Eyyy! How are you guys?

It's been about four, maybe five days since the last chapter and I come bearing the worst of news. I'm afraid I can no longer spoil you with fast updates, alas, my school terms begins anew in less than four days time and I must focus on my studies. No worries though, updates might just end up being once a week or once every two weeks instead of once every 3-5 days. Still frequent but just not as frequent. And school certainly isn't going to stop me from yammering your ears off if you leave me questions or comments!

In other news, I have a dilemma on my hands. There's a lot of information about this verse that I can't explain or have logically in this piece, so I was wondering whether or not you guys wanted me to do a separate series where we went all the way back into history and showed the development of the world and of the Pantheon. It's still a toss-up thing but it depends on whether you guys would read it or not, so in the end, it's up to you.

Anyway, enjoy~!


Chapter 10: Echo


The brunet barely had time to register what Tetsuya said before he could feel his body being invaded by something slimy, yet solid. It started in his feet and scratched its way up his veins, igniting his nerves and making him yell in pain and surprise. The closer it got to his chest, the more it burned. It burned like he was being incinerated from his heart, the flames ferociously devouring his limbs and other extremities until it was burnt so badly that he had felt like he was simply a torso.

'Relax Furihata-san,'

What the fuck.

What the actual fuck was going on right now?

'I'll explain later. For now which way is east?'

"Why the fuck are we going east?"

The brunet heard Tetsuya huff, 'Language, Furihata-san. And we're going to Shibuya.'

Kouki didn't even know when his legs started moving, but apparently he was running now.

What.


Controlling someone else's body without subduing their minds and emotion always served to feel strange to Tetsuya. Humans were naturally very emotive, no matter how bland they looked on the outside, and their minds were the center of those chaotic emotions. Controlling their limbs and eyes without controlling their minds felt an awful lot like driving with a bossy back-seat driver in tow, disdainful and biting comments about how you preferred driving hurled at you at every turn and traffic light.

Tetsuya had experience with carefully maneuvering the treacherous roads of humankind, much more than most of his family, so continuing to run through the streets of Seirin while the midday sun beat down mercilessly upon Furihata's hair and face and attempting to work through Furihata's sudden spell of bitter silence was a little more than child's play.

"Furihata-kun?"

The silence persisted, and Tetsuya would've rolled his eyes if he had any in this state.

"I will answer any question you have at this point."

Furihata stayed stubbornly quiet, a haughty huff echoing through the recesses of his mind.

The shadowy king sighed, "For what it's worth Furihata-kun, I'm sorry I didn't tell you about my plans earlier."

Tetsuya momentarily ignored the cold shoulder being extended to him in favour of slowing the brutal pace he had set nearly an hour ago and ducking into a small clothing store. He moved directly to the back of the store after quietly greeting the clerk and after grabbing a few assorted shirts and a black jacket moved into a changing room, grimacing a bit at the small space.

He quietly apologised to Furihata once more and moved his collected form to his head. He ignored the sharp twinge of pure agony that flowed through his friend's body as he meticulously erased all traces of his taint from the young man's system and seeped through from his mouth onto the ground below. Swiftly, he moved his oozing body to the jacket he had brought into the room and sighed in relief, it was about three sizes too big for him so the hood covered his head perfectly.

Tetsuya glanced over to Furihata and frowned solemnly. The man was still doubled over on the filthy ground, head bowed and chest heaving as he cried silently. He could feel the stress and fear pouring out from the human's core and stretched his now pale fingers out to comfort the human.

As soon as his hands hit the brunet's sun-warmed head however, they were immediately slapped away, the dull thud of his flesh hitting Tetsuya's hollow limbs echoing through the room.

"Furiha—"

"Don't. Touch. Me."

Tetsuya's frown deepened though he kept his eyes carefully blank as he retracted his hand. This would prove problematic very soon. He could hear the soft footsteps of the clerk walking towards their stall and against his better judgment, stretched his fingers out to his right and pulled, ripping a purplish blue vertical slit into existence. He grabbed Furihata by his shoulders and fell backwards into the slit, quickly closing it and cupping his hands to Furihata's nose and mouth all in one fluid movement.

Furihata's fear spiked and morphed into unfiltered terror when he stepped through the rip and quite honestly Tetsuya didn't blame him.

He was expecting to have made one quick trip into Deva, the passageway between the dimensions, and move back into the human world, preferably closer to Shibuya than he was before, but here they stood in a vast hallway tinted in an acidic looking violet with speckles of black and grey splattered on the walls. Tetsuya rubbed his temples and released Furihata gently, baby blue eyes already looking for his pest of a subordinate who was undoubtedly responsible for this makeshift plane.

He felt like this was a good enough reason for his surprise when he felt a heavy leather shoe smack him in the back of his head.


Kouki was freaking out.

He had just had his body possessed and was still recovering from the filthy feeling of having something foul crawling through his veins and wriggling about underneath his skin coupled with the shock of having to retch the being who was possessing him out of his system and the searing, mind-numbing amount of pain that lanced through his nerves. He was burning up in his rage and fear at the moment, though fear was definitely winning.

Kuroko had grabbed him and pulled him into some weird drug-trip looking space that was decorated in dark greys and blacks on an eyeball ignitingly bright purple backdrop and Kouki had no other thoughts in his head when he was released than to escape.

Kuroko had been distracted by something and Kouki seized that opportunity, quickly taking off his fancy Italian leather shoes and hitting Kuroko with them as hard as he could.

The shadow man seemed sufficiently stunned by the attack and Kouki pivoted on his heels and took off in a dead sprint idly impressed that his body could still move after all the stress it had been through. His chest was still stuttering and his breaths were heavy but the brunet simply blinked through the involuntary tears and kept running, he didn't need to know where he was going, he just needed to get away from Kuroko. In his haste however, he failed to spot the lanky frame that stood ahead of him and collided solidly with the figure's chest, legs quivering and giving out on him.

He rubbed his head and groaned as external pain added onto all the internal trauma his body was going through was combining to form the biggest body wide migraine he had ever felt in his life. He squinted up through tear-soaked lashes and yelped in surprise when a rather amused face stared back at him.

The man(?) in front of him was tall and stood casually in the largest pair of geta Kouki had ever seen. The bottoms of the slippers were easily about seven inches and rather thick, which probably attributed to his height. He was dressed in possibly the most elaborate piece of kimono, the grey material of the robe-like clothing wrapping around his torso and falling lightly onto his long legs. His pants weren't like any hakama Kouki had ever witnessed, the near black fabric flaring out at his knees before being held tight by a pair of laces and tapered tightly to the rest of his legs, almost like very long, thick socks. Obsidian beads hung loosely from around his neck, each bead holding a different design stenciled in clear white onto their surfaces and his glasses glinted brightly in the dull lighting.

His hair was dark and messy with a greenish tint to them and he wore a single cross shaped earing in his left ear. On his back was a large rectangular object connected to a prettily decorated blue and cream sash that he had slung over his chest that looked like it had been dyed in a dangerous scarlet hue.

His smile was razor-like, sharp and amused as he held his hand out for Kouki to take.

His expression didn't change as Kouki got up on his own accord, completely ignoring the hand and standing on his own two legs and the strange man simply inclined his head and turned his attention to Kuroko who was making his way to the pair of them and a sedated pace.

"Tetsu-san, is this yours?"

Kouki shivered, his voice was dark and covered in sin. It wasn't scratchy or grating, as a matter of fact it was completely smooth, almost melodic, words slipping out of his mouth like well-made silk.

"Please don't touch Furihata-kun with your hands, Shoichi-kun."

The man, Shoichi, smiled, something a bit less threatening and neatly bowed his head when Tetsuya was in front of him and Kouki idly realized that this was another member of the Pantheon Tetsuya had mentioned so much. Shoichi folded his left hand into his kimono sleeve and ruffled Kuroko's hair with his right, "It's nice to see you well rested. It's been a while, wouldn't you say?"

Kuroko for his part simply removed Shoichi's hand from his hair and tapped a finger onto the backs of his palm causing a small black crescent moon to bloom into existence there and causing Shoichi to hum in pleasure.

Kouki awkwardly stood to the side and Shoichi proceeded to poke and prod and Tetsuya until the smaller being huffed softly and pulled him down to his level, briskly nipping at his throat, "There will be time for this when I have my body back, Shoichi-kun. For now focus on the matter at hand."

The raven haired man's amused smirk was back in place as he stood up to his full height and turned to address Kouki. "Right, you."

Honestly, the brunet had never felt so insulted with a mere two words before, but Shoichi was already walking off, geta clicking nosily as he moved in a seemingly random direction.

"I had high hopes when Tetsu-san mentioned getting someone to vouch for humanity but I suppose he works in mysterious ways."

Kouki bristled, 'vouch for humanity'? Tetsuya never mentioned anything like that before.

"Of course, I was just a bit curious to see exactly what had caught my lord's attention so thoroughly, so changing the course of his portal to sate my curiosity shouldn't count as a crime, right?"

The blue haired deity hummed in the back of his throat, "Mind your words, Shoichi-kun."

The raven giggled a bit and took a right, leading them to a steel door that had a appeared from, quite frankly, nowhere. "Of course, milord. This door leads directly to where you want to go. Say hello to Satsuki for me, okay human."

Kouki didn't know anyone named Satsuki but that man was starting to really get under his skin. He had spoken a grand total of two sentences to him and the brunet was already more than willing to never see him again.

Tetsuya looked back at his friend (Kouki was guessing here, they were really touchy a few moments ago though, so he thought it was a safe guess) and rolled his eyes, "I'll see you soon. Please tell Kazunari-kun to stop pestering Nigou as well."

Shoichi simply smiled and nudged him towards the door good-naturedly, "Tell your brother to stop making so much work for us and you've got a deal."

Kouki swore he saw Kuroko smile before he walked through the portal, vision getting blurred with the rainbow-coloured lights that surrounded him as he passed through the gaps in space and time.


#BackOnTrack, I feel really good about this.

Also, Imayoshi Shoichi is bae. Some people like Akashi, some people like Aomine, me? I love Shoichi. He's such a conniving little bastard, just… 100% woop.

Don't forget to leave a comment and tell me what you think about the short series and about what you thought about this chapter.

Next time, Tetsu and Furihata have a chat.

See ya~