
Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/13489284.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      Gen, M/M
  Fandom:
      Devilman_(Anime_&_Manga), Devilman_Crybaby
  Relationship:
      Asuka_Ryo_|_Satan_&_Fudo_Akira, Asuka_Ryo_|_Satan/Fudo_Akira
  Character:
      Asuka_Ryo_|_Satan, Psycho_Jenny, Makimura_Miki, Fudo_Akira, Kuroda_"Miko"
      Miki, Makimura_Taro
  Additional Tags:
      AU
  Stats:
      Published: 2018-01-26 Completed: 2018-01-31 Chapters: 6/6 Words: 18231
****** With More Successful Hope Resolve ******
by SharpestRose
Summary
     "I want to go back to Japan. Find out where Akira is now. I want to
     live there."
     Ryou makes a decision in childhood that changes everything.
Notes
     This fic draws on background lore from Devilman Lady and other
     Devilman-related titles, but it's not necessary to have read those to
     read this. Rating will increase later on when the characters are
     older. Title is from Paradise Lost and I'm not even sorry.
***** Chapter 1 *****
Other children seemed to seek physical comfort and affection constantly,
hugging and wrestling and chasing and holding hands, as if touch was a sensory
extension of the laughter and play they shared. Ryou rarely played, rarely
laughed, but he didn't mind it when Jenny held him on her lap and hugged him
sometimes.
It was nice. It made him think of something he couldn't remember properly, of
some other soft, grown-up body that had held him once upon a time. Jenny held
him the same way, like there was something reverent in the act, something
worshipful.
There were a lot of things Ryou couldn't remember properly, and even though
being cradled in his guardian's arms gave him such a strong sense of deja vu,
it was even harder to hold onto whole, coherent thoughts when he was cuddled up
close to her like that. Being that close to Jenny always made his thoughts feel
muddled, somehow.
Ryou hated feeling muddled. Clarity of thought made him feel more in control,
less small and helpless and ineffectual. Childhood frustrated him in a way it
didn't seem to bother any of his peers.
So there was always a hesitancy in him about being hugged by Jenny, because it
would lead to his head feeling stuffy and sleepy and strange. He didn't think
she did it on purpose. Perhaps it was a side-effect of the way she only ever
spoke directly into his mind, rather than moving her mouth and vocal cords to
do it. 
Strange mysteries didn't bother Ryou. Science would find the explanation sooner
or later, and he rather liked the idea that not everything had been discovered
yet. Maybe when he was older he'd be the one to solve the puzzle of Jenny's
eccentricities.
For all that he hated feeling muddled, Ryou never turned down those occasional
times when Jenny would find him awake long past his bed-time, scowling at a
book slightly too advanced for his comprehension skills. She'd put the book
aside on the nightstand and sit on the edge of his bed, gathering him up into
her arms and holding him like he was a precious, holy gift until he fell
asleep.
It was nice. Touch, human contact -- people needed that to survive, no matter
how self-sufficient they might strive to be. And Ryou had precious little other
touch in his life.
===============================================================================
 
One morning Ryou stared out the window at the neatly kept, expensive suburban
neighbourhood, at the children walking in groups towards the same extremely
prestigious Catholic elementary school that he attended. Jenny always seemed to
take especial happiness in dropping him off there in the morning. Or, no,
perhaps happiness wasn't quite the correct word. The feeling radiating off
Jenny in those moments was more akin to glee, as if someone had told her a very
funny joke.
"I miss Akira."
Jenny glanced at him from behind the wheel, her smile as fixed and glossy as
always. The boy from the village? she asked. Her memory was much better than
Ryou's; she never seemed to forget anything.
"Yes."
He was ordinary. There are lots of others like him. Your school must have
dozens of other children as unremarkable as he was.
"No." Ryou shook his head. "He was a crybaby and brave at the same time. That's
not ordinary. American boys aren't crybabies, except the ones who get beaten up
for it by bullies. Akira used to be the one who stopped bullies from beating
others. He used to stop the ones who tried to pick on me."
Jenny's hands flexed on the steering wheel, like she was imagining that she was
really holding the fragile necks of cruel children. What reason would they have
to pick on you?
Ryou shrugged. "They called me foreigner, because I was so pale. I get called
it here, as well, because of my Japanese accent. I'm a stranger everywhere."
Those born to rule are never comfortable in the dirt.
He scowled at her. "If I grow up to be a leader of something, it'll be because
I chose it, Jenny. I don't like it when you act like I'm special. People in
charge should be in charge because they're good at it and they want it, not
just because."
Her smile never changed its shape even the slightest bit, but there was
something warm and indulgent in the tone of her thoughts, as if she thought he
was being adorably naive.
Of course, Ryou. You will be a self-made lord.
"Anyway, we're getting off the topic. I want to see Akira. What if he's got
nobody to look after him when he's being a crybaby?" 
Ryou, traces of his scowl lingering, huffed a sigh at the moving view beyond
the window. He didn't voice the other worry he felt: what if Akira had somebody
else to look after him, some other child who needed protecting from bullies who
wanted to pick on the foreign, the different, the seemingly weak?
"I'm sick of America." He knew he was getting dangerously close to whining,
which was a trait he disliked about himself. Childish petulance was a habit
he'd have to try to break in himself. "I want to go back to Japan. Find out
where Akira is now. I want to live there."
Any reasonable guardian or parent would have ignored the demand, or argued with
it while having no intention of indulging such an outrageous whim. Jenny just
turned the car around and drove back towards their comfortably austere
townhouse, full of the while blank smoothness that Ryou found so pleasing.
He perked up at the change of direction. "Really? We're going?"
Yes. While I can't see the appeal of the child's company myself, your own
attachment is something that seems worth pursuing for the sake of your self-
awareness. Education is to be found in places other than books and classes,
after all. 
Your full future self will appreciate whatever lesson you gain through being
drawn to him.
Jenny didn't sound entirely pleased about the situation, but Ryou didn’t care.
Filled with delight at the possibilities in the future, a rare, childlike laugh
escaped from him.
===============================================================================
 
When Ryou took his turn walking through through the security scanners at the
airport that night, the guards tried to take his boxcutter away. All it took
was one of Jenny’s steady, unblinking stares is enough to leave them glassy-
eyed and pliable, however, and so Ryou had the comforting little shape of the
knife safely in his pocket as he settled into his first class seat. 
People often attempted to take the blade from him. Jenny had been called to the
school on near innumerable occasions when one teacher or another had found out
about it. There were never any records kept of these incidents, and nobody but
Ryou ever remembered them, so every time somebody discovered it was a brand new
annoyance.
He was grateful that Jenny never questioned his wish to keep the boxcutter
despite all the trouble it caused. As erudite as he knew he was for his age,
Ryou still found himself at a loss for words as to how to explain that he
needed it.
It wasn’t a matter of self-defence, not exactly. It was something simpler than
that. An autonomy. He could protect himself from threats with it if the need
arose, certainly, but having the boxcutter meant that he could offer a quick,
less painful death, if death was an inevitability.
Ryou couldn’t say why it was so desperately important to him that he have
control over the circumstances of his own death, or the deaths of others. All
he knew was that he always felt an oppressive, terrifying sense of other forces
guiding him, as if he was nothing but a little white rat running through a
maze, watched by the uncaring gaze of some being beyond his comprehension.
Get some sleep, if you can, Jenny told him. She was leafing through a magazine,
ignoring the way the nearby flight attendant was very openly ogling down the
low open collar of her shirt.
Jenny hadn’t often brought lovers back to the townhouse. Ryou had a strong
preference for white decor, and while Jenny had never explained in detail he’d
nevertheless got the impression that all her passions were violent ones, and
better taken care of elsewhere. And police investigations were a little more
difficult to deal with than elementary school disciplinary actions, so that was
another reason for Jenny to keep that part of her life separate from the time
she spent raising Ryou.
Raising. She always seemed gleeful when she used that word, the same way she
did whenever he mentioned anything related to the religious instruction he was
taught at school. Ryou had long since stopped caring what her eccentricities
meant. Any parent or guardian would have quirks of personality; there was no
reason for him to assume that his own should be exempt just because she was in
other ways so singular.
Now, Ryou did his best to follow her suggestion, and settled back in his seat.
He was excited at the thought of seeing Akira again, but letting that
excitement interrupt his sleep schedule would be foolish. 
Turbulence woke him, jolting him out of sleep with a movement hard enough to
snap his neck forward and make him bite his tongue.
There was barely time for him to remember where he was before the first crack
of lightning hit the plane, followed by a second and third strike before the
first was finished. 
They kept coming and coming, like a barrage of gunfire but made of fire and
heat and power, ripping the flimsy metal of the plane apart around him.
The tear ripped through the cabin right below Ryou’s seat, wrenching him away
from Jenny as the two halves fell away from each other. He heard her shout of
surprise and worry inside his head, but only for a moment, and then he couldn’t
hear her.
Everything was darkness and chaos and grinding noise. He couldn’t breathe, he
couldn’t see. His seatbelt kept him tethered to his chair, but his chair was
falling through rushing nothingness.
Ryou knew the exact moment that Jenny died. His mind tore open, one long jagged
slice like a boxcutter to the brain, everything exposed and raw and spilling
out.
He screamed and clutched at the sides of his head, as if he could hold himself
together. It felt like overwhelming physical pain, because the enormity of it
was too much for his weak little human synapses to process any other way.
The seatbelt and part of the ruptured cabin disintegrated to nothing around
him, leaving him falling free and untethered through the air.
Survival instinct almost made him revert to his true form, but even in the
midst of such a maelstrom of chaos Satan knew that it would be idiotic to do
that. The attack on the plane must have been Michael’s doing, and there was
still a slim chance that he didn’t know what Satan’s human form was. Michael
may have been targeting Jenny’s psychic signature, and be ignorant of the
current shape of Satan’s own.
No. No. No. Not Satan. Ryou. He was Ryou. He was...
The shreds of the human identity he’d worn, short in years even by the tiny
scale of human lifespans, clung to the edges of Satan’s consciousness.
I cannot cease to be myself. I must endure. I must see Akira again.
That grounded him, knit the frayed strands of himself back into Ryou once
again. He stopped screaming, more because there was no air left in him than for
any other reason. The horror he felt was more than large enough to warrant
endless shrieks.
Ryou let himself fall and fall and fall until he reached the black waters of
the ocean far below. Now that Jenny was gone, and his all memories were there
to recall once more, Ryou knew that he’d been in this position before.
Then, the waves had eventually carried him to shore, to Akira. This time, he
could direct his course enough to make sure the same thing happened again.
Surviving such a trip wouldn’t be a big enough miracle to attract Michael’s
attention. Hopefully.
Ryou would have laughed at that, if he’d had the ability to laugh at anything
in that moment. What a joke. The optimism of the damned.
He lay on his back on the ocean’s surface and stared up at the moons high
above, and waited for morning.
***** Chapter 2 *****
Even with all the protection against the elements he could provide himself
with, Ryou was barely alive by the time he reached the shore. He crawled onto
the sand and heaved up bile, his stomach too empty to bring up anything else.
His skin was waterlogged and pruned, corpse-white in some places and lobster-
red from burns in others. He'd had to shed his clothes to make staying afloat
easier.
It was night again now, late enough that the beach was deserted. Ryou crawled
across the sand to the small tourist parking lot beyond the dunes, wincing at
every aching movement. There were abrasions all over his body, and sand and
salt made them all sting terribly.
The shower head in the parking lot spluttered and groaned before spitting out a
tepid sprinkle of water over him. Ryou wasn't completely certain that water
intended for rinsing off holiday swimmers was potable, but thirst was clawing
at the inside of his throat and so he gulped it down gratefully regardless. If
it made him ill and he subsequently died of dehydration then he was no worse
off than if he didn't drink and collapsed right there on the cracked asphalt.
As soon as the urgent desperation of needing fresh water was taken care of, a
thousand other demands clamoured for his attention: he was hungry, he was sore
and feverish and miserable, a migraine was screaming behind his eyes.
Most of all, Ryou was weary. The weight of millennia pressed down on his skinny
shoulders.
It had been years since he'd been on this beach, but he remembered a cave off
among the rocks that they'd been forbidden from playing near. The space was too
small and narrow for an adult to get inside, and so children were absolutely
under no circumstances to even think about exploring it.
Finding the little entrance took some time, but once Ryou had squeezed inside
he found that the space opened up somewhat, and that he could stand without
having to bend over. It was cold and dark, the rocky ground uneven and jagged,
but it was dry and quiet. If nothing else, it was safer than the open sea.
Ryou lay down and closed his eyes and slept. 
===============================================================================
A gentle shake of his shoulder woke him. He darted away from it before he was
even fully conscious, self-protective instincts driving him to get his back
against the wall. His hands scrabbled for his boxcutter, lost and rusting out
at sea. Panic made his breath quick and sharp.
 "It's all right. I won't hurt you."
Another child, no larger than himself. A girl, judging by the style of bathing
suit they were wearing and the flower-shaped plastic clip holding back their
hair.
 "Do you want some water?" the girl asked, holding out a refillable sports
bottle. Ryou was relieved to find he hadn't lost any of his proficiency in
Japanese, and then wondered whether he'd still remember it so perfectly if
Jenny was alive. Did the child Ryou really impeccably remember a language he
hadn't used in years, or was it simply that the fallen angel Satan knew all the
tongues of the Earth?
His head hurt so much.
"Are you thirsty?" the girl prompted, an anxious look on her holiday-tanned
face. Ryou nodded and took the bottle from her, sipping at the chilled drink.
If the soul inside him hadn't known better, he'd have thought that the mouthful
of cold water was pure heaven.
"You can have my towel for now," his young visitor went on, her tone taking on
the ruthlessly sensible tone he'd heard other girls use on boys when they
needed gentle bullying for their own sake. "There are real clothes you can wear
back at the house, but you can't walk there naked."
Ryou pulled his knees up to his chest, suddenly sharply aware of his own
nudity. The two halves of himself were split on the issue: Satan didn't see
what the problem was -- bodily shame was part of the flawed, fallen idiocy of
being cast from Eden, and had nothing whatsoever to do with the perfection of
angelic beings; Ryou, on the other hand, had always preferred to wear modest
clothing when possible, uncomfortable with being exposed more than necessary.
For now his human side won out, and if he hadn't been so sunburned he would
have blushed.
"Oh, don't worry, I have a baby brother," the girl told him with a grin,
unfolding the faded swimming towel in her hands and draping it over him like a
blanket. "I've changed him lots of times. My name's Miki, what's yours?"
Memories older than the world stirred in Ryou's head. He squeezed his eyes
shut, as if that could possibly be enough to drive them out. "Do you have any
food?" he asked. His voice was a rasp, and hurt coming out.
"There's food at the house. Come on, Mrs Fudou will give you as much as you
want. They have lots and lots of medicines, too, so we can put dressings on
your cuts."
Fudou. Akira!
For a moment, happiness washed over Ryou, and then dread slammed into him and
left his heart racing in horror. He could remember an end to Akira's parents,
even if he wasn't sure how to fit this knowledge into a timeline that made
sense.
He could remember an end for all of them. This little girl, hardly grown older
at all before her violent death. Akira, whom Ryou had changed into something
stronger and deadlier as a way to save him but who had died anyway. They'd all
died. All of it had ended. Satan had sat beside Akira's body and wept, making
no attempt at escape as Michael drew close and raised his sword...
"You have to get out of here," Ryou rasped, pushing the towel back into Miki's
hands. "You have to get away from me."
She frowned. "You look afraid. I told you, I won't hurt you."
He wanted to laugh. "It's you who should be afraid, Miki Makimura. Being near
me is a death sentence." 
It's all a death sentence. All of it. The Revelation comes and the whole world
turns to fire.
Worry creased a line between her eyebrows and she opened her mouth to say
something. Before she could, Ryou spoke again.
"Do you hate your baby brother?"
Her mouth snapped shut and her eyes narrowed. "What? No. He's my brother, I
love him."
"Yes, yes, of course," Ryou agreed dismissively. "But do you hate him?"
Miki gave a little frown. "He's sick all the time. He cries all night and he
has to see specialists. My parents are exhausted by it. They don't... They
don't have time for me anymore. That's why I'm here for the summer, staying
with their friends. I love him, but I..."
"Resent him?" Ryou offered as a guess. The part of him that was Satan
remembered that feeling, remembered how poisonously jealous he'd felt of all
humankind, God's new special favourite creation, held up above all those who'd
worked so hard for so long to be worthy of that same love.
"Stupid, huh? To be envious of a sick baby." Miki gave a self-deprecating
little chuckle. "Pretty childish."
"You're a child. It would be strange if you weren't childish on occasion," Ryou
pointed out.
"Miki! Miki, where are you? Miki!"
For a moment, the sound of the calling voice was enough to freeze Ryou with
shock, which meant he was too slow to grab Miki before she bounced up and ran
to the tiny mouth of the cave, sticking her head and shoulders out to shout
back a reply.
"Akira, over here! Come and see!"
Akira. Akira was here.
Ryou's teeth began to chatter, as if he was still submerged in the open ocean.
His skin tightened into gooseflesh, and his shoulders shook. 
"Miki, we're not allowed to come in here, it's dangerous. What... Ryou?!"
He was there, standing in the wedge of light afforded by the mouth of the cave,
young and worried and human and alive, soft hair and soft features, not yet
merged with something harder in order to preserve him and even that hadn't been
enough, even then he'd died.
Ryou couldn't remember the specifics, but he could remember that much. 
He missed Jenny. He hoped that she was somewhere safe, that she was all right.
What did death even mean, if the cycle repeated itself over and over?
"Is this world even real?" he asked Akira. "Or is it all just a pageant played
out over and over to punish me? Are you really Akira? Are you really here?"
Akira knelt down, in front of where Ryou sat curled in on himself. "You're
crying." His voice was quiet and gentle. He touched his fingers to Ryou's
cheek, and they came away wet.
Nothing made sense. None of it. But Akira was gathering Ryou in his arms, and
even with all his aches and scrapes and bruises Ryou clung on tight, burying
his face in Akira's shoulder.
"I don't understand," he sobbed. "I don't understand any of it."
"It's all right. You're safe now," Miki repeated again, trying to be soothing.
"No, no, I'm not. Nothing is. And being near me is the most dangerous of all.
You have to-"
"You're delirious," Akira told him quietly. "We'll take you home and my mother
can-"
"No." Ryou pushed himself out of Akira's embrace, staring him in horror.
"Nobody can know I'm here. Absolutely nobody. I need to stay hidden."
"What you need is food and clothes and more water," Miki pointed out. "But... I
guess we could bring those here, without you coming to the house. Just for now,
until you're sensible."
"Get me a knife, too." Even with clothes, he'd feel naked without a blade
nearby. "...Please."
===============================================================================
She brought him a breadknife, long and sharp and serrated. Ryou used it to cut
slices off the loaf she brought, and the block of cheese. 
Akira supplied him with shorts and a t-shirt. Ryou pulled on the shorts -- for
the sake of Akira's modesty, since Miki still didn't care either way -- but
left the shirt off, because it would have been too harsh and painful to wear it
against his broken skin.
"We have to tell somebody," Akira insisted. "Kids can't look after a kid."
Ryou shook his head, swallowing the mouthful he'd been chewing. "It'll be fine.
I just need a computer. I have a lot of secret savings accounts, and I know
ways of making money online. Jenny always made sure I was prepared for any
eventuality."
A roaring empty coldness yawned open wide inside him at the thought of Jenny.
Akira's eyes welled with tears.
"Ryou. You're crying again."
Ryou wrenched himself back from the icy void inside him. "No I'm not. I'm
fine."
"I wish you'd tell us what's happening. Why are boys so stupid about talking?"
Miki scowled in frustration.
"Hey, that's not fair. Girls are too," Akira protested, looking wounded. "Just
because you blog all the time doesn't mean other people know how to say what
they're thinking. I bet most of your friends don't, even the girl ones."
Miki paused, like she was giving his words due consideration. "All right.
You're right. But boys are especially stupid."
Ryou gave a soft snort of amusement. "I'm not certain I even count as a boy
anymore," he murmured to himself.
"I'm the one who found you, and it sure looked like it to me."
"Miki!"
Akira sounded so scandalised that Ryou and Miki couldn't help but laugh at him.
"If I can get to a computer, I can rent an apartment in the city for myself. No
adult ever needs to know," Ryou said once they were done with laughing. "It'll
be fine."
Nothing would ever be fine, not truly, but it would be a start at any rate.
Akira looked upset. "But you'll be lonely."
Miki answered before Ryou could.
"I'll be going back to the city at the end of summer. I can keep an eye on
him."
***** Chapter 3 *****
Living alone was harder than Ryou expected. He had a perpetual sense of bleak
emptiness, only ever as far away as a thin shell of distraction, a shell which
could shatter open at any moment. It was worse than the void of the air beneath
the plane had been when it tore apart. 
What was the point of any of it? No matter what efforts he made to strengthen
Akira it wouldn't be enough in the end. Human lives were so fragile and small.
What if all of it was doomed no matter what he did?
"You're thinking too much, as usual."
Ryou blinked himself out of his reverie. Miki had brought a veritable entourage
with her on this particular occasion, with a friend from school -- also named
Miki, so nicknamed Miko to avoid confusion -- and her own little brother both
in tow. 
Taro Makimura's health had improved a little over time, and now the boy was an
ordinary inquisitive toddler, exploring everything on wobbly uneven legs and
leaving inexplicable sticky patches on everything he touched.
Ryou didn't think of himself as especially fastidious, despite the white-on-
white colour scheme he'd selected throughout his penthouse. Still, sometimes it
was hard to stop himself from wincing when Taro smeared tahini or jam on the
walls.
"He's not allowed peanut butter at his daycare, in case some of the other
children have allergies. So now he's obsessed with tahini and jam sandwiches,
even though they seem disgusting to me," Miki said now, as she wiped away the
latest bit of food-graffiti. She had a talent for carrying a conversation by
herself, a skill that often proved necessary when talking to Ryou. Blogging
probably helped her hone the art of being chatty on her own.
"You both have so much energy even when there's no meat in your diet. It's
crazy," Miko remarked, watching Taro dart away from Miki's attempts to capture
him.
"There's lots of vegetarian ways to get protein." Miki's tone had the mild
automatic defensiveness of someone exhausted with justifying themselves.
"Japanese diets don't have as much meat as lots of other kinds, anyway."
"I wasn't... I was just saying." Now equally defensive, Miko's cheeks flushed a
little as she tried to backpedal from her remark. "I just... You're always
so fast."
Ryou could hear the curdled little curl of resentment in Miko's voice. He
didn't know the girl, having only met her for the first time that day, but was
willing to wager that she'd been the golden child on the middle-school track
team before Miki's recent rise to athletic prowess.
The absurd irony of the situation was that Ryou was fairly certain that Miki's
dedication to running had stemmed at least partially from an unconscious desire
to win attention and praise from her parents, to prove herself as interesting
as the adorable Taro.
Everyone always resented someone else. Satan was jealous of humanity, while
Michael envied Satan's position as most beloved angel, while...
Ryou shook his head to clear his thoughts. These visits from Miki were the best
distraction from himself that his life provided; there was no reason to
squander them by getting lost inside himself while she was here.
He looked again at Miko. She seemed like an ordinary enough adolescent girl,
albeit one with a gaze that betrayed a darker nature behind her normality:
viciously ambitious, a little bitter, choked up with the mess of competitive
admiration that so many people carried inside them.
There were little spots of dirt beneath her short fingernails. A gardener,
then.
"Should I get plants for this place, do you think?"
Miko, surprised at being addressed directly by Miki's weird friend, took a
moment to reply. Ryou watched as she glanced around the airy open space,
frowning slightly to herself.
"I don't know... You might not like the dirt involved very much."
"He's dirtier than you think," Miki cut in with a wicked grin. "He didn't own a
single piece of clothing when I first met him."
Ryou rolled his eyes. "When you phrase it like that it makes me sound like some
kind of hedonist pervert."
"Yeah. That's the joke. Honestly, sometimes talking to you is like trying to
explain humans to a space alien." 
Miko just stared at Ryou throughout the exchange. "Miki didn't tell me anything
about you. Just that you're her friend, and that I wasn't allowed to tell any
adults about you. Who are you?"
"I'm nobody." Quite literally; there were no formal records of him anywhere
since the plane crash. He'd made sure of that. All the expenses related to the
apartment were routed through a Byzantine maze of shell identities and false
documents. For all intents and purposes, Ryou didn't exist at all.
"Nobody's nobody," Miko countered.
Ryou raised an eyebrow. "I would have thought you'd know better than anybody
how invisible a person can be when they live without their name."
She flushed a bright pink, half-embarrassed and half-annoyed. "You shouldn't
get plants here. You'd forget them and kill them."
"You could come look after them for me."
"Why would I do that?"
"I don't know. Why would you?"
Miki gave a delighted hoot of laughter, scooping up the wriggling Taro in her
arms. "He likes you, Miko."
"I'm not interested in girls," Ryou told her, but Miki looked unconvinced.
===============================================================================
So Miko started making regular visits of her own, to tend to the plants Ryou
bought for his apartment. 
"I've never seen any of these types before. Are they foreign?"
"Yes, from South America. I was born there."
"Oh. When Miki said you were from America, I assumed..."
"That's not wrong either. I lived in the United States just before I came back
to Japan."
"The more about you I find out, the more of a mystery you are." The statement
was more complaint than compliment. "But... You've chosen nice plants. They're
pretty."
Sometimes Miki and Miko would bring over board games to play against him, or
puzzles to complete together. He liked those. Other times they'd make him watch
soccer or baseball on the television with them, which he found perplexing.
"I understand competition, and I understand collaboration, but I'm still unsure
as to why people enjoy competitive collaboration," he confessed, observing the
small figures darting across the screen. "Wouldn't it be more beneficial for
the players to each compete on their own individual merit, instead of being
dragged down to the level of inept teammates, or relying on the strength of
others to achieve victory?"
Miki just called him a space alien, as usual, which didn't help him understand
anything. He had faint memories of playing games with Akira involving
competitive collaboration, relay races of team against team. As far as Ryou
could recall, he'd been stubbornly useless at them, refusing to participate in
something he didn't understand no matter how often the rules were explained to
him.
He'd probably made Akira cry. Ryou seemed to have a talent for that, whether he
wanted to or not.
Even murkier and more distant in his memory than his games with Akira, Ryou
could remember watching the children of the tribe he'd been born to playing
games together. He'd never even tried to participate in those. He'd known from
the beginning that he wasn't one of them; that they were afraid of him. Even
when he'd been no older than Taro was now, he'd known that it was his destiny
to be alone. His punishment.
Between Miki and Miko's visits, Ryou used his spare time reading
anthropological texts and journals, or watching documentaries online. For a
while he became fascinated with the Kumari, young girls in Nepal who were
worshipped as manifestations of divine feminine energy. They never spoke in
public, and in private only to immediate family. Their feet could never touch
the ground, at least not until their first period or a serious illness. At that
time, the divine was said to have left them for a new vessel, and the girl was
abandoned back into ordinary life.
Ryou wondered if they were lonely, or if they were pleased and proud of their
divinity. Or if, like him, they'd never felt certain that they really felt
anything at all.
He remembered enough of how things had gone before (if indeed it had been a
'before', and not some other world, or hallucination, or vision of things to
come) to know that he'd completely forgotten his early childhood in the jungle
until very near the end of all of it. This time (if he was currently
experiencing true reality, and not some uniquely cruel punishment set for him
by an eternally vengeful heavenly Father) Ryou could recall a little bit, but
still not very much.
He decided to start discovering what he could from textbooks and the internet.
After all, it was as much a part of his heritage as any other human culture
he'd lived in. Being given a gourd cup full of hot new blood inside his little
thatched palm-leaf shrine had shaped him just as much as the communion wine
he'd tasted in the chapel of his Catholic school, whether he remembered it as
clearly or not.
"I don't know how you can watch all of those. I'd get nightmares," Miki said
one day, scrolling through his YouTube history. Ryou batted her hands away and
took the laptop from her, closing the lid before she could pry further into his
online activities.
He knew she wasn't safe, not truly, no matter whether she knew about him or
not, but he was very good at lying to himself about whether his actions could
change things. The less she knew about him, the better her chances were.
Perhaps.
"I think it's actually quite beautiful," he told her, opening one of his books
to show her one of his favourite pieces. It was an Aztec scene, depicting a
sacrifice to the god Huitzilopochtli. "They cut the hearts out and offered them
up to the sun, to prevent the end of the world. Warriors who died in this way
became part of an immortal army."
Miki just made a face of disgust. "Why can't you just look up weird comedy
skits and vloggers like the rest of us?"
Miko leaned over, pointing to one of the other pictures in the book. "Why are
there butterflies and snakes in this one, instead of a person?"
"They sacrificed those, too."
"They sacrificed butterflies?" She frowned. "That's stupid."
"All religions are, if you want to get technical about it." Ryou grinned at
her. "It's only faith that makes them elegant or profound, I think. But I'm
probably the last person who should be offering an opinion."
Miki shook her head. "For someone who spends all his time looking at YouTube,
you sure have managed to miss the point. Everyone can have an opinion there, no
matter what. That's the beauty of it, and the problem with it."
Ryou sighed. "Not this again..."
"I'm serious! You need to join social media. You're so isolated here. Akira's
useless at email, and now that Taro's started being able to talk I can't bring
him here while I'm babysitting -- he might tell our parents about you. So I
won't be here as much, and Miko's busy too. You need other friends!"
"What part of 'nobody can know I exist' sounds to you like 'time to get a
Twitter account'?"
"Twitter is notorious for how easy it is to be anonymous! Come on, please?"
He shook his head. "It's dangerous."
"As opposed to sleeping with a bread knife under your pillow, which is totally
safe."
Ryou sighed. "Fine. I'll make a Twitter account. Happy?"
Miki gave him a sunny grin. "Yes."
===============================================================================
He never volunteered any personal information about himself, instead using the
account to link to videos and articles he found interesting, or to share small
anecdotes about how his plants were doing or how incomprehensible he continued
to find team sports. 
Despite Ryou's best efforts to keep it impersonal, the pervading sense of doom
that always hung heavy in his mind came through in the tweets anyway -- at
least, he assumed it did, based on how often Miki complained that he was
depressing.
Much to his puzzlement, he quickly amassed a huge following, with bloggers
describing him as "an entertaining persona fusing a backwoods prepper and Mr
Spock" and complimenting the esoteric bloodthirstiness of the hard-to-find
documentaries he linked to.
After a while, he started to feel annoyed at the number of documentaries he
couldn't find online, and created a YouTube channel in order to rip and upload
some of the shows only available in hard copy.
Preserving and sharing data is ultimately futile, of course, he wrote after
pasting the link to one of the videos, but perhaps there's some temporary
satisfaction in making these widely accessible. 
As was becoming standard, the first few replies were all variations on lol
classic and I love you. Ryou frowned at his feed, perplexed.
Then Akira left a reply. It would be awesome if you'd do commentary on these!!
The message was in Japanese. Ryou tended to post his tweets in both Japanese
and English, even though he knew even that choice offered some clues and
context about who he was. But most of the content he found was in English, so
it made sense to share it to an English-speaking audience, and if he didn't
write in Japanese as well then none of his very few friends would be able to
gain anything from his presence online, when it was their fault he was even
there in the first place.
Commentating over a whole documentary, especially when it already had a voice-
over, seemed like a less than ideal way of approaching things. Instead, Ryou
decided to select one of this favourite videos and do a short introductory
lecture to it in both English and Japanese. 
"This old, rather bizarrely animated cartoon is based on Gnostic and Jewish
oral traditions from the Arabian Peninsula," he explained to his camera. He
knew it was risky putting his face out into the world, but Ryou was restless
and lonely and bored, and it wasn't as if anyone knew who the face belonged to,
was it? 
He wanted some kind of connection to the world. It was a weak and pointless
impulse, perhaps, but one that was difficult to ignore. It had been a very long
time since he'd felt properly part of anything.
"The story concerns how the serpent first managed to infiltrate the garden of
Eden. A peacock carries the snake in its beak, after the snake tells the
peacock that all creatures are mortal and that someday its beauty will vanish.
The peacock promises to help the snake in exchange for a piece of fruit from
the tree of eternity.
"While this cartoon specifically doesn't deal with the wider alternative
interpretations of the Eden story, the fact that the peacock is ignorant of its
own finite lifespan until the serpent offers it that knowledge raises many
questions about to what degree the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil is a metaphor for the snake imparting truths that God wished to keep
hidden from humanity..."
The video was twenty-two minutes in English, twenty-eight in Japanese because
of the need to elaborate on concepts not easily translatable. Ryou felt certain
that Akira, Miki, and Miko would all find the topic of discussion depressing
and dull, and that his strange Twitter audience would assume it was some kind
of weird performative comedy piece.
He was right on both counts, but a third group now joined his following,
comprised of academics and scholars interested in debate and discussion. His
view count went up and up and up.
Taro loves the cartoon, Miki tweeted. He says the weird bird is cool.  
Providing weird bird cartoons to his friend's little brother aside, Ryou
wondered if there couldn't be some wider application for his unexpected and
growing fame. He was just about old enough that would have started high school
by now, but that was still very young -- who could say how much attention his
every pronouncement would get by the time he was a full adult? It would hardly
be the first time he'd commanded legions with a word, after all.
His thoughts went wild with imagined scenarios. What if he could hold the dark
at bay by steering the direction of the future? It had been a simple enough
thing for him to bring ruin to the world, in that other-time that haunted his
nightmares, that version of reality where the sky held a single moon and Akira
had been cold and lifeless in his arms.
Could saving the world prove to be as easy as destroying it had been? If Ryou
became a politician, used this unconscious power that made people look at him
and listen to his words...
Humans and demons would always be at odds. He knew there was no total accord to
be found between the two, no matter what the circumstances. Their goals and
needs were too incompatible with one another. But hadn't that been true for
human armies and cultures fighting one another throughout history? Hadn't some
balance always been found in the end, no matter how imperfect it might be?
Diplomatic treaties were just a matter of hard work, of both sides making
whatever compromises they could tolerate.
Fostering chaos and violence had been laughably simple, last time. Turning
people against each other had been hardly any work at all. Could it really be
so much more difficult to do the opposite?
Ryou made more videos, engaged more with his Twitter followers. He began to
plan.
One night, when the darkness pressed heavily on his heart, the video he
uploaded was more introspective and subdued than normal.
"The documentary I've got for you tonight is about Amazonian tribes, a
particular area of interest of mine. When a child is born with deformities,
it's almost always left out in the jungle to die. When twins are born, one is
sent back to the gods. But outsiders who protest these actions are accused of
interfering with cultural traditions. Women are often beaten terribly by their
husbands, but to express anger that this happens is to be accused of
disrespecting their society. How... how do we find a way forward? What's the
answer? How do I make sense of anything, when I can't even understand how to
make humans agree with each other? Is there any point to even trying to stop
violence, when it's ingrained so deeply?"
Akira left one of the first replies on the video. It's not up to you to solve
all the world's problems, man.
Ryou gave a hard, mirthless laugh, touching his fingertips to the screen over
the lines of the comment.
"Oh, love," he muttered softly. "What if it is?"
===============================================================================
Miko was over and tending to the plants on the afternoon when a frantic
pounding sounded from Ryou's front door.  
He checked the security system, surprised to see Miki and a young boy standing
outside.
"Taro?" Ryou asked as he opened the door. "You've gotten so big, I didn't even
recognise you."
The kid stared up at him with puffy, bloodshot eyes. "I was so hungry," he
murmured in a dazed voice. "I couldn't help it."
"I'm sorry, I didn't know where else to go, I need to scrub him off before we
go home, I'm sorry, I..." Miki babbled. She was still actively crying, wiping
at her nose with the back of her hand, the charming put-together high school
student temporarily subsumed underneath a panicking wreck.
Ryou ushered them both inside and locked the door, guiding them in to sit on
the couch. Miko stood in shock, staring at them with the watering can still in
her hands.
Taro was wearing what was clearly his sister's hoodie over his clothes, the
arms much too long and the body too wide. The reason became obvious as soon as
he unzipped it: his own t-shirt and shorts underneath were soaked with thick
spatters of blood. And now that Ryou knew what to look for, he could see traces
of gore around the boy's mouth, as well, wiped away hurriedly by a dry tissue
or cloth.
"We were at the park, and I couldn't see him, and then I found him and he had
a crow, he'd torn it to pieces and he was eating..." Miki broke down into sobs,
followed a moment later by her brother's own wails. 
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he gulped, tears spilling down his cheeks.
"I was just so hungry."
Ryou wanted to fall to his knees and scream. No, no, this can't be happening,
not yet, it's too soon, I'm not ready.
So much for dreams of becoming a politician, of brokering peace between human
and demonkind. The apocalypse was thundering down on them while they were all
still so far from adulthood.
"Miko, help her go wash her face," he said, surprised at how calm he sounded
considering the dark rushing chaos he felt inside his head.
She nodded, her own surprising calm equal to his own, and guided Miki away
towards the bathroom.
Ryou sat down on the couch beside Taro, gathering the little boy into his arms
the way he remembered Jenny doing for him. He felt very, very old. 
Holding the boy on his lap, he grabbed his phone off the coffee table and
selected one of the more versatile delivery services he kept in his address
book. Nothing was hard to get if you had the right connections, and Ryou knew
them all.
"I need, hm," he thought for a moment. "A full cooked turkey, and a variety of
pork -- cooked and uncooked, a selection, all right? As fresh as possible for
the raw portions, fresh enough that they haven't even been refrigerated if
possible. Delivered immediately, of course. And a bottle of Suntory Hibiki; the
fifty-thousand should be fine."
One of the first things that Jenny had taught him was that money made anything
possible; Ryou had rarely been more grateful for the fact than he was at that
moment. With any luck the whisky would help Miki feel a little calmer.
"Damn. I should have ordered you some new clothes to wear. I'll call again once
the food arrives," Ryou said, stroking Taro's head on top of his baseball cap.
Taro mumbled something. "Hmm, what was that?"
"I know you."
"You used to come here with Miki when you were very young. I'm surprised you
remember."
"No. I know you. The... I... The part of me that's hungry knows you. It knows
your real name."
Ryou wanted to howl. It wasn't fair. He wasn't ready.
He didn't care how childish and irrational those feelings were. He might as
well be as childish and irrational if he liked, since it wasn't going to make
any difference at all to what happened next. 
"Shhh. We'll talk about that later, all right? For now, just hold on until the
food gets here, and then you won't have to be hungry anymore."
Placated for the time being, Taro nodded, and snuggled in against Ryou's chest.
The blood on his clothes left stark red smears across the white cotton of
Ryou's shirt, bright as a torn-out heart.
His phone chimed with a new message. Hoping it was the food about to arrive, he
checked the screen.
My parents are going overseas again, Akira had written to him. I'm going to
come live with the Makimura family.
***** Chapter 4 *****
He told Miki and Miko some of the truth about the situation at hand, but not
all of it. The bare minimum that they needed to know was already more than
anyone should have to carry; Ryou wasn't going to burden them with information
that was still unnecessary for the time being. They'd have to learn the rest
soon enough, provided that any of them survived that long.
"Demons exist. They possess humans, like in old horror movies. Sometimes they
hollow out and replace the original host completely, in a manner not dissimilar
to the infamous effect Cordyceps fungi can have--"
"Cut the YouTube ramble for today, ok?" Miki interrupted. "Just please explain
to me what's wrong with my brother."
"Well, the good news is, it isn't that. He hasn't been hollowed out. While the
majority of demon-human interactions are either based on simple predation or
are fatally parasitic, there's a small subset in which the two organisms form a
mutualistic symbiosis, such as that seen with Poaceae and endophytic fungi,
wherein the endophyte prevents disease and increases drought tolerance in
exchange for carbon--"
"Ryou! Please, stay on topic."
"Right. Taro's body is now host to an invading organism. Luckily, the
particular demon here doesn't seem interested in overwriting the body's
previous owner, but instead working together with him. In exchange for the
nutrients it demands, it's strengthening his immune system and other biological
processes. He'll be healthier, fitter, and faster than other children."
"Nutrients... that's why he killed the crow?"
Ryou nodded. "Demons are obligate carnivores. Their survival depends on
nutrients found in animal flesh. Humans, natural omnivores, can opt to be
vegetarian should they so choose. Demons absolutely cannot live without meat."
Miki's eyes welled with tears again. She glanced in the direction of Ryou's
bedroom, where Taro was sleeping after eating a truly astonishing amount of the
food Ryou had ordered. 
The bottle of whisky he'd bought sat on the coffee table between them. Each of
the girls had taken a shot. Ryou was tempted to do the same.
"The other major change you'll see in him is that he's likely going to develop
a violent, conquering streak to his personality."
Miko made a soft scoffing sound. "Well, the meat's going to be an issue, since
the family's all vegetarians, but the rest we can take care of through
enrolling him in lots of sports clubs. Healthier, fitter and faster sounds like
a pretty great trade-off for eating some extra spare ribs, honestly. He's hit
on a pretty awesome deal."
"This isn't a fucking joke," Ryou snapped at her. "People are going to die. A
lot of people. Probably everyone."
Miko went red. Miki poured herself another shot. 
She swallowed it back and winced at the burn. "This is all so much."
"I know," Ryou agreed. "I'm sorry it happened to your brother."
"And you had to carry this on your own." She sounded so sad. "How horrible."
"Frankly, carrying it alone hurt less than sharing it does," Ryou told her.
When Taro woke from his nap, they did their best to instil in him the absolute
importance of keeping everything a secret.
"I know it's going to be difficult to lie to your parents, but you understand
how dangerous it would be for them to know, right? They can't know any of it,
especially that we're not humans."
Miki looked shocked. "What? Are you like Taro, too?"
"No," her brother told her, shaking his head. "He's something else." 
===============================================================================
 
After that, Miki began to bring Taro to Ryou's house each morning before
school, leaving him there while she went for her morning run, burning off a
little of her sadness and restless energy while Taro devoured heaped platefuls
of meat and Ryou checked on his progress.
"This one was scared when it died," Taro commented one morning, tearing another
mouthful of flesh off the raw pork rib chop.
"It tastes better?" Ryou guessed. The boy nodded, clearly relieved that he
didn't have to explain. "Have you had any more fights at school?"
Taro nodded again. "But I'm doing like you said, and only going for bullies. My
dad said he's disappointed in my violence but happy about my sense of justice."
Mr Makimura would probably be less happy if he'd known the 'sense of justice'
was actually advice borrowed from old Dexter episodes and suggested by Satan,
Ryou suspected. Still, any port in a storm, and if it was keeping Taro from
further consequences then it was doing its job.
When Miki returned to collect Taro, Ryou took her aside for a moment. 
"The appetite and need for violence are about at the levels I'd expect to see
after a week and a half of feeding his nature," Ryou assured her. "So he's
doing fine. I realise this may seem an uncomfortable question, given his age,
but have you noticed any signs of sexual precociousness?"
Miki shook her head. "He's always had a kind of dirty sense of humour, but it
hasn't turned into anything different than before."
Ryou nodded. "Maturation rate isn't affected then. I'll keep an eye on it, but
that's good to know. You can take him to school now."
He wondered what Taro's natural life expectancy was now that the boy had a
demonic side. Would he live an ordinary human lifespan? Longer? Shorter?
Then Ryou remembered that the end of the world was just around the corner. None
of them had long at all.
He got out the bottle of fifty-thousand yen whisky he'd bought to calm Miki's
nerves and, even though it wasn't yet nine a.m, drank down several swallows
straight from the lip.
===============================================================================
Life went on. Akira was due to arrive in another three days. Ryou stopped being
able to sleep properly at night.
"Miko's got a boyfriend," Miki announced gleefully as soon as she was inside
that afternoon.
It was rare to hear enthusiasm in her voice, these days. The shadows under her
eyes were as deep and dark as the ones under Ryou's own. 
"He's not a boyfriend," Miko shot back immediately, even as her face went
tomato-red right up to her hairline. "He's a friend who's a boy, that's all. He
likes my gardening."
"His name's Kukun and he invited her to go out next weekend." Miki's delighted
sing-song teasing made Miko's face turn even redder, which Ryou wouldn't
previously have thought possible.
"Be cautious of any kind of contact with new people," Ryou warned her,
frowning. "There's no way to be certain just by looking whether they're demons
or not. Don't forget, Taro's situation is an outlier. Most won't have any
compunction about harming humans."
"I'm not shutting myself away, like you do," Miko snapped, embarrassment
shifting instantly to irritation. "What's the point in being alive in the first
place if we just stay stuck and static? Don't we just have to hope things turn
out to be worth the risk?"
"That's your choice to make," Ryou answered, biting back the argument he
desperately wanted to have. What was the point in fighting with one of his few
allies, when it was all pointless anyway?
Long after Miki had left that afternoon, when Miko was finished tending to
Ryou's plants, she hung around.
"Sorry I got mad earlier. I'm more scared than I let on, honestly. But not for
the reasons you think, or anything like that." She gave a bitter little laugh,
directed at herself. "It's so stupid."
"Miko, our whole lives are increasingly stupid. Go ahead."
"Kukun. My boyf... friend who's a boy. He has this tattoo across his knuckles
that says 'butterfly' in English. It's pretty cool, but... every time I see it,
I think of that book you have. The one with the pictures about how the Aztecs
used to sacrifice butterflies as well as people."
"Well." Ryou couldn't help but smile. "I bet you don't think about that
whenever you meet a person, right? So why worry when you meet a butterfly?"
Miko scowled. "Don't be an asshole. I'm a gardener; I see butterflies get eaten
up by spiders all the time. I don't know why Kukun's tattoo bothers me so much.
It just does."
Ryou wondered if her discomfort was based on some echo from a previous world, a
malevolent sense of deja vu. He hoped not. He didn't want anyone else to have
to bear the burden of memory that he did. God couldn't possibly hate any of
them enough to do that to them, not like He hated Ryou.
That night he got a direct message over Twitter from Miki. Sorry if you wanted
to ask Miko out, but you've had years, so you probably deserved to have her
stolen.
I'm not interested in girls, he wrote back.
After a long moment, her reply arrived. 
If the world really is going to end, you shouldn't hide away from everyone
anymore. It's not like you having a life is going to make things worse.
Whatever it is you're scared of can't be worse than the apocalypse, right? So
you should come to dinner when Akira arrives in a few days. 
It would give him an opportunity to bring an extra serving of meat to Taro in
the evening, as well as the usual morning meal. 
All right. I'll come.
Miki used a string of various sparkly-looking emojis in response.
The other tabs Ryou had open in his browser had much more depressing content
than the chat, however. No matter how much he wanted to pretend that it wasn't
the case, there was no avoiding the fact that the demon activity was happening
more rapidly this time than it had in the reality he remembered. 
What if it just got worse and worse with every reset? What if he'd been in this
same life a hundred times before, a million times before, each one successively
more horrific than the last? What if he was just going to see Akira die and die
for all eternity?
He had a variety of guns and bladed weapons secreted throughout the penthouse.
Perhaps he should use one of them to kill himself. Would the timeline continue
without him? Did reality exist independently of his presence within it, or was
all of this nothing but an elaborate cell to contain his punishment?
It was a moot point, because Ryou knew he wasn't going to commit suicide. The
notion of dying without seeing Akira again, the idea of leaving Miki to cope
alone with Taro's condition, those thoughts kept him tethered to this life.
Ryou wasn't sure he was even capable of being truly suicidal. His self-esteem
was too great.
He shut the laptop and went over to one of his bookshelves, pulling down one of
the innumerable tomes of apocrypha he'd collected over the years. This one had
an illustration of Eden by Al-Hakim Nishapuri on the cover, showing the peacock
beside the door with the serpent. 
Ryou made a mental note to himself to show the book to Taro, who'd liked the
'weird bird' in the cartoon of the same tale so long ago.
He opened now to the story of Moses meeting Satan on the slopes of Sinai, when
Moses asked about Satan refusing to be humble before humanity.
God cast me away, and turned me from angel to devil, the Satan in the story
replied. But it is a temporary condition. Someday I may return to the light of
heaven, despite my banishment for defiance. I work now to prove the weakness in
men's hearts, to show I was right in my refusal to bow before them.
"Yeah, let me know how that works out for you," Ryou muttered, shutting the
book again. The idea that God would ever be kind enough to engage in argument,
to hear counterpoints to His plan, was laughable. There was no compromise in
heaven, no collaboration. Exile was a permanent condition, and only the
beginning of the punishments that the Lord could devise.
===============================================================================
"This meal is delicious."
 Miki grinned, turning to her parents across the dinner table. "From him, you
should take that as extremely high praise. Ryou's usually totally boring about
food, so for him to even notice the taste of a meal means it's amazing. All
that money and he never wants to order nice food or go to restaurants or
anything. Oh, speaking of going places, Miko asked me if I wanted to come out
with her, her new boyfriend, and his friends on the weekend. She says some of
the friends really like my social media stuff."
"Our celebrity's got groupies," Ryou teased. Miki rolled her eyes.
"You've got way more followers online than I do. I bet you've got groupies too,
you're just too clueless to know when someone likes you. Hey, you and Akira
should come along on the weekend as well."
"Perhaps. We'll see."
Taro chomped down on another mouthful of his own meal, still chewing as he
spoke. "Akira, a bunch of Miki's fans online call her Miki the Witch. Are you
gonna have a cool spooky nickname too, now that you're staying here?" 
Akira laughed. "I don't think I'd make a very good warlock or devil, Taro,
would I? I'm too much of a scaredy-cat for that."
"Don't worry," Ryou assured Akira. "Everyone who sees The Wizard of Oz always
likes the cowardly lion more than they like the witch, anyway."
Miki pretended to glare at him. "Hey, whose side are you on here? You're as
heartless as the tin-man." She ate another mouthful of dinner. "Now I think
about it, I haven't seen that movie in years. Probably since I was younger than
Taro."
"I haven't seen it at all," Taro told her. "It sounds weird."
"It's doubtlessly available on one of the streaming services I subscribe to,"
said Ryou. "You can all watch it on my TV sometime if you wish."
"That would be awesome." Akira gave him a beaming grin. "Remember when we were
really small, Ryou, we used to watch Devilman on TV together? And draw pictures
of him? Or, well, I drew pictures, and you'd tell me all the mistakes I made
compared to how the show looked."
Miki gave a snort. "Yeah, that sounds about right."
Taro perked up excitedly. "Devilman? I love that show too!" 
"Great! We can all watch it together!"
"Count me out. That's such a boy show."
"Aw, Miki, don't be like that. It's not a boy show... it's a man show!"
Ryou only paid slight attention to the banter thrown back and forth across the
table. He could remember the action show he'd watched with Akira, yes. He
wondered if its existence was a ripple from the earlier timeline, the product
of some producer's hazy memories of seeing a real hero in another life,
recollections only slightly clearer than whatever Miko could almost remember
about her butterfly-boy.
But... Ryou could remember Devilman existing on television in that earlier
timeline, as well, long before Akira had ever transformed. 
How many echoes of forgotten things influenced their actions in their lives?
How many loops had they gone through that Ryou had lost entirely, that even
Jenny hadn't been able to retain?
He forced himself to eat the remainder of his meal out of politeness to his
hosts, but his appetite had vanished.
After they'd eaten, Ryou, Akira, Taro and Miki sat together in the living room.
Tako, the Makimura family's sleek black cat, butted its head against Ryou's
hand until he gave in to the demand and began to pet it. It purred happily at
the attention.
When Ryou looked up, it was to see Akira watching him with a soft smile.
"What?"
"When we were kids, you used to be so frightened of animals."
"Well, in my defence, animals usually hate me," Ryou replied, lifting his hand
away as the cat climbed across him and settled on Taro. 
"I'm glad you and the animals both know better now, then." Akira was still
smiling. "You've grown up."
They stayed there so long, talking about nothing much, that Taro and the cat
both fell asleep, curled up together against the corner of the couch.
"You should film them for your channel," Miki told Ryou, keeping her voice soft
so she wouldn't disturb them. "A little sweetness to counteract all your gloom
and doom."
"I don't have my camera with me, though. Just my phone."
"Pfft. I'm sure your phone has a better resolution than most people's pro
cameras. Right?"
"Yeah, you got me," Ryou conceded. "Okay, hang on a second."
He stood up carefully, adjusting his angle for the best shot. The little boy
and the cat looked impossibly peaceful together. It didn't seem fair that such
a moment could exist in a world hurtling towards ruin.
"Housecats, like all cats, are obligate carnivores," Ryou commentated quietly.
"That means they don't have any choice about killing to survive. It's in their
nature, and the only way they can endure. But we love them anyway, don't we? As
bloodthirsty as they are, we take care of them, and make them our companions. I
wonder if we'd be so forgiving if they were large enough to be a threat." 
Miki gave a derisive scoff. "You're contradicting the point of filming
something sweet when you add a voiceover like that, you know. You really need
to lighten up sometimes." 
She glanced at Akira, and then back at Ryou. "Why don't the two of you go back
to Ryou's place for tonight? It'll give you a chance to catch up, since you
haven't seen each other in so long. And Akira's room here could probably do
with another night of airing out before he moves in." 
Without waiting for either of them to reply, Miki bent down and scooped Taro
off the couch, the cat still in his arms. As she stood up again, her eyes
briefly met Ryou's own, and she gave him a pronounced wink. The next moment
she'd turned away, carrying Taro towards his bed. "See you both later."
Ryou couldn't believe how ridiculous and hilarious Miki constantly proved
herself to be. Even in the midst of all the fear and strangeness their lives
held now, she was playing at match-maker. How absurd, how wonderful. 
===============================================================================
The two of them ended up lying on their backs on the enormous balcony of Ryou's
penthouse. He seldom went out there on his own, finding the vastness of space
overwhelming to take in. It wasn't so bad with Akira there, though.
"Remember all the fairytales about the moons we knew when we were kids? I'd
tell them to you, and then you'd say that it was all fake, and they were just
cold dead rocks, and I'd cry?"
"Mm." Ryou nodded. The memory was like a double-exposed negative for him,
stories of one moon overlaid with stories of the pair. Two lives, two moments.
Akira was the constant across realities.
Ryou sat up. "There's something I have to tell you. I want you to be the first
one who knows all of it, but... I don't know how to tell you without making it
terrible."
Akira sat up as well, looking at Ryou with wide, concerned eyes. Almost none of
the stars were visible above them, because the lights of the city were so
bright all around. "Something bad happened, didn't it?"
"A few weeks ago--"
"No, before that. Before you showed up in the cave that summer. Something
terrible happened to you."
Ryou looked away, swallowing hard. "It's... a lot more complicated than that."
Before he could say anything else, Akira was kissing him. It was a very
tentative, light kiss, as if Akira was afraid of being shoved away in disgust
at any moment. An innocent kiss, a young kiss.
Ryou didn't think he'd ever felt this young before.
He opened his mouth, letting his tongue slip past his lips to taste Akira's.
Akira sighed happily, his breath a warm soft gust as their mouths pressed
together again, both of them smiling.  
After quite some time (who knew that simply kissing could be so nice?) they
eventually managed to go back indoors, making their way to Ryou's room
together. They held each other's hand as they walked, as if each of them was
worried that the other would disappear if they stopped touching.
They resumed kissing once they were on the bed, but there was an increasing
heat inside Ryou, an ache to touch every part of Akira, to love and worship
this fragile, flawed, glorious mortal body before him.
"I want to..." Suddenly lost for words, Ryou pressed his palm against the
growing hardness in Akira's slacks. "Can I? Just... just my hand, we don't have
to go beyond that, I..."
Akira laughed, a happy shocked sound, and nodded. "Yeah, yeah, let's... yeah."
"I've got... hang on." Blushing at the clumsiness of all his words, Ryou sat
back a little, pulling open the drawer of his nightstand. He retrieved the
bottle of lubricant and was about to close the drawer again when Akira caught
his wrist and stopped him.
"Wait, don't close it yet. I wanna see what kind of porn you use," Akira
teased, eyes bright in his flushed face.
Ryou gave a snort. "Sorry to disappoint, but I don't use any."
"Oh, right. You're utilitarian about food, so you probably are about this too,
huh? Just keeping the body in working order, nothing but biology."
"I'm not that utilitarian, Akira. I just prefer my own imagination to
pornography."
"Well, what do you think about, then?"
Ryou couldn't look at Akira. He felt too exposed, too bared to make eye contact
as he answered in a small voice.
"You. It's always been you."
Akira gave a breathy, shocked little laugh and then they were kissing again.
They fumbled at each other's clothes and at their own, eventually shedding
enough to press their chests skin to skin, the closeness and intimacy enough to
make them both somewhat shy and hesitant.
In this arena, at least, the Satan part of Ryou's self was as inexperienced and
tentative as the mortal element. The only thing that made any of it easier was
undertaking this exploration with Akira. Nothing could ever be absolutely
frightening, so long as Akira was there.
Ryou poured lubricant on his palm, letting it sit there for a few seconds to
warm it with his body heat before wrapping his hand around Akira's length. It
was so delicate, so alive, like all the rest of him. Alive, alive. Ryou could
feel Akira's pulse. It was like cradling a hot, still-beating heart in his
hand, like the offerings of devotion he'd been given by the tribe once upon a
time. This was a kind of devotion to, one Ryou was offering to Akira.
Akira clutched at Ryou's shoulder, pulling him close so their could kiss again
as Ryou found a steady rhythm with his hand. 
"Let me, let me touch you too..." Akira managed to gasp, his own hands fumbling
for the lubricant and then for Ryou's own cock. 
Being together with Akira, pleasuring him and being given pleasure in return,
kissing and kissing like nothing else could ever possibly be as important as
being together... all of it made Ryou feel genuinely, sincerely afraid that he
was seconds away from crying. If anything had ever deserved the shedding of
tears, the sublime happiness he felt in that moment did.
He knew that the happiness he felt was going to make the plummeting misery to
come even worse, the horror sharper and deeper. But in that moment the price
felt worth it. It all felt worth it. Infinite loops, if that was to be his
fate. He'd carry that, in exchange for this. The chance to love Akira was so
infinitely valuable that Ryou didn't feel afraid anymore.
 
===============================================================================
After they were done, Ryou pulled his coat on and went back out onto the
balcony, lighting a cigarette and staring up at the moons. 
He tried to remember as many details of the earlier timeline as he could. The
deaths of Akira's parents would be soon, if events remained in a similar order
to last time. 
Ryou understood loss now, in ways it had been completely opaque to him then. He
didn't want Akira to have to experience that.
Was what he was feeling now empathy? It was so weighty and dense in his chest,
like a knot of borrowed pain.
How many other things were coming that he couldn't recall at all?
He wished he knew how many loops had come before, what he'd forgotten.
"I didn't know you smoked." 
Akira was wearing one of Ryou's own nightshirts, and the sight of him in it was
so expectedly erotic that Ryou wondered if it was possible to avert the
apocalypse by staying in bed for the rest of eternity.
He flicked a bit of ash off the cherry and shrugged. "Hard to think in the long
term, all things considered."
"Will you tell me what you were trying to say earlier? When I, um,
interrupted?"
Ryou sighed. "Mm. Soon. But for now, let's just... stay here. Just for
tonight."
Akira smiled. "Okay."
===============================================================================
 
To: Ryou Asuka, Akira Fudou
From: Miki Makimura
Here's the info Miko sent me about where we're going on the weekend. I expect
both of you to attend. No excuses! If I'm destined to be called Miki the Witch
forever, the least I can do is persuade my friends to come to a Sabbath with
me, right? Hehe!
***** Chapter 5 *****
As the sun rose, he told Akira all of it. 
Ryou started with Jenny's death and worked from there. He told Akira about the
memories and revelations that had ripped a gash through the centre of his
identity, the way reality had splintered out around him as he tumbled through
the howling dark.
He told Akira about the other life he could remember, the slaughter and loss
all across the world. The bitter hard-earned lessons and endless regret Ryou
had felt at the end of it all, when he finally understood the meaning behind
the things that had come before but too late, too late. 
Ryou told Akira all of it, because the burden was too heavy to carry alone
anymore. Because he wanted Akira to know exactly how monstrous and horrible
Ryou was. 
He'd let himself have one night of love. He knew it was more than he could ever
deserve, after all the things he'd done, but he was selfish. And now it was
time to tell Akira the truth, even though it meant Akira would hate him
forever. 
When Ryou finally finished speaking, Akira wept.
For once, Ryou didn't regret making Akira cry, because his own tears were long
used up, and to hear Akira's sobs was a terrible kind of catharsis for his own
aching heart. 
Ryou stood up from the couch where they sat. Akira raised his head from where
his face had been buried in his hands. He looked a wreck, snotty and puffy and
miserable, and Ryou loved him more than all the world.
"Wh-Where are you going?"
"I thought you'd prefer to be alone."
Akira was on his feet and clutching Ryou in an embrace before Ryou knew he was
moving.
"But... you must hate me," Ryou said in confusion.
"Maybe if I could remember any of it for myself, I would," Akira answered,
still holding him. "Maybe I'd hate you then. But I'd love you even when I hated
you. I'm sure that's how I felt, even if I can't remember feeling it. I'm
certain."
"Seems like it would be much easier to just hate me, to be honest."
Akira gave a sniffly laugh, burying his face against Ryou's shoulder. "No
offence, but if I cared about choosing what was easy, I wouldn't have ended up
liking you as much as I do in the first place."
"I think you'll find I'm extremely easy. I was giving you a handjob twenty-five
minutes after our first kiss."
Another laugh, thick and wobbly from the tears still caught in Akira's throat,
but a real laugh nonetheless. "You suck."
"No, we haven't tried that yet, but since you're inexplicably still interested
in spending time with me even after finding out that I'm capable of genocide, I
guess it's still a possibility for the future. I might not be very good at it,
though."
Akira's laughter took on a slightly manic edge. "If you'd spent less time on
ending the world and more time on blowjobs the first time around, you wouldn't
have stage fright now. That'll teach you."
Ryou's phone, which had been vibrating all night with its usual stream of
alerts and emails, gave another shudder across the surface of the coffee table.
"See? You do know--" A yawn cut Akira's words apart. "Some things about
romance. You've stayed off the--" Another yawn. "Internet all night, just to
spend time with me."
Ryou hugged Akira even more tightly. "Loser."
"I'm gonna go back to bed. To sleep, this time." Akira gave a dirty little
chuckle. "I need some time to digest all the things you've told me. You go
check your emails like I know you want to."
"Thank you for staying," Ryou said, trying not to put the weight of just how
grateful he was into the word.
"Don't stay up forever. I bet I like to cuddle," Akira said as he left Ryou to
his phone.
Most of the waiting alerts were retweets of the link to his video of Taro and
Tako which, as was usual for Ryou's uploads, had gone mildly viral among his
strange disparate group of followers. There were also a few messages from some
of his stateside brokers about his various stock portfolios, since their
trading day had been ticking along in the hours Ryou had been occupied with
Akira.
The email from Miki concerning her plans for the weekend was buried deep in the
mix, but the moment Ryou read it he lurched from the mild dissociative boredom
of online communication into an overwhelming and sickening sense of deja vu.
He thought of butterfly sacrifices and Miko's worried glare. 
The Sabbath. That had been the beginning of the end, last time.
Ryou didn't feel sleepy, not in the least, but there was a weariness in him
that made him feel as if all the marrow in his bones had been turned to heavy
lead. He'd read that depression could manifest itself as exhaustion, but he
didn't like the idea of taking drugs on a regular basis, and suspected that
even the most expensive and learned psychiatrists weren't equipped to deal with
the level of defiance disorder problems and daddy issues that Satan could drop
in their laps.
There was a second email from Miki, sent shortly after the first, in which she
said that she wouldn't be bringing Taro round as usual the next morning, in
case Ryou and Akira wanted to sleep in. There were a lot of winking emojis.
Witch, Ryou wrote back. He wanted to have a real-time conversation with her
about the earlier message and its plans, which he knew would have to wait until
later in the day. For now, with the world barely beginning to wake up with the
new morning, there was nothing Ryou could do but wait. 
He went in to the bedroom, where Akira was sprawled out across the majority of
the bed despite his relatively slight size. Ryou lay down beside him, watching
the movement of his eyes beneath their closed lids and the slow rise and fall
of his breathing.
It suddenly seemed desperately important that Ryou bear witness to this, that
he watch Akira sleep for as long as he was able to. There might never be
another chance to do this ever again, because if the Sabbath was close at hand
then soon things were going to change. Akira was going to change. Ryou might
never be this close to this version of Akira ever again, in any world to come.
He kept his eyes open for as long as he could, like he could hold back the
march of time if he just willed it hard enough. But eventually, inevitably,
Ryou's own breathing became deeper and slower, and he slipped into dreaming
along with Akira.
===============================================================================
I implore you to reconsider. I don't know how I can make myself any clearer.
Yet again, Miki's reply came back almost immediately. At least she wasn't
blowing him off, despite the fact his last twenty direct messages had been
variations on 'do not go to the Sabbath'.
Ryou. It's just a rave. I know the TV and news sites make that kinda thing seem
like a scary hotbed of sin but I promise, it's not that big a deal.  
Ryou pinched the bridge of his nose, willing the headache away from where it
was growing behind his eyes. He might as well have been mythology's Kassandra,
hopelessly pleading for others to heed his prophecies, forever doomed to be
ignored.
"Is this my punishment, then?" he muttered to himself.
Akira, who'd been trying his hand at Overwatch on Ryou's rarely-used Xbox, shut
off the screen and turned to face Ryou.
"It seems like you think everything bad that happens to you might be part of
your punishment," he told him. "But... what if it's just life? What if you're
no more or less unlucky than anybody else?"
Oh, Akira. Ever the optimist, until the moment he was doomed to become a
nihilist. Ryou had lost count of the number of times he'd found himself wishing
that there was some way he could protect Akira from the things to come.
In fact, perhaps...
"If I asked you to turn down Miki's invitation, would you? For me? If I told
you it wasn't safe?"
Akira frowned. "It doesn't seem like that big of a deal. I mean, it's probably
not really my speed, but I thought it might be... fun. To go there. With you."
He blushed a little. Then he cleared this throat. "Anyway, if it's not safe,
isn't that more reason to go? To protect Miki and her friends?"
"You'll be more help to me if you keep an eye on Taro that night. I dislike the
thought of him being alone for a whole evening without anyone cognisant of his
affliction in the house." 
Puzzlement flickered across Akira's features and then a frown, as he remembered
that particular element of the insane, sprawling story that Ryou had revealed.
"Is he doing okay? Is he going to be all right?"
In truth, Ryou was almost certain that Taro would be fine without supervision.
For a child, he was exhibiting a remarkable degree of self-control regarding
his new, bloodier appetites. But a white lie to protect Akira would be quite
literally the least of Ryou's sins, so he didn't feel especially bad about it.
"He's doing all right, all things considered, but it would still be better if
you were there, rather than at the Sabbath."
Ryou could remember how desperate his other self had been to merge Akira with
Amon.
Akira had been beautiful, glorious as a devilman... as the Devilman.
But in the end it hadn't helped. He'd died just the same. 
===============================================================================
With Akira out of the path of the coming carnage, Ryou turned his attention to
preparing for his own attendance. He would endeavour to control events as best
as he was able.
He chose his extremely comfortable Maison Martin Margiela Duvet Coat, because
it was outrageously expensive enough that nobody would worry too much about how
absurdly bulky it was for wearing to a rave, and that absurd bulk would easily
hide a Heckler & Koch MP7 and a switchblade, along with a selection of highly
desirable illegal drugs which Ryou would be able to offer to anyone who got too
curious about why he'd decided to accessorise with a concealed submachine gun
and knife. 
The Sabbath was held within the somewhat trite symbolism of a ruined church,
and for the first time Ryou found himself wondering if God could see him, if
God had seen him take communion as a child. Just perversely observing Ryou's
life, without informing Michael of his location. Just watching.
"This is Kukun," Miko introduced her not-a-boyfriend-just-a-friend-who-was-a-
boy, who seemed pleasant enough but far more interested watching Miko's mouth
and chest for someone who was really just a friend-who-was-a-boy. "And his
friends Wamu, Gabi, and Hie."
"Hello." Ryou barely paid attention to the introductions, looking around at the
grinding dancers and writhing young bodies, the drugs and sex and violence
hanging in the air. 
He found a seat off in one of the dark edges of the room and made himself at
home there, dismissing anyone who came too close with a glare or an imperious
flick of his hand.
An hour went by, and then another. Miko and Kukun were entwined together in a
half-collapsed love seat. Miki was dancing with two of the other boys who'd
come with the group, laughing and smiling, but every time she glanced in Ryou's
direction she frowned. 
That was fine. He didn't care if he was ruining her fun with his bad mood.
The gun and the knife weighed heavily on his coat. He itched to use them, to
set off the terrible cavalcade of chaos. Get it over and done with. This
waiting was as bad as the violence to come could possibly be, this nauseated
tension behind his breastbone that was driving him crazy.
"You need to lighten up. You look like you're about to go on a shooting spree
or something, glowering alone over here," Miki told him, standing over where he
sat with her arms crossed. 
Ryou gave her a thin, humourless smile. "There's that witch clairvoyance
showing up again."
"Ugh." With an annoyed scowl, she left again, pulling her phone out of the
pocket of her extremely tight shorts as she did. Hell hath no fury like a
teenage girl posting cryptic subtweets about her shitty friend.
Ryou went back to watching the crowd at large. He kept catching distortions out
of the corner of his eye, bodies with proportions that weren't quite right,
movements unlike those of human forms. But every time he tried to look directly
at the culprit, they'd blended back into the general mass of dancers.
What on earth was he even doing here? At most, he'd be able to get Miko and
Miki and some of the girls' friends out of the line of the worst of the
massacre. He didn't especially relish the idea of killing demons or humans -
- they were all just idiots out looking for a good time and a little pleasure,
after all. Heaven might consider those to be capital offences, but Ryou tended
to be more laissez-faire about such things.
"Miki says you're being an asshole. I asked how that was different from usual,
but she said she was really worried about you."
No. No no no.
Akira gave him an awkward smile. "Also, uh, hi, I guess. I'm here to try to
cheer you up."
Ryou felt like he was going to vomit. "We're all going to die," he said, a
hysterical edge on the words.
That was when the screaming started.
One of the dancers was missing both arms, a messy spray of blood splattering
the crowd around him as he collapsed twitching to the ground, another dancer
gnawing at the missing limbs with a razor-toothed mouth protruding from the
side of her neck.
All around them, bodies were rippling and tearing, shifting like a living bad
trip. The whole world was distorting into new and awful shapes, a nightmare of
eyes and teeth and claws and blood.
The pulse of the bass beat and the whirl of the lights were still going, the
way a chicken's nervous system will keep running even after the head has been
torn off. The whole world was an animal too stupid to know it was already dead.
Ryou grabbed Akira by the hand and ran towards the last place he'd seen Miko
and Miki, over by the love seats and small tables covered in drinks. Their feel
slipped and skidded on the floor, now slick with blood and alcohol and other
sharp-stinking fluids.
They'd nearly reached the others when their way was blocked by a sudden
snakelike demon, whose jaw snapped shut and ripped away the middle section of
one of the young men, leaving his head and a ruined stump of neck to fall with
a sickening thud onto the filthy floor. His mouth was wide open, frozen in a
moment of shock.
Ryou had the gun out from beneath his coat and his finger on the trigger a
second later, firing directly into the demon. Wounded but still mobile, it
swerved away to find less protected prey.
He pulled the switchblade out as well, only to have it immediately plucked from
his hand by a grim-faced Miki, who flicked the blade open and shifted into a
defensive stance with it. Ryou figured that was fair enough; he still owed her
for the bread knife she'd brought him in the cave so many years ago. He might
never have another chance after this to pay the favour back.
Seeing that Miki had armed herself, Miko grabbed a wine bottle off the table
nearest to them and smashed it against the ground, brandishing her makeshift
weapon by the neck. She and one of the remaining young men shoved the table
over onto its side, creating a tiny area of coverage behind it.
"Come on!" she shouted to Kukun, dragging him by his arm.
"But Hie..." he said, voice numb and flat, staring at the remains of his
friend. Miko ignored his protest and pulled him away.
Her face, furious and terrified, seemed strangely radiant to Ryou. There was a
purity in her expression, a determination to save others from the fears and
premonitions that had haunted her. Ryou could tell that Miko was mere moments
away from becoming a being like Akira had been, in another world.
They all fitted behind the overturned table, but only just. 
There was blood everywhere, blood and shit. Nobody ever talked about how much
shit there was when people died. The stink of it in the increasing airless
environment made him gag. So much for ever having a casual smoking habit. He'd
never be able to smell cigarette smoke again without remembering the rest of
this along with it.
Ryou gripped his gun, but held back from firing for the time being. There was
too much chance of hitting the remaining humans out among the crowd. Once upon
a time, he'd seen humans as collateral, hardly worth factoring into his plans
on an individual basis. But now as he looked out at the fleeing, desperate
crowd, all Ryou could think was that any one of them might have plants that
they took care of, or younger brothers that they loved, or someone they adored
and wanted to kiss again someday.
A girl sprinting away was grabbed and wrenched back right in front of their
place of shelter, her bare body smacking hard against the floor before the
demon pursuing her pounced and began to feed. She shrieked and writhed for a
moment, and then went still and lifeless.
Just beyond her were two young men who didn't look any older than Akira, Miki,
or Miko. One of them was seriously injured, perhaps fatally so, and the other
was trying to apply pressure to the pulsing wound, screaming for help that Ryou
knew would never come.
He looked over at Miko with her bottle, Miki with her knife. At Akira, whom
Ryou knew had the potential to become a violent, sublime, monstrous hero.
Perhaps all of them had that potential. But there was no reason that they
should have to be the ones to give up their humanity. Not when Ryou's own had
been on borrowed time for most of his life.
Ryou grabbed Akira by the front of his shirt, pulling him in for a hard,
reckless kiss. Just one more. He didn't deserve it, but he wanted it so much.
He felt like he was going to suffocate from the amount of regret and sadness in
his heart.
He'd certainly learned what it was to be human this time around, and it fucking
ached. 
As Ryou Asuka dissolved to nothing, Satan stood up and surveyed the crowd.
***** Chapter 6 *****
Chapter Notes
     This chapter contains some references to Devilman Lady and Violence
     Jack, but hopefully in a way where it still works all right even if
     you aren't previously familiar with them.
     Also, God is a little different in Crybaby to in other Devilman
     works, and I've tried to hit something like a middle ground here.
     It's not exactly the easiest range of canon to find consistency in!
     The response to this story has been incredible and overwhelming. I
     don't write fic very often, so to be so warmly welcomed means the
     world to me. Thank you for an incredible experience, and I hope that
     reading this fic is even slightly as much fun as writing it was.
===============================================================================
 
Satan's voice rang out clear and loud through the cacophony.
"Stop. This way will only bring ruin and an ending." 
Everyone turned to listen, demon and human alike, all equally transfixed by the
commanding tone.
"Demons must find a way to form a covenant with humankind. That's the only
possible way forward. Surely you didn't slumber all those thousands of years
just to toss your life away on a few nights' worth of glutting yourself with
some stimulant-riddled corpses?"
A demon with a gleaming yellow carapace chittered angrily. "When did you show
up? I thought you perished when we lost Psycho Jenny." 
Satan grinned a knife smile. "I'm surprisingly difficult to kill."
"We were better off without you. Taking human form to learn their weaknesses?
Ha! Their weaknesses are obvious."
"I'm surprisingly difficult to kill, but demons aren't. Your weaknesses are
obvious, too." Satan waved a hand, sending out thin beams of light that sliced
the demon to ribbons. Its remains fell in a neat pile, oozing ichor.
Another demon launched itself at Satan, hissing in fury. That one fell dead as
well, wetter and gorier than the first. 
These actions took no effort whatsoever, not now that Satan had regained total
control. They were easy, nothing. That's all Satan felt. Nothing. Numb. The
bodies tore like paper.
"Are the rest of you willing to listen yet?" Satan asked in a voice as
beautiful and ringing as the church bell of a school cathedral. No further
attacks presented themselves. "A wise choice."
Satan turned and looked down at the children cowering behind the overturned
table. Their faces were pale with reflected radiance and terror. "Miki, please
use your phone to call for as many ambulances as possible."
She nodded, pulling the device out and punching in the number with shaking
thumbs.
"All unharmed humans, and all demons, leave immediately," Satan told the rest
of the room. "Humans who know first aid, stay and help others if you wish, but
know that nobody will fault you for a decision to flee instead."
"This is bullshit!" a demon yelled out, as whiny as a petulant child. "Who died
and made you--"
The attack came out of nowhere, the striking demon clearly trusting that
Satan's hubris was such that the dissenting voice would be allowed to finish
its complaint before receiving retribution. It was the snakelike demon that
Ryou had wounded, its deadly traplike jaws closing on Satan's left forearm and
left lower trunk wing and tearing them both away.
Satan didn't have a chance to retaliate before the creature was dead already,
its face and head reduced to pulp by a neatly-aimed barrage of bullets from
the Heckler & Koch MP7, more lethal than the panicked rain of shots Ryou had
fired into it in the earlier encounter. 
Akira was holding the gun, his face streaming with tears. "Are you gonna be all
right?" he asked Satan, gulping back the worst of his sobs.
The injury was serious enough to hurt, but the pain mattered less than the
melancholy twist in Satan's heart at seeing Akira take up arms. It seemed
curiously unfair that such nuance of human feeling should survive for Satan
even now.
Satan gave a rueful little laugh. "So much for being the invincible protector,
I suppose. Yes, I will be all right. I merely need a minute to rest, and I can
heal myself whole again."
Miki, done with her phone call to emergency services, turned again to look at
Satan. Then her gaze shifted slightly, and she began to scream.
"What makes you think you've got a minute?" Michael asked, and threw Satan
through one of the stained-glass windows staring down at them.
===============================================================================
Satan tumbled through the air for several seconds, trying to rebalance for
flight with only half of one arm and one less wing. 
Michael was in hot pursuit, unharmed and radiant in glowing gold armour. In
other circumstances Satan would have scoffed at such an appearance -- such a
getup was nothing but vanity, the gleaming breastplate and vambraces purely for
show. The two of them were as hardy as one another, equally matched in strength
except for Satan's unexpected injury from the demon.
Armour wouldn't have prevented that attack, and Satan loved being gloriously
unadorned. An angel's form was the ultimate perfection of God's creation, after
all. It seemed stupid to stick armour over that.
Satan could give credit where credit was due, could contain contradictions now:
hating and loving God's actions and choices all at once, revelling in the
happiness of being perfect even while enduring the agony of a breaking heart. 
Human complexity. That much, at least, remained of Ryou.
Satan and Michael dipped and darted, manoeuvring around each other like fencers
in a deadly dance, making small easily-defended strikes at one another as they
each got the measure of their opponent.
They flew higher and higher, until the city was a sprawl of bright dots far
below, the wind roaring and cold around them.
"Protecting humanity? You?" Michael asked mockingly, aiming a punch at Satan's
stomach. "Aren't you the one who said you'd never bow before them and yet here
you are, with a wing and an arm gone for what? The lives of a few grubby club
kids?"
"I must have missed the part where that involved bowing," Satan shot back with
a sneer, landing a heel kick directly to Michael's face.
Michael snarled, grabbing Satan's ankle and twisting it until it cracked. That
was fine, that was fine, they weren't going to be touching down on land any
time soon, so a broken ankle wasn't important. Satan ignored the pain and flew
higher, blood splattering down from the ruined wing onto Michael's head.
Michael flew forward, driving Satan back. Satan glanced up at the stars,
getting the bearings of where the pair of them were now in relation to the
world so far below.
"You're aiming us at North Korea. Not a bad attempt." Always important to give
credit where credit was due.
Michael's grin was bloodthirsty and sharp. "Nothing like a little international
strife to start the end of the world."
Satan darted low and away, redirecting their path out towards the open ocean.
"Really? Not in the mood for an apocalypse today?" Michael asked in mock
surprise. "I thought you'd love that. It's like setting off dominoes. All it
takes is a tiny push."
Michael tried to grab at Satan's other ankle but Satan pulled ahead and out of
range. The air whistled as they shot through it, the two of them moving almost
at the speed of sound.
"Don't give yourself too much credit," Satan scoffed. "It's more like kicking
over a sandcastle. There's no beauty in the chain reaction, just destruction
and loss."
Michael laughed. "You're lecturing me about causing destruction and loss?
Really?"
A sudden burst of speed and Michael had caught up, grabbing Satan's throat with
one gold-clad hand, squeezing so hard the armoured glove began to buckle and
bend.
"Even in the end, that Psycho Jenny creature was protecting you," Michael
sneered. "Want to see what she kept hidden?"
The assault of memory was like a heat-white dagger to the forebrain. Satan
screamed, seizing violently in Michael's grip, every limb and wing convulsing
under the onslaught.
Timelines and timelines and timelines, realities tangled and snarled together
like abandoned yarn. Cruel worlds, barren worlds.
"Not all of your punishments were of heaven's devising, you know. You've always
had a talent for finding your own worst tortures for yourself."
Satan howled as memories of bloomed back into existence. A life as two beings,
a brother and sister, both murdered horribly after long tortures and
violations. In that particular timeline, the boy had eventually died by being
torn in half at the waist.
"We didn't orchestrate any of that for you," Michael explained. "I think it's
fairly easy to guess what you were punishing yourself for, though, isn't it?
Did you really feel that bad about one little murder? After all, you've done so
many others."
Another reset, another timeline. Again born into two bodies, another brother
and sister, but this time the boy had demanded to be raised as a girl instead,
hoping that this disguise would be enough to keep Michael's searching gaze from
finding the angel underneath the human form for at least a little while.
Satan could remember the strange rewarding exhaustion of being Devilman Lady,
of fighting a fight that had felt almost sacred. Both siblings dreaming of
Akira's face, even in a world where Akira didn't exist.
But Akira had existed, just not on Earth. Satan could remember finding him in
hell, that intense earnest expression so dear and familiar even when they were
strangers to one another. They'd touched and loved and found pleasure together,
and even in hell that union had been holy and good and vital. Perhaps
especially in hell.
Always, no matter what, they could find one another. They could love one
another.
"He joined your war on that occasion, you know," Michael explained with
unbridled delight. "I suppose it's easy to hate heaven when you've endured
hell."
The barrage of memory was too much, coupled as it was with Michael's ongoing
strikes and punches, one hand still squeezing Satan's throat. Satan's vision
was beginning to go dark, body losing sensation.
Was this the end, then? Would there be another reset, another world of
punishment, another chance to see Akira die?
Satan scrabbled weakly, pathetically at Michael's wrist.
"You've punished yourself more effectively than anyone else could, you know.
And none of it would ever have happened if God hadn't created humanity."
Michael's voice was taunting now, a sadistic brightness behind every word. "By
all rights you should despise them even more now than you did in the beginning,
and yet... what? You've suddenly decided to play at being their saviour,
protecting them from their well-earned demise? After all the things they've
done? After all that?"
Satan was barely conscious anymore, more injury than form, on the verge of
oblivion. But the answer to Michael's question was easy and obvious.
If humanity didn't exist, there would be no Akira. There would be no direct-
message arguments with Miki punctuated by too many emojis. There would be no
watering can in Miko's hands, nurturing plants imported from the other side of
the world until they flourished. No children who loved their cats, no children
who were willing to keep the secrets of a terrified boy in a cave.
"Yes," Satan croaked. "Who could help but love them, after all that?"
Michael stared at Satan. The hand gripping Satan's throat let go, leaving Satan
to cough and splutter. Slowly, a triumphant, joyous grin widened on Michael's
face.
Michael's next words seemed to be speaking to the endless black of the night
sky.
"I told you so."
And the cold wind and the ocean vanished.
===============================================================================
Ryou was somewhere that wasn't anywhere.
The shift was so instant and startling that it probably wasn't all that
surprising that it took him several seconds before he even noticed that he was
human again.
His left arm was still gone below the elbow, the wound raw but no longer
bleeding profusely. There was enough blood leaking out to make a crime scene
out of the sleeve of his Margiela coat, but not enough that he was going to die
of it any time soon. 
"Hello, Ryou." 
"Michael?"
The angel was bare of armour... and smiling, despite the ruined stump of one
wing and a missing arm.
"No. Not Michael," Satan replied.
"But... how are we talking? Aren't we the same person?"
"It's hardly the first time we've divided our soul. For now, we are distinct
from one another. You are the human part of me, and I am the divine part of
you."
"You might want to consider repairing yourself a little more. You look somewhat
worse for wear," Ryou noted, gesturing to Satan's wing and arm. The other
injuries, from the fight with Michael, were gone.
Satan laughed, a sound as merry as birdsong. "I'm going to keep them this way,
for the time being. To help remind me of knowledge gained through suffering. Of
Akira saving me."
"I'm guessing that means I can't have my arm back either?"
"Don't you want to be reminded of Akira's bravery?"
"Well, I mean, sure, of course I do," Ryou grumbled. "But typing one-handed is
a pain. I guess it's pretty mild as far as our punishments go, though, huh?"
"They weren't punishments." Satan's voice was quiet and gentle. "They were
lessons. But we couldn't see that until we'd learned what they were teaching.
The worst agonies were all things we brought on ourself, as we regretted the
losses we'd caused."
"I don't understand," Ryou confessed helplessly.
"You are my redemption, Ryou Asuka. Your free will. After so much struggle and
so much pain, you chose for yourself what my pride and defiance meant I could
never accept as a simple order."
If he wasn't somewhere outside the physical realm, Ryou thought he'd probably
be sick. "It was all God's trick," he said, aghast. "To make you see humanity's
worth. All those lifetimes, all that horror... it was a trick to make us see.
And it kept resetting every time we failed, until finally we didn't... Talk
about overkill."
"Yeah, God's good at that," Satan agreed drily. "But if I can learn and change
this much, perhaps God can too. We'll see. The fact I'm being given a second
chance at all is pretty fucking surprising."
Ryou blinked. "Are angels allowed to say fuck?"
"You know as well as I do that 'allowed' isn't really a concept I'm especially
good at."
"So, what now? I stop existing, you go back to heaven, humanity has to deal
with demons without anybody looking out for it? Seems like a pretty shitty
ending, I have to say."
"No," Satan assured him. "The demons are sleeping now. Thousands more years
under the ice, until such time humanity is ready for them -- for an accord, or
for a battle. I don't know which it will prove to be. Humanity is always
surprising, after all. That's what makes them so remarkable."
"What about me?"
"When you're finished with your human lifespan, we'll merge into a single being
again. But for now, the least I can give you by way of reward is an ordinary
existence. No divinity, no damnation. Live a lifetime free of those cruelties
we've so often summoned to torment ourselves with. Just be happy, surrounded by
the souls you love."
"Not all the souls I love," Ryou said, thinking of Jenny.
"No, perhaps not," Satan conceded. "But no ending comes without some loss."
"I guess the old apocrypha really was right. Satan's exile was temporary." Ryou
couldn't keep the astonishment out of his voice. 
Then, remembering the 'weird bird' on the cover of his book, Ryou's eyes went
narrow. "What about Taro, and other people who've already got demons within
them?"
"They'll be all right. As human as anyone, with the same chance at a future as
you. A whole lifetime ahead."
Satan held out a hand to Ryou. "Ready?"
Ryou nodded. "As I'll ever be."
===============================================================================
Ryou woke up in a pool of... ugh. A pool of miscellaneous disgusting things,
which for his own sake he wasn't going to investigate into further
specificity. 
All around him the bustle of survival was taking place. Paramedics were
treating the wounded, rescuing them from the violent mess of carnage that had
been a party the night before. 
Morning was breaking, the first rays of sunlight coming through the ruined
stained glass window left behind after his battle with Michael.
Ryou pushed himself up into seating position with his one remaining hand,
shrugging his stained white coat free from his shoulders. He looked around.
Akira was standing together with the others, all of them filthy and exhausted.
Miki was taking charge as usual, deep in conversation with one of the emergency
response personnel. Miko and Kukun were staying upright by leaning against one
another. Kukun's friends, the two who'd survived, were watching Miki as she
spoke.
Akira glanced around, looking at the wreckage covering the room. His eyes
caught Ryou's gaze and widened in shock. 
"Ryou?" he asked. His voice was too quiet to hear in the noise of their
surroundings, but Ryou could tell from the movement of his mouth what he'd
said. 
What a beautiful, blessed thing, to have his name said by the one he loved.
Ryou climbed to his feet and walked forward.
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