Gnarled pieces of wrought iron fence under his oxfords felt rigid against his soles, and a harsh numbness in his joints, caused from mysterious blue flames, blinding, floating around concrete rubble, rose like steam. Ethereal and translucent against his black trench, the flames whisked, as if an angelic blessing had just been bestowed upon him. The thin 15 year old loomed motionless, dazed, his spine arced over like a contorted branch, and confused at the presence of his fingers touching his cheeks, looking arthritic and sharply twisted, he felt also his fingernails mindlessly pressing, digging into his face. A dark wheezing seemed to slowly chuckle it's way up, not from his mouth, but the pit of his throat.
What's going on?
His collared shirt, riddled in smoky streaks, made him panic, but instead of a hot, crackling, blazing whirlwind around him, the whole roof on fire, his hearing began to softly drone back from a vacuumed whirl to wailing wind and thunder. Confused and shivering, remembering the powerful blast that vaulted from the gray clouds above, he opened his eyelids wearily, and watched blood leak in circular droplets from his nose and disperse themselves into the pulsing puddles below his chin. Heavy rain, restraining against his own weight, made it a battle to get a stable elbow on the cobblestone beneath his torso, especially the jarring pain rocketing through his shoulder, like a knife prodding him. That's when he spied a figure, swaying, and after a couple seconds of blinking, wind wafting, he knew who it was.
Flames? A senseless, breathy voice came cracked from Rin's mouth, "Yukio?"
"Waaaa ha ha hah ha hah!" An odd laugh bellowed. Dazzling combustion brightened around the boy. Yukio's head crooked to the side, thick-framed glasses and the fluttering reflections of flames in them, appeared like square glowing orbs, as the head fully turned, slow, and gawked at him.
Corneas uncontrollably quivered, unable to concentrate, how they became when he was tired, and motioning to rub them, his arms wouldn't budge, but spying his image in a shattered piece of mirrored glass, he seen his form trapped in an utterly amusing and awkward position.
I must be in shock.
If only that were true. Stuck, teal eyes deadlocked, unfolding before him a forceful, grotesque animation began: razored teeth spreading across his jaw, and in response, an irrevocable and undefinable pain seared across his jowls. Pointed ears lengthening to that of a lycan, and a forehead full of crevices reshaping his young face, made his skin crawl, then heat, feeling like he was absolutely melting. A hollowed, frozen shriek of pain rung, the weight of the sensation sickening. Staring at parts that shouldn't shift become anthropomorphic made his stomach turn; taste something absolutely foul.
Rin's hands tremored, heart beating recklessly, lungs choking on puffs of air. He knew. It wasn't him, it wasn't his twin brother. "YUKIO! No!"
As his cries abruptly lessened, his mind racing began to cease, he clinched his eyes shut in terror, and he realized his mouth wasn't even open. He had heard himself screech out in pain? Hadn't he? Eyelids, thrown open, he seen. 'It' smiled at Yukio through the water-pooled reflection.
No! No... I'm possessed! And all went dark, monstrosity had replaced him.
The head snapped, catapulting the chin high, a tongue siphoned out to lick blood off split lips, sniffing air, holding palms out to feel the rain pulsing on skin. "Oh you poor poor boy. Your brother, well, he isn't here anymore, and I'm, well, I'm just not sure what to tell you, ha ha, right now, but my darling, I never thought I'd feel the rain again, and oh, oh my does it feel, sensual?
"You... YOU SNAKE! Get out of him!" Bon yelled across the mangled cherry limbs, broken from trees in the garden. Hiding by the corner stairs leading to the library below, he could feel his insides shriveling, lips chapping up, he was afflicted. What could he do? He wanted to do what he could to help get his professor back, no matter how long he had waited for it to show up again; that lucent fire. Even if the odds were against them, but it wasn't safe.
"Aww my poor Rin, my little Rin," All it's attention on him with a voice so profound, "Le'me tell you, Yukio, ha hah ha, is so very interesting." The wicked face was becoming clearer, the eyebrows widening, sharper.
"Leave, leave him alone!" Rin screeched over the sheets of drizzle in anger, he knew it could hear him, "You don't know him... you'll, you've never loved him the way I do!"
"Love? Hmm. Loveeeeee. Ha ha... oh love, precious love... Yukio fears you more than, he loves you." It grinned.
Rin's throat hitched. "That's not true! Y... you're... YOU'RE LYING!"
"Oh yes. Yes. I see it now, wah ha ha (chuckle), oh dear, oh what a spectacle of a life your brother's lived," it shook it's head, "always being the 'watcher', there to control you. Or shall I say it? Waaa hah hah ha! How delightful!"
Bitten by the succulence of the voice, horrid, and icy, that comment made him stop dead in his tracks from trying to pick himself back up. His heavy breathing became apparent through his shirt, which was drenched to where it was practically see-through.
The creature was becoming more lively in it's actions, swinging it's arms like a merry child. "The very reason he became an exorcist; to make sure poor Rinny didn't mess things up." The tone deepened, it rumbled and a sadistic toothy grin shined on it's face, "To put a bullet in that little raven head of yours, in case, ha haha haaa," it shook in irony, wiping a small fake tear away from it's eye, stepping over some of the pieces of debris, "In case, ha ha, you, ha haha, turned out evil!" It erupted in laughter.
Small lines of heat began flowering in the corners of his eyes, and all he could do was whimper, "Not true. Not true."
Bon gasped, watching his weakened friend, hands over ears. He knew it had snapped one of the sticks of Rin's back with that remark, and that it was chipping away at his loving heart on the inside. "SHUT UPPPPP!", a loud, furious timbre, overtook him. He was Rin's rival, but he wasn't about to let him get beat while he was down, especially not in this situation.
He heard a cry, which shook him, from what seemed like a daze. Where is everyone? All he could see was black, his eyes were closed. Another voice, sallow, familiar.
"Oh yes, he hates you. Never allowed to live a normal childhood because of you, you imp. You're pathetic, not even strong enough to hold your dear old daddy!"
"You're not my father!" Rin fought back, "Shiro Fugimoto was our father!"
"Aw, but blood is what blood is my dear."
Mumbles from somewhere, sounded like people were talking while he was underwater.
"Yukio! I know you're in there! Can you hear me?!" Bon shouted so deafening it made his own ears hurt, he was sick of this game.
Rin joined, "Please, Yukio!", begging in a hysterical rage, forcing himself on his feet. He had to fight.
Bon slunk out from behind a contorted frame of metal and concrete to run to his classmate's aid.
"NOOOO! BON!" Shima shrieked. His pink headed comrade concealed with him, nearly toppled over himself, lunging, just missing a grasp on his uniform jacket to yank him back.
"I'm sick of your chihuahua..." It merely changed glance to the sprinting Bon, "get back."
With a flick of the index finger, he was flipped backwards by an invisible force, his rosary flung from his wrist, busting, beads flying all directions, choking his air off. He landed in a heap. Wheezing, he feebly propped himself up, "Where's Yukio, you... you son of a bitch." A patch of red felt warm on his side against the storm and his tattered uniform, filled of streaming blood, down strips of wet fabric like a sponge sucking up dishwater, slow, slick. Some of his silver cartilage earrings had melted out, and he winced to sit up, looking stunned.
"Bon, get... get out of here. You'll get killed." Rin softly said, as they were aside one another closely, rain pounding, Rin, burned also, had toppled to a muddy flowerbed. The pain afflicted upon him was causing the loss of too much blood.
He had felt the power, the heat, Bon nodded, and nervous, the bigger adolescent scrambled to his feet, and limped back to 'safety'. Self-awareness became clear, he wasn't strong enough, he wasn't a demon, he wouldn't live through it. With all the training, all the hardship, it still hadn't been enough. His arrogance, all for not, what was he thinking? Valor couldn't save Rin, couldn't save Yukio.
"He never thought he would get my powers, all given to you at birth, had to be, but no! Oh, silly Yukio, my genes are better than that! Test tubes turning black... he knew my child, he was becoming one of us. Oh my, oh no! A demon! Himself!" It smiled, continuing it's narrative, striding carelessly towards Rin, tossing Bon back like a chew-toy was nothing to it, "Like his big, twin brother. And he hid it from you."
I'm, I'm stuck, I can't move. Who is that?
Yukio was turning? He told me...? He was lying...
"The pulse different, I could smell it, hear it, the boy 's blood was becoming absolutely languid! Those deep powers, one teensy doorcreak at a time," It talked using hands expressionlessly, "All it took, was just a little push." It neared Rin. "If anything, I did Yukio a favor, ha haha, shedding years and training off of his shoulders. Oh wait, but, hmm, his body, it's mine now. Mine mine mine. And so, well, never mind, wha hah aha haha!" Wickedly snarling. It played.
The underwater hum cleared. He wailed, "Satan!"
Satan loomed over Rin at an irregular angle for a human body to be. The pale boy began weeping like trapped kitten, trembling and rained on, tossed in the muck.
"Oh are you sad, because your brother lied to you? Yukio... oh my dear, dear boy. Yukio is a liar." Satan mocked Rin by bringing a fist to an eye as if wiping a tear for a second time.
No. I'm not a liar. It's not like that! He grunted at the weight of the shadow over his eyes.
"I've been nothing but honest with you, you seeeeee, I know who I am my beloved little devil, no lying there, I am who I am! So," It got down on it's knees, grabbed his collar, without Rin's body leaving the ground, to bring him closer to the face, nose to nose, it whispered, "why don't you just come along boy, one time offer, you and I, Assiah, the world of humans, will be ours. What do you think my little Rinny?" Hot breath smelled like sulfur.
NOOOO! He growled and grunted, an invisible force binding him.
"Aww poor Yukio didn't like that comment! Wha ha hah! He's absolutely raging in there!"
Rin started mourning even more, he didn't know what else to do. "No, no Yukio, you're stronger (cough), you're stronger than this."
"Oh ha...he's in there. I made sure of it, so he can hear your defeat. So he knows he's lost, that his fears, have become real. That you become my personal little bigot, my uncontrollable wench. I know you have a hard time controlling those flames of yours. I know. I can see in your brother's head now." The heat of Satan's cerulean flames had been turned off, even though they still flared outwards with a tremendous force. It wanted Yukio broken. It wanted Rin, worse.
"No... (Cough)" Blood trickled out of his mouth, "I'm not yours to... t... to control. I'm not your... any anything." His shaggy hair was matted to his forehead, drenched, his face an absolute busted mess. Rin lit his own blue flames in an attempt to get it back, a feeble attempt to get it away, a last hope, but he was too weak to heat them.
Satan laughed, entertaining himself watching Rin's sharp demon fangs knash and his black thin tail whip anemically. "How pretty, your blood is... everywhere!" Satan launched the opposite hand at Rin's neck, caught it, and forced his skull into the ground.
He exhaled more blood out of his mouth, trying to reach for his sword, the Kurikara.
"Out of reach you little bug." It cooed.
"L... Le... Let me g go." Can't breath. Rin was choking to death, his deep blue eyes widening, air was no where. His body writhed violently. Clawing. None bothered the stronger.
"You denied my offer, so... now I will just have to let poor Yukio listen to your screams, as you burn in the furnace."
No, no. No! You can't do this, YOU CAN'T!
"I can hear him now, poor 'ol Yukio... 'yuki, yuki', so torn up." It licked lips, mocking Rin's nickname for his twin brother.
Rin at that moment, gurgling under pressure, lips going numb, he looked dead into the coal pits Satan's eyes, as if looking for Yukio's soul, he wanted his last breath to be where his brother was, trapped with him on the inside, inside the pit that Satan pushed him into inside himself. There maybe he could find him. He began whimpering and writhing.
Come on, COME ON!
He was scared, he felt the hand warming up around his neck, ever so slowly, Satan was going to savor every moment of burning him.
"Yu... Yuk... pl... plea..." Then he started murderously shaking and violently going into a hazed shock, his lips white.
NOOO RINNNN! Nothing would stop him. He shook. He screamed. He tugged violently.
"Wha haha, ha, ha... touching, touching, I'm simply savoring this mo... mome... momen."
I am... I have... inherited powers." He yanked. "I'm... I'm: a demon!" Something snapped, like a chain, metallic, and lurching forwards, he felt a force somewhere inside... burning.
The mouth clinched, and contorted in a quick twist, "Wha? What?"
Rin felt the fingers spasm around his neck, each joint quivering on it's own like they all were thinking something different.
"You... Y.. You let go of him!" Yukio's voice rang out. Rin's busted mouth opened, lips hanging wryly, eyes swirling in a dream of thick pain. He felt a small trickle of warmth rush back into his face. That's it Yuk. You're the strong one, the trained one: the exorcist. He lumped under the hand.
"Give... it... up brat." The back lurched backwards into an arch, and the grip then gaped enough to allow Rin to topple to the ground, and fall with a soft splash in a puddle of his own blood. The eyes, had a striking, abrupt pang of emotion wipe through them like a finger across a dusty window: anger, sadness... fear.
"What... what did y... you... do to him?!" Any outsider wouldn't have thought twice that this figure was a madman: arms flailed in an uneven manner, head savagely shaking, barbarous growls, an intrinsic fight ensued.
"Ha haha, you st... st... stupid boy." Satan slithered, "You can't... win." The heat began going down.
"Rin... h... hold..."
"Y... you...bitch!" Growling, snarling.
"I'm... gu..." The body on the knees rocked.
"Hold me down!"
Rin with his last strength grabbed, pulled himself up Yukio's body, like a shaky, trembling baby animal, using his own body weight to anchor Yukio's skinny body to sit as best he could, even though he was just as thin as his brother, and he felt so ill, so cold.
"Both... of... y...you. Trash!" Head shaking, mouth spitting.
Rin writhed back and forth from the body shaking hostily. A vocal growl from Yukio sounded.
"Yu... Yukio. You can do it." Rin, his arms wrapped around his twin's torso, fingers wrenched deep into his trench coat like a life raft. Weak.
"R... Ri... Ri..." Yukio rumbled, "Rin... I ha... have him."
I knew he could!
"Rin, h... help me. Damn it."
He looked up then, shivering, the irises behind lens the smallest they've been the whole time. Yukio wouldn't say that, he wouldn't curse.
"H... how?" Yukio needed help? He was the one that couldn't learn anything, the one that couldn't do things right, that fell asleep in class, how could he help? Yukio was his professor, his own brother, his professor in three of his Cram School classes!
Yukio uttered the words that drained color from Rin's handsome face: "Stab me."
"No..." He cried. "Yuki, no no... no... I can't." He babbled, whispering, "No, that's not gunna... nooo Yukio!" He shouted with his last strong breath, "You can fight him, I know you... (sob)... Yuki... you can, you can get him. Yukio, you can..."
Bon had heard it, and so had Shima. They watched the twins, Rin holding onto the other in the rain, helplessly. They stood frozen like pillars, staring. Shima's lids welled up with tears, Bon's hand on his back. Yukio was sacrificing himself, and there was nothing they could do.
An invisible power wobbled the golden-handled Kurikara, towards them. The samurai sword almost wiggled in the downpour towards the boys. Satan gurgled violently, unintelligible words mouthing in Yukio's throat.
Shaky hands, grabbed the blade hopelessly, and Yukio caressed Rin's face, "... he's gaining... str.. strength." Yukio felt heat in his eyes, contrast against the chilled rain pouring down, and as his brother and him touched foreheads, knuckles tight from the grip on Rin, it was apparent, Yukio was crying, and among his own flowing tears: whispers, and Rin, a rock against them.
"Look at everything... around us. Look at everything we've done." Split lips wheezed. Satan growled. "Please."
Rin shook his head 'no'. He loved him too much. No. No... no.
"I don't think I can... save myself."
"Grrrr... you... y..." The one inside, a rippling voice coming out again.
Rin looked into those eyes, the irises, masking slowly into the dark, the fog floating, returning, the teal streams in them, fading, and becoming once again those large black pits with only a small colored outline. "I.. tol... told you."
A fading echo, "Ri... I'm.. dr... drowning here..." A voice, choked.
Rin closed his eyes.
Satan growled. "Path... pathet.."
He stabbed. Slamming his eyes open in the same second, watching the blood spurt from the all corners of his brother's face. A scream erupted from the mouth, a deep growl, scream of girth and anger, demonic, and another of a young scream, right on top of it, the howl of Yukio. Such as soft cry paired with such an evil one, completely contrasting one another. He ripped the sword out as quick as it went in.
Yukio's body slumped, Rin had damaged Satan's vessel, and in a few seconds, in a heinous, intense rage, shrieking, Satan's ever magnetic, deadly flames ceased, and it left the body of Yukio Okamura.
"Soon." Was all it breathed, as it became air. The wind stopped. The rain stopped. The sky just simply looked gray, just as it would if a rainstorm had just passed: the ever lingering, streaky clouds and a simple drizzle, light, sprinkled down. The late afternoon sun, deep orange, creeped over the horizon, through the clouds, looking like bands of smoky color innocently scribbled by a child.
With promise of return, with promise it wasn't over, that it would have what it wanted, that it would take Assiah, that it will reign, holding his brother close to him, all Rin could think, was how strong his brother had been. Cradling the dragoon exorcist in his lap, barely alive, he cried profusely, a complete wreak over him, his own blood leaking all over to join with Yukio's on the ground.
Satan had chained Yukio down, opened his own gates of demonic powers, and revealed so many secrets out in the open. It had truly crushed Yukio, crushed him, wadded him up like a little piece of paper. All of his strength that he thought he had; it effortlessly played with his feelings, and toyed with his one weakness: Rin; and in turn, tried to set Rin ablaze, with his eyes peeled back, duct-taped completely open, so that he had no choice but to watch as Satan slowly burned his brother to a pile of ash. Being stabbed was bad, there was a nasty metallic taste in his mouth, he was losing blood, but it would have been nothing compared to watching Rin die. He would rather be wounded, bleeding, dying in the rain. Protecting his brother was most important Shiro said.
Yukio was done. He and Rin lifelessly mourned, uncontrollably, sobbing, just holding one another, holding onto the only thing they knew was best: each other, until their knuckles began turning white.
"Rin." Whisper. Raindrops on his glasses.
He listened.
"I did lie. (cough), had to." Blood came.
"Shh" Rin whispered. "It's okay." He held him a little tighter, closer, feeling the labored breath warm against his lower cheek. He wouldn't let him go, won't let him.
"The Vat.. Vatican... If they found out..." He coughed worse, "I was turning... "
He took off Yukio's glasses and tossed them.
"they'd..." He smirked. Rin, his big brother, his twin, so unlike him. So wreckless, uncontrollable, lazy, childish at times, but yet so... kind. He brought his palm to Rin's face, and let his teal meet Rin's blue. Rin put his hand over the hand at his face.
"Yuki?" The black exorcist trench had a gaping hole in it, the white shirt that poked through wasn't white, instead gunked with flesh.
Alike but so different; black hair, mine light brown. Pale; freckled. He seen his vision hazing on the sides, and felt a warmth in his mouth. Shorter than me. An image of Rin eating an ice cream bar, standing at the bay window, a few days after they had held their 15th birthday party, floated to his mind.
Rin stared, eyes jolting around at Yukio's slowly blinking in his lap.
"the Vat... they'd take... me..."
It was the evening, the lights were dim in their room. He had stolen a glance at Rin watching the snow from the paperwork at his desk.
Rin touched his cheek then to his cheek, Yukio felt... cold. "Yuk?" Rin heard running footsteps.
The snowfall right outside the window, so dainty, white drops of powder. Lightly falling, the moonlight, a light blue on Rin's pale skin, made him look like he was made of a soft chiffon. So ironic. Cold, against a warm heart.
Rin was motionless, listening to Yukio's beats lessen.
"take me...away..." In the deepest place in hell, it's said it's so hot, it burns blue, cold. He wanted to feel the peace that Rin must of felt in that moment, in the night. He felt his body relaxing.
In his mind, Rin smiled wildly and looked at him, from the window. "Yukio?" It was Rin speaking to him, amidst his broken body, against his cheek.
Rin chuckled, the snowfall behind him. "Yo! Done with work yet Yuki?"
"away from... you." Yukio whispered.
He watched him, quietly as the flakes fell... Silence. Smirk.
Rin... So wrongly... perfect. His hand fell.
"YUKIO!" Rin was yanked back by Bon, he was dragged away, screaming, his classmate jerking wildly, kicking, covered in nothing but red.
Bon yelled from behind him, drastically yanking his writhing, broken friend, "MEDICCCC! OVER HERE!
"Oh my god... NOWW!" Shima screamed, rushing to put his hand under Yukio's lifeless head.