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The night air is cool, a dusky, crisp sort of darkness, a cold night in early spring in London, only just with the threat of snowfall fading from the air.
His windows are open, which doesn’t help.
He’s only just fallen asleep, with the book he was reading resting where it’s fallen beside him.
A little bit aways, tucked in a small nook formed by his lamp, the post on his bed, and the wall, Dusuu lays fast asleep, with their tail feathers softly splayed out of the small bed he made for her out of an old jewelry box of his mother’s, complete with a small coverlet made from a scrap of silk that's possibly a remanent of an old handkerchief.
The air is soft, the room is indigo blue.
And slowly, softly, a figure slips in, through the window, feet landing soundlessly onto the floor.
Felix naturally leans towards being an insomniac, (although that’s been different as of late), and so he tends to be a light sleeper in general. And so he does hear the person taking slow, careful steps to his bed, where he lays, but he’s not alarmed, and so it’s not so much a conscious awareness, but something more dreamlike.
She creeps over, stealing in like a thief, moving in beside him. The bed leans, dipping under her slight weight.
Felix hums softly, not opening his eyes. He’s so tired, and he knows that she is too; and besides, he knows that she’s hoping not to wake him.
She hums, curling into his side, arms wrapping around his torso, having slipped gracefully under the blanket. Her breath is hot against his neck; slowly, with his sluggish, barely awake mind, he notes that she hasn’t detransformed.
His stomach tightens, and he resists the urge to sigh. It’s not a good sign.
Her hands slip under his shirt, gloved fingertips curling against his abdomen, pressing into his skin. He can feel her exhale, her breath hot enough to form steam.
“Ry.” he murmurs softly, eyes cracking open, ever so slightly.
She hums again, pressing closer into him, and her lips find the nape of his neck, nuzzling against him slightly. He shifts closer, relaxing into her; and shuts his eyes. She presses kisses into his neck, a low sort of rumble vibrating in the back of her throat.
Finally he sighs, and twists around in her grasp, to look at her, propping himself up slightly on his elbows. Her tired golden eyes gleam and glow, cutting through the purple violet of the room. Her arms are soft and careful around his torso; she’s so warm.
But dragons would be warm, he muses tiredly.
“Why didn’t you change back?” he asks her, with his eyes barely open. She shrugs, humming, and he does sigh then. His head sinks back into the pillow. He can sense her smile. She’s teased him about it before; about how once he’s asleep, he’s asleep.
He opens his eyes blearily to find her looking at him, a small smile on her face. He blinks a couple of times, but it really doesn’t work to wake him all that much.
Something’s happened, he knows.
Something that Kagami is desperately trying to distract herself from. It could be a fight with her mother, a problem with another girl, or all of them, or it could be nothing more than one of the moods that he knows she falls into; a bleak, black pit, a blue despair that she can’t shake.
So he tries his best to wake up, and be supportive. It’s easier said than done.
Her dark hair blurs, blending with the dark blue of his room. All that he really sees are her gold gold eyes, her gleaming, horned crown. She continues to smile.
He can feel her happiness. It glows like her eyes.
It’s interesting, he thinks, the way that they’re seeming to absorb the traits of their miraculouses. He has gained empathy, not in a metaphorical sense, but real, actual empathic abilities. He starts to feel what others are feeling as soon as they get close to him. It’s the strongest with the people he’s closest to, which means Kagami and his mother.
Kagami’s sadness tints his own world blue.
Dusuu was a little alarmed when he told her what he was sensing, but after undergoing some kind of nonsensical examining the kwami had decided that everything was “probably” fine.
Which made him feel much better. Not.
Felix thinks that Kagami is getting more dragon-like every day. There’s a sort of curling possessiveness about her, a clutching, grabbing, Mine sort of thinking.
She’s very territorial, he knows.
She shifts slightly, moving to hold his wrists so that they’re pressed up beside his head. She’s enjoying this, he thinks mildly.
She’s stronger than him like this. But he’s so comfortable with her that it doesn’t bother him; rather he feels completely and totally safe with her.
It’s a nice feeling, he muses to himself.
She wets her lips slightly with her tongue, eyes gleaming in the darkness. Her grip tightens slightly on his wrists, holding them in place. He watches her, blinking.
He wonders if this is a sort of game for her, some kind of predator and prey situation. She looks awfully like a predator.
She finally bends over, leaning in and kissing him. Her teeth are sharp, biting.
It’s a greedy sort of kiss, needy and wanting. Dragons are greedy creatures, and Ryuko is really no different. She bites down on his bottom lip and he gasps; she smiles, curving against his mouth.
She kisses him, deeper and deeper, wanting, craving all of it, everything. He melts against her, unthinking.
The breath has fallen from his lungs. She presses against him.
He can feel the heat of her, burning like fire against him. Her mouth moves, slipping, biting, to the curve of his neck.
He blinks, his eyes stuttering shut. Her hands have let go of his wrists, slipping around his torso, pulling him tighter against her. He can feel the sharp edges of her suit, the dragon scales, through his shirt.
Her teeth bite into his skin, and he groans. “Kagami.” he says, half as a complaint, because Kagami is, well, bitey.
Sometimes he thinks that she always wants him to have a mark on his neck, a mark from her.
She ignores him, breath hot against his skin. He thinks that she’s not particularly in a mood to listen tonight, and so he gives up.
Her teeth graze his ear, her hands slip back once more under his shirt. Her mouth moves, kissing a trail along his neck, and the feeling of mine really is in the air tonight. Sometimes she actually says it out loud.
He thinks Kagami would actually really like to put him in a treasure vault; to make him good and truly part of her dragon horde. Her gloved fingers trace his skin, and the magic prickles, tingling like static.
He shuts his eyes, and folds his arms around her.
Finally she finishes with whatever she needs to prove to herself, and moves back to his mouth, kissing him slower this time, softer and more human like, less dragon teeth and greediness. His fingers twist into her hair.
They curl together, limbs tangling.
Her breath ghosts against his hair, arms twisting around him. “What’s wrong?” he tries again, eyes drooping from fatigue. She exhales, golden eyes glowing in the dark. “My mother thinks you’re…just fooling around with me.” she admits, her voice a ghost in the twilight.
Felix makes a face. She laughs, breathless.
Softly, he leans upward, kissing her chastely on the mouth. She smiles, fingers tangling in his hair.
And then, finally, they both get to sleep, Felix thinks, rather gratefully.
Kagami, or Ryuko rather, is gone in the morning.
She doesn’t always leave without saying goodbye, but sometimes she does stay, and he thinks that she doesn’t always tell him what’s wrong, and it leaves a lonely sort of sinking feeling in his stomach. He smooths down the blankets where he knows she was, and tries not to feel terrible.
He suspects that Kagami knows about his empathic abilities and sometimes keeps away from him on purpose. The sun is rising outside the window. He glances over, Dusuu is still asleep.
Felix exhales.
His mother is in the kitchen having a cup of coffee when he comes in, still in his pajamas, and still very tired. His mother glances at him and hums into her coffee cup. “I suppose Kagami was here last night.” she says, implication in her voice.
Felix has no reaction; he’d already been in the bathroom that morning and seen the dark splotchy marks on his neck, one nearly purple. It really wasn’t surprising, after all it’s happened before. He sighs.
“You’d better put something on that.” is all his mother says, clearly trying to hide the laughter in her voice. He says nothing, and just gets out the ice pack from the freezer before going over to the stove to put on the kettle.
Felix presses the cold pack to his neck and barely feels it. He feels sort of numb and lost this morning, and he isn’t sure why. His mother looks up at his silence. “Sweetie, what’s wrong?” she asks, surprised.
He shakes his head, as he pours water into the kettle. “Nothing Mum.” he says.
They’re sitting at the kitchen table together, the three of them, eating breakfast, but Felix has no appetite for it.
Something about last night is bothering him.
That heat, the way Kagami looked at him, like she could eat the flesh off his bones. He felt it in his gut, washing down, pounding, overwhelming him.
It was completely alien to him.
And he wonders.
A quiet, lurking sort of thought. He’s never really liked people, never really liked girls, not until Kagami.
He had always written it off as being an other, a creature, a not human. But then Kagami had appeared.
A being like him.
He loves her. But he didn’t feel that churning sort of heat.
That sort of feeling that she felt for him.
He stirred his spoon through his bowl of oatmeal and felt vaguely nauseous.
Was he not doing what he was supposed to be doing? Last night, had he been supposed to turn around and take her in his arms and- do something? He bites down hard on his cheek. And why did that feel like such a terrible thing? Like such a terrible betrayal.
Kagami is his girlfriend. He, loves her.
But maybe he’s just being possessive, maybe he doesn’t love her like he thinks he does. What if that were the reason for Kagami’s unhappiness, her moments of despair? The fact that he is either unable or unwilling to - love her, the way that she clearly wanted.
Another person would do that. And maybe he’s just filling up room, taking up a spot that another person could fill better.
Bile burns at the back of his throat.
“Is everything okay?” his mother asks, again. Felix blinks, looking up.
“I-think there’s something wrong with me.” he says.
“Are you sick?” she asks. He shakes his head. “No. I just-” he stops, almost unable to admit to it aloud.
“I…don’t think I like Kagami. The way she likes me.”
His mother’s face visibly falls.
“Oh…I’m sorry. I just thought, well, that you both liked each other so much. I…quite liked Kagami. Oh, that’s such a…” she murmurs. Slowly it dawns on Felix that he’s somehow said the wrong thing.
“No, Mum. I like her. I still like her. It’s just that. I don’t know.”
Amelie tilts her head. Dusuu has looked up from their little plate, from part of a child’s tea set, set out with a bit of an egg with pepper on it.
“She…wants. Things. And I’m not sure if I- want them.” Felix says awkwardly. Amelie frowns. “Like- jewelry?”
Felix can feel his face reddening. “Me, mum.” he mumbles.
His mother looks at him, thinks for a moment, and then a soft kind of understanding passes over her face. “Oh.” she says quietly. He looks down at his food, suddenly not hungry.
“I really care about her.” he says quietly.
“Oh sweetie.” his mother says, reaching over to press a hand against his shoulder. Amelie is quiet. “She doesn’t…make you feel- uncomfortable, ever, does she?”
Felix immediately shakes his head. “Oh no. No. She’s. No. Never.” he says, and she nods.
“What do I do?” he asks her, feeling a little bit desperate. “I wouldn’t worry too much Felix. You’re so young. Things so often change from when you’re young.” she says lightly.
“But what if they don’t?” he presses. His mother gives him a gentle but firm look. “Then that’s a bridge you can cross when you come to it. And you’re fifteen. You’re too young to be having sex anyway.”
His face burns redder than before. “I wouldn't worry about it, sweetheart.” his mother says briskly, going back to the newspaper.
But Felix doesn’t stop thinking about it, and he only eats part of his breakfast.
It’s three days later, and he’s on the rooftop. Their apartment overlooks the Thames; and the sky stretches upwards, high and grey. Clouds streak overhead, blurring. He exhales out through his nose.
He’s done a quite bad thing.
Kagami has texted him twice in the past three days, and he’s only answered her once.
The guilt is gnawing on him.
He’s afraid, of a lot of things really. He’s mostly afraid that he’ll have led her on, even if it’s without meaning to. And the thought that Kagami isn’t getting what she needs, what she deserves, and because of him, haunts him like a spectre.
He doesn’t want to give her up; but he doesn’t want her to wake up in years and years, and realize that he’s tricked her, just like he’s tricked everybody else. He stares up at the cold grey sky, puts his hands into his pockets, and shuts his eyes.
The breeze, cool and damp, brushes through him, swirling. He misses her. He misses her so much.
The breeze brushes through his hair like fingers, ruffling. And then it swirls together, into something tangible, into a girl-shaped form. He stares, as Ryuko once again appears, in front of him, on the rooftop.
Her golden eyes pierce through him, like she can see straight through his soul. He wonders what it is that she sees.
Felix just stares at her.
Her eyes glint. And then her transformation drops, and it’s just Kagami standing there, looking at him. “Did you get my message?” she asks. He just stares at her.
“Um.” he says, rather lamely.
Kagami frowns. “Are you okay?” she asks, eyes wide, fingers resting on his arm. He looks at her. Her eyes are wide, soft, caring. The sky is so grey.
“I think I’m ace.” he tells her, and it feels like there’s a rock in his throat.
It hurts to say it. It hurts so bad. Kagami just looks at him.
There’s no reaction, no hurt, no offence there on her face. She just looks at him. Eventually, she pats his arm.
“Okay.” she says.
Felix bites his lip. Slowly, something occurs to him. “Did you…know?” he asks her, slowly, feeling rather dumb. Kagami just looks at him, and finally she smiles, a tiny smile that’s full of affection.
“Felix. Only one of us has their hands up the other's shirt, and, well. It’s not you.” she tells him quietly.
His soul twists, like a wrench has been thrown straight into his path. Kagami’s fingers twist into his shirt sleeve, like she knows his despair. “Felix.” she murmurs.
“Are you happy?” he asks her, voice barely a whisper.
Her hands cup his face, brush his hair. She kisses him firmly, without a pause, without a doubt. He kisses her back. He missed her.
“Yeah.” she tells him.
He exhales into her shoulder, breathing out. Her fingers are in his hair.
“I’ve never been more happy in my entire life.” she tells him, voice hushed. He takes another breath, then another. The sky is still grey. It might rain later. But he feels warm inside.
“Me too.” he says, after a long time.