"I told you to leave him alone, Apollo."
"I told you that you couldn't harbor him forever, Hanekoma. The Council has permitted me to do this, and I intend to deliver results. Shibuya is too free. I intend to make it more...humble."
Sanae growled, raising his wings threateningly
"What you intend is to rip her heart out and crush his spirit. I warned you what would happen if you tried."
Apollo laughed "The Council backs me up on this, Sanae! What can you do against that?"
"Against the council?" the angel snorted "Admittedly not much. But against you? Well...Let's just say my failure to ascend these twenty or so times wasn't because I was denied a higher existamce. I've said it once and I'll say it again. You crush my boy, I will crush your skull."
Apollo was taken aback. He never knew Hanekoma had denied so many promotions. At this level, the Producer could easily challenge the Head Councilman for his position and win without raising his base level.
This presented a problem. He had to get Sanae out of the picture for a while.
"If you are so adamant about saving Yoshiya from my...correction...why don't you plead for his case to the Council directly? With your ranking, I'm sure they'd listen."
"That could take weeks. Weeks you could use trying to hunt down your toy. I won't risk you getting lucky, Sarahara."
The man sneered and snickered darkly "But Sanae..." he said smoothly, raising a hand "I already know where he is. Very smart of you, creating a rune that prevents Us from actually entering that house."
Hanekoma looked more disgusted than suprized at the information that was revealed to him
"Through doors, windows, or using the Music. Yes, I've known it was you perverting the melody of Shibuya this whole time. It's the only way you can actually get to Josh without physically snatching him. Well, now my rune prevents you from tormenting him that way, too. Shibuya is ticked off, I'd watch yourself."
The other man laughed "This city doesn't frighten me, Sanae. Nor is Shibuya my concern. You know what you have to do to justify attacking me, and you know that doesn't involve you being here on this plane. Yoshiya is mine to do with as I please until the Council tells me otherwise. You know there's no getting rid of me before then."
Sanae sighed through his nose, rubbing his temples with a hand
"I hate the fact that you're right. I could just erase you right now, before you even lay a finger on my charge...but that would create problems I do not want to deal with right now, and can't afford to fix."
He stood to his full hight and stretched his wings
"All right, you win. I'll go to the Council. But be warned, when I get back I'll expect things to be exactly as I left them. Unless you want me to come back with an execution order."
Apollo looked annoyed "Oh come off it Hanekoma, you aren't really worried now, not with your new rune in place!" He smiled sickly "But I can be very patient. Yoshiya will heal eventually, and want out of his Proxy's prison. He'll come out, and I'll be waiting."
"I'll be back before he heals that much." Sanae said firmly as he teleported to the house.
Apollo sneered as the other being disappeared. One down...now for the Proxy...
With any luck, Sakuraba didn't know what his RG self looked like. This was a very good advantage. On the other hand, the teen didn't seem the type to just let anyone into his house, which was disappointing. No matter what rune was protecting a place, if They were invited inside by the owner of that place, They would be allowed enterance.
His only comfort was the fact that the boy was only human. If he got him to leave the house after getting invited inside, there would be nothing preventing Apollo from locking the teen out. He had no extra abilities, no psychs he could use out of the UG, no powers at all really.
Then Apollo wuld be free to play with the weak, defenseless Yoshiya as much as he wanted with no interference. He'd have to be careful though. In the fragile state the brat was in, he could easily embrace erasure.
"I don't want that, Kiryu...oh I don't want that at all." He cooed as he brought up the menbtal image of his prey, tossing and turning in the throes of another fever dream. It was obviously an older image. Sanae had made sure he could no longer enjoy Kiryu's misery from far off anymore.
"I wonder if you told Sanae what happened during your fourth Game. I'm guessing you didn't. It would have broken his dear old heart...to know that you actually felt...fear."
Ah, that fourth Game...what a pleasurable experience that had been! After being kicked in the teeth by the one-legged cocky prissy ass and forced to regress back into a lowly Officer Reaper, Apollo was furious.
But he was also patient and observant. Kiryu had quickly found his partner, lost his partner to Noise, found another one, lost that one to a Wall Reaper, escaped said Wall Reaper and was searching for yet another Partner, when he found himself in a dead end.
That's when Apollo struck.
"Well now, isn't this my lucky day!" he said from his perch overlooking the alleyway. "A lost Kiryu, looking for another pawn to sacrifice for his own cause!"
The other teen simply snorted and looked at him with that infuriatingly condescending smirk,
"Sarahara! Recovered from your wounded ego so soon? I would think they would have at least given you time to mourn your pride before sending you to work."
He snarled and raised his wings "Such bold words coming from a mere Player without a partner. You're lucky I like you, or you'd be dispursed for mouthing off at me that way. As it is, I'm feelling rather generous."
He pounced with very little warning, giving Kiryu just enough time to turn on his heel before he was pinned under Appollo's weight. He used his Noise Hand to shove the ashen-locked head onto the pavement, and leaned down to hiss in his ear.
"I'm not going to erase you. Oh no...I have much better plans for you, my Kiryu."
He applied the same psych he had on their sixth day as partners, and smiled madly as he felt the skinny form under him slowly stop struggling and go limp.
"Shhhh yes that's it...you like the new level? I perfected it since last time, just for you."
He got up and kicked Kiryu into the wall, hearing a satisfying crack as his spine made contact with the brick finish. Before he could hit the ground, Apollo grabbed his arm and threw him into the side of a dumpster. This time he let him hit the ground before grabbing him by the throat and shoving him into the wall, applying more and more pressure until soft, staticky lines of erasure began climbing up Kiryu's feet. Finally, the dull, dead eyes widened and there it was...the smallest spark of genuine fear.
Satisfied for the moment,and because emotion uisually meant the psych was wearing off, Apollo dropped the younger teen, smiling ferally.
"Remember this, Kiryu. You're MINE...and not even becoming Composer will change that."
He remembered well what had happened after the psych wore off. Kiryu stayed in that alleyway for two days, either really frightened, licking his own pride and wounds, oir he was really pissed. But sadly he was too driven to let Apollo stall him for long, and was soon back to his original infuriating personality.
"But you always kept our little alone time at the back of your mind...diddn't you." Apollo snickered "I remember the Battle for Supremecy. You stayed well away from my touch. You said it was strategy, you said you knew I was a close ranged attacker...but I saw, Kiryu...I saw you didn't want to feel my draining touch. I saw you knew one contact with my special psych would render you completely helpless...and you were terrified! That fear you felt wasn't of me. It was of losing control."
He turned to the house and phased into the highest plane he could so not even Sanae would see him peek in the window at the prone figure on the couch.
"You're terrified of losing control. And I am about to show you...that you were never in control to start with...my Kiryu."