Summary:
Welcome to Rin's guide on how to handle finding out your amoral demonic lover has been in charge of a lab dedicated to horrible, unethical studies involving countless severe crimes against humanity for the past century 101. Rin asks a very important question and Mephisto goes through the seven stages of grief, a first for him.
Notes:
So, if anyone thought that maybe Mephisto was being too nice throughout this fic, I bring to you a helpful reminder that he is not :D
Alternative chapter titles were as follows:
Do you want clones? Because that's how you get clones
Demonic daddy issues
Thanks, Satan
Omg this chapter is killing me idk this is another one of those struggle chapters that fights me the whole wayyyyyy D:
Also, guys, GUYS when I wrote ch 11 and had Rin steal Mephisto's tie at the end, I had no idea that the next manga scene showed Mephisto wearing a new tie! Like? Maybe I am writing the manga, who knows? Incandescence is all happening off scene lololol
Song(s) of the chapter: Blood / Water by Grandson, Bury a Friend by Billie Ellish, Drop The Game by Flume & Chet Faker
Rin blinked when the door to the next scene opened to Mephisto's office where he'd just come from.
"Rin."
There was Mephisto himself, striding down the hall towards him and adjusting another one of those dated-looking suits over his frame. He even had some kind of fedora on, once again wrapped in a familiar strip of pink polka-dotted silk.
But the tie he wore was different.
A sharp grin scrawled its way across Rin's face, bringing his hand to his chest where Mephisto's captured tie rested beneath and around his tail.
He watched the way the motion caused Mephisto's pupils to sliver, green eyes focusing on where he rubbed his fingers against his uniform.
Before he could tease Mephisto about it, he was upon him and Rin gasped, shoved back into the door in a heated kiss.
His clawed hands pressed to Rin's shoulders in an almost bruising hold and the kiss had fangs in it that Rin melted into with a surprised moan, but he wasn't even given time to reciprocate, released just as quickly.
"You're late."
Rin panted, staring up at Mephisto with a sense of bewilderment, his lips still tingling from the rough kiss.
"Come with me, Rin."
Already, Mephisto headed to the main doors and Rin had no choice but to follow, jogging to catch up as they left the room and putting the strange behavior behind him for the time being.
"How long has it been?"
"Four years have passed," Mephisto spoke as they walked past the familiar courtyard he knew from the Academy.
They reached the entrance, a couple of uniformed exorcists nodding with a polite 'Sir Pheles' at them and Mephisto glanced back at Rin, instructing, "Pretend you're my bodyguard."
Rin listened as Mephisto explained that Asylum was set up as a children's shelter as well as an exorcist school, taking in orphans that had run-ins with demons or had demonic blood to train them.
He was distracted by a group of kids walking by them, one of them catching his eye until he realized why. His mother, now a pre-teen, vanished down the hall before he lost sight of her, unable to stop with how Mephisto's long strides outpaced his own shorter ones.
"It was dismantled after the Blue Night." Rin's attention was drawn back to Mephisto, wary of the way his voice had lowered, a dark undercurrent to it that had Rin's hackles rising.
"Do you know why?"
"You know I don't," Rin grumbled, hearing the smirk in the rhetorical question.
Mephisto looked back at him, mouth quirked in a humorless smile.
"Because it was a place of horror."
That-Rin swallowed, feeling a cold sweat break over his body-that didn't sound like something he was going to enjoy learning about.
There wasn't time to consider it further. Mephisto went back to explaining as they drew up to a long chamber leading to a militaristic fenced-off zone that looked out of place in the ornate Academy halls and marble flooring.
"It's all a front, you see," Mephisto led them up to the gates, getting waved through by the exorcists standing guard there. "Asylum rests above a hidden research facility known as Section Thirteen. All very complicated areas of study that boil down to one truth."
A strange combination of scents hit Rin's nose, sterile and metallic and of old misery.
Mephisto's voice came to him through a white noise rushing through his head as they walked to a railing that looked into a vast chamber filled with countless rows of tubes housing floating bodies.
"Simply put, Section Thirteen cloned demon kings and cultivated them for possession."
Everything fell away until it was only Mephisto's voice and his slit-pupiled eyes glinting in the fluorescent lights of the lab that Rin could comprehend.
"Shiro Fujimoto was born here, a clone of Azazel, King of Spirits."
The words slid into his ears like a violin note strung the wrong way, Yukio's own parting words from that night he'd burned alive and woken as a full demon coming back to him with sudden, horrible clarity.
'Mephisto spent countless lives to create vessels for demons and Father Fujimoto was one of the subjects created by them.'
Ice slowed Rin's thoughts to a crawl. He was cold, or at least he felt that way, shivering as the soul-deep chill was replaced by a wave of simmering anger that he clenched his teeth around before it spilled out as flames, still feeling the heatwave rising off his body when his control slipped.
Mephisto watched him, waiting for his reaction with a smile and Rin knew he would be expecting an explosion from the revelation but-but there was only one question twisting through his mind.
"Why?"
The smile warped into something inhuman on Mephisto's face and Rin's heart tightened like it was being squeezed in his hand.
"It's all for Lucifer! The subjects and researchers and research. Everything in this facility!"
He fought for shallow breaths, his pulse jumping until he grew lightheaded as Mephisto laid the last revelation at his feet, "It's all to buy time before Lucifer goes off like a massive bomb."
Rin sucked in a sharp inhale, hands twitching at his side as Mephisto cocked his head to consider how his words had left him, mouth pulled sharp enough to cut. He scrambled to piece his thoughts together, everything scattering in the light reflecting off the tubes fulls of bodies until he no longer knew what he should think.
But…
Something had just become apparent to Rin and he pinned Mephisto in his gaze.
"That's what that kiss was all about earlier."
Mephisto's smirk dropped and he stepped back, spine straightening as if defensive at the off-tangent statement.
Maybe he was wrong, but Rin didn't think it was the case.
Not when...Rin rubbed at his chest where the tie was hidden on his tail, bowing to look up at Mephisto through his bangs. "You knew this was one of the parts I was gonna be angry at you for and wanted something in case I decided this was the thing that pissed me off for good."
The furrowed brows and mouth quirked into a frown answered Rin's question and he huffed out a breath through his nose.
"Okay, let's go then," Rin said, raising his head and squaring his shoulders to the now taken-aback expression on Mephisto's face. "What's next?"
He stalked the last few feet to stand before Mephisto, staring up into the acid-green of his eyes and waiting for the next move.
"Very perceptive, Rin. Once again."
And Mephisto had a black clawed hand cupping the back of his head in a light press, kind smile tugging at his lips.
Rin frowned but sighed, giving up for the moment and leaning forward, careful not to touch his horns to the clothes as he rested against Mephisto's chest.
"Aren't people gonna wonder why you're petting some random bodyguard in your lab?" Rin grumbled out when Mephisto ran his thumb in a warm circle over his scalp, scratching lightly through his hair.
"Yes, that would make me seem eccentric, wouldn't it?" Mephisto responded, a grin in his voice that had Rin rolling his eyes even as he turned his head to settle his cheek more firmly to his chest.
In the quiet surrounding them, Mephisto traced the flats of his claws over his jaw and Rin let the heartbeat echoing beneath his ear soothe him as much as it could.
"Luckily, we aren't in line of sight of any cameras and the only people in the room now are on the lower level amongst the experiments, so our secret is safe for a while longer yet."
His lips twitch into a ghost of a smile as Rin pulle back, though the mention of experiments put a damper on it.
"So? I thought you said I was late."
Mephisto released him, claws leaving his hair, and he turned with a sharp flourish to continue their journey.
"Once again, you're a terrible distraction, Rin."
That brought a snort from Rin as they came to a long hallway with a thick metal door at the end and two guards stationed in front of it. "The only one of us who's terrible is you and you know it."
"Rin."
The way Mephisto said his name had him falling silent, hearing the warning in his voice. "From now on stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and clasp your hands behind your back. Stay behind me and don't talk."
They were through the door and Rin knew why Mephisto had given him those orders.
Lucifer's overwhelming presence hit him right before the scent of rot and decay did and finally, the room itself registered with Rin.
His presence concentrated in the center of a lowered section of the room, Lucifer's skeletal body wrapped in rust-red stained bandages with large tubes running through his stomach and mouth.
He was surrounded by more researchers in lab coats all fiddling around complicated-looking screens and medical equipment, though they looked up at their approach.
There was only the mechanic whoosh of the machine helping Lucifer breathe echoing in the cold room and Rin fought the urge to flee, drawing strength from Mephisto's presence.
Rin focused on Mephisto's scent, letting it block out the others in the room as much as it could, and felt his thudding heart calm a little.
For his part, Mephisto walked forward, hand reaching up to remove his hat as he was greeted by who Rin guessed was the head scientist.
"I apologize for being late, are you ready to begin the experiment, Mr. Eminescu?"
Movement from the side caught Rin's attention and his breath stopped as he recognized one of the Grigori, flashing back to his trial that felt like years ago now and hiding a wince even though he knew they wouldn't recognize him here.
"Oh my, it's Shemihaza and everyone from the Grigori," Mephisto said, voice an affectation of surprise.
"I must witness everything," came the woman's response from under her ornate robed uniform, one of her entourage adding that they couldn't leave a sacred sage alone. The false smiles from the rest of them, all eerily similar, on their faces sent shivers up Rin's spine, only enhancing the discomfort the whole situation was causing him.
Eminescu drew their focus back to begin the experiment and described the process to create what he called elixir number five.
The casual cruelty sent a shudder through Rin, hearing it spoken of without any sign of guilt, as though the man was reading from a textbook and not actively participating in human and demon torture.
It was all to give Lucifer a perfect body.
Rin had no choice but to wait with the rest of them to see how the elixir would affect Lucifer.
He could feel the tension in the room hike up as anything failed to happen, the researchers throwing increasingly nervous looks towards Mephisto and checking their computers as if to find something that their eyes weren't seeing.
"It's been thirty minutes," Mephisto said, voice causing several people to jump. "Any changes, Mr. Eminescu?"
At the stuttered reply to the negative, Rin heard a soft chuckle come from Mephisto and realized he was enjoying Lucifer's suffering. Rin wasn't sure why that surprised him, but the slight smile on his face that Rin caught seemed to confirm his suspicions.
Another reminder about Mephisto's nature.
He glanced back at Rin, a warning in his eyes that Rin guessed was telling him to follow his orders without question. "Stay here."
That said, Mephisto walked down the stairs towards where Lucifer lay. "Can you hear my voice, Lucifer?"
He came to a stop beside the bed, hands behind his back as he smiled down at Lucifer's rotted form with false concern. "How do you feel?"
Rin jolted where he stood when Mephisto's question prompted retching gags from Lucifer, the respirator dislodging from his throat with a wet squelch from the coughed-up blood forced out with it. Rin could smell the rot and decay in the blood, for once wishing he had his old, human, sense of smell back so he could avoid what the scent was telling him.
"The elixir appears to have failed."
The disappointment was palpable in the room, though nobody seemed surprised. Rin couldn't decide how he felt, and a heavy stone seemed to have lodged in his stomach.
"Lucifer." Rin held his breath as Mephisto addressed the still coughing demon. "If you abandon that body, you will be free of your suffering. Leave Assiah alone and return to Gehenna, you can acquire a new body later."
Why Lucifer hadn't left his body already? The sheer agony he must be in at all times was something incomprehensible to Rin. Then Rin realized what Lucifer giving up his body would entail, something all the demon kings went through, and something Rin still didn't know how he would handle if he saw it happening.
Getting a new body meant possessing-no, killing the human it belonged to. The bodies of Amaimon, Mephisto, and of all the demon kings, had once been humans. Humans like Shiro.
Rin felt sickened with himself, and then, looking at Lucifer, felt sick again, finding his eyes had begun fluttering in rapid blinks as his rising emotions twisted like snakes in his gut until he was nauseous.
He didn't have time to think about it further and Rin was relieved despite what the interruption was as the respirator was removed from Lucifer's throat so he could speak.
"Samael, you-"
Lucifer gasped, words weak and like they were dragged from his ruined throat but leaving Rin chilled to his core.
"-are so cruel."
"Someday I will be rewarded." Even with lips rotted away, Lucifer smiled, no longer seeming to be speaking to anyone but himself.
"I believe that."
Rin's vision tunneled, hearing the fanaticism there. He was reminded of Yukio.
Yukio.
He realized he'd begun trembling where he stood.
Mephisto spoke then, though Rin heard it as if through cotton, focused entirely on the now still figure of Lucifer on the soiled table.
It was only when people began moving, filing out of the room, that Rin jerked his head up, staring with wide eyes into Mephisto's as he approached.
But Mephisto only made a short gesture indicating Rin should follow him and the relief to finally get away from Lucifer's madness that shot through him in a full-body shiver almost made Rin sob.
He managed to choke the reaction back and forced his legs into a stumbling walk, following Mephisto when he passed by him to head out the way they'd entered, though Rin's body was numb.
Something made him look back once more only to see Lucifer's pale green eyes locked onto his from the cot and he flinched, pure terror freezing his limbs.
Without knowing how, Rin got out of the room. It was as if he'd blinked and found himself on the other side of the heavy door. Even after making it down the hall, the metallic clang of it shutting lingered in his ears, the scent of Lucifer's rot and the feeling of his presence pressing in on him with each step he took no matter how far he got away.
Then it was just he and Mephisto alone in one of the many seemingly endless cold metal corridors of the nightmare he'd found himself in.
"Did you sense how dangerous his unrestrained wrath would be?"
Rin collapsed to his knees on the ground, clenching his fists in the dark material of his uniform. He registered Mephisto's question but was unable to give it his attention as one thought rose above the rest and he gasped it out.
"Yukio!"
He looked up and saw Mephisto's brows furrowed in confusion, head cocked and hand flexing the grip he had on his hat where he'd been about to put it back on.
"Yukio's with him-I left Yukio with him!"
A growl came from Mephisto then, and Rin's breath stuttered in his lungs at the irritation he heard there.
"You continue to blame yourself for another's actions, Rin." The cold statement didn't help Rin's growing panic and that only served to make Mephisto more frustrated, snarl twisting onto his face at whatever he saw in Rin's expression. "Your brother made his own decision that night, knowing full well who he was going towards and who he was leaving behind."
It wasn't true. It couldn't be true. Yukio would never have felt this side of Lucifer. How could he know what insanity he walked toward? Rin shook his head, face heating and tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. "I'm his older brother, I'm supposed to watch out for him! I knew he was acting strange and something was wrong and I didn't do anything!"
Mephisto's lips drew up into a sneer to reveal he'd let his fangs drop in his mouth, rearing back and drawing in a hissing breath and Rin had never seen him so angry before.
His heart slammed against his ribcage and his hands were white-knuckled where they clenched over his knees and he just wanted Mephisto to comfort him!
The tears started then, escaping his eyes and running down his cheeks as the desperate need to curl up and hide in Mephisto's arms came out of nowhere to squeeze at his heart until it was an almost physical pain.
"That is a childish, human, sentiment."
Ice swept out with Mephisto's words and Rin bit down on his lip until blood welled up, echoing the pain knifing through him and constricting like thorned vines at his insides as he started to tremble.
A faint sound came from around one of the corners and Rin sucked in a sharp breath, hand reaching up to scrub at his mouth only to hear Mephisto take his own long inhaled breath through his nose and snap his fingers.
Rin froze where he found himself stood to Mephisto's side, face cleared away of the blood and tears that had left sticky tracts down it.
He had to force away any new ones from falling as Shiro appeared at the end of the corridor.
Shiro was a teenager now, garbed in a medical gown and walking with a researcher and two exorcists who were clearly his guards.
"Ah, Shiro," Mephisto began, and Rin hid a flinch at how cheerful his voice was. At the smile on his face. How quickly he'd recovered. "Today was your annual day for experimentation. Good work."
Experimentation.
Rin wanted to gag at the revulsion, swallowing around a dry throat.
"I hear you're an excellent exwire," Mephisto continued when Shiro just glared at him. "I hope you make exorcist soon."
"Just die, would ya'," Shiro said, bitter, and went by with the rest of the humans without another word.
They were out of view, Rin once again alone with Mephisto.
"Lucifer will not stop until he has the perfect body, Rin."
The smile had dropped from Mephisto's face, clasping his hands behind his back as he stared Rin down.
"The test subjects exist to suppress his insanity. Do you understand?"
Rin couldn't help but focus on him, thinking back to the madness he'd felt from Lucifer. He understood.
"Come."
Speech failed Rin and he followed as he was led to a room with a viewing window to see a row of beds beyond it, most holding someone who looked like Shiro. Like his dad.
A few researchers sat at their consoles or moving around the room and Rin had to stop himself from asking how they could possibly do what they were doing to other humans, knowing about the human capacity for monstrous acts.
"At first, we made countless clones to serve as his vessels." Mephisto's lips twitched into a smile at some irony he must have been remembering. "It didn't go well."
Was it better or worse to have the ability to empathize with others and still hurt them, or, like a demon, completely lack the ability to empathize at all?
Looking between the humans and Mephisto, Rin didn't know.
"Then, Mr. Eminescu suggested developing an elixir for providing immortality. With something like that, he could have any body as a vessel."
Rin watched as one of the researchers sliced into Shiro's arm with a scalpel while another wrote something down on his clipboard and he wanted to be sick all over again.
"Testing the drugs was hell on the clones."
He heard Mephisto's voice as if through water, seeing the way Shiro held a hand to his newly bandaged arm when he was finally left alone on the cold table. He looked small there, amongst the fluorescent lights and rows of bodies.
"They tested and died like guinea pigs."
That sent a flare of anger like hot Sulphur rising in Rin's gut, a churning nausea that made bile sting at the back of his throat.
"This is the place that gave birth to the man known as Shiro Fujimoto," Mephisto finished, tilting his head to eye Rin with a face devoid of mercy or empathy at what he'd just described, though Rin knew he'd never see those emotions there anyway.
But Mephisto expected a response to the revelations and Rin made himself choke one out, the only one he could think of, "Wasn't there any other way? This is horrible!"
The smile on Mephisto's face warped again, fangs bared and eyes gleaming as he shrugged. Something about the movement seemed off-struggling for casual-and Rin wondered if the argument they'd had in the halls wasn't still affecting him in some way.
"I can't say that I understand how you're feeling, I'm a demon, after all."
Rin bowed his head, breath sticking in his lungs as he tried to exhale, and reached for a calm he didn't feel. "I know you are."
He closed his eyes, finding they were too heavy to keep open anymore and unable to keep looking at Mephisto because all he could see were the rows of bodies on cots through the window behind him.
He breathed out again.
"And I know you don't."
The words tasted like rot and ash in his mouth.
It hit him that he wanted to see Amaimon then with a yearning that was almost a physical ache even though he knew-knew!-that Amaimon wouldn't understand why he was so upset about the lives of the humans being destroyed, that he was just as much a demon as Mephisto.
But Amaimon would also see that he was hurting and move to comfort him, whether he understood the source of the pain or not.
And Mephisto…
"Then, what will you do now, Rin?"
The question broke him out of his thoughts, and he opened his eyes, finding them burning with his emotional exhaustion and the hot tears threatening to fall again.
At least the smile was off of Mephisto's face, back to watching and devoid of any expression that Rin could parse.
He couldn't think of anything to say, lost in the way Mephisto eyed him like he was one of the test subjects, something to be picked apart and analyzed down to his bared core. Nothing left but the base components of his soul for Mephisto to do with whatever he chose.
Mephisto's next question slid into him with the careful precision of a sharpened knife, almost gently, even.
"Will you give that tie back?"
His breath halted in his lungs as Rin gripped the fabric of his coat over his tail where it rested at his heart, feeling the outline of the rumpled tie. If the material hadn't been so sturdy, he might have cut into his own chest again, though the realization came as if he were a bystander, staring down at himself in a haze.
"Lucifer was right about one thing, Mephisto. You are cruel."
Rin brought his eyes up to meet Mephisto's, seeing them glitter with some warning and Rin wondered if he disliked him agreeing with Lucifer about something like that.
He continued anyway, still feeling like he wasn't getting enough air, like the walls of the facility were closing around him, trapping him in the cold of a metal cage. His next words came out forced around the lump that had formed in his throat.
"Why are you doing this?"
Fangs revealed themselves in Mephisto's smile as he turned to glance at the clones in the room behind him like he'd just remembered their existence.
"I thought we just went over that, Rin."
Rin sucked in a thin breath, shaking his head. "Not…that."
Hesitating, Rin shot a look at the researchers clearly eavesdropping on them, suddenly very aware the conversation he was having was moving into personal territory.
Seeing his focus had a flick of Mephisto's own gaze going to the side and he must have realized the same thing because he frowned, straightening his stance so he was no longer leaning against the counter.
A moment later, Mephisto snapped them back to his office.
He leaned to sit back on his desk and arched a brow, silently asking Rin to explain himself.
Rin pressed his lips together, his heart fluttering a nervous beat in his chest as he tried to put his thoughts into a language that Mephisto-that a demon would understand.
"There's this thing you do," Rin started, words slow. "Like just now, at Section Thirteen."
Narrowed eyes and a flat gaze came with Mephisto's response. "I've done many things, you'll have to be more specific, Rin."
The rejoinder slid off Rin, knowing his next sentence wasn't going to make Mephisto any happier or less confused.
"You keep testing me. Like you're trying to push me away."
Rin could see the immediate denial on Mephisto's face, though it was probably more to the effect of his being a demon and thus incapable of having the heart required for such a thingthan any human motive Rin would recognize.
"It's like you're waiting for me to decide I've had enough and walk away. And you keep throwing these things at me like you're hoping I will."
He crossed his arms, listing out examples as if Mephisto didn't know exactly the times he was talking about. "The festival and Shima. That mission to rescue Shura. That night after the Christmas party. Yukio leaving, and my burning."
"And now this," Rin sighed, weary. His heart was a heavy weight in his chest as he tried to understand Mephisto's motives and knew he'd never get the full scope of them if he had the rest of his immortal life to try. "I'll never be able to look past something like the torture you've put these people through. I just don't have it in me to do that."
Mephisto's pupils were slivers in the acid of his eyes, mouth extended into that distorted smile and fangs bristling as he stared at Rin like a snake about to strike, never looking so inhuman as he did at that moment.
When he spoke, it sounded like a challenge. Dark and intense and, once again, almost daring Rin to get angry. To hate. To leave.
"What's. Your. Verdict. Rin."
The familiar question from Mephisto brought a tired smile to Rin's face, the sight of which made something like hesitation-or possibly fear-enter Mephisto's expression, his own smile twitching like it wanted to be a scowl.
It was funny, Rin decided, to have to spell out something he'd thought was so obvious to a creature as ancient as Mephisto.
"I already told you-and I'll keep telling you, if you don't believe me-for as long as you don't believe me, until you do," Rin said, hand coming back up to rest at his heart as he delivered his verdict with finality, holding steady in the face of Mephisto's monstrous gaze.
"I'm yours. You're mine."
Mephisto's breath left him in an animalistic hiss, claws flexing and teeth gritting.
He looked lost, scared, his hand dropping to the edge of the desk as if it was the only thing supporting him and staring at Rin with eyes wide like a child's.
A simple motion of Rin's fingers un-did his uniform and the shirt beneath it enough to reach down and take the tie from around his tail, smiling sadly at the rumpled fabric clutched in his hand and smoothing it once with his thumb.
He held it out to Mephisto, hearing his breath catch in his throat at the sight.
"So, the question isn't, 'will I give the tie back, Mephisto.' It's, 'do you want me to give you your tie back?'"
Silence met him.
That was fine. He'd said his piece. Let Mephisto do with it what he would.
Mephisto didn't respond for a long time and Rin thought he might be at a loss for words, wondering if such a thing had ever happened to him before.
Then Mephisto started shaking, arms crossing tight over his chest as if in a hug until it looked painful and he hunched over as the shaking turned into laughter.
It sounded desperate.
Rin didn't let the choking, ragged laughs faze him, knowing any reaction to such a raw question was never going to have a normal response from Mephisto.
When Mephisto jerked his head up to turn his rictus of a face on Rin, his eyes were glassy in the light and Rin wondered if he'd ever cried from something other than physical pain in the long years of his existence, if he even understood the feeling.
He kept his hand extended, waiting with a quiet patience for Mephisto to come to a decision.
The manic laughter tapered off, though the expression Mephisto wore appeared too bright to be anything but a façade as he stepped a slow, unerring path over the carpet towards Rin.
Rin stared up at him when he stopped, chest just an inch away from brushing his fingertips.
Black clawed hands came to curl around Rin's, Mephisto's chin turned down and bangs shadowing his eyes to focus on where they intertwined as if seeing them together for the first time.
This time when he looked up at Rin, it was with a smile that seemed to show all the ages he'd lived for stamped out in a timeline across his face and Rin thought he was catching a glimpse of what it really meant to be immortal in that moment.
The hands holding his gently closed, bending Rin's fingers into a firm hold over the tie.
"No, Rin," Mephisto said, bringing his hand up to press a kiss to it and murmuring his answer there like a secret just between them, "I don't want you to give me my tie back."
Something settled in Rin. He wondered again if Mephisto was experiencing the same feeling, as the tension in his body unwound and he let out a shaky breath.
His energy left with his exhale and he slumped forward, leaning on where Mephisto hands still clasped his between their bodies, the emotional exhaustion finally catching up to him as the last few hours took their toll.
"Thank you, Mephisto." The three words formed in his mouth, barely a whisper ghosting over their fingers, when he really wanted to say another set of three.
He repeated himself to avoid saying anything else.
"Thank you, thank you thankyou thankyouthankyou-"
Mephisto cut his word stream off with a hard kiss, shuddering as he released his hand only to bring him into a tight embrace like he wanted to meld their bodies together.
The words ran on in a mantra in Rin's head, the urge to say them a physical ache in his ribs and against his lips, but he forced them back with sheer willpower, knowing Mephisto was still too cut open and raw to take them well.
Rin could wait.
He had the rest of eternity to wait.
Mephisto broke away with a gasp, panting into Rin's mouth and nose pressing hard to his cheek when he didn't move back.
Needing time, Rin dropped his head to tuck it beneath Mephisto's, letting his hands rest over his back and feeling the rapid heartbeat there even out until he thought it was safe to speak.
When he did speak, it was low, not wanting to break the stillness of the room but knowing he'd have to.
"I think I should go to the next scene, now."
The hold on him tightened, reluctance to let Rin go evident in the move.
His fingers tapped in a soothing rhythm to the clothed spine under them. "I need to finish this so I can go back to my present."
"I know, Rin," came the muted voice into his hair.
"You were right, though," Rin said, a small smile forming at the admission, "I did need to come back to the past and see this."
A soft chuckle echoed, "I'm often right."
Rin took a steadying breath and pulled away, already missing being enveloped in Mephisto's scent.
He grinned, though it felt tremulous, unsure, up into the green eyes watching him before tugging his shirt open to free his tail a bit more, wincing at how tangled it was.
"This is gonna be such a pain to brush," Rin said, sighing at the knotted mess but raising his hand to present the tie to Mephisto, grin turning to a soft smile when he saw Mephisto hadn't quite recovered yet.
"Do you want to do the honors?"
Mephisto took the tie from him with an almost delicate care and Rin tracked the way he wound it back into place on his tail in a meticulous bow.
The longer strands of fur fell between Mephisto's fingers as he stared at where he let the finished product rest, pale white blending with the pastel pink of the bow and the pallor of his skin.
His claws contrasted against the fur as he drew his thumb in slow motions, just parting through with the black edge of a nail and not even tugging so that Rin barely felt him there.
"I know it's only going to get worse from here, it's okay," Rin said, voice soothing, and he laughed inwardly at the irony of comforting Mephisto instead of the other way around.
"This story ends in tragedy," Mephisto spoke the warning again, though this time it seemed more to himself as his shuttered gaze still hadn't left where he held Rin's tail.
Rin wasn't sure if Mephisto was talking about the past anymore.
He brought his hand up to cover Mephisto's, stopping his repetitive stroking and bringing his attention back.
His words came out measured and calm.
"It's okay, Mephisto."
Mephisto looked lost again, but Rin didn't think there was anything he could do about it this time.
Finally, Rin slipped his tail out of Mephisto's hand as he stepped back to tuck it away in his shirt. He slid the last button of the uniform into place, hand hesitating there as he realized he didn't have anything more to do but leave.
"I'll see you soon, well, soon for me, I guess," Rin tried, hoping to end on something positive as he turned, key in hand, to use on the door behind him.
A hand gripped his arm and he was spun around, shoved against the office door for the second time that day, his lips captured in a desperate kiss as Mephisto simultaneously pressed further to his body while tugging him as close as possible.
His other hand set at Rin's jaw, tilting his head to deepen the kiss like he was trying to memorize the taste of him.
Rin brought his hands up to frame Mephisto's face, claws running soothing lines over the wrinkles of his clenched eyes and furrowed brows.
He brushed the stray hairs away, calming the disarray until the tension singing through Mephisto eased and the kiss became less strained.
"Wasn't it you who said you weren't mad yet, but you would be if we didn't say goodbye to you?"
Mephisto had broken away to press his forehead to Rin's, speaking his words back to him from what seemed like a lifetime ago, though, Rin was realizing, for the king of time, it may as well have happened yesterday.
"You're right again." Rin closed his eyes, a wry smile on his lips at the reminder.
He drew Mephisto into one last gentle kiss, hand at the back of his neck and thumb rubbing a comforting circle at the shorter hairs there, before forcing himself to pull away a final time.
"Goodbye, I'll see you soon, I-" His lips shaped the rest of the words but-Rin shook his head, hand falling away from where he'd still been touching it to Mephisto, and he opened the door into the void.
The darkness swallowed him but the sound of Mephisto's own farewell echoed long after he'd left him behind.
A clicked echoed as the door closed on Rin's parting, bringing the scent and presence of him away until it was just Mephisto alone in the room.
The back of his neck still burned with the ghost of Rin's touch.
He could still taste him on his lips.
His steps, when he forced himself to move to his desk, seemed weighted down with all the years of his existence pressing in on him and Mephisto had to teleport himself to his chair when he found he couldn't go any further.
What did he want?
His empty room stared back at him as if in judgment.
He thought he'd known.
What did he want?
End Notes: What does Mephisto want?