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Fire burns at its brightest right before it is snuffed out.
Tanjirou had learned that, long ago. His family worked with fire, up in their cold mountain home.
He burned logs for charcoal, and each time he put the fire out it made sure to give one last good fight before finally being snuffed. Fire fights for life like any other living thing. Even if it has no soul or heart to cling to, it still fights as though it does. It consumes and claims and fights and Tanjirou always found it oh-so mesmerizing before the flames would finally quiet themselves enough to go out.
Rengoku Kyoujurou is much like a flame. Tanjirou has come to learn that, during the short time that he's known the man. He burns passionately. Brightly. With a ferocious intensity that Tanjirou has never quite seen before and might never see again. He moves with confidence. Fights with vigor. Does his duty with a smile and a laugh and not a single mistake along the way.
He burns brightly. Like an open flame. Tanjirou is awed by it. He never thought a fire could burn so beautifully.
He burns at his brightest in his fight against a demon moon. An upper demon moon. The monster had shown its face, named itself – Akaza , it had said with a proud smile. Its rank written right across its eyes in a way that almost made Tanjirou ill – and challenged the flame to a contest. To see which one could burn the brightest.
Rengoku wins. He burns so brightly that Tanjirou thinks he might be going blind. Brighter and brighter he gets, until finally–
All flames must go out, eventually.
Only, this one doesn't.
Tanjirou isn't sure what he's watching.
The smoke clears. Inosuke is at his side, gasping and panting and finally taking off his mask to at least play at getting a deeper breath. Tanjirou pretends that he doesn't notice tears in Inosuke's eyes. He knows Inosuke wouldn't do the same for him.
The smoke clears. The flames have gone out. And yet Rengoku Kyoujurou is still breathing. Still fighting. Still clinging as though he just can't allow himself to go out yet. The demon wears a confident smirk. His arm has buried itself in Rengoku's chest. Tanjirou feels nauseous. He has to stop himself from throwing up.
"You lose, Kyoujurou~. " The demon purrs, and Tanjirou sees Rengoku's face scrunch up in pain. Veins bulge from his forehead. Something's wrong. Something's wrong. So very very wrong, and Tanjirou can barely manage to reach for his sword before he hears–
Screams.
A blood-curdling scream, followed by a fire so bright that Tanjirou must look away for fear that he really will go blind.
Gasping. Breathing. Someone is fighting, but not with a sword. Tanjirou still can't look. The flame rages on. The demon laughs. Something about something taking and Tanjirou doesn't understand, until–
He opens his eyes.
"Rengoku-san–" He chokes, halfway into the cry.
The flame Hashira's eyes are red. Deep red. Dark red. From the pupils to the whites, his eyes have turned red. His mouth his open, drooling, and his face is twisted into so many emotions that–
Tanjirou knows what this is.
Get up.
He reaches for his sword.
Get up.
He struggles to shaking feet.
Move.
He steps forward.
Help him.
Something holds him back.
"Gonpachiro." Inosuke says, voice shaking and eyes wide. Tanjirou doesn't even care that his name has been said wrong. "Don't move."
Since when is Inosuke the voice of reason?
"I have to–"
Have to what?
Tanjirou doesn't know.
"I'm so glad it took!" The demon – Akaza – snarls and laughs. "Now we can fight each other forever, Kyoujurou~! Aren't you excited! "
Rengoku Kyoujurou's flames have gone out.
Snuffed. By force. Even as the wounds on his torso forcefully sew themselves shut. Even as he opens his formerly lost eye. Even as Rengoku Kyoujurou stands from the ground, seemingly as healthy and alive as he's ever been–
–Tanjirou sees no fire.
"R-Rengoku-san–"
Those eyes – red eyes. Deep red eyes. Horrifically red eyes – zero in on him. Disgusted. Offended. Curious.
"Are you referring to me?"
Tanjirou feels Inosuke tensing.
Tanjirou feels his grip on his sword tightening.
He doesn't say anything. He can't say anything. The sun is rising over the hills, and the demon – the first demon – says that they have to run for it if they don't want to waste so much of Muzan-sama's precious blood.
The new demon – the red eyed one who looked at Tanjirou as though he were nothing – simply nods. The two vanish into the trees without another word.
Tanjirou looks down. At the sword left behind. Bright red. Embossed with flame patters that dance up and down the blade so very beautifully. As though its owner had imbued it with a piece of their very soul.
Tanjirou stumbles to collect it. Holding the sword as though it were the most precious thing in the world.
Its owner is dead.
Rengoku Kyoujurou is dead.
His flames went out.
Giyuu wonders, absently, if this mission really required two Hashira.
Another report of people dying. Nothing out of the ordinary in this endless train of tragedy that Giyuu Tomioka gets to call his normal. And, while he's certainly grateful that he got to spend some quality time with Sanemi, he can't figure out why the both of them were ordered to come here. No upper moons made themselves known. No lower moons, even. The last time that two Hashira were dispatched on a mission, it was the Mt Natagumo incident. The demon there was a lower moon, and even then a mere child had been the one to handle it. A mere child had–
The worst of it must be that Rengoku isn't with them. It's understandable. This mission didn't even need two Hashira. There was no way that they were going to send three. But while Giyuu and Sanemi are here, Kyoujurou is off on his own. On another mission. Aboard that train where people have been disappearing. It had sounded like a much more important mission than this one, and yet–
"Oi, Tomioka, what the fuck're you doing?"
He blinks out of a long, spiraling train of thought. It happens more often than he would care to admit, but he looks up and finds Sanemi's eyes. He's covered in blood. Again. It's not his blood. Giyuu knows that. What's left of that demon is splattered over Sanemi's clothes and sword. The body had crumbled to dust minutes ago.
"...sorry." Giyuu mutters, swinging his sword in an attempt to clear the blood off the blade. He quickly sheathes it with the same fluid motion that he always uses. Sanemi rolls his eyes, mutters something about a "show off" and quickly mirrors Giyuu's actions. Now it's time to let the clean-up crew do their jobs and head back–
Giyuu's train of thought is interrupted once again as the call of a crow blares through the sky.
Giyuu and Sanemi's heads both snap up simultaneously. A crow. A new mission? Already?
Giyuu holds out his arm, and the crow perches. Both Giyuu and Sanemi are silent. Waiting for their next instructions.
"URGENT NEWS!" The crow shouts. Were he not so used to hearing Sanemi scream, Giyuu would probably cover his ears. "RENGOKU KYOUJUROU HAS TRANSFORMED INTO A DEMON!"
Silence.
Giyuu couldn't possibly have heard correctly.
"What–"
"RENGOKU KYOUJUROU HAS TRANSFORMED INTO A DEMON!" The crow repeats. Again. Again. Giyuu is trying to get the words to stick. Demon. Demon. Rengoku Kyoujurou. Demon. Transformed.
Rengoku Kyoujurou transformed–
No.
No way–
Giyuu's mouth drops open. He doesn't know what he's going to say, but before he can say anything a roaring shout tears its way through the air. The clean-up crew all jump to attention.
Giyuu glances Sanemi's way. He isn't surprised. There's no reason to be surprised. It's... typical. Typical of Sanemi to act this way. To respond to something like this–
Rengoku Kyoujurou transformed into a demon.
How is Giyuu meant to respond to something like this?
"THAT BASTARD–" Sanemi screams at the top of his lungs. Giyuu resists the urge to cover his ears. The crow flies off again. Giyuu doesn't know what to do with himself.
"...oh." Giyuu whispers. It's shameful. That's the only thing he can say? He should be angry. He should be crying. He should be throwing a tantrum to rival Sanemi's, and yet all he can do is stand there and say–
Oh.
Rengoku Kyoujurou has–
Giyuu falls into a sitting position. He doesn't have the energy to keep standing anymore.
Sanemi is still screaming. Probably at the clean up crew. Something about if any of them knew about this. If any of them knew that Kyoujurou was planning to betray them. That's what this is, right? A betrayal. They've been betrayed by someone they–
Someone they loved.
Giyuu wonders, absently, if it's his fault. It must be. Kyoujurou didn't think that he was worth being loyal to? Did Giyuu not tell him he loved him enough? Did Giyuu not smile enough? Was it because Giyuu could just never keep up with his bright energy? That must be it. There's no other explanation. How else could–
Giyuu takes a breath. He's shocked by how stable it is.
He wonders, absently, why he can't bring himself to cry.
Is that just how broken he is, that he can't even cry when he learns that one of the men he loved has betrayed him?
All day Giyuu had listened to Sanemi shouting, and Giyuu was done.
Done with it. Done with listening. Done with hearing the same angry words over and over and over and over and over again. By now, Giyuu thinks he could recite the rant from memory until he was blue in the face. He doesn't want to. He doesn't want to hear it anymore. Sanemi just keeps talking and talking and talking and Giyuu thinks he just might snap in half. He can't listen to this anymore. He can't listen to this anymore. He just can't.
"Bastard. Bastard. Traitor." Sanemi's voice just gets louder and louder. Giyuu had tried to walk away, earlier. He had tried because this was just getting to be too much. As upset – angry, he thinks – as he is (or should be) about all of this, that doesn't mean that he can just sit around and listen to Sanemi's unending rant. He had tried to walk away. Sanemi had just followed him.
"Can't believe I ever cared about that bastard." Sanemi growls. "Turns out he was just a no-good–"
That's it.
Giyuu doesn't know why that's it. Sanemi's been saying worse all day and all night and all day yesterday, but that's just it.
"Shinazugawa." He says. His voice doesn't sound any different from normal, he thinks. But it feels different. Kyoujurou would be able to tell the difference. Giyuu hates that it's the first thing that comes to mind. Sanemi's head snaps up, and his eyes are harsh and so very angry and Giyuu is so sick–
He's so sick of listening to this.
He's so tired.
It's only been a day and he's so exhausted.
"What? Got somethin' to add, Tomioka?" Sanemi adds. Anger. Resentment. Disgust. But not directed at Giyuu. Directed at–
Kyoujurou. The other man that Giyuu can say he loves with all his heart.
"...stop." He says, turning his head and staring at the sky with blank eyes.
"Stop what?" Sanemi crosses his arms over his chest.
"...talking."
"Stop talking?" Sanemi raises an eyebrow. "Why the fuck would I stop talking? What the fuck is that gonna do?? Huh???" Sanemi steps towards him. Giyuu doesn't do anything. Fingers wrap themselves around his uniform and he's dragged up, to his feet, and the white haired Hashira gets up in his face. So close that Giyuu could kiss him, if he just leaned forward another inch–
" He's a fuckin' traitor, Tomioka, " Sanemi hisses. Giyuu can't take it anymore. He can't. He can't do this.
It happened again.
Giyuu wasn't enough, again.
He lost someone he loved because he wasn't good enough, again.
Giyuu can't do this.
" He fucked with us. He took advantage of us. Aren't you– "
Sanemi stops. Finally. Finally . Sanemi stops. Maybe he stopped because Giyuu's knees finally gave out. Because Giyuu just can't take it anymore. Because he crumbles, even with Sanemi's fingers curled around his uniform. Maybe Sanemi stops because he finally–
Because he finally realized.
Giyuu can't even cry.
"...Giyuu." Sanemi's voice is suddenly soft. So much softer than Giyuu has heard from him in what must be months. The wind hashira helps him down. Lowers him to the ground. "Hey, Giyuu. Stay with me. Stay with me, okay?" Sanemi sounds panicked. Giyuu can't blame him.
Whenever something like this happened–
–Kyoujurou was always the one to help.
He was just better at it.
Giyuu doesn't know what to do.
Sanemi keeps talking. His voice is soft now. Sanemi talks about a lot of things. Giyuu stops listening, at some point.
It happened again.
Giyuu doesn't know why he's thinking about Sabito, now.
It happened again.
Sabito died because of him. He doesn't think he'll ever forget.
It happened again.
Could Giyuu have saved him?
It happened again?
If Giyuu had done something different, would Kyoujurou have stayed?
It happened again.
"...if I told him I loved him, would he have left?"
He didn't mean to say that out loud.
It happened again.
If Sanemi responds, Giyuu doesn't hear it.