Crush (Tokyo Babylon, Seishirou/Subaru)

It’s times like this when he wonders if he’d done something very wrong in a past life, something he doesn’t remember but continues to pay for, that left him strangely cursed in this life. Not that Subaru actually thinks that he’s cursed, but he wonders sometimes. Right now, though, a curse is really the least of his problems because he’s busy running and trying not to fall over.

He hates seeing blood. No matter how many times it happens, he still can never quite get over the shock of finding out that someone had just died, right there in front of him. It makes his stomach quake and his knees threaten to buckle. He probably would be freaking out a lot more about it – Officer Kurami had been his friend and he’d just been murdered, like Subaru was about to be – but he was a bit busy trying to stay alive.

His mind was busy making calculations. How many people had known that Officer Kurami had been sent to guard Subaru while he cleaned the abandoned – not so abandoned, they’d found out – estate? How soon until someone expected him to check in? Hokuto wouldn’t think to look for him until late tomorrow. He’d warned his twin that the job was likely going to take all night and that he’d be exhausted when he got home. He already was exhausted from the large amount of the estate he’d already managed to cleanse, which made running so much more difficult when all he wanted to do was find a nice corner and go to sleep. As it was his body had decided it wasn’t going a step further until he at least rested for a moment.

Subaru turned the corner, listening carefully to make sure the sounds of pursuit were still far off, and leaned back against the wall to catch his breath. He could stop, just for a minute. Only for a minute, and then he needed to run again, and hopefully make it to the door.

There was always Seishirou, but Subaru knew better than to count on the mysterious veterinarian for help, even if he did have a knack for showing up at the right time and saving Subaru. Hokuto called it fate. Subaru was just grateful and maybe, in a corner of his heart, love-struck. But Seishirou was in Tokyo and Subaru had been quite firm, insistent even, that Seishirou didn’t need to bother himself with visiting Subaru on the job.

Everything would be fine, he’d said. It was just a ritual cleansing. What could go wrong?