Work Text:
“Today,”
Medkit is on the ground, his body light and powerless. His face is bleeding vengeful red and his knuckles are bruised, scarred, and molded after the shape of the man currently sitting on top of him. Subspace holds Medkit’s fist in his open palm and is trying to overpower his arm, somewhat successfully.
“Today is the day this will end, trust me.” His thoughts remain scattered. “All of this is going to finish today, once and… forever…”
Medkit begins to give up, closing his eyes and clenching his fist as if it's going to help him. He thinks about how often he forgets that he's made out of painful and sensitive flesh, wires of nerves bunched up at the surface of the skin that vibrate at every bruise. He forgets how it’s like for this flesh to crumble and suffer the consequences.
Subspace thuds his fist down on the ground. Then takes his hand off as if knowing Medkit wouldn't move under him anymore. So Medkit doesn't.
“Hey, you have to get up. C’mon.”
As Medkit is brought to consciousness, he feels the cold edges of the Subspace’s gas mask dig into his cheekbones. The purple demon is staring at him with one eye, wide open, as if in complete and utter disbelief. His pupil is searching for something under Medkit’s eye mask, and Medkit fucking hates the idea of that.
“What got into youu–u?” He draws out the last word as his hand goes up to grasp Medkit’s jaw from below, squeezing it hard. The medic imagines it being ripped out with one forceful yank – could Subspace do that..? – as sort of like a finishing blow to their current physical encounter, and then he would bleed out. And then he would stay here and fuse with the ground and lay to rest with his dead body and dead soul forever and ever, where nothing can hurt him.
To his surprise, Subspace only lifts his head and peers down at him. “Fine. If you’re so willing to give up, I don’t see the point. That’s just pathetic.”
Medkit exhales. The venom-spawn breathes out, little pink fumes going out of the air filters, and gets up on his feet.
“You know, there’s at least a point to torture. Sometimes, they’re like.. Writhing...” Subspace’s hand, much to Medkit’s disgust, shakes in imitation of said writhing. “Means they’re resisting. Kicking back a little bit. That’s amusing to watch.”
He crosses his arms on his chest. The rotten one has a weaker grasp, Medkit remarks for the hundredth time.
“You, on the other hand, lay here like I'm going to put you on a massaging table and pamper you. Or are you playing dead so that I wouldn't hurt you further?”
“Quit…” Medkit coughs up blood, his elbows bend in an attempt of getting up.
“Ah?”
“Quit talking.” More a rasp than proper speech, the medic manages something out of his mouth before he sits up. The smell of iron fills up his nostrils.
Subspace laughs in response, which sounds more like a metallic trill. “You're springing back up to life! You really had it in you. Good job. Now what?”
Now what?..
That is a good question that Medkit has been trying to answer for the past decade or so. The rather qualified scientist from The Lost Temple is truly stumped for an answer on this one. Wow, Subspace got him even in the mind games.
“Now, I will kill you,” is what Medkit wants to say, or scream, rather, at the top of his lungs. He notices the way that Subspace’s tail slightly hits the ground, left and right, back and forth. He waits as the wind blows and rises the folds on Subspace's sleeves. Something rings between them, the sound waves hitting obstacles and tangling between their legs, an aching and painful feeling of nonexistent and irrelevant matter. The ground stays as it is, unmoving and unable to direct their next actions.
“Now, I'm getting up, and leaving.”
Subspace knits his brows and blinks at him. His throat catches a small and surprised cough when he opens to respond.
“Uh– Hold... Hold on.” He watches hesitantly as Medkit bends his knees, stands up straight, and dusts off his hands with quiet pats. “Why don't you want to get me back? For that? Was I too easy on you this time?”
The medic glares at him, putting his hands in his pockets, and turns away, staring off into the distance.
A beat goes by.
“I'm simply uninterested right now,” Medkit sighs out.
“Was... Was it that boring? What? Huh…” If Subspace was a robot, much like his creations, his wires would start to short circuit now. Medkit smiles at his thoughts.
“I'm heading to a pub. ‘Til later.”
Subspace looks like he can't believe what he's hearing. Something fuels his anger once again, and Medkit watches as the purple demon clenches his fists.
His reasoning for this sudden leave was simple. Medkit fully expected to get killed this time; his expectations were crushed when Subspace got an uncomfortable and almost alien expression on what was visible of his face. Medkit didn’t think he deserved any mercy during their fights, especially considering their past history. Yet, this wasn’t the first time it had happened.
Him being stuffed inside tiny, almost unbreathable spaces, out of which he always managed to get out. Him being beaten to unconsciousness and waking up in blood and sweat, surrounded by empty air. Him being barely responsive to anything Subspace would try to do to him. Disorientingly neutral expressions and hard hands, all at the same time, all at once.
Sometimes, fighting Subspace was more akin to self-defense. The medic hated to think of it this way because it would mean he wasn’t in charge, he wasn’t in control of the situation and what they were doing to each other. Sometimes, Subspace was more akin to a wild animal that needed taming more than an equal fight. Sometimes Medkit was the hunter.
And this time, it was equal. Two hunters trying to slash each other’s throats and taste how white the calcium of their bones is.
Until the very end of their fight.
“Balance,” Medkit sighs out to Subspace, who trails a little behind him with an inquisitive look. “What you need to understand is the balance of power between us. I keep repeating this to you and you don’t even try to acknowledge it.”
Subspace catches these words with a smirk. “Why would I take advice from you, Meddy?”
“Because you could’ve ended me right then and there. Believe me, I had no secret moves that I would pull last minute, no aces up my sleeve. And you just sat there and idled for a while when you could've gone for the kill.”
“...What does the balance of power have to do with this?”
The steps of the concrete staircase Medkit was walking on seem neverending. Until they don’t, and they end, and Medkit stops to look at the city.
Although not usually busy at this time, the Crossroads were beaming with lights, adorning the night. When Medkit would come here on weekends and watch the cars race the highway, he’d feel as if everything was full of life, every soul bound to a body and glowing ever so bright. The anticipation of this usual feeling would dissipate as soon as had to think about his eventual destination.
He doesn’t drink on weekdays.
“I mean,” he says as he steps off the pavement and onto the pedestrian crossing, “For a long time now, we needed a balance of power in our combat. This time, you spared me for no reason, and I truly believe you gave me an unfair advantage here.”
Subspace’s tail curls closer to his leg, and he lowers his gaze down instead of looking at Medkit. Medkit looks away from him and reaches the end of the crossing, listening to the ambience of the city instead of a response that he’s been waiting for from the other demon.
“Look, you don’t even have to tell me why you did it. I’m still bleeding, so you got at least something out of this one. But I just can’t wrap my head around…”
What a grim visage, he thought, just sitting on top of me, ready to kill me any minute. Medkit would die pathetically in an empty alleyway, one of the many they’d choose to fight at. He shudders at this scenario.
“Alright, fine.” The purple demon breathes out and stops speaking immediately after. Something is telling Medkit that this Subspace is not the same one he had to fight today, nor is he the same as the one that could actually kill him.
Or the one that ripped his goddamn eye out.
What has gotten into him? Subspace was 30 (which is an easy number to remember, Medkit was born in the same year), so it’s not like the torture-loving poison maniac suddenly softened around the edges and became a pacifist because he matured. His usual self would show during physical altercations or while speaking normally to virtually anyone else aside from Medkit. He’d raise his voice unnecessarily loud and yelp at the slightest inconvenience. He’d cackle at his opponents trying to fight back and then end them in a blink of an eye. And he’d never consider surrendering.
As they were slowly approaching a strip mall, Medkit thought about how he himself was not supposed to be an exception to Subspace’s usual behavior.
When he’d sit alone in his lab at The Lost Temple and watch his arms tremble in impending anxiety and doom about his eventual fate, he wanted to keel over and end his own life, or at the very least do something about it. To take control. Just to make it less scary to live day to day. Just to make it fucking stop. So, one day, he decided to contact Subspace and put an end to the strange relationship they had going on after he left Blackrock. Sure, once a traitor – forever a traitor, but Medkit had 10 years to recover from being called a petty name over a decision he couldn’t undo in the slightest.
And, for some reason, Subspace wasn’t against his idea.
Waking up after being knocked unconscious for the first time ever prompted Medkit to think that his ex-partner took him up because he wanted to cause him more pain. The healer adored the idea of justice and fairness, so it was natural for him to assume Subspace was seeking out a justified type of revenge in these fights. After all, what Medkit did to him…
Subspace’s arm was rotting. His jaw was rotting. His heart was probably rotting too, from all the pent-up anger and desire for justice, Medkit assumed.
But then, he noticed how the power scales between them had begun to tip, once again in favor of Medkit. At first, he assumed that Subspace knew better and was only going through a rough patch (consequently sparing him 8 times), but he was smart enough to notice a pattern.
Surely one of them was supposed to lose. Surely one of them was supposed to win. Surely this was supposed to finally be over, one way or the other.
It couldn’t have stayed like this forever.
So, today, in particular, he prayed to his deity: Please, make it stop. Today.
“...Is this the bar?” Medkit is pulled back to reality when he realizes they stopped right at their destination. Well, Medkit’s destination.
He actually had no idea what to do with Subspace being here, too. So, he sighs.
“Yes. Now listen: I have no idea why you’d go after me all this way, but I’m assuming you have a reason. I can listen to what you have to say, as long as I rest and drink some. I can’t handle this again sober.”
He looks at the purple demon in front of him as he nods in response, once again ever so calmly. Medkit gets an itch in the back of his eyes and suppresses a lot of pent-up disapproval.
“Usually when I come here, I put on a hood and sit in dim corners. I am very paranoid about being seen outside of The Lost Temple. You understand why.”
“Hmm, sure I understand. Your reputation wouldn’t be as bad if it wasn’t for me.” Subspace suddenly grins, and the teal demon raises his eyebrows. There he is, Medkit smiles back at him, and they mask their appearance to enter the bar.
More often than not, it was sort of beneficial for Medkit if the bars he went to were busy, as there would be less risk he was going to stand out. Today, however, was an average weekday, and the bar caught only the most mind-numbingly bored demons who didn’t have anything better to do than to drink.
Medkit was afraid of becoming this person one day. Would he ever go out of commission?
They order their drinks and sit at a table close to the wall. Medkit feels a twinge of guilt when he notices how pointedly Subspace looks at the place near the window, where moonlight seeps through and falls on the cracks of the wooden table. They didn’t choose to live pretty lives.
Almost immediately as they sit down, the teal demon brings his glass to his lips and drinks fast, trying not to choke. The coffee liquor and the vodka do not even get a chance to mix together before he is more than halfway done.
“Do you really like it this much? What did you even get?” With a hint of ridicule, Subspace leans on the table and observes him closer. Somehow, Medkit having a high alcohol tolerance and being able to throw back something strong was very characteristic and completely uncharacteristic at the same time.
“White Russian. This stuff’s the best.” The healer swallows and speaks quickly between sips before he puts the glass down with barely anything left. “It has vodka, coffee liquor, and cream in it. Basically the best drink combination ever made. Fuck. I used to drink so much coffee during the day and vodka at night, and then I saw someone ordering it, and was like, huh. And my life has changed since then.”
“Heavy on the alcohol. Aren’t you supposed to be a doctor?” Subspace catches a hair strand and twists it between his fingers, smirking at the other demon in what seemed to be a condescending way.
“Aren’t you supposed to be a... Uh…” Suddenly, Medkit is in a stupor. There is no clever comeback that could possibly have any place here. As the blood near his lips and on his collar oxidizes into a dark crimson, his face flushes a hint of red.
By all means, Subspace was, indeed, more accomplished than him. The way of a traitor slash fugitive slash runaway freak slash anything else Medkit has been called all these years wasn’t really an easy one. In the very beginning, maybe nine or so years ago, he assumed he would achieve more. He would get a higher-ranking position at his chosen place of employment, wherever they’d take him. He could do it. Everyone praised him, back in Blackrock, no less, that he had a bright mind and a promising future.
The revolver in his holster felt cold under his palm. He was and wasn’t supposed to be a doctor. Nevertheless, he healed. What else were these crystals good for?
But here is where he encountered a moral dilemma. Once again, his sense of justice told him that the crystals in his possession should never be used for harm. They were mediocre as a healing tool and an astonishingly powerful weapon of destruction. And someone had to use them at their full potential.
“Look at you, can’t even finish your sentence.” Leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms, Subspace narrowed his eyes at the demon in front of him. “How can you insult me in a way that matters? I know you’re good with your gun. Are you good with your words?”
Hearing the smallest praise from someone like Subspace pooled warmth in Medkit’s stomach, and he couldn’t tell whether it was supposed to be good or revolting. Or maybe it was the alcohol.
“I could give you some material to work with, Meddy.” His fingers tap on the table, one by one. “For example, I got nothing meaningful ahead of me.”
Huh.
“What?” Medkit tries not to choke at the other’s words. He feels like all the air got knocked out of his lungs at once. What could he possibly mean by this?
The most successful engineer in all of Blackrock doesn’t have anything meaningful ahead of him?
“Gods, what have the plebeians like us achieved, then? Seeing how you rule society in all of your mighty glory and apparently have “nothing ahead of you”. That’s rich coming from someone with a private factory and an endless amount of resources at his disposal.” Medkit felt his face turn even more red from increasing agitation. A voice in the back of his head told him that they were in public and couldn’t really afford an argument.
“You could’ve had it too. But you already know this.”
A silence falls between them. Without interrupting eye contact, Medkit grips his revolver under the desk. Subspace watches his shoulder move as he does so.
“You fail to understand me. Listen then, Medkit, because this is the entire reason why I came all the way here.”
A beat. Subspace breathes out. Medkit tightens his grip on the gun.
“My face. You see my face? Not really, right? It’s because I emit toxic fumes unless I wear a mask. Because my jaw is rotting off my face. My tongue, though it can move to speak, can’t give me the sensation of taste since what happened between us. My arm is rotting off, too. You’ve dealt with people with injuries on their arm. And their face. Do you remember what their screams sound like?”
Shivers go down the healer’s spine. He cautiously nods.
“Now imagine someone is screaming like this all of the time, and has to endure the pain 24/7. Pain doesn’t get breaks. I don’t get any breaks from this pain. I am no pharmacist, so I had no choice but to hire the best pharmacists in Blackrock to supply me with the strongest painkillers they have. In fact, I pop one on the way to you and three on the way back, usually.
“So, why do I think I have nothing meaningful ahead of me? Medkit, I am 30. This is the age at which some start to question their sanity and capability to continue, to keep up. You and I both know this world doesn’t like weak individuals, they get crushed like bugs by demons who are more competent. I admit that I always loved having power, and this is what I seek to this day. By the way, I like your little remarks about our supposed “power imbalance”. Are you saying you are not good enough to fight me?”
“That’s not–”
“Ah, I am not done talking. Shut it.” The teal demon earns a grin from Subspace, and he continues, slightly amused by the way that Medkit scowls back at him.
“So, as I was saying. I have what I wanted now, which is power. In Blackrock, even outside Blackrock. They know who I am, they even fear me. But that's just it. This is going to be my life and my legacy. Forever. Every day of my life, for the rest of my life, I am the crazy caricature of a creature that should have died a long time ago. I often think about the way I didn’t die back then. Should I have? And what would have been if I died? Would dying be a better solution to my suffering than living in constant pain and apparently making really good technology that can’t even help me?”
Once again, silence falls between them, as Medkit is left utterly speechless.
The doctor in him wants to scream that no one should die. Otherwise, all and everyone would forever give up on each other, and everything would be doomed, and doctors wouldn’t exist, and hospitals wouldn’t be a thing.
After some time, Subspace clears his throat, a sound hollow and narrow.
“You might say, “Do as you see fit”. This sentence is the only piece of advice all of the demons at Blackrock I ever met gave me. I also admit that all of them act in a way that’s usually considered selfish. I am no exception.” He bends his knuckles, purple nails digging into the palm, and glares at a bright golden ring on his middle finger. Medkit cannot help but notice it as well, the light from the chandelier reflecting on the yellow metal. “So, I took you up on your offer, and it was entirely selfish. But not in the way that you might think”
The healer stutters in his breath. “How come? Didn’t you want to just... Execute your revenge? Nice and easy?”
Subspace retracted into himself ever so slightly.
“No. The reason why I agreed is because I wanted to see you live.”
Medkit doesn’t breathe. He looks down and stares at the wooden table.
“The fulfilling and, maybe, happier life we were both supposed to live. If you don’t understand what I’m talking about, I can demonstrate how you live by telling you the names of the members of The Lost Temple whom you happened to befriend. I can even tell you what they like and don’t like based on the pieces of information you dropped while fighting me all of these previous times. Scythe is your boss, Broker is kind of in the same boat as you, but not really. Scythe has a country accent that you always get thrown off by. Scythe and Banhammer are mortal enemies or something along the sort. Maybe not our level “mortal enemies”, but, it’s something.” He manages to smile, weak and bitter, and Medkit doesn’t see it behind the gas mask.
“Point is, again. When I watch you, even in passing, I see you how you live. You guys at The Lost Temple call each other “family”, which sounds like a pretty big deal. Don’t really know how these things are supposed to work – never had a family in the first place, but I can see how you live with one.
“I envy you in this way, Meddy. You have so much ahead of you, and I am dying, every day of my life. For the rest of my life.”
At the end of his long monologue, Subspace has an unreadable expression, and some pink fumes are exiting the mask once again. Deciding not to draw too much attention to himself, he chooses to cover his face with his arm and tries to find something in the distance with his gaze.
And fuck, Medkit feels too drunk for this. Even though he had very little alcohol compared to how much he usually drinks, his head is spinning and his mind is melting out of his ears. What was he supposed to say to any of this?
At the back of his mind, he tries to process the feeling of being used. Truth be told, he was seeking to end his suffering one way or another, and more often than not he’d come to the conclusion that he really needed to die. He thought that meeting up with Subspace even once was the easy way to do it. Now it turns out he wanted Medkit to live, apparently, whatever this emotionally convoluted and complex verb could ever mean to Subspace. Medkit hardly considered what he had a life if he had to live in fear all of the time, but Subspace thinks this is the best it could get? Top best experiences possible in all of the Inphinity?
“...Listen,” Medkit begins, “I have no idea what you mean by any of this, but regardless of whatever you were thinking about me without ever acknowledging and facing the truth – it’s not as happy and perfect for me as it seems. Or, well, you see, for a reason unknown to me. Didn’t you just admit that my reputation was tarnished because of you?” His speech feels like tripping on a step of a ladder. Thoughts fail to form into cohesive strings and narratives, and he muses at the way his unfiltered opinion spills like excess ink on a previously beautifully written page.
Subspace snaps his head back to him. “Yes, but–”
“Enough. It’s my turn now.” Medkit smiles as he gets him back for earlier, and the purple demon huffs in return.
“First, you don’t get to know what my life is like outside of what you get to see. You can assume all you want and feel like you’re missing out, but really, you’re missing out on a complicated situation that I have going on at The Lost Temple. Nothing else. I am obviously not stupid enough to reveal any details to you, because Scythe would kill me, but just know that I am not entirely satisfied. For now, what I have is only enough, but not satisfactory.”
He thinks deeply about his “family” that he had the misfortune of spilling the secret of to Subspace. Although it sounds strange, some demons consider each other siblings simply because of the nature of their reproduction and how hard it was to spawn blood-related siblings. So, it’s not entirely impossible this family of his could just be someone he considers very close now.
It is surely better than the truth.
“Second, I really, and I really can’t believe you pity yourself to this extent.” That sentence seems to tug at Subspace’s nerves too much, and Medkit purses his lips, watching as the other demon begins staring directly into his eye.
“You poor little thing, living the life of your own choosing, doing what you like doing, and helping the big shots at Blackrock to control almost an entire empire of demons.” Supporting his words, Medkit articulates with the smallest mocking hand gestures he can manage so as to not draw attention.
“I guess the grass is always greener on someone else’s lawn, and in this case, it’s mine. Except when you decide to hurt the soldiers of The Lost Temple, I have to suck it up and pack their wounds with gauze for the hundredth time that day.”
“You know Blackrock is not just me, right?” Subspace narrows his eye in growing annoyance at the demon in front of him.
“I don’t care who else is up there. All I know is that you are in charge of a lot, and I have to deal with your shit most of the time, to this day.”
“You are the one who scheduled mandatory weekly combat and chose to seek me out, despite the fact that, like you know and admit, I am always busy.”
“You agreed.”
Subspace breathed out sharply and threw his palms up, visibly getting agitated. “I just spent this entire time explaining to you why I agreed, and you don’t seem to understand at all!”
“All I heard was self-pity and your complete lack of awareness or understanding of my situation, and–”
Suddenly, he feels a dull and aching pain in his foot, as Subspace jabs his heel into it to shut him up. Medkit’s eyes widen in surprise.
“Oh you–!”
The table thuds as their knees shuffle under it, Medkit responding with aggression in an attempt to hurt him the same way. He manages to pin both of Subspace’s feet to the ground with his boots, and Subspace makes a small pained sound and looks at him with so much frustration it makes him want to laugh. They stop as soon as they notice that other demons in the bar are starting to pay attention to them.
“Try that again and I’ll do the same with your hands.” The teal demon whispers to Subspace, leaning in closer.
“Hmm. Be my guest.”
Medkit gets a quick inquisitive look on his face and then looks at Subspace as he puts his half-rotting palm on the table. Immediately and against his will, the doctor in him is very compelled to touch and feel the condition of Subspace’s rot. He forces himself not to, for now, and instead observes how the scientist gets a strange spark in his eye and picks up his drink for the first time since they walked in.
“...What did you get?”
“It’s called Snakebite. Equal parts lager and cider. Looks like blood pooling in oil.”
“Yeah, seems... Fitting.” Medkit watches as the demon in front of him swallows the alcoholic liquid, his throat passing it through in a visible swallow, and holds his breath for a reason unbeknown to him. “Does it really matter what you drink, though? You won’t be able to taste it anyway.”
Subspace scoffs. “Rude. I got it because I like how it looked.”
“Huh. I guess just looking wouldn’t be enough for me, personally.” Medkit sighs out, and their eyes meet in prolonged and intense contact.
The ambience of the bar swallows all sound around them as they sit in silence, unable to speak another word.
Until it starts to rain.
___
Medkit always hated the way his hair would stick to his face when it would rain and he happened to be outside. It would become wet and messy, and the minute he had a chance to step inside, he had to dry it off and immediately untangle it. He used to have longer hair, but since coming to The Lost Temple and having to accept more field missions, he decided to chop it off.
The long hair was also an inevitable and painful reminder of Subspace. Before the incident, they both had long hair.
Subspace never got rid of his.
The rainwater streamed down Subspace’s shoulders and on the metallic plates covering parts of his body. The rainwater seeped between the strands, making his white hair tangle around his lower set of horns. The rainwater wetted the exposed raw flesh on his face, pooling on top of the gas mask, and flowing away and down seconds after.
It was so strange and unfamiliar for Medkit to observe the purple demon in such an intimate manner and remark on the smallest details. Or maybe he was simply trying to distract himself from the fact that Subspace was so drunk he could barely see or be aware of his surroundings.
Before they left, the genius mastermind behind Blackrock’s success realized that he indeed did not have the ability to taste. So, he proceeded to drink as much alcohol as possible, stopping at the point at which he knew it would make him sick. And Medkit was now forced to chaperone him back to his home, which definitely was not part of the plan all along.
An arm wrapped around his old partner’s shoulder, Subspace smiled weakly, trying hard to catch small breaths. Alcohol made him feel like every action he did was manual, even something like walking or thinking. Like he was not controlling his body.
“If.. If you wanna stay out of sight, take a right here,” not so long ago, they entered Blackrock’s territory, and it became incredibly dangerous for Medkit to be seen by anyone. “I don’t really.. Uh. Live close to the border. I live... Some ways away…”
“Alright.” The medic’s voice was stern and unamused. He felt cold, and the thick dark cloth of the hoods they were using to mask themselves and shield them from the rain quickly got wet too. “I don’t need to know where you live. This is the first and last time I’ll be doing this.”
Subspace only laughs in response, a sound raspy and bitter.
By Medkit’s remarks, nothing changed in Blackrock as much since he left. Part of the reason why he agreed to go with Subspace was because he was very curious about what, if anything, did change. When he was younger, he used to think that every corner of every building would have his caricatured face on posters with the large word “WANTED” at the bottom. He was even curious about the price for his head.
As they were walking, he had not encountered any. Yet.
“It almost seems like they are not looking for me anymore,” Medkit says quietly, enough only for Subspace to hear, and tightens the grip around the other’s waist in the half-carry he was performing. The water would make his hand slip from its place way too often.
“What, you.. think you’re some celebrity? Just.. Just because we don’t have billboards plastered with your face on them means we forgot all about Meddy?” He laughs, and again, it comes out sickly and raspy. Medkit can’t stop himself from smiling, too. It annoys him. “One time, they did. They put your face and gear and stuff on a billboard about a year after it happened. I fired an explosive at it.”
A sharp and stinging pain suddenly lands on Subspace’s calves as Medkit hits him with his tail, and he bites the inside of his cheek in time to not make a noise.
“OW! And you know what! You know what?! I fired it at your eye!” He speaks in a loud whisper and braces himself for another hit. This time, Medkit jabs Subspace’s rib with his elbow, letting go of him just as quickly.
“I’m gonna report you. I’m gonna call Blackrock Public Security and you’ll be locked up forever and ever.” Pouting as he is getting back up on his own, the purple demon wraps his arms around his body.
“If you do, I’ll make sure I’ll kill you first.” Medkit put his hands in his pockets, half grinning with his eyes locked on Subspace’s face.
“You have no intention of hurting me.”
“Huh.” Medkit pauses, and his brain processes this sentence. He holds it in his mouth. He chews it, puts it in his tongue to taste it, and it feels sour and bitter.
“I have no intention of hurting you.” Finally, he spits it out, unexpectedly a statement instead of a question. It tastes like the truth.
___
Subspace’s base turns out to be hidden away from the public eye, which makes sense to Medkit. He doesn’t imagine someone like Subspace wanting others prying in his business more than it was necessary.
They see a couple of Biografts on the way, and Medkit tenses up every time they pass one of them. Without any hesitation, however, their creator opens a latch on one of the metallic plates covering his arm and presses something to temporarily turn them off. Perfectly aware of the risks involved in being caught, Subspace was being extremely cautious despite his intoxication.
They reach what Medkit was guessing was Subspace’s private headquarters, with two Biografts guarding each side of the automatic door. As both of the robots get shut off for the night, Medkit walks in, and looks around the room.
He catches a glimpse of his surroundings: a bed, a messy table with multiple monitors hanging off the walls, vials of different liquids scattered around the room, some different mechanical parts stuck in the crevices and corners. He imagines that Subspace pays little to no mind to the clutter around his room, and it makes him feel a sense of familiarity with the fragments of their shared past together.
Before Medkit has any time to think about it further, he is suddenly pushed into the wall, and his body thuds against the cold metallic surface. His head doesn’t hurt as much from the impact, but he feels very disoriented and confused as Subspace’s palms grip at his shoulders.
“Don’t you dare call me self-pitying, Medkit.” The healer feels as the other demon leans closer to his ear, and he widens his eye in shock. “You are a husk of a man you once were. You’re so caught up in feeling bad for yourself that it makes you go out and seek pain anywhere you can find it.”
“That is only fair,” He breathes out, and his hand goes up to press against Subspace’s chest, careful not to touch anything he thought was part of his combat equipment. “I am haunted by the things I have to do because of my job. By the things I have done in the past. All of it was never for the greater good, and it haunts me every day of my life that I can’t do anything about it. All of it was just to get someone something they wanted at the time.”
“You’ve had your chance,” Subspace closes his eye and hums quietly. One of his hands goes up to hold Medkit’s jaw. “Now don’t whine to me you didn’t take it. It’s all your fault you ended up like this.”
“I am perfectly aware.”
The tension between them grows as their chests almost touch from how close they stand. Though Medkit could probably easily overpower the other demon and free himself of his grip, he decides not to; instead, he reaches back behind Subspace’s head and searches for the lock on his mask. The purple demon jerks away from the sudden touch.
“What are you trying to do?” Clearly thrown off, Subspace weakens his grip and puts a hand behind his own head as well.
“Let me see your face. I need to know how bad it is.”
Subspace narrows his eye at him, and the teal demon hears how he huffs inside the mask.
“What, you’re fueling your nightly terrors? Want to add something to have nightmares about to your collection?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I need to own up.”
Subspace’s hand is already slowly fiddling with the lock on the mask, but as soon as he hears Medkit, he stops immediately.
“Own up to what, exactly?” The hand meets Medkit’s hand, still at the back of his head, the straps of the mask now tangled with his hair. The medic swallows and nervously looks down as he finally notices how close they are to each other.
“To how much harm I caused you.” He is not very proud of this answer, and he closes his eyes. He is fully ready to be stabbed by one of the weapons Subspace still probably carries on his armor. His head is fully pressed into the wall, and he feels pinned by his own wrongdoings. It feels like his worst nightmare is coming to life, where he is cornered by his past, and he no longer has any chance to escape.
He hears a thud as the gas mask drops to the ground.
“No, Medkit,” He feels as both of Subspace’s palms hit the wall on both sides of his head. “You need to own up to how much I have died already.”
Medkit opens his eyes.
His arch-nemesis and ex-partner, the forgotten and painful past, the toxic fumes that fill every crevice of every space in his nightmares, the Worst Demon of Blackrock, the Best Demon of Blackrock, the genius inventor of every machine, still looks like his best friend.
With the middle finger of his right hand, Medkit picks up Subspace’s eyepatch and moves it to the side. Behind his rotting eye, he sees the city, the first bolts ever screwed inside a Biograft, the most convoluted strings of code that he would never understand, the color of the painkiller pills, the color of the sky at sunrise. His own reflection.
He gets an idea, as his desire to study everything finally overpowers his active consciousness. Medkit’s open palm slowly caresses the deep rotting wound on Subspace’s left side of the face. The purple demon doesn’t flinch away and only stares back.
“Don’t you dare say that you’re sorry.” Subspace finally speaks, his mental defense mechanisms taking the form of pride. He feels so horribly open and naked that it makes his entire body shake. “I don’t need your pity and I don’t need your apology. Just witness me as I am right now. In what state I have been stuck since you left me.”
“I see you, Subspace.”
Something in Medkit suddenly feels so hollow and empty, and he quickly closes the distance between them.
His mouth presses against Subspace’s mouth, where the rot has not yet overtaken.
Subspace does not move.
The medic straightens his back and feels the dull ache of being in one position for a long time, and Subspace’s lips still taste the same. Slowly, he tries to move right, and he feels how the skin under his mouth becomes rough and scarred. He embraces it.
With closed eyes, they stand for some time, as the teal demon studies the texture and taste of Subspace’s condition. He does not hope for a response at all, instead bracing his body for impact at any second; to his surprise, his ex-partner leans into it, and pushes his head in.
In an awkward and hesitant way, Subspace kisses him back.
After some time passes and Medkit feels slightly less empty, he separates from the other and simply crosses his arms on his chest. When the purple demon looks at him again, he smiles in satisfaction.
“...That’s one way of acknowledging it.” As Subspace smiles back at him, Medkit unequivocally decides that he does like the way it looks. He does, however, dislike the idea that Subspace feels the need to shield himself away. He dislikes the idea that he has to shield himself away as well; at this particular moment, it feels unbalanced and one-sided. So, Medkit leans his head down, pushes his fingers through his hair, and takes off his eyepatch.
“Like I said, I’m not really fond of just looking.”
___
They lay in bed, face to face, some distance between each other, and listen to the sounds of the city. Blackrock lives and breathes somewhere above their heads in deep, dark smoke.
Both of them feel that a gaping hole between them has begun to close, maybe right around the time Medkit decided it would be a good idea to follow Subspace inside the faction that hunted him down. Something felt so different and inevitable that neither could really stop their relationship from going down the path it was going to. Perhaps, they knew it was for the better.
So, Medkit asked Subspace questions, and Subspace tried to answer them to the best of his ability.
“How many versions of Biografts have you made since I left?”
“Maybe 20? 30? I know I'm supposed to be in charge of this kind of stuff, but I do lose track. So many of them are specialized these days.”
“Have you been able to make something new with the poison you obsess over?”
“I'm constantly doing new things, that's kind of the whole point! The latest thing was sort of a pulling toxin that draws enemies in and hurts them over time.”
“What's your next big project?”
“Mm, that's gonna be a secret, especially to you.” His rotting jaw catches in pink fleshy flames as he smiles at the demon in front of him. “I’m not that silly. Don’t even think about it.”
“No, I had... No ill intent.” Medkit feels like his guts are twisting in different directions as he says this, but he knows it is true. He has to learn to accept it. “Alright then. I apologize if this one is going to be slightly personal.”
“Shoot!” Subspace raises his eyebrows at the other demon.
“How dangerous are these fumes to other demons?”
To Medkit’s surprise, Subspace gets a horrified expression on his face and quickly lifts himself off the bed with his elbows.
“What... do you mean, to other demons?” His tone sounds very alarmed. He looks like he forgot about something very important a long time ago and remembered only now. In a panic, he grabs at his face. “Are you saying that you are not affected by them at all?”
“Uh... No.” Medkit watches as Subspace covers his mouth in shock. “How do I explain this? I believe that I am immune. And the reason why I think I am immune is because of the nature of our crystals. Our powers have the same source, just different properties of it. The crystals, although not sentient, have no intention of destroying or harming other crystals. So..”
A dead silence hangs between them. As much as he tries to, Medkit cannot decipher the expression on the other demon’s face, and it worries him horribly.
Subspace looks down at his hands.
“So. Can your healing crystals.. Help me?”
Medkit draws in a deep breath and sighs. He knew this question was going to come up immediately after, but truth be told, he had no idea how to respond. Though both of them have spent years researching the same thing, they went in such different directions that the alignment of their work would be unfathomable. Yet, still, he looked through the pink fumes that crowded the air around Subspace and felt perfectly fine.
“I don’t know if they can. Once again, I am saying this without any ill intent – there is zero proof that I can help you in any meaningful way. Just because they are currently stopping me from getting affected by your toxins doesn’t mean they can work against whatever is happening with your body.”
“It’s because of the toxins!” Subspace gets back up on his elbows and gets a particularly fervent look in his eye. “I know my body really well, I had all this time to study it! The toxins that come from me using my crystals are causing me to rot as well.”
Medkit purses his lips. The logical solution to this was for Subspace to stop working with the crystals altogether, but he doesn’t dare bring it up. He fully knew the implications of this suggestion.
“And, really, if this is the case, then I have no choice but to ask for your help. This might be the only way. I tried so many things, and not a single one of them worked.”
The purple demon slowly sinks back into the bed. He bends his legs and pushes his knees closer to his stomach, and Medkit feels so cold and distant from him again that it eats him alive.
“I feel like I am breaking down into flesh and bone. Every day of my life.” Subspace turns on his back and stares at the ceiling above them. Medkit turns to do the same.
In the silence that follows, he once again considers his personal situation and how much it took him to figure out his eye was incurable. The folks back at Church of the True Eye accepted him with open arms partially because of his condition and his ability to relate to the rest of them. Though he didn’t think of it much before, Medkit realized now how much he dislikes it, as it almost sounded like he was being exploited because of his pain. The teal hands that touched his past have not attempted to mend it; instead, they broke in, invaded it, chased him out of it, and made sure he was under control. Like some sort of obedient animal.
His body shudders at this idea, and he looks away, reluctant to interrupt the formed silence between him and Subspace. He feels the tug of his invisible leash every time he exchanges so much as a neutral sentence with his supposed enemy.
Some time passes. Subspace opens his eyes and proceeds to speak.
“...You know, some time ago I learned about how the life cycle of a salmon fish works.”
Slightly perplexed, Medkit finally comes back down from his thoughts, intrigued by the unexpected and random conversation topic.
“Salmon fish?”
“Yeah. So interesting, we eat them on a regular basis and we don’t really know much about them. Anyway, they are usually born in the same place the older generations of salmon were born in. They do not spend energy on trying to find a new suitable habitat for their families because they can simply have offspring in the same habitats over and over. After they do, the young salmon travel far and distant out into the sea, and their coating changes to protect them in the saltwater.” As Subspace talks, he points an arm upwards and gestures, and the teal demon watches him do so with great interest. “They live an entire life out there, in the sea. And then they come back to their initial habitats, produce more offspring, and die. But the way that they die is what fascinates me the most.”
Subspace turns his head to the side to look at Medkit.
“They are washed up to the shore as they rot alive.”
“...Huh.”
The medic blinks in response and knits his eyebrows.
“After they spend their entire life working hard and ensuring the next generation of salmon are going to be okay, they simply let their body dissolve into nutrients. And the entire time as they do so, they are alive, too. Pushing through the pain of what it feels like, as the water washes their life away.”
A silence falls once again, and Medkit can’t find it in himself to look at Subspace or his face at all.
He thinks about his own life. He thinks long and hard about “going to sea” and “changing his coating” and “working hard” and whatnot that gave his life a little meaning among the rest of everything and everyone that has existed alongside him. He thinks about the factions, how little room everyone gets in choosing what they get to be, how big the flocks of fish become, and how much power they can hold if they stay together. How many die out in the ocean so early and how many don’t get to come back home.
He thinks about how little difference there is between him and Subspace. How many predators they satisfy by giving up their life to them instead of cooperating with each other, and how much it hurts afterwards.
Gently and quietly, Medkit shifts closer to the other demon, and takes his hand.
“Listen,” He begins again, “Though I can’t guarantee you anything, I promise to help. Little by little, we’re going to figure something out. I think we are on to a good start.”
Subspace breathes out and closes his eyes. A smile spreads across his face.
“I think that we are.”