thenearshore | 34 - Love is in the Air

34 - Love is in the Air

Who: Everyone!
What: An enterprising pair of shinki is trying to spread love throughout the Far Shore with exciting blind dates.
When: February 14
Where: Hot romantic spots throughout Tokyo
Summary: Blind dates on Valentine's Day? Sounds like fun (or possibly a disaster, but everyone needs some good disaster stories.) That's not all that's going on, though. Ayakashi are looking to chow down on the negative emotions that a romantic holiday can generate, and those who aren't busy with their own dates might be sucked into helping out followers who need help to make the day go well.

The Dates

Blind Date Matchups

Date One: The Romantic Brunch.
Couples will find themselves with reservations (and pre-paid coupons for the prix fixe menu) at a swanky French restaurant with a wide balcony overlooking the lake in a central Tokyo park. They can dine on dainty pastries, sweet milk coffees, bowls of grapes and hothouse strawberries, and a selection of fancy chocolates and petit-fours-- plus, some of the trees in the park are blooming in holiday-appropriate red and white!

Date Two: The Aquarium.
Couples scheduled for this date have tickets to a rooftop aquarium in Ikebukuro: brightly colored fish, animals including penguins, seals and pelicans, a small petting zoo and plenty of shadowy, secluded nooks to cuddle in make for a fun lunchtime date. The tickets even include admission to the one o'clock penguin and seal show!

Date Three: The Amusement Park.
This date sends couples to spend the evening enjoying themselves at a seaside amusement park. Ride the roller coasters! Take selfies with the costumed attendants! Share an overpriced ice cream cone while you watch the fireworks after sunset, then wind up the night with a ride on the colorfully lit Ferris wheel with a romantic view of the Tokyo skyline.

Ayakashi Menace

dove

shadow

teddy bear

need

Praying for Love

Wild Card

In Summary:

Enjoy your dates
Fight some ayakashi
Make sure to answer prayers for a good Valentine's Day
Have fun~

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[Shen Wei shifts his weight a little -- Yunlan's not sure what he's doing but can't be bothered to care; a few seconds later there's a hand sliding into his hair and another on his waist, pulling him in with surprising strength.

Zhao Yunlan sends up a heartfelt prayer for the ride to break down and strand them here for, oh, the next half-hour, and moves his own free hand from Shen Wei's cheek to the back of his neck, playing with the fine hairs there, grown out a touch messily from what must've been a very neat and professional haircut before he'd neglected it.

Some things about him really do suit the absent-minded very normal professor image. Yunlan chases Shen Wei's tongue with his own, muffling the hungry whine at the back of his throat between their lips.

It's not his first kiss. He knows what he's doing here the same way he'd known his way around a smartphone, but it's the first kiss he remembers, the first kiss he's ever going to remember. Before this, he'd been building himself an image of Zhao Yunlan as a cool guy. Smooth, discerning, in control. That's a huge lie: it turns out he's so easy that one kiss has him ready to let Shen Wei rip his clothes off under the eyes of singing fish and security cameras alike.

Too bad the ride's not breaking down. The light changes as they float out of the last room and back into the lobby, and he breaks the kiss to catch his breath and try to will his hard-on to subside to less uncomfortable and obvious levels before they have to stand up.]

Shen Wei...

[He runs out of ideas for what to say right there, and leaves the name as a sentence, complete and reverent in itself. He's so fucked. Is Shen Wei looking at him as a rebound? Is this going to work? Should he even be wondering about the long term when the Heavens could cull either one of them any minute? Should the possibility of Shen Wei disappearing on him feel so devastating when this is only the third time they've talked?

He sucks in a shaky breath and reaches for his jacket, crumpled under their seat where he'd dropped it somewhere during their kiss. The timing is perfect: he looks away from Shen Wei's drowning-dark eyes just as something above them reaches shadowy hands down to snatch at the both of them. Yunlan's eyes go wide, and he abandons his jacket, diving to put his back between Shen Wei and the claws at the end of those too-long fingers.]

-- watch out!

[ Even without his memories this kiss was still all Zhao Yunlan. The sweep of his tongue against his, the soft little moan at the back of his throat, the taste of him. Shen Wei wanted to press closer, wanted to feel all of him, and his hand tightens as he fought back the urge to just pull his clothing off. It would be highly inappropriate (even if kissing him where everyone could see was that as well) even if Yunlan was willing.

But the ride is slowing down and the darkness fading to bright lights. Shen Wei pulls away just as Yunlan does, his breath coming in short pants and his eyes wide. A part of him wanted to sob, to scream about how unfair this was, and he swallows that urge back. It didn't matter that he forgot, not now. It mattered that they found each other again.

(He still had to be careful, to not tell him that they once lived with each other. That his love he died for was Zhao Yunlan himself. But he could do that, he done it before even if it wasn't exactly the same.)

Reluctantly letting go, Shen Wei double checked that the lollipops were still in his pocket, and felt a shift in the air. He looked up just as Yunlan did and--

-- To say the anger that hit him at that moment was sudden would be an understatement. His whole body stiffened, the muscles in his jaw tighten and the he felt the power inside of him shift. As Yunlan moved to defend him, he wrapped one arm around him to pull him close and brought his other up, a slash of pure raw darkness slicing up at those claws. ]

Yunlan!

[ If he was hurt, if it touched him, Shen Wei was not going to hold back. ]

[That's the first time Shen Wei's used his first name, and even shouted angrily Zhao Yunlan likes the sound of it in his voice. He'll have to see if he can coax Shen Wei into pet names: he'd like Ah-Lan, or Xiao-Lan, or--

-- ow, fuck: the creature's claws score thin lines across his back just above the iron grip of Shen Wei's arm, and Yunlan flinches. The blight burning in every shallow cut is blindingly painful.

Above them, the ayakashi screeches in a twisted voice, and icy liquid spatters down over them. Blood? Yunlan twists in Shen Wei's grip, ignoring the way his back screams at the movement, and slashes a borderline out between them and the ayakashi.

The creature drops heavily to the landing. It's big, easily three times the size of a person now that it's not hiding among the shadows of the ceiling, and the fake "dock" shudders with its weight. A mother, waiting in line with three children, startles in apparent confusion, unaware of the monster lurking just a few paces away.]

Shit-- I'm fine, I'm fine-- we can't let that thing get away.

[There's too many people here, and it's already reaching towards one of the kids with its uninjured arm, claws still glistening with Yunlan's blood as its shattered arm twists and re-forms like a time-lapse of healing. He grits his teeth, lets the borderline drop, and throws another to cut its good arm before it can make that grab.]

[ He hissed as a line of pain blooming on his one hand were it rested just under the slashes in Yunlan's back, and glanced around them. Too many humans, too many targets in this area, and he knew that just him and Yunlan were not going to be able to save them all once that thing started really moving.

They were at a disadvantage here in the boat, too far for any of his more lethal strikes to matter much. He couldn't use his energy blasts either, not the way it was reaching for the humans. He could cause them just as much damage as the ayakashi, maybe even more. The dark energy was not forgiven to the Haixingren and he was sure that these humans would be even worse off if he started flinging energy. ]

We can't stay here!

[ No time to think, let alone acknowledge the pain. Shen Wei kept his grip around Yunlan tight and teleported them from the boat to the dock between the ayakashi and the humans. Pulling Yunlan to his feet with him, Shen Wei curled his fingers at his side even as the ayakashi screamed as Yunlan's borderline cut into its good arm. Still not enough and he curled his fingers as he pulled in dark energy. ]

I'll get the humans to leave, make that thing stay put!

[ Another wave of dark energy, this time curving as it skipped between two artificial stalagmites, hit a wire then scorched into the fuse box. There was a pop, a flash of light and then yellows sparks. A child yelled and more lights started popping as the attendants tried herding the people out of the area. ]

You got it. [Zhao Yunlan stumbles as they hit the deck; he's still not used to that teleportation thing, he trips over himself half the time, but with Shen Wei's arm around him he doesn't fall. He spins towards the ayakashi as Shen Wei turns to take care of -- the fuse box, good idea, it'll be enough of a problem to close the ride for a few hours but not enough to be expensive or difficult to fix. The park workers are doing their job for them already.

Another kid screams, high and wailing, as Yunlan faces down the regenerating shadow-creature. Its face is indistinct, except for bulging eyes, gold irises on blood-red corneas like a guy coming off a week-long bender; he grins at it as his cutting borderline finishes dying.]

How about you mess with somebody your own size, asshole?

[It croons something that sounds like Tasty! run through a voice filter and reaches for him with two (intact, fuck, it heals fast) arms. Yunlan slashes down a borderline that takes off both its hands at the wrists and stays up, bright golden-white and glittering, as its hands dissolve into puddles of purplish ectoplasm and evaporate from the tiles.

It's getting a lot darker in here as lights pop, sizzle and die. The ayakashi blends too well into the shadows, but for those eyes catching the light of Zhao Yunlan's borderline. The wailing child behind him Dopplers away into the distance as the ride attendants keep clearing the area.]

Shen Wei, we're not going to be able to kill it like this!

[He doesn't have his god here, and Shen Wei doesn't have his shinki-- doesn't have a shinki, he'd said, hadn't he? Just one of those soulless, which...

Well.]

Name me?

[ Were the people getting out? Shen Wei gathered more energy to his hands, closing his eyes while letting his senses filter through the darkness flowing around them. There was the bright light of Zhao Yunlan's energy at his back (he would never mistake it for anything else, knowing the taste of it in his soul), the more muted lights of the humans as the last of them are herded out, and the sick, diseased blotch of energy that marked the ayakashi.

His eyes snapped open as he fully turned to the creature, his eyes showing the slight sheen of his underground heritage as they adjust to the darkness. Shen Wei's fingers twitched, the balls of energy he gathered shifting with the motion as he used it to grab water from the ride, shape it into spiked chains and wrap it around the ayakashi's body. ]

You might be right.

[ The ayaksahi hissed and jerked, the water chains barely holding it as it tried to lunge towards them. Shen Wei focused on the chains and froze them. The ayakashi grinned - a wide purplish red mouth of blackened teeth showing - as the frozen chains were broken. Shen Wei's grin was almost as chilling as he flung his hands out catching the flying ice shards and sent them all thudding into the creature's body, driving it back a couple more steps. ]

...What?

[ Zhao Yunlan was always one of the few people to surprise him in his long life. Usuaully everyone was easy to figure out. They wanted to use or control him, they wanted to either set him up or turn their backs on him. They all had levers and he figured out how to either ignore their plots or to plow through them. But Zhao Yunlan had always flipped his expectations around.

This was no different.

Shen Wei couldn't keep pulling in dark energy even though his god status gave him a slight buffer. What damage he was able to cause was quickly repaired, and the ayakashi just seem to get bigger and more focused on them the longer this kept going. None of his weapons will do any damage, and his soulless was back in the Far Chore having been ordered to 'do something with the gardens'.

He closed his eyes at the idea of forcing Yunlan to serve him and reached up to grab his pendant before remembering that he had lost it. His eyes opened and his voice grew cold. ]

Fine. But I am not holding you to me after this. [ Do not argue with him on this one. He will not move from it. ]

My name is Xuanwu. Grasping thy true name, I bind thee here. With borrowed name, I dub thee my servant. The name answers, the vessel to sound. I call thee as my divine instrument. The name, Zhao Yunlan. The vessel, Haku. Come, Hakki!

[I am not holding you to me after this, Shen Wei insists, and Zhao Yunlan doesn't exactly argue.

Instead, he glances over his shoulder to toss Shen Wei his dirtiest grin.]

You can hold me all you want--

[His borderline fails as the name gleams in the darkness between them, as red as blood, and seals itself against Yunlan's left forearm. He takes in one last sharp breath. He dissolves into light.

And then, as the bond forms between them, Shen Wei will see a different place altogether; a stone staircase in Dixing, where they'd once promised to meet, with Zhao Yunlan slumped against it with blood on his mouth.

Zhao feels himself shudder from light back into substance, rippling out into a new form. Sharp, with a powerful spine, a hilt that fits into Shen Wei's hand and a long, broad oxtail saber blade. Boy, he hopes that Shen Wei can use a sword. He'd been in a war -- maybe he should've gotten the gun, and Bakugou the sword?

His vision is clearer in this form, even in the darkness. The ayakashi is moving towards them, clawed hands grasping at Shen Wei.]

[ Why would he expect Zhao Yunlan to be any different during a life and death moment? Shen Wei huffs at that look, wanting to just shake him out of it and knowing that it would only spur him on more.

(In the game of lust and love, Yunlan would always push him to distraction and reveal in any reaction he manages to drag out of him.)

Then the vision hits him with all the force of a thousand blades. Shen Wei felt every painful moment - from the beatings and the fighting and the spark as the lantern lit up. He saw the staircase where they had promised to meet, and felt the way the earth shook and knew just how much daring it took for that final last act. Shen Wei was not prone to tears but he could feel them behind his eyes, and in the back of his throat as Zhao Yunlan's weapon form settled in his hand. He sets his jaw as he opens his eyes, the ayakashi reaching towards him, the gleam of the sword between him and it. ]

Mountain Wind. [ A weapon with nearly the same legendary name as the man who wield it. A weapon that he never seen held by the Kunlun he had met though he knew now that the blade had been buried with the true Kunlun. ]

Looks like I have no choice any more.

[ Shen Wei turned the sword around in his hand, settling it firmly in his grip and pushed back, sliding away from the snatching claws with an ease that made the ayakashi over extend its reach and fall on the icy tiles. ]

It's 'Hakki' now. [Despite how badass 'Mountain Wind' sounds. And it suits his real name, too, 'Yunlan' for the bands of clouds that swathe a mountain peak. He doesn't take too much time to preen; Shen Wei's moving, his hand closing solidly around Zhao Yunlan's hilt--

(he could try not to make that sound dirty, but he doesn't want to)

--and feet moving over the tiles underfoot with an ease that makes it clear he's a master.

The ayakashi goes sprawling, but it's not stopping, not even looking like the fall hurt; instead it ripples up to hands and feet, lunging at them again, faster. It's sheer reflex that has Yunlan drawing a borderline at and through it, cutting without his blade moving. He hadn't known he could do that, and his stunned pride reverberates through his link with both his gods as the ayakashi splits apart and struggles to reform again.]

Is it now, Hakki? [ He snorted, feeling Yunlan's little pleased zing at the old name. It wasn't familiar to him at least, but he liked it all the same. ] I thought that my name for you is suppose to be private.

[ He doesn't seem at all worried about the ayakashi as it comes at them again. Instead he set his feet, balancing easily with the sword resting against his arm as he gathered some more energy into his hand. In this form, the bond between them open, Yunlan could feel the shifting energy as it thrums throughout Shen Wei's body, shifting and shaping itself as fast as thoughts. ]

Try to behave and not be lewd. I have to kill something that vexes me.

[ He felt the surprise ripple through Yunlan even as the borderline flashed and cut into the ayakashi. Shen Wei grinned and charged after the burst of power, using the slick tiles to slide between the swirling masses of the spirit's body, the dark energy raising as a shield as cover while he slashed at the boiling mass to keep it from forming completely. Then on the other side of it, he spun around to face it, giving Yunlan a quick slash to shake off the residue and settle him firmly again in his hand. ]

Are you ready to finish it?

[There is something incredibly sexy about that sudden easy confidence: and it's even sexier how justified it is, as Shen Wei slips through the gash that Yunlan opened in the creature's body, wielding him with swift economy.]

You truly are a normal biology professor of many talents.

[See, he's behaving: that wasn't lewd at all. Or it wouldn't have been, if not for the curl of heat beneath the teasing thought. It's not his fault he's thinking about the strength and sureness of Shen Wei's hands right now. He is literally being wielded by those hands. He can't help it.

The ayakashi, though, is enjoying this a lot less. It's thrashing on the ground, the wounds left by Yunlan's blade gaping open even as the cut from his borderline heals; his attention focuses on it, pity mingling with determination. Ayakashi could have been souls once, he's heard. Wandering ghosts or ill-fated shinki... whatever this thing had once been, it is no longer, and all that's left is to end its pain.]

Yeah, I'm ready.

[ Centuries of fighting had gone into building this confidence and speed. While in many ways Shen Wei feels he was lacking, in this he was sure of his steps. The thrum of power as he released the excess to ice the ground again, the pull of muscles as he settled for another strike, both hands now holding Yunlan's sword form for a strike. ]

I'm not always a biology professor.

[ There was a hint of exasperated fondness in his tone as if he couldn't believe this guy giving him crap over something they both knew wasn't true. Especially with that heat underneath the words, a heat that he knew so well from when they were living.

If they didn't end up making out more after this then he did not know Zhao Yunlan at all.

Was there some mercy in him? Shen Wei looked at the ayakashi as it struggled, twisting around as it tried to get at them again, the slashes he had made still bleeding. It might had been a lost soul that once was a part of the Far Shore. It could have had dreams and hopes and plans until something took it over and twisted it to this. He focused his energy with Yunlan's, narrowing his eyes before springing over the claws and aiming for the head. ]

Time for you to rest... Rend!

[Shen Wei's energy rises around them again, cool and forceful, like the wind breathing from a cave mouth; Yunlan commits his own energy to the spell as his blade sinks into the ayakashi's head between the bulging eyes. It keens and explodes into light.

He's left blinking in the aftermath, as bits of shadow patter down across the floor and evaporate into little wisps of formless power. Well, that's done. The excitement of combat is still running high in him. He shifts, a little, the last wisps of ayakashi gore evaporating from his blade as he swallows back the itch to do more and turns his attention to Shen Wei.

There's blight on his hand. Yunlan radiates protective concern as he notices.]

Come on, Prof, we should go get cleaned up--

--oh shit, I left my jacket in the boat!

[His hilt shifts in Shen Wei's hand as he tries to swing around and see whether knocking the ride's power out stopped their boat.]

[ He moved automatically into a guard position, giving the twisting sword a quick whip as if to clean it of gore before scanning for any more movement. The air felt better, less stifled and nothing moved but the dripping of water off the fake dock and the final few sparks from the fuse box. Shen Wei sighed and stood up, reaching up to push his glasses back into place and then blinked down at the sword in his hand.

Oh that's right. ]

Zhao Yunlan, return.

[ There, enjoy being suddenly back in your own body Yunlan. Giving a quick nod, he turned around and teleported to the boat where it was still bobbing on the track and picked up the jacket. He folded it primly over his arm and teleported back to the dock and held it out to Yunlan. ]

You've been cut too. Let's get back and get cleansed.

Edited 2018-11-09 19:05 (UTC)

[It's funny, how teleporting always throws him off balance, but turning back from a weapon into a human being doesn't disorient him at all anymore. He's getting too used to this afterlife, he thinks, and can't help smiling despite the pain in his back as he reaches out to take his jacket back from Shen Wei.]

The cut's not too bad, but yeah. Let's.

[His shirt's ripped up, though; he can feel cool air on the burning blighted scratches beneath it, so he leaves his jacket over his arm for now.

And catches up Shen Wei's hand, brushing his thumb over the blighted spot--

-- ah, whoops, now he's got a streak of blight on his thumb; he always forgets how fucking contagious that shit is. It's fine, they're about to wash it off anyway.]

Lead on.

[Gods need to be touching to teleport others, and that's definitely the reason Yunlan's capturing his hand. Also because he plans to kiss it the moment they're washed up, but there's no need to give that away so fast.]

[ At his words about his injuries being light, Shen Wei just lifted an eyebrow in silent disapproval. He might be a dead soul in the Far Shore, but Shen Wei was still going to personally see to it that he does not ignore his injuries.

His fingers tighten over Yunlan's, his expression softening as he looks down at their fingers before away. He doesn't let go himself, even though he still maintains a distant look on his face before taking a deep breath and teleporting them to the Far Shore.

Then, in the archway leading to the springs, Shen Wei turns and presses against Zhao Yunlan, leaning up to kiss him softly. ]

( jumping to a log! )

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34 - Love is in the Air

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