Chapter Text
When Hakuji wakes again, he curses himself for fainting (for being so weak). What is he, a helpless maiden? So what if the demons he’s battled so long turned out to be humans? He should have been able to withstand the shock. For the first time in years, though, he feels warm, nestled neatly in a futon, and only then does he realize everything around him has been bathed or washed.
He lifts up his hoari and notes that it smells like an expensive fragrance. He doesn’t hate it.
He looks at everything with a wary eye. Even if this was human territory, he had mindlessly barged into someone else’ estate, fought against two of their comrades, and spat accusations of them terrorizing the human race. There had to be traps laid here, ready to pounce on him to seek revenge.
He wanders a bit around the room. There are shelves of books tidied up on the walls. He flips through them, and realizes they are records of every single demon slayer that were active in every era, down to their breathing styles and, if known, their time of death or retirement.
Shit. Were they actually demon slayers? What were the attempts on his comrades’ lives then? What the hell was that all about?
Mizunoe, Kanoto, Kanoe, Tsuchinoto, Tsuchinoe, Hinoto, Hinoe, Kinoto, and Kinoe… There! Hashira!
He skims through the page, but his confusion slowly grows. Where was Gyutaro and Ume? Where was Douma? Kokushibo? Hantengu? Where were his comrades?
He sees none of those names. Not even his own. Instead, he sees names he’s never even heard of before. He even sees Uzui, with ‘Tengen’ as his last name, which he didn’t even know he had. Didn’t Gyutaro and Ume slice off his head, as well as his three wives’, in the Entertainment District a few days back? Ume kept bitching about them.
Kyojuro?!!! He’s a Hashira??!!!!
Seeing his name glossed on the page was what truly broke him. Hakuji drops the book and cradles his head. Shit. Did he die? Did something happen to him on his last mission? Was he hallucinating? Is he going crazy? He feels like it. He felt perfectly normal before!
He was a Hashira. Then-
Fight me, Hakuji!
Hakuji, you disappoint me!
Hakuji!
Did the demon whose horns prode against his forehead not exist? Was everything he knew a lie?
His vision nearly fails him. He can’t think properly. Has he truly gone insane?
“Oh my.”
A woman’s voice rouses him from his thoughts. He looks to his side, finding himself crouching and curling in on himself, and a woman kneeling right next to him. Her eyes are hollow and filled with intense rage, and it startles Hakuji a little.
“Are you having another meltdown, Mr. Demon Slayer?”
The woman settles for a blank smile. Hakuji doesn’t know what she’s going for, but it certainly successfully interrupted his train of thought. Her stature is so… tiny. Is she one of those little ones that are deadly fast and agile? But her little posture pictures her as a fragile beauty.
She reminds him so much of Koyuki.
“Um. Yeah? Probably? Sorry about that.”
The woman smiles wider. “Don’t be silly. You’re a patient and a slayer. It is my job to look after your wellbeing.”
“Oh. Uh.” Hakuji doesn’t recognize her, but her battle intent is constantly flaring. “Are you…?”
“Hm?” The woman tilts her head. “I am a Hashira, yes. Apparently you are, too. But I have never seen you before. Why is that?”
Her eyes are crinkled, and there is genuine amusement in her words. Is- is she mocking him?!
“I could say the same thing about you.” Hakuji snaps, eyes narrowing. He grabs the book and points to the enlisted names. “I’ve never heard of these people in my life! Who’s Misturi? Who’s Muichiro? Who’s Shinobu?”
“That would be me.” she chirps, unaffected.
“And there’s Kyojuro! Kyojuro! A Hashira?! He gave me this just a few weeks ago!” He lifted his clothes. There is an unsightly scar, pink and angry, blown wide open ok the side of his ribcage. Shinobu, surprisingly, does not react.
“I nearly died thanks to that motherfucker! ‘Become a demon, Hakuji!’ ‘Fight me for eternity, Hakuji!’ And he nearly killed one of my tsugukos! So excuse me if I can’t wrap my head around the fact that he’s actually human and just a freak that likes killing humans!”
The silence that comes after becomes deafening. Hakuji’s cheeks burn, and his hands are wordlessly raised up to his cheeks. “I- I mean- um-”
“Hakuji. Is that your name?” Shinobu wonders aloud, a hand to her chin. She actually looks curious. That shouldn’t be her main takeaway!
“Um. Yes?” he squeaks. “I don’t-”
Her face is near his in an instant. Hakuji forces down the reflex to smack her across the face. “What are the names of your allies, Hakuji?”
There it is again. That flaring, murderous intent, barely hidden by her dull eyes and smile. The floor feels too cold, and the light that shines on the candle oil feels startlingly bright. His heartbeat feels too fast. He feels interrogated, rather than questioned.
For that reason alone, he doesn’t want to answer. But can he not? He suspects this organization is just as wary as he is of them. To obscure information from them when, on paper, they are allies, will arouse suspicion. Her eyes spell danger.
“I can’t trust you enough to tell.”
Shinobu hums, and her gaze turns borderline predatory. A soft butterfly inlaid with poison that could slaughter a thousand men. Her smile refuses to relent, and she cups Hakuji’s cheek with tender hands. Hakuji fears for his life.
Before Hakuji can even speak, he feels a sharp jab of a syringe stabbing down his arm. He hisses at the contact, yet remains pilant as the grip on his cheek squeezes tighter. The hollow eyes with raging fury burst in full bloom, a dark shadow looming over Shinobu’s face. He can’t seem to move.
“You may take on a new face, Akaza, but you are still a demon.”
The syringe on his arm is squeezed down into his blood, and only then does he recognize the fresh scent of wisteria. It breathes through his nose and consumes his lungs. It overwhelms him, but he can’t find himself to react to it.
“Forgive me. Just let me indulge in this a little, hm?”
There is nothing kind about those words, about the sadistic pleasure written clear on her face as wisteria digs deeper into his body. He scrambles to think of the name that was written on the records.
Kocho Shinobu. Insect Hashira.
If a reaction is what she wants, then unfortunately, she’s not young to get any. Hakuji only frowns deeper. “Are you done?” he snarks.
A beat passes, before the fury clears into surprise. Hakuji is let go, and Shinobu’s lips part as she removes the syringe. “How interesting. That was my highest dosage.” she smiles, this time a little more genuine. Hakuji breathes a sigh of relief.
So the demon slayers here are just as on guard about him as he is about them. But they are much more hostile, which doesn’t make sense. He’s seen the sun. Wisteria has no effect on him. He looks entirely human. What more evidence could they possibly need?
“Upper Moon Three!”
That’s right. Kyojuro- Rengoku called him Upper Moon Three. Shinobu called him Akaza. Why was that?
From Shinobu’s words, Akaza was clearly a demon. Perhaps he was who Rengoku was referring to? Did Hakuji have similar traits to him?
“Is Akaza Upper Moon Three?” Hakuji asks tentatively.
A vein pops on Shinobu’s head. She turns to him, humming a deceivingly sweet tune. “You just looked… familiar. That’s all.”
“Right.”
So he sits. He doesn’t know what to say or do to comfort Shinobu. If Hakuji had a guess, this crazy bitch probably has a massive grudge against demons. It may be obvious to some, but there is a surprisingly large amount of people that do join the Corps simply because they have no thrill in their lives.
Most of them die off right away. How Gyokko managed to become a Hashira is beyond him.
Hold on. Hakuji is a Hashira. Gyokko is, too.
“What are the other Upper Moons that you have faced before?”
Hakuji immediately winces as the breakneck speed in how Shinobu spins her neck to meet his eyes. Her eyes are narrowed, mind gears cranking in her head, contemplating what she might say next with every bat of her hooded eyelids.
“I haven’t faced any Upper Moons, but the rest have.” Shinobu finally relents. “Uzui, for instance, had defeated Upper Moon Six, Gyutaro and Daki, along with Tanjiro Kamado, Zenitsu Agatsuma, and Inosuke Haibara.”
“Ume.”
“Hm?”
“Her name isn’t Daki. It’s Ume.”
He remembers a little girl who dyed her hair black and insisted she went along with a new name. Hakuji laughed in her face. Gyutaro scolded him for the next hour.
She picked Daki because it ‘sounded prettier’, and ‘it would finally make these dumbasses realize she’s not a little girl anymore’. Nobody listened to her, and Douma gently dabbed her tears away when she threw another tantrum. Because Ume will always be their little baby sister, and Hakuji isn’t sure what he would do with himself when she finally dies off or quits to marry.
He hasn’t believed in the heavens for a long time. But when Ume laid there, bed-ridden and half-dead with her eardrums near erupted after her fight with Uzui, Hakuji had prayed to the gods that she would live to smile another day.
Shinobu’s reply, though, does give him a solid conclusion. As horrid as it is, somehow, all the roles of the Upper Moons and Hashiras have flipped. Upper Moon Three and Two have turned into humans and are Hashiras, while he, along with Gyutaro and Ume, were accused of being demons.
It’s the most logical Hakuji’s ever been, and he thinks it’s because of a Blood technique.
Hakuji doesn’t know what to do. What can he even do?
“And how would you know that?” Shinobu, either oblivious to his panic, or doesn’t care, speaks.
“Because she’s a Hashira, along with Gyutaro.” Hakuji says, watching as Shinobu’s eyes nearly pop out of her sockets.
Hakuji waits as Shinobu absorbs this information. To her credit, she accepts it without fault, and is dusting her hoari and getting up in a matter of seconds. “I think I am starting to understand your circumstances, Hakuji.” Her eyes shine with genuine concern, and Hakuji relaxes despite himself. “I will write to Master about this, if you don’t mind.”
Not that he has a choice in the matter.
He gets more visitors over the course of his stay in the Butterfly mansion. Shinobu, he finds, is terrifying, despite the way she carries herself; which only makes him more scared of what her demon counterpart would be.
Everything floats like a dream for the next few days. He is to be kept in the mansion until their Master finds out what the hell is going on. He thinks he’s barely passed as sane, and that there is some sense to his story. They think he’s a trap, and he thinks they’re a trap, so they tip-toe around each other, hiding so much and yielding so little; both parties are stuck in a limbo.
Sometimes, he truly believes it is a dream. Until something outworldly happens that reminds him how disconnected he truly is, and his entire subconscious floats out of his body, white edges cornering his vision, until someone pulls him back down. He feels pathetic when it happens, and more so when it’s with the girls.
Hakuji’s weapons are confiscated, and they dress him in civilian clothes. Almost to make him seem harmless. But Hakuji has a foreboding feeling they’re doing this to separate him from their Corp as much as possible.
He draws what he observes in chicken scratches. So far, the people that visited him (though ‘spy’ might be a better word) are the several hashira bear-tackling him the other day. The scrawny man flinging his sword is the Wind Hashira, the man sitting (“He looks like he’s throwing up,” comments Aoi, much to his displeasure) is the Stone Hashira, and –
And. Eugh.
“Good morning, Mr. Akaza!” The random kid beams.
“Please. Please, go away.” Hakuji nearly cries.
“No can do, Mr Akaza.” The kid scoots next to him, smelling like hell had chewed him and spat him back out. “You’re still a pseudo-enemy of the Demon Corp! Everyone needs to keep a safe eye on you until we confirm you’re not Upper Three.”
“You wanna know who Upper Moon Three is?” Hakuji sneers, slamming the table, “It’s that disgusting flame demon who parades around talking about how he nearly killed me.”
“Flame demon?” The kid murmurs. “You’re – oh,” the smile drops, and Hakuji feels every ounce of warmth radiating from the boy seeping right out of his body with a deep frown, “You’re talking about Mr. Rengoku.”
Mr. Rengoku. Hakuji’s blood boils. How has he had this little shit wrapped around his finger the entire time? That self-righteous, egotistical demon who claims to decide how all life should live, is somehow a savior of this world?
“Look,” Hakuji says, “I don’t know who this asshole is in this universe, but in mine, he nearly killed me. He killed thousands of others, too. I don’t want to know what human version of him earned you your respect, but it won’t change the fact that he fucked me up so bad I’m a damn liability now.”
“I'm sorry, Mr. Akaza –” The boy interrupts, not looking sorry at all.
“And stop calling me Akaza.” Hakuji seethes, “I don’t know who that is. My name is Hakuji.”
He didn’t think that memory would resurface, because the name had seemed so insignificant to him. But he has heard Akaza before. Funnily enough, he was the only one unwilling to change it at the time.
A beat passes. Hakuji inhales. Exhales. “Sorry.” he grits out. “M’not usually like this. Well, I am, I just –” he flounders, “Used to having demons as an outlet. So I’m more chill.”
The boy’s nose twitches. Something in his eye softens, and his frown lifts. “I’m sorry, Mr. Hakuji,” he says, genuine, and it takes Hakuji by surprise. “We are just cautious. Because… because you- your demon counterpart had nearly taken Mr. Rengoku’s life.”
Shit.
Hakuji watches as the boy - the fifteen year-old boy, who should be chasing girls and taking care of his family - bows his head down, and he feels like absolute shit.
He remembers the way Ume wailed when he first blinked open his eyes after his encounter with Rengoku. The shrill scream of, “Don’t leave me again, idiot,” and the fear that, though waning off, still squeezing her throat as she threw herself into his bandaged arms.
They had nearly mourned for him, Gyataro later tells. He had been picking his teeth and craning his head to the other side. It is the only semblance of something like a family that has occurred in the years that Akaza has been a slayer. Did this boy get scared, too?
He didn’t know that. Dammit.
“... It’s okay.” He says instead. “An eye for an eye, y’know? S’not that bad.”
The boy’s eyes flit towards the scar, etched deep onto Akaza’s cheek. If he had any comments, he didn’t voice them.
“I could vouch for you, if you’d like.” The boy smiles, “And you’re pretty much in the clear, anyway. I could take you out for a mission?”
Now that seemed like a fantastic idea.