CW (!):graphic violence, death, blood, strangulation, sexual violence (threat + past + on-page), coercive/degrading language, dissociation.
Her irises emptied like spilled ink, dull and depthless.
Her eyes were empty, glazed and drifted past the enforcer's shoulder, anchoring to Kuro's broken form.
Rain tapped his blood-streaked temple… and then it happened.
A twitch.
Just once. A barely-there spasm against the wet concrete.
Hikari's breath stopped. Her hollow stare locked onto his hand.
So faint that Hikari almost thought she'd imagined it. But his eyelids shuddered. Opened.
〖please, …Talk him out of me.〗 she begged, not with words but with the ragged hitch of her breath against the enforcer's palm.
The enforcer groaned, grinding against her hip. "Quit squirming, Bi###," he slurred, his lips trailing sloppily down her neck. "Such a delicate Wh###," too consumed by hunger to notice anything else.
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Kuro's world was pain. A jagged symphony of it—the throbbing fissure in his skull, the white-hot agony where ribs had snapped, the suffocating pressure in his lungs. Consciousness was a dim, flickering light at the end of a tunnel filled with broken glass. He fought towards it, clawing through the fog, guided by a sound cutting through the ringing in his ears.
Grunt. Then a choked, silent gasp.
His eyes snapped open.
Vision swam, blurry and doubled. Rain stung his eyes. He blinked, forcing focus through the haze of blood and concussion.
He saw the enforcer first. Hunched over, legs straddling... her. The girl. The quiet one with the eyes like shattered glass. The one he'd promised.
The enforcer had her pinned against the alley wall, her sweater ripped open at the shoulder, skirt yanked askew at the waist. Her face was turned away, meeting his eyes. Utterly still. Empty. But Kuro saw the violent tremor in her shoulders, the way her fingernails scraped uselessly against the mortar.
Rage ignited. Cold. Pure. Older than his bones.
He rolled onto his side, ignoring the scream of protest from his shattered ribs. His hand closed around the dirt on the ground. Cold. Slick with his own blood.
He moved on the ground. Pushing himself closer to her on his knees, one step after another, like a toddler desperately making one more step.
Not with grace, but with the brutal, shuddering efficiency of a predator mortally wounded but burning with purpose. The dragon, a title he never wanted to wear again, now breathing, now awake, whether he willed it or not.
Kuro rose.
He pushed himself up leaning onto one knee, then standing up slowly. The world tilted violently. He swayed. Bile rose in his throat. He swallowed it, tasting iron and hate.
The enforcer was too focused on his prey, fumbling with his own belt now. He didn't hear the scrape of Kuro's hands and feet on the wet concrete. Didn't hear the ragged, wet drag of his breath.
Kuro's arm clamped like a vise around the man's throat from behind, wrenching him backward off Hikari with brutal force. The enforcer choked, stumbling, his eyes bulging as he was slammed against the ground on top of Kuro.
The enforcer's body slammed onto Kuro's broken rib—a white-hot agony that tore a guttural groan from his throat. Blood streamed from Kuro's nose, slicking his teeth crimson as the enforcer's elbow cracked against his temple. Every joint screamed, every muscle burned, but Kuro's arm stayed locked around the man's throat like rusted iron, squeezing.
"Kid." Kuro's voice was raw.
Hikari didn't move. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused—locked on the rain-slicked bricks.
"Kid!" he barked, louder.
Her head tilted slowly. Hollow eyes met his.
"Kick. Hurt this pile of muscle," Kuro rasped, wrenching the man's head higher—exposing his throat.
The enforcer thrashed, spittle flying. "DON'T YOU DARE, BI###! YOU'RE NOTHING!"
"Kid!" Kuro's grip weakened. Blood dripped onto the enforcer's collar. "Wake up!"
"JUST WAIT 'TIL I KILL THIS FU###NG OLD MAN! I'LL HAVE MY TIME WITH YOU—"
Thud.
Hikari's foot struck the enforcer's stomach. Delicate. Trembling.
Crack.
Her second kick landed on his jaw. Precise. Cold.
Crunch.
The third shattered his nose. Blood sprayed her shoe.
"YOU CHEAP PROSTITUTE! I'LL BREAK YOU APART—!" The enforcer roared, slamming his elbow into Kuro's face, breaking free.
Hikari stumbled back, collapsing to her knees.
The enforcer lurched toward her, choking on blood, rage contorting his face—
—when Kuro tackled him backward.
Left fist. Ribs cracked.
Right fist. Teeth shattered.
Left. Right. Left. Right.
Kuro's knuckles split open as he hammered the man's skull, each blow echoing like wet stone. The enforcer's eyes rolled back, fear dawning in the blankness. Kuro's gaze was death itself—empty, pitiless, final.
Panting, Kuro ripped the phone from the enforcer's jacket. Dialed. The boss's voice screeched before Kuro spoke—flat, final:
"Alleyway. Burning Road 2. Pick your rotting pet up."
The enforcer gurgled, "B-Boss—!"
Kuro slid the phone toward Hikari's feet.
Then his hands closed around the man's throat again.
"Death talked twice today," Kuro hissed, knuckles whitening. "He gets neither of us." The enforcer kicked weakly, gasping like a fish on land.
"You go where violators of women burn," Kuro's voice dropped to a gravelly whisper, each word a nail in a coffin. "Deeper, where child predators scream, despised by the damned themselves."
The enforcer's thrashing slowed. Failed. His eyes bulged—terror, then nothing.
Silence.
Kuro's hands fell away. He swayed, crimson pooling beneath him from his wounds. His eyes met Hikari's—no triumph, just exhaustion. Beside Hikari, the phone crackled: "Kuro?! Answer me! What did you do?!"
Hikari stared at the dead man. At Kuro's shattered body. At the blood on her shoes. At the phone in front of her.
〖He meant it.〗
The thought sliced through her numbness.
〖He talked death out of me.〗
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