Do I look like Master Kazue Kato? Not by a long shot. All awesomeness belongs to her. Enjoy.
Kahara-Taisho
He could always see them. For as far back as his memory allowed, they were always there.
The Scary Monsters.
The Creatures with horns and tails and claws and wings; distorted faced with sharp teeth and long tongues and blazing, wrong colored eyes. That is, if they even had faces. (Sometimes they didn't.) Creatures with missing limbs and moldy patches and oozing wounds and a stench you could smell for miles.
Sometimes they just walked around town with the people; shifting, gliding into the empty spaces between them, wholly ignored by all parties. Other times, they interacted with them; pulling on pigtails and loose scarves, tripping the man with the heavy boxes, the mother with her arms full of groceries.
(They seemed to thoroughly enjoy picking on him. But then again, who didn't.)
Usually, The Monsters were individual, independent entities. They had their own bodies and minds and spaces, but sometimes – only sometimes – they shared with the people. He could look at someone and see the wings and horns and ugly faces, shimmering just below the person's real face. Those ones scared him the most, because when they spoke or looked or laughed, he didn't know, couldn't tell, if it was them, or Them doing it.
(Some of The Monsters weren't as scary, like the tiny, little, black dust puffs that were absolutely everywhere.)
What also scared him, terrified him, was that nobody else saw them. Nobody reacted to them, like they weren't even there at all. For a while, a long time really, he thought they were all in his head, that he was going crazy.
Until Father told him the truth.
("If you want, we can fight together.")
And, oh, what a devastating relief it was that he wasn't crazy, that he wasn't alone, that others could see too.
That there was a way to make them go away.
("Do you want to sit trembling in the darkness forever, or do you want to be strong? Yukio, why don't you join me in the battle.")
Yes. Yes. He'd jumped at the chance, practically begged Father to start the training right this second, because he was so tired of this; of the fear, the hiding, the weakness.
("Tell me about the things you see, son. Tell me about The Scary Monsters.")
And he did. He talked for hours as Father patiently listened; about the Scary Creatures and the Not People, how they looked and acted; how he felt about it all. He told Father everything, about everyone.
Except one.
He'd tried. God forgive him, he'd tried, but every time he did, the words stuck in his throat. His breathing caught, his heart clenched painfully in an entirely different, entirely worse kind of fear.
He'd tried, but he couldn't. He just couldn't, because no matter what – no matter what – Rin Okumura was still his beloved older brother.
He couldn't tell Father that sometimes – only sometimes – when Rin reached a hand out to help him up after the bigger kids pushed him down, the tips of that hand were elongated into pointed claws, and that sometimes – only sometimes – when Rin grabbed his shoulder or hand, he could feel those claws press into his soft, baby skin. (Uncomfortable, but never painful. Rin would never hurt him.)
He couldn't tell Father that sometimes – only sometimes – when Rin smiled that warm, loving smile, his teeth were a sharp, jagged mess snarled beneath dried, cracked lips, and that sometimes – only sometimes – when Rin drooled in his sleep, the saliva wasn't clear, but a weird, deep color. (He never could get a specific shade; the lighting was always too poor to tell.)
He couldn't tell Father that sometimes – only sometimes – when Rin tilted his head just right, turned it away just so, his ears were long and pointy, or that sometimes – only sometimes – Rin had a thin, black tail that ended with a fuzzy, little poof. (But not like the black dust puffs that were everywhere.)
He couldn't tell Father that Rin has this peculiar light around him – not sometimes, but always. Sometimes it's very deep and obvious (at least to him), sometimes it's only a faint glow, but it's always there. It's a rather pretty, shimmery blue, like rippling water, maybe, or... (a dancing flame...)
He couldn't, never would, tell Father about Rin, because it felt like a betrayal of sorts; the unforgivable breaking of an unspoken vow, a bond, between twin boys.
And because it felt like he would be admitting that there was something wrong with Rin and there wasn't.
There was NOTHING wrong with his brother. His brother was FINE.
Because he knew. He saw the looks, heard the whispers.
(Hellspawn. Demon child. Monster. Stay away, he's dangerous.)
And they were wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Rin wasn't like that, not really, and he knew that.
But instinct is instinct.
As much as he hated it – hated himself – he couldn't help it. Couldn't help how he sometimes flinched at Rin's touch; how his voice sometimes trembled at Rin's grin; how Rin – his brother, his protector, his everything – sometimes terrified him.
It was another reason – perhaps even the main reason – he became an Exorcist.
If he could become stronger, learn to understand and control his fear of The Scary Monsters, then maybe – just maybe – he could make his irrational, shameful fear of his own brother go away too.
It was worth a try.