Just outside the bustling, illuminant city of Tokyo sits a mansion, stately and proper and European in its design. Its coloration is like that of a newly-cleaned pearl, with roofing and siding the color of a smooth redwood's outsides. The exterior of the manor, as well as the gardens and grounds, are kept beautifully pristine by the lone man that lives within its powerfully intimidating image; Honda Kiku.
To his friends and neighbors, he is known as Mr. Honda [Honda-san, despite my writing this in English], an upstanding, polite, kind-hearted member of the community. To the business district of Tokyo, he is known by the same term and yet there it was one to respect, a powerful and deeply intelligent business man. To us, we who meet in the World Meeting offices every day, the countries of this earth, he is known as Japan [Nihon, or Nippon, as he is otherwise referred to.]
Kiku is indeed a well-meaning person. He has a kind heart and a weakness for things that are cute [much like me], he cares deeply-though quietly-about his friends and his country. For me, the me who has known him for thousands of years, he is a man who would refuse no one.
Few people know that there are actually two men living in that lovely, large house on the border of the city. Two men indeed, by the very same name; Honda Kiku.
The other Kiku who lives in the house dwells within the mirrors, the dark corners, the closets and rooms without windows. He has piercing, dark eyes, void of humanity like a doll's and they send shivers and bumps to your skin. If one looks carefully enough, his face is set in a maniacal grin, an expression my Kiku would never even dream of mimicking, and if one meets the great misfortune of being touched by him…the feeling can only be described as deathly, as in, the part of the body being touched by him instantly feels broken and cold.
This man, we do not refer to him as Kiku, and instead we call him Ashi.
"Evil." Ashi.
This Ashi, who stole my Kiku's face and abused it with that grin as he tore through Asia and the Pacific, cutting down anyone who got within millimeters of his path to power, is the one who shattered the bones in Alfred's leg, split open the head of my beloved brother city, burned and destroyed the homes of my younger neighbors to the southeast, the Koreans Hyung and Yong Soo. Ashi, who destroyed life after life, stopped heart after heart, and spilled more blood in those few years than many of us ever have, got away without a consequence and instead let my little brother take his fall.
But Kiku shouldn't fret anymore about it. After all, I share his burden now.
~ * ~
"Ha…Yao…you're such a damn slut. No wonder the psycho to the North is stalking you so much."
Yao's mind was wiped clean from his head; he was merely an animal at the moment Ashi spoke those words, an animal receiving the kind of pleasure his body both adored and abhorred. His eyes, so strong and determined whilst in their correct state, were glazed and blank and rolled halfway back in his pleasure, his body arching in such a way that could only be described as agonizing as his brother's lookalike drove himself in and out, from the tip of the head to the hilt itself, of his lower body. Later, he would be covered from the waist down in huge splotches of purple. He'd be immobile, helpless, and forced to prolong his already elongated stay in the dreaded house.
Yet, in his primal state, he couldn't fight. He let the monstrous clone of the man he loved delight in his bare body, destroying it slowly as he moved, digging his fingernails into Yao's skin and tearing it apart. Droplets of blood hit the wooden floor beneath them as Ashi's rhythm picked up considerable speed. Yao's screeching volume increased together with it, and his reality returned. It was only a second before he fell back into the thick sea of rapture, but as he fell, he could hear the sobbing in the corner.
The sobbing which could only belong to Kiku himself.
~ * ~
Ashi's existence, truthfully, is annihilating my Kiku from the inside out. His very existence, the fact that the crimes he committed will never be erased from Japan's history, is draining the energy Kiku needs to survive, to live and grow and move on from the 1940s. Ashi refuses to allow anyone to forget, taking sadistic pleasure in the life he now leads, tormenting the man he was [essentially] born from, taking advantage of another man that Kiku cares so much for.
Kiku is so weak now; it makes me want to cry when I see him. I can see his bones, feel his pulse and veins in places it should never be felt on a body. His skin is becoming whiter than snow, almost translucent, and looks as if it could tear like paper. I can hear his bones creak when he moves, and all the while I feel the most deeply-set revulsion for Ashi and everything he stands for. He is the sole reason my Kiku is dying.
~ * ~
Deeper and faster…destroying tissues and inner textures…leaking a pool of scarlet onto the newly-shined floors…a man turned into a toy by the drugs…a man held hostage by a shadow of himself…a man who in himself is not a man at all…
Yao's body fell to the floor with a violent shove, and he lay still, shaking and panting as his right mentality returned. He curled into a ball, mortified at himself once more at his exposed form and what he knew he'd just done once again. He could feel Ashi's heel digging roughly into his side, and he coiled himself tighter.
"Dumb slut…when you've got drugs in you, you're nothing but a sex toy."
A particularly violent twitch.
"Aha, you like hearing that? You like knowing you're just a toilet for me? Just a place for me to in release whenever I feel like it? Sick little bastard, aren't you?"
His stomach gave a violent jolt, and he retched, spewing the semen he'd been swallowing all night, as well as his own blood and saliva; he hadn't eaten a single thing that day.
"Pig! You're messy and disgusting, it's like having a pig in the house!"
The heel was on the back of his head, driving his lips and nose into the mush he'd ejected. The smells of bitter sex fluids and the iron in his blood made him gag again within his throat; it was disgusting…just like a pig…
"Lick that slop right back up, and get the rest of your blood too. I just had this room cleaned, especially for tonight. You're such an ungrateful little…"
Ashi's voice was interrupted by a strangled cry from the corner; Kiku, dressed in a plain, white robe, was also huddled into a ball, his shoulders shaking fiercely in his sobbing stupor.
"…heh…ungrateful little piglet!"
He stomped down hard on the back of Yao's head, sending his face into the vomit and wood with a sickening crunch; he'd broken his nose.
"Now you're bleeding more? You just can't control yourself, can you?"
The foot had changed positions again; Yao found himself lying on his back, his vision blurred by the mess clinging to his face. His nose throbbed, and his heart gave a sickening jolt at the sight of Ashi's silhouette. He could see Kiku too, out of the corner of his better eye, facing the corner as he curled himself more closely; he obviously couldn't bring himself to watch Yao's suffering, although whether that was out of fatigue or sorrow, Yao couldn't be sure.
"Naughty. You've been naughty, my pet, and now I have to punish you again."
Yao braced himself, as he had countless times before, but the sting that came when the whip fell upon his mistreated skin never lessened.
~ * ~
Why do I allow Ashi to defile my body as he does? Both Yong Soo and my youngest baby brother are always pestering me about it, prodding into things I shouldn't have to expose them to. They wonder why I cannot just allow Kiku to battle his darkness alone, they wonder why I must take the suffering in his stead.
The truth of it all is, I don't have to. It seems obvious that I could just walk away and never return, and physically, I almost could. No, that's not why I don't leave. I cannot leave Kiku to face Ashi alone.
I love him too much for that kind of punishment.
~ * ~
The skin of Yao's back had torn like tissue. His scar and the flesh around it had been gouged open by the spikes on the whip, and the scarlet, life-giving water from his veins flowed freely to join the other fluids littering the floor.
"Ah," Ashi's voice was in a casual annoyance, as if he'd spilled coffee on a lightly-colored rug, "I suppose there's no cleaning it up now. I'll have you do it when you're coherent. In the mean time…"
Bare skin met bare skin, and Yao shuddered, crying out hoarsely when his wounds were jarred. Ashi was straddling his backside, his now-softened manhood pressing dangerously close to the hole he'd been abusing not half an hour ago. His hands rubbed roughly against his victim's bruised shoulders, and Yao, losing himself to the blackness, tensed sharply once more.
Ashi was holding a needle. A hypodermic needle.
"N-no, p-pl-ease!" he begged weakly, turning his face the best he could to face the demon, "a-a-anything b-but tha-"
He stopped short as the needle entered the vein in his throat. Instantly, a warmth like steam began to overtake his body, making him ridiculously sleepy and comfortable. His wounds still belched blood and his stomach still gave agonizing lurches, as Kiku continued to sob in the corner, but he felt relaxed. He felt as though he were drifting away…far away from Ashi and the pain of his humanity…if only he could grab Kiku before he floated off…
~ * ~
"He's yours now," Ashi remarked sharply as he pulled on a pair of pants, "the drug should at least keep him from doing any whimpering. Little shit…have fun, dear creator."
With an obnoxious wink at his lighter half, Ashi exited the bedroom.
Shaking like a feather caught in a tornado, Kiku crawled toward his fallen loved one. Silently, his face a mask of dazed horror, he removed his robe. He wrapped Yao in it, as if he were a young baby shivering from a cold, and held him close, laying on the floor along amongst the sea of blood, sweat, and orgasm. Kiku's face stung from the salt in his tears as he pressed it into Yao's throat; the man was dead to the world, and wouldn't awaken until Ashi administered an antidote, to force him to clean up the fluids coating the floor, and then he would serve him again. Kiku's fragile arms tightened their grip around Yao's midsection, his eyes leaking and seeping the salty water once more.
"My Yao…" he murmured against his tortured skin, "…my angel…my angel…"
~ * ~
Kiku murdered me a few weeks later, and immediately after, took his own life. He crawled down the long, precarious flights of stairs to secure a knife from one of the three kitchens, and dragged himself back up while Ashi was in the city. I was awake but immobile; we stared straight into each other's eyes as my life slipped from my body, as he pushed the knife further into my chest, into my heart. It felt wonderful, sick as that sounds, beautiful, rapturous even, to have him kill me like that. Kiku hovering over me, holding me close, tenderly. Kiku's knife penetrating my skin, ripping apart my heart for me. I loved him so much in that one, single moment.
And then there was light.
He told me he'd torn his abdomen open with the very same knife, once he was sure I was gone. He'd prayed to any and every deity he could fathom as he met his own end, begging them to allow us to be together after death.
Even now, we aren't sure who was listening.
Ashi is Japan now, and he's gone on a homicidal rampage across Asia. The twins have fallen again, and I feel a horrible pang for my beloved Hong Kong, who has since assumed my role as China. He suffers the worst; perhaps, and the thought sickens me, he is my replacement in Ashi's dark bedroom.
Kiku and I are alone now, naked in this dimension, this void made entirely of white. There is no floor, no earth, no sky nor ceiling. There are only our bodies and our hearts, and we haven't let go of one another since we manifested here.