RP log - Yukimura, Tezuka (pt 2)
Summary: The continuation of this log. In Yukimura's room. There is Tez!angst, there is Yukimura!comforting, there are decisions made and decisions reinforced. And more comforting.

Rating: R. Smut. Sort of. >D

Note: The term that Yukimura is calling Tezuka is Spanish, a contraction that means 'my son' or 'my child'.



It was like waking from a dream, to lose the cooled-warm weight on his lap, the fangs in his throat, and to hear spoken words again. Dark brown eyes took their time to readjust to the light once they opened, then Tezuka saw the effect of the feed on Yukimura, a slight blush which was not there before. There was a brief moment of disorientation when he took the offered hand and stood, but it passed quickly. This was different. Niou usually looked drunk after feeding from him, and the vampire would become more docile. Niou liked to lie down on his lap after a feed and he would let him pat his hair. Niou would even kiss him, sometimes.

There was no way Tezuka could shake Niou from his thoughts.

He could not remember what the elevator looked like, how he walked into Yukimura's suite, or how he got into the bed. Once his head sank into the plush pillow, he began to tremble again and he could not say why. Exhaustion, panic, sadness, although now no longer as suffocating as before, twisted together to become something new, something dark. But he refused to open his eyes and search for Yukimura; he could not become any more a liability than he already was. If only he had more blood to give, if only he was exhausted enough to black out from the world.

After situating Tezuka on the bed, Yukimura had brushed a cool kiss across the feeder's forehead and whispered that he'd be back after he changed. The tie had snaked down his body to pool in a coil of cinnamon-red silk on the floor, the jacket sliding off of slender shoulders as he entered the walk-in closet. Shoes and pants followed, leaving the vampire in a white dress shirt and Gold Toe socks. These, too, were quickly shed and replaced with pajamas and slippers.

Changing clothes, however, didn't change what was outside that door. A human who grieved and longed for a vampire who didn't love him back. Niou...you really have no idea how much he cares, do you? It was a sad and piteous state, sharpened into clarity having been so deeply inside Tezuka's mind. These emotions were things he simply did not share with anyone, instead bearing their unfulfillment alone. It's no wonder those fools marked him as easy, expendable prey--his care is all for Niou, and none for himself.

Yet...his intentions were to leave, to get away for his own good. That meant he was not completely lost. Shaken, apprehensive and weary, but not lost. Nor would he be, if Yukimura had anything to do with it.

You focus too much on those with the shortest lives, Seiichi, part of him said, the practical, ruthless side staring back at him in the mirror, almost a separate entity as it sized him up with deep, calculating eyes.

Life is short, even when it's eternal. A grim sort of fatalism from the rest of him. Orders, requests, ultimatums all go down better when they're wrapped in kindness. This clan, their love and their loyalty, is going to be desperately needed in the future. Equally pragmatic, the side of him that cared and cared deeply. Only a fool forgets that. With a shrug at his reflection, Yukimura deposited his glasses--artificial barriers that tended to make the human world view him as one of their own--on the closet's vanity and exited the room.

It bit him when he walked through the door, the despair emanating in waves from his bed. "Kunimitsu?" he ventured softly, slinking down onto the comforter next to Tezuka's back, one fine-boned hand gently rubbing between his shoulder blades. "You're shaking. Please," he said, "look at me." Rather than turn Tezuka to his other side, Yukimura slipped over him like mist, to where he was lying on the bed facing Tezuka.

"I will not bleed you more now, mijo." The vampire's voice, though caring, was grave. "It's not right to tax your body that way, to say nothing of the other costs. Do you feel you have not given me enough, that I am unsatisfied?" Dark hair, coiled like small snakes, shuffled back and forth as he shook his head, and haunting, exotic eyes seemed almost to glow in the dim light. "Nothing of the sort. Even though that wasn't why you came to me today, I couldn't be more pleased, or more honoured, that you shared yourself with me so generously."

Soft, intimate, Yukimura's hands traced Tezuka's face, memorizing him with touch. "I will help you, and I will not leave you. I am not Niou," though, perhaps, that is the crux of the matter, he admitted, "but what happens to you concerns me. You are clan, and that makes you mine. Not as a possession, but a responsibility." There were some behaviors, some mindsets, in Tezuka that were self-destructive and needed changing, but one always gained the trust before invoking any discipline.

"Please, tell me what you need. If you cannot say it, show me. I know it's your nature to withdraw to keep yourself from being hurt. I won't hurt you, mijo," the foreign word danced with his accented English. You've been hurt enough already.

The touch, blood-warmed skin ghosting across his face, invoked minute sparks of sensations, those that always followed a feed, within Tezuka. When dark eyes opened, they gazed steadily at Yukimura, but the shaking of Tezuka's body did not cease. Yukimura was so kind, too kind, had given him so much in the short space of time they had spent together. The vampire was even more beautiful than he appeared on the surface. Tezuka could not burden Yukimura anymore with his foolishness; he did not know what he needed anyway. He did not need anything or anyone, not even Niou, he only wanted the vampire's recognition, and it was this childish, pathetic desire that reduced him to this state.

Pathetic. That was what it was. Yukimura was displaying patience, but even such tolerance could not be infinite and Tezuka knew better than to stretch it anymore the way he had with Yagyuu. Even Tezuka himself was sick and tired of this, thinking and behaving like a teenager in love for the first time, but knowing the problem did not mean solving it, just as exhaustion did not equal sleep.

"Thank you, Yukimura." He began, then took a moment to search for his words before he continued. "I just need to rest." His body, too thin and seeminly frail, tilted towards the vampire just slightly to feel the hand on his face better. He had lost a considerable amount of weight since the incident involving the other vampires; much of everything he had consumed since then had gone towards the mending of his body rather than maintaining his weight. But he was, by no means, physically too weak to travel far away from the clan, for a while or for life.

He hoped Yukimura would understand that he was not trying to dismiss the kindness he had been offered. He had always been so clumsy in expressing himself. But there was something he must say, even if not out loud. Please don't tell them about any of this.

The motion of Yukimura's hands over Tezuka's face never stopped, tracing the too-prominent cheekbones and the hollowed valleys beneath them, encircling the sockets of eyes visible beneath skin stretched taut and spare over them. His expression did not change, but the vampire's mind frowned slightly, his hands skimming down to inspect the lines of ribs beneath clothing, the jutting of hipbones. His experiences had taken a harsh toll on him, eating not just his soul, it seemed.

"You need more than rest, mijo. When was the last time you ate?" the vampire gently asked. "I would be less than a gentleman if I had dinner and did not feed you." Dark brows, elegant as raven's wings, pulled down over Yukimura's large eyes, a sad expression shrouding his face. "You're so thin you feel as if you could break in my hands."

"Do you eat meat? Let me have some food sent up for you before you sleep." While he planned to have the clan doctor prescribe iron pills for Tezuka, the thought that a small sleeping aid would not hurt crossed his mind. Lack of rest, despite his weakened state, stood out on his face. Yukimura was old enough to have seen misuses of chemistry throughout the ages and bear a slight distrust for it, but adaptive enough to know when times had changed. Pharmaceuticals could not separate a feeder from a breaker, but they could blunt the path enough to allow sufficient rest. "Fluids are the first things that need to be replaced when you're bled. I have water and juice in my rooms already. May I get you some?"

As politely as he could, Tezuka moved himself so that Yukimura's hand slid off of him, landing on the comforter softly. His senses were still dulled and at the same tie peaked from the feed, giving him a feeling akin to being drugged. Niou liked to take advantage of this state, touching him, kissing him, luring him towards the edge of giving himself over. Niou would probably say that Tezuka got off from a feed and he would not be too far from the truth - for Tezuka, feeding could rival sex, so intense were the sensations and such was the intimacy. Last time Tezuka gave Niou his blood, he ended up initiating a kiss that almost led to something more. Perhaps it was different for every feeder, perhaps not, but whatever the case, Yukimura's caring touch could prove too much for Tezuka's hypersensitive body to handle, and Tezuka did not think that was Yukimura's intention. Looking away, he scooted himself backwards, once again counting on Yukimura's understanding to not feel offended.

The prospect of food did very little to Tezuka, but he nodded anyway, knowing that come tomorrow, he would need the energy to set off on a long journey. Yukimura had not responded to his request of not telling Niou and Yagyuu about this, but it did not matter as long as he went far enough. Niou would be annoyed that his toy got away, but he would deem Tezuka not worth the trouble of retrieval, and Yagyuu would not bother either because Niou would tell him not to.

Although, Tezuka wondered what their initial reactions would be when they find out about all of this and discover that he had gone. Would there even be the slightest trace of regret?

Laying on his side, hair curling around his face and bare feet peeking from the bottoms of his pajamas, Yukimura watched Tezuka, eyes luminous even in the dim light. The hand the feeder had brushed off lay immobile on the bed, a curious gaze gently dissecting Tezuka. Ah, so that's it, mijo, the vampire murmured to himself, pushing himself into a sitting position. "Wait here, please, while I call for some food."

He slid off the bed in a silken breeze, the white of his pajamas nearly the same shade of pale as his skin, and picked up the phone on the bedside table. The language he spoke to the other end was rapid and flowing, Tezuka's name being the only intelligible word in it. They chattered back and forth for a few brief minutes, then Yukimura hung up the phone after uttering what must have passed for goodbye.

Rather than return directly to the bed, the vampire spun, heading past the foot of the bed for a small refrigerator. He pulled from it a bottle of water and a box of raisins, fetching a glass from atop it as he closed it securely. "Do you prefer straight from the bottle or in a glass?" he asked, rejoining Tezuka on the bed, sitting cross-legged within touching distance but not violating it. "Raisins are iron-rich, and should help your body start repairing itself. Your meal will be here shortly, one of my people will bring it." He held the box out to Tezuka, his eyes following the fine curve of wrist and the spare flesh that covered it.

You ask a lot of me, mijo. It was not a promise to secrecy, nor was it an intent to inform; simply a declaration of truth. It was a lot to ask of their leader, to conceal these things he had learned. However, there were secrets that Yukimura had kept for far longer far deeper. I will not volunteer what I know to them, but if asked I will only disavow knowing something if it benefits the clan more to do so.

"Now," he spoke, voice falling as crystalline upon the ears as it did upon the mind, "eat." As Tezuka had not taken the box from him, Yukimura opened it and poured out a handful of wrinkled raisins, picking up two between his thumb and forefinger and holding them to Tezuka's lips. "You need your strength for whatever path tomorrow's choices bring. Please," his other hand curled around the fruit, the urge to touch him overwhelming and the backs of his fingers skated gently across Tezuka's cheek, "eat for me."

If the good of the clan was Yukimura's reason, then Tezuka could not hold it against the vampire. He was the one who offered the knowledge to Yukimura. In a sense he had given Yukimura an unnecessary burden and to ask for the promise of silence was demanding too much. It did not matter, for there was no reason that disclosing what Yukimura had learned about him would benefit the clan at all.

The sour-sweet smell of the raisins filled Tezuka's nostrils, and even though it did nothing to aid his appetite, he ate anyway, letting Yukimura press the dried fruit past his lips, and then holding out a hand so that the vampire passed him what was in his pale hand. It felt strange to be fed this way, as if he was a child who refused to eat.

Sitting up better, feeling Yukimura arrange the pillows behind him as he did so, he forced the fruit down his throat almost by sheer willpower. He would eat; he had to, just as he would leave because he had to, for himself and for Yagyuu. Yagyuu did not need him as a feeder, a burden, or a hopeless love rival.

Yukimura passed Tezuka the water bottle just before the feeder choked from eating too fast.

"Easy," Yukimura soothed, patting Tezuka gently on the shoulder. "No sense eating it only to give it back." He cracked open the mental barrier between them just slightly, enough to pour calm over the raw wounds of Tezuka's psyche. They were ones that only Tezuka could heal, but which he could continue to blunt for a while.

The hydraulic hiss of the elevator doors was expected and murmuring an apology, Yukimura edged off the bed, gliding over to the human holding a laden tray, designed to fit over one's lap for eating in bed. The clan leader thanked the bearer, standing on tiptoe to kiss his cheek, and returned to Tezuka, the doors closing in his wake.

"The kitchens were better acquainted with how you like your steak than I," he announced, reaching to put down the tray. A momentary pause, as if considering the wisdom of his actions, and then Yukimura situated himself between Tezuka's legs, his own limbs stretching up past the feeder's waist, and placed the tray over them both. Taking up the knife and fork, Yukimura made short work of carving up the sirloin and filet, extending the fork to Tezuka. "It's been...a long time since I've eaten anything like this. It looks quite delicious."

Absently, his other hand stroked Tezuka's thigh, back and forth, then in small circles. "If your decision is to leave, you must promise me to eat well. I want to see you at your normal weight again, healthy and strong. You are beautiful like this, mijo, but it isn't good for you."

It was like having a blanket wrapped around his mind, warm and soothing, and Tezuka let out a sigh, his tremblind dying down a little at the same time. He usually disliked having his mind numbed this way, but it was a last resort, he could not be more grateful that Yukimura had done it for him.

The food looked and smelled delicious, but his stomach was simply not responding. Raisins was one thing, an entire steak was another. Eyes lifting, glasses put aside some time ago and forgotten about, Tezuka gazed into Yukimura's eyes. "I don't mean to be rude, but..." With all that he had in his mind, body still shaking ever so slightly, and his senses playing tricks on his exhausted body the way they always did after a feed, Tezuka did not think he could even manage a bite. "You are doing all this for me and... I'm sorry."


The desire to squirm, not out of discomfort, was strong with Yukimura sittng down the way he did, a hand sending cooled warmth through the material of Tezuka's pants. Shifting his leg Tezuka shyed away from the touch once again. Did Yukimura know how he was feeling? I... Asking Yukimura to leave him alone now would be rude and ungrateful; it was not as if he opposed to intimacy. Maybe... Tezuka could feel his mind starting to cloud over, the way it had last time Niou drank his blood and they kissed. Closing his eyes, the feeder drew a shaky breath through his mouth. Sometimes he thought it was not really because of the feeding, but how it loosened his defenses and showed who he truly was inside, someone who wanted to be wanted.

He hated this side of himself.

The vampire studied Tezuka in silence for what seemed like hours, beautiful eyes absorbing much and saying nothing; however, in actuality it was no more than the passage of several heartbeats, nearly audible in the stillness of the room.

"Ah," Yukimura said at last, lips curved to form the word. "I understand. The nice thing about food is it will keep for a little while until you're hungry. If you get light-headed," this was spoken softly, an intimate, playful secret between them, "I'll catch you." Replacing the fork on the plate, Yukimura lifted the tray and stood, placing it upon the table across the room and pausing before the large floor-to-ceiling window.

The heavy curtains in the room were drawn, only sheer panels blocking the world from full moon's light, and the silvery beams whispered through their gaps, seeking their lover, the creature who walked the nights with them. "Mijo," Yukimura said softly, pulling the thin material aside to greet moonlight's kiss, eyes following the lights and life below, "I am too old to take any of your reluctance personally. Please do not worry that you are offending me. Such 'politically correct' times we live in, where the least offense or slight is magnified into a matter of grave importance."

The moonlight softened his aristocratic profile, casting it in partial shadow. His hair, too, seemed simply part of the illusion, the shadows taken form to coil around him. "What does offend me, if that's the appropriate word, is the unimportance you attach to yourself and the disregard with which you treat your own needs. Perhaps that's a selfish mindset to you, but to survive one must be at least a little selfish." Neither the words nor the tone were angry, falling gently as rain through the large room.

Yukimura turned, the sheers falling closed behind him, the moonlight creeping through their translucent layers a corona around his head as he came closer; a dark saint, a holy demon or both? "The sensitivity, the kindness, the passions you hold so deep in your heart, they aren't the weaknesses you fear them to be. They aren't shameful, no matter how needy and clingy they make you feel." The vampire's teeth stood out as he spoke, sharp and perfect and white against the pale rose of his mouth. "They can be your greatest strengths, if only you can accept them."

He arrived at the end of the bed, a living shadow slithering up the comforter towards Tezuka, a cool, cool breeze heralding his presence. "You desire to be desired, you want to be wanted. Let me want you for a little while, mijo." Yukimura reached, not quite touching Tezuka but embracing him with his power, tenderly caressing down his side with it. "Your skin, it calls out for comfort. Your body, it yearns to be held. A Stradivarius waiting for the touch of a master so that it may sing."

Sing with me...Kunimitsu... the vampire whispered in his mind before drowning him in a kiss.

Yukimura's words were too beautiful to be used on him. Stradivarius? Tezuka felt more like just a tightly wound string that would snap with the gentlest of touch, but when Yukimura's lips descended upon his own, he felt his entire body resonate and respond to this kiss.

Let passion become his strength? Let Yukimura want him? He understood none of that, but he knew he enjoyed this and Niou liked to do this, perhaps Yukimura too, after a feed. The touch of Yukimura's power, the slightest tilt of the bed, the pressure on his lips that told him Yukimura was there, he really was being kissed, and it was because he was being treasured, not used. Words were rapidly fading from Tezuka's conscious mind no matter how hard he tried to hold on to them. He could barely breathe as he began to kiss back, deliberately cutting his tongue with his own tooth before sliding it across Yukimura's lips, staining them with blood. That was how did he had done it with Niou last time, giving him blood through the kiss, although he had stopped them because it was wrong, he did not want to lose to Niou's game, to give himself over just like that. But Yukimura was not Niou, Yukimura was beautiful, almost horribly so, and Tezuka did not love this vampire. He could share himself with Yukimura for this very reason.

Yukimura wanted to show him something Tezuka doubted would make any sense to him because he could not share that age-old wisdom, but he could share himself in return. Still shivering and arms relaxed on his sides, he did not move at all but lapped at Yukimura's lips once more. Stealing a look at the vampire, he saw the way moonlight highlighted the planes of Yukimura's face, and he allowed himself to feel the silken smooth skin with his palm. He was losing his mind. He had to be.

Ah, mijo, don't you realize when you sell yourself short you allow others to treat you with no value, too? The thought fell gently, like the snow outside the large windows. You are very beautiful, and not just that pretty face. Even now, you're still trying to give back to me...

Yukimura licked the offering from his lips and delved deeper into Tezuka's mouth, gently closing the small wound with deliberation. It's a precious thing you offer me, worthy of something precious in return. He turned his face into Tezuka's touch, savoring the calloused humanity of his hand, his own hand coursing down the front of Tezuka's shirt, feeling the muscles in the feeder's stomach clench in response, interrupting the trembles of his body. Tezuka's thought encircled Yukimura, awhirl with energy, of losing his mind.

Let your mind go, mijo...and your body will follow...

Fingers crested over the waist of Tezuka's pants, sliding down the slope of crotch to cup him intimately, to weigh through cloth and convention the heavy prize. Yet another reason to refuse further blood from him: arousal required fuel, and too much after a feed could make even a feeder pass out.

Absently, as Yukimura's silk-clad body snaked down Tezuka's, the clan leader wondered if Tezuka had ever known the pleasure of being inside a vampire's mouth. Knowing Niou, he doubted it, and knowing Niou's jealousy with Yagyuu, he doubted it further. This turned his own thoughts to Syusuke, and his blood sang in response.

Fastenings of pants had changed little in his lifetime, and Tezuka's parted with barely a touch, exposing tight boxers of a nondescript color, made tighter by what strained at the seams. What an inappropriate wrapping for a present, Yukimura thought, though he knew better than to judge these sorts of books by their covers. Deft, sure hands edged them down over Tezuka's wiry hips, the cuts of shadow playing hide and seek in the hollows of spare flesh across his stomach, until he was fully exposed to Yukimura's eyes.

"Mijo," the vampire breathed, his breath hot over Tezuka's cock, "let go and just feel." With the grace of a general directing his army, Yukimura closed the distance, taking Tezuka into his mouth with gentle authority. His fangs fit neatly around the head of Tezuka's cock, rubbing and cajoling with their presence but bearing no threat of piercing him. Millenia of experience teased his tip, dancing back and forth in time with Yukimura's tongue, tasting him and seeking more.

A tremor ran through Tezuka as sensations rippled through his body, the way his shivering had done only moments ago, but this felt so very different. The gasp that tore from his throat was more like a whimper as he leaned back into the pillows which propped him up, his head sinking into the softness, yet he was still able to see what Yukimura was doing to him. Head dipped, lips parted, the clan leader pleasured him with his tongue, his teeth, even his fangs. Giving, and demanding nothing at all in return.

He bit back a cry when Yukimura's lips wrapped a bit tighter, enclosing his erection in the warm, wet cavern, sucking and teasing him. The sides of the sharp teeth scrapped along his length, enticing, never hurting. Already hard from the feeding and the touches, Tezuka was soon throwing his head back, fingers gripping the sheets as he tried to contain himself, not allowing himself to make a sound, not allowing himself to lift his hips.

Yukimura. Propping himself up on an elbow, Tezuka reached forward to brush dark curls away from Yukimura's eyes. Yukimura. He said again, and then lost what he wanted to say to the waves of pleasure crashing over his body. He fought to keep his eyes open, the way he always had when he kissed Niou or got intimate with him, because it was so surreal that seeing was the only way he could believe it really was happening. But then the tongue slid across the head of his cock and all reasons fled.

Eyes closed, all Tezuka knew was the vampire between his legs, the mouth sucking him, and the sensations that ran wild in his body. Pushing himself against the pillows, his hips bucked, shoving himself deeper into Yukimura's mouth, not caring about the presence of sharp teeth. The vampire's name fell from his lips again and again as if it was the only word he knew, as if it was a song of lust, of worship, of everything Yukimura was giving him.

Easy, mijo, Yukimura gently encouraged from within the shadowy recesses of Tezuka's mind, the mist of his presence permeating through the building haze of lust and desire that sparked with the feeder and shocked through the circuit back to the vampire. Don't fight it. Turn loose of your mind; I'll give you everything you need.

And he did. Fellatio was in some ways far more intimate than intercourse, the direct and personal contact, the taste of partner everywhere in your mouth, the striking ability to rend and ravage along with pleasure. The femoral artery nearly flickered out of Tezuka's pale, naked thigh--yet another spot Yukimura felt he could guarantee Tezuka had never properly experienced--with a seductive grace. It took effort, it took extraordinary will in the face of that distraction, and it took a few tricks from millenia ago when vampires could not so easily hide in human society, but Yukimura smoothly retracted his fangs. There is pleasure beyond just blood to be had, mijo, he thought to himself as Tezuka plunged forward.

Catching Tezuka's rhythm as the feeder thrust himself deep into his mouth, Yukimura dropped his jaw. The urgent, desperate motion from Tezuka slid him forward to swallow Tezuka whole, his front teeth tightening in small nips as he reached the base of Tezuka's cock. A hand, unearthly soft, unearthly strong, matched that same pulsing tense-and-release around the human's balls, the other hand sliding against naked buttocks, urging just a moment's patience. With a wet sound Yukimura pulled upwards, flat teeth dragging along firm, sensitive skin. The blood beneath flesh sang to him, and he answered, both hands leaving their posts to grasp Tezuka's hips, to ride his surrender of control until he was spent and exhausted.

With every lift of hips Yukimura sucked harder, delved deeper. Ride it, mijo. Ride your passions. They're hard, deep and full of need. Can't you feel how badly everything in you wants this?

The soundless message was received, processed, but not replied, because Tezuka simply could not do anything else at that moment other from feel everything that Yukimura was giving him.

Yes, he had wanted this with his body and his soul. He had wanted, for once, not be the one on the giving end, he wanted to be treasured, to be touched and to listen to sweet things whispered into his ear. Tezuka had wanted, if only just for a moment, to be loved.

The realisation came as strongly as his climax. He heard a voice, presumably his own but he couldn't recognise it, cry out as his mind splintered and he knew nothing more apart from the fingertips digging into his hips his flesh in Yukimura's mouth, and his release into that welcoming warmth. He whimpered, he groaned, he screamed, tears sprang to his eyes again and spilled down his cheeks.

Tezuka had told himself all along that he deserved more than what he had been getting, and everything Yukimura had just shown him proved the same thing, hardening his resolve to leave. He had to leave to become strong, to become the person he should be, for himself if not to repay Yukimura.

The tensed, arched body collapsed completely, as if every bone in Tezuka's body had melted away. He struggled to see Yukimura but his vision was blurred, so he gave up and just laid there, an arm raised to cover his eyes with the back of a hand. He couldn't stop crying again, but this time because of total relief.

Reluctantly releasing Tezuka from his mouth, Yukimura scrubbed a sleeve slowly across his lips, catching the excess fluid he hadn't been able to swallow. Even at his age he'd never developed much of a taste for it, though freshly-fed vampire had a sweet aftertaste and feeder almost always possessed a bite close to the cocktail they carried in their veins.

The vampire sat back, bottom resting on his feet as he knelt between Tezuka's legs, white pajama top partially undone and curly hair spiraling all around his face. Emotion crackled in the room, spiderwebbings and lightning flashes, but for now it lacked the raw suffering of earlier.

Do you understand now, mijo? Yukimura asked to himself, letting the thought echo in his own mind until it dissapated. Possibility was one of the strongest powers a human could hold, a tiny crack in never's armor to change the scenery just enough for hope to root.

Strange, how the idea of letting him go tasted a little bittersweet now. Yukimura shook his head and undid his pajama top the rest of the way, shrugging out of it and slinking up to Tezuka's side. "Feeling any better?" he gently asked, dabbing at the tears with the silken tail of his shirt. "I didn't hurt you, did I? I forgot to pull my fangs in at first."

Elegant hands traced a path over Tezuka's damp face, into the hollows of his collarbones and across the chest exposed by his undone shirt. He guided Tezuka out of it, discarding it somewhere on the floor. Pants and boxers soon joined it, followed by Yukimura's pajama bottoms, leaving vampire and feeder equally naked.

"Let me turn down the bed. You must be tired by now, mijo. I've put your emotions through so much. Ah, no more of those," Yukimura whispered, catching another stray tear with a kiss to Tezuka's cheek, "unless they're happy ones."

Tezuka didn't bother to answer all the questions; they were mostly rhetorical anyway. He let Yukimura take care of him, too tired for words or movement yet at the same time more refreshed than he had felt for a long, long time, probably ever since Niou broke him. He had invited Yukimura into his mind, but Yukimura had shown him who he really was, what he needed and what his strengths were.

"The sensitivity, the kindness, the passions you hold so deep in your heart, they aren't the weaknesses you fear them to be... They can be your greatest strengths, if only you can accept them."

Cold, naked limbs; skin against skin; face buried in the crook of a neck. Being held by Yukimura felt like being immersed into lukewarm water - strange at first, making Tezuka want to shiver, but when his body adjusted and the blanket was pulled up to cover them, he relaxed into the embrace. Wanting to say something but finding no words, he let his mind send out a soft whisper of gratitude. He could feel sleep calling for him, and he welcomed it.

Little by little, the tensions drained from Tezuka as sleep claimed him, leaving him soft and pliable, gently molded in a half-sprawl across Yukimura's body. Absently, the vampire ran his fingers through Tezuka's hair, keeping him securely by his side with one arm. The temptation was to sleep himself, but some restless portion of soul squelched that notion, preferring instead to lie still, offering small, soothing touches, enough to keep a human mind and spirit calm and resting. The feeder would leave come morning, it was certainty rather than possibility, and thus this time should be savored and imprinted upon memory for later.

Be safe and grow strong, mijo. The thoughts slipped into the mist of Tezuka's dreams, carefully tucked inside to be discovered later when needed. I believe in you.

Yukimura smiled at the dancers on the ceiling as the night blanketed them both.