The Peninsula

The Fiction and Poetry Archive of Liana Mir and scribblemyname

Hands

Mar
07

Saruhiko is good with his hands.

Typing is one thing, and some people might complain that he’s too attached to his computers and gadgets, but Yata loves it, loves seeing the things he’s good at it and what he can do with any system, given enough time and plied with enough food to keep him going. (Saruhiko claims he doesn’t need the food actually.)

Knives is another, and even when they were at each other’s throats, Yata found his eyes drawn to the flick of wrist and fingers, the twirl of blade, silver flashing.

Yata loves to watch those hands.

Change of Plans

Mar
07

He had a plan, a perfect plan even. All it required was Chuuya to cooperate.

Dazai considered that and changed the plan. The only part Chuuya would cooperate with was the one that ended with Chuuya’s fist or foot through the middle of Dazai’s chest, and he wouldn’t fake it, so Dazai would have to think of another way to leave the Mafia and take Chuuya with him.

He didn’t need to drug his partner’s drink, kidnap him, and blow up his car to cover their tracks.

On the plus side, death by Chuuya was still a very real possibility.

Early to Bed

Mar
07

“Dammit, Dazai, you are nothing but skin and bones!” Chuuya complained as he shoved his extremely bony elbow into Dazai’s side to shove him over some.

“Chuuya!” Dazai ignored the hypocritically bony elbow in his gut and wrapped his arms around his short, hot-tempered partner. If he was getting shoved to the floor, he was taking Chuuya with him.

It was a brief struggle, which Chuuya normally might have won, but somehow he ended up flushed red and under Dazai.

“Stop hugging me, you bandaged octopus bastard!” Chuuya muttered.

“I think I’ll sleep here,” Dazai disagreed to Chuuya’s futile sputtering.

Beta

Mar
06

Mikoto had never had alignment testing. It was usually obvious from appearances whether someone needed comfort when hurt or needed to give it when someone else was.

But his family hadn’t cared and neither had he, and somewhere along the way he realized he didn’t feel either.

But he let them comfort him, Tatara and Izumo, when they noticed him brooding, let Tatara try and amazingly succeed at drawing him out of his worst aftermaths. And he let them draw comfort, Anna sitting next to him, claiming his attention with a small hand.

He didn’t feel broken for the lack.

Watching and Waiting

Mar
06

Rhezere’s been staring after Cor from the moment he first saw him.

Kasuru never interfered beyond the reminder that future pilots shouldn’t interact with future integrates. It kept Rhezere from speaking and safeguarded him for the moment they might meet mind to mind.

But he never stopped staring at the way Cor threw himself over the wings and under the bellies of the spaceships he repaired, the way he streamed to practice flights, the way he honed his body in anticipation of his affinity for war.

Cor would be a warship one day, no doubt. Rhezere would be his pilot.

Denial

Mar
05

“Early stages,” the doctor went on and Chuuya barely heard him, still stuck on such completely unexpected results.

It was his second annual hanahaki screening. Kouyou had insisted from the time he hit puberty that he use a fake identity and show up dutifully at the hospital a city over to get them.

He also wasn’t in love.

“There isn’t anyone,” he cut impatiently into the doctor’s rambling. “I’m not in love with anyone.”

The doctor blinked. “Well, you’re a teenager. It may be puppy love and go away.”

“Familial love?” he asked hopefully. Maybe it was Kouyou.

But no.

A Fishy Proposition

Mar
05

“So what kind of fish are you?” Dazai asked skeptically.

Chuuya shot him a rude glare and a ruder gesture. “I’m not a fucking fish, mackerel.”

Dazai’s eyes widened. “Could you? Fuck me, that is?”

The look on Chuuya’s face was priceless, clearly torn between killing Dazai on the spot and his stated desire to never give Dazai what he wanted. “No,” he finally settled for saying.

But his face was a little red. Was he angry or— “Did I make you blush?” Dazai asked leaning in.

Chuuya pulled him into the water with a splash. “I’m not fucking you.”

Thirsty

Mar
04

His mouth went dry, as if he were suddenly parched.

Saruhiko had seen Misaki without his shirts before, had yanked the collar down himself to see what was going on with the mark of Mikoto’s aura, but this was the first time since they’d reconciled that Misaki had tossed off all the layers aimlessly, complaining of summer heat, and padded barefoot into the kitchen to make dinner.

Saruhiko watched as he had always watched his friend, but there was definitely something different than just “summer” heat making him flushed and thirsty.

“What do you want?” Misaki asked.

Saruhiko shrugged. You.

Memories of Us

Mar
02

Anna took the camera out a year after Tatara’s death. Mikoto wasn’t there for her to wake up with it or make memories with. There was no Tatara to absolve her if they damaged the camera.

Even so, she wanted to add her own memories to HOMRA again, so she took the camera in her hand and went out to find Misaki.

He sucked in a breath when he saw it but pasted on a smile as he waved. Fushimi stared at her a moment.

“It’s good to see you,” she said softly.

He was part of their memories too.

Butterflies

Feb
27

Izumo never used to mind butterflies. They weren’t important, pretty enough when one floated by on a breeze. Now, he looks at them like they hurt him personally.

It was just the three of them once upon a time, before Clans and Kings and the Dresden Slates changed everything. It was Tatara and Mikoto and Izumo—friends.

The butterflies he sees now aren’t made of fire and red aura. They don’t rise from Tatara’s hands like proof that flame can be beautiful and not deadly, wielded by the right hands. Everything is gone—Tatara, Mikoto—leaving only Izumo and butterflies.

Quieted

Feb
27

She woke him from a world ending in fire.

Mikoto opened his eyes wide in the dark, heart still hammering, aura still thrumming under his skin and in his blood with the ever-present urge to Burn them. Anna’s serious face, her grim mouth, and intent gaze were mere inches away.

He sat up. “Anna.”

“Nightmare,” she said quietly, simply. It disarmed his desire to brush her off gruffly.

Instead, he allowed her to clamber into the bed beside him and tuck herself under his arm, fingers clutching his shirt over his ribs.

They fell asleep like that, his nightmares quieted.

Trusting

Feb
26

Her little brother was so small.

Zana stared at him, tucked away like a curled up kitten beneath the blanket in her narrow bunk. She barely remembered him, a newborn when she’d been forced to leave.

But here he was now, his breaths soft and even with sleep, his freckled face open and trusting. She wondered why he would trust when it was their own mother that had brought him to the training facility and abandoned him to his sister’s arms.

Zana sighed and shifted in the chair to gently kiss the top of his hair. “I won’t leave you.”

Needs Met

Feb
24

Yata was floored when he realized Saruhiko had never been fussed over, and despite his glassy-eyed illness, managed to convey so much confusion that Yata was taking care of him, it made something in Yata’s chest hurt.

Yata knew he was hardwired to take care of people, but this was Saruhiko. It wasn’t just that need to comfort that had him pasting on his cheeriest expression and trying to show a comforted what it felt like to finally get what he needed.

It took a while, but finally Saruhiko relaxed. He gave the tiniest smile, and Yata’s finally felt real.

Comfort Care

Feb
23

Chuuya always assumed the reason Dazai was an attention whore was because Dazai was one of those people who needed to be fussed over whenever he was hurt.

Which made it annoying when Dazai insisted on treating Chuuya like he needed to be fussed over and comforted in the aftermath of Corruption.

“Go away.”

“What if you died in here?”

He didn’t need Dazai bringing him food, checking his bandages, not when Chuuya itched to do the same for the guy with nothing worse than a broken leg. He hated Dazai, so he resisted.

Dazai petted Chuuya’s hair.

Chuuya groaned.

Weapon

Feb
22

The girl’s golden brown skin was coated in blood. It had splattered across her arms, her heathered green tank top and trousers, and the military boots she wore.

Her grey eyes were grim, her mouth a straight slash, but she seemed to catalogue the bodies surrounding her with mechanical detachment. The troop captain stared at her in horror. He’d been sent to extract a thirteen-year-old girl—not this.

She shrugged her shoulders, and something silver and shimmery poured out of her skin, covering her before flowing across the pile of bodies. It vanished, and with it, the dead and the blood.

Let It Go

Feb
21

Cor knew it wasn’t a lack of trust that made Rhezere shy away from displaying any kind of vulnerability with his own integrate. There were enough issues bubbling between their minds that the filter couldn’t hide for Cor to know it wasn’t even personal. But it grated.

“You okay?” No matter how neutral and offhand the delivery…

“Aww, Cor, you were worried about me!” Rhezere always managed to brush it off with brilliant smiles, a light tone, deliberately changing the subject to something annoying. Anything to avoid letting Cor acknowledge there was vulnerability.

Never talked about the scars they both knew weren’t from accidents. Never talked about the people Rhezere wouldn’t admit to caring about. Never talked about the fact that Cor preferring to sleep in Rhezere’s room wasn’t only because they were synced.

Cor sighed in disgust and let it go.

Define Lonely

Feb
21

She’d never kissed anyone’s mouth, or anyone at all but her little brother after he’d become the only family she’d ever keep. Zana ran the Ijeve pilot and integrate training program with iron will, turning out batch after batch of fleet-ready spaceships and pilots. It didn’t leave time for romance.

“Have you considered—”

“No, Hasu,” she ordered her fellow station head.

“You’ll be lonely,” he suggested quietly. She thought he’d married at some point, had children.

A ship sang in her mind, though anchored, her brother called frequently, and her students and staff filled her days. “I’m not lonely.”

Disbelief

Feb
21

“I love you.” The words were spoken hesitantly enough, slow and thoughtful, with that gleam in Dazai’s eyes that meant he found them just as strange as his hearer did.

That didn’t make his hearer believe them.

Chuuya stared at him, eyes hard, heart full of doubt. “Did you ever love anything or anyone in your life?”

Dazai drew back, visibly stung. “How rude, hatrack. Even you knew about Oda.”

Chuuya hissed through his teeth. Yes, he knew about Oda. Dazai had never looked at Chuuya like he’d looked at Oda.

Dazai? Love Chuuya? He scoffed. “I don’t believe you.”

Stray Child

Feb
20

“Kasuru?”

Kasuru looked up from the ship plans he’d been poring over with Nanere for half the night. He was the designer; she was the builder ripping apart his every bad idea.

It was well past when Rhezere went to bed. The boy was getting longer, and he looked at Nanere like he was deciding how much vulnerability to show with someone else present.

He sighed and trailed over to the couch behind Kasuru’s worktable and flopped down with his blanket. In moments, his breath evened in sleep.

“You have a kid,” Nanere said.

Kasuru shook his head. “He’s not mine.”

She looked pointedly over at the boy curled into his blanket, choosing to sleep near Kasuru rather than in his own dark room and bed.

“He is.”

Healing Moment

Feb
20

He knew it was a bad decision the moment he did it. It had been months since the last time Rhezere contemplated the knives in the drawer with more than clinical disinterest in slicing food. Now, the blood welled up over his fingers as he cradled his arm and stared down at it.

He felt nothing, then sudden overwhelming panic flooded into the spaces where his heart was numb.

He went without thinking, moving quickly into Kasuru’s office where he was meeting with the ship builder Nanere.

She stared.

Kasuru said nothing, just pulled Rhezere to the space beside him and took down the healing scanner, a steadying hand firm on Rhezere’s shoulder.

Nanere dropped her gaze back to the plans they’d been discussing. Kasuru patiently ran over the arm until the wound no longer gaped. The flesh still looked raw and blotchy, less severe but not fully healed.

Kasuru wrapped it in bandages, then tucked his fingers under Rhezere’s chin to draw his gaze up. “We’ll let it rest overnight then look at it again.”

Nothing could be healed in a moment.

Rhezere knew that. Something inside him eased at realizing he’d been willing to be healed at all.