Log; Complete

[gemini-running.livejournal.com]

When; Backdated; May 3rd abouts? When Kamui came back!
Rating; PG for Twinly angst?
Characters; gemini_running Subaru & vampiregemini Kamui
Summary; Kamui comes back to find his twin all comatose and tries to get him out of it. Sadness follows. At least no one lost an eye.

Log;



That fight with Tayuya had opened Kamui's eyes to the fact that, despite dying for him, his beloved twin could be in trouble. He'd reached out to him to help counter one of her illusion attacks, only to be met with an alive, but vacant feeling filtering though their bond, and that... worried him. Enough so that after the fight, he quickly went for the apartment the two of them had shared, seeking out his twin and pushing down that guilty feeling he had. Subaru might hate him and reject him if he saw Kamui, but... Kamui had to at least make sure he was okay.

"Subaru?" he practically was knocking doors down, in such a hurry that he didn't care if they were ever able to close again. And then... he saw him: on the bed, staring vacantly away, and just... not responding. Breathing, but not responding. "B-brother? Shit..." He came to the bed's side, running fingers along his brother's face, trying not to cry over this. It wasn't easy to make him cry, but... what... what had he done?

Subaru blinked slowly, only just registering the touch and the voice attempting to overcome the steady roar of silence in his ears. That touch.. It was so much like the one Seishirou had given him. That's right--Seishirou had taken care of him. Had left with a gentle touch and a whisper against his cheek and an I'll see you again, Subaru-kun, before he too left. Left Subaru all alone. But he had been so kind, kind after.. After what? After someone.. after Kamui had died. Died and bled and left Subaru alone in the shadows.

But the memories and the feelings only floated through the silence, neither causing pain nor bringing forth any reaction. It had happened. And now it was no longer happening. Now Subaru was alone. Although something.. someone.. was calling to him. Calling, but Subaru no longer knew how to call back. There was nothing to call from. Only silence and emptiness flowed through him now.

Subaru had blinked, but... there was still nothing there. His eyes were just a void, and... Kamui suddenly found himself shaking. "Subaru... please... look at me?" Hands found purchase on Subaru's shoulders, shaking him slightly in hopes of snapping him out of it. It wasn't working, nothing was working. "Wake up," and those were tears starting to well in his eyes as he climbed onto the bed with his twin, snuggling up, arms and legs wrapping around him in the manner of a frightened child. "Please?"

Subaru felt, in a vague way, the body of this person touching his own, speaking to him, moving close. The action stirred his memories, and for a moment he was a child, clinging to.. to whom? Who had been there to hold him when nightmares plagued him? Who had he held when the terrors of their kind ravaged his childish mind? Who was it?

Memories pushed and pulled at the haze that surrounded him, begging. No, it was not the memories that begged. It was.. the other. The entity that was now so close, tugging at his clothing. He could feel the heat radiating from this other body. Somehow, it was familiar. It had a name.

"...........Kamui."

Kamui jolted at hearing his name, sitting up just slightly to hover over the other's face, too close to be proper, but right now it didn't matter. "Yes. Subaru, are you...?" Was he waking up? Would he not be stuck this way forever? Relief was starting to rise in him, but he tried to squash it, knowing not to calm so soon. "I'm here, Subaru. Please come back to me." Gently, he stroked his cheek, remaining wrapped around him as best he could.

Back? Here? What did those words mean? Floating across the void that consumed his heart, the words meant little. Hollow things, like the promises of an illusion of a man, or words from the dead. Dead. Yes, that was right. Kamui was dead. Subaru still felt the blood on his hands, heavy like some kind of metal, nothing like the liquid he needed to survive.

But.. this voice. Those hands. Subaru knew them as well as his own--better, perhaps, because Subaru often felt he did not know himself very well at all. Could it be? Did he dare to hope? So far in the darkness that surrounded him, hope was a rare thing. But perhaps.. perhaps if he tried hard enough, he could see for himself. Hadn't Seishirou-san said something similar? He will return, Subaru-kun. As will I.

Those words echoed through him and he blinked again, forcing his eyes to focus. He must crawl back from this dark place. Kamui was here. He could not leave him alone. "Ah....... I...."

"Su... baru," his voice cracked, overly emotional at the fact that... Subaru was returning. Things might not ever be the same, but he wouldn't stay in a void until death. That was enough for Kamui at the moment. He was... glad. So glad.

He placed a kiss on Subaru's cheek, nuzzling into his neck afterwards and whispering, "I'm here."

He blinked again, taking a deep breath, feeling as though the air was singing through his blood. He felt sore from lack of movement, and heart ache deeper than he had ever known--it rushed at him quickly, ripping him from that void, throwing him back, breathless. Kamui was here. But Seishirou-san, if that had indeed been him, was gone. Kamui was here, but he had died. Feelings that had overwhelmed him now just latched onto his flesh and bled him, slowly. Slow enough, this time, that he could breathe.

"Kamui..." he said again, his breath unsteady as he looked down at the ebony hair and the trembling shoulders. Yes, Kamui had returned to him. Gasping softly with the realization, he lifted his arms to hold tightly to his twin, thankful beyond reason for his arrival.

Holding him; Subaru was holding him. "Subaru..." the name came out broken, Kamui's restraint finally snapping as the tears began to fall, face nuzzling more and taking a deep, shaky breath. Subaru was here; he'd come back.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry!" Over and over, he apologized for making Subaru suffer, scared that if he didn't, he would hate him forever. The words were becoming increasingly incoherent as he went, though; finally just becoming sobs that shook his entire body. No one had ever actually seen him being his weak, but... he'd... he'd almost killed Subaru, really. His actions almost killed his twin.

"You came back..." Subaru whispered, and with the words he felt a sense of relief. Small and slight it was, but enough to heal some of the wounds, pull him closer to what could be considered normalcy. And Kamui was crying--such a rare thing, something that forced him from his own pain, made him look and see just how his twin was suffering. Oh, the pain he had caused..

"I'm sorry, Kamui. I'm sorry too."

A few moments, and Kamui was able to regain at least a little control, enough to raise his head and press his forehead to his twin's. "Don't be, it's..." not Subaru's fault, obviously. Kamui had chosen this course of actions on his own, and look what happened. "Are you... here? You won't disappear like that again?" He'd panic if Subaru went back into himself; he wouldn't know what to do, aside from remain curled against him and let the same thing happen to him.

Subaru took a moment to process his brother's words, finding it hard to think quickly, to pull his emotions back into some semblance of order. He took a slow breath, eyes focusing on the blurry glow of Kamui's, still not knowing what to say, but knowing that he must say something. That he could, in fact, speak. "Will you?"

"I don't plan to, no." Kamui said, hurt that his brother would ask that, even though it did make sense. He'd left him once without warning; it wasn't odd to be afraid he would do it again. "I won't do something stupid like that again." Slightly less stupid was still possible, though. Kamui DID tend to attract and/or cause trouble.

"Alright," Subaru said softly, accepting those words at face value. If Kamui said he would not, then he supposed he must believe him. There was little else to do--if he lost faith in his brother, Subaru would lose faith in himself. And he had lost so much already...

"I seem to have missed quite a bit." he murmured, blinking again to clear the rest of the fog from his vision. Though he had returned from that dark abyss, he did not feel quite like himself. That, perhaps, would take time.

Kamui scooted back downward, taking his previous comfy spot, face pressed to Subaru's neck and cuddling him. He needed this right now; the closeness. "Nothing important." And as far as he was concerned, that was true. Kamui cared little for the goings on in the city unless they were particularly amusing or it affected the people special to him.

"Oh." Subaru thought of this for a short moment, letting Kamui stay close, his arms draped lightly over slender shoulders. "Seishirou-san left,” he said after a moment, knowing it would be wrong to bring up such a man, knowing it would cause Kamui pain, but he had no one else to tell. And he so desperately needed to say it, needed to make it known so that it was not his own private torment, not as it had been those days with out Kamui, with only Seishirou's forbidden touch to comfort him.

Kamui flinched hard when Subaru mentioned that man. He was here? Figured. Figured that the city would bring that man about while Kamui wasn't around to do something about it. "Oh." He half contemplated pulling away and just leaving, upset as he was, but instead he found himself holding Subaru tighter, grip not at all painful but definitely possessive. "I see." He wasn't sure how, but he found himself hating Seishirou even more at the moment.

"I'm not even sure if it was really him.." he mused, aware that Kamui had pressed closer. Doomed to hurt Kamui with every breath, it seemed. But at the moment, there was little he could do. "The city, I suppose..." The words kept tumbling out of his mouth, as if he had stored up something great, something secret and forbidden, all that time he had sat in silence. "It was my price, for taking the red ribbon. Which you took from me. I do not believe the city is fair with such prices. I wonder what Yuuko-san would say about that. I wonder if it was really him. I wonder.. if any of this is real."

"It probably wasn't," Kamui said honestly, knowing the city would fuck with people like that. He just did NOT appreciate they had done such a thing to his beloved brother. "I didn't see him, and if anyone else did, they would have mentioned it. I think it was an illusion." At least, it better have been, or he was about to be a lot more pissed off about it all.

For a little while, he was silent, breathing in his brother's scent before he finally broke the still air. "I was here, you know. My price was that you couldn't see, feel, or hear me, but... I was with you almost the entire time before I died." Not that it changed anything, but... at least Subaru had to know he hadn't been abandoned entirely during that time. Sure, Kamui had wandered off a lot to mope and think, but he always someone returned to his twin, at least following him around.

Subaru just nodded, knowing in his heart the words to be true. Of course it had been an illusion. Of course. He wasn't very sure if he would ever see the real Seishirou-san again, not with the constant running from world to world, and the pain his brother felt over it. He felt deeply, devastatingly defeated, emptiness threatening to consume him again. But this was an old feeling, something he had learned to deal with. He would hide it, hold it down deep inside him, and continue on.

"Oh? I'm sorry I didn't see you..." he murmured, wondering at what times Kamui had been there. When he was trying his hardest to ignore the man standing on the veranda? When he was backed against a wall with Seishirou-san's hands on his throat? "Did I act strangely?"

"You did," Kamui paused, as if he was trying to figure out a way to phrase things properly, "but I guess I know why now. That illusion..." Illusion, he reminded himself, illusion. All he could do at this point was let himself believe that was to be the case.

"You're okay now, though, right? We should probably get you cleaned up." He moved away a little, waiting for an answer and being fine with having to assist, if needed. A bath should do him good, but Kamui wasn't sure if he was with it or strong enough to move and take one on his own.

"I'm fine," he said, brushing back his hair momentarily before looking down and realizing he hadn't changed. Seishirou-san had taken care of him, but he hadn't gone that far. Startled by the slight heat rising to his cheeks, Subaru sighed and pulled away in order to stand. "I'll take a bath."

Kamui watched him carefully, "you can stand and walk okay? I don't want you falling..." This was better; focusing on Subaru and taking care of him made him feel much better. It was just as it should be, and at least for the moment, he was trying to ignore everything involving that man he hated so. Subaru, only Subaru.

"Of course." Subaru blinked down at his brother for a moment before smiling. In truth, he felt a little unsteady, having not moved for so long. But he didn't want Kamui to worry--he didn't want anyone to worry. Everything would be fine for now. He just had to convince himself that.

He was trying not to worry him; a little late for that. "If you so much as wobble, I'm carrying you to the bathroom," he warned, sitting up on the bed. "I know you always try to push yourself so that you don't inconvenience people." And Subaru should know that

Subaru smiled again--such words of comfort for the one he always leaned against. Kamui would always say such things, but deep in his heart, Subaru wondered if his twin ever grew tired of his problems. It wasn't easy, dealing with him. Subaru knew he was a great burden, a great cause of pain to the most important person he had. "I'm fine."

Mustering up his strength, he walked to the bathroom, bracing himself for the flood of memories that would surely arrive when he saw the blood and---- But nothing was there. It was clean, and while his stomach lurched at the images that finally arrived, it was not something he could not handle. Kamui was still with him. Back there, waiting for him. This was just a bathroom. Under his breath, he whispered "thank you, Seishirou-san."