You Need a Body Cast For All My Broken Promises ~ (Job w/ Theo ♥)

Theo had had it. Everything in his expression was volatile and dark, an aura of danger surrounding him. As if the horns, fangs, and nails weren't enough to intimidate, being soaked in blood of his own and Oscar just nearly destroyed any normalcy about the jello mage's appearance. Each syllable uttered by this morally deprived and crazed man lit him on fire. How dare him touch his Rin. Dr. Hinami thought she was his? He was mistaken. It'd be the last mistake he ever make.

Theo's body quivered with tenuous control and pure loathing. A bloody snarl twisted his mouth, and he might have even growled. Theo didn't know anymore. He felt the prickle in the back of his mind, Drathir urging him into action. "I'll kill you myself before you hurt her again," Theo's voice rumbled, dripping with venom. He was about to lose control entirely. He was too angry! The pain in his shoulder was agonizing. He hated pain. That said, he knew he had one play before he lost himself and possibly hurt Rin. How could he possibly get to Dr. Hinami and disarm him before he could hurt her? It was too risky. Arguably, this was risky as well, but it seemed like the only option. Petty jello tricks and berserker demon powers would do little in a hostage negotiation.

Reaching up to the slick spot in his black shirt, his hand pressed, as if to make a futile attempt to staunch the flow. When his hand dropped, it was red with his own life force. Inhaling, he closed his eyes and whispered something.

"Drathir taqadam."

It was probably pretty funny to the sick doctor. All of his threatening traits abruptly disappeared, as if he disarmed in surrender. The horns receded, as did the claws and fangs. His eyes went back to normal. Opening his eyes, the icy hues were back, but no less filled with fury. It was the expression of someone looking at a dead man and feeling little remorse in the moment. He let Dr. Hinami have a second of fake victory before the hand of a new person in the room reached out from behind, gripping his head and giving it an immediate twist. A crack. A limp body. Drathir became visible once the doctor fell, shirtless and looking very similar to Theo in full takeover form. "Mmm...it feels good to get a little exercise~"he drawled, stooping to pluck the pocket knife from the fresh body's hand. Looking it over with morbid interest, he stuck it in his pocket as a souvenir. Standing, the summoned demon moved to the bowling ball, giving it a nudge with his foot. "Nice touch."

Theo didn't seem to hear his manifested leech. He rushed forward, arms wide and inviting his lover into his arms even though they were gross with the grime of battle. "Rin, are you okay? Did anyone hurt you?" he asked in a rush, the small pink haired girl being his entire concern for now.


[6577]

As the adrenaline and rage wore off in their embrace, everything started to hit him at once. The curse of his Bloodfang, the bullet wound, expending so much magical and physical energy, the emotional toll of not only relapsing into his old mercenary self but also dallying with his takeover magic...by the time Rin directed him to a chair, he plopped down and would have done so chair or no. His body trembled in pain, and the young man was left to gnaw the inside of his bottom lip to keep from dissolving into a mess. He despised pain. He'd had far too much of it in his life, and feeling it now brought back too many memories. So much pain, so much fear. It was irrational and he knew it. But considering all the unpleasantness already, it wasn't a stretch for his mind to be thrown back into memories of his dying moment and the ungodly pain he'd felt as a flaming fist ripped a hole in his heart and chest like it was nothing but a cushion. Then the pain from battling in seemingly endless darkness against a demon in a fight for life. It was too much. He was trying not to show it, but he wasn't in good shape in any sense. The only thing he could cling to was that he'd helped Rin, he'd saved her...she was okay. That was worth all of this, right? As her skirt fabric pressed against the bloody holes in his shoulder, an unstiflable groan tore from his throat, twisting his pale face into a grimace. He'd lost a lot of blood, but he wasn't in danger of dying. Maybe in danger of falling on his face, but not death.

"Heh...like when Lester dropped that pie on my face..." he muttered, trying to lighten the mood for both their sakes. Soon she was finished and succumbing to her own conditions. The moment of levity died on his face. Leaning forward in his chair, the ragged man tried to get a better look at her. He could see no wounds except the small one at her neck. "What did they do to you?" he asked, sensing that it might not all be nerves. As she stood and stumbled toward the door, he staggered up from his chair, almost meeting the floor abruptly but managing to stay up. Glancing at the amused Drathir who was kicking around the bowling ball still, he sighed. "D-Drathir 'iirjae," Theo unsummoned his demon counterpart, darkness hedging his vision.

Limping along after his love, he paused at the stairs. Blinking a few times, he watched as the staircase split and stopped being able to decide just how close the two images should be to each other. not possessing so much bravado that he'd risk walking down the steps like nothing was wrong, he slowed and clung to the rail. "Ah, we gotta take these slow..." he mumbled quietly, vision further complicated by the troubling images of the days transgressions. He shook his head, sending onyx strands fanning every which way. Maybe he'd take the stairs by feel, using his foot to make sure the step was where it should be.

At the bottom, the opening was a mess. Sparks flew from the keypad wires where they had connected to the door and gears. Speaking of gears, those were strewn about. The door wasn't too far away, pried from the industrial hinges and clawed straight through before it was viciously mangled. Not too far from it was most of a body of Oscar, and the sight of it made Theo double over and barely resist purging the breakfast he'd eaten. He'd done that.

"Uh...l-let's teleport... can you..?" he asked, turning away and trying to fake a brighter expression. Theo didn't want Rin to feel bad. This was something she needed, and he'd do it again. It was scary to say, but he had no doubt that he'd do this the same way if he'd had to. It was for her. He'd do anything for her.


[7254]

Theo might have been three sheets to the wind by the time they got home, but Rin's desperate dash to the bathroom had his adrenaline up. He raced as fast as he could after her, the limp and dizziness hindering him and causing him to skitter onto all fours a couple times, but soon he was pouncing inside the bathroom. Rin was laying on the floor. So still. She'd lied. Panic numbed the pain, and determined fingers rolled her over and searched her lying body for a wound or something. Their foe had been a doctor, so maybe it was a different type of wound, or a substance? Checking obvious areas like her neck and arm. Seeing nothing but the tiny cut on her neck, he grunted in aggravation and started looking elsewhere. Pulling down her shirt collar, he saw it. A small red dot in the no man's land between her neck and arm, a small puncture. His sharp eyes stared at it. They'd given her something. It could be any number of deadly concoctions, and he felt the panic rise even more.

"Lily, they dosed her with something," he barked, bloody hands shaking as he tried to think of what to do. "Ah.." he stammered, trying to think clearly. Hands ran through his hair, he anguished. "I can't even go back and ask what it was because the doctor is dead!" shouted the fearful man, nearly punching the toilet in frustration but thinking better of it. All he needed was a broken hand. "What would they have given her to make her transform back against her will? How do we help her!" Theo lamented, gathering her into his arms and rising them both up on unsteady legs. He narrowly got her onto her bed, the weakness in his injured shoulder making even her light body feel like a ton. "What do we do?!" he cried, leaning down to check for heart beat and listen for breathing.

Hindsight was 20/20, so it was only natural that he started to berate himself for not stopping this whole operation this morning. It'd been a bad idea from the start. No revenge was ever worth it from his experience, but what good was having that experience if you didn't act on it to help yourself or others. He hadn't learned from his mistakes at all! No, he'd just repeated him, and though they'd more or less accomplished what they planned, would her life be the price? "Rin! Rin? Can you hear me?" he asked, touching her cheek and giving it a desperate pat.

[8008]

"Shhh.." quieted her lover, relieved that she was conscious but still worried about the effects of whatever she was given. "I can wait. I'm tougher than I look..." Theo smiled, getting her re-situated back in bed. Those simple movements alone were enough to have him nearly panting. Now that he was running out of adrenaline, it was catching back up with him. Maybe he wasn't as tough as he used to be. These years of peaceful times had changed him, perhaps. He was now less conditioned to functioning with serious wounds. Anticipating his own drop looming on the horizon, he shakily claimed the towel she'd had earlier before crawling into bed beside her. He didn't want to bleed on her bed and her makeshift bandage from her skirt was soaked through. Smoothing the towel down under where his shoulder would lay, he plopped down beside her heavily with a groan. Reaching out to hold her hand, Theo began the struggle of staying awake himself, just to make sure Rin stayed okay. That's all he could do.

Truth was, he'd never been shot before. Guns were largely still unfamiliar to him and a little scary, and as much as he hated and feared pain, he wasn't sure if it hurt worse than anything else he'd endured. He'd been shot with arrows many times, and while they didn't burn like a bullet did, they were often nastier because the arrowhead didn't go all the way through and would get stuck. Extra damage would be done if they were ripped out, so they had to be carefully removed later. However, the pro was that if they were left in, it staunched the bleeding. Bullets seemed to leave nice holes to bleed freely from, so that classified it like a projectile blade in his mind, and less like a bow and arrow combo.

"Lily," Theo muttered, weakly waving his hand to try and get her attention. "Can you...go get the..uh...the medics?" he asked, voice trembling. The young man fought the blackness with everything in him, not only so he could care for Rin, but because he knew what he'd see when he closed his eyes. So many faces...with some new ones to add to the lineup. Rolling against her side, he leaned his forehead against her shoulder, as if the contact would alert him to any changes in her condition. "We're okay..." he whispered. "We're gonna...be...."

It was kinda funny. They'd ended up back where they started-- in bed. Yet their conditions couldn't be any more different. As far as he knew, Rin was either overdosed on something or poisoned, and his body was battered and bruised and a little low on blood. The blood flow from his shoulder had slowed, but not stopped. He had scrapes, bruises, and cuts on his face and body from punches and kicks. If not for his trump card, Oscar would have eventually won that battle. Kid was just as deadly with a knife as he was with a gun. As his consciousness left him laying there beside her, the kid was just one of the people he thought about.

***

Unconsciousness wasn't kind to him. It dumped him back into the blackness of his experience in the afterlife. He could hear Drathir's chilling laugh, feel the terror of not knowing where he'd strike. The endless battle with no rest, just narrowly escaping a fatal blow. But then it came. Drathir's fist bursting though his chest like the blow that had originally murdered him, only from behind. He looked down to see his own clawed hand, gripping his heart that weakly pounded. Where had the light come from? Looking up, he saw a hellish landscape. Theo was standing on a black stage, fire all around and slowly burning inward to him. He needed to move! But..he couldn't. Looking down again, the claw and heart was gone and instead he saw rope. The post at his back was rough and full of splinters, and he was tied tightly to it. Peering out again, he now noticed a crowd. Most were dressed in time-dated yukatas and wrappings to protect from desert winds. Would he ever be able to forget the faces of the lives he'd ended? Shady aristocrats, assassins, thieves... merchants, women of the night who knew too much, a father who wouldn't give up his supplies. Pirates, nobles, friends. Sanders. Oswald. Oscar. Dr. Hinabi. All had torches and formed a line, tossing the flames one by one into the already growing blaze that hungered for his flesh. They laughed. They cried. The swore at him and taunted him.

The flames consumed him, leaving him to shriek until his vocal chords gave out. A moment of blackness. Flash! The light blinded him, but he was no longer on fire, nor in the netherworld. He stood back in the town, under the oppressive shadow of the colosseum. Rin was screaming. The kids were all outside, some running at him, others ganged on Rin. He tried to get to her, but there were too many. They were too strong. Her screams ripped out his broken heart all over again, hurting far worse than all the bullets and knives in his skin. His vision went red, and when he came to, there was something heavy in his hands. He knew what it was. Willing it not to be so, he shut his eyes, as if to take control of his own nightmarish torment, and was vaguely pleased that the weight went away. But...now there was something else. It was warm. Wet. Cracking his eyes open, Theo nearly became ill right there. Bloody claws in the neck of his lover, a disturbing mirror of Tomoe's fate. Feverishly trying to cover the slashes and keep her blood inside her, it was futile. Rin gurgled, glaring hatefully up at him with tears streaming. The look of betrayal, the ultimate agony as a loved one brings death and frees the soul. Theo screamed, a sound so dark and deep that it should have torn the heavens with its thick emotion. All the kids they meant to save surrounded them, clearly dead and screaming along with him until the whole dream ripped like an old film strip.

It was white. The nothingness was soothing. Could he just....stay here? Not exist? Just alone in the endless white, where he couldn't hurt anyone and no one could hurt him...a merciful end. But no, even here, there was no rest. "Why did you do that?" a dream version of Lester asked, voice calm as usual. He sat in a chair, pruning a small plant on a table. Rin was perched on the arm of the chair, frowning at him. "Do what?" Theo asked, self conscious as he stood alone under their judging gazes. "You said you'd changed...but look at all of that mess," he said, vaguely motioning somewhere behind Theo. The jello mage turned, gasping horror at the pile of gore in the distance. "You were supposed to have changed. Become a legal mage. You can't even do that. What does that make him, Rin?" Lester asked the angry girl at his side. She wouldn't even let her eyes touch her lover. "Worthless," she spat, and Lester nodded, sending ivory feathers into his face. As much as Rin scowled, an odd smile stretched across Lester's pale lips. "Mhm. Worthless. What do we do with stems that become worthless to the plant as a whole?" the sugar slayer asked, picking up a sharper pair of snips. His attention seemed to be entirely on the plant, but Theo knew what was happening. "Prune it," Zulu smirked, lounging her way into the guild master's lap. "Good girl," the florist praised, inching a florist's weapon toward the base of the plant. "This poor darling is too far gone. Best to snip it and let it start anew, don't you think?"

Now that Theo was turning his eyes on the plant in hopes that maybe they truly were speaking about the small pot of leaves, he noted that it was...him. His body was brittle and brown, with sickly and shriveled leaves sprouted all over. As soon as his brain fathomed it, now he really was in the dirt, staring with wide wooden eyes up at a giant Lester. Those watermelon eyes were almost kind, like he was doing a great favor. Whether it was for Theo or for the world, it didn't matter. As his roots were sheared by the snips, he yelped and fell stiffly back, dissolving and turning back into dirt.


[9434]

When he reformed, Theo was mistaken to think he had been indeed made anew. He didn't feel Drathir or any of his former darkness. In fact, if he tried to think about it, his brain snapped back to blank. It was so peaceful. Hues dancing around, he noticed he was in a white room. Not the blank white room with nothing in it at first until Lester and Rin appeared, no, this was like a...garden. Only every plant, every speck of dirt, every molecule of air was clear or white. A pure white light blazed overhead, and the sky was nothing but white with white clouds. Birds were white, woodland creatures, centipedes, all pure white. As odd as it was, after screaming his guts out and feeling every bit of physical and emotional pain a human could fathom and somehow beyond, this was a welcome place. The only color in this place was his skin. His hand was pale but still flesh as it reached out to touch a peculiar rose. White roses weren't strange, but white roses with white stems, leaves, thorns were. This was a rose garden. Endless rows of white rose bushes radiating from the center, which he approached slowly.

Most gardens held a fountain or gazebo in the center, but this one held a large mirror. Theo padded on naked feet to it, appreciating how ornamental it was. The carving around the edges was elaborate and dainty, so much so that he was afraid to touch it lest it break. When he finally got around to the reflection, the image startled him. He was dressed in a white yukata, pure like the rest of the garden. His hair looked shocking against it, any color would. The front of his garment was parted. Something caught his eye...or rather, the lack of something. Spreading the luxurious fabric, he noticed his torso was blemish free, smooth as the day he was born. It was a new body, pure and happy, untainted by the bad decisions and fateful encounters a human made as they plundered through life. Joy overtook him, and happy tears trailed down his cheeks. Could he really have a new start, and maybe do it right this time? The relief was so strong, he almost danced off into the glittering whiteness.

Something caught his eye in the mirror. His joy was short lived. The reflection morphed into his old self, covered in scars. It merged with Drathir, then stepped from the mirror as if it had been water the entire time. The second Theo stood beside the first, letting the drastic difference the mirror showed wash over him. The comparison was disgusting. Slowly faces of the dead appeared in the mirror, and for every face his pure body was cut by his dirty one, and one-by-one the white roses turned red with blood until all of them were bleeding. Then they grew black and all the petals oozed unto the ground until it was all black and the floor disappeared, sending him falling into the endless abyss...

***

"AAUGH!"

Theo jolted awake, just a small sample of his dream screaming passing his lips before he stifled it. Bleary eyes blinked and his chest heaved as it slowly trickled into his mind that he wasn't dead, and all that hell had been just a dream. Maybe. He was too scared to take his eyes from the familiar ceiling. How is a ceiling familiar, you ask? Well, you see...there were spider guts just to the left of the light from one he's smashed for Rin days ago, but had been too weirded out himself to clean it off. So now the smear hung overhead to remind him of his bravery, yet also mock him in death. He really needed to clean it off...

Turning his head to look at Rin, he probably seemed extremely weirded out, yet almost relieved. She was alive...and as of yet, neither she nor Lester were about to prune him away. Now his body tried to move toward her, but that was wrong. So wrong. "Nnngh..." he groaned, muscles tensing in pain. It was sharp and fresh, but despite that he felt better. Less like he was walking on a waterbed bladder floor, which was good because he wasn't walking, he was laying. He could taste the ointment on his busted lip. It was bitter. The medics must have been here.

"Rin...are you okay?" he demanded, chiding himself for passing out at such a time. Some lover he was. She could have died in her sleep...and so could he. They could have both died in their sleep because he just crawled into bed and passed out. A frown tugged at his lips. "I'm not...dead am I? Or dreaming?"


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