Big Book of Writing

Under the Starlight (Sanniuri, SDRA2)

Prompt: https://otpprompts.tumblr.com/post/86839643447/imagine-your-otp-falling-asleep-under-the-stars/amp

"Imagine your OTP falling asleep under the stars together... Only to wake up covered in bug bites."

Happy Sannoyomi Day to those who celebrate! It's still a day early for me lol

***

"Mr. Yomiuri! I'm back!" Mikado called, entering the apartment uninvited. 

It was normal for him to break into Nikei's living space, but he made a habit to announce when he was coming in. He usually arrived to check on the journalist, and either forced him into testing food or putting up with his cuddling. He considered it a challenge to see how long it took before Nikei could drive him out, like a bucking bronco ride.

This evening, nobody responded to him at all. That was strange by itself, the journalist would normally yell at him to 'fuck off!' at the very least if he wasn't in the same room as Mikado. The wizard wasn't deterred by this, he was determined to find his cute toy.

After poking his head into a few rooms, he finally found Nikei in his designated 'work room' that he kept separate from his bedroom. The journalist was concentrating on his laptop, and his notepad had been attached to the side of the monitor with tape. His other papers had been propped up nearby so he could see them without looking at his desk.

Mikado slipped into the room with a mischievous smile on his mask, watching over the smaller man as he worked. "Good evening, Mr. Yomiuri! It's a beautiful sunset outside, isn't there?" he loudly announced.

Mikado's words were met with silence as the journalist kept on typing. He wondered if Nikei was either giving him the silent treatment or just trying to ignore him, and decided to change up his methods. Making another plan, he left the room.

A few minutes later, he returned with some heated leftovers on a plate and chopsticks. Bending down to Nikei's eye level, he picked up a piece of food with the chopsticks and touched it to the other man's mouth.

"Mr. Yomiuri, you have to eat something! Shall I feed it to you?" Mikado laughed, expecting Nikei to react angrily from having something shoved in his face. All of his angry, grumpy, or irritated reactions only served to instill further amusement in the wizard.

But to his shock, Nikei didn't have that kind of reaction at all. Instead, he quietly took the food from the chopsticks with his mouth, and quickly ate it while continuing to work. This was an unexpected outcome, but still an interesting one for the wizard.

Mikado repeated the action out of curiosity, and Nikei ate the food once again. He continued to feed the other man, wondering just how much of the plate would be clear before he got noticed by the journalist.

It wasn't long before some of the food's sauce ended up on Nikei's chin, and he wiped it with his hand out of discomfort. When Nikei took a closer look at what he wiped off, his focus from his computer broke and he became aware of his surroundings.

He felt something touch his lips, and he turned to see Mikado kneeling at his eye-level, feeding him with chopsticks. Filled with shock and anger, he hit the chopsticks away from his face and made Mikado accidentally lose his grip on them.

"What the fuck?! How long have you been here?!" Nikei shouted, standing up from his chair.

Mikado clicked his tongue and began cleaning up the mess on the floor. "Honestly, what a waste of food. I really expected you'd know the importance of such things, Mr. Yomiuri-"

"Shut up! Get out of my apartment!" Nikei demanded.

"My, you're quite irritable today. How long have you been working on that article?" the wizard asked, depositing the chopsticks and dropped food into a garbage bin nearby. "Well, that doesn't matter! I wanted to show you something this time!"

Nikei sat back down in his chair and glared at Mikado. "You came into my room just for that," he questioned, "when you could have been doing literally anything else?"

"Yes, I wouldn't have broken in-!" Mikado stopped in the middle of his sentence. "...Well, I probably would have broken into your apartment anyway, just for the hell of it. But this thing is really cool! come on, I'll show you!"

Instead of hollering more at Mikado, Nikei didn't resist when the wizard grabbed his arm and pulled him back to his feet. "Fine, I'll go. Only if it'll get you to shut up for a while," he reluctantly agreed, knowing that this annoying wizard wouldn't leave him alone even if he told him to.

With a spring in his step, Mikado dragged Nikei out of the apartment and down the street. It took a few minutes to reach, but their destination was at the top of a tall hill, under a dead tree with no leaves.

"So? What did you want to show me?" Nikei demanded, his arms crossed. The wizard laid down in the grass and simply pointed upwards, where the sky was barely lit up in the evening.

The nearly-darkened sky was completely free of clouds, and the stars were visible away from the light of the town beside them. The sunlight barely illuminated the hill, and the moon shone bright down on them. Nikei laid down too as he took in the sights in the sky.

"There's lots of stars out tonight. Perhaps we'll see a constellation? I can name three right now," Mikado spoke, and received a sharp slap to the shoulder in response. "Ow..."

"Just be quiet," the journalist told him, continuing to stare up at the stars. Despite his complaints earlier, Mikado could tell that Nikei was no longer protesting being shown this. Perhaps the journalist had been working himself too hard, and was quieter now that he was resting? He thought it was the most likely option.

The wizard quietly sighed and closed his eyes. He knew very well that he wouldn't be able to fall asleep like this, he hadn't been able to get a restful sleep from the moment he was born. But closing his eyes and taking in the warm night air in the middle of summer was relaxing, it created an illusion of peace for him. And the soft snores beside him indicated that Nikei fell asleep.

The act of peacefully resting under the stars wasn't a part of Mikado's plan in the beginning, but the act of letting himself have time to breathe was unnatural for him during his life of looking for Utsuro. He couldn't help feeling uneasy, as if something bad might happen if he wasn't vigilant at all times, but listening to the sounds of Nikei sleeping while taking a break was enough for him.

"Mmn... Ngh, aaah?! What the hell- OW! What the fuck is THIS?!"

Mikado opened his eyes when he heard Nikei suddenly wake and start cussing up a storm. The wizard looked over to the side to see the other man trying to frantically brush something off himself. He decided that he should take Nikei back to his apartment before someone called the police with a noise complaint.

A few minutes later, Mikado located the bug bite remedy and went over to the chair where the journalist was sitting. "In hindsight, if you sit under a dead tree, you probably should have known there would be a lot of bugs," Mikado laughed. "How odd that they all avoided me and went for you!"

Nikei seethed as he sat there in only his underwear, shivering as the wizard applied remedy cream to the numerous bug bites covering his body. "I'm going to fucking kill you, Mikado Sannoji...!"

***

Art credit: wrlrm on twitter