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When Lucifer beckoned you to a confrontation–a fight, no doubt–you turned the other way.
“Young man?” You could feel Aogami’s surprise. “Where are we going?”
You didn’t answer. You touched the leyline fount and let the light take you. When your vision returned, you were standing in your dorm room. The walls were still surprisingly solid–or perhaps it was just harder to see through them in the dark. Outside, the moon was high in the sky, the night speckled with stars. Going through Taito and making your way to the Empyrean had, somehow, taken only a few hours.
It almost hurt to separate from Aogami again. With the separation came an echo of the feeling of having him ripped from you, of your shared soul being torn in half. Even after you had regained your strength in the aftermath of the sacrifice, the edges of you were still jagged: Koshimizu never would have admitted it, but you sensed that it pained him physically to fuse with you. Perhaps that was just a consequence of your incompatibility–two incomplete souls, forced together purely for the sake of power–but you couldn’t help but think that it would have been easier before Aogami died.
You took a long look at Aogami. There he was, solid and real, his golden eyes glowing faintly in the darkness. It was difficult to resist the temptation to stare at him forever: you needed to memorize his face in case you ever lost him again.
“Young man?” Aogami said gently.
You shook your head and pulled him into a hug, burying your face in his chest. He was still for a moment before returning the gesture, drawing you close against him. You had missed him, you said. You had missed him so much.
“I wasn’t gone for long, was I?”
How long had it been? Under a day, you were fairly certain, but it had felt like an eternity. Time passed differently without him. It didn’t matter, you said. Any time at all was too long.
“…I missed you too,” he said after a beat, resting his chin on your head. This close, you should have been able to hear a heartbeat; instead, all you could sense was the magatsuhi flowing through his body. It was oddly comforting. “I’ll never leave you again.”
Finally, tears pricked your eyes. You bit your lip to stop yourself from sobbing embarrassingly, your shoulders shaking. Aogami, for all his talk of not understanding human emotions, knew exactly what to do: he held you close and tight and said nothing.
After a lengthy crying session, the two of you ended up on the bed with you perched sideways on Aogami’s thighs. The biggest of your emotions released, you leaned against his chest, tracing the red lines on the back of his hand with a finger.
You still weren’t close enough to him–could never be close enough, short of being the Nahobino together. But for now, you felt too fragile to let him out of your line of sight. There was something comforting about seeing him, being able to feel his physicality. He was real, alive, safe. You had nothing to worry about, even if you couldn’t stop yourself from fretting anyway.
You murmured his name. He had to move away a little to meet your eyes; immediately, you missed him. “Yes?”
You hesitated. There was no real way to express what you were feeling. Maybe it would be easier if you were fused–then you could just send the exact contents of your mind to him. But some things required words, didn’t they?
You tried to express what you could: that you were glad you met him, that you’d never once regretted taking his hand, that you were incomplete without him. That you had been more relieved about getting him back than slaying the dragon. That everything you’d done since his death, every step towards the Throne you’d taken, had been in pursuit of the hope that you could see him again–that if you were God, maybe you could bring him back.
It came out in three words: I love you.
Aogami stilled for a beat. “Young man–“
You knew what he would say. You shook your head. You didn’t want anyone but him, you told him. You didn’t care that he wasn’t human, that he claimed he couldn’t feel, that he believed he could never love you back. It was impossible not to love him.
“…No,” he said. “I don’t believe I’m incapable of loving you.”
You looked up at him curiously.
“I believe it was what I was made for,” Aogami started slowly. “To love humanity. And to love you.”
You wondered if it was because you were his Knowledge or because of something deeper. Was there a difference? You were his Knowledge, and so you completed him. You completed him, and so you were his Knowledge.
It didn’t matter. You said that you were glad. You wouldn’t have minded if he didn’t love you back–that wasn’t the point–but it was nice to be on the same page.
You suggested that the two of you stay there for a while. You weren’t sure what would happen after you went to see Lucifer.
Aogami nodded. “You deserve to rest.”
He deserved to rest too, you reminded him.
A reluctant sigh. “If you insist.”
Gently, you pushed him over and maneuvered him into lying down properly. The bed was certainly too small for the two of you, but with Aogami on his side and you pressed flush against him, it worked well enough. It was almost comfortable, save for the hardness of his armor.
Before, you would have been worried about crossing a line. Now, having lost him once, you understood how fleeting life could be, the consequences of holding yourself back out of nervousness. You asked him if he could take his armor off.
Aogami paused, considering. “For your comfort, I suppose such a thing would be… sensible.” He took a wary look around the room. “Are you certain it is safe?”
Yes, you told him, and you could just fuse if there was a threat anyway.
“If you are sure.” Aogami carefully disentangled himself from you before getting up. Like in your Nahobino form, his armor was attached to a bodysuit and came off in more or less one piece, save for the shoes. You looked away, feeling a blush coming on.
“Young man?”
Embarrassed, you admitted that you hadn’t seen another person naked in a long time.
“Ah.” A pause. “Should I retrieve something from your wardrobe?”
You pointed out that you doubted anything from there would fit him.
“Well. You need not look, if you would prefer that.” Aogami returned to bed and held you from behind. Even without the armor, he wasn’t quite warm–if you had to compare the feeling to anything, it was like touching a bowl of room-temperature water. It was strange, maybe, but something about it felt comforting.
Slowly, you turned over to face him. Your eyes were level with his chest. (A joke rose to mind: this man had bigger tits than you did.) Some part of you wanted to take advantage of the situation for fear that you wouldn’t get another chance.
You quietly asked if it would be okay if the two of you were intimate.
“Intimate?” he echoed.
Your face heated up. If you could… touch him, you said. Maybe kiss him.
“Oh.” Aogami hesitated. “I am not the kind of demon that… requires that.”
You shook your head. It wasn’t about a need–you didn’t think he was a succubus or something. You told him that you just wanted to make him feel nice.
“I see.” You could practically hear the wheels turning in his head. “Would that please you?”
You insisted that you wanted to know how he would feel about it.
“I suppose it would be a… novel experience.”
That wasn’t good enough. You asked if he was just saying that to be polite.
“No,” Aogami replied quickly. “My apologies. I’ve never… done that before. I do not know the etiquette.”
You shook your head and buried your face in his chest to hide your smile. You hadn’t either, you said, which was why you would be happy to figure it out with him.
“Surely it would be better for you to do this with someone more experienced. Or perhaps a human? I am not certain that it would be appropriate for me to–“
Appropriate? You were of age, you said firmly, and you were fairly certain that sharing a mind and body was more intimate than sex ever could be anyway. If Aogami was going to worry about what was appropriate, he should have done that before he asked you to take his hand.
“…Very well.” He gently pushed you away to meet your eyes, his irises glimmering in the dim light. “But I will admit that I do not know much about this. Perhaps it would be best if you took the lead.”
You could do that. It was you, after all, who piloted your shared body; you were fine with being the one in control in this relationship. You stretched up to pull him into a kiss, your hands going to the back of his head. He reciprocated slowly, cautiously, as if afraid he’d manage to hurt you. Aogami tasted metallic in a way somehow entirely unlike blood. It was distinctly inhuman, a stark reminder of his nature as an artificial being, but you found you liked it.
After you parted, you smiled at him. Good? you asked.
Aogami nodded slowly. “Yes. I think so.”
Good. You flipped him onto his back, careful not to push him off the bed, and positioned yourself on top of him. His eyes were wide and luminous. You did what you had wanted to do for a long time now–traced the contours of his body, admiring his defined physique. It was admittedly impressive, even if he’d literally been made that way.
Aogami let out a soft sigh. “Is there anything I should be doing in return?”
You told him that he could touch you, if he liked. You sat up a bit to remove your school jacket, then the shirt underneath, then your binder–he watched, fascinated, as you did so, but didn’t comment. (You could imagine what he would say–something about human ingenuity and its inventions to change the body.) And don’t be so polite, you added.
“Polite?”
You paused, trying to figure out how to explain this to him. What you settled on was the statement that he was too subservient–he always treated you like he was a subordinate. It was time to go past that, you thought.
“I see.” He cupped your jaw in his hand, then gently traced his way down to your chest. “It is in my nature to be… subordinate. I was created to serve humanity.”
His hand more or less swallowed your breast. You leaned into the contact. It was, admittedly, difficult to imagine Aogami being anything like assertive, as much as you would have liked to see it. Perhaps you could work on that later.
Because there would be a later, wouldn’t there be? You had won; you were going to be God, you and him. Even if you had to stay as one forever, there would be plenty of time to coax Aogami into seeing you as an equal.
Forever. That was what you were facing: an eternity with him. Suddenly too giddy to breathe, you kissed him again, trying to communicate everything you felt in the action. And then–
And then you were one again, and it felt just as perfect and complete as it had the last time. You lay there for a beat, breathing hard, before smiling to yourself.
“Sorry,” Aogami said.
No, this was your fault, you insisted. You were the one who had tried to throw all of your emotions at him–you weren’t sure what else you had expected. You could try again another time. And if not–well, you could get creative.
“Creative?”
You elected to leave him to think on that one. Sex was about intimacy, anyway, and it was impossible to get more intimate than you were now. To sense his mind brushing against yours, to feel his very feelings–no physical touch could measure up to that. If you did have sex, it would be a pale imitation of what you already had.
You stayed there for a while, content to be with him. The future stretched on in front of you, unknowable: soon you would remake the world, soon everything would be different. But for now, all that mattered was that you were together again.
You again told Aogami you loved him. This time, you could feel the warmth that it sparked, the rush of adoration reflected back at you. “I love you too.”