Soubi wakes up in a hospital bed with Ritsuka's crying still ringing in his ears. He can still hear it, even though he's probably far away from where-
The man shudders violently, thrashing though his body was already in excruciating pain. Soubi was needing to break something so badly, his bones creaked against the thick straps holding him down. All he can see is fire and oil drums and the coarse rope that had restrained him to the chair in the middle of it all. The radio set on top of one of the barrels, close enough for him to hear Ritsuka's screams but too far for him to knock it over and spare himself the nightmare of it all. To spare himself from reliving it now.
A sob rattled through his frame and he can only shake his head, skewing his cracked glasses. No. Ritsuka had to be alive.
There's a knife in his heart, rending it in directions he never thought possible. He never realized how happy he was before, so blinded by past scars, until it was too late. Oh god…
In the midst of his emotional turmoil, he barely registers the thin, white gauze draped delicately over his neck and chest and snaking loosely over his arms. His eyes catch and cling to a strip of exposed 'skin', and the charred color of it makes the beginnings of a wail rise up from his throat. He knows where the pain is coming from now. At least half of his skin is burned to bone and muscle, and the agony coursing through him is from the many damaged nerve endings that lay traumatized in his flesh. And he remembers. Then he really does scream.
They saved him instead of Ritsuka. That's why he was here, alive, and not the boy.
Two nurses rush in and push him further down, while another sticks a needle into his arm. Tears are still dripping down his face despite the sedative.
The sound of his cot being cranked upright eventually rouses him from the dregs of unconsciousness. He has no idea what's going on, and it takes inhuman effort to force his lids open. Now that he's finally, truly alone in the world, he supposes the last of his humanity would be gone anyway. He's too bitter to see the irony.
Someone's leaning in front of his face, but his vision is too blurry to make it out. The bridge of his nose is strangely light, he realizes, missing the familiar weight of his glasses. His eyesight was never this bad without them, but then he supposed the drugs in his system and leftover tears still clouding up his corneas didn't help at all.
As if reading his mind, soft, cold hands brush against his face and slip the spectacles back on, and it's enough so that he can actually make out what's around him. Make out who's in front of him.
The first assumption that pops in his head is nurse, since the first thing his bleary gaze lands on is a crisp, white uniform, a lithe frame, slender legs partially obscured by a skirt, a neat, folded cap. He sees long, black hair falling over a shoulder…a flat chest and an Adam's apple…
He sees golden eyes peering down at him from above a snug medical mask.
The nurse slinks back as soon as his bed starts shaking from the force of his struggling and the anger of his unintelligible growls. He knows who this is. He knows who's responsible for what happened.
'She' loops a pale finger into the string securing the mask to her face and pulls it away, hanging it on Soubi's cot instead.
"Ah…" the nurse sighs, slowly lowering himself down into a chair beside the Fighter's bed, completely unfazed by the swearing and threats directed at him. "Hi~"
The smile Soubi gets is a perfect cross between slimy convict and bashful kindergartner.
Nisei rubs at the kohl lining his eyes as if it annoys him, smearing black all down the side of his face until it's barely visible. "You know, I don't want there to be any harsh feelings between us, Soubi. When you and…uh, Ri-"
"RITSUKA."
Soubi's enraged shout failed to deter him. In fact, something about Nisei's demeanor was different, unlike before, he seemed incapable of fear. "-Ritsuka were being abducted, I was trapped in Seven Moons' warehouse. I didn't give those directives."
"Your men, your plan."
Nisei's eyes widen innocently, cocking his head to the side. "Do I look like a guy with a plan?" He drawls, eyes dropping from the other's stare, to his heaving chest, to his stare again. Soubi doesn't reply so he continues.
"You know what I am? I'm a dog chasing cars!" Nisei's voice trembles slightly at the end of the sentence, whispering, hinting a break in his sanity. The man is scary when his theatrics aren't theatrics. When the passion and fervor he displays is for once genuine.
"I wouldn't know what to do with one if I caught it- you know? I just. Do. Things."
Soubi can't believe this is happening, he doesn't believe the snake sitting next to him. But…he can't help but listen, caught up in spiral of the sentouki's words. It's not as if he can do much else anyway.
"Seven Moons has plans, Seimei has plans, Ritsu has plans…they're schemers. Schemers trying to control their little worlds." Nisei makes a pressing gesture so childish, it makes Soubi blink in bewilderment just watching. It's then that he realizes Seimei's lumped in there too, and the whole thing makes sense, why Nisei's here alone, why his irises reflect both a break from reality and off-putting brilliance simultaneously. Seimei would have never let Nisei do this, or at least he doesn't think so.
"I'm not a schemer. I try to show the schemers how pathetic…their attempts to control things really are. So when I say- ah! C'mere-" His hand had reached over to try and hold the blond's, persistent even while the restrained man tried to wrench away. "When I say that you and your Sacrifice were nothing personal," he pats the bandaged hand held in both his own. "You know that I'm telling the truth."
…
Soubi doesn't know what to think, he just wants to be away from here or dead or unconscious again. Nisei's voice is jarring the last piece of him that could actually attempt to cope with all that's happening if left alone for long enough. Very, very, very long enough. But, there isn't any light in him anymore, so Nisei's words affect him more than he would've ever allowed otherwise.
Nisei's undoing his straps. "It's the schemers that put you where you are," he circles a finger in front of him. "You were a schemer, you had plans, and, uh, look where that got you." As soon as the last bond was in the process of being tugged free, Soubi springs up and claws at the other's hands. He's so enraged he can't tell whether he wants to only push Nisei away or to bash his face in.
Neither ended up possible as the long-haired man's hands constricted around his, forcing him still with uncanny resolve.
"I just did what I do best. I took your little plan and I turned it on itself~" he sing-songed. "Look what I did to this organization with a few rogue Fighters and a couple of spells. You know- you know what I noticed? Nobody panics when things go 'according to plan'." Air Quotes. "Even if the plan is horrifying. If tomorrow I told the council a class would get shot, or a dorm would be blown up, nobody panics because it's all 'part of the plan'. But I say one elder Aoyagi is alive, well then EVERYONE LOSES THEIR MINDS!"
The puzzle pieces are fitting together, why Ritsuka's dead, why they were kidnapped in the first place. He's on the brink of another epiphany when Nisei reaches into his nurse dress and pulls out a gun, twirling it around his fingers, then stopping with the handle of it facing Agatsuma.
"Introduce a little anarchy," he rumbles, pushing the gun into Soubi's limp hand. Blue eyes widen at the implications, he can't think, he doesn't want to think.
"Upset the established order-" Nisei cocks the gun for him. "And everything becomes chaos." The word hisses out of his mouth the same way 'power' or 'control' did from Seimei's. The muzzle of the gun waves unsteadily in front of Nisei's face, though not a glimpse of fear shines in his darkened eyes.
"I'm an agent of chaos." Nisei's holding Soubi's hands in his own, helping him steady the weapon to rest right on his temple.
The madman smiles.
"Oh! And you know the thing about chaos?" A finger lifts to wag in Soubi's face. "It's fear."
Something in Soubi snaps, withers, and is gone forever. The blond withdraws his hand from the other's grip and shakily reaches over to the side table, picking up a fire-scarred square. He flips the unmarred side of the memory card to Ritsuka's camera towards Nisei. "You live." Then the charred side, and a purr resounds deep from Nisei's throat. "You die."
"Now we're talking."
Soubi stares into that lightless glare for only a moment longer before he flips the piece of plastic and lets it land into his lap without looking down, instead watching the yellow eyes in front of him dart down in morbid curiosity.
The madman's still smiling.