A/N: Title from 7 O'clock by Penelope Scott
tbh it'd be better for you to read these stories on ao3 (i go by the same username) cause i always forget i have this account so these uploads are super late lmao. also my ao3 has the link to my discord server
i honestly love this fic with a passion HOWEVER it does have some serious warnings!
TW: temp character death, minor character death, blood, cannibalism (but like, a demon eating a human so also kinda not cannibalism?), and suicide
i promise it's worth it, it's not as scary as it sounds!
"Live forever with me, Kyojuro~" the tattooed demon purred in Rengoku Kyojuro's ear as they were pressed together, Kyojuro's sword sliced halfway through the demon's arm. "Live and fight with me forever. You'll never be weak if you're a demon."
Kyojuro scowled. "I already said no, Upper Three, you and I have entirely different philosophies on what makes life precious. My mortality is what makes me strong, not weak!" On those last few words, he forcefully disengaged, slicing through the rest of the demon's arm as he leapt backwards to gain some breathing room.
The demon, Akaza as he had called himself, pouted tremendously as his arm regenerated. "You're so silly, Kyojuro. How could aging ever make you strong?" he laughed, his shattered-glass eyes narrowed in an odd mix of anger and mirth.
Akaza launched himself towards Kyojuro once more and the two began furiously exchanging blows. Kyojuro was overwhelmed. It had been a long time since he had faced an opponent who was this well matched against him and he was struggling to overcome the demon. Blow after blow landed on the other man but it never mattered, the pink haired demon would just regenerate whole limbs in hardly a second. Kyojuro's eyes were wide, trying to keep track of the attacks headed his way.
Blocking a blow towards his face, he felt his left side get crushed beneath a fist. Blood forced its way out of his mouth, bitter and warm.
Akaza paused, growing and stepping back, allowing Kyojuro to do his best to catch his breath. "This is what I mean, Kyojuro. If you were a demon, this would be healed in a heartbeat. What about a permanent injury makes you stronger?" He sighed, shaking his head dramatically.
Kyojuro bared his bloodied teeth into a smile, eyes darting to check on the young demon slayers he was protecting, checking that they were still safe. "It's our weakness that makes us precious," he started, intending to repeat what he had said earlier about the sanctity of life.
"No," Akaza said, interrupting him. "You're precious. You're strong and you're precious and I won't allow you to crumble due to old age." The demon straightened, extending his multi-colored hand towards Kyojuro. "Join us," he said, "Join me or die."
Kyojuro kept his smile plastered across his face as his hands trembled in their grip around his sword. "No," he told the demon. "I'd honestly rather die."
Akaza bared his fangs at him. "You'll die, then."
Kyojuro blinked, shocked at the sight of real tears in the demon's eyes. He was his opponent, a demon slayer, why would a demon cry over his death?
He didn't get much longer to think about it as their fight continued then, the demon hitting even harder and faster than before. Nothing Kyojuro did even slowed him down and the demon knew it. Keeping up with his flurry of blows, Akaza began pleading with Kyojuro, tears leaking down his face from his shattered eyes. "Please, Kyojuro, I don't want to kill you but I can't watch you die slowly either. Please become a demon."
Kyojuro ignored him, entirely focused on survival. Once again, he blocked a blow to his face, the demon's hand caught on the flat of his blade only this time, Kyojuro could feel his muscles failing against the pink haired man's strength. And fail they did. He felt the arm on his left side buckle, weakened from the previous hit. His sword slipped out of the way of the fist and it cracked into his face.
For several seconds, he couldn't see at all, the pain too bright and all-encompassing. After that, he was able to open his eyes again- no. He was able to open his eye, his right eye, the only one that remained.
With his newly limited vision, Kyojuro glanced up, looking for the demon, terrified he had used his distraction to kill the people by the train. He hadn't, however. Akaza was staring at him, a hand to his own face, covering his own left eye. "Kyojuro…" he started, voice thick with emotion, "Kyojuro, please… please…"
"No," Kyojuro snapped. "Haven't I said it enough? I don't like you, Akaza, and I don't like what you stand for. I will not become a demon."
The demon flinched back, visibly gutted by Kyojuro's response. Akaza steadied himself, glancing behind Kyojuro at the horizon. "I can't kill you, Kyojuro," he said softly. "But…" and here he hardened his gaze, focusing back on Kyojuro's face, avoiding looking at his missing eye, "I will turn you into a demon. There are ways to convince you, ways that may make you wish I had killed you after all. I'll see you later, Kyojuro," Akaza promised. A sense of foreboding washed over Kyojuro as their eyes stayed connected and he felt the seriousness of the other man.
He watched, mutely terrified as the demon sped away, leaving Kyojuro behind in agony.
Shinjuro took another swig of the bitter sake he was drinking. He knew he should stop, should get up and prepare for the return of his eldest child. He didn't. He never did, hadn't for years. If he should have done something, it was almost certain he hadn't. His oldest though, Kyojuro, that boy was always doing what he thought he should do, whether due to a sense of duty or the hope of praise that would never come, Shinjuro wasn't certain.
Even after Shinjuro had told him to give up, that he was weak, the stupid boy had gone and become a Hashira anyways, had doomed himself to a life of misery before an early death. Shinjuro sneered. He remembered the day Kyojuro had come to tell him, remembered the conversation his two boys had had where they thought he couldn't hear them.
Kyojuro, the idealistic fool, had told Senjuro that though Shinjuro didn't, Kyojuro believed in him. Believed in Senjuro, someone even weaker than Kyojuro! It was ridiculous.
Luckily, Senjuro at least was mostly aware of this, reinforced by Shinjuro telling him it over and over. Senjuro seemed to know it even more now, seeing his 'strong' brother nearly killed by a demon. How would a boy of his lacking abilities ever hope to survive when someone so much stronger was proven weak? He wouldn't, of course.
Shinjuro snorted into his bottle of sake, taking another sip, reclining on his futon, staring through the open doors out to the evening sky.
"Father?" he heard Senjuro's timid voice speak up from behind him. "Are you planning to join Kyojuro-nii and I for dinner? To, to welcome Kyojuro-nii back home?"
Something about the timid way the boy spoke infuriated Shinjuro, rage rushing through his veins alongside alcohol. "No, you stupid child," he shouted, stumbling to his feet. "I told your idiot brother that being a demon slayer would get him killed, that he was weak, why would I celebrate him returning from a fight that proved just that?" Shinjuro snarled at Senjuro, stalking forwards towards him. The boy trembled, turning to run. Shinjuro raised his arm to send his bottle flying after him when he felt a cold grip around his arm, preventing him from moving.
Overwhelmed with a murderous presence, Shinjuro was frozen. "You called Kyojuro weak," a voice said in his ear, matter-of-fact. "You called precious Kyojuro weak; Kyojuro, who almost beat me, Upper Moon Three; Kyojuro, a Hashira; Kyojuro, who is strong." The grip on his arm tightened until it was almost unbearable, until Shinjuro could feel his bones creaking and grinding together.
Still looking ahead, he saw Senjuro standing paralyzed in the hallway, staring over his shoulder in mute horror. Slowly, slowly, Shinjuro turned his head to meet the gaze of the intruder, eyes widening as he recognized the demon that had attacked his son. The reports hadn't done justice to the sheer force the demon possessed from his gaze alone.
Suddenly, he was released. "Well," the demon laughed, eyes still hard and dangerous, sharps as the shattered glass they resembled, "If Kyojuro is weak, then surely you must be incredibly strong, right?" He laughed again. "I'd love to see it, pops. Go ahead," he goaded, "Go grab your sword from its dusty corner and fight me, prove to me that you're weak and Kyojuro is strong."
Shinjuro turned and sprinted, ran through the doors in his room into the courtyard. He had no idea where his own sword was after all these years but he knew that Senjuro kept his in the garden shed. Throwing open the doors and grabbing the sword from the rack, Shinjuro stepped back out into the courtyard, body finding a familiar stance once more after years of disuse. He looked around for the demon and found him, maliciously smiling in the entrance to Shinjuro's room, the doors he had just fled through.
Suddenly, the demon wasn't there anymore. Suddenly, Shinjuro's chest exploded in pain.
His mouth dropped open in shock, blood pouring out past his lips as he stared down in horror at the arm sprouting from his ribcage.
"Weak," he heard snarled from behind him.
"Worthless," he heard as he watched the arm remove itself from his body.
"Fucking pathetic," he heard as he dropped to the ground.
"I was going to kill you anyways, but now I'll enjoy it," he heard as he felt a foot grind his face into the dirt.
It was, in fact, the last thing he heard before his head was crushed.
Senjuro stared in horror at the headless corpse of his father lying on the ground in the courtyard. His red and yellow eyes slowly traveled up and met the blue and yellow of the demon. Akaza. The one who had nearly killed his brother, who had evidently threatened Kyojuro with a fate worse than death.
The demon stared at him for several seconds before smiling. "You gonna make this easy for yourself, Senjuro-chan?"
Senjuro could hardly hear him over the rush of blood in his ears. His gaze drifted down, watching the blood dripping off the tattooed arm of the demon, sliding from his muscular forearm to his dark finger, the pale skin dyed red.
"Well, Senjuro-chan?" Akaza said, taking a step towards where Senjuro was still standing in the hallway, "You're gonna be a demon either way, but one is significantly more pleasant."
Senjuro… Senjuro didn't know what to do. This was the demon who had permanently injured his brother and had now killed his father. Senjuro knew that even though the man hadn't touched a sword in years, he was still more competent with one than Senjuro ever would be. For him to be killed so quickly, for Kyojuro to have barely survived… Senjuro met Akaza's eyes once more, then turned and ran.
Hearing laughter from behind him, he knew it was futile. There was no way he'd be able to outrun the demon and the sun had just set, there was no way he'd be able to hide until morning. He was doomed.
Not even a second after thinking that, Senjuro felt a powerful force collide with his back, smashing his face into the floor. He cried out, tears filling his eyes as he reached for his newly broken nose. Cold, strong hands gripped his shoulders and flipped him around. Lying on his back, straddled by a powerful demon, all Senjuro could do was sob and struggle futilely. Akaza grinned down at him then bit through his own tattooed wrist, forcing the wound against Senjuro's mouth. Senjuro gagged at the bitter taste, frantically shaking his head to try to dislodge the arm.
"C'mon, buddy," the demon above him crooned, "I'd normally kill weak punks like you but I'm doing your brother a favor. Just drink the blood and it'll all be over~" As he said that, Akaza used his other hand to pinch Senjuro's nose closed. Eyes widening in renewed panic, Senjuro beat on the demon's chest ineffectively before trying to pry the hands from his face, also to no effect.
Body convulsing, vision beginning to fade from lack of oxygen, Senjuro swallowed the demon's blood. Immediately, he could feel it burning in his stomach, spreading through his veins. No, he thought, no, I can't be a demon. If I'm a demon then Kyojuro would have to kill me, that would crush him, I can't do that to him, I can't! With a sudden burst of hysterical strength, Senjuro managed to shove the demon off of him and clamber to his feet, turning and racing to his brother's room.
"What are you doing, kiddo?" Akaza asked from behind him. "My blood's already in ya, quite a bit of it too. You'll be a demon any minute now, there's nothing you can do about it."
Senjuro ignored him, crashing into Kyojuro's bedroom and barreling straight for the extra sword he knew his brother kept by his bed. Grabbing it, he tore the sheath off and brought the edge up to his neck.
"Wha-hey!" Akaza shouted, reaching the doorway, "Stop! Stop, you little fucker!"
Senjuro spun around and smiled at him as he sliced the blade through his neck.
Kyojuro smiled as he reached the gate at the entrance of his family's manor. He was still heavily bandaged and would have a long way to go before he was fighting fit again but at least he was free to be with his brother and father once more. Passing through the gate, he approached the main doors of the house. Opening those dramatically, he called out a loud "I'm home!" Pausing, he waited a second, listening for his little brother to respond. Hearing nothing, he shrugged, figuring Senjuro must have fallen asleep while waiting. It had happened before, after all.
Kyojuro stepped inside and closed the doors behind him, removing his shoes and replacing them with his house slippers. He dropped his traveling bag by the kotatsu and began making his way towards his brother's room to wake him. As he approached the hallway that contained his and Senjuro's rooms, his content smile dropped suddenly. He smelled blood, and quite a bit of it at that, a sour mix of human and demon filling the air.
Kyojuro grasped the handle of his sword tightly. He was more scared now than he had ever been in his life. This was his brother in danger, darling little Senjuro who looked up to him like he had lit the sun ablaze himself. Kyojuro had failed others before, had been too slow or too late to save them, and it was always crushing. But this, this, he would never recover from this if he had failed to save Senjuro. Never.
Taking a deep breath, readying himself to use his forms, Kyojuro crept forwards. Turning the corner, the scent of blood grew stronger. He could see now that his was the only door open. He could see a trail of blood leading into his room. Inching ever closer, he was at the door frame when someone in the room spoke.
"I know you're there, Kyojuro," the voice said and Kyojuro's blood froze in his veins. He knew that voice. He knew that voice and he knew his family was doomed. "Come out from behind the corner, Kyojuro. You're not fooling anyone."
Kyojuro did so, stepping into the open entrance to his room, immediately locking his one-eyed gaze with a blood-covered Akaza who was kneeling in front of Kyojuro's futon, a futon containing the bloodied body of- "Senjuro," Kyojuro breathed.
Senjuro, precious Senjuro, his baby brother, no, no, no-
Kyojuro took a stumbling step forwards, hands leaving his sword as he reached both out as if to cradle his brother in his arms again. Before he could, however, Akaza's face filled his vision once again. "You," Kyojuro snarled, freeing his sword to point at the demon's chest, "What did you do?"
Akaza smiled, grim. "I told you I'd convince you, Kyojuro. Your father is dead and your brother's life rests in my hands."
Kyojuro's breath whooshed out of him at the revelation of his father's demise. He had always been so strong, Kyojuro had been half-hoping that he had managed to escape and get help. Hearing it confirmed that the man was dead shook the foundation of Kyojuro's world a small bit. The part about his brother, though…
"You can't trick me," Kyojuro said, steadying his sword once more. "Senjuro is dead. His throat is cut. His blood," Kyojuro's throat tightened painfully with a harshly smothered sob, "His blood is all over the room. He's dead."
Akaza's head tilted to the side, a smile flickering over his previously solemn features. "Are you sure? He might be dead to a human but demons are special. I can still save him, but only if you become a demon."
Kyojuro hesitated, eye flitting from his brother's body to Akaza's oddly earnest face staring up at him from his place on the floor. Edging around the demon, sword still pointed at him, Kyojuro made it to his brother's side. He knelt to the ground next to the futon on the opposite side to mirror Akaza's position. Warily looking at the demon, Akaza raised his hands in surrender and backed away to give the brothers space. Kyojuro dropped his sword to the side, careless in his desperation to check over his brother.
Senjuro looked terrible, a normally gentle countenance distorted horribly. His nose was bruised and bloodied, obviously broken. His mouth, stuck in a smile, had blood leaking from in between his lips and smeared all over his chin. His throat was the worst though, sliced through with a blade down to the bone. Kyojuro felt tears leak from his eye as he began to cry. "Senjuro, Senjuro please. Otouto, please wake up, don't leave me please, I can't have failed you too."
Senjuro was quiet. Kyojuro knew he would be but it still made him cry harder, sobbing over the body of his brother, the body of the one he would have done anything to protect.
"You didn't fail him," Kyojuro heard from across the room. Snapping his head up, he made confused eye contact with the demon sitting back against the wall. "You didn't," Akaza insisted, his shattered-glass eyes bright and intense. "He was scared and weak and I could have killed him in seconds, but I didn't. I wanted to turn him into a demon too, as a present for you. He was about to turn, too, but he slit his neck before he could. He was strong, at the end. You didn't fail him because that strength is what you taught him."
Kyojuro's insides twisted at the idea of coming home to a bloodthirsty Senjuro, one presented as a gift by this psychotic demon. They nearly came up through his throat at the thought of the aftermath of that. He would have had to kill Senjuro. There was no other way around it. Kyojuro wouldn't have been able to just let him go, not when he posed a threat to the lives of innocents but Kyojuro also wouldn't have been able to let anyone else kill his little brother. It would have had to be him. As much as he didn't want to be proud of being what had provided his brother the 'strength' to end himself, he was perversely grateful for it as it meant he didn't have to fight him.
Kyojuro bent down, planting a kiss on Senjuro's cold forehead. He stayed folded in on himself and closed his eyes, resting his head against his little brother's hair. "You can save him?" he asked Akaza, shifting his head slightly to see him out of the corner of his eye.
The demon nodded, solemn. "I can, but I'll only do it if you join me as a demon."
Kyojuro closed his eyes and breathed out slowly through his nose. He shouldn't become a demon. He shouldn't. He had spent so long protecting others, killing demons and saving humans, if he became a demon now, all that would be worthless and he'd become the very thing he had been trying to destroy.
But… Kyojuro bit his lip harshly, another tear rolling down his cheek to land in his brother's limp hair. But if he didn't, his brother would stay dead, cold and gone forever. He couldn't let that happen. His heart clenched at the thought of fighting the other Hashira, of killing novice demon slayers like Tanjiro-kun and the yellow boy, of eating defenseless civilians.
He hated Akaza for forcing him into this position. He hated himself even more for what he was about to do.
"I… I accept."
"Good boy," he heard, purred into his ear as firm but gentle hands grasped his arms and pulled him up into a sitting position. He smelled the sharp scent of new blood as a torn wrist was brought to his lips but his eye stayed focused on his sweet, sweet baby brother. "The more you drink, the faster it works and the faster your brother will be saved," Akaza told him when Kyojuro hesitated to open his mouth. That sealed the deal. Kyojuro latched onto the demon's wrist, drinking his blood down as fast as it came.
He felt it slide down his throat into his belly. He felt it burning, winding through his veins into his appendages. He felt it, gradually making its way into his heart, into his brain.
Kyojuro's mind became fuzzy. It felt almost as if a warm blanket was being wrapped around his skull, muddling the world around him. He was determined to make the process as short as possible, though, so he determinedly stayed latched on to the demon's wrist even as it began to pull away.
"Shh, shh, Kyojuro, you can let go now," he heard, echoing around his skull. "It's alright, it'll all be better when you wake up."
His eye, still locked onto his brother's closed ones, rolled back into his skull and Kyojuro saw no more.
There was something in his mouth.
It was wet.
It dripped down his throat, past his lips.
There was something on his face.
It was wrapped around his face, moving his jaw open and closed.
He closed his lips and swallowed.
The food tasted heavenly, warm and round and bloody.
He smiled and opened his mouth for more.
"There you go," he heard from above him, "There's a good boy."
He smiled wider as more food was placed into his mouth.
The hand on his face remained even as he chewed the food on his own this time.
"Isn't this so much easier?" the voice continued, "Isn't it so much nicer when you listen to me?"
He nodded, not really sure what the person was talking about but willing to agree with almost anything if it meant he could keep being fed.
The hand on his jaw moved, fingers running through his hair.
"I'm glad you still look about the same," his feeder told him. "It's been so long since I've seen the sun but you're such a wonderful substitute."
He smiled again, nuzzling his face into the lap his head was cradled on.
Swallowing, he opened his mouth for another bite.
The hand in his hair gently scratched their nails along his scalp, sending a pleasant shiver down his spine.
"Open your eyes for me, sweetheart," the voice crooned at him. "I wanna make sure they're both working properly."
He obeyed, blinking the blurriness out of his eyes. Somehow that felt wrong, like he had too many.
"Gorgeous," the pink haired man leaning over him breathed out, "You're even prettier now, I didn't know that was possible."
His eyes moved around, leaving the man's face to take in their surrounding area.
There was someone lying in front of him.
Their yellow hair was red in random patches.
Their skin was peeled back from their bones, blood pooling around their body, staining even more of the yellow strands red.
He recognized that hair. Why did he recognize it…?
"Senjuro," he said, voice dry and breaking.
"Senjuro!" he shouted, bolting upright.
Kyojuro jerked around to face the man behind him. "You said you would save him, you- you promised! You said, you said-"
"Hey, hey, no," Akaza soothed, hands reaching out and grabbing onto Kyojuro's shoulders. "It's not Senjuro-chan, I wouldn't do that to you. Look again, Kyo, look closer."
Allowing Akaza to turn him back around, Kyojuro obeyed. From a first glance, the body looked like it belonged to Senjuro. Focusing on the details, however, made him realize it wasn't. It was his father.
He wasn't as distraught as he felt he should be. No. He smelled his father's blood and he was hungry.
Mouth watering, Kyojuro reached out a tentative hand, grabbing a chunk of flesh that had been sitting to warm by a small fire. He brought it up to his mouth before he hesitated. Something about this seemed wrong, seemed like he shouldn't be doing this, but-
But a hand moved from his shoulder to his wrist, bringing the meat up to his lips.
Kyojuro ate.
"You got so panicked, Kyo, you didn't even notice," Akaza muttered into his ear, scooting closer to rest his chin on Kyojuro's shoulder.
"Hmm?" he asked, mouth full of delectable flesh.
"Look next to you."
Kyojuro did.
There, curled around a pillow, was his little brother.
There, with a black, splintered line across his neck was Senjuro.
There, alive, was his precious baby brother.
Kyojuro crawled forwards, suddenly frantic once more, scooping Senjuro up into his arms.
The movement evidently woke the boy as he spoke with a slurred voice. "Wha...?" His eyes opened, blinking up at Kyojuro, yellow-black-red-yellow-black, different but still obviously Senjuro. "Aniki! You're alright! You slept for so long and Akaza-san said you were just adjusting but I was still worried!"
Senjuro threw his arms around Kyojuro's shoulders, nuzzling into his chest. Kyojuro squeezed him tightly, relieved beyond belief that Akaza had lived up to his end of the deal.
"Well, Kyo?" he heard the older demon say as his tattooed arms wrapped around the pair of brothers from behind. "Are you happy? Aren't you glad you agreed to be with me?"
Kyojuro relaxed into the hug. He honestly couldn't remember why he had been so hesitant before. This body was powerful and his brother's was as well. They would never have to worry about death again.
He smiled. "I am happy. Thank you, Akaza."
