Notes: Soooooo hello, here's my project I went thru for Nanowrimo this year and cranked out 50k for :D you know, instead of working on Incandescence lmao

BUT it should be done in 3 chs and another 20k so I'll be back to working on my other projects in probably a month lol

I'm so excited about this one tho holy shit guys. Like I've been noodling on it for over a year now and I can already hear the screams future chs are gonna cause :D

There is uh, major character death, but considering ghosts are involved that should be obvious XD

And this fic has been 80% Yukio suffering, 10% Rin getting kitchen utensils thrown at his head, and another 10% Mephisto torture, aka my favorite thing to do (besides going for poor Amaimon rip king ily).

SO with that, I hope u guys enjoy~

Song of the Chapter: O Death by Shakey Graves, Monica Martin

The fic playlist is up on Spotify under the name: Shadow Games Book One: Inferno

Fire glowed between ashes and he inhaled.

The scent should have burned his nose, but instead, ash just built around him, suffocating him in the muffled feel of it brushing his cheeks. His heart beat steady and slow, picking up from a lull as he became aware of his surroundings. Something had woken him beside the heat he couldn't actually feel.

Through all of it, a voiceless scream hemmed him in as much as the ash that whirled as if scattered by the scream.

In a flurry that parted ash enough to see, a figure stood a breath away.

His heart shattered from the heavy pace it had started at, filling his ears and almost covering the sound of the scream. His scream.

He couldn't breathe, each lungful deepened the burn the more he fought, bringing more ash to coat his tongue and cake the inside of his throat. Another choked gasp and he gagged, stuck in place facing the nightmare creature screaming and screaming until it looked like it would swallow him whole and he burned alive in the pyre with it.

Black spots ate at the glow of the embers beneath what had once been skin, consuming more of his view until it eclipsed the creature from view and stole the last of his sight.

Yukio woke with a ragged gasp, heaving in place around aching ribs as if he'd been trapped beneath solid concrete and just broken free. His vision blurred even after he rubbed at his eyes before he scrabbled at the nightstand for his glasses.

Even having them on, it still took formless minutes until the darkness of his room faded and he adjusted.

A glance at his phone showed him it was still hours to go, the sun below the horizon and only the light from his screen brightening the room. Morning classes would begin soon, he should sleep again to steal a few hours he'd more than definitely need to function.

He couldn't.

His hand fell, phone dropping to the twisted sheets, and a shiver tensed his body. Sweat had dampened him, and, now that the initial confusion had faded, the rest of his body's signals clamored for attention.

There wasn't any way to tell his body that the threat was gone, that it had just been a dream. A nightmare. One he hadn't had since…

Yukio gave up the farce, taking himself from the bed and beginning his day. He put memories and images of a burning corpse and the soundless scream always accompanying it back into the box that never held them for long with the routine of his day.

Hours passed him by, Yukio catching up on what work he still needed to do before his first lecture. Finally, muted light filtered in through the curtains of his apartment window.

Sudden ringing jolted him from contemplating his tea, but he controlled the movement, flipping his phone to see who'd be calling this early. He could eliminate at least two people in his primary contacts list.

The third, "Good morning, father."

"Hey kiddo, at least you pick up when I call," Shiro said from the other side. His gruff voice spoke of an early morning on his end, too, a trait they both shared. Even without the nightmares, Yukio was an early riser.

"Your mother's still dragging her head out from the covers," Shiro continued, "and that brother of yours is probably still dead to the world."

Ah, that answered why his father had started the call with a complaint. "So, Rin didn't answer. What did you need from us?"

Though he had a good idea, given the usual nature of their calls.

"We're headed out on another job, or I'm heading out, and your mother had one of her 'hunches' and is inviting herself for the ride."

Yuri had half the station wrapped around her finger and a clearance level someone listed as a consultant normally wouldn't have, except that she was almost universally loved. Above that, her hunches led to more than one solved case. Meaning, despite Shiro's complaints that she shouldn't be nosing around as much as she did, Yuri went along more often than not.

"Rin didn't answer, but I'm sure he'll be calling me back later," Shiro said in confirmation, and Yukio could hear shuffling as he must have been getting things ready to go. "I need one of you to come by and cat-sit Kuro while we're out, make sure that lazy thing doesn't get into the food bag again."

By then, the remainders of his nightmare had vanished, locked tight into their box by the familiar way his dad grumbled about cats too smart for their own good.

"Your mother told me to call. You know, aside from wrangling one of you two into getting over here." Shiro's voice snapped him from his thoughts and Yukio smiled privately. "Everything good with your classes? Not that I even need to ask, my kid's the smartest one at the university and I'll eat my badge if I'm wrong."

The over-the-top praise sent heat to his cheeks as it always did. "Thank you, I'm doing alright, I'll be looking for internships soon, by the end of the year, I think."

Better to distract his dad from any more questions about how he, personally, was doing and keep it focused on school where he could safely say he excelled.

"Anyway, I can tell her she's worrying for nothing and she needs to get her 'hunches' checked out."

Promising his dad he'd be by that night to their flat in the city, Yukio let him go back to getting his mom the rest of the way out of bed and out the door.

He had to catch the bus soon.

It was time to put dreams of fire behind him and focus on reality, not waste time thinking about why they were suddenly reappearing again.

If the dead could talk, would their voices carry any of the memories they'd left in life? Any of the joys and sorrows, any of the resentment? Or would their concerns look so far from human that only the impression of their bodies resembled anything of what they were, an impression of life?

Would they remember past grievances? Past harms? Or was it time that healed all wounds, as the saying went?

Some beliefs said that asking for forgiveness would wash away the sins collected in life. Others weighed a soul by the deeds that had accumulated, balancing them to see if the good outweighed the bad, however good and bad were delineated.

Was bringing a life into existence the same as taking one out, then? Would time grant him amnesty in his theoretical weighing of a soul? Maybe it was the lifespan of the life you took, in which case, he'd need several lifetimes.

He laughed into his coffee cup at the humor his sudden thought aroused. If that were the case, he'd need to bring quite a lot of life into the world to cancel his debts.

In truth, he suspected the dead didn't care about penance. Only the living.

Around him, the masses moved in a continuous stream, their meaningless conversations a white noise that he thought must sound something like the hypothetical dead. It felt familiar, the sounds of his city welcoming him with open arms as if in joyous rapture.

Their prodigal son, returned.

So many he had to pay a visit to. There was plenty of time, of course, but he couldn't help the sparks of excitement in his veins, heady and calling him on from the coffee shop he'd always enjoyed.

His favorites hadn't gone far, unable to sever the ties they held to the place, possibly. Or waiting for his return. They might have been just as excited to see him as he was.

Ah, but it was time to see how his oldest was doing.

The minutiae of the day stared up at Mephisto from mockingly dull documents. They wouldn't be that way for long, not after he got through marking them up with one of his many gel pens.

Beside the stack, his handheld console with the newest game he'd been itching to play for months now waited for him to get through several hours of meetings and paperwork. Then there was discussion over an upcoming interview he'd really prefer to wing, and he would finally have the freedom to play.

He could have chosen an easier field. Had considered what would satisfy his goals in the ways he needed.

An absent sigh drifted from his lips.

While he could have chosen to take dear Lucifer's route, this one afforded him several luxuries that made life the fun sort of complicated and less the life-threatening kind. Not that Lucifer's life was worth living, regardless of threats to his life.

His little private joke sent a smile curling over his lips and he chose the gold pen in Lucifer's honor. He flicked at the bobble-head of one of his many figurines lining his desk like his own private audience and got to work.

An hour later he exhaled a long groan, cracking his back and deciding he did deserve a break ahead of schedule. There were three good minutes to cook his instant ramen, and then the however long he took to actually eat his lunch.

Plenty of time for a game.

Mephisto smiled to himself and set everything up at his window table set beneath the ornate gun he kept in the office–a custom one he'd had made specifically for himself–enjoying the weak fall sunlight that warmed him while he waited.

The little timer on his instant ramen clicked forward and the title-screen music began on his game as he made himself comfortable with a wiggle into the high-backed chair.

A glance out the window froze him in the middle of pressing a button, thumb shaking where it hovered.

There, across the street below where thousands walked everyday, one stood still. His pulse fluttered in a fearhorrorrunhehadtorunwhere–he hadn't felt in years and which only came to him in dreams now. The beating bird-wings of his heart broke themselves against his ribcage and his ears filled with white-noise to drown out the room, suffocating him in a memory of a frigid winter and steam rising from-

It couldn't be.

Not now, after so long.

Not when he hadn't prepared–Mephisto's throat clicked on a dry swallow, thumb spasming beyond his control.

Music changed in a loud scattering of notes that jolted him in his seat, gaze flicking to the screen and shutting the volume off, heart pounding as he looked back to the window.

Gone, the figure was gone.

His breath exhaled shaky from his lungs as he searched for the figure, unable to spot any hint in the shifting crowds.

Why now? He clawed his hand through his hair to tug his bangs back, pulling strands free with his lack of care. After eighteen years without a sign, when he'd thought his goal had lost its target, and now to reappear?

Mephisto's eyes squeezed shut and he laughed before tearing them open again. How many times had he thought he'd seen something in a crowd or found some lead to send the police scurrying after like the good worker ants they were?

Too many. And each time they'd come back to him without a trace.

The chances of this figure being the one haunting his every choice were slim, and after all these years, that that particular nightmare would show up on his proverbial doorstep again after vanishing made him less than inclined to trust shadows.

"I'm jumping at figments," he muttered to himself, taking years of skill at building his masks to draw one up and work to convince his body that it was the truth.

A sharp snap through the air tested it immediately and Mephisto jerked his head around just as the timer went off on his ramen.

Ringing filled the room and his skull as he stared at the head of one of his figurines rolling to a stop on the floor, the body toppled to the surface of his desk as if dropped there. Its eyes stared at him from a smiling face and he didn't move for a long time.

An emptiness seemed to hollow the room, something gone that he'd never noticed present until its absence created a void.

"Shit!" Ringing accompanied Rin's shout as he tugged his legs from the tangle he'd made of his sheets. The alarm he'd snoozed five times already blared loud and mocking from the floor where he'd knocked it on the last snooze.

He now had exactly no time to get ready in the morning for his shift.

"Oh god, oh shit." Rin lost track of what, actually, he did as he made it to the bus stop and squeezed into a seat.

It wasn't until he could breathe without feeling his heart slamming to his ribs that he looked at the offending phone that hadn't done a good enough job of waking him up like it was supposed to.

Shiro had called, and of course, he'd missed it.

Without a doubt, he'd get shit for it later. At least his mom would have his back.

The ride rushed by, Rin telling himself he'd get a louder alarm next time because he couldn't lose the only job that hadn't fired him yet. His feet bound over the cracked sidewalk until he tripped up to the back entrance to the restaurant and slipped inside.

"You're late."

Rin flinched, laughing as he hunched his shoulders beneath the glowering face of his boss.

Apologies were made, and Rin scraped by on the grace of his benevolent overlord. The rest of the day passed as they always did in a flurry of fast-paced prep work and trying to read the messy order scribbles.

A break came in the form of a radiant smile and soft green eyes and his short lunch he got to share with their owner.

"Ah, your boss is glaring, Rin," Shiemi said into the green tea she'd ordered.

"Ignore her," he said with a wave of his hand. The wrinkles furrowed over a deepening glower until they left his back and he could exhale, turning back to Shiemi.

"Have you had a chance to talk to Yukio, Rin?" She just had to go for the difficult question right off the bat, didn't she? How she managed without ever having a clue it was bugging him in the first place…

"Well, kinda," Rin sighed, the sound muffled around a mouthful of noodles. "I caught him during a study break last week."

Caught him for fifteen minutes, then Yukio had buried himself in books again and Rin had let himself out. Not before he'd forced some kind of food into Yukio, of course. Anything to ease the tightening creases under his eyes. The third time they'd flicked to the place over Rin's shoulder with an accompanying tension to his body, he'd known Yukio would be asking him if it wasn't getting late and 'Shouldn't he head home before it got dark?'

"He's pushing himself too hard," he added as he slumped to the table. "If I didn't just go over he'd never see me."

If Rin were any less sure his brother loved him he'd think he was being purposefully ignored.

Noise from the TV dragged his thoughts free from the mire that was Yukio's avoidance tendencies, though what he saw didn't exactly improve his mood any.

"Oh man, it's that clown of a politician my dad loves to hate. How does your grandma' work with him?" he said in a mutter. Ice cracked between his teeth from his drink as he watched the eccentric man talking about some event or another in the city with the usual flair and pizzazz Rin thought belonged more in a circus ring than on TV. The bright white suit and gaudy pink polka-dotted scarf tucked into the front beneath purple hair should have been counted as an eyesore. How'd he even get elected in the first place?

Giggles came from Shiemi and she drew the topic to other, safer things.

Their lunch ended and Rin found himself back in the kitchen, more at ease after eating and ready to face the rest of the day.

A whine of steam being released jerked his head towards the stovetop to see a pot bubbling over. Chills swept his skin despite the sweltering kitchen and Rin watched as if in slow-motion as the whine reached a peak.

Metal twanged, Rin moved before he registered he'd done it, and a disk of hot metal flung itself past his face.

He opened his mouth, gasp caught in his lungs as he stared at the dented wall that could have been his skull, ears ringing with the lid where it rattled on the floor by his feet.

"Jesus, that nearly took your head off," Godaiin yelped from his station next to Rin.

"Y-yeah," Rin said, finding he could breathe again as he hesitated, then picked up the lid like it would bite if he wasn't careful.

Nothing, just a regular pot lid, and–Rin slowly set it back to the pot after he'd reduced it to a simmer–there was no reason it should have just attacked him, not when it wasn't pressurized in the first place.

The room was sweltering again. He put the event behind him and got back to work.

Yukio shut the door to his parent's apartment in the city, breathing in familiar scents and feeling comforted despite himself and what he knew would follow. His chest ached.

An equally familiar feeling began to knot in his gut as he took off his shoes and moved further into the home.

Shadows seemed to hem his steps in. Yukio shook them off with long practice.

"Kuro?" he called softly, the sound of his own voice echoing without others to fill the places it lacked.

The open door leading to the hall of his and Rin's old bedroom and Yuri's hobby room stayed dark even though he knew there was a window that should have been letting in light at the end of it. Out of the corner of his eyes, a burning glow flickered like an afterimage.

If he'd just turn his head, he'd see what blocked the window.

Meowing and a soft touch of fur brushing his legs unfroze Yukio and he ducked with a smile to pet Kuro where he wound at his feet.

"Hey," he whispered, picking the little black cat up and using his comforting weight to keep him present and away from memories. He didn't let the taste of ash in his mouth register.

His socks made no sound as he padded to the kitchen, Yukio setting out to his tasks with all the focus he usually gave his most intensive study sessions. At every turn to wash a spoon or clean the empty wet food can, ash drifted, faint, and vanished in blinks of his eyes.

One cat happily catered to, he sighed, brushing his fingers through the fur in absent motions that became meditative the longer he lingered. Yukio watched his hand repeat its path, listening to the purr Kuro let out, happy with his offerings and attention and oblivious to the ash that settled just on the peripherals.

Heat licked up Yukio's neck and he broke from his pattern, standing in a smooth motion and heading back to the door.

"Bye, Kuro," he said, knowing it was to himself but needing to hear something that wasn't a scream in his ears.

It was always worse at home.

Shivers tried to go through him, tightly controlled as he locked the door. His hairs raised instead.

With deliberate ease, he left, heading down the stairs until he exited to the street below.

Heat flared on his skin like a sunny day when he'd seen just seen clouds so there couldn't be–Yukio couldn't stop the flinch as pressure welled in his head with a scream that was louder than it ever was outside of-

"Excuse me, are you ok?"

The scream dissipated, swallowed in a vacuum of silence that left his ears ringing like it hadn't stopped.

Blinking in a flutter of lashes, Yukio forced himself to swallow his racing heart behind a benign smile and raised his head to the voice that had torn the scream away more than any distance from home–from Ri–ever had.

"No, sorry, migraine," Yukio lied easily.

"Oh, well, I know something of migraines," the soft-spoken man facing him on the sidewalk laughed, eyes kind behind his glasses. A shock of white sprang back from his hairline, and the wrinkles on his face marked him as comfortably middle-aged. He looked like someone's father, someone whose presence settled the rest of his nerves.

"I hope it doesn't linger," the man continued. No shadows moved beside the ones that should be there. The only sounds Yukio heard were from the city and his own racing heart.

Ash no longer coated his mouth and his skin stayed cool beneath the overcast sky.

"Thank you, sir," he managed before the silence–it was so silent–stretched too long.

He'd sounded convincing enough, the man nodding before humming and leaving.

Reality reasserted itself with his absence piece by piece. Flickers appeared on his peripherals, shadows that trailed his steps and built the more people he walked past. The ash stayed away, still.

By the time he got on the bus back to his place, Yukio could sit straight without feeling the oppressive weight of shadows along his spine. They'd dimmed to something anyone would say was caused by the natural light. Small shadows that gathered in nooks or scattered around the other people sitting next to him like a second skin.

If he asked them if they saw them too, they'd say of course, who didn't see shadows?

And Yukio would smile and apologize for the strange question.

It wasn't until Rin had nearly forgotten his frantic morning rush and the events at work and sat down to eat at home that he remembered he had to call Shiro back.

"Definitely going to get shit for this," he muttered as the phone rang.

"Brat!" Shiro said instead of any normal greeting. "My poor, sweet, favorite child could be starving and lonely by now if I had to rely on you to check up on him."

A muffled shout in the background told Rin Yuri had heard his dumb joke.

"Kuro's on his own?" Rin knew exactly which 'favorite child' he was in competition with.

"No, your brother's watching him for us this time," Shiro sighed, sounds coming from his end like he shuffled around.

Rin leaned back in his seat at the table, ignoring the creak he was pretty sure meant it was on its last leg. The sky had darkened, earlier now with the changing weather, though it was still nice enough out he'd left the window open. Above him, the light flickered and he frowned. He'd just replaced it…

"Wait," Rin said as he processed Shiro's words. "He said he'd go home? But he-ah, no that's great! I'm glad he's spending time with Kuro."

The last time Yukio had been home to visit was–he was pretty sure it was for their birthday.

Last year.

"Help him out if you can, Rin," Shiro said in a low voice, the layers of humor vanished for a moment as Rin hurried to agree. "He's been pushing himself so hard recently…"

He would help Yukio! In fact, "I can call him and see if he wants me to stop by, too!"

"Great, good to hear it, kiddo," Shiro returned to his usual cheer, breaking the strange quiet he'd created before hanging up and leaving Rin to process it.

Silence stretched around Rin. It had gone completely dark outside, though he was only peripherally aware of it, gaze lost on the far wall he stared at without seeing.

Was it really a year? Not since he'd seen Yukio, definitely not. They'd had lunches together. He'd cooked them himself and brought them, knowing Yukio would forget to grab anything that wasn't quick and convenient in between classes.

Home, though.

Memories of his childhood with Yukio dusted themselves off one by one. Of their cool bunkbed and the pirate-themed room they'd had. Of the old office where his mom had collected all sorts of cool things Rin had spent hours examining where nothing ever seemed to keep him still for more than the time it took him to get antsy.

That room had been his favorite, and Yukio's least.

Where the objects in jars, the delicate animal bones, her deck of cars and the table at the center of it all thrilled him, Yukio had cried, even with Rin's insistence that it was cool, they weren't scary, don't be scared. So Rin hadn't ever made him go back and tried not to talk about the readings their mom did for people that he sat in on, no matter how exciting it all was.

But, had it really been a year?

No. Yukio must have been back at some point, especially if he'd agreed to go watch Kuro while they were out.

Maybe–he'd have to call, find time to grab lunch and see if Yukio was feeling ok.

What had brought him home again? Rin had thought-

The light flickered.

An electric buzz reached Rin just as he glanced up, brows furrowing on the rapid blinks making him squint.

His skin prickled, hairs raising over his skin as Rin watched the bulb dim until it nearly turned off and the room darkened. He was cold.

"Uh," he began.

The bulb brightened in a flash.

Then it shattered.

Rin jerked his head away with a cry, falling back in the chair to bang his elbow to the floor. A curse left his mouth and he scrambled against the linoleum until a sharp pain cut into his palm.

"Ah!" Rin fumbled for the shard of what was definitely glass from the bulb stabbed through his skin before he dropped his hand away. Couldn't touch it, he'd probably jam it in further or break the sliver off inside or something.

Somehow, between one curse and the next, he found the light switch to the lamp in the living room, flicking it on and panting where he stood.

"What the fu-" Rin cut himself off, eyes wide on the sight of the kitchen as he blinked black spots away.

Glass littered the floor, more glittering shards on his poor plate of food he'd almost been done with. "Guess I'm done now."

Who the weak attempt at humor was for, Rin didn't know. His gaze went to the sliver that had wound up in his palm and he sighed, fighting a wince as he began to hunt for where he was sure he had tweezers somewhere in his junk drawer.

Dinner wound up in the trash after Rin finished with his hand and found a broom next to take care of the rest of the mess, glaring at the broken fixture the whole time. If he was lucky the landlord would send someone to fix it by the end of the week. If he was lucky.

The chill hadn't left either. He shut the window, some part of his mind half-hysterically wondering if it would shatter on him, too.

Rin put his second near-death away as he spent the rest of the night distracting himself with a game, some mindless thing to work out the restlessness his day had caused. He'd have gone for a run, but Yuri had gotten onto him about the dangers of running so late at night when she'd discovered his habit and, knowing she'd have figured it out if he'd lied one way or another–the way she always did–Rin had tried to keep his runs to earlier in the day.

Night came eventually, though, and he collapsed into bed, wishing, again, that he had the time during the day for a cat and wasn't gone at the restaurant too long to make it fair for a pet. Being alone all day like that would suck.

He exhaled through his nose, pulling the blanket to his chin when the chill of his room settled like a shroud. He'd have to check the thermostat tomorrow.

When sleep took him, Rin went without a fight.

His next exhaled breath came out visible to a silent room.

Drifting through the dreamless hours occupied his unaware mind. In sleep, a shroud had eclipsed his eyes, void impenetrable despite the slow blinks he gave as if through molasses. Everything felt slow, something Rin registered in the way he did all his lucid dreams, as a reality he would take into account and see where the dream went.

Blinking wasn't the only difficulty, his sight blurring even though he'd always had perfect vision.

Not like Yukio. He'd needed glasses almost as long as they could both remember. The sudden thought brought the image of his brother to his mind and Rin would have frowned if he'd been awake.

Rin tried to suck in a breath, finding they'd slowed to the same glacial crawl as his blinks, the efforts to move through the empty expanse of his dream almost frozen now.

On the next blink, Rin couldn't move.

Couldn't breathe.

Through the void, twin flares the same gold as his kitchen light had been flickered into existence. They moved closer, their sudden presence working to distract Rin from his breathless lungs and gaping mouth.

Each inch cut more of the darkness away even as it eclipsed whatever the darkness might have covered.

But features melded into being around the glow, a mouth stretched wide, and from the mouth, a scream.

From the scream, blood.

It poured out, vivid in the light, warm where it splashed to his chest he just realized burned with the chill like he'd just come out of a frozen lake.

He couldn't breathe.

Against his shoulders and his stomach weights joined the ice preventing him from getting air. They pressed in as a frozen block to his middle and two sets of five icicles dug into his bare skin and the weight increased while fire began to swallow him from below.

When the fire reached his mouth, he registered a metallic tang and saw the mouth above his and below the twin flares and realized he was about to drown in a pool of blood.

Rin screamed.

His scream broke the paralysis and Rin choked, waking.

Without his say, his eyes opened, the scream in his ears ragged and sharp, torn loose from his raw lungs. It took him aching, erratic moments to register he hadn't drowned, that he could breathe again.

He still couldn't move.

Above Rin, twin lights glowed and his mouth still tasted metallic through his panted breaths. The pressure on his body kept him frozen.

What was on his chest? Why couldn't he move?

Get off, his mind shrieked. Move! As if the internal commands would do anything to the force weighing each limb to the mattress. Ice bruised at his middle and his shoulders where it squeezed. It squeezed, frozen fingers that wouldn't free him until he was the same rictus figure as the one overhead.

Stop. Rin pled with something merciless. Please. He continued anyway.

Like the last struggles of a dying animal, Rin's thoughts slid sideways, trying to escape what his body couldn't. They fell to Yukio, and the sinking sensation that he hadn't been able to see him that week like he'd wanted.

The weight left his chest like it had never been. A whoosh of breath exhaled from Rin as surprise sent his body arching and hands scrabbling to the sheets and his stomach, searching for what had kept him down. His search turned up nothing, just ended with welts where he'd clawed he could suddenly feel as sensation returned to his skin.

"Hah," Rin gasped shallow breaths, and his eyes shot open again, having closed them without notice at some point during his frantic movements.

Where before golden flares had peered, now, he saw light from the streetlamps outside reflecting off the ceiling fan blades.

He'd left the blinds up.

Rin's panting trailed into the dark and he sniffled, something stretching at his skin that had him bringing his hand to scrub in a rough pass to his mouth, pulling away to see half-dried blood blackening the skin.

A bloody nose. Had all that been because of a blood nose? He tried to suck in air through the obstruction and failed.

"Stupid," he mumbled, feeling like the exact definition of the word. Of all the ways to wake up, a nightmare of suffocation brought on by a bloody nose and not closing his blinds was right up there with the dumbest things to have happened.

Even less logically, Rin had the urge to call Yukio pressing him to check his phone, some subconscious part of him wondering if there might be a message waiting. There wasn't, and he tried not to let the irrational disappointment rise. Why would Yukio message him so late at night, anyway?

When he'd wiped the blood from his face in the bathroom and closed the blinds again, Rin forced himself to sleep.

End Notes:

Yeah, Rin, I too wake up from horrible nightmares and sleep paralysis demons just hanging out causing nosebleeds it's nbd, you'll be fine! Yukio, on the other hand .