windfall | light a cigarette, i'll watch as it burns

light a cigarette, i'll watch as it burns

[ Knocking. The roar of ammunition fire in his ears. Blasts of heat and debris sticking to his face, dust crusting in his eyes. A delirious and delicious taste, sweet red like pomegranate, like Aki's skin scraping open in his mouth.

Denji doesn't talk much about what happened that day.

Not unusual, since he doesn't really talk much about any of what transpired prior to meeting Nayuta, either. Or about how sometimes he can still sense, not even hear, but sense a phone ringing in the distance, its pull like a spiral cord that's gone taut, that's trying to make its way back home and if he follows its trail, he might just find someone familiar on the other end of the receiver.

No, he doesn't tell anyone all that, because, see, the last time he did, Kishibe had just hummed and looked at him, the kind of look Denji would get from adults whenever they caught him picking through the dumpster for his next meal: pitying. Then, he'd shook out a flask from the inside of his coat and said, "Sometimes it's better for the line to go dead, kid."

Weird response, right? It'd made Denji go silent, think a bit. And after a while, he hadn't liked that so much, so he'd changed the subject to something inoffensive, like complaining about how much Nayuta's so much better at arcade games than he is, but Kishibe had cut him short at that point to go take a call.

Naturally, Denji had followed.

It's a little sad that a man in his silver years is the only person he can confide in, but Kishibe's not a bad guy — and that's coming from someone who generally hates men. Then again, the guy doesn't show his gaunt face around these parts unless he absolutely has to, which is probably by his own design, so it helps that he's never around long enough for Denji to get sick of seeing him. Up until that conversation, his absence wouldn't have been something Denji paid notice to. It'd usually take weeks and months and Nayuta asking where the funny, drunk geezer who always sneaks her hard candy is for him to see past the everyday chaos of being Tokyo's friendly neighborhood Chainsaw Man.

But as Denji creeped closer, overhearing some words but not registering most of them, a dangerous curiosity brought him to the edge of his hiding spot. What the hell has this dude been up to?

And then he'd froze.

"So the Gun Devil's position has been compromised. Initiate a tactical retreat."

Afterward, he hadn't done anything for a solid week besides go to school, kick some devil ass and stare vacantly at a pair of eggs frying in the pan for dinner each evening. Predictably, Nayuta had rapidly gotten sick of the menu. So before he could make his eighth pair of fried eggs, she'd scaled up his back and twisted his earlobes until he begged for forgiveness.

"Stuuupid! Dummy! Get a hold of yourself!" Nayuta raged on. "No more acting weird, or else I'm putting doggy kibble in your cereal again!"

She was right. He needed to get a hold of himself. Yeah, he was dumb, but that didn't mean he had eggshells for brains. He could still do stuff in his own way.

In the following weeks, Denji spent his time hounding members of the Devil Hunter Club for all and any relevant knowledge pertaining to devils. From rumors about recent devil sightings, to insights into things like the theoretical mechanics behind how long it took for certain types of devils to die in Hell and be reborn, to mathematical equations projecting the survivability rate of fiends based on the velocity and quantity of violence…

Of course, he only understood about three-percent of anything at any given time, but one detail of interest shared by some gloomy, pig-tailed girl stood out to him. According to her, a mysterious amount of devils had been slain in the Kabukicho district, none of which had been reported by either civilian hunters or Public Safety ones.

Anyone with half their wits would be able to easily determine that this wasn't a reasonable lead, but for Denji? He could feel something trilling out to him. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ The dustpan passes between their hands easily for one reason only, and that's so his grip can hop to Aki's wrist, tight, like the squeeze of a collar around the neck of a stubborn dog refusing to move with its leash. Denji's not sure what his next move is, though, he hadn't thought that far — it feels more like everything he wants to say is reserved for the devil beating its rotten heart inside Aki's chest, as if that thing's the reason why this morning has gone to crap. Why he feels like crap, having Aki clean up a mess they should share.

Man, he really doesn't want to go to school. There's just never enough time to figure himself out. ]

Promise you'll find something to eat while I'm gone?

[ Whatever Aki says or does, whether that's to simply agree, pull away from him again, or commit to another pinky swear, it matters to Denji that he hears him, that he knows they're both on the same side.

Nayuta exits from bathroom then, eyes red and puffy — from scrubbing and nothing else, surely? — as she trudges toward her bag. Seeing her, Denji lets go, almost in a hurry. He stands to address her, but she doesn't glance at either of them, doesn't look like she'll be saying sorry anytime soon, either. She flicks open the flap to her backpack, double-checking her things before redoing the clasp and shouldering one of the straps. Her unbraided hair bounces against her shoulders, and he thinks for a moment he should tell her to hang back, let him fix that, but the door opens and shuts without a single word reaching her.

Obsessed is what Aki called her. But Denji can't agree with that observation, not without guilt burning through every other feeling upsetting his stomach, outliving his own attachment to a dead woman and the debt he owes her. Carries in tandem with her. Nayuta's not obsessed; she just needs him the same way he needs her.

From that point, he rushes his way through getting ready for school, tossing his jacket over the same Chainsaw Man tee he always wears. Maybe he can still catch up with Nayuta. Slinging his backpack on as he heads out the door, Denji spares Aki a nod, the furrow of his brows apologetic. Afterward, the door closes behind him in much the same way it'd closed behind Nayuta, leaving Aki alone. ]

[Aki hasn't missed the way Denji seems concerned about his eating. He doesn't really understand why. Doesn't get why it's something he's so focused on. But he nods, pulling his wrist free from his grasp gently so he can start sweeping up the small shards of the dishes.]

I will.

[He watches the two of them leave, not expecting an apology from the devil because that just seems like too high a bar for her to meet. He nods at Denji when he leaves, a muttered, I'll see you tonight, under his breath, and he squats back down with a soapy rag to continue cleaning up the spill.]

[He does eat, at least. Has a quick breakfast and watches the news for a bit before having to turn it off. Every time he watches it, it makes him feel powerless. At least he could feign indifference in government care. Here, it's a constant background noise. It's torture. He can't stay inside.]

[Which leads to the landlady spotting him as he heads down the stairs and he has to take a few minutes to thank her for the vegetables, which leads her to showing him her little herb garden beside some shrubs separating it from the road which is compeltely overrun with weeds. Aki didn't even realize it was meant to be anything at all but a patch of decaying grass until he sees some singular, struggling rosemary leaves beneath all the overgrowth. He does the neighborly thing which is offering to help clean it out and she thanks him like that wasn't at all why she showed it to him. Calls him a "young man" which no one has referred to him as since he was in high school. So that's how he ends up spending most of the afternoon baking in the sun and pulling weeds.]

[By the time Denji should be home, he's got everything ready to show them how to make curry. Well, Denji knows how to make this. Aki showed him how back when he was in recovery, still struggling with only having one arm and needing to show him something simple to make. But the devil said she likes curry, and while it's not an olive branch, it's not the barrel of a gun, either. Better this than nothing.]

[At least, he's hoping he'll be home. Tapping his foot while staring down at his fingernails and trying to pick dirt out of them while a TV program featuring an actress from some decades-old movie talks about something utterly trivial and unimportant. Music to his ears.]

[ He's surprised to see Nayuta waiting for him at the foot of the stairs, kicking her sneakers at a dead patch of grass. That’s what he thinks she's doing, at least, up to skipping over the busted step down and landing beside her, seeing that she’d just scattered an anthill out into the sidewalk, the now homeless colony scurrying to rebuild their nest. A proper grown-up might tell her that hurting the defenseless cheapens your character, that it’s pointless, a waste of energy, inconsiderate to those who have to look at something ugly and pick up the pieces. But being a kid himself, he understands there are uglier things in this city, uglier people than an upset girl-devil who doesn't know any better than take her anger out on something that can't bruise her knees back.

A bug is a bug; their every action is motivated by survival, not sadness or fear or grief, not even when they heft their dead onto their backs and bury them. Nayuta is Nayuta; she doesn't know how to braid her own hair right without help. Ask him who matters more and there isn't a single doubt in his mind.

So he gives her a long look. Do you feel better, he says, subdued, to avoid sounding interrogative or accusing; he knows how he would react to that line of questioning, depending on the tone. A careful balancing act: err too far to one side, and he might trigger her flight — to the other, and she might just fly off the rails. To her credit, Nayuta answers, just as subdued, with a slow shake of her head, left to right to left. She doesn't. Alright. He guesses that's pretty expected.

Here's what isn't: “I don’t feel like going to school.”

What about your perfect attendance… is what he nearly asks, but Nayuta's a smart kid who can catch back up in no time after missing a day. She probably already realizes there's always next year for that kind of award for someone like her. For someone who isn't like her, though… Denji's brown eyes drift up to their apartment. While the window blinds are open, there doesn't appear to be a shadow of anyone hovering behind them. Still cleaning, he assumes.

When Denji looks back down, he notices an ant climbing onto his shoe. He pauses, then kicks it off. And then, he nods at her. Okay. He doesn't feel like going to school, either.

They go to the arcade first, wiling their time and Denji's money away at a UFO Catcher until one of the attendants takes pity on them and repositions the tiny Chainsaw Man plush, making it easier to drop into the receptacle. Nayuta whines at him to play Dance Dance Mushroom with her, but for some reason, he doesn't think Pochita wants to see that, and refuses. They eat burgers and way too many fries, which she looks happy about for the first time that day, so he tries not to wince every time he pulls out a couple dirty coins from his wallet to pay. By the time they leave, there are clouds gathering outside, offering a little bit of relief from the dry heat of summer. It's still hot as balls but they can't exactly go to the pool or something… So one of them suggests that they may as well sweat it out at the batting cages, since they've never been before. The nearest dome just so happens to be in Kabukicho.

Of course, when they arrive the main street greets them with crime scene tape and uniformed devil hunters.

"Shouldn't you kids be in class?" a grim voice asks.

When they turn, it's luckily not an officer or hunter addressing them, but a crabby reporter smoking next to her camera operator, threads of smoldering tobacco rising from her nostrils, like the exhaust fumes of a revving car. How do people smoke in this weather?

"This area's off-limits. You're gonna get told to beat it if you go any further." Bitterly, she adds beneath her breath, like she's been waiting for someone new to complain to about this: "Damn Public Safety. They're not even letting us do our jobs and report what's going on back there."

That was pretty obvious bait.

Denji falls for it, prods. Real casual, like he doesn't even care that his pulse has hiked up a gear from — something. It has to be because the reporter lady's pretty. Yeah, that has to be why. Delighted to have an audience, the reporter hushedly tells him that, off the record, no one's been able to run coverage on the story beyond revealing that there's an ongoing situation and that all through traffic must reroute for the duration of the blockage. But the reality is, from her observation, that there's a real bad news devil hanging out underground, attracting mobs of others — making it impossible for hunters to create a path down and relying on movement patterns in the ground to approximate the thing's next location.

Denji's about to suggest to Nayuta that they go get popsicles or something instead, but she excited shakes and tugs on his arm. "Denji! See, even this lady thinks it would be amazing if Chainsaw Man came and saved the day!"

The reporter looks at Nayuta strangely, as if about to say, no, those words weren't anywhere near her mouth but the Control Devil stares her down, unshakeable. A tautness in her expression — reminiscent of the chain links hanging from the reporter's head, same as her camera person. Blinking, he's about to tell her to knock it off, but an outpouring of distressed clamor gushes from a short distance away. Something is shifting, worming. In a repeat of before, the same vine-like tendrils pierce out from the tarmac, the ground crunching, going uneven, heedless of whoever is standing there. Noxious spores fill the area.

Denji shoves himself and Nayuta into a cranny in the street, a dead-end walkway hosting several closed and shuttered shops, her now mindless underlings following after like twin zombies. No other devils entering the mix yet, but it's only a matter of time. They should get out of there. But as he's saying this to Nayuta, he notices her speaking over him. To a camera.

"…Live from Kabukicho, we're on the scene to investigate the mysterious incident holding up traffic. Hey, miss. Do you think the super awesome Chainsaw Man will finally come and fight off whatever weird devil has made its home here?" the reporter tonelessly prompts, an odd glaze to her eyes as she holds a mic out to Nayuta.

"Duh! Obviously. Chainsaw Man's been on vacation for so long because people keep saying he eats cats!" Nayuta yells, swinging her Chainsaw Man doll with each wild gesture. Behind her, a door creeps agape, strings of mucus catching against the awning, stretching, and slinging out a slimy devil. Headed straight for her. "He'd never disappoint his fans, or cats, or dogs, or me — "

Vrrrm, vrrrrrrmm!

"And there he is!" She twists, just in time to watch Denji — no, Chainsaw Man, in a streak of glinting metal and vibrating sparks, razor through the thing's translucent body in the background. She cheers. "Awww, yeah! Chainsaw Man's back! You, camera guy, make sure you catch this."

Instead of catching whatever it is Nayuta wanted, the camera operator drops the equipment to the ground from the intensity of the earth shuddering unsteadily underfoot. Probably a good thing, too, because it's not pretty how Denji gets into her face to tell her to leave while he takes care of this. He doesn't wait to see if she listens to him or not because he's already mounting up the wall, jumping from sign to sign, to get to the roof and spring himself off into the loving embrace of the disorder below. ]

[Aki thinks that he should look into getting a cone for making drip coffee. Everyone likes the smell of coffee. Maybe the devil won't hate him as much if he makes the kitchen smell like coffee in the morning. But then he thinks, How long am I going to be here? Is it even worth it? It's the exact same questions he would ask himself after he used Curse. With only two years left, is it worth it to do this or that?]

...www, yeah! Chainsaw Man's back!

[Aki's head snaps up as he looks at the TV. Just a moment ago it was at a news desk covering some attack somewhere or another. Basic news. Devil hunters on the scene. As common as a rain forecast in late summer. His eyes jump to the clock, but it's only 2pm - So it can't be Denji. But the camera swerves and he sees a flash of metal jumping up to the top of a sign, broken off suddenly by the rumble of concrete fracturing and a yelp like someone is hurt, the camera shaking and dropping. A rush cut back to the studio. "That was the live scene from Kabukicho, Kabukicho, yes - The attack is still ongoing and officials are asking all civilians to stay out of the way while Public Safety handles the attack - But would you look at that, that was definitely him! That was Chainsaw Man, wasn't it?!"]

[The TV confirms that to no one, as Aki is already out the door, the unit left on to update no one but the dogs.]

[His heart is racing. No, no, no, he keeps thinking. Whatever that devil is, it doesn't matter. Public Safety exists to deal with this. Denji isn't Public Safety. Denji isn't a superhero. He's just a kid. He's a teenager. He's supposed to live a normal life - be happy - be free. He can't be doing this. He can't keep throwing himself at these devils. Someone else will deal with it, someone more trained and better equipped and who has already chosen to throw their life into the maws of death. Someone with a dream beyond the ideal of being loved. Someone like him.]

[An officer holds him back when he gets to the scene, despite his snaps and shouts that he knows someone who is there, to let him through - he used to be in Public Safety, he knows what he's doing, but his clothes make him look like any one of the other pedestrians trying to rush from the scene. The only difference with Aki is that he's desperately trying to go toward it. The officer threatens to arrest him if he trespasses but he can't get the full threat out before there's another crash, the ground crumbling a few hundred meters ahead. Aki swears he hears chainsaws. Tells himself he would know that noise better than anyone. He grips the barricade and considers jumping it, but the cop will just chase him. He backs away and watches for a moment, jaw set tight.]

[When he finds an opening, it's due to seeing a devil hunter crouched over, blood rushing down her head. She's alone with no weapons but struggling to sit upright, the redness covering her eyes, dirtying her hair. Hit by cement, Aki realizes, and moves over to her in the alley blocked by an unguarded stanchion. The officer who had threatened to arrest him is busy getting a civilian to cover.]

[He asks her if she saw Chainsaw Man and she looks at Aki like he's insane. "He's in there," she mutters, her voice weak. "Down in the pit." Aki turns to look toward the dust and clumps of ripped up buildings and pavement. A hole is forming in the earth, revealing a devil nest swarming with smoke and devil corpses. Like they've been sucked of energy, dehydrated to feed something greater. Aki helps lift her toward the stanchion, comforting himself that maybe someone will see her, but she's unconscious by the time he has his arms under hers. Which gives him an idea.]

[It's not much in way of a disguise, of course, but the Public Safety jacket has built in protection. He pulls his arms through, the woman being a bit smaller than him but the size fitting close enough. Raising the collar of his shirt over his mouth and nose, he steps forward toward the pit, trying to look down. The scent hits him hard. Blood, death - and something else he can't recognize.]

[Gun is thrashing inside him. So excited. Thrilled. Like Aki just walked into a jungle gym and he wants to swing on the bars.]

Chainsaw Man! [He shouts it into the pit. Tries to ignore the head rush. The feeling of his mind swimming. The sensation of snow on his shoulders.] Chainsaw!

[ He doesn't know why he pulled the cord. If he took the time to think things over, there had to have been another way to get rid of such a puny devil, protect Nayuta, and still keep his end of the deal with Aki. To avoid disappointing him, to make him happy, that's something he cares about more than his own despicable life, he swears it. It's just hearing that he was needed, that Nayuta needed him and that this shitty corner of Tokyo needed him because no one else could do what he could, not even those Public Safety goody two-shoes — something about it was electrifying. So much so, he could have mistaken it for a defibrillator zapping through his chest, resurrecting that old feeling of his, that sense that he could be okay with being this city's little pull-string toy forever and ever, no better than the kind he'd won from the arcade. He could launch himself into a beehive of writhing devils and feel an excruciating joy indistinguishable from the pain of having his ribs snapped one by one, his every organ blended into a pulpy puree, shattered like a plate that was broken far before it ever hit the ground. He could do it and he would.

Denji's body isn't his own as he hacks away one devil after the next, drinking in the same spores aggravating his foes. He doesn't mind that for now, bruised from the inside-out, but liberated in the slaughterhouse he's turned this sinkhole into in his path toward the flower pistils. It's probably a kind of blasphemy to be a creature of hell experiencing this sort of deliverance, this endless free-flow of motion, succumbing to it. But he's never been a religious guy, wouldn't be able to tell apart a prayer from someone yelling at the sky — hey, speaking of yelling, there's someone doing a lot of that somewhere, he thinks, distractedly, giving a devil the chance to tear into his side, making party streamers out of his intestinal tracts.

A pained bellow sails out of him in an instant, of course, but it doesn't take long for the sound to unravel into high-pitched laughter. ]

Gyaaaahahaha — damn, that hurts! Fuck this fucknuts! I need these to eat and shit at least three times — maybe four!

[ His knee crashes into the dirt. He can't make out much of what's going on around him anymore over the incessant thunderclap of his heart ricocheting in his ears, the blood spraying out of his split open stomach like a fizz of shaken soda.

Denji's blades rope out, lassoing around the offending devil, the teeth of his chains barbing into its skin, refusing to release, as he fully wrenches it toward him. Grime and gore slip through his jaws, tickling his taste buds as he feasts, and — it's not as good as the meals Aki makes, nothing like the warm miso from that first morning running down the back of his throat, dripping into his stomach, or yesterday's fluffy tamagoyaki. But in his current dispossession of rationality, anything, devil or human blood, is fair game to subsist on, fuel him past the hunger pangs that always come with his flesh and tissue stitching back together. Once he's had his fill, the carcass flumps over into the rubble.

Not wanting to let the fray go even more out of control, he moves to rejoin —

But that's when he hears him. ]

Aki…? Hrrgh — aaahhhhhhhh!!

[ A stampeding bull devil rams straight into him, sharpened horns stabbing clean through his thigh and dragging him along in its rampage. Some Public Safety hunter who'd managed to whip herself on the hump of its back, clings desperately to its back, shrieking. ]

Oh, come on! I just ate, my tummy's all sorts of whoozy!

[The sight of Denji being ripped to shreds is both familiar and alien. It's something Aki never actually got used to. He can think of so many moments he looked like this - the Eternity Devil, the Leech Devil, the bomb girl... Darkness Devil.]

[Himself.]

[He recognizes the fear swamping his mind because the devils notice it, the ones not yet in Denji's jaws turning their beady eyes up to him and clawing at the edges of the pit. Training kicks in and he smothers the fear down, reminds himself it isn't useful. Kishibe words and logic. They should be more afraid of you than you are of them. Otherwise you're gonna die. He takes in a breath, staring down into the pit of chaos strewn with crushed flowers, then starts to drop down when he sees her. Human. Riding a devil like a clown in a bull fight, straight into Denji. If he fires and she sees him - What will happen? Don't even think about it. More Kishibe words. His heart thrums violent in his chest.]

[He could end this in a moment but instead he picks up a long piece of copper pipe, still dripping dirty water, and drops down into the fray. The smell he can't place smothers him in an instant and the heady feeling that envelops him nearly makes him forget what he just decided, his body starting to turn. But Aki is more focused than Denji and stamps down on it, taking a deep breath through the collar of his shirt and swinging hard at the bull, the pipe cracking loud as it splits its head in two and sends the hunter rolling to the ground with the force of the hit. She's groaning, but Aki is more fixated on Denji, reaching out to snag him by the shoulder.]

You need - Get out of here - [Why is it so hard to breathe down here? Why does he feel like he's been dunked in a vat of perfume? The smell is horrible and overwhelming but he feels lighter than air. He grips his fingers into his shoulder, feeling cold metal start to coat them like a silk glove.] One... thousand needles, you stupid -

[ Dizzy from being swung around, or perhaps from the stink of something very wrong curling up his nose, cloying his senses with honey — whichever it is, he can barely tell up from down, left from right, his internal compass spinning wildly out of control. One second, all he sees is the clouded sky hanging endless above the street, dark and ashen, as he thrashes about like a feral animal trapped in a snare, trying to dislodge his leg from the devil's head. The next moment, he and his half of the bisected bastard are crashing to the floor, the flurry of movement forcing his wound deeper, even more open. But before the instinct to hiss out a flood of curses hits him, Aki's yanking him free, his blood webbing around the horn, clinging as strings of it stretch out with them across the sudden gulf.

Knowing Aki was on the field used to always feel like a comfort, like regardless of whether his heart stopped beating, his lungs stopped expanding to let air in, he could rest assured someone to be there to drag him back alive and out from the pitch black undertow. Right now, though, seeing him here livid and struggling to catch his breath, having the right to yell at him, he doesn't know what emotion is cresting in his chest. He knows he should feel bad, he should feel guilty for going back on his word, but instead — ]

Forget the promise, you were wrong!

[ He feels vindicated. ]

No one, there was no other hero to replace me, no Public Safety to fix crap —

[ The last time they'd met each other in the middle of combat like this, he'd folded to his demands; he hadn't been sure if that was the right thing to do or the thing he'd wanted to do, but it'd been for Aki, and… Damn it, he just — he can't think. He needs to think. And he can't do that while Aki's holding onto him, the weight of his hand both frigid and searing all at once. Confusing. ]

Augh, fuck, save it! Now's not the time — [ With a harsh twist, Denji staggers toward the devil hunter, just in time to lash an arm out and sever the extended tongue of a toad devil that'd wound onto her ankle. He steals the dripping tip of the muscle, squeezing the blood into his mouth like juice from a carton.

Though their numbers have thinned, either from his handiwork or from the mysterious ability of the devil plaguing Kabukicho's underground, there are still devils crawling their way into the pit, hungry to eat up the hysteria and tumult of the situation. There's no time to focus on each other. ]

[Aki watches Denji, nearly frozen from the combination of the scene around them and the words he's saying. For the past year, he's worked mostly away from the chaos of a direct fight. Gun is cheap in that way - most of his work can be done at a distance, closing in slowly, going only so far as he needs to. Killing devils that spawn in the countryside and grow slowly until they're strong enough to attack a city and do actual damage. The times he has been in populated areas, they've been cleared out for his presence. Most of his fights in the past year, Aki has been alone.]

[Now, with a devil hunter cringing away from her bleeding leg and Denji's chainsaws ripping through the air, he's right back in the thick of things. The first time he ever got into an altercation with multiple devils at once, years ago. The first time he was ever truly overpowered, could see his own life flash before his eyes. Back then he had cheap hits like Curse that had expensive aftermarket taxes. Now, the only thing he's paying for when he's using a devil is a little more esoteric. His future, but in a different kind of way.]

[The devil hunter makes eye contact with him. She looks petrified. He recognizes the expression. He can almost feel the devils around them growing more rabid with that metaphoric blood dripping into the water. He can't use Gun like this.]

Get her out of here, then - [He grabs Denji and pushes him toward the hunter.] You're a hero, right? Then save a girl, you dumbass!

[The hunter looks less than thrilled with a teenager covered in chainsaws being shoved her way, but Aki doesn't care. He pulls off the jacket he stole and reaches up to take his hair down. He doesn't want to break another elastic.]

[He can clear this, he thinks. Thirty seconds and it'll be over. But he needs to lessen the number of eyes below the rubble.]

What?

[ He doesn't so much as glance at the girl, her life more of an afterthought set side-by-side to the person in front of him, which is a horrid thing to think being someone's only hope of making it out in one piece. But he doesn't care. Can't when his stare bores into the back of Aki's head and all he can imagine seeing is the butt of a gun jutting its way out, like some swamp monster surfacing from the marsh. It's funny. He'd sounded so high and mighty saying all that crap about forgetting their promise, the silly bounce of their fingers linking in the train car; he's not sure if he really meant it but it'd felt good in the moment to say. Except now he feels as small as an anthill.

He recalls when he first heard of Aki's contract to Curse, back when they were fighting the Eternity Devil. How Aki had mentioned using his sword and how, with the same speed a someone might spark a lighter, Himeno had appeared at his side, gating him, told him to put that thought away. He hadn't understood it then, why you'd stop someone from relinquishing something they're so willing to give up, but he thinks he gets it a little now. ]

That's… That's right, I am a hero. And you're —

[ Not moving from his place, his saw chains whip around the base of a nearby utility pole, teetering on the precipice of falling down into the crater. Teeth gritting, his biceps strain and screech as he wrests it down, cables uprooting until it crash-lands at a slope, nearly hitting the injured hunter. ]

You're the dumbass if you think I'm gonna leave you alone out here to look cool all on your own!

[ Immediately, dust clouds up but once it clears, a precarious escape way is there for the woman. She looks at him like he's insane, especially because there are still mites of electricity splashing out from the twisted cables. However, when Denji makes a shooing motion with his arm, she decides to take her chances periling up the pole with her injured leg rather than rely on the psycho chainsaw head.

Denji knows Aki can't die, that he may not even get overly hurt the same way he does on the regular, but the thought of stranding him in a thrall of devils? Unthinkable. He can't stomach it. ]

[The pseudo-ladder comes down and Aki's eyes widen in shock. It lets the hunter get out, sure, but it creates an easy escape path for devils as well. Seeing a human already start climbing her way up and out, a few are already crawling toward the post to follow along. Aki looks to Denji like he's about to yell at him for this when he sees something bigger moving beyond him, something cracking up the concrete as it moves along. The flowers or plants or whatever they are that are stuck to its body keep wilting before regrowing each time a devil gets too close, their bodies sucked dry and the buds popping full again only to release more spores and wilt again. It's like a stupid, endless cycle. Constantly dying, constantly regrowing. Like weeds. What are like weeds?]

[He can't focus on identifying the devil right now. Seeing the devils split in multiple paths, some following the main source and others crawling towards either Aki and Denji or the pole with the hunter just now reaching the top of and running away from, he makes a split decision and rolls up his sleeve.]

Go for the big one. Find the heart - Don't breathe the plants directly. Tear straight through. [His left arm starts to fold inward on itself, like the two bones are snapping into a single one, but it reforms itself like clay and starts to create the shape of a long assault rifle, black and webbed where it attaches to his shoulder. He aims toward the devils starting to climb the pole and the whole thing nearly shatters with the force of the blast. Aki, himself, doesn't even flinch from the knock-back.]

Go! [He'll take care of all the small fry.]

[ Aki doesn't flinch, but Denji does, his arm thrusting up in reflex, like the chainsaw might deflect either the peal of gunfire or the order hurtled his way, he couldn't tell you which — though even if he could, he probably wouldn't willingly volunteer an answer.

Forcing himself to shake off the panic that'd momentarily flared through him, Denji shoots him one last look, unreadable from the metal face he wears, then breaks away. Booking it for where, he can only assume, the roots or the stalks of the more fearsome devil perforate underground. He'd spotted it around the same time Aki had: the slabs of cement rising and flattening back into place, like a breath being taken, flashes of a greenish vein humping up, exposed in the crevasses of the ruined road. If the flowers are more like the thing's fingertips, its way of sending out feelers and hunting dense flocks of devils to feed on, what's beneath them probably isn't anything like a heart, but maybe it could be a path through to it?

Moving like a needle, he sews in and out of range of the lesser devils, secure in his trust that Aki will mow them down before they can give thought to targeting him. Running up an overturned mini truck and using it as a launching pad, Denji blurs through the air, bladed arms tucked in a cross at his chest to lessen his inertia and spin out into the moving ground. His chainsaws sink past the cover of stone, past the fuzzy hairs of the tendril and into a solid mass, something that might be closer to flesh. But it's not a clean penetration. The stone having acted as a kind of armor, his attack only gouges about halfway deep — and the devil's reaction is instantaneous. All the buds rescinding from their other locations in the pit, retreating back to this singular limb, the concrete floor abrades, pieces of it quaking and grinding, until a giant hand erupts out, exploding devils and debris in all directions. Or it looks like a hand, something like vines twined together in a clump to imitate a human arm. Water bursts from the collapsed plumbing. Streams of sediment cascade from the space between its fingers.

During all this, Denji had shot chainsaws out of his heels to cling tight but he hardly needed to as he sits neatly in the palm of the risen hand. So big, the pit is eclipsed by its shadow. ]

Uh-oh.

[ He's about to try shanking his way out just as the fist curls, to keep him squished in place, not so tight as to crush his skeleton but enough to make sure he can't move freely as buds sprout from all five of its digits. Each of their petals opening to spray his face with the spores. ]

[Aki can leave Denji to this part. The charge onto the devil - he's handled that enough times. Seen him jump down their throats and into their line of sight enough that it had been annoying sometimes. But this time he puts his trust into him that he can handle exposing the main body, whatever is below ground that all the devils are so excited over. It makes for easy target practice. 30 rounds in his arm, and it takes up to three to kill a single devil. They splatter like eggs on the ripped up pavement and dirt, broken sewage lines leaking dirty water to mix with the already putrid smell. What the hell is that smell? He can't figure it out. When he feels his arm empty of shells, the pit has grown quiet but no more still than it was, the ground still buckling, just with the added assortment of dark blood an entrails from the slain. He reaches down to feed his fingers into the magazine of the rifle, but before he can reload it the hand starts to come up and Aki watches it ascend above them, shading the mass of bodies below.]

[The fist curls in and for a moment Aki can't see him at all and he shouts with his voice crackling in rage and terror - ] Denji!

[The flood of spores sprouting from the ground combined with the shock of the outstretched hand sends his mind into a frenzy. He can't focus, can't devise a plan that isn't to turn this whole place into one giant bullet hole. His vision goes grey as he feels metal curl over his face, down over his eyes and stretching a cold, metallic chill down his spine. Facing the hand reaching out of the ground, Aki fires and the area acting as a wrist snaps in two like hay against flame. The vines stretch from the ground like nerves with no skin and splay outward in search of the lost hand which crashes to the ground. Aki runs forward, yanking apart the flowers until he can pull Denji out. It smells awful. It's so overwhelming. His knees feel weak. He wants to lay down. He could just give up. It doesn't matter. Denji was already dead in his mind, before this. He went through a year mourning him. And Power is still gone. Angel is still gone. If it's just Denji, does it even matter? If he saves him, isn't he delaying the inevitable? Another devil will kill him, surely. None of this even matters. He could never defeat Gun and he can never rid the world of devils. There will always be more, and Gun's very existence prevents his goal. He can't enjoy his victory, ever. How can he live happily knowing he's prolonging his own suffering? It's all so...]

[Aki gasps out of his brief stupor like surfacing in the ocean, waves still crashing his face as he grabs Denji and yanks him free. He stumbles back and rolls onto his side, coughing hard from the onslaught of spores covering his body. None of it matters, so why can't he just do what he wants? Does everything he does have to have a purpose? Can't he just - Fuck. He coughs again, pulling himself onto his knees as he reaches out to grab for Denji.]

Denji - Denji, get up - Come on. [He's talking to him as much as to himself. His face still half concealed with the barrel of a pistol, he stares at Denji through the fog of metal and begs for just one more day with him. At least one more night with him clung to his body like a selfish child.]

[ Deceptively gentle is the way the fist envelops Denji, closing around him not to cause hurt or mete out a punishment, but to seal out the rest of the world. A protective shell from the eventuality — and subsequent agony — of everything rejecting him. The spores pervade into what space there is inside his enclosure and he hungrily gulps it all down, savoring the taste, pleasant and saccharine and safe, like how it must feel swimming in the primordial ooze of a cocoon. An egg. A mother’s womb. Or like when some people will cup a fragile insect between their hands, careful not to apply too much pressure, as they release them outside. The kind of care and delicacy he never deserved, never had enough pocket change to afford in bulk without any terms and conditions attached.

His back hits the wall of the devil's palm, the cold alloy of his chainsaw arms liquefying into goop at his sides, leaving only his head covered. He slides down.

I don't wanna go back out there, Denji thinks with startling clarity. Tokyo is too big, too full; how could there be any room for someone like him to stow away through the cracks? Steal a crumb of a life not his to enjoy? Maybe if he could always be Chainsaw Man that'd be the case. He could be normal about going to school. See a future for himself that didn't end in his blood watering earth's soil, hell's waving grasses, his disfigured body remaking, recycling over and over again. He could hold someone's hand. Kiss someone he's always wanted to without worrying if they like him, really, actually like him, or if they'll wise up and realize he's too damaged in the head, in his borrowed heart, to play at being a good human, that he's better off playing a dead one —

His body rattles inside the fist as it smashes to the pavement, head banging up against the the wriggling vines. He doesn't understand what's happening. Hasn't yet realized the vines are in pain. The only thing he's able to register in his hollowed state is the ringing in his eyes, even as light suddenly punches through his prison. Denji doesn't move. He can't. It turns out he doesn't need to, though, because Aki is calling his name, Aki is pulling him close. At least he thinks so. The face staring down at him is different, frayed by a horrid metal, as dark as a void. But his arms are familiar. His arms are familiar…

However, what relief swells in his chest is laced with a series of thoughts so venomous, it sours the feeling entirely within seconds: Who cares if Aki is calling his name when he’s just filling a hole? A short-term substitute for every person who meant more to him? Who connected with him better, understood him more. Just like every other damn thing in this life, this doesn't matter. ]

Don't!

[ He jerks away from Aki. Stumbling to the ground beside him, his hands scraping hard against the jagged surface. When he stares at his palms, they're bleeding. ]

Don't… Something's — wrong. I-I have to…

[ It's harder to do this with his arms returned to normal. No matter how much he tugs at his starter cable, only the barest hint of a razor forms at his knuckles. Breathing labored, Denji unsteadily scavenges the dirt for something sharp, something usable. His fingers close around a hefty piece of scrap metal, its edges pointed. This should do. Wordlessly, he swings the the metal into the side of his own skull, several times if Aki doesn't stop him, bludgeoning the hardened guard until blood dribbles and leaks from the self-inflicted wound. ]

[Gun's thoughts are starting to knock on his door. He can feel him scratching at the wood, trying to come through. Why not just blow it all up? Why not? Denji throws him away, his chainsaws retracted, and Aki uses the brief separation to catch his breath. Why does the divide feel so weak right now? Why can't he think straight? He keeps dipping lower, dropping like he's sinking, the suffocating feeling of - ]

Hey!

[Seeing Denji suddenly stab himself snaps him out of it and Aki runs at him, grabbing his wrist with his non-rifle arm.]

Don't - What are you doing, you idiot?! Stop it - This...

[The door between him and Gun goes steely again. His head is clearing. Chest still heaving heavy, he tightens his grip on Denji's wrist.]

It's - neurotoxin, it's something attacking your mind. [What is it? If he thinks too deeply about what kind of devil it is the thoughts circles back on themselves and he's right back where he started. What the hell is this?] Don't let yourself think - We just have to... The heart, that's the target. It's the heart. Just think about the heart.

[Said as much for Denji's sake as his own. He swallows and faces the vines swimming out of the ground and searching for the hand, trying to reclaim its body. The brief pause while it searches for itself has meant the spores aren't covering them anymore but Aki knows they're still in the air, just not as overwhelming. It has to be a clean strike, no room for error. He can't leave it to Denji.]

Let me take care of it.

[ Aki snatches his wrist before he can land one more anchoring blow to his head, and the touch is blistering, like the sensation of white heat sweeping through his nervous system, as if he'd laid a fragment of the sun against his skin instead of his hand. If he stopped thinking so hard, he could want it, lean in and draw out the contact, but that's — stupid. A thick growl seizes in his throat from frustration. Denji drops the scrap metal, letting it clang to the floor among the other pieces of rubble, as he desperately tries to twist out of his reach again. Recoup what mental footing he can now that he can't trust his own mind.

Neuro… Whatever Aki called it. Is that what's making sweat trail down his back? His head feel so warm and pressurized? ]

Aki…

[ Denji wants to tell him not to dive back into combat like this, that he's got a bad feeling about and they should go find blood for him to drink. They need to regroup or something, far away from this place. Another voice from the deepest reaches of his mind wants him to say, instead, Of course, you're just gonna go where I can't chase after you. But then Aki tells him to think about the heart. He means the heart of the devil they're after, and yet all he can do is think of his own.

Finally, what comes out of his mouth is this: ] Don't leave me.

[Aki doesn't want to let go but he does. Denji reacts so rough to his touch and the contact itself feels... He doesn't know. It doesn't feel like last night. Like that hug. It feels like he's touching metal against metal. He can't feel the pulse of blood through his veins, his smooth layer of skin, the way his muscles move below it. Why does it all suddenly feel so out of reach?]

[Staring at Denji with blood running down his head, his arms covered in it, he wants to wrap him in his arms and tell him to stop. Stop bleeding, stop fighting, just stop. He knows Denji would writhe and fight him if he did. Would struggle and curse him in his arms. Why is it so impossible to get through to him? Why does he never listen? Why is he so selfish?]

[And then he tells him not to leave him. Aki thinks - Of course I'm going to leave you. The thought stings like a spike to the heart. He knows it's true. Knows he's going to have to leave Denji eventually. The word of Gun spottings will die down, dismissed as conspiracy and the babblings of nutjobs. He'll go back to the government and they'll resume their tight control on him. He'll do exactly what they say and destroy whatever they point to without a word to the contrary. Denji will be a memory again. He can't stay with him forever. He knows this. It's selfish to think otherwise.]

You know I will, one day.

[It's a cruel statement, but not unlike plenty of the others he's given him in their past. You don't have human rights, he told him once. Well, look at Aki now. None to speak of yet bold enough to act like that's what he deserves.]

[Without another word, he rushes forward and blasts a hole through the mass of vines that have finally found its hand, the lengths trying to wrap around one another to reform. The hole that explodes through the center opens a wide gap in its body as it makes a noise not too different from a groan of annoyance. Standing on the precipice of the pit above where the vines curl from the ground, he thinks he sees it through the exit wound - a curled up creature, not human and not animal. The vines hurry to wrap back around it and conceal it again, each one withering as it touches the creature before more rush to cover it again. An endless, pointless dance of death and retries. Maybe it looks a little like Denji, Aki thinks, raising his rifle arm to aim at the being. Vines are rushing up to grab at his ankles and body, trying to dislodge him from his spot, but Gun is faster, fires straight through. The heart bursts, vines crackling, and then his little precipice of an island starts to collapse as the devil folds in on itself, bringing Aki down with it.]

[ Aki strikes him with the finality of those words, straightforward and uncomplicated, similar to if he'd cleanly slipped a knife-edge between his ribs, and then left him to bleed out. He regrets ever saying anything to him at all. He doesn't watch him go.

Denji's shoulders sag low, head bowed, his breaths evening out — just another body surrendering to gravity, letting the weight and tension fall away from his back for once, after spending his whole life in constant motion. When was the last time he sat on this side of a battle? If he wasn't fighting, he was usually dead and waiting for someone to kick-start his motorized heart, waiting for the next command to tell him where to go. That was the good thing about being part of Public Safety, he didn't have to be liable for his own wants and actions the way he has to as a free man. The punishments aren't personal. The rejection isn't personal. People get hurt, or people die, or people quit to join the private sector and none of it is personal.

He's so sick of thinking.

A wet sensation hits the back of his neck, sliding down into his collar — rain, he belatedly understands, metaled helm tipping up. His open palm raises to meet a few of the droplets from the steady drizzle halfway, the water stinging his scratched palms. That's the only reason he looks back up in time to watch Aki's artillery fire discharge into the core of the devil, its feeble heart. Watching him troubles his stomach, maybe because like this, he really is a marvel, moving with such ease and laser precision in a body he's only had for a year; if he fought him back then as he is now, Denji's not so sure he would have won.

No longer able to sustain itself, the scenery and the vines change so rapidly, the green rotting to a blanched, sickly shade, he almost feels sorry for it. Putting up a fight for these past few days, plying energy from other devils and conserving its own strength for one big hurrah. Only to die like gutter trash. Honestly, it's all just…

The last of the vines shearing, Denji rockily gets to his feet, propelled by a twinge of fear, that Aki might be disappear inside the confetti of the devil's remains if he doesn't retrieve him… But he stops. No, Aki will be just fine. The less threatening devils have either died off or slunk back into hiding. He doesn't need him.

When Aki next finds Denji, he'll have dragged himself with much difficulty to a higher vantage point well above the hubbub of Public Safety securing the perimeter, the remainder of cable and steel shed off his form sometime prior. The rain's battering down harder now, but that doesn't stop him from rifling through the faces of people filtering in and out, trying to find Nayuta among them. He doesn't face him. ]

Yippee. You did it.

[When Aki returns to him, his body is a mix of brown and grey. The metal is gone, the guns dropped into goop onto the ground somewhere. Fading into his sullied clothing bathed in mud, blood, and devil guts. His breath is shallow as he finally comes across him, reaching out to grab him, his hand on his collar as if to keep him close by. His eyes are wide. Still pinned - whether from the exertion or the devil's spores or something else. He doesn't know and doesn't care. Heart pumping like a locomotive hitting top speed, he holds up his other hand, a single grey mass sitting in the palm.]

Gun.

[He almost sounds enthralled. Like it's not entirely his voice saying the word. A definition more than a statement of celebration or fear or anything else. He squeezes it in his hand and drops it, pushing it into his pocket. Inside his racing heart below his wheezing chest, Gun is ecstatic. So is he, and he doesn't know why.]

[Why it feels so good to have another piece.]

Come on.

[He tugs him by the collar, aiming to get him off their high point and take him back home, drenched like wet dogs and covered in god knows what. Mission successful. Time to head back to base. Time to rest and wait for the next day that will be exactly the same. The head-rush of endless victory and loss melded into one.]

[ A glance his way. ]

…Gun?

[ That would explain why the devil was such a pain in the ass. There's a hushed quality to his voice, genuinely astonished to see the warped chunk of gun flesh in plain view for the first time in over a year. Astonishment, though, swiftly chars into unsettled as his brow crinkles. Hunting down Gun's pieces is just a continuation of that confusing war stuff Makima explained to them what feels like an endless amount of time ago. It's hard to share in Aki's excitement. Some distance away from Aki has helped clear his head, but he's still majorly suffering from the haze wrought upon by the encounter with that devil and its perfume; plus, the knowledge that this is just one other thing that'll take him farther out of his reach doesn't help.

His gaze starts to return to the commotion below when his collar chokes painfully into his throat, Aki's yank digging out a sputter of coughs from his chest. Annoyed, he digs his heels in, whipping around to look at him. ]

Stop it — what's with you? [ He huffs, careful to avoid laying a hand on Aki, as he wraps a hand into his damp shirt, stretching out his collar to relax the chafing against his neck. His jacket got lost somewhere in the battle, which his teachers won't be happy about, but whatever. ] Nayuta probably stuck around the whole fight to watch, so I gotta find her. Make sure she's safe. [ Denji's not so dumb to think he's in any place to demand Aki go on ahead without him, so weakly, he adds: ] We can grab something to eat on the way home if you wanna celebrate, but it has to be the three of us.

[ Not like it's the first time they've walked around in tattered clothes, utterly caked in devil guts. ]

[Denji shakes him off and it gives Aki a moment to catch his breath, come down from the high he's in. It's only a step down a whole flight, however - his mind still feels submerged in clouds, a constant rush running through his blood and making it hard to calm his breathing or relax his muscles. And Denji - Why is he so upset? Is it because he used Gun? Because he didn't let him be the one who finished it off? What would it matter? The devil was going to die, whether it be by their hands, Public Safety's, or a private hunter. All Aki did was make it quick. He blinks as a raindrop hits his eye and reaches up to rub his palm against it, smearing devil gunk on his cheek.]

You're worried about her?

[Even his voice sounds a little detached and high. As if he could simply head back on his own and keep walking until he ends up somewhere new. The feds will pick him back up eventually. Not like they'll kill him. So what's the point? No matter what they do next, Aki's situation is set in stone. And that's created a strange feeling inside of him, the recognition of his range. Like a dog who has been tethered to a stake, he knows just how far he can run and, thanks to that, can enjoy the little circle of land he's trapped within for the time being. It's all going to be over eventually - why not make the most of it?]

[He feels impossibly warm. His cheeks are hot. Digging around in the guts of that devil for that long... Maybe it has a lasting effect. Aki steps forward to wrap his hand around Denji's wrist, staring at him directly with pinned pupils.]

Let's get char-siu. [He's craving meat. Maybe he's been subconsciously thinking about it since Denji told him what he did to Makima.]

[ Someone has to worry about her, Denji would say — if he didn't suddenly doubt himself, the words dying on his lips. Someone has to, sure. Does it have to be him?

She wasn't a responsibility he ever wanted, just a convenient pair of eyes for Kishibe to stick on her. He's not getting anything tangible out of caring for Nayuta besides her adoration, maybe, but just how much does that really mean to him? He's adored plenty of people who once stood in her very place. Makima, Pochita. A younger, brighter version of his pops, at one time, before the alcohol and the debt swarmed the last stalks of his good senses, devoured his future like locusts emaciating a field of crops.

Look, something whispers to him, despair given a voice. Look where that got them. Where that got him. Nayuta could lose him, too, one day, and… What? What after that? Would she cry like she did in the bathroom this morning? Would she be fine by her next meal?

When Aki moves and grabs him a second time, Denji blinks slow at first, then rapid, as his attention skids down to look at where they're skin-to-skin now, one scorching point of convergence. His pulse springing to meet Aki's palm, so rowdily it might just hop the fence to get there, an overexcited puppy who hasn't yet learned how to sit still. There it is again, that syrupy feeling twisting his insides, the faint aroma of spiced earth drifting to his nose, though the rainfall should have scattered every trace of that devil's musk. ]

Ah… Yeah. Char siu.

[ His chin drops a nearly unnoticeable degree, something like a nod, despite not knowing of any nearby places that offer pork cuts in that style. They'll make it work.

Inexplicably, his free hand rises to the smear staining Aki's cheek, scrubbing at the spot. Unable to look away from him, as if there were a swinging pendulum in his eyes and not just a peculiar glint. When he next speaks, he isn't worried about Nayuta a single bit. ]

If that's all you want. We could — stop by anywhere. Order anything to eat. Watch a ton of movies.

[Denji's hand rubs the mess off Aki's cheek and Aki blinks, recognition coming to him in a way that makes him see something that he should have seen before. If it was a snake, it would have bitten him, it's so close to his eyes. Denji is feeling this, too, he sees. This high.]

Devils with airborne detritus can leave effects on a human for up to six hours even post-death. [He recites that like he's reading out of a textbook. His sullied hand reaches up to Denji's face, rubbing over his cheek and imagining it slipping below his skin, sinking into his blood vessels and tendons and bone and becoming one with him. Instead of being alone save for his work, being together with Denji. Like he is with Gun. He presses his thumb against his jawbone as he stares at him, pupils so pinned it's hard to see. Like he still has that pistol over his eyes.]

I don't care where we go. As long as it's with you.

[He told him not twenty minutes ago that Denji knows he's going to be gone eventually. This is his response to that silence he gave him in return. Like coaxing a child after a dose of bitter medicine. It's okay. It's all temporary, anyway.]

[ One of Denji's eyes closes while he muddies his face with an unidentifiable grease. The dirt doesn't matter to him, not really. Aki's trailing fingers could be talons grating through his flesh for all he cares, the sizzling mouth of a gun, and Denji would still press in. Let his hands roam cavernous membrane and tissue, warmth and pain alighting his nerves in concurrent streams, if it meant that he'd be there with him. Inside him.

Would it be enough, though?

It feels just as cruel to hear him say exactly what Denji wants to hear as it’d been to hear him speak the plain truth of their situation. The inside of his throat like sandpaper grating together, an aching lump forming straight down the middle as he listens to him — he could cry, just like this, and maybe this time with both their faces slick from the downpour, Aki won't notice, won't try to make him feel better. He thinks he'd prefer that. Because how lousy would that be? To be witnessed crying two nights in a row over the same jackass?

So before Aki can say something else that'll make him want to throw himself off this building, the hand Denji has at his cheek tangles through his damp hair, roughly, his face forced low and tilted to smash their wet mouths together. He kisses him hard and angry, but starved for his skin for however long he'll have it within reach, any inch of him to close his lips around.

Six hours for humans, Aki said. So what is that for in-between beings like them? ]

[Denji charges against his mouth and Aki curls the hand that was against his jaw to hold him around his neck instead. He meets his kiss eagerly, moreso than before, even when it was a convenient way to keep from looking at him directly, an easy way to calm him down. Right now, it's less of a kiss for Denji and more for himself. He wants that warmth again, that strange connection he had to him in that moment. Pressing his palm to the back of his head, he forces Denji to tilt up and into him, his other arm wrapping around his waist.]

Did you really miss me?

[He says it against his lips, almost eager to hear the admission. How many times has he actually heard Denji say something painful? He always clams up when there's a difficult conversation to have. Right now, he wants to hear it. Wants to dig deeper into him and feel his attachment to him. Otherwise, how could he truly believe it?]

[ Denji slants into him, his palm coasting down the smooth runway of Aki's nape, the ends of his inky hair scrunching up as he massages into the spot. Melting into the closeness, like their combined body heat is thawing the glacier distance that's made up this past year. Dizzy with desperation to believe this could be enough to last beyond however far away Aki could be someday. Even though his question reminds him that there might be a time where it won't be just the hours at school separating them. ]

I — [ The way his breath catches in the back of his throat is telling — asking Denji this is hardly any different from prying a fresh scab open. ]

I missed you. Really missed you. [ Misses him right now, right this moment, right as he tries to chase away the bitterness seeping through by pressing in all the more viciously, his lips, sticky with spit, moving against the corner of Aki's mouth as he murmurs, ] Woulda killed myself just to see you again —

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