Disclaimer: If i were CLAMP, this manga would have focused primarily on Ioryogi, Suishou, and the animals, as i find their story much more interesting than Kobato's.

Warnings: Swearing, Biblically-inspired violence and destruction, one sentence of gore.

Pairings: Iorogi/Suishou

Continuity: Set at the end of Ioryogi's war, which means before canon but with spoilers for late in the manga.

Pronouns: Xe/xem/xyrs for the angels. I tried other sets of neopronouns, but these just seemed to work best.

Iorogi knew what he was doing when he stole an angel.

Or so he'd like to believe, but now, with the war just about over and his kingdom overrun with the heavenly host, it was starting to look like he'd gotten in over his head.

Like hell he'd ever admit it, mind – and it wasn't like he had the forces of Hell on his doorstep.

Iorogi could still get the two of them out of this. There were other worlds. All he needed was time.

"Hold them off!" he snapped at Ginsei. The boy was looking pale, but he still wore his bravado like armor. "They won't get past me!" he proclaimed.

Iorogi nodded. "Good man." He turned to Suishou, looking lost and uncertain amidst the chaos of the battle. "Come on," he said, more gently than he knew he was capable of. "Let's go."

His angel looked up at him with large, shadowed brown eyes. "Everyone's fighting."

"Yeah. They're fighting for us, so we can be together."

Suishou took a breath, but there was no time for a conversation now. He took the angel's hand, squeezed it tight. He hoped it was reassuring. "We have to go. Or else this whole fight, it'll be for nothing."

He took off running, and his angel ran with him. Iorogi guided them back down the halls of the castle. It was no fortress anymore, not with its walls breached – hell, it didn't even hold the angels off for a moment. All it had taken was a single shout, the voices of all the host calling out as one, and the outer walls had fallen.

If he lived through this, Iorogi was going to have words with his architects.

The angels had poured in, as bright and terrible as a wildfire. Their spells should have been nothing. Iorogi's vassals had spells.

Iorogi'd fought. They'd all fought.

And it hadn't been enough. All his power, all his strength in combat, everyone who followed him, and they couldn't even stem the tide of angels sweeping in to take back from him all that he had ever loved.

And when he realized that, he knew he needed to go. He had to take Suishou and get to someplace the angels wouldn't be able to reach them – he never had any interest in the monarchy anyway. He didn't need to be king.

If he could only buy enough time to become stronger, he could return later and drive the forces of heaven away. There was still a world where he could win this.

That world was not this one. The ground was shaking. Something huge and powerful smashed into the castle, knocking the hall ahead of him into rubble. Iorogi checked his stride – it took only an instant to see before he turned and led Suishou down a side corridor.

(That rock – was it a rock? It almost looked like metal – seemed too small to cause such damage, though it would certainly kill anyone it struck. And from the angle of the impact, it couldn't have been launched from the ground. Were they attacking from above as well? That was all he needed.)

He was torn between considering exactly what kind of weapons the enemy were using against him, and ignoring them to get Suishou to safety as fast as possible. Suishou took the decision out of his hands when xe stopped stock-still, clutching Iorogi's hand in both of xyrs. He skidded to a halt, unable and unwilling to tear his angel's arm from its socket.

Suishou gave him a smile. The angel wanted to seem brave, he could see that, but he could also see how Suishou was barely holding back tears. At any moment, the floodgates might burst. "I'm sorry, Ioryogi-san," xe said. "Truly, i am. I wish i could go with you." Xe raised his hand to xyr cheek, pressing it close, hiding xyr face. Iorogi wanted to wrap his free arm around the angel, hold xem close, never let go. But there was a distance now, he could feel it. Even if he did, he wouldn't reach Suishou.

"It's too much now, can't you see?" Suishou went on. "Your people can't win. They're dying, and it will all be for nothing. We must go back – i must go back. If i do . . . i can pray for mercy. Maybe God will show mercy."

Iorogi shook his head in disbelief. "Do you really think that'll work? Look around you! Look at this – does it look like mercy to you?"

Suishou shook xyr head. "No, but you're still fighting. They won't stop until the battle is over. If you just lay down your arms . . ." Xe scrubbed the hem of xyr sleeve across xyr eyes.

Iorogi didn't care anymore. He released Suishou's hand to throw both arms around his angel. He squeezed xem tight against his chest. Suishou didn't resist him, instead leaning limply against him. He didn't know what to do. He couldn't say that he expected no mercy from the enemy – that he wouldn't show mercy in their place.

"It's the only way," Suishou murmured into his chest. "I have to try. If i can only save you . . ."

Suishou's words were like a white-hot arrow into his heart. He wanted to tear the world apart to protect his angel. He wanted to give Suishou the one and only thing xe had ever asked him for.

There was no time to do either. Someone approached from a side corridor. Iorogi heard a voice. An unfamiliar voice. A beautiful voice.

He didn't spare time to think. He opened his mouth and released a brilliant red energy beam.

The new angel hadn't been chanting an invocation for defense. That attack met his with a flare of incandescent light. Suishou screamed.

Something happened then, something Iorogi couldn't explain. His line of sight blacked out, so suddenly he thought the enemy angel's attack had blinded him.

Partially, at least – he could still catch glimpses of his home in his peripheral vision.

But no. The black shape in front of him wasn't burned into his eyes. It was like a hole in the air.

A tear through the space between him and Suishou on one end, and the angel on the other.

He could see through it, a room of the sort you saw more and more in the human world, lit red with the blast.

Then Suishou gasped and leaped forward into the rift, before Iorogi could do a thing.

"Suishou!" he bellowed, and followed without hesitation.

The room was patterned with strange shadows from the battle on the other side. Iorogi's angel knelt over a human child. A dead or dying one. One who looked just like . . .

Iorogi felt his heart stop frozen in his chest. Suishou. This child was another Suishou. The Suishou of another world.

His own Suishou looked up at him, anguish written clear across the angel's face.

He realized the angel had made a decision.

He didn't want to believe it.

Everything was still, terribly still. The battle must be over. Iorogi couldn't run any further. Even if he did, he couldn't bring his angel with him. There would be no point. He might as well die.

But he had to make sure Suishou would be alright. Even if he could never see xem again, he had to know. As long as he knew Suishou was alright . . .

Well. Iorogi had made this mess. He was man enough to face the consequences.

He raised his face to the rift in the space between white-painted walls and waited.

He didn't have to wait long. He tasted an acrid tang in the air, like lightning, and more angels appeared in the room.

There were four of them, standing at the four directions like guards. Or witnesses. Their faces were shining with light, as bright as lightning, and Iorogi had no doubt that if one of them were to strike, it would be every bit as destructive.

It hurt even to look at them.

Holy shit. Holy fuck. Was this what he had gotten himself into?

Suishou's hand tightened in his, and he looked down at his angel. His angel. Suishou was still here, standing with him, but xe looked small and terrified compared to the vessels of divine wrath around them.

He pulled Suishou close, wrapped his free arm protectively over xyr shoulders. He didn't regret it. If this was to be his death, so be it. He didn't regret one single thing he did.

Something small and white spiraled down towards them, fluttering like a falling flower petal. As it drew closer, Iorogi could make it out; it was a rabbit, or something like a rabbit, with a blank smile and feathered wings, clutching a bundle of flowers in one stubby paw.

It was so incongruous that Iorogi could do nothing but stare at it. He didn't understand. Something like that had no reason to exist, let alone visit the site of a desperate battle as it ended. It couldn't be real.

Something in his body must have revealed his confusion, or perhaps Suishou simply noticed that the stillness had gone one too long. His angel raised xyr face to his. "Ioryogi-san?"

He didn't even think to correct xyr pronunciation of his name. He barely even noticed. "What the hell is that?" he muttered.

Suishou turned in his arms, following his gaze. Iorogi heard a soft intake of breath. "Usyagi-san?"

At last he looked down at Suishou. "What was that?"

Worry creased Suishou's forehead as xe returned xyr eyes to him. "Usyagi-san is God's special messenger. It must have come to pass God's judgement."

Iorogi felt as if the ground had dropped out from under him. "You're kidding me. That thing?"

Suishou pressed him back, stepped in front of him as if that slight frame could shield him from the wrath of Heaven. "Please, Usyagi-san! Please allow me to fix this!"

There was no part of that rabbit's face that could hint at its thoughts. That was the worst kind of enemy to face. Iorogi put a hand on Suishou's shoulder – to do what, he didn't know.

Suishou didn't even seem to notice. "That child has done nothing wrong. She does not deserve to be a casualty of a war she knows nothing about and had no part in. Please, if i have the same soul she does, let me use my life to save hers."

The rabbit regarded xem silently. With one paw, it freed a flower from the bunch it clutched and offered the blossom to the angel. Iorogi didn't know what it was. Some kind of rose, maybe, but different. That detail shouldn't matter, but everything stood out in stark clarity. Focusing on irrelevant details was the only way to keep it from hurting.

Suishou stepped forward – Iorogi followed helplessly – he couldn't let go now, couldn't let Suishou face this alone – and held up both hands. The flower drifted down through the air from the rabbit to the angel. When it touched Suishou's palms, it vanished in a burst of white light.

Iorogi flinched back from the brightness. Cold knowledge was spreading from Suishou's body into his, through his hand on xyr shoulder. His stomach roiled. He hadn't felt this awful since his first battle.

The rabbit had something to show them – the world shifted.

They were in two places at once. Iorogi still stood with Suishou in the bare room, the human child crumpled at their feet. That hadn't changed, or the rabbit floating above them and the four other angels surrounding them at the cardinal points.

At the same time, they were in the ruins of what had been Iorogi's fortress. The stonework had been smashed to pieces – no, that wasn't a strong enough description. The entire building had been ground down to gravel and sand. The foundation and grounds were nothing but rubble, even into the forest. Massive trees that had always loomed over Iorogi's memories were smashed to splinters.

And that was only the landscape.

The people – Iorogi's people – some soldiers, some who weren't – were just as devastated. There were shattered bodies, faces with the eyes burned from their sockets, pools of blood, broken bits of bone. Everywhere.

Suishou stepped back, against Iorogi. His arm went around the angel without direction from his mind, which was still reeling from the destruction.

Survivors were being herded together. Distantly Iorogi recognized Ginsei and Genkai among them, but didn't have it in him even to feel relief. The toll had been too great.

If this was the fury Heaven unleashed on its enemies, Iorogi would hate to see how they treated perceived traitors.

No. he would never allow that to happen. He pulled Suishou behind him. "I'm the one you want. I'm the one who forced xem to come."

The rabbit turned its blank, all-seeing gaze on him. Iorogi swallowed. "Go on, do your worst to me," he said. "But Suishou doesn't deserve this. Neither does that kid, or anyone else." Behind him, Suishou made a soft sound.

The rabbit tipped its head. Iorogi wished very much that he could read its expression. Anything to know what that damnable thing was thinking.

He could hear Suishou swallow, and the angel stepped out from behind him. "Please, Usyagi-san," xe said. "If a foolish angel such as myself is able to make this right, please allow me to try."

Usyagi waved a stubby paw. It took a striped rose from the bunch and held it forth.

Suishou stepped forward. He clutched at xem, but Suishou gently removed his hand. "It's alright now, Ioryogi-san," xe said with a watery smile. "I'll do whatever i must. Thank you for everything."

Iorogi was helpless to do anything but watch as the angel who had been his accepted the flower. Suishou's face lit up. All tension had visibly left xyr body. "Thank you – thank you, Usyagi-san!"

Iorogi's breath caught. He wanted to leap forward and catch Suishou and never let go, stop the angel from sacrificing xyrself for this. It was all his own – Suishou should never–

But this was what the angel wanted. If Iorogi interfered now, he would lose xem forever.

(He would lose xem anyway, he had to–)

It was too late. Suishou was gone, absorbed into the human child's body as if vanishing into a mirror. The human gasped. The deathly pallor faded from her cheeks. She was alive. She was alive because Suishou's own soul was sustaining her–

Iorogi lunged forward. He couldn't stop himself. Never mind the angel's wishes, he would yank xem out of the human–

Something stopped him. Iorogi couldn't move any closer to the human child. Something was holding him off. The other angels, surrounding him from the four directions, flared brighter. Blindingly bright.

He cast about for somewhere else to look, and he spotted the rabbit floating overhead.

Suishou said that rabbit was God's special messenger. That it was here to deliver God's judgement.

There was nothing more Iorogi could do. His own strength had failed.

He would have to appeal to a higher authority.

Iorogi flung himself onto his knees, on the ground in front of the rabbit. Bile rose in his throat. He was angry – at the world, at Suishou, at himself, at God, for the way everything had turned out. For having to do this. Because he was afraid.

Suishou could die, and he would bow his head. To an enemy.

"Please," he said hoarsely. "You have to save them. Both of them."

The rabbit continued to stare down at him with the same inscrutable expression.

Iorogi ducked his head as a tidal wave of emotion threatened to overwhelm him, so strong he could no longer tell what its component parts were. "I know!" he snarled through the pain. "I know it's not what Suishou wants! But i need Suishou to live, and if that girl doesn't survive too, Suishou will never be able to forgive xyrself. I don't care if xe hates me – i don't care what happens to me! Just save those two." No, it was no good. His naturally domineering self was coming through too much. "Please!" he added through gritted teeth.

He heard the sound of fluttering wings, and looked up to Usyagi's approach. The rabbit's face didn't change, it didn't make an attempt to speak, but it separated another flower from the bunch and offered it to him. Iorogi recognized this one. Wolfsbane.

He put out his hand. The flower vanished as it brushed against his palm. He breathed in sharply as knowledge flooded into his mind.

The girl's name was Kobato Hanato, and she had already been fragile. Iorogi's war had shattered her very constitution. Suishou's soul would be fused with hers until she had recovered. In the process, all her accumulated experiences would be lost. Iorogi would have to protect her until she could survive on her own. He would have to help her fulfill her wish, whatever that was.

And all the while, as a punishment, Iorogi would lose his true shape. People would think he was nothing but a toy. They would look down on him. And he would have to put up with it.

"Fine," he growled though gritted teeth. "I accept your terms. I'll do it."

As he spoke, power engulfed him. (He couldn't call it magic. This was reality itself.) His strength evaporated. His body collapsed – or was he shrinking?

When it settled, he looked down at himself. His arms and legs were soft, stubby, and blue. He hoped to whatever power might still care that he didn't look just like that damn rabbit. He felt his face – both his hands and what might be a muzzle squished under pressure. Whatever. He'd take it.

He didn't regret anything. He couldn't.

Floriography used:

Dog rose – pleasure & pain

Striped rose – hope for unity

Wolfsbane – knight

A/N: I always thought that Ioryogi and Suishou's storyline was more interesting than Kobato's, though it is very CLAMP to take the collateral damage of a war shaking the foundations of Heaven and Earth, and then to make her the main character of the story rather than focus on the war itself.