Loveless, Ritsuka/Soubi

[white_aster]

Title: Id
Author: White Aster
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Submissive and very messed-up headspace.
Word count: 1062
Summary: Soubi's never felt like he's earned Ritsuka's trust. Prompt: Trust issues - Soubi trying to prove himself

Author's Notes: Set sometime in a nebulous future!AU where Ritsuka is legal and things work out and they stay together.

-------------

Ritsuka is walking in front of him, smiling, his ears and tail high and happy. He has a bandage wrapped around his left hand, a bandaid on his right forearm, a slight yellow bruise on his left cheekbone. He is looking to the left, watching something to the side of the path they're on. Soubi thinks that it might be a small animal on the grass.

The wind blows through their hair. Soubi smiles slightly.

Kill him.

Soubi's smile falters.

I order you to kill him.

The voice was Seimei's....or was it? Soubi wasn't sure.

Ritsuka knelt down, oblivious, deaf to the voice, one hand on his knees, the other tossing crackers to the squirrel that chittered uncertainly at him.

Kill him, Soubi. Kill him. Kill him.

It was Seimei. And Ritsu-sensei. And Tomo. And Kou. And Mariko. And Haname. And every master that Soubi could remember, and some he knew that he didn't. The chorus echoed in his head, drowning out thought. That was good, wasn't it? Not having to think? All he had to do was follow orders....

But...no.... Ritsuka....

KILL HIM.

Soubi didn't want to. He tried to fight, muscles clenching against the bones in resistance. But his hands weren't his own, had never been his own, would never be his own, reaching out for Ritsuka, and Ritsuka looked up at him, smiling, trusting, just as Soubi's hands closed around his neck and started to squeeze--

"SOUBI, WAKE UP DAMMIT!"

Soubi dropped into wakefulness like a tub of cold water. It left him gasping, sweating, blinking in the light from the bedside lamp. His shin hurt, and it took him a moment to realize that it was because Ritsuka had kicked him.

Ritsuka was frowning at him, squinting in the light. "What the hell was that?"

"I'm...sorry I woke you." Soubi closed his eyes, until his heart stopped pounding. Until he stopped expecting to hear that demanding chorus of masters any second. Just a dream. Just a dream....

"Woke me? I thought someone was dying."

Soubi's eyes flew open, going to Ritsuka's throat. No marks, red or bruised or otherwise. "I...I didn't...attack you, did I?"

"What?" Ritsuka looked up from where he was trying to wrestle some order into the twisted bedclothes. Soubi wasn't entirely used to Ritsuka giving him that look without his ears. It wasn't quite the same without Ritsuka's ears flattened irritably on top of his head. "Attack me? No. Why, what were you dreaming about?"

Soubi closed his eyes and shook his head as he laid back. No. He wouldn't say it. Words had power. If he didn't say them, they wouldn't be real.

Ritsuka sighed and reached over to turn off the light again. He settled back down next to Soubi, and it only took a few seconds for his fingers to worm their way over to Soubi's. "You ok?"

Soubi drew Ritsuka's hand up, until it was flat against his chest, over his heart. He rolled towards Ritsuka, until he could curl next to him, until he could smell Ritsuka's salty-clean smell. "Do you trust me?"

He felt Ritsuka's sigh against his face. "I hate it when you ask that, Soubi, you know that."

"Do you?" Soubi breathed. "Do you trust me?"

"YES. Idiot." Ritsuka bumped their noses together. "You were dreaming about me, weren't you? You kept calling my name, saying you didn't want to hurt me--"

Soubi stopped the words with a kiss. Ritsuka tasted like sunshine and toothpaste, but he wouldn't be distracted, letting the kiss go on for a moment before pulling back. "Soubi. Listen to me. Dreams are just dreams. They don't mean anything." He squeezed Soubi's hand, pulling it up to his own chest. "I know that you won't hurt me. I trust you. We've been through this. I know."

"Do you? Sometimes I think that I don't deserve it. Like I'm a loaded gun for anyone to point, a weapon for anyone to--"

"Shut up," Ritsuka hissed, pressing his fingers to Soubi's lips. "Don't say that. Don't EVER say that."

Soubi couldn't stop, though. It was like a boil being lanced. "If one of the others showed up. One of them that I've served. One of those that weren't there and you've never seen. If they came back, if they gave me an order...."

Ritsuka's breath changed in the dark. "Would you follow it?"

"I...don't know."

Ritsuka's fingers carded through Soubi's damp hair, gentle and worried and thoughtful. "What about if I order you not to? Do my orders override theirs? If I ordered you not to...would that work?"

Soubi thought about that. His mind, his conscience, the do's and don'ts of so many masters, laid like a webwork of steel on his mind. "Yes."

Ritsuka moved closer, skin warm against Soubi's under the covers. "Then I order you to never take orders from anyone but me." He paused, as if thinking. "And...and if I can't give you orders because I'm hurt or...I can't...then I order you to do what you think is best."

Soubi felt the tension in the back of his mind, tension he hadn't even known that was there, the ground the nightmare had sprung from, fade and fade even more into nothing.

"How's...how's that?" Ritsuka tilted his head to look at Soubi in the dark.

Yes. Yes, that was what had been missing. A silly thing. A small thing. But Soubi was made up of things like that. "Yes." Soubi nuzzled into Ritsuka's neck, nibbling on his earlobe contentedly. "Yes."

"Good. Can we go to sleep now?"

"Do you want to sleep?" Soubi ran his tongue up the edge of Ritsuka's ear.

"Soubiiii." Ritsuka thumped his hand against Soubi's shoulder, twitching his ear out of tongue-reach. "Yes, sleep. I've got to be up early for work, and so do you."

"All right. Good night, Ritsuka."

"Good night, Soubi." A soft, butterfly kiss, and then Ritsuka turned away to curl into his own pillow.

Soubi stayed where he was, his eyes slipping shut, something like peace pulsing warmly in his chest. He couldn't trust himself, after all, but he could trust Ritsuka. And someday, maybe, he would prove himself worthy of everything that Ritsuka gave him so generously.

For now, though, he drew Ritsuka's faith around him like a blanket, and the last shreds of the nightmare faded to nothing behind his eyes.

Comments

[kispexi2.livejournal.com]

OMG. Ouch. And sigh. And that was GREAT. You have such a wonderfully convincing way with Soubi. And the writing is lovely too. I liked the cold bath awakening and Ritsuka tasting of sunshine and toothpaste. You do a good Ritsuka too. He's so gently commanding and responsible and competent.

Do you have any more Loveless stories? Is there a decent comm on LJ you'd rec?

[white_aster]

Glad you liked! :) I'm glad that I can do Soubi convincingly, as he's just such an alien mindset that I sometimes have trouble getting a hold on him. And my Ritsuka, I know, is less flaily and more adult than most, so I'm glad that he seems in-character.

I don't write much Loveless, but I've got at least one other story under my Loveless tag. Sorry, can't help you with comms, as I don't follow them much. Lazulisong does some good Loveless, too, but she doesn't fic them too much. I think I inherited my Loveless muses from her, though.

[kispexi2.livejournal.com]

I don't write much Loveless, but I've got at least one other story under my Loveless tag.

Well, that's a darn shame! :-) I'd read the other fic a day or so ago and thought it was excellent too.

[cloudednine.livejournal.com]

Ooh, this is really good. I agree, ouch. Poor Soubi. I really like the way you've shown the way Ritsuka and Soubi have managed to work out a relationship, though, despite the problems.

[white_aster]

Thank you! I'm glad you liked. I have trouble wrangling Soubi, because it's hard to get across just how broken he is and still allow him to be functional. :)

Ritsuka and Soubi's relationship = 1 part affection + 1 part lust + 2 parts slapping emotional bandaids on each other's particular psychological problems. :)

[white_aster]

Thanks! I'm glad you liked it! :) Poor Soubi, his head's such a mess of old orders.

[marokura.livejournal.com]

Oooh, lovely. I love the dream mindset, the way you've described the scene and the voices, as if two separate realities are occurring at once. It seemed like dream-RL was in slow motion while the voices were chanting for him to harm Ritsuka.

Love the subtle implication of Ritsuka having no ears - and the image of them with him flattened is just too cute. XD

A silly thing. A small thing. But Soubi was made up of things like that.

Love it.

[white_aster]

Thank you! :) I'm glad that the dream worked for you, and the rest of it, too. Soubi can be a pain to write, but I thought that I did a pretty good job with him this time. :)

[orvida.livejournal.com]

Aw you done it again. You have a brilliant way of writing soubi and ritsuka that i can truly understand even through i'm new to the loveless series. And i must ad mitt very few writers can captured the characters soul such as you seem to with this story. Soubi having a nightmare in which he is ordered to kill ritsuka and ritsuka having the fore sight to order soubi to disregard, all future, and present order from former masters.

[white_aster]

Thank you! I'm glad you liked it. :)