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YOU – All at once it is bright. Brighter. The drag from the darkness to the light is a jarring contrast to the way the *dreams* had been doing it on and off all night. There is no immediate yelling in your head, and it’s too gentle. Too slow. Your vision is fuzzy as you blink against the strip of light horribly washed across your face.
1. - Jump up.
2. - Go back to sleep.
3. - Check the time.
YOU – You throw an arm over your face in an attempt to shield yourself from the sun in your eyes. Your head turns to the side, as if automatic, to look at the clock on the nearby wall.
It’s 06:43. You’re awake too early.
DRAMA – You’re dying for sure this time. That’s the only possible explanation, sire. Time to go big, spend your final hours being *really cool.*
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – And getting high, baby.
YOU – You push yourself up groggily to rest on your elbows. Your body still isn’t quite used to the couch you’ve been bunking on for the last two weeks. It’s not quite big enough to fit all of your limbs on properly, feet or knees and at least one arm always slung over an edge.
PAIN THRESHOLD – It definitely isn’t good for your healing bullet wound either. Still, somehow it’s colossally better than going back to your own bed. Plus you have Kim here. It helps. *He* helps.
ESPRIT DE CORPS – He will ask you to leave sometime soon. The dingy basement in Jamrock misses your stench, and Lieutenant Kitsuragi is sick of your shit. Every night you stay here pushes the boundary of unprofessional, even for *your* standards.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim potters around the kitchenette across the room. You watch the muscles in his back flex through his shirt as he moves. He seems to be making coffee, the low hum of the machine drifting between the walls, softly filling the apartment. And is that…
PERCEPTION (HEARING) – The lieutenant is humming, too, quiet underneath the whirr of the coffee machine. It’s a tune you have a vague but implacable recollection of. If you really focus you can almost piece together a blurred and marred image of yourself, much younger, incomprehensibly singing the lyrics to the same song.
EMPATHY – He is happy. Something really *good* is happening today.
SUGGESTION – Don’t you love seeing him like this? Don’t you think he loves seeing you like that, too? He woke you up to share his happiness.
LOGIC – He wouldn’t wake you up on purpose.
HALF LIGHT – Stop staring. Staring down a cop never ends well. You should know that well enough from the four accidental fights you’ve managed to get yourself into with Vicquemare since Martinaise alone.
1. - Stop staring.
2. - [SAVOIR FAIRE – Challenging 18] – You’re captivated. Keep staring.
3. - “Hey, Kim.”
SAVOIR FAIRE [Challenging: Failure] – You keep staring. The lieutenant turns, coffee in hand, and locks eyes with you. His humming stops abruptly.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim steps back a little, his socks making the footsteps his boots would usually amplify entirely silent. He looks down at his coffee and then back to you before the wisp of rising steam manages to begin to fog up his lenses. “Apologies if I woke you, Detective.”
The tone of his voice is level but hesitant, as if he doesn’t quite know what to say. He has come this far without accidentally waking you, though, which you’re pretty sure counts for something. And it wasn’t even by an hour. Still, his quick shift in vibe kind of makes you feel like shit.
The lieutenant clears his throat.
EMPATHY – You made him uncomfortable. It’s written all over his face. Tell him he didn’t wake you up to make him feel better.
LOGIC – He knows by this point that you always wake at 07:30 on the dot. He’s not stupid, you know.
1. - [DRAMA – Heroic 15] – “You didn’t. Just happened to wake up early today.”
2. - Reassure him.
3. - Say nothing.
YOU – “Don’t worry about it,” you say. Your voice is gruff but sincere. “You shouldn’t have to tiptoe ‘round your own place for me.”
KIM KITSURAGI – “Alright.” He nods. “If you would like coffee, feel free.”
YOU – “Yes please.”
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim seems puzzled for a second, his brows pulling together a little. He must not be long out of bed, you realise, because he still looks sort of disheveled. His hair is out of place and his glasses are ever so slightly askew. He is wearing his work pants, but upon closer inspection he hasn’t changed his shirt from the one he slept in yet. You get the feeling he just grabbed whatever to save himself from you potentially seeing him in his underwear.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – A reaaaal shame.
KIM KITSURAGI – “Oh,” he says. Then repeats: “Alright.”
EMPATHY – He wasn’t asking if you’d like *him* to make coffee for you. He’s going to do it anyway though. He wouldn’t if you were anyone else. Maybe he wouldn’t if he weren’t in such a good mood.
1. - Get up. You can make your own coffee.
2. - Let Kim make the coffee.
3. - Apologise. Maybe add something self deprecating so he knows how terrible you feel about this situation.
YOU – “Wait, I’ll do it,” you tell the lieutenant. You jump up off the couch, shoving your makeshift bedding to the floor as you do. Your bad leg almost gives way under the sudden weight of the rest of your body. Ouch.
COMPOSURE – This is not the worst pain you’ve been in over the last two weeks. You are already inconveniencing Kim enough. Grit your teeth and keep your cool, Lieutenant double-yefreitor Du Bois.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim huffs something like a laugh as he fiddles with the coffee pot. You wish you could see his expression. “I don’t mind, Harry. Sit back down and I’ll bring it over,” he says.
Then, as if he’s reading your mind (isn’t that *your* thing?), he opens a cabinet and pulls out a box of drouamine. He turns to you with a subtle smile—something kind and sympathetic yet almost a wince—as he pushes the last two capsules out of the blister pack and places them softly beside the empty coffee cup on the counter. You briefly wonder why he trusts you enough to keep painkillers somewhere you can get to them so easily, especially when he’s witnessed the Jamrock Shuffle up close and personal.
CONCEPTUALISATION – You *have* been trying to be respectful of his space. Not that he has much material possession to be respectful of. The interior design is lacking, and the mould on the walls of your health hazard of a basement probably has more artistic license than the lieutenant does. If you stick around the place much longer it wouldn’t hurt to put a painting or two on the walls. The minimalism is depressing.
EMPATHY – Where it can be helped Kim is all business, no pleasure. Something tells you that at its core it might be down to fear. Deep rooted survival instincts twisted to make sense to him and only him; almost the same reason that he keeps a pistol lodged alongside his passport and a hundred reál at the back of a kitchen drawer, and can only sleep restfully with his back to a wall.
He has to be ready for everything to change at the drop of a hat. It’s happened before, and he learned the hard way that it’s easier if you stay distant and unsentimental. That’s depressing too.
KIM KITSURAGI – “Here,” Kim says. He approaches the couch slowly so as to not trip on the blanket still strewn across the floor, coffee in one hand and the other closed around the drouamine. He hands you both, his knuckles brushing your palm as he places the painkillers into it, then produces a bottle of water from under his arm and cracks it open in one swift motion. He holds that out too. “For the pills.”
He has seen you take enough pills in the last few weeks without water. You’re pretty sure across the span of your life you have taken *more* than enough pills without water. You’re a seasoned fucking *professional* dry pill taker if you do say so yourself. Even so, every time the lieutenant brings you painkillers they’re accompanied by a bottle of water. Maybe a habit from when you were in and out of consciousness in the days following the mercenary tribunal—you have a mosaic-like memory of him holding a bottle to your lips, softly coaxing you to try and swallow. A mumble so quiet you aren’t sure he even truly wanted you to hear it: “I will not lose you to fucking dehydration when you just survived a bullet, Harry.”
It’s an odd and unnecessary special addition to this little song and dance routine. Maybe you should start collecting the bottles and taking them to Frittte again. You’ve seen one on the drive between Kim’s apartment building and your bus stop, and the walk wouldn’t be unreasonable.
ENDURANCE – The whisper of Kim’s fingers against your skin remains even as you swallow the capsules with two generous mouthfuls of water (if just to prove that you’re grateful).
KIM KITSURAGI – “Good,” Kim says, and screws the cap back onto the bottle. He bends down to put it on the coffee table, condensation quickly drawing a wet ring against the dark wood. The shadows where the light from the small window doesn’t hit him round out his features. It makes him look softer. “Big day ahead.”
He makes a little noise like he’s amused at himself.
1. - Ask him why.
2. - [LOGIC – Formidable 13] – Try to figure out why.
YOU – You tilt your head to the side a little. Kim holds your gaze. “What’s so special?” you ask.
KIM KITSURAGI – His eyes sparkle behind the thick lenses of his glasses. “Just something at work.”
COMPOSURE – He is trying very, very hard to stop himself from smiling again. He fails, but turns away in hopes you won’t notice.
1. - Ask him why.
2. - [LOGIC – Formidable 13] – Try to figure out why.
+1 The lieutenant admitted it was work related.
+1 You caught the secret smile.
+1 Kim made you a morning coffee.
LOGIC [Formidable: Failure] – You narrow your eyes to squint at the back of Kim’s head as he goes to collect his own coffee from where it rests cooling in the tiny kitchen. He leans forward on his elbows against the counter and takes a long, slow sip. He looks content and composed. You’ve got nothing.
It seems, Detective, that your dear friend Kim is *up to some shit.*
YOU – On and off, you hum the not quite right, distant memory version of the song Kim had been humming when you woke up for the rest of the morning. You make sandwiches while Kim showers. He went shopping yesterday before he stopped by to pick you up from Precinct 41, which is apparently a thing he sometimes does now, and he bought good quality lunch meats and wholegrain bread. You wrap them haphazardly in aluminium foil and put them into separate bags: one for you to take to the forty-first and the other for him to take to the fifty-seventh.
SHIVERS – The downpour this morning is a blanket covering the entirety of Revachol and her children alike. The city is so quiet in the dark sky’s wake, almost as if she has forgotten herself much like you did. Spotted sunlight beams pierce sharp through the gaps in the clouds, as if fighting against imminent devastation.
Distantly, a soaked cat darts across a road and tucks itself into the precarious shelter behind a tyre of a Coupris 40. There is a low tap of papers being piled into a neat stack in an office nearby. A deep sigh as a man looks out of the window into the rain in lieu of skimming over the words for what must be the fifteenth time. He will sign the line later, once he is in company, and it will be definitive.
KIM KITSURAGI – “Careful, Lieutenant,” Kim says as you clamber a bit too clumsily into his MC and almost lose your footing on the step. He is already in the driver’s seat and glances up at you in the rear-view as he fiddles with the controls of the radio. “Today might be the worst possible day for you to rack up any more injuries, though I would rather you generally try your best to keep out of harm’s way until further notice.”
EMPATHY – *I do not need to lose anyone else* is carefully omitted from his request. He has grown awfully fond of you since your time together in Martinaise. Don’t let him lose you, Detective. It would be horribly stupid.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim turns the radio over from Revachol’s news channel as you settle into your seat. It’s obvious that he’s fine you knowing his preferences now, even if it was much to his own initial embarrassment. It didn’t actually take long for him to start openly playing Speedfreaks FM with you sitting in the back of the Kineema—apparently getting him that shout-out which he pretended not to be overjoyed by earned you some points in the Kitsuragi good books.
RHETORIC – *Sometimes* he lets you put on Sad FM if you ask nicely enough. He’d probably play it right now if you requested it without needing much persuasion.
1. - [RHETORIC – Medium 10] – “Could you switch over to Sad FM?”
2. - Leave him be. You’re kind of starting to like Speedfreaks.
CONCEPTUALISATION – This isn’t you, Harry. Where’s your passion for real music?
1. - [RHETORIC – Medium 10] – “Could you switch over to Sad FM?”
2. - Leave him be. You’re kind of starting to like Speedfreaks.
3. - Seriously. You *want* to listen to Speedfreaks FM.
YOU – You could kneel to Dolores Dei in the flesh and tell her confidently that you would pretty much get behind anything Kim enjoys just because Kim enjoys it. You lean back in the seat and rest your head against the Kineema’s window with a hollow thunk. Kim adjusts his glasses in the mirror and sneaks another look at you before he pulls out of his spot.
COUPRIS KINEEMA – Even with the radio playing, the drone of the MC’s engine could put you to sleep. Sometimes it’s like white noise that settles itself into your brain, filling every crevice and muffling the internal sounds (and, really, you have a *lot* of those). You have actually fallen asleep back here a few times already, usually after a big day rather than before one. Kim never mentions it, just drives.
INTERFACING – Sometimes he turns the radio’s volume down so that it doesn’t wake you up.
ESPRIT DE CORPS – Even when he has also had a long day. He used to turn it up to keep himself awake on the drive, you know. You’re not the only cop that fifteen hour shifts take it out of.
HALF LIGHT – Basically, if he falls asleep behind the wheel and kills you both it’s your fault.
ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN – Stay awake, Harry.
YOU – You open your eyes just as the MC continues down the street Kim would usually let you jump out on. There’s two makeshift parking spots outside of a takeout Samaran place you sometimes order from, and it’s always your drop-off point. It’s a bus ride from Precinct 41, but the early walk does you some good *and* saves Kim from detouring too far by turning left where he’s supposed to turn right to get to the fifty-seventh.
“Kim, you missed it,” you say. “If it’s because of the rain, I’m a big boy.”
KIM KITSURAGI – The lieutenant just hums. His expression does not give anything away.
INLAND EMPIRE – He’s totally kidnapping you.
LOGIC – He is not kidnapping you. What use would Lieutenant Kitsuragi have for kidnapping you?
1. - Stay quiet.
2. - Repeat yourself.
3. - Ask him if he’s kidnapping you.
4. - [PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT – Impossible 18] – Open the door and jump out of the motor carriage.
YOU – “Are you kidnapping me?”
KIM KITSURAGI – His eyes stay on the road. “Yes, Officer. I am kidnapping you. Absolutely.”
LOGIC – You’re in the back of the lieutenant’s custom Kineema driving down a street you drive down every single day *from his apartment.* This would be the worst possible way for him to kidnap you, if he had any reason to do so in the first place. Which he doesn’t. Does it even count as kidnapping when you’re in your forties?
ENCYCLOPAEDIA – Kidnapping is a criminal offence consisting of the unlawful taking or carrying away of a person by force or fraud, or the unlawful detention of a person against his will. Victims of kidnapping can be any age, including adults.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – Does it count as kidnapping if old Harry-boy here would let Kitsuragi do whatever he wants with him anyway?
AUTHORITY – …
YOU – “Okay, cool.”
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim looks at you, now. He briefly makes eye contact with you in the rear-view mirror and *laughs* as he takes the left turn towards Central Jamrock. “You’re fine with that?”
YOU – “Sure. Just wanted to make sure we’re on the same page.”
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – It’s more than fine. He should tie you up, too. That would really add something exciting to the mix.
VOLITION – Do not under any circumstances ask him if he’s going to tie you up. This is not some weird psychosexual thing at all.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – Yes it is.
DRAMA – Yes it is.
SUGGESTION – Yes it is.
LOGIC – He is not kidnapping you. Psychosexually or otherwise.
1. - [SUGGESTION – Godly 17] – Ask him if he’s going to tie you up.
2. - Do not ask him if he’s going to tie you up.
SUGGESTION [Godly: Success] – You let your voice drop just subtly lower—silkier. It’s done in a way that could easily play this off if it goes sideways.
“Are you going to tie me up, too?” you say. Good, straight to the point.
PERCEPTION (SIGHT) – Kim’s hands tighten around the steering levers.
KIM KITSURAGI – There’s a beat. His hands relax again and he rolls his head back to stretch his neck. “If you play your cards right I’ll think about it.”
EMPATHY – Okay, it totally became a weird psychosexual thing for Kim as well. He can feel the tips of his ears burning. That’s positive. You would be embarrassed otherwise.
COMPOSURE – Kim turns up the radio. He’s trying not to think about tying you up.
YOU – Your head drops to rest against the window again as the MC heads south-west towards Central Jamrock. Speedfreaks FM, when it’s louder, and the possibility that Kim is kidnapping you do a pretty good job working together to keep you awake.
When you finally pull into Precinct 41’s staff parking lot, the lieutenant unbuckles his seatbelt alongside you.
KIM KITSURAGI – Lieutenant Kitsuragi leans over to the back of the vehicle and holds his hand out for you to pass him his bag and cloak from where they’re tucked on the seat beside your own things. “Come on, Detective,” he says.
LOGIC – What?
YOU – “What?”
KIM KITSURAGI – “We will be late for work if you sit in the back of my Kineema gawking at me for too long. Come on.” He motions towards his things again. “My bag, please. I will look disorganised if I walk in empty-handed.”
LOGIC – He’s coming in. Has he..?
YOU – “You’re coming in.” You pass him his bag. He forgoes asking for the cloak again—he never wears it anyway—and gets out of the car. You follow him out like a lost dog.
KIM KITSURAGI – “Surprise,” Kim says with a sheepish grin as you approach his side. “Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi, Precinct 41.”
EMPATHY – The weather is soiling his plans somewhat. The rain has let up a little and the MC is providing you with the slightest amount of cover, but Kim is wondering if he should have told you in the Kineema instead of getting out of it first. He hadn’t anticipated you standing still getting soaked instead of immediately jumping for joy, and the water droplets collecting on his glasses are hindering his vision at an increasing rate. Say something before he starts to think this was a bad idea.
KIM KITSURAGI – “You look like I just kicked a puppy, and that the puppy is you.”
DRAMA – You may love this man, sire. You have just remembered what love is at this precise moment, and this is *exactly* what it feels like. You can feel it, hot, running through your veins, breaking down your body from the inside out. You might as well melt to disgusting wet goo right now and become one with the rain, forever integrated in the water cycle. Not an apricot in the vicinity.
1. - Continue saying nothing.
2. - “Does this mean we’re partners again?”
3. - [DRAMA – Legendary 14] – “I love you.”
4. - [DRAMA – Trivial 7] – “I hate you.” (Lie.)
5. - Continue saying nothing and fall to your knees (become part of the water cycle).
DRAMA [Trivial: Failure] – “I hate you,” you say.
KIM KITSURAGI – His composure breaks; he snorts. “No, you don’t.”
1. - Continue saying nothing.
2. - “Does this mean we’re partners again?”
3. - [DRAMA – Legendary 14] – “I love you.”
4. - Continue saying nothing and fall to your knees (become part of the water cycle).
YOU – “So, does this mean we’re partners again? Officially?”
KIM KITSURAGI – “Nothing is official yet. I didn’t want to make any assumptions, despite your—khm—eagerness.”
INLAND EMPIRE – A hunch tells you that he means when you were drunk last week, clinging to him like your life depended on it, talking about how *even though you can’t actually remember not knowing him, you’re pretty sure being his partner is the best thing that’s ever happened in your entire life.* You said something like: “I want to work with you in every universe, Kim.”
Don’t cringe. He thought it was nice, despite the circumstances.
The fact that he is following through with this even after seeing that you are clearly still a drunken mess is honourable. Maybe he knows that you really *are* trying. Even if he doesn’t strictly know you’re doing it *for him.*
KIM KITSURAGI – The lieutenant grins up at you over the rims of his glasses. “I have already discussed it with Lieutenant Vicquemare, however, and he is accepting of that happening if it is what you would like going forward.”
EMPATHY – So *that’s* why Vicquemare has been acting like that.
Lieutenant Vicquemare knew about Kim’s move but kept it a secret because Kim asked him to. Even if he has been in a mood about it, it’s actually kind of sweet.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – And kind of *homo-sexual.* Everyone and their father is in love with you around here. You still got it, Harrier.
1. - “So that’s why Vicquemare’s been acting so crazy for the last week.”
2. - “Nice to have you on board, partner.”
3. - [SUGGESTION – Easy 8] – Ace’s High.
YOU – “So that’s why Vicquemare’s been acting so crazy for the last week. He’s my jealous ex.”
KIM KITSURAGI – The lieutenant’s eyes open wide in surprise for a second, then he laughs loudly. It makes the fizzy-melty feeling inside of your flesh intensify. “Something tells me that Officer Vicquemare is just like that,” Kim says.
1. - “So that’s why Vicquemare’s been acting so weird for the last week.”
2. - “Nice to have you on board, partner.”
3. - [SUGGESTION – Easy 8] – Ace’s High.
SUGGESTION [Easy: Success] – You hold your hand up towards the lieutenant for an Ace’s High. He steps a little closer and hits it with an unwavering smile, hard. And then..!
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim follows it through for an Ace’s Low.
REACTION SPEED – Oh *hell* fucking yes. You meet him there without a second thought.
ESPRIT DE CORPS – The day is mostly paperwork. Finalising Lieutenant Kitsuragi’s transferral; arranging the logistics of your partnership change; ink on dotted lines. Outside of the paperwork it’s tuning out the whispers of your colleagues. About you, all of them. Sometimes directed at Kim, other times not. You don’t care to listen to what any of them have to say.
You get out for a while at 14:00. You and Kim eat the sandwiches you made for the two of you, and end up switching at some point to efficiently sample the goods. You cross the road to put the foil into a trashcan and find a dead body in an alleyway. Du Bois and Kitsuragi (The Duo) are back, baby.
YOU – It’s later, much later, when you tell him, “Thanks, Kim.”
SHIVERS – Central Jamrock is half-asleep across Revachol. About the same distance in the other direction lights blink on cranes along the harbour of Martinaise. La Revacholiere never fully sleeps, much as most of the city does not. She has not slept more than a wink since the Revolution, and perhaps even before that it was barely much more.
The rain has subsided, though, and the clouds followed close behind. The sky is clear; the constellations try to speak. A mother hushes them in an attempt to settle her whimpering baby as she fusses in her crib.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim looks up from the file he’s wrapping up—the final review of his ultimate case from Precinct 57. “Me? For what?”
YOU – “Everything. I don’t know.” You let your head lean back against the couch cushions, glaring at the ceiling for a moment before you roll sideways to catch his eye. He’s backlit from the lamp he’s using to read. You’re drowsy from a lack of sleep and an emotionally fuelled day. It bubbles together as an affectionate cocktail.
VOLITION – Mocktail.
YOU – “Saving my life. Putting up with my alcoholic bullshit. Letting me crash on your sofa for two weeks. Being really fucking cool.”
KIM KITSURAGI – He leans forwards to put his notebook onto the coffee table by his ashtray, then sits back again and faces you using one hand to prop his head up against the back of the couch. “You’re thanking me for *being cool*?”
YOU – “*Really* cool, Kim.”
KIM KITSURAGI – “Right,” he says. “You’re welcome. And thank you for saving my life too. I do not think I’ve said it enough.”
He gives you a little affection-riddled smile.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – JUMP HIM.
YOU – Smile back.
PERCEPTION (SIGHT) – Kim’s eyes fall to your lips. Pointedly. His gaze lingers there longer than you know to be regular lip-staring time.
KIM KITSURAGI – You shuffle forwards, testing the waters. Your movement jolts Kim back to reality. “Detective,” he says.
EMPATHY – He’s trying to assert some level of professionalism because he’s worried you’re not thinking straight. This is some *textbook* internal conflict.
RHETORIC – Show him you mean it. Something subtle, for now.
YOU – You stop moving and reach out your hand towards him along the couch cushions. It’s a quiet invitation; a little piece of reassurance. He notices immediately and traces a line up your index finger using his own. “It’s fine,” you tell him.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim huffs quietly through his nose. “Yes, alright.”
*Now* he is waiting for you to do something. You know that his self-control will not falter first.
1. - Stay like this.
2. - [ELECTROCHEMISTRY – Heroic 15] – Jump Kim.
3. - Kiss Kim.
YOU – The hand that is not covered with Kim’s between you snakes around his waist to pull him closer. He complies easily; his weight gives little resistance to the pressure. Your lips barely brush his, your cheek bumping softly against the frame of his glasses.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim sighs softly, something light and content. He removes his glasses and puts them on top of his notebook on the table, then returns to you and runs blunt nails up through your facial hair before he leans back in to kiss you *properly.* He uses his leverage of your face to tilt your head to the side a little and give himself better access to your mouth.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – Thaaaat’s it. Open up.
KIM KITSURAGI – He kisses into your mouth like he’s trying to split you apart, like he wants you to eat him whole. The hand that isn’t holding your face to his moves to grip your shirt in his fist, tugging you closer.
PERCEPTION (TASTE) – The lieutenant tastes distinctly like expensive cigarettes and cheap toothpaste. It’s so mundane and so lovely.
You smoke with him, some days, when he has his one cigarette. Today wasn’t one of those days. It didn’t need to be.
PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT – You are forgetting to breathe. Hold on. Take a breath.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim stares at you, hands still tight against your body. He is panting less than you are; he has breath left for you to take. He rests his forehead against your own. “Less than a month ago you had forgotten what a homo-sexual was and now you are kissing your best friend on his couch late at night.”
YOU – You put on the most insufferably puppy-like puppy dog eyes you can conjure from the very core of your being. Kim is already preemptively rolling his eyes as you say: “Kim, I’m your best friend?”
KIM KITSURAGI – “I did not say that.” He grips his fistful of your shirt a little tighter then visibly considers pulling you impossibly closer by your ugly neck tie. You sort of want him to. The horrible fabric wrapped firmly around his hand would be hot.
SAVOIR FAIRE – Tuck that away for now. You can come back to it later, when you aren’t on the edge of an emotional conversation about trust and friendship.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY – You’d better come back to it, Harry. He wants it too. Wants to see how you would writhe under his control. You know he does. Psychosexual kidnapping, Harry.
KIM KITSURAGI – “I merely meant that I am *your* best friend, because you lost all of your memories and do not, at present, have any others.”
DRAMA – That’s not what he meant at all. You’re totally his best friend. Best friends who kiss, homo-style.
YOU – “Maybe Jean is my best friend.”
KIM KITSURAGI – “You were telling me mere hours ago about how you have a hunch that he finds you insufferable. You don’t even call him Jean. That’s the first time I have heard you call him Jean.”
Kim’s gaze falls back to your lips—parted, breathless. You lick them in anticipation and he looks back up at you and his eyes are dark, dark, dark. “You know, I would have kissed you sooner had I known you were so inclined.”
SUGGESTION – You’re his *type,* Harry. He’s wanted you this whole time.
YOU – “To be fair, I also didn’t know I was so inclined.”
KIM KITSURAGI – The lieutenant raises an eyebrow at you. He leans closer so that his breath ghosts against your mouth as he says: “But you are.” He punctuates it with another brush of his lips against yours.
It’s not a question, but you’re pretty sure he wants some sort of confirmation.
1. - “Yes I am.”
2. - “No I’m not.”
3. - “Maybe. Wanna test the theory?”
YOU – “Maybe I am. Wanna test the theory?”
KIM KITSURAGI – You get a light hit to your shoulder in response. “No,” Kim says bluntly. “I want to sleep.”
YOU – Bring the puppy dog eyes back out. Throw in a pout, too. Lethal combination.
KIM KITSURAGI – Kim chuckles and leans up to kiss you again. Your fingers dig into the flesh of his waist and he sighs into your open mouth, properly, infatuated, before he presses a kiss against the corner of your lips, then your jaw. “No,” he repeats into your skin. “You can sleep with me, though—actually sleep—I know that you’re tired. You need a bed and I have one.”
He stands and you follow. It’s an easy tumble until you’re skin to skin, eyes half closed, body heat muddled and melted between you.
SHIVERS – The city trips over knotted reeds along the shore, curls through a traffic jam away from the coast, whispers into the bedroom through the crack in the window.
HE WILL LOVE YOU, TOO.
LIMBIC SYSTEM – She digs her nails through your skull and pulls you under.