Red and Blue, Black and Blond | By : lemonykisses Category: zMisplaced Stories [ADMIN use only] > Games Views: 994 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0 |
Disclaimer: I do not own the game .hack//GU or characters within the game. I am not making, nor ever made any money or profit from this game or merchandise related to the game or company(ies). I'm also not making any money or profit from writing this story. Than |
Shout-out to reviwers:
Masuda-san – Aiiieee!! *glomps* When I read your review I felt my face was about to split from smiling so hard! Thank you soooo much! And I am so sorry if I confused you on the names. But don’t worry, I won’t be using them so much. In the future chapters, I will be more than happy to give a small chart of the characters and player’s names of them (except for Ryou and Kaoru of course). Thanks for the info! I’m glad you loved Kaoru laughing; it brought a smile to my face when I pictured it. I’m also glad you loved the video rental scene also. Expect more of that in the future! Yay!!
Notes: I’m sorry it’s taking a bit to get Endrance and Ryou together, but it’ll be worth it when they do. Hopefully you all will like this awkward chapter next!
((())) - Marking where someone in "The World" comes out in the real world and vice-versa.
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Chapter 3 – Bills And Roses
When Ryou brought them home, he started preparing a stew dinner for the both of them. Kaoru was cutting vegetables on the marble counter next to the oven; which was on his right; to add in the broth. On the island Ryou kneaded the dough so he could flatten it and stuff it with ground-up beef to make dumplings to add into the soup.
"I need to add some spices now," Ryou said to make Kaoru move and the blond did a little too quickly, as if the raven-haired man would strike him down if he went any slower.
"You don’t have to make such an elaborate meal for me, Ryou." Kaoru said low as he crossed him arms over his narrow chest.
Ryou’s brow furrowed with his back to the blond as he stirred the broth. "This isn’t elaborate, I make this three times a week." He then went back to working on the dumplings. "And healthy food is what you need to help work on your injuries. I heard a while ago that vegetables are good for the skin, which would mean your cuts and bruises would heal faster." He sealed the last dumpling up and set it on a small pan with the already-made ones.
"Oh." Kaoru said and looked down on the ground, feeling a small blush on his cheeks. /He does care/ "I appreciate it, then."
Ryou froze for a moment while washing his hands, then grumbled low and finished to dry his hands. He then took the vegetables that Kaoru had cut up and put them in the broth.
They both were in silence as Ryou stirred the soup again.
Kaoru stood to Ryou’s right, glancing at him, watching his profile.
Ryou felt eyes on him again and the hair on the back of his neck bristled. "Set up the table. Bowls are in this cabinet-" He pointed to the cabinet door on his right with a free hand "-And the silverware and napkins are in this drawer." He then pointed to the left side drawer next to him.
Kaoru nodded, whether Ryou saw it or not and did as he was told.
Suddenly Ryou then left the soup and went into the fridge to pull out a couple of bottles of beer. "You drink?"
Kaoru looked at him, then at the bottles. "I’ve only had wine, but I’ll try it."
Ryou nodded slightly and set them on the table and grabbed two glasses. Unfortunately the cabinet they were in is right above where Kaoru was getting the silverware and they accidentally bumped into each other.
"Oh!" Kaoru said as Ryou grunted low. "Sorry," the blond wilted away from him.
Ryou stared at him for a moment, then looked down and opened the drawer for Kaoru. "You first."
The blond looked at him for a moment, then nodded and took out two large spoons with two black cloth napkins.
"Get forks, too. I have tiramisu for dessert, unless you don’t like it."
"Oh, I enjoy it," Kaoru said softly and took said utensils out of the drawer. He spread everything out as Ryou grabbed two glasses and placed them at the designated table settings.
The teen then reached into the utensil drawer and pulled out a bottle opener, said "Catch" real quick and tossed the opener over his shoulder. He smirked when it didn’t hit the floor meaning Kaoru caught it.
Even though the blond had never opened a bottle of beer before, he got the hang of it after a second try. He held onto the bottle caps and opener until Ryou said to toss the caps in the trash and put the opener back in the drawer.
"You’re allowed to do what you want here, Kaoru. Even when I’m at work you can have whatever’s in the fridge." Ryou said as he stirred the soup some more. It was starting to smell better with the vegetables.
"Then can I play ‘The World’?" The blond man asked with slight eagerness, but suddenly regretting what he asked when he thought about what was said earlier in the day. "Oh, never mind."
"No, it’s okay. You can. Just a few hours, okay?" Ryou asked a bit too kindly and was thankful his back was to the blond as he blushed slightly. "I mean, just try not to run up the bill." He added quickly after.
Kaoru nodded to his back and there was silence for a moment. Then something struck Kaoru. "Where do you work?" He asked in interest.
Ryou smirked as he set the timer on the stove and turned from the soup to lean against the counter on the left side of the stove. He crossed his arms, looking like a dark-haired and normal-clothed Haseo. To Kaoru the long-sleeve snug black shirt made Ryou’s muscles in his arms and chest bulge out more noticeably. Ryou had the sleeves rolled up to above the crook of his elbows to expose lower arms. "Truthfully, I’m a chef."
Kaoru couldn’t help but smile low. "That must be nice."
"It’s not bad; the pay’s great; just don’t tell anyone though."
Kaoru’s eyebrows furrowed at him in question.
"Anyone online, I mean. It’s not very ‘Terror of Death’, you see?"
Kaoru actually giggled softly with a slight upward crook on each corner of his thin lips when he got the small joke. "I would never betray you, Ryou."
That actually made the raven-haired teen uncomfortable and he glanced sideways as he sighed and turned around. "So um…" he then turned back around while crossing his arms again. "There’s something we need to talk about."
"Oh?"
"First off, you have to call the police on your father, Kaoru, it’s not right to let him walk around free."
If Kaoru wasn’t so upset he would’ve melted inside that Ryou called him by his first name. /How did he-? I never told him about-/ He crossed his arms over himself, as if putting up a barrier from letting anyone in. "How did you know it was my father?" He looked away, missing a look in Ryou’s eyes that seemed so foreign in them.
"I didn’t, but from one survivor to another, the evidence was pretty obvious." He looked away, his stance showing discomfort.
Kaoru gasped low as he looked up at the raven-haired with surprise. "Ryou-"
The teen looked at him with a hard scowl on his face. "It’s not something I also broadcast, either, Ichinose, and I only told you because I’ve been on that boat." He lifted his head to face the ceiling and closed his eyes. A harsh inhale and matching exhale was heard from him before he lowered his face and opened his eyes to glance at the blond with a softer, but still serious look. "Does he starve you also?"
"No, I would just forget from playing ‘The World’ all day and night." He looked away, uneasy. "And my mother doesn’t call me down anymore, so I wouldn’t know what time it is until I get so sleepy that I can’t keep my eyes open anymore."
Ryou nodded slightly in acknowledgement. "Why didn’t you call the police? Why did you find me?"
Kaoru was feeling more insecure. "Because you were the only one besides Mia who needed me."
Ryou rolled his eyes with a growl. "Come off it!" He pulled away from the counter and stepped to Kaoru. "Don’t you get it?! Only Endrance can have a game over, not you, Ichinose!"
The blond wilted away again, quickly backing away from between Ryou and the island on the raven-haired man’s left.
"Stop it- agh!" He was grabbed by his left arm and turned roughly to look into darkened brown eyes.
"Stop running!"
"You’re hurting me-" Kaoru began in a whimpering voice, feeling the very familiar pangs of horror that his mind became accustomed to. He tried pulling away from Ryou’s strong hold.
The teens’ eyes widen from memory of that same look tone of fear he once possessed. He felt that fear a long time ago. The lump in his chest plummeted into his bowels and he immediately snatched his hand away from Kaoru, as if he were blistering hot. Pangs of revulsion gurgled in his stomach, threatening to make him vomit. Suddenly the smell of stew was overpowering and he collapsed against the islander, huffing as light perspiration appeared on his temples.
Kaoru shrieked when Ryou collapsed against the islander and his fear from another beating immediately faded into fear for Ryou’s safety if the teen had fainted. He grabbed the younger man just before Ryou’s knees gave out under him. It would’ve resulted into the teen banging either his throat or chin against the edge of the islander.
But the teen proved to be too heavy for Kaoru to hold up and they both collapsed on their knees, jarring Kaoru for a moment of pain, to the floor with the raven-haired man against Kaoru’s thin chest, his face buried into him. Kaoru had held on for dear-life to Ryou, panting as if out of breath from trying not to fall against the islander himself.
Meanwhile Ryou knew what happened and pushed away feebly from the blond. They stared at each other, Ryou with mild confusion, Kaoru with held-back fear. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Ryou rubbed his eyes, fighting back tears of emotional overload. He had fought back those memories for so long and it took one man to bring them all back. He got on his wobbly feet, using the islander as a crutch.
Kaoru watched him carefully as he got up also. "Maybe you should-" He hesitated to place a hand on Ryou’s left shoulder.
"I’m fine." He knocked the hand away and continued stirring the soup with his back to the blond. "Sit down." From his stance he looked like nothing had happened within the last few minutes, and Kaoru could only nod to the back of Ryou’s head as he did as he was told. But unbeknownst to the blond man, Ryou’s hands were shaking uncontrollably as he kept them out of the Kaoru’s sight.
There was silence once again, except for the occasional soft scrapping of stainless steel-against-stainless steel sound from Ryou stirring.
/You have to call the police, Ichinose. For your sake and mine-/
"Do you remember when I looked for you to replace Alkaid?" Ryou suddenly asked.
Kaoru, in his own head, jerked from the sudden voice of the teen. "Hm? Yes, of course I do." He nodded to Ryou’s back.
"Do you remember what I told you?"
Not sensing where this was going, Kaoru played along. "I could never forget. You said you needed me to replace her in the fight against the infected Bordeaux when Sakaki gave her an AIDA seed."
Ryou sighed, "Well, this is almost the same thing." He stopped stirring and turned to face the blond who was sitting at the table. "Only your life here is in danger." He sighed while crossing his arms over his chest again. He looked at the floor, his face scrunched up as if it pained him to speak. /I have no idea where I’m going with this/ He sighed once more and looked at the blond with a softer face. "I need you, okay?"
Kaoru audibly gasped as he jumped out of his chair. "Haseo!"
Ryou suddenly blushed, realizing what he said, but pressed on. "I need you to be strong, Ichinose, against your father. Do that for me, okay?"
Unsure of where this was going, he was too happy to understand it. "Of course! I’ll do what you want me to do, Hase-I mean Ryou." He went to the raven-haired teen and pulled the man against him with surprising strength that made the teen grunt in surprise.
"Woah-woah! He said as he pushed Kaoru away. "Don’t get excited, that wasn’t a declaration of love or something sappy like that!"
The blond smile warmly. "It doesn’t matter, my heart still belongs to you, Ryou." He crossed his arms over his chest, feeling all warm and nice inside.
Ryou scoffed low in annoyance at Kaoru’s lovesick feelings of weirdness at him and rolled his eyes once more, this time in humor. "Fine-" Just then the timer went off, making Ryou sigh again. "We’ll talk more after we eat." He then went to the fridge and grabbed the dumplings to set them into the soup.
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They ate dinner with some small talk in between, neither one bringing up the conversation they had earlier. They didn’t talk after dinner though, just watched a movie in silence. They sat on opposite sides of the couch: Ryou with his legs wide open as he had his arms crossed over his chest; Kaoru with his legs tucked slightly under him on his left side and leaned on the arm of the sofa with a pillow on his lap. He absently played with a lock of hair in his right hand as his elbow rested on the sofa’s arm.
Meanwhile Ryou was on his fourth bottle of beer as Kaoru opted for drinking milk for the night. The raven-haired teen enjoyed his buzz. He even laid his head back and closed his eyes to listen to the movie, having already seen it several times before.
"Ryou?" The familiar wilting voice asked low after nearly five minutes of Ryou enjoying darkness.
"Hmm?" He asked without either opening his eyes or moving.
"I don’t know if I should bring this up… but-"
The teen could feel the hesitation and sighed. "Spit it out."
"Oh, yes, well… how did you get away? From your father, I mean."
Ryou smirked bitterly. "You want my life’s story, eh?"
Kaoru blushed, thankful that Ryou kept his eyes closed. "It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me."
But the raven-haired teen blew out air as he lifted his head and opened his eyes.
The blond did his best to cover his pink cheeks with a couch pillow.
"There’s nothing much to tell. I was sixteen and I ran away the night the cast was removed from my right leg."
"He broke your leg?" Kaoru asked in astonishment.
Ryou laughed a bit. "No, no. It was a skiing accident from a school trip. But my father had to show how much he hated paying for the medical bills, nonetheless." He then reached down for the the hem of his tank, but he lifted his hands up to Kaoru with hands splayed and palms towards him, in a ‘I surrender’ gesture.
"Look, I’m not coming on to you, or anything, just showing you my own scars."
The blond first felt a tick on his right eye, but the hint of annoyance dissolved when Ryou lifted his tank.
The teen exposed a very toned abdomen with a horrific slash of white scar tissue, nearly half a centimeter wide, going diagonal from left to right from Kaoru’s point of view, and over a foot long, spanning across said-abdomen.
Kaoru’s first reaction is complete shock. /I never got any that bad/ He had to cover his mouth or else he would’ve cried out in pain.
"Yeah, ugly little thing, huh?" Ryou asked casually as if showing a puppy, then slipped his tank back down over his abdomen. "It’s not as big as when it first healed, my mom’s sister insisted paying for the skin-graft surgeries, since dad told her that a dog attacked me." He sighed again as he relaxed against the couch again, closing his eyes. "So yeah, when my leg was fully healed I ran away and lived on the streets for a few weeks, taking baths in the river, stealing food from the displays on carts.
"I eventually got caught and would’ve been taken into custody had it not been for Saito-san, my current boss, who saw me stealing rice balls, and claimed me as her child, surprising as it was."
"Really? And she gave you a job at the restaurant?"
"Yes, she felt sorry for me, she told me she was just like me, only she ran from a drug-addicted parents who threatened to make her a prostitute if she got any fatter from eating only one bowl of rice a day."
"Oh," was all Kaoru could say. /And my life was tragic. Ryou, you were homeless!/ "So what happened to your father?" He suddenly asked.
There was that bitter smirk again. "Died of a heart attack two days after I ran away. I got news of it when I accidentally bumped into my mother nearly a year later."
"Oh," Kaoru said with sadness this time.
"It’s alright. I still talk to my mom, but not as a normal son would, you understand?"
"Yes." The blond nodded. While his father beat him up, his mother just sat back, afraid to intervene.
Suddenly the teen yawned low.
"Are you sleepy, Ryou? I can go to bed if you want."
"No, I’m fine." He lifted his head and opened his eyes. "I’ve seen this movie too many times to count. Plus I’m a little drunk." He pointed to the bottle on the coffee table.
"Oh, but don’t you have work tomorrow?"
Ryou laid his head back with his eyes closed. "It’s not until eleven."
"Well, if you’ve seen this movie, we can watch something else. I’m not following it."
He sighed in resignation. "Alright." He opened his eyes as he grunted lightly to get up, but fell promptly back on the couch due to sudden dizziness.
"Whoops," he said with a small chuckle.
"I can do it-" Kaoru began.
"No offense but you might break the DVD," Ryou interrupted and got up slowly again.
Kaoru looked away in slight embarrassment as the raven-haired teen stopped the disc-player, popped the movie disc out and put a in new one. "There. You might like this one. It even has a gay swordsman in it." Realizing what he said when he sat down, he froze, looked at Kaoru, who looked at him, then shook his head in his own disgust. "Never mind." He then lifted his long-sleeve over his head to expose a tight white tank under it and bulging muscles for a young adult.
Kaoru couldn’t help but stare as Ryou laid back with eyes closed again. He took in every curve of muscle, every vein, every dip. His eyes gazed upward at Ryou’s Adam’s Apple as it bobbed from him swallowing reflexively. Then as he was taking in his face-
"Quit staring at me. I told you I hate that."
Kaoru blushed at being caught and looked back at the screen. "Sorry."
Ryou cracked his right open and Kaoru. "Look man, I appreciate the flattery, but I don’t swing that way, as I said before."
"I know, I remember." Kaoru sounded a bit sad.
Ryou rolled his eyes as they were closed and sighed. "Whatever." He opened them up and got up slowly again to go to the kitchen to get another bottle of beer since the one on the coffee table was empty.
Kaoru had his eyes on the screen but his ears followed Ryou the entire time. /This movie I can’t get into either when you’re walking around with a shirt like that/
Ryou came back and flopped on the couch again; unbeknownst to himself he had fallen closer to Kaoru to where he was in the middle. He popped the bottle open and took a few large gulps of alcohol before exhaling a rather large belch.
Kaoru made a face in disgust.
Ryou didn’t apologize and watched the screen.
"So when did you find out you were gay?" Ryou asked suddenly.
"What?!" Kaoru asked with slight indignity in his tone.
"It’s a simple question, Ichinose. When did you realize?"
"I don’t know what you’re talking about."
Ryou sighed as if he had a heavy burden on him. "Well, do you think I am?"
Kaoru’s eyes widened slightly, sensing dangerous ground Ryou was leading him to. "No."
"Really? Because that’s what Chigusa- Atoli as you know her- told me when she broke up with me."
This took Kaoru’s interest. "I would never have guessed."
"Well, I mean she didn’t outright say that I must be gay, but she hinted around it in her prissy, delicate way, you know?"
"Ah." the blond said when he had nothing to say.
"Yeah, she said, now if I can remember this straight…" He then cleared his throat. "‘Haseo-‘," he began in a high-pitched voice, trying to sound like Atoli. Kaoru smiled lightly. "’I think we need to come clean and realize that we each need to go our own separate paths. While I believe you to be a sweet and kind person underneath that hard exterior, I think I’m not the girl for you. Come to think of it I don’t think any girl is right for you right now, because you can be so crude and mean’." His voice then deepened back to normal but took on a harsh tone. "God, what a bitch!" He took another swallow of beer.
"Well, I don’t think she meant that you might be gay. It maybe just meant that you’re not ready to date girls. She meant you need some growing up."
"That’s what I thought. But get this!" He then takes another swig. "She also said-" He threw his pitch higher again. "Let’s face it Haseo, when you’re with the other guys you feel at home with them. With girls like Shino and me, you just don’t know how to act."
"That can mean that you loved both of them and have a hard time showing your feelings."
"Waitwaitwait, not done!" Ryou finished his beer, and then he belched before making his voice go high again. "’The only girl you’re comfortable with is Alkaid, and I don’t even know if she’s a girl in real life!"
Kaoru’s eyes widen slightly in shock and Ryou saw the look.
"Uh-huh, told you." He got up but fell back in the couch. "God damnit!" He got up slowly this time. And went into the kitchen. This time Kaoru followed close behind him.
"So she called you ‘gay’, what’s the big deal?" He asked as Ryou got another beer.
Ryou closed the door of the fridge. "Well, it’s not for you, but I’m not." He opened the bottle and took a sip.
"How do you know unless you haven’t tried?"
"So you have?" Ryou asked coyly as he leaned against the fridge.
The blond blushed. "No, I’ve never-" He stopped, watching Ryou take a few sips of beer. "I think you should stop."
Ryou smirked sideways. "And what are young going to do about it?" It was a harmless question, but something in Ryou’s eyes made Kaoru think twice about what he was going to answer back.
The blond instead lifted an eyebrow, then went back to the couch without another word.
Ryou stayed in the kitchen and sat on the counter, drinking his beer alone.
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The alarm blared in Ryou’s ear, startling him but not enough for him to open his eyes. With an annoyed groan he reached into the air and slammed his hand on the offending device, silencing it. He felt incredibly warm. It was very nice.
Suddenly his heavy and soft blanket stirred and grunted low.
Ryou’s eyes snapped open. "Kao-!" And that’s when the blinding pain came. "Grahh!" He sat up, knocking Kaoru’s form off him and grabbed his head between his hands.
"I told you to stop drinking last night," the blond said matter-of-factly. He got up and went promptly to the bathroom, now used to living in another’s apartment.
Ryou squinted despite the pain with a low growl in his throat. /Another nightmare, eh?/ Letting that go, Ryou slowly got up and made his way to the kitchen to drink three full glasses of water. On his second one, he realized he had morning wood. "Great, don’t you go gay on me, man," he mumbled to his throbbing member.
"Are you talking to someone, Ryou?" Kaoru asked as he came around the corner of the livingroom to enter the kitchen.
The raven-haired teen blushed furiously as he quickly turned his back to the blond. "Don’t eavesdrop, it’s rude!"
"Oh." Kaoru stopped short from entering the kitchen now. "Well, can I play ‘The World’? I haven’t played since the night before."
Ryou couldn’t help but smirk. "A feat for you, even. Yeah, go ahead." He waited for Kaoru to leave when he turned back around and adjusted his erection in the confines of his boxer-briefs. "Go down!" He whispered furiously at it.
/Okay, think of something disgusting. Uh… Gaspard in a bikini!-No! Too disgusting. I might loose my dick after that image! Um… com’on! Pi and Yata kissing! Yeah-Ack! Damnit!/ He grabbed his eyes and grunted from the mental picture overloading his still-hung-over mind. /Go away!/ The pink-haired barely-dressed woman and bald-tanned man wiped away from his mind, making him relax again. He readjusted for the third time, finding a hard place to sit his erection in his boxer-briefs.
"Ryou I can’t get the connection-" Kaoru began as he came back into the kitchen, but stopped dead when he caught sight of the teen fondling himself. "-started."
Ryou could die of embarrassment right now. It would save him a lot of trouble. His cheeks blushed so red he swore he could hear them sizzle. /Great fucking timing, Endrance-/ But then the embarrassment turned right into anger. /How dare he look at me like I’m a piece of meat!/
"Hey!" He barked, having the blond look at him in the eyes instead of below his waist. "It’s called ‘morning wood’. All guys, including you, get it."
"I know that-" Kaoru began, now ashamed and looked away. "I’m sorry. Forgive me."
Grumbling, Ryou walked past him back into the livingroom, ignoring his second brain as it swayed and bobbed from the tempo of his steps, and sat promptly down on the floor in front of his computer. "What’s wrong now?"
"Um, an error came up when I tried to connect to the Internet," Kaoru answered softly behind him, still ashamed of looking at Ryou like that.
The teen ignored it and clicked on the icon that would connect his computer. A window came up immediately after that. "Shit! I forgot to pay the bill!" He hissed and got up. He went into the bedroom to slip on a pair of jeans and sneakers.
Kaoru now sat on the edge of the roll-out bed, fighting to get that image of Ryou’s tented underwear out of his head.
"Just, get some breakfast. There’s a bank down the street and my cellphone’s in the shop. I’ll be back." He heard the teen say and there was the slam of a door.
Now alone, Kaoru exhaled breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. /Oh my-/ The blond man couldn’t stop his idle left hand from reaching into his borrowed boxers and fondle his own hard-on. /Maybe I am gay/ It only took a few deliberate strokes for him to squirt all over the front of the boxers, just from the mental image he had seen in person not more than a few minutes ago. Panting while in euphoria (a place he very rarely went to) he fell back on the bed. He stared up at the ceiling with eyes boring through it. /My infatuation with Haseo is becoming something more-/
He suddenly sat up with a gasp in horror. He then looked down at the mess he made on Ryou’s boxers. /Damn! He’s going to find out!/
Quickly getting up and removing his pajamas he tossed them in the hamper on the balcony next to the washing machine then ran right into the shower.
Ryou came back home a few minutes later, panting from running both to the bank and back. The cold had killed his erection and he sighed out in relief. /Gonna have to take care of that when I have some private time/
"Kaoru? I paid the bill and you can go on now!" He called out, then realized he could hear water running from his bathroom. "Oh." He sat down on the edge of the roll-out bed, almost where Kaoru was sitting earlier. He ran his fingers through his thick black hair. /What do I care if he saw my morning wood? He’s a guy, he understands it happens and we have no control over them… but he’s a guy who loves Haseo, which is me/ He stared down at the floorboards but his gaze went through them. /So is this how every morning is going to be like? Waking up with him as either a pillow or blanket? Morning wood randomly and having him stare at it like it’s a rare treasure?/ He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair again. /I can’t do it. It’s too… gay… but I can’t kick him out. No one else lives close around me for him to live with until I get this settled between him and his father-/
A door opening awoke him from his thoughts and he turned his head towards the hallway to see the lithe blond rubbing down his hair nonchalantly with a towel as another wrapped around his thin waist. The bruises and scraps were still present, but they’re fading, revealing creamy skin that hasn’t seen the light of day for a long time. There was even a reddish tint from the heat of the water pelting it.
Ryou ran his eyes down the body, admiring first of Kaoru taking all those beatings, then the muscular area around his arms, lower legs, faint traces of abdominal muscles, and barely any pectoral muscles.
Suddenly Kaoru felt like he was being watched and turned his head, gasping when he hadn’t realized Ryou was already home. He covered his chest with the towel he was using for his hair. "I’m sorry! I didn’t realize you were home already! Forgive me for using the shower again!"
Ryou smirked low while watching the man bow slightly and his cheeks were flushed slightly, but then caught himself and shook his head slightly with a sound of clearing his throat. "It’s alright, Ichinose. I’ll get you some clothes again and I’ll do laundry before I leave-" He started to get up when Kaoru interrupted him.
"Oh let me!"
That stopped Ryou and he gave the blond a questioning look. "You know how to-"
"I can learn. But let me. It’s the least I can do!" Kaoru tried to give a convincing smile, but smiles weren’t his thing.
Ryou raised his right eyebrow and the same corner of his mouth in disbelief. "Fine. I’ll show you." He headed outside to the balcony.
The balcony was glassed in and the insulation is barely over a year-old, so Kaoru didn’t freeze when he joined Ryou on it.
The teen gave the instructions on working the machines, measuring the detergent and fabric softener, then had Kaoru relay everything back to him, making sure the older man had paid attention.
Kaoru almost got distracted when Ryou bent down to open the dryer drawer and show him how know if it stops working, and random naughty images came up, making the blond flush and curse his brain.
"Alright? You’ve got it?" Ryou asked.
Kaoru nodded for what felt like the twentieth time to the teen. /I may be naïve but I’m not stupid, cutie-cutie? Since when do I say that?/
"I’ll go make us some breakfast, since you didn’t listen to me earlier."
"About what?"
Ryou rolled his eyes for what felt like the hundredth time this past couple of days to the blond. "Like I said." Ryou went into the apartment with a shake of his head, leaving the blond staring at the back of his head with a questioning look.
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It was after noon and Ryou had already left for work. Kaoru had been in ‘The World’ for only an hour and he already felt exhausted after going on a quest at the request of Saku. Don’t get him wrong, the monsters were at level 132 while he and Saku were at 150, they were no problem, so it puzzled him why he was exhausted.
"Master En! Here, I brought you some restoring drops!" The whiney girl-voice exclaimed in enthusiasm as said-blonde girl handed him several small icons shaped into 3-D hexagonal containers, colored leafy-green and sparkling.
"Oh, thank you… Saku." He took them gently and added them to his inventory in his small violet pouch that matched his outfit. He absently flicked a lock of hair from his face, getting several girly swoons around him in reaction.
It had come to his attention that all movement that was female-related had stopped the second he had entered Breg Epona’s shopping district. Eyes were all over him, which he was used to, because he simply ignored them.
"Oh, Master En! If you are so tired you should have told me and I would’ve taken care of those monsters for you!" Saku beamed with fingers tangled together from her hands together at her chest in a lovesick idol-worship stance.
/She seems unfazed to Ryou attacking her yesterday/ Endrance thought. /Come to think of it, it’s not like her to not bring up Haseo and a vile comment rolling off her tongue towards him.
"Saku, do you remember being with Bo yesterday?" He asked suddenly with interest.
She simply sighed at having his attention focused on her. "Oh, Master En! Of course I do! I heard you laughing and I couldn’t resist hugging you!"
"So, you remember Ry-I mean, Haseo attacking you?" He crossed his arms over his chest, getting more sighs and swoons of glee from the female onlookers.
Blue eyes looked up at him in perplexing-confusion, then reverted to annoyance. She crossed his arms over her budding chest with a stance of annoyance also. "Ha! Haseo attacking me!? Never! I would Vak Dom his annoying ass to next Tuesday!-" Then as quick as a light flicking on, her annoyed stance quickly bled into pleading as she clasped her hands together under her chin and a pleading look plastered her character’s face. "But, I would never hurt Haseo, not in a million years, Master En! You made me promise to leave him alone, and I’ve been a good little girlfriend for you!"
He sighed and flicked some locks back from his face again, once more having a chorus of sighs, giggles, and small gasps of excitement around him. "Saku, for the last time-"
Her gasp in excitement interrupted him. "I know, Master En! We can go on an even lower-level area. I know just the place!" She suddenly grabbed his hand and dragged him towards the direction the Chaos Gate would be.
"S-Saku!" He exclaimed from the sudden jerk of movement.
"Don’t grab Master En like that!" A girl cried out from the crowd of twenty-or-thirty females of all shapes and sizes that had surrounded both he and Saku. The ring parted when the blond girl lead him out.
"Saku, I can walk-"
"I found it yesterday and wouldn’t you believe it! There’s an area that grows beautiful rose bushes! Not just red, yellow, white and pink like in the real world, but blue, black, and purple also! I forgot all about it!" She explained in her usual fast-talk when she got excited.
They arrived at the Chaos Gate and she scrolled through the words in the three slots. She then sounded them out when she found the words she wanted.
"Sigma-Gleaming-Placating-Thorns! Those are the area words, Master En!" She then stood back as the familiar portal of white and sky-blue bled through thin air, appearing magically. She waited anxiously for Endrance step through.
/Well, it couldn’t hurt, I do love roses/ He then stepped through with her following-
The sinking feeling of being transported was a dull thrum through his body, but it would always be there.
Endrance then opened his eyes to a field area with grass, an ocean with a beach shore, bird calling, and a even a soft wind to stir his silver gleaming hair.
"Com’on Master En! They’re this way!" She grabbed his hand again, jerking him uncomfortably since she was practically three-quarters his height.
*******************************************************************************
Meanwhile, back in Breg Epona, Haseo transported onto the platform. He was dressed this time in his second form, favoring it for the moment.
"Hey, it’s Haseo!" A random male character called out, having passerby’s cheer at his arrival. He blushed slightly with a soft wave. /I’ll never get used to that./
"Oh! Haseo hey!" He heard the familiar squeaky voice of Gaspard before the orange beast character waddled up. He stopped short of jumping on Haseo with excitement like he usually did. Instead he looked down while scratching his head, nervous. "H-How are you?"
Haseo mentally rolled his eyes, remembering his behavior yesterday. "I’m fine, Gaspard. I said I was sorry to Iori, you saw it."
"Oh." He then looked up and gave a cheerful smile. "So where are you going? I was going to find some people to go on an adventure with."
"Uh, well," Haseo ran his fingers through his silver hair. "You didn’t happen to see Endrance around, did you? I need to talk to him."
"Oh, um, no, actually-"
"Oh, I saw him, Haseo!" A female character exclaimed nearby, having both Haseo and Gaspard turn to look at a female beast character as tell as Haseo. She was a cat-type beast with purple and green warrior clothes. "That awful Saku dragged poor Master En off before I could fend him for myself!" She said in a pathetic lovesick voice.
"Where?"
"To the Chaos Gate! She said something about rose bushes! Can you imagine it?! An area with rose bushes!? At least I think that’s where she was taking him."
Haseo looked at her with confusion. "Rose bushes?" He then looked at Gaspard to see if he had heard right.
"Uh, I don’t know any area that has- Wait! Yes I do! Now that I think about it, Kuhn sent me an email me once that he had taken some girl to an area where rose bushes grow instead of wild flowers." He looked down sadly again. "She wasn’t impressed though from what he told me." He then perked up. "But he said I should take Mai there one time."
"You remember the words?" Haseo asked.
"Hold on, let me look at my inventory." Gaspard face then took on a blank look, familiar to everyone in "The World" that the player was away from the character at the moment.
Haseo suddenly remembered the female beast was still standing by. "Oh, thank you!" He bowed politely to her, having her "hmph!" in annoyance for waiting impatiently to be thanked.
The silver-haired warrior mentally rolled his eyes again as Gaspard’s blank look came back to life.
"Oh-kay! The area words are ‘Sigma-Gleaming-Placating-Thorns."
"Thanks, Gaspard." He said and scrolled down the three-word catalogue.
"No problem, I do what I can! See ya later, Haseo!" He waved with a giant hand then bounded off towards the shopping district.
Bringing up the right area words, a portal of blue and white appeared out of thin air. When it was big enough, Haseo stepped through-
*******************************************************************************
"See, Master En? Aren’t they just beauuuuutiful?!" Saku exclaimed as she stepped gingerly between each thorny wild bush that grew to twice Endrance’s height and the expanded nearly big enough that created walls.
"Yes, they are," Endrance said low in surprise. Blooms as big as two of his hands cupped together, he could practically smell the intoxicating aroma that should be in the wind as it stirred up his hair again.
She was right: red, white, yellow, and pink roses grew around, but other colors of the rainbow existed also in their area. Lime green, aquamarine, tangerine, even gold-colored roses shimmered in the sunlight. It was like walking in a dream garden that had been left unattended for several years.
"Yeah, I overheard that pervert Kuhn talking about this area and I had to tell you. Aren’t you proud of me!?" She leaned up on her toes to sniff a bloom of robin’-egg-blue, mimicking real life. "You can almost smell them, can’t you?"
Endrance cupped an enchanting indigo colored-rose in full-bloom, the petal shimmered like liquid velvet, entrancing him. "Yes-"
"Endrance!"
The silver-haired man literally jumped, not expecting that voice for another several hours, and accidentally crushed the bloom in his hands. "Oh!" He gasped in shock and relaxed his hands-
((()))
Kaoru lifted the visor off his head and looked around the livingroom, seeing no sign of the raven-haired teen.
"Endrance!" He heard the voice again, finding it was coming from the speakers of Ryou’s M2D.
"He’s online?" He slipped the visor back on-
((()))
Endrance turned around ‘til he saw Haseo running up to him.
"Ry-Haseo?" He asked in confusion. "What are you doing here?"
"Oh! How did he get here?!" Sake exclaimed in dismay.
"Um, is it okay if we talk for a moment?" Haseo asked glanced sideways at Saku, signaling that what needed to be said had to be in private.
Endrance slowly caught on. "Oh! Oh, yes." He then turned to the blond little girl. "Saku, would you mind-"
"Oh!" She said, infuriated and stomped off with her nose held up high a few meters from them.
Endrance turned to Haseo rubbing fingers through his silver hair, a familiar thing he was used to seeing Ryou do now. "What is it, Haseo?"
"Um, well, I was letting you know that a girl at work asked if I could go to a club with her and a few friends, like a quadruple-date of sorts. I was going with them after I get off work, but I’m stopping by to get some clothes."
"Oh," Endrance’s heart plummeted. "T-that’s okay. Thank you for le-letting me know."
Haseo’s brows furrowed. "You’re not upset are you? Did you want to do something tonight?"
"No!" Endrance shook his head, fighting the tears back. "No, it’s nothing! Um, is it fine if I order Chinese food then? I have some money left over when I came to your apartment."
"Of course. Call Ming-Loa, I have their number on the fridge. Great dumplings."
Endrance nodded, having nothing to comment on that. He then crossed his arms over his body, shielding himself from bursting into tears. /You know he’s never going to be into you./ "So how did you get here?"
"Oh, the boss let’s me use the office computer, since she pretty much freaked when she realized I was ‘The Haseo’." The teen made quotation marks when he emphasized his character name. "It’s just in case another crises involving AIDA ever comes up."
"Oh," Endrance nodded, sounding at least interested in the topic, but inside he was twisting and writhing in agony.
"Haseo," He said suddenly, sounding very serious. "Who is this girl?"
"My boss?"
"No, the one you’re taking out."
"Well, she doesn’t play ‘The World’, if that’s what you’re asking." Haseo then crossed his arms over his chest.
Endrance then tucked his left arm around his chest with his hand in the crook of his underarm as his right extended slightly to turn his right hand palm up. "No, what I meant was, do you trust her well enough to trust her friends? I’m assuming they don’t work where both of you are at."
Haseo smirked. "Look, Endrance. I can see you’re jealous-"
That made the taller man’s cheeks blush. "Excuse me?"
Haseo waved his hands in defeat. "It’s alright. I’m flattered, once again, but you need to lay off."
Endrance’s eyes widened as his manicured eyebrows rose nearly to his scalp. "How rude!" In sudden annoyance that he hadn’t felt towards the teen ever since their first encounter he stormed off and slapped Haseo’s willing hand away when the man tried to stop him.
"Hey!" Haseo backed up, almost having been run over by the pissed-off Blade Brandier.
"Master En!" Saku shrieked out as she ran after him like a lost puppy.
The taller man made it to the Chaos Gate and warped without hesitation.
Saku, on the other hand, turned to Haseo and using her right index finger, pulled down her right cheek enough to show her eye while sticking her tongue out at him. She then smiled sweetly and warped.
Haseo was left to himself, surprised yet annoyed at Endrance’s reaction at being called ‘jealous’. He ran his fingers through his hair again. "Okay, why did that upset me more than it should?" He crossed his arms over his chest.
He then tsked in annoyance when he couldn’t find the answer he was looking for, and went to the Chaos Gate to warp out of the area.
((()))
Ryou logged out and sat back in the office chair at Saito-san’s desk, clutching his chest. He had grabbed it suddenly from his lungs suddenly losing air when Endrance shoved his hand away because Haseo tried to stop the man and calm him down.
"Damnit!" This was pissing him off more than it should. Normally if it was Alkaid or even Atoli, he would just write it off as ‘PMS’, but he knew for a fact that End-Ichinose wasn’t a girl, or a woman for that matter.
/So he’s just jealous that I’m going out with a girl. So what?/
Something in the back of his head was nagging him, and damned him that he couldn’t decipher it.
"Me and my big mouth. It gets me in more trouble than I’m worth." He sat up straight. "What am I saying? Who the fuck am I? Some weepy little girl?" He shoved away from the desk with more force than necessary and forgot the chair was on wheels, so he went flying across the office and slammed into something solid that knocked him to the floor.
"Ow…" He held his forehead as it was what hit the floor first, and the door to Saito-san’s office swung open with said-woman herself coming in.
"What the Hell are you doing, Misaki?! Trying to break my furniture?!" She exclaimed.
"Forgive me, I forgot the chair was on wheels," He said truthfully as he crawled onto his feet.
&&TO BE CONTINUED…&&
Wow. I wish I were a real writer so that I can go "Ha! I had the planned all along!" Not bad for on the spot, huh? Only took me two days. Hope you liked Masuda-san!!
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