AUTHOR: Macx and Lara Bee

DISCLAIMER: not mine. Definitely not! I just play with them and hope
I tread on no one's toes.

Author's Voice of Warning (aka Author's Note):

English is not my first language; it's German. This is the best I can
do. Any mistakes you find in here, collect them and you might win a prize
<g> The spell-checker said everything's okay, but you know how trustworthy
those thingies are.....

ARCHIVE: yes

WARNINGS: violence, Sohryu ouchies, Touda ouchies…

TYPE: yaoi

PAIRING(S):

Touda/Byakko (established relationship)

Tsuzuki/Hisoka (established relationship)

Sohryu/Rikugo (memory)

and one surprise pairing... the main one. We've never seen it before
anywhere at all. Have fun...

FEEDBACK: empty inbox seeks emails <g>

 

Part I -- Encounter

 

 

"Rikugo?"

"Hm?"

"Can I ask you something?"

Dark eyes glanced at his companion and the astrologer smiled. "You know
you can ask me anything, Tsuzuki."

It drew a light smile. "Well, yeah. Just asking."

"What's the question?"

The shinigami looked out over the wide expanse of GensouKai. They were
sitting on top of Rikugo's palace, watching the approaching dusk. Tsuzuki
had come by just as Rikugo had planned on spending a night watching the
stars, studying the old charts, maybe add a few new observations to the
old. He did that once a while, and the last time had been actually decades
ago.

"Why can't you and Sohryu stand each other?"

The blond shikigami briefly closed his eyes, a fine smile playing over
his features. "It's not like we hate each other, Tsuzuki," he pointed out.

Amethyst eyes turned to look at him. Tsuzuki's face was set in a serious
expression. "I wasn't saying 'hate'. I said you can't stand each other.
I know you don't like him, Rikugo. You once mentioned he isn't fit to lead
you."

A sigh. "Yes, I did."

"Why?"

"It's… complicated."

"Uncomplicate it for me?"

He looked at his shinigami master, wondering what was going on behind
those unusually colored eyes. Tsuzuki was hard to read sometimes, while
being completely open and accessible at other times. Without using his
other eyes, Rikugo had no chance of finding out what was going on, and
he would never scan his master without permission.

"Sohryu and I go back a long time," he finally said, tearing his gaze
away from those fascinating eyes. He resumed his vigil over the stars.
"Aside from Genbu, Sohryu's one of the oldest Gods. His destiny was always
clear to us and to him. He had been born to the Sky Dragon, the oldest
son and heir to the power and title. He was raised to become our leader
and I was one of his teachers."

Tsuzuki just raised an eyebrow, but he didn't comment.

"When he became one of the four Gods after his father's untimely demise
in the first GensouKai war, he was very young. But he lead our people and
won. He served the Emperor and he served us. But the wars to come changed
him, changed his perception of life. He began to distrust visitors, he
began to hate those who claimed shikigami as their servants."

Tsuzuki nodded. "Well, I know that hatred personally," he murmured.

Rikugo smiled faintly. Yes, Tsuzuki did. The hatred had launched a challenge
that had nearly killed the young man at his side, but which had ultimately
bound Sohryu to this incredible person.

"You changed him, Tsuzuki. Never doubt that. He was different before
he met you, very different. His hostility was what broke my trust in him
as a leader. He wanted us to live secluded from your world, to pull away.
When we had to move into the realm of the computer net, when we removed
ourselves from your dimension, it was just a first step in many for him
to cut us off from what defines us. I fought him on that move, but I lost."

Rikugo sighed softly. It had been a harsh fight, one where auras had
clashed, where wills had battled, and where Sohryu had used his innate
power and his status to finally defeat Rikugo.

"But it saved you," Tsuzuki argued.

"Yes, it did. I confess that we survived in much better shape because
we went into the net, but it cost us. In the beginning we had to reestablish
everything. It was a difficult time."

"You survived," Tsuzuki repeated calmly.

Rikugo met those violet eyes, smiling. "We survived," he agreed. "We
stepped back, we gave up, and we survived. But it didn't stop there. Sohryu
became obsessed with our safety, with finding new enemies, and it destroyed
my faith in him as a leader. When his wife died, things became even more
difficult."

"He shoulders a great responsibility," the shinigami at his side murmured.
"He's responsible for your survival. He made sacrifices for the greater
good. It didn't help that I actually mastered him, hm?" There was a brief
smile.

"Actually, it gave him a new perspective of things." Rikugo looked into
the now almost dark sky. "Like it gave me a new perspective. You changed
us, but the distrust is still there. I can't follow him blindly, Tsuzuki.
I have to second guess him, I have to find the reasons for his moves."

"Maybe that makes you more of an ally to him than an enemy. Your opposition
makes him rethink plans, too."

"I doubt it. He always does what he decided on."

"Are you sure?"

"He's the Azure Dragon of the Sky, the Protector of the East, a God,"
Rikugo told him. "His word is the law, it rules."

Amethyst eyes narrowed a little. "But you don't know that. You never
knew his initial plan, you only know the results."

"True."

"So… maybe he needs you to be a thorn in his side to be what he is,
Rikugo. Maybe he needs someone to oppose him, to get his blood going, to
tear him out of routine. I know he works hard. His job's not easy and all
the chocolate cake in the world can't make him take a break on a regular
basis." Tsuzuki grinned a little. "He needs to be hit out of the blue to
jolt him back onto the right course. Maybe that's you."

"And you?" Rikugo added mildly.

"Yeah, well, while I'm here I try to do my best. When he gets one of
those moods where he's ready to tear my head off I'm not so sure I've got
an impact."

Sohryu had been, mildly put, completely furious with Tsuzuki for a while.
Tsuzuki knew why. He had tried to commit suicide, using Touda, and Sohryu
hadn't forgiven him lightly. Maybe he never had, but at least the permanent
scowl was gone, as was the narrow-eyed look of ever-lasting criticism.
Touda's later freedom from the visor, his pardon, all that had added to
things.

"You have an impact on all of us," Rikugo told him calmly.

Tsuzuki had no reply for it, but his aura wafted off him in gentle waves,
touching Rikugo's, making him relax. It was simply Tsuzuki, that strange
mix of innocence and darkness, of warmth and ruthlessness. Two souls that
lived in one body and which were so entwined they were inseparable. Whether
he carried demon blood and power or not, Rikugo couldn't care less. The
result was what counted, and the result was a fascinating individual who
held such incredible power.

°

Rikugo stood in his study, paging through an old text. He finally lowered
the ancient book and took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes. His mind wasn't
really on his work. It was revolving around a tall, blue-haired God with
an attitude that irked him like nothing else. What he had told Tsuzuki
had been the truth, but a part had been missing. The part about the private
matter between the two shikigami. The part that was a well-kept secret.

Well, mostly secret. Genbu knew, but only because he knew everything
there was about his student. Rikugo didn't mind.

He sat down at his work table and stared at the charts and papers without
seeing anything. Instead his inner eyes recalled a lithe, muscular body,
perfectly toned; a face radiating nothing but intense pleasure; eyes the
color of the sky throughout a thunder storm, glowing with something so
intense, it took his breath away; long hair, held back haphazardly by a
loose ribbon, cascading down a strong back.

No one knew. No one. And Sohryu pushed the affair away.

Affair.

Rikugo huffed. More like an ongoing fight. His body remembered those
encounters, wild and steamy and filled with the dominating power of a sky
god, mixed with the strong aura of someone who delved into the secrets
of the universe. Two bodies entwined; not once but again and again. Not
love but lust. Not release but an ongoing tension.

They had gotten together over a fight. It had been one of those arguments
that had ended with auras flaring, with Sohryu gritting his teeth, snarling
something uncomplimentary, and with Rikugo flinging the same back at him.
All their arguments went down like this, with tempers rising, voices as
well, and finally one of the two combatants leaving the other.

Back then it had been different.

Back then Sohryu hadn't turned. He had advanced on him, Rikugo's power
flared, and then he was pushed against the wall, looking into fiery eyes.

Fiery.

Hot.

And something had snapped.

Rikugo couldn't explain the frenzy that had then taken over, as mouth
crushed into each other, as hands tore off clothes, as bodies fought for
dominance. Neither wanted to give in, but Rikugo had finally surrendered
with a sharp cry as Sohryu pushed himself inside him. There had been nothing
gentle about the encounter, nothing refined. It had been wild and unrestrained,
down and dirty.

Sohryu had left him where he had weakly collapsed, gasping for breath,
trying to wrap his mind around what had just happened.

No, he had never understood.

It hadn't been the last time, either.

It had meant nothing, but it had happened again and again.

All that changed over time was the fact that it grew gentler, but not
loving. Dominance fights were still prevailing and Sohryu didn't always
win. Rikugo suspected that the other dragon wanted to be pushed down and
just be the passive part once in a while.

He gladly did so.

It was what described them. They would never find a common ground, neither
in public nor in private. They would never find peace, just more reasons
to fight, to release their pent-up energy and anger. Rikugo knew that Sohryu
would never admit defeat and neither would he. It was a vicious cycle that
could not be broken. He would never submit and Sohryu was… Sohryu.

He was a dragon.

Dragons never submitted – even if this one had been mastered.

But never tamed.

The astrologer pushed his glasses back onto his nose.

He couldn't get free of the powerful man who rubbed him all the wrong
ways. Sohryu couldn't free himself of his thorn either. They were bound
together, unbreakable, and for all his words about Sohryu not fitting his
role of their leader, Rikugo had no ambitions to take over. It was the
last thing on his mind.

Maybe we've been helping each other all the time, he mused.

He wanted it to happen, even though he fought back each time. Sohryu
never gave any indication that he preferred him over countless shikigami
he could have had to fulfil his needs.

No emotions.

Never emotions.

Rikugo smoothed the creases in a chart.

No, emotions got in the way. It was too complicated and emotions wouldn't
solve anything. They never talked about what had happened; it had never
happened. So many things... so many nights and days... so many moments...
and they had never happened.

And their relationship in this life out there, in GensouKai, didn't
get better, but it also didn't get worse. They tolerated the other's presence,
they drifted toward each other, meeting in an explosion of need and hatred
of it, in lust and denial of it.

Rikugo smiled slightly. No, he would never confess to anything concerning
Sohryu, and the dragon would rather cut his own tongue out than to say
something to Rikugo.

It'll kill us one day, he mused. Unless we tear each other apart before
that happens. Fire would burn Earth, Earth would bury and extinguish the
fiery flame.

Destiny.

 

tbc...