Fushigi Yuugi Fan Fiction ❯ Facepaint ❯ Seishi Skillz ( Chapter 3 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

FY is still not mine, this is still a yaoi, etc.

Facepaint

by Sunandshadow

Chapter 3 - Seishi Skillz

The practice field turned out to be, literally enough, a field, and the first glimpse I'd had of the world outside the palace. The trees and other plants looked fairly normal, not like man-eating flytraps and animate snapdragons, or whatever other exotica I might have expected to find in a magical land if my subconscious mind had made it up. So maybe I was actually here and I hadn't lost my mind? I shrugged philosophically. It didn't really matter anyway; I would feel the same things and act according to my ethics either way, I wasn't one to go around lying or stealing just because I was in a dream. Not because I was some Sunday-school 'Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil, do no evil' kind of girl, not at all! Err… kind of guy? Kind of person. Ahem.

What I was, was a lucid dreamer. When I dreamed I generally knew I was dreaming and could make decisions that would affect the path of the dream. I could have turned every dream into a peaceful flight through fluffy white clouds just by spreading my arms like wings and asserting my will that I was flying. But I didn't. A peaceful flight through fluffy white clouds is meaningless. I stayed on the ground, or flew low enough that I could be chased and caught, I played along with whatever scenario my unconscious mind had dreamed up that night, because I wanted the challenge, the new and different, the emotional roller coaster.

Maybe it would sound strange to someone else, but one of my favorite dreams I ever had was just me angsting over the fact that my lover had rejected me and was now ignoring me; all I did was gaze at him longingly from afar, I didn't even try to talk to him. It wasn't that I got off on being rejected, it was that I was savoring the beautiful rush of emotion I was feeling. I am naturally of a placid, staid temperament and it is rare that anything really makes me feel deeply, yet I crave drama and emotion in my life. I try to feed my craving by creating evocative art and stories, and living dramatically. Dream or real, this was an adventure and I was going to give it my usual enthusiastic and cunning attempt.

It was in this spirit that I stepped for the first time out into the foreign sun, and that I watched with awe the red whirlwind that was Soi and her sword, giving lessons to some new recruit. Wow, she's as good as the state level competitors in my university's fencing program! She had all the beauty of the victorious athlete: muscles poised with delicious tension, then flowing into motion; skin glistening with a light sheen of sweat; long auburn hair whipping behind her in counterpoint to each motion of her body.

"Wow…" I remarked distractedly to my companion. Soi forced her opponent to yield, ending her battle. I turned to Tomo to complete my sentence, but was slightly taken aback to find him sneering rather angrily at her. I remembered their earlier exchange off insults and realized I had made the diplomatic error of complimenting her to her rival. Oops. I hesitated over what to say next, then decided that the only way to repair the situation was to continue on the topic and give him a chance to vent his spleen about it. This would be much preferable to having him play 'malevolent figure lurking in the background' while I was trying to get Soi to help me. So, I heaved a dramatic sigh to get Tomo's attention back on me, then finished my original sentence, "Damn. Lessons or not, I am never going to be that good with a sword." I shook my head mournfully.

Tomo scowled, and I blinked at the startling way the twist of a few muscles transformed his facepaint from interesting and dramatic to frightening. Huh, what a weird effect. Maybe those bars of color are placed at psychologically significant places on the face?

"Soi's not that good." he said petulantly.

I raised one eyebrow skeptically at this evaluation. "Compared to who? She'd wipe the field with me. Do you fence?"

He sniffed haughtily. "The sword is a weapon of brute force. I prefer the delicate balance of the throwing blade."

I blinked, impressed. "You can throw daggers?"

Tomo buffed his nails with practiced nonchalance. "I can hit a target the size of a man's hand at thirty paces."

My eyes got round. "Wow, cool! I always thought throwing daggers were a romantic weapon, you know because they're the weapon of an assassin or a thief or something." I realized the implications of what I had just said and rushed to apologize. "Err… not that I meant that you're an assassin or a thief or anything!"

Already mentally off balance from my slip of the tongue, I startled at the sound of Soi's voice at my shoulder, where she had approached while I was talking to Tomo. "No, he's not good enough to be an assassin. A thief though…" she gave him a knowing smirk.

He glared at her. "Shut up Soi." I blinked. Did that imply that he was a thief? Anyone with the dexterity to throw knives would probably make a nimble pickpocket, but he'd never be able to sneak around unnoticed in that get-up…

Soi smirked at him, "Make me."

Interesting as it would be to see the two of them get into a cat fight, I had things to accomplish today. Down girls! I thought, but did not dare voice. Instead I cleared my throat to attract their attention. "Um, hi Soi. We're here to see if you could help with getting the sword and the horse. We both know a fair amount about horses but little about swords, and Tomo thought your expertise might be helpful.

Soi looked askance at Tomo. "Expertise?"

Tomo snorted. "What I said was that you knew the officer in charge of the stable."

"Ahhh, I see." Soi waited just long enough for Tomo to look satisfied, then added, "Mareu's polite." Tomo's expression went instantly sour, and I had to put a hand over my mouth to keep from laughing and putting him into a worse mood.

"Where I come from there is a saying: 'You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.' So I try to be sweet. Although personally I've always preferred the taste of vinegar… but that's neither here nor there." I shrugged. "Anyway, can you help?" Had I been alone with Soi I would have been more persuasive - smiled and batted my eyelids or some such silliness - but Tomo seemed always on the borderline of being jealous of Soi, and I didn't want to aggravate that.

"Yes, alright, I'm not needed here at the moment. The armory is closest, this way." she strode off, and Tomo and I followed.

* * *

So, now I had a sword I didn't know how to use, a pretty gray horse accompanied by the threat of early morning riding lessons beginning next week (ugh, I hate getting up early!), and, best of all, a purse full of gold and two amusing shopping companions. They were still bickering; I was beginning to get the feeling that they did this all the time, although my presence was stirring them up by providing a new audience whose alliance they could fight over. I was having fun derailing their arguments by agreeing with both of them, or coming up with an unexpected third option, or replying with a cryptic proverb that could be interpreted as agreeing with either of them. I decided that I liked Tomo and Soi.

[They shop for various things]

I sat down, crossed my legs… and suddenly howled, as a pain much like a really bad menstrual cramp twisted my guts. "Owww!!!" My legs swiftly came uncrossed and I doubled over, instinctively trying to protect the injured spot. Soi, Tomo, and the shopkeeper all hurried over to see what in the four kingdoms was the matter with me.

"Mareu?! What happened?"

"Are you okay?"

Through gritted teeth I managed to spit out, "I'm fine."

"You don't look fine." commented Tomo dryly, probably recognizing the universal pose of a man curled around offended balls.

At the same time, Soi demanded, "But what happened?"

Teeth still gritted I rolled my eyes at the shopkeeper and ground out, "Tell you later." Thankfully the shopkeeper got the hint and retreated, leaving me to my misery and embarrassment.

"Do you need to see a healer?" asked Soi with real concern. Tomo was trying hard not to snicker.

"No. What I need are lessons in how guys manage to cross their legs without kneeing themselves in the balls." I grumbled, feeling just slightly better enough to speak in a normal tone of voice. Tomo tried vainly to stifle a snort of laughter, while Soi's eyes got big in sudden comprehension.

I tried to fix Tomo with one of my more withering glares and growl, "Gee, laugh at my pain why don't you?" but I couldn't help but snicker at the comicality of my situation, which kind of ruined my ability to be intimidating.

[Mareu recovers, they move on to the jewelry store]

Now, I adore shopping for jewelry. That's why I've gotten most of my piercings - more holes=more jewelry opportunities! And this shop had some really cool archaic stuff, stuff you would never find in an average jewelry store in America - not find any you could afford, anyway. There was lots of jade, of course, but I'm not a big fan of jade, it looks odd against my yellowy skin tone. There were necklaces made of coins, dragons clutching pearls, jewelry incorporating fangs, boar tusks, antlers, peacock feathers… I hardly knew where to look first.

[Mareu picks out a pair of opal earrings to coo over, but they're too expensive. Tomo is looking curiously over his shoulder. The shopkeeper, annoyed that they're not going to buy anything, insults the three seishi in various ways, including some sort of derogatory comment about homosexuality. They get pissed off and yell at the shopkeeper, then leave.]

"Gah! What a pompous ass!" I grumbled companionably to my seishi.

Tomo suddenly grinned evilly. "So, would you perhaps like a little revenge?" Now there was a leading question if ever I'd heard one.

Cautiously I inquired, "What sort of revenge did you have in mind?"

Tomo grinned a me a little more widely, then he turned and smirked at Soi. "You wanted to see how good a thief I am?"

Soi's eyes widened at the implication of the question. She hadn't seen Tomo pocket anything, but then she had been busy glaring at that shopkeeper… "Did you take something?"

Tomo turned to me. "Mareu, hold out your hand."

I blinked, but I trusted him, so I held out my hand, palm up. Tomo held his closed fist over my hand and opened it, dropping two little somethings into my palm. Then he withdrew his hand with the flare of a stage magician, and suddenly to Soi's and my eyes was revealed a familiar pair of brilliant green and pink jelly opal earrings. My eyes widened.

"Oh wow! These are the opals I was looking at!"

Tomo smirked triumphantly. "Put them on."

I was very excited to show them off, and I reached to take out my second pair of earrings and replace them with the opal studs. But then I paused. "Err… You don't think I'll get in trouble, do you? What if someone sees me wearing these and knows that some just like them were just stolen…?"

Tomo just smirked more widely. "Oh, but they haven't just been stolen. They're sitting right where they were before - or at least, that's what you would think if you didn't know they were an illusion." he orated, illustrating his story with graceful hand gestures. "Unfortunately, the next time that pompous fool picks them up, they're going to slip right through his fat fingers. And no matter how much he crawls around looking for them, he won't find a thing - it will be as if they had just vanished into thin air."

I blinked, imagining this scenario. Then a huge grin took over my face. "That's wicked! I love it!" Reassured that I was not going to be accused as an accessory to theft, I gleefully put on the beautiful opals, then tossed my head to show off how they sparkled in the sun. "Well? Do they as good on me as they looked on display?"

Soi smiled. "Yes, they look lovely."

Tomo huffed at her words, then looked me all over more critically. "Hmm… I think… no."

Soi and I both looked at him in disbelief. Soi voiced the question for me: "What do you mean, 'no'?! That's very rude."

Tomo snorted, but turned to me to give his serious reply. "No, they don't look as good on you as they did on the display… they look better. In the store, they were just jewelry. Now they look… alive."

[Mareu thinks about the ethics of theft as revenge. They go back to the palace, Soi leaves them to attend to her duties, and Tomo and Mareu say good night in front of Mareu's door.]

"Oh, Tomo, could I ask one favor of you?" I gave him a persuasive I'm-so-sweet-and-cute,-don't-you-just-want-to-do-anything-I-ask? look. Was I flirting with him? Well not realllly…

He regarded me with wary surprise. "What exactly would you like me to do?" he asked, politely for him but still skeptically.

"Well you see, I've never been much of a morning person, normally I have an alarm clock, but obviously they don't exist here, and left to my own devices I would probably sleep until noon, so… would you mind waking me up in the morning when you get up? I'll lend you the key…" Okay, so maybe I was flirting with him; my subconscious seemed to have decided it wanted him, and simply neglected to inform my conscious mind of this fact.

I still didn't know a whole lot about him, but everything that I'd seen, I liked. Even that crazy make-up… hell, not only have I gone out with goth bois in whiteface and eyeliner before, I've volunteered my art skills to do face painting for Halloween and body painting for parties and sports games lots of times; good body art like tribal tattoos are one of my minor fetishes, I suppose. And speaking of fetishes, he had such gorgeous long hair… And for some reason I found it terribly flattering that he was willing to shoplift for me, morally twisted though that thought was…

Mentally I shrugged, and thought, What the hell; this could be the start of something beautiful! Not to mention fun! Then I put on one of my sexiest smiles and held out the key: not between my fingertips, but on the palm of my hand, so he would have to touch me to pick it up. Mwahaha I'm so devious!

Tomo studied me for a moment, his expression suggesting that he had caught the flirty subtext there, but doubted whether I meant it or he was just reading too much into my request. He was clearly tempted, though. He stretched out one elegant hand towards mine, hesitated a moment, then plucked the key from my palm, brushing me with long red nails and soft white fingertips in the process. He retreated back a step to a safer, more 'correct' distance, and tried to cover up his earlier hesitation by stating brusquely, "I will awaken you, then. Goodnight, Mareu."

I gave him a softer smile. "Goodnight Tomo." I thought a moment, then mischievously added, "Sweet dreams!" and backed into my room, closing the door behind me. I flipped the lock, and immediately felt comforted to be able to shut out this weird world for a few restful hours. Sure it was an adventure, but I had definitely had my fill of the new and different for the day. Grinning to myself I kicked my sneakers and socks off, then lowered myself into the friendly looking armchair with an appreciative "Uhhh…" as my tired muscles rejoiced at having the opportunity to relax.

I let my eyes close and just rested for a few moments. Then my curiosity reviving and bringing back some of my energy with it, I opened my eyes and looked at the contents of my room. Desk, bed, hey, who the hell's that guy in the…?! Oh. In the mirror. I smacked myself in the forehead. Riiiight. I took a few deep breaths to get rid of my slight panic at seeing someone else in my room. Once I had regained my mental centering I chuckled at myself a little, then got up to study my new reflection.

Hmm. Well, all the colors were the same: green eyes, golden-blond hair, light golden skin. As always, I felt lucky for the attractive coloration, face, and figure nature had given me, although the face and figure were now attractive in a bit different way than they had been before. My face hadn't changed that much, but my jaw was definitely broader and more masculine. The most noticeable changes, though, were in my body. I was even taller than I usually was; I had always been tall for a girl at 5' 11", but now I towered over everyone at 6' 4". Well, everyone but Nakago. Why the heck did he look just like me anyway?

Having no ground from which to even begin guessing about that, I pushed the idea to the back of my mind and continued my inventory. My shoulders were broader, my hips narrower, my muscles a little more obvious, though I still wasn't really built because I never did anything more strenuous than carry art supplies up the stairs to my dorm room.

That thought prompted me that if I really wanted to get to know this body, clothes were going to get in the way. My hand went automatically to the buttons of my shirt and popped two of them open before I paused, surprised. Surprised to realize that I wasn't nervous, or particularly aroused; I was just matter-of-factly getting undressed. I pondered this and realized: male or not, it's still my body. The bones and flesh were my home, the skin my clothing, the limbs and digits my trusty tools. Like a car with an antique kit applied to it, it looked very different but it handled just the same.

Maybe my hands were a little larger now, but I could feel the sense-memory of holding a paintbrush, and I knew these hands would draw the same fine lines the others had. Maybe my feet were bigger and my legs longer, but I hadn't been tripping over things today. My bountiful bosom had vanished and my hips had narrowed, but I wasn't off balance, and my usual stride was a comfortable as ever. It was strange, really; had I ever thought about it I would have assumed it felt different to wear a male body, but apparently my brain stem knew perfectly well how to drive it. Huh, maybe men and women were even more similar than I had always thought. I shrugged one shoulder and resumed removing my clothing.

Doffing my shirt and pants, I reached the level of undress I had had at the tailor's. Ah, I thought, surveying the man in the mirror, so this is what Tomo's gaze was so riveted by. It was a nice enough view. Not my type, I liked the slender ones, the ones like Tomo and Soi… but nice. "Hey, I'm hot, I'd do me." I quoted, chuckling madly, from one of my favorite books on the psychology of being bisexual.

Oh well, only the boxers left now… time to finally get a look at the really different bits. I gathered up my courage and slid my boxers off. And looked down.

Oh. Oh, now that… that was interesting. Not what it looked like, though it was a pretty enough dick, but what it felt like as I watched it rise and stiffen. Oooh, cool! I was reminded of the first time a guy let me play with his anatomy and get a good look at it - I had blown on his balls and giggled in childish delight as they scrunched up like some furry amoeba. Older and wiser now, I wasn't surprised by what my anatomy did, but I was fascinated to be able to feel it from the inside while I watched the outside.

I was uncut, which made sense on a variety of levels - my female body had never had anything like that done to it, and it wasn't something Chinese culture did… er, I thought not anyway. I'd never really researched which cultures did circumcision and which didn't. Either way I was happy, because this way I would get the whole male experience, not miss out on what it would be like to have a foreskin. I was reasonably big too - at least 7 inches, maybe 8 if I were really damn hard.

[Imagine a masturbation lemon here]

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