[ Her cavalier attitude towards his longevity has long-running precedent in the weightlessness with which she views the lives of others: the many lost heroically and ignominiously in the line of duty affect her with the profundity of a sudden change in the direction of the wind; the destruction of living bodies is a natural phenomenon in the everyday cycle of predation and is in no way preeminent over the unfolding of any other event before her eyes. To insist that she invest emotion into the process is to ask an animal to mourn perfect strangers.
But therein is the distinction that pulls Aki from the throng of unremarkable faces: he is a stranger no more. In Aki, her irreverence towards human life is confronted with a familiarity completely novel to her during her tenure on earth, giving rise to the schizophrenic mélange of callousness and affection that colours her perception of the Hunter.
The delicacy which she lacks in every respect but this one would not have been possible without Nyako's influence; in an alternative timeline an overenthusiastic Power has already crushed his organs in her embrace. For a time they are suspended in stillness, her unconscious of the solemn complexity of the feeling that grips him, but perhaps her full understanding is not required for him to draw solace from her arms.
Her forehead resurfaces bearing wrinkles. ]
Huuuh? You hit your head or something? There's no use in being good if you got nothing to show for it!
[ A posthumous medal for following protocol is hardly worth the price of obedience in her book. Oh, but she is attuned to the transit of blood in his veins and how it rushes counter to the rhythm of his words. Power hoists herself on the toes of one foot and leans askance into Aki with her lips pursed in the manner of a duck and annoys his jawline with little smooches. ]
Kissy-kissy-boy-Hayakawa~
[ Just when the limits of her daring appear established, Power outright grabs his shoulders and turns him bodily to face her with such might that his hair whips the air. Her dress shirt presses to his chest as she locks lips with Aki. Contrary to her manhandling of him, her kiss is soft, like a sudden switching of the gears, and deep enough to justify the tilt of her head. ]
( it's not as though he expected more from her — truthfully, aki is surprised that his ever-looming mortality had registered to the fiend enough to bring it up now. indifference is the best that a human could risk to expect for from them; regardless of how much his time with power and angel has muddied the waters of his past convictions about devils and fiends, he isn't about to go paving over the base truths that should be kept at the foundation of any human's mind, and especially devil hunters. they are born of human fear, and, drawing power from that, will always be forced to contend with an instinct that will want to feed that fear: with pain, with death.
traitorously, he sometimes wonders if these tenets should be considered as immutable, resolute. he has seen enough change in the devils and fiends he spends time around that it has given him a half-second of pause and enough doubt to slip in through that gap in his logical defense. but even then, his doubts end up piggybacked with doubts. at the end of the day, the non-human members of the special division are pressganged into their positions; it would be foolish to think that any changes in their behavior might happen in different circumstances. perhaps they stemmed from survival instincts. perhaps it was a defeated sort of affection, like the bond one might form with a rodent sharing their home that they do not yet have the equipment or opportunity to kill.
he leaves it all aside. despite it all, he doesn't try to remove her, quietly (and selfishly) appreciative in the silent, slow moment. it does feel nice. and there is — a marked difference to it. power is devoid of the expectations and burdens a human might bring to this. he didn't have to shoulder her pity or sorrow at his impending death. he didn't have to concern himself with this serving to deepen a future wound of bereavement because it wouldn't exist in the first place.
it feels like a dangerous train of thought to consider. no, his obedience to protocol, to so-called decency, to sense offer him precious little in actual return, but pride in his adherence to Public Safety had been one of the few things that had truly been his, these past ten or so years.
his motions slow to a halt as she stretches tall enough to lean over his shoulder and peck a series of kisses into the line of his jaw. irritation sparks and takes hold within his ribcage; it sweeps away any of the contemplation that had begun to flourish in the vacuum of silence. another sigh rattles through his throat. ) What do you think y—
( the rest of his sentence is yanked just as forcibly as he is, spun to face her with such speed and precision that he has no leeway to react, let alone resist. the words are supplanted with a nonverbal, "mmf," as their lips lock — but there's nothing in it that harkens back to the almost cartoonish nature she had been worrying at his jawline just a moment before. her lips are soft and warm against his, the kiss confident enough to make him question just where a fiend had picked up on all of this. no, he doesn't kiss her back; he is characteristically and frustratingly stoic, made all the more baffling for the way his heart races. after a moment's hesitation, his right hand raises to her face; the thumb finds the delta of soft flesh beneath the sharp delineation of her jaw, his fingers brushing past her ear and into her hair. with this purchase, he pushes her back to grant him an inch or so of space, but only just that. for a moment he stares into her cruciform eyes, his own depicting an internal riot.
and in the end...
fuck.) You can't breathe a word about this to anyone. ( though hushed and low, the tone is serious. his left hand finds her hip; still damp, it causes the fabric to cling to her skin. ) The second you sense that Denji's home, tell me.
( really, he feels that his conditions are relatively simple and understandable: 1) obviously Public Safety cannot become aware of this because he would most likely, at best, be removed from his position, and, 2) he will not deal with whatever denji might say or do if he became aware of it, because he's already enough to deal with as he is.
[ The anxieties that coincide with the crossing of boundaries in the thoroughfare of social relations could not be further from her mind. If she were to elect the defining characteristic of the human race, she might attribute the trait to the torturous practice of agonising over what is to come. Even Denji, whose social dysfunction is at home in a division of misfits, is prone to interrogating the universe for some insight into his future prospects (with the despicable Makima!). Does touch demand that they rework their relationship into a form palatable to others so as to not appear unseemly in the act, or should so-called unprofessional gestures be swept under the rug, redacted like so many lines from the bureau's dossier? Power spares not a thought for such dilemmas save the one: things will unfold as they please. She negates expectations in favour of anarchy.
Hence the fiend's malformed, almost child-like conception of Aki's forthcoming departure from life, which her imagination illustrates as emptiness where there was once presence. She pictures neither the funeral nor the grief. On the other hand, if Aki wished to confide in Power and the blabby devil resolved to keep her trap shut, he could tell her anything without fear of being patronised on the grounds of his terminal prognosis.
His cool reception does not offend; instead she pushes her cheek into his hand like a beast seeking its caress. ]
Gyahaha...
[ She is warded off and peers back at his mask of stoicism with giddy curiosity. The grinning fiend indulges his demand for secrecy by fastening her lips with a phantom zipper. Despite her perfidy, the observance of contracts is an instinctual compulsion for her kind. That is to say, she gets it. ]
Fret not for I'll smell him from a mile away!
[ Her hands descend and her fingers pass through the gaps in his and she lifts Aki's hands and moves in slow tempo to the evening radio filtering through their balcony from below. She speaks as she motivates his limbs to pulse along with success or without: ]
Sneaking around sounds fun! but don't you want Denji in on it? We could be like—
[ Power outstretches their fingers and connects their hands into a kind of lock meant to represent something, where hers and Aki's hands are surrogates for each respective party. ]
( it was a consequence of being mortal. the future was not an unbounded infinite for them — it was a set length of track that would one day dead end, and so they had to contend with the existential injury of trying to wring from that limited amount of time anything and everything they felt necessary to have lived a worthwhile life. this is one of the many things that aki doesn't think any devil or fiend would ever perfectly be able to comprehend; the configurations of their existences were simply too different to allow for it. they can only find fleeting understanding and agreeance by reaching blindly out at odd angles, often enough finding it slipping away just as soon as it had been grasped — and yet they still count themselves fortunate for having accomplished the impossible regardless.
aki has little to say about his own future. bizarrely enough, he views it largely like power does: there will come a day where he will be an absence where once was, and if there was anyone left to mourn him as he had mourned dozens throughout these last thirteen years, he would be blind and deaf to them. as soft-hearted as he really is, still able to feel the unfathomable shear of loss just as keenly now as he had felt it watching his childhood life scattered to the winds right in front of his eyes, he tries not to think of that part. perhaps aki withdraws because he doesn't want to leave behind pain like that; it had made sense for himeno (even if she had ended up going before him), but... with power, it's less of a concern. he couldn't believe that the fiend would mourn him.
oddly enough, that makes it easier.
there's something feline in the way she presses into the touch of his hand; it isn't the first and won't be the last similarity he can see between her and the familiar that she had brought along with her. he eases visibly at her agreement to his terms, lapsing into a momentary passivity that allows for her to take his hands and lead him slowly through the steps of an impromptu dance set to the music he can hear filtering in from somewhere outside; he doesn't feel cut out for something like this, but he at least tries to play along. aki moves with all the alacrity of a wooden toy soldier, creaking and sticking at the joints, but he does move. )
Absolutely not. ( as if his diction isn't enough to close that door, he clearly enunciates each syllable to punctuate it.
he allows her to bring their hands together into... what she must think is some sort of explanation, or example, but it does little to budge the frown etched nearly permanently into aki's expression. he grouses, ) Aren't we already enough like that?( he feels like he lives with these two practically under his skin already, and besides, there's absolutely no way he can think of injecting denji into this situation that doesn't make it either exponentially more awkward, more difficult, or more stiflingly uncomfortable. this is already enough of an imposition as it is, having pried aki partially out of the bounds of what he feels is either permissible or safe or both. )
He's difficult enough as it is. ( power is as well, but her methods are seemingly more effective on him. )
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
But therein is the distinction that pulls Aki from the throng of unremarkable faces: he is a stranger no more. In Aki, her irreverence towards human life is confronted with a familiarity completely novel to her during her tenure on earth, giving rise to the schizophrenic mélange of callousness and affection that colours her perception of the Hunter.
The delicacy which she lacks in every respect but this one would not have been possible without Nyako's influence; in an alternative timeline an overenthusiastic Power has already crushed his organs in her embrace. For a time they are suspended in stillness, her unconscious of the solemn complexity of the feeling that grips him, but perhaps her full understanding is not required for him to draw solace from her arms.
Her forehead resurfaces bearing wrinkles. ]
Huuuh? You hit your head or something? There's no use in being good if you got nothing to show for it!
[ A posthumous medal for following protocol is hardly worth the price of obedience in her book. Oh, but she is attuned to the transit of blood in his veins and how it rushes counter to the rhythm of his words. Power hoists herself on the toes of one foot and leans askance into Aki with her lips pursed in the manner of a duck and annoys his jawline with little smooches. ]
Kissy-kissy-boy-Hayakawa~
[ Just when the limits of her daring appear established, Power outright grabs his shoulders and turns him bodily to face her with such might that his hair whips the air. Her dress shirt presses to his chest as she locks lips with Aki. Contrary to her manhandling of him, her kiss is soft, like a sudden switching of the gears, and deep enough to justify the tilt of her head. ]
no subject
traitorously, he sometimes wonders if these tenets should be considered as immutable, resolute. he has seen enough change in the devils and fiends he spends time around that it has given him a half-second of pause and enough doubt to slip in through that gap in his logical defense. but even then, his doubts end up piggybacked with doubts. at the end of the day, the non-human members of the special division are pressganged into their positions; it would be foolish to think that any changes in their behavior might happen in different circumstances. perhaps they stemmed from survival instincts. perhaps it was a defeated sort of affection, like the bond one might form with a rodent sharing their home that they do not yet have the equipment or opportunity to kill.
he leaves it all aside. despite it all, he doesn't try to remove her, quietly (and selfishly) appreciative in the silent, slow moment. it does feel nice. and there is — a marked difference to it. power is devoid of the expectations and burdens a human might bring to this. he didn't have to shoulder her pity or sorrow at his impending death. he didn't have to concern himself with this serving to deepen a future wound of bereavement because it wouldn't exist in the first place.
it feels like a dangerous train of thought to consider. no, his obedience to protocol, to so-called decency, to sense offer him precious little in actual return, but pride in his adherence to Public Safety had been one of the few things that had truly been his, these past ten or so years.
his motions slow to a halt as she stretches tall enough to lean over his shoulder and peck a series of kisses into the line of his jaw. irritation sparks and takes hold within his ribcage; it sweeps away any of the contemplation that had begun to flourish in the vacuum of silence. another sigh rattles through his throat. ) What do you think y—
( the rest of his sentence is yanked just as forcibly as he is, spun to face her with such speed and precision that he has no leeway to react, let alone resist. the words are supplanted with a nonverbal, "mmf," as their lips lock — but there's nothing in it that harkens back to the almost cartoonish nature she had been worrying at his jawline just a moment before. her lips are soft and warm against his, the kiss confident enough to make him question just where a fiend had picked up on all of this. no, he doesn't kiss her back; he is characteristically and frustratingly stoic, made all the more baffling for the way his heart races. after a moment's hesitation, his right hand raises to her face; the thumb finds the delta of soft flesh beneath the sharp delineation of her jaw, his fingers brushing past her ear and into her hair. with this purchase, he pushes her back to grant him an inch or so of space, but only just that. for a moment he stares into her cruciform eyes, his own depicting an internal riot.
and in the end...
fuck. ) You can't breathe a word about this to anyone. ( though hushed and low, the tone is serious. his left hand finds her hip; still damp, it causes the fabric to cling to her skin. ) The second you sense that Denji's home, tell me.
( really, he feels that his conditions are relatively simple and understandable:
1) obviously Public Safety cannot become aware of this because he would most likely, at best, be removed from his position, and,
2) he will not deal with whatever denji might say or do if he became aware of it, because he's already enough to deal with as he is.
humans can impose contracts of their very own. )
no subject
Hence the fiend's malformed, almost child-like conception of Aki's forthcoming departure from life, which her imagination illustrates as emptiness where there was once presence. She pictures neither the funeral nor the grief. On the other hand, if Aki wished to confide in Power and the blabby devil resolved to keep her trap shut, he could tell her anything without fear of being patronised on the grounds of his terminal prognosis.
His cool reception does not offend; instead she pushes her cheek into his hand like a beast seeking its caress. ]
Gyahaha...
[ She is warded off and peers back at his mask of stoicism with giddy curiosity. The grinning fiend indulges his demand for secrecy by fastening her lips with a phantom zipper. Despite her perfidy, the observance of contracts is an instinctual compulsion for her kind. That is to say, she gets it. ]
Fret not for I'll smell him from a mile away!
[ Her hands descend and her fingers pass through the gaps in his and she lifts Aki's hands and moves in slow tempo to the evening radio filtering through their balcony from below. She speaks as she motivates his limbs to pulse along with success or without: ]
Sneaking around sounds fun! but don't you want Denji in on it? We could be like—
[ Power outstretches their fingers and connects their hands into a kind of lock meant to represent something, where hers and Aki's hands are surrogates for each respective party. ]
this.
no subject
aki has little to say about his own future. bizarrely enough, he views it largely like power does: there will come a day where he will be an absence where once was, and if there was anyone left to mourn him as he had mourned dozens throughout these last thirteen years, he would be blind and deaf to them. as soft-hearted as he really is, still able to feel the unfathomable shear of loss just as keenly now as he had felt it watching his childhood life scattered to the winds right in front of his eyes, he tries not to think of that part. perhaps aki withdraws because he doesn't want to leave behind pain like that; it had made sense for himeno (even if she had ended up going before him), but... with power, it's less of a concern. he couldn't believe that the fiend would mourn him.
oddly enough, that makes it easier.
there's something feline in the way she presses into the touch of his hand; it isn't the first and won't be the last similarity he can see between her and the familiar that she had brought along with her. he eases visibly at her agreement to his terms, lapsing into a momentary passivity that allows for her to take his hands and lead him slowly through the steps of an impromptu dance set to the music he can hear filtering in from somewhere outside; he doesn't feel cut out for something like this, but he at least tries to play along. aki moves with all the alacrity of a wooden toy soldier, creaking and sticking at the joints, but he does move. )
Absolutely not. ( as if his diction isn't enough to close that door, he clearly enunciates each syllable to punctuate it.
he allows her to bring their hands together into... what she must think is some sort of explanation, or example, but it does little to budge the frown etched nearly permanently into aki's expression. he grouses, ) Aren't we already enough like that? ( he feels like he lives with these two practically under his skin already, and besides, there's absolutely no way he can think of injecting denji into this situation that doesn't make it either exponentially more awkward, more difficult, or more stiflingly uncomfortable. this is already enough of an imposition as it is, having pried aki partially out of the bounds of what he feels is either permissible or safe or both. )
He's difficult enough as it is. ( power is as well, but her methods are seemingly more effective on him. )