Chapter Text
Finding shelter in those circumstances seemed like a mirage. A building abandoned since the beginning of the apocalypse, with dust-covered furniture and opaque glass, was no luxury. However, Yuuichirou had clung to the white sheets of the queen-sized bed with so much need that his eyes closed with delight.
Mikaela sat beside him with calmness, making the old wood creak and stealing a silly giggle from Yuu, who kept his cheek pressed against the fabric. His eyes looked at him sweetly, with that glint so characteristic of him; that innocence that was still preserved despite so much tragedy witnessed.
Emerald eyes in a crimson world. Too good to be real.
Mika couldn't stop thinking, thinking about how to escape, about all the possible ways to get away unscathed. Sitting there and watching him seemed like a beautiful distraction. They couldn't afford to stay there, no matter how much...
"I can hear you thinking from here," Yuu said in amusement and stretched out his arm so he could reach for his pale wrist.
Mikaela sighed heavily, closing his eyes for a moment to collect himself.
Yuuichirou was a child in a teenager's body. There was no other explanation for why the blond struggled to understand his reasons, same as why Yuu was so insistent on relying on Guren, clinging to the man with a devout, mindless trust, just like a religious fanatic.
Despite his incongruities, those tender eyes stared insistently at him, tilting his head with an endearing curiosity, seeking the blond's gaze at all costs. Until, of course, Mika locked their gazes together, surrendering before him as he always did.
Yuu had him eating out of the palm of his hand, and something inside the vampire told him he might end up intoxicated.
What could he do? What else was he to do if the boy, after all, was just that: a hurting child in the body of a teenager.
And so was he.
He could feel his hand, there, holding onto him. That warmth he lacked was like a divine sensation. Mikaela was dying for him, dying to have those warm hands over his ice-cold skin.
Just a caress, a grasp without ulterior motives, could make him shiver, could make him feel more human and less like the emotionless monster he was about to become.
"Just lie with me for a while, Mika," he heard, and without taking off his boots or that cape, he did so; stiff as an oak, fearful as a kitten, looking with longing at his friend who sighed, content but very, very tired. "Get some sleep..." Yuu added, closing his eyes and burying his face into the pillow without letting go of his wrist.
...
"I don't need to sleep, Yuu-chan," Mika said, and the brunet opened his eyes as wide as saucers.
"That's true!" replied the other, letting out a goofy laugh that made Mika immediately roll his eyes with a tight smile on his face.
"You're such a fool..." the blond muttered in amusement, earning a playful shove from Yuuichirou, who couldn't stop laughing.
Laughing with him, as they may have never laughed before, regardless of how simple it was. Who could know if they would ever laugh like that again?
Once they stopped, Yuu apologized softly, leaving a gentle touch on his arm.
While taking a deep breath and letting out a sigh, Yuuichirou nodded after Mika told him that it was okay for him if he slept. At least for a while, because they had to plan what to do next with all that mess going on outside. So Yuu closed his eyes again, tightening the grip on his wrist as if the boy was going to run away if he didn't hold on.
Mika swallowed dryly. The sight of Yuu's hand so close to his own made him sigh as well. He looked up at the ceiling, but then lowered his gaze back down to his sleepy face after a few seconds.
Eyes that went back and forth in silence; the light that pierced the orange curtains of the room, reflecting over them; the winter wind blowing wild behind the windows.
Suddenly, that hand squeezed him. A little noise came out of his friend's mouth, and when he laid his eyes back on Yuu, he found his face unbelievably close.
His mouth opened in surprise, his eyes widened, and he felt the air get stuck in the middle of his throat.
Mika knew that, if his heart were still beating, it would be pounding out of control for him right now. He felt like an idiot reacting in such a childish way.
What could he do? What else was he to do...?
He reacted like that, acknowledging the love within him whenever he saw him. So close and yet so unreal. Years of misery, far away in the darkness like an old memory, a bad dream.
Yuuichirou squeezed his wrist once more, and Mika closed his eyes fast so he wouldn't catch him staring. Nevertheless, the younger boy chuckled, so he reopened his eyes to find those emerald orbs peering deep inside him.
"You're really here, Mika..." Yuu pronounced his name in a sigh with a hint of nostalgia in his voice. "I thought I'd lost you forever that day."
Star-like gazes in the gloom of the room. Mika smiled shyly and looked at him, intrigued, when Yuu let go and moved his hand to his cheek in a natural and spontaneous way. Without hesitating—just like almost everything the brunet did—he caressed him. Driven by feelings, by the emotions of the moment, by the aching need to feel his little face in his hands once again.
His cheek and jaw, those strands of golden hair he brushed away from his eyes. Touching him so blatantly, and yet so him as if there was nothing strange, as if it was okay to look and caress each other like that, as if Yuu felt the same way about him.
Mika let himself be pampered, unconsciously seeking more of his touch as he leaned closer, feeling a lump in his throat because it was as beautiful as a dream, and he didn't want to wake up no matter how unreal any of it was.
He felt the bed stir, Yuuichirou moving dangerously close to him until their legs brushed with demure against each other and their foreheads slowly met.
"Mika," he heard him say. His breath so close he could feel it above his lips. Still, he pretended to be calm as if so much sudden contact wasn't foreign to him. Mikaela looked up at him, wondering why Yuu was observing him like that and if he had always done it with this much adoration.
His caresses had stopped moments before; now he was just holding his face, staring at him. In seconds that seemed eternal and so hard to bear, Mika watched him close his eyes with a downcast demeanor, without moving an inch, and thought about whether he should say something or remain silent so as not to ruin it.
It wasn't necessary for Mika, though. He didn't want to talk; he just wanted to keep looking at his face this close for a thousand years more or until the world found its end in their hands.
By the time Yuu faced him again, anyone could have noticed the urgency behind their gazes; they seemed to be begging for mercy, pleading to one another to do something about it.
And Yuuichirou did.
He kissed him, and he did it without a second thought.
He did it as though it were the only thing keeping him alive, as if holding back for a single second more could kill him. He kissed him without realizing that this was his first time; so focused on letting him feel all the love he carried inside that nothing else mattered to him.
They clung to each other's bodies in a tight embrace, legs intertwined. Cursed beings like them had never been so close to touching heaven.
Mika closed his eyelids, trying to feel it, to drown in that feeling until he couldn't think of anything other than Yuu—than his lips, than the way he was wrapped and grasped around his waist, squeezing the fabric of his cape with desire running through his veins.
One kiss that became another and followed into many more. They never separated beyond their hungry mouths, beyond those flustered faces that looked at each other with overflowing love spilling out of their eyes, relating a beautiful romance tainted with tragedy.
Embraced, nuzzled against their necks, they breathed each other in.
Mikaela could feel the warmth under his gloves; the quiet and oh-so-slow breathing on his neck. He would bristle, feeling the fear of uncertainty upon his still chest, waiting for Yuu to tell him something concise once and for all, but he didn't.
His words never came, and so the blond opened his eyes with his nose pressed to Yuu's shoulder and his gaze fixed on that back stained with blood and dirt from so many falls.
"Yuu-chan," he uttered hesitantly, and heard the younger boy gulp before answering.
"Tell me, Mika..."
Those hands on his waist, face on his neck, and voice... His childlike, strident voice was now so sweet that there could be no mistake. There could be no trick or trap. It couldn't be a joke.
It couldn't be, because death was chasing after them.
And because Yuu was his only family. Yuu was the only person in his life, the only person he would die for a thousand times until there was nothing left but mere ashes of his wretched existence.
"I love you..."
Something inside Yuuichirou froze. It felt like a sharp slap to his face that made his eyes widen and his heart race; his pulse throb.
Yuu pulled away, sitting on the bed with such evident confusion on his face that Mikaela felt the world crumbling once again in front of him as he looked away in embarrassment. Yuu did nothing but sit still and stare at the sheets, stunned by his words.
Then, enlightened, he looked up and leaned over him with such an excited gaze that it disconcerted the vampire even more.
"Yuu-chan, never mind..."
"This whole time it's been like this, hasn't it?"
Yuuichirou let out an airy laugh, shaking his head just before biting his lip and fixing, once again, his gaze on him.
He who looked back at him lost and with flushed cheeks; hair disheveled, cape already crumpled; blood on his clothes and flowing behind his eyes. He who never ceased to be in his mind even when he gave him up for dead.
Mika; his reason for living.
The only reason he had to get up in the mornings, give himself encouragement, stop crying, and pick up his sword. The only reason he kept breathing even in times when he just wanted to die.
Why was his brain so shocked if his heart had known it for so long? Why was he trembling if he had always felt that way about him?
So selfless and so real. As pure as that glint in his eyes.
Yuuichirou had never been interested in romance, never felt the need to have a lover, to feel another person's lips against his—not the way he was feeling it right now. It was intense, and it scared him. That fragility, that vulnerability coursing through his chest that yet made him feel so strong. So powerful, so capable of anything.
So capable of going out and fighting for him as soon as he felt the blond's cheeks between his hands once more. That icy breath brushing against his warm lips, that nervous, impatient look the older boy had as he was dying to speak but didn't.
Mika shivered beneath him and looked up in fear of misunderstanding as soon as their noses touched. Yuu joined their foreheads together, smiling sweetly and so happy that he couldn't do anything but stare at him because he was everything he wished for in his pitiful life.
And now he was in his hands.
And he was his.
He loved him so much that he didn't need to say it. Mika asked it without words, needing nothing but that look on his face to get Yuu to nod, smiling and crying like a fool—or like the hurting child he really was—and who felt at home as soon as their lips met again. Hugging, so tightly clung to each other that there was no beginning and no end, just the two of them, kissing as if the world wasn't falling apart out there, as if there was nothing beyond that room.
There just wasn't.
There wasn't for them as they squeezed each other's clothes, backs and waists, necks and heads; sighing and sobbing; laughing and moaning amongst their mouths that did nothing but kiss like crazy, turning on the bed and changing positions, leaving Yuu underneath, clinging to Mikaela by his neck. Mika kissed his lips ever so gently and moved to his cheek, tracing a path all over his face until he planted a kiss so heartfelt on his forehead that Yuuichirou looked at him in disbelief at so much love.
Mika pulled away, barely rising above him, and was met with that... extremely devoted expression from the younger boy.
"You scared me so much..."
"Why?"
The blond bent his head and brought his hand to caress his hair so delicately that his beloved closed his eyes with a content smile.
"I thought you wouldn't reciprocate my feelings this way, Yuu-chan."
"I... I've always loved you, Mika... I just never thought about how."
Without missing a second, Yuu let out a giggle.
"What?"
"Good thing you told me, because I would've never figured it out. Or maybe I would... after all this mess was over."
"So, never," Mika replied, amused, making him laugh again.
Mikaela looked at the boy's face, thoughtful. He noticed the wounds on his neck previously caused by his fangs. They were recent and looked rather brutal to him. However, Yuu didn't seem to care much, or at least not when he knew that with his blood he could keep the vampire alive.
When Yuuichirou opened his eyes, he caught him approaching his neck and felt a kiss that made him assume Mika would want to drink again. But he got quite a surprise when he felt more of them being spread with tenderness all over his skin.
Twilight had fallen. The room would have gone dark if it weren't for the delicate strands of silver light coming in through the window. Nothing could be heard besides Mikaela's wet kisses on his neck; kisses that soon made the human sigh and clench his arms with trembling hands.
He had never felt anything like this before, like falling apart with each loving kiss that made him look up at the ceiling with desire sparkling in his pupils.
He moaned softly and shyly, pronouncing the vampire's name with longing, but the latter just kept going, focused on his task, relishing the taste of his skin under his tongue, but with no intention of going any further. No intention of anything more than making him feel loved, but oblivious to the fact that, unlike him, the human could experience sexual desire.
Only when he felt his hair being grabbed did he lift his head and saw the boy lost in all those sensations.
Blushing and aroused, his neck reddened and wet from the saliva of his licks; Mika swallowed hard at the mere sight of him like that and pulled away for good, causing the other to look at him, wondering why he had stopped.
"Desire... it's not good right now, Yuu-chan."
"But..."
"I can't let it consume you," he interrupted him right away. "You know your demon feeds on it."
"So what about that?" he asked, sitting up with the older boy upon his legs and silently looking into his eyes with determination. "Mika..."
"You know I'm right, Yuu-chan."
"And you know that I can control it."
"Yuu..."
"Mika," he said abruptly, now interrupting him.
Mikaela sighed while being held by both arms and receiving that same look as it happened that day, when the other convinced him to drink his blood in order to survive. He didn't really know what it was—whether it was his eyes or the way he spoke—but he always fell for it, as if with every word Yuuichirou uttered, he cast a spell on him.
"Let me be consumed by desire..."
For the first time in his life, he felt kisses and caresses over his clothes that made him forget about his very existence. He intertwined his fingers in Mika's hair—the one who had sunk against his neck and who wouldn't move his hands beyond the appropriate. It seemed that anything they could do might be wrong or forbidden, but such boundaries didn't exist.
So they would look at each other for permission, to unbutton their uniforms with trembling fingers and clumsy smooches, baring their chests and exposing themselves to each other. They who were but two young boys inexperienced in love and whatever was beautiful. They who knew no life beyond pain, breaking once and for all that karma that had made them cry tears of blood each day of their lives, questioning if happiness could really exist in a world that was so destroyed.
Yuu touched him and whispered sweet nothings in his ear. Mikaela sighed with rosy cheeks. He could feel his hands running across his body, and every movement the younger boy made caused a mess of incomprehensible emotions for a creature like him, who wasn't supposed to be able to feel anything for anyone but still had millions of butterflies fluttering inside of him.
"Your hands are so warm..." he murmured against his hair, and Yuu kissed him on the cheek, hugging him tight with affection.
"I want you to touch me too..."
"My hands are freezing," the fair-haired boy responded with melancholy in his gaze.
Yuu laughed under his breath, taking those pale hands between his own to bring them up to his mouth and warm them with his breath, gently rubbing them together and unintentionally melting Mika, who kept gazing at him with endless love burning through his eyes.
Mika and Yuu didn't make love that night. Maybe for that moment, it would take days, weeks, or possibly months, but they did what felt good, what felt natural to do. After all, it was the first time, and they barely had more than a few hours to stay in that building, and because they had to run.
They touched each other without crossing limits but walking over them, exploring themselves with innocent want and the curiosity to know what it felt like. They kissed deeply in the quiet of the room, in that silence they interrupted with the sounds of their love.
It was when they heard some movement behind the door that they stopped, remaining in each other's arms loosely and without saying a word. They heard the squad walking and talking, Kimizuki arguing with Shinoa about what he could do with his sister now that he had her back, and Yoichi trying to keep the atmosphere calm.
Once again, everything was back to normal, and the bubble of serenity had burst.
Yuu remained leaning against Mikaela's chest with concern, staring blankly at the white wall in front of them.
"Who can we trust!? They're all using us, even Guren, dammit!"
A thump on the table and the painful silence after that.
"We must be going now, Yuu-chan..." Mika whispered.
Slowly, Yuuichirou sat up. He looked at the door with a completely changed countenance. Would it ever change? Would all of this ever be over? But more importantly, would they even be alive to see it?
He hoped so.
He hoped none of it would be in vain.
He hoped he could reach the day when he could be at ease and happy with Mika by his side. But how much longer did he have to wait?
How much longer does life have to keep hurting?