tampered | LOG; GINTOKI + SAKAMOTO, ONGOING

LOG; GINTOKI + SAKAMOTO, ONGOING

When; Thursday, the night of the curse.
Rating; ~~F for Faggotry~~ hur hur, PG-13 for mature themes and slaaaaaaaash
Characters; Sakata Gintoki (

ginironosora) + Sakamoto Tatsuma (

canicrynow)
Summary; The City's curses get suddenly cruel for many of its former samurai.
Log;

They can blame us all they want. We aren't guilty of anything, and don't you ever think it's true. Everyone entered the war knowing the consequences-- I'm just thankful I was able to protect you, Zura, and Taka...

Tatsuma could have said, 'wonder what?' and defused the possibility of an uncomfortable situation. He honestly could have, but his environment, the ghosts, the everything...well, there was a limit to even Sakamoto Tatsuma's positive thinking and his coping mechanism was growing thin. The stress was getting to him.

Instead of acting like an idiot and asking Gintoki to continue and share more, he leaned against the slightly shoddy table in the kitchen, staring back across at the veranda as he uncapped the bottle of cheap, obviously home-brew liquor that he'd picked up a moment ago. It was cool against his throat. He'd been crying for a while on the veranda when they'd appeared. He'd avoided all other contact until he felt he could face the world as a man steadily growing closer to middle age than he was to youth.

A small line of the clear liquid fell down his chin and he wiped it with the back of his arm, tapping his thigh with the glass bottle. The one still wrapped tightly beneath his pants.

"Thankful even about that Takasugi fellow?"

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Gintoki was silent for a long, long few moments, wondering about it himself. He hadn't missed the unmistakable signs-- the slightly-red eyes, the damp, clumped eyelashes-- but he'd tactfully ignored them.

Taking the bottle for himself, the silver-haired samurai took a swig and handed it back, and looked off to the side. He gave a sigh, one hand resting on his hip.

"I would never regret protecting my friends. If it's one more life I could save, of course I'd be thankful."

He gave only the briefest pause before continuing, "But I regret that it means it's my fault he lived to hurt you and Zura. A life for a life. He watched my back on the battlefield, and I watched his. My debt was repaid."

Sakamoto sat at the edge of the table, long legs still easily reaching the floor, heavy bottle still easily resting against his clothed thigh, chilly. He could feel Gintoki's strangely-colored eyes on his face and resisted the urge to blush or laugh or rub at his own eyes to break the look away. The other man's hand was lifting the bottle away from him a moment later.

Gintoki took a deep drink and handed the bottle back. He looked. Well. Like a man who was just as unsure and deeply annoyed by the circumstances and just as unwilling to show it as Tatsuma was.

He rested a hand on the back of his neck, curling in the damp fringe of his brown hair, and spoke again. Coming from another man, the words might have had a different meaning, but coming from a man so steadfastly conflict-avoidant as Tatsuma...

"So if your debt is repaid, what will you do if he comes after--" He didn't say, 'me,' or 'Zura,' because he disliked the idea that he was using Gintoki for protection (although it was an honest truth.) "--you again?"

He contemplated the words, crossing his arms unconsciously and staring pointedly at Sakamoto's leg-- where he'd been stabbed through the thigh.

Images flashed through his mind from times long since past-- the war, classes with Shoyou-sensei, the first time he met Sakamoto, glancing around as countless enemies surrounded him, remembered the feeling of equally-strong backs pressed against his own-- Katsura, Sakamoto, Takasugi-- countless other allies. He could identify everyone by the feel of their back.

Takasugi was the main frequenter of those images, even the small memories running past, like an old movie clip. Failed attempts at dinner and nightwatch full of joking and pushing each other around, all of them huddled in their tent-- it made him question himself far too much, and he didn't like it.

"Honestly?"

He took the few steps it took to cross to Sakamoto's side, and leaned against the table next to him. Being in front of him was unnerving, that way.

"I don't know. I don't know if I can throw away our friendship, everything we shared and fought for together, to fight him. To end him."

The samurai leaned back a bit, Tatsuma's shoulder pressing between his shoulderblades.

Tatsuma raised the bottle to his lips again as he felt more than saw Gintoki slide out of his field of vision, moving around to his side, behind him, and settling down onto the table which seemed to take the weight of both of them well enough.

Tatsuma didn't have as many memories like Gintoki's. He'd never been too friendly with Zura and less so with Takasugi, because when it came down to it, Tatsuma just never was meant to fit in with men like that. There was no way he could blame Gintoki for his next words, no way at all. They generally agreed with Tatsuma's sentiments.

He shifted Gintoki's weight slightly when it came to rest between his shoulders, an almost-cruel reminder, given the circumstances. The dead were around, telling him how disappointed they were he'd run away like a coward. Gintoki was leaning against him like they were in a cramped tent on a rainy night.

He shivered. The cold bottle was less comforting after that memory.

"You know," he said at length, voice a little rough from the cheap alcohol he'd been throwing back, drinking to get rid of the headache from crying and stress, and tomorrow he'd be drinking to get rid of the hangover.

"You know he doesn't feel the same way about you. I can feel it from him. He's not the same kind of person as--well."

The table gave an audible creak, the sound of which sent a shiver up his spine, but it seemed sturdy enough. He let his head tilt back, resting against Tatsuma's. Was it strange that he was reminded of the same thing? Though he'd never know the same image ran through the other man's mind as his own. A tiny tent with three-too-many teenagers on a starless, rainy night.

"As us? Yeah. I know it too well. Makes me wanna puke."

He tried to smile and laugh, but all that resulted was a harsh smirk and a chuckle that left a bitter aftertaste. Gintoki wasn't angry. He wasn't annoyed, agitated, aggravated-- whatever the word for it was, it didn't start with an 'a'. Maybe more of a 'j'... jaded might fit well.

"But you know..."

And he was quiet again for a moment, reformulating his words before he continued, "you know... Thinking that out of that whole war, only a few hundred survived... and knowing that all four of us survived it together, fought together, ate together, slept together..."

The samurai shook his head vaguely, barely a twitch in each direction. "I can't forget it. It's not something that I can put behind me. I still have the headband. The white cloth we all tied around our heads. I wonder if you guys do. I still have my chest armor too-- it's clean and polished, but when you look close, there's dents, blood ingrained in the scratches-- there will always be physical remnants of bad times. I think Takasugi is like that, for us."

But then he really did laugh, though it still didn't sound very mirthful. He snaked a hand around for the bottle of alcohol and shrugged. "Or maybe all those dead guys are just making me babble like a retard, who knows."

The starless nights were always the ones Tatsuma hated the most, but there were good points to even bad memories. He had never been a man who particularly liked being alone, had always been happier in small, intimate groups, had always been able to feel more confident in himself that way.

It was good that he was reunited with Gintoki recently, and reunited again in this stupid place with its stupid ghosts telling Tatsuma how he never wanted to take responsibility. It was good because it gave him the confidence to turn to the side on his seat on the table and dig long fingers through the other man's shaggy head and pull him against his own forehead, staring above the frame of his glasses and down the bridge of his nose and laughing.

It was nice to have confidence.

"That stupid armor, I melted it down. It's part of the Kaientai, now. I wonder what those retard ghosts would say to that! They can go rot if they have something to warn me about and I won't take their advice, because they're dead and I've seen things that they haven't!"

Seeing things was just what Gintoki was busy doing-- he couldn't recall if he'd ever seen Tatsuma's eyes so close, but they were a startling, clear blue. The kind of blue that colored the night sky where stars gathered together, or the color of the ocean at dusk.

His searching hand rested on the other man's waist and his nose brushed against Tatsuma's, turning himself slightly for a better angle, and when the other man gave no sign of resisting, Gintoki placed a kiss on Tatsuma's lips, lingering for a few moments before he pressed their foreheads together again.

"Who needs the dead when you have the living at your side, though, right?"

It was the absolutey last thing that Tatsuma had been expecting from a man like Gintoki, a man who always preferred to stay within his comfort zone (or at least, until recently, Tatsuma had thought). Gintoki, he'd always seen the other man as someone who was fickle as far as relationships went-- no time or patience for women for more than a one-night stand or admiring the weather girl on television. It certainly wouldn't have occurred to him that Gintoki would go out on a limb and kiss him.

But neither one of them was young or inexperienced enough in any sense of the word to think that this was just boyish experimentation. It was, in Tatsuma's rather romanticized brain, a clinging to of comforting familiarities and a realization that something positive came from even the bad things in life. Simply, an idea Tatsuma could get behind with some enthusiasm

He sighed and laughed softly when Gintoki pulled away, a laugh that said he knew what he was getting himself into. The chuckle joined the sound of their hair rubbing together and of Gintoki's hand shifting against the leather of his jacket. He pressed his glasses back up to cover his eyes with one hand and then reached to grab the nearby bottle of wine, throwing his head back with the thin neck in his mouth and holding a finger out to Gintoki.

'Just wait for it.'

Gintoki leaned over to pull the finger into his mouth, laving his tongue around the fingertip, his hair brushing against the bare bit of chest, and straightened back up. He pulled the dark sunglasses off of the other man's face, smirking, and moved in for another kiss once the bottle was set back down, tasting the alcohol on Sakamoto's lips.

"I hate those glasses. You have such nice eyes~"

Tatsuma had to put the bottle down and swallow when Gintoki wrapped his tongue around the tip of his finger to keep from spitting the alcohol out, swallowing it roughly, almost choking from the position his neck was in, adam's apple bobbing. That certainly wasn't holding on and waiting for him to finish. He coughed before leaning into Gintoki's kiss, enjoying the feel of the thinner lips against his own. Ones that weren't covered with sticky cosmetics like all the lonely alien women he'd entertained for a night.

He picked the bottle up again, considering how long it would take the stuff to be gone and done with already. Tatsuma shoved it into Gintoki's hand forcibly, wiping his mouth off with the back of his arm.

"Drink! We're not gone enough yet to be allowed to do this without a hangover and an alibi! Drink!"

The other hand snatched the sunglasses from his nose and tossed them across the kitchen to prove a point. They were getting uncomfortable anyway. He was warm from the crying, the booze.

He laughed, pulling back to take a deep swig from the bottle, followed by another. It made sense, at least. This night was crazy-- and somehow, he thought it was about to get crazier.

But the samurai was quite pleased as Tatsuma threw his glasses across the room, his pretty blue eyes now fully visible, but it begged the question.

Setting the bottle down after one final swig, he put the stopper in it and reached a hand over Tatsuma's lap, propping himself over the other man lazily. "So tell me. Why's it look like you've been crying?"

Tatsuma watched as Gintoki took his own fair share from the bottle, hooking long thumbs under the lapels of his jacket and sliding it off, tossing it onto the floor to join the glasses as he considered the other man. All that time out in space, all those people he'd met, it was surprising to him that he'd never even thought to seriously consider Gintoki as one of the more attractive ones. Despite any joking he'd done since their reuniting.

All that wavy white hair and pale skin. Honestly.

He laughed, limbs already growing heavy from alcohol. Gintoki'd leaned all over him in the past when they were drunk, ruffling hair, rubbing faces. It hadn't meant much then, but the memories were pleasant and tossed away the cold feelings Tatsuma'd had just a little earlier, even when Gintoki brought them up.

Still, he didn't want to answer and ruin it all. "Haha, you see, I was just outside and overcome by the beauty of the snow. Now you tell me if that pretty, pretty white hair is the same color as the pretty white hair one your..."

Gintoki chuckled faintly, leaning in close enough to rub noses again. "You can't fool me, and don't change the subject. If something's making you unhappy, I want to know."

He pressed a light kiss to Sakamoto's lips-- soft and full, they were nice-- and then smiled. "P.S: the rug always matches the curtains, doesn't it?"

He mentally cringed when he heard his words starting to slur-- it may taste like crap, but that alcohol was some strong shit. He put a heavy hand on Tatsuma's shoulder, getting back to business and staring him down. He wasn't letting anymore clothes come off until he had an answer.

A slight frown graced his features, so unused to the expression that it made him look more nauseous than anything. Tatsuma could smell the sweetness of the grape wine under Gintoki's breath, that extra sweetness when Gintoki kissed him again that was a reminder that Gintoki hadn't been eating right lately.

He would have to answer. Gintoki would coax it out of him eventually, and Tatsuma had little chance of changing the other man's mind once it was made up. It hadn't worked 11 years ago, it was decidedly not going to work now.

"It was just that man you all were always going on about, back then. He said some not-so nice things about best intentions, you know..."

It was as much of anything Gintoki was going to get that wasn't a bolstering of his own ego. The sunglasses were gone and his eyes were still red at the edges and he didn't want to feel raw anymore.

"Shoyou-sensei...?" He frowned as well. What would Shoyou-sensei have possibly said...? He had always been kind...

Gintoki rested his other hand on Tatsuma's cheek, stroking it lightly, and he nuzzled the other side of his face. His hand slipped to the back of Sakamoto's head and he caught his earlobe between his lips, nibbling lightly before he ran his tongue up around the shell of the other man's ear. "What'd he say..?"

"Haha...well." He shrugged as well as he could under Gintoki's ministrations, both of them slow to react, relaxed muscles and the alcohol determining the pace of the conversation and the impromptu intimacy. He moved a hand to push Gintoki's head away from his, to get rid of the teeth that were nipping at his ear, because honestly, if Gintoki wanted an answer he was going to have to make it so that Tatsuma could produce anything but idiotic gasping noises.

He could only imagine where his friend had learned to do that, but then, Gintoki always had been amazingly able at almost anything he'd decided to undertake. There was also the business of living in the red light district...

He threaded his fingers into Gintoki's hair, to hold him still for just a moment.

"Just some heavy Bushido-type things about not lying to people you cared about."

He allowed himself to be nudged away, the lithe fingers threading in his hair sending a shiver up his spine. The sudden mention of Shoyou had thrown him off, but now he was intrigued. Another of those weird ghosts. But were they trustworthy? Was it just another curse made to cause suffering? He couldn't be sure, and the forced wine was making his trains of thought reeling in wrong directions.

"This would then lead me to ask whether you're lying to me or you don't care about me, but I'll just keep thinking neither is true. I know they're not true. So don't let some idiotic wannabes from a stupid curse get to you." It was about as sentimental and honest as he'd get drunk, and he leaned forward to rest his head on Sakamoto's shoulder, nuzzling his neck.

"So don't get all sad, 'kay? You'll make me sad too."

He favored Gintoki with another smoke-toned laugh, smiling to let Gintoki know that neither one of those things were true, because a smile could be the only real way to do it. Especially now, with the wine stripping away any of the eloquence Tatsuma could show. The scarf around his neck was getting in the way now; he tugged it off, tossed it into the pile. Sometimes, he really did think he wore too many layers.

He left one hand in the other man's hair, the free one falling to wrap around Gintoki's back, enjoying the broadness for a moment before his head bobbed. It was late, he was worn out from the stupid City's stupidness and he was drunk off his balls.

But this was nice and he'd do it again.

"'M really drunk, Kintoki."

The silver-haired freelancer laughed too, a warm chuckle that sounded pleasant on his own ears. Things seemed to be winding down, and that was a plus. He wrapped long arms around Tatsuma and leaned back, pulling the other with him to lay down on the table and hugged him tight. "I am too, Tatsumo... I am too."

Gintoki buried his nose in Sakamoto's hair, breathing in his scent-- leathery and spicy. He liked it. He could feel his eyelids getting heavy, starting to drift off. The ghosts should be gone in a few hours anyways, right? They didn't have anything to worry about.

Winding down was one way to put it. Tatsuma never had been able to hold his liquor very well, less so on an empty stomach. And as much as it could be said that under normal circumstances he would have objected to sleeping on an old friend on the kitchen table, that was basically patently untrue.

The breath in his hair was rhythmic and drowsy. They would be sore when they woke up, the roommates might be scarred, but that was alright. They would just have to learn how to laugh it off.

He kicked his geta off and told himself not too snore too loudly.

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LOG; GINTOKI + SAKAMOTO, ONGOING

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