disclaimer: disclaimed.
dedication: Emily & Chloe. hay gurl hay.
notes: i honestly thought i could avoid this chapter, but apparently not. you all need to understand how fucked up Yukio honestly is. because you don't even know.
chapter title: sA†An
summary: In a world where someone else found the twins that snowy night, Rin leads a demon army. — Rin/Shiemi.
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"Did you find her?"
"Does it look like I found her, Shima?!"
"Calm down, Bon," Konekomaru said tiredly. "Yelling at Renzou won't get you anywhere."
Bon turned to glare at him, enraged. Konekomaru crossed his arms over his chest and stared the taller man down—they'd been friends far too long for any fear of actual physical ramifications to curb his tongue. Shima stood between them, looking back and forth, nervous as a mouse.
"There's nothing we can do right now. Stop being childish," he said. For a moment, Konekomaru actually thought that Bon was going to hit him.
Then Bon's shoulders slumped and both the breath and the fight rushed out of him at once. They looked at each, soaked in melancholy. They'd stayed static in childhood, the three of them, still as close as they had been the day they'd entered True Cross Academy. And then there had been growing up and fighting and Bon's pathetically obvious crush on Shiemi—there had been a lot of things.
Konekomaru's hand dropped to the sword at his waist. The only reason he wielded it at all was because of Shura-sensei's incessant nagging (because that was the real story behind it—she'd pushed him in front of a bus and then ordered him to pick up a blade in compensation for wasting her time). It was a good blade. Something reliable.
He closed his palm around the hilt, wondering whether to draw it out and drop it to the dirt.
But then, knowing Shura-sensei, she'd probably hit him, yell her lungs out, and then steal his money. She was a terrible teacher, Koneko though, fond.
The sky turned to pale grey pre-dawn above them, and the three men stared upwards.
"Kamiki should be back by now," Bon said.
Konekomaru watched Shima clench his hands into fists, staring determinedly anywhere but Bon.
"Izumo-chan is fine," he growled.
"She should still be back by now," Bon said again.
Konekomaru stood between his best friends and pinched the bridge of his nose to ward off the oncoming headache. As much as he cared about them, there were sometimes just things that a person couldn't do—there was only so much a single person could take.
"They'll be fine," he said, decisive. "Just late. That's all. Hell, they probably have Moriyama with them."
This seemed to reassure the both of them, and they fell silent, staring at the sky. But something deep in the pit of Konekomaru's stomach told him not to hope for too much.
He bit his tongue and said nothing.
/ / /
Shura's head swam. Her vision was blurry when she opened her eyes and the world tilted crazily for a moment. She didn't know quite where she was; only that her limbs felt like lead and she felt violently ill.
She rolled over and emptied the contents of her stomach onto the floor, gut clenching unpleasantly. It was disgusting.
She spat twice and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, grimacing. "Ugh."
Shura hadn't vomited like that since she'd been sixteen and taking shot after shot of tequila behind Shiro's back in a dingy bar just south of the border of Mexico. She couldn't speak a word of Spanish, but the bartender had thought she was pretty and the tequila was cheap, anyway.
It had been the worst hangover she'd ever had, and right at this moment, she felt worse.
Shura groaned and pressed the heels of her palms into her eyelids, trying to ward off the headache that she knew was coming.
It was quiet and she was alone.
Shura stretched and there was pain in her muscles. The skin on her arms was mottled black and blue; some were already turning a sickly purplish-green-yellow, the colour of weeks-old bruises. She hadn't realized that the damage was this bad. With that in mind, she shoved the covers away, and examined herself.
There were bite marks all over her inner thighs, dark marks across her chest, and finger-bruises around her wrists. There were dark nail-gouges in her palms where dried blood crinkled in the lines and the skin around her seals was darker than normal, still flushed and scratched.
But none of this compared to her hips.
They looked and felt like a shark had mauled them. Most of it was still fresh enough to make her wince when she brushed her fingers over them—some still sluggishly oozed blood. Demon healing or not, this was ridiculous.
Shura was not impressed.
She sat naked on an unfamiliar bed and looked at the ceiling, pursing her lips. There wasn't even any shame; Shura spent so much of her time with so little clothing on that her own nudity had no effect on her. She ran her fingers through her hair, sticky and cold with sweat and dirt, and pulled a face.
"Attractive."
It was such an ugly thing.
Shura raised her head, bangs falling into her eyes as she tipped her head and smirked. "M'glad ya think so. What's yer name, anyway?"
He raised an eyebrow at her. "God, apparently."
"I don' believe in God," Shura replied, smiling with her teeth.
"I repeat only what you deigned to call me," he said, inclining his head an inch in her direction. There was something slow and dangerous in his gaze, and Shura felt it sinking into the dark sticky parts of her soul that she never wanted anyone to see. It was like antifreeze; sweet but poison down her throat, tainting and changing everything it touched inside of her.
She slid her legs over the side of the bed, hands still tangled in the sheets. She pulled herself free and stood slowly, hair falling into a curtain of red-gold around her, curling around her mauled hips. His eyes flicked up then down then back up again—and Shura knew men, and she knew that look, and she was still not very impressed.
Shura waved a hand at him. "M'gonna need m'clothes."
He raised pale arms in a bored half-shrug. "I suppose you would."
They looked at each other for a moment.
And then:
"Devour the seven princesses, slay the serpent—"
They were both moving.
It was like small explosions, their interactions; there was no explaining the need to destroy and rend each other apart.
There was a flare of blue fire and Shura ducked and swung.
Blood splattered across the tile, crimson against white, and Shura stood with Kusanagi at his throat. A thin red line appeared across her cheek, dribbling down her face, down her throat and along her collar bone.
Shura smiled when he leaned against Kusanagi's edge to wipe it away, mirroring the line on his own skin. It was a cancer, quietly eating away at her sanity, and she hadn't noticed it yet; maybe she would, eventually.
"My clothes," Shura said.
He tipped his head slightly, eyes gone cold and burning. Shura stepped back, a wary eye trained on the man standing behind her, and went to ruffle through the mass of stained cloth strewn across the floor. There were holes in her shirt, and her shorts looked even smaller than they normally were.
Shura tsked. "Well, this's a pain in th' ass. Ya ruined my clothes—"
"And you are not paying attention. A pity," he murmured. "I thought you would be more careful."
"Wha—"
A prick against the back of her neck had Shura hissing in pain. It was a syringe, emptying into her bloodstream—whatever it was burned and she gnashed her teeth and whipped around, Kusanagi hunting for his arteries.
"Silly girl," and she thought he smiled. "It will only hit you system faster if you move."
Her vision went blurry as her hands began to shake. Kusanagi clattered to the floor and Shura's knees gave out beneath her, the burning in her veins intensifying. Her breathing turned ragged, arms shaking as she tried to hold herself up. He knelt down in front of her and gathered her up against his chest.
"Wha—what'd ya do to me?" she snarled into his throat.
"I am not finished analyzing you yet," he chuckled. "Come now, did you think I would let such an interesting specimen go? Don't worry, you'll be safe."
"I hate ya," she tried to spit the words out, to lace them with acid and bile and all the disgust that bubbled in the stomach. But they came out softly, gently, quiet as a lamb.
"Good girl," he murmured. He smoother her hair back from her face, and all Shura could do in retaliation was to shake her head back and forth, uncomfortable.
The world blurred around her even further, 'til there were neither distinct colours nor shapes. The whole thing was a lovely smear around her, like a carousel of lights at the carnival where she'd once danced on a railing three stories up just to prove to Shiro that she could. Shura tried to chuckle, and couldn't.
Later, she would think that whatever it was that he'd drugged her with had been strong; strong enough to incapacitate her demon blood from burning it off, and the thought would give her the chills.
Shura dozed through a haze. Time had no meaning in this colour smear-place behind her eyelids—yells, bells, cockles shells; children's rhymes and children's times, all flickering in and out of mind.
Like a long-forgotten dream.
Reality came back into focus slowly. It was a little bit surreal; the light morphed slowly into golden flickers along the floor. Cold metal around her wrists and her arms up—the stretch hurt, like she'd been left to hang there for a long time and her bones and sinews were protesting the indignity of it all. She shifted and fabric shifted with her; it was starched and uncomfortable.
Shura's eyes flicked open, but only just. They were dark slats of flat colour against the pale skin of her face.
It was a round room filled with a million candles all glowing gold, all flickering with fire all at once. It might have been a cathedral, once, but no longer. Shura's flame hair fit in, bright, carnivorous and lusting.
"I know yer here," she murmured, voice hoarse.
"Intuitive," he replied, stepping from the shadow of the doorway. He wore black and Shura watched him like a hawk through lidded eyes. He picked his way through the gleaming candles to stand in front of her with his sleeves pulled to his elbows and oh, she would bite through his throat and bury him in the ocean floor so no one would hear him scream.
"Whaddaya want?" she asked. She felt like she hadn't spoken in days.
The candlelight glinted off his glasses. "I don't think you want to know."
"Yer wrong. I wanna know more'n anything."
"Even who I am?"
"That don' matter so much. I don' need'ta know ya t'kill ya," Shura grinned.
"Of course not."
"So whaddaya want?" she asked again, but it wasn't a question—it was a demand, and she would destroy him for her answers. There was catastrophe in her eyes.
He laughed and touched her face. He breathed her in.
"I want to peel your skin away from your face and slip inside you to grind against your bones until we turn to dust and I would eat you slowly if I could."
Softly, chillingly.
Shura wanted to jerk back, but that would show fear and Shura was not afraid.
"Yer repulsive," she said.
Cold and factual and yet he laughed again, pressing his mouth to the pounding pulse-point in her throat. It was such an unholy heaving, caught in her throat and she could not speak.
"And you do not feel the same?" he said.
Possessive, and Shura hated him so because she could not deny it. She hung in dark suspension with his hands curved around her hips and it was like waking up to the end of the world—there was nothing special about it because it was the same as every other morning and the world was burning to the ground.
She hooked her chained arms around his neck and drew him closer.
"That is what I thought," he chuckled.
Shura knew then that there was no escaping this—she'd been too slow and fallen too far. It had been too easy to slip into complacency. It had been too easy to let this happen. It had been too hard to fight, too easy to let herself pretend that he was anything but exactly what he was.
And names were such precious, precious things. Shura grit her teeth, and felt herself giving in. She tipped her head back and shuddered when his teeth dug into her throat (tear his throat out and bury him under the ocean where it was suffocating and safe and—).
The supressed demon in her mind cooed in satisfaction.
She'd lost this round.
Shura hated everything.
/ / /
Three days.
It had been three days.
Shura-sensei had been gone for three days. Izumo had been gone for three days. Shiemi had been gone a week.
Konekomaru stared at the ground.
She'd never been gone for that long before. Yes, there were times when she disappeared for long stretches, but she'd always sent word to stop them from doing something stupid.
And Konekomaru could tell that Bon and Shima were both antsy—but he understood. How could he not? Bon adored Shiemi even if she didn't know it, and Shima and Izumo—well, that was a different story entirely.
Loving someone was dangerous.
And Konekomaru did love Shura-sensei.
Sometimes, he loved her so much that he couldn't stand it. Sometimes, he loved her so much that it made him sick to his stomach. Sometimes, he loved her so much that he didn't even know what to do.
Sometimes, he loved her so much that he hated her.
His hand found its way to the sword at his hip. He held the hilt for comfort and for pain, for remembrance, weakness, strength. He thought of his Shura-sensei, with her drinking and her arbitrary moral system, and he sighed.
But oh, how he loved her.
Konekomaru clenched his jaw.
He needed to find her.
Quietly, he snuck back into the tent. Bon and Shima were sleeping; sleep wasn't something they had much of, and getting rest whenever possible was always the smartest thing anyone could do, Konekomaru thought.
He packed medical supplies but no rations, and slipped them into the deep pockets of his Exorcist uniform. Everything but that was unnecessary—he would not be gone for very long.
Just long enough to find his teacher-love. He nodded to himself.
That was everything, he thought.
And with that, he slipped out of the tent, and into the afternoon light.
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tbc.
notes2: stupid filler / explanation chapter is stupid. bah.
notes3: please don't favourite without leaing a review! :)
