Tokyo Babylon Fan Fiction / X/1999 Fan Fiction ❯ A Perfect Circle ❯ Shadows ( Chapter 8 )

When all you can think about is just one man… only a person with an ailing heart can do that.

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It was gone.

Subaru lowered his arm from shielding his eyes, slowly watching the echoing, dark hallway through his fingers until he felt at ease enough to fully drop his arm. He took a deep breath. There was only a curl of pearly smoke undulating from some hidden vestige-node of power settled in the air, akin to incense. The smoke illuminated the black air.

He took a deep breath and cautiously walked forward over broken window glass, feeing every crunch through his spine and allowing the feeling to lance up through his bones and settle on his shoulders. He shifted his ofuda between his fingers and prepared to throw them at the first indication of another approaching presence. The atmosphere was tangibly tense. The scattering of braver patrons and medical staff were straightening from curled positions against the walls and poking heads out of rooms, respectively shaking glass off of their clothing and hair and yelling concern and requests for information regarding what the hell had happened. One of the doctors demanded that Subaru explain; Subaru ignored her. Somebody down the hallway called hysterically that all of the backup power sources had failed, simultaneously. The screaming faded into a distant commotion and a surrounding of unsettling panic.

Subaru slid over the glass mosaic and took a deep breath of the rain-laden, cool night air wafting from the jagged windows. The wind played with the smoke and swirled it into a stringy cyclone, fishtailing until it dissipated.

The power came back on. Computers whined back to life; printers started to spit documents in the nurses' station a few yards away. Phones started ringing off the hook. With the light came a long moment of shock, followed by some sort of communal renewed vigor and remembrance of the far less surreal reality in need of attendance. The medical staff ran in search of various tasks and information, the guests going in search of the same, but with less direction and more personal agendas. Subaru sighed and allowed the tension to slide out of his shoulders and melt down his back.

//…Kamui…//

Subaru walked back into Kamui's room and closed the door to the commotion in the hallway. Kamui was hugging his knees as tightly as his wounds would allow and facing the blown-out window, quaking. The hospital gown left his slender back open and revealed the white brace securing his shoulder's blue fiberglass cast. Subaru stopped tentatively, not knowing whether to make a clear indicator of his presence to allow Kamui time to dry up if he was crying, or whether to approach silently and see if he actually was crying or just gnashing in shock. He sighed and slipped forward. If Kamui was in the mood to sense him, he would.

"Kamui, are you all right?"

Kamui shuddered and tensed his neck so tightly that his head shook from the root. It looked as though he was having a seizure. Subaru stopped in front of him and watched carefully for a moment, noting that Kamui's eyes were glassy and distant, dilated severely, and twitching in forming pools of tears. Kamui blinked rapidly and screwed his eyes shut, sucking in air. The gathering liquid spilled down his cheeks.

Subaru hesitated and then sat down aside Kamui on the edge of the bed to rub his back. Kamui tensed under the touch-Subaru felt a lance through his stomach at the aversion-and then relaxed. Both sighed in relief.

"…what?"

"Huh?"

"Nothing. You just… sighed. I don't know."

"Oh. Um. Just glad you're all right." Subaru smiled to himself and kneaded the nape of Kamui's neck, attention the latter was numbly absorbing. Subaru hoped that he could also assume a degree of gratefulness and healing coming from his ministrations. He sighed once again and began to also massage Kamui's good shoulder with his free hand. The muscles were incredibly tense.

"Relax. You're going to be all right. I promise."

"…it's not me I'm so worried about."

"…oh." A weight dropped into Subaru's stomach as he stared at the back of Kamui's bowed head. Kamui sighed and shifted under his fingers. //He's not thinking about me, even though I'm touching him like this. I can't take this. I. Cannot. Take. This.//

"Subaru, are you all right?"

Subaru opened heavy eyes and gazed back at Kamui vaguely, then closed his eyes once again. The poison in his stomach was spreading and turning his heart to lead. He sighed, despairingly concentrating on the heat and tension beneath Kamui's skin, and coming to the conclusion that even though he had finally been able to get this close, the touches were received and nullified as completely chaste. //It was better when I could fantasize on a different response. Nervousness, shallow breathing, fluttering eyes, leaning back. Wanting to receive this. I-//

"Subaru?"

"Fine. Really. Fine." Subaru sighed and moved his thumb beneath Kamui's shoulder blade to knead the tension out of the joint. Kamui took a shaking breath. Subaru sighed and shook his head.

"Don't worry."

"…I'm scared."

"I am as well. We have a good reason to be scared." Subaru sighed and closed his eyes once again. He was recalling clearly the details of what he had seen, bringing to the front of his mind the image that had been tickling his current preoccupation and chuckling at the futility of his general actions in the sphere of relationships. The skin beneath his palm faded into a dim, hot presence, his anchor on reality. He sighed and locked the offending image into his mind. It was staring at him. It frightened him.

It was staring at him.

//Sei-//

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"…I see."

"Yeah."

"Yeah..."

Subaru sat aside Kamui's bed in one of the provided plastic chairs and stared at the wall, chin in hand, avoiding Kamui's eyes as Kamui was avoiding his. Both were lost in individual pools of jealousy and isolation.

"…so, you're sure that's what you saw? I mean… you're SURE… you weren't assuming-"

"I am pretty fucking sure, Subaru."

"…so."

"Yeah, you were right."

Subaru glanced at Kamui. The boy was sitting upright and clutching his sheets into knots, staring in the opposite direction. Subaru sighed and reached for his breast pocket, recalled the ordinance against smoking in the hospital, and folded his hands in his lap. He sighed.
"…this is what I feared."

Kamui did not reply. Subaru sighed again and shook his head.

"Kamui, you have to talk to me. I know that you're angry-"

"I'm going to kill him."

"What?"

"I am going to rip his head off." Kamui glared at Subaru and crossed his arms. "I don't care how you feel about him, Subaru, and I'm really sorry, but I am going to kill him myself. I know that was your wish. I-" Kamui stopped, took several deep breaths, relaxed his shoulders, and licked his lips. Subaru stared back blankly.

"…sorry." Kamui looked away once again. "…I forgot. He killed your sister, didn't he? You have more of a right to him than I do, no matter what he did to me or Fuuma. It-but are you actually going to kill him?"

Subaru stared dully at Kamui beneath heavy eyelids. Kamui glanced over his shoulder quickly before resuming his vigil of the wall.

"…Subaru, are you gay?"

"…what?"

"You really are in love with Sakurazuka, aren't you?

//And this wasn't obvious? I thought that I reflected rainbows as badly as you do, Kamui. //

"Yes, I am homosexual. And… yeah, I am…"

"I don't mind. I've got nothing against it. It... was just kind of obvious. I mean…" Kamui glanced over his shoulder nervously. "…do you like girls… at all? I mean… do you swing both ways?"

"No, I don't." Subaru sighed and pulled the Wild 7's pack out of his breast pocket, remembered once again that smoking was not allowed, and fiddled with it nervously. He flicked the edge of the cellophane with his fingernail. "I… well, I had a crush back in elementary school on this one girl, but that was before I was mature. I… I don't know." He stared at the face of the pack. "…I didn't maintain an interest in anybody before Seishirou. I… well, Hokuto-she's my sister-tried to set me up with several girls before I met him. It just didn't feel right. I liked them a lot-they were really nice-but I didn't feel something. Some basic potential attraction. I never felt anything when I saw pretty girls in magazines or on television. I mean, I thought they were nice to look at, the same way Hokuto-chan did, and their outfits were nice, but I didn't feel something. I-I did when there were pretty men on TV. Hokuto realized that I was gay before I did. She was… she was really nice about it. I thought she would get weirded out." He smiled and flipped the pack over. "She even thought it was cute. She had to keep it from Grandma, though. That was a few months before Seishirou walked into our lives. She jumped on the opportunity when she found out that he was bisexual. It didn't take long to figure out."

"…Seishirou's bi?"

"Yeah."

"And… you're okay with that?"

"Huh?"

"I mean… you don't think it's really off base or something?"

"Well… I can't understand it myself. I mean… most people swing one way or the other. Being truly bisexual is incredibly rare. It-well, when I first heard of the idea, it made little sense to me. It was almost as if you would sleep with anything. I-I couldn't really understand it. It seemed to take the meaning out of sexuality. But I was still, you know, okay with the idea. But Seishirou wasn't like that. He was so normal. Or… hell… bad example. I don't know. Sort of. Um. Why do you ask--"

"Just wondering. I mean… so you'd be okay being with a guy who was bi?"

Subaru gave Kamui a wan smile and pocketed the cigarette pack. "Would I be so tortured if I wouldn't?"

"…oh." Kamui was still facing the wall and intermittently taking nervous glances at Subaru over his shoulder. "So… it's like… really uncommon. And people think it's freakish."

"…yeah." Subaru shrugged. "People think the same thing about being gay, to some degree. Hokuto-chan advised me to keep that hidden so that my career wouldn't suffer, which she said would be a job to keep under wraps considering how much I, according to her, 'reflected rainbows' everywhere I went. She said I was the cutest little gay boy she had ever seen." He smiled sadly to himself. "…I… really miss her."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring her up."

"You didn't. I did." Subaru sighed. "When something is always on your mind, everything will bring it up. You could talk about the weather and I would remember how much she liked the sunshine."

"…I see." Kamui looked around the room, seemingly distracted. His breathing was becoming shallow. Subaru looked up and creased his eyebrows.

"Kamui, are you all right?"

"Fine. It's… just… a little hot in here…" his voice trailed off.

"Would you like some water? Do you feel faint?"

"No, I… actually, yeah."

Subaru stood, pushed the over-bed table back over Kamui's lap, and poured water out of the half-full pitcher of the sort left in all rooms. Kamui accepted the glass with shaking hands and drank the entire glass in two gulps. He reached for the pitcher and nearly knocked it over.

"…sorry-"

"No, I'll do it." Subaru poured Kamui another glass and watched as he downed the water. His face was flushed. The boy blinked several times, squirmed, and drew his knees up to his chest, turning sideways to avoid knocking the table. He was taking deep, calming breaths.

…shit… "Kamui, it's happening again, isn't it?"

"God-damn-fucking-bastard-I'm-going-to-kill-him."

"Kamui, you have to let me in."

"GET AWAY!"

"Kamui!-"

"This is disgusting! Get away from me! I'm a freak!"

"What the-KAMUI." Subaru stood up, firmly yanked Kamui's hands off of his eyes, and shook his shoulders. "Kamui, look at me. It's all right. This isn't your fault. You have to let me dive in. I have to see what is happening."

"NO!"

"Kamui, please." Subaru brushed Kamui's hair out of his eyes and stared at him. "Look at me. Focus on me. All right. Calm down." Kamui was beginning to writhe. "It's all right. You're not disgusting, Kamui. You can't help this. This is a natural, healthy response. You have to let me in. For a second, stop throwing up walls to try to keep everything out. I promise I won't let him get you. I can't make that promise if you don't trust me."

"NOT DISGUSTING? IT'S GETTING ME OFF-"

"That's normal, all right?" //I'm the nasty one. I'm getting off just watching you.// Subaru sighed, ran his fingers through Kamui's hair until he was cradling the temples, and touched his forehead against Kamui's, still stroking Kamui comfortingly with his fingertips. Kamui's skin was slick and hot. Subaru took a shuddering breath, attempted to force himself with little success to ignore Kamui's breath on his own neck and the small mewing noises he was trying to suppress, and closed his eyes. "All right, I'm going to dive in." //Sicko. Sicko. Don't even think of it in that sense. Concentrate!// "Open up."

Subaru slipped through the minute opening in Kamui's mental defenses and fell out of his body into Kamui's subconscious. He probed around blearily, sensing the pseudo-corporeal and weightless formation his own consciousness was taking to maintain distinction as its own entity, separate of Kamui, and glanced around the most pressing turmoil. The lower layers of Kamui's mind, the memories and the very back where constant thoughts lingered, Subaru saw represented as a maelstrom beneath the dark space of the current preoccupation. It was the space directly behind Kamui's eyes and atop his mind where Subaru currently drifted.

Subaru spread his back-awareness to the infinitely complex architecture of Kamui's mind and maintained his current concentration on the events unfolding in the dark. It was just as Kamui had explained - as though walking into a pitch-black room from the sunlight. Thoughts were beginning to form and develop distinction and depth as the weight in Kamui's mind subsided. Subaru shuddered without knowing the cause and glanced around carefully, probing with his own mind into the fabric of the thoughts. The consciousness flowed into his own and processed through his mind.

//This would be a beautiful thing for lovers to do. See the same dreams, comprehend the same thoughts, no more isolation, far more-STOP IT CONCENTRATE CONCENTRATE CONCENTRATE-//

//Seishirou.//

Subaru stared in blind terror and shock at the presence that was beginning to become coherent. There was a second presence - a dark mirror, a blank reflection of another soul superimposed over a repressed consciousness that Subaru realized was the actual Fuuma. Seishirou's mind was flowing through the mirror's, melding slowly, reaching past the mirror and skimming over the actual Fuuma's sleeping heart. Kamui's spirit was merging into the deluge and superimposing over the mirror. Subaru glanced around the architecture, feeling all around him in every essence of Kamui the big picture and the actual effects of the merger of consciousnesses that paralleled the smaller, more detached symbols unfolding before him. Subaru gasped. Kamui and Fuuma were lying within the same corporeal "body", and the Dark Kamui's persona was perfectly overlapping sections of Kamui's deep subconscious. It settled at the bottom of his heart, entrapped perfectly by the original.

//A shadow!//

Fuuma awoke. Subaru felt the new, awakened consciousness slip into the merger, utterly confused, disoriented, terrified, frantic, and yet somehow numbed, as though in a drugged stupor. Kamui's consciousness locked up in shock.

The gears of fate ground to a halt.

Subaru gasped, only numbly aware of the stillness as the other three consciousnesses were. Seishirou was becoming progressively more detached and stroking eagerly at Subaru's essence, beckoning him to come closer and open further. Kamui and Fuuma were lying within the same shell, poignantly aware of one another as individuals, separate once again, and then broken off. Their immediate memories faded into a sustained stupor.

Subaru gasped and glanced at the symbols coming into coherent relief. Skin so pale it glowed like milk, inky hair, long limbs, broad, angular shoulders, completely bare, a mismatched pair of eyes- this was one of Seishirou's illusions, he knew damn well, conjured to be seen in the mind's eye-staring. Staring. Smirking. He was perched on the side of the bed, stroking somebody's hair. Fuuma-Fuuma was lying on the bed of congealed darkness, eyes rolling back into his head and flickering fitfully, loose as a rag doll. All of the aggression and malice had melted from his being.

Seishirou nodded to Subaru and continued to stroke. He smiled.

//What do you want, Seishirou?-//

Smile--

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"Subaru!"

Subaru looked up sharply. Kamui was shaking Subaru's shoulder, twisted around from his perch on the bed. Kamui's voice was on edge.

"I've yelled at you at least ten times. What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Oh! Yeah, I'm sorry." Subaru replaced his hands on Kamui's shoulders and rotated him about-face once again, continuing with his massage. "No, nothing is wrong, Kamui. I was just thinking about what we just saw… you know, inside of you."

"…you're hiding something from me."

"That's not it."

"What did you see out in the hallway? What happened?"

//A hell of a lot of stuff. The bloody answer to what's been going on.// "…Kamui, there is something I need to tell you about Fuuma."

"What?"

"He's been possessed by a reflection of your shadow."

"...the hell does that mean?"

"That is why he acts the way he does. All right, look." Subaru slid his hands down Kamui's shoulders and turned him aside. Kamui followed and turned himself completely in Subaru's loose grip. "Do you know what a shadow is?"

"…a shadow sacrifice?"

"No. Not a shadow sacrifice. A shadow. A person's personality-shadow."

"No."

"All right." Subaru thought for a moment and shoved his hands into his coat pockets. The bed creaked under the shifted weight. "I'm not good at explaining things. I'll try my best. A shadow is… well…" Subaru held his hand over his heart. "It lines the base of your heart. It's… on a layer beneath your conscious self. It's in the base of your gut as well, so basic that you always know it's there, and yet, you don't. You really don't control it."

"…what?"

"It's your opposite. Like, your inverse reflection. There are several theories that it shows on the outside when people are placed in situations of extreme emotional or mental stress. That's… well, that's what happens when people are put through so much grief that they don't seem like themselves. People who are usually stoic, calm, rational, that sort of thing, go weepy and emotional. People who are usually emotional and weepy turn ice cold and unemotional. For example. I mean… does that make any sense to you? That shadow is part of what makes humans so universal and complex, so… well, full of contradictions."

Kamui was silent. Subaru cleared his throat and continued.

"So, your shadow would be… well, the opposite of you. You're emotional, hot-tempered, you… well, you're self-centered insofar as you only care about what happens to your closest friends and yourself. It's all right; that's not a bad thing. You're… possessive. You're prideful. You're… uh…" //Sexually submissive, at least on the outside. Don't even mention that.// "…you have a strong sense of identity. So your shadow would be… Fuuma. I mean, Dark Fuuma. Unemotional, without any sense of self, pride, or identity, completely changing his appearance and mannerism to avoid conflict and please people - you definitely don't do that; you're standoffish - he… he grants wishes without discrimination."

"What?"

"Did any of that make sense to you at all?"

"Sort of. No."

"You know how Fuuma goes around claiming that he's only trying to grant everybody's wish?"

"Yes."

"That is the tendency of your shadow. You… well, when you're faced with people who are in a lot of pain or grieving, do you just want to give them what they desire the most despite the consequences? Even if their wishes conflict with others or would cause destruction and harm? Indulge them, even if it would be better for them to wait out? It's a form of weakness."

"Not really. Well, I don't know. I think everybody does…"

"It would be really hard to know. You… well, you're not very introspective." Subaru sighed. //I'm really tripping all over my self. Good-for-nothing rhetoric class would come in handy right now. Maybe if I had actually attended I would be better at this.// "It's a basic gut reaction, before consciousness, before you realize it. It's below… like, on a layer below what you're thinking, just in the background. You usually brush it off. It's so basic and against your will that you don't give it much regard and let it run in the background, so to speak."

"…I see."

"Did that make any sense at all?"

"No, you're making sense."

"Oh. Good." //He seems mad. Great. Um.// "So what Fuuma is right now is a reflection of that shadow. He's… basically you, Kamui. Your twin star, the other half of 'Kamui'. Your opposite. The Gemini. The compliment. Whatever. It's really you that is in conflict for the fate of the world. One person. You know, like, the complete and… full of opposites, how would you say… paradoxical?-paradoxical human mind is fighting for the fate of the world and I don't know. I'm not good at this. Sorry."

"…so I killed Kotori."

"NO." Subaru sighed heavily and gripped Kamui's shoulders. Kamui was gritting his teeth and clenching the sheets. //Finally, it comes around to this.// "This is why I didn't want to tell you about this, because I knew that you would start blaming yourself for all of the stuff Fuuma's done. You listen to me." //All right, what did I plan to say again? …shit.// "You could not control your shadow, the same way you absolutely cannot control your emotions. You can only control your actions. And if something picks up on your thoughts, you own shadow-that is hallowed ground-and makes it happen, you can't help that. We all have a shadow. You were just the unlucky one to have it projected without your consent. We… we would all produce monsters like you did."

"But who wished that Kotori would die? Whose wish was that?"

Subaru stopped for a moment and thought. "…she died as soon as the decision was made, didn't she?"

"Yes."

"I see." Subaru thought for a moment. Kamui was glaring straight down at the knotted sheets and blinking rapidly to keep tears of rage from spilling. "I don't know, Kamui."

"But I KILLED HER."

"Maybe she herself wished for death."

"NO!" Kamui buried his head in his hands and whined with the effort of holding back sobs. Subaru poured him another glass of water and offered a tissue from the bedside counter. Kamui took both, gulped down the water, and wiped his nose. "…sorry, just… I… no, Kotori wasn't like that! She was happy! She really wanted to live! She was… so full of life. It was… nice…" Kamui moved his mouth blankly and searched for words, crumpling the tissue into his fist. "…I just can't live with myself any more."

"Kamui-"

"Why? I mean-do people really wish for all of that hideous stuff? All of that torture and blood? The-the tongue stuff? What the hell is all of that? This-this can't be what people are really wishing for. It's sick!"

"…there is another part to the shadow."

"Huh?"

"As the name would suggest, the shadow also harbors a lot of suppressed, dark urges. Sort of the fascination with death and blood that some have. Some don't have it. Look…" Subaru smiled at Kamui. "Your shadow is one of the more beautiful in the world. It wishes to grant wishes. Its intention is pure, in a way, even if it does harm. Some shadows are utterly hideous." //Like Seishirou's. Like mine…// "That-that doesn't make the people any worse so long as they control their actions-it makes it harder; they have more of a burden to carry-but you're just pure gold inside and out."

"Get over yourself. I am not. I'm really fucked up."

"…we all are. We all are." Subaru sighed. Kamui took another gulp of water and a deep breath. "The blood stuff… well… it's eh… there is just something alluring about violence and erotica to a lot of people. That's… the licking thing and all of that. I mean, will you admit that you find that stuff sort of hot?"

"Not when it's actually happening to me. It fucking hurts."

"Of course it hurts. But it doesn't get you off at all? It isn't at all edgy? That mixture of the cutting stuff and the… well… all of the tongue stuff?" //Like Fuuma practically crawling all over you?//

Kamui shrugged and made a non-committal noise.

"That's what I thought. Maybe you also like to deal it out. Yeah. That would make more sense. Fuuma is your shadow, after all."

"What?"

"You're sadistic. Probably a little masochistic. Do you ever have moments where you're just daydreaming and you casually think of doing something like ripping the person's head off next to you or slashing your arms up with a razor? I mean… not consciously, almost. It's sort of a fly-by fantasy. It's… it's really common. That would also-"

"I fucking do not. …That's it." Kamui hurled the ball of tissue into the trashcan near the wall and tore another one out of the box on Subaru's lap. "I'm going to kill myself."

"You don't mean that."

"Watch me." Kamui blew his nose and sniffed. "…it's selfish of me to want to live if I can't control what I do to people. Nobody else can die."

"I won't allow you to even consider hurting yourself."

"…why?"

"…well…"

"Why do people wish for all of this nonsense?"

//I thought you were going to ask-well, I was going to spill my guts out and somehow drop more hints than I already have been dropping. Kamui, you are so dense. Or you aren't interested in me at all.// "…people don't wish for what's good for them, sometimes." Subaru sighed. "They… well… they wish for specific things, not just to be happy. Sometimes the things they wish for will only cause more pain to them. And wishes conflict. When people wish for the exclusive right to the same thing-a position of power, the love of a person, whatever-there is conflict. That is where Fuuma has no power. Or he has to choose one person to indulge-well, you do."

"This sucks."

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Well… why didn't you tell me all of this earlier?"

"…I only had a vague idea. I wanted to be sure." Subaru motioned for permission to have a sip of water. Kamui obliged him. "And I knew you'd blow up like this and start torturing and blaming yourself for something you absolutely cannot control. But what I saw confirmed my theory. And considering what is happening, I think it is best that you know."

"What the hell did you see out in the hallway, anyway?"

"Well, the reflection of your shadow, abandoning its body. It looked exactly like you, just… well, acting like Fuuma's been acting. Those eyes. You know, that look?"

"Yes."

"It was like seeing a ghost of yourself. I-well, after I broke consciousness with you, I ran out there to see why the power was cut off all of a sudden. When I got out there, the windows all blew out. People were screaming. It… well, it was kind of cool." Subaru smiled weakly over the rim of the glass and handed it back to Kamui. He had gulped half of the water. "I dispelled it. It disappeared soon after that. That's when the power came back on."

"And it's just… gone?"

"The reflection is gone." Subaru pointed at Kamui's chest. "The original is still right here."

"…I'm going to rip my heart out."

"Shush." Subaru sighed. "There is still a chance that it might… come back…"

"…I know." Kamui sniffed hard and looked up, licking his lips and setting his jaw. He took a deep breath. "So what state is Fuuma in right now? Is he all right?"

"I don't know. He's going to be a little bit messed up in the head for a while."

"…I need to find him."

"Wait. Give it time." Subaru pushed Kamui back down onto his rear. "Trust me. I promise I will go find him later. He's fine for now. You will stay here and rest."

"But Seishirou-"

"Is not hunting." Subaru held up his hands. "My hands would tell me if he was."

"That doesn't mean that he's not raping his brains out or ripping his guts out or something."

"…Seishirou doesn't do that."

"I beg your pardon? What do you think he's been doing lately?"

"Not without good reason. I mean… that's another thing that's been bugging me lately. Other than the obvious jealousy." Subaru weakly smiled at his joke. "…right. Ha. Um. Funny. Okay." Kamui was arching his eyebrow. "… Seishirou doesn't sleep around at all. He's neurotic about not having human emotions, so he wouldn't. I don't think he would even acknowledge his own sexual urges. He has to be up to something."

"The spells, right?"

"I'm positive now that he's doing something like that, because of what I saw, and because of your hands. You're marked like me."

"…with the star?"

"The pentagram, yes. I am positive that I saw it on the back of your hands this afternoon."

"…and that means…?"

"I think that Fuuma has been marked as his prey."

"Why? What the hell has Fuuma done to him?"

"Dark Kamui had the ability to see into people's souls-I think that's another thing, you misunderstand people easily, so he doesn't-beyond any and all defense to see what they truly desire. He probably saw far more in Seishirou than Seishirou himself would want to acknowledge exists inside of him. Fuuma probably has those memories. That would be a perfect reason to kill Fuuma."

"…and prove to Fuuma that he doesn't feel?"

"What?"

"I don't know. It just seems like Seishirou is always trying to prove to everybody that he doesn't feel. It kind of reminds me of some guys I knew when I went to school up north. They were bastards. Real insecure punks. I did a lot of thinking on it, actually."

"You? Think?"

"Shut up." Kamui gave Subaru a wan smile and threw a wadded tissue at him. Subaru felt a drop in his stomach. //His smile looks like mine. Dear god, Kamui, please don't turn into me. God, no, please.// "I guess because I was just like them in a lot of ways. I was a punk."

"You are a punk."

"I mean a real punk. Ditching school, sleeping underneath bridges, smoking between classes. I quit, finally, so don't tell me that you can't. I've done it. I got into a lot of fights with local gangs. Really got myself into some shit. But I was actually doing something under bridges, you know. I kind of figured out that not only were we trying to prove it to everybody else, we were trying to prove it to ourselves. I guess I'm sort of like Seishirou in a way. Maybe people who have any shadow-or-whatever in to the whole violence thing have a really messed up side like that. You know, liking pain for some reason. I don't know. Pretty deep, huh?"

"You denying that you have emotions is sort of like a boulder trying to convince itself that it can swim."

"Wow, thanks."

"No problem. Well, you do think much more than people think that you do." //It's a pretty obvious thing to realize, Kamui, but you're still young. At least you're trying. You remind me of me in some ways when I was your age. Oh, god, please… don't turn out like me…//

"You noticed?"

"I have been watching." //Oh-shit. That sounds really bad. Cover it. Cover it.// "…you know, for signs of danger. Keeping you out of trouble. Protecting you like I'm supposed to."

"Thanks. Um, Subaru…"

"Yes?"

"There is something I need to tell you as well."