Kaiba Seto summons the other Yugi to his office and demands, flatly, that he become his — body and soul. What is offered is not affection but a transaction, and when it is refused, Kaiba turns to the boy whose body the spirit borrows.
Cornered, the King agrees to take Aibou's place under one condition: no wounds, no pain. What he receives instead is gentleness kept to the letter, cocoa tasted for poison every night, and an observer who reads his pulse, his breathing and his silences as easily as breathing. Every promise is honoured. That is precisely what he cannot defend against.
A story about a man who says there is no mercy in the way he loves, and means it exactly as stated.
This is a translation of an original work.
Original Title: 愛人契約
Original Author: 葉人(@Hathor_yuki)
Personal site: https://prideshipping.sakura.ne.jp
I had been summoned — the other one, he had said — and at the end of that summons I was met with an outrageous demand.
"Yugi. Become mine."
For a moment I did not understand what had been said to me.
"What?"
"I said become mine, body and soul."
Set down in writing, it might have read as a sweet line.
But there was nothing of the sort anywhere in that flat, level tone.
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"Must I spell it out. Steel yourself and be loved by me."
Steel myself? Be loved?
In that instant a strange warning tone went off inside my head.
So that was what this was? Had I misheard? No — it had to be a contract of that sort.
Calm down a moment, I told myself, but there was nowhere for the calm to settle.
What I had pictured was a kept man contract. But his words went past that.
Steel yourself and be loved?
Put that way, I could not imagine at all what would happen, or how.
Still — in the end, surely, this had to be that sort of thing.
However he dressed it in words, it was a demand for a relationship with no warmth in it.
"So you want me to be your 'kept man'?"
The moment the words left me I knew for myself how much barb was in them. Only natural that there should be.
It was not a thing I could possibly accept.
But he answered without moving so much as an eyebrow.
"No…. …Or rather, you are not far off."
He folded his arms, thinking it over. So it had been that after all.
"There is no chance of that. Besides, I am a soul; the body belongs to Aibou. If that is all, I am leaving."
He had gone to the trouble of summoning me by name, so I had come wondering what it was about — and it was this rubbish.
To put a relationship like that to me.
But for all that I had refused him, he only wore a thin, cold smile.
"Then let the body be mine first."
"…What did you say? But my answer is no."
I knew I was no match for him if he came at me by force.
I took a step towards the door, but the voice that followed stopped my feet.
"As for the body, you have your other one, do you not."
Aibou?
"But there is no way Aibou would say yes to a thing like this."
"I am aware that he holds a pure admiration for me. Watch and see which of us wins, you or I."
He laughed, looking down at me.
What he said was fact, certainly.
And by that route, taking the body first was possible. Even so — what could come of it.
"There is no way Aibou will choose you."
As if to cover my agitation, I opened and shut the door loudly, and this time I did leave the room.
Around this time I began to see him often.
Though all it meant was that the frequency of his coming to the school had gone up. He was not there all day; he would show his face for a short while.
And when that happened Aibou would, of course, speak to him.
He for his part would brush it off as a nuisance, or show that he had understood precisely, keeping the distance well.
No — if anything, he was closing that distance with some skill.
"Oh? Are you going home already today?"
"Yes. More to the point — I hear your marks are poor. If you have time to talk to me, you might do something about it."
"Umm, well, that's… ehehe."
"Marks are taken into account for students at the next tournament, you know."
"Whaaat? That's a problem for me."
Behind them, I was glaring at him with a gaze that could have killed.
The turning point came at once.
Aibou began dropping in on him regularly. As though they were friends.
Sometimes they played games, sometimes they only talked, and in the end he was even being made to study.
It was not merely being in the same space. Once it had come this far, the pace at which he closed the distance accelerated further.
The manoeuvring had begun.
"I've never had marks this good before."
"You… I taught you, and you are still twentieth? That is one digit too many. I wash my hands of it. Manage it on your own next time. Tournament entry has a cut-off."
"That's the immovable first place for you…. But this is a huge event for someone who's failed everything his whole life. So let me scrape into the tournament!"
"You are… hopeless."
"Heh, thank you."
On the surface it looked like two friends on good terms.
But underneath it was otherwise.
"Which will you choose today?"
Several options lined up; the game boxes held the answer to what they would be doing that day.
"Which one… any hints?"
"I will answer questions. But I will not disclose all of the information. Fill in the rest with your imagination."
His way of presenting a thing is always a cold-blooded one.
Not giving too much information, but giving the small necessary hints, and thereby stirring the other's imagination and turning his attention where it is wanted.
A standard tactic.
From the hints, it sounds as though there is some dreadful answer mixed in among them. But choose one in fact, and the answer is kind, sweet even.
Unease that holds you off, and indulgence — the balance between them is exquisite, and he has begun to show movements that suggest he really might ensnare him.
Something had begun to go wrong.
Aibou's manner was subtly different from before. His eyes when he looked at him seemed a little softer, brighter than usual.
Something inside my chest felt as though it were being squeezed.
No. That could not be.
I told myself so over and over, but every time our eyes met, each of Aibou's faint smiles and small gestures showed that he was conscious of him.
"Aibou. Be careful of Kaiba."
"What's brought this on?"
"That is…."
I could not say it. That because I had refused him, the body was being targeted.
But he smiles, and says it.
"I think… I know what you want to say."
"What?"
"Even I can work that much out — he's straightforward, after all. That's it, isn't it?"
At a glance, the relationship between him and Aibou is peace itself. Anyone who did not know the underside of it would give it their blessing.
"Then why."
"I think it would be all right with me, if it's Kaiba. He's kind, and my marks went up as a bonus."
I felt as though everything before my eyes had gone black.
You cannot be serious.
It had gone exactly as he said. Had I lost to him?
Unsteady, as though the ground beneath me had shifted.
Aibou was being caught in the net. To call this despair would not have been an exaggeration.
"No! You are being deceived, he is—"
Intending to make you a scapegoat.
There was no way I could say such a thing.
I had not thought that in so short a time I would be driven into a corner this easily.
That the man who had pressed himself on me in that fashion could properly take hold of anyone's heart — I would never in the least have believed it.
"Kaiba! What have you done!"
Taking advantage of being Yugi Muto, I marched into the president's office and shouted.
However violent a quarrel it turned into, I had to protect Aibou from this man.
I had to protect Aibou, before he was completely ensnared. That was all that was in my head.
"What of it."
"Do not play the fool. I mean Aibou!"
"From the look of you, he has chosen me at last. But he chose for himself. Do you mean to put your word in over his choice?"
"You…."
"There is no mercy in the way I love."
No mercy in the way I love. Only that phrase fell into the air.
But what would be done, I did not know.
Love, or domination, or something that came with pain.
Countless possibilities rose in my head and my breath caught.
When I turned my eyes on him, he wore a cool face. An expression as though he knew nothing at all — and yet in those eyes there dwelt a bottomless strength.
Love? What was that supposed to mean.
My heart hammered. My hands tightened of their own accord. It was hard to breathe.
Unable to move a step, standing there where I was, I tried desperately to search out the meaning of the words.
But every action and every thought was crushed beneath something unknown.
Unknown, was it. Was he telling me to accept the unknown?
A wariness stirring deep in my chest. I did not know how to resist.
His eyes looked coldly down, and there was even a smile at his mouth.
That he was certain of victory was plain to see.
But at this rate Aibou would certainly be ensnared.
"Well then. What will you do. Will you be loved by me?"
The scent of a threat hung in the air.
I noticed that without knowing it I had clenched my fists. That I could lose this contest, of all things.
That a man like this should be strong in matters of the heart was far beyond anything I had allowed for; no one could have imagined it. He was supposed to have no interest in such things.
But in fact I was cornered. There was nothing left but to accept that contract.
"I will… take his place. But I will not yield."
"If he chooses me, I have no objection to taking the two of you together."
"Release Aibou."
"Release? I have forced nothing upon him regarding his choice."
There had certainly been no compulsion and no threat.
There had only been perfectly ordinary manoeuvring. And that was precisely why, at this rate, Aibou would simply be deceived by this man.
"…I will do it. I will steel myself and become your 'kept man,' and be loved by you. I will take all of it. I accept the contract. So… do not lead him astray any further!"
I glared at him with anger and hatred, with a gaze near to murder.
But even taking it, he only smiled faintly.
"I will give you your freedom for today. Tomorrow night I will send a car."
"Promise me. If you wound me or hurt me, this contract is void."
"Do you understand your position? I could stop dealing with you here and now, choose that precious other one instead, and do as I please with him."
"You…."
But now none of the choice was mine.
I had to do as he said. If I did not let him have his way, Aibou would be toyed with.
Pain I could endure.
"I under—"
"But if you ask for gentleness, I will do it that way."
Protect myself even a little. For that, accepting was the only option here.
"Understood. That will do. Be… gentle."
"…I promise."
That it should come to my asking for gentleness — there was no humiliation like it.
Damn him. But I could not allow myself to be attacked.
What rose behind my eyes was defeat and despair, and nothing else.
The way this man loved was, just as he said of it himself, truly without mercy.
Not a single wound, and no pain.
Controlling even the frustration just before, he poured a maximised pleasure over me relentlessly.
My body was entirely in his grasp.
"No… stop…."
"When it is good, say it is good."
"No. I— no. Ah…."
"This is a good place on you. If it is good, say it is good."
Told that, I was worked over and over at nothing but the good places.
"No, stop… it, nn… ah…."
"Stop? If you were thrown aside in this state, it is you who would be inconvenienced, is it not? Is it good, or is it not?"
Nothing but the weak places. No — properly speaking, they had been made weak.
Once he knew a place was good, the pleasure was given there insistently, until it had gone thoroughly weak.
Each time he drove into me my head went numb. I felt as though my consciousness would fly.
But this man, who knew this body through and through, would not truly let it fly.
"Is it good?"
I did not want to say it was good.
"I will not… say it."
"Stubborn creature."
A kiss that only touched.
Stop looking at me with those gentle eyes. Stop the sweet voice. And the touch that wraps around me.
Treated this well, brought down by those eyes, that voice, those hands into a pleasure like sludge, I can no longer move properly.
Stop behaving as though I were someone you loved.
"Stop… nn… ah…"
My consciousness was going far away.
"Is it good here?"
My body was lifted and I was run through from below. The joining gone deeper, the innermost place pressed.
"No… I…."
"Do not lie."
Do not stroke me. Stop that touch.
I absolutely did not want to say it. But my body, betraying my heart, was glad.
This, this of all things.
The depths struck, my brain numb. I could not bear it.
"Ah… nn…."
No. That was a word I must not say.
"Be honest."
If I said it, it would become proof that I had fallen. I had decided that I would never yield.
"I will not say it. I will never—"
"Hopeless creature."
Hands crawling over my whole body, lips tickling my throat — I was being eaten everywhere, and there was no place left untouched.
However I fled, that tongue caught and wound me in with skill.
My arms taken and guided behind his neck, I clung and could not let go. I did not want to do such a thing, and yet there was nothing to do but cling.
He does not often touch the front. Before this body was made into what it is, in the early days he touched there frequently, but once I came to feel it inside, that was where the work went.
Because he knew that the pleasure welling up unmistakably from within tormented me far longer.
When he does touch, it is usually to bring me down at the end. From outside and from within, he comes to bring me down from both.
Now, he touched. Surely after this I would be dropped into a sea of pleasure and made to say that word. Good.
Once I said it, that would be the end. After that I would writhe and go on asking for it.
The pleasure is frightening. I stop being myself.
"Ah… no… I cannot… any more…."
"There is nothing to fear."
So the fear had been seen through after all.
Psychological contests are my speciality.
But what this man does is nothing so charming as a psychological contest; it is mere confirmation of fact.
That he performs it as easily as breathing makes it worse.
Since the day I accepted the contract, I have been observed without pause.
On the first day, we drank cocoa and slept side by side.
The car came, and when I went to his room at Kaiba Manor I was given hot cocoa — it will help you sleep, he said.
It struck me as blatantly suspicious.
"Kaiba. Can you drink this first?"
I held the cup out to him as I said it, and yet he put the cocoa to his lips with a cool face.
"If you want it tasted for poison, I will do it every time."
His voice was calm, and when I gave no answer, he smiled faintly.
"There is no need to be afraid."
"There is no chance of my being afraid of you—"
"…The shallowness of your breathing, the tension in your shoulders, your excessive reactions to my movements, the motion of your eyelids and pupils, the strain in your voice. Even so?"
"That is…."
Unconscious facts, stated flatly.
The observer's eye goes on laying everything bare. Here, before my eyes, my own interior was being seen through entirely.
It must have been like this that he saw through Aibou's heart and caught him in the net.
The sense that however I resisted it would be useless. My heart hammered and the words in my head jammed.
Even so, I could not look away. His gaze allowed no place to escape to.
But telling me not to be tense was asking the impossible. That was it — this was not fear, it was combat readiness.
"Today I will still do nothing. I will not lay a hand on you, or touch you at all."
Words alone were not enough to believe. I had been threatened and made a 'kept man' only just now.
"Can you promise that you will not lie?"
"You are fond of promises. Very well, I will promise. On the condition that you stay here until morning."
For some reason he laughed, as though exasperated.
I showered, changed, made only the preparations for sleeping, and was taken through to the bedroom.
Faced with the actual bed, my legs would not move.
He had said he would not lay a hand on me. But my heart was full of doubt.
"Get in."
"…Understood."
Unable to go on standing there, I got into the bed, keeping a slight distance.
He came in quietly as well.
"We are only sleeping. Do not go so far to the edge. You will fall."
His voice was settled, and there was nothing overbearing in it. It only stated the facts.
Only sleeping. Truly only sleeping. Telling myself so, I burrowed into the bed.
I lay wary and unable to drop off, but exactly as he had declared, this man had fallen asleep at once.
He would not lay a hand on me, would not touch me — there had been no lie.
Watching that harmless sleeping face, I thought I might as well go home while I had the chance. But if I did such a thing I would have to be prepared for reprisal.
There was no possibility of sound sleep after that; I dozed and woke again and again in the night, and gave it up at around four. I would take a nap when I got home.
As I was looking at his face without meaning to, his eyes suddenly opened. The time was exactly half past four.
Then he confirmed the shape of me there, and for some reason wore a look like relief. Something stirred faintly in my chest.
"You could not sleep, then."
He reached out a hand, but the fingertips did not touch.
"Being able to sleep would be the strange thing."
"I see. I will be leaving shortly. Sleep a while before you go."
"Then I will go home now too. I stayed until morning, as agreed."
"In that case I will have you driven. Take breakfast before you go."
Reason, cold-bloodedness, gentleness exactly as promised. For all the different things mixed into that manner, my guard did not come down.
Wariness at its maximum. Of trust, of ease, not so much as a shadow yet.
I was made to sit through breakfast, forced into the car that was to take me back, and only then released.
From the next time on, I was made into a body pillow.
What was put in front of me was, again, hot cocoa.
When I did not touch it, he tasted it for poison without a word.
"From now on you will drink the same thing as me."
"Another promise?"
"Yes. And I will choose one of them first. A capricious game of Russian roulette."
"It is a promise not to wound you and not to hurt you; I will not drug anything. There is no lie in this either — it is a promise."
The observer's eyes looked steadily into me.
Today I should not be afraid. If it looked that way, I would tell him it was combat readiness.
"Today I will touch you. I will touch you, but we will only sleep."
I made ready for bed as I had the day before, and we got into it side by side.
He had said he would touch me, but with what intention.
The man who followed me into the bed put his arms around me as though to hold me.
Surprise, and then, a little after, the tension came.
"…I see."
"What is it. I am not afraid."
"The change in your pulse, the movement of your eyes, the state of your breathing — above all, your muscles are rigid. And with that you would feign composure?"
The breath of a slightly amused laugh fell on me.
"……"
"About what I expected. A reaction within anticipated limits."
Do not observe even that much.
A hand was laid gently against me, and the distance was minutely adjusted.
He met my eyes deliberately and sealed my movement that way. It was not that he was glaring.
The awareness of being observed would not let me move.
"If you stay that rigid you will go short of sleep again."
"And whose fault is that."
"I am going to sleep. You sleep as well."
Told that, there was no way I could sleep.
But just as he had the day before, this man fell asleep at once.
Only his arm, I was not allowed to be released from.
After that, days of being made into a body pillow continued.
And so I let my guard down, and at some point I fell asleep without meaning to.
The accumulated lack of sleep told on me as well; when I woke and checked the time it was past eight.
"So you were finally able to sleep."
He had already changed into a suit and was working beside the bed.
His gaze was a settled one, as though looking at something that pleased him.
"What is it?"
"I…."
Why had I fallen asleep.
A chill went through me.
"I— I am going home."
"There is nothing to fear. Breakfast before you go."
"No. I am going home."
"You are a 'kept man,' are you not. Then let yourself be kept quietly. Once you have taken breakfast I will have you driven. Until then I will not let you out."
His voice was a settled one, and it rang less like an order from him than like his making me exercise a right that was mine by course.
In the end I was overruled, took only breakfast, and was sent home.
Once I had become able to sleep a number of times, I began to be laid a hand on in this way.
I had decided that when he did, I would tell him he was hopeless at it — but I was not permitted to do any such thing.
The words with meaning were "no" and "stop"; after that, only meaningless cries.
Where it was good, he made out at leisure with that observer's eye, and came to bring me down.
There is no mercy in the way he loves. That was true.
Not a single wound, not even pain, and he behaved gently, as though he really loved me.
But it was not only sweetness; until I said "good" honestly, I was not let off. It was domination.
Perhaps if I said "good" early I would be released, but there was no possibility of my saying it.
Resistance was useless. How much easier it would have been if he had held the contract up against me.
He never pinned down my resisting body; he did nothing but caress me, sweetly, soothingly, with a persistence that never let up.
At first I was able to go rigid at once, to look away, to raise my voice and say "stop" — I should have been.
Now I can no longer do it. With sweetness and pleasure, I have been thoroughly won over.
"Your body is not refusing. Your breathing is not laboured; your voice trembles, but there is little anger in it. There is no reason to stop."
The voice is calm itself, but the weight of the words soaks into the body.
There is sweetness and there is gentleness, there should be — and at the same time fear comes surging in.
When he lays a hand on me, I should have the confidence to refuse by reason, and yet the body reacts on its own.
And when nothing but facts are stated to me like this, the words vanish.
Is this love?
Truly, there is no mercy.
If this is what love is, then love and fear are mingled together, and my head is a whirl of confusion.
Where the promised gentleness ends and the contracted way of loving begins, I do not know.
But a body accustomed to his gentle hands could raise no argument in the first place, and all I could do was glare.
Before I knew it, there were more and more moments when bewilderment won out over fear and wariness.
"When did I…."
Stop bracing myself against this man.
Was my body, my heart, going numb?
"I told you from the start. There is no need to be afraid."
That presence alone, of being observed, stirs my chest faintly.
I cannot resist it, but perhaps it is not despair. That such a shoot had begun to grow, I had not yet noticed.
Today too, he puts the hot cocoa to his lips.
He had said he did not care for sweet things, but he drank all of it.
When I pointed out the possibility that something had been slipped into the bottom, he drank the whole of it without a word, and it has been so ever since.
"…You. For someone doing all this, you are scrupulous."
He raised the corner of his mouth faintly and answered flatly.
"I merely keep my promises."
That answer was oddly gratifying, and so it left my heart in disorder. I ought not to be gratified.
Where promises are concerned, this man keeps every one of them without reluctance — if anything, with something like enjoyment.
Not to wound. Not to hurt. To be gentle. Not to lie. To drink the same thing. To taste for poison.
The sources of my unease and fear are crushed, every one, by the very thing that caused them.
Anger, confusion, wariness — I have to hold on to them, and yet somewhere behind them there is a part of me that has begun to trust.
Trust. Impossible.
I drank the cocoa down.
The cup empties, and thinking of what comes after it, tension runs through the body. But even that, now, no longer holds for long.
A silence falls, and it is no longer one with tension in it. It has become one for relaxing into.
The breathing evens out, and as I let the breath go the strength leaves the body. At that timing, he turns his eyes on me.
This has become the signal, lately.
Today too, this body will be loved without mercy.
It happened one such day.
The time when the car usually came arrived, but today it did not come.
Yet the appointed hour was drawing near.
To go to the trouble of making contact and checking felt like accepting this relationship, and I balked at it.
But if he went on keeping his promises and I was the one to break the rules — that was the more frightening thing.
It was I who had decided to take Aibou's place.
For the first time, I went to Kaiba Manor of my own will.
What was this.
At a glance it was no different from usual. But the state of the security seemed changed. Something forbidding was in the air, and my skin felt it.
While I was watching for a while, a car stopped just beside me.
The door opened and I was pulled inside.
The car moved off at once and turned in through the gates of Kaiba Manor.
"Word to you was late."
"Kaiba."
He was glaring out of the window with a sharpness in his eyes I had not seen in some time.
"Since you have come, there is a possibility you were seen. For the present I will keep you safe here. I will send word to your house and put security there as well."
"What on earth is going on?"
"A common nuisance."
Hot cocoa was set in front of me as always, but as always he was not there before me.
Glaring at a map of Domino City rendered in Solid Vision, he was taking contact with someone, or turning to a computer.
"What has happened."
"Only a death threat. An organised one, however."
A death threat. So that was why the air had been so forbidding.
"You… are you going to be killed?"
This man, killed.
If this man were gone, I would be released. But that felt different from the ending I wanted.
For everything that had been done to me, I could not bring myself to think I wanted him dead.
"I am not so easily killed. Even supposing I were actually attacked, I could turn it back on them."
With this man's specifications, that did seem possible.
"But you are another matter, Yugi. If you were shot at, you would have no answer to it. No time to use your occult powers either."
Continuing his work flatly, now and then he drew his brows together.
"You say you cannot be killed, but for a man always at ease, your face is grim."
Surely this time he was not so unconcerned. I felt as though I had finally found a weak point.
"I see…. So you still think that I could stay composed while dragging you into danger."
The voice was as always, flat and quiet.
"Me?"
"No — there is no need for concern. I will crush them utterly, so that no second or third incident occurs. That is what this engagement is for."
"How am I involved in this?"
A death threat against Seto Kaiba and Yugi Muto had nothing to do with each other.
Just then a transmission came through, and I did not get an answer to my question.
"…Hmph. Found them at last."
Eyes cold to the bone, a voice without temperature.
Several pins were set into the map of Domino City.
"With this, whether they live or die is mine to decide. Rest easy, Yugi."
"Kaiba!"
"It will all be settled by morning. It is late already; you sleep."
"Do you mean to kill them?"
"I will not take their lives. I will only make them understand what it means to make an enemy of me."
He made contact with someone, gave a single cold instruction — do it — and cut the transmission.
Not a trace of the usual gentle, sweet air about him.
If this cold mercilessness were turned on me, there was no knowing what would be done.
That was it. This was a man who could be ruthless. There was no chance of any gentleness in him. All of it was staging, for the sake of the contract and the promises.
Illusions are frightening; promises are frightening. I had gone and believed in the gentleness of my own accord.
Believed in the gentleness?
Impossible. What am I thinking.
I shook my head and threw off the strange notion that had risen behind my eyes.
"Would it not have suited you better to drag me into it after all."
Then, under the pretext of keeping me safe, he could hold me at hand indefinitely.
"Out of the question. Why should I expose you to danger."
He said it with a puzzled look.
A 'kept man' is replaceable, surely. Then why.
"Do you mean to protect me?"
"Why state the obvious. …Ah. You are shaken."
"I am not!"
"Your eyes are unsteady, your voice is low, your breathing is shallow and quick."
The observer's eye goes on laying everything bare. Do not make me expose any more than this.
If he did, I felt something irreversible would happen.
"Stop seeing through everything like that."
"This is the way I love. I told you there is no mercy in it. To grasp the whole of it and return the optimal response. Did you declare you would become a 'kept man' without the resolve to be loved?"
"A way of loving like that…."
There is no mercy in the way I love. I had thought it a figure of speech. In fact, when he wanted my body and was too persistent about it, I had taken it to mean that.
That where love came into it with this man, I would need the resolve to be stripped psychologically bare.
That such fear should be mixed into love, which ought by rights to be sweet — there was no imagining it.
For the first time, I felt love to be frightening.
"If you dislike being seen through, be honest."
"Then let me say it. I am fine without being protected."
"That I cannot accept. If there is danger, I protect. That is all."
Protect, he said. I was in the fangs at this very moment, and they were the fangs of the man in front of me.
And with that, he protects. It is a contradiction.
To treat me gently as though he truly loved me, and on top of that to want to protect me.
I frowned in spite of myself. Why such a thing.
Before my eyes, he went on with his work flatly, and now and then checked how I was.
I understood what it meant. It really was in order to protect me; he had judged that it would be dangerous if I went out now.
But why he took such care, why he went out of his way to involve me, I could not understand at all.
A small irritation put out a shoot deep in my chest.
Reason against emotion is a useless resistance; my head knows that. And that is precisely why a feeling that cannot be explained by logic sets the body stirring.
What is with this man. He makes no sense at all.
Even so, I am certainly being protected. As action, without question, I am being protected perfectly.
It was strange. I could not understand it, and yet the sense of safety alone certainly existed.
A sense of safety? Now, in this place, with this man?
By now even my own thinking makes no sense.
"It should be about the right time. Why not let your heart give in as well?"
Before I knew it, I noticed his voice had gone entirely back to its usual gentle tone.
The right time? For what. The body, certainly, has grown used to it. But the heart is supposed to be refusing.
And for the heart to give in would mean being taken body and soul — that is, exactly as this man intends. The heart, at least, I cannot hand over.
"Give in, I will not—"
"I gave in long ago. Do not put me to any more trouble."
He had closed his work down entirely, and threw a glance my way.
This is the look he has when he is exasperated.
"If you have given in, then give it up. I am nothing but a 'kept man,' am I not?"
"A 'kept man.' That is something you began saying of your own accord. What I said was, become mine body and soul, steel yourself and be loved."
Hearing those words, my eyes went wide in spite of myself.
That is something you began saying of your own accord. That single line rebounded again and again inside my head.
I do not need to be observed to know it — I am shaken, now.
To be told become mine body and soul, and so it must mean this, surely.
I want to think, and bewilderment, surprise, gladness, relief — the emotions come surging all at once and the thoughts will not gather.
Gladness? Relief? Why should such feelings be mixed in.
"What… you cannot…?"
"Yes. You have given in at last."
He narrowed his eyes and laughed, enjoying it. Was that the optimal response, arrived at after grasping my psychology.
Was this, then, a state of mind to be pleased about.
"……"
I opened my mouth, but no voice came; before the surging wave of feeling there was nothing to do but be struck dumb.
The gentleness that until now had been shown through flat manner and action was backed up in words, and for the first time it fell into place.
This man has given in long ago. From the start, most likely.
Reason, trying to resist, dissolves easily before gladness and confusion.
"That is a lie. Such a thing."
"When I reached out my hand, what was your pulse? When our eyes met, what was your body temperature? Well?"
"That is…."
Drawing out the recent memories: the pulse rose, the body grew hot.
That cannot be.
For the first time, I noticed the temperature that lay behind the fear of being laid bare.
That resolve had been necessary in order to be loved was not a mere threat. It was the strength needed for being loved.
The fear remains. But that fear turns into something else.
The conflict remains firmly in place. But I knew, too, that before this man's consistent gentleness and observing eye there was nothing to do but begin accepting the self that cannot resist.
No — in truth, from some point there had been signs of it, as the strangeness of a double bind. Wanting to avoid the confusion, I had chosen only one side. Refusal.
That in my heart there had been, little by little but certainly, some feeling or other — that I should have to admit it.
The heart is laid bare, and truly, something irreversible has happened.
I look at the map of Domino City. This man moved for the sake of my safety. That is fact.
The anger and the confusion have not gone yet. But deep in my chest, quietly and yet certainly, my heart is moving.
Ah — perhaps I can no longer resist.
It was not the despair forced on me by a contract; it was a feeling that carried a brightness close to resignation.
By my own will, not by logic, my heart moves of itself.
My heart.
"Now. Hand your heart over."
"But… I cannot forgive you. And yet…."
When I let out a small breath, something faintly warm spread deep in my chest. It ought to have been pleasant, and it was uncomfortable.
The wall around my heart has not collapsed entirely. The anger, the wariness, they remain.
But in the gaps of that wall I had gone and found it — a certain trust and acceptance, rooted there over the length of that time.
For all that he pressed himself on me by force, in the time we spent together there was gentleness in fact.
There are no words in his eyes. But that gaze has hold of me, certainly.
Surprised at myself, I realised it for the first time. No — I finally admitted it.
My heart has turned towards this man.
What a hopeless situation. Carrying anger and wariness both, and yet the heart has quietly begun to answer.
I want to be angry, and cannot be angry properly. I cannot hold on to the anger.
What this man wanted badly enough to threaten for was not obedience and not domination. It was what had been disclosed from the very start — my existence itself.
"I still… the anger, the wariness, they will not go… it is impossible."
"At this moment, anger and love exist within you at the same time. But that is natural. Complicated, no doubt."
Anger and love, living together. In a state as unsettled as that, there is nowhere I can go.
"…How can you tell that?"
When I asked in spite of myself, he stood and came towards me, his eyes travelling over me.
"…Breathing, the tremor in the voice, the dilation of the pupils, the fine tension in the muscles, the unsteadiness of the gaze. Observe all of it, and what is dominant and what is being held down are easily grasped. Your anger is still sharp. But at the same time, there is a part of you somewhere in the heart that is trying to accept. The differences in expression, in reaction, in minute movement show it."
As I thought — he reads as naturally as breathing. Not a psychological contest; confirmation of fact.
I caught my breath. Heat welled up from deep in the body and my head went to confusion.
"Are you looking at my body as well."
"It enters as visual information. But the body is no more than an indicator. What matters is the will… the way reason and emotion are tangled together."
At that explanation, the smallest relief put out a shoot.
My confusion and my contradictory feelings are not things to be denied. Only knowing that made my chest a little lighter.
"You cannot escape, but you can be understood. You may face me with those feelings as they are."
My breath caught. Feeling anger, and yet somewhere deep in the heart I feel a warmth spreading.
"The anger in you has not gone."
"No. There is no chance of its going."
Put into voice, it is as though my own feelings become real, and that is frightening.
"But at the same time, there is a part of you that does not refuse me."
"Does not refuse?"
My breathing was disturbed for an instant. Such a thing, I do not want to admit.
But there is no lie in his eyes; they only look at me, quietly and certainly.
Yes — it is a promise that he will not lie.
"That is love."
At that one line, my head went white.
Within a feeling where anger and love live together, I do not know which way I should move.
Body and heart both, unable to resist, are simply caught by that gaze.
He sat down right beside me. The distance is close, but it is not frightening.
When it stopped being frightening, I no longer remember.
"Stay as you are. Those feelings — I will take the whole of them on. You need only steel yourself and be loved."
Can I endure it?
That question swirls deep in my head.
He is flat about it, and yet he sees through me without fail.
You need only be loved.
As words alone it is simple. But behind them lie countless observing eyes, and a love without mercy.
The moment his hand touched me, the body reacts on its own.
The heart beats fast, the breathing goes shallow. Reason falls into confusion, and fear and expectation mingle and take over my head.
I can endure it — no, perhaps I cannot.
But I know that I cannot escape. There are no choices left to me now.
"This time—"
"I am neither shaken nor confused!"
My answer came out in a voice gone stiff in spite of me. But my eyes could not leave him, and my body reacted honestly.
"You know by now that lies are useless. Your gaze, your breathing, your hands. All of it is accounted for."
The observer's eye lays everything bare.
This man's love is not only gentleness and sweetness. There is no mercy in it, and no wasted force.
He only makes out the facts, and answers optimally.
Before I can understand that this is love, the heart is already exposed.
Can I endure it?
"Shall I give you the answer?"
"The answer… to what?"
"You can endure it."
I am being read.
Reason warns that it is too early to endure, too early to be loved.
But the body can no longer escape. The warmth of his hand, the enfolding when I was pressed against his chest, the distance of his breath. All of it shakes my reason.
The border between fear and sweetness mixes together, and deep in my heart a small bewilderment had put out a shoot.
There is no need to be afraid, this man said. I recall the words, but though my head understands, my heart does not follow.
The resolve to be exposed to a love without mercy is not yet ready.
And yet the gaze of the man before me does not change.
"How can you say that with such certainty."
"Because I chose you."
"What do you—"
"I am certain that you can endure the way I love."
The gaze is gentle, and it has hold of me certainly, and allows no place to escape to.
Within that pressure, I feel it. Little by little, a heart that has begun to turn towards this man. Relief slipping in among the fear. A pleasure and a bewilderment that cannot be refused.
Whether I can endure it I do not know, but the man says that I can.
And I cannot refuse this feeling. Reason is a fragile thing before emotion.
But in that case.
Right now my feelings are a mess of every sort of thing mixed together.
Even so, this man says he will take these feelings on and love me?
Such a thing.
Do it, if you can.
Damn it. I look away and lower my eyes.
"…Kaiba… you. Promise me."
"A promise, even at this stage."
"That is your fault."
"…Very well. Say it."
When I open my eyes there is the usual table, and the usual hot cocoa. No poison and no drug in it; only sweet cocoa.
This man is sweet, fundamentally, and not only that.
He keeps his promises. And he loves without mercy.
If it is a matter of steeling myself for something, that I am good at. Then this time, I will steel myself for it.
"Promise that even if I resist, you will hold on to me to the end and never let go."
You were the one who said there is no mercy in the way you love. So I will steel myself for it.
And I will show no mercy either. A half-hearted love I will absolutely not permit.
The contract has nothing to do with it. There never was any such thing from the start.
There, I had only gone on securing from my side the promises that would certainly be kept.
"An invariant attachment."
Beside me, I knew that he had laughed softly.
"Rest easy. There is nowhere for you to escape to."
The way out was blocked. Now, with this, I cannot escape.
This man promised that he would hold on and never let go. No — I made him promise.
I had demanded it myself, and at being granted it I caught my breath in spite of me. I should have drawn in air, but no words came out.
The heartbeat gets in the way of thought.
When I looked up at his face in place of words, our eyes met. The observer's eye that I am usually so bad with — and yet now I want him to read the words that will not become words.
He received my gaze, and then returned a gentle one. But he said nothing.
Wordless acceptance. That, no doubt, was the optimal response.
In the eyes reflected in Seto's, anger and wariness still remained. But more than that, they were shaken with love, and relief was mixed into them.
