Hidden Blade

"Child of my body, flesh of my soul… Yuusui…" That voice which called to him and spoke his name… Haunted him. Deceitful syllables, swooning with fake and demented praise for his life, his actions kept Yuusui turning over in his sleep. The tone of voice was exactly how he remembered it too. As if not a single day had been missed, and not a single part of his windpipe had been crushed as it was in reality.

"Oh… My son… Mother would be so happy to see you like this… Shame you left before her completion." In the world of dreams, there was nowhere one could hide from a nightmare. Stuck on the spot in a dark, empty void, Yuusui trembled as a cold finger trailed down his cheek with a loving caress. It made his whole body seize up, heart along with it as it felt as if the organ had transmigrated into his mouth.

"Come now… Don't be like this, Yuusui." The voice spoke to him again, cold breath now darting against the brunette's eardrums and slithering down his back. Yuusui, however, remained silent. Half drove by his own free will, twice as much by compulsion and the words dying in his throat before they could make their escape. His hands tensed by his side, glassy eyes not wanting to regard their motion around his own throat.

"I don't like you lying to yourself, Yuusui… It means you're lying to me as well…" This time around, the voice betrayed a cold fury, not unlike one Yuusui had grown so familiar with. It filled his being with a kind of wicked nostalgia, pulling at the connection to the voice he had tried to bury deep within him.

"It made you feel ALIVE, didn't it? Oh, Yuusui, I know that feeling better than anyone. Don't rob yourself of it, embrace it!" Delusional, cold hands wrapped around his waist, Yuusui finding himself powerless to stop it. Bony, frozen fingers carding through his hair with an insidious tenderness making his whole-body squirm. "Don't be ashamed, it's only nature taking its course."

Shame… That was the name of the emotion Yuusui felt when he first saw Kyte in the hallway. Shameful hands trying to strangle the life out of Oscar, lost fully to an indecipherable base urge within his soul. The same desire HE was trying to nurture like a growing plant, longing to reap the seed that had been sown. "That power in your hands… It's your birthright, my son. I made sure to pick out the right Quirk for you…" A cruel cackle slipped down Yuusui's ears, making the teen shiver.

Perhaps the worst feeling about this was how long it dragged on. Time seemed to trickle for Yuusui, falling away at the speed that one person could count every individual blade of grass in a field. All he could do was listen to this monster lay down the wicked tale of Yuusui's life. "If you believe yours is the only way, you're the fool that lives to die."

Yuusui's face flushed at the frosty hands that threatened to take a final, decisive hold over him. No matter the resistance he could theoretically put up; the brunette made no move to protect himself at all. Not in years had he felt so small, so controlled, so utterly dominated. The wicked nostalgia that pulled at him from inside amplified tenfold as he could just about make out shadows mixing out the corner of his eyes.

There was no move to prevent the inevitable as well. Not a single iota of his body sought to rush to his defence, too busy being drained of all energy from the brutal damage it had taken from Kyte and Oscar. It left him so tired, so drained. Like he could slump over like ten pounds of shit in a five-pound bag.

As cool hands began to press against his forehead once more, Yuusui had resigned himself to his fate, lacking the strength to even tremble at this point. His eyes were glazed over, his mind endlessly repeating the words spoken to him like a broken record. At least… At the very least, he had managed to prove himself with his last act…

"Oi…" A voice, then a quick tap on his still damp forehead. It sounded nothing like HIS voice, nor did it quite sound like the voice of Sateriasis. Yuusui's shut eyes cracked open slightly, small beams of flickering light dancing across their surface.

"Oi, Dollface, answer me." The voice, Arius, his mind helpfully recognised and supplied, called out to him. Once more, it was followed up by a tap to the forehead. However, this time, Arius' hand lingered a bit longer, a growing concern radiating from the bedside chair he sat on. "You've been tossing and turning something fierce, answer me already."

Part of Yuusui couldn't help but want to scoff, what was Arius so concerned about it all of a sudden? He hadn't seen much of the Immortal one, but every sign he had seen pointed towards the spiky-haired teen as a colossal jackoff. The type of dog that was all bark, some bite, and total bitch when faced with any kind of adversity. It actually reminded the brunette of some of the others he had come across at work in the past.

"Tch, fuckin' course that shitty bastard leaves me just when you decide to turn into a pincushion," Arius complained, tone unpleasant and vile as he spat at the mere implication of Sateriasis. In a way, Yuusui could sympathise. He too would be annoyed to hell and back if he was left to his own devices with an injured patient.

Yuusui's ears then picked up the swivelling of the chair Arius was sitting on, followed by another batch of dampness assaulting his forehead. Was… Was Arius trying to do some kind of makeshift treatment on him with towels? Had the beating given him some kind of temperature? It would explain the kind of fire he had started to feel under his skin, mimicking the sensation of molten lava trying to knit his skin back together.

Did… Did that explain why he was so paralysed in that dream? Yuusui had so many questions to ask, bouncing around in his head like a rapid-fire machine gun mowing down troops. However, he found his ability to speak was just as absent as it was in his dream. His mouth ending up as dry as the Saharan Desert was all that greeted him when he tried to catch Arius' attention verbally.

To say that every iota of his body wasn't crying out for the sweet release of death would be a gross understatement, he felt like Kyte's hand had been imprinted on his soul with the way his chest heaved up and down with every breath.

But then again… Each passing second… It was getting… Lighter? Yuusui knitted his brows as best as he could at the sensation that thrummed underneath his skin. Whilst he had started off sounding like an old man who smoked forty packets of cigarettes a day, he soon found his chest lifting again with remarkable ease.

The grogginess in his eyes seemed to be fading as well, adjusting to the light that shone upon them like a beacon of hope. Yuusui was finally able to see the infirmary for the first time since he arrived at the Foundation, and instantly he was scanning his surroundings with the critical eye he had become known for.

For one, he could see Arius clearly now. The spiky-haired teen had his back turned to the brunette, rummaging through one of the crammed drawers that jutted out from the small desk in the corner. A sight that was almost painfully nice to see again, it reminded Yuusui of so many times he had seen… Well, it at least reminded him of some of the calmer times in his life.

Pulling at the quilt that covered his body, his rough, calloused fingers felt the quality that they possessed. Compared to the ones that were present in the dorms, which he wasn't criticising at the end of the day, they felt like actual money had been spent on them. Probably right from the pocket of the nurse if Yuusui had to hazard a guess.

Then his eyes darted away from the security of the quilt and gurney to the other side and his breath hitched. The amount of rusty, discarded medical instruments let the dark cloud of dread take home over Yuusui. He could've gone the whole day without seeing all of those things, much less when ninety per cent of them were coated in some kind of blood, which he could only hope didn't mean the worst had happened…

Tearing his eyes away and taking a few deep breaths, Yuusui clutched at the quilt a bit tighter than before. Focusing on things like that was never going to be helpful for what Kyte and the old man would've wanted for him, and he wasn't going to end up wasting their faith. Even if it felt like he was walking a tightrope over the top of an active volcano.

Instead, he focused on what he knew would help him.

What was his name? Yuusui Migoro.

Where was he? The infirmary of the Broken Heart Foundation, the place that promised to help him. The place that seemed like the end of the road if all else failed.

Who was he with? Arius Amilios, a mild irritant in the best of times who seemed to have been at least trying to help him out. The damp towels on his forehead remained, cooling his body down somewhat despite the red-hot heat he felt towards his toes.

How did he get here? That… That he didn't know. He could only assume Kyte had plucked him from that hellish recreation of his past.

Why was he here? He… he had just been through his test…

Oh God, what had he done there? It felt like that whole timeframe had become a black hole in his memory. Of course, he remembered being there. How could he not? His whole body's pain was a living memory he wasn't soon going to forget. However, the images of the event had been torn up like a film reel left on the cutting room floor.

No matter how hard he thought about it, all he could see in his mind's eye was his arrival, descent down to that room, and then the arrival of Kyte which led to his ultimate defeat. There was an entire portion that had vanished into the ether, the only memorial to it being the slumped, defeated form of Oscar he found his hands around the throat of.

Simply thinking about that image made Yuusui want to be swallowed whole by the ground. HIS cooing voice in the dream seemed to know that as well, why else would it have been beaten into his head like the rhythmic bang of a drum on a slave ship?

With a shaky hand reaching to run through his hair, Yuusui attempted to swallow the heavy lump that had gathered in his throat. He… He couldn't have given into it that easily, could he? His skin… His skin felt wrong. Like he had been shoved into a body with actions that were both his own and someone else's, the puppet strings of past influences still attached to him with the whims of a sadistic master trying to eradicate the good he had tried to do.

His whole body itched, and the urge to scratch was beyond the point of no return. He… He needed to know what had happened to Oscar, at least enough to put his mind to rest and stop it from tearing itself apart over the incessant questions that pestered it.

Everything felt so, so wrong.

"Stop, would you kindly?" But then, his whole body went slack and all feelings started to dissipate, once more controlled by the strings of someone else's desires. More particularly, the form of the returning Sateriasis Fauser to his workplace

For the third time in such a short burst, nostalgia flooded its way into Yuusui's body. The coat Sateriasis was wearing, even if it was all black and made him look more like an undertaker than a doctor, felt comfortable to be around. For once, it didn't feel like the oncoming train of death was present as the nurse stood at the end of his bed.

The brunette watched carefully as Sateriasis turned his attention to Arius, a scowl crossing the spiky-haired teen's lips whenever he saw who was behind him. With his arms folded, Sateriasis spoke lowly but was loud enough for Yuusui's ears to pick up. "Is that what you call looking after the patient, Amilios?" The nurse's jaw was clenched as he spoke, eyes narrowed down at Arius.

On the inverse, Arius rolled back his shoulders, and Yuusui noticed how his fists had been balled at his sides. "For your information, I've been here longer with Dollface than you have, and it ain't even my job!" Came a reply with characteristic bravado, even if it was emanating from someone who sounded more like a cornered, frightened dog.

Yuusui gave a slight, dusty chuckle at the nickname Arius had given him. It beat out some of the others he had gotten in his life, although that wasn't a hard sell when the brunette went down the list. At least it was more creative than Glass Eyes and didn't nearly trigger the same emotions that one did…

The chuckle alerted Sateriasis to the level of Yuusui's lucidity, ripping those kaleidoscope-like eyes from Arius to their new job of analysing every part of the teen's body. Yuusui had already prepared himself for what the diagnosis was going to be. He could already imagine Sateriasis going into intense detail about how his insides had been turned into mush and every bone in his body was broken, because that's what it felt like without all the adrenaline pumping through his soul.

When hands pressed against his skin for the umpteenth time in reality and his dreams, Yuusui took solace in that he had finally found some kind of warmth in one of them. "At least one part of you was useful," Sateriasis murmured, briefly looking over his shoulder at Arius before turning back to the brunette. "Otherwise, I think you'd be in much more trouble, Migoro-kun."

Yuusui blinked. Huh? What was Sateriasis talking about? He might not have been able to recall the images, but he knew full well the pain he was put through and presently still in. There was no possible way that he wasn't littered with at least seventy different stab wounds, and the chance his chest didn't need multiple stitches was slim to none.

"I think it says something if some 'Shitty kid' can do a lot more than someone who supposedly has a medical degree." Arius sniped from the background, slowly walking his way up the other side of the bed and staring down at Yuusui with a golden-brown gaze. It might have been fleeting, but for the moment both of their eyes met, Yuusui could've sworn there was some fleck of worry in there.

It didn't stay for long because the mood instantly shifted when Sateriasis spoke again. "When I tell you to watch over when I'm out, I expect you to do it, do I make myself clear? Or do I have to keep you in here for even longer?" The cold threat lingered in the air, throwing frosty chills down the spine of Arius and the prone Yuusui.

Arius turned his head away for the moment, at a loss for words with what to come back with. For Yuusui, the case was as clear as day. Arius didn't want to be within five thousand feet of this place or Sateriasis, so the question remained a simple one in his head. Why was he here? And then, as a follow-up, why had they been paired together by Subaru and Kyte. Not an awful lot here made sense.

With careful hands, Sateriasis continued to trace Yuusui's body. The methodical pace was cool and composed, the only thing that linked the charlatan nurse to a properly qualified doctor. "You're lucky that Niijima-sama wasn't harsher on you, one more blow and you might have been looking at a longer shelf life." He spoke, dragging his hands back down to his sides, taking care to avoid touching the scars he knew were irreparably a part of Yuusui's body.

"That was all Kyte?" Arius found himself asking, a genuine interest seeping into his voice. Yuusui reckoned he must've been present when he had been dropped into the infirmary, it had to have been a massive shock to the system to see someone that badly beaten up.

Sateriasis nodded, placing a hand on the side of his face. "Oh, not exactly. Hiroto had a little hand in making it have an extra kick, but that chest and that handprint are the work of Niijima-sama one hundred per cent. As he likes to say, God's going to chop you down if you let him." The unnerving smirk that crossed the nurse's face was enough to bring the shivers back to Yuusui and Arius.

The power really was that tremendous. Had Yuusui simply heard of that assessment two days ago, he'd have given it thought but ultimately would discard it as nothing more than claptrap. He could list down every time everyone in his life who had equated themselves to God and he'd run out of paper before he got to the end. But now? With his chest turned purple? It would be foolish to underestimate the power the Foundation's owner had. It only made him more interested in the Quirk as well.

That sentiment was shared by Arius as well. In fact, it made the spiky-haired teen giddy as he rubbed his hands together at the idea of finally getting another strong challenge to overcome. "His Quirk must be super strong then, and here I was thinking it would just be a simple cosmetic one… Keh, I guess he wasn't a Pro for nothin'."

Ah, that was right. Yuusui had missed that part of the equation, having not been present during the first induction speech that the Vampire Lord made. In all honesty, when he had first met Kyte, that topic had been quietly put to bed and suffocated by a tight pillow to the face. It was easy to assume he was one, though. Otherwise, the old man would have never handed him over, despite the desperate plea that was made. It put a lot of the power he had received on the crackback into perspective.

Sateriasis turned to one of the many syringes that were in a pile on the desk beside him, picking out the cleanest one he could find as he flicked the needle to make sure it wouldn't break on minuscule contact. "I see that look in your eyes, Kid. Believe me, if you stepped up to him, you better be prepared to get stepped on." He said, sounding like he was juggling between caring about Arius' wellbeing and the morbid interest he had in seeing that fight go down.

Yuusui, meanwhile, grimaced at the sight of the needle. At least this one looked clean enough compared to all the rusty, blood-soaked equipment he had seen earlier on. Although, that didn't make him okay with seeing the implement being shoved into his body or appearing before his eyes. He bit down on his bottom lip, a slight whine escaping him as the cold metal began to break the top layer of his skin.

"You too? Fucking hell…" Yuusui heard Sateriasis mutter, frustration welling within those perpetually changing, mesmerising eyes. "Don't move, Migoro-kun, it won't be much longer to go now. If you do move, I might slice something off of Amilios back there by accident." With the order given, the brunette remained stationary despite every little thing feeling wrong in his body. If he could turn invisible right now, he would've already been out of this place and boarded up in his room, pretending as if nothing had ever happened.

"Oi! Is that supposed to be a threat?" Arius shouted back as Sateriasis pulled the syringe, now full of Yuusui's blood, out of the skin and quickly began to apply pressure to the puncture with a small cotton ball.

"It's whatever you want it to be because you're only going to look at it that way," Sateriasis murmured, not paying much heed at all to Arius' objections. He was going to need a nice long amount of time to himself when the day was over, far away from Arius, far away from Subaru, and with maybe only his trusted assistants present if they could be damned to be normal people for five hours. "Are you feeling better at all now, Migoro-kun?" He asked, his eyebrow quirked up.

Unable to really say an awful lot, the teen nodded toward the white-haired nurse. Whilst his body still felt like it was dancing in an inferno, it had been getting lighter and easier to breathe the longer time passed on. It didn't feel like there was an industrial-grade hydraulic press on his chest anymore, and for that, he had to be thankful.

"Good. I promise that you won't have to be here for much longer." Sateriasis replied, brushing a hand through his hair, and slicking it back somewhat. As the nurse noticed the glassy gaze of Yuusui still tracking around the room, he puffed out another reply. "Morales is fine. You don't need to worry about him, he's in another ward being checked over by Hideyoshi."

Yuusui's chest fell down with a sigh of relief pushing out of his cracked lips. Thank God… He didn't know what he would do with himself had whatever possessed him done more damage. It was supposed to be a simple test, even if it ended up being run by the most sadistic guardian angel he had ever met. None of what happened was supposed to have happened, he knew that deep within his very heart and soul.

"You fucked him up pretty good, Dollface." Arius replied, folding his arms, and leaning back on the wall behind him. His voice gave off an air of restrained, reluctant admiration. Why couldn't he have been the one to get the test? In his head, he was already the most physically gifted one here by a country mile. The others might outmatch him power-wise with the raw strength of their Quirks, but this adult masquerading as a nineteen-year-old was nothing like that! Give him a shoot and he would've had Oscar begging for mercy before he knew what hit him! "He looked like a right sack of shit, to be honest. All those muscles and he has no idea how to use them, what a shame."

Yuusui didn't get the chance to reply, not that he would've been able before he saw the death glare that Sateriasis sent Arius' way. The temperature fell to near arctic levels, popping goosebumps up all over both teens' bodies. "Please, don't talk about what happened in that fashion. I know it's going to be hard for you to understand, but if Niijima-sama hears you say anything close to that in his presence, you're going to find yourself on the receiving ending of what Migoro-kun felt."

The threat, of course, didn't go unnoticed when it was blaring louder than a foghorn. In fact, it only grew louder, pounding like the drums of war, the second the sound of quick footsteps began to reverberate around the room. There was a special kind of emotion behind these ones that Yuusui couldn't discern right away, unsure as to whether it was a raging fire coming to set them alight in the flames of hell or a cold tidal wave coming to sweep them away.

It was, then, a good thing that none of the three had to wait much longer. First hearing the steps to the form of Kyte emerging in the doorway took a mere three seconds in real-time, the Foundation's owner quickly stalked up to the edge of Yuusui's bed. "Fauser. What's the progress?" His tone was just as calm as it had been when Yuusui remembered being chopped into the ground. Red eyes remained calculating, studying the teen with an even more analytical, surgical glare than the purported nurse.

Placing a hand under his chin, Sateriasis smirked, eyeing Arius for a short moment before responding to his boss. "Migoro-kun is making steady progress, Niijima-sama. He'll need some time to recover from his injuries, but I believe he will be able to participate in the training once all is said and done. However, I must also add that my work has been made so much easier through the assistance of Amilios here, he's been succccccchhhhhh a wonderfullllllllll help."

Yuusui didn't need to be an expert to understand the overall sneering, underhanded tone with which Sateriasis spoke about Arius. The first part had seemed genuine, which helped to quell the brunette's fears that he was going to be injured long-term. However, as soon as Arius' name touched his lips, the nurse was trying to bury him like he was the worst thing to come out of Japan in years.

Arius, for what it was worth, picked up on this too. The indignant squawk he gave off combined with the glare he shot out did more to show off his anger than any words could, his muscles subconsciously flexing and the grip his hands had on his biceps got as deep as to turn his knuckles right in the process. "If you hadn't been off doing who knows what and allowing me to do what I wanted to do, this all would've ended a hell of a lot sooner!"

Kyte's bored red eyes glanced at Arius for only a second before he turned his attention back to the person he had come here for. "Are you able to speak?" The feeling of Kyte's gaze for Yuusui was so much more different than it had been in the corridor. There, it had spoken more to the unmatched intensity of the situation. Now, it felt like the curious contemplation of a deadly predator diagnosing whether the prey was too weak to move.

At the behest of Kyte, though, Yuusui did try to speak. His attempt to call out to Arius beforehand had been stymied by the sandpaper-like quality his throat had taken on. "S-Sort o-of-f-f…" This time around, the attempt was a modicum more successful. The brunette hadn't quite realised how terrible it had gotten until he heard it back in his own ears. Goddamn, he sounded like a centuries-old mummy that had risen from its sarcophagus to feast on the living.

It must've been really bad as well if both Kyte and Sateriasis looked at each other the way they did. Pairs of eyes matched in concern in a way Yuusui had never seen before, not even when he was a simple government dog trying to get by the scraps that were fed to him. "Don't move. Don't talk. Don't do anything until you're 100% healthy, you understand me?" Came Kyte's decree, throwing him right back to sounding like the all-conquering Emperor Yuusui couldn't help but imagine him as.

Without so much as a crossed word, Yuusui nodded. If Kyte decreed it, he would follow. It was a simple order, one he had to follow no matter if he wanted to or not. His whole life had been like that, really. Plus, given the state he had placed himself in, there was little chance people were going to be wanting to see him up and about.

"Good. It's nice to see someone's going to listen to me for once." Kyte huffed, venting off the frustration he had been dealing with for a good while now. Having to deal with Monsoon and then Subaru one after each other, and in such a short time, was a recipe for even the world's calmest person to lose their shit. "Take care of the sweathogs, Fauser. I need to have a word with Subaru. Amilios, you're free to go as well if you wish." He added at the end, turning on his heel and already wanting to leave this episode behind him.

"As you wish, Niijima-sama." Sateriasis answered, hand on his chest and bowing down to him, much like how a butler would respond to his master. In a way, Yuusui couldn't help but look at the nurse in that light now… He did seem like one of the more reliable and loyal members of the staff he had come across so far.

On the other end of the equation, Arius pumped his fists and broke into a large grin. He was finally set free from the shackles of this shitty, terrible infirmary that gave him more creeped-out feelings than your average graveyard! Oh, he would tell his future children of this day! The spiky-haired teen had to stop himself from falling to his knees and kissing the outside ground as soon as he followed Kyte out the door.

It once more left Yuusui alone in the room, only Sateriasis in the background to remind him that he wasn't truly by himself. The nurse remained poised as the door closed behind him, his shoulders sagging a barely perceptible amount when he was assured that there was going to be no more interruptions. "You see? If Niijima-sama told you there's nothing to worry about, there's nothing to worry about." He said, clinical loyalty and unwavering belief undercutting his voice.

That kind of resolve was something Yuusui hadn't heard in a long time. Too much time spent around people that would toss you under the bus for a minor promotion had poisoned his view on the matter. To have someone as loyal as that… Kyte must've been really lucky to come across Sateriasis. The brunette could only wish that he had someone like that too… But he pushed them away…

"Eyes up here." Yuusui did what he was asked before he knew what was happening. His eyes instantly flicked up towards Sateriasis, who once more approached the side of the bed, the time with a grin on his face. "It's a cold, coldddddddddd world out there, Migoro-kun. Buckle up. Let's see if your dreams can stand up to it."

But it felt so much more than a dream because Yuusui knew his nightmare was the furthest thing from one.

On the other end of the door, and already halfway down the Foundation's corridors, Arius was simply glad to be free from Sateriasis' claws. If he so wished, he'd have been dancing his way back to his room or the area he was searching for, no longer needing to hold his breath with every step or risk getting yelled at for daring to do more than that shitty doctor did.

Plus, escaping the stuffy confines of the dead, dreary, rusty, bloody infirmary was also going to be positive. He didn't want to spend another second in there as long as he lived, even if that meant barricading himself in his room, handcuffing himself to a tree like a hippy, or straight up faking his own death at this point.

The glorious freedom that his escape gave him rushed through his body like a live wire, dictating actions he normally would never take. The cocky grin that crossed his face, though, was perfectly normal. Arius' tense body, with its high-strung shoulders and cramping back muscles, began to relax as he padded steadily through the endless winding halls of the Foundation.

Now, it was time to finally get around to what he had wanted to do before Subaru had come in like the annoyance he was and ruined everything. "Where is it…? That clown didn't get that strong by accident…" Arius muttered to himself, keeping his almond-shaped eyes carefully peeled for an indent in the wall that would suggest a hidden entrance was present.

What was he looking for? Arius was convinced, much more like knew, there had to be some kind of secret training room in this place. The strength of Subaru's grip on his shoulders still haunted him, how it felt like both hands could crush through his shoulders with minimal effort.

Call Arius an adrenaline junkie but finding where that strength had come from infected his very being with the need to match it. Was he always going to be the strongest person in the room? Hell no! He had seen the monstrous strength of Fukuro upfront, and he could hazard a guess that in her transformed state Hisumi was much stronger than he could hope to imagine.

But it was never for a lack of trying. Arius' hands balled into fists as he tried to triangulate his exact position. Having been confined to the cafeteria, his room, and then the infirmary had left his knowledge of the layout sorely lacking in comparison to some of the others.

Right now, it didn't look like he was any distinctive part of the Foundation. There was maybe the odd footstep he could hear around the corner, likely the staff shuffling behind hidden doors, but nothing concrete. Out of the corner of his eyes, the cameras that littered the roof were sending live footage of his search to that creepy, shitty leech that treated them like pet goldfish. He had to hold back a shiver every time he thought of that weird ass voice, and the memories it brought back of seeing Joseph nearly breakdown.

Shaking his head clear of the thoughts, Arius began to drag his hands across the walls. From what he could remember, Subaru had taken them to the simulation chamber by banging his elbow on the wall. Then, the clown also emerged from another hidden door to separate them into groups. This place was teeming with them, the spiky-haired teen heard them as he was walking through. "Come on… Come on…!"

All his calloused fingers met with were sleek, if somewhat dusty, perfectly flush walls. Not a single indent he was looking for, nor some kind of hidden panel that he could remove to reveal all manner of electronic bugs and gizmos that would take him around the whole place and back.

On the wall in question, his hands balled into fists and began to pound away. The frustration that bubbled behind his eyes, and had been collecting for a good while now, was transferred to his fists. He didn't care if he heard them cracking, the bones would simply regrow like they always did. Pain was irrelevant when your only emotion was the anger that superseded it all.

When he had first left his home for this place, he had been promised the world and more by that sneaky vampire. Had been promised that he could start not only his road to recovery, which he was already doubting but that he could move towards the goal he really wanted. When he had first stepped through those lift doors, he thought that it was going to be that fresh start he so desperately needed.

Now? It felt like a living nightmare. Shoved in an area he had no desire to be in, separated from what he really wanted to do, and treated more like a meathead by a faculty that rolled their eyes at the suffering they were inflicting on those that wanted to get better. The one thing that stopped him from marching over to Kyte to give him a piece of his mind was the latent longing hidden within him, the part that didn't want to give up his dream just yet.

"Careful…" Came a gravelly voice from behind him, making the hair on the back of his neck stand up in a hurry. Arius quickly swivelled around on his heel to meet whoever dared to interrupt him in his moment of anger, only to be met with the grinning form of Ani, who very much looked like she would enjoy getting her lights knocked out. "Otherwise, don't blame me when you might find a few new additions walking around."

At first, Arius didn't know how to reply. Slowly, he removed his fists from the wall and let them fall down by his side, still refusing to let go of the lingering anger contained within them. "How long have you been watching me?" He then asked, his eyes narrow and accusatory. He could vaguely remember the sounds of shuffling that had plagued him throughout his journey.

Ani, for what it was worth, took a while to reply. Her mangled face wasn't a pretty sight to look at by any metric, and Arius would rather not talk to loli bait for any longer than necessary, even if he did enjoy riling her up back when they first met. "A bit." The answer remained short and snappy, no doubt to make the length she dragged out more annoying. It looked like she was angling for payback for everything said back then.

Arius folded his arms against his chest, leaning back on the wall. One of his eyebrows raised up to his hairline when Ani spoke, had she been the one using all the secret passageways? Would that mean she knew what he was wanting to look for? "You weren't exactly subtle, I could hear your footsteps a mile away." For now, though, he had to keep his lips sealed and his words tight.

"Is that why you looked like a slaughtered pig when I turned up?" Trust Ani to use a violent metaphor like that, Arius rolled his eyes. She looked sooooo happy with it as well if the grin on her putrid face was anything to go by.

"I didn't expect you to be such a coward, Shortstack." Arius responded, tone dismissive and subdued, far from the usual cockiness it was dipped in. Why was this happening to him right now? Couldn't he have one moment to himself where things went right? He couldn't have had his stay here peak with his fight against Fukuro!

Unlike the first time they had spoken to each other, Ani didn't launch into a threatening posture. Her arm didn't go straight for Arius' throat, nor did that hideous tail of hers, with its gnashing gun teeth, lunge to bust his kneecaps in two. For once, she was exercising restraint. "As if! I was merely looking for something to entertain myself whilst we wait for our physical activities to resume."

Oh, wonderful. In no uncertain terms, Arius wanted to put his hand through her head. He wanted to see all that grey matter splatter on the walls and hide her body in the darkest corner of this hellhole. Using that was about as close to a low blow one could get without physically kicking him in his dick. "Yeah, yeah, good for you. Maybe they'll teach you how to grow taller, otherwise, you should keep dreaming on that front!" Was it his best material? No. Arius' frustration was too great to show anything else.

Ani gave a deep, gravelly laugh. It was incredible to think a voice such as that could be placed in such a small form… Even if said form did look like it was created by some God that was high off all manners of drugs. "Well, I was wanting to test myself actually. The offering they gave me didn't quite satisfy me, you could say." She answered, flashing a slasher-like smile with all of her sharp teeth looking like they each carried their own knives.

Arius couldn't blame her, though. If his memory served him right she had been placed up against a chunni idiot and that creepy smiling cat, the whole fight had been academic from the second that they were the last three remaining in the room. "Well, wouldn't you know who won the pony? If I didn't know any better, I would say that you're angling to fight me, no?"

The spiky-haired teen's suspicions were confirmed the second he saw that smirk wasn't leaving Ani's face anytime soon. "I don't forget the people that insult me, and my little babies have been wanting to have a run out for so long, who would I be to prevent them from achieving their purpose?" She said, the sound of gnawing and gnashing at flesh permeating the background. "But not here… Not yet… We can't risk the Boss finding this one out, can we? After all, you're not a member of the group allowed to be physical."

Did she always have to cut so fucking deep? Arius may have been frustrated before, but right now he was utterly indignant. His hands curled back into fists, and he grabbed at the front of Ani's clothes, taking enough care as to not accidentally strike another area of her chest in the process. "I'm going to take that as a yes." He whispered, his voice low as his eyes glared through her mangled ones.

Of course, for Ani, the situation was nothing short of perfect. Who knew Arius would be so easy to crawl under the skin of? She wanted to coo and crow about how simple the act of wounding his pride could be, she wanted to thank Subaru for exposing that side of him in front of everyone, and she wanted nothing more than to see if her pretties could turn this regenerating meat bag into something useful.

"Then please, follow me." Before Arius could squawk out in indignance he didn't know he still had after his time with Sateriasis, Ani marched forwards ever so slightly and slapped her hand against the side of the wall right in front of them. The same one that Arius had scoured every nook and cranny of. In disbelief, Arius had to watch as the wall shifted upon her touch, pulling apart and revealing a blank, totally spacious hallway with an extra barricaded door at the end of it. "I believe I found the right location where we can get down to business. What do you say?"

The question was almost mocking, was Arius really going to follow her?

…Not like he had much of a choice if we wanted to get what he sought after. Swallowing his pride, Arius followed the girl into the hallway as the secret door that hid it closed up behind them. "This better be worth it…" He muttered to himself, biting his usually liberal tongue back from saying anything else and sighing.

Well, if it gave him a place to strut his stuff… Maybe it wouldn't be so bad?

On the other side of the Foundation, Kagekatsu had a problem. Now, his usual solution to problems came from two directions, allowing him to switch between them at a moment's notice for whatever was beneficial at the time. His first option, the one he liked the most, was to simply ignore it until it went away. He'd blast music into his ears at full volume, he'd pretend to be asleep, he'd busy himself fixing up small amounts of makeup. It was the easy way out of the problem, pretending like it was never real.

Of course, when he had tried it on Akashi to try and get the pissant cat away from banging on his door, there was a slight fault in the plan. Mainly, Akashi's boundless, and borderline worrying, lack of self-preservation. Every time he thought about the catboy, Kagekatsu wanted to roll his eyes. Part of him wondered how Ruby Carbuncle had managed to survive this long, meanwhile, the other part of him wonder how long it would take before someone here snapped and finished the job with a quick snap of the neck.

On the other hand, there was a plan B. There was always a plan B, his dad used to tell him. Kagekatsu's second option was much more complex and sly. Instead of pretending like he couldn't hear or see the problem, the foxboy made himself into so much of a cantankerous asshole that people dropped him to the wayside without bothering to consult him on the matter. It worked great whenever it wasn't his problem! Not so much when it directly affected him…

Case in point, when Akashi knocked on his door for the second time in consecutive days, both solutions were shoved out of the window quicker than one of the Iida moron's recipro bursts kicking the shit out of a villain. "Nakky! Come on! I'll just take a quick peek and then you'll never hear from me again!" Goddamnit, he didn't need his own enhanced hearing to hear the nuisance was smiling from ear to ear. The cat mutant was the walking example of someone's face sticking when the wind changed.

Kagekatsu thought he had heard the voice of the Devil before, cold, raspy, body missing an ear, name your price and the foxboy could recall the detail. Now? The Devil was a shitty, tiny, disposable catboy that he wanted to treat to a seafood buffet, courtesy of a quick dip in the ocean of course. Maybe he'd have him eat a fucking catfish in the process, and no, he didn't care it looked nothing like a cat. "Mind your own goddamn business!" He yelled out, burying his head in his pillow.

At least, if he was forced into opening the door out of sheer annoyance again, he would be dressed and look presentable in comparison to yesterday. It just so happened that Akashi had interrupted him in the middle of a workout session he had done so many times it was like the back of his hand… And it would've been the second time during his stay here that someone walked in on him doing it. Was nowhere here safe?

His words had no effect on the infectious enthusiasm Akashi possessed. "Come on! I was able to see a decent amount yesterday, Yoshizumi-san's room was sooooo cool! It was all traditional, had all these really neat looking art pieces, you should've seen it!" Came that annoying, devilish voice assaulting his eardrums. Its owner was blissfully unaware of the torment that was coming his way, if Kagekatsu had an axe right now then the odds were good he would've been keeping that thing sharp until the end of days.

"And?! What makes you think I'm going to allow you in!" The indignance in his voice was matched only in kind by Arius' outburst at Sateriasis early in the day, the twitching brows and tail of the foxboy made it very clear that Akashi was dancing on the edge of a volcano. A particularly impotent and weak volcano that could spit small chunks of magma every now and again, but a volcano nonetheless.

Those twitching ears that swivelled around on his head, desperate to drown in any other sound, then picked up an audible sigh from the other side of the door. "Alright then…" Was this it? Had he finally managed to stop Akashi in his tracks? That forlorn voice, usually reserved for the loss of close friends or family, made his tail beat around like a happy puppy. "You leave me no choice…"

Oh, oh fuck no! Kagekatsu realised far too late that he had just fallen into a trap, he knew that cat was a crafty bastard at the end of the day! With the goddamn pity points he had racked up like child's play during his stay here, it was just too easy to buy into the idea he was going to piss off now. But Kagekatsu knew… He knew what was going to happen now, and he had royally fucked himself over.

"Mr Clown! I can see you down there! Hey!" Kagekatsu fell to his knees, slapping his hands together in prayer faster than he had ever done before, a speed that Flashfire would've been impressed by had they still kept in touch. "Hey! Can you help me get Nakky to be… I don't know, a little more friendly?" It was like your little sibling whining to your parents that you never played with them, only replace the parents with a sociopathic clown for the effects of the dread that consumed the foxboy.

No enhanced senses were needed to hear the pounding of Subaru's footsteps across the ground. Despite his violent nature, one thing Kagekatsu noticed about the clown is that he always managed to retain a certain grace and speed in his movements. He never made more sound than necessary, which easily would've made him a terrifying foe in a stealth-based encounter. The fact that they were audible meant that they were slow, and that meant it was deliberate, which meant nothing but trouble.

"I could, but if Kage-chan wants to maintain his privacy then I'm not going to press him~!" Even the usually jovial voice, for as hollow as that joy was, had been replaced. In its stead had come a much deeper one, almost dipping down into a baritone. It sounded like Subaru had been screaming in a dark wardrobe for hours on end, leaving him deprived of any kind of sleep in the process. To put it in blunt, simple times, his voice sounded like shit.

It seemed to have caught Akashi off guard as well, Kagekatsu's ears picking up the increased heavy breathing that the catboy undertook. The new status quo didn't last for too long though, before even five seconds had passed Akashi was right back into his mission statement. "Ah, but sir! Wouldn't this be what Mr Vamp would want us to do? Y'know, it can be like a bonding session, if you get me!"

Kagekatsu rolled his eyes, it was the most naive excuse for the invasion of his privacy that he could think of. What went through that moron's head? If anything, rocking up to someone's door and asking to see what they kept secret from the others, especially in a place like this, felt like playing Russian Roulette with all six bullets loaded. A part of him doubted that even Subaru was insane enough to go along with that idea.

However, when Subaru had forcibly done the same to Ikariko a few short days prior, the pink-haired male could hardly be called a neutral arbiter. A sound of rustling floated through the door next, Kagekatsu assumed that it was Subaru petting the other like a cat and smiling in only the way that he could. "You know something, Akashi-kun? That's a wonderful idea! I'm sure I can talk it over with Niijima-sama at a later date! You can even go after Kage-chan's room first if you wish!"

That bastard! The one thing that stopped Kagekatsu from storming out of his room right then and there was the logical part of his brain that screamed it was just a test. Subaru was purposefully manipulating him by saying that as loud as he could, wanting to fan the flames of rage as if he were the conductor of a grand orchestra. Without thinking, the foxboy's hand went up to the side of his head and started to scratch at the still stitched wound he had spoken with Shion.

"Yep! Thank you so much, Mr Clown! I think it would be really neat, I would what everyone else's ones are like… What they would like to eat…" And before either Subaru or Kagekatsu knew it, the catboy had devolved into a muttering mess obsessing over every little detail that he could. Some might have found it endearing, provided he dropped the Stepford smiler gimmick when he was talking. Otherwise, it sounded like he was making plans for how best to stalk them.

At least, if Kagekatsu could credit Subaru with something positive, he'd managed to kick the can down the road for another day at a bare minimum. Odds were good he'd have to face the music sooner rather than later, but as his shoulders loosed from the tension, and he dragged himself back up from his knees, the long-haired teen could appreciate how life had finally granted him one reprieve. Take that -30 luck stat!

"Yes, yes, now carry on. I have some business to attend to with your friend here, and I would rather you not interrupt me again. You got that?" In an instant, Kagekatsu felt the temperature drop. The whole Foundation was already pretty frigid on its best day, the joys of having a vampire as the owner the golden eye teen mused. However, Subaru's voice felt dipped in the arctic itself, then blasted with liquid nitrogen for good measure.

"Y-yes, sir!" The meek Akashi was no match for it. The meeping and mewling would've been so much funnier had Kagekatsu not also been considering his last rites at the moment. Sorry, little footsteps began to pad away, no other sound filling the void until a door gently shut in the background. Only then did Kagekatsu release the breath he had been holding in.

A gentle thump on his door greeted him a few seconds afterwards, Subaru's frosty voice making one emphatic declaration. "Out. Now." Kagekatsu knew it wasn't just an order, he had enough experience around these types of people. What he had been told was the verbal equivalent of being held at gunpoint with no escape.

Kagekatsu didn't speak a single word in reply, he didn't need to. No matter how much his head, heart, and every part of his body screamed at him to stay still and freeze, he found himself unlocking the door. Shaky fingers pulled back on the handle, wondering if this was going to be the last time he went through these motions.

Gazing upwards, he was met with a rather haggard-looking Subaru. While it would be wrong to say Subaru was his type, for many, many reasons, the clown had always been firmly placed in the Ikemen camp in Kagekatsu's view. So, to see him with haggard hair, dark circles under his eyes, and sloppily put together makeup, was something of a shock. Still, it was one that he wouldn't dare speak about.

"Follow me, Nakamura." Came another command which Kagekatsu followed to the letter, his body moving on its own at this point as his eyes stared at the white, overcoated back of Subaru, the man barely taller than him but still so much more predatory in his movements. "I have something that I would like you to do for me."

Kagekatsu nodded, but the situation was just… Strange… He had spoken with Subaru in private before, and it went nothing like how this was going. Sure, he knew full well what the monster in front of him was probably capable of, the clown had made no secret of his willingness to gut Arius where he stood during their first training session together. The sadism rolled off the clown as naturally as breathing came to humans.

However, never before had he seen the other in such a state. There was no playfulness, no mirth in those eyes that could be described as the textbook definition of the word. It was almost as if all the life had been sucked out of him, leaving him a shambling husk that was clinging to the last semblance of authority he had.

"Did you get any kind of sleep last night?" Kagekatsu asked, slapping his hands over his mouth, and cursing the day he was born without a filter. In one second, he had taken a look at the careful tension that had built between them on the journey to their destination and had elected to open pandora's box. He wanted nothing more than for the ground to swallow him whole then and there, at least it would be a more merciful death.

Subaru stopped dead in his tracks, craning his head around at Kagekatsu, something of a smirk on his lips as something vaguely resembling his normal voice took over. "Nope!" He said, popping the 'p' happily. "That's why I look like trash, but I like to think I'm premium-grade trash. Even at my worst, I can be fabulous. Don't you think?" The clown finished, playing with some strands of hair as he began to walk once more.

The flash of the 'normal' Subaru coming out confused Kagekatsu even more. One second, the man was moving like a season serial killer, speaking like he was a god amongst men that was letting the mortals live because he was too bored to end their lives. The next, he was ambling about like always and talking about how good he looked. It was fucking maddening!

With Kagekatsu silent, Subaru carried on after he heaved a long sigh out. "Someone knocked over my house of cards, you see. I'm not going to say who, but let's say together that when I find him, his hair isn't going to be white any longer. I had to spend all night building it back up to its rightful height!" He declared, sounding like it was the most natural thing in the world for him to switch between blatant threats towards Sateriasis and blowing smoke up his own ass.

Kagekatsu shook it out of his head, though. Right now was perhaps the best chance he had to glean information out of Subaru, who seemed to be transitioning back to a more agreeable state. "Are you taking me to that woman again?" This time, it was the foxboy's turn for his hands to ball into fists. Another visit to Shion was bound to end up with him tacked onto a gurney from blood loss again.

"Oh? Shion? No, no, no! Perish the thought! Even I wouldn't be that cruel!" Subaru answered with typical dramatic flair, sticking the back of his hand to his forehead and feigning a very typical feminine pratfall.

Somehow, Kagekatsu doubted the last part of the statement. Psychopathic clowns weren't the most historically trustworthy demographic, he was pretty sure that his dad had even taught him to run away from anyone dressed like Subaru. God, everything came full circle, didn't it? "Then can you tell me where the hell we're going? I was having a nice time before you and that pest turned up at my door!" Still, now finding himself on more familiar ground, he wasn't going to drop the point until he got what he wanted.

"Nishishi, and a magician should reveal his secrets whenever the audience asks him to?" Subaru's laugh sounded normal at least, its hyena-like quality remaining a steady source of both terror and comfort for Kagekatsu as graceful swagger began to return to the clown's step. "But I'm sure that when you meet the wonderous assistant I've picked out for you, you're going to love it before you know it!"

Kagekatsu shivered, unable to feel anything but sorry for the poor sap that had been taken with him, very likely against their will too. In a sense, though, it meant he could trust Subaru's word that he wasn't going to be carted off to that supposed therapist. Not unless they had come up with the terrible reality that was group therapy settings… Those… Kagekatsu often shivered more at the thought of those than the thought of being decapitated.

For once though, he could walk through the halls of the Foundation without bleeding or fearing that someone else was going to come around the corner and scare him out of his socks. Even if it was with Subaru Fujinaga, a man getting progressively higher on the list of people he wouldn't wish on his worst enemy. "In fact, I think you'll find your job quite interesting, Nakamura. I do often enjoy pulling the curtain back from time to time." Subaru added, gliding through the Foundation he knew like the back of his hand.

As he followed Subaru through the many hidden door shortcuts, another pleasant thing about travelling with him, Kagekatsu's eyebrow quirked upwards. Pulling back the curtain? What the hell did that mean? It sounded like some kind of circus or magician vernacular if he had to guess, literature was never his strongest point in school. But with how cryptic the venom with which Subaru had laced it with meant anything, it was doing a good job at piquing his curiosity.

Fortunately, for Kagekatsu, he didn't have to wait much longer. Before he knew it mentally, never mind that he felt like his legs were on fire trying to keep up with Subaru, he found himself in front of a very familiar sight. Right before him, Subaru's office stood with the owner standing tall and proud by the door.

"You have got to be kidding me…" Kagekatsu muttered to himself, burying his face in his hands. Out of all places, he'd have to be here. He'd have much rather scrubbed the deck of the Foundation toilets at this point, at least then he wouldn't be dealing with the threat of having his balls cut off.

Subaru, meanwhile, kept on smirking like nothing in the past few minutes had happened. "I knew you'd like it! Considering you felt the need to interrupt me in the midst of a very important meeting the last time you were here!" He rapped on the door, tapping on it like a pair of bongo drums, taking immense pleasure in the reaction he was receiving.

"Weren't you by yourself?" Kagekatsu shot with an accusatory look. He distinctly remembered seeing Subaru all by himself when he had arrived with Yuusui the day before the other teen's test. The foxboy still had the bitter memory of freezing his balls off and being ignored as the clown seemed to take much more interest in the brunette beside him, not that he could be blamed for the way the long-haired teen had acted.

"Details! Details!" Subaru waved off, now fiddling with the door handle for a few seconds before he pushed it open. "But look at it this way, Kage-chan! You'll never be alone this time! You had Yuu-chan last time, and now look who you have with you!" The clown stepped away from the doorway, folding his arms against his chest and leaning back on the wall as he waited for the reaction he so desired.

True to form, the second Kagekatsu saw who he was going to be working with on whatever task he had been assigned, the anger that had been bubbling away in his core decided that now would be the ideal time to boil over. "What the fuck! You have any idea what the fuck you're doing, idiot?!" He yelled, ostensibly to Subaru, but also to the person who remained as still as a statue in the office.

He might have tolerated literally anyone else, even Akashi, even the boring as sin morons that hadn't spoken much during this stay here. However, the last person he expected to see in his path was the form of Joseph, who looked about as bored as ever and totally fed up, regardless of what his blank face showed off.

"Worst and best!" Subaru chimed in, sparing no expense to put Kagekatsu down in his reply. Shrugging his shoulders, the clown closed his eyes and began to fuss about with his messy hair. "I would shove Yuu-chan in here, but he's currently recovering from his own test. I think there would be several ethics codes I would be breaking by forcing dear old Sati to bring him out here."

Both teens narrowed their eyes at that. Joseph, for lack of a better term, because he knew that the taller teen had managed to hit the button at the same time as he did. Kagekatsu, more so, because he was very much aware of the brutality they had expended on themselves. His whole body broke out in goosebumps thinking about what Subaru could do to someone by themselves, assumedly with no consequences.

"That doesn't explain why we're here." Joseph droned, wanting to carry on with the business as swiftly as possible. At least Kagekatsu could sympathise with the teen who had busted his nose here, the quicker they got this over with, the faster they would be able to go back to whatever they wanted to do. This was eating into their mandated "free" time, no less.

Subaru placed a fist under his chin, mimicking the famous 'The Thinker' statue as he dragged out his answer for as long as possible. No doubt another tool at his disposal to drive people up the wall. "I've been thinking about how to deal with you two for a while now, what would make the best use of the talents you've shown me. It was a long old road, that was for sure. Juggling it with other matters hasn't helped me in the slightest, but I believe I have the appropriate reward and punishment for the pair of you." Dead red eyes snapped open, manic glee present in them. "You are going to clean my office for me!"

If Kagekatsu thought before that he had reached the zenith of his frustration and anger, he had spoken much too soon. Right now, only Krakatoa could match up to the overwhelming fire inside of him that threatened to spew hot chunks of venom at Subaru. Right now, he wanted to time travel back to his days in the Inner Circle, stick Subaru's name down in front of Painmaker, and tell him that he wanted the clown to die a painful death! Right now, he wa-

"Okay." Came the affirmation from Joseph, his tone robotic underneath the lack of any real emotion or inflexion. A simple nod of the head was all he gave towards Kagekatsu as well, acting like it was the most natural thing in the world to be expected to do another person's busy work. Because that's what this was. A chore that Subaru didn't want to do and was foisted on them.

Before Kagekatsu could get his reply out, though, Subaru's hand came down from behind him and onto his shoulder. The hitching of his breath was very noticeable, Joseph's eyes darting over to him as pink hair came into the foxboy's peripheral vision. "See, if Jo-chan can do it, why can't you? Orders are real easy to follow, aren't they?" The tightening grip was strong than anything Kagekatsu had ever felt in his life, what the fuck did that man eat? Was this what Arius felt like? If so, he owed the asshole an apology.

Unable to speak, Kagekatsu rapidly nodded his head, looking like one of those perpetual motion machines being overclocked. For as much as his mouth got him in trouble, there was still a brain lodged in that head somewhere. It might have been sputtered into life by the occasional meeting of two brain cells, but one didn't survive what he had without using it on occasion.

"That's good." Before another word could be crossed, Subaru was on his way out "I've got a meeting with Niijima-sama to attend, so I'll have a look at your progress when I'm done. Are we clear? Good. The vague mutters of "Fucking mudpeople and sweathogs," were picked up by Kagekatsu's hyper-sensitive hearing, but the foxboy bit his tongue back. He may have had a death wish at some point, but right now he'd very much like to be alive.

If there was one thing Kagekatsu knew better than anyone on this planet it was to not mess with a tired man, they were unpredictable and vitriolic. Worse still, that was with normal members of society like his dad. With Subaru? Well, Kagekatsu's quivering tail and bit bottom lip told all that was needed to know.

"Typical. Leaving us to do his dirty work." Joseph commented from the side, already annoyance dipping into his usual monotone. It was an emotion that Kagekatsu found hard to argue against, busy work of any description usually sucked. Doing it for your sadistic clown overlord that had a hard-on for making things more difficult than they needed to be? That was just the fucking worst.

The foxboy brushed some stray hairs from his eyes as he looked over at Joseph and then out to the office. "If we get this done quickly, we can forget this happened in the first place. Hell, the clown might even get off our backs for once." It might have summed up to nothing more than wishful thinking on his end, but Kagekatsu preferred to have some degree of optimism from time to time. Everything was really tedious and tiring if you approached it with the same level of anger constantly.

Joseph responded with a grunt, vaguely committal in nature as he began to drag his feet across the messy floor. He supposed it was an order at the end of the day, and orders were the easiest thing in the world to follow. Even a moron could make themselves look like a genius if they listened to one for long enough. "Alright." He eventually said, bending down and getting to work.

To say there would be a lot of work that needed to be done was an understatement, it was going to be a colossal task.

When Kagekatsu had turned up in Subaru's office the other day, it hadn't looked half bad. The white walls were clean and reflective, shining like a diamond down in a coal mine. It looked like it belonged to that particularly paranoid Roman Emperor the foxboy had heard Dad speak about, the one who wanted every corner of his palace polished to make sure he could always see the reflection of someone sneaking up on him.

It was about the only thing that remained clean and tidy at this point, though. The desk, which had been kept all nice and pristine, had somehow managed to be littered with enough dust to send a vacuum cleaner into a midlife crisis. Kagekatsu didn't know how it was physically possible for something to end up like that in a short amount of time, but given that this was Subaru's office, he had to bite back any comments. Logic had no place here.

The foxboy kept his distance from Joseph, for the time being, watching the energy demon quickly sweep the floors with almost military-grade precision. Once more, the amount of crap that had managed to find its way onto the floor was unimaginable a few days prior. Kagekatsu could spy burnt cards, playing cards that were torn in half, paper that had been thrown from the desk, and even what looked like a piece of the wheel he had dragged out for the first meeting they all had together.

"Good Lord does this asshole know what a duster is?!" Kagekatsu complained, covering up his mouth to stop the dusty books from assaulting his throat with their hideous attacks. He then dragged his free hand across the top of the desk, his eyes rolling when he found that it was also soon covered in dust, just as expected. "Evidently fucking not…" He muttered, words muffled by the hand covering his mouth.

With no reply from Joseph, he moved his gaze from the front of the room to the back. The place where Subaru normally sat, where there were also fewer things overtly wrong with the place. For one, the chair looked like it was fit for a King or a Queen, depending on the gender of the owner. He hadn't noticed it when he first came in, but with the golden and silver buttons that poked out of the red velvet, the lingering greed within the foxboy tugged within him, whispering in his ear about how much money he would make by pawning the thing off.

He quickly, and literally, slapped that out of his head, though. Now was not the time and place to be considering selling people's shit for a quick and easy paycheck. Although, with a quick glance over his shoulder and the twitching of his still semi-broken nose, he wondered how much he would get for the energy-sucking bastard behind him… A dark smile broke out on his face, the idea getting more intoxicating every passing second.

"Are you going to do anything? Or are you going to stand there and look at me do all the fucking work?" Joseph said, not turning around, but knowing full well what the foxboy was doing. He didn't need to have eyes on the back of his head either, he just knew, knew, that Kagekatsu was a lazy layabout in the best of times. That initial meeting when the other had elected to try and microwave noodles over Joseph's perfectly delicious and well-cooked meal still burned bright in his memory.

The dark smile on Kagekatsu's face faded, the foxboy holding his hands up in mock surrender. "Woah, let's not get too testy here, alright? You're doing so much of the stuff on your side of things, I just wanted to move onto the other side and get my side done so we can both get out of here." He lied, making up his reasoning on the spot and hoping that Joseph would buy it.

"Whatever. Just get it done." Luckily for Kagekatsu, it seemed like Joseph had indeed bought the lie. Whether the payment was in genuine trust, or simply because he didn't feel like pressing the issue anymore, the foxboy didn't care.

The long-haired teen's attention switched back to his side of the room, looking at Subaru's end of the desk. The drawers were absolutely stuffed to the brim and then some, pieces of paper sticking out of every crack imaginable. It would be like if someone's school back had a massive hole right in the corner where you could see all of their folders, yet it somehow hadn't broken away yet. Each level of the desk looked like it was mere minutes or one wrong touch from exploding.

So, naturally, Kagekatsu elected to touch it, rolling up the sleeves of his kimono and pulling out the top one first. His eyes widened slightly when he realised what he had just stumbled upon before they then shifted into a more confused slant. "He keeps them in here…?" He muttered to himself, fishing through the sea of papers, most of which were blank, and pulling out one of those manila files that he had seen the clown carry around from time to time.

Kagekatsu's eyes darted upwards to Joseph, making sure the other's back was still turned. He had no idea whose file he had in his hands, the few indications he could glean without pulling back that tempting cover was that he was slim. Very slim. Like someone had barely put much thought into it, shitting it out when they were high off their mind.

Unable to hide his temptation any longer, Kagekatsu practically tore at the cover, desperate to see what lay beneath…. Only to be met with severe disappointment when he saw whose file it indeed was. "Huh… No wonder I forgot his name… Jesus Christ!" His tone was that of both frustration and that of a parent that wasn't mad, just disappointed.

Haru's file sat in his hands, a single page with barely any information on it. All it consisted of was a picture, the forgettable jobber's name, and then maybe a paragraph or two about some vague personality quirks to watch out for. It clearly wasn't written in Subaru's hand as well, because he could very much see on the papers that had writing on them that the clown was the one with the chicken scrawl handwriting. Meaning that whoever had the misfortune of writing this had probably given up halfway through, leaving the other sections blank to fill in later and simply never getting around to it.

Kagekatsu shook his head, shoving it back into the top drawer with a scowl on his face. If the person who wrote it couldn't be bothered, then he wasn't going to be either. The next drawer down was much of the same thing. Files of roughly the same size were stacked up haphazardly against each other, more pieces of paper with more ineligible scribbles on them, and a few playing cards that had been left lying about.

It didn't take Kagekatsu long to sort this one out either, electing to group all of the stray pieces of paper back up in the top drawer, and keep the files where they were whilst he chucked the cards over to where Joseph stood.

For the last one, though, Kagekatsu struggled to get open. It was much heavier than the others, way heavier for a matter of fact. It felt like the whole weight of the world was in there and then some, which of course went wonderfully well with the scrawny, stick figure-like arms that the foxboy had. Muscles felt like they were about to catch fire, his chest constricting like he had just been stabbed.

The huffing and puffing must've been way more obvious than he thought because a quick peek above the desk showed off Joseph looking at him like had grown two heads, the energy demon's brain churning to find the right words. "What the fuck are you doing over there? Why do I smell smoke?" Okay, maybe not the best choice of words in the world, but no one could fault Joseph for wanting to be blunt.

"None of your business! Keep sweeping and once I'm done here, we'll get out of here!" Kagekatsu's brief glance over at where Joseph was working showed that the energy demon had naturally worked at a much faster pace than he did, most of the floor was once again spotless and here he was, stuck trying to open the drawer with all his might.

Ha, if only All Might could be here right about now, Kagekatsu could've used someone with a strength Quirk to save him from the humiliation he was receiving, which was no doubt a plot of Subaru's all along.

With one almighty pull, though, Kagekatsu could finally dance around in celebration, his tail deciding now would be a great time to do its rendition of "Happy Puppy that was fed for the first time in the day." His whole body might end up crying for death, but he could now die happy knowing he had no regrets about this godforsaken desk!

However, his mind was quickly switched into another mode once he saw what had given him the majority of the issues. Compared to the other ones, which were messes but still mainly packed to the brim, this one was comparably smaller. All because there was in fact only one thing in it, a veritable monster at that.

The singular file was arguably larger than the drawer itself. Its cover was tattered at the edges, crushed from the amount of time it had spent in there, suffocating from the pressure put on it. The small divots in the side showed that someone had attempted to bind it all together at one point, but the ripped paper around it suggested that had been a monumental failure.

But one question remained in Kagekatsu's mind? Whose was it? It couldn't be his, he knew that for sure. For as fucked up as the foxboy was, he wasn't that bad. A few of the others might have fit the bill but given how they seemed as one-note as Haru, and Haru's file could be heard going 'Eh, I'll do it later,' there was a more than zero chance it belonged to them.

Which left only one real option. Throwing a side-eyed gaze over in Joseph's direction, Kagekatsu's sharp nails gently peeled back the cover, careful to not make a single sound that could get him caught. Digging into people's information had been a hobby of his for quite a while, but this… this felt dirty if he was correct in his assumption.

That dirty feeling only got worse when he saw a picture of Joseph staring back at him, the name was written in both English and Japanese for the sake of covering all basis, the English in a nice flowing cursive and the Japanese looking all nice and formal like the signature on a contract.

But the mere sight and size made Kagekatsu's heart pound in his eardrums. His mind became awash with all sorts of theories about how Joseph's file could possibly be that size. Hell, the behemoth looked more like a manuscript that would some an ancient devil than it did a simple collection of information. What could have possibly happened? Sure, Joseph was clearly all sorts of fucked up, but everyone here was.

There was not a single person in this Foundation that was here because their life went well, they had all befallen some kind of tragedy. The only difference was that they didn't have what seemed like an entire epic fantasy novel under their belt. Kagekatsu's mouth ran dry, any explanation he put in his head failed him, and his brain continued to whiz about at lightning speed.

"Are you done yet?" Kagekatsu perked up, barely avoiding hitting his head on the edge of the desk as every part of his body went stiff. Joseph's voice, as monotone as it was, had never been more intimidating to him than at that moment. The dark-eyed teen was leaning back against the wall like how Subaru was earlier, evidently bored out of his mind.

For a few seconds, Kagekatsu was at a loss for words. His mind still couldn't get rid of the connection between the teen he saw before him and the monster of a file that lay in the drawer he had managed to kick back into place at the last second. "Uhh…" His eyes scanned across the room, desperate to land on anything to get away from what he had just seen. Settling on the bookshelf behind him like it was the holy grail of excuses "Give me a few seconds to check out the bookshelf! There's a few knocked over and then we can go!"

Joseph seemed to be satisfied enough with the answer for what it was worth, although the tightening grip on his shirt's cuff didn't fill Kagekatsu with much confidence as the foxboy turned around to deal with his saviour.

There were a few books that Kagekatsu knew like the back of his hand. However, for the brief moment he ended up pulling out Frankenstein it made him want to gag, he could've done without seeing that book again for as long as he lived. He wasted a whole goddamn year on that thing when he was already halfway to prison. If they really wanted to torture the foxboy, they should've locked him in with it as his only source of entertainment. That would've guaranteed his descent into madness.

Other ones he had less of an opinion on. They were mainly classical literature he had seen around his Dad's office when he would accidentally wander in there as a kid. Things like Crime and Punishment, the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Dracula, The Idiot, and Les Misérables, were all neatly splayed out together and kept in pristine condition. It seemed like Subaru had some degree of care for objects after all.

However, as he was making sure they were still in their proper condition because Subaru would likely have his guts for garters if he wasn't keeping them absolutely perfect, his eyes focused on three books in particular. At that moment, the whole world felt like it had slowed down to a sickening crawl.

To Be What Others Cannot Be by HYDE

Live Forever As You Are Now by Kyousuke Mayuzumi

The Other Side by Akira Hiiragi

Kagekatsu's breath hitched… There was no way… He had many thoughts about Subaru as a person, and if he wasn't dealing with the threat of the man around every possible corner, he would be more than happy to list out his issues in a public forum. But… Combining this with what he had he had just seen earlier, especially when he reread who had written the final book his eyes had fallen on, it realigned those issues totally.

Not a single part of him wanted to believe it, backing away the second he had slotted them back into place with the others, and not passing Joseph a single glance as he quickly departed from the room into the halls of the Foundation. A part of him hated leaving the energy demon to fend for himself when Subaru came back, but there was no way Kagekatsu was going to be able to meet the pink-haired adult's gaze in the same right about now.

The foxboy's golden gaze remained locked to the floor, the overwhelming feeling of dread slicking its vile claws into his mind in a way he hadn't felt in a long time. His right hand went right to where his open wound was, not quite digging in just yet, but threatening to turn the geyser of blood back into an active volcano if one more thing went south.

He didn't know where he was walking at this point, but any sort of action to clear his mind was more than welcome. With what had happened right before, Kagekatsu felt like something dark was brewing away, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer if the books he had seen before him had anything to do with it…

"Along the shore the cloud waves break, the twin suns sink behind the lake, the shadows lengthen In Carcosa." Today had been a terrible one for Subaru, one that seemed to only get worse the longer it went on. One night only and it was already feeling like a lifetime before he could sleep this one-off, pretending like it never happened.

The more he got what Kyte had told him out of his head, the better. The clown didn't need stupid bullshit like that poisoning his mind, there was already enough toxicity in his body, thank you very much! His hands curled around the book he had held in them, threatening to tear through the flimsy cover he had taped back on over the years.

"Strange is the night where black stars rise, and strange moons circle through the skies, but stranger still is Lost Carcosa." His first thought, tonight, had been a simple one. Ready to his little girl and put her to bed like was always done. No matter the age Yua was, Subaru had always possessed a soft spot for lulling her to sleep with quiet tales of fantastical, cosmic creatures that had unmatched and irresistible power.

They were some of her favourites, and definitely some of his too. It was why none of them dared to live in that festering crapsack that was his office, lest they be covered in more grime and dust than the underside of a car exhaust system. Honestly, it was a masterstroke that he was able to coerce Joseph and Kagekatsu into doing it. Turns out, he could be very persuasive whenever he felt like turning on the charm to go along with the threats.

His own room was far nicer, far different from the clinical and cold patterns that sucked the life out of the Foundation's walls. Different from the harsh darkness that splattered Kyte-sama's office, different from the rustic, yet somehow modern look that befell dear old Sati's abode that he shared with the twins.

Subaru's room was much alive, as he would put it to himself. Dotting in wonderful mixes of both purple, pink, and black across the walls. All three colours swirled together in one illustrious work of art, converging into a single point at the centre of the high ceiling, not much unlike how a circus tent would do so.

However, that was merely the beginning. With pristinely swept floors, the level of cleanliness was one that was unmatched by any other place in the Foundation. It was comfortable enough to eat a full five-course meal with extra dessert without complaints, with even the smallest bit of dust being obsessively cleaned away. A fact the pink-haired adult couldn't be prouder of, especially when he had to deal with such a troublesome little tyke all the time.

Speaking of her, Subaru's lips curled up into half of a smile as he took the time to stop reading and look at the girl in front of him. Little thing had been so exhausted as of recent, after years of begging she had finally gotten what she wanted and then some.

Of course, that meant more nights spent in her caretaker's room in place of her own. Subaru's bed was one that befit more for a King and Queen than a small, barely 5-foot tall, 15-year-old girl that had as much energy remaining as a dead battery. The four-poster bed was probably the most expensive thing in the whole Foundation, more so than the incredibly lavishly furnished staff room. Its ivory pillars combined with the mahogany base in such a wonderous clash of colours, the occasional flecks of gold making the lavish luxury it possessed even deeper and more pronounced.

Within it all, rested Yua, surrounded by the heavy crimson, silk blanket like a cocoon. Her head calmly rested on one of the pristine, fluffy white pillows that felt like heaven for anyone to sleep on. She looked so… Tiny. It made Subaru want to laugh, how someone that small could have that much energy… it made the corners of his eyes crease in amusement.

"Songs that the Hyades shall sing, where flap the tatters of the King, must die unheard in Dim Carcosa." At this point, he was near the end of the story, the last lines of the poem flowing out of his mouth like they had thousands of times before. Yua always fell asleep around this point, never quite managing to hear the end of this story as Subaru hid the book in his personal belongings far away from her.

Perhaps it was for the best, this book was not meant for kids, after all. Subaru's grip on the final page loosened, hovering limply at the end of the corer as he recited the passage from his endless memory of it.

"Song of my soul, my voice is dead, die thou, unsung, as tears unshed shall dry and die in Lost Carcosa." With that last verse, he placed the back down on the bedside table to his left. His gaze didn't dip from regarding the tiny, precious form of the little girl in front of him. It allowed him to notice how… Feeble she was in this situation. They were the only two people in their bubble now, with no one to distract them, and no one to cry out for help should the situation develop into a deadly one.

Subaru turned away before he could act on that impulsive thought, catching his footing and dragging himself to the vanity that lay right in the corner of the room. Much like everything else that had furnished the clown's home, it too showed off a degree of luxury and elegance. Its ornate and intricate, purple-coloured carvings stretched far and wide, lovingly crafted by the master artists he had carefully been cultivating over his life. He'd have to thank Tommaso one of these days… Ah, well. That could always be done later.

The mirror itself was about as simple as one could get, though. Nothing fancy, nothing too tricky about it. It wasn't one of those gimmick mirrors you would see in a magic show, there were no hidden panels that would open up a super-secret compartment where Subaru was keeping test tube experiments like he was some modern-day Victor Frankenstein. No, it was a normal place for him to touch up make-up that had slowly been fading as the day went on.

Anything to get his mind off today would work, anything that would get him away from the bedside would also work. Lord knows what he did when full of energy, a cranky, pissed-off Subaru was perhaps even worse than when he was in full control of his impulses. Sateriasis would be the first one to make that point, he'd never miss a chance to talk shit about the clown.

Ack, now he was thinking about the shitty things again. Subaru shook his head clear of those thoughts, shoving them into the lockbox in his head and throwing away the key. He reached out for the tube of black lip-gloss, another move to further cast his mind onto more enjoyable topics. The next few hours awake were going to be absolute hell on earth.

Puffing out a sigh, Subaru began to gently apply another coat, careful to avoid the piercings that dangled dangerously close. Maybe getting well over fifty of them on his face had been one of his more unwarranted ideas, but shit happens. Especially when you were a good-for-nothing twenty-year-old running about in a fucking circus full of both literal and metaphorical clowns!

Before he had realised it, Subaru had slammed his fist on the vanity's table, leaving a heavy indent in the wood and splinters in his right hand. Quickly, he sent a dead glance over in the direction of Yua, wanting to make sure that she was still asleep. The last thing he needed about now was to send her into a frenzy by waking her up and making her think they were under attack.

She might have been a loveable ball of fluff, but he may have gone overboard in teaching her how to treat danger. The conversation he had with the little shit about treating Ikariko a certain way was more than enough evidence of that.

Seeing her sleeping form, he shook his head again and rolled his eyes. There he went again… Getting worried over absolutely nothing. God, it was so frustrating from time to time, and it made his chest tighter every time he dared to explore whatever was causing that feeling to creep up on him. But at least… At least he had seen that she was safe…

She's not yours.

Subaru's head perked up instantly, eyes darting around at the sound of a voice not dissimilar from his own. No… No! Not now! Not fucking now! He didn't need to hear any of this shit!

"Shut up! I know that!" He yelled back, his eyes settling on the mirror in front of him. The clown brought the chair closer to the desk, placing both of his elbows back on said desk with a dull thud. His words stank of vitriol, a venom that was usually reserved for the conversations he absolutely despised with all his being.

Why do you pretend it's real then?

There it was again. That goddamn voice! The one so close to his own, so painfully close that they were indistinguishable to every ear but Subaru's. In the mirror, he could see his lips move without any words or sounds coming out of them, but he knew perfectly well what they were saying without the need for audio… It all came from the same place at the end of the day.

"I don't have to answer that." He hated this… HATED this. Subaru ducked his gaze from the mirror as he spoke, yet his fists balled with barely contained rage. His teeth were gritted against each other, not unlike how Ikariko would grind down his teeth when frustrated, both of them close to making their teeth closer to nubs the more they did it.

Pfft, running away like a dog again, are we?

Subaru didn't see it this time, but he could hear the smirk that was present in the voice. It infected his eardrums with its vacuous poison, corrupting the airwaves with toxicity at every syllable and every individual letter.

"You're a face in the mirror." The pink-haired adult couldn't look away longer, let alone spend longer listening to this festering pile of crap. He tore his eyes from the floor and glared at the reflection that stared him back in the mirror with a sinister look crossing both faces in the process. His words were defiant to the last.

I am you. You are me. I'll live on forever!

It did nothing to dampen the voice of the reflection in front of him, his own voice, which was defiant in its own right, if not a little more youthful. It always was, never stopping to consider the idea that it could ever be wrong, drawing the real Subaru's attention to it like a moth to a flame.

"You need me. I don't need you." Drawing his ire was the one thing someone with a will to live never did with Subaru, otherwise, they were going to find themselves a one-way ticket to the grave before they could realise their throat had been slit. His threats to Arius weren't empty, every single word that had sent chills down the Immortal's spine was dead serious.

Say what you want, but what's done is done. You can't change that, Subaru.

That same sinister nature was contained in the reflection. Every word was spoken with the same serious conviction, not a single wavering of the voice. Cold, merciless, demented. Those were all the adjectives Subaru could assign off the top of his head, knowing the depravity went so much deeper than just those three.

It's a matter of time, Subaru. The more you deny me… Well, you know the rest. Nature doesn't leap. Soon, the rest of the mudpeople will realise that.

The reflection was so painfully familiar, yet different at the same time. Sharp grins that he still dealt out, but with the tinge of malice he so desperately tried to hide over the past twenty years. A face, with all of its youthful vibrance, that haunted him despite everything he had put on over the years to hide it.

Subaru cracked the mirror with a vicious elbow strike, the shards of glass raining down on the floor and jabbing themselves through his clothes and into his elbow proper. A harsh grimace turned up on his face, free hand rushing to put pressure on his injured elbow, which no doubt would soon start trickling out blood and cause him a trip to Sateriasis.

Could today get any worse at this point?

His eyes tracked down to where the book sat, still perched up in its divider with its creamy yellow pages fanned across the table, crumbling under the intense weight. The King in Yellow… He hadn't bought it, rather it had ended up in possession by ulterior means and Subaru simply elected to hold onto it. The fact it had now transformed into Yua's bedtime story was not a fork in the road he expected to come to, least of all with the miasma that clung to the pages like death. But his life had the habit of throwing up more twists and turns than a racetrack.

Subaru groaned, rubbing at his elbow as he sat back down on the bedside chair. Maybe he could grin and bear it? With what Kyte had told him, there was little doubt he was going to be allowed to roam as freely as he had beforehand. Not that it was that shocking. If anything, the pink-haired adult had to resist the urge to roll his eyes at how this happened like clockwork every three years. All things considered, it might give him ample time to recover and hide the injury.

The fractured mirror lay at his feet, the other half of the soft, sharp sprinkle of shattered glass dusted around it like a circle of salt around a snail. The clown clicked his tongue and sneered, what number was it now? Fifty? Fifty-one? He had lost track of the amount he had broken at this point.

Either way, he certainly wasn't going to be falling asleep tonight. His eyes glanced over at Yua, who was sound asleep in a bed that didn't belong to her and made her look comically small as he stood himself at the foot of it.

"Hey… Yua…" He began, leaning forward and placing his hands on the side of two of the posters, an unreadable, indiscernible emotion flickering in his hollow eyes. "I know you can't hear this, so actually, I don't know why I'm bothering you at this point…"

God, he couldn't even get through a simple sentence anymore. How fucking troublesome. The sight of the still girl that was leeching on his bed, like one of Sateriasis' parasites did around their marks, didn't help in the slightest. Subaru's black nails curled around the posters, digging into the wood as his lips formed into a strained smile.

"No matter… It's not a problem…" The clown muttered to himself, barely remembering what his original train of thought was. At this point, his mind was moving faster than one of those morons that ran around still trying to carry out the Ingenium name. "Hey, Yua… Have you ever wanted something so badly that you no longer remembered who you were in the first place? Starting a journey with no destination. Wandering about with no real desire, only the vague hope that there is something you could hold close to your chest and call your own?"

The small girl, barely a teenager physically, and nowhere close to one mentally, remained as still as a sleeping log. The total lack of movement made Subaru's eyes narrow that little bit more, his pupils growing sharper, more predatory as normally playful red eyes grew harsh and cold.

With a few quiet steps, not daring to wake his little one from her beauty sleep, Subaru positioned himself a few short inches away from her. "…You're a pain, you know that? Darling?" A wry chuckle escaped from his lips as he reached for her hand, which was so much smaller than his own. Carefully, his thumb dusted over the palm, tracing small circles. "You're cruel too. Stealing my bed, my room from me like this."

Subaru looked away for a second, mind churning with ideas about who he would be able to leech off of for the night. Sure, minutes prior he had been complaining about not being able to get sleep in his own room, and the elbow injury that continued to make him grimace did no favours either. Yet still, there was always a plan B for Subaru Fujinaga.

The pink-haired adult dropped his grip on Yua's hand with a cool detachment, bending down to his knees shortly thereafter. "Hey… Yua… What would you feel like if I decided to gut every single new member from the new intake? I just took them in one by one, slit their throats, and sold their organs off to some back-alley Quirk Doctor to be tuned into medical abominations? Clearly, Kyte-sama believes I'm very capable of that, otherwise he wouldn't have said what he said to me." The lingering bitterness to every word spoke to more than the simple brutality they were often laced with.

God, he fucking hated this with every fibre of his being. Those words had slipped out of his mouth before he knew what he was saying, and they weren't going to stop no matter how much he tried to put the kibosh on them. It made him want to tear out his own eyeballs, so he didn't have to look in the mirror the next time around.

"Forget it, I didn't say anything." Subaru stood up as quickly as he dismissed the last few seconds in human history, shaking his head and rubbing at both temples. Short, sharp breaths wrecked his lungs. Calm… He needed to be calm right now. "You… You're the real hero here, Yua." He added, punctuating it with a kiss on her forehead before turning away on his heel.

Tomorrow… Tomorrow was another day…

Keh, keep holding your hand close to the flame. That's the Fujinaga Way, Subaru.

Running his finger across the top of the dusty rail in front of him wasn't one of Monsoon's finer moments. Everything in Japan was infested with ninety different diseases at any given moment, maybe that bar from the other day had raised his standards far too high. Either way, cleaning said finger was going to require about seven different products to get it back up to acceptable standards.

Why had he left Russia again? For some kind of stupid call to arms by Kyte? The more he looked back on that decision, the more the Wind of Destruction continued to wonder if his brain had been leaking out of his ears the past few years.

Even more so with where he was now. His ruby red eyes lifted from the railing and towards the ramshackle shithole placed in front of him, the blue-haired male leaning back across the rail as he resisted the urge to roll his eyes at both his actions and what he was looking at.

"Too cheap to even fix the sign?" Monsoon sighed to himself, pushing hands through his hair, the continued lack of his hairband once more nudging him further into frustration. "Could've titled this place 'We sell children' instead and it would get a better rap." Further sarcasm dripped from cracked lips.

The sign in question was rusted beyond belief, coated head to toe in an unavoidable red prison of iron oxide. Every letter felt as if it were one slight gust of wind from blowing off and vanishing without a trace. The fact it even remained in place was a sight to behold, the hinges were creaking and gasping for oil as much as someone with a crushed windpipe begged for air. How it had managed to get away with this cover for years was straight-up baffling to Monsoon.

Then again, when it did get raided, it's not hard to see why the place was left in such a state… Monsoon had gotten enough phone calls that day to last a lifetime, definitely enough to ruin his Middle Eastern escape for the time being.

Not a chance in hell existed that he was going to step into this place once again. The inside was probably worse than the last time, crawling with bugs, moss, and even more violent offenders that replaced the previous staff. Of course, that said nothing to the possible state of the kids that were being kept in their special Hell for the entertainment of villains and their sadistic "Director," as the bastard liked to call himself.

If Kyte had called him here to do away with this wretched place, then Monsoon would've jumped the hat in a heartbeat. The mere chance to do away with yet another loose end of his destiny, to tie it up and kick it to the bottom of the ocean as he had done to so many, had him salivating at the mere thought.

Instead, he was stuck playing glorified scout because of Kyte's twenty-year-long tantrum. Even moonlighting for one of those cack-handed government departments was better than basically having to be a babysitter. God, when were those two going to pay for the rent they had in one another's heads?

Either way, reality had to take precedence over his dreams. Lighting a cigarette and puffing out a cool breath, Monsoon much preferred waiting outside the Crimson Coliseum for his meetup. The soft glow of the setting sun behind him as he silently stayed patient, punctuality was never a virtue of the Japanese from what we could glean from his time here.

"It's a disgusting habit." Came a voice at his side, measured carefully between disgust and trying to sound amicable. A glance upwards made Monsoon smirk slightly, the form of Flashfire, looking much the same since the last time the pair had met, was wandering towards him. "Kills your lungs." The redheaded arsonist spoke with trademark curtness as if speaking was some great pain in general.

"I do that already by breathing Japanese air." Monsoon replied swiftly, laughing at his own joke in the process. With another drag of his cigarette, not at all close to being finished, he tossed the sin stick behind him and stubbed it out with his back heel. The least he could do was erect some basic decorum. "But I suppose I can thank a guardian angel for making me realise the error of my ways~."

Flashfire grunted, more than a little displeased with the situation. The sunglasses hid his eyes perfectly, just like was always planned, but Monsoon did not doubt that they were burning with the kind of fire that so often lit up the arsonist's enemies. "That suggests you're worthy of salvation." The redhead put his hands in his jacket pockets, turning his gaze first towards the Crimson Coliseum and then back to Monsoon.

Monsoon picked up on the wordless implication and quickly gave his account. "Yoshi, do you really want to be in that place? I know I don't." He said, spelling it out like it was the most obvious thing in the history of everything ever. Going into a dump was a more enticing alternative than stepping foot in the coliseum.

"As if." Flashfire joined Monsoon's side, carefully reclining back onto the guardrail, the slight breeze buffeting his hair. "I'd rather go to a whorehouse with a fistful of fifties, as Taka likes to say." Quoting Osprey made every iota of his body cringe in synch with one another, but the foulmouthed member of their triumvirate could put out a decent point once in a while.

"Taka?" Monsoon queried with an eyebrow raised, that was the first time he was hearing that name come out of Flashfire's mouth. Did they replace his protégé already? After all that time he had put into that kid? Fucking typical, couldn't trust the Japanese to pass a lie detector test at this point!

"One of Akira's pet projects." Flashfire's reply was calm, keeping his tone measured despite the lingering images of Osprey still in his head. "The Exalted One sent him and Akira off to do this mission." Came the rest, shifting the conversation away from any dangerous areas for the Inner Circle with breakneck speed.

"Which gives you the opportunity to deal with me. Tell me, what did you do to piss him off this time?" Monsoon laughed, not caring for the glare that was sent his way. Watching the suffering of the Japanese was always a highlight of his time spent here. Watching the suffering of the same Japanese bastards that tore him away from his protégé was an extra layer of honey on top.

Flashfire, though, remained silent. He placed a hand across his chest, carefully dodging the burns around it. Monsoon didn't need to know anything of what the Exalted One was planning, least of all did he deserve to simply hear the idea. The redhead didn't fancy having his dick in a blender if it was found out he had touted.

On the other side of things, Monsoon appeared to grant the other mercy, cleaning out his left ear with one of his long, bony fingers. "If you talk the ear off me like that, I might end up going deaf!" For the third time, the Wind of Destruction amused himself when not a single soul on the planet would've laughed at his joke. "But I don't blame you. I assume you're only here because he finally decided to check his phone for once?"

A swift nod was dealt out, yet lips remained shut. It made the slippage of the name 'Taka' earlier more confusing to Monsoon, considering that Flashfire was more tight-lipped than Johnny Tightlips if he was sequestered in the most well-defended area of Fort Knox.

Scratching the side of his face, cracked, dehydrated flakes of skin floating softly down to the tarmac, Monsoon continued. "Either way, I guess that if he's on the case of this dumpster fire too, then it's not going to be much longer for the world." Moving the conversation back onto common ground would be enough for now. Having to juggle Kyte's need for info and his own personal curiosity proved to be much more of a double-edged sword than thought.

Flashfire pushed out his hands, framing the 'Orphanage' in front of him like an artist appreciating the artwork. The vaguest inklings of a smile split onto his lips as the tips of his fiery, wispy red hair seemed to burn brighter. "I want to burn it already. I'm waiting for the word." If there was one thing that could elicit an emotion other than apathy, it was the beautiful sight of an entire building falling under his power.

"At this point, I could light a cigarette in there and it'd probably blow up because of some gas leak." Monsoon got his shots in too. Times like this made him grateful that his sense of smell had faded over the years. Not enough to block out the hideous smell of Japan, but enough to the point where he didn't have to carry a vomit bag with him. "There must be a reason you're not allowed to do it yet, though. Am I right?"

Flashfire clicked his tongue, turning his gaze back down to the floor as fingers thrummed over the top of his coat's fabric. "This is your old place, isn't it?" Instead of answering the other, though, the redhead decided he wanted to flip the script as he eyed Monsoon up and down with cold, sapphire eyes.

Whatever the arsonist had planned seemed to have struck something deep within the Wind of Destruction, eyes narrowing and whole body becoming a lot smaller, sharper, and more on edge in the process. "Oh, I wouldn't put it like that. Then again, you're not exactly wrong." Monsoon replied, bitter words dripping off his tongue like pure poison. Regret was an emotion he didn't often feel, the scenario this time around made it even worse than usual.

"Then you should know." Flashfire held onto the initiative with an iron grip. With both men of a similar height and build, enough in previous generations to be considered overwhelmingly intimidating, the only method of domination both possessed was their diction. The Inner Circle's Agitator may not speak much, but when he did, it was straight for the jugular.

Monsoon passed Flashfire a side-eyed glance, placing one hand in his own jacket. "Come on, I know Akia. You wanted a fox in the hen house, didn't you?" He pressed, knowing more than enough of Painmaker to understand the serial killer's wicked mindset. "My betting is that your "Exalted One" wanted you to make sure that you were 100% certain they were gone, whilst using the whole place as a practice ground. Right?"

"If I can burn heretics and do my job, I consider anything permissible." Just like that Flashfire internally growled, running a hand through his increasingly fiery hair. He could feel the control he had wrestled being dragged away from him, much more when he saw the sharp, razor teeth laden smirk pressed onto Monsoon's pallid face.

The man in question chuckled, placing his arms behind his head, almost like he was ready to kick his feet up on an armchair. "Oh, Yoshi, I hope Akira isn't that short-sighted as to believe they hold any actual weight. I've seen the crap they feed those guys. Trust me, they ain't thinking straight. It's honestly kinda impressive. Like Trigger on steroids. They've gone full monkey brained at this point, also quite funny now that I think about it."

Flashfire didn't refute what was being said, slowly starting to run his fingers more precisely through his hair. That would do a good job of explaining why the heretics he had sparred with had been so, so violent. To the degree where it felt like they were caged up in a room with no food or water and were fighting for the mere idea that they might have been carted out to some shitty fast food place. "What's your point, Monsoon?"

With how Monsoon grinned, Flashfire felt a cold shiver race down his spine. He had seen that face before… Only once, mind you that was enough for one lifetime. It spoke to the special kind of emptiness deep within the other's soul. "Knowing what you're looking for, I wonder if those two are weeping somewhere. Somewhere without the light shining over them, or the spectre of their shadow chasing them. Although, for the latter, I believe their time is slipping away. It's an interesting question, don't you think so, Yoshi?"

"So, you don't intend on being useful to the Inner Circle after all." Flashfire scoffed, refusing to be cowed by a simple expression. Remembering his mission, his purpose, and his crusade remained all more than enough to prompt his mind back into business mode. At the end of the day, Taka's research meant he knew full well what the Wind of Destruction was on about.

"Maybe return my calls every once in a while, then you'll see me be cooperative." Of course, it was laced with Monsoon's trademarked pettiness. Was he seriously going to harp on about one phone call going to voice mail? You bet your fucking ass he was! His time was precious, not something to be wasted by gutter trash that didn't know how to swipe right! "Nah, I've got a different song to sing this time. Once I'm done with it, I'll make sure you remember the lyrics to the day you die."

Instead of honouring Monsoon with a response, Flashfire turned on his heel. His collar popped upwards, the sight of the other man was now eradicated, letting a wave of relief wash like the elixir of life over his body. "Then don't get in our way. Otherwise, you're going to be another bump in the road to immortality."

In-kind, Monsoon remained stationary. He was perfectly relaxed where he was, the memories of the brief time he was rattled now fading into obscurity. Out of his jacket, he pulled another cigarette and placed it to his lips. "Heh, always did hate you the most." Lighting it, he pointed towards the Coliseum, fully aware that Flashfire wasn't looking. "When this is all said and done, make sure to tell your leader that I want to have a nice long conversation with him."

Flashfire, of course, paid no heed. His form vanished over the top of the horizon, the setting sun providing the appropriate backdrop for his departure. Not a single extra thought was placed on Monsoon, the redhead wanted to act as if it had never happened in the first place. Once the debriefing with the Exalted One was done, he was definitely going to need some extra time off with Akira.

"Typical… Just typical…" Monsoon muttered to himself, turning his attention back to the Crimson Coliseum. The smoke at the edge of his cigarette evaporated off the end as he reclined further back on the guardrail, to the point his whole 6'6 frame looked like hastily discarded clothes thrown over the top of a sofa.

True to form, the Inner Circle gave him no leeway. That was always the case, but it proved to be much more of a pain this time around. Once upon a time, being able to flub their lines and run circles around them was his favourite pastime. Ah, what a blissful handful of years those had been.

Of course, there were… Issues which needed to be worked through, even back then. The swinging brick for his heart had snapped one of those blissful days, making his chest feel so much emptier than it ever had before. Like someone had drawn a big, black circle over the top of his torso, ripping the vital organ out whole as if they were an Aztec Priest.

Right now, though? He'd have to play the long game. Biding his time until the possibility to strike came, whilst also making sure to fulfil his obligation to Kyte. Uncovering the motives behind their movements might have been like swimming through treacle, but he at least now knew for sure whose proxy their goal was under.

With only half focus paid to the scene around him, Monsoon pulled out his phone and quickly punched in Kyte's number. A cold smile graced his lips, the flickering embers of the cigarette framing the scene as he waited for the Vampire Lord to pick up.

Those two kids, poor little souls they were, better be ready for the fight of their life. Or else they might just find their wings clipped for the comfort of their barbaric cage once more.

The storm had only just started to crack the horizon.

A/N: Sooo, yeah, it's another monster of a chapter. It was going to be longer as well, but I cut out a scene because even I am not that cruel to force you to read it all fully. Either way, I hope you all enjoyed the chapter for those that have read it, and I hope you will enjoy the next one when it comes out too.

Till next time.