kurama appeared to have picked up on her train of thought. “I think our Kuwabara thought you were his girlfriend. Apparently, that was not correct,” his voice lilted slightly at the end of the sentence, almost making it a question.

Yukina felt herself frowning. Her next words coming out careful and slow. “But…a “girlfriend” is merely a girl, who is a friend…right?”

At that, the red-haired man across from her sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He seemed suddenly exhausted, and much older than his human body actually was.

Hiei snorted, and finally uttered a few scathing and dreadfully illuminating words on the matter. “Human males use the term to refer to women they wish to mate with.”

Horror steadily rose within Yukina. “Oh, my…I thought…” I just thought Kazuma wanted my friendship. Even she knew how incredibly naïve that would make her sound, so she left the sentence unfinished aloud.

“What’s worse,” Kurama added his voice thin with a tiredness that had nothing to do with insufficient sleep. “Kuwabara doesn’t know the two of you are siblings.”

“That would make a difference?” Yukina asked, puzzled.

The former Fox Demon looked from her to her brother, who was resolutely refusing to look at either of them. “Perhaps not.” His expression grew shrewd as his eyes continued to gaze intently at Hiei.

The Fire Apparition met Kurama’s gaze then, his red eyes burning with the confirmation his partner had been seeking.

“You know the rules of this world, Hiei,” Kurama spoke, his tone firm.

“I know that they are ridiculous,” Hiei retorted coldly.

The other man nodded. “True enough, but they are nonetheless the rules of the world we are currently residing in.”

Yukina felt rather like she had turned invisible, as though she was no longer a part of the conversation.

Kurama turned to her just then, unnervingly like he had read her thoughts. “You should know that incestuous relationships are not smiled upon in the Human World.”

She blinked. She had known for a great while that the Fire Demon next to her, radiating such distinctly angry energy at the moment, was very dear to her, whether or not he was her brother had little to do with it.

Ever since the moment when she had clutched his arm to her breast to prevent him murdering the human who had tortured her into whoring her tears to the Black Market, she had felt a link form between them, unbreakable and precious. She hadn’t felt it necessary to assign a name to this connection, what mattered was that it was there. She hadn’t thought to categorize the intentions behind all those kisses she had bestowed upon her brother’s skin, that too she hadn’t considered necessary. Looking into their guest’s so serious eyes, however, she was beginning to think that unwise in the Human Realm.

A dull ache lodged itself between the Ice Maiden’s eyes. She wasn’t used to analyzing and labeling every thought in her head. Why did humans have to make everything so…complicated? At least the last few hours of her life were starting to make sense in a horrific, nauseating sort of way.

Yukina raised a hand, massaging her forehead. Her brain was exploding with new information, and question after question. She couldn’t understand why wanting to be with her brother in every way possible was unacceptable by human standards, but she knew making inquiries would clarify nothing, and only make her more confused. She had learned her lesson on that point years before, after Yusuke had made a particularly unpleasant joke, and she had asked, “But what’s wrong with two men wanting to be together?”

She was never going to fully understand the bizarre parameters human beings liked to erect around themselves, shutting themselves inside cages of “morality.” Her own people had been the same way, imposing pointless restrictions and regulations that didn’t make any sense to her. She couldn’t get her mind around this peculiar need to box oneself into standards of behavior that were decided upon by other people.

She had always felt that love, in whatever variant form it took, should be freely expressed.

Yukina pushed these thoughts away as they seemed to be dumping generous amounts of fuel on her headache. Come to think of it, the headache was more likely a byproduct of having been tossed to the ground like a defenseless doll, but the swirling thoughts certainly weren’t helping.

“So,” she rested her hand upon her lap once more. “Kazuma thought he and I were…romantically involved, and he’s likely to take things even worse if it is made known to him that Hiei and I are siblings. It is also likely that Master Genkai is quite disgusted with us now, and her reaction will probably be mirrored by our other human friends. Is my comprehension of the situation incorrect?” She could tell that at that moment her eyes must have looked like cold, dead things.

No one said anything in response. They didn’t have to.

“I see,” she looked over her brother’s spiky hair at the makeshift repairs to the wall Kuwabara had ruined. She did not know of an appropriate deity to call upon, so she settled for, to whomever may be able to help, please do.

~*~*~

It didn’t matter how she looked at it, the person before Botan was definitely a toddler, the incessant sucking noises and bobbing of the baby blue pacifier just made it that much more obscene. She had never found this form of Koenma’s so sickening in all her immortal life.

The truth was that she had never honestly seen Koenma as an adult, or even an adolescent. Centuries old, yes, but somewhere in the recesses of her mind she had only ever viewed him as an eternal child ruler. Until the day that she had seen the man she had begun to consider her boyfriend on his knees before the overseer of Human World. No matter what shape Koenma assumed, he was no infant; he had performed, witnessed, and received things that no infant could. She knew that now, and no amount of effort could make her return to not knowing it.

And yet a child’s face gazed up at her, hardly visible over the desk, engulfed by the modest throne, large orb-like eyes blinking innocently, and suck, suck, sucking on that freaking pacifier. What had the enlarged version of that mouth done? Had it ever kissed full, moist lips? Had it laid trials of kisses down a slender but muscular chest, and lower still? Had that tongue provided suction for things other than the robber he was gnawing on?

Botan’s hands collided with the yellow top of the desk, smacking against the surface. “Will you take that fucking thing out of your mouth at least?” Her voice screeched before she could think about what she was saying. Her chest heaved within the confines of her pink kimono, and blood rushed behind her ears.

Silence fell.

Koenma sat very still, regarding the enraged woman before him. Finally, he reached up, slowly removing the offending pacifier. A string of saliva trialed between it and his tongue.

Nausea pushed back the fury hammering through Botan. He was doing this on purpose, and dammit, it was working.

She shut her eyes, turning her face away from the sight.

“Come now, Botan,” that squeaky little voice chided. “You’ve delivered reports to me hundreds—thousands—of times while I’m in this form, and I’ve always had my pacifier. Why the foul language, hmm?” It was there, hiding within the voice of a harmless baby; he was laughing at her.

Botan had known Koenma for longer than mortal memory served. She had seen his cruelty, his vindictiveness, but always it had been directed towards others. She hadn’t fully appreciated his sadism until that exact moment. There had always on occasion been a glint of steel in the eyes, a slight twist in the smile, but she hadn’t realized how far the river ran, or that it might lead to an ocean.

She opened her eyes and looked into the mockingly pleasant baby face. “You make me sick.”

“Careful, Botan,” there was nothing pleasant about the tiny ruler’s face now. “I have plenty more Agents of Death who would pounce on the chance to have your job.”

“Fine,” Botan pulled herself to her full height, crossing, as best she could, fabric-laden arms over her obi. “Fine,” she repeated. “Fire me. However, my lord, you and I both know that I get the nastier jobs—the paranormal slaughter houses, the worst of the murders and accidents—because I can handle them. Most of those girls would lose their heads if they had to face cities filled with demon insect possessed zombies, or had to escort the souls of young women who died because their half-breed babies ate through their wombs. So fire me, and good luck explaining to King Yama why half your Grim Reapers are twitching in therapy, while your best Reaper is having cocktails in Hawaii.”

She took a deep breath in through her nose. “I may be a few centuries younger than you, Lord Koenma, but I am no more a baby than you are, so don’t you dare try threatening me like one! Now, do you want my bloody report, or don’t you?”

Silence.

Koenma’s features bore an anger never seen on the faces of true infants. He replaced his pacifier, closing his eyes a moment. When he reopened them the anger had gone, a docile mask in its place. “Your report then, if you please, Botan.”

Botan ignored the stares from the multi-colored sea of ogre faces as she departed the office half an hour later. She walked stiffly to the waiting room nobody used anymore. She shut the door, and cried.

The next morning, she wasn’t at all surprised to find a vibrant blue post it stuck to her record folder, noting that she had been late handing in her report, and commenting that her “attitude needed an adjustment.”

Her official write up would appear on King Yama’s desk within the hour, and would be added to her folder soon after. “Disciplinary action” would be taken within the week.

She should have been filled with dread, but her eyes were still red and puffy, so she just wasn’t.

Hearts of Ice - 5/8 - Hiei x Yukina / Kurama x Botan

2009-12-14T16:01:17Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own YuYu Hakusho, or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Hearts of Ice

FANDOM: YuYu Hakusho anime-verse.

RATED: R

WARNING: Strong adult content, sexual situations, and language.

PAIRINGS: Hiei x Yukina, Kurama x Botan, Koenma x Kurama, (one-sided) Kuwabara x Yukina.

SUMMARY: Two very different women must face the cold truth, and confront the fact that their realities are not at all what they seem to be.

Chapter Three: The Heart’s Battlefield

The air was crisp, and devoid of snowflakes. The sun had begun its descent, preparing to rise on the other side of the earth.

Yukina stood in pleasant silence with the Fire Demon. There were no longer any crashing noises or shouts issuing from the temple, presumably Master Genkai had successfully placated Kuwabara.

“How long has it been, Hiei?” Yukina dropped the honorific at the end of his name. They were alone, and she liked the way his name sounded without it. And somehow she knew he wouldn’t mind. She watched the snow on the trees weigh down the branches, until bundles of it fell upon the white ground.

The last time she had laid eyes upon Hiei had been as he prepared to disappear into the Demon Plane, his eyes dancing with the glow of the portal behind them, that iridescent blue making his skin look like something carved of ice.

There had been a time when she had firmly believed that the man beside her was indeed her brother. If that were true, however, why hadn’t he told her? Why would he remain quiet, lying through his silence, when he knew how desperately she wished to know and be with her lost sibling? In the end, she had to concede that she had simply wanted it to be Hiei; she had wanted him to be the missing half of her heart.

“Yukina…I…”

She turned to that oddly vulnerable-sounding voice. Hiei’s ruby-red eyes, so uncannily like her own, were downcast, and his fist was held to his chest, clutching something tightly.

Everything was suddenly sluggish, like film in slow motion, chopped up with flash backs pasted into the margins. Hiei extended his arm toward her—she held out the Tear Gem to him, beseeching him to deliver it to her brother, hoping against hope that its match was already before her—his fingers unfurled, just like a flower blooming—she stood in the courtyard, her face turned up to the sky; awaiting his return; her hopes breaking with each passing second. It wasn’t him—and lying there on his palm were two pure, glittering, identical blue jewels.

“You jerk!”

Smack!

Yukina’s hand stung furiously, there was a coinciding red mark on Hiei’s cheek, and her own Tear Gems were pelting the snowy ground.

“I was just thinking that it couldn’t possibly be you!” She covered her face and cried into her hands, more gems falling through her fingers. “All this time…all this time I wanted it to be you so badly! Why?” She lowered her hands, blinking through the thickly pouring tears to look into the guilty face of her brother. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Before she knew it, she was sobbing against his so warm shoulder, wrapped in the radiant heat of his aura.

Standing there, clinging to Hiei’s familiar warmth, through the tears, realization turned a light on in her mind. Some final piece of the puzzle snapped sharply into place. “You…” She pulled away from him enough to focus on the face reflecting all the pain that had built within them over the cold and lonely years. “It’s always been you,” She gently traced fingers across a forehead covered in cloth. She could feel the pulsing of the Jagan’s power, as if it had its own heartbeat, pushing slightly against her fingers; the eye that had followed her all these years.

Yukina felt the flow of tears slow, the last of the gems falling from her chin. The fortunes that her tears could earn someone could not buy the joy that was creeping into her being. Her fingers travelled over Hiei’s face, memorizing every last detail, as if she could etch them onto her soul.

“I’m sorry,” Hiei confessed, attempting to break away from her.

Yukina stayed with him, taking the necessary steps forward. “I accept your apology,” she could still vaguely feel the betrayal of having been lied to, but it seemed exceptionally unimportant now. What was important was the fact that at long last she was with her family. She could reach out and touch her only real kin, and that was far more precious than any worldly treasure. She could have been offered the moon on a pretty silver chain just then, but if the price was this sweet knowledge of the identity of the man with her, she would have turned it down without so much as blinking.

But Hiei was still pulling away. “You deserve…more than I…”

Yukina resolutely closed the distance between them, wrapping her arms around her twin’s neck.

Hiei was so startled he over-corrected his balance, and the snow crunched as they fell upon it in a tangled heap.

The sister lost no time in planting light, rapid kisses on every bit of her brother’s face that she could reach. She stared down into his stunned eyes once she had finished. “Are you deaf?” She asked, feeling strangely bold. “I wanted it to be you. I’ve never wanted something so much in all my life. You’re the most wonderful person a girl could ever have as a brother. Just promise,” She continued, laying another kiss on his cheek. “Promise that you’ll never keep secrets from me again.”

Hiei blinked up at her in awe for a moment, and then nodded silently.

The joy of before welled in Yukina’s chest once more. She didn’t think about it, she just acted on the impulse sealing their lips together in a gentle kiss.

“GET YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF MY GIRLFRIEND!”

Yukina looked up just in time to see Kuwabara barrelling towards them, then she was lying on her back in the snow. What felt like tiny round pebbles were digging into her shoulders; her Tear Gems. The back of her head was throbbing; she must have been thrown.

She blinked up at the quickly darkening sky, then she was sitting up, spots exploding before her eyes, her sore head protesting the sudden movement. It took another moment for her vision to clear. Once it did, the sight it presented was like something directly lifted from her own nightmares.

“No, stop!”

Kuwabara had been driven to his knees. Hiei was behind him, one boot pushing on the other’s back, both of Kuwabara’s arms held at a sharp, cruel angle, poising to break the bones.

“Please, stop!”

Hiei looked at her, the fury draining from his face. He immediately released Kuwabara, and backed away several paces.

Silence fell thickly upon the scene, as the temperature dropped with the sun.

Yukina tried to pull the cold inside her, but her panicked heart hammering scolding blood through her veins made it impossible to achieve blissful, icy numbness. Her breath rose in a frosty mist just like the others’, and inside her head it was chaos.

Something was breaking. She could sense it. Right that very instant, something between the three of them was shattering.

“How could you…?” Kuwabara turned horrible, hurt eyes to Yukina as they both remained kneeling in the snow, an endless battlefield stretching out between them, where the coming war would be waged. “How could you?” He rounded on Hiei, pulling himself up to his full, impressive height. “You know she’s my girlfriend—”

“I know no such thing,” Hiei snarled into his former teammate’s face.

“Hiei didn’t do anything wrong, Kazuma,” except for lying to me for years, but Yukina kept that last to herself as she stood, carefully feeling out the muscles that still resisted the motion.

She wished her eyes hadn’t adjusted so well to the dimming light; she didn’t think she could ever erase the look of utter heartbreak on Kuwabara’s face from her memory.

“Now, children, that’s enough.” The scent of nicotine mixed with the biting air heralded Master Genkai’s approach. All eyes turned to the tiny woman, and the glowing orange end of her cigarette.

“Go home, Kuwabara.”

“But—”

“Get lost!” All would be tenderness evanesced from Genkai’s voice as she barked the command. “You have desecrated this sacred place enough for one day!”

Yukina’s eyes seemed inevitably drawn to the temple wall behind Genkai where it appeared that Kuwabara had created an impromtu exit.

“As for you two,” the master rounded on the twins. “Get your asses inside.” The finality in her voice was of the kind that only the very old could muster, and was not to be argued with.

~*~*~

Kurama had lost count of how many steps he had climbed. The air was bitter and cold, nipping at any part of him it could reach through his layers of clothes. His cheeks, nose, and ears were tingling with numbness.

The sun had set, the darkness retaining only the faintest shimmer of moonlight, occasionally broken by the thickly gathering clouds. There would be more snow later in the night.

Kurama’s head jerked up. A turmoil of Spirit Energy was heading his way, and he knew its owner all too well. It made sense, he supposed; Kuwabara had recently divulged his intentions of proposing marriage to Yukina. Although, from the feel of his Spirit Energy, everything had not gone according to plan.

Kurama attempted to summon up the appropriate level of sympathy for his friend, but found the reserve of his emotions dry. He just didn’t have the wherewithal to care properly. There was still enough of him left to feel mildly horrified by the revelation, but that reaction as well required far too much effort to maintain for more than a moment.

“’Sat you, Kurama?” Kuwabara’s voice sounded as miserable, hurt, and angry as Kurama ought to have felt.

The former King of Thieves paused upon his stair, and blinked slowly at his once teammate’s moonlit face a few stairs up from him. The thought of speech was daunting. Kurama took a breath and forced his mouth to work. “Obviously.”

Kuwabara didn’t ask what was wrong, and neither did Kurama. They stood there in the frigid night in silent understanding. Then the moment ended, and they passed each other on the stairs.

The trees became thicker and thicker as Kurama continued to climb higher and higher.

Finally, as the familiar archway came into view, he sensed what he had come here, up an obscenely tall mountain, for. That wash of warmth that had long ago become synonymous with “home.” He felt its owner likewise recognize his presence, could almost see those red, red eyes turn abruptly in his direction, lips forming the word, “Kurama.”

“Hiei.”

As Kurama entered the courtyard, he heard one of the screens of the temple slide back with a snap, a blade of yellow light seeming to split the snow blanketed ground in half. He squinted at the black, spikey-haired silhouette. It had been too long since they had shared the same physical space.

“Hn, you look like shit.”

Just hearing that voice, the snide remark, conjured something in Kurama’s gut that might have been relief. Suddenly everything seemed just a little bit easier, because Hiei was there.

“Spirit World intelligence was correct, I see,” even Kurama’s voice sounded more like his own, as he approached one of his only living comrades, and the light of the temple. “Mukuro truly has allowed you to return to the Human World.”

“‘Allowed’ is not the right word,” Hiei’s features, as they came into view, were pinched tight almost as if in pain.

Kurama pushed aside his own woes, coming to stand a mere foot from his dearest friend. He laid a hand on the tiny shoulder, warmth immediately bleeding over his fingers and hand. “I’m sorry.” This had been one part of Spirit World intelligence that he had hoped was misinformed. It’s a sad day when soulmates tear themselves asunder.

Hiei said nothing, but he didn’t brush Kurama’s hand away either.

“Hello, Kurama,” a soft voice sounded from deeper within the temple. “It’s been far too long.”

POEM - Cyber Groupie

2009-12-09T18:49:17Z

CLAIMER: This is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is my third poem in under 24 hours. Clearly, I've got issues.

Cyber Groupie
By Ikuni Kea Ko

Oh, no,
Baby, you're beautiful.
My heart skipped,
the second I remembered her face.
Now you're standing in her place.

Oh, no,
Baby, you'll make a fool of me.
Reach out to touch what I can't see,
but it's not you,
it's me.
Oh, no, baby.

Oh, no,
Baby, stay away,
'cause I'll want you to break me,
so keep back,
and we'll stay on track.

Oh, Lord,
Baby, heed this warning:
She didn't remember in the morning,
but my blood is still grieving;
don't let me near you,
or it'll be yours, too.

POEM - Promises

2009-12-09T13:44:36Z

CLAIMER: Original work, mine, no stealing.

Promises
By Ikuni Kea Ko

Something important is dying,
And if I don't revive it soon,
I'm going to lose you.

Hello, Depression.
Hello, Rejection.
Hello, Razorblade.
Where are my band-aids?

Something vital is fading,
Some cord is breaking.
Super Woman is tired,
Without the strength to call out, "Liar!"

Hello, Starbucks.
Goodbye, Sex.
Hello, Complex.
Just have to sign by the ex.

Something has broken,
Between now and when,
And I can't keep playing,
Pick up your heart,
'Cause I was lying,
When you promised to stop.

POEM - Goodbye, Pretty

2009-12-09T13:35:41Z

CLAIMER: This poem is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.

Goodbye, Pretty
By Ikuni Kea Ko

Your ugly,
Can't match my scary.
Your freaky,
Ain't got shit on my nasty.
And your divinity,
Can't purify my depravity.

Don't try to hold me,
'Cause I know how to bleed.
Stop trying to fix me,
My puzzle's got pieces missing,
You see.
Don't attempt to change me,
'Cause I'm fine this way.

My vulgarity,
Will eat your mercy,
Anyway.

Monsters - 3/3 - Vegeta/Future Trunks

2009-12-07T16:30:22Z

Part Three: Romance

Bulma didn’t know what to do. Her son, Trunks, had just suddenly dissolved in front of her, and she was left on the floor, holding him in her arms as violent sobs shook him to the core. She held the man she had given birth to, the hero who had saved their seemingly apocalyptic world from the Androids, the man who had travelled through time to aid in the same aim, she held him and didn’t know what else to do.

She knew that he had been different upon returning to their time. Some light had gone out off his eyes, some innocence lost. She could remember one day looking into her bathroom mirror and seeing a similar effect in her own eyes so many years ago. At that time, she had looked down at the streamline, white pregnancy test, and its sneering positive mark. She had thrown it at the mirror, and collapsed in her own heap of tears on the floor. Shortly after, she had marched out into the yard, where Vegeta was preparing to take one of CapsuleCorps. space-worthy ships to some godforsaken planet somewhere to continue his training away from “distractions.”

“Vegeta!” Her voice had trembled with tears and rage.

He didn’t even turn to her, just continued to fiddle with something on the ship’s outer hull.

“I just wanted you to know that this “annoying distracting” is pregnant. And it so happens that this “annoying distraction” hasn’t fucked anyone lately except you!” Pretty red painted fingernails bit into her palms, as hot liquid continued to roll down her cheeks.

Vegeta turned then, just enough to give her one contemptuous glaring eye. “And what do you want me to do about it, woman? It’s your problem.”

Some thread in her mind snapped then. “My problem? It’s my fucking problem, is it? So, if I just flushed it down the toilet, that would, what, just be me solving my FUCKING PROBLEM?” She advanced on him, and he had the decency to turn to her, but his eyes remained cold and dead. “Go! Go train away from distractions, and feelings, and your fucking conscience! Go become a Super Saiyan, or whatever. I hope you blow yourself up in the process, because I don’t ever want to see you again! I don’t want to be reminded of how stupid I was to think that you had a soul!” And then she had run crying back into her parents’ home, and just minutes later the ship taking off shook the floor.

Bulma seriously doubted that her son had just discovered an unexpected pregnancy, unless Saiyan males were hiding female reproductive organs somewhere beneath all that muscle. No, it wasn’t the same exactly, but she knew the basic cause. Somehow, she knew.

She laid a gentle kiss on the top of her son’s head, and thought—she thought as hard and as loud as she could, hoping that in some way the words would make it to her son, because she couldn’t say it out loud. For his sake, she couldn’t say it—I know you feel like you’re dying right now. I can’t begin to imagine all you’ve been through, and I don’t know exactly what he did to you…but you’re going to be okay, Trunks, because from now on I am going to protect you from all the monsters.

She could vividly remember the first time she saw the man clinging to her. He had been crying then, too.

The doctor had held up the pink, wriggling, screaming bundle of flesh, still slick with the juices of her womb, fresh and new to the world. She couldn’t make up her mind if she wanted to cry or laugh so she just settled for choking and sobbing, as she felt the holes in her heart stitching themselves back together in the shape of that wailing face. He was perfect.

Hours later, as she held the sleeping baby in her arms, she had asked her father to fetch her camera.

“Look, Vegeta…It’s your son. Say hello to your daddy, Trunks.”

End

POEM - Void

2009-12-06T16:23:25Z

CLAIMER: This poem is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.
WARNING: Contains explicit content.

Void
By Ikuni Kea Ko

Don't wanna penetrate,
and at this rate,
just wanna make you scream,
until you bleed.
Baby, just wanna dominate you.

Don't wanna fuck,
just wanna pluck,
out your heart.
Precision darts,
hit that spot.

Don't want your love,
just to play in the dark.
Mark you up with my nails,
to your cross.
Lost my heart,
so, I'll take yours.
Fill the hole in me,
Baby, please,
Just leave.

Monsters - 2/3 - Vegeta/Future Trunks

2009-12-04T18:26:24Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Dragon Ball/Z or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit off of this work of fanfiction.
TITLE: Monsters
AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)
FANDOM: Dragon Ball Z
RATED: R
WARNING: Adult themes, sexual content, language
PAIRING: Vegeta/Future Trunks, Vegeta/Bulma
A/N: Ugh, this series is proving extremely difficult to write due to the incredibly high level of emotional density. This section was a little easier, because Trunks is a more obedient subject than Vegeta, but it still required a certain amount of headdesking.

My ultimate goal with this series of three (extremely) short stories, besides writing good Vegeta/Trunks, is to really flush out and explore the emotional and psychological impact that Future Trunks’ arrival and departure from the main timeline had on my favorite family of DBZ characters. This next segment is dedicated to “Present” Trunks, and is written in a completely different style than part one.

Also – new pairing to add to the list: Goten/Trunks. D’aaaww.

Part Two: Reflection

Ever since I can remember, everyone has told me how awesome my future self was. Ever since I could through a punch, my father told me that my future self was better at everything. My mother would tell me, “Eat your fruits and veggies, ‘cause you wanna grow up to be big and strong like your future self, right?”

I am five-tears-old, and I am throwing a bowl of carrots at my mother.

It didn’t matter that I could become a Super Saiyan, and work quadratic equations before most children could spell “quadratic,” because I wasn’t anything special. My future self had been a time traveller, he had saved Goku’s life, he had defeated Frieza, he had fought to save the world from Cell, and he did it all while I was either still pissing my diapers, or not even a conscious life form yet. I couldn’t do anything, no matter how hard I trained, how badly I wanted it, in the end the adults had to step in and save the world for me.

I am ten-years-old, and there is blood in my mouth. I’ve bitten down on my thumb to prevent myself from sobbing, because if I’m caught crying dad will yell at me.

Goten, my best friend, could tell me I was awesome a thousand times, and I could never really believe it. I could boast my throat raw, but in the end not even I bought a single word of it.

I am fifteen-years-old. My sister is pitching a fit in the other room. I am trying to figure out when I broke my bedroom mirror, and why there’s blood running down my arms.

Training. Endless hours of it, of sweat, muscles burning, pushed to the brink, of bones aching with every collision, of having my status as a failure, not good enough, not strong enough, pummelled into me, first by my father then by my best friend. But it isn’t them that I fight, I know this. I’m fighting my doppleganger, a facsimile of myself through a hazy reflection; I’m battling the me in the mirror.

So, I suppose that’s how I came to be here. Standing awkwardly in a doorway, listening to the creak of the weight lifting machines that my mom made for dad. I’m looking at my yellow boots, hands crammed in my pockets.

“Dad?”

“What?” The predictably irritable, clipped response.

I want to ask if it’s okay if I’m just a letdown from here on. I want to get his permission to just be me, and fail at everything, but I know he’ll never give it. He won’t understand; he can’t. His entire existence has hinged on being the best, the greatest, the Prince of all Saiyans once again, and no son of his is going to be anything less than perfect. You already had your perfect son! I want to scream. So, let me be defective, and love me anyway!

“I-it’s nothing,” I stammer, turning on my heel, and marching away before any snide comments can be issued.

I’m sitting alone in my room, counting seconds in the dark, searching the night for any telltale trace of energy. I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore; I can’t seem to connect with whatever it is within us that allows us to feel. My head is filled with nothing but static, and my heart is just a thing that beats and pumps blood into my veins.

Tapping on my window jerks my head up. The smiling face of my best friend is scrunched up against the glass.

I know how this is going to end; exactly the same way it has for the past two months. I’ll cry on his shoulder, and he’ll tell me that I’m perfect just the way I am. I won’t believe him, but I’ll let him kiss me anyway, because I need to feel something. I’m not even sure how we came to this. I suppose this kind of relationship just seemed to be the most logical conclusion for us. Goten is the only person who doesn’t compare me to a shadow, because he was just as unaware as I was when it all happened. He only sees me, and not the me I’m supposed to be.

I don’t want to think about what’ll happen when my dad finds out, as I open the window. I don’t want to imagine what he’ll say when he discovers that I’m engaging in acts that will do nothing to further our bloodline, as Goten hops into the room. And I certainly don’t want to think on how deeply insulted he will be to learn that isn’t just anyone, it’s “Kakarrot’s brat.” And as I look into that vividly happy face, I can almost manage not to.

Monsters - 1/3 - Vegeta/Future Trunks

2009-12-04T13:38:06Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Dragon Ball/Z or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit off of this work of fanfiction.
TITLE: Monsters
AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)
FANDOM: Dragon Ball Z
RATED: R
WARNING: Adult themes, sexual content, language
PAIRING: Vegeta/Future Trunks, Vegeta/Bulma
A/N: I've become quite fed up with the lack of good fanfiction featuring Vegeta/Trunks. I don't know if it's because none of the little kiddies have the balls to tackle father-son incest, or what, but the little fanfiction I can find seems to be mostly crap. So, I'm biting the bullet, since no one else seems to be willing to. I make no apologies for this fic, and if incest offends you/this pairing rapes your idea of DBZ/kills your childhood and yet you still read it, don't come crying to me, because I'm likely to just laugh at you.

Technically, this is a three part series, but I will be posting them all under the name "Monsters" to make it easier to access them properly.

P.S. GT does not exist in my world. So there. Also, it has been FOREVER since I saw certain portions of DBZ, so if I seriously fuck something up plot-wise... uh, sorry?

Monsters

Part One: Birth

Consequences; they weren't really something that the Prince of all Saiyans wasted too much consideration upon. That seemed a somewhat foolish blunder now. Vegeta hadn't ever really thought about what it might feel like to watch his son grow up, to watch childish features mature into a perfect mirror of the face that he had become so accustomed to seeing beneath him. He hadn't quite been able to comprehend what it would be like to be rendered incapable of looking at his own son without that awful ache tugging at his center.

It had been an easy mistake to make. The young half-Saiyan that had struggled through the tidal waves of time to save them all, the youth with the tumultuous blue eyes, and hands that knew hard work and pain that so reflected the ugly knot in Vegeta's chest that he had long since learned to transform into fuel for power. The warrior who had immediately become a shield for the unwilling Prince; the love-starved hero, willing to compromise himself for the affection of a stranger. It was so damn easy to get to thinking that the fully formed individual standing before Vegeta was not the same person that Bulma held in her arms, and crooned at. But the truth was they were comprised of exactly the same matter; physically identical. An irreversible truth thrown in Vegeta's face every single day.

It was quite convenient to blame the future incarnation of his son for this mess. It was satisfying somehow to think that the little shit had done it on purpose to screw with his head. But once again, the truth wasn't nearly so pretty. It was more likely that neither of them had been thinking of the consequences. Trunks didn't have it in him to intentionally harm the people he cared about, anyway, although he would have been well within his rights to do it.

No, that was the tragedy of it. That look in young vulnerable eyes that didn't know any better. Whispered words falling from trembling, bruised lips, "You monster." The incomprehensible innocence that he got to watch die suspended between space and time. Blue eyes turned to cold skies, once clear, now clogged by clouds and knowledge that ate away at the inside. By the time they looked up and realized what they had done, it was too late. There were battles to win, planets to save, and no time to mend what they had broken. And when it was all over, the blue eyes vanished back to their own time, leaving behind a quagmire of complexes, and mind fucks in their wake.

It didn't matter how hard Vegeta trained, it didn't matter if he pushed his body beyond the point of exhaustion, the record in his brain kept playing for him on endless repeat those helpless choked sounds that had begun to sound more and more like the voice of the child that had been born while he was away doing other things.

He could remember, while he was training on a different planet, manically seeking the level of Super Saiyan, the messages that Bulma insisted on sending him, to keep him "up-to-date." He never told her, but he watched every single one. Watched her belly grow and grow with the life forming inside it. He remembered the fist time he saw his son, just hours after delivery Bulma had turned on the camera. "Look, Vegeta! It's your son! Say hello to your daddy, Trunks!" Such a small, pink little face, enormous blue eyes blinking in wonder at the world. He never thought he'd see those eyes looking up at him, fogged over with a need that pulled at him, compelled him not to stop, to stay just a few seconds ahead of his mind's ability to reason. Never thought that the voice box issuing those infuriating wailing screams would also plead for things that no infant could even comprehend, because it was and it wasn't that same voice.

Now that he thought about it, that hadn't been the first time he saw Trunks. Technically, he had seen him years before, slicing Frieza into pieces. Trying to puzzle it all out in a way that made sense gave Vegeta headaches, most days he didn't even try. Most days, he concentrated on becoming stronger, on driving the memories out with physical pain and drills; most days, he tried to not to see the shadow of another in his son's smile, in his pretty little eyes.

"Daddy, come play with me!"

"Not today."

"Why not?"

"I don't have time for childish games."

"Dad, let's train together! If I promise to be good, and not bother you, will you train with me? Oh, please, please, please!"

In the end, the two sides of the coin called Trunks were exactly the same. Both clambering for love and approval, both needy and greedy. And Vegeta's worst fear, the thing that ate away at his mind every day was that their methods of seeking his attention would align someday. But the worst part was the hope that they would, the sick longing for a touch that he should not know.

"Monster." What an appropriate title.

POEM - Inches

2009-12-02T03:42:34Z

CLAIMER: This poem is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.
DEDICATION: To all the women reading this, especially to those who inspired it. You know who you are.

Inches
By Ikuni Kea Ko

She's dancing all alone,
Phoned in responses are gold.
She's playing with blades,
Laid away her shattered heart,
In the bottom drawer.

Punching holes in her soul,
Fills 'em in with metal,
And prescription mold.
Since six-years-old,
Been told she's worth what she weighs;
The less, the more we'll love her,
So we say.

Won't you save her?
She's your daughter,
Your lover,
Your mother,
Your Grade A canon fodder.

Killing herself by inches,
Drowning crimson lines.
Where's your conscience?
Six ways blind.
Her coffin's lined,
With your hopes,
Your dreams,
And your silver-laced lies.
Will putting her in it,
Wake you up?
Was it worth it?

POEM - Fiction Friction

2009-11-29T14:31:34Z

CLAIMER: This poem is my own original work. No stealing, please.

Fiction Friction

By Ikuni Kea Ko

May I touch you?
Can I just pretend to?
I know I promised not to,
Use you,
But, darling, you're so sweet.
Can't resist your treats.

May I abuse you a little?
Just one bruise or two.
I won't bleed you,
I just want it, baby,
Let me take your honey.

May I poison you?
Three drops and that's it.
Can't I caress you?
One stroke across the slit.

It's not real,
Just illusions we can feel,
So don't look at me like that,
I didn't do anything,
That won't heal.

Games - 5/5 - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-25T14:03:45Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, or any of the characters or content therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.
AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)
TITLE: Games
FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh
RATED: Hard R
WARNING: Sexual content (including graphic sexual dialogue), language, mind games, possible non-con
PAIRING: Seto x Jonouchi
DEDICATION: To my aibou, atomic_oblaat.
A/N: You really don't want to know how many drafts, headaches, and cups of coffee this chapter took to complete. I'm still not happy with it, but I'm sick of tweaking it.

Chapter Five: End Game

I’m not really sure what happened in-between your study and my bedroom halfway across town. It was like I blinked, and I was sitting in the corner of my room; vision blurry, head echoing with the intoxicating sound of us calling for the other, body aching with what we’d done. Your scent clung to my skin, saturated my clothes, filled my nostrils, but I couldn’t get up to take a shower. Cleaning up would be admission of what I’d let you do to me; washing away the evidence would be acknowledging that it was real. I didn’t want it to be real. I didn’t want to deal with it. I wanted to crawl back into my nice, safe, easily defined bubble, but it had popped, and I was left in a frightening, complicated world that I didn’t understand.

This wasn’t like me. I wasn’t one to sit and cower. I was supposed to be the incorrigable idiot, the bull-headed numbskull, who charged in without looking, or so I thought. You’d turned a light on in my head, and made me realize how ugly it is in here. You’d taken everything I thought I was, thought I knew, and turned it inside out showing me that none of it was what I’d taken it for. And all this devastation because I hadn’t been able to just let one little thing go.

The phone rang.

I heard my father bellow from the living room for me to get it, with a few colorful additions for good measure.

I could almost see myself standing up, crossing the room, opening the door. It was as if I was only just barely still inside my own skull.

The stench of alcohol hit me hard in the face, like walking straight into a wall, reminding me that I was my body; things like smell could reach. I wasn’t disembodied yet.

My father lay sprawled on the couch, surrounded by liquor bottles. I didn’t want to know how many of them were empty. There are some realities of my life that will never change.

I made it to the phone without stepping on any of the half-eaten pizza strewn across the floor. “Hello?”

“Jonouchi-kun?”

“Yuugi,” my stomach did a weird sort of backflip.

“Are you okay?” There was real concern in his voice, concern that made me want to confess everything.

“S’that that faggot little friend of yours?” A voice slurred from behind me.

“Shut up, dad,” I turned enough to glare at the man hiccuping down another drink.

“Don’t fucking speak to me like that!” He roared suddenly, brandishing a bottle at me.

“You’re drunk. I’ll speak to you however I fucking please!” My whole body trembled, the phone shaking in my hand, under the strain of it all. “Yuugi, I’ll see you at school.” I hung up.

I didn’t see Yuugi at school the next day. I went to KaibaCorp instead, because that night, as my father’s fists tried to beat my simple world back into me, I realized that I’d rather tumble down the rabbit hole. I’d rather have your marks on my skin. I’d rather get lost in your strange, scary Wonder Land than live in my old world, where I’d only fooled myself into thinking it was safe.

You didn’t ask me where the bruises came from, because I think you already knew. You didn’t even issue a single verbal barb as you complied with my plea to make me feel something else.

What am I doing? I have no idea.

End

POEM - Shame

2009-11-23T22:26:30Z

CLAIMER: This poem is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.

Shame
By Ikuni Kea Ko

There you are,
Still breathing;
Here I am,
Still breathing, too.
What a miracle to lose,
That straining link,
Between us two.

I've a few more scars,
Than you remember;
You've a few more flaws,
Than last I saw you.
Yet the structure remains,
Stains upon the frame,
Blueprints incompatible,
Still such a shame.

Games - 4/5 - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-23T14:43:04Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, or any of the characters or content therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.
AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)
TITLE: Games
FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh
RATED: Hard R
WARNING: Sexual content (including graphic sexual dialogue), language, mind games, possible non-con
PAIRING: Seto x Jonouchi
DEDICATION: To my aibou, atomic_oblaat.

Chapter Four: Aces and Spades

To this day, I can’t understand how you seem to know exactly how to manipulate me, whether it’s emotionally, mentally, or physically. Perhaps it has nothing to do with you; maybe it’s just that I needed someone to break me open and spill the contents of my soul over a smoothly polished surface. Maybe I fell so fast and hard, because for the longest time I had stood with my toes on the edge. Maybe I wanted someone to push me over. The truth is, no matter how much I cry about it, no matter how much I hate us both, losing everything to you gets me off.

Your touch has ruined me, your words have poisoned me, and I can’t imagine being with someone for whom I would buy gifts, someone who would hold my hand, and enjoy romantic movies and candlelit dinners. I don’t want Valentine’s Day cards, I just want to be thrown down and used until I can’t see straight.

I lost my normalcy to you as crooning Christmas tunes drifted from the other room. I lost the ability to be satisfied with anything less than jagged edges and frozen blue eyes.

The last part of me that had hoped someday for a wife and kids died as my knees trembled, and you dragged nails across me, spiking the pleasure with pain, making me whimper and writhe.

You pressed our bodies together, trapping me between you and the unflinching wood of the desk. I could feel you, so hard it caught my breath in a gasp, against the back of my jeans.

Your voice breathed into my ear, sending a shower of shivers down my spine, “I won’t let you cum unless you tell me that you want me to fuck you.”

Another pathetic noise left my mouth.

“I have to hear you say it.”

This was it. The cards had been dealt; your hand held all the aces, and mine nothing but a pair of deuces. It was time to lay our hands on the table, and declare a winner. Of course, we knew all along what the outcome would be; you were counting cards before I even realized we were playing.

Shame, such as I had never felt, boiled in my gut, eating at the inside of me. “I want you to fuck me.”

In an instant your hands were gone from me. I only just had time to register this before my cheek collided with the cool wood. Your hand between my shoulder blades held me down as my head ached, and you kicked my legs farther apart.

What am I doing?

The jingle of a belt unbuckling, the rush of cold air as my pants were pulled to my knees, memorizing the surface against my fingertips and cheek, shutting my eyes as two slick digits pushed inside me. The uncomfortable sensation of stretching and sparks of pain that didn’t at all hurt in the way they should have.

You leaned over me, whispering into my hair, “You’re a virgin, I can feel it.” I could hear the smile tearing at your lips, your fingers working in and out of me, laughing at me silently.

You laid your chest flat against my back, your fingers suddenly absent. Your lips brushed my ear with each syllable, “Remember me. Every time someone else takes you, remember that I had you first.”

I knew, with my pants straining around my knees, bent over the desk, I knew that I’d never be able to erase those words from my memory. They would remain; charred scars on my heart.

There are times when I want to ask you if you’re happy now that I’m a mess. Are you satisfied? Does watching me bleed heal your own scars? It doesn’t matter how many times you knock my intelligence, I know that you weren’t born this way. I know that in your past, there is a stepfather and abuse that broke you into pieces equal to the number of thorns you now bear, thorns that tear apart everything around you. You’ve been rendered incapable of giving the love that people like us are too far gone to even want anymore. I can loathe you all I want, but these facts I can’t escape.

I blinked at the outline of a bookshelf in the gloom, and then it was like every other thing ceased to exist, and there was only you filling me.

Everyone wonders what sex, the act itself, pure and simple, will be like, but nothing a clean mind can conjure can match it. There are no violins; it’s not graceful or tidy. It’s messy, dirty, and doesn’t finish neatly at the end of a three minute pop song. It’s scary. It’s painfully personal. And it’s not something one can fool themselves into thinking they’ll only do once.

However, anything I’ve ever experienced under your body seems absolutely worthless compared to hearing your panting breath and the small noises choked in your throat. Bearing witness to the tiniest breaches in that legendary iron wall of control brings me more pleasure than anything else could possibly hope to.

I realize that this could just be a part of your elaborate game. You’re more than capable of playing me with something as seemingly uncontrollable as your body. But I doubt it. Hidden in each labored breath is the possibility that you might need me in a way not dissimilar to my need for you; within every little sound is the potential evidence that perhaps you haven’t been holding as many aces as your smirking face wishes the world to believe. Or this could all be another outcropping of the mess you’ve made in my head. It’s possible that I really am still a lovesick puppy, clouded by delusions of wishful thinking. You tell me.

All RPS now under an F-Lock

2009-11-22T13:44:09Z

Last night, I put all my J-Rock fanfiction under an F-Lock (and yes, it did take forever) for various reasons, the main ones being:

1. I'm just not comfortable having RPS visible to the general public.

2. I felt this was a good alternative to deleting it all. I had decided some months ago that taking down my J-Rock fanfiction would be distinctly shitty, but on the other hand, I don't really like the idea of it just floating around the internet. This is a way in which I can appeal to my sense of decency, while hopefully preventing fans of my RPS wanting to cyber mutilate me for it. So, put away those scimitars, please. XD

Obviously, this means that if you wish to read my J-Rock fanfiction you will need to add me. I'm not overly stingy about who I add on this journal, so don't feel awkward, just go ahead and add me if you want. I won't bite...much. XD

And to all my little anime fans out there, yes, the next chapter of Games is coming, I promise. Work decided to rape me up the ass without lube (yeay, holidays D:), but I have a little bit of off time now, so hopefully I will be able to get that posted before Thanks Giving hits and the general populace goes batshit.

Games - 3/5 - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-15T13:10:00Z

Chapter Three: Restart or Continue?

Panic spiked through me. We were out in the open, anyone could have walked in. I suppose that somebody could have just followed us into that hallway too, but something about the open space and the lights made me feel distinctly exposed and vulnerable. And like any cornered animal, I lashed out.

"Get off me!" The jacket fell to the floor between us as if in slow motion. I had somehow summoned the strength to push you away.

You gave me an appraising look, as if I had finally done something unexpected, and you were recalculating me in your head, assimilating the new information and re-balancing the values. That was when I truly realized that this was nothing but a game to you, just another way for you to prove yourself superior to me, another way to beat me into submission. Right then, I knew that I hated you, purely and deeply hated you. Your ability to warp everything that should be beautiful into something obscene and cold, those eyes that should have been a peephole into your soul where just pools of dry ice leading nowhere, the only warmth to be gleaned from them would still leave one's fingers frostbitten and numb; everything about you, I despised.

A fragment of clarity flashed across my consciousness. In some morbid parody of destiny, we suited each other, we still do. I, all emotion and not much thought, and you, all equations and frost. I didn't stand a chance in hell of winning this game, but I couldn't back out. I couldn't admit defeat, so I would keep playing until my heart finally bled out, and bleed out it would. And you knew this, you knew it all along. You had probably sat and waited for a long time, collecting data and compiling the perfect method with which to capture me. I was prey from the very beginning.

You bent down, picking up my jacket from the floor, running the denim through your fingers. You smiled, a smile that said you knew everything that I had just thought, a smile of a cat purring over cream, and threw the clothing back at me.

Startled, I fumbled and dropped it again. By the time I had retrieved it from the floor, you had disappeared. However, there was an open door, that I could have sworn had been closed before. Honestly, counting all the times I could have backed out of this has become pointless. The point is that I was on the other side of the looking glass now, and I couldn't get back, because I hadn't quite realized that I'd fallen through it yet.
I knew that I should leave. I knew that going through that door would lead to nothing good, but the dark gape between frame and door was also a challenge: Follow if you dare. I was always the kid who ended up out on the porch, naked, in the freezing winter on a dare as his friends laughed from the warm side of the window.

I was in some sort of study. The light from the entry revealed bookshelves, and a desk, before the door closed behind me, and all was dark.

Your arm snaked around my stomach, and the front of you was pressed against my back, every inch, not a single bit of us wasted. I should have fought you off, but instead all I could think was that our bodies seemed to fit together like pieces of a--ha!--puzzle. That same cord seemed to snap inside my head; I couldn't think, I couldn't struggle as your free hand trailed up the side of my leg, a finger hooking in my belt loop.

"You need to make up your mind," your voice vibrated against my neck. "Do you want me...to touch you, or don't you?" The pause in your speech had been as deliberate as anything else you had done that night, and the most horrible part was that it made my skin tingle, my stomach do a backflip.

My brain feebly tried to reboot itself. I wanted to run away and never, ever look back. But the heat of a body pressed to mine called to something deep, deep within me, something that transcends thought, that overrides logic: the need for skin, and sweat, for the taste of sin, for moans and panting breath.
I shook my head, attempted to swallow back the images flooding my mind.

Your hand crept beneath my shirt, fingers playing over my skin, and I nearly jumped out of that skin. "Answer me," There wasn't any room in your voice for argument, only compliance.

Someone answered, "Touch me," and the voice sounded an awful lot like mine, except that my voice never sounded that pathetic, that needy, that sad.

"Heh," one small sound of triumph by my ear was the last thing I heard before my world cracked completely, the looking glass shattering, my only way out falling at your feet in shards.

My mind screamed, suddenly functional again, but it was too late. I was pushed further into the room. I stumbled, suddenly cold and alone. Not for long. You were at my back again, and my fingers found the wood of the desk; it became my anchor in this dark new world. Something was knocked to the ground by my blind fingers, but your mouth at my neck made all else seem unimportant.

'No, no, stop!' My mind protested, but all that left my throat was a gasp as your hands lost no time in undoing the button and zipper on my jeans.

'This can't be happening,' my mind supplied frantically. 'I hate Kaiba. He hates me. Rivals don't do this.' The voice in my head kept insisting that this wasn't real, while the voice that emanated from my body made a noise that I hadn't realized I could produce.

Those treacherous hands of yours were no longer remaining on the outside of my jeans, and silence abruptly fell within my head; there was only you, me, and the darkness.

Games - 2/5 - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-14T02:51:39Z

Chapter Two: Reshuffle

“Jonouchi-kun, are you okay?” The inquiries of my concerned friends followed me out the door. I didn’t look back; I didn’t answer any of them.

The cold air slapped my face the second I made it out the front door. I paused for a moment in the December chill, registering that I hadn’t retrieved my jacket, and deciding that I didn’t care. I was just about to step off the obscenely large front porch when…

“Jonouchi-kun!” Yuugi stood panting in the doorway, my jacket clutched in his hands. “You forgot this,” he held it out to me tentatively, as though afraid that any sudden movement would frighten me off. And perhaps he was right to do so.

My head was filled with thoughts chasing each other so swiftly round in circles that I couldn’t get a good look at any of them. I had just kissed a guy for the first time in my life. Paint me a square, but I had never even so much as contemplated doing such a thing. It had never crossed my mind that I might need to contemplate it. And to make matters worse, it hadn’t been just any guy; it had been you, the arrogant, obnoxious prick who I thought I couldn’t tolerate the presence of.

I took the jacket. “Thanks,” I muttered. I stood there, awkwardly holding the article of clothing. I could have put it on, but the mental commands for an action as mundane as that couldn’t possibly make it through the quagmire of near hysteria inside my head.

Yuugi shut the door, and stood out in the cold with me, hugging his own body heat to him. “You don’t have to talk to me about it, but…is everything alright? Did Kaiba-kun say something to you?”

I flinched. I fucking flinched at the mere mention of your name. “What makes you say that?” My voice didn’t sound good. It sounded panicked, like something frantic and caged.

Yuugi blinked those big violet eyes at me, and the look in their depths gave me the uncomfortable notion that he had at least a vague inkling of what was really wrong. That, more than anything, made me want to run away.

The thought of anyone knowing what had happened between us made acid burn and twist in my gut. Of course, in retrospect that seems absolutely ridiculous. A kiss in a dark hallway is nothing to be ashamed of, comparatively. Since then, you’ve stretched my boundaries to the point that I no longer recognize the shape of myself. The soul isn’t like a rubber band; it doesn’t just snap back. You’ve stained me the colors of disgrace, torn apart my integrity, desecrated my body, and fulfilled me in ways that I’d never imagined existed. But at the time, a little kiss seemed a perfectly reasonable thing to have a meltdown over.

Yuugi had opened his mouth to say something, but what that something might have been I never found out. The door opened again, and there you stood, glaring ice at us.

“Surely, I must be mistaken to think that the two of you would depart the Christmas party that my baby brother has spent two weeks preparing without even saying goodbye to him. Why, if that were the case, I might have to ask whether or not the two of you were raised in barns. Of course, you have better manners than that, don’t you?” Your lips twitched, as though you were working hard not to smirk. “Well, Yuugi anyway. You, Jonouchi, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that you’d been raised in a toilet.”

“Kaiba-kun!” Yuugi exclaimed, spinning around. “That’s not very nice!” It’s sometimes easy to forget that deep down Yuugi is a sweet little kid, who still believes in fairness. And it was clear from the look on your face that for once we were thinking the exact same thing.

“It may have escaped your noticed, but I’m not a very nice person, Yuugi,” with that you turned to leave.

“Truer words hath never been spoken,” I was shocked to hear my own voice, firm and even again.

I heard you make a disparaging noise. “If you two freeze to death on my doorstep, I’ll be charged with man slaughter, so either get lost, or come back inside.”

Yuugi stepped back over the threshold. He gave me one last worried look, and disappeared into the house/mansion, leaving me standing out in the cold, and you standing in the entry way with your back still turned to me.

“So that’s your move?” I could hear you smirking very clearly in the traces of sadistic joy in every syllable.

“Fuck you.” My fists trembled at my side, the kind of rage building in me that can only be brought forth by you.

You turned then, and sure enough the smirk was there.

I instantly regretted my choice of words even before you crossed the distance between us in just a few strides. I was yanked forward by my shirt, the door slammed, and suddenly I could feel its fancy ridges pressing into my back.

“Stop. It.” Each word squeezed through my gritted teeth. I could feel your breath, so warm, on my neck, your hands to either side of my shoulders, trapping me. My knees felt weak, and it took everything I had to keep myself contained and immobile. Now that my body knew what just a little of yours felt like, tasted like, it wanted it back. There was me, wanting nothing better than to never see you again and there was my body, wanting you to kiss me again.

“I’m not doing anything,” you whispered against my neck, and shivers ran down my spine. “Not yet.”

Games - 1/5 - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-13T21:45:35Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, or any of the characters or content therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.
AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)
TITLE: Games
FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh
RATED: R (thus far…)
WARNING: Sexual content, language, mind games, possible non-con
PAIRING: Seto x Jonouchi
DEDICATION: To my aibou, atomic_oblaat.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Well, it’s about time somebody wrote this pairing in a manner not all involving sunshine and tulips.

Games

Chapter One: Game Start

POV: Jonouchi

What am I doing? I always think that at some point between entering your office and getting pushed up against the desk. But I can’t ever come up with an answer, because all I can feel is you, and my nails scraping wood.

If one of my friends asked me how we came to this, I would have nothing to say. I guess if I think about it, it started last Christmas; amongst twinkling lights, mistletoe, and laughing friends. I hadn’t been able to fully comprehend the consequences of accepting Mokuba’s invitation to a Christmas party. Sure, I had been the one to complain that you would be there as well; something about Death-T all over again, but I didn’t seriously think there was any danger. Not really.

You hung back in the corners of the room. I could have bet that you were only there because your little brother had insisted, but by the end of the night I suspected a different motive.

I could feel your eyes chiseling at the back of my skull the entire night. As presents and alcohol were exchanged, the sensation of tiny blue drills boring into my head never wavered.

“What the hell are you staring at, Kaiba?” My words came out satisfactorily menacing.

Anzu’s laugh sounded somewhere from behind me, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to punch that serenely blank face. You didn’t even look real that night. Your eyes were like sparkling cerulean jewels, glistening in a porcelain and frozen doll’s face. The trademark sneer was absent. Your hair looked like perfectly melted milk chocolate. It was like someone had painted a portrait of you, but had embellished the edges, erased the minute flaws for the benefit of the museum goers.

Then the illusion broke, and your lips tilted up in a smirk. You sipped your drink, and walked away without a word, depositing the liquor-filled glass on a table.

Then came The Moment. The moment when I could have walked in the exact opposite direction. The moment when I should have just let it be. But you had initiated a game, a game that I always lose, and you knew it. That’s probably why you did it.

I went after you.

“Hey, asshole, hold it!”

The life and vibrancy of the vast living room disappeared in an instant, swallowed by a claustrophobic and dark hallway. I’d never been in this hall before. In my haste to chase you, I hadn’t paid any attention to the direction you were headed in.

You paused. Some trick of physics caught a gleam of light in the one blue orb gazing at me over your shoulder. “And what are you going to do if I don’t? Hm?”

It’s like some sort of magical ability you have. Suddenly, all that adrenalin and testosterone that was pumping through my veins not two seconds before had evaporated, and I was left feeling small and stupid. I had childishly pursued you without thinking it through at all. My thoughtlessness had propelled me over a line, and I couldn’t seem to back up over it again. Unfortunately for me, I couldn’t see what line it was that I had crossed.

“I…shut up.” It wasn’t as though you had paid me any direct insults that night. I was being juvenile and impulsive, but now that I was there, I wasn’t about to admit it. Stubbornness was one game that always ended in a stalemate with us.

“Hn. That’s what I thought.”

It was like one second we were standing feet apart, and the next second that Goddamn sneer was looking down at me from a matter of inches away. The air was all at once thicker, much harder to suck into my lungs, and once there reluctant to leave.

Looking back, this was the second moment. If I had turned around and ran right then, in that moment precisely, if I had folded and withdrawn from the game then I would have remained safe and secure in my nice simple world, where my nemesis was nothing but a jerk I had to defeat, where a multimillionaire CEO didn’t screw me on desks that cost more than my apartment. Instead, I stayed where I was, and fell through the stupid looking glass.

The briefly suspended paralysis between us didn’t last long. The next few seconds where a blurred confusion of motion. I ended up against the wall. The back of my head hurt where it has smacked against the solid barrier, but that didn’t seem too important just then, because there was a pair of lips against mine and a tongue determined to breach my defenses. At least I can say that I did try to push you off me at first. I attempted to get my knee in-between us, but there was no room to maneuver.

Then something inside me snapped. I abruptly ceased struggling. My mind, which had screamed so loudly before, went blank as I melted into that mouth. But the instant I gave in, you pulled back. If you had just kept going, I could have avoided thinking about what I’d just done for a little longer. I could have stayed empty of anything but need. But as soon as you stopped touching me, my mind switched back on, which was exactly what you wanted. You wanted to fuck with my head.

“Your move,” your breath brushed my ear, and then you were gone.

POEM - Thanks for the Complex

2009-11-11T15:48:39Z

CLAIMER: Original work, all mine, no stealing, you know the drill.

Thanks for the Complex
By Ikuni Kea Ko

Well, congratulations!
You didn't sink with the ship.
And as I look up at you,
From the ocean floor,
My airless lungs scream,
"WE DON'T NEED YOU ANYMORE!"

POEM - Clarity

2009-11-11T15:43:24Z

CLAIMER: Original work. All mine. No stealing.

Clarity
By Ikuni Kea Ko

For a second there,
I thought I was falling for you.
Then you made it clear,
You're never gonna be there.
I can't keep standing here,
Awaiting your decency;
It's not coming, now I see.

I'm sick of crying over you.
I'm not so much,
As a second thought to you.
So, I'm fine with being the bitch,
If that's what it takes,
To get your bullshit off my plate.

I'm in no mood to play,
'Cause I ran out of "give a shit" today.

POEM - For you

2009-11-11T15:33:53Z

CLAIMER: This poem is an original work, and belongs to me. No stealing.

For You
By Ikuni Kea Ko

This one is for my father,
For the man for whom I wish,
I could believe in Heaven.
This one is for the man,
Whose heart I tried to align with,
Whose breath regulated mine.
This one is the one,
For my hero.
This one holds the forgiveness,
That a child hoarded.
It's for the prankster,
The working class warrior,
The fighter of fire,
The gardener,
The chief,
The father,
The man I miss.
This one is for you.

Hearts of Ice - 4/8 - Hiei x Yukina / Kurama x Botan

2009-11-04T17:39:36Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own YuYu Hakusho, or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Hearts of Ice

FANDOM: YuYu Hakusho anime-verse.

RATED: R

WARNING: Strong adult content, sexual situations, and language.

PAIRINGS: Hiei x Yukina, Kurama x Botan, Koenma x Kurama, (one-sided) Kuwabara x Yukina.

SUMMARY: Two very different women must face the cold truth, and confront the fact that their realities are not at all what they seem to be.

BONUS CHAPTER: Dirty High

Kurama sat in the tiny, dark waiting room. No one really used the room anymore. Most visitors to the Spirit World waited out in the main lobby with the hustling, bustling Ogres, until such time that the Great Lord Koenma condescended to make room in his busy schedule for them. Kurama had chosen the waiting room, because he didn’t feel like being on display for the gossip committee to freely discuss.

Since the “incident” months before, nasty rumors had begun circulating, and the worst part was that a fairly large bulk of them were true. Those were always the worst kinds of rumors, because there was no hope of ever dispelling them by just coming clean.

Whispers had always followed Kurama ever since his miraculously light sentencing after stealing the sacred artifacts, especially once it became common knowledge that he was in fact a blend of human and demon, and the demon portion was guilty of a long list of crimes, most of which infamous. It had always been a matter of great speculation: how exactly had he gotten off with just probation? Wild theories had flown between the work desks for years, but now one prevailing theory was gaining serious momentum: the idea that he had bought his freedom by carnal means.

That rumor contained only one major misconception; the notion that Kurama had been the one doing the bribing.

It wasn’t long before Kurama felt that tell tale wisp of Spirit Energy that most mistook for a sign of weakness, but he knew better. It was not all the energy the person in question possessed, it was simply all that leaked out; the “child ruler’s” body was a perfectly constructed container for Spirit Energy.

The door creaked open, giving testament to its ill use over the centuries. A slender frame, draped in blue, red, and gold, with a splash of brown hair that fell perfectly despite its short cut, slipped between the space separating door and frame.

“Well, Kurama,” that so disgustingly cultured drawl rolled through the stale air. “I must admit that I was shocked to learn that you were here. You’re not due to report to me for another month, and I don’t recall issuing any…other form of summons recently.” The teenaged incarnation of Koenma crossed delicate arms, leaning against the wall, gazing at the liaison to Demon World with poorly concealed glee. He would enjoy every last second of this; that was obvious.

Someone of duller wit than Kurama would have found the thin, mildly effeminate teenager, with a pacifier protruding from his mouth, to be a harmless joke. The truth was far, far from that. Koenma was a masterful actor, and capable of reading people with ease. If assuming the form and posture of a baby having a tantrum would make his target give him what he wanted, then he’d do it. He could seduce, cry, scream, laugh, soothe, snub, and yell, all with convincing sincerity at the drop of a hat; whatever it took to get what he wanted. And if all else failed, there was always blackmail. Telling him no was a waste of time. He played innocent as well as anything else, but he had lived centuries longer than even Kurama, and had fully mastered the terrible art of manipulation. Kurama looked like a cheap con-artist next to him.

“Not going to talk today, hm?”

Kurama remained still and silent, but his pulse was pounding so, so loudly in his ears.

Koenma crossed the room then, stopping just in front of Kurama, so close his robes brushed the red-head’s knees. “Would this have anything to do with why Botan is late reporting back?”

Kurama said nothing, but he knew that all his silence did was confirm every word the obnoxious ruler uttered.

“Oh me, oh my, are you actually coming to me after having a fight with your ‘girlfriend?’” The words vibrated with a chuckle.

Koenma removed the pacifier, stowing it somewhere in his robes. He leaned forward, purposeful in his slow movements, until his cheek was close enough to Kurama’s that their body heats pushed restlessly at each other, and his breath ghosted over the other’s ear as he whispered, “I’m flattered, Kurama.” That breath carried the faintest hint of energy that prickled along the skin, raising goosebumps.

Kurama shuddered. This was so completely backward. He could acknowledge the fact that it made no sense to react to his argument with Botan by, for the first time, willingly offering himself up to the very behavior that had caused all the fighting, the damage, and his need to escape it. It was total nonsense. And yet, he was sitting there, doing absolutely nothing to stop it. Quite to the contrary, he leaned up, and obediently parted his lips as another mouth covered his.

Everywhere Koenma’s mouth made contact it tingled, and as his tongue probed the velvety wetness of the other’s mouth, something pulsing with heat and life poured down Kurama’s throat; raw energy entering his body, pumping through him. Koenma’s mouth was the conductor for all that energy he hoarded within himself, and now he was using it to spill his very essence into Kurama, where it could reach things, caress things, that no hand could ever hope to.

The sound that escaped the once legendary thief was somewhere betwixt a whimper and a moan; a vocalization of need.

Koenma pulled back, a succulent, wicked smile playing across his lips. “Careful. You don’t want us to get caught again, do you?”

Kurama could hardly comprehend the words. Energy was still swirling within his body, his flesh felt feverish with it. He could barely think through all the sensations that that insidious energy was causing to run a muck of his every nerve ending. And that was ultimately why he was there, perverse as it was; to be thoughtless, to forget everything but the feeling. Some humans shot toxins into their veins, Kurama got high off the power that could save the worlds, or cause such dirty ecstasy.

During the days in-between these “meetings,” he could make believe that this “arrangement” was still distasteful to him, that he had no choice but to engage in these acts. But this time was nothing but choice, and he had chosen to immerse himself in uncouth pleasure. The ugly, revolting truth was that he had come to crave it. He hid in the sheepskin of a victim, enabling him to feel self-righteous and even torn up enough about it to cry, all the while agreeing with all the nasty names Botan had called him. Because when no one but the Prince of Spirit World was looking, he revelled in his addiction.

Hearts of Ice - 3/8 - Hiei x Yukina / Kurama x Botan

2009-11-02T16:18:00Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own YuYu Hakusho, or any of the content and characters therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Hearts of Ice

FANDOM: YuYu Hakusho anime-verse.

RATED: R

WARNING: Strong adult content, sexual situations, and language.

PAIRINGS: Hiei x Yukina, Kurama x Botan, Koenma x Kurama, (one-sided) Kuwabara x Yukina.

SUMMARY: Two very different women must face the cold truth, and confront the fact that their realities are not at all what they seem to be.

Chapter Two: Screaming in the Dark

Yukina lay on her back, gazing up at the sky as snowflakes gathered on her face and body. The snow in the Human World was so docile, not even human blizzards could compare to the snow storms of her once home in the Demon Plane. It was almost as if human winters were just a cheap, watered down imitation of the real thing, or maybe a pale reflection through a hazy mirror.

She wondered distantly if her brother was looking up at this same sky. She had come out here to forget him, to relinquish her search at last and resign herself to living this life fully with the people who were in it, instead of waiting around for some phantom stranger, who might not even be alive still. She wasn’t doing a very good job. She couldn’t seem to make herself let it go, let him go. Perhaps it was that feeling of being watched cropping up again, but she felt closer to her brother somehow, not farther away.

“I suppose telling you that you’ll freeze to death is pointless,” a raspy voice drifted on the wind, along with the distinct stink of cigarettes.

Yukina sat up; this put her at nearly eye level with the shrivelled elderly woman, standing a mere foot or two away. “Master Genkai.”

Genkai made an odd snorting sound as she turned her back to the younger woman. “There’s a big oaf up at the temple, refusing to leave, unless I produce you.” She began to walk away, her movements as remarkably un-labored as ever. “Do an old woman a favor, and get him out of my hair.”

Yukina got silently to her feet, the snow falling from her, and followed the petite warrior to another clearing where stood a massive and regal temple. She paused beneath the touring archway leading to the snow-blanketed grounds within. “Who else is here, Master Genkai?”

“Hmm?” Genkai peered over her shoulder. “Oh. Hiei arrived this morning.” She smirked. “You’re quite the popular girl.”

Yukina blinked, while they resumed their walk, attempting to puzzle out the meaning behind those words.

As they drew nearer to the main building, Yukina could indeed sense the hot, pulsing aura that belonged to the aforementioned fiery little demon. Judging from the feel of it, he wasn’t very happy, and it became quite clear why that was in a matter of seconds.

“WHAT WAS THAT, PIPSQUEAK?! I DARE YOU TO SAY THAT TO MY FACE LIKE A MAN!” The signature howl of Kazuma Kuwabara penetrated the walls and air as the two women stepped into the temple, removing their shoes as they went.

Yukina could have sworn she heard some of the more hearty birds, that stuck it out through the colder months, startle from the surrounding trees. “Oh, dear…” she murmured.

As they padded toward the room from which all the Kuwabara-induced ruckus was issuing, a haughty, cutting voice wafted through the space. “Hn, it wouldn’t matter how many times I said it, it could never effectively seep through that hideously thick and ugly skull of yours.”

Genkai slid the screen open leading to the steadily escalating row within. “Now, boys, no dismembering each other in front of the young lady.”

The scene before Yukina was truly distasteful.

Kuwabara was like one giant wall of fury, and his fists were balled up in the front of black robes belonging to another fighter nearly two feet shorter than the other. Hiei’s jet black hair was making its usual vertical bid for freedom, like dark flames rising from his skull. Flashing ruby eyes were looking up at Kuwabara like they had spotted a large grotesque insect and were contemplating how much bug spray it would require. It might have been comical if not for the unmistakable swirl of murderous intent around the pair.

“Stop it!”

“Oh, Yukina!” Kuwabara sprang away from Hiei, and suddenly his hands were clasping Yukina’s.

She looked up into his big, goofy, smiling face that just moments before was issuing forth threats, and wished that he wouldn’t touch her just then. “Hello, Kazuma,” she greeted, and attempting to extract her hands, but his grip didn’t give a centimeter; he didn’t even seem aware of her struggled movements.

Kuwabara blinked at her for a moment. “Gosh, Yukina, I haven’t seen you in a kimono in ages!” He exclaimed.

“Oh…yes,” Yukina glanced down at the pale blue and white fabrics wrapped tightly around her body. She had in essence set out to reject the fantasy of her brother, and it seemed appropriate to wear the attire of her people for such a cold-hearted act. She had failed to accomplish this goal, however, and now felt silly in the kimono, ashamed of what it represented.

Kuwabara continued to blink at her. “Wow, your hands are freezing.”

Genkai made a thick, lung-clearing sound that was something like a kind of laugh-snort.

“Of course they’re cold, you lump,” Hiei’s sardonic voice sounded from the corner. “She’s an Ice Apparition.”

“I know that!” Kuwabara retorted, anger flaring back up as he let go of Yukina and rounded on Hiei. “Don’t talk to me like I’m stupid.”

Hiei’s upper lip curled unpleasantly. “Isn’t there something in that precious Honor Code of yours about not lying? You shouldn’t demand that other people go against your own ridiculous moral standards.”

“WHAT—”

“It’s nice to see you again, Hiei-san.”

Hiei’s expression softened instantly the way it always did whenever she addressed him, and for the briefest second there was something vulnerable and pained there. It had been years ago that she had first realized that she had this mysterious effect on the other demon. She didn’t like it, because of that split second in which he looked to be in agony before he regained control of his expressions, but if it would prevent the senseless blood-letting that this situation promised, then she would use it.

“How have you been?” She inquired, taking a few steps around Kuwabara and entering the room.

Before Hiei could formulate a response, Kuwabara’s hulking frame once again consumed Yukina’s field of vision. “Why don’t you ask how I’ve been?” He lost no time answering the query she hadn’t spoken, and promptly began babbling about something called “university” and “the responsibilities of being a real man.”

She pretended to be listening attentively. She’d learned over the years how to be a good audience, even when she had no idea what he was on about, which was most of the time.

Usually, Kuwabara would wind himself down after a few minutes of incessant chatter, but today he seemed to be powered by a super-charged battery of nervous energy.

She wished he would just spit out whatever it was that he really wanted to say. She had truly desired an answer to the question she had addressed to Hiei, and she wasn’t going to get it at this rate.

Once upon a time, when she had been naïve of the worlds beyond her home, she hadn’t noticed it, but it had become clear to her that Kuwabara didn’t want her to converse with other males, and he always went out of his way to defame Hiei and cut off her interactions with him. She knew that the two man didn’t get along at all, but she saw no reason why she couldn’t be friends with both of them.

Another thing that reflection and time had revealed was that Hiei made no secret of his distaste for Kuwabara, but he never stood in the way whenever Yukina spoke with him. In fact, Hiei had never made any demands on her behavior. The closest he’d ever come to that was the night he had told her to get stronger, and move forward with her life. It was advice that she had desperately needed to be given, however unable to follow it she might be.

Yukina realized with a jolt that Kuwabara was no longer speaking to her. Somehow Genkai had maneuvered him away, and was strong-arming him into regurgitating details about her former pupil, Yusuke Urameshi. No doubt the wise hermit had picked up on her ward’s unease, and had accomplished this feat on purpose.

Yukina swallowed and approached Hiei, who had taken up disapproving residence in the farthest corner.

“Would you do me the honor of walking with me?”

Hiei regarded her skeptically.

“It has been a very long time since we last spoke,” Yukina supplied with what she hoped was a encouraging smile.

Hiei nodded his ascent, but there was something reluctant in his eyes and posture.

They had nearly reached the threshold when Kuwabara’s booming howl sounded once more, “HEY, RUNT-BOY, WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ARE GOING WITH MY YUKINA??!”

“We’ll be right back, Kazuma,” Yukina gave him her cutest smile and quickly shut the door on more protests, and Genkai’s appeals to reason in vain.

~*~*~

Kasane Shrine had had always had a calming effect on Botan, but today its ancient structure, the prayer alter, and the stillness could offer her little in the way of comfort. If she was completely, unsparingly honest with herself, what she needed was to be sitting in a cozy apartment on the other side of the city, wrapped in slender, strong arms, gazing into emerald orbs. But the reason she needed that comfort had been caused by the owner of those very eyes. The irony was bitter enough to make her want to puke.

She had to wonder, as her nose began to run from the cold, just how the hell had she landed herself here? She tried to look back at the months stretching out behind her, and spot the exact twist in her path that had led to this. But she couldn’t find it; the definitive moment that had resulted in the best night of her life, only to be followed by months of hell. Where had she stumbled? What happened? When did she give silent permission to another to crack open her heart and rummage around in it?

She knew that there had to be something between point A and Z. There had to be something between friendship and screaming in the dark. There had to be something that tipped the scale, but she couldn’t rediscover it. It had sunken back into the murky depths of memory, and she was unable to recover it. But she could perfectly recall how she had gotten from Kurama’s bed to sitting here in the snow, feeling the icy liquid seeping through her jeans. That she could see clearly.

“You’re going to make yourself sick out here!” The snow crunched as little feet came closer.

Botan arched her spine, bending backwards to loop up into the Spirit World’s flamingly red-haired Guide, Hinageshi.

“I just received a message from Lord Koenma,” Hinageshi continued, dropping an extra coat on Botan’s upturned face. “He wants to know why he’s still awaiting your report.”

Botan spluttered, and wrestled the coat away, throwing it aggressively in the direction of the entrance to the grounds. “Well, you can tell Koenma that I really don’t feel like setting sight on his pacifier-sucking face right now!”

“Botan!” Hinageshi sounded every bit the age she looked just then; a girl of 13, aghast at her friend’s foul mouth.

In that precise moment, the Pilot of the River Styx didn’t much care who she offended or insulted. Besides, despite her perpetually scolding Yusuke for saying exactly what she just had, she had always wanted to utter it herself. And Koenma deserved it.

Hinageshi sat daintily beside Botan, apparently without regard for the cold herself now. The red of her tradition priestess robes turned maroon as her body heat melted the snow, turning it to frigid water to soak into the cloth. “Why would you say such things about Lord Koenma?”

Botan bit her lip. She couldn’t possibly tell Hinageshi that she had walked in on her then brand new lover performing oral sex on their boss…could she? No, it was absolutely not possible. “It’s…I’m just really stressed,” she lied lamely.

Even considering the truth had been a mistake. She was suddenly outside Koenma’s office again.

Jorge had been making up desperate reasons why she couldn’t enter the office, but it had been very important that she speak with King Yama’s brat son. She couldn’t even remember now why that was, but ultimately the why wasn’t vital information. All that mattered now was that she had somehow pushed passed the panicky, babbling Ogre, opened the door, and her world promptly cracked down the center.

It had taken her mind an unusually long time to fully process what was before her. By the time it had sunken in, a horrible silence had fallen.

Koenma had already gotten himself together and was seated behind his desk, his faux-teenaged features perfectly composed as he replaced that ridiculous little blue pacifier.

Kurama, however, hadn’t moved from his kneeling position before the ornate desk, but he had turned enough to look at Botan. His face was blank, like a staring, still doll. It wasn’t the stony apathy of battle; he was utterly without expression. The eyes empty, as if someone had turned out the lights. Slowly, so slowly, a single teardrop leaked from one deep green eye, and traced a wet line down a cheek to fall into full lips slightly red and abused.

The image was too perfectly surreal, and even now, as Botan watched the sun sinking into the horizon, she couldn’t be sure that she hadn’t invented it in her shocked state.

“Botan?” Hinageshi’s voice sounded uncertain as she watched her senior tremble and hug her knees, tears steadily tumbling down her face.

Stupid Botan! The Agent of Death thought savagely. Stupid Kurama! Stupid Koenma! Stupid, stupid, stupid!

Slow Burn - FICLET - Seto x Jonouchi

2009-11-01T21:52:09Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, or any of the characters and content therein. They belong solely to their respective copyright holder(s). If they didn’t, then there would be canonized Seto/Jonouchi sexin’. I am making no profit off of this work of fanfiction.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Slow Burn

FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh

RATED: PG-13

WARNING: Sexual situations

PAIRING: Seto x Jonouchi

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Dude, it’s my first Seto/Jonouchi fic, which is quite shameful, since I’ve wanted to ship them for, oh, years.
DEDICATED TO: You know who you are. And as it turns out, what won't kill me, really will make me stronger. So, thanks.

Slow Burn

POV: Jonouchi

I never understood when someone would say, “I just can’t help it.” I guess that’s ‘cause I had never experienced losing all control of myself before you.

I’ve always been the kind of person who knows what he wants, what he doesn’t, and behaves accordingly. It had never occurred to me that I could hate something, and find myself irresistibly pulled into it. I couldn’t have imagined that one day I would discover my hands clutching cerulean sheets, your breath so hot against my neck, your fingers bruising my hips, your body beating that sweet rhythm into mine. It hadn’t so much as crossed my mind as a possibility.

I know that you despise me just as much as I do you, but the way you say my name, the only time you don’t use my surname, as you’re just about to cross over that edge might convince a gullible person that you love me. And there have been nights when I’ve wished I was as stupid as you think I am. Just the thought makes me want to vomit; the fact that somewhere within me is a small piece that wants you to cherish me, to appreciate me, to approve of me, to acknowledge my existence as having some significance besides getting you off. But in the end, I’m just one other in the long line of poor shmucks desperate for your attention.

I can’t figure out what it is about you that draws the whole world to you. What is it about those frozen blue eyes? Why does the way your lips curl into a condescending sneer make me weak in the knees? What is it about the way you hold yourself that is so alluring? Why do humans seek the acceptance of the very people we can intellectually acknowledge will never grant it?

I know that I need to walk away from you. I’ve worked so hard to make myself into someone who deserves better than this, but then you’ll pin me down, and I’ll back slide into the sad, needy boy who’s kissing you back.

Your body always makes such quick work of mine; I can hardly contemplate telling you to stop. And even if I managed to form the words, you would disregard them like everything else that inconveniences you. It doesn’t matter anyway, ‘cause I’ll never be able to say them. My skin screams out for you louder than the logical protests of my mind. Your fingers, your mouth, temporarily erase all reason, burning it up in your bed.

And as I lay in the silent dark, sweat and thicker things cooling on my skin, I know I’ll get up soon, get dressed, and depart. It’s been such a long time since the nights when you would order me out. You’ve made it quite clear that my body is the only thing of value that I have to offer you.

So, I shut the door behind me, leaning on it for a moment, knowing that soon I’ll be back on the other side of it, because I just can’t help it.

End

Jacob's Ladder - ONESHOT

2009-10-28T23:47:11Z

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, or any of the characters and content therein. They belong to their respective copyright holder(s.

AUTHOR: claustro_phobia (Ikuni Kea Ko)

TITLE: Jacob's Ladder FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh!

RATED: PG-13 (to be safe)

WARNING: Adult themes, implied murder, brief language

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This fic is heavy with religious blasphemy. Duly warned. If you flame me, Bakura will sodomize your corpse. Once again, duly warned.

Fic is set at the beginning of the World of Memory/Millennium World arc in the anime. After the whole Ryou fleeing into the chapel, and Bakura breaking all the windows bit. And I decided, that since an exact location is never given, the chapel in question is in England. It seems likely, since Ryou is part British, and churches aren't particularly common in Japan.

A NOTE ON DARK BAKURA'S ACCENT: Since he does share a body with Ryou, is it reasonable to assume that he can speak English. I include him having an accent, however, since he primarily speaks Japanese, but is from Ancient Egypt. So, his accent is somewhere between a Japanese and a Middle Eastern accent, which is why the dear priest has some trouble placing it.

And lasly, sorry if the formatting is all screwed up. Send your complaints to Notepad.

Jacob's Ladder

Shattered glass crunched beneath his feet. Father Thomas looked about at his decimated chapel. All the windows seemed to have been smashed, and the organ was a gnarled mess. He made the symbol of the cross, and clutched his Bible closer.

Persecution was always something the Catholic man must face, Father Thomas knew that, but who could have done this? Who could have such hate in their heart as to attack a House of God?

The Father pushed back questions of why. Why did not matter. It was not his place to hate the one who had done it. He straightened his glasses, and took another step forward.

Amidst the rubble, seated upon one of the pews, was a person of slender build, with long, bushy white hair.
For a moment, selfish logic kicked in. He should leave, and go to the police. File a report. It was dangerous here. The person before him might be the culprit.

He shook his head. No. He could not be sure of that. It could be a member of his flock, horror struck as he was, and in need of comfort. And even the one who had done this must surely feel the weight of his sins. No, it was his duty to stay.
"Child, why are you here?"

The figure kept its head down, concealing its face. "Forgive me Father for I have sinned," the voice that issued from the figure was high and cold, the English accented but hard to place. It was too high for a man's voice, but there was some element to it that was not of woman.

Father Thomas swallowed. The air was suddenly full of thick invisible things; whispers seeming to emanate from the figure. "How have you sinned, my child?"

Arms lean yet muscled crossed a flat chest, and a set of piercing brown eyes peaked out from under the hair. "I have murdered, and I have raped, and I have coveted my neighbor's goods."

Glass shards slid under his shoes as the Father took a step back, his breath leaving him in a gasp.

Cruel, ringing laughter erupted, reverberating off the walls, of their souls, as the sinner threw his mane of hair over his shoulder, his lips seeming to tear open in a smile. "Oh, Father, the look on your face!" He (as Father Thomas had realized he must be) stood as suddenly as the laughter had ended, as if his body was that of a doll, pulled up not of it's own will, but by strings.

"Creature, what are you?" The Father found his voice thin, but level, his conviction returning. He took back the step he had lost, holding God's Sacred Word firmly in his hands. "In the name of Christ our Lord, I command thee--"

The youth waved a hand. "You're better off calling on Ammit. The bitch has been nipping at me since before your precious Jesus popped out of Mary's tight virgin hole."

"How dare you--"

"How dare I?" A chuckle shook the sinner's shoulders. "Who's gonna stop me? Your God has no more power here than you do." The eerie smile pulled at the corners of his mouth once more. "I've prayed, dear Father." He dropped dramatically to his knees before the Father. He clasped hands to his chest, "Oh, Lord, forgive me of my sins! Oh, God, let me never sin again!" Leering eyes looked up. "And yet your Almighty, One True God, can't even halt my tongue from speaking blasphemy! I wonder..." Slowly, he drew himself back up, as if his limbs weren't quite working properly. "Would he prevent me from killing you now? Would your God save your lifeless body from being sodomized after the deed?"

Glass scraped the ground, and Father Thomas found himself gazing blearily up at the youth, his glasses askew, his body protesting the collision with the floor.

"Oh, allow me to help you."

A pale hand reached out, righting the Father's glasses. Jean-clad legs crouched down beside him.

"There's one other sin I forgot, Father..."

The morning was silent. There was no flock of birds fleeing their homes. No loud scream. Just silence as the sun began to rise, sparkling on the fractured stained glass.

A figure emerged from the chapel. Chocolate brown eyes squinting up at the ascending golden sphere, crimson liquid dripping from long fingers. "Lord, forgive this vessel. He knows not what I've done."

End