Chapter Text
Tooru took a deep breath and even that made his entire body hurt. He was bruised and sticky with his own blood, sweaty and tired.
But he had everything under control.
He wasn’t going to die of pain. He was one of the strongest demons in Hell and the fact that they had managed to capture him and torture him made no difference to the fact that when he could set himself free he would kill them all.
Of course, he wasn’t going to free himself until he could move his wings, which had been knit together with silver thread, but he would think of a way to get out of this mess; he was good at planning tactics, after all.
“Let me repeat myself, just in case you didn’t hear correctly,” the demon said, circling around Tooru —who was hanging from the ceiling by his bounded wrists— with a sharp blade dancing between her swift fingers. She placed the tip of the blade on Tooru’s naked back, and he was even surprised he could still feel more pain there. “Are you going to be on our side?” she asked, carving doodles on Tooru’s flesh.
Tooru bit the inside of his cheek to avoid screaming in pain but his in entire body shivered, betraying his composure.
“I’m not giving the power over the entire kingdom to you. You’ll have to kill me first.”
“Oh,” the demon said pushing the blade into Tooru’s shoulder, this time earning a low cry from Tooru’s throat. “You see, we can’t do that, Prince Tooru. You are way too important for us to kill you.”
“Nice way of showing it, torturing me like this,” he said, only in a whispered, afraid his voice would break if he spoke louder.
Maybe he didn’t have the situation as under control as he thought.
“They are different things, your Highness,” the demon said standing in front of Tooru, leaving the blade in his shoulder. “You are important because your little brother is extremely useful for his innate skills to control any army, but you are just as good a commander as he is. Besides, the people love you, Prince Tooru. Your brother isn’t much loved by the people, but we can’t deny he’s the most useful pawn Master has.” She gave a couple of steps forwards and took another blade to carve swift lines on Tooru’s torso. “But you can not only lead armies, you can also swoon the masses, make them believe in Master’s commands.”
“I don’t believe in your Master. And why would I give in to his orders, when I am the future King?” he said with a menacing glare.
The demon looked up at him and smiled. “I am sure you will come to realize this is the only sensible course of action, my dear Prince.”
“Or you are going to kill me?”
The demon covered her mouth in mimicking horror “Oh, of course not, your Highness. You are way too important, like I said. It’s not like you are your traitorous little brother. They say middle sons are the disgrace and I cannot but agree” she said, and if she had expected it to be comforting, it did exactly the opposite.
“What did you do to my brother?”
The demon smiled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Kuroo was dragged into the dungeons as if he was a dog. He was an all-mighty prince and a strong fighter, but there was so much a single demon could do against an entire army before running out of energy and options. In the end, he had been captured.
The soldier had bounded his feet together and had tied one rope to each of his arms so they could drag him like a captured wild animal. He knew it was part of the humiliation they were order to put him through, part of the lesson he had to learn for being a traitor.
It was an interesting definition: traitor. He wasn’t really one. A traitor is someone who goes against something he once believed in —or at least pretended to believe in—, but Kuroo had always been honest about how he didn’t care for the demon world and how he felt himself to belong more among humans than among demons.
That’s why, when the Earthquake hit Japan he found it absolutely natural to go to the Tokyo Knights to warn them about the plans the demons had. But word spreads quickly, and soon half an army was after his ass and they’d managed to get it.
One of the biggest demons picked Kuroo up by the front of his shirt and shoved him violently into a cell. The only other person inside the tiny cell was a trembling little figure wearing baggy clothes and a burlap bag over his head.
Kuroo’s head hit painfully the wall and the sound echoed loudly in the cell, but of course it wasn’t enough to make him pass out. He heard the little guy beside him give a low incoherent cry and guessed he’d been gagged.
The soldiers closed the cell doors and one of them stepped closer, his hands on the bar, eyeing Kuroo with an interested gaze.
“You sure are brave enough, Prince Tetsurou,” the guy said. “Did you think you could get away with betraying us?”
“Kuroo,” was all he said in reply.
“Your given name was Tetsurou. Humans think they chose it, but you were born with it. Kuroo is the surname that humans gave you.”
Kuroo smiled. “And that’s why I’m calling myself that,” he said.
The soldier shook his head. “I can’t believe you were raised to become like this.”
“My human family raised me well, while my father and mother were busy fangirling over my older brother and pampering my little brother. It’s not my brothers’ fault, of course, but I never had someone to raise me here,” he said.
“That is no excuse to betray the King!”
“The King?! We have no King! My older brother is supposed to take over the throne.”
“But he won’t,” he soldier said simply. “The little Prince will take his place, Prince Tooru will be his right hand and you, Prince Tetsurou, won’t be a nuisance anymore.”
Kuroo sighed and rested his back against the wall, a small smile spreading on his face because he was defeated, and that meant he had nothing left to lose.
“Are you going to kill me?”
“We wouldn’t do that. That’s why we left you a treat,” he said pointing at the trembling little boy. “If you wish to escape and go back to your little pitiful humans, you just have to eat his soul and you’ll have enough strength to leave. We’ve been instructed not to hurt you on your way back to Earth, so this will do.”
Kuroo narrowed his eyes. “What’s the catch?”
The soldier shook his head. “No catch, Prince Tetsurou. If you feel that you can take one human life for the sake of a lot more, then do so,” he said with a smile. “If not, then die in this cell.”
Kuroo watched them leave and thought about his possibilities. He could sit down in that cell and die, next to this little human who was probably also going to die, or he could eat just one soul and he could go back to Earth and fight along with the people he knew for the ones he loved.
The choice was so easy he was mildly afraid of how easy it was for him to take a life.
“I’m sorry, kid,” he told the boy. “It’s not really personal, and there’s no way I can apologize for what I’m going to do to you, but I—”
He felt like an asshole taking someone else’s soul like this, with the kid gagged and his face covered. He wanted to give the kid at least the chance to fight back, to spit at him if he wanted to. He deserved it.
He unbounded the kid’s hands and then he took off the bag.
When he saw the boy’s face and the kid looked at him he dropped the bag and backed away, his heart racing, his face paling, his entire body shaking.
No, no, no, no. Fucking no. Tell me this is a fucking joke.
But it wasn’t.
In front of him sat completely frightened, wide teary eyes piercing Kuroo with pain, entire little frame shaking, the person Kuroo cared about the most.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Tobio stood in a big round office on top of one of the tallest buildings in Hell. From the window he could see the greatest army he had set his eyes upon: thousands and thousands of demons wearing protective clothes all over them and sharp blades on the wings, carrying more than two weapons. Each stood still waiting for their commander to give the orders.
He was the commander.
The only person along with him in the room was Official Ushijima, one of the highest ranks in the entire dimension. He was stoic and fierce, but two could play the same game.
“I refuse to attack the Earth,” Tobio declared, in spite of his gut telling him that there wasn’t really a difference between saying something eleven times or twelve.
Ushijima didn’t move, didn’t even flinch.
“You were order to do it and you are going to do it, your Highness.”
“I refuse.”
“You cannot. You will lead the army and attack Earth as planned.”
“I didn’t plan anything. You just made a plan and put me in it without even asking me if I wanted to join in, which I don’t. Our war isn’t against humans; our war is against the angels.”
Ushijima walked to the window and looked at the gray sky above them. The sky was always gray and dusty; the sun was a foreign concept in Hell.
“Look outside, your Highness. We are forced to live here when our time on Earth ends. We are forced to leave under this unwelcoming sky and to feed from human souls to survive a little longer, to await a war against the angels. Angels have Heaven and humans have the Earth, and that is not fair. We are going to claim the Earth for ourselves.”
“Do you even listen to yourself? Killing humans is not going to solve anything.”
“We don’t need to kill them. We are going to reveal ourselves and ask them peacefully to surrender under our commands.”
“And if they don’t?”
Ushijima shrugged, still looking at the sky. “Then we’ll kill them.”
“I refuse to lead the army,” he repeated.
They needed one of the princes to lead the army, not only because Tobio’s innate skills to lead was useful, but also because only royalty could start wars. He knew his brothers wouldn’t take part in unnecessary murder either, so there was no way Ushijima could keep up with his plan—
Ushijima tapped the glass of the window once and the image suddenly changed. Now, instead of the sight of the city, there was a wide-smiled ginger looking at him with caring eyes. Then the image zoomed out and Tobio had a full view of the entire team: Suga’s warm smile, Asahi-san’s awkward posture as Nishinoya-senpai hung from his neck, captain Daichi scolding Tanaka-senpai, Yamaguchi smiling kindly at an annoyed Tsukishima... Hinata, smiling widely at him.
He swallowed hard but said nothing.
“Now, prince Tobio,” Ushijima said, turning back to him. “You were telling me how thrilled you were about leading our army to take over the Earth.”