Corruption
A Tokyo Babylon fanfic by Epeeblade aka C. Pontoriero
http://www.geocities.com/epeeblade
I. Body
There is little gentleness in what we are doing, and truthfully, there never was in this act.
I never could call it making love, for anything I ever did with /him/ was simply fucking.
Right now I’m bent over the edge of the mattress, a willing receptacle for his length,
which pounds into me with abandon. I’m naked, he’s fully clothed, as usual, simply
slipping himself out to claim me, as he always does. Does it hurt? The better question
would be, has it ever /not/ hurt?
But as he reaches his own pinnacle he reaches around and makes sure that I take some
pleasure in this act of tearing pain. Another of his lessons. Pleasure and pain, what’s the
difference? And truly, after nearly a year of this, the two blur in my mind, in my body.
We gasp our pleasure together, I staining the sheets with evidence of my own orgasm, he,
staining the insides of my body with his. He falls beside me, spent, then turns to regard
my trembling form.
“Get dressed, Subaru-kun. There are things that must be done this night.” He rolls off the
mattress, stuffing himself back into his pants.
I stare at him, admiring his beauty, his simple sinister perfection. This is my only post
coital comfort, just looking at him. “You are not sated enough?”
He laughs, a clever construct, because I don’t think he can feel enough to laugh, although
he’s certainly capable of being amused. “There are different kinds of satisfaction, my
prey, and there is another we must fulfill tonight. Besides,” and here his face darkens,
“the tree calls.”
Always, the damn tree, like a third presence in our “relationship.” In my more perverse
moments, I wonder why we don’t simply add the creature to our nightly ritual of pain and
pleasure, I think the Sakura would like to have blood spilt willingly at its roots. The
thought reminds me of the current state of my body and I slip out of bed carefully,
knowing he won't give me a chance to clean myself off first. I dress and follow him to
our quarry.
***
I don’t know who the man is, and truthfully, it’s easier to think of them as quarry, as
prey. Not a man with a family somewhere, someone who would cry to know he was
dead.
No, mustn’t think like that. That’s the old Subaru-kun, the one not worthy of his love.
Keep your thoughts on the kills, Subby, that’s how it goes.
He finds himself walking a path that has no ending, and no matter how far he runs, he
can’t get out of the park. A clever and simple illusion my Seishirou-san has created. So
easy for me to slip down from the tree, show the victim the gleaming daggers in my
hands. Like the others, his eyes open widely and he tries to back away, but there’s
nowhere to go. Will this one plead? Or scream perhaps?
It doesn’t matter, one slash and blood pours from the gash in his throat. The body slumps
to the ground, the head hanging in a way no head should hang.
Then Seishirou-san comes and takes it away. It’s time for the binding. I don’t like to
watch this, but I don’t have a choice. Again, another lesson.
He buries the body in a shallow grave at the foot of the Sakura. There is no need for
anything deeper since the trees roots will swallow the body, absorbing the blood until all
that’s left is a dry carcass of bones and stretched skin, preserved better than any mummy
I’ve ever seen in books or on TV. As you can tell, this is not the first time I’ve seen this.
“Can we go now?” I ask sullenly, watching the roots surround the body, trying to shut out
the sounds of the tree sucking out the blood, gulping down the liquid in some obscene
form.
“So impatient, my Subaru-kun,” he comes to my side, stroking my cheek with one blood
stained hand.
I reach into my pocket and pull out our package of cigarettes. I hand him one and slip one
into my own mouth. He lights mine for me, a simple gesture of courtesy in our frenzied
lives, and I light his. We regard the tree for a while, smoke floating languidly above our
heads before he finally speaks, “You have another test this night. The year is almost
over.”
“I know.”
“She still lives, Subaru-kun.”
“I know,” I regard my hands silently, thinking about how they’ve just killed this night,
not for the first time. And apparently, not for the last. The stars he imprinted me with, so
long ago, shine even brighter when they’ve been blooded.
“Then let us be off.”
II. Soul
I didn’t notice the slight drizzle of rain until I see her, walking down the street, an open
umbrella in one hand, a bundle of shopping bags clutched in the other. Then I feel the
wetness that grazes my cheek, so faint compared to the blood he has left upon my face.
What is she doing out so late, one part of my mind demands, doesn’t she know it’s
dangerous?
It’s not that late, I forget sometimes, how little time it actually takes to murder a man in
cold blood.
“Go,” he whispers and once again, I obey.
She’s come to an alley entrance, so simple to trap her in an illusion-loop, to keep her
there. But he doesn’t and I don’t move to either. I merely step out of the shadows and
regard her. My daggers are sheathed at my waist and can be in my hands faster than
thought.
“Subaru.” She gasps, dropping her bags, and slamming the umbrella shut with a quick
motion.
“Hokuto-chan,” I greet, a smile upon my face. She shudders and I know it’s /his/ smile I
wear.
“I’ve been looking for you.” She says, for once in our lives almost subdued.
“Why?” I ask nonchalantly, she should have forgot about me, it would have been better
for us all.
“Please Subaru, come home, don’t let the Sakurazukamori win!” she cries.
I laugh, “Come now, Hokuto-chan, aren’t you the one who always wanted he and I to get
together?” The daggers are in my hands now, and I attack.
She brings the umbrella up to parry my slash, knocking my blades askew and whirling
out of my way.
“What are you going to do, sister dear? Pull out a tube of lipstick?” I mock, jumping back
to regard her carefully. She was trained just as I was, I had forgotten, I couldn’t best her
physically, unless she lets her guard down.
“You’ve changed,” she says softly, not moving her gaze from my eyes and I wonder what
she sees there. I have changed, I’m taller now, and I dress more like /him/ in tailored
blacks and a long, flattering coat.
“Yes, I’m not your dress-up doll anymore.” I spit out, bitter at the way she’d manipulated
me my whole life. “I’ve finally got a sense of style now, aren’t you happy, Hokuto?”
Then she’s moving, knocking the daggers out of my hands and pinning me to the ground,
the umbrella at my throat. I almost laugh. Does she think me helpless?
“Subaru, please, I know you think you’ve gone beyond redemption but you haven’t. I
know you don’t use onmyoujitsu to kill, I’ve read the papers…you’re not completely his.
Please come back to us.”
“You didn’t say that when I killed grandmother.” I taunt. And that’s the last straw, her
face shuts down and she’s finally given up hope that somehow I’ll turn from this course
I’ve chosen. Sadly, I regard her and whisper, “There’s a hole in my chest where my heart
used to be.”
“And what of your soul?” she whispers back.
“You’ve got all that’s left.” I tell her.
She pulls the umbrella away and I can see the tears forming in her eyes. She turns away
and runs. I lean back on the cold concrete and as the wetness seeps into my back, my
thoughts go back, viewing memory like an old movie…
*
The darkness of the illusion, the even darker taint of memory once repressed, a child and
a teenager, under a tree that rained blood. And the words, more full of pain that anything
he had done to my body.
"I don't hate you, but I don't love you either. You aren't to me anything more than a
simple object if I have soiled the purity of your spirit. Ultimately, this fact has not
changed anything. Farewell, Subaru Sumeragi.”
“Wait!” I don’t know what possessed me to cry out. He told me to fight, that if I fought I
could have the possibility of surviving the nightmare. But how could I fight him? I loved
him.
“Is there something you have to say to me?” As I said, he’s capable of amusement.
“You said, you could not love me, even though I was pure and innocent. Maybe, maybe
that is not something you can love?”
“What are you saying?”
“I am proposing another promise, another wager. Just one more year, Seishirou-san, what
is that in a lifetime?”
“And the wager?”
“Corrupt me, and then see if you can love me…”
*
III. Mind
“You did well, Subaru-kun.”
We are in the bed again, this time he’s as nude as I am. This is how we sleep, after a night
of killing and mocking some poor soul. Sometimes we fuck again, other times, we don’t.
Now he rains gentle kisses along my collarbone, moving his tongue down my chest. Oh
my, is this another game of seduction? He starts out so kind, so loving, treating me like a
precious object.
Which I am, anyway, I know he loves the prize he’s won, which is an entirely different
thing from loving me. I kiss him back, enjoying the gentleness for one last time. “What
do you mean? I failed to kill my twin.” My twin, the keeper of my soul, the only other
person in this world I loved and hated as much as I did the man before me.
“You’ve destroyed her emotionally, it is enough. Don’t you see Subaru-kun, how
emotion neatly clouds our thinking? How it distorts our actions?”
“Is this to be another lesson?” I reply drolly.
He pulls my hand to his lips, tonguing each finger before moving to the back of my hand
and gently sucking upon the star he placed there himself so many years ago. “You are so
cute, Subaru-kun.”
“I AM NOT CUTE!” I cry, snatching my hand from him. “Not anymore.”
“I see.” And his eyes mock me, amber and white, gazing at me like the damned fool I am.
I smile at him, wanting to ease the sting of my words. “Of course, I can be cute for you.”
He chuckles and he sits up. I know he’s reaching for the tube of lubricant on the dresser
and for a moment, he’s turned away from me.
The spell is on my lips before he can turn and my hand is through his chest as he gazes up
at me in shock. He does not scream as the blood bubbles at the corner of his lips. Both of
his eyes are now glassy and he clutches at my arm, once, twice before the body twitches
backward, eyes still open even in death.
Pity.
I do so love it when they scream.
End
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