kuroo tetsurou

Looking at the issue from all sides, Kuroo is about five percent disappointed in himself. If one examines the whole situation, that is far more than expected. The rest of his brain capacity is taken up by overheated whirring and wildly spinning coils at the moment, so he refuses to be blamed for his lack of investment in scolding himself.

“Kuro,” Kenma says. He’s still sitting there on Kuroo’s bed, one hand in his hair to push it up the side of his head, thumb gently nudging his earlobe forward.

Kuroo swallows.

“Are you deaf?”

He’s not, but it’s damn near close. Stupid heartbeat so loud in his ears. “No. I, uhm. It’s.” Be cool, fuck, remember how to do that still? “When did you get it?”

“Yesterday. It barely hurt.” Kenma doesn’t even flinch when Kuroo reaches to touch, but his lip twitches a bit. “Careful though.”

“‘Course.” So this is his life now, Kuroo thinks while he runs his fingertip over the silver stud resting in the flesh of Kenma’s ear. “Other side too?”

“Would look stupid otherwise.” A yawn. Kenma rubs a hand over his eyes, then winds away from Kuroo’s touch and drapes himself over his lap. The familiar shiver of warmth down his spine is one of the few things Kuroo knows better than his own face. Together with Kenma’s, his hands, the feeling of ground below his feet and, well, okay, that mouth against his own.

He waits (patient, of course, always for him) until Kenma has arranged himself. His strategy seems to be going for cuddling tonight, Kuroo deduces from the rough nudge against his fingers, Kenma’s forehead prodding until Kuroo threads a hand into the peach soft hair of his neck.

“Why now?” They only have a few nights. Then, it’s university for him again, and that last year for Kenma.

“Dunno,” Kenma mumbles into his leg.

“Liar.”

“Mhm.”

“Tell me. Please?” They all think that Kenma’s the one to get what he wants, no matter how ridiculous. It’s like that most of the time, but oh, not always. Kuroo leans down, kisses the hair that smells dark-sweet of sweat, this afternoon’s pie, grass and lemonade from earlier, their sheets and skin rubbing on another until it’s pink.

Kenma is quiet for a while. His fingers play with the hem of Kuroo’s pajama, tickles along the hair on his knee. The moon’s all the light for them.

A breath exhales against his leg. “I can’t get real piercings yet. I have to wait until school is over and I’m at university. It’s all I have until then. Not enough, but… but I’ll take it. I can wait.” He looks up at Kuroo, pale in the night with old kisses glinting dark over his neck and red on his mouth, a curved smile. “Can you?”

Kuroo wants to love him until they wither away.

“Yeah. ‘course.”

Kenma’s eyes are gone. Dark, hollow caves swallow the light where they used to be. His contours are shifting, bones cracking in his body. Kuroo can’t run. His leg is broken where Kenma’s claws have rammed into it, and the pain is so intense that his mouth tastes white and searing and his vision is smoky.

“Three questions,” Kenma sing-songs. His mouth is tiny and red. He’s licked some of Kuroo’s blood from his claws. The gym is empty. Kuroo is against a wall, crying, silent and pathetic because he can’t wrap his mind around this.

“Wh…” Blood is in his mouth. Kuroo chokes, whimpers. “Why?”

Kenma takes a step. “A person has to eat.”

“You’re not a person.”

Kenma smiles, soft, almost fond. “I was, for you, for the years I was weak and grew in this body. But no, I’m not. I’ll count that as a question, so you have one more left.”

The gym is quiet. Nobody knows he’s here. He wants to know many things. Kenma takes a step. His naked toes touch Kuroo’s, trace his sneakers.

He can’t close his eyes, not even when Kenma’s jaw makes a terrible crack, when it unhinges and reveals a maw that’s so red and wet it’s almost pretty.

Kuroo lets his head fall against the wall. The thump is a dull echo in his skull.

“Was Kenma ever in there, or was it only just you?”

The hollow caves of Kenma’s, no, the thing’s eyes seem to grow. Black envisions Kuroo. Something wet touches his skin, and he feels numbness spread throughout his – oh. Poison. He can’t feel anymore, then.

A whisper reaches his ears.

“Help me.”

A slow grin spreads on Kuroo’s lips. “Hey there, kitten.” He rips his eyes open, fingers shooting forward, and before the thing can so much as snarl, Kuroo’s hands go up in flames, shoving down its throat with a burst of sparks.

The thing roars. Black goo spurts from its tongue, spills over Kuroo’s arms, but he just grins, grins, fingers twisting and the tips pressing deep into the thing’s esophagus.

“You know,” Kuroo says, tilting his head as his fire takes the monster apart, its agonizing screams almost drowning out Kuroo’s voice, “that’s the thing with you monsters. First off, you think you know humans, but you don’t. We lie, and some of us are pretty good actors. We also know when someone’s lying, just like you did before about all those years. Bullshit. And second, we really don’t appreciate it when you engulf the gorgeous boys that we’re bonded to into your disgusting bodies, and especially not when it’s on their anniversary. So.” He takes a deep breath, plants both feet on the ground, and his smile vanishes.

“Either you give me back my boyfriend, or I fry you from the inside like a goddamn chicken nugget. Or – oh well. Too late. Guess my magic reached him.”

Kuroo takes a step back and pulls his hands out of the thing’s throat. It’s a trembling lump of black goo now, all the outer shell of Kenma’s imitation melted away. The gym is silent for a few seconds. Then, an angry hum fills the air.

“Too bad. You could have had this quick, mostly pain-free, but you pissed him off.” Kuroo sits down, crosses his legs, waiting with a smile. The thing makes a hurt noise somewhere in its body, and then the entire gym begins to shake.

“’s not really a good idea to mess with a mage and their dragon.”

Daichi comes to an end on the Friday after his graduation. Everything is set up to be a nice and relaxed night. He would have preferred getting food and drinks over karaoke, sure, but Asahi and Kuroo are looking like they’re having far too much fun with their version of Fantastic Baby (including dance performance, Christ; Daichi did not need to know that Asahi’s hips could move like that).

And how he ended up crammed into a tiny karaoke room with the other former third-years from Seijouh and Nekoma, well, Daichi doesn’t know. Dammit, let him enjoy the night and Suga’s hand on his arm in peace. It’s such a nice hand. Suga has the most beautiful fingers. Not that Daichi has ever told him, not even now that his head is sitting comfortably on Suga’s shoulder, and they could almost be holding hands.

Then the song changes, and Suga twitches by his side. “I love that song!”

“Mhm?” Daichi glances up at him. “’s that so.” Shit, he’s so unfairly pretty. The first thing Suga did after graduation was to get his ear shell pierced. Daichi is very gay, and happily so.

“C’mon, let’s dance!”

“I don’t dance,” Daichi says.

Something glints in Suga’s eyes. He tilts his head, flashes a grin. “I know you can,” he sing-songs.

Before Daichi realizes the trap, his lips move. “Not a chance, no,” his mouth sings back.

The silence afterwards is stunning. Daichi prays to everyone that nobody’s heard them, but there’s not a chance (Oh god. Fucking. Damnit.) that Suga didn’t catch that he just referenced to Chad’s and Ryan’s courtship song.

“Daichi.”

“I, well – “

A hand grabs his arm, and Suga is pulling him outside. Daichi barely catches a glimpse of a very drunk Kuroo taking a stand against Oikawa with something that suspiciously sounds like I Will Survive.

Then they’re outside and Suga is laughing. His dimples are perfect, his mouth is perfect, and Daichi feels numb and burning from the inside all at once. His head is dizzy. Suga’s fingers are in his, thumb tracing Daichi’s sweaty knuckles.

“First off, I know for a fact that every guy who knows the words to that song from High School Musical two has some kind of rhythm. And second – what other dark musical secrets have you been hiding from me?”

“Uhm.” Daichi swallows. It’s very hard to think when Suga steps even closer, and then Daichi’s hands somehow finds a way to Suga’s cheek. “I… like anything where characters sing about what they’re doing?”

Suga smiles, wide and soft. “How about we go to my place then, you don’t laugh at me for liking musicals almost as much as I like you, and then you… you could tell me about it, stud.”

Daichi’s throat is dry. He manages to nod, too many times and too hard, but Suga doesn’t seem to mind. His fingers squeeze Daichi’s. “Okay. That’s convenient, because,” Daichi clears his throat and starts walking, dramatically gesturing at the empty street ahead. “My place is just a jump to the left.”

Then Suga is laughing even more, his forehead falling against Daichi’s neck, and they make it home in each other’s arms. Daichi doesn’t really remember how much of Grease they end up watching, but when he wakes up the next morning, his and Suga’s clothes stink of sweat and night air and a tiny bit like each other, from falling asleep in a tangle of limbs and with Daichi’s hand in Suga’s soft, familiar hair.

“We have to get out of here.” Bokuto’s voice cracks like glass. The metal bar that he’s shoved through the door’s handles is creaking with every impact from the outside.

Kenma doesn’t hear him.

“Fuck, fuck, come on – don’t touch him!”

Kenma reaches, careful, and his fingers tremble when he brushes a bloody strand of hair from Kuroo’s forehead.

Bokuto’s scream pitches into a sob. “He’s fucking turning, Kenma, we can’t help him, we can’t, we can’t, we have to get outta here!”

No. His vision is black and crimson. Kuroo’s eyes are wide and dead and then they’re alive again, and his body starts to seize. The white of his eyes, the soft brown of his iris that Kenma loves more than himself is flooded by darkness.

“Please, please.” Bokuto’s knees hit the ground by his side. “Kenma. They bit him. Kenma, Kenma.” They can’t help, the camp with the cure is far away, but Kenma can’t just watch and do nothing, not after how Akaashi –

The door behind them howls with another impact. Bokuto falls silent. His fingers dig into Kenma’s shoulder, all nails and force, but when Kenma finally goes pliant and yields, it’s too late.

Kuroo, or what he used to be, surges. There’s no time to scream, because Bokuto’s rifle knocks against the top of his head, so wild and desperate that it would have killed anything that’s still alive. But Kuroo’s teeth are already sinking into Kenma’s hand, through bone and muscle, something snapping between his jaws.

Kenma doesn’t know how it ends. Screams echo through his dreams, a wave of other voices, their group having found them. When he wakes, something feels like it’s missing. A look down his body, past filthy clothes and blood all over himself, tells him that he’s back in the camp.

His wrist is empty. There’s a bandage around the stump.

And across the room is the cage, the one where they’d done terrible things to not-anymore-humans to find a cure, and Kuroo’s in it with eyes that flicker between black and brown. A needle is still stuck in his arm. The timer on the cage stands at 30:57, counting down from sixty minutes. So there’s half an hour left to know if they got the cure into his veins in time.

Kenma lies back down, holding his empty wrist, and waits.

“We don’t have a lot of – oh fuck.” There’s a vulnerable grace in the curve of Kuroo’s throat, so Kenma puts his mouth against it and brings a kiss down. It’s narrow in the equipment room of the club, but it’ll do, it has to. A nest of their training jackets and Kuroo’s shirt keeps the ground’s cold off their knees and allows Kenma to sit between Kuroo’s legs, grants him the privilege to run his curious fingers over trembling skin.

“We,” Kuroo starts again, the words sounding heavy in his mouth. It’s all red and swollen, Kenma thinks when he looks up at him, letting go of his throat for barely a second. “Not much time. I know. How much?” Not that he really cares for a reply. Kuroo’s the responsible one here, his eyes are the gold that focuses on the clock hanging across the room while Kenma loses himself in touches, whispers, his own nails raking flickers of white down Kuroo’s darker skin.

“Five. Not more, and if the others – God. You’re gorgeous.”

Kenma lets a soft, tiny noise escape his lips when Kuroo touches his chin. His eyes flutter shut, hand pressed to Kuroo’s warm stomach, the other drawing circles by the ivory of his hipbones. “Kiss,” Kenma demands, quiet as always.

Kuroo gives. He gives in and gives away, granting Kenma whatever wish he has, be it the fact that he accepted Kenma’s awkward confessions months ago or that he kissed him on the last day of training camp, where they had sneaked onto the roof and held hands under too many stars above their heads.

Then he’s back in reality. Kuroo has an arm around his back, hand smoothing against Kenma’s ribcage with a reverence that has been stealing his breath since they were twelve and Kuroo had hugged him as Kenma’s first friend ever. Now, their skin melts together in a harsh twitch of bodies. Kenma curls one of his leg around Kuroo’s waist, and he moans in a broken shadow of his own voice when a soft tongue pushes between his lips, bringing heat and slick pressure to his mouth. Kuroo shifts when Kenma kisses him back, and a noise seeps into the air trembling between their lips. Oh, Kenma thinks, spreading his legs over Kuroo’s lap, he’s hard.

“Kitten.” Kuroo says it like a prayer, when Kenma’s hand finds a way down, and his eyes are liquid gold, home, a ray of yes I want you I have chosen you and we’re each other’s. “You don’t have to – “

“You never make me do anything.” Kenma kisses him, tugs at Kuroo’s lips with careful teeth, until they’re so out of breath that the entire room seems to fill with nothing but them. “I want to. I really, really want to. If you don’t, I won’t, but – can I, could I.”

Kuroo doesn’t let the insecurity spread. His hands are on Kenma’s cheeks, thumbs tracing his breathless mouth. A brush of lips sears against his forehead. “Okay,” Kuroo rasps, “okay. I want you to. Kenma, Kenma.”

They’re late for training. Kenma’s hand is warm, his mouth and cheeks feel like they’re woven from fire, and his skin smells like Kuroo had poured his entire being all over Kenma (when really, he’d gotten his release with a dark noise in Kenma’s hand, lashes black and mouth a cherry-fever that Kenma would never forget). “I want to do that to you, too,” Kuroo had said after they got dressed.
Kenma had smiled.

Daichi knows that something is going on, and it can’t be good. Training camp is exhausting his team, he’s got to make sure they work hard but don’t strain themselves, and the heat isn’t helping either. But Daichi still isn’t blind. He notices things in the periphery of his vision.

So when Kuroo moves to stand by his left side and Bokuto’s arm slides around his shoulder from the right, Daichi can reduce his wincing to a minimum. He doesn’t even get to say hello.

“Lovely day, isn’t it,” Kuroo says. Daichi squints at him. This is going somewhere that he most definitely won’t like.

“Absolutely peachy,” Bokuto grins. His golden eyes are far too fixed on Daichi’s face. “Perfect conditions.”

“Indeed.” Daichi shakes Bokuto’s arm off and takes a step back. “May I help you two-”

“You know who’s also very lovely?” Kuroo’s lips twitch at one corner.

“I know!” Unbelievable. Bokuto actually fucking puts a finger to his chin as if he’s thinking. “That setter of yours, ah, what’s his name again?”

“Hm, I forgot it too,” Kuroo says, faux sadness clouding his face. “I only remember that cute voice and his nice legs.”

“His name is Suga,” Daichi growls. He gets ignored.

“Yeah, those are damn nice.”

“Irresistible even.”

“Impossible to miss. Especially when you’re around him all the time.”

“And I mean, we’re all just men, you can’t just keep your eyes from wandering a bit-”

Daichi’s hands clench into fists. He shouldn’t say anything, fuck, of course Suga is gorgeous, brilliantly so, even guys can pick that up, and the other captains are known for picking partners by attraction and not what’s between their legs, but does it have to be his Suga?

Wait. No. Suga isn’t his boyfriend. Maybe, just maybe, Daichi kind of wouldn’t mind if he was.

“It’s interesting,” Kuroo keeps going, “that you knew I was talking about him when I mentioned that he’s hot.”

Daichi wants to die. He looks away from those idiots, searches for an escape. “I was guessing.”

“You didn’t deny that he’s attractive.”

“Well, judging from an objective basis-”

“Dude.” Bokuto slaps his shoulder so hard that Daichi starts coughing. “He’s so into you. But I mean, if you don’t care for a guy as sweet and dang hot as Koushi-”

“Don’t use his first name. He doesn’t like that.” Daichi runs a hand down his face. Then his brain catches up on what Bokuto said. He stares at the other captains. “…he what?”

“Finally,” Kuroo nods, looking like a very pleased father. “He’s catching up with the newest information.”

“Because we were so kind to help out.” Bokuto wipes an invisible tear from his eye. “I almost went to kiss poor Suga myself, just to make captain dense here jealous.”

“He wouldn’t like that.” Daichi’s voice is tiny. “Are you guys joking? Is. Am I…” He clears his throat. His entire face burns. “Is it that obvious?”

Bokuto wraps an arm around Kuroo’s shoulder. “Our job here is done. Look who’s coming over to check on his captain’s safety.”
Daichi can’t help but turn around. He doesn’t hear the other captains run off, a high five clapping through the gym somewhere far away from Daichi’s mind. Suga is striding over to him along the side lines. There’s a dark crease between his brows and his eyes ask a silent question: Are you okay?

Daichi swallows. Absolutely not. He’s so fucked and in love and has been for longer than he’d ever admit. But when Suga is by his side, there’s somehow enough courage in Daichi to reach for Suga’s hand and hook their little fingers together.

Daichi doesn’t know what Suga’s face shows when he pulls him back towards the team. He hopes that it’s something good – the shy squeeze of a sweaty palm against his own seems to be a nice omen.

“There’s a first time for everything,” Kuroo had told him. “You’re eighteen. It’s time to let your gay out a bit.” Alright, maybe he was right, but Bokuto still wasn’t prepared for all of – this. The name of the club had flashed in front of his eyes for just a moment, high above the long line of people trying to get in. Kuroo had pushed at his shoulders, fumbled with both of their IDs, and then they were in.

The crowd is a trembling ocean of lights and skin blinking from beneath dark clothes. Bokuto can’t recognise any faces, can’t even see exactly what’s going on along the walls, where the bar is, but Kuroo’s hand is at his elbow. “You wanted to dance, right?” – “Yeah,” Bokuto shouts back, because it’s loud and the song that comes on goes straight to his blood, roars through his bones. “I’ll just go and – you’ll find me again, yeah?”

Kuroo just grins and claps his shoulder. There’s no way he’d ever let Bokuto out of eyesight. Fuck, Bokuto thinks as he moves, pushing himself through the people standing around, to the dancefloor where the lights dance in so many colours that he just has to open his eyes wider, drinking them in. He’s wanted this for so long, to go out and be himself, like this, to feel the rhythm and just be.

Then, it’s easy. He finds space somewhere, fits himself into the waves of other humans, and the beat floods him. Everything is all at once. The music is thunder with twitching lightning as the melody, and Bokuto puts his hands over his head, neck bare, feet following some pulse he didn’t know he could feel.

The boy appears during the third song. He’s wearing all black, his hair’s a mess of sweat and lights pouring colour over his neck, and Bokuto can’t see his face. The lasers flitting around only throw tiny spots of red and blue, it’s anonymous and united, and so Bokuto moves. The boy, no, they’re all not teenagers and yet, he curves his body into a shivering wave, head fallen back, his skin gleaming almost white. Bokuto swallows. He shouldn’t, it’s just someone he doesn’t know, but that man moves like he’s been born to slither his way into Bokuto’s head, hypnotizing and utterly gorgeous –

A hand grazes his arm. Bokuto’s eyes whip forward. The man is facing him, and just now the lights have dimmed, so his expression is impossible to read. Anything after that is a blur in Bokuto’s head. He remembers that his hands find slender shoulders, thumb brushing against collarbones, that his thigh pushes against hips that roll softly into his motion. Songs pass by, music drowning into his bones, skin burning where the other man shows him a new dimension of what dancing is, and Bokuto’s fingers grasp at a shirt, naked skin over thin hipbones.

It could have been hours, or years. The music goes quiet, light flickering through the room – and Bokuto blinks. The crowd has dissolved. Almost nobody is left. It’s almost silent, then, and from the corner of his eyes he finds Kuroo, leaning at the bar, mouth agape.

The man stands before him. Bokuto’s hands are on his hips, and that face, he would recognise that anywhere.

“Akaashi?”

The smile on Akaashi’s lips is tiny, trembling. “Is that the moment where you pull back and say that you didn’t mean it like that?”

He’s gorgeous, God, he’s incredible, Bokuto thinks and lifts Akaashi’s fingers to his lips in an impulse. “No, I just – you were so – I didn’t know you could move like that.” His mouth brushes Akaashi’s knuckles. “We should do that again.”

Akaashi’s smiles softens. “We should,” he says, and then he winks at Kuroo who’s still speechless and looking like he tries to comprehend all of this. “But somewhere more private, where I can look at you, and you can see me.”

The music’s rhythm pulses through his veins like a breath of aconite. He wants to go home. He wants to go home. He wants –

Kuroo is in the crowd. He’s carrying drinks, one for himself, something else for Kenma, and everyone moves along him like a court bowing for their king. Majesty, come through, let the music roar to your glory. He doesn’t even know it, Kenma thinks and bites at his own lip until it tastes bad and red. They adore him. Everyone does, he’s too nice, kind underneath all that snark and grinning, with hands that frame Kenma’s face like a masterpiece when Kuroo kisses him.

A girl. She smiles, oh she’s beautiful, Kenma looks down on the floor. His jeans are torn, shoes dirty. Why Kuroo took him here, he doesn’t know, something about having fun, about Kenma liking to dance with him? He does. It’s true.

The girl’s fingers touch Kuroo’s arm. Her nails are half-moons, rose-thorns, and Kuroo looks at her with a flip of his head.

Please, Kenma thinks. His fingers dig into the fabric of his jeans. He’s still out of breath from dancing, remembers Kuroo’s hands by his hips, their bodies together. It had been like living through a starburst, moving along with Kuroo, knowing everyone envied Kenma, looking at them.

But please, don’t, Kenma begs across the room with wordless eyes, don’t take him. Don’t touch him. Don’t take him away, even if you could. Let him be.

Kuroo shakes his head.

A shudder rakes down Kenma’s spine. He stands, bottom lip between teeth, staring at Kuroo as he comes over. One day, he’s going to lose him, to someone with grace and feather-light laughter and without cracked ugliness scattered across their past.

“Let’s go home.” Kuroo pushes the drink into his hand, lips tracing a kiss along Kenma’s temple. “You’re zoning out. Take my hand?”

“Okay.”

When they’re outside, drinks finished and jackets around their shoulders, Kenma pulls him down. He kisses Kuroo until their lungs ache, until Kuroo’s fingers burn in his neck and at his hip, until Kenma feels like they melt together again.

Kuroo kisses him, his nose, lips, the bow over his mouth that’s named after love’s god, until Kenma allows himself to cry. It’s silent between them. There are no words on the way home. Kenma’s hand is in Kuroo’s. He thinks back to the girl, but then they’re through the door and Kuroo nuzzles his hair once more before starting to talk about hot cocoa, about going to bed afterwards.

Kenma leans against the wall of the corridor and closes his eyes.

The girl’s face is in his mind, soft, overwhelmingly unbroken.

Not today, he thinks. And if I can do anything, everything, never.

Then Kuroo calls his name. “I’m here,” Kenma says, and moments later, Kuroo’s by his side again, pushing a mug into his hand, finding him in the corridor without turning on the light. “Let’s sleep in a few, yeah?”

Kenma smiles around the edge of the mug. The cocoa is sweet. Outside the window, the sun rises. “Yeah.”

rainbowd00dles:

for @moami‘s cute lil’ fic here

You are successfully killing me with your wonderful art on a regular basis. Thank you so, so much for transforming my words into lines. I love how you included Yaku, how he talks so casually with Kuroo who’s used to Kenma needing to recharge, aaa I am so happy. This touched my heart. Thank you. ♥

Kenma recharges in a very special and, admittedly, kind of strange way.

And Kuroo doesn’t know when it began – sometime when they were smaller and the world was loud, scary, colourful – but it’s a ritual now, one that won’t break.

The team understands. They watch with a mix of amusement and fondness, because as soon as their coach calls for a break, Kenma reaches for Kuroo’s wrist. His fingers wrap around it, tugging once, twice. “I’m tired, Kuro.”

Kuroo talks to their other teammates while he sits on the bench. Nobody even looks twice when Kenma climbs onto his lap, legs sliding around his waist. They don’t question why Kenma nuzzles Kuroo’s neck, lips a soft pressure against his skin, dark lashes fluttering above his cheeks like feathers. There were never any questions asked about what relationship is going on there, exactly, it only mattered that Kenma could play and felt good and that Kuroo was grinning.

And because nobody really pays attention to it anymore, because it became so normal in its uniqueness, nobody is surprised that Kenma always enters the court with a tiny smile after their coach calls them back into training.