sangria 28; cranberry 4
Author: Marika Kailaya
Title: Blackout
'Verse: Nagekawashii; MeYu
Challenge: Sangria: 28. And fired the shot heard round the world - Ralph Waldo Emerson; Cranberry: 4. The Emperor
Toppings/Extras: N/A
Wordcount: 1115
Rating: R
A/N: immortal dick-measuring contest i guess. also i wondered what would happen when pyre inevitably dies and mallory inevitably goes full avenging angel.
There's a storm brewing over the house where Hakuri and Tatsuri live as mortal men, and, in the end, that's how he finds them. In the swirl of decidedly human thundering black clouds, they are a too-bright inhuman center. They have made no effort at hiding themselves from human or demon, in spite of notoriety in both worlds. That alone, he speculates, should make him turn back.
He materializes at the door anyway, receiving no chance to knock before it is opened.
It occurs to the White Lord, then, why they are not hidden.
Hakuri is residing as a tall man with long black hair and bright blue eyes half-obscured by smudged, thick glasses. He is wearing torn jeans and a black t-shirt that rudely invites the reader to fuck themselves. Black ink stains the pads of his fingers; pale scars stain the rest of his visible flesh.
Miyori hasn't bothered with concealing himself either, and Hakuri doesn't bother with surprise at the white, red-clawed hand that peeks out from silken robes and grips an ivory cane.
Hakuri smiles. Miyori is six thousand years old, this man barely half a millennium; yet a chill creeps into Miyori's bones that has nothing to do with the wind that tosses the tree branches about overhead.
"You might want to come inside," Hakuri, death-killer, says pleasantly, stepping to one side and holding the door. "It looks like rain."
Miyori inclines his head and steps through into a darkened, incredibly human kitchen. There are dishes in the sink and a newspaper and three cups of tea at a table where a red-haired man in a sweater and jeans sits.
Tatsuri.
Brother of death.
He is smaller in body and in presence than Hakuri, and Miyori realizes that the brightness in the storm does not belong to them both: only to Hakuri.
He realizes, too, that Tatsuri is the threat to the mortal world; Hakuri is the threat to the universe. It creeps into his mind without him allowing it, and he glances sharply at Hakuri, who lifts his shoulders in an inelegant shrug. "Sorry," he says contritely. "I can't help what slips into the thoughts of others."
Death's brother lights a cigarette and laughs as though there is indeed something funny at all.
There is not.
The White Lord in the North is out of his depth.
Hakuri smiles crookedly, goes to the sink and fills a kettle, puts it on the stove, and takes a seat, gesturing for Miyori to do the same; and so, awkwardly, with some amount of trouble, Miyori does.
"Do you...know who I am?" he chooses to ask. He is trying not to use words he will regret later, but foxes are foxes, and if Miyori is one of them, then he is surely out of his league now.
Hakuri exchanges a glance with his husband. "You watched us die," is what he answers with.
It is the strangest experience, Miyori thinks, speaking with ghosts. He has done it often. But they have never been so dangerous, nor so vengeful.
"I watched you escape," Miyori says coldly. He directs this at Tatsuri, who still has barely lifted his gaze from the tea in front of him.
The kettle on the stove screeches. Hakuri rises to retrieve it and pours Miyori a cup of tea that smells of citrus and cinnamon.
Tatsuri flicks his cigarette into a silver ashtray. For a very brief moment in time Miyori thinks the scars lining his arm and hand glow white. He is making a point; Miyori has chosen his words wrongly. "You watched me tear the barrier, after killing my brother and my lover, after a century of torture that could've been easily prevented," Tatsuri agrees mildly. He doesn't say, and look where it got us all. He really does not need to.
"Was it you who hid from Shi in the mountains until you were crippled by a woman?" Hakuri asks, settling down at the table again. He ties his hair up with a battered black elastic from his wrist; as he does so Miyori reads the scar on his neck.
Words, a signature.
Deny me? -Chi Yuku. Carved with the tip of a thin knife a long time ago, Miyori realizes.
"You regret coming here," Hakuri muses. "Did you come here to ask our help?"
"I...did. Do you know of Sangmin, possessed by Huomo?" For the first time in a very long time, Miyori uses the given name of the Fire, and feels sick.
"I know of Huomo," Hakuri responds. He sips his tea; Tatsuri eyes the newspaper on the table, like he's got better things on his mind.
"Sangmin destroyed Huomo, quite a few years ago now."
"Oh, good," Tatsuri mutters, "that's another one down."
"Sangmin is dying," Miyori says painfully. And it does indeed look like it hurts him. "Huomo was burned out of his soul and now he is burning himself away. I came to the two impossible foxes to find an impossible solution."
"I am impossible, and I am fire; I burned the air out of the Death Lord's lungs," Hakuri concedes, showing his teeth. They are mortal teeth: yellowed, chipped. Many of them capped in silver. Still Miyori has the idle thought of having his throat torn out by them. "But what do you want me to do about it?"
And Hakuri smiles, all innocent.
"This would matter to you," Miyori says, "if you understood what Mallory Laurent will do if I let Sangmin die."
"If he's just a human, then what threat can he pose?" Tatsuri asks, exhaling a slow wave of smoke that burns Miyori's inhale.
Miyori readjusts his breathing, and looks into Hakuri's eyes for the full half second he can before he begins to feel like he's looking into a bright abyss he can't ever leave. "I know what you've done here," Miyori says quietly, "as mortal men. I am asking you to help me."
"I serve one god," Hakuri says. Out of the corner of Miyori's eye he sees Chi Yuku, once Tatsuri, glance up from his tea. His trickster-red hair falls away from his face and he looks entirely human and utterly unassuming, and Miyori who cast the entire world under an illusion nearly finds himself trapped in one. "I'm not planning on ever serving anyone else ever again," Hakuri says.
Miyori stands up. "It wasn't Sangmin who killed the Fire," he says, moving towards the door. "It was Mallory, and I am very sure he could destroy both worlds if driven to it."
"Not if I get there first," Hakuri says.
His laughter echoes in Miyori's ears long past the time Miyori has gone.
Title: Blackout
'Verse: Nagekawashii; MeYu
Challenge: Sangria: 28. And fired the shot heard round the world - Ralph Waldo Emerson; Cranberry: 4. The Emperor
Toppings/Extras: N/A
Wordcount: 1115
Rating: R
A/N: immortal dick-measuring contest i guess. also i wondered what would happen when pyre inevitably dies and mallory inevitably goes full avenging angel.
There's a storm brewing over the house where Hakuri and Tatsuri live as mortal men, and, in the end, that's how he finds them. In the swirl of decidedly human thundering black clouds, they are a too-bright inhuman center. They have made no effort at hiding themselves from human or demon, in spite of notoriety in both worlds. That alone, he speculates, should make him turn back.
He materializes at the door anyway, receiving no chance to knock before it is opened.
It occurs to the White Lord, then, why they are not hidden.
Hakuri is residing as a tall man with long black hair and bright blue eyes half-obscured by smudged, thick glasses. He is wearing torn jeans and a black t-shirt that rudely invites the reader to fuck themselves. Black ink stains the pads of his fingers; pale scars stain the rest of his visible flesh.
Miyori hasn't bothered with concealing himself either, and Hakuri doesn't bother with surprise at the white, red-clawed hand that peeks out from silken robes and grips an ivory cane.
Hakuri smiles. Miyori is six thousand years old, this man barely half a millennium; yet a chill creeps into Miyori's bones that has nothing to do with the wind that tosses the tree branches about overhead.
"You might want to come inside," Hakuri, death-killer, says pleasantly, stepping to one side and holding the door. "It looks like rain."
Miyori inclines his head and steps through into a darkened, incredibly human kitchen. There are dishes in the sink and a newspaper and three cups of tea at a table where a red-haired man in a sweater and jeans sits.
Tatsuri.
Brother of death.
He is smaller in body and in presence than Hakuri, and Miyori realizes that the brightness in the storm does not belong to them both: only to Hakuri.
He realizes, too, that Tatsuri is the threat to the mortal world; Hakuri is the threat to the universe. It creeps into his mind without him allowing it, and he glances sharply at Hakuri, who lifts his shoulders in an inelegant shrug. "Sorry," he says contritely. "I can't help what slips into the thoughts of others."
Death's brother lights a cigarette and laughs as though there is indeed something funny at all.
There is not.
The White Lord in the North is out of his depth.
Hakuri smiles crookedly, goes to the sink and fills a kettle, puts it on the stove, and takes a seat, gesturing for Miyori to do the same; and so, awkwardly, with some amount of trouble, Miyori does.
"Do you...know who I am?" he chooses to ask. He is trying not to use words he will regret later, but foxes are foxes, and if Miyori is one of them, then he is surely out of his league now.
Hakuri exchanges a glance with his husband. "You watched us die," is what he answers with.
It is the strangest experience, Miyori thinks, speaking with ghosts. He has done it often. But they have never been so dangerous, nor so vengeful.
"I watched you escape," Miyori says coldly. He directs this at Tatsuri, who still has barely lifted his gaze from the tea in front of him.
The kettle on the stove screeches. Hakuri rises to retrieve it and pours Miyori a cup of tea that smells of citrus and cinnamon.
Tatsuri flicks his cigarette into a silver ashtray. For a very brief moment in time Miyori thinks the scars lining his arm and hand glow white. He is making a point; Miyori has chosen his words wrongly. "You watched me tear the barrier, after killing my brother and my lover, after a century of torture that could've been easily prevented," Tatsuri agrees mildly. He doesn't say, and look where it got us all. He really does not need to.
"Was it you who hid from Shi in the mountains until you were crippled by a woman?" Hakuri asks, settling down at the table again. He ties his hair up with a battered black elastic from his wrist; as he does so Miyori reads the scar on his neck.
Words, a signature.
Deny me? -Chi Yuku. Carved with the tip of a thin knife a long time ago, Miyori realizes.
"You regret coming here," Hakuri muses. "Did you come here to ask our help?"
"I...did. Do you know of Sangmin, possessed by Huomo?" For the first time in a very long time, Miyori uses the given name of the Fire, and feels sick.
"I know of Huomo," Hakuri responds. He sips his tea; Tatsuri eyes the newspaper on the table, like he's got better things on his mind.
"Sangmin destroyed Huomo, quite a few years ago now."
"Oh, good," Tatsuri mutters, "that's another one down."
"Sangmin is dying," Miyori says painfully. And it does indeed look like it hurts him. "Huomo was burned out of his soul and now he is burning himself away. I came to the two impossible foxes to find an impossible solution."
"I am impossible, and I am fire; I burned the air out of the Death Lord's lungs," Hakuri concedes, showing his teeth. They are mortal teeth: yellowed, chipped. Many of them capped in silver. Still Miyori has the idle thought of having his throat torn out by them. "But what do you want me to do about it?"
And Hakuri smiles, all innocent.
"This would matter to you," Miyori says, "if you understood what Mallory Laurent will do if I let Sangmin die."
"If he's just a human, then what threat can he pose?" Tatsuri asks, exhaling a slow wave of smoke that burns Miyori's inhale.
Miyori readjusts his breathing, and looks into Hakuri's eyes for the full half second he can before he begins to feel like he's looking into a bright abyss he can't ever leave. "I know what you've done here," Miyori says quietly, "as mortal men. I am asking you to help me."
"I serve one god," Hakuri says. Out of the corner of Miyori's eye he sees Chi Yuku, once Tatsuri, glance up from his tea. His trickster-red hair falls away from his face and he looks entirely human and utterly unassuming, and Miyori who cast the entire world under an illusion nearly finds himself trapped in one. "I'm not planning on ever serving anyone else ever again," Hakuri says.
Miyori stands up. "It wasn't Sangmin who killed the Fire," he says, moving towards the door. "It was Mallory, and I am very sure he could destroy both worlds if driven to it."
"Not if I get there first," Hakuri says.
His laughter echoes in Miyori's ears long past the time Miyori has gone.