Such kind eyes...

Despite sharing the same apartment, her interactions with the latter had been few and far-between-- stretched out and forced, much like this one was already starting off as Emiko pressed her palms against the window, marveling for just a moment at the white blur on the opposite side.

“...It looks... Dangerous out there.” She begins, quietly, too hesitant to even glance in Sanae’s direction just yet. Emiko finds herself able to speak more freely with the girl than she is with Rui but even so, the demon keeps the vast majority of her thoughts and feelings to herself. Like she always has.

“It would be safest for you to be inside…if possible. If you need shelter, you can stay at my home if you wish.” he already seems to be carrying what looks like some supplies over his shoulder. 

“...” For just a second does she remain mute, moved by the kindness of the stranger. It reminds her of the young, human boy who had taken such mercy on her so seemingly long ago.

She isn’t leaving. That’s the first thing he notices. The second thing he notices is that she seems to be uncertain of what to even do, as if he hadn’t clearly laid out some sort of plan that she could easily follow. Why shouldn’t she just want to leave him alone here to suffer all by himself? Isn’t that what she’d always wanted? Her and Sanae both, they –

– but she’s staying.

It has another whimper catch in Rui’s throat, and he tries his best to blink the tears from his eyes so that he can at least try to properly focus in on what she’s doing. Still, that doesn’t help him make any more sense of it. His own voice echoes in his head just barely above the pain and the misery: what would make you happy?

Is that why she’s still here? Is this what’s making her happy?

“… why?”

He doesn’t understand. He really can’t wrap his head around it. Why is she staying? Why is she asking what happened? Why is this what would make her happy?

“… why do you… care…?”

The words are so, so difficult to get out. His voice is far weaker than he’d like for it to be, but with how he’s been trying to barely eat in this city coupled with how limited his regeneration is, it’s taking too much energy from him – and lasting too long – for anything to start healing properly.

“After everything I did to you… shouldn’t you be happy? Shouldn’t you be turning and…” The words fall short as he stops to gasp for a breath. “… and running… in the opposite direction? I don’t deserve… – you shouldn’t be… worrying about me.”

Talking hurts. Breathing hurts. Everything aches so much.

And yet – and yet – Rui finds himself quietly crawling around the tree, opting to curl himself tightly back up in the little huddled mess he had been by Emiko’s side instead of against the hard bark of the tree. There’s a degree of distance he’s trying to keep – he doesn’t get quite as close as his heart might otherwise dictate he wants to, but he’s close enough that they’re touching. His head hovers just above her shoulder.

“… that… man.”

He could probably say it. He knows Muzan is less powerful here than he should otherwise be, but that doesn’t mean he’s any less ruthless. A lack of power doesn’t mean a lack of means, and Rui’s had a fear instilled in him to even try saying it.

“He’s here. And I failed him, didn’t I? So he… he…” But he can’t finish. Rui just sobs. He sobs, and he curls up smaller, and it all hurts hurts hurts. He hates this, he hates being this miserable, he hates having failed, he hates having remembered, he hates feeling anything. He wishes he could just shut it all off again. Even that constant emptiness in his soul had been so much better than this. “… my… eye. He took… – and I, I deserved it. I deserve this. So… why are you staying?”

I hurt you. I hurt you so much worse than this. It’s obvious what he means, even if he isn’t vocalizing it.

“Shouldn’t… you be celebrating?”

Her emotions have always been her biggest downfall in the eyes of her fake ‘family’-- her outbursts always frowned upon and so to see Rui in such a state fills her with something akin to pity. Watching him whimper reminds her that he is, after all, only a child.

But so was she.

Her gaze hardens once more, lips stretching out into a frown as he overwhelms her with his words-- telling her how she is supposed to feel. How she should feel. She knows that he’s right in every sense of the word and yet her brain is somehow incapable of following through. Perhaps she is more broken than she ever thought possible? She isn’t given much time to fret before his presence invades her senses, terror paralyzing her as he suddenly draws so close without warning and all the things she planned on saying die on her tongue. 

She remains still even so, fingers digging into her skin hard enough for her nails to leave behind crescent marks as she gives him an uneasy glance, gulping and unsure of what to do now as he sobs right beside her, so close that just the slightest movement would have his head rested against her shoulder. She wonders, briefly, if he can feel her trembling as a new fear clutches at her heart. She knows exactly who he is speaking of and also dares not to utter the name aloud. 

His name has been a hushed murmur across all demons far and wide, and she never could have imagined that he would show up here of all places. Muzan is an unstoppable force and it is clear that he is enraged given the punishment that he inflicted upon the child, her own eyes squeezing shut at the painful reminder that it brings. She knows the pain he is going through; she’s experienced it before though at the hands of another. Though his regeneration is clearly taking far longer than the norm, eventually the physical pain will heal. The mental pain, horror and trauma? Not so much. 

Before she realizes it, she has reached out to Rui, hand gently resting upon the crown of his head as she stares straight ahead once more, unable to stomach watching him in such a state any longer. Perhaps this is just a test, a hesitant attempt to challenge him and find out whether he truly has changed by allowing her to grace him with her touch or if he will swat her away in fury. She cannot offer any words of comfort and has been very careful at the few things she has dared to say to him upon their first meeting-- there is nothing she can say to take his suffering away. But even still...

“...Perhaps you are right.” Only a fool would stay here to support him. She has always been such. Her touch ghosts across him as she brushes softly at the wild strands.

“… it gets easier to ignore them over time.”

It’s a genuine piece of advice, though his expression and tone don’t particularly match up with his intent as per usual. He’s drawn to the same out-of-the-way places as usual even after the months he’s been here, though, and it seems like this woman is the same way.

“That doesn’t mean it gets any less annoying, but you learn to move on. Everyone will do what they’re going to go, have fun with it for a day, and then move on again. I’ve started taking it as a blessing that means they’re leaving you alone while preoccupied with one another, if that helps any.”

“…”

Hold on. Now that he’s getting a good look at her, with his eyes adjusting to the night a little better –

“… do… you have family here?”

The demon drags her gaze over to the stranger, surprised by his input but intrigued to hear whatever he has to say to her nonetheless. She goes quiet as she processes it all, brows furrowing together. 

“Maybe you’re right...” A moment of hesitation precedes her admission and she is rather quick to add on, “They aren’t all so bad, though.” Truthfully, up until meeting the strange boy who had taken mercy on her, Emiko had never once cared much about any of the humans that she had tortured by turning them into puppets or even thought twice about her actions. Everything seems so different now.

ENOUGH!

          @woefulwebs​​.

It hurt. It hurt, it hurt, it hurt, it hurt, it hurt. He’d barely managed to get anywhere from where he’d started, dragging himself along half-falling over until finally his knees gave way and he collapsed. Regeneration or not – and oh, it was slow, it was so slow – everything hurt, a pain that he’d been at a mercy to have never experienced before but that he knew he had earned, he had deserved, he would always deserved.

He was stained in blood, curled up in on himself as tight as possible, nestled away against a tree and just hoping, hoping, hoping that he would be left alone. The pain wasn’t getting any lesser. It kept growing with each moment, in waves that caused him to be unable to keep himself from shaking.

Rui was small, and pathetic, and trembling. He couldn’t hear anything around him except for the pounding of his own heart and his own whimpers, his own gasps for breath. It hurt. It hurt. It hurt.

It would be a mercy for him to be left alone – a mercy he wasn’t worthy of, and probably never would be. It was why he wasn’t dragging himself home, if he even had any strength in his body to be able to; he didn’t want to deal with any of the humans he had to share a house with seeing him in this state. He didn’t want anyone to see him in this state.

Another whimper. His trembling intensified.

He thought it was his heartbeat at first, growing louder, but the noise that soon reached him grew arrhythmic, out of tempo. Rui raised his head (it burned just doing that), eye trying to focus in on whoever could be approaching. He didn’t want them near him.

“Stay back!”

It was half a hiss, half a pained shout. Whoever it was became visible around the tree; his vision was blurry, but he could make out white. Too much white. Too familiar a silhouette. His right eye widened (the other tried to, but behind his hair was stuck tight with dried blood).

“… Mo…ther?” Not Emiko, but instead a quiet, desperate plea. Despite his want for comfort, he didn’t want anyone to see him. He wanted to be left alone. “Go… go away. Go away…!”

It is impossible to escape him; this much she had learned and it was the only thing in this place that she was certain of. No matter how large the city spanned out, it seemed inevitable that Emiko would bump into Rui one way or another whether she liked it or not. (She was quite partial to the latter, as his change of behavior that should bring comfort only ever supplied her with an unwanted onslaught of paranoia, always leaving her distraught in his wake). Though she has grown quickly accustomed to running into him at random, the circumstances surrounding this meeting give her pause when she spots the other curled up at the base of a tree. There is something even more strange about him this time around, eyes scanning over his crumpled form as her ears pick up on the faint, pained whimpering. He has been wounded.

It shouldn’t matter to her-- or, if anything, should cause a spark of joy to ignite within her at the very sight of him suffering just as she had all those years before but she finds herself disgusted when it has the opposite effect. Her legs act on their own accord, propelling her forward, though steps remain hesitant and slow as she draws nearer out of both curiosity and an underlying concern. She can see the dried up blood spattered among his clothes and face though the source of the wound is not quite so clear with his hair matted over the worst of it. Whoever attacked must have been an extremely strong and fierce enemy to have successfully left a mark on his person. Either that, or this place has left him far weaker than she could have imagined; there was no doubt that, despite his small stature, the lower moon was anybody to mess around with. He was strong and had been chosen for reasons unbeknownst to Emiko. (She never wanted to find them out).

‘What are you doing?! Just walk away!’ her mind screams but Emiko ignores it, and although she visibly cringes when he calls out to her using that term, it is only his aggression that causes her to freeze, body seizing up and trembling upon instinct regardless of how desperately she wills for it to stop. The demand is irritating-- had he not told her himself that he wanted her to do whatever it was that made her happy? Granted remaining here with him will not make her happy in any regard, it should be her own decision to make. Not his! She is so sick of obeying his orders without any sense of her own will but that trauma unfortunately can not go away overnight and the demon finds herself standing there conflicted and battling an internal war as her eyes narrow upon the other. ‘Pathetic’ she wants to snarl, just as he has done to her before when she was the one whimpering and suffering. 

The thought of angering him any further is terrifying but the possibility of fleeing and letting him get away with, once again, ruling over her leaves an equally bitter taste in her mouth and so she stalks off without a word, seemingly content with leaving him there to suffer on his own.

If only...

In actuality, Emiko crosses over to the opposite end of the tree, hands shaking at her act of rebellion (if one could even call it that) as she sits at the trunk of it, back pressed against the rough bark. This way, she has both appeased to Rui’s wish while also allowing herself to follow through with her own desire as well. Her silence may be preferred but she finds herself unable to hold back, voice hoarse though she knows he will be able to pick up on it as she isn’t far from him at all.

‘You would have to actually have a heart in order to do that, Rui ‘ 

–Is what she wants to say, tongue suddenly heavy in her mouth as she glances down at the boy with a sudden unease. She doesn’t think that she will ever get used to hearing him be so open– so kind and honest with her and no matter how many times that it happens she still finds herself torn up inside, fretting over the right way to react to it; always waiting for the moment where something will change and things will go back to the way they used to be. The way he used to be. Some days she is angry with him, just the sight of the lower moon filling her with disgust and on those days she goes out of her way to avoid him, relieved that this place allows her to put so much distance between the two that she is almost confident they would never bump into one another again if she so desired with how huge the place is. But she knows that she cannot stay away for too long, both the fear and co-dependency eventually dragging her back. Lately being around him has gotten at least a little more tolerable.

The hands that were resting within her lap clench at her kimono, the fabric bunching up beneath her fingers as she struggles with a response that will please him. She’s been trying her best to answer him more honestly when they speak but it’s difficult to erase the years of trauma that got her to this point to begin with.

“You can’t.”

She winces at how the statement comes out despite it being nothing but the truth. He can’t possibly begin to imagine her pain or what she went through. What he put her through. The demon freezes, terrified to make a single sound or sudden move, certain that he will lash out at her for talking back to him in such a way but the moment never comes. 

After a long while does her posture ease back up, relaxing only slightly when she steals another glance at him and realizes that he is just patiently waiting for her to finish. 

“So…”

“…I don’t know what’s that like.”

Things would be so much simpler if she could relate.

She’s so hurt.

Her tears have stopped, but he can still so easily tell how hurt she is. She’s shaking, and she can’t meet his eyes anymore. Rui doesn’t blame her – he takes a step backwards, then another, awkwardly folding his hands in front of himself.

“… E…miko.”

It’s a cute name, which is maybe why it sounds so wrong coming out of his mouth. It suits her though, doesn’t it? He knows how she’s supposed to look – so young and innocent – and mother was never something that fit that demon. But he’d forced her into that role. He’d forced Emiko into that role.

“Whatever–” Whatever will make him happy? Is that what she’d said? … right. Right. It would take a lot more to make him happy now than she was able to give, and he doesn’t want her to… expend any energy, really, never mind that much energy. He wouldn’t be happy because of it anyway. “–no. No. That’s… you don’t have to do that.”

She’s not fully listening to him. He knows that much; he can pick up on it. It’s why he’s trying to keep what he’s saying short and to the point, as much as he wants to say more – even if it would take too long. He still isn’t good with words. He isn’t good with… with the childhood that was ripped away from him. He wants to be, but he isn’t, and he doesn’t know if he ever will be, now.

Rui shifts his weight. He’s uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as Emiko is, so it doesn’t matter.

“… what would make you happy?”

It sounds so fake. It doesn’t sound like he means it, and he almost winces. He’s… trying. He’s really trying, but even just looking at her hurts. He wants to leave and hide away and never see her again, never deal with this again. With – with feeling. He’d locked it all away, forgotten it all, and having it all come crashing back so suddenly, so much…

“I don’t have to call you it, if you don’t want me to.” That was… good, right? That was a good way of phrasing it? “You… you – you should be happy, too. Happier than me. You want to hurt me, don’t you? So… you can tell me what you really want. I won’t – I won’t do anything about it. I won’t harm you. I p… I… I pr…”

He can’t get the words out. They burn like acid in his throat.

I promise.

He speaks of happiness now-- an emotion that has become foreign to her in the time spent playing this silly little game of make-believe ‘house’ among the other demons. She tries to reflect back on the last time she felt that way, lips twitching at the corners as she desperately wracks her brain for a moment in time in which she could laugh and smile without fear or being forced to act happy in such a situation where she was anything but. The only thing that she can pull from memory is her death by the hands of that human child but even then it had been more like a wave of relief than anything; the knowledge that she would finally be free lulling her into a false sense of comfort as she had woken up here in this strange place and, as it turns out, is anything but. She can remember the warmth she felt at that time and desperately clings to the memory of it only to be yanked back to the cold and harsh reality that awaits her at the sound of Rui’s voice.

What would make her happy? The fact that she cannot think of a single thing bears down on her with a sudden, crushing weight, tears that had been blinked away suddenly resurfacing and clinging to her long lashes as her gaze remains trained onto the ground. “I-I don’t know...” and she really doesn’t. Is she even capable of feeling such a way anymore? Is it possible? What’s worse yet is that Rui, who had become the main source of her pain and agony right alongside the demon he had deemed as a ‘father’, is the one asking such a personal and impossible question. How could she be expected to answer something like that?

He continues to speak and at the mention of hurting him does she finally look up again, watery gaze meeting his own albeit hesitantly, “I...Won’t hurt you, Rui.” It’s all that she says, not offering to give him an explanation. Not because she doesn’t think of him as deserving of such a reaction and certainly not because she forgives him-- but rather, for her own peace of mind. Because she isn’t like him, (doesn’t ever want to be compared to the likes of him). It was for this very reason that she often found herself getting punished so much in the past. She does not play what is befitting in his mind of the role of a mother well-- never has; and even now when he is offering to hear her out will she likely disappoint yet again. Because as much as she would like to believe that he is being sincere, there is still a chance that he is not and it is too big of a chance for her to take. The result would be unbearable, this much she is certain of.

“You can call me whatever you’d like.” It comes out with more conviction this second time around, the tension slowly beginning to ease out from her body as she reluctantly accepts her fate; to be in this position with the one still standing before her forever, though her guard remains strong and unwavering. 

“...I really don’t know what I want.” The admission is soft, tone barely above a whisper as the realization continues to unwillingly sink in. She has not been allowed to even just think for herself in so long, having grown accustomed to always doing as she is told. Even now, for as much as she despises him, does she still yearn for more of the small acts of kindness that has has displayed thus far and seeks out his guidance on where she should go and what she should do from this point forward. Pathetic.

@woefulwebs

“So now all failures think they can be near an upper moon? Tch, only ‘coz I lost you can hang out with me, ‘kay? Don’t misunderstand.”

“You...Lost?”