The elderly man's forehead slammed into the table once more with a sickening WHAM before being wrenched back upwards and slammed against the tabletop again, blood and teeth spraying across the shiny brown wood that had been swept clean of papers and pens.
"This is all your fault, you know," snarled the thin air beside his bleeding ear menacingly. The man's hair was bunched painfully at the back as though it was being gripped by someone– but he was alone.
"Your fault." Slam. "Your." Slam. "Fault."
The door of the office the man was in creaked open and a young man stood there, his brown hair chopped to just under his shoulders, his fringe framing his tanned, handsome face with jagged locks. His grey-blue eyes watched impassively as the elderly man's face was slammed into his own desk multiple times before his quiet eyes glanced back out of the doorway, as though looking for trouble that was obviously going to come.
The elderly man's head was wrenched back once more and all the aged man could do was only choke and splutter on his own blood, mind confused and swimming from so many beatings in such little time.
"You should've known I'd find out," growled the air by the elderly man's ear. "I've known for years. I've known, and I tried to stay loyal-- But, you know what? Loyalty doesn't exist."
Suddenly, the old man's chin and cheeks were distorted, as though being gripped by invisible fingers, and he was violently wrenched to look at the doorway, where the young brunet stood, door-handle still in hand, grey-blue eyes glancing from the empty hallway outside, to the beaten elder.
"You see him?" snarled the air beside the old man's ear. "See him? He used to be one of your best Operatives. He doesn't care if you die now." The elderly man's hair was wrenched painfully in the air and the young man in the doorway did nothing, the invisible grip on the elder's wrinkled chin tightening and making the old flesh turn white. "The loyalty you base your operations on doesn't exist, you wrinkled, senile old bastard."
The man's face was slammed against the polished wooden desk once more, more teeth clattering across the fine grain. The man in the doorway was silent and looked back to the hallway.
The old man's head was wrenched back once more, and his large, chubby hands twisted with exertion, his face contorting, the distortions in his wrinkled chin, gone.
"Leon...!" he croaked painfully, blood spewing from his near-toothless mouth as the man in the doorway looked around at the sound of his name. "Help me... please!"
The brunet in the doorway; Leon; was silent. After a moment of just staring fixedly at the bloodied and beaten man with impassive, empty eyes, he shook his head, brown locks swaying around his ears and tickling at his shoulders.
The old man spluttered pleadingly, and the brunet in the doorway shook his head again.
"You deserve this," Leon said neutrally, impassive grey-blue orbs watching as tears gathered in the wrinkles around the elderly man's eyes. "I'm not saving you this time, sir."
Quite suddenly, the door few open so violently that it crashed loudly against the wall as it shot open and the hinges came loose. Leon whipped around just in time to have an arm snap around his neck, to be bodily twisted around, and a gun shoved against his temple.
"We've been looking for you," snarled a voice in his ear gleefully.
Behind Leon were six people. One holding the gun to his head, and five others whipping out their guns and moving to point them in different directions in the room–
But, before they could--
The elderly man's head did a complete one-eighty-degee turn and his neck snapped, the sound shattering through the air.
"Holy--!" squeaked one of the men in the doorway, staring as the elderly man's broken and bloody body fell to the desk limply.
"Shut up!" snapped the man holding Leon, pressing the gun more painfully against the brunet's temple. "I know you're here, Cloud!" he called into the room, his eyes snapping all over the office, as though someone was there. All six men slowly moved into the room, one of them closing the battered door behind them, and the one speaking; pushing Leon forward with him, like a shield. "You Operatives always go around in pairs!"
Quite suddenly, one of the men flew back and slammed against the wall as though he'd been kicked in the gut, his head snapping around like the elderly man's had a split second later. At the scream of shock from one of the other men, Leon snatched the gun at his temple and let his arm fly back, his elbow slamming into the face of the one holding him.
Then, it was chaos.
Gunshots; screaming; cursing; snapping of bones. Everything. It was chaos. Not many could survive in this realm of mayhem, but, some were used to it. Shots and splashes of colour; piercing noises blasting into ears; explosions of pain and agony. Some people liked the mayhem.
There was one last gunshot and Leon panted from where he stood, brown hair in disarray, blood seeping through a single hole in his shoulder, from where a bullet had lodged there, blood clinging to his split lip, a bruise on his cheek, but, he was very much alive.
All six men lay on the blood-speckled carpet: bones broken, perfect circular bullet-holes in their weeping flesh, heads snapped, joints shattered.
With a quiet breath, Leon looked up. "Clou--"
He couldn't finish.
About a metre and a half above the floor a little distance from the dead bodies, were three bullets in mid-air. Just suspended there. Not moving. Not held there by anything seen. Just there.
Leon watched silently as red liquid slowly seeped into the air around the bullets and started trickling down from through an unseen entry-wound. It was like a sick child's game. The bullets made an almost perfect equilateral triangle in the air.
Suddenly, there was a harsh cough and blood peppered the ground before the bullets, though now-blood-covered, invisible lips that were suspended above the bullets.
"No..." breathed the brunet.
The bullets jolted in the air slightly and tilted, blood covered invisible lips opening silently.
With a choke, Leon shot forward and snatched hold of seemingly thin air around the bullets and he felt the heavy weight of another person fall into his arms as his knees buckled and he fell to the ground too, cushioning the invisible weight clumsily on his lap.
"Hey," he panted, hand grasping the air just behind those bloody lips, a solid weight in his hand and draped across his lap, invisible silky short hair tickling at his fingertips. "You okay, Cloud?"
"Not really," replied the bloody lips quietly, voice croaky and weak.
"You should've dodged," Leon breathed, his voice tinged with something he couldn't identify, grey-blue eyes glancing from the bloody lips to the three bullet-wounds that were oozing blood from above the floor. "You can dodge anything."
"Didn't feel like it," replied the air through those two blood-covered lines casually.
"Why?" returned the brunet, quiet eyes looking back at those bloody lips.
Those two lines of blood twitched up at the side in a sardonic kind of smirk. "You wanted to see me, didn't you?" breathed those bloody lips, voice slow and throaty, more of that red liquid trickling down from the edge of that bloody mouth.
"Yes," whispered Leon, a coldness enveloping at his chest. "But you said that was impossible." They'd been talking the night before. Leon had been having a shower, and from where Cloud's voice had been coming from, he'd been wandering about in the bedroom. Their conversations had wafted from one subject to another, before falling upon the other man's 'situation'.
"I lied," said the air.
With a thick swallow, Leon said nothing, grey-blue eyes staring down at those blood-covered invisible lips.
"When my kind die, we become visible for the first time in our lives," said the blood-covered lines of invisible flesh absently. "At least, I'm pretty sure we do... My parents did when that bastard killed them." Grey-blue eyes glance at the broken body of the elderly man at his desk.
"So, I thought I'd let you see me."
Leon's eyes snap back to those bloody lips.
"So, you decided to commit suicide?" the brunet hisses.
They'd been partners in the organisation for three years. Their partners had died one by one, and they'd finally been paired up together. They were the most elite. They were the ones who survived. They were the freaks.
"I wasn't the one who was holding the gun," argued the air lightly.
"But you didn't dodge!" snarled Leon.
They were the Ghost and the Empty. Cloud was never seen. Leon was never emotional. One was a freak of nature, the other was a freak of nurture. One stealthy, the other just never noticed.
"Why are you yelling at me?" asks the bloody lips faintly. "I'm just another partner. You'll get another one in... Oh, wait. I just killed the leader of the organisation. No more partners. Sorry."
"You're not just another partner," breathes the brunet.
Leon feels so...
He hurts.
"I'm just a faceless person you've had to put up with in your immediate vicinity for three years," replies the air through those two lines of blood. "I'm just another person, Leon."
The brunet clutches at that short, invisible hair tightly and opens his mouth to scream some words he'd never uttered aloud before, but he freezes.
Those bloody lips smile.
"Am I visible yet?"
In Leon's arms is foggy, greyish air. For the first time, the brunet can tell visibly where his invisible partner starts, and where the air is. He's still mostly invisible, but he's... fading into colour.
"You're lucky my kind takes so long to die," murmurs those grey lips covered in blood quietly. "Otherwise you'd have never seen this."
Grey-blue eyes dance in a mixture of horror and awe over the foggy body in his arms. Human. Two arms, two legs. He stares as the grey fades into a gently tanned flesh colour and becomes solid. No longer see-through. Actually there.
Leon's free hand slowly drags over a muscled, smooth shoulder, then over some slender ribs, and coming to a feather-light stop on a naked hip. He's naked. He's bleeding. He's dying.
Eyes dragging back up that body he'd never seen before, Leon looks at his partner's face for the first time.
Cloud's eyes are a piercing, inhuman blue; they're half-open, staring blankly at Leon's bleeding shoulder. His short hair is a glistening gold, spiked intricately in an oddly natural way, falling into his eyes and framing his beautifully handsome face, his lips and mouth coated thickly with his own gore.
"You're beautiful," Leon whispers without even knowing what he's saying. The weeping bullet sounds are all in the blond's left lung. One directly under his left clavicle, dangerously close to his throat, the second just under his arm and beside his pectoral, the third bare inches from his heart.
Those inhuman eyes close and those bloody lips smile in that sadly sardonic way once more. "I wouldn't know," he breathes.
Leon's hand is lifted from Cloud's naked hip, fingertips dragging lightly over soft, virgin flesh before touching a soft cheek, smearing the blood that was dribbling from those soft lips.
"Don't die," whispers the brunet.
Those inhuman blue eyes don't open. "Can't stop it now," he replies smoothly. Quietly. Contentedly. "You can see me."
"You can't..." breathes Leon, voice tinged with emotion that had never been expressed before. He was far too emotional. Far too open. Far too scared.
"Why not?" Cloud opens his eyes, and the two Operatives finally look each other in the eyes. The blond's first ever eye-contact. First time someone has looked at him without it being an accident, or looking at something entirely different. "What could you possibly want with me?" he breathes.
The brunet swallows. He can't answer that.
"Why do you think loyalty doesn't exist?" he asks. He'd never asked in their three years of familiarity. There are so many things he never asked.
"It doesn't," is the simple reply. "In my life of never being seen, I have seen that loyalty is but an illusion." A quiet, broken sigh falls from those lips, bubbles and globs of blood foaming out of the side of his mouth to gather in Leon's hand. His kind took hours to die. Blue eyes slide closed.
"Loyalty doesn't exist," he continues quietly, dragging a blood-saturated tongue over a soft bottom lip, smearing the perfect redness. "I've seen what happens with spouses when their other isn't there. I've seen traitors. I've seen spies. It always comes back to yourself. What you want." His inhuman eyes slide open and fix on Leon's own grey-blue ones. "What makes you so sure loyalty exists in a realm of traitors?"
Leon's reply is barely audible. Barely there, but-- Cloud hears it.
"Because love does."
The brunet watches in silence as those inhuman blue eyes roll skyward. Cloud then looks back at him with a look that he'd never seen before- but definitely felt directed at him a few times. It was his 'you incompetent fool' look.
"I don't believe in love," sighs the blond quietly. "It's--" he coughs sharply, blood flying from his mouth to pepper the brunet's chest and dribble down his cheek and chin languidly. Leon doesn't wince, but the moment the coughing is over, he drags his thumb over the blood gathering around the blond's mouth, smearing the clotting redness over smooth, lightly tanned skin like ink over paper.
Cloud's hot breath brushes over the other man's hand, a few more bubbles of blood gathering at the edge of his mouth.
"I don't believe in love, because love is loyalty," he croaks, lips moving minutely, inhuman blue eyes dragging closed before opening half-way once more. He was dying a little more quickly than he'd guessed he would. "... And loyalty doesn't exist."
"You're so fixated on that," breathes Leon, fingertips stained with the other male's blood. "Why are you so adamant on keeping that in mind?" He runs a bloody finger down the blond's cheek- drawing a perfect red line down from one of the male's inhuman blue eyes- as though he'd cried blood.
"Because it's true," replies Cloud quietly. "I say nothing more than what I know."
"What would you say if I said I loved you?"
Half-open blue eyes open completely and stare up at masked grey-blue ones for a silent moment.
"I'd say you were insane, and that you are taking this far too personally," Cloud says, voice stronger than it'd been moments ago, his slender blond eyebrows tilting down in a masked frown.
"I've been killing people since I was four," murmurs Leon emotionlessly. "I think the insanity is a given."
More blood dribbles from the edge of the blond's mouth, and the two are silent for a moment, grey-blue eyes masked, and inhuman blue ones staring upward into the others; analysing; cryptic. Blood was pooling around the two males, streaming off Cloud's body in wine-coloured rivers.
"You can't love someone you've never seen," breathes the blond finally.
"I've seen you now."
"Indeed you have, but you can't love me." A thick swallow. "Just because one has a deep connection with someone, it doesn't mean you're in love."
For some reason, Leon feels a smirk on his face. "You sound like you've experienced love, Cloud."
Inhuman eyes glare scorchingly up at grey-blue ones. "I said I didn't believe it. I never said I hadn't experienced it." He's... angry. His body is lifeless and unmoving, but he's angry.
That bloody hand sweeps over Cloud's mouth again, smearing away the clotting, jelly-like globs of blood gathering around his lips. Leon just stares down at the blond emotionlessly, his hand coming to a stop at the side of his face, making a perfect red hand-print along his jaw.
"Why did you do this?" he breathes.
The anger clinging to Cloud's dying, bloody body seeps away like that red liquid fleeing his flesh. "I've..." Inhuman eyes close and a quiet sigh floats from his gore-blanketed mouth. "I've lived longer than you'd think, Leon." Blue eyes open. He's almost pleading. "I just want to sleep."
"You've killed the one who killed your family, so, you've accomplished all you want?" Leon whispers, staring down at the blond with grey-blue eyes, masked emotions swirling in their depths like a storm over the sea.
A small smile. "Exactly."
There was a harsh BANG as the door slammed open once more, two men with guns trained on Leon and Cloud, both newcomers taking in the seven corpses within a second and taking a few steps into the room. Neither Leon nor Cloud moved.
"Leon!" snapped the closest intruder, voice demanding, the long-haired brunet looking up emotionlessly. "You're a real dunce for coming back here. You and Cloud have been running for weeks. Why the hell are you back here?"
"Might be something to do with that," piped in the intruder's partner, who motioned his gun in the direction of the corpse of the old man which was still crumpled over his desk.
"Shut up!" snapped the first trespasser, readying his gun once more upon Leon.
The intruder's partner blinked at the bloodied naked body in the brunet's grasp, tilting his head curiously to the side. "Who's that?" he asked, dropping his gun to his side, wide eyes blinking.
"Will you keep your mind on the job, jackass?!" snapped the first man.
"He's got a naked dead guy in his lap. I'm curious."
"If it was a naked girl, I'm sure you'd be more interested, you sick fuck."
"Not really."
The first intruder stared at his partner silently over his shoulder, before snapping back to the situation and hand- but the moment he did, he found Leon standing directly in front of him, and a fist millimetres away from smashing his nose.
Cloud lay silently in a lake of his own blood as he listened to the yells and occasional gunshots and shattering of bones, inhuman blue eyes staring up at the ceiling. He could feel the slow trickling of his life leaving his body. He was dying. He was happy.
Leon stood over the two intruders, back hunched. The first intruder was at his feet, arms fallen at odd angles, jaw hanging open, back of his head blasted apart. The second was barely propped up against the wall beside the door, face contorted in pain, shoulder shattered, knee broken, several ribs sticking out from under his shirt, blood dribbling down his chin. He squinted painfully up at the brunet.
The Operative swayed a little in his place, a hand slowly coming up to cup his side, where perfect red blood was dribbling from a single bullet-hole in his lung.
With a choke, blood sprayed from Leon's mouth and onto the dead man at his feet. The brunet staggered to turn around, taking lurching steps back toward his partner. Just as he was only a metre or so away from the blond, his knees buckled and more blood spewed from his mouth, Leon collapsing on his side as he continued choking on the blood that was flooding his insides.
"You're so fragile..."
Clouded grey-blue eyes looked up at inhuman blue ones which watched him quietly.
"You're just a freak," Leon choked in reply, bubbles and globules of blood pooling under his mouth onto the carpet.
Sardonic smirk taking over his handsome, calm face once more, Cloud let his closest arm drag across the ground, smearing his blood across the carpet, before his bloody fingertips could barely touch the brunet's cheek. With a pained grunt, Leon shifted closer, making it so the blond's hand cupped his face, the blood spewing from his mouth gathering in the other Operative's palm.
"Three bullets for me," smiled Cloud. "One bullet for you. What does that say about your species' ability to survive?"
"Shut up," gagged Leon weakly.
A soft, bloody thumb drew a red line over the brunet's cheek gently, and the blond's soft, content smile warmed.
"We're going to die together," he whispered, inhuman eyes dulling. "Didn't see that coming..."
"Your new partner is in there. Say hello."
Leon glanced from the man, to the simple white door before him. With a quiet breath through his nose –it was rather irritating getting a new partner. Always changing. Always dying–, the brunet placed a hand on the door-handle and turned it.
The moment he entered the small interrogation room, a single table and two chairs in the centre, Leon got an odd feeling. Grey-blue eyes dancing over the area silently, thin lips pursed, he quietly closed the door behind him.
He was alone, but...
He was being watched.
The room was empty. Silent. Different shades of white and grey. The brunet took in the single camera in the corner; unplugged.
Who was watching him?
How?
Like a flash of lightning, Leon's hand snapped up automatically, his instincts something to be admired by all, and snatched hold of thin air a mere hands' width from his nose. Except-- the air wasn't thin.
It was warm, what he was holding. It was fleshy. Solid. But, he couldn't see it. It wasn't even there. It was invisible. All he could see was his hand wrapped around air.
"Nice reflexes," came a breathy, deep voice an arm's length away. He was alone, but he was holding something, and he was being spoken to by a voice that was obviously coming from a person almost a metre away- where there was nothing but thin air.
"Who are you?" Leon murmurs, his grip tightening on the invisible thing in front of his face. He wasn't panicking. He couldn't really. Emotionally impossible. But, he was curious.
"Don't have a name," says the voice. "You can give me one, if you want."
Feather-light touches brush against Leon's cheek and a frown melts onto the brunet's face. "What are you?"
"Can't answer a question you don't know the answer to," replies the voice airily, a large, warm hand placing itself against the brunet's cheek. It was invisible. The thing he was talking to was invisible and it was touching him.
"You're my new partner?" Leon asks, his grip in the air tightening suddenly, the hand on his cheek twitching back.
"I am, yes." What he guessed was a forearm that he was holding, is suddenly torn from his grip with unimaginable force and Leon felt a jolt of pain shoot through his shoulder, but he said nothing. "We're partners until one of us dies." A quiet laugh floats kittenishly around in the air like a ribbon. "''Till death do us part', you could say."
"We're married to the job," Leon breathes, eyes fixed on the empty air where the voice was coming from. "Not each other."
"Whatever you say," said the voice airily. "Marriage is just a word, anyway. I see no reason why we should be loyal to a faceless collective of higher-ranked pricks or a specific person for the rest of our lives."
A twitch of a smirk appears on the brunet's face and he rakes his fingers through his hair, grey-blue eyes floating around the seemingly empty room once more.
"'Till death do us part," Leon breathes.
Both sets of misted eyes dragged closed and never opened again.
In a realm of traitors, sometimes there are ones who speak the truth.
((END. Well... Uh... I based this off a dream I had a couple of days ago, and I truly did not think that it would take this long to write, nor that it would be this big. Uh... Nothing much to say about it except that dream-bullets hurt. Enjoy.))