A tiny photo of a smiling girl, the friends around her cropped out of view. A photo of a man caught in the middle of a laugh. A photo of a woman making a silly face for a silly photo. A disheveled collection of smiling, happy faces, immortalized in the still frames of thin pieces of printed paper. If they were still smiling today, was unknown. If they would ever truly smile again, was a mystery. How many could still see the light of day? How many would never see it ever again?
Papers stretched across the entirety of a surface, shift around in a loose shuffle, before being scooped hastily into washi paper folders. Characters reading out unspoken names passing by. Photographs and prints of forgotten faces stuffed between the masses of paper. A pencil rolls into the folder, swept along with the tide of paper. A hand reaches out to take the pencil, yet stops midway in a pause. A shrug of finger movements motioning as they simply left the pencil to its fate. The files and folders were then picked up, stuffed into a briefcase before it was locked and sealed with fidgeting hands.
Within the darkness of the small house, only cracks of pale, dewy light from the crevices of the front door lit the interior. A prominent disarray of sealed garbage bags and wrinkled clothes hid within the shadows and corners, out of the way and out of sight.
The suitcase was picked up by its handle. Its carrier sharply turned and made their immediate way towards the light that emanated from the distant door. Yet something halted them in their tracks, not a noise, not a sight, not a smell, nor a taste, a feeling. Indented into the nearby wall, just outside the carrier's peripheral, the frozen stare of paper eyes bore into them. A small, dusty shrine on a lone shelf, upon it, sat the memory of a smiling, young woman.
Droplets of water fell upon the solid wood flooring, landing right in front of the suitcase carrier's feet. With a deep inhale of their hunched posture, their shoulders and body lifting with each breath, they swiped a sleeve across their face before continuing their way to the front door. Turning the doorknob and shoving it open, the pale light of a cloudy day shines onto the carrier and leaks into the house behind them. The door shuts closed behind them, submerging the house in shadows once again after but a small glimpse of sunlight.
A car door opens, and the suitcase is placed loosely upon the passenger seat. Placing themselves onto the driver's seat was an individual in the middle of combing their hair neatly into what appeared to be a smooth bowl cut, the bangs seemingly slightly brushed to a mild tilt. Adjusting the neck of their black turtleneck comfortably. The dark shades of the sweater lined up finely with the black suit they wore over it. Steady hands buttoning the sleeves to their suit with minimal finger movement. Eyes utilizing the rear view mirror for inspecting their face for loose hairs or any other impurities. A rather healthy face, kept well care of and maintained. A lack of facial hair of any kind. A lack of many wrinkles or blemishes, a younger appearance than the truth.
The rear view mirror is accidentally bumped from its original orientation by a stray finger. The individual's focus veers from their face, over to the reflection of a woman standing across the street, staring at the car. They find themselves frozen in place, staring at the little woman in the mirror. The attention and professionalism that sang through their actions, silently melting in a gradual spiral with the slight tremble of an index finger upon a lowering hand.
A little woman in the mirror, dressed in all black, her expression too small to see. Something that is shaped like a smile, yet does not feel anything like one. With a slow turn, they steadily continue down the sidewalk, leaving the space of the little mirror. Yet the eyes can't pull away from it, glued to the reflection. The car hums to life, and begins driving off to its destination.
Eyes watch the traffic carefully, glancing towards signs and advertisements, people passing to and from. Blue lights, yellow lights, red lights, flicking overhead in dizzying, demanding patterns. All things that didn't require too much thought. Yet, in their drifting thoughts, something seemed to be calling out to them. Something calling out their name? Spelling out their name?
"What is that?" The driver mumbles to themself in a bewildered tone as their attention hones in on something on the side of the road. A baffled expression growing upon their face. It was spelling out their name! Jumping around and dancing, calling them and only them out in specific.
"Please Pick Me Up! Hatsu Furutani!" A sign, dangling from the chest of a seemingly energetic man dressed in slacks and a suit, read out. The man was waving towards the driver with a big open smile on their face.
The car pulled over to the side of the road, the man quickly skipping over to it. Opening the passenger door, the man looked over to the driver, then down at the suitcase occupying the seat. The driver reached over to grab the case, lifting it up to toss it into the backseats to clear the space. Yet in the process of doing so, the young man had already slammed shut the passenger door and crawled into the backseats. Pausing with the suitcase in their hand, the driver simply placed it back down onto the passenger seat.
"Uncle! It's been a while!" The man exclaimed with a big smile on their face. They were a young person of a rather average height and build, if not a little on the short side. Their hair was a disheveled case of what could be best described as simply bed hair, with a noticeable trait of the left side of their hair being seemingly bleached to an unnatural shade of blonde while the rest remained an untouched and pure shade of common black.
"You. You're Goro, right? What do you think you're doing?" The driver asked as he stared at the young man through the reflection of the rear view mirror. Their voice holding a tone akin to a mild scold, yet not fully realized or pressed.
"You're heading to that city, right? I can't remember the name. But it's where the terrorist struck, correct?!" The young man replied, staring at the driver with wide, bright eyes as he adjusted and scooted himself in the backseats.
"I am. What about it? Why were you dancing on the side of the road with my name written all on your chest? People might get the wrong idea." The driver asked, watching their supposed nephew struggle to take off the mentioned sign in the cramped space.
"Did you like it?! That was my ingenuity and idea! And it worked!" The nephew responded in an optimistic, unserious tone after they pulled their head out from the sign.
"What are you talking about?" The driver asked, trying to get to the point.
"I'm supposed to ride with you over there!" Goro then says with a smile, playfully giving their uncle's arm a poke.
"What?" The driver questioned with narrowing, confused eyes.
"Me and the old folks know you don't answer the phone when family calls, but apparently you also don't answer it when the department calls either! I'm a new member of the Public Safety Devil Hunters! I'm being sent as backup!" Goro informed the confused Hatsu, waving his hands around and making phone shaped gestures during the explanation.
"You?! Why are you part of Public Safety?!" Hatsu jerked his head around towards the young man as his tone bursted out of its simple demeanor in surprise.
"You know how dangerous it is, right?! Your folks were ok with this?! And how'd they even let you in with that delinquent hair?!" Hatsu's hesitation and casualness seemed to disperse upon realizing his nephew's situation, ready to give a full on lecture and scolding.
"I know it's dangerous. I know you haven't checked in on us in a while, but the family has been struggling lately. Money is hard to keep these days. I got to do my part! Well, for the time at least! Eventually my big sister will make sure the family is taken care of, we'll probably move in with her at Fukuoka once she gets that promotion." Goro explained, his voice and volume become more gentle and reserved. A small smile still etched on their face as they stared at Hatsu.
"In plus, I'm not even contracted to a devil yet! I just joined! So I'll probably be stuck in the office as an intern for the time being!" The young man assured the driver, his unserious tone starting to return.
"Oh! And this hair? I'll have you know it's for a good cause! Before graduation, me and a few classmates of mine bleached our hair because a buddy of ours was worried about their naturally blonde hair! Blonde should not be considered a sign of delinquency! And I'll stand for that!" Goro finished, planting a fist against his chest with a proud smirk.
Hatsu stared at the young man for a few seconds, their expression mellowing in what looked to be deep thought. They did not appear optimistic, happy, anything positive or reassuring, simply understanding or at the very least, compliant. With a small sigh, they turned their head back toward the front of the car, shifting the vehicle back into gear.
"How is your older sister doing by the way?" Hatsu asked, keeping their eyes on the road. Their tone held a feeling of reluctance, a feeling of a disliked acceptance.
"Good! She writes letters to us every week! The company and workplace is very generous and kind, and last I heard, she might have found her special someone in life!" Goro cheered as he poked his head out from between the front seats.
"That's good to hear." Hatsu simply responded. The car exited the bustling streets of Osaka, delving into the rural countryside.
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A bloodied arm flies through the air. Scrambling feet, wearing a vast assortment of varying shoes desperately flee. A malformed head is sawed in half. Yodels and singing continuously fill the air as the human shaped appendage of the massive devil swings freely in the air.
This particular yodel, regards the singer as someone who likes to yodel and sing.
The whirling of a saw sounds as blood jettisons all over the exposed teeth and deformed face of a man with whirling buzzsaws covering their head.
The singer loves to yodel so much, they travel to the Alps every year.
A pair of legs are sliced off by a circular saw, toppling the fleeing body onto the ground with a meaty thud.
The singer travels to the Alps every year, because a yodeler, is always welcomed in the Alps.
A piston from the Buzzsaw Man's arm extends outwards, raising a deformed body up into the air. The circular blade whirling wildly, sawing the body in half while gravity holds them in place. Blood showering onto any standing below the grisly display.
And a yodeler, is most happy and free in the Alps.
"Huh. So he is like that chainsaw guy in Tokyo." Noriko commented quietly as both her and Aishi watched the elevated body get sawed in half right outside the alleyway. The crowd surrounding the black car no longer paying the two devil hunters inside any mind as their proportionless eyes were locked onto the alleyway entrance.
Members of the crowd had swarmed to the entryway of the alley, stacking on top of each other with their blades and knives at the ready. Frozen in their unflinching position of defense as their eyes watched the oncoming enemy intently. The last fleeing members from the alley slipped through tiny gaps in the wall of bodies, finding refuge once more within the crowd that flooded the street. Blood rained down upon the phalanx of deformed bodies as the body elevated above them was continually sawed in half, right down the middle. When the body finally gave way, the two halves falling into the crowd, the elongated tongues of the phalanx slither across their heads and faces to lick and suck the blood that had come to shower them. While the tongues crawled and suckled, their eyes remained completely focused.
On the other side of the wall of bodies, the blood stained Buzzsaw Man could be seen bobbing their head side to side in rhythm with the yodeling that had been continuously deafening to those all around. Once a deafening detriment to them, they now seemed to be enjoying it.
"Not my usual jam. But like hell I'm going to pass up the chance to rock out while sticking it to a devil!" The Buzzsaw Man exclaimed as his elongated tongue flung around wildly. The saws on his feet spinning up once more, sparks scattering all across, preparing for another launch forward. The phalanx aimed their knives and tightened their formation as they prepared for the Buzzsaw Man to charge.
When the Buzzsaw Man launched forward, his direction curved, sending his path vertically upwards across one of the walls of the alleyway. The phalanx simultaneously tilted their heads and blades up as the man launched into a somersault high above, headed straight towards them, straight above them. Whirling saw blades plunging into the faces of two members positioned at the very top of the wall, toppling the wall of bodies over before the Buzzsaw Man glided forward, soaring further into the crowd.
Blood and screams sprayed and splattered as the Buzzsaw Man was treating the mass of devilish bodies flooding the road like a bumpy, fleshy ice rink. Demented giggling escaped the hybrid's mouth as they continuously cut and sliced with their feet in a twisted skating performance. Their head bobbing side to side more and more as the yodeling flooded their absent ears. The man was beginning to lose themself in the music.
The Buzzsaw Man did not know much about the Alps, yodeling, or the Alpine people, but he recalled at this moment, a postcard he once saw. It featured a blond, smiling girl with lengthy, curling pigtails, holding an amass of mugs in both hands. Making a lean to the side, he veered himself from the edge of the crowd, right back towards the center of the panicking mass of bodies.
The Buzzsaw Man's head bobbed side to side more and more, the reality through his tube-like eyes beginning to distort. Looking towards the green mountains that encapsulated the small city, his mind started to paint a picture of what it would be like to be in the Alps. Reaching a hand down into the crowd, he pulled up a random, alarmed member of the mob. He spun around to begin skating across the crowd backwards as he dragged the random member behind him by the hands.
"Won't you allow me this dance, milady?!" The Buzzsaw man yelled over the screams and yodels before proceeding to swing the random member's hands around aimlessly with their own. The member was what looked to be a salary man with an upside down face, yet to the Buzzsaw Man, they were at this very moment, the pretty pigtail girl from the poster card.
"Blee blah bloo blah vrah vrah kaaa! Knees some boo ba cram da yee!" The Buzzsaw Man attempted to sing, trying to imitate the words being sung by the yodels that they were dancing to so feverishly. A beautiful ice rink in the green mountains of the winter Alps, dancing with a girl he met at the local pub, who fell for his amazing singing. The girl's golden pigtails whipping and swinging around in the wind wildly. She let out a funny sounding giggle as she gave a big, cheeky smile with rose colored, freckled cheeks, exposing the noticeable gap between her two front teeth.
Aishi and Noriko, trapped within the confines of the black car, watched the unhinged display with slightly dropped jaws and furrowed brows. They both were seemingly trying to process what was currently happening. The clearly unhinged figure that was once the new member of Fourth Division, Wei-Ting, was currently dancing while rollerblading across a sea of deformed, scrambling, devil-possessed bodies. Skating and slicing through the heads of countless human bodies, their "dancing" was really nothing but wildly swinging the unfortunate body clutched in their hands around, far off tempo.
"Cheep cheep. Cheep cheep cheep!" The pigtailed girl made what sounded like an imitation of rapid chicken noises, as if trying to say something to her dancing partner.
"What's that?! What did you say?!" The Buzzsaw Man replied with another yell as he turned his nonexistent ear towards them and leaned in closer.
"I said, you should give me your cassette player!" The girl stated, their voice distorting and warping from a funny, high pitched squeal, into a familiar, androgynous voice, mid sentence. The Buzzsaw Man jerked his head back towards the girl. Yet it was no longer the girl, it was Plyn, wearing the girl's dress and sporting her bouncy pigtails. The Scam Fiend simply gave a mischievous smile, showing off their pointed canines and bouncing their eyebrows up and down. The winter Alp mountains surrounding them, beginning to fade, and the ice rink below them, starting to melt away.
Before the Buzzsaw Man could even properly react, only having the chance to let their jaw drop. A monstrous, ghoulish scream tore through the sound of yodeling. Turning towards the scream, reality nonconsensually returned to the Buzzsaw Man's vision just in time to witness a giant fist made entirely of deformed human bodies rocket right towards them. Each finger made up of a cluttered cluster of legs, while the knuckles were bloated, screaming, human faces.
The fist impacted the unsuspecting Buzzsaw Man, sending them and their dance partner somersaulting wildly over the blood drenched crowd. Passing over the crowd, they landed right into one of the open, giant mouths of the pillar of flesh that was the Yodel Devil. Right as they landed upon the tongue, the monstrous pair of teeth shut closed. Blood squirting and spraying from between the rows of teeth. The yodeling finally ceasing as the colossal devil began to chew.
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"Wei-Ting!" A worried shout emits from the black car's interior. The fiend inside had lunged themselves forward upon witnessing the Buzzsaw Man getting eaten by the Yodel Devil. Their trembling eyes watched blood squirt and spray from between the monstrous pair of teeth in horror and disbelief.
"I can't take this. I have to take responsibility for this." Aishi began mumbling to himself as his gloved fingers reached for the lock on his door. Tears looked to be leaking from his eyes.
"Aishi. What are you doing? You know you can't do anything significant to a devil like that. You're just going to die." Noriko scolded as she grabbed onto one of the fiend's arms.
"It hasn't even been an entire day, and our newest member is already dead!" Aishi snapped in response, his demeanor was leaking of overwhelming guilt and shame as water flowed down the sides of his pale face.
"It happens all the time in this line of work, Aishi. You know this." Noriko responded, picking up her volume and tone, trying to calm the fiend as best as she could.
"I'm the one who dragged you all here! Someone just died because of my own selfish wish to hear that accursed yodeling once more! I'm the reason he's dead! His blood is on my hands!" Aishi cried out, jerking his arm free of her grasp and pulling the lock on his car door up.
"I can't live with the shame of walking away from this alive, when a member of the division I am supposed to be responsible for dies." Aishi finished in a strained whisper before he opened the door and exited, leaving the safety of the black car.
"We're not an official div-" Noriko began to speak, but was cut off by the car door slamming shut behind Aishi.
Dead, discarded bodies and blood now scattered the road that was once overflowed by the demented crowd. Now at its center, were the remaining members, huddled and cluttered around the giant fist composed of malformed and warped flesh.
"Eat up. Eat up! My sweetheart! How does the blood of that devil hunter taste?! They won't be bothering us any more!" A rumbling, booming voice with a familiar tone echoed from within the clutch of the giant fist. Discarded, empty clothes and shoes littering the floor around the fist, and the bodies pressing themselves against the base of its arm indicated that the fist was composed entirely of members of the crowd itself. Flesh, reconfigured and repurposed, individuals amalgamated into a single, defined entity.
The fist then reeled itself backwards, the legs of the human fingers dancing and kicking their feet upwards like synchronized swimmers performing a show, like yoga practitioners entering an asana, like puppets of flesh obeying silent tugs upon their strings. With the fingers uncurling, the hand exposed its palm to the sky, revealing what lay sealed within. A single, warped arm rose from a tumorous mass of screaming faces at the center of the palm. Each elongated finger upon this singular arm seemingly originated from different bodies, judging by the varying skin tones and shapes, meshed together by a calcified sleeve similar to incomplete bone. The warped arm twirled its divergent fingers in the air, the giant amalgamated hand obeying and swirling its large fingers around the base of the palm until the structure of flesh blossomed into a bouquet-like structure. At the spiral's base, the molds and shapes of large human bodies could be seen emerging and forming, kneeling like a mass holding up the weight of something tremendous.
The members of the crowd, not yet assimilated into the flesh, rotated their heads in unnatural degrees towards the torture fiend. Gazing their horde of yellowing eyes upon the exposed, pale flesh, that was willingly leaving the comfort of their motorized sanctuary.
"Torture. That's you, isn't it? The devil you are? You're much more… Pathetic. In person." The booming voice emanated once again from the pillar of flesh, a gravely, stained tone, much akin, if not the same voice of the shriveled figure from earlier. The tumor of screaming faces at the palm's center then bloated into a mushroom-like shape before sculpting itself into something more defined.
"Much to be desired for something so… Feared and resented." The voice continued as its body took a more definite shape. A crown of around six human heads, all missing their lower jaws. Each head facing a different direction while their eyes honed and strained to look upon whatever their master's gaze followed. A singular, large mouth with enough teeth for three separate people, constantly grinning with muscly gums and missing lips. A horrendously long, veiny tongue dangling from an orifice below the mouth to represent a trailing, trimmed beard of a wise man. A strip of youthful, pure flesh wrapped around the length above the freakish mouth, where a pair of, gentle, neatly trimmed eyes remained closed shut, like a monk in peaceful meditation. Ears with elongated and stretched lobes marked the ends of where the strip of flesh began and ceased upon the abomination's flesh.
"It's truly a shame." The voice continued as the mass moved closer to the edge of the pillar of flesh. Its torso was composed and structured by exposed limbs, hands and feet. Screaming, bloated, and stretched faces made the rounded shoulders while decorations of bones and calcified fillings made its upper humanoid body complete. Its lower body grounded and connected to the mass of bubbling, shifting flesh within the center of the gigantic palm.
"I too enjoy the Yodel Devil's singing!" Aishi yelled abruptly with a cracked voice toward the devil as he carefully walked toward it. Each step hesitant as the last, each breath, waiting to be its last.
"Oh? You're a fan of my beloved's music?" The devil's echoing voice croaked as it snapped its head into a sudden, crooked tilt. The sound of a bone snapping filling the air upon the sudden tilt.
"I brought my team here. Just so I could hear it. Just so I could get the chance to listen to its beautiful song once again. I've heard it's gorgeous up in the Bavarian Alps, so I wanted to picture myself there by way of its song." The fiend confessed, admitting his sin with trembling and shaking words. Atoning and making peace with himself, even if in his heart, he knew he wasn't ready. There was no heaven for a devil to go to, there was no salvation.
"Yet it wouldn't hurt to try. " The fiend thought to himself, trying to cope with his decision.
"Admirable. I wish circumstances were different so we could talk. But I said. What I said. I'm a simple devil. With simple needs and simple desires. And when I say you are going to die. I simply mean you are going to die." The devil croaked with its straining voice, the horrid mouth remaining unmoving as it spoke its grisly words. It extended a deformed finger forward, and the crowd drew their knives and blades on command, aiming towards the trembling fiend.
Aishi pursed his lips as he took a shaky inhale of breath. His gloved hands in clenched, trembling fists, gathering his thoughts as he prepared to scream his final, last words. What could he even say at this moment? What could he even do? What would a human do in their final moments?
"Drown them in blades, my crowd." The simple devil simply commanded in an unenthusiastic voice. The horde rushed forward the moment the final syllable left the abomination's elongated tongue that twitched and wriggled, curling and whirling with each word spoken like a beheaded snake.
Aishi gritted his teeth as he took another inhale, bloating his lungs with air to scream his last bloody murder.
Then. A muffled, whirling noise caught the attention of all upon the street. The crowd halted in their tracks, Aishi choked his scream as his eyes wrenched themselves open, and the devil spun its head around as its arm was raised to halt the crowd. All eyes veering towards the Yodel Devil behind them as its body bubbled, boiled, and wriggled around violently.
"Beloved? What's wrong? Are you unwell?" The simple devil hesitantly asked its twitching, thrashing partner, as the whirling noise grew louder and louder from inside it. The crooked mass of flesh grinds its armada of mouths and teeth around in what appeared to be a warped expression of agony. Limbs going flail and limb, falling and collapsing to the ground. Diseased blood of unnatural colorings, squirting from bloated bubbles of flesh stemming from its center.
"Yodel?" The simple devil's crooked, booming voice asked in a shred of concern. The Yodel Devil's body gradually bloated all around the thin stem at the center of its twisted body in the next few seconds. Starting with a jettison of blood hosing down a body or two of the crowd, wiping them across the street, before it began raining down upon all around. The Yodel Devil's body collapsed like a bouncy castle deflating, as its center exploded and raptured in a blossoming of gore, unleashing a ravenous noise that was none other than the whirling of buzzsaws, and the howling of maddening laughter.
"You thought you could kill Buzzsaw Man that easily?! You just tossed me into the worst and only all you can eat buffet I've ever been in!" The Buzzsaw Man exclaimed as the saws on their arms continued spinning, their entire body drenched by the Yodel Devil's malformed and discolored blood.
The devil of the crowd stared at the Buzzsaw Man in disbelief. His echoing, raspy voice cracking, searching for words but only emitting grunts of confusion and despair.
"I think I get it now! You're the idiot devil! The devil of morons and imbeciles! 'Cause you and this flash mob are nothing but dumbasses!" The Buzzsaw Man mocked as they wobbled and stumbled out the collapsed remains of the Yodel Devil, laughing and pointing at the devil.
"I'll kill you." The echoing voice trembled in a mutter as the crowd around them started to convulse and shake in an erratic fashion.
"Huh?! Speak up, will ya?!" The Buzzsaw Man yelled as he placed a hand near where his ear should be.
The bouquet of giant fingers slammed shut like the teeth of a bear trap, and every member of the crowd gravitated in a violent manner towards the pillar of flesh, sinking into and expanding its mass. The mass then began lunging forward on a horde of jumbling, incomplete limbs as it hurled itself towards Buzzsaw Man in pure rage.
"I'll kill you!" A giant imprint of a screaming face bulged out from the hurtling mass of flesh as the devil's voice grew more and more ghoulish and inhuman. A laugh started to brew as the Buzzsaw Man charged toward the catapulting mass, revving the saws on his arms.
"I'll kill you dead!" The voice continued as malformed, giant fists emerged from the mass to pulverize and smash the hybrid flat into the pavement. Blood spilling and chunks of flesh and limbs hurling off as the circular saws slashed and cleaved at the swarm of pummels thrown.
"How dare you mock the Crowd Devil!" The screaming face distorted into a mob of screaming human heads. The mass of bodies threw even more flesh, more force, and more desperation trying to crush the gorger of their lover. The robber of their comfort and simplicity.
"How dare you decimate my work and pride!" The Crowd Devil bellowed. Blood mixing with blood, drenching the discarded and torn bodies of those once collected and controlled. Yet the more the devil threw at the Buzzsaw Man, the more they lost.
"How dare you take away my precious Yodel!" The Crowd Devil cried as the various pairs of eyes that made up their face wept and teared. The devil was feeding every part of themself into the fire that was their rage and anger. Lunging forth, incomplete fists that pummeled and swarmed all around the Buzzsaw Man, like a den of vipers collectively tearing down any who dare step upon their lair with fangs and venom. The Buzzsaw Man lowered himself further and further with the sound of cracking bones as he was overwhelmed, yet continued swinging his saws around wildly, still fighting against the sea of flesh consuming him. Like anything that doesn't belong in the sea, he will eventually drown. Between the fire and the sea, only time will judge who remains.
The sound of an engine then roars through the air, followed by a sudden crash of steel ramming into the Crowd Devil's back, splattering more blood across the street. The sounds of loose bones cracking and shattering throughout the bulbous body.
"Ack?!" The Crowd Devil choked with a reverberating grunt as their malformed body jerked backwards in reaction to the sudden impact. Their body losing balance and collapsing atop the black, busted up car that had rammed into them. Aishi behind the wheel, and Noriko sitting in the passenger seat, both currently dealing with and recovering from the airbags that just went off.
The Crowd Devil began letting out shrieks of pain as the whirling of Buzzsaws started up once again. The Buzzsaw Man peeked out their four tubular eyes from the devil's lower body. Climbing atop the devil's body as their saws whirled a few times each, just enough to dig into the flesh, fancying them like that of a mountain climber's ice picks that carried them upward.
"No! Stay away! Stay back!" The devil begged as it tried to crawl away, its giant representation of a face beginning to shrivel as it tried stretching itself away from the main body. The Buzzsaw Man gradually grew a ravenous chuckle with each step taken, approaching the begging devil's face.
"Who dare? How dare? You asked? Well, when you get to hell." The Buzzsaw Man growled, leaning over the giant, malformed face.
"Tell 'em Buzzsaw sent ya!" With a holler into the sky, the Buzzsaw Man reeled his arms back as the circular saws hungrily whirled to life. With a thrust of his arms, the pistons extended, driving themselves into the devil's neck and digging through the flesh and blood. Gore rocketing into the air while the hybrid's head swung around wildly, letting his elongated tongue swing freely in the bloody breeze. A final scream of agony howling out the giant, deformed, shifting, shriveling head. The sound gradually dying down to a breathy hiss as the air escaped from their mangled organs.
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The car below the devil's corpse then began making a peculiar noise as the saws continued whirling. The sound of metal against metal beginning to sound.
"Huh? Oh no- Wei-Ting! No! Stop! You're cutting the engine! No! Wei-Ting! Stop stop stop!" Aishi began yelling upon realizing that the Buzzsaw Man's circular blades had already cut through the devil's flesh, and were now cutting into the front hood of the car. His voice drowned out under the muffle of the car and the howling laughter. The fiend frantically lowered the window to stick his head out of it.
"Wei-Ting! Stop! You're going to ruin the car!" Aishi yelled once again, wedging and squeezing his head out the halfway down window.
"Whaaat?" The Buzzsaw Man yelled in response, the saws still whirling and obliviously cutting deeper into the car's hood. The engine inside beginning to howl in malfunction and error.
"Stop! It's dead! Stop stop stop! Stop the buzzsaws!" Aishi frantically begged as he stuck his arm out the window and began waving it around. The saws then halted to a stop, the pistons retracted back into the Buzzsaw Man's arms. Aishi let out a breath of relief as he brought his head back into the car. The bloated corpse rolled off the side of the car, and the Buzzsaw Man tumbled onto the hood of the beaten car. The amass of devil blood across the hood caused the hybrid to immediately slip and fall. With a roll of their body off the front, the Buzzsaw Man landed clumsily onto the blood-coated street feet first.
Silence dawned across the street as everyone took a moment to process and recover from the past, recent events. The corpse of the Yodel Devil, ripped and torn to an unrecognizable pile of flesh. The devil's limbs and curtains of meat hanging and dangling from the wires of overhead telephone poles. The middle of the street sprawling its organs out to give a clear view of the other side of the road past it. The corpse of the Crowd Devil, sawed completely in half, right under its deformed, screaming shape of a head. The carcass morphing and deflating slowly into what appeared to be a mass of cluttered bones.
A familiar whistle out in the distance playfully approaches the three from the side of the street. The sound of squishing blood and organs sounding with each step as they tiptoed and hopped around. They were trying their best to avoid the gory carnage like one would avoid drenching their shoes in puddles from a rainy day. A short figure with blond hair revealing themself casually as the source of the whistling, as they leisurely took their time to walk over to the battered, beaten, black car. Their strangely decorated eyes gazing and glancing around the messy street while their tongue continued to wordlessly sing into the air.
"Welp! Seems like a job well done to me!" The Scam Fiend exclaimed with a big smile as they adjusted the odd frying pan with the extended handle over their shoulder into a more comfortable position. Waving and easing the utensil down like one would with a reliable, two handed weapon.
The car window lowered fully, tilting and jumbling while making unpleasant squeaking noises as it did so. Aishi and Noriko both peeking out the window to look towards Plyn, while the Buzzsaw Man was staring out, past the Yodel's Devil's pile of organs.
"Yes! Both devils are exterminated! And everyone is alive, and ok!" Aishi replied with a joyous expression, overwhelmed with relief of seeing each and every member of his unofficial division moving and breathing. Circular blades bursted out of the Buzzsaw Man's feet, raising him off the ground by a few inches. Aishi was still looking towards Plyn, while Noriko was looking right towards the transformed Wei-Ting, before leaning their head to the side to see past the hybrid.
"Aishi?" Noriko called the fiend with her usual, quiet tone while her eyes remained pointed towards the front of the car.
"Yes?" Aishi quickly replied, turning his head toward the woman without a worry on his mind.
"You really are a Buzzsaw Man! Really showed them devils who's boss, huh?" Plyn said as they turned toward the Buzzsaw Man standing in front of the car.
"Fight on! Fight on!" A man's voice proudly cheered in the distance, emitting from further down the street, far past the Yodel Devil's corpse.
"Remember the other day when we were in the lobby to hand in Third Division's paperwork." Noriko asked, keeping her eyes forward.
"Mmhm, and we overheard Second Division complaining about the chainsaw man fanboy!" Aishi recalled, nodding his head, continuing to remain oblivious to an upcoming disaster.
"Buzz? What's wrong, partner?" Plyn asked, curious as to why they weren't getting a response from the transformed Wei-Ting.
The Buzzsaw Man started grinding his teeth together viciously. The tubular eyes narrowing and focusing their beaming lights on a figure dancing down the street.
"They said-" Noriko began, queuing Aishi to finish the rest of the sentence.
"He even made himself an entire chainsaw man mascot suit!" Aishi finished, his tone and expression racing from joyful to dreadful with each word as he started to realize the implications.
Right as Aishi finished speaking, the saws on the Buzzsaw Man's feet began to whirl, sending sparks into the air. By the next moment, they were soaring down the road, catapulting towards the dancing figure.
"Fight on! Fight on!" The dancing figure cheered on. They appeared to be a man wearing a costume with an enlarged head, seeming made mostly of a cloth structure. The head represented a man with a chainsaw blade sticking out of their metal, spiky orange head. A mesh structure right on the maw of spikes that represented teeth, most likely allowing the wearer to see what was in front of them. Despite the rest of their uniform being just slacks and a white shirt with a tie, this portion also completely covered the wearer in a bulky, cloth design fit for a mascot. While the image it represented was rather violent and menacing, the entire suit was stylized to a very friendly, cute interpretation of the character the wearer was representing.
"Fight o-!" The cheering was then cut short with a sudden, surprised scream as the dancing chainsaw man fan was tackled across the street by the Buzzsaw Man. The two, interlocking men, skidded across the street as the Buzzsaw Man discarded the circular saws across his body, save for the ones lodged in his head.
"Huh?! Who are you?!" The mascot cried out with a frightened voice once the two halted to a stop.
"You're cheering for the wrong guy, bastard!" The Buzzsaw Man hollered as his fists began ramming themselves into the plush-like head of the cutesy chainsaw man. Squeaks sounding with each fist that dove into the mascot's head.
"Ah! I'm sorry for offending you! Please stop!" The mascot cried out, wailing their limbs around helplessly.
Plyn turned around towards Aishi and Noriko with an astonished expression, before tossing their frying pan to the ground and dashing off after the rampant Buzzsaw Man. Aishi stared in disbelief, frozen in place, clutching the steering wheel in front of him as tightly as he could. Everything had worked out, right until now, right at the very end. Noriko simply stared in silence, slowly pursing her lips, yet remaining mostly unfazed to the current events.
"Buzz! Stop! That's a civilian!" Plyn cried out once they were halfway to the Buzzsaw Man and the mascot. Behind them, a clean, unbeaten black car pulled onto the street from the side. Aishi's pupils shrink further into despair as he watches three figures exit the car. Two of which hurry and follow after the scampering Scam Fiend, yet the last one remains standing in place. The last figure had a distinct, hunched over posture with black, messy hair.
"No no no." Aishi mumbled to himself as he slowly shook his head side to side, wishing to deny the situation that was occurring at this very moment.
The hunched over figure turned their head towards the transformed Wei-Ting, watching as Plyn and the other two figures wrestle him off the terrified fanboy. The hunched over figure then turned towards the beaten and battered car, drenched and caked in blood on the opposing side of the street. The Torture Fiend, behind the wheel of the wrecked car, could feel the figure's baggy eyes stare directly into his. The figure was none other than Captain Barusa.
Aishi slowly sank into his seat, his head lowering under the dashboard, hiding away from Barusa's judging gaze.
"The modern man would describe this. As torture." Noriko simply stated with an unfazed expression. Only a pinch of mockery leaking from her voice, the kind of mockery shared between close friends or seasoned accomplices.
A few feet behind the battered black car, a manhole lid in the middle of the road slides closed.
_(4)_
Darkness. A pitch tenebrosity that consumes all sight and vision, floods an unknown stage. A small room? An endless space? None could tell, none would know.
The creak of a drifting piece of metal upon a hanging contraption, rotating with a subtle idleness.
A scarred and blood stained finger twitches in pain upon a restrained hand. Wood and stained splinters, dug and embedded under the nails. Scratch marks like that of a desperate, cornered animal, left upon the wood the hand's palm was settled atop.
A strained and shivering eye, rotating and curling, scanning vainly within the dark in a frantic curl of frequented motions.
The sound of a dress shoe taking a firm step forward, echoes throughout the darkness. And with it, comes a wave of quivers and panicked breathing, reverberating from all around the darkness.
Fingernails begin to scratch and claw against anything within reach, whether that be wood or steel. Rapid puffs of nasally air, trying to keep themselves quiet, yet unable to keep still. Metal pieces creek louder as they rub against each other from the slightest trembles and jerks.
A silence follows after the footstep is not followed by another for a significant amount of time. The unseen wave begins to settle and calm, believing themselves to be safe, believing only a false alarm had passed. Yet the unease in the blackness, it would not settle, for how could it ever settle.
Two gloved hands emerged from the darkness, their wrists shadowed in the sleeves of a suit. They reached out to the viewer gracefully, in sync and symmetry with each other. The blackened fabric of the gloves hover over scarred and bruised skin that twitch and squirm in an uncontrollable panic as muffled whimpers fill the nearby air.
A gloved hand slowly sweeps right over a metal tray of various tools and devices. Even without knowing all their names, it was evident by their various shapes that each one was designed and purposed to bring about ill intentions upon a human body. Tools ment to open the human mind to unusual suggestions and questions. Piercing, puncturing, clipping, cutting, crunching, peeling, pulling, all purposes to a foul heart's inner desires to inflict upon their fellow man or woman.
A straining eye begins shaking and dilating in terror, staring at the vague shape of a thin figure standing within the dark before them. A figure wearing a black suit and tie, only a single button fastened upon the coat, which caused a significant, almost unnatural tightness around where the waist should be. Sharp flaps that drooped down to the thighs, defined shoulders, an abnormal, unnatural, yet not quite uncanny body shape. Yet that very fact seemed to paradoxically make it uncanny in its own manner. And on top of it all, the shape of a head that hunches forward, it features and details shrouded in the shadows.
Another gloved hand lowers the needle of a gramophone onto a slotted record. Moments after, the contraption begins to sing into the air, filling the darkness with a crackling, grimly tune, far unfitting for the mood. An upbeat, whimsical tone and tempo, once meant to spread uplift among the broken and despairing spirits of the world. Now as a crackling, crispy shell of its former flow, it lets loose a newfound perverse usage to the aging tune it hums. A tune of fear, a tune of horror, a tune of pain, a tune of punishment and atonement.
Out in the distance, the lights to what appears to be a makeup station flicker on, illuminating a pale mask upon its countertop. The mask stares into its own blank reflection, unmoving in its demeanor. Strapped and settled snugly onto a false, plastic, head. The material of said mask consisting of an unruly latex, drenched in a thick, smooth coat of white paint. The back tied and tightened by a zipper that stretches across the back of the head vertically. Folds and crevices depicted the mask representing the vague face of a human, gynandrous in manner, graceful in demeanor. Pressed, lightly puckered, shut lips giving just the slightest hint of a grin.
The light of the station shines upon silhouettes in the dark, only revealing their shapes and positions. Some were trapped in sturdy seats, others were dangling upside down by their feet. Tables with human shapes strapped upon them. Webs of ropes and chains binding down squirming figures upon the floor. Muffled squeals and whines singing from the wriggling shapes like a muted, unorganized choir of mice and rats.
The gloved hands in the dark lunge forward like the strike of a viper, clamping down on various fabrics stuffed into the trembling mouths of many. With a sudden yank, the cloths wrinkled and unfolded, stained in what seemed to be saliva, yet an iron smell said perhaps another liquid was within the mix.
"Please! Let me go! I promise, I've changed! I'm better! I'll do better! I'll turn my life around- just let me go! Please please please!" The dry, raspy voice of a middle aged man cried and begged like a teary eyed child the moment they could properly fill their lungs with air.
"I'll do better! I'll do better! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Just let me go!" The voice of a weary, wailing lady pleaded out profusely. The creaking and squeaking of metal sounding high above her as she squirms.
"L-l-let me go. Let me go. Let me go. Please please please, oh please." A meek voice quietly squeals with a trembling tongue, stricken in fear. To hush and reserved to tell if the source was of a masculine or feminine nature.
Gloved hands gently place an array set of sickly pale foundations next to the white mask.
"You want to be let go? So soon? Why?" An uncanny tone sings from the suited figure in the dark, tilting and shaking their head with each word. An androgyny pitch spoken like a whisper which echoes like a speaker through the dark. No matter how far they were or appeared to be, their hissing, breathy words were crystal clear. A rhythm dreadfully slow, a tempo fit for shame and nightmares.
"I've seen the error of my ways! I've been too selfish! I treat my family better! I'll respect my elders! I'll donate to charity! Whatever you want!" The middle aged man cried. A gloved finger carefully trails down a scar covered arm, rubbing over a tight, leather strap. Running the fabric touch down the back of the hand, and down a single finger, lightly strumming a nail less finger, that squirms and trembles upon contact.
"I'll change my policies! I'll seek a different career! I won't strive and profit off of trickery and deceit anymore!" The lady begged. The sound of a metal tool clamping and turning approaching them gradually.
"It hurts, it hurts so much. I can't take it anymore. I won't hurt anyone ever again. I'll run away from it all. I'm just a burden." The meek voice whimpers. A gloved fingers gently brushes hair away from the meek one's face, careful not to touch their skin.
A gloved hand dips and coats a brush into a grimy primer. Another hand settles itself right under the chin of the mask to keep it still in front of the mirror. Music continues singing from the old gramophone as the gloves move playfully to the beat it sings.
"You know what you've done. Do you truly believe you've changed? That your sins and faults won't ever surface again? For as long as you live?" The figure in the dark hisses, slithering their head back and forth, tilting from one side to the other slowly with each sentence spoken.
"Yes! I've changed! I've seen the error of my ways! I truly have!" The middle aged man cried.
"I'll never do it again! My eyes have been opened so I may see the light!" The lady begged.
"I won't ever hurt anyone again. I'll never see anyone again. I'll shut myself away. It's for the best, right? It's the only way." The meek voice whimpers.
The gloved hand begins slathering the primer onto the white mask, smoothening the base and crackling wrinkles. The other hand smoothly rotating and shifting the head when needed.
"But you're still so… Wicked. So… Selfish. So… Naughty. Don't you think?" The figure whispers into the air, leaning closer.
"N-no! No more! You've changed me! You've changed me for the better! Thank you! Thank you!" The middle aged man cried.
The gloved hand begins applying the pale foundation onto the mask. Gentle and precise strokes with each touch of the brush.
"You've enlightened me! Shown me my wrongdoings! You're a one of a kind teacher! You've taught me in a way no else could! You truly are amazing!" The lady begged.
The gloved hand begins powdering the mask, sending the substances adrift into the air around. The other gloved hand letting go of the head to fan the adrift powder away from the mask.
"You've shown me I've been too selfish. I realize that now. I'm just a waste of air. I'm just a waste of flesh. I'm too scared to take my own life. But I promise I won't burden anyone ever again." The meek voice whimpers. Tears flowing down their trembling eyes.
"Changed? You truly believed that you have changed?" The figure asks with their serpentine tone. Humoring them, the voice pretends to be on the verge of convincing with a tone only the desperate would fall for.
"Yes! I've changed! I've changed!" The middle aged cries.
"I have! I have! I'm a changed person! I swear!" The lady begged.
"I'm sorry. I can't promise anything. But I'll do my best. I swear. I'll try my hardest. I'll try my hardest with every fiber of my being." The meek voice whimpers.
"If that is so. I'll let you go. But only shall I let you go, should you swear me a promise only I will know. And I shall know if it may ever be broke." The figure cooed breathy rhymes as they inched closer and closer.
The gloved hands settled the brushes down carefully onto the table. They were now turning and raising the wax of an uncovered lipstick of a pitch blackish.
"Do that, and agree to me a deal, favor, or solid. Whichever you prefer. As long as you concur. And I shall let you go." The figure offered, leaning even closer and closer. Their breath breezing air through the dark with each and every word.
The gloved hand held the plastic head firmly in place, while the other hand approached the lips of the mask with the blackened lipstick. The record upon the gramophone suddenly stopped, shoving the needle up into the air. Silence filling the void once again. Carefully and precisely, the gloved hands coated the latex lips of the white mask in the grimy blackness of the lipstick.
After a long silence, metal pieces unbuckled and unlocked, leather straps loosened and curled. Trembling, stiff limbs of numerous figures shuffled off of their containments, one by one. A pair of strained eyes turned and jolted to a blinding array of speckled lights that suddenly appeared before them. Like an insect draws to flame, they immediately flock towards it.
One of these many human shapes within the dark is held back however, grabbed by the arm and reeled back into the blackness by a graceful embrace. A gloved hand gently wrapping across their chest as the shape reaches out towards the light.
"Ah, ah, ah. Not you. My little humble one." The suited figure whispers to the shape in their grasp. Their other gloved hand caresses their face, rubbing the cheek with their thumb, while the other fingers strum and shift under the chin.
"B-but you said." The meek voice whimpers from the shape, weakened and shriveling in the figure's embrace. Too weak to even resist.
"Because I have a special purpose for you." The figure whispers into the meek shape's ear. The rays of light slowly fade before them, muffled hiccups of tears emitting from the shape.
The gloved hands unzip the mask off of the plastic head, presenting the unpainted, latex insides of the mask to the suited figure in the dark.
"I'm going to give you the purpose in life you lack." The figure then whispers, cupping their gloved hand under the meek shape's chin. The sound of something incredibly heavy echoes in the distance, like a building grinding against the pavement. The gloved hand turns the shape's gaze to the side, towards the sound. The two watch as a large, blackened steel container of some sort, slides towards them. Violent banging echoing from it as it tosses and turns, the deafened wails of what sounds like a ghoulish siren scream from within its thick walls. A rounded slot on the front of it, just big enough to stick one's arm through, opens upon the container.
The figure slowly wraps the mask onto their head, fastening and sealing it on tightly. An unkept, messy drizzle of hair then overlaps its scalp, strands beginning to dangle over the blackened eye holes.
"It will be quick. I promise."
"I have a date to attend to tonight, after all." He said.
_(5)_
"Kachi kachi kachi." A grinning Third Division Captain mumbles to himself as he stares down at a wristwatch, seemingly imitating its tiny ticking noises. Pacing forward across a sidewalk, one foot after the other. The arms of the little watch clicking and moving bit by bit. Their eyes then glanced up towards the sun in the sky.
"Not much time left, Third Division!" Meruki then exclaimed as he spun around with a brisk turn of his foot. He was now looking towards a scrambling, scattered, array of individuals wearing suits and uniformed police officers. Each and every one trying to investigate the current area in any manner they possibly could think of.
Some groups and individuals were in the middle of talking to citizens, pausing their conversations to pay attention to Meruki. Some poking their heads out of alleyways and gaps to look towards their division captain. An officer walks out from behind a corner with a division member currently riding on their shoulders, pausing their current investigative activity. A division member pauses in the middle of climbing a tree, their arms wrapped tightly around the base, their hair littered with leaves and tiny branches while their suit was stained with smudges of greenery.
"You've all been working very hard! Truly!" Meruki begins loudly proclaiming with a singular clap of his hands, an ever present smile still etched upon his face. A division member and two officers peak off the edge of a nearby building's roof, looking down towards the division captain.
Heavy, ragged breathing sounds from a blinding darkness, the echoes of dripping water sounding from around the source of the breathing. Their eyes stare towards specks of light beaming high above them, wrapping swollen, bruised fingers onto pieces of metal to climb closer and closer to it.
"But I believe it's safe to say our efforts are not producing any results!" The captain continues, gazing around at the widespread dispatch of members. His feet shuffling and moving in place, making the smallest implications of dance and exercise.
The heavy breathing was growing faster with each swallow of air, as if an overwhelming excitement was swelling within their body the closer and closer they got to the specks of light. A scratchy chuckle escaped their body as they reached a wobbly hand up towards the specks. Their fingers find themselves pressed against a cold, damp metal surface. With a strained grunt, they began pushing against the steel surface, a low sounding grind of metal rubbing against metal echoing in the confined space.
"So why don't we just-" Meruki began speaking. His smiling expression suddenly dropped as his eyes widening, his head jerked towards a seemingly random direction, then another direction by the next moment. He turned around to look towards another direction, then another, and another. His feet shuffling and planting inconsistently in place while making a full spin around, the flaps of his coat swaying in the air.
The devil hunters and officers watched the captain's sudden spasms with confused gazes and expressions, some also turning their heads in the various directions Meruki was looking towards. Yet they were all left puzzled upon not seeing anything of particular interest or immediate attention.
The captain then spun around before locking their gaze towards a manhole further down the street. As if on cue, the round metal piece slowly elevated itself off of its compartment, before sliding off onto the neighboring pavement.
With that, the captain immediately dashed off across the street, towards a line of black cars parked on the other side of the road. A sudden leap was then made when close enough to one of the cars. The captain straightened out and pointed his body, feet first, towards one of the open car windows. Hurling his lanky body inside.
Bruised, swollen, trembling fingers rose out from the manhole, following them was a disheveled cluster of hair upon a woman's scarred head. Widened, yellow eyes peek out from under the cluster of hair, staring towards the array of officers and division members out in the distance. The array found themselves frozen in place, staring dumbfounded at the manhole, as if collectively attempting to process what was happening at the current moment.
A few kids on the outskirts of the city, were found messing with the locked door of a rusty, abandoned shed overtaken by foliage. Mischievous looks upon their faces as one boy focused on the doorknob, while the others kept watch. Spouting little whispers to each other with hints of delinquent giggles. The boy at the door then made a remark of success as he turned the handle and swung the door open. The other kids immediately turning around to peer over his shoulders, curious as to what their endevors may have unfolded.
"Help me!" A raspy, almost ghoulish, heartfelt shriek bellowed from a pair of freakish eyes above a set of yellowing teeth within a dark corner of the shed's interior. Blood stained, outstretched arms reaching out towards the kids desperately.
The group of kids collectively immediately started screaming before they all turned tail to bolt away from the horrific sight. The raspy voice from within the shed crying out apologies and pleas.
A brightly lit, busy office floor with many pacing employees is interrupted by a closet door suddenly swinging open. A man in torn, ragged attire stumbles out the closet as he lands face first onto the carpeted floor. The professionally dressed employees halt in their tracks to turn and stare at the man while other workers peer over their cubicles to look in his direction. The man picks himself up to stand up on his knees as he gazes around the office frantically. A smile grows upon his bleeding face before he reels his head back to let out a shriek of unfiltered joy. Workers simply glance at each other in confusion before looking back towards the man.
The large, empty oven of a restaurant kitchen opens seemingly on its own before a scarred hand reaches out of it. A nearby cook drops their frying pan upon seeing the hand, spilling hot oil and food onto the floor before letting out a scream.
"They're back!" The frightened cook cries out before scrambling away.
In a news station somewhere in the city, Second Division Captain Kasupa was talking and discussing a matter with a few reporters and anchors. His body was leaning and resting against a nearby counter as he was looking down towards the seated reporters who would nod in response to his words. A gentle, lax grin upon his face while he twirled one hand around as he spoke. Standing behind him was another suited devil hunter, a woman taller than Kasupa, wearing thick, squarish glasses. Her hair was just a bit messy, reaching shoulder length and curling at its tips to give the impression of a scrambled and unorganized, thick mane of hair. She was glancing around the station with a seemingly awkward expression upon her face while keeping her hands clasped in a polite manner, it seemed as if she was unsure what to do at the current moment.
Far behind the captain and the devil hunter was the news set. Camera men and other employees could be seen getting prepped for the next broadcast.
A thud then sounds from the roof above the set, where several exposed air ducts could be seen. The devil hunter and a few camera men glance toward the thud while Kasupa and the other reporters pay no mind. A few moments later, a scream bursts into the room as a woman falls out from one of the air ducts, flailing in the air before landing on top of the anchor's desk in the center of the set. The devil hunter jumps with a sharp gasp, flinging her limbs around into a random pose before freezing in place. Kasupa's chummy expression drops into a mix of surprise and concern, his head turning around toward the sudden scene behind him.
Two well dressed secretaries stand side by side in a professional, proper, and prim manner in an elevator. Both staring towards the elevator door with polite smiles and postures. A clatter sounds above them before a hatch from the elevator roof swings open and drops and a cloud of dust and a yelling body that grunts upon landing onto the floor. One secretary tosses their documents into the air with a scream as they stumble into a corner of the small compartment. The other secretary immediately goes on the instinctive defensive and shoves the intruder into the elevator door with an aggressive push of their high heeled foot. Another grunt sounds from the body as they slam into the elevator door with a painful thud.
A smiling, well dressed man is driving his car down the city streets with not a worry on his mind. In the backseat of the man's car, a grime covered, blood stained figure raises their head up. The figure's yellow, strained eyes blink a few times before gazing around the car in a lost, frightened manner.
_(6)_
Hands press firmly against a glass window as two attentive eyes stare out into a passing field of blooming poppies. The gray eyes stray and flicker from colorful petal to petal, only catching glimpses of their passing beauty. The flickers and blurs, all painting the hills in soothing shades of warmth.
"Amazing. I thought poppies only bloomed around May, yet they still look so pretty this late into the year!" Goro said, his jaw dangling loose as he stared in awe at the scenery. Coming from the cloudy skies of Osaka, the sky cleared and brightened the closer they got to the city nestled in the mountains. A common feeling that occurs when traveling afar, yet regardlessly surreal with each experience.
"Hm? What did you say?" Hatsu asked, furrowing his brow in curiosity as he glanced at the rear view to look towards his nephew.
At that moment, the wandering eyes of his nephew caught a glimpse of something, the slightest sliver of a silhouette that drifted for but a moment past the gray irises and the pupils. A silhouette not in the shape of a person, but a shape in itself, something with an inorganic, firm shape. Something out in the far distance.
For a moment, the nephew remained unresponsive, staring out the window, frozen. Hatsu looked towards the road for a moment, then back towards his nephew again. His curious expression grows the slightest hints of concern, the slightest bits of worry.
"Goro!" Hatsu called out his nephew's name, putting a little more force behind his voice. Not anything too fierce or assertive, a simple increase in volume and tone.
"Huh? What did you say?" The split haired nephew quickly reeled their head back behind the gap between the front car seats, looking towards the man with the bowl cut.
"I was asking what you said." Hatsu replied, placing his gaze once more onto the road.
"Said about what?" Goro responded with a clueless, blank, open jaw blink.
"About the… The flowers I think? You said something just a moment ago! What was it?" Hatsu followed up, strumming and waving his fingers around the steering wheel as he tried to recall what the nephew had said.
"The flowers? I'm not too sure. I don't think I said anything." An uncertain tone rose from Goro's voice as he turned toward the window yet again.
Hatsu's brow once again furrowed as he glanced toward the rear view mirror, staring at his passenger's face and expression.
"They look to be poppies though, some really pretty ones too!" Goro then responds as a smile springs upon his face. He begins bobbing his head around to gaze at the fields of passing flowers while still keeping himself within his uncle's line of sight between the two front car seats.
Hatsu continued observing the young man, squinting his eyes as he watched Goro's facial expression from the side profile. Something didn't feel right. It didn't seem significant, just possibly a careless nephew simply forgetting what he said just a minute ago. However, something in the gut was turning by just a bit, just the tiniest bit, just enough to grab the detective's attention. Goro's head then turned towards the front, eyes looking out the front window.
"Uncle! Hit the brakes!" The nephew cried out with a sudden change in expression, pointing a finger towards the road ahead of them. The uncle broke out of his concentration and spun his head towards the front immediately. Just a glimpse, while turning their head. A silhouette out in the far distance, out behind the fields and mountains, gracing their line of sight for but a mere moment.
A smiling portrait before a tiny shrine in a dark room begins to blur. The eyes, nose, and mouth slowly fading to a colorless smear.
"Uncle! The brakes!" The nephew cries out again. The car beginning to veer off the road. The driver couldn't focus, his line of sight snared within visions of his own mind.
The lighting of incense before a night sky begins to die down. The flame of a candle smothers.
The nephew lunges out of the back seats and wraps his fingers around a lever in the middle of the car, pressing his thumb down on its end before pulling it backwards. The tires of the car screech and cry. The car swerved to the side before bouncing and scrambling across the grass. Several dirty sounding thuds filling the air before the car finally halted to a stop.
The driver's hand covers their own mouth. Tears falling off their face, yet they could not understand why these tears were falling. For what reason? For what purpose?
"Uncle! Why didn't you hit the brakes?!" The nephew's voice called out. Their voice muddled and warped as the noggin struggled to compose itself.
Something hurts, something in the heart, something in the soul. Poppies sway freely in the faint breeze while the birds sing.
"Uncle! Talk to me! What's wrong?!" The nephew cried out. Their concerned expression becoming more clear in the rear view mirror. Why were they worried? What was there to worry about?
Yet what was it? What was this pain? Why couldn't they remember? The slightest scent of a spicy, almost smoky flavor fills the air and nostrils. The subtle scent of poppies, never overbearing or overwhelming, simply there in the air. A calming fragrance that lulls the senses.
A trembling pair of scarred, bare feet coated in streaks of dried blood stands firmly in place in the middle of the road. The sound of a raspy, low giggling beginning to rise above the exposed, bleeding toes.
"Uncle!" Goro's voice shouted, shaking the older individual's shoulder aggressively.
"Huh? Wha? What happened?" Hatsu finally responded in a mildly quiet voice, snapping out of their trance. Quickly glancing frantically at their surroundings as they picked their head up from its lowered position. The car was stumped in a thicket of grass on the side of the road.
"You almost hit that guy!" Goro responded, reaching his arm over one of the passenger seats to point out one of the front windows of the car. Hatsu aligned his gaze with Goro's arm, peering past the tall grass enshrouding the car and onto the street.
Standing in the middle of the street, on wobbly, bare feet, was what appeared to be a slouched human figure. Draped in torn, dirtied and worn out clothes, dry blood stained smudges upon the chest of their white shirt and the thighs of what was left of their pants. Pale, clammy skin, covered in punctures, scars and goosebumps. Trembling fingers with several missing the nails, replaced by blackened, swollen, scratchy flesh, worn and torn by misuse. They turned their disheveled head in the direction of the car, yet their squinting gaze was up towards the clear blue sky. Despite the horrid state their body was in, despite nearly being hit by a car, despite their bare feet aching upon the scratchy road, their face held a most unexpected expression.
Hatsu could feel their skin crawl as they focused upon the figure's face. Giving their eyes a quick, harshly, rub, they looked towards the figure's face again to see if what they were witnessing was true. Their expression fell as the gentle sun shined down upon the abused figure's face, making it as clear as this fine day.
Within the fields of grass, greenery crawls and frees itself from the dirt. It was the bud of a poppy, slowly rising itself above the endless towers of grass that cover the good Earth.
The figure was smiling, as bright and wide as one possibly could. Their thumb and index resting under their chin while their teeth glowed in the reflection. The face crinkling and folding all around the jaw and eyes to pour their heart out in this single expression. It was the happiest expression the detective had ever seen in their entire life. An overwhelming happiness that sang the individual's thoughts and feelings without speaking or even mouthing a singular word.
The poppy bud blooms, stretching its pedals out towards the great blue of the sky. Exposing itself to the graceful warmth of the sun, basking in its newfound liberation.
Does pain hurt less when you don't know where it's coming from? When you can't remember where it once came from? Does it heal quicker when it's not the focus of your attention? How does one truly heal a scar? They do not, a scar is there to stay. Yet it can be ignored, it can be forgotten. So for a scar, does it hurt less when you don't remember that it's even there? Is life more comfortable with its presence out of your mind?