Clary: (sheepish laugh) ... This chapter... is kinda late... isn't it...?
Lia: She has no one to blame but herself.
Clary: IT'S NOT MY FAULT, OKAY! Damn it, Lia, whose side are you ON?
Lia: Yours.
Clary: SO IT'S NOT MY FAULT! It's Nate's fault for telling~~~~~
Lia: Nate was just being a good kid, unlike you.
Clary NO ONE told him to tell Mom I used the computer. Some brother he is... (grumble)
Lia: Issa got grounded (for swearing, wouldn't you know it) and while she was grounded, she sneaked and used the computer to post chapter three so she got more grounded.
Clary: BECAUSE NATE TOLD MOM! NOT MY FAULT~~~
Lia: If you just waited out your three days like a good little girl, you probably would have been able to do this sooner. You have no one to blame but yourself.
Clary: I thought you were on MY side! (Lia, just because Elle and Rien DOTE on you...)
Lia: No, I'm not on your side. LIA is on your side, but your EDITOR, who is trying to make you please your readers (who have, thus far, been kind and wonderful and all awesome) is none to happy with the situation. There is a difference. (And it's not my fault that I'm the youngest, so there)
Clary: (grumbles) WHATEVER, LIA. Fuck you.
Lia: Here's the fourth chapter, anyhow. Please enjoy. (Careful with your language or you might end up grounded again, Issa)
DEATH PLAY
Written by: Clary~
Acknowledgements to: Lia (Clary's not-editor), Alatarielf (Thank you so, so, so much~~~ You inspire us always~ We hope you like this chapter~~), neumegami (KYAAAAAAAA~~~~~~ Your drawing is too delicious, we're just like hyperventilating because of its delicious-ness~~~ We love you~), phoenixfirekitsune (is this update considered soon? –sheepish smile-), Shuzuka (thank you~ We're glad~~), BleuFleur (thanks so much~~ We were trying to make it so there's danger everywhere to Syusuke, actually, you know, both in and out the school.. (: And thanks for sympathizing with the scene cuts~~ It's nice to be sympathized with~)
IV. CIRCLES
He was five, Syusuke was four.
Their parents didn't believe in kindergarten, or rather, didn't believe very much in any other school apart from the Academy, and since they had yet to get a letter or be paid a visit, they didn't have school, not that they needed it, they learned so much more at home, reading books, tending the garden, practicing by themselves, and listening to their grandfather. It didn't matter that they didn't go to school, they probably even knew so much more than the kids who went to kindergarten who spent the better part of their classes "sleeping and having nap time" (their grandfather's words).
They were both precocious children, anyway.
It was one of those days, it was early spring and though no one would have minded that they took a break from studying, they were inside the house because Syusuke had begged not to go out.
Tezuka never did very well at refusing Syusuke when he begged, he never did very well at refusing Syusuke anything, even if he didn't beg, but he did and that was that.
The crisp white paper was spread out in the table in front of Tezuka. He was practicing calligraphy, and while he didn't like it very much, he didn't exactly dislike it, either, and he still had some strokes to improve, because he was good at it but altogether not good enough for him.
Syusuke sat at the other end of the room, a book spread out before him. For all his begging not to go out, he spent half the time looking out the window, barely paying attention to his reading, spending more time than was necessary in one page. If Tezuka had been reading with him, he would have made Syusuke focus, but he wasn't reading, he was doing calligraphy, and he spent a few moments comtemplating whether or not it had been a good decision to back off after Syusuke's first (prepared) teary speech about why he should not touch a calligraphy brush ever again. Syusuke hated calligraphy, he was too impatient for it, he hated all its rules and restrictions and he hated, absolutely hated, to sit with his legs under him and his spine stiff and back straight, the way their grandfather had demonstrated when he first started teaching them.
He turned back to his paper.
Five minutes later, Syusuke had, excitedly, come up beside him, shoving the book in his face, its glossy pages merely a few centimeters from coming in contact with his nose.
"Ne, ne, onii-sama," Syusuke said, giving him an eager grin. "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"
The chicken, of course, the eggs wouldn't be there if the chickens weren't there to lay them in the first place, and even though this sounded a little childish, Tezuka was five, there wasn't anything more anyone could expect from him, so he proceeded to give Syusuke his answer.
Syusuke's smile morphed into a thoughtful frown and Tezuka suddenly found himself inspecting his words, trying to find something wrong in there or at least, something that could've made Syusuke frown.
"But..." Syusuke trailed off, biting his lip and looking down at the book's glossy pages once more. It was one of those picture encyclopedias and Tezuka noticed it was opened to the page of (what did he expect, really?) developing chicks.
"But what?" Tezuka asked gently, poking Syusuke's arm so he looked up again. "Speak freely, Syusuke. And don't bite your lip."
"Well, see, it's.." Syusuke sighed, before his turned his head to look away. "It's just that, don't chickens hatch from eggs? So, if there weren't eggs, then there wouldn't be chickens. But there wouldn't be eggs if there weren't chickens... so... and..." He sighed again. "I'm confused."
He was right, of course, he was right most of the time, and he was hardly ever confused. Tezuka took time to think about it, trying to find a satisfying enough answer for his brother, and he had to, or else Syusuke would spend the next few days (or weeks or months) obsessing about it until he forgot (unlikely, but Tezuka can hope) or he found an answer to the question.
Tezuka dipped the brush to the ink and regarded his paper. "Look, Syusuke," he said, beginning to draw. First, an egg at the topmost part, then a chick to its lower left, then a chicken opposite the chick.
Syusuke giggled at his crude, childish drawing, but it'll have to do.
"There's the egg," Tezuka said, pointing. "Then, it'll hatch to a chick." He drew a curving arrow to the chick. "Then, the chick will grow up and become a chicken." He drew another curving arrow towards the chicken. "Then, the chicken will lay an egg." Another arrow. "It's a cycle, see? But what more does it look like to you?"
Syusuke looked at the drawing, gave another thoughtful little frown and said, "A circle."
"That's correct. Remember what grandfather said about circles? They have..." Tezuka trailed off, letting Syusuke fill in the sentence.
"... Neither a beginning nor an end," Syusuke finished, grinning. His face lit up happily at his new discovery.
"Onii-sama," he said, peering at Tezuka with his wide, guileless blue eyes. "Is very, very smart."
He giggled to himself before bouncing back to his previous position, flipping the page and reading again, with a rather contented smile on his face.
Tezuka watched him with a fond smile, just like an older brother would, though he didn't say anything and just turned back to his paper, with its childish drawings.
It was the first time his heart fluttered at a compliment from his younger brother.
And the first time he noticed just how beautiful those eyes were, so blue, like the sky, sparkling with joy, framed with long, lush lashes.
It was the first time Tezuka called his brother beautiful.
./.
Tezuka Kunimitsu, the perfect, stoic, emotionless Tezuka Kunimitsu lusted after his brother.
Tezuka cringed.
It sounded so, so wrong in his thoughts, he didn't even want to say it out loud, not that he wanted to in the first place. Vaguely, Tezuka wondered how that would sound like in the lips of shameless Chitose Senri or egotistic Atobe Keigo and wished that he never would have the privilege to know.
It hadn't begun that way, Tezuka knew it hadn't begun that way, because first, more than anything, more than this... this desire for Syusuke, Tezuka loved him. Tezuka, really and truly did love Syusuke, more than anything, he wanted for Syusuke to be happy, more than anything, he wanted to care for, protect and cherish his younger brother. He didn't know why, it went beyond the fact that they were siblings, it was... something, just something fluttering, something in his heart telling him that... to...
...
... Great. So now, Tezuka wasn't just lusting after Syusuke, apparently, he loved his brother, too. And that posed so, so much more problems than the latter.
But it was true.
It was true, and there was nothing Tezuka can do about it. It was true, and sometimes, Tezuka wished that this... this rational, analytical part of his mind would just shut up, he didn't want to think about it, he didn't, he wanted to at least have the illusion that maybe, maybe... maybe he was wrong.
He wasn't, of course.
Ho loved Syusuke, more than what was allowed, more than what was right, more than what society said was right for two siblings.
He loved Syusuke, and he had even before, when they were very young. Tezuka recalled the way his skin would tingle when they touched, the way his heart would flutter when he smiled, the way his entire world, his whole universe revolved around one, just one person. (And then, he recalled the dreams, the desire to do more than hold his hand, the want to press his lips against those smiling ones, the cold showers in the mornings.)
He'd loved Syusuke even before, and the lust, the lust was there, always there, Tezuka had just been too young and too innocent to give a name to those feelings. (Or perhaps, he already did know, and just didn't want to acknowledge it because, whichever way anyone looked at it, it was wrong.)
There was love, and there was the lust and more than anything (even more than not wanting to realize that his feelings towards his brother were all wrong and twisted), more than anything, Tezuka didn't want to know which came first.
"Ne, ne, onii-sama. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"
Tezuka wanted to say he loved Syusuke first, that the lust came much, much later, but... But he hadn't realized that he loved Syusuke, either. So, it was also highly probable that the... desire was there, even before, he just didn't know it, and he didn't want to know it, he didn't.
Because if lust came first, then...
Tezuka really, truly wanted to believe he was a proper, honorable person, in every way proper and honorable were, and that was already almost impossible, considering his feelings towards his own brother, but if he'd lusted after him first... If he'd lusted after Syusuke when he was five...
... Then there'd be no solution to this problem.
./.
Persona felt ecstatic.
Actually, he didn't quite know what to feel, staring down at Tezuka Kunimitsu's younger brother's file like this, trying to calculate in his head how many fucking problems he could have easily solved in the past god knows how many fucking years if he'd just fucking read the kid's fucking file instead of dumping it at the bottom of the Academy records room drawer because he was deceived by the kid's fucking appearance.
It took him an entire fucking night trying to find the damn file jammed at the back of the file drawers. It didn't make him happy, it did quite the opposite, actually, Persona was not a patient person and he certainly did not appreciate it that he had to stay up until early dawn before he could find a kid's file for just a single tidbit of information he could've known if he'd read the fucking file in the first place.
He'd been highly annoyed, if all the smashed furniture in his office had anything to say about it. So it was understandable that when he finally, finally found the kid's file, he'd torn the folder neatly in half before he'd fervently scanned the papers, trying to locate just what the hell the kid can do.
And when he found out, his irritation rose to an unbearable peak... and then, he felt ecstatic.
He mentally ran his head through his (very small) roster of memorable kids who'd been assigned to his jurisdiction in all the years he'd been 'teaching', and realized that none of them, absolutely none of them, not even Tezuka Kunimitsu himself could match the potential there was to Tezuka Syusuke's capabilities with his alice.
An alice that allowed him to walk in death. Not only that, an alice that lets him bring death and undo it.
In comparison, the alice of pain, the alice of fire, the alice of whatever else there was, were horribly outmatched.
Persona's mind was reeling with perverse glee. It was everything he could have wanted for a Dangerous Ability Type student. Not only that, all the brilliant potential was encased inside a very, very unassuming body that had even Persona himself fooled. If Persona couldn't even see it, no one else could see the kid coming. He could walk up to his target, with all his made-up innocence and girlishness and the target wouldn't even see death coming right up until the very, very , very last moment, when it was too late.
He could ditch his entire inner circle of favorites (even Tezuka Kunimitsu, who'd made himself quite invaluable) and still manage to accomplish all the duties of the Dangerous Ability Type with just one kid.
It would make things damn easier and he wouldn't have to do things like stalk Chitose Senri so he could find something to curb the brat's eccentricity because he only would have one kid to worry about.
It felt very, very liberating.
And very, very irritating, too, once he got to it, considering just how he could've saved himself all this grief if he'd just read the kid's damn file in the first place.
He spent the rest of the morning completely demolishing his office.
./.
Somewhere between then and now, Syusuke had managed to crawl into his bed. He didn't know how, and he was too sick to worry about something as trivial as how he managed the suddenly large distance between his bathroom and his bed, just that he was in his bed, so that's it.
He'd had the nightmares, it was wrong to expect anything else, and he'd woken up with a half-formed scream and a hoarse throat for his troubles. He spent the next few hours trying to keep himself awake, curled up underneath layers and layers of blankets and pillows that did nothing to keep him warm.
He wanted to skip school today, he didn't care about the long lectures and the worried glances he'd have to suffer from his brother as a result, frankly, he didn't care about anything right now, if it wasn't here in his little cocoon of pillows and blankets and darkness. He expected to be left alone the entire day before he'd have to face his brother tonight, when he (hopefully) felt a little better and had (hopefully) came up with some sort of decent explanation as to why he was so sick he had to miss an entire day's worth of classes (not to mention yesterday's afternoon classes).
He certainly didn't expect to have his covers thrown back, his heavy curtains parted so that he was blinking painfully against the harsh morning sunlight. Blindly, he groped for a pillow and stuffed his head against it and the mattress, trying to drown out the light.
"I guess I was right to worry about you."
It was Seiichi. For some reason, Seiichi was always there when he felt terrible, sometimes even before his nii-san himself, he was just always there, and while he had always liked it before, he didn't particularly like it now, not after his horrible night, and equally horrible morning.
Don't get him wrong, he liked Seiichi. Seiichi was probably the one person he liked the most out of their group of friends, and it had nothing to do with the fact that they were cousins... Well, okay, it could have a little to do with the fact that they were cousins, he supposed, but he liked Seiichi because he cut a very comforting figure in Syusuke's life, and while he wasn't as comforting as his nii-san, he was a (very, very) close second and that was a whole lot of comforting, once he thought about it. It wasn't very comforting, though, to know that Seiichi was aware of his condition and could, very easily go to his nii-san next door to tell while he'd be powerless to stop him.
So Syusuke said, "Why are you here?" that sounded more strained than harsh even to Syusuke's own ears.
He winced.
"Hmm?" the voice lazily drifted down to where he was desperately trying to pull the blankets up above his head again. "I had a feeling."
Seiichi never 'had a feeling' as far as Syusuke knew, Seiichi was where he was because he knew it was where he wanted to be, no matter what Seiichi said about it and Syusuke knew it and Seiichi knew that Syusuke knew it, but it didn't stop him from saying the contrary, if only by sheer force of habit.
"Shadows talk, Syusuke," he said this time, thankfully drawing back the curtains so the room was in darkness once again.
Of course, by that, he meant that shadows talk to him, not to Syusuke, not to anyone else, because Syusuke had spent the entire night with shadows and darkness and he hadn't heard anything aside from his own screams.
"I don't hear anything," Syusuke mumbled to the pillow, trying to find a way to get Seiichi to promise not to tell his nii-san anything before he had a ready excuse made.
Seiichi drew the blankets back a little so Syusuke's head poked out, before slowly stroking his hair. "Are you going to tell me how you ended up like this or should I guess?"
Syusuke thought about it. He wanted to tell Seiichi the truth, he supposed it would be easier to tell somebody instead of keeping it all to himself but then again, Seiichi was his cousin and he will (and Syusuke knew that he will) sometime during the day have to report Syusuke's condition (and its cause) to his brother like a good cousin should so... "I don't want to talk about it."
"That's okay, I could pretty much guess what happened, anyway." And Syusuke knew that the 'guess' would probably be spot on because 'shadows talk' and so far, they had never been wrong.
"... Are you going to tell nii-san?"
The stroking stopped, and a contemplative silence filled the room. But before Syusuke could say anything, the stroking started again. "He has his worries, it'd be best to leave him alone. I'll have to tell, of course, but for now..."
He bent down to kiss Syusuke's head. "I'll lie for you."
Before Syusuke could appreciate the comfort the kiss had given him, it was gone, and so was Seiichi's weight on his bed.
"Feel better, okay? And no more trips to Death just yet." And Seiichi left.
./.
Maihara Chizuru liked wearing elaborate kimonos and makeup that reminded Hinako of geishas in a time long past and best forgotten. Perhaps it was Chizuru's way of staying connected with her past or something, Hinako never understood it, why Chizuru felt the need to remain connected with her past, Hinako would have gladly forgotten hers, if it was only possible.
Today, she was wearing a kimono of summer weight in shades of brown and gold, with deer nuzzling one another below the waist amidst a background of browns and golds patterned to look like falling autumn leaves, and had a plum-colored obi that was interwoven with silver threads. She looked very pretty, despite the fact that she wasn't wearing make-up or she didn't style her hair up like she usually did, and beside her, Hinako, in her soft yellow strapless dress felt like a child.
"It's spring, Yurehime, not fall," Hinako said, with a grumble in her tone. "Why are you wearing a kimono that looks like fall?"
Chizuru eyed her out of indulgent eyes, the way she did whenever Hinako used her geisha name. "Fall kimonos in fall?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. "Groundbreaking."
Hinako suddenly got the feeling that Chizuru was having fun at her expense, though she didn't have the slightest idea why or how. "Are you... Are you being sarcastic?" she asked, starting to whine. "Mou, Yurehime, are you being sarcastic to me? You know I don't like it when you're sarcastic!"
"I'm not being sarcastic," Chizuru replied, though they both knew she wasn't telling the truth.
Hinako started to grumble, as she always did when Chizuru did things like that and Chizuru let her because it was too much of an effort to get her to stop and Chizuru understood that it was her way of venting out frustration. She never said it, and Ashikaga-san might be much happier if Hinako never did it, but she did, and Chizuru, who'd spent almost a century with her, knew her better than anybody.
"... the sense of having a summer weight kimono with an autumn design. Why she wears kimono in the first place, I'd never get. How could she even move to do her job properly..."
Chizuru smiled. "You know as well as I do that the restrictions of kimono never bother me."
Hinako stuck out her tongue. "Why do you insist on wearing things like this, Chizu-nee? You've spent your time playing geisha already –"
"So have you."
Yes, Hinako had, and she had nothing but bad memories of it. It was somewhere near the beginning of her (very long) life, when she had been stupid enough to think that the world of those pretty ladies with their pretty kimono and pretty make-up and pretty parties and pretty dances would be the happiest and the best world for her.
It was everything but.
The only good that came out of being a geisha was that she got to meet Chizuru (who had been a very, very popular geisha then) and Murakami-nii and Ashikaga-san. Ashikaga-san, who'd given her another chance to relive her life and undo the mistakes that came from her false preconceptions of the geisha world. For that, she'll always follow him.
"How was the Academy?" she asked, trying to change the subject.
Chizuru made a face. "Precious." And she said it with a very, very disgusted tone, as if it would explain everything to Hinako.
It didn't, of course, but she laughed anyway. They all hated the Academy, perhaps because Ashikaga-san hated it, and she didn't know why he hated it but he did and so did they.
Chizuru sniffed disdainfully before drawing her sleeves towards her and folding her arms against her chest. "It's not funny. You try going in there, simpering with those obnoxious special little brats."
"Really? Nobody caught your interest?" Hinako looked up and tried to consider this. "You do know that a few of those students went and slaughtered two of Ashikaga-san's trained battalions."
Chizuru sniffed again, she always liked sniffing and she did it (like she did everything else) very, very elegantly. Hinako never knew how she managed, she'd tried sniffing (elegantly) and it never came out quite right. "They'll all die, soon enough."
"Yes, well, that's true. I'd like to get my hands on some of them, though."
"We'll have our chance," Chizuru assured her. "I'll be sure to enjoy every second of it."
Hinako looked at Chizuru for a very long moment, watching her and the wicked edge to her smile. "You know, Murakami-nii is having trouble getting into death."
"I know, Ashikaga-san mentioned it." Chizuru didn't look particularly troubled by this, but then again, she was never particularly troubled about anything, having lived as long as she had.
"If Ashikaga-san doesn't get his army and that Greater Dead creature he wanted, do you suppose-"
"You know we'll get into death eventually, Hinako."
"I know, but just suppose he doesn't, do you think he'll let us do the job for him?"
Well, Chizuru's smile, if it was any indication, said that she wanted it to happen, but Chizuru was devoted to Ashikaga-san too much to want his plans to fail, even though she'd very much enjoy it. So, instead of answering, Chizuru glared at her the way she did when she had enough of Hinako's whining and wanted her to stop, otherwise, Hinako would find herself awakening in her room with blood soaking her new strapless dress of the day.
"Okay, okay, I could hope, you know," Hinako said instead of pressing the issue because she didn't particularly like dying, and she didn't want her new dress ruined with blood again.
"There was an article in the newspaper today," Chizuru started, eyeing her with sort of an amused glint in her eyes. "Something about killings in France?"
At that, Hinako laughed. "I read it. It was very funny. Apparently, I'm a serial killer now."
Chizuru laughed along with her, but for a completely different reason, and that reason was, "The media dubbed you, 'The Drunkard.'"
Hinako stopped laughing. "I did not read that. Where did you read that?"
"What did you expect, really? You killed half of France's wine growers, and all the workers in their vineyards."
Hinako pouted. "It's not like I didn't get permission. Ashikaga-san said I could kill them if they were a bother to me. Well, they were a bother, so I killed them." She nodded once, so convinced was she of the sense of her reasoning.
Chizuru laughed again. "How was it?"
Hinako's eyes twinkled merrily as she recalled those happy, happy times. "Fun."
Clary: I know this sucks. (cries) I'm so, so, so, sorry for disappointing you guys.
Lia: (sigh) Here we go again.
Clary: It's just that school opened last week. SCHOOL! And to top it off, I was grounded. (cries some more)
Lia: Yep, that's right... (waiting for more)
Clary: It's SCHOOL that everyone should be beware of! BEWARE! School drains all of the people's creative juices until there's NONE left~~~ BEWARE~~~
Lia: I've heard this exact same rant I don't know how many times already, by the way. This is Issa's main excuse every time she deletes a line now. (imitating Issa) Liaaaaaaaaaa~~~~~ School's drained me off of my creative-ness~~~~~ I suck now~~~~~ Noooooooo~~~~~~
Clary: I DID NOT SAY I SUCKED! I said MY WRITING sucked. There is a HUGE line between ME sucking and MY WRITING sucking. (I hate you, Lia)
Lia: It's close enough. (I hate you, too)
Clary: WHATEVER. Whatever, Lia. WHATEVER. (bitch)
(turns to readers) I love you guys and to make it up to you, here's a preview of chap 5~ Yey~
(Lia: I was against this, by the way. I told her she'd do more damage, but she didn't listen. Why am I not surprised?)
Chapter V: Persona's Puppets
"What's this, Tezuka? What does Persona mean? You can kill immortals?"
"No, he can't," Persona answered for him. "But he knows someone who can, and very capably."
Atobe turned to him. "Who?"
Persona raised an eyebrow, challenging Tezuka to speak. He didn't, just like Persona expected him to. His smile widened and he felt like laughing.
"Tezuka Syusuke."
Lia: I was also against putting THIS (there were a dozen other lines to choose from) scene, when she insisted on doing this, but what can I do? She's the author. (I still think this is a stupid mistake. Especially since she used THIS scene) But please do review~