#sumikifics

Francis is draped across the couch when Arthur enters the room, cold and tired from a busy day at work.

With nimble fingers he unbuttoned his drab brown coat, taking time on the more stubborn ones before draping it on his coat rack. Francis watched him with lidded eyes, resting his head against his hand and allowing a smile to play across his lips.

"How was your day, monsieur?"

He didn't say anything; just removed his gloves and stuffed them in his pockets, before stooping down to remove his leather boots and black socks.

"..." Francis slowly sat up straight. "...Arthur."

"I'm not in the mood." He snaps, and it's not Francis's fault and he knows it.

--

She stops when he draws closer, holding her fan up to her face instinctively. "Judal-chan?"

"Quiet. I'm thinking." He observes her large pink eyes and button nose, before resting his gaze on her lips. They were certainly kissable; nice and plump, though nowhere as pretty as the third princess's, but slightly chapped and girly, nonetheless. He considers lathering peach across her lips to soften them.

"...You're too close." He briefly looked up at her mumbling, idly taking a bite out of his peach before scowling, flicking his eyes up at the ceiling. There wasn't enough left for a peach balm.

"Maybe you're too close." He counters; watching in amusement as she processed this, and to his delight, flushed candy, stumbling back.

"Calm down, I'm just playing with you." He raises his hands and cartwheels over to her, landing gracefully in front of her tiny form. She smiles, tilting her head in a way Judal would find adorable, if he used that sort of language. At his kindest, Kougyoku was simply "mildly entertaining".

(typically, he replied with variations of the word annoying.)

"How do you suppose ol' Sin kisses?" He rests a lazy hand on his hip. She practically buries her face in the fan.

"A p-princess doesn't think about such things." She raises her head, spreading the fan. Judal nods, biting into the core of his peach.

"Yet you do anyway." He catches her biting her lip from behind the sheer fabric. Judal smirks.

"I--You musn't tell anyone!" He blinks when suddenly her fan is dangling in front of his face, pointed dangerously in a position to slit his throat. This was an interesting development. He followed the length of her slender arm to her face, to the determination reflected in her eyes, even with her cheeks still painted pink and her lip still pouty.

Judal holds back a smile. He'd never let Sindria have this one.

The magi took a delicate step forward, pushing her fan down and taking one last bite of his peach before throwing it behind him. He's shocked when she doesn't object to him leaning in and resting his arms on her fragile shoulders.

"Now, have you ever been kissed hag?" He lowers his voice to a sultry number, all slow and husky.

She turns even more red, if that was physically possible. Judal would have to go on a toddler's color hunt later.

"...yes." Judal pauses, his arms tensing. Well, that had not been the answer he was expecting. He bit back an angry accusation, choosing to throw her answer right out the palace window.

Strangely determined, he leaned in closer so that their noses touched. He watched her for a reaction, and when he got none, let his warm breath ghost over her lips before tilting his head and pressing his mouth to hers.

She shut her eyes almost immediately, stiffening. Judal tsked, his eyes wide open as he took in her childish features. He tentatively flicked his tongue against her lower lip, wrapping his arms around her upper back. Some sort of a pleased whimper rises from the back of her throat, and Judal dully realizes he has overstayed his welcome.

Before she can kiss back he lets go of her, stepping back and crossing his arms behind his back. Kougyoku presses fingers to her lips, lightly tapping them. Judal sighs dramatically, already bored and slightly anxious. “Well, time to raid the garden for peaches.”

He's 15, she's 17, and both sit in a field of magnolias.

Yamuraiha plucks some magnolias from the meadow, seething before pausing and moving to pick up spare flowers off the ground instead. She rubs her lips together subconsciously.

Sharrkan swings his sword around and plunges it into the dirt, scowling as he props a lean leg up. The magician turned to face him with a cold grimace. "Keep your dirty knife out of this beautiful meadow."

He pulls the sword out of the ground and points it in her direction. "That's a sword to you, desperate. And I don't want to hear it from a teeth-clasher."

Flushing, she turned back, grumbling something as she continued to pick up more magnolias, focusing her attention on the flowers she couldn't find on Sindria. Maybe if she brought it back to the palace Ja'far-san would...?

Nope. The idea shuts down before it passes phase one. His instructions had been clear: Don't ever leave Sindria without informing Sinbad or I of your whereabouts.

She looked around at the unknown island and hurried her picking up of magnolias. Yamu paused when she felt an arm encircle her waist, pulling her upwards. She looked to the side and up at Sharrkan, who was looking away, as if uncomfortable.

"...Be honest. Do you think I have good kissing skills?"

"No." She interrupts before he can continue. "Is this about that girl you like? Haven't you gotten over that?"

"It's not!" He removes his hand from her waist, rubbing the back of his neck as he stepped away. "I just..."

She regarded him, the too-tall boy with the golden eyes, before grabbing his hand and pulling him with her towards the shoreline. "There's a whole section over there with more magnolias and other flowers. Help me look for some."

"Why should--" Yamu raises a hand to silence to him, and he waits, holding on to her hand and walking in tune with her. She sighs, in pure regret, before continuing. "I'll help you hide your drinking habits from Ja'far-san. For only a month." She quickly added.

He nods, pleased with this deal. They grow closer to the meadow, and Yamu holds her arms full with magnolias close to her, before letting go of Sharrkan and turning to whisper in his ear.

"You're a sloppy kisser; I'd get rid of the saliva."

--

Rio sits on a throne of lies.

The throne is, admittedly, rather pretty, with falsehoods weaved into the intricate fabric she's dolled it in and a flush of velvet keeping her in all her cruel wickedry afloat. The cushion is the most stunning, an impossibly, impossible crimson that mirrors the color her own cheeks once took—

Too soon, she thinks, for thinking is all she can do now.

Death is not as bad of an experience that she had been lead to believe; a crying toddler learning for the first time what it meant for the jaws of death to snatch away someone in the blink of an eye. Leaning to her dear, dear, dear brother for support, as she bawled in the darkness of the station, tears still glistening on rouge cheeks as the old officer shooed them off, grumbling about stupid children.

(—but then, she's never really been human, let alone a human child, has she?)

And she is alone. She sits on a throne in not-hell (but close enough), and she endures the petals that fall next to her, unsure of why she even dreams up a tree in the first place. It's terrible useless, now that she's dead and all, unable to even get up to pick up the spare petals. Merag—Rio, she curses at herself—is frozen solid; lips frosted and every bit of her colder than the old Arctic.

Everything she sees with her wide eyes is false, yet his warm breath ghosting on her neck shouldn't feel so real, so explicitly unattainable. His sinfully scorching lips nip all so wrongly down her neckline, mouth marring her cold flesh with melting kisses until her skin starts to melt. This version she's created for herself is mocking her, she's absolutely sure. You, see, we're both dead. But I'm the only one who was ever actually human.

It's a terrible reminder she's dug for herself, fire always beats ice, and if it was a sin for her to torture herself and his blessed memory with these dreams, then she'd ask to go to hell. If only she wasn't still contemplating whether that was where she was currently. Sinking into depravity has been a long, if unstoppable, journey, and she gives herself props for still being able to think rationally.

Wonderful. Her vision blurs as he turns almost briefly transparent, not-quite-so-adult hands working their way down her alien waist. I come here to get my hands on you, and you still sulk the day away. Thomas is, a strange light in her bleary world, all primary with his reds and yellows and pumpkin oranges.

Some days, she'll think she'd like to be able to move, very much. Rise off the throne she's built for herself and grab him and press her lips against his, until his flames-sparked eyes turned icy blue and he's turned as dull and worthless as her. She wonders how long she'd be able to get him to stay with her, as lively and bright as he was, in this cold world she's found herself in. Wonders if he'd agree to let her bury him in the very blue petals that dance around her feet.

It's almost disgusting.

He makes her feel deliciously human, something she's been deprived with ever since she'd heard the blasted news (darling, you've never truly been of this earth), and he's a guilty desire she won't give up. She'll replay him melting her until she's past the point of no return, and she'll hate him in the most twisted sense the whole while.

She has eternity alone to do it. 

.

.

"Have you ever been?"

"What?"

"Have you ever been to the ocean?" He repeats, smiling at her with a strange sort of giddiness in his eyes. Armin is irresponsibly trusting, but never gullible.

Her hand clenches at her side, and she looks down, anywhere but into his eyes. "...Of course not. How could I?" She spits it out, letting some of her bitterness flow out with her words.

"Oh." He lets out a disappointed breath. "I suppose it would have been too much to hope that it was walking distance."

"My hometown is barely walking distance." She points out, her short blonde hair brushing against her neck as she looks back up. He grins again, and it's so unbearably friendly and warm, both things she's not used to, that she looks away again.

"I don't know too much about your hometown. What was it like?" A split second passes, and suddenly he's a lot closer than he used to be, and her breath clenches in her throat.

".....The usual." She's awfully careful with her words, playing them out in her head while making words with her mouth. "...Surrounded by Titans, hiding, most of the village eaten..."

"I see."

Her hand brushes the back of her neck as she sweeps her hair into her hand and ties it up briefly with a spare hair-tie Mina had given her. He says nothing for a while afterwards, and their shallow breathing is drowned out by the muffled noise the boy's dorm behind them is making.

Deep down inside, Annie knows that he's aware that she's lying. For whatever reason he may have, he chooses not to say anything about it. She thanks him silently.

"What is the ocean like then?"

"...Blue. But lots of green and white and purple and pinks too."

"Really?" She finally gains the courage to look him in the eye. He's intently listening, and she flushes at his attention.

"...It's loud. It can be peaceful one second, but then scary and dangerous the next." She continues, her hand briefly playing out a little wave pattern.

"It's like another world."

"..." He sighs then, all dreamy and longing at once. His eyelashes flutter like a hopeful girl's, and now he's the one who looks away.

"....We should go one day."

This makes her blink. "What?"

"You've never been to the ocean either, right? One day when this is all over, let's go." He makes strong eye contact with her blue ones, grinning widely.

"I mean,” he corrects with a light scatter of red across his cheeks, “ Eren and Mikasa are coming too, and it'd be nice to take everyone on a group trip but--"

"Impossible." She cuts him off with one word, not giving him a chance to speak again. "We'll all be dead before then." It'll all be my fault.

"...No." He says loudly, and some of the voices in the rooms behind him suddenly disappear. "We won't. We're stronger than that. We can survive."

"You'll survive Armin." There is no reason for him to, the boy who barely flew through physical training, but she knows he will. "...And you should be the one to go see the ocean."

She turns before he can answer and she rushes off. The door to the boy's dorm opens. "Annie! Annie! Annie, wait!"

"Armin, for fuck's sake, talk to your girlfriend tomorrow; some of us are trying to SLEEP."

She doesn't stick around to hear the reply. If she were were him, she would have kicked horse-face in the crotch, but she's only a shadow in the night, and she has no valid opinion.

Yet he still thinks she's worthy of joining him in glimpsing the ocean in all it's wonder.

“I made you chocolate.” He says after a few seconds, holding out a pan of messy brown lumps. She's too busy staring at his outfit to notice.

“Your clothes.” She says, stuttering as she wonders how the hell someone could screw up that bad. He let out an impatient sigh, fumbling as he rubbed the sole of his right shoe against the bare skin of his left leg. “Yeah, yeah I know. Long story short I asked the little rich girl from Sinnoh to help me out.” He sighed, as if remembering a painful memory. “She can't cook.”

“You didn't have to.” She takes the pan with both her hands, meaning every word she said. “I mean, you should have just bought a batch of brownies at the bakery.”

“Yeah I know,” Gold grins all lopsidedly, “But I wanted to try it. You're my last stop.”

Last stop? Last stop. She's suddenly painfully aware that this isn't an attempt on his part to serenade her. “You made these for the other dex holders too?”

“Yeah of course.” He eyes her with a confused look in his eye, and he looks embarrassingly comical; half-naked like he had just gone through a grenade shower and rosy cheeks dusted with flour. “Why wouldn't I?”

She realizes her mistake too late when his eyes widen before her mouth can retort, “Were you hoping I made them just for you?” He grins. Fuck, damn, shit.

“Of course not.” She says, her voice an octave higher than it should be as she steps back into her house. “Thank you for the cookies, but you should be going now--”

“WAIT.” She pauses just as she's about to close the door. He waits for a second, allowing an awkward silence to commence, before continuing. “I was planning on bunking at your house.” 

He looks to the left before meeting her eyes again. "My house is under... repairs. Silver's out to kill me anyway."

“Really?” She raises an eyebrow, before he interrupts. “I promise I won't do anything bad to you, I give you my word on that.” She crosses her arms, and he looks her dead in the eye, and he looks almost... apologetic.

She lets him in despite her mind screaming for her to reconsider, and she's not sure whether its due to the effort he put into the cookies that she gave in, or due to the fact that he promised to give up chasing after girls for a week.

–

(--he lied, she thinks furiously, accidentally catching him lewdly flirting with a Unovian beauty.)