Title:  The Fire and Shadows series
Fandom:  Yami no Matsuei [a.k.a. The Descendants of Darkness]
Pairing:  Tsuzuki/Tatsumi, some Tatsumi/Watari friends-with-benefits
Categories:  Angst, romance, action, drama, supernatural, hurt/comfort
Length:  Long [~24,000 words between all three fics]
Warnings:  some violence; references to canon rape, character death, attempted suicide  


Author on LJ:  scribblemoose 
Website:  Scribblemoose's Fiction

Review:  Tatsumi and Tsuzuki miscommunicate on their first night together, just before Nagasaki.  As a result, even though they both love one another, the canon failure of their partnership occurs.  50 years later, Hisoka and Watari figure out what happened, and try to push the two back together - but a rising evil may end their reconciliation before it even begins.

If you're curious about the fandom/canon, try Ashlea's Cropped Scan Theatre for a (funny) summary of the existing manga.  Hmm, for everyone else, this is a yaoi take on the duties of shinigami, or "death gods"; here, they're the traumatically-killed dead, who make sure that everyone dies on schedule.  They usually get too emotionally involved to be really effective.  Also, sprinkle some sorcery and serial killers on top.

If you hate plots that hinge on a nigh-ridiculous communications failure, then maybe this series is not for you.  On the other hand, canon itself somewhat supports this plot: Tatsumi does love Tsuzuki, and hasn't told him about his feelings, and he does try to make Tsuzuki happy by supporting Tsuzuki's new partnership with Hisoka.  While Hisoka/Tsuzuki and Tatsumi/Watari are the fandom OTPs, this fic makes you root for old unrequited loves. 

The first story covers that night 50 years ago.  The second story involves Hisoka and Tsuzuki talking about Nagasaki, and Watari comforting Tatsumi.  The last story expands the series' plot out beyond the personal dramas of the shinigami, and could be read by itself as an interesting episode of the anime, complete with monsters, resurrections and angst - however, Scribblemoose deftly weaves in the issues from the first two stories, and really ties the series together in an entirely satisfying way.  The communications failure is solved perhaps *too* easily, but at that point, I was ready for a happy ending.

Bonus: P.L. Nunn was commissioned to, and drew, two pictures for this series (very NSFW; there are links at the end of the fics).

Devastation
Anniversary
Seeds of Evil