:) hello everyone, this is my second monster fanfic. From the moment I first set eyes on this series, it has become one of my favorites. This little oneshot is a kind of twisted Tenma/Johan. The italicized portions are either part of a dream or the past.
The one little sentence in german is not mine, it's from the series. I do not own monster, because if I did it probably wouldn't be so awesome.
Indiscriminate
He runs. He runs, he runs, he runs. He's faster than the wind-but he still can't escape. His lank black hair sticks to his face and the raindrops on his gun make their way to the tip of the barrel and fall. The unrelenting rain heavily obscures his vision. He squeezes his eyes shut but he never stops running.
"Doctor Tenma," says the boy, "So nice to see you again."
The doctor notices that the boy's hair is a tad bit longer than it had been during their last encounter. The boy's eyes remain the same startling shade of blue, a color that reminds Kenzo of both rain and ice.
Suddenly he realizes that Johan is long past his boyhood.
Johan is no child.
Sometimes Kenzo wakes up shaking and alone, in the middle of the night. He has dreams that won't stop coming. And every time he has a dream, it's always the same one.
The instant the dream begins he feels phantom fingertips sliding up his neck. And then he hears-no, more like feels-someone else's laughter vibrating against his chest. And at this point in the dream he can always, always see. And he always wishes that he couldn't.
It's him.
It's Johan.
Johan's burning fingers wander up to the back of Kenzo's neck. And right then the doctor starts shivering and he can't help himself and he's just a little bit scared. He nearly screams out loud, but the dream won't allow him to. He's powerless to stop anything in this world; the dream is already plotted out. The fingers on his neck tighten, nearly choking, and he thinks he's going to die-
Johan kisses him.
Kenzo is overwhelmed by his own fear, and it isn't necessarily his fear of Johan. What really disturbs him is the complete lack of feeling or emotion behind Johan's pretty lips. Even unwilling kisses are supposed to be passionate, intense, angry. But the doctor feels nothing. Johan detects his displeasure and breaks off the kiss. Though he knows that Kenzo can tell he's angry, the blond man's face never loses its composure.
In a moment Johan's hands wind fully around the doctors neck with a startlingly strong grip. Kenzo's throat constricts and pretty soon he's gasping for breath. And the doctor can't change what he says in the dream, no matter how much he wants to. So every single time the dream reaches this point, he speaks the exact same words.
"You monster..."
Those words always make Johan smile. His smile is always perfectly fake.
"If it pleases you, dear doctor, then a monster I shall be."
Kenzo doesn't get a chance to respond. He's got no more breath left for speaking, but he still struggles in Johan's hold and tries to escape. And every night Kenzo's dream ends with the exact same words.
"Why do try to escape, dear doctor, why do you try to escape? There are monsters everywhere. You're never going to be safe."
Kenzo's vision blacks out and when he opens his eyes he's always back in reality.
He remembers a particular conversation he'd had early on with Grimmer. Grimmer, who'd never been quite sure of how to use his learned emotions, had managed to find a crack in Tenma's persona.
He spoke to Kenzo.
"Why are you so set on finding and killing Johan? Surely it isn't simply to prove your innocence."
The doctor gave his usual answer.
"It's my responsibility. I brought him back to life, so I should be the one to kill him."
Grimmer sighed, and the doctor looked at him questioningly.
"You know something, Dr. Tenma? If I were in your position, I wouldn't think it was my fault. If I saved the life of a child, I would be proud of myself. If I saved the life of a dangerous criminal, in a way I would be even prouder. Life-saving is supposed to be indiscriminate, doctor. We 're not supposed to pick and choose who lives and who dies, since we're just humans ourselves. Final judgment is God's job, isn't it?"
Grimmer couldn't see it all, Kenzo knew. Though he'd experienced horrid things, the internal working of hospital politics hadn't been one of them. Tenma knew that every single doctor worked for money and for recognition, and that to them patients were not equal. They would perform surgeries on whom the director believed would be most likely to benefit the hospital, regardless of who came in first.
And Grimmer's idea had one fatal flaw: he hadn't realized that the 'God' in Kenzo's real life scenario was a pretty young man named Johan.
Kenzo thinks that it must be hurtful to be tortured or betrayed by your god. He feels an internal sting every time he watches Johan pull the trigger, and wants to vomit every time he feels Johan's bloodstained hands roaming over his body. And Kenzo thinks-and he pauses in his thoughts.
It scares him when he realizes that he's been thinking of Johan as his god.
Kenzo cries every time he's forced to pull the trigger. It reminds him of how far gone he is, and it reminds him that he's falling from grace.
And it forces him to accept that he's not so different from Johan, really.
Once upon a time, there was a young doctor who defied regulations and saved the life of an innocent little boy.
The doctor loved this little boy with all of his heart.
The little boy had no heart with which he could love him back.
It's some sort of barrier. Tenma remains close to the dirty, squalid ground and Johan remains untouchable above him. Johan is always one step ahead of him.
He knows Johan is a monster. He knows that Johan is horrifying, deceptive, and cruel. He destroys not only his victim's bodies, but damages their minds as well. Many times he doesn't even lay a finger on his victims-they all just die by themselves. And yet, Johan feels no regret and no remorse. He's free of guilt since he has no conscience. Johan doesn't feel the weight of what he's doing to the world.
And for that, Kenzo can't help but to envy him.
He loves him.
He loves him, even though he knows that Johan doesn't love him back.
He's running, he's running, he's still running. His lank black hair sticks to his face and the raindrops on his gun make their way to the tip of the barrel and fall. The rain is relentlessly falling. He squeezes his eyes shut and never stops running.
But things are different now.
He's given up.
He knows he can't escape from the monster inside of himself.
"Hilfe! Das monstrum im mir wird explodieren!"
Johan is so very happy. He's finally broken Kenzo.
He's finally won the game.
The end! :D how was it? drop reviews, for they shall make me eternally happy :3!