Work Text:
Marks 2 (2013.02.25)
From the back, no matter if they have a wig on or strange clothes or whatever, Kagami can usually pick out the people he knows in a crowd. It's a mixture of the way they walk, or stand, or just tilt - once he gets used to them, he knows them, knows the way they strut.
It's an fitting word for Akashi, who parts the crowd like he was made to do so, shorter than Kagami but with no less presence. At the beginning of his stay the airport had botched Kagami's luggage and in five minutes, Akashi had called down the branch manager for Epsilon Airlines and had him groveling on the floor for forgiveness.
Even when he sleeps he has presence. Kuroko's skin - a pang lances through him - had always looked perfectly luminescent no matter where he was, unless it was out in the sun for too long. Then it turned lobster red in a matter of minutes - something that nobody ever passed up the opportunity to laugh at, much to his chagrin - including, that one memorable time when they had decided to go to the beach together and Kagami had spent the whole day running away from #2.
Akashi, however, is a shade darker, dark enough so that his skin turns purple or brown depending on the light. His hair loses its color until it is simply dark and light, poking Kagami in the chest. His limbs are loosely sprawled on the bed in a general gesture of uncharacteristic untidiness, because he kicks in his sleep, sometimes very hard when he's distressed. There is a kind of twist in his lips that speaks of authority, and not bullying, because Akashi actually listens to people. In the moonlight Kagami also picks out a strange puckered mark on one shoulderblade.
"My father's cigar," Akashi says quite clearly against his collarbone. Kagami jumps in surprise.
"Um. You're awake."
"Evidently," Akashi drawls.
"Did I wake you?"
The two of them shift so Akashi is nose-to-nose with him. The kiss is drowsy and languid; for all that he sounds alert, Akashi's eyes are hooded with sleep. Kagami knows from experience that he'll stay awake for maybe ten more minutes, and then drift off.
"Your father," he echoes. He is surprised to feel no horror in his voice. Well, his brain rages for a little bit before grudgingly accepting that Akashi probably came out stronger for it.
"It was a long time ago." Akashi voices for both of them. And I'm over it, Kagami hears the unspoken statement.
His fingers find another mark. "Lucky knife. Martial arts practice."
"Pretty dirty fighting, sounds like."
"Mm. My family doesn't fight nice."
The way he says that word - like it doesn't matter - sends a pang through him. Here in this empty house, Akashi's father 'away' somewhere, his mother's cremation plaque in the living room, Kagami always subconsciously wished for Akashi's upbringing to be less messed up than his own, at least. For the first ten, twenty years of their lives children are dependent on their guardians for everything - and Kagami is always of the mindset that every minute, every second teaches a child something new.
Thus there are fucked-up kids and then there are fucked-up adults, but Kagami refuses to believe that anybody he knows is in the second category. Akashi can bring a grown man to his knees in minutes, yeah, but for Kagami, he doesn't make him. Just, in his own little way, makes his wish known.
"Fell on a rock." Kagami snickers at that one and Akashi jabs him with his elbow. "Cardboard cut." "Chewed my nails when I was a child." "Got off a bicycle wrong." "Jumped in the pool backwards and hit the underside of my chin." Now Kagami's chuckle rumbles like thunder in the room and Akashi jabs him again, harder this time.
"You were a clumsy kid," Kagami's words sweep all of the wounds together. Akashi leans back just long enough to give him one long, even look of Don't say it like you weren't, Taiga. The admonishing factor makes Kagami melt, just a little. "Not that you are now." How else could he say, Cuz see, you've got me right where you want me.
"What about you?" Akashi's voice is crisp in the darkness. "The knife, the ropes are all there. Tit for tat, Taiga - you're long overdue a turn."
Kagami squeezes Akashi's fingers absently. Recently they've cooled down from the destructive, bloodplay kind of high and the sex is once again sappy and vanilla. Akashi alternately fights him and rides him, bites him and kisses him with such sweetness his head spins. Laps at him until Kagami is ready to yank the cock ring off and jerk himself to the feel of Akashi panting against his thigh. Kiss him again, and kiss him, and kiss him. Kiss him while their hips grind, toes curl, tongues lock. Kiss him until he fucks Kagami through the mattress that is still stained red under the sheets.
Akashi had looked so terrifically, desperately content afterwards that Kagami's fears were washed away. Akashi had been long to fall asleep that night, a bundle of sheets Kagami lazily threw one leg over as he felt the blood trickle down his back. The next morning the possessiveness had shrunk into Akashi, tamed and contrite. His fingers rubbed ointment all over Kagami's body patiently and quietly, as if it was the last time. Kagami kissed the tips and watched as Akashi's eyes fluttered shut. His mouth parted involuntarily and when he took that hand and guided it to his own ass, Akashi didn't move away, just deeply and skillfully finger-fucked him, until his name was hoarse on Kagami's lips.
"I don't need it." He understands well that there were two sides to marks: the maker and the made. He has tasted one. He wonders if Akashi has come to this understanding too, with someone else.
"Why not."
"We're different people. You needed it. You can have it again. Those are for you."
"And you." The monster tenderly kisses the pads of Kagami's fingers, leaving tingles of heat in his wake. "What do you want?" It is the question of a lifetime.
Clumsy children. He grew up without heroes or love stories, yet he fumbled through life looking for them. Wanting to be them. Wanting to love someone or something that would love him back just as hard. He gets the feeling that he hasn't quite grown out of that.
Even now the question sticks at the tip of his tongue. Do you love me, Akashi, and do I love you back? Is this just now? Or is this forever?
If I could make my heart choose, would it really be you?
His foot moves slow, the back of his big toe brushing up Akashi's ankle, then back down. Only, that means his leg had to move, which means it is actually his whole leg that is rubbing against the outside of Akashi's body. Pale hands settles on his chest. Each breath Akashi takes sent chills up his spine.
I don't need anything from you but this. Akashi only fights back when he knows Kagami wants him to. Now, he is pliant with one of Kagami's hands pushing him into the bed, shoving the pillow underneath his hips. Akashi throbs, leaking and needy, curling delicately upwards. The moonlight plays havoc over the rise and fall of his back and the indistinct lines of his imperfect skin. Kagami only has to nip at his sac before Akashi whimpers, ready and spilling in waves. He is boneless and sated as Kagami leisurely spreads, slicks himself and takes him.
His skin is a whole map of little scars, he realized, starting from his neck and ending at his feet. The landmarks of a man. The bunch of his muscles, the gasps as Kagami hits the right place and Akashi starts to twitch back to life, the strain of Akashi's lungs expanding and stuttering - he is caught in the storm with no release. He isn't sure if he feels more human or more beast when they have sex. He is only aware that their combined need is insatiable.
As if in a dream he reaches for the drawer and the knife. He flicks it open and centimeters from Akashi's hip, he asks, "Will it bleed a lot if I put it here?" With his finger he draws a line diagonally across.
Akashi looks at him from under hooded, desperate eyes. "No," he says. The tremble of his arms scream Yes.
Still, he pauses. "Do you want this?" he asks rhetorically.
Akashi jabs him with his elbow and Kagami can't help but laugh. It isn't funny - here he is, cock-deep in someone else with a knife in his hand, and nothing he's done in life until now has prepared him for the heady twirl of power going to his head. He is doing this for someone else who just happens to be a lover but that would mean he loves and maybe he should, maybe he should jump. Let himself fall. Leave himself to chance. Akashi would be worth it and more, Akashi who always looks before he leaps but for Kagami, has walked into the fire itself, felt it licking his face like a million tongues, has scraped his hands until they were red and bleeding to show there was no one else in the world but Kagami that he wanted.
When he thinks of it that way it's a small price to pay. He cuts a small X. There is a little bit of blood and that's it. He tosses the knife to one side and in three thrusts he's gone, bending over him, teeth biting into scarred flesh and bone. Afterwards he finds his palm is bloody where he gripped while he rocked and Akashi winces when he rolls over, but even injured they cobble together into their regular position, nose-to-nose. Their mouths become increasingly slick and easy as Kagami strokes him down for the last time, feeling each pulse of Akashi's cock as he arches into his touch. His release paints only sound and heat in the dark against Kagami's stomach; he can't see it because the moon is off. The X is sticky when he touches it with the edge of the sheet, but the bleeding has mostly stopped by the time Akashi starts to drift off.
"You said you didn't -" he yawns, too tired to care if it looks plebian or not, "- said 'no marks' or..."
I wouldn't have denied you this, even if you had never asked. Instead he traces the place he loves the most on Akashi's body, where he can feel his core. Because Akashi's eyes are amazing and can tell the future, sure, but Akashi wouldn't be the force of nature he is if he wasn't fast, or strong too. People move from their middles, Taiga, he can still hear Alex say. Every facet of Akashi deserves admiration and while the reasons for the crisscross of marks may have been all different, he too happened to Akashi.
"I'm here," he says. "Here."
Again Akashi doesn't answer. But his wandering hands trace the bumps of his own knife-scars, written on Kagami's torso, before his eyes drift closed.