[15-08-05] [Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle] This Place

[still-ciircee.livejournal.com]

Title: This Place
Day/Theme: 16 August 05/ Kingdom of the Mad
Series: Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles
Character/Pairing: Kurogane et. all-- Kurogane/Fai
Rating: G? Pg? It's not porn and that's what matters.




“I don’t like this place.”

“Kuro-ri-ri, we just got here. Give it five seconds before you say you don’t like it.”

“Fine. Count them off.”

“Gladly. One, one thousand.”

A lady dressed in nothing but exotic feathers stuck her hand down his pants.

“Two, one thousand.”

He hauled the hand out of his pants just as a drunk threw up on his shoes.

“Three, one thousand.”

The drunk passed out on Fai’s shoes.

“Four, one thousand.”

A man dressed like a melon danced past them and put a silly hat on Syaoran.

“Five, one thousand.”

Four other men, dressed in various garish costumes, put hats on all of them and walked off singing.

“I gave it a chance. I don’t like it.”

Fai grinned at him, shaking his head so hard that the shaggy blonde hair whipped into his eyes. Kurogane frowned. Stupid, big blue eyes. “It’s probably festival time.” The grin widened. “It’s perfect. We could all use some fun time to relax!”

“We relaxed last time,” Kurogane muttered irritably. “We ran a hot springs bath house. You never got out of the water.” White skin constantly pink like an idiot staying out in the sun too long.

“Obviously Kuro-ru needs to relax a little more if he can’t even enjoy a party.” Fai patted his cheek lightly and looked over his shoulder. “I’m going to find out what I can,” he said before diving into the teeming crowd, weaving in and out as fascinating and graceful as a black silk ribbon unspooling.

Kurogane turned and frowned at Syaoran and Sakura. “I hate this place,” he announced.

Syaoran shrugged. “It’s very busy,” he said.

“They have stuffed bears,” Sakura’s voice was soft, far away, almost like she was remembering something wistful and sweet. Which he knew she couldn’t. But from the arrested look on Syaoran’s face, Kurogane was willing to bet that there was a memory of bears that would never come back again.

“Would you like to go look at them?” Syaoran asked softly.

“Mokona wants to look!” Mokona piped up.

Rolling his eyes, Kurogane waved them off. “I’ll be here.”

“I’ll keep my eyes open,” Syaoran promised him quietly and Kurogane shrugged. The best person to defend a princess was somebody who loved a princess.

But that didn’t mean that Kurogane was going to close his eyes. Annoyingly, Fai was right; he really couldn’t enjoy a party. Too busy, too noisy, too many places and things for a ninja to really see. He stared at the fluxing mass of human bodies and tried to pick out individual faces; it wasn’t hard, nobody tried to hide even when they were wearing masks, the masks slipped and revealed what had been hidden. There were big, silly grins plastered everywhere and flushed cheeks and eyes gleaming with wild happiness.

“I knew there was a reason I didn’t like this place,” Kurogane muttered roughly, pushing his way into the crowd. “Syaoran,” he bent to talk lowly in the kid’s ear. “We need to leave here and find a place to stay,” he hoped that the kid would see beyond the tactful words to the tactical suggestion.

Syaoran tipped his head. “Don’t we have a little time?” Kurogane saw his eyes dart sideways and looked over at a giggling Sakura.

“No,” Kurogane said. He reached out and caught the princess by the hood of her cloak and threw her, still giggling, over his shoulder. “It’s spreading,” he said ignoring Syaoran’s shocked look. Scanning the crowd for a certain white-blond head, Kurogane lifted a hand to shade his eyes. “Can’t you see it in their faces?” he asked. It was mostly rhetorical. Most men wouldn't see what a ninja saw. Most men never confronted another man whose soul will was bent to one purpose. How many times a day did a normal man stare madness in the eye? He spotted it. “Come on,” he commanded. He stomped off, ignoring everything around him while simultaneously taking it all in. Ninjas saw everything…and looked at nothing but their goal.

“Kuro-Kuro!” Fai called gaily, waving wildly. “I have somebody for you to meet!” He pointed at the crowd in general.

“Great,” Kurogane grunted, ducking to put his shoulder into Fai’s stomach. He stood with Fai draped more or less comfortably down his back and he headed for the nearest building that looked like an inn, Syaoran trotting obediently in his wake.


The cost of the room, which Kurogane let Fai pay, was a complex, secret handshake that he and the innkeeper made up on the spot. At least it was cheap.

“We have to leave here,” Syaoran said, stirring a pot of rice. “Sakura’s too delicate for this.”

Kurogane agreed. Being out of the immediate mob seemed to have brought her, and Fai, more or less to their senses, but Sakura was missing memories and, to his way of thinking, wasn’t as sound as everybody else.

“Mokona senses a feather.” Mokona took the opportunity to say.

Of course. It was probably going to be one that was hard to find and even harder to get. “Where?”

“There!” Fai shouted. Kurogane crossed to the window and looked out. “The parade!” Fai said, turning a wide, happy smile on him.

With a sigh, Kurogane cuffed him on the side of the head. “We’re looking for a feather, not a parade.”

“Ouch,” Fai said companionable, rubbing his ear. “But the feather is there, too. The parade master has it.”

Looking at the parade, the crowd, and the feather, Kurogane had a pretty good idea of just what might happen when they waded into it all. “Let’s go.”

“But the rice will burn,” Syaoran said reasonably. “We can’t let it burn. It’s the rice festival.” With another sigh, Kurogane slapped Syaoran on the back of the head. Syaoran nodded. “The feather. Thank you.”


On the street Kurogane swept them all close behind him. “Stay back there,” he instructed. Fai darted past him, jumping on to a float with fake, plastic horses in a fake, plastic ranch setting. From the way that Syaoran swore, he imagined that Sakura had taken it upon herself to wander as well. “Stay with her and the meat-bun,” Kurogane growled. “I’m going after that feather.”

The parade master was a little boy with dark hair and pale skin and glasses. He wore black robes with the sun and moon on them, too long for him, and a huge, matching hat. He was carrying a stuffed cat with wings and a golden staff. He had the feather tucked over his ear. He was waving at the crowd and holding up the toy as though showing the crowd to it. Kurogane rushed him, sure that the crowd would stop him or that the kid would fire some sort of magic out of that wicked, pointy staff. Instead the boy stepped nimbly to the side and smiled gamely. “It’s my birthday,” the boy told him. “I’m having a proper party for once. I’m twelve.”

Kurogane didn’t say a word in reply, merely reached out and plucked the feather off of the kid and turned to where Syaoran was dragging Sakura through the crowd. “Hey!” he called out, holding up his prize.

“You. Took. My. Present.” The voice was a hiss behind him and Kurogane’s body took over for his mind, vaulting him forward and up as a blast of fire singed the spot he’d been standing in. He landed on Fai’s float and darted along the fake fields, crouching low as he did so when he heard the boy yell out another spell.

“I love you, Big Puppy,” Fai sang out as Kurogane pulled him off the pony. “And I love ice cream, and sour pickles, and teeny-tiny soda crackers…”

Just what he needed…a stupid, babbling Fai. For all of one, helpless second Kurogane stared into insanity and then he did the stupidest thing he could think of. He buried a hand in Fai’s hair and kissed him for all he was worth, with his eyes wide open. He saw Fai’s mind fall back into place and click and whir to life. He could almost hear the first coherent thought pop into his head and knew that, for once, they were in complete agreement. Kurogane’s lost his mind. He tore his mouth away and set Fai on his feet, holding the feather up between them. “Get this to her,” he instructed before turning to face the shadow he could feel flying at his back.

“Kurogane!” Fai’s voice was startled and horrified, but Kurogane didn’t really have time to deal with it as he buckled under the full weight of a jaguar. With wings.

Cute, kid, he thought sourly. “Sakura,” he reminded Fai through gritted teeth, planting his feet in the beast's belly and shoving as hard as he could, holding the snapping, snarling head at bay, a plastic pony hoof poking him in the back of the head. He could see, around the head of the cat, Fai use the jaguar’s back as a launching pad and disappearing into the rioting crowd. “Come on, kitty,” he goaded the cat, feeling it shift as his strength won out over gravity. “You’re nothing to the greatest ninja who ever lived!”

“Oh, come now,” the cat said reasonably, in a comfortably deep voice. Then it shook off his hands, and diving for his jugular, bit him.

Kurogane got his arm up and felt the teeth sink in, felt at least one sharp score on his neck and realized that he was probably going to die because he could already feel the blood pooling. “I hate this place,” he muttered, getting his other arm up as the first one dropped limply and the cat attacked again. No bite came. Instead he saw Syaoran’s foot sail past and was then hauled to his feet

“Time to go,” Fai said.

So his consciousness went.


When he woke up, there was a lamp and there was darkness. His head hurt but his arm and neck felt fine. He turned his head and saw the sleeping forms of Sakura, Syaoran and Mokona as well as several stabled horses. He started to sit.

“No, lie down,” Fai’s voice said from beside him. He turned to look at Fai, sitting up and glowing white in the shadows. “They healed you very quickly and very well, but said you should rest as much as you can.”

Kurogane considered it. The idea alone chafed. He pushed himself up and discovered that the most he could manage was to raise himself up to rest back on his elbows. “Hell.”

Fai shrugged, a smile catching the dim light. “If you fall down, I’m going to laugh at you,” he warned.

“Why are you up?” he asked, ignoring the fact that falling down was a very real possibility.

In answer, Fai stood up and went to the unused blankets that were stretched between Mokona and himself. Fai lay down and looked at him. “I was waiting for you to wake up.”

“Oh.” Kurogane let himself lay back again. “That was stupid.”

There was a soft chuff of laughter and then silence. He was beginning to drift when Fai spoke again. “You kissed me.”

“I had to do something. You were out of your mind.”

“And you weren’t?”

Kurogane rolled over. “Of course I was.”

He fell asleep listing to Fai chuckling and thinking I don’t like this place.