Take Me By the Hand

Part Three: Possessive Revenge

Author's Note: I'm sorry for the long break in between chapters: I can only plead a bad block. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy this anyway! The action begins, and the darker side of the Zero begins to surface from here onwards: their fascination with pain and cruelty. And at the same time, a warmer, more touching side: their fascination with each other.
'Natsuo? What's this?' Youji asked, cocking his head curiously.

'Hmm?' Natsuo asked, sitting up lazily in bed. Two weeks into being together, and they were still discovering things about each other. Youji didn't like drinking cold milk, and Youji always slept on his left side, so Natsuo always warmed the milk and slept on his right, so he could face Youji. Natsuo didn't like eating vegetables and liked taking hot baths, so Youji ate half and made Natsuo eat the rest, and didn't use all the hot water or invited Natsuo to share the bathtub with him.

Youji was surprised that he liked it, but he did. It was fun learning to compromise with whatever Natsuo wanted, and it was coming naturally to him, without question and without the slightest trace of difficulty. There was no hesitation in the way they adapted to suit each other, the way they slipped into living together like they had done it for years instead of a mere fourteen days.

And there was nothing to it, nothing besides his wish to find out more about Natsuo, so that he could be closer to the other boy, and Youji knew, without asking and without words, that it was reciprocated by Natsuo too. Youji wanted to know everything about the beautiful creature who was suddenly his, this boy with the reddish rust hair and the wonderful green eyes, and the pale, pale skin that made Natsuo look so wonderful and exotic.

So it came to pass that Natsuo was just lying on the bed and doing nothing in particular, and Youji had gone to get a glass of water for the both of them and as he was returning to the bed he'd noticed the weird jagged scar on the sole of Natsuo's foot, and that was a weird place to get cut, wasn't it, even in a fight?

'Ahh, it's from that time when the other students were trying to get me,' Natsuo answered, pulling his foot up with an amazing flexibility to stare at the jagged cut.

'What?' Youji asked, sitting down beside Natsuo and reaching out a finger to trace the scar with a gentle finger. 'What do you mean?'

'Before you came,' Natsuo answered nonchalantly; setting his foot down and letting his head fall into Youji's lap. 'The other students didn't like me very much. They played all kinds of pranks. They put glass in my shoe and I didn't realize it, cause it went straight in but it didn't hurt.'

The sudden flare of protective anger surprised even Youji himself with its intensity, and for a moment he saw red, red mist, angry and searching for a target for it, a target that he could fall upon and rend and tear and kill and hurt, hurt, hurt it so badly – But there was only Natsuo in the room, Natsuo who was his, and how dare they touch him and hurt him that way –

'Youji,' and Natsuo voice brought him back to reality. 'Youji? Are you alright?'

Youji blinked the red filming from his eyes, twining his arms around Natsuo and bringing him down to the bed. 'Mine,' he whispered quietly into Natsuo's ears. 'They hurt you, Natsuo.'

'No, they didn't,' Natsuo corrected gently. 'We don't feel pain, remember?'

That doesn't matter, Youji wanted to tell him. Natsuo is his, every inch of Natsuo, just like Youji belongs to his sentouki, and therefore Natsuo's blood and Natsuo's flesh is his property, his possessions – how dare they shed it, how dare they cut that tender, young skin? Instead, Youji ran fingers over Natsuo's cat ears – soft like crushed velvet, and tender under his searching fingers – and commanded, 'Show me, your scars. Show me.'

Natsuo complied, tugging off the shirt first, a fluid, graceful movement, pointing out the scars on his skin and explaining to Youji how he got each one, stripping as he went. This one from a sentouki fight, this one from someone's nails scratching him, this one from someone coming at him with a knife, this one also from a sentouki fight... Youji listened and his urge to hurt something grew stronger and stronger, his urge to find the people who did this and make them pay the price for laying a finger on something that belonged so solely to Youji and Youji alone.

But that would have to wait. Instead, Youji leaned in and began to mark Natsuo instead, on the intimate places – the inside of Natsuo's elbow, his wrist, then bolder, when Natsuo shuddered in pleasure as the red marks bloomed on his pale skin. A taut, brown nipple, and Natsuo's body jerked when Youji closed his teeth around it. Youji smiled and licked it a little before doing the same to the other one. He trailed downwards, marked Natsuo's inner thighs, a trail of small red nips left by sharp teeth as Natsuo made small; mewling noises and fisted his hands in Youji's hair.

To any other observer it would have looked sexual; looking back at that moment from their current age, it was. They were precocious little brats, after all. But at that moment, it wasn't. At that moment the pleasure that surged through Youji and Natsuo and formed an iron bond was the pleasure of belonging to each other, the pleasure of being bitten and the pleasure of pleasure itself, self-contained and existing for no reason but to exist. And it was wanting more of that sensation – that sheer ownership – that Youji threw himself back on the bed and invited Natsuo to do the same to him.

Natsuo's bites were harsher than Youji – they went deeper, those vicious little fangs sinking in, but Youji merely watched the blood rise and watched Natsuo moving against him. He felt the pressure but certainly no pain, and as a result there was nothing but that pleasure that flowed through the both of them, leaping from their bodies like stray electrons and ionizing the air around them in a charged cloud, their own protective little aura. A world belonging only to the two of them, a haze that shielded them from everyone else.

When Natsuo was done he curled up beside Youji, who tugged up the blankets around them before leaning in to share a bloodstained kiss – not because a kiss was what other people did, what lovers did, but because they wanted to taste it, each other's blood in each other's mouths. Youji curled arms around Natsuo and murmured, 'We supposed to always be polite, ne, Natsuo?'

Natsuo pricked his ears – that was one of Nagisa-sensei's teachings, and Youji had never shown much interest in whatever Nagisa-sensei said. 'Mm, yes?' he replied, making it sound more like a question as he waited for Youji to reveal what he had in mind.

Youji smiled then, a small secret smile that turned lavender eyes hard, like amethyst gemstones. 'So... about the people who hurt you, Natsuo. We should return the favor, ne?' And if Youji's eyes were like darkened quartz, Natsuo's eyes turned to deep, viridian emeralds as understanding sank in.

'Of course, Youji.' And he shuddered lightly in Youji's arms; the thought sending small sparks up his spine.

They got their first chance sooner than they expected to have it. It was one of the other Sacrifice-sentouki pairs, the female Fighter several years older than them, and obviously jealous of, and disturbed by, Natsuo's strength. She was one of the better of Nagisa's non-Zero Fighters, and yet it was plain to anyone with eyes that Natsuo was strong and growing ever stronger.

Nagisa-sensei had eyes.

They entered from opposite ends of the room, one of Nagisa-sensei's sterile black-and-white battlegrounds, and the sudden tightening of Natsuo's hand around Youji's told him what he needed to know. Here, then, was their first target. They would be... examples.

The Sacrifice (a small boy dressed in nondescript clothing and overshadowed by his sentouki) watched Youji – after all, everyone here knew what Natsuo was like now. Fierce, unrelenting, and merciless. But Youji... Youji was the unknown in this battle. The news was all over the school – a young boy with long, turquoise hair and lavender eyes, a delicate facial structure that made him look fey and beautiful. No one knew what he was like beneath the exterior, though – no one had even heard of him before.

That was probably a good thing, though. After all, that would mean this Youji had no combat experience, no idea what it really meant to be a Sacrifice. It was one thing to comprehend it at the conscious mental level, another thing to understand what a Sacrifice had to do in the heat of battle and take it in at the level of the emotions.

And then this Youji looked up with a sharp, vicious grin that showed pointed canines, and a shudder of fear struck him.

'Go ahead, Natsuo,' Youji murmured, smiling from within glazed eyes. His opponents wouldn't hear, but Youji wanted to get this battle started. The look of fear on the other boy's face, when he had locked gazes with Youji... it struck a responsive chord somewhere deep within him. The power to provoke that look, and what it implied about him and Natsuo...

Natsuo grinned back fiercely. 'We declare a spell battle. Do you accept?' His challenge rang loud in the empty room, and the echoes of it resounded with the tones of a battle clarion, wild and strong and unmatched even by the answering call of 'We accept!' from the opposite pair.

Natsuo settled into silent anticipation, waiting for the opponents to make the first move, his grin increasingly feral as he stayed in a ready half-crouch beside Youji, who instinctively knew what Natsuo was trying to do. Natsuo was trying to unnerve their opponents, and it was working.

Finally, they snapped. The girl screamed, 'Burst! May the winds rend and tear their skin!'

Almost snarling in fierce joy, Natsuo made no attempt to defend, merely let her attack happen and watched the red blossom on his skin and Youji's. 'We are Zero, and for trying to hurt us we give your our pain. The hurt we cannot feel is yours to suffer!'

'Defend!' the girl cried out, her Sacrifice turning sheet-white.

'Useless!' Natsuo ground out. 'This pain is born from inside you. There is no defense against your body's betrayal. Restriction!'

The Sacrifice choked out a whimper as the collar-and-chains of a restriction encircled his throat. The Fighter looked like she was about to panic. 'Restriction!' she called, a pitiful counter-attack.

Natsuo laughed. 'Shatter!' he replied, and the attack never reached them. 'You'll need a longer spell than that to catch us,' he murmured. 'Do you feel the pain? Can you feel it creeping up every square inch of your skin? Like an army of red ants setting your nerves on fire with sharp little teeth.'

Her Sacrifice screamed.

Natsuo never gave in, never let up, 'Does it hurt a lot? We wouldn't know, after all. We're Zero. We cannot know what it's like to suffer pain, but you can. Your suffering is our lesson. Show us what it's like to suffer pain, like being pierced by a million hot needles, sinking into your skin. Burning. Searing. Killing you slowly.'

The screaming intensified and continued, one long, endless wail of sheer pain as the restrictions increased. 'No!' the Fighter girl cried out. 'We surrender! Stop this!'

Natsuo turned to Youji, a question in his eyes. Youji twitched and realized he was breathing heavily, and there was an unfamiliar sensation coursing through him – delight. Sheer, real delight at seeing another person suffer, helpless on the ground in the face of the power that Natsuo and him held in tandem.

'Restrict! If they cannot feel pain let them suffer in a world of no sensation. Let their Sacrifice's senses be muffled and may fear grip him!' the sudden sentence, the attack directed solely at Youji – was unexpected, and there was no defense against it. A moment later, there was a collar encircling Youji's neck, and a cry escaped his lips.

There was nothing, all of a sudden. The world was black and silent and Natsuo was nowhere. 'No!' Youji cried, but there was no sound issuing from his lips. No! was the visceral, sudden response to what had just happened – Natsuo's disappearance. No, no, no.

This wasn't true, was it? Youji took a deep, shuddering breath as the events of the last few moments came flooding back. This was a spell battle. They had been attacked, that's why he couldn't see or hear or feel anything. He would stay calm. He retreated inwards, into himself, recalling to when he had first held Natsuo in his arms. There had been an almost audible internal click, a recognition, a knowing that Natsuo was there. And nothing had changed. He would know, he would know if Natsuo was truly gone from him, and Natsuo wasn't.

'Natsuo,' he spoke. 'You can hear me, even if I can't hear you. I'm alright. Teach them, Natsuo – teach them what it means to hurt. Teach them what it means to be afraid. Show them how small dark things can creep into them, into their ears and mouths and eyes, and devour them from the inside out and take them slowly.'

And he waited. He waited and was patient because he trusted Natsuo and he knew Natsuo would never fail him, and there was absolutely no chance that this second-rate pair could even think of defeating them.

And then suddenly the waiting was over and his senses were on overload, charged with a blaze of wonderful, silky scented crimson. Natsuo's long hair, and his triumphant little smile as he held Youji in his arms and helped him to stand.

A pair of corpses lay in front of them, and their last screams reverberated with pleasure in Natsuo's ears.

Author's Note: Review! I will be very much appreciative.