Chapter Text
It took a while for Kyoujurou’s world to adjust to accommodate the knowledge that his father had hit his little brother. Senjurou wouldn’t tell him how or when it started, but that didn’t matter. It had probably been happening for years, and that tore Kyoujurou up from the inside out.
He continued to see his father after his missions, but only because he didn’t want Senjurou to be the one to have to tell him that Kyoujurou was home. He could forgive grievances against himself, but hurting Senjurou?? He would not tolerate anything of the sort. He didn’t even scold Nezuko for the verbal wounds she'd inflicted while he was away. As far as Kyoujurou was concerned, his father had deserved every word of it.
Frankly, he was a little surprised that the man had come out of the encounter with all his limbs attached.
Kyoujurou never spoke during these meetings. Neither did his father, but that wasn't all that unusual. The problem was, Kyoujurou couldn’t tell if his father knew that something had changed between them or not. He couldn’t tell if he even cared, and, well, that stung more than it probably should have.
Because for the first time in his life, Kyoujurou truly wanted to cause someone pain. He wanted to dig his claws in and say See? Doesn’t it hurt?
He could give the cold shoulder all he wanted, but if his father didn’t even notice it, then what was the point? And if he stopped because his father didn’t acknowledge the shift, then he was letting him win. And Kyoujurou had never liked to lose.
But things did get better, despite Kyoujurou’s unwavering anger and inner turmoil. Zenitsu and Inosuke continued to argue and tease, and go on their missions, and kill, and come home. Tanjirou slept and helped his sister perfect their family’s kagura. Nezuko trained and trained and trained, and when she wasn’t training, she and Senjurou would disappear into the heart of the garden for hours, locked away in their own little world.
It was good for Senjurou to have found a friend. It brought out a side to him that Kyoujurou hadn’t known existed. The Senjurou of his memories was always so small and meek, but with Nezuko, he seemed...so big . He was bright, and funny, and alive in a way that Kyoujurou had never noticed he wasn't before. He had a dry, slightly sarcastic sense of humour, and Kyoujurou hadn't known that either.
It…it was nice, that he had found someone his age, someone who made him feel whole. It really, truly was.
But Kyoujurou had never dared to venture into the garden’s core, because that was Senjurou’s safe place, the place he vanished to when he’d had a bad day, the place he could truly escape from all his troubles.
He had always assumed that no one else was permitted to enter Senjurou’s garden, but Nezuko had. And now, Nezuko seemed like she was a part of it, like she'd grown a piece of that garden inside of her; like wherever Nezuko went, Senjurou could follow, and know that he would always find a safe place to land.
Maybe it was silly, that creeping little feeling of fond sadness that dug into his heart when he watched the two of them run off together, to hide away where no one could see them, becoming closer to one another than Kyoujurou could ever hope to be with either of them.
He didn’t feel jealous of them , per se. But it reminded him…well, it was a reminder that he didn’t have a second half lying around, waiting for him at the end of every day. He didn’t have someone to tell every secret, every concern. Nezuko knew all of them, of course, on principle, but that wasn’t the same.
Senjurou and Nezuko had formed a closeness with one another that Kyoujurou hadn't even realized he craved, a closeness that he knew he’d probably never find. Not in this life, at least.
Because as a Pillar, he was meant to burn bright, bright, bright, until he burned himself to the ground. And that had always been okay, because he’d never thought to look for anything more. It was okay, because he’d assumed that every other slayer felt the same. It had been okay, until Nezuko had shown him that being a slayer didn't guarantee solitude—Nezuko, with her gang of ruffians, Nezuko, with her sharp smiles and sharper tongue. Nezuko, who had a heart big enough to fit the whole wide world inside of it, who would always be a safe haven for anyone that she deemed worthy.
Nezuko, who had shown Kyoujurou that he didn't have to be alone.
Only now, he had no idea what to do with that information, nor the ache that had come with it.
↜↝
It was a quiet night, with all those noisy brats out of the house and Kyoujurou far away on some mission or other. Where any of them had gone, Shinjirou didn't know. He wasn't privy to that kind of information these days.
Shinjurou used to like quiet nights. Well, perhaps it was more accurate to say that he hadn't hated them quite as much as he'd hated the rowdy nights. His mind was always so loud...without any background noise, the comotion in his skull became tolerable. When it was quiet, he could reign himself in a bit. When it was quiet, he was nothing more than a sad old drunk, pathetically slow and nearly as weak. When it was quiet, he used to be able to think that maybe, if he could still the voices in his mind, he'd be able to hear Ruka's once more.
But then that pink-eyed brat had crashed into his home with an impact radius of a space rock, and Shinjirou's world had been shaken to its very core. Quiet nights were few and far between these days, and even when they came around, Shinjirou could never quite lower the volume in his mind to anything that resembled ‘peaceful’.
And if he was being honest, he wasn't even sure he wanted a taste of that peace, of the possibility of hearing his wife. Because whatever Ruka might say to him, he was now certain that it couldn't possibly be anything soft and kind like he'd been fantasizing for so many years.
Maybe his mind was so much louder these days because he was afraid of what he would hear if it was quiet.
And to make everything so much worse, he was isolated, choked off from the world. Ever since that night when the pink brat barged into his business, Kyoujurou wouldn’t speak a word in his presence. He would sit in silence before he left for a mission, and he would sit in silence when he returned, and Shinjirou had turned up the voices in his mind because the silence was deafening, unbearable. And Senjurou didn’t come around anymore either, and when Shinjirou saw him, he was always with that brat, like the two of them were bound to one another in an inescapable kind of way, like they believed that not even death could part them.
All of this...the isolation, the noise in his mind, the horrible silence...it was all that brat’s fault.
Or maybe it was his own.
Because, you know, the brat hadn’t forced him to take his agitation out on his youngest son. The brat hadn’t made him drink and drink and drink, until he wasn’t sure he’d know how to be alive if he didn’t. The brat hadn’t taken Ruka away from him. All she’d done was spit the truth at him like ammunition, cut away all the ribbons in front of his eyes and force him to take a nice long look at who he’d become. And if he was being honest, he didn't like what he saw—not one bit.
~
Rengoku and the boys were out on missions. Senjurou had a bit of a sniffle, so he’d gone to bed early. And of course, Tanjirou was asleep, always asleep. The only person who wasn’t asleep or absent was Rengoku’s father, who felt like he wanted to tear his own skull to pieces, a kind of antsy desperation that made Nezuko want to scream.
She didn’t though. Instead, she slowly got up from her place on the enganwa, and made her way to Rengoku Shinjurou’s open screen door.
He didn’t see her until she was nearly standing next to him, and he jolted when he noticed her, eyes flying to her sword belt as he checked for her weapon.
“Relax,” she snorted. “I’m not here to finish you off.”
“Then what are you here for?” Rengoku’s father asked after a moment. His voice was less slurred but more hollow than it was the last time Nezuko had heard it. She decided not to mention that. She also decided not to mention how tormented and confused and broken his soul felt.
“Mind if I join you?” she asked softly instead, folding into a sitting position a few feet away from him.
Shinjurou eyed her wearily, his soul tattered and confused, fluttering like a torn sail. “What do you want?” he asked.
~
Speak of the devil and she shall appear—the moment he’d started resenting the girl, she’d waltzed right up to him like she owned the place, sat herself down like she couldn’t be bothered to be even the least bit afraid of an old drunk like him. To be fair, she probably had no reason to be. Shinjurou had seen what she could do with a blade. Begrudgingly, he privately agreed that she was rather good.
“Before…with Senjurou,” she started quietly. “I said that everyone dies, and that didn’t mean you could take your pain out of the living.”
“I remember,” Shinjurou spat hoarsely. “...Come to apologize or something?”
The girl hummed. “I don’t generally apologize for most things,” she replied. “And no offence, but you’re the last man alive I would ever say sorry to.”
That...was probably fair. “Alright,” he grunted.
“I meant what I said.”
“...About apologizing? Yeah, I figured.”
“No…well, yes. But also about people dying.”
"You don't have to tell me that," Shinjurou growled. “I know that everyone dies.”
“Yeah,” she agreed, and looked right at him, her damn eyes almost silver in the moonlight. “That doesn’t mean it hurts any less.”
Shinjurou froze. Stared at her.
“I know it’s useless to say that I’m sorry your wife died, but for what it’s worth, my father died when I was fairly young, and the rest of my family was taken by demons a few years ago. I know it’s not the same as losing a spouse, but, well, it’s something.” She smiled, a little bitterly. “I know it hurts a lot . Feels like it's never gonna get easier.”
“...No,” Shinjurou replied, throat dry. He almost reached for the sake jar sitting next to him, but something held him back. His fingers twitched once, twice, and then fell still.
The girl wasn’t looking at him anymore, but something about her posture screamed of solemness, of a twisted sort of surety. “In order to move forward, I had to let them go. You can love someone with all your heart, and still choose the living over the dead.” She looked directly at him again, those unnerving eyes digging into his skin. “Kyoujurou taught me that.”
“And where would he have learned anything so stupid?” Shinjurou grunted.
“I’m assuming not from you,” the girl retorted instantly, before wincing and closing her eyes. “Sorry,” she muttered. “My brother’s a lot nicer than I am. Too bad he isn’t the one out here.”
“Nice doesn’t seem to work on me,” Shinjurou muttered.
“Clearly,” the girl snorted, before wincing again and pinching the bridge of her nose, like she wanted desperately to hold her tongue but wasn’t quite sure how. “Anyways, I don’t really know why I felt like I needed to tell you that. Not like you have to listen to a thing I say anyways.” She paused, glancing at him again. “I wanted to ask you something. About what you called me before?”
“A bitch?” Shinjirou asked dubiously. A girl like that…surely she’d been called worse—
She snorted. “Absolutely not. I am well aware of what that means, thank you very much. I meant Sun Breather.” She studied him fully, intense eyes latching onto every weak spot. “What did you mean by that?”
Damn him and his fat mouth. Well, that was fine. Shinjirou didn’t have to tell her anything. He really didn’t. In fact, he opened his mouth to say exactly that, and what came out was: “The first breathing style, according to legend. I don’t know much else. There used to be texts, but I think I destroyed them.”
She raised an eyebrow. “At least you’re honest,” she muttered, shaking her head. “Well, I tried.”
She stood, hands slipping into pockets, and turned to leave. Before she walked away though, she paused. “For what it’s worth, I know that your boys are pretty amazing people. Personally, I won’t ever forgive you, but Senjurou probably would in an instant if you asked him to. I think Kyoujurou will take a little time, but he’ll come around if Senjurou does. Once again, pretty sure they don’t get that from you, which means your wife will most likely forgive you too, as long as they do.” She turned her face a little, so Shinjurou had a clear view of her profile, sharp and cold in the moonlight. “But if you tell them that you’re sorry, you better mean it. Because if you break Senjurou’s heart again, I will end you myself, no matter what he says. That’s a threat and a promise.”
“...I’ll keep that in mind,” Shinjurou murmured, feeling a little like he’d just been swept up in a hurricane of madness, where up was down and nothing else made a whole lot of sense.
“You’d better,” the girl replied. And then she was gone, slipping along the enganwa like a shadow until the night swallowed her whole.
↜↝
For weeks now, Akaza had been keeping an eye on the Flame Estate. One day early on, he’d found a cave near enough that he could observe, but far enough that Nezuko’s interesting little soul couldn't latch onto him, and he’d decided to sate his curiosity once and for all. It was time to figure out what it was about Nezuko and Kyoujurou that made them so damn special.
Of course, it was meant to be a one-time thing; something that he allowed himself to indulge in once so he could get it out of his mind and continue his search for the blue spider lily. After all, observing the Flame Estate wasn’t part of his official mission from Muzan-sama, and that made it an extremely risky move.
But once turned into twice, and then three times, and so on and so forth, until no matter how often or how sternly he told himself to stop, he couldn't keep himself from coming back, day after day, like he couldn’t look away even if he wanted to. And he didn’t want to. He really, really didn’t.
In fact, he was fascinated by it…this pitiful little life they all led, everyone running around, clamouring for attention and recognition. Yes, pitiful was the only word that could really describe it, and yet Akaza still couldn’t look away. He was completely and utterly captivated by it all—by the way Kyoujurou trained each of his little fools; by the life he’d provided for them down there; by the way Nezuko’s soul swirled so protectively around Kyoujurou’s young kin; by the way she navigated the ins and outs of each of her strange friends’ foolish whims; by the way she never really stopped moving.
And even more intriguing was the way they all paid one another back in full, the way the yellow boy and the boar rose to Nezuko’s aid the moment they felt she was threatened, as though they were actually worried that she’d ever have the audacity to leave this world for good; as though they would lay down their lives for her without hesitation, because they knew she would do the same.
Akaza wasn’t a jealous person…er, demon. He was a whole laundry list of other things, but jealous had never really been one of them.
And yet, witnessing that comradery day in and day out was building something in his throat, something subtle and ugly, something that tasted like weakness but was undeniably strong.
He hated it.
…He kinda wanted to know what it tasted like.
Which clearly made absolutely no sense, because Akaza would die for Muzan-sama, and that should have been enough. He didn’t need comrades . He certainly didn’t need friends.
But after watching the Flame Estate for so long, something inside him was telling him that he maybe wasn’t as right as he wanted to be.
And it had taken some time to admit it to himself, but the thing about these humans that really drew him in wasn’t Kyoujurou. It was Nezuko.
It was in the way she didn’t seem like she knew how to stop, in the way she haunted the Estate day in and day out, training, training, training , like it was the air she breathed, like she was running out of time, like she needed it in order to survive. It was in the way he’d been so careful to hide himself from her, in the way her soul had found him anyways.
It was a bit of a tough pill to swallow, if he was being perfectly honest. Akaza had always been drawn to strength—he’d sought out the strongest Hashira and fought them for centuries, begging them to join him forever, killing them when they refused. And sure, Nezuko was strong. For a human . By a demon’s standards, especially a demon like Akaza, she was nothing special.
But she had something other than strength. She had the cunning of a fox, the durability of a wolf. She was a predator of persistence, something that stared at you from behind dangerous, intelligent eyes, and told you that you were done for, that it would follow you to the end of the earth, that it would follow you until you dropped dead. She had the kind of eyes that told you there was nowhere you could run that she wouldn't find you.
Akaza had never been drawn to this type of human before, and something in him rebelled at the notion, especially when Kyoujurou’s soul was so mouth-wateringly perfect .
Kyoujurou’s fighting spirit was probably the most magnificent one Akaza had seen in a hundred years. It swelled, vast as the ocean itself, like he’d been made to battle, like he’d been made to burn.
Kyoujurou was so many types of glorious that sometimes Akaza sometimes got a little disoriented when he remembered that he was human. That he always would be.
Because Kyoujurou would probably be many things in his life. A demon would never be one of them.
Akaza wasn’t stupid. Delusional, perhaps; obsessed, absolutely. But not stupid, never stupid. He knew that no matter how many times he asked or what he threatened, Kyoujurou’s answer would never waver.
He was a mountain in a windstorm, a quartz pillar in the sea. He was something so impossibly large and magnificent that petty things like threats and temptations would never work on him. His spine was made of something that probably didn’t even know how to bend; he bowed to no one and nothing other than his own beliefs. He was the kind of man who would become a martyr for the world. He was a hero .
And, well. Nezuko was many things…but just as Kyoujurou would never be the villain, Nezuko would never be the hero. She was too dirty for that. Her soul contained so much gray area, she was practically made out of storm clouds. She was chaotic. She was unpredictable. She wouldn’t snub an opportunity, if she thought it might benefit her interests.
Kyoujurou would never become a demon. But Nezuko might.
Kyoujurou was something to be conquered; something to feel in the heat of battle; something that Akaza could try his hardest to break, and maybe all his strength still wouldn’t be enough to put a scratch on him.
But Nezuko was something that could be twisted, something that could be won. She was scrappy, underhanded. She was the kind of creature who made others question if she was sent from heaven or hell; Akaza had never been the pious sort, but Nezuko made him wonder if he should be. Because there was no way she was completely human, not with a smile like that, not with those teeth dripping blood from her victory.
And well, Akaza was a bit of a gray character himself, from a demon’s point of view. He didn’t kill women, and he refused to stray from his own little collection of morals. And…well, for the past week or so, he’d been thinking that maybe he wouldn’t mind working alongside a human, if they could get him what he wanted.
Nezuko seemed like the kind of human that could.
The more Akaza saw of Nezuko, the more he needed her. In fact, he needed her so badly that his soul physically ached. She would make such a brilliant demon, if he could convince her that she needed to become one...
Tonight was one of the few nights that Nezuko was truly all by herself. Kyoujurou's weakling brother had gone to bed hours ago, the demon boy (who'd somehow managed to survive) never really seemed to fully wake up, and she'd left the old man alone with his sake. She was alone on the rooftop, her whirlwind soul calling out to Akaza, pulling him in, teasing him.
It touched everything. It touched him .
Akaza knew better than to stick his fingers too close to those flames. He knew better than to be enticed by Nezuko's gravity.
But did he really? Because he kept coming back into her range, day after day, and sometimes even night after night. He was supposed to be searching for the blue spider lily and reflecting on his own incompetence, because he was his master's favourite dog, and good dogs are meant to obey. He was supposed to be clawing his way back into Muzan-sama's good graces, not watching this strange child and endlessly circling through all the questions he wanted to ask her, wondering why he felt so strangely, selfishly possessive of this slayer that Muzan-sama wanted dead, like maybe if he kept his eye on her, he'd be able to keep her all to himself.
And that, of course, was a very dangerous line to toe.
Akaza hadn’t seen Muzan-sama in the months that had followed his punishment, but he could feel his master growing restless, and those images that he’d tortured Akaza with swirled around in his brain, taking up a permanent sort of residence. Pink eyes, eyes that were the same shade of Nezuko’s but couldn’t have been more different. A laugh that filled him with love and shame and sadness and anger.
And of course, that image of Nezuko, overlaid with the form of a figure with a scar that looked hauntingly familiar, pulsing with dread that was not his own.
Akaza looked down at Nezuko’s lithe figure on the rooftop, and wondered if Muzan-sama even realized that he feared Nezuko. Probably not . After all, very few people knew how to admit when they were afraid, and demons were no different; not even their King.
~
Nezuko could feel Akaza just outside her range of sight. She felt him watching her, felt the desire wafting off him, the curious jealousy, the fascination.
The first time she’d sensed him had been about a week ago, and it had startled her so badly that she’d shattered the gourd she was blowing into, straining her lungs in the process.
He must have gotten sloppy, because Nezuko got the sense that he’d been watching them for a while now. Yet he’d never come down to challenge Rengoku on the nights that he was home, nor had he ever attacked the Flame Estate when the Pillar was out. In fact, he rarely seemed to be around at night.
It didn’t make any sense. That is, until Nezuko started digging into the layers of his soul, as gently as she could so as not to disturb him. She got the sense that he could tell when she’d sensed him somehow, something to do with the way he could see her soul.
The more Nezuko peeled away Akaza’s outer skin, searching for the intentions beneath, the more interested she became in him. On lazy afternoons in the garden with Senjurou, where he drew and drew and Nezuko offered up her arms and legs as his canvas, she would study the demon, trying to pick apart the way he worked.
He was dangerously playfully on the surface, obsessed with strength and battle. And yet, he was set in a conviction that didn't seem to know how to waver; Nezuko felt it curling along the shape of his bones like it was the only thing keeping him standing.
He was sharp and hungry, but he did things his way or not at all. He didn’t know how to back down, and when he forced himself to learn, it was like everything inside him rebelled against it.
He felt...he felt a little bit like how Nezuko imagined her own soul might feel. At first, it had terrified and fascinated her in equal measure. These days, she was starting to worry that she was a little too fascinated.
Because Akaza terrified her. He terrified her because he could end her life so easily, and yet he didn’t. He watched, waited, like maybe he was growing his own set of fascination alongside hers.
In fact, Nezuko knew that he was.
They compelled one another in a way that neither of them really understood; in a way that kindred spirits often do. Nezuko didn’t find the thought of being his kindred spirit as repulsive as she probably should. In fact, she found it a little too exciting.
She wanted so badly to understand...understand why Akaza was here, why he came every day without fail, always lurking just beyond what she could see, waiting and watching and feeling so many conflicting emotions that not even Nezuko was sure she understood them all.
Something unpredictable was overtaking Nezuko these days, something that seemed to be connected to this demon who watched her train every day, who left every night. She wanted to understand him the way she wanted to understand all of her victims, the way she wanted to get inside the mind of every confusing creature and crack it open like a jam jar, dig out all the interesting bits and taste them for herself.
And tonight…tonight was a good night to be doing things that she shouldn’t. Rengoku-nii wasn’t home, and Tanjirou and Senjurou (both of her impulse controls) were out cold. Shinjirou was the only other person home, and Nezuko didn’t think he would stop her even if he knew what was happening.
Tonight was a good night to be a little reckless.
So she looked up and zeroed in on Akaza’s position in the darkness, on the way his soul pulsed in her mind like a live coal. She felt his twinge of surprise, and knew that she’d captured his attention. And then, she smiled.
~
That smile was so perfectly demonic that Akaza physically couldn’t resist: he practically vibrated out of his own skin as he shot towards Nezuko, landing softly on the other side of the rooftop.
She watched him, sitting careful and cross legged, her hands placed neatly on her knees. Her soul swelled, zipping outwards like lightning, anchoring her to everything around her.
“Nezuko,” Akaza greeted, slinking a little closer. The cord of her soul that touched him swelled, stinging faintly.
“Akaza,” Nezuko replied, tilting her head back a little, watching him. “Finally decided to say hello, I see.”
Cheeky little brat. Akaza grinned. “I had to work up the courage.”
“Makes sense,” she replied. “Fourteen-year-old girls can be quite intimidating.”
Akaza nearly paused, because was she really only fourteen?? That seemed young. Far too young, actually. But he didn’t say that. Instead, he grinned slyly, like she hadn’t thrown him just a little bit off balance. “I think we both know that you aren’t exactly an ordinary fourteen-year-old.”
Nezuko grinned again, and Akaza took a step closer, just to see if she would tremble. Her eyes narrowed, her lips tightened. Feral . Akaza loved it.
“I suppose you could say that,” she replied.
“Most fourteen-year-olds would be afraid of me,” Akaza continued, stalking another step closer. “Are you?”
“Do you even have to ask?” she replied, sliding to her feet. “I wouldn’t be sane if I wasn’t.”
“So you are,” he confirmed.
“All reasonable creatures fear the dark,” she countered.
“You don’t seem entirely reasonable to me,” Akaza replied.
“Just proves how little you know me,” Nezuko replied, flashing another sharp smile. Her nose twitched just a little.
“Then teach me,” Akaza replied.
“Teach you what?”
“About you.”
Nezuko snorted. “I don’t think so.”
“I could kill you instead,” he offered, ignoring how bitter the lie tasted.
“I seem to recall you saying that you don’t kill girls,” Nezuko smirked.
“Does that mean you think you’re safe?”
She cocked her head to the side. “A little.”
Akaza grinned. “Let’s play a game,” he offered. “A question for a question, three for three. Oh, and you have to tell the truth.”
Nezuko’s eyes narrowed, tracking something that Akaza couldn’t see. “Do I have the right to refuse a question?”
Akaza liked the way she thought. “You can refuse one . So choose wisely.”
~
Akaza had no way of knowing this, but Nezuko was practically a human lie detector, among other things. Most people put at least a little bit of intention into their lies; the air coloured differently with the weight of them. Plus, just sensing his soul would probably tell her more than his answers did anyways.
She grinned. “I’m game,” she replied. “On one condition.”
“What is it?” Akaza purred, sinking into a crouch several feet away from her.
“You promise not to harm Rengoku-nii, Zenitsu, Inosuke, Tanjirou, and Senjurou.”
“I don’t know who any of those people are,” Akaza replied cheekily, checking a phantom imperfection in his nails.
“Kyoujurou, the yellow boy, the boar, the demon boy, and Kyoujurou’s brother,” Nezuko shot back.
“Cheeky brat,” Akaza grinned.
“Says you,” she retorted.
“Alright, fine. I won’t harm them. You have my word.”
A demon’s word probably didn’t mean much, but Nezuko still felt a little better. With that out of the way, she let a smile curl over her features again. “Alright, let’s begin.”
↜↝
Akaza came back the next night, and the night after that. They started out swinging, of course: Akaza asked how her arm had healed so quickly, how her brother had survived (which she had refused to answer), and what was going on with her soul. Before answering the last question, she’d asked him if he was going to report back to his master, and he’d smiled like he was full of secrets, but Nezuko saw right through him. He wouldn’t. Not on purpose, anyways.
She’d asked him where Kibutsuji was (Akaza didn’t know exactly; to her chagrin, he was telling the truth), why Kibutsuji wanted her dead (“Because you scare him, though I doubt he realizes it”), and why Akaza had been watching them (“Because it’s interesting. Particularly you, little Nezi”).
The next night, he’d asked how she’d come to know each of her companions, who Tanjirou was to her, and how she’d ended up being a demon slayer.
She’d asked how he’d become a demon (he didn’t remember), where the other Upper Moons were hiding (he didn’t know, nor did he care), and why he wanted her to become a demon (“Because then I can fight you and not worry about you dying!”). That last one was only partially true, though Nezuko was pretty sure Akaza didn’t know that. Really, he was…lonely. There were people that he missed, though he didn’t remember them. He…He was tired of being alone. That hurt something inside Nezuko probably more than it should have.
By the third night, Nezuko was tired of the game. “Alright, Akaza, let’s cut to the chase, shall we?” she asked when he arrived, rising to her feet with her arms crossed. “Why are you really here? I know you want something from me, so spit it out.”
~
Akaza blinked, staring at Nezuko. He’d come to like her even more, these past few days. She was playful, but feisty. He’d met so few feisty people in the last couple hundred years. The way she was scowling was absolutely delightful.
“I want you to become a demon,” he replied.
“I won’t,” Nezuko replied at once. “What are you going to do about that?”
He grinned. “Maybe you won’t right now, but don’t write it off yet, Nezi. You might need me one day.”
“Theoretically, what could I do as a demon that I can’t do as a human? Besides living forever and wrecking lives,” Nezuko added condescendingly.
“Fight the demon king?” Akaza suggested, and watched her fall for it, hook, line, and sinker.
For the briefest moment, her eyes widened, before she shook it off. “I could do that as a human.”
“But could you win? Could you live ?”
“That last part doesn’t really matter.”
Akaza stared at her. “You humans are so reckless with your fragile lives. I’ll never understand it.”
“You were human once too,” Nezuko said.
“I can’t remember it. That means it didn’t happen.”
Nezuko snorted, but the sound was almost sad. “You were, Akaza. I can promise you that.”
“And how would you know? Because of your…soul thing?”
She smiled. It was gentler than he was used to. “If that’s what you want to call it.”
Suddenly, the two of them were sinking into the silence Nezuko had left behind, and Akaza seemed to be the only one bothered by it. He shifted, felt her eyes digging into him, like she could claw out secrets he didn’t even know he had.
With a start, Akaza realized that maybe she could.
“I want to train you to fight,” he blurted out.
~
Akaza himself looked almost as startled by his suggestion as Nezuko felt, like he’d been so desperate to escape the force of her seriousness that he’d said the first thing that came to mind.
“Really?” Nezuko found herself asking, and that was pretty surprising too.
Something inside Akaza’s soul shifted…something hard and bitter, molten anger dried into a thick crust. Behind it was the glimmer of a passion that he’d probably never been able to fulfil in his human life. “Yeah,” he replied. He was almost hesitant in his response, like he was testing the waters with one toe. It was…interesting. A lot of things about Akaza were.
And even more interesting was—
“Okay. Teach me to fight like you do.”
↜↝
“Are you a healer?”
The voice was raspy but deep, and Aoi turned, face to face with a frail face pulled over delicate bones, deep black eyes that looked like they’d been lit from within. They reminded Aoi of someone.
“Yes,” she replied, studying the newcomer. “How can I help you?”
“I was told by a man with a fiery haori that someone here could help me,” the man replied softly.
Aoi propped the basket she was carrying against her hip, and took a closer look at the man. He was sick, that much was obvious. Normal doctors most likely wouldn’t be able to cure him, but Shinobu-san probably could. She’d likely even do it for free, since he didn’t look like he owned a single possession aside from the clothes on his back, if those rags could even really be classified as clothing.
“Shinobu-san will be home in a few days, most likely, but since you’re not a slayer and you aren’t dying right now, it will probably be a few weeks before she can really take a good look at you. If you want, I’ll send a crow for you when she’s returned.” Aoi turned to leave.
“You misunderstood me, Miss,” the man said, calling her back. “I don’t wish to be healed…well, I do. But more importantly, I wish to learn.”
Aoi turned back to him slowly, studying him. “You want to become a healer?”
“Yes,” the man replied earnestly. “I met a girl a few months ago. She…she was braver than anyone else I’ve ever met in my life, and she changed me completely. I want to repay her, and I’ve heard she ends up in infirmaries far more than she probably should.” He shuffled his feet, and smiled hesitantly up at Aoi. He looked like he'd never smiled before and wasn't sure if he was doing it right. "I figured becoming a healer was a good place to start."
“This girl…what was her name?” Aoi asked, though she had a sinking suspicion that she knew who it was. More than one person in Aoi's acquaintance had worn that facial expression after an encounter with the Demon Slayer Corps' very own walking-natural-disaster.
“I didn’t learn it for myself, but...I’ve heard that she’s called Nezuko.”
Dammit, Nezuko. You’ve brought in another stray, and he isn’t even a slayer, Aoi muttered internally. And he's sick, to top it all off.
Aoi wanted to know where Nezuko even came across these people. “I’ll teach you,” she replied slowly. “Maybe I can help you find a cure while Shinobu-san’s away.” She paused, beckoning him to join her. “What’s your name?”
The man smiled, and it looked a little more natural this time around. “Kutsuki.”
↜↝
It had been more than a week since Aoi had started working with Kutsuki, and she had very few complaints. He was surprisingly smart, and he wasn't afraid of making mistakes as long as Aoi taught him how to fix them. She'd never taught anyone medicine before, but Kutsuki was a good student. She liked working with him.
But she should have known...she should have realized that she hadn't had an episode in a while, that the next one would be something straight from hell's ugly depths, just because it could be.
You see, Aoi had days where the air felt too harsh in her lungs, where the world seemed to press in too close and too fast, and nothing she did was enough to get the weight of it off her back.
She had days where her hands shook like aspen leaves in a breeze, where her heartbeat was that of a cornered deer-mouse, where her mind was nothing more than a lightning-struck tree, splintered trunk and charred wood and deep scars that couldn’t be carved away.
There were times where her nightmares tried to swallow her whole, where her skin was soaked with sweat and her lungs were full of sulphur, where she was trapped in that cave all over again, dark and dank and claustrophobic, where the sun would never reach her again for as long as she would conceivably live, where blood dripped down her splintered hand and the voice of that demon called out to her, echoing in the dim chambers while Aoi ran for her life and prayed to every god she could remember that someone would save her from this game of cat-and-mouse from Hell.
There were days and nights and everything in between where Aoi felt like the only way for her to survive was to crawl out of this tainted skin and find herself another.
Tonight...happened to be one of those nights.
That was why she'd bid Kutsuki goodnight much earlier than normal, and locked herself in the small unused room near the back of the estate. Because normally, on nights like these, or days, or whatever else, Aoi would take to her more… destructive methods of coping…the ones were she took that clean little scalpel that she’d stolen from Shinobu-san’s medical supplies years ago, and pressed the blade deep into the scar-riddled skin of her thighs and hips, like maybe she could bleed the tension out of her veins if she cut deep enough.
She never could.
…Aoi wished she could say that she wasn’t sure how the horrible habit had come about…but she did. She knew exactly why it had happened, exactly what had pushed her to the edge of rationality…she wished she didn’t. But she did.
After her rescue from the cave, Aoi had become even more withdrawn and closed off than she’d been before, which was probably understandable. She hadn’t wanted to talk about it with anyone, which was also understandable, but mostly unhealthy.
Kanae-san had never been one to bottle feelings up, and as both the Pillar who’d co-trained Aoi and the primary mentor figure in her life, the former Mistress of the Butterfly Mansion took it upon herself to crack Aoi open like a delicate little egg, and get rid of all the terror that nestled deep inside her, clacifed around her heart like a shield.
Simply put, she wouldn’t let the issue go.
Aoi had loved Kanae-san dearly, like a mother, like a sister, like a second home. But the harder she pushed Aoi to open up, the farther Aoi retreated into herself to escape the memories. The woman who had practically raised her had gone from someone that Aoi looked up to and respected, to someone who triggered her deepest anxieties the moment she stepped foot in Aoi's general proximity.
It had strained and tarnished their relationship in the months leading up to Kanae-san’s death, so much so that Aoi had, disgustingly, felt the smallest flicker of relief among her broken heart when she heard what had happened.
And that…well, that had opened all sorts of new doorways for her anxious mind to lead her. Self-hatred and disgust turned every food she consumed bitter, and the voices that told her she was weak, pathetic, despicable , grew so loud in her mind that she’d taken to cutting herself open, like that would get rid of all the ugliness inside her skin.
Aoi was a doctor. She knew how to avoid arteries and major veins. She knew how to clean a wound and patch herself up when she was all done, knew how to stitch closed the deepest cuts, knew how to clean blood off the clean wooden floors.
Normally when Aoi was in a mood like this, she cut herself open, like she was dissecting a live mouse to see the way its heart beat.
But tonight, when she reached her trembling hands for her scalpel, all she could think of was Kutsuki, the way he looked at her with wonder, the way he was so eager and content to learn. He thought of the way he praised Nezuko, of how softly he spoke of the horrible things he'd done, of how Nezuko's soul had been a religious experience for him. Aoi thought about Kutsuki, and her hand wouldn't stop shaking, because she couldn't get the phrase she loves like she could bring the world back from the brink to stop playing on a loop in her hand.
And now she was thinking of Nezuko’s eyes, the way she’d gone on and on about how loving someone, losing someone, meant having to let them go.
She thought of Nezuko on a windy laundry day before the Mugen Train had become a permanent resident in her mind, saying, if you really want to kill demons, there’s more than one way to do it . A sly smile. You seem like the kind of person that could get creative with that. A splattering of freckles across the bridge of a nose, almost too light to see. But not killing demons doesn’t mean you’re worthless.
She thought of a man wrapped in his sickness, walking into the mansion and asking if she would teach him to heal himself, to heal others, to heal the world .
She thought of pink eyes and sheets hanging from a clothes line, an intense girl with an earnest, piercing gaze. She thought of you can exist without any backlash, and knew that she couldn’t .
So tonight, instead of slicing herself into neat, hateful strips, she slipped out into the cold autumn night with Shinobu-san’s book of house-call addresses and directions in hand, and started to walk, demons be damned, fear be damned, life itself be damned.
She started to walk, but before she knew it she was running, pushing her legs in a way that she hadn’t since she’d failed as a slayer. She pushed and pushed, and decided that she was tired of being useless. But maybe she didn’t have to be a slayer in order to escape the clinging feeling of you’re not enough that stuck to her spine. Maybe, like Nezuko had once told her on a sunny day before a hole got punched through her arm, Aoi could be the kind of person that got creative. Maybe she could be something new, if she wanted it.
~
Tengen stilled at the sound of a soft knock on the front door, a soft rag dangling from his hands. He wasn't expecting any visitors, and certainly not at this time of night. His wives were gone, having left for their mission a few weeks ago, and they would neer knock. Despite his generally flamboyant nature, very few people actually knew where the Sound Estate was located.
Slowly, Tengen rose to his feet, slipping a knife into his palm. He peeked through the door, and tracked the figure with his eyes—a small, dark shape outlined against the moonlight. No demon would ever be so polite, but demons weren't the only monsters in this world.
He opened the door, and the figure looked up.
Blue eyes dug into his, and the figure bowed, lowering her hood. “Uzui-sama,” Kanzaki Aoi said, her voice soft and a little uncertain.
He blinked down at her. “Kanzaki,” he replied. “What are you doing at my estate? How…how do you even know where I live?”
“Shinobu-san has a book of house-call addresses," she replied, waving a small black book absently. Her eyes were fixed on his face in a desperate way.
"Did...she send you here?" Tengen asked at the same time as Kanzaki blurted, “Please forgive the intrusion, but I have something that I need to ask you.”
“What is it?” Tengen asked. He didn't like the anxious look in Kanzaki's eyes, or the way her fingers wouldn't stop fidgeting. She looked like she was ready to rip out of her skin, like she needed a release or she'd die. Tengen had seen that expression too many times not to be wary of it.
“Uzui-sama…I want you to train me.”
“...As a tsuguko?” Tengen replied, frowning. “I was under the impression that you already know how to wield a sword thanks to Kochou-san—”
“No!” Kanzaki interrupted, and Tengen fell silent. “Not as a slayer.” She took a deep breath, and Tengen could nearly feel the air traveling to every part of her. “I want you to train me…as a shinobi.”