#devildealshipping

“I want to duel for you. For Haruto.” Kaito said, keeping his expression as neutral as he could manage. Once the words left his lips Mr. Heartland grinned, tapping his chin. The city illuminated behind him through the massive windows of Heartland Tower cast bizarre colors and patterns across the mayor’s already gaudy apparel. It would have been ridiculous, if Kaito didn’t know the kind of man Heartland was.

He knew he had made a deal with the devil.

For as long as he could remember, his father Dr. Faker had known him. Heartland hadn’t always been the mayor – his father had seen to that. A well-funded campaign, a rigged election, it wasn’t all that difficult. Kaito turned a blind eye to the power plays of his father and his lap dog, but he refused to ignore what started to go on in Heartland Tower, the monolith in the center of the city.

“My burning heart can’t stand to see children unhappy and without!” Heartland proclaimed loudly, and the city lauded him as a philanthropist; the truth was those children were being groomed into duelists, meant to serve Heartland: both the man and the city. The difference between Kaito and them was that they had no choice in the matter, orphans with no future aside from the one Mr. Heartland laid before them. Kaito was different; he volunteered. Chris had shown him the strength in dueling, and when Haruto’s sickness got worse the mayor had suggested collecting these special cards – these Numbers – would help heal him.

“Is that so? Your father will be most pleased.” Mr. Heartland turned from the view of the city through the window to face Kaito, spreading his arms wide. The mayor’s words and movements were always marked with panache; it was one of the things Kaito hated most about the man. It was a colorful mockery of what the man was truly like on the inside.

Heartland closed the distance between them and placed a heavy hand on Kaito’s shoulder. The feel of him made his skin crawl, but he endured it. This was a deal he needed to close, and Heartland would get what he wanted from him.

“Do you know how you can prove your loyalty to me, Kaito?”

“My father won’t like it,” he responded abruptly; he’d had the answer mentally prepared in his head for some time. It was no secret Mr. Heartland did more than oversee the training of the young duelists. Kaito saw it in the way Droite would subtly flinch in the man’s presence, the way Gauche would try and shield her from the mayor’s affections.

Apparently Heartland had an answer preloaded for this response too. “But you won’t tell him, will you Kaito?”

The tip of the mayor’s cane lifted Kaito’s chin upward, forcing their eyes to meet. Heartland went on, his voice soft yet somehow full of malice. “Your father needs me, and so do you. I know you want your brother to be well, yes?”

Mr. Heartland leaned forward into him, pressing down over him until his lips brushed Kaito’s ear. It took every ounce of his willpower not to strike the man to the ground. When Kaito didn’t answer him initially, he went on.

“Bow to me and I’ll make you a Numbers Hunter.”

Kaito knew he expected a physical response now, an affirmation of their arrangement. When Mr. Heartland lowered his cane and brought his face close to his own, Kaito didn’t protest. When the mayor kissed him and entrapped Kaito’s body with his arms, groping him with a dangerous hunger, Kaito let him. He never reciprocated, just let the man take what he wanted.

When it was finally finished, he felt sick. The taste of Heartland on his lips and tongue was foul, revolting. The sight of the man made his stomach churn, but Heartland seemed satisfied. He broke away from Kaito and readjusted his suit, the ridiculous mishmash of garish colors making the whole situation even more nightmarish.

Mr. Heartland smiled warmly and patted Kaito on the head, ruffling his hair up slightly. “Good boy; you made the right choice, Kaito. Report tomorrow to the sublevels and we’ll start your training~!” The singsong pitch had returned to Heartland’s words, but he ignored it and left the room without belaying how disgusted he felt.

Selling his soul to the devil? It was a high price to pay, and only after he left the room – and Heartland – behind him, did he exhale shakily and wonder if he had done the right thing. Maybe, maybe not, but Kaito realized it didn’t matter. He would do anything to protect Haruto, even this.

It's a simple enough deal, for a creature like that. They'll find the ones that took his family away, and then his soul will be forfeit. Haruto will be returned.

(what's his soul, his life, for Haruto?)

(what does it mean to consign himself to hell, when a world without Haruto is hell enough already?)

The creature smiles – though it has no mouth that he can see, he knows regardless – and says only, "Yes, my Lord."

—

It – he, Kaito supposes, though he never quite manages to think of it that way – plays the part well. The humble butler, except that sometimes there's that particular flash of a smirk, or that little brush of fingers across his shoulders that says, you're mine.

(as if Kaito could ever forget)

But it behaves, at least. It's smug and superior but it plays the part, brings them ever and ever closer to finding out. To finding an answer.

(ever and ever closer to it swallowing him whole)

—

He's younger than most of its past conquests, it tells him, but still older than its preference.

(he's barely more than a child)

(disgusting)

It only smiles when he expresses his disgust, though. Says yes, my Lord, and then brushes gloved fingers over Kaito's skin until there's something thick and hot - and disgusted and guilty, but that only adds to the effect - building up in his stomach and his cheeks are flushed and burning.

(he is burning, he burns under its hands, and maybe once he lets that slip – fuck, fuck, I'm burning up – and it only laughs and asks, wondering, how he'll ever deal with hell if this undoes him so easily)

—

It goes on. Day after day, week after week, a calendar marked off in his mind of how many days it's been; how much of Haruto's time he's wasted away scrabbling in the dirt for answers. 

And then it comes.

(it's over and they know and it's time and he—)

(he has never once feared this but now he does, he does, he's afraid but it's for Haruto and he'll do anything for Haruto)

(he's ready)

—

It draws things out, though. "You can put your affairs in order, of course," it tells him, lips smile-curved against his ear so that the teeth graze his skin. "Do you think me so cruel as to not allow you even that, my dear?"

(it's brazen now, shameless and smug)

(why does it need to rush, when it knows its meal is assured whenever it wants?)

Five days he has, in the end. Five days before it enters his room come sundown with eyes afire and lips curved up and he knows, knows this is his last night.

(there should be fear but after the waiting there is only relief)

It enters his room and it enters his bed and it tortures him in ways that nothing but a demon could ever quite manage; with pain that becomes pleasure and pleasure that becomes pain until he wonders whether it's already devoured him, whether this pleasure is what hell truly is because it feels as though it's stripping away his very essence.

The feelings go on, though, taking him from one peak into another until he doesn't know whether he's been there minutes or hours or days or years, doesn't know anything at all but the feeling of its mouth and its fingers and more beside. Can't tell anything about the passage of time until he sees the beginnings of dawn sunlight slanting through a gap in the curtains.

(it's wrong, he thinks, wrong that a light should be shed upon something like this at all)

Perhaps it agrees with him, or at least knows what he's thinking, because it looks down on him – misty-eyed and bruised and aching and broken in a way that feels like heaven even if it'll lead him to hell – and smiles, smug. The cat that got the cream. The demon that got the soul.