The Mortal City

by MidnightRun42

(Post-SD2) Waking up is never the hardest part.

23. All the Little Oysters

DAY THREE
03:50:45 UTC
-continued-
-ooo-

"The phrase "Rest in peace" seems incredibly self-serving. It basically means, "Stay in your grave. Don't haunt me.""
- Jenny Lawson, Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things

-ooo-

"Geez, it's really coming down, huh?"

Dark water sloshed around his legs, a weak protest that slowed his movements infinitesimally, a silent testament to the truth the fiend's words.

Still, he ignored the comment and thrust the shovel into the soggy earth once more, tapping it down with one booted foot.

His socks and pants had soaked through long ago and the weight only grew more uncomfortable with each passing moment, the seams chafing unevenly against the inside of his thighs with every move he made. Painful though it might be, he still found himself grateful for the minor irritation - a far cry from the constant, too familiar throb of discomfort in his chest and arms - in that it gave him something new to focus on beyond the typical aches that plagued him. A distraction to pull his attention from the tenacious shade currently banging its cursed heels against the wall of the pit above him and chattering on about the weather as if it had nothing better to do with its precious time.

To ease the constant growling irritant of all those little flecks of mud and rock falling upon him as they were sheered off with the motion of those feet and cast down to land against his head and bared shoulders and neck, to ooze pitifully down his back and neck before the rain had a chance to wash them away.

"I mean… I kind of figured that… I don't know. Shouldn't the weather be nicer here? Or maybe rain just suits my mood? I mean it was always so hot here, wasn't it?"

That high tittering laugh had a strange nervous pitch to it.

It made it sound far too much like the real thing.

Foolish.

It was dangerous to let such ideas traipse pass the frail boundaries of his mental shields.

To surrender even a moment's consideration to such false comforts.

He was the reigning lord of this dismal hellscape and he could not allow what peace he managed to summon to be shattered once more by the persistent urgings of that foul shadow. That foolish creature that refused to recognize its place in the ancient hierarchy of the arcane, choosing instead to make a mockery of him by circumventing past the wards he'd painstakingly erected at the four corners of that scared space. All those symbols etched in blood and soil, carved deep and weighted by the elements, by the small sacrifices he'd made to assure himself of their validity.

It was his own misfortune that his strongest affinity with the elements had always been with the magnificent cold of ice. In retrospect, it was no surprise that the relentless heat had had an adverse impact upon his power, his ability to call upon the dark forces to aid him. The rain that had followed the fiend's arrival likely only served to further ruin what paltry protections he had been able to muster in his weakened state.

Truly the fiend was fortunate the weather had conspired against him or there was little doubt it would have been destroyed the moment it dared to step foot within his circle.

Cursed weather.

"I mean, I know they said there was gonna be a storm and everything, but I mean, c'mon, does it really have to rain everywhere? Seems like I should at least be able to escape it inside my own head, don't you think? It's just... it's a bit much, isn't it?"

It might have been a horse of a different color had that cursed visage from his past at least come bearing a sacrifice worthy of his attention, but all it offered was a seemingly endless series of complaints to feed that bloated sense of anxiety and confusion in his gut.

Nothing it said made sense.

Nothing it had ever said made sense.

Not even from those first moments in the darkness.

Foul, useless shade.

Still- if nothing else- he could at least agree that the sudden and unrelenting onslaught of rain was inconvenient or, at the very least, ill-timed.

It had been far easier to navigate the depths of his creations without the addition of such vast quantities of water. He couldn't help but wonder whether it was merely an unfortunate and inevitable inconvenience or some greater sign that he was on the right track, that his efforts would eventually bear fruit.

Either way, the pit continued to fill up around him, water sloshing cold and unpleasant around his calves as he hefted another shovel full of mud and filthy rainwater up and out of the hole.

His aim proved true and he couldn't hold back a savage grin as the shade perched at the edge of the pit yelped and spluttered above him even as a goodly amount of the mud and water was flung back down upon him.

"Ah, c'mon! Gross! That's just freaking rude!" It squealed, a flurry of movement in the very corner of his eye line. "You're an asshole, you know that? Either stop pretending you can't hear me or stop throwing stuff at me. You can't ignore me and be pissed at me at the same time it's stupid. So, stop being a jerk and just talk to me already!"

He would not offer it the satisfaction of a reply.

Still the temptation to look upon it, to speak with it, to glean what little information he might lingered.

Or perhaps it was simply a foolish longing, not for information as would be wisest path, but instead for simply the shallow satisfaction of speaking with another being even if it were a conversation that would leave him worse off for having chosen to partake.

He had fallen into that trap too many times before to do so again.

It was too easy to forget himself, to drop his hard-won defenses, to treat it as if it were the genuine article rather than a cruel shadow that would leave him the moment he grew too accustomed to its company.

If he were destined to spend eternity alone in such a prison, better to bear that sentence in silence than to give in to the allure of such brief respite only to find himself left wanting and confused in the end.

The first time had been a mistake made in ignorance of his situation; the second had been merely a momentary lapse in good judgement, a base and undesirable weakness.

He could not allow a third such misstep.

He had had weeks alone to build his resolve brick by brick. His mind was clear, safeguarded by a hundred well-crafted sigils that would protect his mind and body from that hardy shade's clearly formidable powers of persuasion.

Even now the momentary urge to surrender had dulled, fading beneath the beat of rain against his bent head until it was easy to ignore.

He would persevere in his chosen tactic.

It would give up and leave eventually.

It's eventual absence was, after all, the one thing about it on which he could truly depend.

DAY ONE
-ooo-

There was a moment in the darkness.

A moment when everything made sense.

When the entirety of his life was laid open before him like a stain spreading across the floor.

A moment when all was clear.

He was what he had always been.

Darkness.

Despair.

Nothing had changed.

There was no ending nor was there a new beginning.

Nothing had been made clean.

There was only the darkness.

She was not there.

He remained alone.

Shrouded in the suffocating warmth of that darkened womb.

Perhaps he slept for a time.

Or perhaps not.

Time had no meaning in a darkness so complete.

His head was stuffed with wood shavings and everything felt very distant and unimportant.

And then….

"Hey," a sleepy voice sighed into the darkness as a hand groped aimlessly across his chest.

It was a familiar voice, to be sure, but one he could not tie to a name or a face.

Strange.

Stranger still that the casual contact did not rouse the beginnings of panic or revulsion in his chest.

He was still water and that touch a leaf floating upon the surface of his world.

Trespassing fingers sauntered across his chest and there was a tension building within him with each touch.

His life had not been one filled with the casual touch of others. He was a cursed being, after all, destined to be lord of all he surveyed, a solitary figure standing atop the mountain. It was no surprise humans avoided him, it was only to be expected, after all his touch was… toxic. His continued survival a blight upon the very fabric of existence.

The fingers traipsing across his chest collapsed into the broad expanse of a hand, pressing firm and brief against the center of his body before sweeping low, seeking and finding the hem of his shirt and slipping beneath to smooth across his vulnerable underbelly.

He could not silence the groan that invasive touch forced from his lips, could not still the arch of his traitorous body as it leapt to meet the unfamiliar warm of calloused fingertips as they smoothed across his flesh; as they chased the breath from his lungs and lit a smoldering fire in the icy depths of his being.

The hand went flat against his stomach with the force of a gentle slap before withdrawing quickly, tugging his shirt back down with one quick, jerky motion and smoothing across it as if doing so might erase the evidence of its passage. "Holy crap, you're a dude."

The fire in his belly died a sudden private death, extinguished by the rush of ice in his veins, the familiar sting of such human rejection.

"Oh, damn, whew, sorry about that, I thought this was like a sexy dream and you were just a really flat-chested girl. Or maybe I didn't. Maybe I was just totally into it anyway. Oh man, was I?"

"Foolish mortal," he scoffed, sickened by the quaver in his voice and thankful that the darkness concealed the heat of mortification that flooded his his face. "You should thank the grace of whatever God has granted you his favor that my Devas were not here to tear the flesh from your offending hand."

"Hey, wh- oh, holy crap, wait... no way. You're… oh no, nope, no way. I'm not… oh, man… this is too messed up. You're dead."

He...

He was on a beach, the heat of the sun bearing down against his back, sweat thick and slick beneath his clothes, as he sketched sigils in the sand.

He could hear them coming, feel death riding him down, but still he would fight. He would fight till his last breath and he faced down that heard of charging beasts and that fiendish bear who rode upon them.

An exquisite agony burst forth from the center of his being as he was lifted, thrown into the air, as the world spun around him.

He was lying on the beach, the grit of damp sand rough beneath his cheek.

They were there, beautiful and untouched.

Safe.

Their fur bright and their eyes glistening in the light of the setting sun.

The thunder of hooves fading all around them.

It was... a good death.

And then he was in the darkness again.

"Man, I didn't even like you. How can I be having sexy dreams about… oh man, what… what the hell, dude."

Hands shoved at his chest carelessly and pain erupted through his body. It seemed impossible that such a paltry blow should be capable of rending him asunder, of splitting him open and battering the inside of his chest and yet it still sent a crashing wave of searing torment racing through his battle-damaged body like a fox speeding across an open field. The beginnings of a scream hissed through his teeth, high and unrestrained like the whistle of steam rising from a kettle. His body quaked uncontrollably as he forced his disobedient limbs to curl in around the pain as if such efforts could seal that misery within himself, lock it away deep inside where it could not escape, could not be seen or heard.

He might have laughed.

He might have screamed.

He was not sure.

Perhaps his conscious mind simply fled to graze in safer pastures.

Eventually he came back to himself to find the agony of those moments had faded to a dull ache, a pain that throbbed an unsteady rhythm within his chest, a slow, persistent beat in his head.

The fiend continued to speak- unmoved by his torment- his voice rattling like bones shaken in a can, even though his exhaustion he could hear the fear in his voice, in the frantic rasp of words spewing from his mouth, of breath blowing fast and warm between them, the fevered slap of a hand meeting skin again and again, as if the fiend were raining down blows upon his own flesh, as if he were trying to jar himself from some terrible dream. He could smell that fear rising from his skin to fill the air between them with a stench like cat piss marking dangerous ground, "-gonna turn all gross and soggy and grab me and I can't do this. I can't... this is too much, just… no. Heck no. I wasn't... I was supposed to wake up. So why don't you just wake up already, huh? What the crap is wrong with me? I am not into this horror movie bullshit. This is why I never watched them, not even when Dad used to turn them on when I was a kid, I'd always just go hide out in my room, because I didn't want a bunch of half-repressed traumatized horror crap hanging around in my stupid head. Come on, just wake up. Wake up."

"Foolish mortal, one can not simply opt out of the dark abyss," he chuckled, his voice felt rough and probably sounded twice as bad, as if he'd swallowed a half a bag of gravel and then gargled with the rest. The worst of the pain was gone though he was uncertain whether it had truly faded or if he'd simply become used to it. Gingerly, he uncurled his body from into protective huddle, wincing into the darkness as each movement caused fresh anguish to spawn within his chest, as if the claws of unseen creatures were scrapping within, battering his organs, demanding freedom from the fleshy prison that was his chest cavity.

The presence beside him scrambled back and away, a flurry of baggy clothes and ruffled feathers, "You! You shut up! This nightmare sucks and you suck and your freaking hamsters suck too! They kept sneaking into my room and nibbling on my hair!"

"You are fortunate to have won their favor," he replied choosing his words carefully as he continued to force his body to move through the heavy darkness. "If you had earned their ire you would have met a far more gruesome fate."

He pressed a hand against the ground to leverage his weight and his fingers sunk into wet sand as a wave rolled up and crashed against him, spilling salt water against his lips, soaking through his clothing where he lay against the ground.

He opened stinging eyes to find himself staring at the horizon, at the orange splendor of the sun vanishing from the sky, swallowed by the vast, endless blue of ocean waves.

Another wave rolls up to meet him, water soaking his clothes, chilling his body as he pushes himself slowly, painstakingly to his hands and knees.

Had he been dreaming?

Was he dead or dying?

Did it matter?

His chest still ached fiercely.

When he was young, his mother had taken him to a house of worship. He was uncertain now what faith it had been devoted to, but he remembered the towering ceilings and the high windows fitted with colored glass that was layers so thick with dust and grime that what light filtered through seemed dim and dull compared to the blinding sunlit day outside.

She'd been a small woman, his mother, or perhaps the priest had been particularly tall and had simply made her seem so.

His other memories of her, few as they were to begin with, had been worn thin by time and he was uncertain how much of what he thought he knew was truth and how much the product of a mind grasping for a connection that had been lost long ago.

He remembered her shoes though.

Neat and black and with just enough heel to clack against the title as they'd strode across the church floor.

Her fingers had been tight around his wrist.

Tight enough to bruise.

Sometimes- during those infrequent moments when his mind lingered on thoughts of that day- he could still feel her thin fingers pressed into his wrist like a brand, making all he was obvious for all the world to see.

Cursed child.

Abandoned child.

Abomination.

His mother had spoken with the priest in hushed tones, casting furtive looks in his direction without ever quite looking at him.

It had made him feel small and lost, a paper boat set adrift in a vast ocean he could not hope to understand.

He'd picked at a scab on his knee until it bled all over his fingertips.

He'd wiped the blood away against his skirt.

Her heels had seemed to clack twice as loud as she left him behind.

He hadn't watched her go.

DAY TWO
-ooo-

The chill water had felt sinfully good against his peeling, overheated flesh.

It was the only reason he could think of for why he had not heard the shower door open for there was no doubt that whatever manner of fiend it was that had crept up behind him, it was not one that had the power to pass through solid matter.

He'd scrubbed bandaged hands across his face, grimacing at the feel of the soggy gauze rough against his tender, sunburned face, before turning about and startling back against the shower wall when he found that foul creature standing in his path wearing that familiar visage. He remembered all too well the feel of hands in the darkness, the relentless pain that had followed him into the waking world alongside the memory of that voice.

"What manner of fiend are you?" He snarled, raising his fists between them, it was poor protection to be sure, but better than any other his scattered consciousness might have summoned. "How dare you show yourself before me once again? I will cast you down into the bowels of hell for daring to make a mockery of me in this way."

"Whoa, look, what's your problem? I just... I heard the shower and I saw you were here so I thought I just... wanted to... needed to... see you."

It seemed as if his entire body had been set aflame by those words, by the fragile promise of them.

The earnest expression on its face.

As if he were truly... no.

He would not fall for such a petty trick.

He turned away slowly to retrieve the towel folded neatly in the corner.

It was always there, folded neatly in the corner, clean and pressed and simply waiting to be used regardless of where he'd last left it.

Always.

And yet when he reached for it, his hand groped through empty space.

No shelf.

No towel.

Nothing.

He was left naked, defenseless before the beast at his door.

Curses.

He heard the squeak of rubber against wet tile and whirled about, dropping into a crouch, his hands already flickering through the first signs of a barrier spell as the fiend wheeled away, stumbling backwards until his back hit the wall as if he'd been startled by his movements.

"Whoa, whoa! I'm not gonna hurt you!" It squealed, hands raised in the universal sign of surrender.

It was right to be wary.

The very thought that he could be felled by such a frail and cowardly fiend was preposterous.

In the many years he had lived, he had defeated far more sinister shades than the foul imitation that haunted his shower room.

What an utterly ridiculous notion.

As if one such as it could ever bring harm to Tanaka the Forbidden. He who had stood against the great beast Cerberus, he who had braved the treacherous waters of Ceto to rescue the terrible Leviathan from her monstrous grasp, he who had drawn first blood on Catoblepas. As if such a pale shade, so obviously weak of heart and fragile of body, could possibly stand against Tanaka the Forbidden and live to tell the tale if he chose not to be merciful.

Ignorant fool.

"Of course not," he scoffed aloud, "I would destroy you. What is that you want of me then? If you lack the will to fight, why bother appearing before me at all? What is it that you seek?"

"I just… I mean, like…. I kind of just... I was hoping you'd let me touch the scars on your neck."

There was nothing elegant about the request and yet those words resonated within him, tolling like a bell in the depths of his soul, as if he had heard them before.

Such words were power.

Power enough to snare even the darkest and most forbidding of creatures, to overwhelm unprepared hearts, to grasp the reigns of his heart and steal the strength from the knees of even a being such as he.

It was a black, insidious magic that invoked another time, another life far from the earth on which they stood.

He could feel those words and the memory they carried with them echoing within him, giving rise to the desire to see it done, begging his body to comply, extinguishing the will to resist.

He could not begin to understand the power that cheap facade, that dismal shade cloaked in the guise of the familiar, that he could wield to make such a humble request - conveyed by such a clumsy, stumbling tongue - sound so sweet as to entice him to willingly offer that creature his back.

All for the unspoken promise of a chance to catch a glimpse a world before islands and death and the blood-soaked wreckage of a world consumed by despair.

Such was his own weakness that he submitted to it willingly. That he welcomed it.

The world sank and rose around him.

He was clothed and sitting in a metal box as they traveled across an endless sea.

The slosh of the ocean waves was loud against the hull of the ship, made distant only be the thickness of steel and glass.

He had never watched him sleep.

He found the sight strangely engrossing.

It had seemed as if the temptation to doze beside him must have reared its head more than once during their time together, but they had both always been quick enough to go their separate ways.

To preserve a degree of distance despite the fervor of their carnal relations.

Had it been so in the early days?

Before their tentative partnership gave way to something more?

He was not certain.

Time and distance had bleached pale those early days, before death had taken too much and despair had eaten what remain. The years since had leached what color and emotion lingered within the fragile memories of those early days until all that was left were the smear of ashes across his fingertips.

Whatever they had been in the beginning, in the end there had been nothing more to bind them together than their devotion to her and the momentary satisfaction of physical gratification.

Once he had been something closer to human.

Something weak and fragile that had sat beside him in the darkness and united their blood as one.

Perhaps it was simply some surviving sliver of that cursed boy that kept his gaze riveted to his slumbering figure.

Or perhaps he had merely tired of watching the ocean waves.

It was far too late for soul searching.

Kazuichi slept with his mouth open, one arm tucked beneath his head and the other curled around his stomach, legs drawn in against his body as if he were chilled though the container that held them was unpleasantly warm.

He was also strangely pleased to discover that he snored.

It was not a loud or particularly obtrusive sound, but it was there all the same. Just a quiet grumble that filled the silence and resounded against the walls of their little prison. It was not unlike the purr of the majestic Nekomata, a fearsome beast who had slept beside him during the long weeks he'd spent at the forefront of the She-Cat's invasion of Shanghai.

"Hey," he murmured, rousing from his doze to scrub roughly at his eyes with one grease-stained fist before pushing himself up onto his elbows to squint at his surroundings before turning his gaze back to him. "This a boat?"

It was disconcerting to see him looking back at him with eyes made unfamiliar by the lack of all those fanciful trappings that had once seemed to define him.

He had never seen him like that either.

Of course, he imagined he must look equally strange.

Both of them naked of all their many affectations.

The sheen of sweat across his forehead was thick enough that it glistened even in the dim light that streamed into their metal prison through that tiny window. He sighed heavily as he fell back against the bench, head impacting metal with a quiet thump, "I was just dreaming about you."

"A nightmare? Should I have woken you?" His voice was rough with disuse. He'd seen little point in answering the queries of his captors and before that he'd spent little enough time outside the company of beasts so it had been some while since he'd had use for words.

"No, don't wake me," he murmured, a smile quirking his lips as his eyes fell closed once more. "This is a nice dream."

Perhaps it seemed so.

Dreams were, after all, merely nightmares with their make-up on. Reality hidden beneath a layer of pleasant lies.

By the time he considered replying, he was snoring once more and there was little point.

It was just as well.

He isn't certain what he would have said or if he even wished to say anything at all.

What point there would be to doing so so close to the end of their long journey.

Some doors were better left shut.

He turned his gaze back to the window, to the subtle churn of endless water, the distant blue of the sky beyond.

There was little point in dwelling on that which was past.

The deep blue of wavering water gave way to a closed door in an empty hall.

He'd been there for some time.

He rapped his knuckles against the door again, harder this time.

Hard enough that they ached in the aftermath.

He flexed them gingerly as he waited for some sign that his summons had been noted.

The door stayed resolutely closed.

He had had quite enough of waiting.

"Go," he murmured, the note of command in his voice enough to send Jum-P scurrying down the length of his scarf to drop to the floor.

He did not worry that she would be unable to find her way.

After all, this was not the first time they had been forced to use such methods to rouse him from his self-imposed isolation.

The door clicked and he put a hand to it pressing it open without hesitation and stealing silently into the darkened room beyond.

When he shut the door behind him it sealed the dim light of the hall away leaving him to the pitch black darkness of the sealed room. A lesser being might have found such darkness disconcerting, might have been bothered by the sickly grind of mysterious machinery, would almost certainly have recoiled from the stench of unwashed skin and the reek of burnt oil.

He was not so weak.

He was Tanaka the Forbidden.

To one who had passed through the gates of hell and traversed the paths of the forgotten realms such challenges were barely worth mention.

"Just go away, man," he called, his voice was muffled by what was no doubt layers of blankets. Yet still somehow the whine in it came through clearly enough.

He had expected as much.

He was, after all, well used to conquering such paltry defenses.

"I will not," he replied easily, moving carefully through the room, the toes of his boots gently nudging against unseen obstacles. A sea of mechanical debris and discarded tools, soiled clothes and crisp wrappers that crinkled as he urged them aside as he continued ever onward in his quest to reach the heart of this putrid darkness. "I waited the requested time and since you have not deigned to emerge as promised, I have come for you."

"It's already been two days?"

"It has," he answered, gravely.

"Oh," the word was said quietly, as muffled as the rest.

He knew well enough from his own experiences that time had very little meaning during such dark moments of the soul.

His knees found the edge of the low bed, knocking against the blanket-covered wood and he sank down upon the edge, dropping a hand against the snuffling unseen lump beside him.

Jum-P returned to him from where he had no doubt been surveying the situation, scaling his scarf once more to tuck the warmth of his tiny body against the back of his neck. He pulled a seed from the pouch at his hip and slipped it into Jum-P's waiting paws.

He had performed his duty most admirably.

Now it was to him to set the lure and reel in his prey.

"I require a new exercise wheel."

"So?" Came the muffled reply, made sharp by derision. "Go buy one. Probably be better than anything I could make for you."

"Hardly. I have searched near and far and have found that the weak, paltry offerings on display do not suit the needs of the Dark Devas of Destruction or their cursed offspring. I must have a wheel which will be able to consider the size and capabilities of each of these majestic creatures and tune itself to their particular needs automatically. These cheap imitations would break beneath the girth of the mighty Cham-P and I am concerned the smallest of their offspring would be crushed beneath the plastic spokes should they have the misfortune of seeking shelter there."

"I know what you're doing, you know. You're not fooling anyone with this bullshit."

"Oh? Would you have me use such inferior devices? Would you have me gamble their lives and growth on these poor shadows of what you might create?"

"They failed me, Gundham. FAILED. I'm on freaking academic probation. They're gonna kick me out. They're gonna send me back home, because I suck. Why the crap would you want someone like me to build you anything?"

He had known, of course.

Even if he had not confessed as much to him through a crack in his door days ago, it would have been impossible not to know thanks to the list that had been pinned to the main bulletin board for all to see.

The red ink that had called out failure had been glaringly obvious even from a distance.

Mercifully, Kazuichi was likely unaware how public his humiliation had been made since he had hidden himself away in his room immediately after the presentations had taken place.

He envied She-Cat her ability to put others at ease with carefully crafted speech, but it was a skill he knew well enough that he would never possess.

His was not an existence meant to offer comfort to humans.

Not that he truly believed such cheap platitudes would have penetrated the gloom that surrounded the boy at his side even if he'd had the will or words to attempt to offer him such paltry solace.

"The freaking rocket just… I don't know what happened. It was… everything should have been fine. I tested it like a billion times. A billion times! It worked! I mean, you saw it work, right? Those tweaks I made to the air filtration and cooling systems totally compensated for the additional heat from the larger engine. Everything was working just like it was supposed to! I just- I don't understand what went wrong."

The last word was a moan of protest, of frustration, a demand for fairness in a world where the odds were stacked against them all.

There was a rustle of cloth as the blankets were shoved back and he emerged from their depths to sit up beside him.

The gust of breath that blew across his face was as foul as that of the Nuckelavee and would likely have laid waste to a lesser being. Fortunately, he had trained long to withstand the stench of the excrement of even the most wretched of creatures.

"I must have messed something up, you know? Like I got one of the calculations wrong or I didn't check everything the way I should have. Maybe there was like a loose screw or something that I should have tightened down. I mean he… he died because of me, because I messed up. I promised you he'd be safe, how can you even…"

Ah.

He trailed off into something that sounded suspiciously like a sob.

Fingers wound tight against the material of his jacket, pulling it tight across the back of his neck. Jum-P squeaked a grumble of discontent and the grip was instantly released, a rasping series of apologies spoken quick as gunfire. "Ah, crap, sorry, sorry, that was my bad, I didn't know that… sorry."

"As if he could be harmed by one such as you," he scoffed.

"That's not-"

A grumble of discontent, frustration.

He understood well enough what those apologies were truly for.

After all, he had trained that Dola himself, raised him with his own hand when he found him abandoned in a storm drain by humans who cared not for the plight of such domesticated creatures. His nature had been too sweet and biddable to allow him to be trained as the Devas were, but he had still been a fantastic beast all the same. A magnificent creature of great intelligence and value, kind and affectionate and unique in all the world and he mourned his passing as he would mourn the passing of all such creatures.

Still, he would not mourn long.

Death was a part of life as inevitable and certain as the coming of the end days.

There was little point in lingering over a loss so sudden and unavoidable, at railing against Fate's terrible whims.

"It was a fine death," he commented after a moment's consideration, offering Jum-P an additional seed for his troubles. "All creatures are born alone and many die having known little affection in their short lives. His was a life lived at the beck and call of a cursed being that had little use for a creature of such a fond and gentle nature. In my keeping, he would have continued to grow fat and spoiled and would have likely been made a sacrifice to a greater beast. You gave him greater purpose and affection and for that I believe Spectacular Dark Beast of the Southern Isles would have been glad to have met his end at your hands. He enjoyed your time together and it was not in his nature to lay blame for such a strange turn of fickle fate. Do not dishonor his sacrifice by holding yourself to account for that which you could not anticipate."

He loosed a tired laugh, like the squeal of a rusty gate banging in the wind, "Man, you really know what to say to make a guy feel better, huh?"

"I am well-versed in the thirty-nine blessed psalms used to ease the heart of ailing creatures," he agreed, though - in truth - all of those required far more set up and preparation than he'd been willing to put forth in this effort. Also, he wasn't certain how they would impact a human soul. They were as like to strip the skin from his poor body as sooth his aching soul, he imagined, so it was probably best that he did not chance it.

"Yeah, fine, alright. If you really want me to... I guess I could maybe put something together for you, but only because l don't want Cham-P squishing the babies, because that's really disgusting, okay? It'd have to be made out of a sturdier material than plastic, I guess. I've got some titanium which is light and definitely durable enough, but it's tough to work with, you know? I'd have to get permission to order some specialized equipment for the shop."

"If it is funds you require, I will be glad to provide them."

Kazuichi snorted at the offer and he felt the tension of the past two days ease from his shoulders at the sound, "Shut up, I'm not gonna make you pay for stuff like that. You can reimburse me for actual materials, if you want, but I already have most of what I'll probably need laying around and I'll just tell them I need the extra machinery for the circulation and filtration systems they're having me install in the main building. I mean they said I could finish it, even if I… even if I lose my place. Won't even be a lie, I mean, not really, because I'm gonna have to build like a monster fan for that thing and a bunch of other stuff, so I'd probably need most of it for that anyway. Maybe you could help with some of the installation or something, huh? I mean, not like you have to or anything, just… I thought maybe it'd be… I don't know. You don't have to."

"I would not be opposed to aiding you in your endeavors. We have struck similar deals before... though you really should be more cautious of entering into bargains with beings such as myself."

"Huh? Oh, right, that whole curse thing, yeah, well, I mean, I think we're already kinda past the point of no return on that right?"

"You have no sense of self-preservation."

He laughed, high and nervous, "You think so? I mean, my Dad says so too, but, I mean, I've gotten by alright this far, haven't I?"

He had seen purple and green splotches pressed into his wrists and throat like paint splatter when he returned from holidays and breaks, laughed off as clumsiness during the infrequent moments when those around him took enough of an interest to inquire.

A cluster of old scars on his neck, little circles of pale, wilted flesh.

Every time he saw those marks, those scars, he recalled the scent of burnt flesh, charring in the inferno that had consumed the den in which he had lived his middling years.

"Sure," he continued, sheets rustling in the darkness as he flopped back against the bed. "Yeah, I mean… it's fine anyway. I like making stuff for you. It's interesting, you know? Challenging, I guess. Plus... I like... I like having an excuse to have you hang out with me. So maybe we can just... make a pact or whatever. You get to use me however you want and you help me with my projects and stuff. I mean, you don't have to if you don't wanna, but it'd be good to always have something to keep my hands busy. Keep my head… you know."

He did.

There was danger in stillness, in stagnation.

It was a danger he knew well.

A creeping, eldritch horror that seeped through the cracks in his defenses and saturated his mind, rendering all his careful preparations and protections useless.

"If that is your wish, so be it. The pact will be formed between us and shall be sealed in blood."

"Blood? Seriously? You didn't say anything about blood."

"I did not believe it necessary to state the obvious. It is common knowledge that all true pacts are sealed in blood."

"Well, I mean we didn't have to before, right?"

"You do wish this to be a more permanent arrangement, correct?"

"I guess so, but that's so… ugh, no way, man. Like can't we just- I don't know- like spit on our hands and shake or something?"

"Spit is for the binding of less formal arrangements and I would still need to carve a sigil upon your weapon."

"You wanna carve a what on my what? Oh man, tell me weapon isn't how you say dick."

"Of course not. Don't be ridiculous."

"Oh, good, you had me worried for a second there. Like seriously worried. Don't carve things on your dick, dude. That's… just… no. Are you really serious about this blood thing?"

"Do you truly think I would jest…"

"Okay, okay, I get it. Fine, just… hang on a minute."

There was a brief ruckus followed by the clatter of shifting metal and then he was back, hand groping across the sheets until he found his bandaged hand where it lay against the sheets, "Hey, maybe you could just unwind this a little then you'll be able to just wrap it back up when we're done. I mean, you kind of already have enough bandages without adding another, right?"

"A fine idea," he replied, unpinning the bandage and carefully unwinding it from around his hand.

"Cool. Okay, so, how do I do this? I don't have to like slice my whole hand open or anything, do I?"

"A mere pinprick will suffice. It's mostly a symbolic gesture."

He snorted back a laugh, "If it's just symbolic than why can't we just use spit?"

"It's symbolic of the act of sacrifice. There is absolutely nothing sacrificial about drooling on your hand."

"Okay, fine, I get the point. Whatever. Alright, let's just get this over with, okay?"

A hiss of pain erupted through the darkness and then damp fingers caught against the tender flesh of his newly revealed hand, "Shit. I think I messed that up and cut a little too deep. Crap, I really should have turned on the lights before we did this."

"You will be fine. Besides there is power to be found in darkness," he replied easily as the handle of a knife was pressed in against his palm.

"Yeah, I figured you'd say something like that. Either way, it's too late now. Here, take it."

"I would have you do it."

"Are you crazy? I'm bleeding all over the place."

"I trust your steady hand."

"You're so nuts," he breathed, but there was joy in the tone that stole whatever sting the words might have otherwise carried. "Okay, I'm gonna do it. Do you, uh, need to say anything? I mean this is supposed to be like a ritual or something, right?"

"You shall aid me as I require and I shall provide you with my expertise in the construction of your air filtration system and any other projects that should be assigned you in the future. However! Know that I shall require this new wheel be completed as soon as possible. The latest litter grows plumper by the day and the survivors will need to begin their training soon."

"Survivors? Oh c'mon, don't let her eat them again. They're just babies."

"We could no more stop her from managing her litter as she sees fit than we could coax the moon from the sky," he answered, fingers of his free hand finding and settling against the stiff tangle of unseen hair, unmoved by the soft mewl of protest his touch pulled from his throat.

"Ugh, it's so gross," he grumbled, though it was unclear whether he referred to the unfortunate unwashed state of his hair or the inevitable demise of the weakest of the litter.

"Is it?"

"Yes."

He shrugged though he knew the motion would go unseen and unremarked.

"Okay, fine, just let me… I'm gonna turn on my phone, okay? I need to be able to see you if I'm going to be the one doing this."

The light was dim, the screen set for night, but its eerie glow was more than enough to illuminate their hands, to make visible the dark of spilled blood spread like ink stains across their fingertips.

He looked worse than he'd imagined he might. His eyes seemed very dark and his skin very pale within the hallowed darkness that surrounded them, his hair was ragged and sticking up at strange angles where his free hand was still caught against it. A smile quirked his lips into a parody of a smile, it was weak but likely all the more genuine for it. "Wow, this is somehow weirder when I can see you. You sure you want me to do it?"

"Yes," he replied, his voice firm even as his belly quivered with anticipation, an eager pup begging a treat.

"Cool," he breathed, licking his lips as he set the phone aside and picked up the bloodstained knife from the equally bloody sheets.

His gaze was focused.

He looked excited as he set the tip of the knife against his fingers, "Okay… ready?"

"Do your worst."

A flash of teeth and then the knife dug in against the flesh of his forefinger, pressing down just hard enough to puncture the skin as it slipped seamlessly across his fingertip, blood welling up in its wake.

It drew a sigh from his lips and he shuddered, eyes drifting shut as a thread of satisfaction wove through his veins.

Sacrifice always felt like a release, especially when it came at the hands of another.

"Okay?" Kazuichi murmured, his voice rougher, lower than it had been, as he turned his hand over, slid their fingers together until blood smeared thick across them.

He sounded as if he already knew the answer.

After he left that room and returned to his own, he hadn't been able to help wondering how he must have looked to him in that moment, what secrets had been laid bare in his expression during those vulnerable moments.

But as he'd sat upon the edge of that bed, in that darkened room, he'd merely nodded dumbly, allowed the motion to convey the words that seemed momentarily lodged within in his throat.

"Okay, cool, so that's it?"

"Yes, that was all that was required to make binding our arrangement."

"Cool, okay, so, um, I've gotta, uh, go shower before I get started on the plans," he stood quickly, almost dashing towards the bathroom, leaving his phone behind on the bed. He hesitated at the threshold, his fingers catching against the frame though he didn't quite turn back around. "Uh, you can, um, stay if you want…."

He trailed off as if he weren't certain what else to say.

It was just as well, he had no intention of overstaying his welcome.

"I should return and see the the well-being of the creatures in my care. The hour of feeding is almost upon us."

Plus there were certain inconveniences that should be dealt with exclusively within the cool, soothing darkness of his own space.

"Yeah, of course, I'll, um, see you later."

"Yes," he said, though as his reply was made to the bathroom door clicking shut between them, he could not be certain that he'd been heard.

DAY TWO
-continued-
-ooo-

Caught up and bound by that most subtle of curses, he had turned and bared his scars for its perusal.

It was not the first time.

He knew that.

Could feel the touch of similar hands imprinted beneath his skin.

He had done this before.

They had done this before.

Not in a shower with the damp slip of shower tile beneath his feet, but on a hot rooftop in the middle of summer, the sticky black of tar giving subtly beneath his booted feet, his skin slick with the lukewarm of sweat rather than the chill of shower water.

Still the familiarity of the moment was so intense it overwhelmed him, cast a curse upon him that rendered him dizzy, afflicted with a strange, queazy sort of sickness in his gut.

Those words.

That careful touch, tracing the darkened ridges of those aging scars where the skin was most tender with such reverence... as if each ridge were the finest silk strung across the delicate webs of Tsuchigumo. It drew along the length of each of those long trailing, twisting scars in turn, fingertips delving into the smallest divots and rising over and around each curve and plain.

Just that would have been challenge enough to bear, but it was made all the worse by the soft noises of appreciation and interest that whispered between them as the pressure of that touch grew heavier, became greedy and devout as it dug in against the thickest of those scars as if it might be able to pull the puckered flesh apart and examine it from the inside out.

Good.

It felt good.

The world was a cruel machine and they but cogs upon their own lonely wheels turning endlessly within it, destined to meet and part again and again, to scrap their ragged edges against one another until they were worn away to nothing.

The taste of fresh blood filled his mouth as he dug his teeth mercilessly against his bottom lip to keep from offering that shade even the faintest note of gratification as the fire within him rose, as it flared hot, driving pleasure through his veins to swell to heat the blood within his cold, untouched flesh. His hands fell to brace his weight against the damp of shower tile, eyes held wide as that touch spread warmth like a curse through his veins, drew tension through his muscles, carved sigils into his bones.

There were cracks in the tiles.

A dark series of insidious lines branching out in all directions with no clear origin.

His hands spread across those cracks as if they might seal away whatever horrors lay within.

Water dripped, falling from the faucet head above in a slow, irregular rhythm against his bowed head, sending thin trails of water trickling down his neck to spill over the fingers sweeping across those scars, skidding out to brush clumsily across the unblemished skin between.

He could almost remember what those fingers had felt like curling against his back, scratching new marks over old.

The way that voice would sound as it drew out his name in long syllables, like a hiss.

As it asked question after question.

As it begged.

His voice wavered as he spoke, eyes held painfully wide as if that might help battle the temptation to submit to that ghostly familiarity, to those strange remnants of a life he did not truly know and almost certainly did not want.

"Do not think you can tempt me with such fiendish intimacies, I have trained six lifetimes to withstand the lustful intentions of incubi as I traversed each level of hell in search of those magnificent creatures of darkness that had summoned the Forbidden to give them aid."

The touch stilled at his words, wavered where it had settled near the base of his spine, as if his treacherous opponent had not expected him to speak or had forgotten he was capable, "You are such a dork."

When it continued once more upon its journey, it was tentative, slow, trembling and uncertain… as if he would truly be fooled by the appearance of such hesitance. "But I remember this," the shade murmured, voice as rough as the scrap of its fingertips. "We used to… you and me… we…."

It was not him.

It was not what it pretended to be.

He knew that.

He was certain.

Yet its words, its touch, still seared through his meager defenses to summon long gone days, to call those distant memories to the surface, entice them to tear their way free of whatever prison held them to claw their way to the surface to overwhelm his conscious mind and drag him down.

It was blisteringly hot on the roof of the academy. Far more so than he'd anticipated when he'd agreed to assist him in his mechanical endeavors. It wasn't as if he were not well used to such conditions, after all many levels of hell were far hotter than the mortal realm could ever aspire to be, however, he had not prepared the proper equipment or cast the necessary spells to mitigate such conditions.

When the mechanic had shrugged free of his protective suit, leaving it to hang loose around his waist and shucked his shirt to use to wipe grease from his hands it had seemed only natural that he too should follow suit.

He had, after all, already set aside his scarf at his request because of his absurd concern that it might get caught in the mechanisms he was repairing.

Perhaps it was the heat of the day.

Or the strange comfort of the mechanic's endless babble.

Either way, he'd given very little consideration to the consequence of shedding his coat and shirt. While he imagined that less clothing would do precious little to decrease the heat of the day or its effect on him, he found he welcomed the opportunity to lose the discomfort of sweat-soaked cloth for the relative relief provided by open air.

"Wow, are those… are those burns?"

Clearly it had been a grave miscalculation to suppose that one such as he - with his eye for detail and inquisitive mind - would not notice that which his layers of cloth protection typically kept well-concealed from the prying eyes of mortals.

He stilled, shirt still clutched in his hands, breath catching in his throat at the sudden question, the foolishly unexpected scrutiny.

"Yes," he answered, brief and to the point, his throat clenched around the urge to relay the tale behind those scars.

It was a tale he had told many times before to all who had seen and dared to inquire as to their cause.

To the men who had come asking as he lay in the hospital recovering from the battle.

To those wincing few who had caught glimpses of it in baths or locker rooms.

He was quite certain he told it well, that he did justice to the majestic horror of that eldritch horror he had battled for the life of that magnificent creature, the first and most beautiful Deva of Creation - the same deadly creature that had eventually birthed his splendid Devas of Destruction - who he had cared for with his own hands and nursed back to health as they both recovered from the wounds that great battle had left upon them.

It was not a tale of regret or loss, but one of triumph and sacrifice.

He was not certain why the tale had stuck in his throat.

"Cool," he had murmured, in that same, odd breathy tone typically reserved for fawning over machine parts and rocket ship designs. Almost reverent. Eager and breathless and fascinated. "So cool. Dude. Dude, why didn't you tell me you had awesome scars? They're so… oh, man… can I touch them?"

Anything he might have said, any answer he might have given had died instead an ignoble death against the back of his throat as by the time he opened his mouth to utter them, the fool had already dared to breach his barriers to run his fingers across the sensitive skin that edged the scars at the back of his neck.

He stood frozen in place, fighting the urge to shut his eyes. He had the strangest inkling that that rough unfamiliar touch might be enough to bring him to his knees without sight to distract his mind from the sensation.

What might it be like to wield such power over another?

He might never know.

The pressure of his fingertips lingered on the uncertain boundary between pain and pleasure, neither pleasant nor unpleasant, merely intense and strange.

It made his heart race and his breath quicken and his stomach swoop.

He stood so close behind him that he could feel the damp heat of sun-warmed flesh radiating from him, a furnace that seemed to burn hotter than the darkest pits of hell itself.

He should never have agreed to accompany him here so ill-prepared.

It was utterly unlike him.

What was it about this singular human that put him so far off his guard?

"Dude, this is so, so… wow…"

What manner of creature was he truly?

What foul magic had he used to make him shed his armor with so little regard for the inherent dangers of doing so?

The soft, cursed body hidden beneath his well-warded trappings had never been something he wished to yield to the touch of another.

And yet he stood there- vibrating with tension- as those calloused fragile human hands explored that map of battles won and lost etched across his flesh.

He did not crave pity, had never desired whatever sympathy such marks might engender in those who could not understand the pride of a warrior writ large across his flesh, those who would shy away from his pain, would avert their eyes from his wounds.

Was it perhaps not dark sorcery after all, but only the lingering knowledge of the scars he'd seen as he hunched over his plans and sketches, those subtle discolorations and faded marks that told better than words the tale of a life lived beneath the yolk of a great and vile human beast.

Perhaps it was that as much as his skill that had brought him to speak with him that first day.

That inspired this strange feeling of kinship within him, that dim and faltering hope that had kindled to flame during that first meaningful exchange. The promise of something...

There was startled hiss at his back, that froze his body in place, sent his stomach plummeting with the sudden, inevitable crash of disappointment.

It would not be the first time he had misread a human face, misinterpreted or inscribed too much of what he desired into the flesh of those selfish, simple creatures that so often disappointed his already limited expectations.

It was one of many reasons he preferred the company of the great beasts of field and wood and stream to the casual cruelty of those who proclaimed themselves their betters.

Regret tore through him as he crumpled the cloth in his fists.

Fool.

"Oh, wow, these are… wow," his touch is a rough trespass that sweeps over his skin, quick and eager and almost careless, the excited rush of breath against his skin is warm as he leans in rather than pulling away. "This one is the best. Do they hurt? Oh man, look at this one, it's… holy crap, they're all so freaking cool. If I had scars like yours I'd never wear a shirt again."

The rush of relief that statement brought with it had brought laughter bubbling up to issue forth from his lips, thick and low with the weight of the emotion it carried with it.

"Hey! What are you laughing about? It's not that weird, right? Oh, man, is it? It is, isn't it? Crap. Well, I mean, they're just… I don't know… really manly, I guess? Girls! Girls would probably be all over you with scars like these."

His skin felt hot and the urge to hide his face beneath the cover of his discarded scarf was nearly overwhelming. He stared intently at the ground instead, grateful that he was at his back where he could not see the proof of embarrassment flushed bright against the dark of his skin, "Most would find them discomfiting."

"Really? Why? They're awesome. Can I touch them? Oh… crap, I already did, didn't I? Like a lot. Sorry, I should have asked. Or, I guess I did ask, but I definitely should have like waited for permission before I did. Sorry, that was totally my bad. I just get excited sometimes, you know? Should you even… oh… oh, crap! Should they be out in the sun like this? These ones are all burn scars, right? Doesn't that hurt? When they're out in the sun? Oh man, it probably does, doesn't it? I shouldn't have… oh, oh, crap! Here, um, let me, ah, crap, crap! Where is your shirt?"

He watched wide-eyed and dumbstruck as the mechanic flailed around the roof, tossing tools and tarps aside in his sudden, haphazard search. Yanking his cap down further over the pink of his hair as he looked about frantically, "Crap, I can't find it! Oh, man, this is bad, isn't it?" He snatched his own discarded, oil-stained shirt from the ground and jogged back over to him. "Here just… just take mine, I mean, it's kinda dirty but it's better than… oh, huh. Right, well, there it is… uh… mystery solved, I guess."

He blinked down at the filthy shirt the mechanic had shoved into his hands.

Hands that were still wound up in his own recently discarded shirt.

Ridiculous.

His face burned, head and sides aching as the relieved chuckles of moments before turned into full-blown laughter.

His cheeks had ached as he'd glanced back up to find the mechanic's skin was stained as pink as his hair, his mouth left empty and gapping as the seemingly endless flow of words died into mortified silence before bursting into a sudden nervous trill of laughter that rattled across the roof like coins falling across a barren floor.

It had felt like….

Like what had begun in a carefully negotiated exchange had suddenly burst forth into something beautiful and dangerous.

He could hear its voice was strange, garbled, like it was underwater, like they both were and each word was more difficult to parse than the last, "We… used… to…"

It was difficult to focus with that touch skidding across his back, with that voice becoming softer and more hesitant with each passing moment.

To pull himself from the gooey tendrils of memory.

From that white sharp-toothed smile.

And then the world righted itself once more, the world speeding up around him and he was standing with his hands against those cool tiles once more, cracks spreading out beneath his hands like a disease running rampant through an infected colony and that fiend's breath at his throat.

"You smell really good," the devious imposter whispered, words a warm rush against his shower damp skin. "Is that creepy? It is, isn't it? I don't… I don't really mean it in a creepy way, it's just… a thing... that I noticed. Sometimes you'd sit near me at the restaurant or we'd be standing together with the rest of the group and I'd just… I noticed. I mean, it was only because I thought it was weird, you know? You always had those hamsters all over you and you were always messing around with all those animals over on the farm, but you always smelled so good. Like… I don't know, campfires or waterfalls or whatever. It was just… I mean, I know I always kind of stink. I mean, it's not like I don't shower, I totally do, it's just... I smell like grease and motor oil and, I mean, I know I've got some kind of crazy BO so I just thought… I… crap. This is super gay, isn't it?"

He sounded ashamed.

The way he said the word.

Softer than the rest... as if it were a secret.

Gay.

It was such a human concept to be ashamed of what one desired.

He had never...

The talented humans of Hope's Peak had a tendency to converge at the central tables in the cafeteria, to group together like pack animals seeking the approval of those who dominated the rest.

He had always been a solitary creature and that hadn't changed when he'd been invited to Hope's Peak. He enjoyed the time he spent with the She-Cat when they found quiet corners in which to discuss the arcane or the training of the Devas, but he disliked associating with her too frequently outside of the confines of the classroom. Hers was an existence that seemed destined for sunlight, that attracted others like ants scenting a picnic's bounty. Being around such crowds made him anxious so he kept his distance, skirting around the fringes during his infrequent journeys to the kitchen to forage for food for himself and his charges. Most often he chose to take his meals, such as they were, within the confines of his room or out in the few secluded areas on the grounds that allowed him the solitude he craved.

It was how he had known that the mechanic tended to eat his meals in the garden and that he might be able to find him there when he came from his latest meeting with that cursed old man, his heart aching and rage simmering in his soul. He'd stopped in the kitchen only to retrieve enough food to keep the gnawing hunger at bay while he sought him out in the hopes that he might be able to aid him where more official channels would not.

They did not know each other, not truly, had not spoken in the classrooms and halls of Hope's Peak, but he was a distinctive presence and he had heard of his talent, seen it in the brief displays in those inventions he'd occasionally brought with him to tinker with during class.

He found him in the corner of the part of the garden furthest from the main building, seated on the ground and half-hidden behind a strangely ornate marble bench.

Some graduate of the school must have been a sculptor, he could think of no other reason besides foolish pride that anyone would allow such a grotesque monstrosity to remain on display.

There was an open can of soda and a half-eaten sandwich laid out atop a torn brown paper bag on the bench's uneven top. The mechanic himself was sprawled on the ground beside it with a vast array of metal pieces spread out across a towel, a large black bag filled with tools beside him.

He settled on the unused portion of the bench and pulled an apple from his bag with every intention of simply waiting until the mechanic had finished his task before speaking with him, but from the moment he settled down upon the bench's rough surface the mechanic tensed like a rabbit in the field scenting a predator on the wind.

His movements became quick and abrupt and his gaze kept darting to him and then away again and again, as if he were expecting something.

He frowned at the display before slipping four seeds from his pocket and offering him to the Devas nestled in his scarf.

"Okay, look," the mechanic said finally, tossing his tool back in the bag and frowning up at him, tugging at his hat. "Do you want something or what? Because you're kind of freaking me out."

Ah... of course it was that.

He nodded sagely, well-used to such reactions. It came as no surprise that the mechanic would be different than all the rest, one human was much like the next after all, talents be damned. Still, Tanaka the Forbidden had never been one to back down from a challenge. He had come to this place with a singular purpose in mind and he could not in good conscious leave without at least making the attempt.

He began his story slowly just as he had when he'd imparted the tale to the principal and just as before, just as always, he found himself adding little embellishments, details that would make the story better, more compelling.

He was surprised when the mechanic stood and began to pace as he spoke, nodding often, his gaze distant and thoughtful.

"So," the mechanic commented thoughtfully, when he had finally brought his tale to a close, "you need like an insulated transportation unit with better than average stabilization built-in and a couple power redundancies to make sure it never actually loses power even if something goes wrong. And it's, uh, it's for a penguin, right? I mean, that's what a… what'd you say it was?"

"Yuki-onna," he answered, hesitantly. No one reacted this way to his stories, not even She-Cat for all her deep enthusiasm both for the source material.

"Right, Yuki-onna. That's a great name. You get to work with all kinds of different animals, huh?"

"Yes."

"Oh, man, that's cool. I've seen you with Miss Sonia... I bet she likes animals too," he bounced on his toes, worrying at a fingernail as he stared down at the mass of parts spread across the towel. "Okay, so, it's a transport unit and that means it's gotta be pretty lightweight, but since it needs to stay cold you'll need a pretty decent-size compressor and I'll need to find a way to rig the coils and the expansion for maximum efficiency because if the power unit is too massive its gonna really add to the… oh! Oh crap, it needs to be pretty big too, right? Gotta give the little fella some space to roam around. So, if I'm gonna lose some weight it's gonna have to be in the materials probably since it's definitely gonna need all that other stuff." He patted his hands against the pockets of his coveralls, frowning, "Crap, you don't happen to have something to write with, do you? Think I left my pen in my workshop. Oh, there, cool."

He plucked the pencil from his breast pocket as if it was nothing, as if his barriers and protections meant nothing.

What manner of fiend was he?

His stomach knotted as the mechanic hesitated- gaze no doubt catching the well-chewed end- before he dropped to his knees beside the bench, pulling the paper bag from beneath his dinner. He set the can of cola aside and held the half-eaten sandwich in his free hand. "I chew all my pens too," he commented distractedly, as he began sketching out shapes across the stained brown paper using the elbow of his other arm to hold it still. "I think everybody does, but most people just like to pretend they don't, which is kind of dumb, right? I mean, who cares? Anyway, I'm pretty sure I can rig something up for you... if you want me to. You do want me to, right?"

He nodded once, quick and tight, it was still difficult to admit that this was not something he could procure for himself, but the school had been reluctant to bear the cost of the production of such a vital and expensive piece of equipment. Had denied his requests no matter how he phrased them, no matter how he tried to stress the urgency and importance of the situation or that what funds he had would never be enough to cover the purchase or even the rental of such a unit.

For some unfathomable reason the mechanic had seemed relieved by his acquiescence, "Cool! Alright, um, it's gonna take me a little while to, uh, figure out all the numbers and such. Do you know how much… she? Is it a she?"

"Yes."

"Cool, okay, so do you know how much she weighs?"

"Approximately 4.1kg."

"Cool, okay, that's not too bad. And like how cold are we talking? Like chilly or like freezing balls?"

"In her natural habitat, the temperature rarely rises above freezing."

"Okay, freezing balls, got it. Here, let me… hold on," he tucked the pencil behind his ear and took a large bite out of his sandwich before crawling over to dig through his bag, tossing bits and pieces out of the way until he reemerged with a battered notebook. "Ha! Sorry, just remembered I threw this in here this morning. Okay, so, here's what I'm…."

"Are you mocking me?"

The mechanic glanced up, swallowing hard, his eyes comically wide, "Huh?"

"If you are simply humoring me and have no intention of fulfilling my request I would ask that you tell me now for if you attempt to string me along and some harm should befall that Yuki-onna as a result I shall bring down a curse upon you that wi-"

"Whoa! Okay, no, stop, okay. I…" He shook his head quickly, waving his sandwich and notebook back and forth frantically enough that part of the sandwich's filling splattered across the bench between them.

Tuna perhaps?

Some sort of fish surely.

He was not certain, but it was distraction enough that he found himself silenced as the mechanic sped on filling the silence between with a spill of earnest words.

"Okay, I know I probably seem like that kinda guy, but I'm really… I wouldn't do that. Please let me… look. I know you probably don't… no one asks me to do stuff, okay? You're the first person to ever ask, you know? The school has me work on projects for them as kind of like a work study thing. And I mean, it's cool and all and it's not like I don't need the money, but it's not really all that interesting, you know? Stuff like this," he tapped his finger against the scribbled over paper bag. "This is why I came here. I thought I'd be able to do this kind of stuff all the time. I mean, sure I work on my own personal projects, but… I don't know. Look, if you don't want me to do it, I get it, it's fine, but… I want to. I mean, I could probably even get it done this week if you don't mind giving me a hand in the shop."

"I will do what I must to assure her continued well-being," he agreed slowly, though the strange nervous feeling in his belly remained.

The mechanic's smile was wide and immediate, "Oh, man, that's great. What was her name again?"

"Yuki-onna."

"Right, yeah, I remembered just… didn't want to say it wrong. Does that seem dumb?"

He had no idea what to make of this fiend and his unnatural enthusiasm. In truth, he reminded him of the She-Cat in that way and there was comfort to be had in the familiar.

Still, he was still uncertain of how much of what he could see was lies and how much truth.

"What is it you wish in return for this favor?"

"In return?"

That same shocked expression.

He still couldn't tell if it were genuine or not.

"I do not wish to be in your debt without knowing your price, fiend. What would you have of me? Blood? Sacrifice? My first-born?"

"Oh… oh! Payment, right, I don't really... uh… how about you help me with some of my projects? To make up the time I'll spend on this one? The school keeps asking me to build things and fix stuff, but they never really give me enough time or help or anything."

"What kind of... projects?"

"There's, uh, hold on, I've got the list here somewhere just… hang on a second," he tucked the notebook under one arm and took another bite of the meager remains of his sandwich as he patted his free hand over his pockets, finally producing a crumbled scrap of paper from his back pocket. "Ha, found it. Okay, so there's a generator in the old school building and a couple of air conditioning units in the main building and the reserve course building and then they want me to get to work on some sort of fancy isolation tank thing. So, nothing too crazy, there's just a lot of it and it'd go faster if I had someone to lend me a hand, you know?"

"I know nothing useful about the workings of lightning and steel."

"Oh, that's not a problem, I mean I just…" he hesitated, shifting uncomfortably. "Look, you don't have to if you don't want to, it's fine, I just thought… maybe…." He trailed off with a shrug, shoving the rest of his sandwich in his mouth and crumpling the list back into his pocket.

He watched him chew in silence.

His sandwich-bloated cheeks reminded him pleasantly of Cham-P.

The mechanic shifted from foot to foot, fiddling with his notebook restlessly before setting it down on the bench, pushing it this way and that as if he were attempting to nudge it into a very specific position.

Eventually he swallowed and offered him a wilting smile before he pulled the pencil from behind his ear and turned his full attention to his notebook. "Sorry, I shouldn't have asked. Just… don't mind. It was a dumb idea anyway. I'll still build your thing for you and you can just, I don't know, pay for the materials or whatever. I can have an estima-"

"I do not jest," he began, face and ears burning as he forced himself to speak past the lump forming in his throat. "I know nothing of invention or the demons of bridled lightning. Even the most simplistic of devices has been known to prove an almost insurmountable challenge."

"Huh? Uh…. oh! You mean you're no good with mechanical stuff? That's fine. I mean, if you want, I can teach you."

Were his intentions honorable?

Was his offer made in good faith?

He seemed earnest enough, but he had been fooled before.

"Very well," he said warily, searching the mechanic's expression for even the faintest hint of deception. "If that is the price you would ask of me, I shall gladly accept your offer."

"Really?" His teeth were very white and very sharp when he grinned, "Okay, cool. If you've got some time, you could help me work on the specs now, if you want to."

He seemed so… excited.

His stomach churned.

Perhaps he should have eaten something more substantial for dinner after all.

The feel of the bench faded and he was standing once more on legs felt faltering and weak.

If he had been a lesser being, he would have dismissed the warmth in his face and the tightness in his belly as the seeds of some terrible illness.

In a way, he would not have been wrong.

He slumped forward against the cool of the shower wall, vaguely conscious of the hands still grazing the scars that lined his back.

His knees trembled with the strange echo of that feeling so like what he'd felt on the rollercoaster, that swooping sensation of momentarily weightlessness.

His face had been so warm.

Absurd.

All of this was so... absurd.

That hadn't… they weren't….

He had barely exchanged more than a handful of words with him during their time together on the island.

This had to be just another ploy, another stall to prevent him from breaking free of this unholy snare.

He was not so weak as to be swayed by such obvious lies.

A hand slid over his hip, rough calluses marking a path low across his belly, catching rough and painful against edges of the scattering of wounds there, edging up towards the gory reminder of how he had come to be in that unchanging Hell.

It had become difficult to breathe, as if the wretched fiend at his back were stealing the very oxygen from the air even as his touch sapped the strength from his body.

"Hey, you know," the fiend murmured, knit material of his hat touching down against his shoulder. "Nobody'd probably know if we were to...uh..."

The material was softer than what he remembered.

He swallowed hard as that rough hand smoothed across his stomach, bringing warmth coursing through his body despite himself, his blood surging hot and low to harden that which had laid slack and listless between his legs since his arrival in this dismal place.

"Hey," he murmured, lips and breath warm against his shoulder blade. His fingers traced the edge of one of the smaller gashes on his belly idly; pain buzzed in his head as if the wings of Beelzebub brushing against his brain. "You should really put something on these, they'll get infected if you don't. They probably have some stuff at the pharmacy or the hospital or something."

He laughed, he could not help it, the fiend's words were simply too absurd to be borne, "No infection could survive in a body conditioned to withstand the venom of the great basilisk."

The touch withdrew and his skin felt all the colder for the loss.

"Freaking seriously?"

There was something ugly in those words, the way they were spat out as if they were bitter medicine.

He turned to stare at the creature behind him, startled by the sudden shift.

He looked different somehow, as if some piece of the illusion were wearing thin to reveal something more of the fiend he truly was rather than the familiar mask he wore.

He seemed… taller, perhaps?

Stretched thin, face gone sallow, hair too long, caught back in ragged braids beneath the dark material of its hat. Its eyes were wide, wild, its hands shaking as it pulled at the dark of its shirt, as its fingers scrapped over its chest as if they'd been cast adrift and searching for a place to lay anchor. "Why can't I just… why can't you just let me enjoy this? Why can't I just… enjoy… whatever the heck this is, huh? I just wanted… I just…."

Ragged fingernails scrapped across its cheeks leaving pale lines behind before its fingers finally found purchase in its hat, tugging it down over its ears, low across its brow.

"I am deadly serious," he began, slowly. Whatever manner of fiend this shade truly was it was most certainly a creature best approached with caution. "What good would I be as a warrior were my body not made to withstand such things?"

It giggled.

It was a terrible sound.

"Are you freaking kidding me?" The shade snarled, his voice rising shrill with something like rage, something that stank of hysteria. "You can't withstand shit! You died, you freaking asshole!" The fiend's teeth were bared, its eyes wide and furious, knuckles white. "You freaking killed him and then you freaking died!"

He should not allow this beast to rile him with such obvious attacks, but knowing that did not keep the heat of anger from stirring within his breast. If it had come to say those words wearing a different face, it might have been easy to ignore, but no demon worth fighting would dare come to challenge him wearing so simple a guise.

He was ashamed to admit it had been difficult to remember from one moment to the next that the fiend before him had been a trick and not the genuine article.

"Would it have been better if we had all simply died a slow, agonizing death in that place?" He'd snapped, advancing on the fiend before him and thrusting a finger against its chest. "Would you have rather I allowed us to destroy each other when we were far too long gone to recover? Would you rather I had laid down and simply allowed that fiendish bear to win the day?"

"You're making it worse, man!" The fiend snarled, its face twisted up in a parody of agony that made his chest ache in sympathy, as if that illusion of pain were enough to pierce his own faltering defenses. "Don't say it like that! Don't say it like you did it for us. Like there weren't other options. Hinata would have- we would have- thought of something."

He forced a laugh, loud and boisterous, he would not allow this shade to see how its carefully chosen words had affected him. He would not allow himself to fall prey to such a tepid scheme, to second guess actions that could never be taken back, "Fool. I would have never sacrificed my existence for such a cause. I would never lend my aid to save those that lacked the will to save themselves."

"We didn't… I mean we would have… shut up! Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Spittle landed damp and warm against his cool flesh as the fiend's temper flared, face reddening with the frustration of a battle lost.

They'd reached the door to the shower room, left open when the fiend had entered - or perhaps he himself had never thought to close it when he'd entered that cursed room to cleanse the filth of days from his flesh - either way the blithering shade continued to give way before him, stumbling back through the door and tripping over its own feet, tumbling back onto the ground with a yelp.

Joy surged through his breast, sudden and unexpected, turning his bravado into something real, "If I were to die, I would at least choose the method of my demise. I would not allow the wheel of fate to crush me beneath her heel as they all so clearly intended to allow it to crush them. That they survived was merely a reasonably satisfactory side effect of my efforts to save myself from such a pitiable death."

"S-screw you," the shade at his feet snapped in reply, glaring up at him with narrowed, defiant eyes as if the fight weren't already won and it had not been dealt a critical blow that was surely enough to banish it from the board.

Perhaps that had been his mistake- to believe an enemy defeated merely because he wished it so- for he did not expect or react in time to prevent the blow when the fiend lashed out at him with a sudden kick, felling him as if he were a mighty oak brought low by a single powerful, deplorable blow scored against that most sensitive of areas.

The pain was sudden, blinding in its intensity as it shot needles through his brain and blackened his vision. He dropped to his knees, groaning as his hands leapt to shield the injury too late.

It had been only a glancing blow, but even so weak a touch could be fatal when it landed so precisely against one's most sensitive area.

"Oh! Oh, man, oh shit, shit, sorry, I… oh crap, I didn't mean to… why didn't you dodge or something?" The fiend's screech seemed pitched specifically to worsen the ache in his head as he lay upon the floor, panting, as snarling black tendrils of agony ripped through his body, powerless to do anything but suffer and writhe beneath the spell of a torment far more severe than any he had suffered before. Even dying had been a pleasure cruise, the thrust of a rhino's tusk a mercy and all the aches that had haunted the long days since seemed but a minor inconvenience compared to the bitter, terrible throb caused by that desperate blow. "Oh, man, this is your fault! You just kept coming at me and I just… I mean… fuck. Sorry. Sorry, I didn't… sorry. It's just… you're supposed to be… what the heck, man? Crap, crap, crap."

He could feel hands fluttering against his skin like moth's wings- brushing against his shoulder, his arm, his back- unable to settle, perhaps uncertain of their welcome.

It was a unpleasant sensation, but one he hadn't the presence of mind to turn away.

His balls ached.

Everything hurt.

"Oh man, should I… should I just go get you some clothes or some ice or… crap. Where would I… I want some ice. Ice, ice, ice, ice, ice, ice, dammit. Stupid freaking broken freaking brain, why won't you do anything I want you to do, huh? "

He'd cracked his eyes open to glare up at him, but he'd found his vision cloudy with unbidden tears and quickly closed them again, turning his face into the ground so the fiend would not see the vile evidence of such human fragility trickling across his cheeks, dripping from the bridge of his nose.

Fortunately, it seemed the fiend was far more interested in playing its role than exploiting such obvious weakness. "This is so stupid, man. What the hell… I just… you need, um, ice. Look, I'll, uh, I'll go get some. Yeah, I'm gonna… there was like a diner or something near here, right? I'll just… I'll just go… do… that… I guess. I'll… um… I'll be back."

And then he was gone.

The door banging shut carelessly behind him and he was left to the tender mercies of throbbing pain the lukewarm tiles of the shower floor.

Never had he imagined he would be so grateful for silence.

-ooo-