"Here There be Monsters"
Part 1: Vicious Deja Vu
The shadows were razors cutting into the fleeing light. Street lamps hoarded their tight, flickering pools of greedy illumination. An empty soda can clattered along the sidewalk in stuttering bursts. It was kicked once again and rattled away into the shadows. Honda glared ahead, not caring about the loss of his target. He walked familiar streets with his jaw held in a grim line.
It was past time to be going home. Another afternoon spent in useless conversation. There was nothing they could do! No amount of pitying glances and shamed hushes could soothe Yuugi's desperate determination. They spoke of using the Tork to peer within the Puzzle or shattering his Puzzle and reassembling it. They even spoke of using the Ring once again. Gentle words, honest words, but meaningless.
The pharaoh was lost...
Enough of that. He had to get home. Honda turned a familiar corner more out of habit than deliberate intent. The soft tread of his sneakers against concrete echoed strangely in the streets. He stopped. Something wrong. It shouldn't have echoed at all. The evening was soundless. Where were the cars? No distant growling engines or bleating horns. No faint trails of exhaust. Even the buzzing of the street lamps had vanished.
Dead silence.
tch
Honda whirled around. "Who's there!" he demanded.
tsch-tch
His heart battered against his ribcage and sudden breaths scoured his lungs dry. He licked his lips and he could feel the hair raise on the back of his neck. "Who's there?"
Something tittered drunkenly in response.
The street lamps flickered suddenly, dying one by one. His head snapped up. The bulb above him pulsed once, twice, then flared into darkness. Honda backed up until the cold ridges of the post pressed snugly against his spine. He blinked rapidly to clear his vision. The bulb sparked. Honda could hear the faint snap and hiss as the lamp struggled to rekindle itself. Light returned in a sullen flash.
Inches from his face, a monster smiled at Honda. Fangs like shattered glass erupted from its jaws at random angles and stretched in a wide grin. It reached with a single talon to trace the line of Honda's jaw. That talon held all the dead warmth of bone left to crack and dry in the sun. A thin, crimson line followed its trail.
Honda noticed with horror that its smile was almost gentle.
The bulb crackled again and he was left in darkness with the monster. The touch of the creature's obscenely warm talon lifted from his face. He couldn't breath. Darkness pressed insistently against his eyelids. The monster's lurking heat was gone, the stink of it's rotted breath hanging sourceless in the air.
zzt-bzz
Treacherous light! The false sanctuary of darkness was torn away; the monster brought once more to grin in his face.
zzzt
Honda screamed into the empty darkness. He ran blindly and the lamps, like traitors upon the pyre, illuminated his escape. Streets and sidewalks canted at alien angles. He rushed along unknown paths, heedless of whatever might lay ahead, his heart consumed with the animal instinct to flee the predator. He turned to look behind him. The beast followed, wavering in and out of existence with the capricious will of the street lamps.
Brick smacked harshly against his palms. Dead end! He whirled around, his back slamming against the barrier preventing his survival. Walls rose to block him on three sides. The monster guarded the only exist. His hands clawed into the rough wall, as though trying to dig his way free. Honda's fingernails chipped and dust inflamed a fresh ripped hangnail. His hand closed around something cold and metal.
Doorknob.
Door! Now his hands felt smooth and slick surface, not the rough texture of unyielding brick. The knob slipped beneath his sweaty palms. Open! Open! It turned and a rush of frigid air stung Honda's skin even through his pants and shirt. He didn't care where the door came from, where it lead, anything to get away! He risked a look into this spontaneous miracle. Darkness as thick as blood stared back at him.
The beast crooned behind him.
He plunged through the door and
the other Yuugi set the card without looking. The wind cut and howled around him as Honda watched. It was madness. The other Yuugi stood before Marik and his mad other half, bitterly defying them in the set of his jaw and iron of his spine. "I end my turn," he announced, visibly trying not to look at his other half, suspended and vulnerable.
Honda turned to Otogi, a similar expression of disbelief writ across his face. He heard Jounouchi exclaim, "He's crazy! He's got no idea what he just played!" Anzu stared at the dueling arena with solemn intensity.
"Mr. Motou! It is against the rules to set a card with out looking! If the card set is a monster card, it has been placed in the wrong slot!" Isono, another of Kaiba's legion of employees, tried to instill some sort of logic in the mad proceedings.
"Let them duel," Kaiba called from the sidelines and Honda whipped his head around to stare at the duelist.
Wild screeching laughter echoed against the roiling shadows that cut them off from the outside world and Honda winced. "You've gone mad, haven't you, Pharaoh?" Marik's mad fiend asked, his voice dropping to a rolling laugh. "That is the last draw of your life. You should take a good look at your souvenir."
"It's your turn."
Honda clutched at the nearest arm. He felt Otogi start and the two turned at the same time to glance at one another before returning their gaze to the dueling arena. "This is insane," Honda muttered. He heard Otogi mumble a barely heard affirmative.
The fury of the gods echoed all around them, vibrating the steel deck beneath their feet, reverberating in their breastbones. Ra was reborn. A low chant rose, almost tangible in its age. Words of power, words of force, archaic and driving. "Open your eyes and let this sight be sealed upon your mind!" the fiend screeched as his body dissolved to dust. "My life becomes Ra's power!"
A single eye remained to roll madly and glare down at them. The rest of the fiend rode upon the Winged Dragon's brow. A monster on Marik's side of the field, lone and insignificant, screeched in despair as it to dispersed, a sacrifice to the god. Ra grew in power. No rolling numbers upon digital display were needed to know that. The obscenity swelled and bloated on the combined sacrifices of summoner and monster. "This is the One Turn Kill! You are finished, Pharaoh!"
Honda heard Jounouchi speak as though from a galaxy away. "Marik'll win if he attacks directly..."
Ra breathed hellfire upon the pharaoh.
The other Yuugi screamed into the Winged Dragon's holocaust. "I activate my facedown card!" The holographic card reared up, lost in the glare of the oncoming attack. "Activate Fiend Sanctuary!" A symbol blazed into existence, an occult star to shield the other Yuugi. Round silver beads spilled from this star across the dueling arena, spinning and clinging to one another like a child's bead doll. Ra struck.
He couldn't breath. No. That wasn't how it happened. That should have happened, Yuugi should have set that card, should have had the Fiend Token to protect him and his other half for a few another precious turn. That should have happened. The rightness of it screamed into Honda's mind, clamored and struck against the doubt that stubbornly insisted on existing.
Reality and illusion splintered. The duality of what was and what should have been lay superimposed, one over the other. The fiery bulk of Ra loomed behind the fiend and rushed forward for the attack at the same time. The others' faces flickered between victorious hope and devastating dread like followers of a mad Janus. Honda grasped at the illusion anyway, vain hope, vain belief in the reward to the faithful.
"This isn't happening..." he whispered to himself. "It can't be..."
Victory and defeat. It thrummed against his skull. It faltered and recoiled against rational thought, little more than a cheap plastic wrapper covering corosive poison. The illusion with its bright oily colors was unable to hide what truly lay beneath. With a snap of realization that hurt, the splinters of reality dug in.
Fiend's Sanctuary was never drawn.
The other Yuugi screamed into the Winged Dragon's holocaust. "I activate my facedown card!" The holographic card reared up, lost in the glare of the oncoming attack. "Activate Share the Pain!" Chains the color of rust and blood exploded from the face of the card, rushed to encircle the muzzle of the Winged Dragon, twining viciously around the fiend perched upon Ra. Those chains, so strong and heavy, looked comical on the god, like thread wound around the muzzle of a rabid dog. Honda saw Anzu stuff her hands against her mouth to muffle a scream when those chains twined just as viciously around the other Yuugi.
"NO!" Yuugi screamed, twisting against the bonds that held him pinned against the darkness. "Stop!"
No. It echoed in each of their faces. Stop. They were actors caught in the play, none able to turn away from their cues. No. Fate was writ in the cards and the final hand was being played. Stop.
"I am sorry, partner." The words were tight and choked through the chains. "If you give your life to Ra, I give my life for Yuugi! Due to the effect of Share the Pain, each of us must select a Tribute. Ra is immune. You and I are not." A strangled smile crossed the other Yuugi's face. "If you insist on burying me in the darkness, the least you can do is keep me company!"
Ra shrieked. The fiend was torn down, flung at Ra's clawed feet like an unworthy sacrifice. A madcap grin stretched his face out of any human proportions. "I will make you die in that eternal dark, Pharaoh." He struggled to his feet.
The chains rattled and dragged the unwilling captives to slam into one another. They were held suspended above the center of the dueling arena. A whirling maelstrom dissolved in the metal beneath them, lapping with hungry intensity at their feet. The other Yuugi hung limply in the chains, gaze beseeching his partner. Marik's fiend brayed a harsh laugh that cut into the observers' ears.
Honda barely resisted the urge to clap his hands over his ears. He saw Anzu bite down hard enough on her knuckles to draw blood. He wanted to close his eyes against this madness. 'No,' something spoke from within. 'This must be witnessed.' His fingernails bit crescents into the palms of his tightly clenched hands. Witness be damned.
They sank together into the darkness, fiend and pharaoh. Black tendrils surged to tangle and drag them down. The other Yuugi struggled against his restraints, head thrusting up to gasp for air as he sank down to his chin. The fiend merely bellowed his low, rasping laughter.
A blur of movement caught the corner of his eye and Honda barely turned into time to grab Jounouchi. "Let go of me, you bastard! I gotta help him!" the blond yelled. An elbow slammed into Honda's gut and a flailing fist clipped his jaw. "LET GO!"
Ra screeched unholy fury to the skies and ceased to exist. For one terrifying moment, it seemed the world would follow. Then the shadows clinging to the duel arena dispersed. Yuugi and Marik dropped from their restraints to the floor with audible thuds. Sunlight seared them with stark reality. Marik clutched a hand to his face, a mad violet iris rolling wildly between his spread fingers.
Stunned silence.
Yuugi rose to his knees and stared unblinking into the light. His hands curled into fists. Tremors racked his body. "Pharaoh?" Yuugi's voice trembled in the silence. "PHARAOH!"
Honda's grip on Jounouchi went weak. He watched Jounouchi rush to the dueling arena. Numb. So numb. Anzu sobbed brokenly beside him. Otogi pushed past Honda to follow Jounouchi. The Kaiba brothers were stunned to silence. Isis walked with faltering steps to her brother.
Everything happened around him. Honda stumbled backwards. The metal railing pressed into the small of his back and he clutched convulsively at the cold bar. "No. Stop," he whispered in a pale echo of Yuugi's denial. No one heard him. His head snapped from person to person, eyes flicking desperately from face to face. "Not again." Honda's voice rose to a yell. "Not again! This already happened!"
He launched himself from the railing. Sharp winds and vertigo spun bitter taunts of nausea in his throat. Wind buffeted his back, plastering his jacket tight to his skin. Honda slapped a hand over his mouth. Door. Find a door. Get out of here, get away from this. Sink to knees. Squeeze eyes shut. Wrap arms around his chest. Tilt head upwards, gasp for breath as the other Yuugi did in his final moments.
Door. Get out.
On his feet. Move. Lurch and stumble. Freezing metal slapped against his palms. Seam of door beneath numb fingers. Door knob, cold alien slick against his skin. Open, open. Illusion insisting, reality raging. Turn and push. Demand the illusion cease.
"No. Stop."
He plunged through the door and
jerked up from his desk hard enough to tip his chair back. The chair settled forward with a jarring thump and Honda looked around wildly. "What the hell!" he yelled. He rubbed at his eyes and his vision cleared slightly. Trembling fingers traced the texture of his school jacket imprinted on his cheek. "Dream. It was just a dream."
The classroom was empty and the clock pointed at five minutes past lunch. Honda got up from his seat. He saw Yuugi sitting near the door, hunched protectively over a small box. But... he furrowed his brow. The classroom was empty, right? He shook his head. Never mind. Just the dream. "Hey, Yuugi! Sorry about all the yelling, man," Honda said with a sheepish grin.
Yuugi didn't look up, but continued working, muttering to himself. "It's something that you see, but have never seen before. What do you think it is?"
"Yuugi?"
A flutter of movement caught his eye and Honda turned to look at the door. Someone walked in. Jounouchi and-
"No way." Honda staggered back. "Just no way." He waited for that queer crack in reality to signal the dream once again. Of course he came through the door. Through the door from the monster, through the door from the illusion.
Through the door with Jounouchi.
Honda watched with horrified detachment as Jounouchi and his own mirror image slunk into the room. The not-Honda looked every bit as sinister and threatening as an evil twin from a bad soap opera. They towered over the smaller boy. Yuugi didn't notice them until the box was swiped from his hands.
"Heh. What are you talking to yourself about, Yuugi!" Honda heard his other sneer. "You win the prize for creepy! 'Your greatest treasure'?"
Yuugi jumped from his seat and snatched at the box. "Give it back, Honda!"
The not-Honda held the box teasingly above Yuugi's head for a moment before tossing it to Jounouchi. "Catch!"
It unfolded before Honda like a bizarre play. Every line was spoken as though for the first time and no one missed their mark. The words were repetitious, however, echoes from memory. He watched Jounouchi play the misguided bully, himself the skulking crony. It was painful, yet he couldn't turn away.
"Were you proud of this?"
There was nothing, not even the rush of misplaced air, to indicate when the stranger appeared next to him. Impassive eyes as bright and lifeless as jewels gazed down at Honda. His face was blank of emotion and his arms rested slack at his sides. Loose robes hung from his shoulders and a turban wound tight around his head. The only flare of life about the man was a strange, cross-shaped pendent hanging from his neck.
"Gah!" Honda jumped to the side, struck his hip against a desk. He thrust a finger at the stranger. "You! You were on the blimp when I fell over the edge!" His voice weakened. "You caught me. Us. Me and Otogi. Who are you?"
The performance in front of them halted. Yuugi was caught mid-jump, Jounouchi mid-speech, and the not-Honda caught with his hands outstretched to catch the box again. The stranger walked past Honda to stand beside his double. "You had no malice towards the young boy," he said. Now that impassive gaze sharpened. "You merely followed your friend, as faithful and witless as a mongrel dog."
"I didn't mean to. We were just..." Honda faltered. He frowned and narrowed his eyes. "You're the one dragging me through this! Who the hell are you!"
"Is that your defense? You do not even deny. You refuse to acknowledge entirely." The stranger turned his back to Honda. "This is not your only offense. Follow, or I will leave you to yourself to find a way out." He walked towards the door and passed through the barrier as though he were nothing more than another of Kaiba's holographic monsters.
Honda had little choice but to follow. His hand shook when he grabbed the doorknob. Where now? Another heart rending illusion? Another memory best left to fade? Or perhaps even the monster met in the alley? He opened the door and the school hallway facing him was as shocking in its normalcy as both previous doorways had been in their oddness.
He noticed with a start that the stranger was well ahead of him down the hall. Lockers and school posters whipped past on both sides as Honda ran to catch up. "Hey, wait! Where are we going?" he said as he caught abreast of the stranger.
Once again the stranger refused a direct answer. "You were so carelessly cruel to him."
"I get the point," Honda growled through clenched teeth. "We were assholes." The stranger halted suddenly and Honda stumbled a few steps ahead of him. He turned around and stared at the odd man who might be his only way out. "What?"
"Your friend had his own misguided reasons for targeting the boy. He sensed a familiar weakness in him. However hurtful his methods, he sought only to protect that weakness and give his strength in its stead."
"And me?" Honda asked quietly.
"You were merely content to have a target."
"Okay," Honda replied with tight control, "I was the asshole." Frustration and anger yammered in twin stereo in his head. There were so many furious words and denials he wanted to shout. Honda shoved them back, however, and bit down on the bitter truth. "I was the asshole, happy? Now would you please help me out of here?"
The stranger brushed past him. "Follow me."
"Um, thanks. I think."
Lockers and doors fell into constant procession on either side of Honda and the stranger. Honda could hear the occasional murmur of voices behind a classroom door or just around a corner. Whoever else might have existed in this strange place, his classmates were reduced to ghosts. He pushed away the terrifying thought that they might be the ghosts. Silence followed them for a time.
"This isn't real, is it?" Honda asked at last in a vain attempt to shatter the invasive quiet. "The whole school isn't this freaking big."
The stranger paused to glance over his shoulder. "Do you doubt me?" he asked softly.
"No, I just..." Now it was Honda's turn to halt. "You couldn't care less if I make it out of here or not." Old, familiar anger burned away the last of the fear clinging to him. He readied himself for the fight, body remembering the ingrained stance without his mind's conscience consent. "You don't give a damn what happens! Why bother showing up, then? Why'd you even waste the time on the blimp?"
"The pharaoh could not be distracted from the duel." The stranger was a sphinx. His words and gaze were etched into the stone of his voice and eyes. "Your presence was meaningless, but your absence would have been noticed. He could not afford even that small distraction."
He felt as though the air had been yanked from his lungs. "Needless?" Honda echoed.
The stranger rewarded his reluctant pupil with a slight nod. "Yes. Your death would have been a needless distraction."
Honda threw his hands up in the air. "Forget this! Forget you! I'll find my own way out!" It hurt. Reduced to a needless distraction. Oh god it hurt. He spun around and yanked at the nearest door. It was as stubborn as he, however, and refused to open. Honda continued to yank at it.
"I couldn't stand to watch you. I thought you were an idiot."
"Jounouchi?" He snatched his hand from the door as though it burned. Honda began to struggle against the door, throwing his weight and shoulder into it, trying to batter it down by sheer force. "Hey! I'm out here!" He stopped to look through the small, wire-crossed window set high in the door. Darkness. Dim shapes. He pounded on the door. "Hey!"
"But I wasn't really made at you, Yuugi," Jounouchi continued without any sign he heard Honda. "I was mad at myself."
"Damn it, Jounouchi! Out here!"
Then a familiar voice. His own voice was rendered nearly alien heard outside of his head. His own words were once again reduced to memory's echoes. "I know how you feel...I was the same. I would get so wound up... I just needed to pick a fight." Honda sank to his knees. His forehead pressed against the worn wood of the door. "It didn't matter who," he mouthed silently while the voice on the other side continued in muffled tones. "Some local punks, even a telephone pole. I'd hit them with everything I had. Then I'd realize, the person I really wanted to hit..."
"...Was me," Honda finished aloud.
"There are other doors," the stranger said. His voice held the same gentleness as the alley monster's fang-filled smile. It was all the more horrifying to come from this cold ghost of a man. "But they will all lead to the same."
"They can't all..." he protested weakly. The wood grain of the door blurred into meaningless patterns. He squeezed his eyes shut. "Not all of them..."
"Is this all it takes to break you, then? Uncomfortable memories? Unpleasant truths?"
"Shut up."
The stranger's voice found a sudden passion. "You are little more than a surly mongrel who creeps behind, begging for scraps of attention."
"Shut up."
He heard the swish of robes behind him. It was the first noise he was aware of the stranger making. "What are you to them? You lack the strength of heart to support them, the strength of wisdom to guide them. You are a meaningless voice, calling from the edges of combat to offer your support."
Honda turned from the door to glare at the stranger. "I said shut up."
"Whose voice was it that spurred your friend to return to full life? It was not your pleading. It was the pharaoh's need that brought him back. Not yours."
He rushed to his feet and at the stranger. He halted only when their faces were a mere breath apart. "You don't know anything about me or my friends," Honda hissed. "You might know what happened, thanks to this little mind fuck of yours, but you don't know a thing about who we are or what we feel."
He squared his shoulders and leaned aggressively forward. This, finally, was something he could lash out at. "You're right, I guess I was an asshole, maybe I still am a little bit. But Yuugi and Jounouchi have shown me better than that, that people are worth protecting. And I don't need some space case in a dress to come and tell me that means nothing!"
The stranger gave him no physical response. He merely dropped back into that same infuriating calm. "You wish to help them bring back the pharaoh, don't you?"
Abrupt confusion disoriented Honda. He took an involuntary step back. "I- yes! We all do!"
"What would you sacrifice? Anything?" The stranger pressed forward.
"Yeah, but-"
"Everything?"
"No! What-"
"You would not sacrifice everything to bring back the only one who can duel against the darkness?" The stranger's voice dropped to a dangerous sibilance. "Why would you, who has so little to give, not even offer that?"
Honda found himself pressed to the wall once again, pinned in place by the sudden intensity of the stranger's gaze. "Because, he- Damn it! Because sometimes the sacrifice is more than what you're trying to get! The other Yuugi'd hate it if we did that! Yuugi..." He gasped for breath, trying to pull the words from the air itself. "Yuugi would hate himself if we did that. I couldn't do that. I couldn't hurt Yuugi even if that's what it took to get the pharaoh back."
"You are not even a worthy sacrifice to bring back the pharaoh. You are not even the mangy cur to snap at their heels. You are barely the mule to carry them from place to place."
"Fine!" He shouted. Defiance flared in his voice and body, every bit as strong as the other Yuugi's last play. "I guess that's all I good for, then! I'll be the fucking mule! I'll carry them when they fall!"
The stranger's eyes snapped wide. "What?"
"I said," Honda snarled, "that I'll carry them when they fall. If I'm not the duelist or the cheerleader, that's the least I can do, right?" He turned away from the stranger. "I'll find my own way out."
"You would carry- Wait!"
He chose a door at random. "This one," Honda muttered to himself. "This is the one that will get me out of here." It was a forced certainty that bordered on denial. His fingers clenched the doorknob. "This is the one that will get me out of here. This is the one that will get me out of here."
"It is like any of the other doors, it will lead only to the same." The stranger stood beside Honda, grasped his wrist with a cold hand. "Listen, please, I beg of you. The others, you said you would-"
"Stuff it," Honda said and opened the door.
There was no splinter in reality this time. A sudden flash of sunlight made him shield his face as he stepped forward. The door swung shut behind Honda with a metallic snik. He blinked to clear away the glare. A breeze wafted through an open window, carrying with it the distinct scents of the city suburbs. A bed sat shoved in a corner, covered with rumpled sheets and flanked on it's open side by a small dresser. Clothes crouched in a messy heap in another corner. A worn, blue rug lay on the floor, pinned beneath an equally worn desk. Posters covered the walls, motorcycles on some, planes on others.
"I am rebuked," the stranger said from an empty corner.
"You don't belong here! This is my place!" Honda protested.
He heard the stranger suck in a startled breath. "Yes," he said at last. "This is your 'place,' your soul room. And you are correct in that I do not belong here." The stranger pointed to an awkward collage of photos pasted to a poster board above the desk. Jounouchi. Yuugi. Anzu. Otogi. Even Shizuka and Bakura. "You carry them with you even here."
"Just leave me alone."
"I cannot now." The odd cross hanging around the stranger's neck flared. "You are worthy to carry it for a time, to use it as a tool as much as these items can be used." He removed the cross.
Honda's eyes widened. "That thing- that's like Yuugi's Puzzle! It's one of those Sennen things!"
"Yes. It is the Key."
"Keep it away from me!" Honda shouted. "I know what those things can do to people!"
"I spoke of sacrifice and offerings. Take this then, and sacrifice no more than you would be willing. It might demand the rest, but only if you are weak." The stranger closed his eyes and bowed his head. "I believe now you are strong enough. Take this and find the false heir, the one who would claim the Puzzle unjustly. It is the key to unlock another's soul room and discover what lies within."
"Keep it away from..." Honda's voice died. A flare of gold caught his eye, captured him, wavered hypnotic in his vision. A cross. Dark leather cord wrapped around a loop of gold, cross and key hanging beneath. Gold the color of Ra's flame, of Obelisk's rage, of Osiris' cold eyes. He felt the cord touch the back of his neck, the stranger's breath warm against his cheek.
"Find the false heir and protect the pharaoh," he whispered. "I offer my name to you. I am called Shaadi."
The Key burned against his skin. Felt heavy enough to drag him to the ground, an anchor to carry him deep to the darkness. Darkness as thick as blood, darkness as comforting as a lover's embrace, carried him deep. Not an anchor, nothing to drag him down, but a Key, to unlock this door and all others that might come before. The Key, avatar and symbol of all before and all to follow.
He followed it down into the dark.
Cold pressed insistently against Honda's cheek. He coughed deep and wracking; grit shifted beneath his face to scratch and mark. His arms trembled with the simple exertion of raising himself to his knees. Shirt hanging open, cold stinging his flesh. He clutched at his chest. Bare skin beneath his palm so very, very tender. Flinch. Move and shuffle and groan to sit on his rear instead of his belly.
A street lamp flickered above him. He looked up. Bugs wove in and about the surface of the bulb. One flew too close and wafted down like a tiny Icarus to catch in Honda's hair. He shook his head. Icarus fell to the sidewalk and was crushed beneath Honda's hand as he struggled to his feet.
School bag?
'There, by the wall.'
Home?
'East. Go. Too dangerous here.'
He staggered along the wall, jacket catching occasionally against the rough brick. Home. There. Familiar. Turn and cross the street. 'Both ways! Look both ways!' Lawn and grass and stumble and something rumbling uncomfortably against (inside?) his chest. Door... not another door... Please... 'Just open it. Open and go inside, like the last time. Safe.' Stairs and door. Stumble towards... yeah, bed. Home. Crawl under the sheets, hide, don't move. 'Morning soon. Don't worry.'
The Key lay on Honda's chest as he slept, warm and heavy, rising and falling with every breath.