Chapter Text
Kunikuzushi woke to his own screaming.
He did not take pride in the fact that it no longer frightened him, hearing himself being torn apart from within.
At first it was simple.
At first, it wasn’t so bad; back when he was only one hundred or so years old. He was naïve and young and that biting fury that seemed to seer at his thoughts had yet to set in; Kabukimono was pliable, soft.
Dottore would summon him to his labs and instruct him to lay on the table, bare and cold and the puppet would climb onto the metal bench, waiting, not a question on his pitiful mind.
It began with small things.
Hairs, nails, a needle to the arm and fingers in his mouth stretching it wide to see the teeth lined perfectly within it. Then, hours contorted with limbs unaching and unmoving as The Doctor sat before him, scratching out sketches of his anatomy.
But then, he got curious -interested - and he started looking inside, rather than out.
The puppet remembered that evening as if it were yesterday. As he closed the door of the lab, the harbinger slid behind him and locked it, wordlessly. Then it was ‘lay down’ and he lay down, clasps closed around his wrists and a strap held him to the table, this time a white sheet atop the cold metal which, upon entering offered some comfort. He didn’t know it was there to catch the mess.
Kunikuzushi still felt the phantom sting of a scalpel plunging into his chest and dragging down the centre of it to his lower stomach slow and steady, with the grace of a gentle lover and the ruthless precision of a sociopath. He still felt the vomit-inducing pull of his false skin hardening as it was punctured and clinging to his insides as the harbinger forced it from his body to set it on a tray, sinking his hands into the wires of his body, wordless and unfeeling.
When he woke, he felt lost.
Who was that? Talking?
A muffled voice, urgent and raised over a scream – his scream which tore at his throat red and raw.
He struggled against the hands clutching his chest steady (not clasps, not straps) and liquid screamed down the sides of his head tickling his ears, cold and wet flying into splattering droplets onto his cheeks as he ripped himself away from the fingers too gentle and too hesitant to hold his body still.
Kunikuzushi choked on a sob and began to retch as someone brushed his body – the softest wires and tubes deep within his viscera burning with agony and gut-wrenching torture. They were gentle – too gentle but resilient and cold through their gloves; he could feel the folds of latex surrounding each finger drag and prod at his ‘organs,’ shifting them into place.
He ripped his eyes open, vision white.
One, no, two to his left, and one to his right. Shapes. People.
Green and green and white (not blue) and red and the person talking kept going on and on into his ear, low and grounded, stroking his head and sweatless brow.
“It’s alright – it’s okay, we’re nearly done – nearly finished now. Just a bit longer – “
Pain consumed his torso, back arching over the softness of the plush table and he cried, loud and hoarse.
He begged for it to stop – for it to be over for what felt like an eternity as they continued fiddling away at his body. When at last the coolness of air on his organs was blocked and what resembled a curved tile, a sculpted piece of porcelain smoothed over his side he trembled with relief – cold all over.
“-that’s it, nice and steady now. Easy does it.”
Kunikuzushi’s blinked away the wetness blurring his vision and tried locating the voice. Blonde hair, tied back with red.
The architect.
He scrambled to speak, throat dry as the desert.
Desert.
The fragment -
“S’thos – Seth – is- “
Kaveh smoothed a hand over the puppet’s hair, shushing him like a child.
“Sethos is alright – he’s going to be okay. He’s on the mend right this moment,” the architect said.
The puppet could have cried; he was already crying.
And so, he closed his eyes.
When he next came to – the room was empty, sans himself. It was blue, this and the softness of the mattress below was familiar. His bedroom in the Sanctuary.
For the longest time he lay still, staring at the ceiling of painted stars glowing in the darkness of the night. As the blueish hue of the moon morphed into vibrant violets and yellows that lit the cobalt walls a glowing cyan the door creaked open, and from the corner of his eye he spied a head, below the height of the handle, white and green. He couldn’t find the strength within himself to speak, the tightly wrapped bandages encasing his torso clutched his body tight like a log and exhaustion consumed him.
‘Buer,’ he thought.
The little god set a plate of sliced fruits on his desk and climbed onto a nearby stool, swinging her feet.
Kunikuzushi swallowed down his pride – what was there left of it at that point?
He gave into his guilt.
‘Buer…I’m sorry.’
She paused, looking at him curiously. Silent. Listening.
‘I was cruel to you,’ he whispered in his head, ‘I was angry – and scared and I- ‘
The puppet stared up at the ceiling, still. Coldness seeped down the face, soaking the pillow.
‘-was wrong. You aren’t useless…or disgusting – you’re good. You care.’
He thought nothing more through the link.
And then, Buer slipped off the stool and wrapped her small arms around his head. Warmth engulfed him whole and he closed his eyes, tears falling over his cheeks as he tucked his face into her shoulder as deeply as he could. Kunikuzushi couldn’t move, but he could cry – and so he did, shoulders trembling with every stunted gasp. Buer said nothing, only held him closer because she knew she could say nothing to console him.
What was he to do from there on out?
What was he to be?
The fragment – Bastet, it had worked, just as he had wanted and dreaded. And soon enough Sethos would wake and he’d find out what had been done to him and then leave.
His breath hitched into a choking sob.
Kunikuzushi wouldn’t blame him. It was the lesser of two evils, that choice down there in the tombs of Tulaytullah, but it was selfish. He was a selfish creature. He was heartless and unloving. He was a fool – a fool who had sentenced the person who had crawled his way into his life so bright and kind and full of goodness to an endless existence of grief and loss.
Sethos would live through the end of the universe. And Kunikuzushi would watch.
He begged them not to tell him.
Kunikuzushi lay still through check-up and visit. They would lift his upper body from the bed and change the wrapping around his torso, checking the edges of the plate where it met his ‘skin,’ and observe how they melded into two as his body absorbed the material into itself, pulling apart the molecules of it and devouring them into ‘flesh,’ anew.
A few times, the architect came to speak with him, marvelling at the intricacies of his structure and the puppet didn’t have the energy to turn him away. Perhaps a year ago he would have scorned the human for seeing him at such a low, there on the table of the operating theatre. But at that moment, he didn’t seem to care.
The days dragged through each other painfully – all muddled into a hazy confusion of dawns and dusks, some slept through entirely. Some spent awake in their entirety.
He grew to dread the clicking of his door as it opened, praying it was and wasn’t the person he knew he would have to confront.
As it creaked open, he would freeze, hold his breath.
Then melt.
Just another doctor or Buer.
The puppet slept feverishly and woke like death.
He tossed in the sheets clutching his side, sweatless and cold through the nights where it was just a little too dark and the shadows crawling up the walls became claws, pincers and swooping blades reaching towards his body.
They all started off like a dream.
A smile and a touch to his arm. Then, it pulled away, sharp and stinging.
“…What?” Sethos said, confused.
He would shake his head and exhale in disbelief, stepping backward out of reach.
“No, that’s – not – you wouldn’t – “
And then he cried, angry and hurt and held his head in his hands, turning his back and falling to the ground, knees clashing onto marble. Kunikuzushi reached out but Sethos moved further and further out of reach until he was a mere spec, but nothing less. There, on the horizon in nothingness where he could be seen and never spoken to. Never touched. Never loved. As he ran into the distance where that figure sat impossibly far, he’d slip and the ground would fall out from under his feet and wake with gasping breaths, throwing his body out of bed.
Buer saw his disarray and offered a hand glowing with dendro to his mind but he pushed her away gently. She left with a sad smile, letting him lie with his own thoughts.
He hadn’t fallen asleep since and spent the days doing nothing but trying to forget the nightmares that plagued him. It felt useless – not only his efforts to erase them from his mind, but also simply lying there. He couldn’t offer anything of himself to anyone, the fragility of his body prevented any and all activities that might relieve his anxiousness. How could anyone love this? This hollow shell of a body?
He curled into himself and closed his eyes.
It was when Buer knocked again in the evening that he felt at his limits of it all.
He was not in the mood to talk or listen to whatever she had to say – what he wanted was to be alone, away from people before he could cause any more harm.
The door opened and he turned into the duvet, squeezing his eyes shut.
“Go away, Buer.”
“Well, since I’m not her, do I get a pass?”
Kunikuzushi froze.
And twisted his body, looking over his shoulder to the voice.
There he stood, leaning against the doorframe with a hefty portion of his weight in jumper, a thin white robe and slippers. At the corners of his eyes, the skin crinkled and his lips tugged into a rugged grin. Sethos gave him a little wave.
Kunikuzushi noticed his chin wobble slightly.
He wasn’t sure if he was ready.
The puppet lifted himself from the bed and hissed, clutching his side as it shifted painfully and Sethos stumbled forwards from the door, letting it shut behind him. He fell towards the bed, tumbling into the duvet and Kunikuzushi rushed to grab his spindly arms and they collided into a mess of limbs onto the bed, half sat and half laid on top of one another.
Sethos let out an ‘oomph,’ and out with it came a kind of retching-groan when the puppet accidentally jabbed him in the ribs (Kunikuzushi couldn’t produce the words to apologise) – the human laughed, loud and bright.
“-Oh gods,” he giggled, voice muffled as he tried to untangle himself from the sheets, “I have never heard myself make that sound before.”
It felt like it had been a hundred years since he’d heard that voice.
With shaky hands, Kunikuzushi pulled the duvet from the other’s head and out came a great mass of curls, brown and white and Sethos burst from the fabric, suddenly inches away.
Their eyes met, violet and verdant.
In a flurry of movement, Sethos leapt forward, wrapping his arms around the puppet’s neck and clutching his tight. Kunikuzushi’s hands hanged uselessly in the air for a split second before he clung to him back, burrowing his nose into the man’s hair. It was silky and honeyed, tickling slightly. Their bodies pressed together and the puppet noted the softness of the stomach against his – the image of bone jutting out from beneath skin flew from his mind in an instant and he held him tighter, it was warm. The vibrations of Sethos’s laughs turned into what might have been cries of relief.
For a long minute, they clutched each other, legs awkwardly arranged in disarray that wasn’t in the least comfortable for either of the two. When the human finally pulled away, he held himself close still, noses practically pressed together so that all the puppet might smell and hear and see was him, there. Their foreheads met and Sethos looked at him with shining eyes.
“Hi,” he whispered.
Kunikuzushi couldn’t hold back his tears and a choking sob came out in the place of any words.
The human’s eyebrows furrowed into a frown and he cupped the other’s face in his hands, stroking over the streaks of wetness.
“Hey…what’s goin’ on? Are ya in pain?”
Sethos suddenly looked very panicked, face pale.
“Oh gods, did I hurt you just now falling into you like an idiot?” He said, voice high,” I did, didn’t I. Oh my – I am so sorry, I am just such a clutz – “
The puppet burst out in wet laughter and shook his head.
“No – “he whispered, “No, you didn’t – idiot. I just- “
Sethos’s shoulders dropped in relief, smile returning, crooked and wry, “Missed me sooo much, then?”
In that moment, Kunikuzushi couldn’t find it in himself to deny it and he nodded eagerly, clutching the man’s hands over where they held him, squeezing his fingers firmly. The familiar roughness of callouses and softness of the skin between so hot and alive was like the sun pouring over your face on a summer’s morning.
He gazed into the other’s eyes, vision swimming.
“Don’t you do that ever again, you got that?”
Sethos nodded, looking guilty, “I won’t. Sorry, I must have scared ya pretty bad; Lord Kusanali said ya found me all limp an’ loose in my room. Gods, if I was in your place I woulda freaked so much.”
Kunikuzushi felt the shakiness begin to return. ‘Limp and loose’ was a bit of an understatement.
“But I’m gettin’ better now, kay?” Sethos said quietly.
He wiggled his fingers around, turning his hand around to show a cannula, the edges of the tape securing it a little worn and fuzzy.
“I should be gettin’ this thing taken off permanently soon, but this one’s not so bad; that tube down my throat?”
Sethos pulled a face of disgust.
“That thing was nasty.”
Kunikuzushi tried not to picture a hollow tube weaving its way through a nose and down the channel of a throat but his mind jumped to the mental image regardless as the human said something about cake. He nodded a little dizzily, half the words missing from his head.
“Wait, what about you? Oh gods – “
Sethos looked down at the trunk of bandages wrapped around Kunikuzushi and winced.
“- That doesn’t look good – were you speared by a scorpion or somethin’?!”
The puppet offered a half-grimace.
“More like The Wenut…”
Sethos gaped.
His mouth hanged open for a moment before he shook his head, laughing incredulously.
“Okay, you have got to tell me everything.”
Kunikuzushi swallowed.
The human adjusted himself on the bed to get into a more comfortable position, heaving his legs properly onto the mattress with a grunt and that crawling sensation of dread came running up Kunikuzushi’s back again at the sight of him in full view.
Sethos wore a soft green cardigan, thick and woollen which brought out a certain glow to his skin, looking a lot more radiant than he had laid out there in the open Sanctuary. His cheeks were flushed a gentle pink and the corners of his mouth seemed to be etched into a smile without repose – he looked so…happy. And well.
Two warm hands slipped into his own, holding them together unreasonably carefully and Kunikuzushi took a sharp breath.
Before him, Sethos waited eager and patient.
“Well?” he said, voice teasing, “Go on then, spill.”
The puppet stilled.
His body seemed to cease function as he met eyes with the human. They glinted bright in the lights of his lamp.
Sethos tilted his head, then, his face fell into something gentler. He squeezed the hands in his and shuffled a little closer.
“Okay, somethin’s definitely up,” he said softly, “…Is it that thing Cyno said you wanted to tell me?”
Kunikuzushi’s expression must have given it away by the look in the other’s eyes.
He hesitated, then nodded ever so slightly. No words seemed to be able to reach past his tightened throat but – he had to tell him. He had to do it.
Sethos stared at him through thick, dark lashes.
“Look, you don’t need to tell me right now, alright? If it’s upsettin’ ya then we can just chill today, and you can come to me in your own time when you’re ready.”
A burst of panic shot through the puppet.
“No!” he blurted.
It came out sharp and urgent and before the human could say anything more, Kunikuzushi spoke once more because he knew himself better than to stop there; if he didn’t say it right there and right at that moment then he’d never summon the courage to do it and that would be cruel. That would be inhumane to do to the person who held him so gently, who spoke to him with such care and consideration, even now.
He had indulged himself enough – it was time to rip away that illusion. The falsehood that was his own humanity.
“I – “the puppet began shakily.
In front of him, the human let the air sit in silence, waiting patiently for Kunikuzushi to go on and that somehow made it all worse, so much worse.
“I did something to you,” the puppet said, not daring to meet the other’s eyes, “I – I chose something for you that I can’t ever take back – that you can never change for the rest of your life.”
Sethos frowned a little from the corner of his eye, then nodded slowly.
“Okay…is this about Bastet? Because I can only thank you for that, Lord Kusanali told me all about it. Look, it’s fine, I was basically in a coma, there was no chance I could make any decisions myself and I trust ya to be the one to make them for me. Besides – “
Kunikuzushi’s lips trembled as he pressed them together, shaking his head.
“No – no, you don’t understand – “
“I think I do,” Sethos said, leaning in more, “You saved my life, didn’t you? I don’t care how it was done, if it was this way or that, it’s alright.”
“It’s not alright, Sethos!” Kunikuzushi gasped, trying to tug himself away but the human held him close.
“Then what? Tell me what’s goin’ on, cause it’s making you unhappy and I hate seein’ that – “
“Sethos, you can’t die!”
The puppet’s chest heaved.
His eyes glued to the floor, vision blurry.
“You can’t…die,” he said quietly, “Ever.”
Sethos was silent, his grip on the other’s hands loosened a little.
In the air, a terrible emptiness hung.
“That was the deal – with Bastet – with the charm and the seal and – “
Kunikuzushi’s core shook with an unnamed emotion. Was it relief? Or perhaps regret? Whatever it was, it didn’t matter now.
He’d done it.
“- It was my choice…to do that.”
Silence.
He waited for those words. For Sethos to look at him and that fury to swell up in his eyes, the pinch of his brows, mouth curling into an expression of disgust and dismay. For the anger that he felt at himself to finally be inflicted upon him like he deserved but –
It never came.
He glanced up.
Before him, Sethos’s head had fallen down a little. His shoulders had slackened and face was obscured by thick curls.
He said nothing.
An awful, hollow feeling tore at Kunikuzushi’s throat.
“…I’m sorry,” he whispered hoarsely, because there was nothing else he could think to say. Nothing but those two useless words to console the person who he’d subjected to that.
Sethos was still for another long moment, and then, a drop of wetness fell onto the back of the puppet’s hand.
Horrible, gut-wrenching guilt welled up, swelling into something larger than any words he could say, any language spoken or not that he might ever learn.
A second tear fell, then a third.
Kunikuzushi pulled his hands out for the other’s hold and the coolness of air upon empty skin had never felt so icy.
He pulled them into his chest, clutching them close and his gaze dropped into his lap. Perhaps he had just retracted his right to even look at the human.
Sniffles and hitched breaths filled the empty room like smoke, accumulating with every moment into a great cloud of horrible emotions that clogged the puppet’s every thought with its burning smog.
His eyes stung – but he tried his best to blink the tears away, squeezing them shut so that they might not fall. He wasn’t the one who could cry.
With a trembling breath, quiet as he could make it, he turned away from the human, swiping at his face, soaking his sleeve.
Kunikuzushi grieved; so that was the end.
That was it.
He let himself sit for another moment, moving to leave but then – he froze.
Something pressed to his back.
His eyes fluttered open, staring forwards in the silence of the room.
It was warm.
Like the sun.
A hand slipped its way through the inner side of his elbow, then another on the other side, and they clung to the bandages around his stomach, gentle yet firm.
Behind his ear, he heard soft breaths, they tickled at his skin, hot and the puppet’s body began to melt, but he held himself as firm as he might manage until a head fell onto the blade of his shoulder, nuzzling into his back.
“Thank you,” a voice whispered.
And Kunikuzushi fell.
He fell all over again.
He searched for the right words, confusion, shock and fear, fear that he was dreaming once more shook through his body.
“…W-what?”
Sethos spoke into his skin, it sank through his body, soaking it to its core like molten light.
“Thank you…for doin’ that for me,” he said wetly, “I’m sure it was real hard to make that choice.”
The puppet couldn’t move an inch.
What?
He managed to shake his head, the motion was jolting and robotic.
“Sethos, you – e-everyone that you care about – everyone you love will die. They’ll die right in front of your eyes and you won’t be able to do anything to stop it, don’t you understand what I’ve done to you?”
At this, the human raised his head to let it sit on Kunikuzushi’s shoulder and looked him in the face with teary eyes.
Sethos’s smile came weakly, it wobbled but beneath that it spoke only of love.
“I understand,” he whispered.
‘Then why won’t you hate me?’ Kunikuzushi begged internally.
“But…you won’t. Die, that is.”
He supposed that was true.
“Now I’m sure you know what you’re talkin’ about and you’ve had your share of grief, and I have too but I know myself,” the human said, sniffling quietly, “And I’ve come to know you and I’m certain – I am certain that, whatever happens it’ll be different. Because you’re here, and now…I guess I will be too so we can stick together, right?”
No words came forward.
The puppet listened, watching those watery green eyes shine like gold and his lips fell open.
“I’m not sayin’ it’s gonna be easy but…I think we can do it.”
Sethos’s brows drew into an expression so kind it stole the breath from Kunikuzushi’s throat.
“We’ll work through it all together, whatever happens,” he said, then looked down a little bashfully, “That is, if you’ll have me?”
And the puppet searched.
He searched within himself and he wasn’t even sure why he was doing it because he knew what the answer was. He knew himself.
Kunikuzushi nodded, that tremble returning but it was not fear that shook him this time, no, in that moment it was happiness beyond elation.
“Of course,” he whispered.
Sethos smiled.
They clung together, there in his bedroom in the Sanctuary of Surasthana, lounging and talking for what might have been hours. The flurrying storm of emotions within Kunikuzushi settled into a gentle breeze and for not even one moment did Sethos release the puppet’s hands from his grip, fiddling with each finger, skin warming his own into a blazing horizon of light that spread across his body like wildfire.
As the sun sank beneath the hills, they conversed softly and in those words, many an apology was offered and rejected and tears shed as they shared the details of their time apart, from the strange dreams, to nightmares to the investigation at the Temple (at which Sethos faltered a little, taking long, deep breaths to pause as emotion choked at his words).
Kunikuzushi had been wrong.
He and the priest had been wrong because they forgot one crucial variable of the matter and that was the fact that Sethos wasn’t alone. Buer, Cyno, the forest watcher, all those from the desert, the city and the rainforest, Sethos had made into his own family. One that he had chosen for himself this time.
As the human clutched his hands in his own, the puppet wondered if he too might be considered part of that family.
The subject came to the puppet’s fears.
Sethos listened patiently and it all seemed to come tumbling from his mouth in a manner that was simply impossible to stop; it was at that moment that Kunikuzushi marvelled once more at the human – at his compassion, at his care, and at the deep seated, undeniable empathy in his eyes. The guilt he felt for misjudging the man was overwhelmed by the awe of the warmth of his character. On and on they spoke, until as last, the human fell quiet to listen to the story of Kunikuzushi’s journey through the bounding dunes of the desert.
He laughed, throwing his head of curls back into the pillow.
It was bliss.
“Are you serious – an aranara? Those little guys just can’t get enough of you.”
Kunikuzushi offered a small smile, to be talking so simply like this, it felt almost like a dream. The best of dreams.
“I guess…I don’t know why they keep doing that; I didn’t even see where he waddled off to after the fight so I couldn’t thank him.”
Sethos’s eyes glinted with excitement.
“’The fight?’”
The puppet rolled his eyes.
Of course this idiot would be most thrilled at the fighting-the-giant-desert-worm bit, luckily he had no intentions of trying it for himself and it seemed that the details of his own endeavours down in the cavern was enough to suffice his thirst for knowledge, listening with eager ears and chiming in with gasps and cries at each twist and turn.
“Then I just flew to the city and that was it really.”
Sethos raised an eyebrow, mouth agape.
“’That was it?’” he said incredulously, “Dude – you fought a giant billion foot tall, super-mega strong, gravity defyin’ snake worm serpent thing, AND with like, under half your strength, that is beyond awesome.”
Kunikuzushi ducked his head into the pillow, heat crawling up his neck.
“…not like I had a choice, idiot. It had the fragment anyway so I had to get it or you’d – you know.”
“Well, technically ya didn’t have to – did ya?” Sethos said cheekily.
He paused to strike a pose of deep thought, searching the air of the room with a pursed brow.
“What was it that Lord Kusanali said? ‘Fought for me with…’ ah yes! ‘An abundance of love!’ That was it!”
Kunikuzushi was going to have words with the little god when he saw her next.
“I – that’s not,” he stuttered, “She’s always making up stupid metaphors like that, don’t think about it too hard.”
“Really?” Sethos drawled.
He sighed, turning away from the puppet dramatically.
“Well, I guess I shouldn’ta got my hopes up then,” he said, sniffling loud, “And here I was, thinkin’ ya really loved me. Guess that’s not the case then – I think I’m gonna have to leave you for forever.”
“No!” Kunikuzushi said quickly.
Then, he took one look at the human who had peaked over his shoulder with the driest of eyes and tugged out the pillow from under his head to smack him with it. Sethos laughed, blocking it with his arms and kicking at the duvet childishly.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry, darlin’ I was just teasin’!” he cried as he was assaulted with linen.
Kunikuzushi pouted.
He, a 502-year-old mega-evil creation of destruction, pouted.
With a roll of his eyes, he slowly put the pillow down and Sethos looked up at him through the flurry of feathers covering the bed. They fell through the air, slower than slow, one landing on the highest point of his cheek.
The human smiled dumbly.
“Well, I love you.”
Kunikuzushi blinked.
Heat shot through his body and Sethos just continued to peer up at him through half-lidded eyes, hair a mess of curls, static and tangled.
The human tilted his head into the sheets and rubbed the back of his neck, arm looking a little strained in its movement.
His face flushed pink.
“I don’t need to hear anythin’ ya don’t want to say,” he said, the smile audible in his voice, “I just wanted you to know. That. I do.”
The puppet’s legs trembled a little where he knelt and simply stared, mind a haze of blankness. It was warm, quite warm – was the room suddenly hotter? He stopped breathing and a hand rubbing at his knuckles jolted him out of his stupor.
“Aww, did I break you?” Sethos said teasingly.
Kunikuzushi looked down; he saw the most beautiful person he had ever known.
“…you mean that?”
“Well, ya think I’d say it if I didn’t?” the human laughed, “Course I mean it, silly.”
Sethos then paused and sat, pushing himself up with shaky arms.
“Oh gods, your bandages – they’re comin’ off.”
The puppet looked down to see that they had indeed slipped loose from his torso, sliding down his body to reveal the irritated edges of his skin against the semi-absorbed porcelain. A part of him thought to scramble to hide it, to cover its ugliness with his hands but another held his arms firm at his sides.
All the while, Sethos had slipped off the bed, stumbling as he hit the floor and rumbling through the drawers loudly, muttering to himself.
Kunikuzushi looked at him, mind still foggy with that haze of heat and the human wobbled forward, fresh bandage in hand.
“May I?” he asked.
The puppet watched as his hair shined in the dim glow of the room’s lights, each curl glimmering at every rounded twist and as Sethos looked up with wide, green eyes, brow’s drawn together, he could only muster a nod in reply.
A hand gently lifted his arms to unravel the old wrapping from his body, slow and steady and as the human reached around to grab the end behind Kunikuzushi’s waist their bodies came together closer, one gaze focused on the wound at his side and the other on the soft curve of that face, golden. As the fabric finally came free from his body, Sethos took a second to survey the skin beneath but made haste to unravel the fresh roll and re-wrap it with practised ease, checking in to make sure that it wasn’t too tight every few loops.
He tucked the edge of it in, seemingly pleased with him work.
“There. All done.”
Sethos peered up at him with a soft grin.
Kunikuzushi surged forward and kissed him.
For a split second, there was no movement against his lips and the puppet thought that he had perhaps moved too fast but then a hand came to cup his cheek, shaking a little against his skin and soft lips suckled at his mouth back with a whine of surprise. Hot, wet breaths licked at his tongue and Sethos caressed Kunikuzushi’s face as they kissed, careful yet desperate all the same, drinking from each other as if starved for it.
The puppet’s eyes fluttered open ever so slightly as it slowed a little and at last, their lips pulled away from one another, wet and puffy.
Sethos’s faze was ablaze and the tips of his ear burned a shade of red he had never seen before.
It was a funny sight. A smile tugged at the puppet’s mouth.
“What, never had someone kiss you properly?”
The human shook his head, words breathless, “…Never kissed anyone before – woah.”
Sethos reach up slowly to feel the wetness upon his lips and his eyes glistened with stars. His tongue darted out to swipe over it.
Kunikuzushi watched him carefully.
“How was it?”
“Very – uh, very nice,” the other said dumbly.
He cleared his throat, “Very nice – d’ya mind if we do that again?”
A chuckle burst from the puppet’s lips and he shook his head, pressing a fleeting peck to the other’s mouth.
He hesitated a little before he spoke his next words.
“…There’s no need to rush - we’ve got a long while to do what whatever you want, stupid.”
A tiny hint of doubt still scratched at his mind at the implication but it was all swept away in one quick motion at the human’s expression.
Sethos yawned, smiling as he swung his arms around the other’s neck.
“Forever is a long while, huh?” he said idly, “I’m gonna expect a lotta kisses comin’ my way then. Don’t you forget that, eh?”
Kunikuzushi’s eyes became wet.
He nodded.
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”