Shonen Onmyouji - Reaching Out - June 3rd

[macavitykitsune.livejournal.com]

Reaching out

Author: macavitykitsune
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Pairings: none
Prompt:  June 3rd: Shounen Onmyouji, Guren/Mini!Masahiro: Babysitting - "Masahiro! That's not food!"

Summary: They say that to live in the present, you have to let go of the past. Somehow, he's done without that. 

 

 

 

The first time Guren babysat Masahiro was something of an accident (or so he thought at the time) – Seimei simply handed him the baby and told him ‘Here, take him for a second,’ and went back to reading his scroll. 

He didn’t quite know how to hold him with his claws, so he laid the baby down on the wooden floor and looked at him. The baby stared back with large, curious eyes, sucking its thumb contemplatively.

Guren winced, closed his eyes and waited for the ear-piercing wailing to begin. All the children of Seimei’s household reacted that way – in fact, everyone did; Taiin still hid behind Genbu whenever she saw him coming and she wasn’t even human.

After a couple of minutes, he peeked an eye open.

The baby was fast asleep.

Curious, he reached over and prodded lightly at its swaddling cloth with a delicate claw-tip; there was no reaction.

‘He’s not crying,’ Guren said aloud, mildly surprised.

‘If you want to see him cry so badly, you can poke him,’ Seimei suggested wryly.

Guren gave him a Look and phased out of the room.

A few weeks after that, there was the Lake Incident, as it came to be known – and Guren had saved him. (It didn’t help that Seiryuu should have been on duty at the time, had he not been called away by Seimei for just a moment  – the shiki regarded Guren’s intervention as some sort of underhanded attempt to curry favour with Seimei. Not that Guren cared, or Seimei.)

Guren hauled him out of the water’s edge unceremoniously, and Masahiro squawked indignantly as his reflection – and the water demon which had been casting it – were ripped away from him. It would upset the boy, but Guren had to do it, and he sent a short burst of flame into the water, incinerating the threat even as he moved quickly away from the lake and plopped Masahiro down on the fresh green grass.

Masahiro looked vaguely bewildered; apparently things were moving too fast for him. He looked at Guren, the water, Guren, and then stared some more.

Then he apparently reached some sort of decision, because he giggled, smiled and held out his hands.

For a long moment, Guren couldn’t even move. That smile had burned deep down into him like a new kind of fire, pure and joyous, sparking something in his soul that he had gone without for so long that he had even stopped noticing its absence.

And then Masahiro reached out, fearlessly, tiny frail human hand on lethal shiki claws, and it was insane, but he could feel tears welling up in his eyes as he gently closed his talons and fingers around it. Masahiro smiled again and reached out - to be picked up, Guren thought, and panicked slightly even as he opened his arms to gather him in.

Of course, that was when he sensed Seiryuu phasing in. He quickly stepped back, and Masahiro made a tiny noise of disapproval as he found himself alone again.

 

 

Seimei noticed, of course. The old fox noticed everything, Guren had learned, and the more inconvenient it was the quicker he noticed it. So it was only two days later that he announced that Guren would be taking over all duties relating to Masahiro.

The other Shinshou objected strongly. Their arguments ranged from He’s completely incompetent (Suzaku) to He’s too dangerous (Seiryuu) to He’s too scary (Taiin), but the clincher seemed to be that everyone thought that Masahiro wouldn’t like being around Touda.

So Seimei told Tsuyuki to fetch him, and Masahiro toddled unerringly past the other shikigami right to Guren where he was sitting in the corner, growing more uncomfortable by the second.

At that point, the discussion ended.

Which was how he found himself spending more and more time around the little boy; Seimei never called him to battle and none of the Shinshou even talked to him except Kou, who was never around much. He learnt the basics quickly – never let him out of your sight, never let him explore the kitchen, the garden, the road outside, never let him near horses or large animals, or fire, or water, or mud, because it goes everywhere. He didn’t see what exactly Masahiro could do which didn’t involve one of these, but he nodded dutifully and let the child do exactly what he liked as long as it was safe, because he cried when Guren pulled him away from something and Guren found it painful when he did that, and not just to his eardrums.

Masahiro had his hyperactive spells, where he raced all over the grounds like a little missile, doing nothing in particular, and Guren followed him, invisible, but there were other moments too, when all he wanted was to cuddle up to something (usually Guren) and go to sleep. It was slightly uncomfortable, but he slowly became accustomed to having Masahiro curled in a warm sleepy ball in his arms, or under his sash. On the more peaceful days, he’d nod off himself with Masahiro in his arms, back against a tree and the wind in his hair.

Today was like that; the sun was blazing hot and Masahiro had tired quickly. They were under a tree in the garden, and Guren found himself humming quietly as Masahiro tossed mud and grass around and talked to himself; getting his clothes dirty, but Guren could wash them quietly later so no one would know he had been playing.

There was a momentary alarm when a clod of mud came suspiciously close to being eaten, but Guren flicked it neatly out of his fingers with a talon. ‘Masahiro, that’s not food!’ he said reprovingly.

Masahiro’s face screwed up into what was possibly the beginning of a howl, and Guren reacted quickly, picking him up, tossing him into the air and catching him on the way down. It was something Masahiro loved, and he laughed and laughed as he flew up and down, throwing his arms wide and grinning, until he sighed happily and burrowed into Guren’s chest like a little animal.

They didn’t talk much, either of them, Guren thought, leaning back against the tree and looking at Masahiro, sleeping peacefully. Of course, Masahiro couldn’t really talk yet and he didn’t know what to say to a baby, so that was probably natural, not that he knew much about all that. But he found he was anticipating that a little, the day when Masahiro could look up at him and call him Guren. He wondered how long he had before Masahiro learned the truth of who he was, and that he was not anticipating at all, because that would be the last time those arms would ever reach out to him, and the very thought was unbearable.

Still, he thought, and closed his eyes, those days were a long way away, and he had learned to take what he could get, for as long as he could get it.

Comments

[lirren.livejournal.com]

Oh, that was adorable! Such a sweet little peek into the past.

[darlingfox.livejournal.com]

Awwwww, that was both sweet and just a little bit heartbreaking. ♥

[animegoil.livejournal.com]

I love them sooo much... omg, so cute. It's just so adorable to think of Guren babysitting him. <3 I loved that part about him washing his clothes so taht Masahiro could play in the mud.

[bootoye.livejournal.com]

Wonderful. I enjoyed reading this. Those two really have a unique bond

[ingrid hilario (from livejournal.com)]

Great job! Adorable, but a little bittersweet at the end. *sniffle*