Errancy

Author’s Note: There was a tightness in my chest this evening. This is what I did with it.

Pairing: Riku/Sora (Sora is aggressive and dominant but receiving)

Summary: Sora wasn’t the abusive type at all, but that night, with that tightness in his chest urging him on, cruelty was all he really was. R/S Oneshot

Things in this closet: violence, anger, and physical abuse inflicted under the influence of a sadistic, supernatural force.

Enjoy the silence.

Errancy

‘You will not hear me say I’m sorry.
Where is the light?
Wonder if it’s weeping somewhere…’
—Akira Yamaoka, “Room of Angel”

~*~


It was a strange, timorous sort of night. The sort where the cold night air contained shallow shafts of air which were colder and empty and swirled about, searching for kindred spirits with whom they could commune amicably. The normal air sounded like Goodnight, hush, love you, love you, definitely, but those colder, empty shafts of air whispered other things. They chanted low, mean songs without rhyme, their only pleasantry in their low hum. They washed by windows, through trees, under cars, and over homes, crooning Ooh, ooh, kill people, bad people, yes people! Now, now, now.

That air changed people. When it found someone it liked, it sank into their bones and lodged as an insistent visitor in the body. This air would pass through walls, skin, sentiment, and bonds of trust. That air could sense a kindred spirit from the street outside of a person’s house, which was how one of those cold, empty shafts found Sora.

-o-o-

Sora felt strange when he looked at his boyfriend that evening. There was a tightness in his chest that made it somewhat difficult to breathe. It settled abruptly in his chest, in the space between his lungs an hour ago, and wouldn’t give.

Sora was in Riku’s house, in Riku’s small bedroom. The walls were a gray-blue, his bed was against the far wall with the headboard near the one window, and the three other corners of the room were occupied by two heavy, wooden bookshelves and a desk. There was a nightstand beside Riku’s bed.

The window was open and had been for several hours. It looked out onto the street. It was after nine o’clock.

Normally, Sora thought Riku’s room was relatively cozy. However, since the tightness settled in his chest, Sora viewed the room and interpreted a different flavor. The walls looked dark and dingy. The bookcases looked old and clunky, and the room was cramped.

Riku was kissing him. His muscular arms gripped Sora tightly; his calloused hands swept over the brunet’s body, lingering on his bum. He squeezed. He nibbled Sora’s lower lip and pressed against him. Normally, Sora would be returning these gestures and his dick would be twitching and swelling in his pants, but not that evening. The tightness in his lungs was something mean that said This isn’t it. I’m not telling what it is; find it.

So Sora kissed his boyfriend languidly, quite unenthusiastic. Riku was the opposite. His long dick was pressed against the brunet’s front. Sora could feel it, and, despite the will of the tightness in him, he shivered when the silver-haired male rocked his hips into his. Riku moaned, but he didn’t speed up—perhaps he did have a brain when he was horny, Sora thought snidely. Perhaps he did have enough brain cells to notice the implications of Sora’s lagging pace.

Sora was surprised with himself. He wasn’t disparaging of Riku.

Sora noticed his uncharacteristically mean thoughts. He also noticed that the glaring, angry tightness in his chest seemed to shrink marginally when Sora squeezed Riku’s neck tightly. More tightly than was normal in an affectionate squeeze. Borderline Let’s have some not-fun-for-you fun.

Sora heeded it, curious and careless for the moment. He squeezed Riku’s neck harder, so hard he knew it hurt. Riku hissed and pulled away. He stared at Sora with a confused, disturbed expression.

“What was that?” Riku asked, rubbing his neck. The brunet’s eyes lingered on his wrist. His bones were thick.

“What’s wrong?”

Sora didn’t answer. That wrist seemed tempting, just then. He reached forward, grabbed it roughly, and knocked Riku’s forearm against the wall. Riku cried out and drew back again.

“What is wrong with you?”

Sora didn’t answer, because, for some strange reason, this felt right. The tightness in his chest was easing; it no longer felt like a mean, separate thing. It became cohesive with his lungs and bones and bloodstream.

Riku was going to have more wounds before morning.

Sora grabbed Riku by his jacket and kissed him hard. It wasn’t a real kiss on Sora’s part, because he was using it as a distraction, or a going-through-the-motions sort of thing. Riku seemed willing to forget what just happened and kissed back.

“Don’t worry,” Sora said in a voice that, to him, sounded somewhat unlike his own. “I want to fuck you. I won’t kill you. I just…I want…”

He gently pushed his boyfriend back onto the bed and straddled his hips. Riku seemed wary. He placed his hands on Sora’s hips as though to steady one or both of them.

“I—ha!—I want this,” Sora said, without alluding to what “this” was. Riku discovered what it was soon enough; the brunet backhanded him across the face. He knocked Riku’s head ninety degrees; Riku let out a surprised, scared grunt. He looked up at Sora fearfully—he was stronger, he could fight Sora off, but would he consent to letting things possibly get that far?

Yes, as a matter of fact, he was. But it was because of the paralyzing effect of fear rather than actual willingness. Riku was afraid of the dark, and for the first time in his life, he saw something dark within Sora. It wasn’t average, under-the-bed dark, no—it was the sort of dark that turned him into a powerless child who knew it had better shut up and do what it was told, or else.

Sora had never done this before. There were pauses, during which Riku felt anxious, between Sora’s actions as he weighed his options. Sora punched Riku in the other cheek. Riku shrunk from him. Sora growled. He was becoming angry. Suddenly, he hated seeing weakness. He grabbed Riku’s shirt and shook him a bit, trying to get a rise, trying to get something strong and forceful out of him, but he was left disappointed. Sora shifted so one knee was between Riku’s legs—and Riku knew what was coming next.

“Fuck, shit!” Riku cried out, curling up onto his side with his hands cupping his balls. His eyes were watering. He was afraid. Sora didn’t care; that was why he was afraid. The silver-haired male gasped, more from the fear of his changed best friend than the pain. He let out a choked cry when Sora’s shoe-clad foot harshly met the middle of his back and knocked him into the wall. When Riku’s forehead collided with the hard surface, there was a loud, hard sound, but thankfully not a breaking sound.

Sora was seething, but not with anger—something else was welling up within him, and he liked it. He smiled absently. There was no tightness in his chest anymore. He went over to Riku, pulled him onto his back, and beat him in the face, then the ribs, and then he gave a powerful stomp on his hipbone. Sora fumed, but not with rage. He liked Riku’s scared sounds; soft sounds, trembling sounds, sounds that reminded him of small animals and carcasses and broken glass and…

Get a hold of yourself, soldier. Stay on task, soldier; march or die with all the things I’ve carried. You want his dick in you, still, don’t you, yes, now, I know?

Sora didn’t know the origin of that voice, but at that moment, he felt like Goldilocks, only without the two “not rights” and the golden ringlets. This seemed natural, something about which he needn’t be concerned, and it was just right.

Sora gave Riku a powerful kick in the thigh, once, twice, then clawed the sensitive skin of his boyfriend’s upper arm. Riku raised his hands in a defensive gesture, but Sora’s short but sharp nails kept coming and tearing at him. Riku’s skin was searing. The brunet punched him in the face again, this time meeting the area around his brow, to teach him not to protect himself.

Riku was crying. A few tear drops leaked out of his eyes. The skin around his eyebrows was cut and bleeding out rivulets down his face. Some of the red fluid was swimming in his eyes—he couldn’t see, and that made this even worse. He rubbed his eyes but he could not get it out.

“Sora, please,” Riku pleaded, but faltered when he saw the sudden stillness that overtook his lover’s form. “Sora, stop, can you stop? I-I…” He took in a sharp, audible gasp when Sora’s hand suddenly grasped his cheek. The brunet didn’t squeeze, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t coming.

Sora was suddenly softer, far more tender, and gently slid onto Riku’s groin. The brunet bent forward, looking sad, and comfortingly caressed his boyfriend’s face. Riku trembled under his touch, but he was definitely ready for the episode of sadism to end; hope and relief broke out over his face and he soon warmed to Sora’s touch. Sora petted him on the face, leaned forward, and kissed his damaged cheeks and brow. He kissed the hurt skin and softly rubbed his bruised ribs.

Sora lifted Riku’s shirt and placed kisses there, but he stopped when the tightness returned. It returned when he saw that there were no bruises on his boyfriend’s ribs. Sora thought he hit him harder than that. That was disappointing. And the sad, desperate look on Riku’s face, longing for the tenderness to come again, was so pleasing. A twisted smile grew like a gnarled tree root over Sora’s face and Riku blanched. A sad, wet, fearful sound rose in his throat like a moan meshed with a whimper. Too bad—the sound was encouraging.

Sora hit him in the ribs again, and again, until he was damn sure this time they would bruise, fracture, or maybe break. But then he didn’t really want to fracture or break Riku’s ribs, because that bone breakage was agony to heal; every breath he took while the bones were reconnecting would spark the sharp, grinding pain of rough bone fragments knocking and grating against each other for weeks. So Sora took pity on the silver-haired male’s abused ribcage before he heard any telltale snaps or cracks. Sora fell forward onto Riku, who hugged his chest to protect himself from more blows. Sora kissed Riku on the mouth—sweet, tender things of the lips. Now he was ready to be sweet.

Sora’s eyes widened and moistened. The fluid gathering in his eyes was the substance of disbelief and fear of self.

“I’m sorry, Riku, I really am sorry,” he murmured honestly. The breath that Riku was holding broke and sobs cracked out in its place. Sora cradled Riku’s head in his hands and kissed him tenderly on the mouth, the cheeks, the eyelids, and the forehead. He caressed the elder male’s head in a comforting, repetitive motion. Sora whispered sincere things that gradually diminished the trembling that was racking Riku’s body.

Sora was not lying when he apologized. He knew he regretted this, he just didn’t feel remorse at the moment.

Riku’s nose and eyes were running. He was biting his lip and his eyes were tightly pinched shut, as though that thin layer of skin could offer him some protection. The bleeding from his brow had slowed and his tears had washed his eyes relatively clean of blood. Riku sobbed; he was not ready to trust Sora.

The brunet gently rubbed his boyfriend’s shoulders and upper arms, then cradled and kissed the forearm that was knocked against the wall earlier. Sora meant everything he said. He gently coaxed Riku into opening his eyes and softening to him again. Riku, trembling and reluctant, opened his arms so Sora could nestle on his chest. And Sora did; he made nice. He wrapped his arms around Riku’s back and kissed his chest. He cried a little, too, but not nearly as much as Riku, and that was in part because the purpose of his tears was to show remorse, which would prepare Riku for another round of thrashing. Sora hid his smile inside, deep inside, next to the dark thing in his chest which approved of this deliberate, strategic coddling.

Bring him up to make the fall longer and harder; that’s it, my friend. I am proud of you, you, you!

It took half an hour before Riku’s heartbeat slowed and he was genuinely, relatively at ease with the situation. He returned Sora’s comfort kisses and no longer trembled at his touch. He was still crying a bit, sensitive, confused, and scared—and all too ready for Sora to continue being nice. He clung to Sora, stroked him, as if that would make the good Sora, the one he loved, the one he knew, stay. Just stay. Just stay and never leave, so he could be safe in the company of the one person who kept his light from being extinguished for over two years. It scared Riku to be this close to something dark again.

Sora continued his ministrations, seeming tender until he began kissing anatomy below the level of Riku’s face. He tugged at his boyfriend’s leather belt. Sora rubbed his crotch enticingly against Riku’s as he unbuttoned and unzipped Riku’s fly. All of his actions during this period of tenderness were sweet and entirely lacked the threat of a backlash, yet that did not make Riku ready for sex after being physically abused. Part of Riku, the good part, was waiting for the cruelty to return. There was a small tension in the brunet’s closed eyes as he pressed his soft lips over Riku’s pale skin that made him wary.

He tried to stay Sora’s progression. He half expected to incur Sora’s new, hiding wrath again by doing so, but the tanner male only softened and came back to Riku’s face to give him soft comforts again. The silver-haired male shivered, but happily, at the unexpected change—it was better than he’d hoped. He began to relax further; he was able to fully enjoy Sora’s affectionate kisses to his cheeks and nose, and he responded well to the kisses placed on his lips. Riku felt as though, by keeping Sora’s face near his, he would encourage the longevity of his sweetness and live through the night without further injury.

However, eventually Sora’s patience faded. He insisted, though gently, on things progressing. He ground his hips down on Riku’s groin. By then, Riku was starting to grow reasonably comfortable. He was even hopeful for good sex, although he was not in a state to move much. Riku moaned as the brunet grinded against him; his cock was swelling to fullness quickly. He removed Sora’s jacket and began inching up the hem of his shirt.

Sora smiled flirtatiously down at him. He shivered, loving the cool tickle of Riku’s fingertips on his taut abdomen. The feeling made the muscles there quiver. Sora felt good and warm, because he was nearly on top of a good, hard, long, thick thing that was going to be inside of him soon. Deep inside, he loved having it inside—he moaned at the thought.

“Make me feel good, Riku,” Sora cooed. He locked eyes with Riku, stuck his moist, hot tongue out of his mouth, and pressed his fingers against it. Sora took his moistened fingers and made brief trails around the paler male’s chest, over his strong, swollen muscles. He leaned forward, licked, and sucked on Riku’s nipples. He felt Riku’s cock twitch beneath him.

“I’ll do all the work. All I need you to do,” the brunet continued, shimmying out of his pants and kicking off his shoes, “Is be inside me.”

There were still bloodstains on Riku’s face, but Sora saw no need to remind him of those and the events that caused them. Riku was just getting into it.

The silver-haired male, wanting comfort, wanting panacea, concentrated on divesting Sora of his boxers. Riku’s lips stretched into a pleased, smug smirk when his boyfriend’s penis bobbed up from the confines of the fabric. He stroked the silky skin there teasingly. He was lost in Sora’s resulting shiver. It made his balls twitch.

Sora gently tugged the waistband of Riku’s pants lower on his hips, until his dick was accessible. Sora left it at that; no use trying to tear the rest off, as it would only cause his injuries to complain. The tanner male gave little, light, teasing tugs at the silver hair above Riku’s cock. Riku crooned lowly. He gave the brunet a heated look and slid his pale hands onto Sora’s bum. He squeezed and pulled Sora so that his hole was in line with his cock. Riku wanted to forget what transpired less than an hour ago.

Sora giggled, leaned over Riku, and grabbed a bottle of lube from the drawer on Riku’s nightstand. He gave the silver-haired male a quick kiss while he was at it. That peck turned into a series of longer, hotter, wetter kisses that involved hunger and insistence and passion. Sora was softening to the nature of these kisses—all the things that the presence inside of him was not. The presence momentarily concentrated, sharply, in his chest as a harsh reminder. And Sora recalled cruelty, and how it seemed natural to him.

The brunet lubricated Riku, giving him long, tight strokes to keep him up, and then worked on himself. He took his slick fingers and gently pressed into the passageway between his cheeks and prepared himself for his boyfriend’s size. He moaned, and his moan made Riku’s eyes go half-lidded and glassy. Riku grasped the hand Sora was using to stretch himself and added his strength to the gentle thrusts. Sora loudly gasped and trembled. After a few moments, Riku’s leaking cock ached with waiting, and the silver-haired male gave Sora a few downward presses on his slim hips to intimate his meaning.

Sora smirked at him and slowly lowered himself onto the hot, needy organ. Sora gasped and groaned as the thing slid into him—he could never remember just how big it felt. Being filled was its own reward, but the head of Riku’s cock was already just brushing against something that sent sparks into Sora’s ribs and lungs. He flushed when he heard Riku’s appreciative hiss; the brunet’s tight ring of muscle squeezed his dick, milking it, sending shockwaves of pleasure through his body.

Sora started bouncing on his boyfriend’s groin. His eyes slid closed and a stream of soft, pleasant-sounding moans puffed out of his open mouth. Riku moaned and grunted. He was grateful for Sora’s choice in position—he only had to use his mostly undamaged arms and hands to aid Sora. Riku angled his head so he could watch his swollen member being engulfed by Sora’s bum.

The brunet smirked, suddenly filling with a pleasurable apprehension of something new he was about to do.

Sora stretched his arms over his head and gazed lustily down at Riku, who was panting and sweating, bloodstained, beneath him. His blue eyes met those of aquamarine for one exciting moment before Sora slammed his open palm into his boyfriend’s face again. Riku let out a frightened, pained sound. His hands shot from Sora’s hips to protect his face and as much of his torso as he could cover. Sora smirked again. He punched Riku in the stomach and dug his nails into his best friend’s sides; this earned him a forceful grunt as he forced the air out of his lungs and a threatened whimper from the cuts he was making.

Riku’s wide eyes were filling with tears again. He sobbed—he didn’t want this to happen again, he never wanted this to happen again, he didn’t understand. Where did his Sora go?

The brunet was still bouncing happily on Riku’s cock. He was surprised that it hadn’t become flaccid yet due to his cruelties. He wondered how much more it would take to do that. Sora felt a little angry that his actions up until then hadn’t been enough to cause something so basic, so he tore Riku’s hands away from his wounded face and thrashed him wildly. Sora grunted and yelled at him, screamed things he didn’t understand, and pulled harshly at his hair, which was one of the last things that Sora would ever do, and made Riku feel like the lowest, weakest thing in the world.

Riku, sobbing, tried to block Sora’s hands and push him off—he couldn’t get any leverage, and whenever he grasped something substantial, he made an opening for one of his boyfriend’s painful hands.

“Sora, stop it!” he screamed hoarsely at the blue-eyed male riding him. “Why are you doing this!? It hurts!”

But Sora wouldn’t stop. He let up on his cruelties for a few minutes, before backhanding him again, and he bit Riku’s fingers. Riku was terrified that Sora was going to sever them, but he retrieved the damaged, bruised, acutely aching, digits moments later. He cradled them to his chest. Sora dug his nails into Riku’s face, starting at the forehead, then dragged them down over his nose and cheeks. At the silver-haired male’s pained yowl, Sora grabbed his boyfriend’s jaw so his fingers were inside his mouth, digging into his gums, and used it as a handle to shake his head from left to right. It looked funny: it made Sora laugh.

It was exhaustion, adrenaline, fear, or a complex combination of factors that finally made Riku’s cock twitch in that definite way that heralded stains and louder groans, at least in relation to more pleasurable sex. Riku, caught up in all this shit and pain, somehow got it in his head to be grateful that he jizzed after Sora did—he didn’t want to give Sora a reason to hurt him again.

The brunet saddled on his groin gave a series of particularly loud moans and sighs. He jerked his hips about, back and forth a bit, and buried Riku’s cock to the hilt, at which point the elder male’s organ pumped his seed into him.

So Sora came and Riku came; Sora collapsed onto Riku and Riku secretly crumbled underneath him; Sora sighed with pleasure and exhaustion and Riku cried. And the feeling of tightness once more concentrated in Sora’s chest as a mean, separate thing that made it somewhat difficult to breath. Right between his lungs—that place, right there. Sora could feel its meanness, little purple veins sliding underneath the egg-like shell. It had catharsis; it bore no ill will towards Sora, and it vacated his body. It dispersed into eight little fragments of shallow shafts of cold, empty air that flitted out of his body in eight different directions, then traversed easily through his skin. The fragments wafted into one, whole shaft and it drifted out into the night air through the open, screened window to the left of the headboard of Riku’s bed. It sped happily to something else. Its malignant drive was satiated by the brunet’s actions, but that fulfillment was short-lived, as was to be expected from something with such a cruel nature. It went in search of others, already forming vague, sing-song visions of its next prey.

I am pleased, I am pleased; next one: yes, yes, yes. Let’s fine a red hair, a red hair, a red hair, and a blondie.

-o-o-

Later that evening, when they recovered enough strength and grit to confront this disturbing exchange, Sora had no words for it. He couldn’t explain himself, he couldn’t smooth this over, and he couldn’t offer Riku any semblance of the control he was supposed to have over himself. Riku, seeming hollow, eventually asked if it was the darkness. Sora said he didn’t know. It didn’t feel like it, at least. Perhaps it was a shade of gray. Sora sat on the floor beside the bed and grasped Riku’s hand tightly.

He apologized, fervently, now able to feel his remorse, and wished he could put Riku at ease. The brunet’s eyes leaked a few tears from fear of self, confusion, and powerlessness. What was this? He wanted to understand. Sora wanted to put the pieces together and erase the bruises on Riku’s body. What frightened Sora more was something else he noticed, about which he kept quiet. It felt as though there was a tiny shaft of air in him, and it made him feel a strange sense of detached, sadistic amusement when Sora recalled the event.

Riku couldn’t be alone and comfortable in a room with Sora for weeks. But by the time his smile was no longer strained, it became apparent that Sora was not unchanged.

A tiny, residual splinter of that cold, empty air remained in Sora. It wasn’t much, but it was filled with enough mean and hit and I want to make you hurt to make Sora stare at Riku from the corner of his dark, little room with an expression that made Riku feel trapped and hopeless. The splinter was wanting, and emerged to stroke Sora’s skin from the inside, silently intimating understood desires. Thankfully, Sora always thought when he returned to his normal state, the splinter was so small that it could be appeased by inspiring Riku’s fear without escalating into violence. But it was always a slow-in-coming, reluctant, restless satisfaction. And the weeks and months in between each resurgence were tainted with anxiety, apologies that could not erase pain, and a feeling of powerlessness that made Sora feel truly low.

So Sora did not hit Riku again. However, Riku did not fully trust Sora again, because periodically, without warning, Sora would have to scoot back against the wall, hug his knees to his chest, and pin Riku with a latent, threatening gaze. His eyes would fill with skeletons of mockingbirds and doves that flapped, spasmodically, through his head. In response, Riku froze inside and could only watch him warily from his bed, feeling like a small animal awaiting the inevitable move of a hungry predator. He would stare anxiously at Sora’s teeth, which suddenly looked like thousands of rows of needles, and gape at the wild, abstract things flitting, confused, behind the glassy surface of his large, blue, uncaring eyes.

—le fin