Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Inspired ❯ Pranks and Realizations ( Chapter 21 )

Pairings: Ryu/Taki, Tatsuha/Shu (or is Shu/Tatsuha?) and a little bit of YukixSuguru (Come on, it's not that weird. Trust me, if you've read the manga, you know where I'm coming from.)

Rating: PG 13 for some language and sexual innuendos.

Summary: Suguru demonstrates his wild side, intriguing Yuki. Just what is going on between those two? Some Taki and Ryuichi fluff, now that Taki's getting serious. Also some serious TatsuhaxShu stuff as Shuichi is forced to prove himself.

Also, for those who have live journal, I now have a gravitation fanfic community for those who like odd pairings. You can find a link for it in my profile. Yes, I'm a shameless pimp, I know, I know.

I also want to pimp the Gravity Doujin by Sammy Hill, aka Kawaii Amethyst and the Gravitation RPGs, Kill Me Shining and xxx_gravirp_xxx. Once again, links can be found in my profile.

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Inspired

Chapter 21

When Mika Seguchi opened the door, the last person she expected to see was her brother, Eiri Yuki. "Eiri? Is something wrong?" The blonde cocked an eyebrow at her question.

"Are things really so bad between us that I can't drop by for no reason other than to have dinner?" Seeing the flustered look on his sister's face, Yuki smirked. "Well, are you going to let me in?"

Regaining her composure, Mika stepped aside. As Yuki entered and proceed to take his shoes off, Mika still felt a million alarm bells going off inside her head. Before she could ask though, she was surprised to hear a rather chipper voice call out behind her.

"Good Evening, Yuki-san! I'm so glad you came! I wasn't sure if you would, so I'm very relieved!" Suguru had just entered the room and was unusually hyper. Yuki glanced back at him and shrugged.

"When I saw your letter, how could I resist?" Mika looked between the two men who seemed to be oblivious to her existence. "Now what's this about Tohma?" Suguru was about to say something when he glanced at Mika. Grabbing Yuki's arm, he began to pull the older man away.

"Let's talk somewhere else. I don't want to spoil the surprise." Nodding, the blonde-haired man followed Suguru, leaving an utterly lost Mika behind. [Since when are those two so friendly?]

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The moment they had gotten back to Ryuichi's place, Taki had been jumped without any warning. But, he hadn't minded as it lead to lots and lots of sex. Afterwards though, they had to clean up all the damage which consisted of a knocked over house plant, some over turned chairs, a table that had it's contents pushed onto floor and whipped cream that had made it's way to various corners of the living room. Even after the clean up, Taki was still missing a shoe, but ignored it for the time being, so that he could order some pizza. Anything to prevent Ryuichi from cooking.

After dialing the number and making it quite clear that he was going to hold them to the 'thirty minutes or your pizza's' free' rule, he went to back to the living room where Ryuichi was sitting. "I could have made something." Ryuichi said as he pouted at Taki, who sat down next to him.

"What is it with you and cooking? And you can stop looking at me like that. It's too late." Ryuichi looked annoyed now, but shrugged it off, choosing to stare off for a moment before looking Taki in the eye again.

"I used to cook all the time when I lived at home. Do you cook?"

"Why? Are you trying to size me up to see if I'd make a good wife?" Taki chuckled at Ryuichi's dumbfounded expression. "No, I don't cook much. Not if I can help it. But, if I do make something, I can usually choke it down. I actually prefer the microwave or instant method, if you know what I mean." They were silent for a few minutes before Ryuichi spoke up.

"Taki, you know, I'll take care of you, right? I'll make sure to take care of things so you don't have to worry anymore."

"What are you going on about?" The way Ryuichi was talking you'd think he'd done something wrong.

"Well, what I mean is, I know I'm a lot of trouble for you and that things will probably get even harder the longer we stay together." Taki had a look of disbelief on his face as Ryuichi continued. "Just leave things to me and everything will be fine. You don't have to get upset again, okay?" The older man flashed him a smile, which gave Taki the strangest urge. This urge was a combination of two desires: the desire to hug Ryuichi and the desire to smack him upside the head. Taki chose annoyance instead.

"Listen, I don't need to be protected. I'm not a toy." Seeing Ryuichi's look of fear and shock, Taki knew he hadn't chosen the best course of action. "What I mean is, don't try so hard, alright? It just makes me feel inadequate."

"You feel inadequate? You?" It was obvious that Ryuichi couldn't understand the concept.

"Yes, I feel inadequate. Trust me, if you were dating someone much more famous and popular than you, you'd be going through the same thing."

"But, you're famous too, Taki. Besides, I thought you didn't care who I was. Even if I was God." Ryuichi grinned at Taki, who was trying to come up with a good retort.

"I just wanted to get you into the sack, that's all. I was trying to appear cold. People are really into that nowadays." The older man wrinkled his nose in annoyance.

"Liar." But, Taki was now ignoring Ryuichi in favor of playing with the other's hair.

"How do you keep it so soft?" Ryuichi swatted Taki's hand away.

"Don't change the subject!" At that moment, the door bell rang and Taki got to his feet to answer it. "Hey, I'm not done with you!" The younger man merely tuned him out and opened the door to reveal the pizza delivery man. Ryuichi fumed to himself as Taki paid the man. [You may have won this time, but eventually, I'm going to make you say you're mine.]

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"So, tell me what conspiracy you're a part of." Shuichi had his arms crossed, indicating that he was in a no nonsense mood.

"Conspiracy? What conspiracy?" Tatsuha really couldn't believe he was having this conversation with Shuichi. It was really reminding the dark-haired teen that he was the younger of the two.

"The conspiracy that would require a lazy bum like you to go corporate."

"Hey, what do you mean by the lazy bum thing? I just wanted a job, okay? I need to support myself. That's all right, isn't it?" They glared at each other, both secretly scrambling to find the right words to say so that the situation wouldn't get out of control. Shuichi was the first one to grab onto a coherent thought.

"Well, why not chose a normal job? A job that's normal for teenagers."

"Because, it looks lame."

"Why would that look lame?" Tatsuha merely shrugged and muttered something under his breath that Shuichi couldn't make out.

"What was that?"

"You don't understand what it's like, being compared to him all the time."

"Huh?" Shuichi was surprised by the darker tone the teenager had taken on.

"No matter what he does, everyone still loves him. No matter how much the old man complains, I know he still wants Eiri to take over the temple. Even though Eiri doesn't want to, even though he doesn't care."

Tatsuha seemed like he was going to cry. Shuichi reached out towards him, but stopped when Tatsuha started speaking again.

"And Mika and Tohma. He acts like a creep towards them, but they still like him… And God, why do I have to look like him? Blonde hair aside, we look just alike, and everyone's always mixing us up and..." Tatsuha was unable to stop himself now. Regardless of how much he loved his brother, there always had been a bit of resentment towards him as well. It was only lately that he'd been feeling it this intensely.

"You two aren't anything alike." Shuichi said abruptly, causing Tatsuha to look at him strangely. "Well, you look alike, but that's because you're brothers. I mean if you look like Yuki, that means you look like Mika right?" The pink-haired boy smirked at the incredulous look that crossed Tatsuha's face. "And well, personality wise, you guys are as different as night and day." Seeing the younger teen staring at him still, Shuichi was worried that he had said something wrong.

"Go on." Tatsuha said, obviously surprised.

"Well, what I mean is…" Shuichi took a moment to collect his thoughts, as he was shocked that he was being taken seriously. "You may goof off, but you're smart about relationships and stuff. I mean, you were one of the people who convinced me that it didn't matter if I happened to fall in love with a man. And well, you do good other times as well. And you've always listened to what I had to say when I was worried about me and Yuki. Plus, you care about the other people around you. You don't act like it, but I know that if something happened to someone you cared about, you'd be there in a flash, no matter how bad things were between the both of you." Tatsuha had the strangest look on his face.

"No ones ever said anything like that to me. The most I get is that I'm good in bed." Tatsuha chuckled bitterly. "And even those girls, I know that they think my brother's better. I'm just an amusement."

"Tatsuha, that just means they're idiots." Shuichi slid his arms around Tatsuha and held him. "So you got that job to prove something?"

"Yeah. I wanted you to think I was dependable. Pretty stupid, huh?" He couldn't believe he was crying. Tatsuha Uesugi didn't cry.

"It is pretty stupid." Feeling Tatsuha tense up, Shuichi chuckled. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm not the most dependable person either." Before Tatsuha could retort, Shuichi kissed him.

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Tohma was really surprised that Yuki had come to dinner. He was also surprised that Suguru was sitting right next to the novelist. Normally, his cousin avoided sitting next to people he was unfamiliar with, and when he did, he didn't look that happy about it. [Shindou-san does one thing and everything changes yet again.] He really needed to figure out the boy's secret. But, for now he would just be content with the lovely dinner gift.

"Mika, pass the gravy." Plus, he was indulging in western food this time, one of his few favorites, turkey with stuffing and gravy. Just as he was about to drench his food in delicious goodness though, the door bell rang. A servant came in with a nervous look on his face.

"Seguchi-sama, there is something that you need to attend to." Tohma nodded and headed out after the servant. A few minutes after he had left, Suguru began to giggle. Mika stared at him in shock, and saw that Yuki was trying really hard to hide his smirk.

"What are you two… Are you planning to…" Comprehension dawned dawned on her, causing Mika to get out of her chair and rush to the door. Or that was the plan, but Yuki's hand was firmly on her shoulder.

"Don't you want to see him taken down a peg for once? I'm sure he's done something that you want to pay him back for." Mika's eyes darkened and she muttered something under her breath. "What?"

"Last night, he taped over my soap opera." She said this in a low tone, fists trembling with rage.

Yuki was taken aback at first, then he grinned. "So are you on our side?" Suguru and Yuki looked at her expectantly.

"Yes, he must be made to pay for his sins."

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As Tohma walked toward the room where the visitor was supposedly waiting, it occurred to him that things were a little to quiet. He wasn't the paranoid type though, and merely assumed that Mika and Eiri had merely made the situation in the kitchen awkward as was often the case between those two.

Walking into the room though, he was surprised to see a camera crew sitting in there, as if for an interview. [No one told me about this? I'll fire the entire staff for this slip up.] "Can I help you gentlemen?" The man in charge of the operation, who had a microphone in his hand, walked up to Tohma with a smile on his face.

"Are you the Tohma Seguchi?" He was looking Tohma over from head to toe, as if confirming something. "Oh, of course you must be. My bad." Tohma blinked as the man grabbed his hand and shook it. "You are a real sport for doing this though. A real sport."

"Excuse me, but could you tell me what this is all about?"

"Why you've been selected to on our latest segment of 'Fashion Police."

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Ryuichi still hadn't gotten a chance to get Taki back on track. After eating their pizza, he turned the tv station over to another horror movie. This time it was something along the lines of Friday the 13th and Ryuichi wasn't enjoying it at all. But, as usual, Taki was rather absorbed in the movie. Every time Ryuichi was about to bring up the their early conversation, something scary would happen onscreen and he'd end up burying his face in Taki's shoulder or chest, thus ending any serious conversation. He couldn't really help it, he was a scaredy cat and the younger man was very, very comfortable.

Taki himself knew he was being insufferable, but he couldn't help it. Ryuichi was being too, Ryuichi. Not that it was a bad thing to be himself, but the guy could be dense as a brick sometimes. Taki had been learning to be unusually tolerant with Ryuichi, who just didn't get that you didn't say certain things to a guy, dating or not. [Then again, what do I know about it? I haven't been with a guy before, so he is one step ahead of me here.]

"Turn it off! Turn it off!" Cried Ryuichi, as he continued hiding his face. Taki considered the option carefully. [If I turn it off, he'll want to talk… But, then again there is something I want to say to him, but I don't want to say it either.] After a few minutes of internal debate Taki grabbed the remote and turned the tv off.

"Oh thank you, so much!!!" Ryuichi was now hugging the life out of Taki who was trying really hard to resist the urge to panic. A natural urge when you were being nearly suffocated to death.

"Ryuichi, we need to talk."

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"Fashion… Police?" Tohma was in pure shock and couldn't stop himself from glancing at his apparel. He was wearing a frilly shirt, ala Ryuichi's usual style, but a little more conservative, underneath a black over coat. To complete the look he was wearing a pair of rather tight leather pants and some really expensive Italian shoes. "I do not see what is wrong with my fashion sense."

"Well, you see, most men don't have your sense of style. In fact most women don't dress like that either."

Tohma crossed his arms as he felt his annoyance grow. "I fail to see why that would imply that I'm a bad dresser." The interviewer was now nervous and looked back to his crew, who offered no support.

"Well, your style is interesting, I'll give you that. But, it's just so unorthodox." [Must not crush… Must not crush…]

"Oh, when the camera rolls, can you actually smile?"

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Shuichi looked around the apartment, trying to puzzle some things out. He had forced Tatsuha to go take a bath so that he could have some alone time. The apartment was so big, even with all his stuff spaced out all over the place. All his stuff, none of Tatsuha's…

[But, that should change… Ideally.]

Well, depending on how things went it could be difficult. Tatsuha was sixteen and if Shuichi's past experiences with the Uesugi elder were any indication, the old man wasn't going to be quiet while his youngest ran off with a nineteen year old boy. One who had already 'corrupted' his oldest son.

[Speaking of the oldest one…] Shuichi thought as he saw a photo album that had been sitting on the shelf. Grabbing it, he walked over to the sofa and sat down. He began to flip through the pictures and found himself grinning as he looked at them. [Yuki reminds me of Tatsuha…]

A picture of Yuki asleep at his desktop. Another when he was lying on the couch. One that Shuichi had accidentally taken when the novelist was pissed at him. One that was a little inappropriate…

[Crap. I have to return these. It's creepy keeping them and if Tatsuha sees them, he's going to get insecure again.]

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Mika, Suguru and Yuki had been peaking their heads through a door and were having a hard time not laughing at Tohma's humiliation. "So, how much longer do you think it will be until he snaps?" Suguru whispered to Yuki.

"Another twenty minutes I'd say…" The author was enjoying this a little too much. Then again, it was rare to see Tohma taken down a peg.

"No." Mika said as she tried to get a better look. She had just heard the interviewer's latest question and was near laughing her ass off. "They just insinuated that he looks gayer than Ryuichi. He has ten minutes left till he blows his top." [Of course, he's more Uesugisexual than anything…] Mika thought to herself, but decided to quash that thought. Now that her brother was 'single' again, she didn't want to think about having possible competition. Again.

"So these are all college grads?" Yuki said as he watched the performance, enjoying the squirming that was going on.

"Hai. They're the prop division of the theatre department there. I meet them when I was doing college visits last year. Since they were so kind to me, I thought I should give them a present." Yuki shuddered visibablly. [Great, he's already developing connections.]

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Tohma had finally reached his limit. He didn't know what had sparked it, all he knew was that he had his cell phone out and was calling, not the police, but some rather friendly yakuza who owed him a few favors. At the moment the interviewer saw him pull out the phone though, his tone changed. "Oh, before you call anyone, could you do me one more favor?" Tohma was about to say no, but realizing that he was about to end the poor sod's life, he decided a final wish was in order.

"Alright." At that moment the man pulled out a camera and aimed it at Tohma. Before he could protest, the flash had gone off catching the bewildered look on Tohma's face. With that the whole crew began to clean up all their equipment. "What are you doing?" Tohma was in even more shock than before.

"Oh, it's the end of the mission, so I'm afraid we must be leaving. Tell Suguru-kun that we'll have plenty of pictures for him and his friends by next week." By now, Tohma was beginning to twitch.

"You mean this was all a scam?" At that the crew looked rather nervous.

"Well, Suguru-kun implied that you had sense of humor about these things…"

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At that moment, Suguru decided to take his leave of Yuki and Mika. "I think I'm going out for a walk." The teenager slowly walked out, obviously meaning to go out one of the back doors. After he was gone, Mika shrugged her shoulders.

"Well, I'd better stop Tohma from suing them." With that she headed out the door to calm Tohma, secretly delighted that her soap opera had been avenged. Yuki crossed his arms as he thought about what had just happened. [Shuichi always described him as an uptight stick in the mud.] The prank Suguru pulled reminded him of when he was younger. Only this prank was a little more elaborate.

[Still, why did he want me here to see it?]

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To Be Continued…

Just what is up with Suguru? Does he have, gasp, feelings for Yuki? Does Yuki care? What does Tohma think about this? And what is it that Taki wanted to talk to Ryuichi about? And what happens when Shuichi sees Yuki again? How does Tatsuha handle it?

Sorry to leave off on the cliffy. What can I say, I'll follow up on the Ryuichi/Taki stuff next chapter. Once again, to keep Yuki/Shu fans from expecting much, no they will not realize they love each other and get magically back together. If it doesn't work out with Tatsuha, I'm going to allow Shuichi to stay single for a while.