The Doctor

"My sister is not an eyesore," Tanjiro angrily expressed to Yushiro as they all walked to what appeared to be a dead end on a city street. "I can't believe you called her that!"

"Calm down," James tried to tell him. "I think he gets it."

"Shut up," Yushiro then instructed both of them. "We're entering our mansion grounds. Stay quiet!" Tamayo first slipped through the wall, passing through as if it did not exist, amazing Tanjiro. Yushiro followed her.

"An illusion," James remarked. "Clever." James, Tanjiro, and Nezuko followed them, and as they emerged on the other side, they found that the illusion Tamayo performed hid a decently-sized house and doctor's office. James could see in the backyard that one of the trees had a small treehouse built around it on top.

Once inside, all four of them sat in one of the patient rooms. Tamayo sat down in a chair and began speaking first, telling the group, "As you might have guessed by now, me and Yushiro are demons. I used my Blood Demon Art to create the illusion of a dead end to hide our mansion."

"So if you're a doctor," Tanjiro asked her. "Is it hard to hold back your need for blood when treating a patient?"

The question was rather offensive to Yushiro, who struck him in the chest out of anger as James himself also sighed in disbelief at the insensitivity of the question. "You fool," Yushiro angrily asked him. "Do you think we choke back saliva when we're trying to save somebody's life?!"

"Now, now," Tamayo calmed him down with. "He wasn't trying to be offensive, Yushiro. Calm down."

Then, another man, a human rather than a demon, emerged into the room, carrying three

briefcases. James immediately recognized them as his. "Here you go, Doctor Nakamura. I got all of the American's belonglings from his hotel room."

"Huh?" James was deeply confused as to how and why she had managed to get someone to collect all of his belongings. "How the fuck... How?"

As the human left the room, Tamayo explained, "It's not particularly safe for you to stay at the hotel you're at. I insist you stay here for now. Anyway, I'm particularly interested in American demons. For a long time, I have heard the stories of how they could walk around in the sunlight without dying at the cost of some of their abilities, and of Muzan's failed attempts to bring that ability here."

"Limited Sunlight Resistance?"

Tanjiro was amazed by the revelation. "Demons in America can walk during the day?!"

"Indeed," James explained as he opened up one of his briefcases and pulled out a book. "We can walk in the sunlight. The problem's that we can't regenerate any lost body parts durin' the day, our Blood Demon Arts are significantly weakened, and we aren't as physically strong." He then drew his arm out to show the others. "Speaking of, I might as well show y'all my Blood Demon Art. I just need a bucket. By the way, my name is James Colby, but y'all don't have to do that last name thing with me, or even any honorifics. Just call me James, or Jack. Either one is fine."

"Here's one," Tamayo replied as she handed him one. "What are you going to do, James?"

"This," James replied as he nonchalantly drew a knife and cut his arm down from his wrist up to halfway up his forearm. He only mildly grimaced in pain as the blood poured into the bucket, filling it with crimson red.

As Tanjiro watched in disbelief, Yushiro got mad over the mess it was making. "You're making a mess on Tamayo-sama's floor! Stop it!"

"Hold your horses," James replied. "Watch the blood." "But there's no horses," Tanjiro expressed in confusion.

"It's an American phrase meaning to wait." As he said that, his wound began to heal as the blood in and around the bucket began to dry up and emit light smoke. Within about 15 seconds, the blood disappeared, and in its place were bullets and shotgun shells. "I can make metal out of my blood. I make all my bullets and shells for my guns out of it, and all the blades on my knives as well. The metal my blood emits can absorb sunlight, and I can soak it in Wisteria poison for an added punch."

"That sounds like a Nichirin blade," Tanjiro noted to him as he pulled his sword out. "Nichirin is a type of metal that the Demon Slayers use to make their swords. It's strong enough to decapitate a demon, and it also absorbs sunlight like your bullets. It changes color depending on the person who wields it. As you can see, my blade is black. Do they have it in America?"

"I don't think it's called Nichi-whatever," James replied as he began to pick up the bullets and put them away in another briefcase. "But it's probably similar in composition. We also have other poisons in America we can use, like oleander and castor beans."

"I've studied demons and demon hunting in China," Tamayo explained to him. "But never in America or the Philippine Islands. Those are the other two areas where our kind exists. If I may, do you mind giving me a sample of your blood, James."

"Absolutely," James replied. As he looked to the book he had pulled out of his briefcase earlier, he could sense that Yushiro was jealous of him to an extent. "This guy's head over fuckin' heels for her," he thought to himself. "How does she not notice it?" "Also," he further explained. "You should have this book. It's a copy of a book I made that composed spells that the Negro slaves of old made. Many of them are steeped in hundreds of years of traditional worship. They're used to hunt demons."

"Spells?" Tamayo was very curious as to these spells, as was Tanjiro.

"Tanjiro," James explained as he sat down and crossed his legs. "That thing I did in front of you with my scent was a spell. All spells involve paintin' a shape in the spellcaster's blood and then invokin' a specific statement in any language to make it work. Some are simple, like the Scent Mask Spell. Others are far more complicated and dangerous, and don't work all the time. Some can even kill the spellcaster if you're not careful." Just as he finished his explanation, he noticed that Nezuko had crawled up to him while lying on the ground, resting her head next to his right leg. "Huh? Oh." Nezuko closed her eyes and reached her hand up to pet his shoulder. James smiled and pet her head. "You don't mind this, right, Tanjiro?"

"No," he replied, shaking his head. "She does this to friendly people. She sees all humans as our family. She probably thinks you're our father or something."

"That's adorable," James replied to him. "I can't believe Muzan did such a horrible thing to such a sweet girl and your family. I swear, Tanjiro, I'll make him pay."

"Get in line," Tanjiro replied jokingly. "I'm pretty sure there's a lot of people who want to, me included."

"Not a bad thing," James acknowledged. "Not at all."

"Anyway," Tamayo continued after an awkward silence. "You're probably wondering how me and Yushiro don't eat humans. Well, we've modified ourselves extensively so we don't have to devour blood as much. We get blood ethically from voluntary donors. As for me, I was able to free myself from Muzan's curse."

"Curse?"

"The Progenitor Curse," James explained. "All Progenitor demons have the ability to place a curse upon the demons they create that enables them to basically spy on them. While not all demons

have it, an overwhelming majority do. I must ask, Tamayo-san, how did you free yourself without a spell?"

"Muzan trusted me enough at one point to lift his curse on me," Tamayo explained. "I was able to escape before he realized his mistake. How did you get freed?"

James sighed and looked down. "I suppose y'all are owed an explanation. Tamayo-san, you seem like a very knowledgeable woman. Do you know about the American Civil War?"

"Indeed," she nodded. "Did you fight in it?"

"As a human," James clarified. "I was only 16 when I lied about my age to fight as a Union soldier. I had lived in Minnesota until then, raised by my Swabian German mother and my natural-born father." He then switched from Japanese to standard German. "I wonder, can you understand me?"

"I can," Tamayo replied back in accented but fluent German. "I can speak German and English as well as Japanese, and I'm slowly picking up French. As a doctor, I have kept abreast of my international counterparts."

James then chuckled. "Well, uh, you'll be surprised by how my mother's native German sounded then." In a flash, he switched from the standard dialect of German to the dialect of Swabia. "Now, how about this? This German sounds very different. My mother knew standard German, too, but she mostly spoke this informally."

Tamayo was taken aback, blinking several times in disbelief at how different Swabian German sounded to her ears. "Oh my God, where did your mother learn German?"

"You know," James replied back in standard German. "That is not the first time I've heard someone say Swabian German sounds bad. They say us Swabians are clean freaks, and I gotta say, they're not entirely wrong." Tamayo laughed in response, amused by James' self-deprecating joke.

Tanjiro, deeply confused and clueless, asked in Japanese, "Okay, um, not to be rude, but what the fuck are you guy's speaking? It sounds like two people with really bad coughs in your throa-" Yushiro then smacked Tanjiro in the stomach, causing the air to rush out of his lungs. "Agh, fuck!"

Yushiro angrily scolded Tanjiro, telling him, "Don't insult Tamayo-sama's linguistic abilities!" "Enough, Yushiro," Tamayo ordered, causing him to back down. She then gave an explanation.

"Tanjiro, me and James were speaking German. It's somewhat related to English, but sounds very different. I can speak it and English, and some French."

"I can speak it, French, and Spanish," James added. "Travelin' to Mexico, Cuba, and Canada leads you to pick up on new things. Anyway, where was I? Oh, right!" He then continued his story. "In 1863, my entire platoon of soldiers was murdered by the main progenitors of America: Thaddeus and George Jackson. They were slave-ownin' demons who sided with the Confederacy as rebels. They were traitors to humanity and to their country. Those fuckers are why I'm here, and I think they're here meetin' Muzan. They wouldn't know decency if it hit 'em right in their fuckin' faces. They turned me into a demon by accident, and as they fled, I devoured the bodies of my already dead comrades. Soon after I came to, I realized what I had done, and I fled. I was taken in by a Negro, a former slave who had escaped to freedom named Ezekiel."

Tanjiro asked, "I assume he was the one who taught you how to hunt demons?"

"Correct," James answered. "Zeke was a kind man. For one, it's because of him that I got my accent in English. In all seriousness, though, I would have died without him. He taught me all the spells he knew, and I copied 'em into a book. He also freed me from my Progenitor Curse with a dangerous spell known as the Progenitor Release Spell. It requires a six-sided star, and even if you chant it correctly, y'all only got a 50% chance of it succeedin'. I was willin' to take that risk, and it worked." He then sighed again as the story took a sad turn. "Sadly, Zeke ain't with us no more. In 1873, while I was out huntin' animals for me to drink blood from, since us American demons evolved the ability to survive on animal blood due to the greater distance between people there, the local KKK kidnapped 'em."

"KKK?" Tanjiro did not know what the acronym meant.

"The Ku Klux Klan," James explained. "A group of morons who think that humans are automatically superior or inferior 'cause of their skin color. For them, they think those who are white and European are superior to those who ain't, and they think those with black skin, the Negroes, are at the bottom of the hierarchy. They don't like 'uppity niggers' like Zeke, not one bit. When I returned, I found them gathered 'round a tree. Those motherfuckers had beaten him and then fuckin' hanged him while I was gone, all for the crime of bein' a Negro who wasn't afraid of them."

Tamayo, Tanjiro, and Yushiro all expressed either shock or sadness at the idea of racism. Tanjiro asked him in disbelief, "They murdered him for having darker skin?!"

"Yep," James replied. "I went into a rage. I killed every last one of those pieces of human fuckin' garbage , and then I devoured every last bit of 'em. I've only eaten live humans twice in my life. The first was then. The second were four bandits who murdered my birth family in 1878 after I had returned to them and came back into their lives. If that sends me to Hell, I'll gladly burn, because I know all of 'em are down there, too."

Tamayo was saddened by his past, relating to him due to her own. "I'm terribly sorry to hear all of that happened to you. I lost my family when I was turned into a demon by Muzan unwillingly. In a blind rage, I ate my husband, my children, and many of my friends before I came to and realized what I had done."

"If there ever was a time it was justified to eat a human," Yushiro remarked in sympathy and slight anger. "The two times you did would be included by far."

"I have to agree," Tanjiro somewhat reluctantly agreed. "I would have done the same most likely. What kind of person murders another because their skin color is a bit weird or something, like,

how petty do you have to be to have that affect your life that much?"

...

Meanwhile, outside, the footsteps of two people, a young woman about 16 with black and orange hair, and a young man with his eyes closed about 20, approached the false dead end of the street. The woman was bouncing a brightly-colored handball, and the man stopped dead in his tracks along with the woman. She asked him, "Try to see if you can track footprints, Yahaba."

"Of course," the man replied as he bent down and placed his hands down towards the ground, which contained large eyes with arrows inside their pupils. "Hmmm... I see the footprints of four people, one of which was carrying a large box... These are definitely our targets, Susamaru."

"Good," she replied. "You got any idea where they end?"

"Wait a minute," Yahaba, confused, noted to her. "These footprints end right at a dead end, after they take a left at the T-intersection ahead of us, as if they go through a wall... How do they...?"

"Let's go to the dead end and find out," Susamaru joyfully replied. "Come on, maybe it'll be some fun illusion they have!" She then raced ahead of him, calling out, "I betcha you can't catch me!"

"We're on a mission, you know," Yahaba sighed. "No time for fun and games."

"Awww, come on," Susamaru replied, dejected. "You can't be serious all the time, you know. That shit gets old after a while." She then began repeatedly tossing her handball up in the air and catching it. "With the blood our master gave me, we can give 'em what for with ease, and have plenty of fun doing so. Treating every little thing as serious business all the time leads to an unfulfilling life, and we're gonna live infinitely long ones!"

...

A few minutes later, as the discussion from earlier continued, Yushiro began to feel a slight sense of impending doom. As he looked around the room, he saw no reason for the feeling, only making him more worried. Then, in a flash, everything changed. As James and Tamayo were discussing the blood work Tamayo was going to do on him, he shouted, "GET THE FUCK DOWN!"

Mere moments later, a handball came barrelling through the walls as if it were a cannon, bursting through and knocking the light in the room out as it bounced along the walls, barely avoiding the group of five. "Fucking hell," James exclaimed as he took cover, his US Army training kicking into gear. "Everyone, stay the fuck down until this thing leaves! We're under attack!" He then drew his revolver as he aimed in the direction of the handball's entrance and fired several rounds, scaring Nezuko as she clung to Tanjiro for cover.

"Your bullets are useless!" From the smoke emerged their attackers, Yahaba and Susamaru. The latter exclaimed as her handball returned to her. "A few balls of lead won't stop us!"