Delicious Blood II

[flakedice]

 An xXxholic fic.

Watanuki meets Yuuko for the first time.

Title: Delicious Blood
Rating: PG
Pairing: Watanuki/Doumeki
Chapter: 2/2
Comment: AU.  Sort of.
Warning: Bad language. Watanuki, you bad man!
Summary: The vampires are out to chomp on him and Doumeki's protective streak is nearing a mile wide.  Vampire-bait Watanuki goes to Yuuko for a solution.

Delicious Blood

II

Watanuki sauntered up the pathway to the entrance of the building.  It was nearly full dark now and it was mostly shrouded in shadow, but what he could see of it, showed that it didn't belong in the city. 

A portal.  It must have been.  But why Doumeki couldn't pass, was a mystery.

Watanuki shrugged.  He could handle this himself.  He'd check it out then get back before Doumeki got too antsy.  If he was too worked up, Watanuki would cook him something when they got home.  Food was the only thing that seemed to distract him these days.

Watanuki stepped up to the front door only to have it opened before he could touch it.  Two little girls, one with blue hair and one with pink, stood revealed within.  There was something odd about them, aside from their appearance, which he couldn't quite grasp.

"The mistress is waiting."  They chanted in unison before he could say anything.  They reached forward and grabbed one hand each, pulling him into the building.

Watanuki let them, willing to go along with it.  It must have been a shop of some sort.  What exactly was uncertain but trade seemed to be a staple of the portals.  Either way, he'd find out.

After traversing several hallways, the two little girls brought him to a stop in front of a large set of sliding doors.  They dropped his hands in favour of the doors and slid them back.   After one last look at them both, he stepped into the dimly lit space before him.  The doors closed behind him and he found himself in a room.  His eyes swept over it, taking in all the details before his gaze settled on the sole occupant on the far side.

A pale woman with long black hair lounged on an elaborate couch.  She wore close fitting clothes, the neckline low and the skirts split high to show off her legs.  Smoke from the pipe she was smoking created a mysterious haze in the room.  It curled and wavered as if alive.

Watanuki wasn't impressed.  In his experience anyone showing their tits was trying to distract you from noticing what was really important.

"You came here for a reason."  Her voice was low and loaded with a knowing timbre.

State the bloody obvious, why don't you? Watanuki crossed his arms.  "I wouldn't have come inside, otherwise."   

She smiled as if something amused her.  "True."  She sat up, suddenly looking like a more reputable dealer.

Watanuki figured that she'd realized the tit show wasn't working.

"The people who come to my store have wishes they want granted."  The smile still lingered but her eyes had hooded, giving her a mysterious air.

He nearly rolled his eyes.  It was a good opening ploy but this was taking it a bit far.  Everyone had wishes.  He decided to cut through the crap.  "And you grant them, I suppose?"

A corner of her mouth twitched and annoyance briefly shone through her eyes.  "Yes."

Watanuki allowed himself a slight smile.  "I've got bloody vampires left and right trying to chomp on me.  It's making my man" he noted the sudden gleam in her eyes and took a mental note "possessive as hell, not to mention a little distracted, if you know what I mean.  To top it all off, my best friend can't get too close to me for fear of draining me dry."

"A complicated situation."  She seemed to have regained some equilibrium.  The amusement was back.  "I suppose you wish to be able to take the attraction of your blood away."

Hah! Got you! Watanuki shook his head. "I like my blood the way it is."  It was okay for Doumeki to be a little protective, after all.  Just not so like a sodding barnacle.  Besides, tampering with one's blood was never a good idea.  "I just want to suppress the hunger of any vampire that gets in a ten metre radius."

She was good, Watanuki had to give her that.  The lady simply cranked her smile up a bit more.  "Such a wish would require a high price."

Watanuki had suspected as much.  But every price was negotiable.  He let a slight thread of grudging eagerness enter his voice.  "What do you have in mind?"

Her eyes lidded.  A pale finger flicked out.  "That earring."

He'd suspected it might be.  "That's impossible."

A slender brow arched mockingly.  "Too high a price?"

"Of course it is!"  He scoffed. "I give you my earring and you get some of my blood as well don't you?  I'm not bloody stupid."

She had gone still at his response but by the time he was finished she was smiling again.  "That is the price of your wish."

"If I pay for it all at once."  It had been a white dog.  They'd never led him astray once.  It was certain that there was some way to get what he wanted without giving up the earring.

The woman seemed intrigued by the idea.  He could tell that she was thinking it over.

"I search the portals for a living."  He started watching her carefully.  "They only stay open for a short time but they contain all sorts of interesting stuff.  Not just artefacts."  He paused, ready to deliver his ace.  "I collected a stash of grog last month."

Definite flash of interest.  Watanuki kept his eyes from the glass he'd spotted on entering, half-hidden behind the couch leg. 

"Your wish would need a lot of these treasures to be paid in full."  She was sitting up normally, now.  Her eyes were no longer hooded but weighing up the possibilities.

Watanuki tapped the fingers of one hand on the bicep they rested on.  "The portals are dangerous.  It may be that I wouldn't survive long enough to pay in full."  He gave a small shrug.  "If that happened, we would be left with an imbalance.  You with the payment and me without any purchase."  Not to mention dead. 

Bloody hell, the things he did for love.

His words seemed to strike a chord.  He'd hoped they would.  Balance seemed to be a big deal for those who dwelt in the portals.

She nodded slowly.  "True."  She seemed to be turning something over in her mind.  But she finally reached a decision.  "Very well.  I will grant your wish.  The suppression will last for a limited time after each payment.  Only when you have paid in full will it remain."

Watanuki only considered it a moment.  It was a good deal.  And any time he decided it wasn't worth it, he could simply stop paying and go back to the way things were.  "Done.  What do you want as the first payment?"

The smirk had returned to her face.  "The collar."

He nearly laughed.  Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.  He pulled the collar from his jacket pocket and tossed it, the metal studs glinting in the faint light.  She caught it neatly in one hand and examined it closely before putting it aside.  Her expression reminded him of the one she wore when he mentioned Doumeki.

Chicks.  There was no explaining what got them off.  Sometimes he wondered how other guys handled it.  At least for all his other faults, Doumeki was a guy.  He could almost understand the lug at times.

A prickling in his shoulder distracted his thoughts.  He glanced at the woman, only to find her smirking at him.  No answers there, apparently.  She could at least drop the all-knowing act now she had her price.

Watanuki shrugged off his leather jacket and pulled up the sleeve of his t-shirt.  A line of inked thorns snaked from his armpit to his shoulder.  It wasn't to his taste but it wasn't too bad.  After all it could have been something girly instead. 

"So I'm going to end up with this all over my body?"

Another smirk.  "Only the arm."

Watanuki didn't want to know what she was thinking.  He let the sleeve fall and pulled his jacket back on.  "How long will it last?"

The smile was gone and the eyes were lidded again.  Watanuki suddenly wondered if there was a bottle stashed under the couch along with the glass.  "The dog will show you the way."

Figured that she could see them too.  Nonetheless, Watanuki left the room in a considerably better mood than the one he'd arrived with.

Now maybe he could finally get a good uninterrupted fuck.

~x~X~x~

Doumeki was as close to frantic as he got when Watanuki emerged.

"What the fuck happened?"  Doumeki almost never swore.

Watanuki shrugged, sort of enjoying the role reversal.  "It must have been a portal.  The house of some dealer."

While Doumeki might be an idiot, he wasn't stupid.  "You made a trade?"  He was looking Watanuki over as if to search for a missing appendage.  Watanuki started to get irritated again.

"I got something to keep the vamps away for a while." 

"What was it?"  The gold eyes were fierce. 

Watanuki tapped his shoulder.  "A tattoo of some kind.  I haven't got a good look at it yet."

A molten glance.  "I'll check it when we get home."

Clothes off.  Check.  Watanuki made a mental note to feed him first, though.  If wouldn't do for him to get hungry at the wrong moment.  And if he was really lucky, Doumeki might have an undiscovered tattoo fetish.

"So what did it cost?" 

Watanuki shrugged, slightly less irritated at the irksome stare when it was directed on him instead of potential threats.  "I gave her the collar."  He didn't miss the glare Doumeki shot the empty lot.  Was it the leather?  Or the studs?  Well, he still had the wrist braces.  "The rest is in payments with stuff we get from the portals."

Doumeki was still sending daggers at the lot.  "It's too dangerous."

Watanuki was getting frustrated.  He wanted to get home, feed the bastard and get his clothes off.  Was that too much to ask?  "We do that all the time, anyway."  He started walking.  "It's not going to make much of a difference.  Besides her first price was too much."

"You should have given her what she wanted."  Doumeki looked angry.  But he was leaving the lot behind to walk with him.  "Now you're going to have to keep going back there again."  It looked like with the threat of vampires dealt with, the idiot had found something else to focus his paranoia on.

Watanuki sniffed.  There was no way he was going to give up the earring that possessive lout had given him when he first moved in.  Some things couldn't be bought.

Every good dealer knew that. 

~x~X~x~

And so now you know - Watanuki doesn't mind the vamps as much as the sexual frustration that comes from it.  I was going to have them going at each other like a pair of sex-starved love monkeys but no, it turned out like this.

Damn, cheeky isn't he? Some things I just stared at after I wrote it and went - where the hell did that come from? He's probably only going to get worse, too. 

Hope it met your expections - if not *shrug* I can only write what comes to me.

Comments

[flakedice.livejournal.com]

And have been for a while ;) I must admit it's nice not to have to do all the work to put them together :)