Author's Note: Please, please, please, please, please review!

#14: If I can't be Good, then I'll be Bad

"You're… Kajiko…?" said Kanji incredulously. "What…?"

The chains fell off the girl's shoulders and slipped to her ankles, revealing her bare arms and midriff. She was clothed in rather skimpy black leather with spiked bracelets and a matching choker. Piercings poked out of every possible corner – her eyebrow, her lower lip, her navel – in addition to the familiar locations that she and Kanji shared.

Below her neck, her skin was almost solid black with the print of countless interlaced tattoos, which were wrinkled in many places by long, ropy scars. The places where her pale skin shone through were shaped like an overlay of bones, so when seen in the darkness out of the corner of the eye, she appeared to be a skeleton.

She was almost like a wicked caricature of what someone who only vaguely knew Kajiko might have envisioned. "You ain't her!" Kanji snarled. "What are you? Some Shadow playin' make-believe? I know what you freaks get up to!"

"Yeah, an' who do you think you are, punk?" the Shadow girl snarled, her mouth twisting with fury. She threw out her arms and shoved Kanji backwards.

Kanji tripped over and fell flat. "Ow! The hell was that for?"

Shadow Kajiko stood over him and planted her foot on his chest. "Aw, who cares?" she shrugged. "You were just pissin' me off. You come into my territory and talk shit to me, I teach you a lesson. Got that?" The toe of her boot dug into Kanji's windpipe. "I said, you got that?"

The boy turned crimson with anger and forced the girl's leg off his throat. "I don't gotta listen to anything you say," he said, jumping to his feet. "And there's no way in hell that you're Kajiko! She ain't like you!"

Shadow Kajiko's eye twitched, and she reached in her pocket. Kanji swung his fist before her hand could come out with what it was rooting around for – he'd seen that move plenty of times and he didn't want to be on the bad end of a set of those. But the Shadow was faster than he was. She caught his punch with her free hand and twisted his arm around, then let loose with the other fist.

Kanji felt a ghost of pain from the brass knuckles before they even hit, but it was nothing compared to when they smashed against the side of his face. The Shadow had inhuman strength as well, which only made it worse, and she managed to get in a kick to his shins before he wrenched his arm from her grip.

"Shit…" grunted Kanji, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth. "You're going to friggin' pay for that!"

The Shadow girl's hands flew behind her back and emerged whirling a blackjack. "Ya think?" she sniggered. "Let's see you try! C'mon, man, I've been waitin' for a good fight for sooo long!"

How many weapons was she carrying around? "Oh yeah? Well, then bring it—argh!" Something hit Kanji's back and swung onto his shoulder. "Huh? T-Table-chan?"

Cloth brushed by his ear as the Laughing Table flung its knife at the Shadow girl, aiming straight for her throat.

The Shadow's yellow eyes glinted and her hand flashed forward. In the next second, the knife had halted in midair, and the Shadow girl's fist had closed around the blade. Dark blood dripped from her palm and sizzled on the floor.

Kanji gulped. "Shit… Wait, Table-chan, don't—!" The Laughing Table, seeing that its first assault had failed, leaped off the boy's shoulder and galloped to attack. "Stop!" shouted Kanji. "Look out!"

It was too late to warn it, though. The Table had already leaped, and Shadow Kajiko had her bleeding hand around the handle of the knife. She sliced it in front of her and something thin and black parted from the Table and flew away. The Table hit the floor, wobbled, and then collapsed forward, unable to stand.

It had been the second of the Table's front legs.

Kanji was choking on fury at this point, and he didn't know why he couldn't get his feet to move. "You… you… you little…"

Shadow Kajiko next swung the blackjack at her side, and then smashed it down, pinning the now two-legged Table to the floor. Its inventory fell out of the air. Blue sparks spat out of the sphere that it had been carrying when it struck the Table's surface, and Shadow Kajiko's eyes zeroed in on it.

"You carried that around with you?" she said, gloating. "When you're weak to lightning? You really are one crazy-ass Table!" And she raised a foot and stamped hard on the Table's surface, grinding her heel into the ball of electricity and smashing it into splinters.

The electricity trapped in the sphere burst out like sparks from a forge. It wreathed the Laughing Table, who writhed under Shadow Kajiko's heel, its two remaining legs jerking and flopping helplessly. Curls of smoke began to spiral up from its smoldering cloth.

"You bitch!" Kanji roared, finally coming unglued from his frozen state of horror. He charged forward and threw the Shadow girl back against the wall. "I'll kill you for that!"

Shadow Kajiko spat in his face and then jerked her knee up.

Kanji folded over, grunting in agony. His eyes watered. "Ngh… Motherf—"

"Yeah… how d'you like that?" said Shadow Kajiko, popping the air in her knuckles and smirking. "It always cracks me up how you big tough men cry like babies after one good hit between the legs. Pathetic!"

Kanji levered himself upright. "You're… you're crazy," he mumbled, gathering up the limp Laughing Table and sadly running a finger over the frayed hem of the cloth. "Yo, Table-chan… you okay…?" The Table's remaining attached arms clung to Kanji's neck. Its frame was shivering.

The Shadow girl dropped the knife to the floor. "I just hate that thing," she said, glaring at the Laughing Table. "I'm glad it attacked me."

Kanji clutched the crippled Table tighter to his chest. "You… Table-chan… why?"

"That Table shouldn't even exist, man," the Shadow girl said harshly. "Some idiot put a piece of human longing in it, and that idiot was me. Kajiko did it. She made it into a part of herself."

"So why d'you hate it… her so much?" demanded Kanji. "What'd she ever do to you?"

"It thinks it's better'n me," whispered Shadow Kajiko. "It thinks it knows what it's like to be Kajiko Tatsumi better'n I do, but it's wrong! I ain't some pathetic loser who'll follow around the first person to treat me nice! I live on my own damn terms!"

"I still don't get it. You Shadows don't make no frikkin' sense sometimes." Kanji turned his body away, protectively hiding the Table from the other Kajiko's yellow stare.

Shadow Kajiko tapped the blackjack against her thigh impatiently. "What the hell are you waiting for?" she demanded. "Don't you wanna get revenge on me? Don't you wanna make me pay? Come and fight me already! Do it!"

Kanji weighed his options and then held out his hands. "Okay," he said, breathing hard as he attempted to contain his anger. "You know what? I don't really wanna fight you anymore. Ya look too much like her, anyway. It wouldn't feel right."

"You'd hit somethin' that looked like you, though, wouldn't you?" snarled Shadow Kajiko. "So just 'cause I'm a girl, you won't—"

"That ain't it!" Kanji snapped. "I just don't feel like fightin' any more of you things!" He clenched his fists in frustration. "I'm sick of this whole Shadow-self shit! The Kajiko I know doesn't beat people up without a damn good reason, and… and neither do I! So where's the Kajiko I know?"

The Shadow raised a pierced eyebrow. "Hell if I know," she grumbled, sounding irritated. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a cigarette, which she lit with a snap of her fingers. "She's been runnin' from me for a week, and I ain't found shit." The girl heaved hard on the cigarette and then clamped it between her back teeth.

Kanji sucked in a shocked breath, and then regretted it, gagging. The smoke had already wafted over to where he was standing. "A week!?" he repeated, aghast. "You mean we've been in here a week?" He shook his head slowly. "So I guess she had a right to be so mad that no one's found us yet… A whole week…"

"Why would anyone come try and find me?" Shadow Kajiko demanded. She smacked the weight on the end of the blackjack against her palm and fiercely wrapped the sock around her bleeding hand, then took the cigarette out of her mouth and gestured with it. "Ha! D-don't be stupid! No one gives a rat's ass about Kajiko Tatsumi!"

Kanji blinked and rubbed his mouth. "So… that's how you really figure it is?"

"Don't try to get all sympathetic!" the girl snapped, coughing. "There ain't nothin' to be done about it! Like I care what the crowd thinks? Most humans are all boring, mindless sheep!" She swung the blackjack at the wall and knocked off a spray of plaster and stone. "So who gives a shit what they say? If I can't be good, then I'll be bad! I like bein' bad!"

"Kajiko… isn't bad," said Kanji slowly. "Sure, she's a hothead… well, so'm I… but she's a good kid—"

"Shut the fuck up," said Shadow Kajiko flatly. "You don't know me."

Kanji said nothing.

"Who even cares what people really think of me!" the girl went on angrily. "Isn't it so pathetic how I pretend to be bothered, when all I really want to do is show 'em the end of my fist? Old housewives who think I'm no good? I'll prove to 'em they're right! Let's go break their windows! Piss on their lawn, toilet paper all over their hedgerows, trip'em up on the street instead of helpin' em across! Why should I let 'em be wrong about me, huh?"

"I do know Kajiko," said Kanji stubbornly. "She ain't a dumb thug like you."

Shadow Kajiko began to laugh hoarsely. "Like you know a thing about your own true self! You don't even wanna admit that you feel just the same way!"

"What?" Kanji scratched his head. "Like I wanna just beat the shit out of everyone who ever looked at me funny? 'Course I feel like that sometimes. Everyone does, I bet. That don't make you so bad."

It was the Shadow's turn to fall silent. She stubbed her cigarette out on the nearest window sill and scraped her brass knuckles along the pane, etching an indecipherable word on the glass.

A notion of idea crawled into Kanji's brain. "So… it was you who drew all this crap on the walls, huh?"

"Yeah, I…" She leaned her forehead against the wall. "I got time to kill, y'know? Time to kill and a can of spray paint."

Kanji gave her a friendly thump on the arm. "Well, I think it's pretty cool," he said reluctantly. "It's some neat shit. Weird to say this, but… you got real talent."

Shadow Kajiko tensed, and then slumped down. "I'm not tryin' to make art here," she grumbled. "It's just graffiti. We're trashin' this place."

Kanji knelt by her side. "'We', huh? Who's 'we'?"

"Me 'n' my gang," muttered the girl. "We gonna tear this joint apart once we get together. I'm just softenin' it up for 'em."

"Kajiko…" Kanji said softly. "You got a gang?"

The girl buried her face in her knees. "No… I wish," she finally said, wiping her eyes. "But it's just me here… 's always just me, huh?"

"You got me," said Kanji hopefully. "Look, I ain't so nice that I won't wreck a place myself when I get in the mood. I could help out."

"You… you don't count," said Shadow Kajiko, sniffling. "You're not…"

"Yeah, I know I'm not, but still…" Kanji grabbed her by her elbow and pulled her to her feet. "Damn… don't get all weepy, okay? Here, I got somethin' for you…" He rummaged around in his pocket and pulled out an embroidered handkerchief.

The girl snatched up the cloth and pushed Kanji away. "I ain't cryin'," she said. "I don't need this." But she spread it out over her knee and devoured the pattern with her eyes. "Ha. It's kinda cute. You made this yourself?"

Kanji blew air out of the side of his mouth and looked away. "Yeah, I made that thing. What of it, huh? You got a problem with that?"

"You're messed up, dude," said Shadow Kajiko. "You're trippin' balls. The only one who's got a problem with this is you. You know that, right?"

"Yeah, if only," muttered Kanji. "How come they gotta say all those things, then?" He ran his fingers through his hair. "Oh, forget it. What am I sayin'? This is just plain stupid. Like any of this is important anymore."

"Of course it's important," said the girl, standing up and idly kicking the wall. "That's how all this stuff works in the Shadow World. Of course I was always too stupid to figure things like that until it was too late, huh? I'm always too stupid."

"Naw, that ain't true," said Kanji, settling back with his hands in his pockets. "That's bullshit, man. We ain't stupid, neither of us."

The girl kicked the wall again, harder. "Oh, but Kajiko Tatsumi can't ever do shit," she said vindictively. "Not math, not spellin', not readin', not even talkin' to people. She ain't a proper lady, and she ain't never gonna be." She drew back her brass-knuckled fist and punched the stone. "The only thing she can do… the only thing I can do… is be a real pain in people's ass. So I figure I'd better make a livin' offa that, since I can't do anything else!"

"So you can't, uh… you can't do sewin' and all that?" Kanji's forehead wrinkled. "You can do that stuff, can't you? If you're, you know, really me?"

"Sewing!?" shrieked Shadow Kajiko."Knitting!? Who's gonna take me seriously if that's all I do? Nobody, that's who! And… and I can't do any of that with my life! If I did, people'd think I was a good girl… and when they see I'm not, they'll all leave me!" She ran to the center of the room and scooped up the piles of chains. "This is where I belong! Locked away, in a place where everyone's bad! And that way, no one can act like I'm the weird one!" She sank to her knees, giggling uncontrollably. "They'd have to accept me for who I am! They'd have to!"

Kanji flinched. Were all the Shadows like this? Teetering on the precipice of madness, with exaggerated personalities and ludicrous fixations with the darker parts of the human soul? Well it made sense, perhaps, since that was what they claimed to be. How was it, anyway, that some Shadows acted like people and others like mindless beasts?

"Where do they find you people?" Kanji muttered to himself. "You sound just like that freak copy of me, too."

"What!? I'm nothin' like that… that hypocritical man-whore," the Shadow snapped. "We ain't alike at all!"

"Sure you are," said Kanji. "You're both frikkin' lunatics!"

When the girl turned around, the skeleton-shaped negative space on her tattooed skin seemed to glow in the light, like a cartoon X-ray effect that appeared when characters got electrocuted. It was certainly far more dramatic than a simple skull and crossbones on one arm, like what Kanji had.

Kanji felt a bead of sweat trickle down his neck. Unconsciously, he clung more tightly to the Laughing Table. "So j-just chill the hell out, okay?" he added lamely.

Shadow Kajiko pulled the long knife out of the floor and began to clean under her fingernails with it. "Oh, I'm chill. You're right, I am a lunatic. Ain't it cool?"

Kanji squinted at her. "I guess you could see it that way…"

"Y'know, I kinda like you," the girl said. "You're decent. Shame you're gonna die in like a minute."

Kanji swallowed. "Why's that, huh? You gonna kill me?"

"That ain't in my job description," shrugged the Shadow girl. "And I just said I kinda liked you,right? But you know that whiny creep? Your own Shadow? Yeah, he's in here. And he's gonna find you, one way or another."

"S-so… you Shadow people are, what?" Kanji worked it out in his head. "You guys are made to kill whoever you look like?"

"Well, you could put it like that," shrugged the girl. "You're the ones who do it to yourselves. We just help it along, y'know?"

"That's what my Shadow said, too!" said Kanji, as a burst of memory hit him. "We do it to ourselves? The hell does that even mean? You think I wanna die?"

"There's a part of you that you don't like," said the Shadow matter-of-factly. "And guess what? In here, that part of you doesn't really like you back. So as long as you refuse to admit that it's a part of you, it'll be out there, tryin'a kill ya." She snorted. "If the other Shadows don't get you first, that is."

"The other Shadows…" said Kanji, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. "You mean, the ones we've been seein' all over the damn place?"

"That's right," said Shadow Kajiko. She stretched herself out, flexed her muscles, and the luminescence in her eyes seemed to increase in strength. "You're one lucky punk, you know that? Survivin' this long after the fog cleared up… that was plain, dumb luck."

Kanji shook his head. "No way. It ain't just luck that I got away from my Shadow in the first place. It wasn't luck that got me past all those Shadows, and it wasn't luck that I ain't back in the bathhouse bein' stepped on by a hunk in a codpiece. I owe all that to Girl-Kanji bein' here."

Shadow Kajiko laughed. "Okay, so maybe it wasn't luck. But it wasn't all me, either. Why d'you think she even showed up in the first place?"

"Hell, I don't know," said Kanji. "I thought it was two universes goin' all…" He laced his fingers together. "Y'know, weavy. Ain't that it?"

"Oh, sure," said Shadow Kajiko. "Goin' all weavy… that's probably it. Makes total sense to me."

Kanji had the feeling that anyone else would have thought she was being sarcastic. But he knew himself, and so he knew that she was being entirely sincere. "Right… so… So what does that actually mean?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out," the Shadow said amiably. "But you'd better find it out quick, 'cause you don't got much time left." She shrank back into the darkness in the corner of the room. "I'm real sorry I can't chat longer. But there's a thing I gotta do. I need to know… what kinda person I really am."

"What... kind of person you really are...?" murmured Kanji, feeling the blood drain from his face.

He thought he was beginning to understand Shadow Kajiko now. The girl was full of affect and posture, but she had a genuine streak that he couldn't help but respect. She was, though she denied it, very much like Table-chan; she craved recognition, eagerly devoured any human contact she could find. And she was very much like Kanji's Shadow. Though she was wrapped up in bitterness and rejection, she bared her soul to anyone, open to the air like a torn callous, unable to contain herself. In fact, he could see the resemblance between them, as plain as day. It was pretty silly, really, that you could even think of them all as different people.

There was still the problem that he couldn't work around, the part of all this that he refused to let fall into place. Nothing he'd done here had seemed to indicate that he was what his Shadow said he was. He certainly saw how Kajiko could have had this… this sad, desperate being that was Shadow Kajiko trapped inside her. He thought he could understand where she was coming from, although there were still some pieces of the picture missing. But Kanji didn't know what to make of all the things that Shadow Kanji had been saying.

Something had stuck in his mind, though, something that Kajiko's Shadow had echoed and brought back up in Kanji's memory.

"Dammit, of course it's empty! You think ANYONE really wants to be around me?" The Shadow boy had pointed at Kanji. "And it's all YOUR fault! If you just made up your damn mind about who you were, you wouldn't have to push everyone away because you're too scared they'll decide all that for you!"

"Argh! It doesn't make any sense!" Kanji groaned. "If I push everyone away, then why do I want to be accepted? And if I want to be accepted, then why would I want to let the things that other people say about me be true? And if that's how it is, then why don't I want to care what people think about me?" He held the Laughing Table out in front of him and glared at its hollow eyes. "Where the hell do you come into all this? What part of me are you? And what… what in the hell does all this have to do with girls and boys and all those things my Shadow can't stop yammerin' about?"

Kanji stamped his foot on the floor. "Screw this!" he shouted. "I've had enough of bein' in the dark about everything! Dammit, why can't someone just explain it all to me! Someone! Anyone! Even that damn sissy Shadow's got to have some answers for me, but where is he?"

The boy sank to his knees. "I've been stuck in a freaky spirit world for a week and the only people I've met are pieces of myself! Am I goin' crazy?" He shut his eyes and clutched his head. "Who the hell am I?"

As if on cue, the door behind him burst open.

End note: Please, please, please, please, please review! (as you can see, I've dropped all subtleties about it).