Sweet notes: For Becca-san, I’m here to support you till the end!

 

Warnings: Sappy, citrus, shounen-ai, Nakago/Tasuki, light humour, mildly angsty in the end.

 

Disclaimer: I don’t own them.

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Only One; The moment after, it was gone.

 

~ By Sweetdeily.

 

In dedication to my dear friend Leta-chan, if we have too, we’ll stalk you.

*

 

“Sugary sweet/ How I want to meet/ I won’t be beat/ come to me for a treat/…” Tasuki set the pink paper down on the wooden tabletop and moved it away from him. Far away from himself. “What the hell?...<sigh> this is the third one this week…”

 

He shook his head and glanced around his room, checking to make sure he was as alone as he’d ever be.

 

“They may not rhyme very well, but I… I guess it’s kind of… cute.” He coughed discreetly to himself and glanced at the ‘anonymous’ love letter a last time before scrunching it up and throwing it in the bin as carelessly as he could.

 

Whoever this person was, they were damn good at not letting anyone track them. Where ever the letters came from was a grand mystery, they just seemed to pop up like evil little garden gnomes. At first he’d gone to Chichiri, asking the wanderer if he could find out who had sent him the first two little notes. But the result was the same. It was either one of the Seyiru Seishi or… well, he wasn’t entirely sure what that ‘or’ was. So far it was only words, but… and Tasuki blushed at this thought, but if the person made well on some of the promises in the second letter…… Tasuki left that thought alone and in the cold… very alone. In fact, he gave that hentai little thought so little food it didn’t dare to present him of pictures of a masked figure torturing him in a velveteen soft place, no imagery of being pounded into by some dark and handsome sadist, no second thought about cumming so much he cried to stop. Yeah, that thought was really beyond him, the chances of such a thought popping into his mind were so far fetched, they were far fetched!

 

 He was really stumped as to who it was. Was it Miaka?

 

Highly, highly, highly unlikely. She was slobbering on a certain blue haired someone.

 

Nuriko?

 

Doubtfully, Nuriko probably rhymed better. And he was slobbering on someone of his own.

 

Chiriko?

 

Tasuki would so NOT be going there. Chiriko seemed too smart to know about dating.

 

Chichiri?

 

Explanation, but still, Chichiri didn’t strike him as the incredibly bad at sap type. And he probably rhymed better.

 

What was worse was the fact that he wasn’t even sure why he was suddenly getting these letters. He was afraid to ask too many people… the letters were kind of embarrassing, but sooner or later he’d have to find out why someone was sending him love letters, how they were getting to him and… well, just WHY?

 

And… and… and then what would he do exactly?

 

Tasuki wasn’t sure, but he knew one thing. Something would happen.

 

Sighing softly he got out of his chair and ambled out of his room. The best place to think was the kitchen. With food. Often, with food, came brainpower, which protruded answers.

 

~ ~ ~

 

“I want to make you scream my name as I- ” Tasuki coughed and Chichiri stopped reading the fourth note aloud, they were both a brilliant red in facial shading.

 

Chichiri coughed. “Well… I think we’ve narrowed it down to a male.”

 

Tasuki blushed. “Who is it, Chichiri? Please, this is driving me insane! If they get any more perverse I’m gonna’ have a nosebleed and die of blood loss an’ I really want to know what people are gonna’ be doin’ to my body. Well I don’t want to know… but… gahhh!”

 

Chichiri cleared his throat and stopped blushing, somewhat forcefully on the stopping side of things. “Well, it says from N right here… Who do we know whose name starts with N?”

 

Tasuki’s eyes widened and he covered his mouth in shock. “Oh shit! Nuriko?”

 

They sat in silence for a while. “But Nuriko hardly seems the type to write stuff like this… or be that bad a rhyming.” Chichiri finally spoke, echoing Tasuki’s thoughts.

 

“Yeah, but who else starts with N?”

 

Chichiri shrugged. “Suzaku Seishi?”

 

Tasuki shuddered at the scary thought of been wanted for anything more then dead from that lot. “I doubt it.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Tasuki sighed and shoved the fifth love letter off his pillow; he stared at it for a moment where it sat in silent outburst on his bed before lifting it up gingerly, almost as if he thought it might bite him… bite him harder then previously promised.

 

“Whoever you are… you sure are perverse…” He muttered aloud. Luckily no one answered.

 

He began reading this letter and realized it was a riddle.

 

Not in see but seeing.

 

Read the first line. Tasuki bit his lower lip in though… not in see but in seeing? What wasn’t in see but in seeing? It was a letter… he was pretty sure it was N, but it could be a few other letters, assuming it was N he read the next line, if worse came to worse he could wake Chichiri up and ask him, Chiriko was smart too, so he’d ask him if Chichiri couldn’t figure it out.

 

An animal, an apple but not whip.

 

Easy! The letter A. Tasuki grinned then frowned, Na? Who had a name with Na? Nuriko was Nu, so… so, did that mean it wasn’t Nuriko?

 

Once in an attack twice in a kick but never in hate.

 

Tasuki  frowned. This one was hard…  He stood and paced around the room a few times, reread to riddle and frowned, he wasn’t sure. Yawning he shrugged, he’d figure it out in the morning.

 

~ ~ ~

“Once in an attack twice in a kick but never in hate? And if it’s a letter it is K, Tasuki-san.” Chiriko stated firmly, moving to the next one. The bandit and the kid were sitting in a parlor, pouring over the fifth letter. Chichiri hadn’t been able to help.

 

“Again and again, eating game. Hmm, that’s another A. These riddles are kind of dumb, I mean, a child could have written them.” He glanced up from the paper where he was reading across the table to see a confused Tasuki twisting in his seat, knawing on his bottom lip.

 

“Naka? Who the hell is Naka?!” Tasuki asked, gripping the table briefly, leaning closer, leaning back then snorting and tapping his finger on the table.

 

“There’s more, Tasuki, calm down.” He chided.

 

Tasuki ground his teeth; he’d wanted to solve the rest himself, really, this was annoying!

 

“Going, going, grieving, not in.  Not in… not in… not i-n. The letter G.”

 

“How’d you get that?”

 

“… You probably wouldn’t understand.”

 

Tasuki huffed at being told that and snatched the love letter off Chiriko, storming away and slamming the door behind him.

 

Chiriko pouted. “And there I was about to tell him I knew who it was… Oh well, let him figure it out for himself.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

Tasuki sat down in the garden, throwing a stone into the pond. He glanced down and saw next to his hand yet another note, this one was red in color and smelt softly of flowers. Blinking he reached out and opened the card. Not worrying about how it got there so fast.

 

Running out of patients?

                                                                                                                                                                                          

If you want me, meet me, in the forest north of the city at noon.

 

~ N.

 

Tasuki growled and scrunched the paper up. “You bet I’ll meet you… and then I’ll smash your face in for this mind game, whoever the hell you are.” He glanced at the riddle letter, glared at it before scrunching the pretty pink paper into a ball and throwing it in the pond.

 

“How can anyone be so weird?”

 

He sighed anger leaving him quickly now that he was alone.  Maybe the person idolized him…? but he wasn’t very good at solving riddles even if they were easy…

 

Maybe it was all a mind game? He couldn’t help the growl that came out of his throat if it was a mind game. Someone would be dying if it was.

 

Tasuki glanced at his clothes. “I wonder if I should change…Nah.”

 

~ ~ ~

 

“Chiriko! How could you not tell him? What if it’s a trap?”

 

The small seishi shrugged. “Then we can rescue him. I don’t think it’s a trap however.”

 

“Why not? It’s the perfect lure for him, he doesn’t have anyone we know about that cares about him in that way.”

 

“I don’t think that he would go to all this trouble and humiliation (have you read some of those letters? The rhyming is horrible…) just for a trap, and I think there would have been more letters and effort in them, or they would have been a little less obvious, I don’t think it would have been countered on that Tasuki would ask for our help deciphering them.”

 

“Maybe. But these letters only just started a few days ago; there are no holidays for this kind of thing right now.”

 

“Not here, Hotohori-sama, but in the Kutou city they are about to have an annual parade. This kind of thing is common for them at the moment.”

 

“Chiriko… it’s still too dangerous, even thinking… thinking that you are right and this isn’t some kind of trap… the kind of situation it would put him in…”

 

“I think everyone is well aware of that… but maybe it’s no more than cardinal lust. You guys are pretty weird when it comes to this stuff. I can understand that it would be the same over there.”

 

Tamahome slammed his hand down. “It’s still not good enough… we have to help him!”

 

Chiriko sighed, telling the others had been a mistake, it would interfere with something… he was sure of it. He felt as if there was some kind of special thing waiting just a few hours away for Tasuki, but what…?

 

He sighed and nodded, resigning himself to Tasuki’s fate. At least the bandit had a head start on them.

 

~ ~ ~

Tasuki moved his hand in a sweeping motion, flaring his fan at just the right angle, and grinning. “Yeah! And then I boot ‘em in the chest and they go ‘a down!” he glanced at the sky again, shoulders slumping.

 

 “Yer late ye’ ass.” He spoke into the darkening sky.

 

The air had been chill all day and now, in the evening it looked close to raining. Clouds rolled in, promising the aforementioned rain. The hills looked dark and foreboding.

 

 Tasuki nearly jumped out of his skin when his mindless muttering was answered by someone other then himself.

 

 “So sorry to keep you waiting, Tasuki-san.” A cool voice coed from right behind his ear.

 

Tasuki whipped around, chocolate eyes widening in shock.

 

 

His first impulse was to get ready for a fight, but his second impulse caught him before he had time.

 

~ ~ ~

Chiriko could feel the seishi just up ahead, knowing that Chichiri could as well, two ki’s one very powerful. “Chichiri-san… we can’t interfere… please?”

 

Chichiri sighed and nodded, using his magic to slip back and tie himself up. Chiriko stopped and yelled at the others to come and help, praying to give Tasuki more time.

 

~ ~ ~

 

He put a hand over his mouth to stop it, but when his shoulders started shaking he had trouble keeping it at bay…

 

Tasuki threw his head back and howl with laughter, ending up sprawled on the ground, laughing so hard tears fell from the corners of his eyes. If someone had of wanted to attack him, he would have been completely open.

 

Slowly, after a few moments he stopped cackling hysterically and calmed to a giggle. “…hehehehehe…. Hehehe… <cough> hehe, YOU?”

 

A well defined hand flicked back soft golden hair. “I fail to see this humour.”

 

Tasuki chuckled before coughing to at least look more serious. He dug his fangs into his lip as he talked, his mouth twitching with the need to laugh more. “Your… poems… <snort> and, uh rhyming… hehe, no lessons or anything, all just,” He had to stop to chuckle again, “Natural talent?”

 

Nakago growled and knelt so he was on eye level with the other seishi, grabbing the fire head’s chin and bringing their faces to mere inches away. “Are you serious?”

 

Tasuki’s face lost all laughter as the bandit gripped his fan. Chocolate eyes and blue eyes locked in silent contemplation.

 

“Deadly.”

 

It seemed hours past as they sat there, bodies losing feeling, wind scuttling around them, thunder echoing in the distance. The stare that caught between them seeming harsh and immoveable. A million thoughts racing through each mind, battle tactics, the wonder on who would move first. Not even blinking Tasuki spoke, all funnies drained from his eyes.

 

“Why?”

 

“Have you looked in a mirror lately?” although the man already knew the answer to that, when you stalk someone you know a lot of things about their habits.

 

“…Not really, not since yesterday.”

 

“You’re very do-able.”

 

“Yeah, I’m sure you have your own people to… do.”

 

“And I’m sure yours would just love to be around you.”

 

“What would you know?”

“Enough to know that you need something like me.”

 

“Something like you?”

 

“Hai.”

 

“I don’t need anything like you.”

 

“You want it though.”

 

“Well, need and want are different things, now aren’t they?”

 

A long pause ensured; eyes uncertain, wavery, faltering.

 

“Are you gonna kiss me now or what?”

 

There was a long pause before the soft flesh touched against other soft flesh. A skittish brush across a rose before the rose opened.

 

For that one sugar lips kiss, for that instant, there were no thorns.

 

But it was only that one instant.

 

It happened in an instant, a moment in which good and bad didn’t care, right and wrong were unsure and nothing much really mattered.

 

 

 

Sometimes, he would think about that one instant in time, frozen in his mind. He’d think about it… think how precise it was, how unplanned, or out of place or… remember it.

 

You can’t coordinate those moments. You can’t count them up, store them…

 

Sometimes… for some people… you only get one.

 

Tasuki flipped the red letter over and over in his hands, he remembered… he would always remember.

 

 

 

 

~ Owari.

 

 

*snuggles* Lele… please don’t kill me!!!!!!