Fracture (Pin, NC-17) [2/2]

[maayacolabackup]

*

Sometimes, when things start to fade, Yamapi bites his tongue and the taste of his own blood keeps him in control for just a little longer. The pain anchors him to his own body, and the voice hisses and spits with rage.

It won’t work forever, the voice tells him.

Yamapi just needs something that works for now. He can’t even begin to worry about later.

*

“Blossom,” Yamapi says, “sit.” Blossom looks at him, vacantly, before continuing her slow meander about the kitchen. “Why will you sit for Ryo and not for me?”

Blossom looks at him again, and her ears perk up at Ryo’s name.

“You’re supposed to be my dog,” he mumbles, and he’s resentful. He knows he shouldn’t be, because it’s not like Blossom doesn’t love him and he’s being silly. He knows this, but his heart twinges a little anyway, and it makes him angry too.

She’s supposed to love you best, teases the voice. She’s supposed to be your dog.

The blackness tickles the edges of his vision as he looks at her, tail wagging innocently as she gazes out the window.

No, Yamapi thinks, as the world starts fading away. No, no, no.

I can make you do whatever I want, the voice tells him smugly. I can make you teach her a lesson. I can teach you a lesson, too.


*

He thinks of Ryo's cheerful face, as Blossom affectionately sticks her nose into his neck, and he's filled with rage. He picks Blossom up into his arms, or he tries to, but somehow his hands end up around her neck, and he's squeezing.

"Don't you know you're only supposed to love me?" he says, and Blossom whimpers and squeals and claws at his arms and he can't let go until Blossom is still and cold.

"Stupid dog," he whispers, as he runs his hands through Blossom's fur. She certainly won't love anyone more than him now.

He invites Ryo over for dinner.

"What is this?" Ryo jokes. "The meat is a bit tough."

"It’s just regular meat," he says, and Ryo shrugs.

"Aren't you going to eat?" Ryo asks between mouthfuls, and he smiles.

"I already did," he says, and then he hears a key in the door. "Jin!"

Jin beams at him, his infectious smile lighting up the dimly lit kitchen. This kind of light is the only kind that doesn’t piss him off, anymore. "Hey, Pi," Jin says, and immediately plops down next to him, leaning close.

He soaks in Jin’s warmth, and relishes the slide of Jin's skin against his own. "Hey," he says, and Ryo looks at them, and he wants to smirk because in this, at least, he will always be the one loved most.

Jin just leans closer in response, and it makes his heart clench with satisfaction in his chest. Jin smells fresh and appealing—he wants to taste him so badly but it’s not the time or the place. He'll never have to teach Jin any lessons about who he belongs to, because Jin instinctively knows.

"Where's Blossom?" Ryo says suddenly, and he pastes a tragic look onto his face. "I wanna say hi to my favorite pup."

"I didn't want to say anything until after dinner," he whispers, looking down at the table. "She got hit by a car this morning."

"Oh god," Jin says, and he laces their hands together. "I'm so sorry, Pi. I know how much you loved her."

"I did," he says, and then finally, he raises his head to look at Jin.

There's probably no emotion in his eyes, but no one really expects any, because Yamapi's eyes have always been hard to read.

Ryo looks like he's about to cry. He hopes Blossom's flesh eats him from the inside.

*

When Yamapi resumes consciousness, he finds Blossom cowering under the table, shivering and shaking, and Yamapi’s jagged nails have dug into his palms, leaving small red crescent moons embedded in the flesh.

I told you, didn’t I? I can make you do anything, the voice says. And you’ll never know if it’s real or all in your head. Yamapi wraps his arms around himself and wonders if he’s truly lost his mind.

What are you? Yamapi asks, and he doesn’t need to say the words out loud but his lips form them anyway.

I’m everything you can’t be, is the reply, and then there’s only the sound of the voice’s laughter resounding in every corner of his head, and trickling down to his heart.

*

It’s amazing how fast one person can fall apart.

He should go see someone. A doctor. A psychiatrist. Someone who’ll lock him up or tell him it’s all some hallucination that he can fix with a few pills. Someone who’ll make him less afraid to close his eyes.

But.

“Is everything okay?” Shige asks. “You seem…off.”

“I’m fine,” Yamapi says, and Shige shrugs.

“If you say so. But with our comeback soon, the last thing we need is you in the hospital or anything, okay?” Shige sighs. “Take care of yourself, Yamapi.”

You can’t be weak now, the voice says. They’re counting on you.

*

Jin’s eyes are closed, his head leaning back against the couch. He looks innocent, eyelashes fluttering softly in slumber and breathing slow and even.

You could kiss him, the voice says, and Yamapi wills it to go away, to shut UP, to stop running through his head and leave him alone. He would never know.

Get out of my head, Yamapi thinks. Just get out! Yamapi brings his hands up to his ears, palms covering them as if he can block the sound from inside. Can’t you just leave me be?

The voice chuckles. You could strangle him,the voice whispers. You could strangle him and you would never know.

Yamapi trembles, and prays that the world doesn’t go black.

It doesn’t. This time.

*
Jin’s blood tastes better than anyone else’s. He knew it would, he’s always known, somehow, that Jin would be the best. Jin is cold and lifeless now, still, and even if Jin’s heart is still beating in the palm of his hand, it won’t be for long. He raises it to his lips, and drinks.

*

He stays in control for days sometimes. No blackouts, no missing sections of time where he has no idea where he’s been or what he’s done. The voice is loud and dissatisfied then, clamoring for blood and violence in a way that mixes deceitfully with Yamapi’s own thoughts until he can’t tell the two apart at all.

*

It's on the news, one day.

That there are girls going missing all over Tokyo.

Yamapi thinks about the taste of blood in his mouth, and the slow glide of sweat-soaked skin, and soft feminine growls and groans, and it makes him feel like he’s sinking.

There’s nothing Yamapi can do but pray that it’s not real—that those flashes of sweat and skin are just hallucinations, are just things the voice is showing him to make him scared.

Jin is pressed against his side, head resting on Yamapi’s shoulder, watching the news with him, and it’s only Jin’s presence that is holding him together right now.

“When did it get so cold?” Jin asks, and Yamapi wonders if Jin is talking about the weather, or about the temperature of his body thanks to his barely beating heart.

*

“I’m going over to Yu’s place to play video games,” Jin says, and he cracks his back.

Yamapi’s hands clench into fists, and it’s like he felt with Blossom, like Jin is his and he shouldn’t be leaving Yamapi on Yamapi’s only day off this week. “But I only have today off,” Yamapi says.

“Yeah, but I see you all the time,” Jin replies. “I never get to see Yu.”

“You’re choosing him over me?” Yamapi says, and the voice in his head is silent. That’s okay, Yamapi is taunting himself enough.

“I’d never choose anyone over you,” Jin says. “Don’t you know that?” Jin’s hand wanders up to his neck, and he bites his lower lip as his fingers run across something obscured by his high-necked shirt. “How can you not know that?”

“Okay,” Yamapi says, and then Jin swallows and lets his hand fall from his own neck.

“I’ll be back in a couple of hours,” Jin says, and then he pauses, like he wants to say something else, but then he just sighs, and walks out the door.

*

She’s foreign, this time, and her hair is wild and her eyes are light. She drinks beer, and holds her liquor better than he can.

She’s perfect, really.

No. He frowns, and it’s there again. I said NO.

“What’s your name?” Yamapi asks, hands gripping the counter at the bar until his knuckles turn white.

“Sarah,” she says. “It’s Sarah.”

Ten minutes later, he excuses himself, and climbs into the taxi alone, heart beating like it wants to thump right out of his chest.

You’ve ruined my fun, the voice says, and Yamapi quavers at the sinister tone of the voice.

Were you going to kill her? Yamapi thinks. Was I going to kill her?

Maybe.

There’s an image, in his head then, of Jin beneath him, shuddering and bleeding, and it makes Yamapi panic. Not Jin, Yamapi says.

Then don’t interrupt.

*

He can’t find his brush anywhere. It’s not on the dresser, where he left it, and it’s not anywhere in his room at all, and no matter how many times he checks, it’s not in the bathroom either. It makes him want to scream in frustration, because Yamapi has always been careful with his things.

“What are you looking for?” Jin asks, and he’s watching Yamapi hesitantly from the doorway of his own room, hands shoved into his pockets and mouth set in a small frown.

“My hairbrush,” Yamapi says distractedly, and the voice makes a tiny little chuckle in his mind that makes Yamapi pause, and sets off all kinds of alarms behind his eyes.

Jin looks at him for a moment, still, before he retreats into his room and re-emerges with Yamapi’s hairbrush in hand. He holds it out toward Yamapi, and Yamapi thinks Jin’s hand might look a little unsteady. “You left it in my room yesterday,” Jin says quietly, his voice seeming to trip over the words. “When I was brushing your hair.”

Yamapi’s heart, for a moment, stops beating; it just freezes in his chest and his blood, cold enough to begin with, runs even colder. “Right,” he says, and his own hand is far from steady either as he reaches out to take the brush. Their hands touch, and their eyes meet, and Yamapi sees his own uncertainty reflected back in Jin’s eyes.

… The problem is Yamapi doesn’t know what else he’s doing when everything is black.

It’s terrifying.

*

So much power, in his hands. He likes the way that right now, she’s his. He likes the way she moans, wantonly, and the way her hands reach around his back and pull him deeper inside of her.

Later, he likes the way she looks, cold and unmoving; like he’s created a statue.


*

“What do I have to do to make this stop?” Yamapi says, as he looks in the mirror. “Tell me what you want.”

Let me help you, the vice says. Let me show you what you really want.

The voice is like silk now, smooth and inviting. Yamapi lets it wash over him, and his mind shows him Jin, smiling softly at him.

He’s never wanted something as much as he’s always wanted Jin.

“Okay,” Yamapi whispers. He splashes water on his face, and stares at his own reflection. For some reason, he doesn’t recognize his own face. “Okay,” he repeats, and then he gives in.

About time.

Yamapi slams his fist into the mirror, and sees a different face in each piece of shattered glass.

*

Yamapi buys a new mirror before Jin can see the remains of the old one, and gathers the pieces up, putting them in the drawer of his bedside table.

Sometimes, when he looks at the chunks of glass, he sees two of himself side by side. Maybe looking into something fractured is the only way they can both exist simultaneously.

*

Yamapi is ready to go out. He's dressed to kill, black pants slick and sleek against his skin.

"Hey, Pi..." Jin says, uncertain, and he's standing in the doorway like he doesn't know that he belongs next to Yamapi, that anywhere Yamapi is, that's where Jin should be too. "Can I...talk to you?"

"Of course," Yamapi says, and he pats the space next to him at the kitchen counter. Jin shuffles in place and then moves a little closer, to the other end of the counter, but he doesn't stand next to Yamapi.

"All the girls," Jin says finally. "I don’t... I don’t like all the girls. It’s weird. It’s not like you." Jin clears his throat. "It's just I kind of thought..."

Yamapi doesn't understand why Jin hesitates.

Pay attention, whispers the voice. Look at him. Smell him.

And then, then he does understand, because Yamapi can see the uncertainty flickering in Jin’s eyes, and he can see that something, that something he’s seen before but couldn’t identify, and now he thinks he might know what it is. He can smell Jin’s fear, and more than that, he can smell Jin’s arousal.

You see? He’s yours. And I won’t let you ignore it anymore.

And then Yamapi’s vision starts to fade, going dark around the edges. Not now, he thinks to himself. Let me have this.

We can share.

It’s strange, to watch something happen through your own eyes, and yet not be able to control your own body. But he can feel. He can feel everything.

"What's wrong, Jin? Jealous?" It’s his mouth moving, but not his words, and not him making the mouth move.

Jin's whole face goes red, caught between anger and embarrassment. "No," he says petulantly, and Yamapi can smell the lie, too. Jin's arm hair stands on end, Yamapi notices, and it sends a delightful tingle through his (their?) belly, because he loves that it’s him making Jin on edge.

Jin has always been able to make him feel the most. Even now, or maybe especially now, Jin is the only one who can make him feel anything but afraid.

Yamapi wonders how much Jin can make him feel. The voice seems to wonder, too.

Yamapi’s face smiles at Jin, and something about his smile must look as predatory as he feels in that moment, because Jin's eyes widen and he gulps. The vein in Jin's neck pulses, and Yamapi's eyes narrow in on it, on the tempting life flowing through Jin's veins. "It's okay, Jin," his body, the voice, says, and walks over to him, trapping him against the kitchen counter. "I promise I like you better."

Jin's face goes a furious red, and he shoves Yamapi hard, away from him. "Cut it out, Pi," Jin mutters. "Just go out already. I don’t know what to do when you’re like this. It makes me confused."

The voice smiles, amused, when Jin retreats to his room and slams the door, and Yamapi can feel that smile stretch across his face.

Do you see? the voice says. Already yours.

Yamapi feels the control fade back in, an awareness of his limbs and torso return to him all of a sudden. “Already mine,” Yamapi says. Mine.

And against all reason, he wants to smile, too.

He knocks on Jin's door, and doesn't wait for an answer before he peeks in. "I've decided to stay in," Yamapi says, and Jin looks up at him from underneath his covers in surprise. "You want to watch a movie?"

Jin nods hesitantly, and Yamapi smiles at him warmly, and things feel like normal. “You’re back,” Jin says, sighing with relief, and Yamapi tilts his head to the side and looks at Jin with warm eyes.

“I never left,” Yamapi says, and Jin pauses, his hands half-way through pushing back the covers. Jin sucks his lower lip into his mouth, then, and examines Yamapi out of the corner of his eye.

“Okay,” he says, and then his hand wraps around Yamapi’s wrist, and the fingers are comforting and familiar.

In the back of his mind, the voice is quiet. But Yamapi knows it’s not for long. He also knows it’s looking less and less worthwhile to fight it.


*

Sometimes, when Yamapi is sitting next to Jin on the balcony of their apartment, Jin with his guitar and Yamapi nursing a wine-cooler, it feels like old times.

Yamapi feels the most in control then. “You seem…at peace,” Jin tells him. “It’s nice. Haven’t seen that look in a while.”

“Haven’t felt it in a while,” Yamapi admits, taking another swig of his drink. He turns to smile at Jin, and Jin reddens and turns away.

“You should. Being at peace suits you.”

It’s not that simple, but tonight he can try.

*

It’s easy, now, to give in to touch. Yamapi doesn’t try and fight it anymore, just lets his gaze linger too long on the curve of Jin’s strong shoulders or the upturn of his lips. His hands toy with the skin at Jin’s waist, when they sit beside each other, and Jin stiffens in his arms but a moment before melting into them, easy and hot.

But when their eyes meet, Jin becomes skittish, like he can see them both behind Yamapi’s eyes, and it makes him nervous.

"Jin, what's wrong?" Yamapi’s body says, and even though it's a question, the syllables drawl out so nice and long.

"There's something...off about you." Jin says. His voice is scratchy, and Yamapi can hear the fear and the desire tangled together in every word Jin speaks. "You've been looking at me all...weird, lately."

"You've been looking at me weird, too," Yamapi’s mouth says, and then his mouth curls into a smile. "Like you want something from me."

Jin blushes and looks away. "Don't be ridiculous. I'm just worried about you. You never used to…get so close. You never used to forget things. You never used to make me feel so…nervous." Jin’s hand comes up to his neck, almost touching it before dropping it again.

"There's nothing wrong with me, Jin," Yamapi purrs. "I'm perfectly fine."

Jin's eyes involuntarily sweep over Yamapi's body before he can stop them. Yamapi and the voice had thought they might; that's why he didn't put on a shirt.

"Jin, you look a bit flushed," Yamapi’s mouth says, stepping closer. He puts a cold hand on Jin's forehead. "Are you feeling quite alright?" He's in Jin's space now, can feel Jin's breath on his cheek, can feel Jin's heartbeat thrumming through his body. Jin is so wonderfully, sexily alive, and Yamapi wants to take some of that life for his own.

*

The slicing of carrots is a common sound in the apartment, the uneven chops of Jin’s knife echoing through the kitchen as he doggedly cuts the vegetables.

Yamapi can barely register the shift in control this time, only suddenly he is the watcher, not the actor.

"Ouch," Jin says, but he knows what has happened before Jin even does. He can smell the blood in the air, tangy and sweet. "Fuck, I cut myself!"

He walks over to Jin, who is frowning at the cut, and takes Jin’s hand between his own two. “You should be more careful,” he says. He brings the hand up to his mouth and sucks Jin’s bleeding finger into his mouth, lathing his tongue around the tip of it before he releases it with a soft pop.

“Pi…” Jin croaks, and his eyes are opened wide, and he’s looking torn between disgust and arousal.

He likes the confusion.

Yamapi quickly drops Jin’s hand and takes two steps back. “I’m going to my room,” Yamapi says. “Let me know when dinner is ready.”

Once the door is safely closed behind him he sinks down to the floor, his back resting against the hard, cold door, and he buries his face in his hands.

It tastes sweet, doesn’t it? The blood.

The thing that makes Yamapi the most repulsed is that it does taste sweet. It lingers sticky and hot on his lips and he wants to lick them.

The feeling of blood in his stomach has become too familiar.


*

Jin’s hair is wet from the shower, and the towel wrapped around his waist hangs on for dear life.

“Pi!” Jin says, when he sees Yamapi standing in the hallway, eyes running up and down Jin’s form. “I didn’t know you were home.”

“Where else would I be?” Yamapi says, enjoying the flush that creeps up Jin’s chest all the way to his face at Yamapi’s unabashed stare.

“Out a club, or something,” Jin mumbles, and Yamapi smiles. “Bringing home girls to fuck whose names you probably don’t know.”

“You didn’t like that,” Yamapi says. “So why would I do it?”

Jin averts his eyes then, but Yamapi can still see that they’re wide, and the whites of Jin’s eyes make them look even more striking. “I don’t know,” Jin says, and his head is turned to the side now, and Yamapi can see something there, in the curve between Jin’s neck and shoulder.

Yamapi moves toward Jin without thinking, fingers finding the spot and touching it as he struggles to pull something to the forefront of his memory.

He bites down, hard, into the skin there, piercing the skin with his teeth and drawing blood, and Jin hisses and then groans and the bite is followed with a gentle licking motion as he soothes the skin. Jin whimpers, and hovers on the edge of wakefulness, but Yamapi’s hand finds its way into Jin’s hair and tenderly brushes through it, and though Jin’s lashes flutter, he doesn’t awaken.

It’s difficult to know, Yamapi thinks, what is real and what is only his mind playing tricks on him. What’s the voice trying to make him disappear. But Jin, he thinks, his fingers caressing Jin’s neck, Jin is always real.

“I just want to make you happy,” Yamapi says. “Because you’re mine.” His fingers brush again along the mark, his mark. “My best friend.”

*

His mouth is dry, and he drinks glass after glass of water, but water isn’t what his body wants.

Maybe he’ll waste away to nothing, and it won’t matter anymore.

*

Shirota lazily puts his large hand on Jin's neck, thick strands of Jin's hair sliding between his fingers. He smiles indulgently down at Jin as Jin mutters in random English phrases, just relaxing into Jin's warmth.

Yamapi hates him right now. How dare he touch what’s yours, the voice says, and Yamapi doesn’t bother resisting the voice, not anymore. When he resists, now, that’s when he fades out the fastest. That’s when he loses control. Are you just going to let him keep touching?

The voice eggs him on, and he feels anger start bubbling faster in his veins.

"Um, Earth to Yamapi," cuts Ryo's voice into Yamapi's red haze of rage. "Did Shirota key your car or something? You look a little homicidal right now, and to be honest, it's really creepy."

Yamapi looks at Ryo, who flinches back at whatever he sees in Yamapi's face. "Oh wow. Did he have sex with your girlfriend AND key your car? I wouldn't put it past him. I firmly believe you shouldn't trust people with abnormally large bodies, there's lots of space inside of them for deceit."

You’re powerless, the voice taunts. You’re always powerless.

"No," Yamapi grits out between clenched teeth. "Nothing's wrong."

"Oh, and I'm a virgin," Ryo says, and Yamapi is so confused he forgets that he's trying to make Shirota's heart stop with pure willpower.

"What?"

"Sorry, I thought we were saying things that were blatantly untrue." Ryo cackles, and Yamapi relaxes, just a little. "Now, tell me what's up. You make this terrible inhuman growling sound every time the Big Friendly Giant over there says or does anything to Jin..." Ryo’s eyes get round, like disks. "Are you...jealous?"

Kusano perks up at the word jealous, and leans over to join the conversation. "What's Yamapi jealous of?"

"Shirota and Jin. Guess he can't stand having anyone else move in on his position of 'abnormally close homoerotic best friend,' or something." Ryo rolls his eyes and Kusano barks out a laugh.

Yamapi taps his fingers against the side of his beer can, still full because Yamapi doesn't drink beer. "He's touching what's mine," Yamapi growls, before he can think better of it, and Kusano gives a low whistle.

"Hey, you know the homoerotic part was a joke, right?" Kusano says, awkwardly laughing. Ryo is looking at him too closely, though, and Yamapi remembers himself.

"I mean, he's my roommate, and I hardly get to see him, and he just hangs out with Yu all night," Yamapi says, quickly and smoothly, and Kusano's features smooth out immediately. Ryo though, is looking at him with speculation.

"Okay, whatever you say, Pi," Ryo tells him, and Yamapi can sense his amusement and curiosity.

Ryo spends the rest of the night watching Yamapi, which sort of gets in the way of his plans to watch Jin like a hawk all night, but Yamapi tries not to think of it as Ryo interfering. Maybe you should get rid of him rings in the back of his head, but he ruthlessly squashes that down. Ryo isn’t the problem.

The problem is only what's his and what he doesn't care about. NewS is his, and his other friends are his, too, in some ways. Toma is his. Most importantly right now, Jin is his, and he won't have anyone else taking what belongs to him, especially not Shirota, whose slow, seductive intentions make Yamapi's skin crawl with anger.

Get angry, says the voice. Otherwise he’ll take Jin away from you.

Shut up, Yamapi says, and he closes his eyes, and wishes, vaguely, that when everything goes black, it is really because he is fading away to nothing.


*

Yamapi wonders if it is because of the new tension between them that Jin is always leaving the house, always disappearing, slipping out of his sight and out of his grasp.

It makes Yamapi so frustrated, and the voice is constantly shifting wrathfully in the back of his mind.

When it rushes forward, fading him out, he almost welcomes it.

*

"I won't let anyone else touch you," Yamapi’s mouth tells Jin, fingers digging hard enough to bruise into Jin's shoulder, "and I certainly won't let you touch anyone else."

Jin's breath hitches, and he whines at the painful grip of Yamapi's fingers. "Pi, let me go," Jin says, and Yamapi can barely hear him over the rushing rage in his mind.

Jin is his property, his territory. He's chosen him, and hell if anyone else will lay a hand on him.

Jin wraps his own fingers around Yamapi's hand, trying to pull him off, and Yamapi’s fingers don’t budge. "Pi, you're hurting me." Jin sounds a little scared, and it makes Yamapi want to come back to himself. Stop it.

He pushes.

His fingers release, and Jin takes a step back. "Pi what the fuck?" Jin is rubbing his abused shoulder, and staring at Yamapi like he would a wild animal.

"You smell like him. Like Shirota," Yamapi’s voice growls, and clenches his fists to keep from grabbing Jin and shaking him. "It's disgusting."

"Yeah, I went over his house and played video games for awhile, like I do sometimes." Jin stares at Yamapi with gentle eyes. "It's not a big deal, Pi. I promise."

Jin is right. It isn't a big deal, and it isn't even like it hasn't happened before. Stop it.

But it hasn't happened since we’ve known Shirota was after Jin. That’s the difference.

"He wants you," Yamapi’s voice tells Jin, speaking low. "He wants you like that."

Jin puts his hands in the pockets of his jeans, and his bare feet kick at the tile of the kitchen floor. "Yamapi, you're being crazy." Jin looks uncomfortable, and Yamapi can feel it again, the arousal, and it's not for Shirota at all.

"No I'm not," Yamapi can feel his mouth say, and he's calm, back on familiar ground. He leans against the frame of the kitchen doorway, and lazily scratches his stomach. "He can't have you." He pitches his voice low and velvet, and Jin looks down at his feet. Yamapi can feel Jin's heart rate increase, can see visual clues of arousal and desire in every bit of bare skin. The blood races under his skin, and he looks fucking delicious.

Yamapi’s body straightens, and takes a step toward Jin, which makes Jin jump like a skittish colt. "I'm going to take a shower," Jin says in a rush, fumbling over the words. "I'll...see you later."

He tries to brush past Yamapi quickly, but Yamapi’s hand darts out, sliding lightly across Jin's collarbone and making him shudder. "You're mine," Yamapi is whispering, barely audible, and Jin stills, swallowing. "I won't let him touch you."

Yamapi watches himself walk out of the door and into his room, leaving Jin frozen in the doorway. The smell of Jin's confusion is too sweet, and it pulls Yamapi out all the way and back into control.

*

Blossom won’t come near him, and sometimes Jin won’t either. They all do a complicated dance around each other, and Jin looks just as torn as Yamapi about wanting to touch.

Yamapi can feel his life spiraling out of order, all the pieces of it tumbling end over end until there’s nothing left the way it should be, and Yamapi has no idea how to set it to rights.

*

Yamapi gains consciousness in the middle of a subway station, hands covered in blood and chest bruised and no idea how he got there. He knows it can’t go on like this.

When he climbs the stairs out into the night, rain falls heavy from the sky, soaking him to the bone in seconds. He feels like he’s walking forever, but finally he makes it home, and Jin is standing in the doorway, looking angry and frightened and all sorts of other emotions that Yamapi can’t pinpoint, but he thinks he feels them too.

“Do you know how worried I was?” Jin says, and it’s almost a shout. “Don’t you remember the last time you didn’t come home?”

“Yes,” Yamapi says, and it’s more of a sob than a word, because since then, everything has changed, and there’s nothing he can control. Yes, the voice says, and it’s filled with terrifying delight.

“Pi, what’s wrong?” Jin says, and now he’s close, his hands pushing Yamapi’s long wet hair off of his face, fingers tugging the strands and then Jin’s hands are gripping the sides of Yamapi’s face and Yamapi can’t do this anymore. He can’t take anything anymore and he wants to focus of the tingle of his skin where the rough pads of Jin’s fingertips are gripping, and it’s too harsh, and too soft, and scary and perfect.

He leans down and kisses Jin, hard, lips pressing almost too forcefully, and Jin is still, so still, and then Jin is sighing, like he’s relieved, like he’s been waiting, and kissing him back. Yamapi’s hands wrap around Jin’s waist, and drag him closer, and the heat of Jin’s body is in sharp relief against the cold planes of his own soaking form, and Yamapi needs that warmth, needs something to put him back together. He and the voice can only agree on one thing, after all.

Jin.

“Jin, I need help,” Yamapi whispers softly against the skin of Jin’s neck. “I really…need help. I can’t control it anymore.” His hands dig in to the flesh at Jin’s waist, and maybe Jin is crying too, and maybe Jin’s known there was something wrong and he didn’t know how to fix it either.

Jin’s pulse beats strong beneath his lips, where they rest along the vein. Yamapi isn’t sure, anymore, when the urge washes over him to sink his lips into it and drink, whose urge it is.

*

“It’s highly unusual for your friend to be allowed in here for a private session,” she says, her mouth in a firm downturn as she looks at Jin.

“He stays,” Yamapi says, and Jin’s fingers grip his sleeve, and Yamapi focuses on the weight of that, instead of on the woman in front of him. It calms his nerves.

“It’s usually caused by a traumatic event,” she says, a clipboard in her lap making it all seem very clinical, very routine.

“Like what?” Jin asks. “He was fine until he got mugged. They knocked him unconscious and left him in the road. Then things started getting strange.”

“Did you ever find out who mugged you? What they did to you while you were unconscious?”

A sickening churn in Yamapi’s belly. “No,” Yamapi says, and the voice is eerily silent.

“That could be as good a trigger as anything. Looking through your medical records, your attacker also injected you with a still unidentified substance?”

“Yes,” Jin says, and the woman narrows her eyes at him.

“Let Mr. Yamashita speak, please,” she snaps. She doesn’t have the right to tell him what to do, the voice says, and Yamapi licks his lips. “If that substance was a hallucinogen, it could have exacerbated the disassociation—made it worse, faster. Your mind would have latched onto that personality as real.”

“Oh,” Yamapi says, and the voice laughs. I am real.

“What does the voice sound like? How many are there?”

“Only one,” Yamapi says, and then he closes his eyes. “There’s only one. He sounds like me, but more…dangerous.”

“What do you mean by dangerous?” She asks, and she’s leaning closer, looking interested, like Yamapi is suddenly worth her time. “Does it tell you to do dangerous things? Does it make you do dangerous things?”

Don’t tell her, the voice says, and it makes Yamapi open his eyes to escape the dark. Don’t tell her or you’ll be locked away.

I should be locked away, Yamapi thinks, but then Jin’s hand encircles his wrist, thumb rubbing along his wrist bone, and Yamapi thinks he might just be too selfish to do what’s right.

“No, not really. It’s just…angry. He likes blood. Seeing it. Tasting it,” he says, and the woman twists her lips.

“There’s a treatment we can try,” she says. “A new medication that will try and…suppress the alter, leaving only you. It might work because there’s only one dissociated identity.”

“Okay,” Yamapi says, and Jin laces their fingers together, and the voice doesn’t say a thing.

*

“What’s it like?” Jin asks, when they’re home and standing in the hallway. “Having two people inside of your head?”

Yamapi bends over to untie his shoelaces, taking time to think carefully about his answer. “Scary,” he says, finally, and Jin makes a tiny noise of sympathy. “Like you never know when you’re going to be in control, or when you’re going to wake up somewhere and not know how you got there.”

“Ah,” Jin says, and then he’s quiet for a moment, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “About last Friday…” Jin starts, and Yamapi remembers the taste of Jin on his lips, the soft warmth of his body that he could feel through his clothes and the way Jin melted into his arms.

He wants more. The voice is silent, now, and maybe someday it will be silent forever, but Yamapi knows the voice wants it just as much as he does.

Jin squares his shoulders and takes a deep breath. “About last Friday, when we…”

“Kissed?” Yamapi asks, and then he’s slipping out of his shoes and stepping closer to Jin.

“Yeah,” Jin says, his voice hesitant and quiet, but he still sounds like himself, and it makes Yamapi’s heart beat faster in his chest to hear it. “Who was that? I mean, which one of, well, you kissed me?”

Yamapi can do nothing but slide his hands around Jin’s waist, and bring their chests together so their hearts beat in tandem. “Both of us,” he says. “It’s the only thing we agree on.”

“That’s so creepy,” Jin says, and then he tentatively leans forward, brushing his lips against Yamapi’s, soft as the wings of a butterfly, a gentle flutter that isn’t nearly enough.

“Jin,” Yamapi says. “You’re the only thing holding me to sanity right now.” He presses his mouth against Jin’s, hard, claiming it for his own, like he wants every bit of Jin to be his own, and Jin gasps, mouth tumbling open until they are breathing the same air, tongues tangling together, a mess of moist, slick, and hot.

“That’s funny,” Jin says, when they finally part. His breathing is ragged and his eyes look lost, like he doesn’t have any idea what he’s doing, but he’s sure it’s what he wants anyway. “Because I think you’re making me insane.”

Yamapi laughs, and his hands slide up into Jin’s sweatshirt, exploring the soft skin beneath his palms, and he finds Jin’s mouth again, and Jin is groaning into the kiss, pressing impossibly close.

Yamapi captures Jin’s lower lip between his teeth, and bites, hard enough to make Jin hiss, and it draws blood, Yamapi’s tongue darts out and licks along the wound, and Jin’s blood is as sweet at he remembers.

More, says the voice, and this…it’s the last time they’ll be sharing Yamapi’s head, and Yamapi doesn’t want to deny either of them everything they’ve wanted.

“Jin,” Yamapi whispers, his lips brushing against Jin’s as he speaks. “Can you trust me?”

Jin, whose hands have been running a steady path up and down Yamapi’s back, across muscles that quiver under Jin’s explorative touch, pauses, and leans back, looking into Yamapi’s eyes.

Yamapi wonders if Jin can see them both there, reflected back in Yamapi’s dark gaze. Jin swallows, and licks at his own swollen lower lip, which shines with a mixture of spit and blood. “Yes,” he says, and then Yamapi is pushing him backwards into the apartment, nibbling and sucking at the juncture between Jin’s neck and jaw, and Jin is raking his nails down Yamapi’s neck at the sensation. “I’ll always trust you,” Jin says.

Their clothes hit the floor at record speeds, and Yamapi halts his actions, for just a moment, when they reach his bedroom, to stare at the pale unmarred flesh of Jin’s torso, his eyes raking over the smooth, perfect skin.

He pushes Jin back onto his bed, straddling him, and reaches into the drawer, pulling out a piece of glass. There’s nothing hesitating in his grasp as he holds it tight, the glass cutting into his palm as he shifts his grip.

Jin simply watches him, eyes wide and dark, lips slightly parted, little puffs of air making the short hair in the front blow up.

“Put your arms above your head,” Yamapi says, and it surprises him how husky his voice is. It makes Jin shudder, and Jin’s hands grip the metal of the headboard. Jin’s mark is beautiful and stark in the crook of his neck. You’re in control.

Yamapi lays the glass to the side and licks a trail across Jin’s collarbone, and Jin whines in the back of his throat as Yamapi nips at the skin there. Jin’s hips lift a little toward his own, and it burns deep in the pit of Yamapi’s belly as their erections brush against each other.

It thrills Yamapi that he’s in control and Jin likes it that way. It thrills Yamapi that Jin is as turned on by being at his mercy as Yamapi is at having him there. Most of all, he loves that Jin is his; that even in the end, when Jin knows that Yamapi is holding onto sanity with the most fragile grip, Jin still belongs to him completely. Wants to belong to him completely.

Yamapi blows air along the line of wet skin, and Jin closes his eyes, inhaling deeply at the sensation, and Yamapi wants him to watch. He’s yours, says the voice. He’s always been yours.

“Open your eyes,” Yamapi says, and Jin’s eyes flicker open, eyelashes fluttering until Yamapi can see nothing but the warm chocolate of Jin’s eyes. He takes the glass and slices a thin line, and then presses his mouth to Jin’s collarbone, and Jin makes a hitching sound in the back of his throat that makes Yamapi even harder, and then he’s sucking up the tiny rivulets of blood that escape from the cut.

He leans up and kisses Jin full on the mouth, then, and the taste of Jin’s blood mingles with the taste of Jin’s saliva, and it’s even sweeter because he’s sharing it with Jin.

He slices small lines along the inside of Jin’s wrists, bringing them up to his mouth and sucking, and Jin’s eyes are heavy lidded. “Do you still trust me?”

“Yes,” Jin says, and then Yamapi is licking his way down Jin’s belly, bumping Jin’s cock with his chin as he devotes himself to little nicks and slices around Jin’s hip bones, enjoying how they desperately rock toward him and he sucks on the flesh.

He reaches into the bedside table again, the lower drawer, and grabs lube, and Jin is still watching him without protest. Yamapi enjoys the image of Jin, tiny jagged bleeding lines along his wrists and chest, his perfect skin perfectly flawed now. Beautiful, the voice whispers.

The lube is cold, so he warms it in the palm of his hand before he coats his fingers, sliding one slippery and slick into Jin’s depths, and Jin arches toward him, cock purple and needy with neglect, so Yamapi leans forward and catches it with his mouth, tongue circling the head and making Jin cry out loud and long under the combined ministrations of Yamapi’s tongue on his cock and questing finger.

Yamapi slides in another finger, and another, until Jin is a writhing mess in front of him, cuts running and face flushed dark and red from the blood still running inside his body. His eyes are pleading, and it’s that, that begging gaze, that makes Yamapi roll on the condom and slide home into Jin, the tight heat making him release his own deep groan in sharp contrast to Jin’s high pitched keening whine as Yamapi fills him completely. “Pi,” Jin says, and Yamapi buries his face in Jin’s neck, smelling the skin there, letting his tongue lick at it to taste there.

Yours.

“Mine,” Yamapi says, aloud, and the words are muffled against the sweaty skin of Jin’s neck but Jin hears. He hears and he just rocks their hips together, harder than before, pulling Yamapi so deep inside it makes his vision go white for the briefest of moments.

“Yes,” Jin gasps. “Yours.” Jin is almost sobbing beneath him, and it’s a gorgeous sound of pleasure and of surrender. “I’ve always been yours.”

And then Yamapi is picking up the glass and making a thin and careful line across Jin’s neck, shallow and straight, and fastening his mouth there.

Jin comes silently, like maybe all possible sounds have already escaped his body and he’s got nothing left, his arms above his head still, and Yamapi’s hand wrapped around Jin’s cock even as he sucks the blood from Jin’s neck. The shuddering of Jin around Yamapi, combined with the delicious heat running down Yamapi’s esophagus straight down to his gut to merge with the arousal already there waiting, is enough to drag him over the edge too, and his cry is muffled by Jin’s tangy skin. “Mine.”

*

Jin lies dizzy and boneless in his arms, half awake and half asleep as Yamapi licks his wrist clean of blood. "Do you like the blood as much as he does?" Jin asks, his voice barely audible, his throat rough from screams. "Does ‘other you’ want to kill me?"

Yamapi looks at Jin, and offers him an incredulous smile, as the edges of his vision go black.

"Why would I do that?" He gives Jin's wrist another long slow lick. "If I leave you alive, I can taste you again, and again, and again." He slips the shard across the skin of Jin's abdomen. "And you'll taste just as good in the morning as you did tonight."

Jin lets out a raw sound that's a cross between a laugh and a moan. "I don't think this is what my mom meant when she said I should settle down," he mumbles, as Yamapi’s mouth laps at the cut beside Jin's belly button.

"Your mom loves me," Yamapi is saying, sliding up Jin's body, and goose-bumps spring up across Jin's skin wherever Yamapi's cool chest touches. Yamapi settles his head in the crook of Jin's neck. Jin's pulse is slow, but it'll speed back up when Jin's body produces more blood.

"She does," Jin agrees, and then he flushes faintly. "Not just her, either."

Jin's half-open eyes are doting, when he looks down at Yamapi, and his blood tastes perfect, like cake frosting for breakfast, or like Jin’s mother’s udon noodles. Yamapi gently reaches up, and strokes a soothing hand down Jin's arm, from shoulder to elbow, and Jin sighs, and lets his eyes fall shut.

Yamapi thinks that as fucked up as everything is, that this might be love.

*

“If you have any problems with the medication, you should come see us immediately,” she says, handing Yamapi the bottle. “This should leave you feeling stable. Only the dominant personality will remain.” She clears her throat. “It is…a trial though. Any problems, you stop taking it and come in and see me immediately.”

Yamapi feels the weight of the bottle in his hand, and enjoys the texture of the label beneath his fingertips.

*

Yamapi knows Jin's heart is still in Jin’s chest, but it feels like it's in his hands-- like he's holding it as it pumps.

But surprisingly, he prefers the way Jin's eyes look when they are sparkling with life.

*

"Pi, can we get another dog?" Jin asks, and he smiles.

"Sure we can," he says, pressing his nose into Jin’s hair, smelling the cigarette smoke and the gentle flowery scent of Jin’s shampoo. "Anything you want."

"We can name her Buttercup," Jin says, "so she can have a B name like Blossom."

He smiles wider. Jin's pulse beats hot against his cheek.

The thing about his new medication is that it works. The problem is that no one had ever said which personality was the dominant one. No one had any way of knowing which personality would end up being suppressed.

“Jin?” He says, and Jin looks up at him adoringly.

“Yeah?”

“Call me Tomo.”

In his head, it’s mercifully silent.