Chapter 2 – Equivalent Exchange

Suoh Mikoto was in hell. That was the only way to describe it, though he was sure that pretty much every part of that sentence was inaccurate. Firstly, Suoh Mikoto was dead. He remembered that clearly, from the first drop of blood to the last melting snowflake on his breath. Which meant that whatever he was now, it was just some idea of Suoh Mikoto – a very detailed and convincing facsimile. Secondly, was. That word implied being, and he was not exactly that. For one thing, he could not affect anything, like a ghost. He was not visible to anyone, also like a ghost. And he had trouble staying in any one place for... he couldn't tell how long, because he couldn't keep track of time any better than he could keep track of his location. He had no continuity, just these brief episodes. Lastly, in hell. Most of the places that he flitted through in his non-being state resembled those he'd left behind in the real world – like his room at the bar and the street he grew up on and even that ridiculous little cell he had stayed in during his "visit" to Scepter 4 – so maybe it was the real world, but one that he couldn't touch anymore, like an exhibit in a museum, so it was hell to him. Where he belonged, he supposed, because he wasn't Totsuka and hadn't protected Totsuka like a proper King should have done. His punishment therefore was being forever unable to change anything. Also, never seeing Totsuka again. Instead, he was seeing a lot of Munakata, who was apparently trapped in a hell of his own while still living, which was unsurprising; the man was clenched so tightly that he probably had to drink fiber supplements with every meal just to have any hope of a bowel movement.

Munakata, he had learned, was very sad. Not in a pathetic loser sense (the Blue King was his own worst enemy, sure, but he was neither incompetent nor a coward). No, Munakata was sad in the way of a man who cannot come out of the rain. Which Mikoto recognized because it was likely the only trait they shared.

Also, Munakata talked to him. Not the real him obviously, because he wasn't really there in any tangible sort of way, but being spoken at was still nice, almost like being an actual person again. Or rather Munakata's idea of a person called Suoh Mikoto, who was frankly a dick, and the fact that Munakata loved him just added insult to injury.

He didn't mind it otherwise. When you were a King your options were limited. Anyone who came into any sort of prolonged contact with you pledged fealty eventually, and that all but assured their love, which made it not entirely honest. Case in point, Munakata's dubious royal charms had poached Fushimi, but since a clansman's bond was unto death, Mikoto had remained in Saruhiko's heart, causing mild derangement, right up to his last breath. And now that Fushimi was free of him, he had latched onto Munakata like a burr. The only person who could genuinely care for a King of their own free will was another King. Or possibly someone like Tatara or Izumo, who'd known and loved Mikoto before he was a King. So he understood Munakata's regard for him. The man longed for a lover who was his equal. So sorry Saruhiko. Maybe give Yata another go.

Anyway, when he wasn't haunting the HOMRA bar or his old high school or whatever, Mikoto was forced to watch Munakata fail at life. Like right now, for example, the man was loitering in the street like an overdressed tourist, attempting to find a house that didn't exist. Mikoto knew the house didn't exist because he had grown up in it, but then the neighborhood had gentrified and his house had been knocked down and the land repurposed for a parking lot. Munakata was surveying this parking lot in a methodical counterclockwise fashion and glaring at all things like he expected to be attacked at any moment, perhaps by the lone bicycle chained to the fire hydrant. Mikoto wanted to kick him – not out of any malice but just to see him vindicated in this unwarranted vigilance – but then the man stepped forward into the lot and just vanished.

Okay, so that was weird and unexpected and possibly the most interesting thing that had happened since Mikoto had died and the lords of hell had set him to watching life go on without him and occasionally stalking the dull as tofu Blue King. He examined the spot where he had watched Munakata disappear and saw a picture of balance scales drawn in chalk on the ground. He poked at it with the tip of his boot, but it was just like everything else in the world, impossible for him to touch, until he took a step forward and suddenly found himself transported to the living room of his childhood home, arriving within an arm's reach of Munakata, who was scoffing down his nose at a little girl in a pink dress with an absurd number of lace petticoats. The girl, likely a new Strain, because how else to explain the red eyes and the temporal anomaly, had a sprinkle of freckles across her face and shiny red curls tied up in a huge pink bow.

"Welcome," she chirped up at him. "May I offer you tea?"

"What are you?" asked Munakata, who was going a little blue at the edges, which is how Mikoto knew that he was pig-biting mad. "Release me." Ah, thought Mikoto, realization hitting him. The Blue King couldn't move. A picture of balance scales, just like the one in the parking lot, maybe even the same one, was chalked onto the floor, and Munakata was standing atop one of the cups. The thing was pretty amazing to be able to restrain a King. Though, interestingly enough, being an insubstantial remnant of Suoh Mikoto was for the first time turning into a perk, as the picture hampered him no more than anything else in the world.

"Are you sure you don't want any tea?" said the little girl. "We serve the most delightful milk oolong."

"No," said Munakata, focusing all of his fury on his right foot and managing to shift the tip of his boot a couple of centimeters.

"Oh, that is very good," said the girl. "I can see that you consider yourself a cut above the rest, but you're still going to have to give up something to step off the scales."

"Such as?"

"We deal fairly. If you renounce that which has brought you here, you may go back. But almost nobody does that. Most of our guests choose to pay the price and go forward. That is the deal."

Mikoto examined the drawing that held Munakata prisoner. It didn't look like much. Not that he could have done anything for the Blue King even if it were just chalk. The perks of being a damned soul cut both ways.

"What price?"

"Depends on your wish. There must be an equivalent exchange. You may have anything you want, but you must offer up your heart's greatest desire to balance the scales."

Well that was a stupid system, thought Mikoto. If you gave up wanting what you wanted, then what was the use of getting it. Munakata being Munakata, however, was considering it. Shit, thought Mikoto as he heard his name and suddenly felt his feet touch the floor.

"Suoh," said Munakata again. "That's one for one. Fair?"

"Hm," said the girl, looking at the scales. "Keep talking. Do you wish to undo the past?"

"No," said Munakata. "You said that even an impossible wish could be granted. And that is what I want. The impossible. Suoh Mikoto as I knew him, alive again. Not yesterday or a year ago, but now and until nature takes its course."

Shit shit shitshitshit! Mikoto's feet wouldn't obey him. What was that fool Reisi thinking! This mad Strain might actually do as he asked, and who knew how that might warp their reality. He wasn't exactly a genius, but even he knew that raising the dead was a bad idea. Sure, being a ghost was crap, but at least this way he was not a danger to the world. And he didn't have any responsibilities he could fuck up.

"You want us to simply restore him?" clarified the girl.

"Yes."

"Easy enough. The Dresden Slate keeps copies of you all, you know. Memories. We can give them a physical form again. Would that be satisfactory?"

Mikoto was outraged. It was the Slate's fault he was stuck this way?! Bugger that ancient relic with a fucking cudgel! First, it had ruined his life. Then, it had fucked up his unlife. If Reisi went through with this unwanted necromancy, the first thing Mikoto would do is drop his Sword of Damocles onto that misbegotten Nazi artifact.

"Yes," said Munakata again.

"Very well," said the girl, and Mikoto felt like he was falling, but it was only the drawing realigning under his feet, the scales tilting. "Now, the payment. We must weigh it against Suoh's life. All that he was and may yet be. A very nearly infinite thing."

Oh thank the fucking gods, thought Mikoto. No way Munakata loved him that much. But the relief felt hollow, and he watched with alarm as the girl touched Munakata's half of the scales and some unseen hand forced the Blue King to his knees so she could reach his heart. She brushed her slender fingers across his chest and smiled like a cat in sunlight.

"Oh yes," she said. "Yes, that will do." Then, she seemed to reach inside Munakata and extract something that burned like a star in her palm. He fought whatever force held him in place as if driven by blind animal instinct to reclaim that light. "I know it hurts," the girl soothed him. "But it'll soon be over and you will be free. I promise."

She placed the star onto the scales and its light spilled all around Munakata, overflowing the cup and making the chalk outline gleam like a constellation. The scales tilted, swung wildly – too wildly for Mikoto to keep his feet – then came to a stop, perfectly balanced. And he felt the pain of being run through with a sword for the second time in his life. It radiated from his center all the way out to the tips of his limbs, foaming in his blood and clenching his teeth around a scream. Everything hurt. Even his hair. He couldn't breathe.

And then he could.

The pain was gone, but in its place was exhaustion and hunger and the sound of his own heartbeat and the smell of dust after rain. He was lying in the parking lot, the pavement scraping his cheek, and Munakata was hovering over him, a calculating look coalescing behind his glasses.

"Welcome back, Suoh," he said finally, proffering his hand as if he were cajoling a feral cat into his palm, and before he could stop himself Mikoto was already reaching for it, warmth spreading from the point of contact. He regained his feet, drawing in lungfuls of air and craving a cigarette. Life lashed at him like wind atop a cliff. But something was wrong. More than one thing.

First, Munakata. He looked delighted, but something was missing from his eyes. Mikoto knew that it had been there before, because he'd never seen the Blue King without it. The man usually tried to hide it behind his glasses, which only made it more evident, but now Munakata's eyes looked naked. No secrets tangled in their lashes and no cracks showed in his facade. A wall rose where there had once been a doorway.

Second, him. He seemed to have something extra. A feeling of intense disquiet centered on the Blue King. Munakata was frowning. Why? And what in holy dirigibles was wrong with him?! Since when did he give a fuck about how Munakata felt? Mikoto reached for the anger in his heart and it blazed up red and unquenchable, but... less than half of what he had been able to draw before. The rest of it was... it was... somewhere south. He could feel it burning there like the sun, exerting a steady pull on him. Anna!

"It's... gone," he said slowly.

"I wondered about that," said Munakata. "It makes sense. The Slate could hardly allow there to be two Red Kings, so one of you had to be demoted. Aren't you glad it was you?"

Strangely enough, he was glad. And furious. Hissing blue sparks crackled up through his hair. At this Munakata looked even more delighted, and he didn't think that was possible. What the fuck? Mikoto delved within again, and sure enough there was a whole network of crystalline blue coral inside him now, trying to cage his flames. Oh, he was more than furious at that. How dare the sly bastard take advantage of his muddled state to bond him!

"It's for your own good," said Munakata. "Can you imagine what it would be like if you went back to HOMRA?"

Mikoto could imagine it only too well. His clansmen had thought the sun rose and set on him, and in their memories they loved him still, but now they would see him for the first time without his kingly aura and realize that he was just some disagreeable punk with no good sense. The only ones who might accept that would be Izumo and maybe Anna. The former because their friendship dated from before the Slate got its claws into Mikoto and the latter because the bond went both ways. It would be awkward at best and a complete disaster in any scenario that was even a sliver less than best.

But as gods and wish-granting devils were his witness, even Munakata had to see that turning him Blue and dragging him kicking and screaming to Scepter 4 would be several magnitudes more awkward. He would literally rip that pretentious uniform to shreds the second someone tried to stuff him into it, and then Izumo's "secret" girlfriend would squash him like a bug with the personal gravity of her boobs for refusing to fall in line with the rest of the ponces.

"You do not have to join Scepter 4," said Munakata. "Just as the Reds should not be your only option. I am not trying to compel you, Suoh. Only to keep you from having to sleep in the street."

"By offering me your bed?"

Munakata blinked.

"No," he said. "Of course not." He looked genuinely flummoxed and Mikoto finally saw what it was that Munakata was missing. Pain. There was no desperate hunger in his eyes. The little she-devil really had taken it. He hadn't expected it to sting, but the amiable and ever so slightly patronizing way Munakata was looking at him now made Mikoto want to find the little wench and wring her neck. He had never wanted Reisi's searing feelings for him, but now that they were gone he felt burgled.

"Fine," he told the Blue King. "I'll sleep on the floor."