ren amamiya (au) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
willowandoak) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
personavelvetroomdr2024-06-01 06:38 pm
willowandoak) wrote in personavelvetroomdr2024-06-01 06:38 pm
Entry tags:
my montage of lost things, my shining trinkets of grief
((cw: hallucinations, panic, the general poor mental state of someone with a Palace))
Ren is not exactly at his most presentable. Like, yeah, he's clean and dressed, but that's about all you can say for him. His hair is a snarl of tangles, his skin is unhealthily pale, he holds himself rigidly, and the shadows under his eyes are so dark that it looks like they might never leave. And he knows he looks bad, but by now he's beyond caring. With everything that's happening to him, someone judging his hair is the least of his fucking concerns.
He doesn't usually like to go out, these days. A lot can happen when he's out of his apartment. Too many things he can't control, and too many places that remind him of home, which lately is to be avoided at all costs. But his apartment isn't much better. There's nowhere he can look where he hasn't seen Shido, or Akechi, or Shido and Akechi, or his parents or his orphanage directors or fuck knows who else. There's nowhere he can sit where he hasn't heard their voices. And when he's not hallucinating, he's alone with his thoughts, which is worse.
All that is to say, there was a whole thing earlier where he felt like he couldn't breathe, and it sucked, but it's over now! He's fine. Still, it made him want to get out of his apartment. So here he is, out in Shibuya. And outside has turned out to be as vertiginous and full of danger as he was afraid of, but, well. At least it's different.
1. all the things that i ran from i now bring as close to me as i can
He stands with his back to the wall of a storefront and searches the constant stream of passing cognitions. His expression is fraught. He knows he hasn't really been seeing people from his past, he's not stupid, but the idea of being blindsided by a hallucinatory Shido or orphanage director amidst the crowd is terrifying enough to keep him rooted in place, watching endlessly.
2. gripping hotel sheets with gritted teeth
He's finally escaped the crowds. Curled up on the grimy concrete in a Shibuya alleyway, his knees to his chest and his back once again pressed to the wall, he tries to calm down. Akechi made him breathe, that time when he freaked out in his Palace. He tries to match the rhythm he remembers, but it just makes him think about the Palace, so he abandons that plan almost at once and goes back to waiting out the terror. He'll be fine if he just grits his teeth and endures it. That... usually works, anyway.
Ren is not exactly at his most presentable. Like, yeah, he's clean and dressed, but that's about all you can say for him. His hair is a snarl of tangles, his skin is unhealthily pale, he holds himself rigidly, and the shadows under his eyes are so dark that it looks like they might never leave. And he knows he looks bad, but by now he's beyond caring. With everything that's happening to him, someone judging his hair is the least of his fucking concerns.
He doesn't usually like to go out, these days. A lot can happen when he's out of his apartment. Too many things he can't control, and too many places that remind him of home, which lately is to be avoided at all costs. But his apartment isn't much better. There's nowhere he can look where he hasn't seen Shido, or Akechi, or Shido and Akechi, or his parents or his orphanage directors or fuck knows who else. There's nowhere he can sit where he hasn't heard their voices. And when he's not hallucinating, he's alone with his thoughts, which is worse.
All that is to say, there was a whole thing earlier where he felt like he couldn't breathe, and it sucked, but it's over now! He's fine. Still, it made him want to get out of his apartment. So here he is, out in Shibuya. And outside has turned out to be as vertiginous and full of danger as he was afraid of, but, well. At least it's different.
1. all the things that i ran from i now bring as close to me as i can
He stands with his back to the wall of a storefront and searches the constant stream of passing cognitions. His expression is fraught. He knows he hasn't really been seeing people from his past, he's not stupid, but the idea of being blindsided by a hallucinatory Shido or orphanage director amidst the crowd is terrifying enough to keep him rooted in place, watching endlessly.
2. gripping hotel sheets with gritted teeth
He's finally escaped the crowds. Curled up on the grimy concrete in a Shibuya alleyway, his knees to his chest and his back once again pressed to the wall, he tries to calm down. Akechi made him breathe, that time when he freaked out in his Palace. He tries to match the rhythm he remembers, but it just makes him think about the Palace, so he abandons that plan almost at once and goes back to waiting out the terror. He'll be fine if he just grits his teeth and endures it. That... usually works, anyway.
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A fellow Ren, then, but if they're both Ren... "Drake," he nods, leaning back on the balls of his feet, his yellow eyes looking over Drake. "Hm. Could smell you down the street. Figured I'd take a look. Glad to help."
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Oh, wait. Human sense of smell and taste. Right.
"Your fear. I mean." He makes a gesture at the air around them, flicking his tongue out briefly like a snake. "I can smell it. And taste it. In the air."
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Demon stuff. Right. The idea is a welcome distraction, so Ren thinks about it for a moment.
"That seems like it could be a lot. Like, if you're surrounded by people."
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It only occurs to him afterwards that it's probably a strange thing to say, to admit that someone's emotion smells like food to him, but it's also the only somewhat-accurate way he can reply to that.
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But, like. He might be out of it, but he's not so far gone that he can't hear the implication there. "Do you eat people?"
Maybe he should be more alarmed. But, frankly, he's never been an easier target, and Fiend hasn't eaten him yet. So it's probably fine.
Cannibalism mention
Despite it all, he used to be human. He has no qualms with it (he hasn't for a long time), but he'd rather avoid it if not necessary. And isn't part of his quest to beat YHVH and Lucifer to free humanity from their influence?
"Some humans deserve it," he decides to say, in hopes of... reassuring Drake he's not going to eat him? Yeah, something like that. "Most don't. So."
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"Not quite," he hums. "Just a byproduct."
His face quickly slides back into neutral, eyeing Drake up and down. His breathing has slowed. His heartbeat, too. "Better now?"
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It's an invitation to talk about it, if Fiend wants, but oblique enough that Fiend can also easily brush it off.
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"Yes," he agrees. "Short version. I hunt gods."
And half the time, those gods draw their power from humans. Just the same like any demon.
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"I've only heard bad things about gods since I got here. Like, across universes, they always suck. So it's probably a public service to hunt them."
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He looks tired for a second. But only for a second.
"Don't let them make you hesitate. If you run into one," he says, voice firm. "They just want control."
He speaks from experience, after all.
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He certainly didn't think he'd end up the way he did when he first heard Arsène talk to him, or when he formed the Phantom Thieves.
Well, it still happened. No changing that now.
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Fiend thinks about his Akechi. The champion of Yaldabaoth.
About the puppet Akechi'd become, in the end. The puppet Fiend himself had to put out of its misery, thanks to Maruki. About how he'd been dead, long before that. About how he never got to get his revenge, dying for his sake- for the sake of saving the Phantom Thieves. About being brought back as a bargaining chip.
His gaze hardens.
"Then break the cycle," he says, no, commands, lips pulled into a snarl. "Give them what they deserve. Live. Don't let them have you."
Is Fiend talking about Yaldabaoth? About Maruki? About Shido? Hard to say. His instincts thrum with fury, with the desire to rip something apart. He finally looks like the demon he is, marks brighter than before.
He clearly has strong feelings on this.
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Then his face falls, and he looks away. "You sound like Akechi."
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Fiend's anger dissipates, returning back to the deadpan, neutral look of indifference. He blinks once. Twice. Pushes down the instinctual fury. Drake looks upset. He wonders if he said something wrong, but if he did, he's not going to take it back. It's a truth he firmly believes, that it's better to stand up and fight than to let it happen. To let them toy with you.
Still, Drake must be talking about his own Akechi.
And there's... that nostalgia again. Drake's Akechi must be different from his own, but-
"What's he like?"
It shouldn't matter. Doesn't matter. But he's curious. And, perhaps, can provide a distraction for Drake.
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But how to describe him? Akechi is so complicated, and a lot of it isn't for Ren to talk about. "He's stubborn," he says after a moment's thought, remembering his earlier conversation with Falcon. "He decides what he thinks is right, and he sticks to it, no matter what. Even when he needs to let things go for his own sake. And he's... bent on saving people. Like, society or whatever, but also individual people." Ask Ren how he knows! "He doesn't care enough about his safety. It's fucking stressful, actually.
"And he's a nerd. He reads philosophy books for fun. Very... composed, usually, but in the Metaverse..." He trails off. "He really loses it. It's—" beautiful. mesmerizing. "—hilarious."
He doesn't sound amused, though. He sounds kind of wistful.
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Not all of it; Drake's Akechi is clearly so very different from Fiend's own. He doesn't think his Akechi ever cared about saving society, or even cared about society to begin with, not when it had so carelessly tossed him to the wolves for the crime of being born. Even when he wanted to destroy Maruki's reality... it was selfish. Yet at the same time, he was clinging to his own justice. To what he felt was right.
Fiend can't believe he was so hesitant about it, now. What hindsight will do to a motherfucker.
Drake's wistful look isn't missed. Ah, even in other universes, with their roles swapped, huh...? Fiend doesn't feel love anymore. Not the way people usually do. But he remembers what it was like.
"Great to watch him let loose. Yeah?" he hums. "Thrilling."