Archive of Our Own

i.

Something about the Bow Hybrid. He wouldn’t know anything about her beyond what Makima disclosed, that the massacre happened so fast that nobody had time to anticipate it—or counteract. In the end, only two survivors remain; the captain of the division, and one lone devil hunter.

They must have waited for this opportunity to arise, when the isolation and tedium browbeat him into the closest form of submission, because he swears when Makima enters with his new partner in tow, wearing a face that only speaks of pure despair, her smile’s wider, knowing, mocking. A dead man walking, waiting to drop any second, paired with one of the most dangerous devils in existence. He finds himself unable to name many instances where he saw the life of a human fully drained from them.

“I’d like for you to meet Angel.”

It could only go downhill from there.

He knew the repercussions of inhabiting a human body, that he would soon adopt the mannerisms and thoughts of whoever heralded it first if he were really unlucky, but he didn’t care at the time. He coveted self-preservation at the cost of anything, even himself, so long as he remained alive enough to wreak his havoc. This was different.

His host maintained complicated thoughts even by most humans' standards, wrought with emotional distress and unresolved tension from almost all aspects of its life. It carried the weight of it all like a buoy, as though it wasn’t drowning holding onto it. Leaving him to wrangle with them in its stead. The two months after he woke up dedicated themselves to that, rooting through unfinished memories filtered like burned polaroids, static, and voices speaking in tongues. He’d almost preferred being preserved and frozen in Public Safety’s dingy labs instead of this. Once he lost the eagerness to fight, powerless in enacting revenge or sating his bloodlust, he sat on the corner of the bed provided and thought. Just thought. Mapping out the image of his host with what little information he could glean, only able to conclude that it was certainly fucked up.

Seeing the human Makima paired him with, seeing those droopy owlish eyes, gave him access to a part of the host’s life he’d deliberately attempted to bury. In that instant, he felt a sudden rush full of sensations he’d never felt but knows like an old friend, an old blanket or stuffed toy. Soft-serve ice cream melting in the sun, droplets dripping on pianist fingers. A monotone voice that sounded warmer saying his name (imagination? Hope? Futile hope?). A touch fleeting, too tantalizing, too full of greed that one couldn’t possibly be good enough—

You’re kidding me. His luck couldn’t get any better.

“Now that I have you two here,” she starts, her dreary voice bouncing off the walls of his enclosure, “I’d like to delve into a few things. Firstly, we find that the attack on your division was not mere happenstance. It was, actually, a calculated move to whittle our numbers down. We didn’t quite determine the reason, but we have reason to assume that a more complex plot is at play.”

Yawn. So what? A few small fries eradicated? He’d be sooner to congratulate the hybrid on a job well done. While all humans meet his ire, none half as much as devil hunters, whom he’d even go as far as to categorize as subhuman at best. Noble, parading around the goal of a better world, taking up contracts with the enslaved pets they were to kill eventually as well. He finds their hypocrisy otherworldly.

“As a result, we’ve merged both your and my divisions together,” she continues, though he’s halfway tuned her out as she casts a knowing glance at the other human beside her. “The Gun Fiend is technically my possession, but I’m willing to share my toys for a greater cause.”

Toy. Possession.

“I’ve explained the situation to you individually, but allow me to reiterate. Starting ‌today, you two will be partners,” Makima says. Her head turns to face them both, smiling like she’s won a fight. Victorious, because she could have it all and more, could do anything without consequence. What set her—or Public Safety—apart from devils? At least he doesn’t hide what he is. “For now, I’d like you to patrol with one another, get used to being partners. I have a feeling you’ll reap the benefit sooner than you’re expecting.”

It must be a joke to her. How could she not know?

“Got it. Thanks,” the human says, and the resentment rolls off with such little effort that he has to wonder if the flat expression and voice is some act.

“Any questions or concerns?” He finds he’s not in the mood to speak, not willing to entertain this further. The light overhead them blinks as neither addresses her. “No? My, Angel, you’re a little more opinionated than that,” she teases when her head tilts to face it again. “Cat got your tongue?”

“Among other things. Can I go?”

“Mm… I think that’s all I’ll need from you for the time being. Should anything arise, I’ll inform you. Good luck, you two.”

Boring.

He opts to exit the room first, eager for the first sliver of freedom they’re granting him. The human doesn’t follow, and he gets the impression the two maintain a lot of… friction. Whatever the problem remains between those two may explain why it looks ready to keel over out of spite. He’d share the sentiment if he thought he deserved to die.

He runs over what he’s gathered so far. Definitely had a romantic affair. Did it know? It would’ve displayed some form of acknowledgment or recollection if so, unless it didn’t emote at all. Which was more plausible?

He thinks of the face it might wear if he shared it, taunted him about it and the love they shared but wouldn’t dare speak into existence because of this or that, whether it would just blink or start crying. What could it take for that soft face to contort with despair just before he killed it?

I’d rather you not tell him these things. But what if he did?

He finds himself so caught up in his thoughts that he almost misses it, when a creature announces its intent to kill and harm. He senses the desire radiating from the damn thing just in time to turn his head sideways to gauge who’s plotting to attack and find the sharp blade of a knife driven through the bridge of his nose, blood spraying across his face as he hears an audible crunch from the bone shattering. As his back hits the wall, struggling to hold his weight and the human’s own as it latches onto him, as it jerks the knife out only to stab into his cheek and the tip scrapes against bone, he catches it—the human’s darkened gaze fixed into a harsh glare as though it’s never wanted to kill more in its life, as though his very existence is an injustice to be corrected. Intense enough that sheer will alone could complete the act.

His hand flails to catch the human’s wrist and root it in place, the promise of what would happen to him should he retaliate a burning reminder in the recesses of his mind. You’re more expendable than he is. His damage takes time to mend itself back to its original form by the time he takes notice of how the human has stopped moving, how its breath escapes in puffs harsh enough to leave its deltoids quivering like it’d run a marathon. But its eyes aren’t on him anymore, nor even on the weapon. Its eyes pin on his hand bolted around its wrist.

He spits onto the floor to dislodge the pooled blood under his tongue, mouth twisted into a deep scowl as he watches it, watches the anger fade from him into something mellowed, confused.

I’m breaking this useless thing’s wrist now, he declares, but his body won’t move to make the effort. His muscles tense in anticipation so that he can carry out the decision to fruition, fingers flexing against its skin, convinced that even if repercussions await him in the aftermath, a human of all things can’t just get away with injuring him.

But he doesn’t carry through with it.

The human blinks back into reality and yanks its hand away from him, wordlessly stomping away in the other direction like a petulant child being told no. He glances down at his trembling palm, at his own blood staining the sleek floor. He’d never witnessed a human, even a devil hunter, move with such speed that he only had time to acknowledge the attack but not defend himself or retaliate. And he’d never had his own body disobey him either, refusing an attack when before he wouldn’t have even needed to consider it.

Makima undersold the human. It was special. It could accomplish supernatural feats. It… struck him.

He makes up his mind—it won’t be an easy feat, but that’s okay. If it were, that’d be burdensome to lack any challenge to entertain him. Once he watches the blood seep from its fragile body, flesh struggling to cling to bone and a face twisted in pure agony, a lifeless, twitching thing writhing on the ground unrecognizable—fuck, won’t the sight be sweeter than ambrosia.

He wants to play. He wants to play.

ii.

The human catches him in the middle of another attempt at wrangling these urges into something tamable and knowable, rubbing the sleep out of those large eyes with a yawn and a subtle crease in his brow.

Aki halfway pays him no mind, if only to quell his thoughts. His own mind denies him access when it would serve him easier to just remember what’s driving him at all. What would it take for his body to cooperate and provide him the answers he so desperately needs to function?

Angel’s eyes narrow from where he stands hovering by the entrance of the kitchen, his sleep shirt hanging off one sun-kissed shoulder. “What is that?” he asks.

And Aki… can’t say. What began as a simple dish found itself morphing into something indecipherable. Obeying these instincts blindly isn’t the solution either. Good to know. “I don’t know,” he says, certain he’ll receive grief for it.

Angel’s eyes narrow thinner, bare feet padding along the floor as he approaches the bowl on the counter. “Didn’t you make it?”

“I did.” He’s in the middle of determining his next idea when he spots the thick white bandages encasing Angel’s forearm. When had that happened? “Your arm’s injured,” he says.

Angel casts a glance downward at it before delivering a shrug, fingers ghosting along an edge. “It’s not bad. Just stings a little.”

“It’s not typical of you to get hurt like that. You’re getting sloppy.” Angel cultivated a reputation out of being nigh-untouchable. Aki’s not only witnessed his sheer speed and agility but became victimized by it on more than one occasion. What devil out there could hurt him?

Angel must not care himself from the way his shoulders lift in another non-committal shrug, his gaze elsewhere. “It was an off day,” he excuses, and Aki just knows it’s related to wherever he disappeared to.

Angel’s expression remains unreadable as ever as he enters the kitchen, doe eyes scanning the grotesque mess Aki made. He delivers a verdict. “Think I should invest in a cookbook?”

He’d banked on Angel not waking up during his endeavor, because either the damned human would choose to taunt or berate him. Right now, he’d have preferred the latter, because the jab unravels Aki at the seams as a near-growl pushes past his lips and his hand tangles in his hair. “I’m getting tired of this. It’s like knowing how to ride a bike, but you don’t actually remember learning it. The fact it keeps turning me…” He struggles to find the accurate word before it flies out with too much ease. “Domestic is nothing short of humiliating.” He regrets the words before they’ve finished leaving him when he catches the indignant twitch of Angel’s nose as he stifles a mocking laugh at Aki’s expense, the only shift in his otherwise blank expression.

“I’m guessing being a human isn’t all that fascinating. It must be nicer to just be violent and kill senselessly, huh?”

Aki doesn’t gratify him with a response, but his blood boils from beneath as he turns away to fixate on the stovetop, snapping the dial back into place with a firm twist to kill the gas. Angel’s oversimplifying it—he can’t possibly reap a benefit from it, but he does it anyway like it means something. Like it doesn’t tear him open to even glance at him. Like it doesn’t do the same to Aki too.

Angel speaks up again, but his next words contain less bite, almost idle like he’s talking just to hear his own voice. “You’re quiet these days. Would’ve thought you’d be more satisfied seeing me injured like this.”

If he didn’t know better, he’d have mistaken the observation for concern. Perhaps it is, but Aki isn’t so naïve to believe that. “I’m disappointed it didn’t finish you off.”

Angel’s mouth twists at the corner as he glances at his forearm again. “Mm. Didn’t really come close.” Well, of course it didn’t. Why would something that meaningless ever come close to taking down someone so unenduring? If Angel survived this long in the face of chaos, then small fries couldn’t topple him either.

“So why the bandages?” he asks anyway, despite himself. What should it matter?

“Wouldn’t stop bleeding at first,” Angel scoffs, affronted as his fingers idly trace along the edge again. “It’s not like it was even deep, either. Stupid thing just got me at the worst time.”

Aki’s hand lurches before he recognizes it, before he’s mentally voiced the opposition to his nerves. At first, he thinks with bated breath, finally. I can hurt him. I’ll tear him apart and leave him writhing on the ground, choking on his own blood. He’ll look beautiful bathed in it, drowning in it. Give it to me. Give yourself to me.

Then he remembers how little any of it matters.

When his fingers coil around Angel’s bandaged arm, it’s a death sentence. Because no matter how much he voices his dissent, no matter how much he envisions all the way Angel could die prettily, no matter how sweet his blood tastes, what Aki seeks lies beyond comprehension—and reasoning.

Fix him. Break him. Fix it. Break him.

One side emerges victorious. It’s the side that’s still him too.

He thinks next, there’s less of me and more of him now as Angel’s staring up at him with those eyes widened by a fraction as his whole body freezes from the contact. His pink lips parted. If Aki confessed the burden, would Angel find comfort in it?

He relinquishes his hold on Angel’s arm as something sours in his chest, and those parted lips breathe out a trembling sigh. He fills the silence with something at least. “You should eat more. You wouldn’t be stumbling around like an idiot if you did.” If Angel did die to a devil, he’d prefer one far more powerful. One that deserved the honor of slaying one of the most powerful devil hunters in existence.

He’d prefer it were him.

iii.

Four times—that’s how many times he’s had his blood. Twice in the midst of a fight with another devil, once after they fought each other, and then—when he was covered in enough of his own to practically swim in it.

He hadn’t expected to lean forward and kiss Angel, but by then his nerves buzzed with something destructive and desiring, to mend the quiet despair on his face—to taunt him. Angel would give it to him, he’s sure of it, would give him everything if Aki demanded it, if he said it politely enough, because that’s just how good Angel is to him. To let anything happen to him because it was Aki.

But once he felt the taste of him, licked along the roof of his mouth and unearthed a groan so soft Angel himself might not have heard it, Aki felt the closest to Hayakawa than ever before in that moment. This body couldn’t commit to more than the thought of enacting violence against Angel, entertaining all sorts of gruesome and gory scenarios to destroy him from the inside out, but this proves sweeter than any kill. No wonder Hayakawa yearned for Angel with such fervor. If they had met in other circumstances, perhaps Aki would be no better than a human indeed, blind to desire he’s only now naming. Only now understanding how all-encompassing it is that he would only associate it as bloodlust due to how insatiable it is.

Angel’s body was responsive, warm, and tense before melting and giving in. Hollow victory.

He took it anyway, ignoring that it had to be Hayakawa that Angel wanted instead, that he must have been imagining that moment to be different, less twisted in nature and intent. Pretending it’s someone else. Wishing it was someone else.

But Aki wasn’t reciprocating. Who else if not Angel? Who else would stab him with that look of pure hatred, then in the same breath speak to him so softly, with reverence? Who else would let Aki do these things for him? At what point did these feelings become his own and no longer just his host’s? At what point did there lack a distinction?

He’s asking it while holding him a second time that day, swallowing down his sweet moans with a kiss, hips bucking into him with reckless abandon. He holds the memories of their first sexual encounter, but wouldn’t even let himself consider it, full of envy and reprieve. I get to do this again, he thinks, before his thoughts remind him, I’m doing this for the first time.

It shouldn’t matter, but it does, because the parts that aren’t him are sighing with familiarity, but they’re made of him too now, aren’t they?

Aki never imagined sex or any sexual encounters to be anything more than gross, sweaty bodies rubbing against each other, the pursuit in that high climb of pleasure more of a burden than satisfying, and a sensation that’s fleeting and too much effort. He’s more than glad to be proven wrong from the moment Angel’s hands land on him, and all he can think is, He should’ve told me to stop. Why didn’t he tell me to stop?

But Angel didn’t hesitate. He didn’t stutter or pause in thought, even though he’d been the one to voice his opposition. But it had been far less because he desired it to stop and more out of pragmatism, because when else could they do this? Where else but in the blanket of night?

Angel’s calm, impenetrable disposition would often meet Aki’s ire, but at the moment—oh, at the moment, it twists and flexes with a stark range of emotions, cherry-red lips separated and releasing obscene, vocal pants.

His actions are not his own. It’s as though another entity puppets him, willing hot neediness into his hand, his hips as it grinds down into Angel, his mouth as he captures those pretty pink lips over and over again. He’d go further if Angel asked to—begged to, even hinted at it, spilling into him, watching supple flesh bounce and ripple from being jostled. His back arching as endless moans spill from him. The thought alone unravels Aki at the seams as he grips Angel tighter against him, unable to part with him.

Angel opts not to go further. It may just be that this alone proves to be more than enough to overwhelm him, his fingertips grazing along Aki’s face and neck, along the underside of his shirt. Drinking him up with that greedy little gaze of his.

When they lay there, clothes sticking to skin from sweat and cum, Angel’s sharp shuddery breaths fanning against his neck, he thinks he might abhor Hayakawa. To toss this away just because the indulgence hurt, because self-control could only hold both at bay for so long, is an injustice.

Even as he vows to not allow the opportunity to slip by him a second time, the thrill fades fast and in settles what desire held at bay—regret.

Devils would find themselves hard-pressed to comprehend societal expectations, but he still harbors the thoughts and feelings of a human. It toils away at his stomach to replace the blinding rush he’d earlier succumbed to as though punishing him.

Angel’s wordless, and Aki finds himself wondering what he’s thinking. What could he be holding at bay?

He decides it’s less important when Angel lifts himself closer so that they’re eye level, lips on his. Whatever he’s regretting can wait until tomorrow.

iv.

“I’ve got an idea,” Angel drawls, “and it’s not really my best one. But humor me for a bit, alright?”

They’re outside more these days despite Angel’s earlier reservations. The balcony, when not lit by the living room’s lights, provides enough coverage from any passersby, but Angel still hesitated at the start. The night they had sex changed things. It changed everything, for better or worse.

Maybe it’s for the worst, because Angel’s since developed a fondness for touching him. Pressing the side of his head against Aki’s shoulder, fingers brushing against his own, and perhaps it’s with intent to stifle any thoughts as it succeeds without much effort. Still, he finds his voice. “You have ideas? Thought even that would be too much effort,” he says. Why he goads even when he can’t mean it if he tries, he doesn’t know. A last-ditch effort to regain some form of control?

“Funny.” Angel doesn’t humor him much anymore. “I’m gonna get real busy soon,” he says, but doesn’t continue. He’s finished his own bowl, scraping along the curve with his chopsticks as his bangs hang to hide part of his face. Aki bites back the urge to brush them behind his ear, hand pressed at his side.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks in order to prompt him to continue.

“Tomorrow night, I’m supposed to be going to that dinner party,” he says. “A really, really stupid idea, so you’re gonna be home alone.”

“Sound a little less enthusiastic, why don’t you?” Aki says.

Angel ignores him with a shake of his head, not meeting his gaze. “And hypothetically…” He trails off. He trails off? That’s new. “But if we could go anywhere for a little bit, where would you go? Hypothetically.”

Aki considers that there aren’t many places he’s traveled that he looks back at fondly. In his original form, he hadn’t even considered the sights. “I doubt Public Safety would let that slide,” he points out. “It wouldn’t be worth the trouble of even asking.”

“I have a lot of PTO saved up.”

“With the amount of times you wouldn’t even come to work?”

Angel shrugs his shoulders as his head traitorously lifts away from Aki’s shoulder. “They’d never fire me for it. At least I still kept all the benefits, too. I think if I really sweet-talked Himeno then she’d put in a good word and sway Makima. It’s just a thought, more than it is an idea.”

You’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately. He almost unearths the thought, even opens his mouth to do so and call out the oddities in his behavior, but something else comes out instead. “What’s your home like?”

Angel takes his time responding, almost convincing Aki he’d said the wrong thing. “You weren’t alone,” Angel says, his voice softening. “And there was always some work to be done. Cooking, repairs, tailoring clothes. Somehow, it was all very fun.”

He envisions this version of Angel, even though it’s entirely opposite to how he is now. Someone who was proactive, unable to sit still. Someone who was loved and knew it. And loved just as much without concealing a fraction of it.

“You sang songs, danced, and played games. The younger kids always loved me because of how I’d drop whatever I was doing to play with them. Never went hungry and never went a day without smiling.”

He can’t reconcile the idea of this with the Angel he knows now, the one who only gets out of bed when he’s bothered to. The one with sunken eyes like it’s seen everything the world has to offer, and a voice that never wanes in tone, much less curls with any form of excitement or glee. Hayakawa might have heard him laugh once, but Aki can’t mimic those results. Not like this.

It’s moments like this that he acknowledges how there’s no longer a true difference between himself and his host, that ‌hoping to find one is fruitless. But he’d sometimes prefer if he were more like Hayakawa, because no matter how many memories and instincts he unlocks… One of them has the luxury of knowing more about Angel. The other does not.

“If there was anywhere to go, there,” Aki says, almost like it’s an afterthought. “You make it sound peaceful.”

A short exhale, bordering on a mirthless laugh, leaves Angel’s nose as one hand reaches to rub against his eyes, his mouth extending into a wide yawn. “Yeah, well, it was.” He adds more bite than necessary to the word as his head shakes. “It was burned down to destroy any pathogens, so there’s nothing left but a nice view, I guess. I imagine nobody’s tried going near it since.”

“Where would you go, then?” Aki asks him.

Angel blinks like he hadn’t considered the question for himself, his hand lowering to his lap. The moon reflects in his eyes. What’s the point in living if everything you loved is gone without even a trace? “Anywhere,” he says with a shrug. “Just not here. And I’d rather I took you with.”

And what would be the point of that, really? “I suppose.” He snaps his head away when his chest sours hotly. “Good luck with your dinner party tomorrow.” He supposes he should pry for more details, but he finds himself no longer in the mood to talk, and he finds himself at a loss when discerning why.

Angel must either sense it or not, because he trades any further responses for actions. A hand cupping Aki’s cheek and lips pressed to his own. He takes his time leaning in, long lashes fluttering shut, but Aki still finds himself caught off-guard—and soon reciprocating before he knows it. Uncaring that he’s not who Angel wants, because he still gets his touch at the end of the day, and it’s the one triumph over this needless body that denies obedience and self-control. Hollow victory.

Aki’s hand tangles in Angel’s hair in order to root him there, to ensure the moment couldn’t end so soon. He told himself after the first time to forget it, to pretend it hadn’t happened. He’d assumed, stupidly, that Angel shared the same sentiment until now.

Humans are just made up of their instincts too. It has to be Hayakawa that Angel seeks ‌when their tongues brush together, when he emits the sweetest noise as their hips connect, as they sway to the same tuneless song. It has to be, because what else can Angel want more?

If Aki had his head on tighter, the notion wouldn’t matter. But he’s had a taste of Angel on more than one occasion, can name the sensations he’s enduring, and with that in mind he can’t determine why it plagues him like a dark cloud hanging over his head - Angel will never be out of love with Hayakawa. They’ll share sentiments and feelings, and they’ll warp into something ugly, but it won’t be the same.

He tugs himself away before he loses himself in the sensation, but his hand betrays him and refuses to unbolt from Angel’s hair, grabbing it tighter as though to protest the idea of fully separating from him. “Why are you—” He decides fast that he doesn’t want the answer. If he gains it and gains the confirmation that Angel will never want him as he is, he’s not sure what he’ll do. To even lament over something like that is humiliating enough.

Angel doesn’t answer him either, letting loose a sigh that deflates his whole body. He stays perched in Aki’s lap, half-hard and panting under his breath, but not needy enough to continue his pursuits. He must not have reached the same conclusion. But why?

But he’s only made up of his own instincts too, so he snuffs out any further thoughts as he shoves his hand down Angel’s shorts in order to earn a muffled moan and hot breath against his shirt.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

v.

He holds him. Entirely above foolishness, he still anticipated ‌Angel to wake up, to blink those owlish eyes again and stare up at him, utter something outlandish. Aki would take him home, cook, and they’d put this all behind them.

And then what?

Continue fighting in Public Safety? Putting their lives on the line to preserve the reprieve they had outside of exhaustion? Aki could never erase the target painted on his back, and Angel could never find fulfillment stuck in a land he never could call home. But they’d still be together. He wouldn’t be alone to handle it all.

He stares down at the corpse in the sand—because that’s what it is now. One in a million that dies every single day. He couldn’t even put a name to the amount of death he’s witnessed in his existence, but Angel’s special. Had been from the start. So much that the stench of his blood as it clashes with the gentle salty tang of the ocean turns his stomach. Once upon a time ago, he’d have grinned at the mere sight or scent of it. But as it permeates the air, something tears loose from him.

Aki had crouched down just to inspect him. The bullet shot cleanly through the center of Angel’s forehead and he slumped into the sand like he belonged there, so there’s no reason to even inspect the handiwork that killed him.

The realization sits heavy with him. It declined to feel real, not as he woke up that morning and found Angel already in the living room donning his uniform, eyes blank like they had already seen everything the world had to offer. It declined to feel real as they walked between the alleyways, talking about everything and nothing, as though it were a normal day. And it declined to feel real until now, when it’s over, when there’s nothing to salvage.

But he holds Angel close anyway, biting back a gag from the blood as it seeps through his clothes. Better than the alternative, he wants to tell himself. Better than a random devil that didn’t earn the honor of taking down one of the most powerful devil hunters.

Still, he holds him.

He could defy death one last time and Aki wouldn’t be mad.

Just one more time. That’s all he had to do. Just wake up.

Wake up.

It would be like Angel to disobey out of sheer spite. If he did wake up, he might have goaded and teased Aki for his sentimentality, for being this worked up over a human. Aki would scowl and mutter some biting threat he knew he’d never mean, and they’d brush themselves off to go home.

And then what?

Aki glances up and out at the ocean as light blue waves lap against the shoreline, eager to reach them. Would sending his corpse ‌to the sea be better than giving it up to Public Safety? What would they even do with it?

Ideas sprout into his head—their cruelty knows no bounds, and this would be no different. They’d have him endure suffering that even devils wouldn’t commit. Revitalize him as a puppet so that he continues his servitude, no doubt. Angel wouldn’t forgive him.

But Aki can’t forgive him for abandoning him either.

The ocean can’t take him either. But he can’t just leave him here. He racks his head for any other alternatives of what to do with the body—with Angel. They hadn’t discussed that, and now he prefers they had, even if the conversation would have left a lump in the back of his throat.

He can’t tear his eyes away, wrong in thinking that the sight of a dead Angel would be the sweetest sight.

And now what?

Aki should get back to work. Long days only await him now.

He loosens his hold on Angel, even though he’d stay here for the rest of his life. Hayakawa’s life lost all meaning when Angel left his life. Aki feels closer to his host than ever. How cruel of Angel to commit an unforgivable act a second time.

But he can’t leave him either.

The impulse hits him hot and heavy, even if it’s still the furthest thing he wants.

Aki’s mouth extends wide as he yanks him closer, wishing those eyes were lit up again and staring up at him. It might be easier if he were alive, could react, could unearth those soft groans as his fingers bury into Aki’s hair to root him in place, brush against the handle in the back of his head without flinching away.

Aki takes in his scent for the last time as he noses along the thin slope of his neck. He’ll breathe him in, take him in, and it’ll have to be the last time.

The first bite takes minimal effort, canines puncturing through him, blood pooling—bitter, still warm. He pulls away flesh that desperately clings to sinew and bone, desperate to stay together. He swallows.

He bites into the esophagus—connective tissue, tough to chew, stubborn thing just like the rest of him—

Pharynx (he spoke with such bite when prompted), trapezius, collarbone (chewy), deltoid, pectoralis major and minor (puffs up when angry, firm and smooth like the rest of him), bicep, stomach (not full enough, should’ve eaten more, should’ve fed him more)—intestines, drink him up, take everything, because nobody else will take care of him.

Aki’s covered in blood by the time he’s crouched over him, a monster caving into his desires. He’s sickened by the sight of Angel’s open ribs poking out from his chest, from the shine of his organs as the sunlight catches them before they’re swallowed down, but once Aki’s begun, he can’t stop. He takes it all. Each time Angel’s body twitches and jerks, Aki’s head whips up to witness it, to hope that he awakens at this exact moment, call him expletives for the open display of savagery. If only Angel were a devil or fiend, then Aki would feast on him daily. They’d live forever, mistaking love for violence and violence for love, and uncaring to determine the distinction.

He thinks he’s been there for hours, again staring at his handiwork. Little remains of the corpse that he hasn’t dug his hands into and stolen, consumed for no one else to dare take from him. At the moment, they’re one, and he supposes it counts for something. Angel still got his wish, to have Aki be the one to end his life.

Someone comes for him two weeks later.

Aki takes shelter in Angel’s room instead of his own, drawing back to that nightmare of waking up alone without him. How harsh it is to have it come to fruition, to have this be his new normal.

He almost doesn’t open the front door, having skipped out on work for this long because he simply couldn’t bear the notion of facing anyone that wasn’t who he wanted. The stupid crabs and unmade bed greeted him when he returned from the beach, a sore and useless sight. Then he realized how the bedsheets smelled of him, and Aki traced idle patterns in the bloodstains from when he fed from Angel that one fateful night, unable to sleep.

But he wills himself out of bed anyway. If he’s not hasty in reentering reality, then Makima or Kishibe will show him no kindness nor reprieve and drag him out. Less out of self-preservation and more to maintain the promise he made to Angel, Aki won’t be dying anytime soon.

Trudging out of bed proves to take more effort in him than he has to spare, having given enough away just to kill Angel. Aki’s felt this before, this dread and aimlessness that he ran on autopilot instead just to carry on through the day. It’s the lingering mourning from Hayakawa when the two were separated, and the pain didn’t ease. Not with work, not with distractions, nothing filled that emptiness.

To feel it twofold… Angel’s cruelty knows no bounds.

Aki senses that behind the door it’s a human, so his immediate guess is Makima coming to collect him. A job is a job, and he’s yet to outlive his usefulness to them. He unlatches the door and swings it open, the harsh sunlight beaming down on his face that he has to shield it with his forearm, failing to process who’s at his doorstep.

“Hello, Gun Fiend,” a smooth voice says, and his entire body tenses like it’s ready to fight—or run. “I heard you don’t have eyes. Why is it that you flinch from the sunlight?”

His throat closes around words he never intended to share, his arm lowering. As a feeble excuse, he says, “I can see somewhat.” Like that matters.

Haruka nods her head like she understands his poor explanation, but even if he could. “Well. May I come in?”

He finds that even if he knew how to say no to her, he wouldn’t, and he steps aside to allow her inside. Her eyes scan around the barren living room and attached kitchenette, and her gaze lingers longest on the bloodstains in the wooden floor where Angel stabbed him. “That was a long time ago,” he says without thinking about it.

“You don’t have to lie to me,” she says, her head still turned away from him. “How long did you two know each other?”

“Three months. One where I was partnered up with him and the other two where I lived with him.” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, aware of the fact he hadn’t showered nor eaten in the past two weeks. His stomach churns with the reminder that he’d had plenty to eat already.

“Not very long, is it?” Haruka notes.

“I guess not.” Humans were often hesitant and struggled with their words, struggled with expressing themselves. He found himself fortunate to never have that issue present itself, until he became a fiend. From there, he’s lost the ability to say what’s on his mind and put words to emotions that beat fervently inside him, fused into him the moment he woke up. Waking up with nothing but disorientation, a craving, and loneliness that denied rectification.

“I suppose that even such a short interaction made all the difference, didn’t it?” When her head turns back to face him, he gets what Angel’s infatuation with the color blue was about. Because her own, layered with a thin sheen of gloss, shine in the sunlight and tell him everything he’s ever wanted to know.

Wordlessly, he nods his head.

“Some people are like that,” she continues with a rueful smile tugging her lips. “They enter your life with the full intention of changing it and then leave. For better or worse.”

For worse, he thinks, almost certain he means it. He went and left me just when I finally knew what I wanted from him. He’s not sure he can voice those thoughts.

“I wanted to check on you,” Haruka says. “I figured that you would be grieving.”

“Grieving?” he repeats. Well, that’s the word, isn’t it? That’s what Angel had been doing when he’d lay in bed decomposing like he’d died too, neglecting to eat or sleep. Grieving his home, grieving Hayakawa, grieving a life he’d never experience because he was nothing but a weapon.

“I did it too when my son died,” she says, her head dipping as she sighs. “I don’t remember any of it, either. When you’re born into this world, it’s a guarantee you’ll only know loss. My condolences, Gun Fiend. He was a kind soul.”

That’s not my name. I’m more than just that. He doesn’t say that either. The name Angel gave him now feels unearned, a mockery. “How did you find me?” he asks instead, earning a small scoff.

Her fingers reach up to massage the bridge of her nose. “My meddlesome one at home seems to know a little too much about you two,” she mutters. “I would have done it the conventional way by asking Public Safety, but it was obviously pointless to. That’s really neither here nor there.” She waves her hand in a dismissive gesture. “How are you feeling?”

He’d opt to keep the truth at bay if he thought he would get away with it. Something nags at him in the back of his head like a warning—he should best give her what she wants. Still, he’s never gained the luxury of sharing his feelings about Angel with anyone else, who had the likes of Princi, Tendo, or Galgali to exchange words with. “It… hurts,” he says, and it’s laughable. The concept of disliking pain when all he does is inflict it. His existence demands it. “I keep thinking he’ll just show up, and things will be back to normal.”

“That happens,” she says with another nod.

“And I have this horrible pain.” His palm flattens against his chest. “That makes me not want to do anything. Or be anything.” He knows now what Angel had been experiencing all while facing mockery and scrutiny for it. Why it was easier to give up than to keep trying.

“Here. Let’s sit down,” she offers. And he still can’t say no to her.

He keeps his head lowered while seated at the table across from where Angel would normally sit, a sharp aromatic scent filling the air. Words aren’t exchanged between the two, on his part because he lacks anything intelligent to say. All he sees when he casts even a mere glance at her is a woman whose life had been ruined twice by him.

Yet she cooks for him. When the scent wafts into his nose, he gives himself no time before he’s digging in. She’s observing from over the rim of a mug as steam curls around her face, but says nothing until he’s halfway through the bowl. “Tell me about him,” she says. “It gets easier when you talk about them, I’ve found.”

He pauses in his ministrations, fingers flexing against his chopsticks. What can he say? What suffices if nothing else? “He hated me initially,” he starts, unsure where else to. “I knew who he was from the start. Public Safety played him up to be a formidable devil hunter, and I found out firsthand how true that was. It wasn’t long at all before he attacked me.”

She lowers her cup to the table with a soft thud. “Quite the conundrum,” she says, giving little of her thoughts away.

Once he’s started, he can’t stop. It’s like everything of Angel belongs to her too, and for a reason he can’t name, the notion doesn’t sound horrible. “He was so abysmal at taking care of himself that it was astounding how he didn’t die yet. Getting that idiot to eat was impossible, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why I cared so much if he lived or died. But I did. It felt… right to.”

“He must have been difficult to deal with,” she says. “But it looks like the caring won out in the end.”

“I didn’t—” he starts, stops, then doesn’t know what else to say, lacking the bandwidth to express himself again. “I don’t know. About any of this.” He might have gotten used to tackling these confusing and overpowering emotions on his own. Most have scorned him, and he doesn’t fault them. But it meant the only person who tangled his thoughts to begin with was the only one who could help untangle them. “Devils really don’t care about each other, not like this. It’s not normal.”

“Him and your… host,” she says it like she’s carrying glass, “were quite close. It only makes sense that you two would be as close as well.”

“I guess.” He’s not so sure about that. Even now, he often doubts if Angel thought of him enough to decide he and Hayakawa were now one and the same, indistinguishable from each other. Whether it mattered. In the end, Hayakawa wasn’t the one to hold him one last time. Hollow victory. He glances down at his bowl as his stomach churns with the reminder of what he’d done, that he’d had his fill and decided nothing would taste the same.

“The grief doesn’t go away,” Haruka says, her fingers curled around the mug as she stares down into the reflection. “I often find myself losing my breath because it hits so suddenly, so out of nowhere. It manifests in such ugly ways.”

“I’d rather just move on,” he says, like that was possible to begin with.

“That will never happen.” When she says it, with such tranquility, he wonders if he’ll ever reach that point. Accepting that he’ll never truly move on, that he’ll be shackled to this grief until he dies. Time moves a lot slower for devils, so would he be stuck like this for years? Decades?

Centuries?

Would time keep marching forward, uncaring, impartial?

The cruelty leaves his head spinning as he lowers it. “I don’t think I can do this.” How selfish.

“You don’t have a choice,” she says. It passes easier than sympathy. “That boy saw something in you. You can’t afford to disappoint him.”

He thinks of telling her. The words form in such a bleak, practical manner - I ate him. Swallowed his body whole. There’s nothing left to impress. Would she still regard him with any form of respect? Would the illusion of him being similar enough to her son shatter?

He doesn’t. He finishes the rest of his bowl, and she makes him a second helping.

Aki wills himself to bathe when she leaves. He sits under the hot water until it chills, staring down at his pruning fingers. As Hayakawa, these hands were capable of only kindness. But as Aki, as the Gun Fiend, little remains but something wanting to be kind when it’s far too late for any redemption.

He drifts back to when he and Angel bathed together, how the small space was even smaller with both of them staring at each other, wondering what to do with one another. Wondering if whatever they paraded as meant anything anymore as they saw each other for what they were - someone too tired but still capable of caring and someone growing terrified of what he was becoming.

It might have been easier when he was a devil. At least he couldn’t be bothered.

He’s halfway dried off by the time he catches the telephone in the living room ringing, the harsh noise bouncing off the walls. With a towel draped across his shoulders, he lifts it up to his ear, ceasing the ringing. “Ah, Gun Fiend,” he hears the caller say with a lighter tone. “I’d hoped to hear from you, but I suppose you needed time off. How are you feeling?”

The same question is addressed to him a second time, but he finds it’s not out of any genuine concern. “Makima,” he intones.

“Goodness, you sound a bit rough,” she says, tone unchanged. “My condolences for your loss. Angel was truly one of our best devil hunters we could’ve had. However, as sympathetic to your loss I am, I do require you to return to work at some point. The sooner, the better.”

“Is that all you called me for?”

“Well, there’s the matter of not knowing where Angel’s body is,” she says, but it appears to be the last worry on her mind as her voice drifts with distraction. “We’d have wanted to give him a funeral alongside Michiko Tendo.”

A tightness in his chest mirrors the clenching of his fingers around the phone. “You’re lying,” he hisses out between gritted teeth.

“Hm, well, that was the initial plan, but I asked Kishibe if there were other alternatives. Should we have the Zombie Devil in our custody—”

“Like that would even work,” he says.

“I’m aware. But it would be a shame to lose him even if he could no longer perform the same duties as before,” she muses. “I knew he’d give up sooner or later, but this is rather inconvenient. His abilities were so instrumental. If only he saw it for himself.”

If he could shoot her through the phone, he would. Consequences be damned.

“Be as it may, when will you be returning? We’d like to discuss further matters of handling the upcoming expedition.”

Sure. Sure, fine, whatever. Aki can’t be whole again, but reality doesn’t care. It seeks to have him return to it, to go about his days aimless and famished for something—for someone—he’ll never have again. It’s the fitting fate after all he’s done. “Tomorrow,” he says, voice clipped. He has half a mind to opt for longer time, but he doubts even ten years to recuperate can suffice. “I’ll come in tomorrow.”

“Splendid,” Makima says. “We’ll have to find you a new partner, but I think that shouldn’t take much effort. But, Aki? I’m rather curious. Where is Angel’s body?”

He almost tastes it again, the corners of his mouth aching when it unhinged to bite him open, tear him open, in hopes of leaving nothing behind. Not for the sea, not for Public Safety. It means something if he tells himself it does. “I killed him by the beach.” He almost surprises himself with how natural it sounds. I killed him. “His decision.”

“Stubborn until the end, I see. I suppose if nothing else, one can commend him for his consistency,” she says. “I won’t take up more of your time. Those were the only concerns I had. Do take care, Aki.” He’s still crushing the phone between his fingers even after it clicks to indicate she’s hung up. When he flexes his fingers, he finds his grip leaves behind a harsh indent in the material.

He sets it down in place as his own words echo in his ears. I killed him.

He killed Angel.

Willing himself to leave the enclosure for the first time in two whole weeks proves to be a challenge. Why do that when he can lay there, breathing his scent in, surrounded by the stupid stuffed crabs and burger-shaped Hello Kittys, watching as the soap opera window couple spiral, make up, spiral, then make up again? He’s watching their latest development. A’s about four months pregnant and is proposing so that B stays in the child’s life. Angel would’ve made fun of them with that softening glint in his eyes he gets at the sight of people in love. Aki knows what that look means now.

He’s spending his time decontextualizing everything. It’s one of the few ways to pass the time, to distance himself from the memory of it, the impact. But for him, it only happened a day prior. The taste and scent linger like he’s only now coming home from the carnage he inflicted.

The more time passes, the more it hurts.

Aki tells his body to move, to face the day regardless of the pain, that he’s better than this, smarter, stronger, whatever, but it declines to listen. It roots him in place under the bedsheets, and as a helpless prisoner to his own torment, he can’t fight back. So he doesn’t. And he lays there.

And he lays there.

It’s quiet.

He should catch some sleep.

Each day gets harder. Haruka said that only time heals it, but she never told him how grief means giving away yourself day after day to it, to surrender to it. To covet it because it’s all you have to remember them by. They never had enough time.

Someone collects him the next day. Is it the next day? Who cares? Whatever. He pulls himself back into reality again by yanking on the covers encasing him. “Aki,” Princi says as she looms over him. “I was tasked with retrieving you. Until you receive an optimal partner, I will be yours.”

His throat’s a dry desert when his lips part. “Uh-huh…” He tells his body one more time—just get up. The action takes such minimal effort. Why can’t he move?

“Aki,” Princi says, unmoving. “You have obligations. It is unwise to sit idly.”

“Uh-huh.” Why can’t he move? It denies him even a mere twitch of a muscle, like it knows and doesn’t care. “In a minute.”

She doesn’t give him a minute. She clasps a firm hand around the handguard part of his M4, tugging him out of bed like he weighs as much as air. He grunts out when his whole body hits the floor with a loud thud, and she drags it across the floorboards. “No,” she says. “Not in a minute.”

Aki lets himself get dragged out. If it came down to it, he’d have struck her and painted the walls in her blood. But even the imagery as it enters his head fails enticement, the handle in the back of his head scraping noisily against the floor. “Princi, have you ever lost something before?” He’s not sure why he asked. What would she care about something like that?

She perks her head up anyway at the question, her expression blank as always. “Inevitably. There are some I have found myself fond of, but we all die sooner or later. It is foolish to hope that it is later.”

Sure, whatever. A sigh loosens between his lips as he faces the ceiling instead of her. Is this really his new normal? Not knowing—again—who or what he’s supposed to be? “I don’t think I can get up.” He’s not lying.

“I can reach Miss Makima and inform her you’re still unwell,” Princi says, almost phrasing it as helping. Oh, wait, no, she’s helping.

“But then you’d have come all this way for nothing,” he says.

“Who says this was for nothing?”

So he doesn’t go to work again. Instead, the two lay on the floor in the hallway, side by side. Princi’s own hands clasp and rest on top of her stomach while his own twitches at his side, trying to will more strength into this weak prison of his. “I don’t get how humans can live like this,” he says. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt this powerless in a long time.”

“It must be because of your existence as a fiend,” she says. “You all seem more sentimental.” Her inky hair splays out on the floor as she stares up at the ceiling. “I must admit, however, that I felt sorrow when I found out. The times Angel and I interacted were rather… pleasant.”

Pleasant. Right, Angel was different with their coworkers. Gentler in intent, slower to react. With Aki, his gaze would grow sharper and he’d be swift in his snark, refusing to conceal his genuine emotions and actions. Only for him. It only ever indicates that Aki saw the real Angel without false pretenses. “They were, huh? He was a bit mean to me.” He’d let himself get stabbed a thousand times if fate ordained it, so long as it was Angel holding the knife, scraping his insides, dark eyes colored with an intensity, a passion that he’d never display elsewhere.

“I suppose it was his way of showing he cared for you,” Princi theorizes. Rather cute in theory if it were true.

He supposes that it had to be if Angel asked to die by his hand to begin with.

Aki sighs long and hard, unable to spare a glance in her direction without his stomach toiling for his troubles. He must appear ridiculous like this, a display of grief and confusion that knows nothing about how to resolve these feelings. Mourning was embedded in him from the moment he woke up, for all that was and never was, for all that should’ve been but was never going to be, for all that would be and was. Hayakawa learned to find peace because he had no choice. Aki can’t be like his former predecessor, pressing on through the mundane motions of life on autopilot because he had little else to look forward to.

So he gets up and showers again. When he emerges, Princi’s standing by the doorway, hands clasped in front of her and unmoving. He supposes that a chaperone makes it easier.

He checks into work as he would regularly, like today’s just a normal day. Princi accompanies him all the way to Makima’s office, stopping two steps before the door. “If you are still unwell, you may stay home,” she says. “It would be unwise to push yourself when you are incapable of it.”

“Thanks for the advice, Princi,” he says, unable to face her again. It’s no wonder Angel was so fond of her. “But I’m fine.” Or at least, he has no choice in that either. He’s never felt closer to Hayakawa than he does in that moment, throwing himself into work for a distraction, for an alternative to the suffering, a substitution for company he’ll never have again. Even despite his reservations, history repeats itself. Angel has doomed him until he’ll die yet again.

He might have done more to heed Princi’s warnings about overexerting himself, but how is one meant to know their limit if they never reach it? Aki asks himself this in the infirmary after his first devil attack since Angel’s death, the ceiling meeting his gaze again as he shifts against the gritty material of the medical cot’s bedsheets with his shirt and blazer removed, deep wounds struggling to mend over mutilated flesh. Beside him, a beaten and bruised Blood Hybrid Power is guffawing, her stomach caving in from the effort. “What a catastrophe! Even the great Gun Fiend isn’t so impenetrable!” she squeals, pointing at him as Galgali’s shoulders reach his ears when he sucks in a sharp breath.

“Okay, Power, you’re supposed to be helping,” he says, hand extending to gesture toward the fridge where their stock of blood lies. Power doesn’t move from her spot on the cot to their left, enjoying Aki’s predicament too much that Galgali’s scolding flies in one ear and out the other.

“‘Tis hilarious, ‘tis hilarious!” she says, her shrill voice bouncing off the walls. “What a complete and utter failure!”

“I still killed it,” Aki mutters bitterly, turning his nose away. When did he become so powerless that any devil can just… maim him with ease now? “You’re welcome, by the way.”

“Nay, I was out of harm’s way this entire time,” Power says, her hands firm on her hips. “There is no gratitude required.”

“You were inside its mouth.”

“Defeating it from the inside!”

He might have overstated to Angel how much he liked Power.

“Got a point, though,” Galgali says as he reaches over for the fridge’s handle instead, deeming his assistant useless. “You’re a lot better than that. No way the Bat Devil actually got a few licks in.”

“Off day.” Except every day is an off day if he aspires to be generous with the truth. Galgali unravels a long strip before tearing it off between his thumb and forefinger. “It won’t happen again.”

“Hope not. You’re kinda our strongest devil hunter now,” he says, extending a labeled bag of blood towards Aki, who doesn’t take it. The ‘now’ part speaks with such loudness that it’s almost deafening. He must recognize it himself, because he brings a closed fist to the mouth portion of his mask to cough into it, ready to divert the topic as though the three of them could remain oblivious to what he means. “Anyway. So, like, be more careful. Would hate to see you bite the dust.”

Aki can’t name what causes such a rapid reaction, but what leaves him is an indignant, "Yeah, I'd hate to be like Angel."

Galgali flinches both hands away from him as though touching something hot. “I didn’t—” he starts, but Aki cuts him off.

“I’d hate to end up like him, a zombie going through the day just because. Unmotivated, lazy, can barely take care of himself, thoughtless, and stupid enough to die so young. It would be the worst to end up like that.” He sits up halfway, ignoring the sharp pang in his side from the effort. Blood. He’s gone without since killing Angel, the mere thought of touching any leaving a sour taste in his mouth, but he’s hungry. The emptiness eats at him and refuses to ease, denying him the ability to heal at all. “I appreciate the sentiment, but I’m better than that. It’s going to take far more than that to kill me.”

Aki says it, and his mouth tastes like ash anyway. He says that with such pride ballooning in his chest, like his existing alone is a victory over Angel. He won. He survived, and Angel didn’t.

It was easier when he could pretend he wanted Angel dead.

The dreams come next.

Most fiends don’t dream—he’d asked Denji once before if he had bred from curiosity at the time, only to receive a sheepish response that it wasn’t without effort, just not feasible. Aki left it at that, assuming it to be exclusive for them all.

But he found out rather fast how he could. On some rare nights, he would find himself plagued with warped visions and memories that didn’t belong to him, and desires that did.

He’d sooner forget almost all of them by the time he woke up, but tonight is different. Late in the night, he’s awoken when he’d have preferred to stay asleep, stay in the dream world conjured up by his sorrow and want.

He saw Angel.

They sat by the beach, by an ocean bluer than anything he’s ever seen before, and he watched Angel’s round face alight with joy. His cheeks rosy and his lips stretched into a wide grin, laughter in his lungs over a punchline Aki doesn’t remember. He recalls the time he’d heard soft laughter ringing in his ears, shoulders trembling and eyes narrowed. He’d never look like that again.

Angel might have stifled a laugh here and there at Aki’s expense, but nothing to hold a candle to when he was alone with Hayakawa instead, drunk so that they both had an excuse to be themselves around the other for once. So hearing it in his dream, he only hoped that he never had to wake up.

But Aki does anyway, because he has to. Because lying in bed nursing these wounds won’t do any good. It won’t make him feel any better, and it won’t bring back Angel.

Aki chalked up the first two times to ‌mere coincidence, mere happenstance. But then it became habitual, then expected, to greet Angel in his dreams, where he could live there instead of the real world. He’d look most forward to nights on long workdays, and would sleep in on days off, denying himself blood or interaction just to will who he wants to see more than anyone or anything. They’ll sit by the beach’s shoreline, icy water lapping at their feet. The sunlight caresses the soft parts of Angel’s face, makes him younger, less tired of it all. Talking about everything and nothing until the taste of his sticky and dry mouth irritated him awake.

One evening, Aki finds himself in the middle of another dream where they’re sitting outside, watching the moon together with Angel’s head against his arm. He’d live in the illusion if he could. But a persistent ringing at his door rouses him awake, and he half-convinces himself to just lie there in hopes of drifting off again.

Sleep doesn’t come. Two full minutes of ceaseless ringing tears a growl from him as he snaps upright in bed. “There’s no way,” he says aloud, like the newcomer can hear his complaint.

But it is. He’s only two footsteps away from the doorway when he recognizes the scent, groaning to himself as he shakes his head. “You have to be kidding me.” He twists the doorknob, and the ringing halts. He only has it ajar by a mere inch before two palms shove against it, revealing a rosy-faced boy with wide, cerulean eyes. “Aha!” Taiyo says louder than necessary, his hair askew as each pant that flees him leaves behind a tremble in his shoulders. “Knew you’d still be here!”

“What the—how did you find out I live here?” Aki asks in astonishment, taking a reflexive step back.

“Future,” Taiyo says with a shrug, but only shakes his head as a grin stretches his lips over his own triumphant deduction skills. “But I had to guess on my own what your days off were. And since my parents have me practically under lock and key now,” his head tilts when he rolls his eyes as though the idea offends him, “I had to bide my time. Glad it paid off. So you’re the Gun Fiend, huh? Wow. You look just like my big brother.”

He might have been too mean to Angel pertaining to Taiyo, because the idea of pushing him out and slamming the door shut tightens his chest. “That happens,” he says, at a loss for what to say. What are human children like again? They start forming actual thoughts at a certain age, but they’re still rather naïve about how the world functions and require guidance. Isn’t Power the same age? Oh, that makes it easier.

“Really wanted to talk to you while everything was going on,” he says, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “But that obviously didn’t get to happen. I just wanted to see what you were like and what Angel was so protective over that he wouldn’t even tell me anything about you.”

“Like you would’ve been able to handle it,” he points out.

“I’m handling it now, aren’t I?” His head tilts aslant, bringing back memories of a little boy who could manipulate affairs for his own benefit with just a glance and a pouty bottom lip. His head tilts upright again as his nose wrinkles. “Why’s it smell so weird in here?”

Oh, right. The expired vegetables in the fridge and unclean kitchen. Still, he’s uninterested in divulging any detail about his predicament, and he’s eager to turn the boy away so that he can return to bed. “Where are your parents?”

“Papa got caught up at work and Mama really needed a nap.” A boy trying to seem adult labeling his parents with such childish monikers. Aki resists the urge to roll his eyes. “Hey, they’re technically your parents too. You should come over for dinner sometime!”

“I’m sure they’d love to stare at the corpse of their own kid,” he deadpans. Since when was he ever the pragmatic type? “Much less one controlled by a devil that almost killed them twenty-nine years ago.”

“Yeah, so, why did you do that?” Taiyo asks. Either he can’t read a room or refuses to when it doesn’t benefit him.

Still, Aki pauses at the question. Why did he? Well, simple. Easier to answer than anything he’s been asked before. “I love when people fear me. And I love bloodshed.” Or had. Since waking up in the body of a man who fixated on the wellbeing of everyone around him, the two sides struggled to find a compromise. They decided to become two sides of the same coin. He let it be since, unable to continue fighting to be only himself when he had to be more than that now if he wanted reconciliation.

“But you still did a lot to rescue people that night,” Taiyo says, his lips curled into another soft smile. “Guess you’re not so bad after all. That’s just like my big brother. He had a way of influencing anyone to do good.”

But it couldn’t save anyone Aki really wanted to save. He shakes his head to deny the proposition, one bred from such foolishness that he lacks the resolve to refute it. “Whatever. Go home, Taiyo. I was asleep.”

“At four in the afternoon?” Taiyo says, his brow arched.

Aki pauses, taking a glance outside at the bright and shining sun hanging high in the sky right behind Taiyo. Holy shit, is it only four? “Thought it was later than that,” he mutters, more to himself. If that’s the case, he’d been passed out for over twenty hours, then.

“Sheesh, is devil hunting really that tiring?”

“We’ll go with that, sure,” he says, casting another glance at the boy. “Go home.”

“My mom’s coming over to check on you anyway, so I might as well stay here,” he says with a shrug, letting himself in. He steps forward into the genkan, two fingers wedged between the heel of his foot and his shoe. “‘Sides, you look lonely! And I’ve always wanted to talk to you.”

“Talk about—” He’s so stunned by Taiyo’s sheer audacity inviting himself into someone else’s apartment that the words fail to register. “You’re—hey, what are you—”

Taiyo lets loose a whistle as he steps further into the apartment. “Wow. No decorations? Like at all? Not even a TV? Would’ve thought Public Safety paid huge stacks,” he says, poking his head around to view the kitchen. His thumb and middle finger fly up to pinch his nostrils shut, a complaint leaving him nasally. “Found the source of that weird smell.”

“Can you leave?” Aki asks as he follows behind with the door still left ajar, exasperated. How on earth did Hayakawa put up with this for so long? No wonder he fled the prefecture. “Hey—do not go into that room!”

Taiyo’s ears malfunction as he opens doors and closets down the hall, marveling at Aki’s bare room to the spare closet of Angel’s stuffed toys that couldn’t fit on his bed, stopping right at Angel’s room but not opening the door. In fact, the enthusiasm he’d displayed unabashed until now drains from him as his face softens. “So… he’s really gone, isn’t he?” he asks, not facing Aki.

And just like that, whatever was slighting Aki before is a mere background event as he stands by the hallway entrance, seeing what Taiyo does. “The result of his contract,” he says, only able to carry the truth for himself. It brought Angel closer to death, but Aki had been the one to deliver the final blow.

“Weird. I didn’t know him that long, but…” Taiyo trails off with no intent of finishing his sentence. “Well. Guessing you’re not handling it very well. Aren’t you, like, hundreds of years old?”

“Doesn’t make that big of a difference,” he confesses, though he’s aware Taiyo wouldn’t understand. He’d lived a dozen lifetimes, but he’s only met Angel in this one. None of the other years before or after him matter.

“Sorry for your loss,” Taiyo says, his voice failing to reach above a murmur. “Losing people you love hurts. It feels like they took a piece of you with them and you’re never getting it back.”

Aki only realizes how true it is when Taiyo says it, how whatever of himself felt concrete enough when he was made up of two souls struggling to process they were now one and the same only emerged because of Angel, and now Angel’s taken that with him to the grave. That level of greed’s become his undoing. And now just what is Aki to become without him? All that meant anything died with Angel too. “I see,” he says, just to say anything at all.

Taiyo provides no further quip nor input as he stares at the door, as though expecting Angel to emerge from it. Maybe Aki mimics the action in want of the same thing too. He’d be a lot nicer if given the opportunity, because now that he knows, he can no longer fault him for anything.

They stand there for so long that he only snaps back into reality because of a shrill “Taiyo!” torn loose from the lungs of a paranoid and traumatized mother. Both heads whip back to find Haruka with wide, frantic eyes that only grow more frantic at the sight of Taiyo, who sheepishly laughs.

“Hi, Mama. You sure woke up from your nap fast,” he says, tone lighter to assuage the situation, but it’s too late.

“Taiyo Hayakawa, you’re grounded until you’re in your thirties!” She’s in such a haste to remove her shoes that she almost stumbles forward, forcing a wince out of both boys as they watch. “I swear, it’s like you’re trying to kill me!”

“Well, if you just—” She cuts him off fast, unwilling to entertain his antics.

“None of that!” she snaps. The steam runs out fast as her hand rests against the wall beside her for support, her head hanging as her dark hair obscures her face. “God. God, what even is this? You’re driving me nuts. How is anyone supposed to know what to do about all of this…?”

The sight alone reminds him of how Hayakawa should’ve called more. “I asked him to leave earlier,” he says, his voice a distant rumble in the back of his throat.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t want to.” Taiyo’s own leaves in a huff as he crosses his arms over his chest. “It sucks everyone got to talk to you but me.”

“And was there not a good reason for it?” Haruka asks as she lifts her head, no longer frantic but far from calmed. “The situation is too complicated. You’re not helping, Taiyo.”

“We talked about this. You made a compromise,” Taiyo says. His voice with more bass in his chest than he can justify. “You’re not keeping your word.”

Haruka’s expression firms. “Car. Now.”

Whatever prevails in her gaze proves to be enough to force Taiyo back into complicity as he shakes his head, sparing neither a glance as he stomps away from Angel’s bedroom door and toward the genkan to bend over and retrieve his shoes. Haruka shuts her eyes until the front door slams behind Taiyo to indicate the two are now alone, but she says nothing.

He doesn’t either, in part because he never finds the correct words to offer the woman whose gaze fills with a quiet sorrow whenever she’s in the same room as him. But he finds that he should still say something. “I have most of his memories,” he says. It might pass for comfort. “Taiyo, I seem to remember the most out of everything. He seems unchanged.”

Her sigh lowers her shoulders. “It’s almost something new everyday,” she says. “I find it impossible to understand him anymore. I don’t know if it’s a fruitless endeavor even trying, but he deserves better than to be given up on.” She shakes her head and takes a glance around the apartment for herself. “I see you’ve been faring poorly.”

“More or less.” It’s somehow worse when she takes notice of his predicament. “I get better sometimes, but that just means I’m less worse.”

“That’s how it goes, yes,” she agrees with a nod.

“I don’t want to live like this at all.” How selfish of him, to wish he were spared from the fate he’d inflicted on countless others. The dam breaks as he runs a hand through his hair. “I can’t. I can’t do this. It gets easier, then it doesn’t. I feel motivated, then I don’t. Sometimes I even hate him and I feel better he’s gone so I never have to need or rely on him again, then outside of it I think it’d be easier to die so I could pretend I’d see him again in death. Doing this everyday means just that, that I have to do this everyday.”

He’s not sure what he expects her to say. He might not have expected much at all from her, but he’s still caught off-guard when she tugs him closer to him, arms so gentle and warm that his breath catches in his throat. She should hate him. It would be easier if she hated him. But even the thought makes him crumble in defeat. If she killed him here and now, he couldn’t imagine a better way to die.

He begrudges Hayakawa. As much as she couldn’t understand, as much as the two drifted, he should’ve called more.

“It’s going to feel like this for a long time,” she whispers into the air, a hand smoothing out his hair. “It may even feel like this forever. One moment, you think you’ll have finally learned to handle it, but then it starts drowning you all over again. There is nothing I can say or do that will ever make this go away or feel less horrible. You lose someone, and you carry that forever. This is the burden of loving someone.”

Then he’d have been better off never loving. He’d have been better off snuffing out any thoughts of Angel before they emerged into something uncontrollable, before he’d come to the realization that he sought kindness and not destruction. But it’s too late.

“There’s this rather common turn of phrase. Time heals all wounds,” she continues, stroking his hair. “It’s somewhat true. They don’t tell you that it hurts the entire time, just that it gets easier to deal with. Over time, you learn to swim. Days come when you forget to, they always do. It’s inevitable. And you have no choice.”

Aki only shakes his head, but it’s no use. What if he never learns? What if all he can do is sink into nothing? What then? What is he meant to do?

What then?

Haruka stays. He doesn’t remember falling asleep, but he sinks anyway.

Aki doesn’t know how long he’s laid in bed, listening to the indistinct whispers between Taiyo and Haruka. He makes out sparse details, but nothing concrete. He could go out and join them, but he’s neither motivated nor willing to, opting to close his eyes instead to block out the noise. God, what would Angel say if he witnessed this pathetic display? Would he snicker under his breath and say, “Not so nice when it’s your turn, is it?”

Aki would turn his head away and mutter a, “Shut up,” but he’d never mean it. He’d rather hear Angel talk as long as possible, about God until he believed it, about the ocean until he aspired to view that elusive blue just to see what was special about it, about his own kindness until he saw it for himself.

Angel would sigh, and it would ruffle his bangs as he’d turn his head away. And then he’d say something like, “It never got easier for me. I just found things I liked more than thinking about the pain.” He had such a way with saying such simple yet profound things, like he knew everything there already was to know. And he’d found none of it impressive.

Aki would glance at him, because he was always staring. Watching—always watching at Angel’s idle fingers tapping on the table or his lips pursing together in thought. He would say, “I was too harsh to you.”

“Is that your way of apologizing? Or is it pity?”

He would ask what’s the difference.

“Whichever one makes you feel better.”

He would ask if it mattered. Angel would shrug his shoulders and continue staring out into the sky, the sunlight kissing along the soft contours of his face. He would look younger, unattainable. A muse.

Aki rolls over on the bed, nose wrinkling as he flattens a stuffed crab in the effort. The noise outside the bedroom has ceased, leaving a dreadful lull to hang in the air. When it’s silent, his thoughts persist.

The scent of Angel no longer permeates the room. Aki had taken residence here in his space long enough to erase most traces of him. It’s instead become a prison, and only he’s able to free himself from it.

Whatever resolve he has left in him deigns to allow him to sit up, take in how sunlight filters in through the curtains. Outside, the window soap opera couple dote on a newborn infant, hand in hand. It’s a beautiful day.

He needs a smoke.