"When I was as young as you, it was unheard of for women to become anything more than nuns. Now I am being ordered around by a female Arch-Bishop." Bishop Shimura frowned distastefully. "Times have changed."
"You don't sound pleased," husked his companion, walking side by side with him.
"Well, I'm of an older generation." Bishop Shimura stated. "I've been usurped by more fools than I care for, but I've never had to live with the insult of being outranked by a woman." He held up his hands, fingers curled towards the palms, palms facing towards the ceiling. "Women are defiled creatures. Without them, men would never have sinned, and now they are tainting the very foundation of our existence that keeps Hell at bay from snatching us all off the face of the earth and into flames!"
Father Sabaku listened to him with a calm aura, an even calmer expression, and, unsettling Bishop Shimura with its intensity, with unwavering focus. There was something not right about his eyes, how pale and emotionless they were, compared to the heaviness of his lids that spoke of many sleepless nights.
And that tattoo. There was no doubt in Bishop Shimura's mind that Father Sabaku had led a sinful life before he had found God.
Inwardly, he sneered at the creature sent to his cathedral, his cathedral, on some whim of Arch-Bishop Senju, that damnable hag who always thought to invade his territory and mock him. And now this.
He hadn't even known that the Most Holy Father answered emails, much less took them seriously.
"We are all damned at this rate," he continued on indignantly, busying his hands with his vestment robes. The silence between them stretched without an argument or agreement from the other man.
"I think I've talked long enough. Why don't you tell me about yourself, Father Sabaku?"
Another thing he didn't like about the younger man: His hair, there was no possible way that it was naturally so vibrantly crimson. If Bishop Shimura left it to himself to interpret the man's appearance, he would say that the priest was a murderer.
Hair could only be that red if there had been blood spilled and the bags under his eyes must have been from countless hours of the dead haunting him, never allowing him the rest he didn't deserve. And that focus of his – suspicious.
No, Bishop Shimura did not like this man at all.
"You know why I'm here." Father Sabaku came to a standstill in the crossing before the chancel. Light filtered in dully through the stained glass windows, catching dust particles in a glow and yet, somehow, throwing the priest into shadows.
It was daunting and Bishop Shimura rounded the chancel to stand at the alter, putting distance between them. A shaft of light also separated them and he mentally thanked the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit for it.
Something wasn't right in the least about Father Sabaku and he didn't know a soul who would disagree with him.
"You've been avoiding talking about it since I arrived," the priest went on, speaking in a low, raspy voice. "Arch-Bishop Senju called you before I came."
"So she did." A hint of bitterness entered his tone. "But I never asked why you were here. I asked about you. Or is what and who you are defined by what you do?"
Father Sabaku gave him a very strange look, one that was directed over Bishop Shimura's shoulder with the cold passion of a beast on the scent of a lamb, and he prowled closer to him, ignoring every obstacle Bishop Shimura had put between them.
He reached out, fast as Creation, and Bishop Shimura only had time to watch his hand retreat before he realized that anything had happened at all.
Father Sabaku held his hand in a tight fist at his side and returned his unnerving gaze to Bishop Shimura's face. "You know more about me than you want to. That's enough."
He turned on his heel and stalked down the nave towards the exit. His hand, still a fist, appeared stranger and stranger the longer Bishop Shimura stared at it. It was shaking. No, it was in spasm. No, it was bleeding.
At the set of double doors, Father Sabaku paused. "You should be careful of the company you keep on your shoulders." And then the doors opened and closed as he left, leaving Bishop Shimura alone to get ready for Mass.
He stared at the strawberry blonde carpet that clothed the nave and aisles. Every step Father Sabaku had taken to leave was accompanied by droplets of blood.
He crossed himself and then frowned.
No, he did not like the man at all, and he wanted him gone as soon as possible.
~""~
Gaara doused his hand in Holy Water – and the little bugger struggling free of his grasp with it.
It screamed something unholy and burned, like acid against his skin, but pain was something he had accustomed himself to and the sound of something sizzling hardly ever made his stomach roll anymore.
"Saint Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle.
Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray;
and do Thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host -
by the Divine Power of God -
cast into hell, Satan and all the evil spirits,
who roam throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls."
"Amen," he added in a small breath, and the demon screeched again before it became silent and oozed through the cracks of his fingers like oil, its futile attempts at freedom finally done with.
With little thought for it, he washed away the acidic mess with what was left of the Holy Water, wiped his hand off on his black cassock, and then drew it away to stare at the raw red skin and the beginning of blisters where the small demon's flesh had poisoned his. That would hurt for some time, he thought dismissively to himself. And then he retrieved a roll of white gauze from one of his inner pockets and carefully wrapped his wounded appendage.
He would let it air out when he was ready to retreat to his room. For now, there was work to do.
Anyone watching him wouldn't have noticed a change in his expression, but everything in him grew tired at the thought. Yes, work to do. Always, there was work to do, and the age old fury he had learned to control gnashed and clawed at its fetters.
'USELESS! Everything you do is USELESS! Not enough or done too late, haven't you realized it yet? Stop LYING to yourself and ADMIT IT. It's useless, you're powerless, and you'll never WIN.'
He closed his mind off to the voice of doubt. If he was in doubt, his faith would be weakened. Any weakness in his faith could be exploited as a weakness in his spirit and that was how demons slipped through, into the body, into the mind, into the heart – through unsteady conviction, through the 'But maybe…'
He pulled his glass rosary from his breast pocket and pressed it to his lips. It was warm, always warm, and he breathed a sigh of slight relief.
Now, however, was not the time for pause. Now, introductions aside, it was time to go to work.
He glanced sharply at the demons that danced around and round the cathedral. It was only a building. It was made of glass and wood and stone and cement and plaster and it was supported by no magical means. It had been built by Man and it would ultimately crumble with age.
The demons knew it and they pranced up the stairs and wriggled through the crevices and cracks of the church, worming their way in.
Faith would have stopped them; they would have shied away from the cathedral as if Holy Water and Grace poured from its very floors and walls and pews. Had the cathedral homed true faith, a kindness in the hearts of everyone within, the cathedral would have been a haven, a Holy Place as it had been meant to be. However, it only ever took one dark soul to spoil the light.
Bishop Shimura had been right about one thing: the foundation of their existence was tainted. It was rotting away, as surely as wood would with termites eating at it and the weather beating on it. But women had little to do with it.
Bishop Shimura was a hunted man, a sick, hunted man whose faith was so absolutely twisted, he couldn't even see the evil that followed him like a caravan.
~""~
Author's Note: A longer update to make up for the last chapter. See? See? Slowly, but surely, my chapters are getting somewhat lengthier.