“Stay here; I’ll run you a bath,” Lorenz said before scampering to fetch his housemaid, urgency in his step.
Ignatz lurched from the threshold until he landed on the nearest armchair to the still-open door. Primrose patterned upholstery was stained irredeemably red, and cold, damp air misted into the house, but Ignatz didn’t have an iota of energy left with which to react. His glasses laid crooked, broken, on his face.
The maid was nowhere in sight--he’d sent her home early today, of all days!--so Lorenz had to hustle to the powder room himself, shirtsleeves rolled up, to draw the hot water. Sweat already lit his brow, only made damper by the fireplace at his back. He’d never been taken with so much worry for someone other than himself.
By the time Lorenz returned downstairs, his hair had come undone, falling into streaks across his shoulders. It wounded him to even look at poor Ignatz--how he hoped that the blood across his cheeks was someone else’s. If he were to ask Ignatz, though, even he wouldn’t be able to give a straight answer to that fact.
Lorenz brushed past his slouching friend to press the front door shut as softly as he could manage, given the wind of the decaying storm. Then, he stooped at Ignatz and took him by the clammy hand. “Darling,” Lorenz cooed in an attempt to stir his friend.
All Ignatz could do was loll his head until his chin was off of his chest. The sight put Lorenz on the verge of weeping.
“Darling,” Lorenz said again. “Come on.”
He heaped Ignatz’s arm across his narrow shoulders, surprised by the density. There was a new padding of muscle to his old friend, one which made him doubt whether Ignatz had actually been only painting since he’d gotten into town. Such a fact would explain his state just now, but it offered Lorenz no comfort at all.
The bath water stung. It stung so much that when Lorenz plucked the crooked glasses from Ignatz’s face, there were tears beading his eyes. It made Lorenz pull back, afraid to lay his hands on his friend. His touch had never harmed before, not like the beast hunters of the city. The thought that he might make Ignatz hurt was sickening.
But, Ignatz didn’t let Lorenz pull back. He gripped Lorenz’s slender wrist with trembling firmness--how long had he been so strong?
It was only after he’d been wetted down, after he and Lorenz both had confirmed just how much blood was his own, that Ignatz spoke up. As Lorenz rasped a washcloth over a cherry-red scrape, Ignatz said, “I’m sorry.”
“You mustn’t be,” Lorenz replied. “Anything I might have had for tonight, it’s infinitely less important than this.”
“But, after what I said--”
“Don’t worry about that.” Lorenz sank until he sat back on his heels. Between the blood and soap and rain, his pants were already ruined, so he didn’t care about a little bit of shoe polish now.
Ignatz splashed his face, then said, “I can... take it back. After this--” he gestured to the claw-foot tub “--it’s only fair I work for you.”
There was a wet slap when Lorenz let the washcloth drop to the floor, instead furiously gripping the edge of the tub. “This is not a business visit, Ignatz Victor. You won’t make it thus, not while you’re wounded. Now, hush.”
Yuya bolts awake when he feels a foreign weight on his chest. For a second he thinks he’s in the xyz dimension, or even synchro but after a few breathes he realizes that he’s in his own house. His own bedroom. With his wife-
“Yuzu?” Yuya speaks in the darkness.
The response he gets is only a sniff against his chest. Yuya in return place his hand around Yuzu’s head and holds her close. “Are you okay?”
They lay in silence, with the exception of Yuzu’s fast shallows breathes, for few moments until Yuzu finally gains some semblance of composure. “Sorry,” she speaks, her voice raspy and dry. “It was just a nightmare. It’s stupid.”
Yuya shakes his head, “It’s not. You can tell me Yuzu.”
“Sometimes....” Yuzu starts, “sometimes I get visions of Ray’s life. And see destruction, and death and I see him-”
“Yuz-”
“And I sometimes I get scared that you’ll end up just like him.”
Yuya freezes. Yuzu feels it and she regrets voicing her fears. They were hers and he shouldn’t worry her stupid fears-
Yuzu lets out a soft gasp as she feels a hand stroking through her hair. She looks up and even if the dark she can make out Yuya’s soft red eyes.
“That won’t happen, I promise.”
It’s just words but Yuzu let’s out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding, and she relaxes into Yuya’s touches.
“You’d hit me with that fan of yours until I stopped.”
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
I’m back y’all! Gonna be posting some links to the archived stuff I have on Ao3. Unfortunately, the shorter, headcanon stuff that was only on my blog is now gone ;m; But at least some of the things I made have been posted elsewhere!!
Zarc groans as he feels his head pounding and struggles to keep the contents of his stomach in his stomach. He doesn’t know where he and he couldn’t care less he just wants the world to stop moving.
“-cking handful, you know that?”
It takes a moment to pin a name to that voice but Zarc eventually concludes that it’s Ray with him. He wants to say something but all he can do is groan again.
“If my dad finds you here we’re both screwed so keep it down.” Ray speaks. Zarc doubts she knows he’s awake - she has a habit to talk to herself just like himself, a side effect of years of talking to duel spirits.
Still Zarc keeps his groans and moans down to a minimum.
After sometime Zarc feels something cover him, a blanket. Is he in Ray’s bed? The lights around him are too bright for him to open his eyes and check.
“If you puke, I’ll kill you,” Zarc hears Ray’s voice above him. If he wasn’t so tired he’d snort at that.
Ray walks around the room and continues to talk to herself before eventually making her way to the other side of the bed.
“This is not how I imagine us sharing a bed for the first time.”
