Walk forward, into the world

Title: Walk forward, into the world
Author: Ainzfern
Genre: Ai no Kusabi – Post OVA
Code: Iason/Riki
Rating: NC-17
Parts: WIP – 5/?


“Here.”

The clatter of the heavy item landing on Riki’s desk right beside his terminal startled him deeply and he cursed, swiping away the small splash of coffee he’d slopped beside the keyboard and glaring up at Katze, who was grinning smugly and standing right beside him.

“Did you have to do that?”

Katze removed the smoldering cigarette from his mouth and blew a stream of sweet-scented smoke across the top of Riki’s head. “Not really, but then it’s amazing the things an ex-Furniture will do for a laugh.”

“Funny.” Riki deadpanned. His brow creased curiously as he picked up the object Katze had just thrown down. It was a man’s silver bracelet; the heavy yet elegantly cast links glinting in the light filtering through Riki’s bedroom window. Holding it up to Katze he arched a brow at him. “What’s this for?”

Katze sat down on the end of Riki’s bed, looking at him in a mildly amused manner. “Well, where I come from, we call it a gratuity.”

“Katze,” Riki rolled his eyes and dropped the bracelet back onto the desk-top, swiveling his chair around to fully face his boss, “You came out of the slums, just like I did and I’m telling you, man, no-one there uses that word.”

Sighing with mock-sufferance Katze frowned at him. “It’s a gift, Riki,” He explained pointedly, “A little acknowledgment for a job well done.” He smiled, genuine approval lighting his eyes. “The crack job you did on the federation up-link that I passed to you last week was good work. I was very pleased with the outcome.”

Riki snorted and drained the remaining half of his semi warm coffee, wrinkling his nose slightly at the tepid taste of it. “You mean the Elites who used the information in the up-link to batter down their trade opponents were very pleased with the outcome,” he corrected wryly.

“Well,” Katze leaned back on his hands, grinning smugly. “As we say in the business, my luck is your luck, Riki.”

Setting his coffee cup down, Riki picked up the bracelet and examined it again. “It’s nice, thanks.”

“So you like it?”

“I guess,” Shrugging in a non-committal way, Riki winked at him. “I would’ve preferred the keys to a new hover-bike, but…”

Katze snorted gracelessly. “I think you’d have to crack something a little larger if you want a ‘thank you’ that big.”

“Like what?”

“Jupiter Tower, perhaps?” Katze’s reply was blandly smug.

“Fuck off,” Riki told him amiably, slipping the bracelet onto his wrist and securing the clasp. He looked up again, his smile almost shy. “Seriously, I like it.”

“Good.”

“And I deserve it, man” Riki’s rakish grin returned, “That was one hell of a boring subject I had to crack into.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Katze examined his fingernails for a moment, “There are some people who would say that reserve pricings on raw fuel deposits are just full of quiet interest.”

“Yeah. Well, I never want to meet ‘em.”

“Trust me,” Katze murmured, his eyes shifting to look out the window. “That will never be an issue for you.” He frowned then, his mouth turning down at the corners.

“What? What is it?” Caught by the change, Riki got to his feet and approached the window. As he looked out he felt the same slow wave of helpless anger roil through his guts again. “Damn it,” he sighed softly, his eyes staring fixedly at the wretched tableau in the square outside the safe-house’s outer walls. “They got another one.”

“Hmm.” Peripherally, Riki saw Katze joining him at the window, heard the click of his lighter as he lit his next cigarette. “We’re close to the edge of Midas here, you see,” he murmured, “It happens fairly regularly, I’m afraid.”

“So I’ve come to realize,” Riki replied in a dull hurt voice.

In the square just beyond the wall, a group of slum thugs had gathered around a slender solitary young man, their predatory intent visible even at this distance. The young man was crouched against the side of a building, attempting to shield himself from the barrage of kicks and blows the gang was raining down on him.

It was very clear to Riki that the young victim was an ex-Pet.

Just like all the rest he had seen fall to the same cruel fate over the weeks he had been living here.

“It’s not fair, Katze,” Riki muttered, watching as the group moved on, leaving the broken and bloody corpse crumpled against the wall like so much garbage. “All they’re trying to do is escape the whore-pits of Midas.”

“You cannot get involved, Riki,” Katze’s tone was deadly serious. “You cannot do anything that might bring the wrong sort of attention to the business that we run here.”

“I know.” Riki sighed again, not at all surprised to note that his hands were tightly clenched. “I just wish we could.”

“Riki…”

“Just something, y’know?” Riki shook his head. “A safe haven. A place to hide, where they could have some protection. We could do it, Katze.”

With a low growl, Katze grabbed Riki’s arm, jerking him roughly around to face him. “Put the notion out of your head, kid,” he hissed, his eyes flashing sudden anger. “You are talking about the kind of foolish pseudo-revolutionary act that would do nothing but bring the full force of the Elite law officials down on you!”

“What?” Riki wrenched his arm free, stepping back and glaring at the ex-Furniture, “All I’m a talking about is- -“

“It won’t work!” Katze moved forward into his space once more. “No one wants them, Riki. The Elite don’t want them because they simply won’t acknowledge that they even exist. Midas doesn’t want them because they are a living reminder of the average citizen’s true ugliness of soul, and the slums of Ceres won’t help them because even the lowly need to feel superior to someone.”

“Fuck it all, Katze!’ Riki shouted, pointing wildly at the window. “That could’ve been me! Do you get that? It could have been me!”

He broke off, trembling, his chest heaving in great sharp pants.

Slowly, Katze approached him, gripping both his shoulders in a firm but gentle hold and looking at him with deep compassion on his scarred face. “Do you think I don’t know that?”

“Katze…” Riki choked on the word, swallowing hard. He pushed away again and sat back at his desk, roughly swiping the back of his hand across his glistening eyes to clear them.

“Do you think I don’t hear what you suffer in the night, Riki?” Katze asked in that same gentle tone.

Startled, Riki stared up at him.

“You know that I have a secondary link to my office here, don’t you? Just two doors down from this room?” Katze smiled, but there was no humor in it, “Every night that I come to work here instead of travelling to my apartment, I hear you.”

Riki broke his gaze, averting his eyes to the floor.

“Every night that I am here, Riki,” Katze continued implacably.

“I don’t…”

“Are you dreaming of him? Still? Even after all this time?”

Jerking his head up, Riki snarled at him. “No,” he literally spat the words out, “I don’t dream of him. He’s dead. There’s nothing to dream of there. There never was.”

“And you expect me to believe that?”

“Shit, Katze,” Riki threw his hands up in a frustrated gesture, “Think about it for a second, would you? I was castrated, poisoned and blown up, all in one fuckin’ day! Don’t you think that entitles me to wake up screaming every now and then?!”

Once more sitting down slowly on the edge of Riki’s bed, Katze looked at him with an almost apologetic expression. “You don’t wake up screaming, Riki,” he said softly. “You wake up sobbing.”

Riki felt his face blanch, the words bulleting through his head like a strike of lightening. He froze, his eyes widening and staring at nothing, his breath stilling in his throat.

For a moment, there was no sound at all then…

“Get out,” Riki whispered.

“No.”

“Get the fuck out, Katze,” Riki whispered again, his hands clenching once more, white knuckled and shaking.

“No.” Undaunted, Katze simply continued to stare at him. “I need you to tell me the truth, Riki.”

Painfully, Riki closed his eyes, his mind whirling with thoughts both confusing and contradictory. He felt sick. Tired. All he really knew for sure right now was that he didn’t want to have this conversation.

There was only so much probing a raw wound could take.

“The truth about what?” he asked through his suddenly clenched jaw.

“Did you love him?”

Heaving a great sigh, Riki let his head drop forward. “Katze, there’s no fuckin’ point in answering that question now.” He said tightly, “Iason is dead, okay? What I feel, or felt, or didn’t feel… It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“It matters, Riki,” Katze replied, the intensity in his voice equaling Riki’s own. “You may not understand it, but it matters. Please... tell me.”

Looking up at him once more, Riki grew still, shocked at the depth of feeling reflecting back at him from the ex-Furniture’s eyes. In that single moment, he saw Katze’s own pain, as real as his own, and he wet his lips and nodded, reluctantly, but nevertheless a confirmation.

“Yes,” he murmured on a mere breath of sound. “Yes, Katze. I loved him.”

Katze closed his eyes for a moment, the tension leaving his shoulders. “He loved you too, you know.”

“I know,” Riki sat back again. “I didn’t get that at first but, I saw it… just before the end. In his eyes.”

“Well, you got to keep that much, at least.” Rising to his feet, Katze turned to leave.

“Hey,” Setting his jaw, Riki waited until Katze turned back to face him. “That tank that Raoul Am put me in..? The one that healed me? ”

“Yes?” Katze frowned slightly.

“Did it occur to you to ask that Blondie to shove you in it for a while?” Riki felt his eyes narrowing, his anger seeping back in through the cracks of his pain. “Y’know, maybe grow back a couple of things you lost a while back?”

Katze’s face paled. “You little bastard,” his hissed softly.

“Oh c’mon, boss,” Riki’s mouth twisted, “Fair’s fair. You got me to answer a couple of questions that I didn’t want to… so you get to do the same.”

Pulling in a deep breath, his nostrils white and pinched with anger, Katze shook his head shortly. “No, I did not ask.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t care to experience the way it would feel when I was told no.”

Nodding, Riki pressed his lips tightly together, acknowledging the truth in Katze’s harsh expression. “Hurts, doesn’t it?” he asked quietly, his own expression softening once more.

For a moment Katze just stared at him then, with a tiny grimace, he nodded. “Yes, it does.”

“Then we’re even.”

“I suppose we are.” Glancing out the window briefly, Katze drew his shoulders back. “I’ll come by tomorrow with your next set of files. Early evening, if that’s okay with you.”

“It’s fine.” Riki told him as he turned towards the door. “Oh… and boss?”

“Yes?” Katze didn’t turn around, but the tilt of his jaw told him he was listening.

“Have a good night, okay?”

Katze sighed deeply. “You too, Riki,” he murmured.

With that said, he left in silence, while Riki turned back to his terminal once more.


TBC…