Ark 17 Eposide 28: White is a demon too.

            



         ‘I’m floating... There’s nothing below me and I’m going to fall...’ Yasei Murasame looked below him to see a gaping pit of black yawning there to swallow him up. He didn’t feel afraid but somehow comforted by this darkness, it felt warm and cozy and he couldn’t get enough. ‘Maybe this is what it feels like to die...’ A laugh pealed out his mouth, its pitch was high and the tone cracked with the realization that he was actually dying or so he thought. He laughed again, its crazed waves echoing through the emptiness; he started to fall and laughed more. With each foot he descended, his laughter became even more frantic and by the time he felt like he reached the bottom the laughing meant nothing more than a demon finally going home. Yasei stopped.

                Outside the realm of his mind, Yasei lay on a hospital bed with machines whirring and clicking beside him, each connected to his body monitoring kami knows what. His chest gently rose and fell with each of his regular breaths; no he wasn’t dying but some guy he fought two days earlier had cracked his head open and unconsciousness felt like a warm welcome instead of pain. Reiko wanted to stay with him until he woke up but she knew that the children came first and therefore wasn’t sitting at his bedside like she wanted. No one sat with him save for the occasional nurse or doctor to check his vitals or pen down some stats on their all-important clipboards. He floated in the recesses of his mind, blissfully unaware on how incapacitated he was. His body may be limp and unconscious but his mind raced on through the dark confines of his subconscious.

                ‘Where the fuck am I if I’m not dead...’ Yasei thought to himself as the dark world around him still swallowed him in. Last he remembered was feeling his skull nearly caving in and his vision shutting off like a lamp. Now he floated in some primordial think tank where the only thoughts around were his own and even they abandoned him for the most part. As he expected, he got no answer from the blackness and continued to wonder what the hell happened to him. The gaping maw below him suddenly stopped being so gaping and even though all he could see was nothing but black, the hole under him began to close. For a moment, Yasei felt panicked. The world he felt he’d been falling through forever was now changing and he didn’t know why or what to do and he panicked. His heart raced and sweat beaded up on his skin. Something was here besides him, he could feel it. In the darkness, he kept turning around to try and catch the specter haunting his subconscious. Seconds ticked by in mere instants, time meant nothing and he felt the thing mocking him with each and every fiber of his being. ‘Sh-show yourself d-damn it!’ Again, he rapidly spun around, his frantic grey eyes catching nothing but notes on the wind, mere peripheral glances of whatever was here. His heart raced even more, he didn’t feel terrified persay but an apprehension and of course that panicked feeling that something was going to happen and he wasn’t going to like it. ‘I-I know you’re fucking here!’

''“Who’s here? Only you have access to the confines of your mind young Yasei. Who else could be in here besides you?” ''Yasei halted and growled, what the hell was that? ‘Who the fuck are you?’

''“Tsk tsk... I would have thought you knew who I am already. Don’t I feel familiar? Think, feel me, use that brain power and tell me who I am.”''

Yasei thought, the person was violent, crazed and bloodthirsty; it felt like Arcturus, that fucking bastard. ‘''It’s not him though; I slaughtered that fucking cunt... No, that’s me. That’s me when I’m too pissed to let my emotions keep in check.’ ''Something clicked, a shred of memory surfaced and a snippet of a conversation he had with his dad when he was a kid flashed before his eyes. ''~“We all have demons inside of us, some of us though, have the real deal tearing us apart from the inside out. Oni’s are a part of us whether we like it or not...”~''

''‘Y-your my oni...’ “Good boy.” ''The oni smirked softly. He still didn’t allow himself to come into view just yet; he wanted Yasei to get a feel for him first. ''‘What the hell do you want?’ “I want what you want. To kill those who have hurt me or my friends. That’s all I care about really. You know that anger, you know that pain of loss, and I’m here to keep you feeling like that, hone it and utilize it. Without it, you wouldn’t be a good fighter at all; you’d be nothing without me! Your skills would be mediocre at best and everything you have done will be all for naught.” ''Yasei walked toward the sound of the voice but still saw nothing. He felt frustrated, so frustrated now. What did his Oni know about him, fuck all that’s what...? ''‘You think you fucking know me? It’s funny how even though you’re me, you know so fucking little. Let me tell you one thing here. I do not fuel my hatred with anger. I fuel my anger with my hatred and my hatred is kept in check.’''

“AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!” His oni cackled in the darkness and moved so that he was directly behind Yasei. Yasei spun around and faced the being called his oni. He was tall, taller than Yasei and had an all-white body. Strange boney protrusions stuck out from his head and he looked more like a demon than a person. The thing that stuck out to Yasei the most though, were his two bright golden eyes with black pin prick pupils dotting the center. The oni stood there and smirked at Yasei, his smile growing as large as the mask Yasei wore. ''“You really are naive aren’t you? Let me tell you something Ya-sei-Kun. That manifestation of all those feelings is what I am. That dark shadow that lies upon your good intentions, that’s all I am to you and if you want to deny that then go ahead. I’ll wait until your ass is ready to accept everything I have to offer. Until then, I’ll make your life a living hell, you’ll be forced to relive each and every night the horror of you stabbing Natsuhi-chan over and over again. But wait, you already do I think. Now, let me help you, I can you know make things easier for you all the way around, make those nightmares turn into a goal, that goal to kill everyone that hurt the people you loved.”''

Yasei never liked threats but this one seemed to make something in him snap a bit more than he already had. Another thread of sanity slipped from his brain and he actually considered letting his Oni help him. The offer was tempting; Yasei knew he could help as his oni already helped him kill the fuck that stole Natsuh. He didn’t know it at the time but that’s what happened. Every second he thought about it, he slipped further and further toward accepting, if he could control the power given to him by the Oni he’d be golden. No matter what though he couldn’t let it get the better of him. Yasei clenched his fists tight and stared straight into his Oni’s eyes, making sure he knew Yasei meant business. ''‘Ok here’s the thing. I’ll let you help me but if you think for one fucking second you can control me, you’re fuckin mistaken. You are going to obey me or I will find a way to shut you out completely.’ “Deal; though don’t say I didn’t warn you. I’ll suck every last bit of you dry until there’s nothing but me left. Try to cow me and you’ll wish you never came to talk to me.” ''Yasei felt a strange sensation slither through his body as if another being wriggled up inside of him in the worst way possible. He felt violated and sick but soon the feelings subsided and he felt a calm descend on him. The black world Yasei floated in soon started to shrink and a white light seemed to seep into the edges of his mind. He felt a pounding sensation thrumming against his skull and his pulse seemed to echo a drum beat strong and harsh. His hands shakily reached up and grasped his head and felt gauze and tape wrapped around his head over his hair and forehead. ‘What the hell happened to me... Oh right, that cheerful fuck damn near bashed my head in.’ One of the many plethora of nursing staff came into the room seeing Yasei awake and asked him a few questions as she could tell he was awake. The woman, a buxom woman who’s figure made you instantly think of old timey movie star, forced Yasei’s eyes open so she could check if his eyes dilated properly. He cringed and slapped her hands away, forcing his eyes back shut again. “Hmmmm... You’ll be free to leave soon. I need to get a bit of paperwork filled out for your discharge and you’ll be good to go Yasei-san. If anything goes wrong for any reason, come back and we’ll take a look.” She smiled softly and returned about ten minutes later with a few pages that Yasei signed. Within another few minutes, he was out the door and standing on the sidewalk outside of the hospital wondering what the hell he was going to do with his Oni.