Chapter Text

2: Genesis

"Hayakawa-kun," she says. "Do you know about the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum physics?"

Aki looks at her blankly. It's a stroke of luck that the room they've put him in has a window to blow smoke out of, and another that the nurses never catch him.

Makima's visiting him. It's not like her. She's usually too busy, and even then, a hunter getting hospitalized isn't anything to write home about. It would've made him feel special, before. Now he's not sure what he's feeling. Scared, maybe? Helpless? None of the words feel right. He does know that he's feeling the waffled bedsheets in his palms, and they're itchy and uncomfortable. Cicadas are droning outside. Makima's a smile in the corner of his eye, sitting there in the chair meant for family members.

"See, Hayakawa-kun, the rules that govern light and matter aren't the same ones that apply to people like you and me. It's just not common sense." She reaches over to the side table and takes a sip of her tea. The bag's label is still hanging over the side of the styrofoam cup. "Many physicists have attempted to find interpretations of these rules that make sense. To laymen, all of these interpretations sound crazy. But as a devil hunter, you should know that crazy doesn't necessarily mean something is bad or wrong."

Under his bandages, Aki's missing eye throbs. It was a clean expulsion, they said— no leftover tissue for the enucleation process, even, and instead just a neat, if-traumatic, separation from his extraocular eye muscles. Like his head just decided to push it out. The prosthetic implant they've put in there to keep his socket from healing over feels heavy, even through the layers of anaesthetic and pain medication— heavier than his real eye ever did.

"The theory is usually accredited to an American named Everett in the mid-1950's, but technically, Erwin Schrodinger came up with it independently with his cat problem some years earlier. Everett then refined the concept of the two universes by introducing the idea of one that splits endlessly into different versions of itself at every divulging path," continues Makima monotonally, setting her cup down. Aki's only half-listening, and she probably knows this. "Dewitt in the 1970's then popularized the interpretation of our reality being a multiverse made up of an infinite superposition of universes, and he called this his Many Worlds."

He wants to ask about the Angel Devil. Wants to ask about what he might've done, on the beach. What a contract with such a devil might look like. Makima is usually his source of information for these things, and it's not like Angel is anywhere to be seen— in Aki's hazy memory, of when he lived this day the first time, though obviously without the impromptu trip to the hospital, he remembers Angel being there. On patrol with him, on that street with the still-smoking devil and the burst hydrant. He complained about having to do more laundry. When Aki awoke this time, Angel wasn't there.

A long chain of ash from the end of his cigarette falls suddenly, onto the crisp white bedding. Aki stares at it for a moment— he honestly forgot the thing was in his mouth— and then wipes the ashes away to nothing with the back of his hand.

He can't ask Makima, though. Not after what the Future Devil showed him, after what Angel said. Makima killed you. He saw it with his own missing eye. He doesn't remember a thing after he spoke to her on the beach, after he told her he'd make any contract; her hypnotic eyes cast down upon him and it was like she simply slid him out of the captain's chair inside his head and grabbed the wheel. According to Future's final vision, she used him and Angel as vessels of power in her tug-of-war over Gun. Worse— she used Aki to get to Denji.

A part of him has known this for a long time. That Public Safety is just a rats' nest of people vying for control of each other, of people acting out this pantomime of a real workforce when really, half their agents are there because they have a hard-on for killing people and the other half are there for revenge. Everyone's just going through the motions in a huge game of fucking each other over, and Aki's position in Public Safety was no different. He was just using Denji to get to the Gun Devil, he told himself, and in the same breath, he told himself that Makima pairing the two of them together was more of the same— Makima using him and facilitating his use of Denji.

He was wrong, obviously. It's like a veil's been drawn back over his face and he's seeing clearly for the first time in years. Thinking about it feels like a pit opens up in his stomach. He can't fucking believe it. That he'd be so stupid. That he thought— that he actually liked her, for helping him, and for seeing him as useful in that way, for at least being transparent and cooperative in their goal of destroying Gun. He can't believe he ever thought that Makima saving his life and establishing their little household and their positions together in Public Safety as something helpful, and not just another thing she had control of and could destroy at any time. That she would ever think of anyone besides herself.

She knew from the start that Aki was weak. She knew, even when Aki himself couldn't accept that he cared and deliberately manipulated that weakness— sandwiching the three of them together to create this bond that she could break apart like some horrible chemical reaction. She knew what he was going to say on the beach before he'd even tugged his shoes on that morning and that's why she was dressed like that and fuck, she's been looking down on him this whole fucking time!

Aki Hayakawa thinks all of this and has to keep it to himself. Makima is just a few feet away from him, watching him like a particularly disinterested hawk. He's thankful for the medication, once again, for making all of his realizations feel far away and less important than they are. So, he doesn't ask Makima about Angel, or about what's happened. But it feels like tightrope walking, trying not to.

"Under this interpretation, there are infinite versions of you and me, and Power-chan and Denji-kun," Makima has continued, as if she was politely waiting for him to finish his train of thought. "A universe for every different arrangement of particles in existence. There could be worlds where you and I never met, or ones where devils don't exist at all. You could go so far as to say that any work of fiction in our world could be another world's reality."

She smiles. "You could be James Bond."

"Bond…?"

"Or Spider-Man."

"Spider-Man…" echoes Aki again, dumbly. "Why are you telling me this?"

Makima's smile grows a little cheeky, and she produces a magazine from under her arm, from the stack of reading material provided by the hospital. Some monthly science rag. The cover is a stock image of neurons and a glowing, bald head. "I thought it was interesting."

Aki stubs his cigarette out against the bed's metal railing. The words just fall out of his mouth, and he has to hope it's what she wants to hear. "The Future Devil broke our contract."

The red-haired woman hums in thought. She crosses and uncrosses her legs. "I see," she says, eventually.

Aki scoffs. "You're not going to tell me that's impossible?" he asks. He wonders what would've happened, if he'd lost the eye naturally, like in an accident or something. Whether it would've null-and-voided his contract with Future, too. Like this, though— for a supposedly all-knowing being to turn tail and eject itself out of his head… It's kind of like admitting it was wrong. "I've never heard of anything like this happening before."

"You're right. I don't understand it, but I have no choice but to accept it despite that. What I do know—" She traces the rim of her cup with a perfect finger, and looks at Aki with those terrible, devilish eyes. "— is that something very strange has happened, Aki-kun."

—

The city's a blur of blue and white and orange out the car window, traffic lights and neon signs reflecting off the wet tarmac— with all the light pollution, it's like the night sky has swapped places with the ground. Kishibe's escorting him back to the apartment, and he's little more than an arm placed lazily on the wheel and a frown in the rear-view from where Aki's sat feeling small in the back seat. Not even the stink of bleach and the stack of tree-shaped air fresheners hung on the dash get rid of the smell of blood, soaked into the cushions and the floor mats. The car smells just like the damn hospital.

"The Angel Devil hasn't been seen since he was on patrol with you," Kishibe mutters, not even trying to sound casual. Doesn't even have the decency to preface it with a hi, how are you, sorry about the eye, by the way— "Any idea where he might be? It's a serious breach of his contractual obligations."

Their eyes meet in the mirror. Anxiety continues to roil away in Aki's stomach. It tells him to lie to Kishibe.

"He's always saying how much he hates his job. I wouldn't be surprised if he saw his out when I got injured and ran."

One of Kishibe's eyebrows crawls up his forehead like a catterpillar. "He seem particularly flighty to you?"

Aki shrugs. The motion makes his wound throb and the world spin. "No, but— never trust a devil."

The words sound hollow, even to him. 'My nurse told me that Aki Hayakawa is Public Safety's number one devil hater,' Angel told him, what feels like yesterday, after Aki helped him put his shirt and jacket on without arms. 'Looks like you're much different than the rumors say.'

He wonders what that nurse had thought of him, visiting the maimed Angel with his head low and his sword on his back. She probably thought he was there to kill him. For being weak. For proving he wasn't a useful tool for Public Safety anymore. He wonders what she would've thought, if she'd overheard their pathetic conversations.

The older man settles back into the driver's seat with a sigh, gone husky from decades of chain-smoking. It's like a glimpse into Aki's future— or, he guesses it's not, actually, because he's seen the future and knows exactly how it goes already, and he doesn't have months, let alone decades, to build up his burgeoning smoker's lung. He thinks back to what Makima said, about endless worlds and endless possibilities. It's a glimpse into the future of a different Aki.

"You're one of our best, Hayakawa. If something happened, you can tell me."

It's too many words to say you're lying. It's fine, thinks Aki— Kishibe can be suspicious of him all he wants. It's not like Aki knows much more than he does, anyway, at least about Angel.

"I'll be sure to tell you if anything comes up, sir."

The old hunter's grunt sounds like a threat. "You do that."

—

Aki's at the apartment door, with his finger poised to press the doorbell. There's a sliver of light coming from underneath it, illuminating his scuffed shoes in a soft, homely orange. He can hear Power and Denji moving around in there. He can't bring himself to ring the damn bell. It's like someone's holding his hand back, or there's a forcefield around the little button that won't let him get any closer. His hand is shaking— he just can't do it. Kishibe drove off at least five minutes ago. He's just standing in front of his own door like some kind of vagrant, mapping the network of sweat droplets forming on his neck. He can see the other side of the door, in his mind's eye. Denji is in the hallway holding the phone to his ear. He's got this look on his face, like he's in so much disbelief it's become funny. The doorbell rings. Once. Twice. Three times, then five, then eight, more and more and faster and faster and over and over and over and over—

'Topknot still hasn't come home, remember?'

His vision tunnels. In shock, maybe, or fear. With his one eye, it's— it's not—

Aki swallows thickly. It's hard, to even get his body to listen to him over a stupid fucking motion like swallowing his own spit.

It's not unlike staring down the barrel of a gun.

The door opens. It's Power. The light in the genkan makes her hair glow like a halo.

"Aha!" she exclaims, wearing a triumphant expression. "You think you can hide, but I can smell you!"

Her grin falls as she looks over him, the bandages, the hounded hunch of his shoulders, the greasy hair falling around his ears and chin. Denji's head comes around the corner at the end of the hall.

"Woah," he goes. Completely without tact, as always. "Man, what happened to you? You look like shit!"

It's not like Aki can disagree. He spent the whole ride back from the hospital trying not to look at the ghostly reflection in the window. Nyako, having come to the door with Power, is tangling herself around Aki's feet. The girl herself— she looks so nervous. She looks— in the open doorway like that, her mouth tight and her eyes unsure, darting up to his face and away again— she looks— she looks like— the cake box is only a little crumpled— theres's only a little icing stuck to the sides— she tried her best to carry it carefully, she really did— fuck!

His head falls forward, dejectedly, onto Power's bony shoulder. He can feel the warmth of her skin there, the life in it, and her hands hover awkwardly around his back because, well— this isn't something they do. He's the number one devil-hater, after all. Aki might be able to tentatively admit that he loves them, but that definitely doesn't mean he shows it.

He lets out a long, racking sigh. The words are thick in his mouth. "Lost the eye," he tells them.

Power's pushing him back, then, with both hands on his shoulders and a very serious face. She's peering at the bandages around Aki's head like she might be able to gauge the severity of his wound through x-ray vision, or something. "Not to worry, topknot," she says, giving Aki's arm a firm pat. Crimson, crystalline blood is leaching up her wrist and pooling in her hand, into a sort-of triangular shape. "I'll fix you with my blood—"

Then she's bringing the knife to the pale skin of her other arm, pressing against a major vein there, and then Aki's over the threshold and trying to wrestle the weapon from her, and then Denji's having to get involved when Power starts screaming about how he should feel grateful to be blessed with the healing properties of her regal blood and their tussle knocks over the bowl of keys and random shit by the door— and then Nyako's getting under Aki's feet and all three of them are going down in the cramped hallway, and Power's scuffed her elbows on the linoleum when she's fallen down on top of him, and Aki's narrowly avoided losing a digit, too, with the way the knife is stuck out of the vinyl floor perfectly slotted between his middle and pointer fingers.

With Power still laying on him and gripping the front of his jacket tightly, her face pressed into Aki's chest, he and Denji have to explain to her that Aki's still human, and he can't just heal from injuries like the two of them can with a little virgin blood and willpower. It's a conversation Aki's had with them before, after Darkness took his arm, and it's weird to be having it again. He puts his hand reassuringly on Power's back while she complains about how stupid it is that a stupid starfish can grow back its stupid limbs but Aki— who she goes on the record to say is at least twice as good as a starfish— can't. When he looks over at Denji, the kid's got this pout going on, and Aki follows his eyes to where he's holding Power. He reaches up and smooths out Denji's wiry hair, and then messes it up again, just for fun.

"You promised you'd make dinner," Denji tells him, looking pink and shy and like he's fighting the urge to lean into Aki's touch. "We've been waiting."

Aki lets his hand fall. He makes a mental note to teach Denji how to cook for himself. Just in case.

—

The first time he did this, Aki got home from patrolling with a new fragment of the Gun Devil in hand and he made the three of them nikujaga. Power cut the potatoes in all different shapes and sizes so they cooked unevenly, with most of them still hard, and the gas burner tripped the breaker halfway through reducing. He doesn't let Power prep the veggies, this time, and he plugs the stove into a different outlet.

He cuts himself slicing a carrot. All of a sudden, there's just bright red blood all over the cutting board, pooling on the bench and dripping down onto the floor. He thought his fingers were further away from the knife than they actually were, and confidently skinned right across one of them, leaving an awkward flap of sore flesh behind.

He goes to skim the pork scum off the top of the simmering pot of dashi and meat and vegetables, and the breaker trips when he adjusts the dial. He sends Denji out to the box to flip the power back on.

Sitting at their low dining table, Aki takes a bite of the meal he's just made. It's dusty and tasteless, at least to him. The potato is still only half-cooked. He even left it for double the usual amount of time, just to make sure they'd cook through.

A universe that splits endlessly into different versions of itself at every divulging path…

Aki's eye starts to sting again.

Nothing changed. He did things differently, trying to guarantee a different outcome, but it's still the same, in the end. The potatoes are still hard in the middle. Even though he overcooked them. Even though it shouldn't be possible. It might even be worse, this time— he's got a fat wad of gauze and electrical tape around his finger to show for it. The only thing he did change, and it's worse.

"Eh?" goes Denji, talking with his mouth full and spitting chewed-up shirataki onto his lap. "It remind you of your mom, or something?"

Aki sits his bowl down and stares into it, watching the brown broth ripple as a tear drips off the end of his nose.

After all this— what if he can't change anything? A miracle, Angel had called it. A precious, precious do-over. And Aki Hayakawa is such a good-for-nothing motherfucker that he can't change a single thing— he can't influence a damn vegetable, let alone the fucking world! What if all he can do is sit and watch? As he makes the same choices, the same mistakes— as Makima uses him and she uses Power and she uses Denji, exactly the same as she did before, and takes everything from all of them all over again? To this Aki, who's seen the future, doesn't this fate seem worse— knowing everything but being powerless to stop anything? Is he going to have to watch himself submit to Makima again, but this time knowing what it sets in motion? Knowing what he's making Denji do? What if—

What if it's worse, this time? In every way, this today was worse than the first one. What if he can only make more mistakes? Angel asked him to kill Makima— how is he supposed to fight, like this? He can't even get his own damn fingers out of the way of his own damn knife! His chopsticks are missing the bowl, for fuck's sake! In this state, he might lose a fight with a punching bag, let alone Makima, who can put him down with a single word.

"Yeah, it just—" he replies, quietly, barely getting the words out.

He thinks about Hokkaido. Of snow, of the purifying water freezing as he pours it over the tombstone. Of Denji eating the manju from the next grave over. Of Power picking vegetables out of her food one-by-one.

A ball of ice hits the back of his jacket and turns to powder.

"—it just reminds me of my family."

It's all his fault.

—

"Keep your voice down."

Aki's just gone to bed, after a long, scalding hot shower and an even longer amount of time spent stuck looking at himself in the bathroom mirror. At his long, limp hair and the smoker's lines starting around his mouth and the damn hole in his head and trying not to think about who he looks like now. He's just redosed his pain medication and he feels tired and slow. Despite that—

He sits up with a gasp that's quickly stifled by a wad of bedding getting shoved into his mouth.

"What did I just say?" the Angel Devil hisses, frowning. He's perched over Aki on the bed, straddling his legs like they're— well. Like they're fucking, his lazy brain supplies. Close like this, even without warning, he's careful not to touch, and Aki suddenly feels very aware of his hands, his bare arms, the way Angel's hair is falling around them like a curtain, or one of those nets that keep mosquitos out. "Do you want them knowing I'm here?"

Aki slides himself out from under the devil on his forearms, pushing his back up the wall. He wipes his damp bangs out of his eyes. "Why shouldn't they know?"

Angel looks at him like he's stupid. "You saw the future, didn't you?"

"How did you—"

"And to be completely honest with you, I don't trust them." Angel's eyes rove around Aki's room, the empty and person-less space. He takes in the drawers blocked from ever opening by the bed, the shelves with nothing on them, the blank walls. The only personal affects are an ashtray on the balcony and an alarm clock beside the bed. Everything Aki Hayakawa has is asleep in the other room. All there is in here is vice, and the steady passing of time. "Don't take it personally."

The red-haired man swings his legs off Aki and over the side of the mattress, perching himself on the edge there. His wings take up an enormous amount of space in the tiny room, and with the glow from his halo, it's like someone's turned the overhead light on.

"I saw it too," he says. "The future. Probably because of our contract."

There it is. That damned word. Aki was ready to believe it might've been another horrible dream.

"If Makima's plan works out, she's going to kill us, and Blood, and probably Chainsaw, too. I can't risk her finding out through those kids and their big mouths."

Aki looks out the double doors, onto the balcony. Last time he really looked out there was when he summoned Future, and the night sky darkened and the lights of the city and blinking planes above vanished, replaced with the devil's visage, cackling at him through the railing, tormenting him with images with no context. Part of him still expects to look over and see his twisting, six-eyed head eavesdropping there. There's nothing, though. Just the windows of the next condo over. Tokyo's endless sprawl through the gaps.

"Why do you care so much?" Aki asks the Angel. "You want to die anyway."

Angel sinks down onto the floor beside the bed. He huffs out a spiteful laugh, and leans his head back against the thin mattress. "I got my memories back. I didn't—" His voice chokes off strangely, and then he laughs again. "I didn't realize how much she took from me. I didn't even know, but I could—"

Aki can smell the ocean. Salt and sun, clumps of seaweed on the beach. Water droplets like crystals on her tanned skin— wait, what? Who is—

"I could feel it. This whole time. I know what it's like to lose everything." Angel lifts one of his deadly, delicate hands. He inspects the back of it, the quicks of his nails like there's something new to find there. He flexes and unflexes his fingers in front of the light from the balcony, casting strange shadow puppets on his moonlit face. "It's no wonder I want to die. But I can't sit by and watch her do what she did to me to someone else."

"So, what? You contracted with me out of empathy?" Aki huffs, sounding more like a petulant little boy than he wants to. "You're a devil. You don't feel emotions like that."

"You're right. It's not empathy. I want revenge and you can help me get it."

Revenge, huh? Aki reckons this one might not be so easy. He thinks back to that hospital room, to Angel sitting upright in the bed— no arms, no agency for himself. 'If I just let you die,' he'd said. 'I have this feeling that you'll start haunting my dreams too'. He knew immediately that the Angel was just disguising his care for Aki as self-interest— Aki couldn't blame him. He does the same thing every damn day. Between Angel and Power, not even he believes that all devils are evil. He's been fed the line since he was born. That devils are selfish, and even if they can be useful or seem benevolent at times, there's always a silver lining or a trap lying in wait. Even the weakest devil would kill you if it had the chance, just to feed off your fear in the moment, just for a smidgeon more power. Aki's learnt that most humans are the same. Self-important liars and fakes. It's how you survive in a world like this— if you don't put yourself first, you'll get chewed up and spat out at the first opportunity. Maybe Hell is like that, too. Millions of devils stuck in an eternal rat-race towards survival. Maybe some devils can learn to feel, in spite of that. Hasn't Aki?

Increasingly now, he thinks that some devils can feel empathy, and other emotions like that. Watching Power be so open in her love for Nyako and Denji… watching Angel in his bedroom now… He thinks that maybe they just can't say it out loud. They lie and pretend and aggrandize their devildom as a shield around the heart. Catching feelings, in the most technical sense, makes you weaker— more and more soft spots in your shell for them to strike at, to exploit— and why would a devil ever want to be weak? In a world like this, why would he ever want to be weak?

Still. It sneaks up on you. Through the tiniest of cracks. Aki knows this very well. He thought it was just human nature, but…

Looks like you're much different than the rumors say.

Aki can't say it out loud either.

"This contract," he asks the back of Angel's glowing head. "This can't be all there is to it. What terms did I agree to?"

Angel huffs and waves his hand in dismissal. He sounds tired, and annoyed. "I would've told you the first time, if you weren't so quick on the draw. It's your own fault, really."

The little devil stands then, groaning under his own weight like he weighs ten of himself. He turns to Aki and his wings block most of the light from outside, except for what little filters through his long, veiny flight feathers. It tints them blue. Like a TV does. The way his eyes, usually a kind-of autumnal red but looking black in the night, meet Aki's brings a horrible image to mind.

"You can't die anymore, Hayakawa."

When Aki was just starting out, just a week or so into his partnership with Himeno, they caught the metro to work together. In their suits and ties, the only things that differentiated them from the swathes of other commuting salarymen were the bandages still wrapped around Himeno's head and arms and the sword at Aki's back. The usual announcement rang out, signalling the arrival of a train to the platform. A man placed his briefcase on the ground, stepped over the yellow line and committed suicide. Blood had splattered across Aki's freshly-starched white shirt. Several people in the vicinity screamed, but Himeno just looked at her watch. She clicked her tongue and complained that they'd be late. Aki, who hadn't really felt anything since the death of his family, didn't really feel anything, and wiped the blood off his face with his sleeve.

"You can't age or get sick," continues the Angel Devil. "Every mortal wound you receive will heal."

In the moment before the collision, the man had locked eyes with Aki.

"Everyone you love will die and you'll powerlessly watch them do it."

Aki's grip on the bedsheets tightens. The light cast downwards from Angel's halo makes his face look gaunt, like he's telling scary stories around a fire. He tilts his head in contemplation.

"If you think about it, it's the opposite fate to the one you faced before."

He was wondering what the catch was. Every contract he's seen has been a cruel thing— even when he met with Future, the other hunters had told him the old devil's deals were notoriously harsh. Taking away that poor sod's senses just for a glimpse of it… Future taught him that, for omnipotent beings like them, the cruelty of any particular contract is subjective. Contracting with Aki for essentially nothing in return was their way of poking fun at how doomed he already was. Convincing Aki of his own terrible fate was payment enough. The worst possible end, the Future Devil called it. He supposes this is more of the same.

For some people, immortality might be a massive boon. The kind of people that aren't sick and tired of all the people they love dying in front of them. People that aren't Aki Hayakawa. Even if they succeed— even if they change the fate Future showed them, what then? How many doomed futures would Aki have to divert to keep everyone alive forever? Would they even want him to? Or would he fail anyway, just around the next bend, and lose everything all over again? He doesn't think he could do it. Start over from zero, that is. He doesn't think he has it in him.

"How—" starts Aki, his voice weirdly dry in his mouth. It makes sense. If Angel can take life with every touch and manifest the years physically, he can probably manipulate it in other ways, too. "How long have you… given me?"

Angel shrugs. "Long enough."

Aki frowns. He's trying very hard not to yell. "How long?"

When the Angel Devil's mouth moves, no sound comes out. Aki is forced to look down and read the answer off his lips.

It feels like his stomach has just fallen out and tumbled onto the carpet. That's— that's so—

Aki reaches into the drawer beside the bed, feeling around. When he pulls out a lighter and a single stick from the crumpled packet, he notices his hands are shaking. He brings the smoke to his mouth and sparks the lighter— once, twice, three times— tiny flashes of yellow as he strikes the flint, come on, damn you— four times, five—

He throws the lighter across the room and brings his knees up to his chest. His hands tug at the pathetic crest of hair that sticks out weirdly over his bandages, loosening some of the fresh gauze. Staring down the tiny gap between his knees, Aki chews at the spongy cigarette filter until it's squashed and wet. He wonders if this is how that idiot feels every day.

There's a click from beside him. The only tell that Angel's approached him was his halo glow creeping up the duvet. Aki looks over. A flame dances there. White to blue to orange to red. He stares into the white-hot center so hard it leaves a negative impression in his eye. Angel's thumb is probably hurting by now, holding the ignition down like that. Aki moves his head until the tip of his tortured cigarette breaches the flame and finally catches. Nicotine rushes into his lungs, numbing and familiar. He watches Angel pocket his lighter. Bastard.

Aki breathes out a cloud of silver smoke. After a while, he reaches over the side of the mattress and taps the end off his cigarette. Angel, oddly helpful, rubs the ash away with his foot.

"My eye," croaks out Aki eventually. "It isn't healing."

Angel's holding out a hand. Not like the last one— not a hand he'd ever want Aki to take. He's asking for something— the cigarette, Aki realizes, and takes it from between his lips. The Angel, in turn, takes two fingers and carefully grabs the smoking thing by the wrong end. He's keeping as much distance as he can between their hands. The last cigarette Aki shared was with Himeno. It was always a weird, intimate thing between them. Now that she's dead, Aki can acknowledge that Himeno was using it as a substitute for kissing him. Meanwhile Aki didn't think of it as anything more than bumming the half-a-cig she'd waste in the ash tray anyway.

"I said mortal wounds would heal. A scratch like that isn't going to kill you."

Aki's teeth clench. He barely manages to reel himself in from reaching out to scruff the devil angrily by his shirt collar.

"You—"

"Relax," goads the Angel, leaning back and away, like he somehow foresaw the motion Aki didn't make. "You're not a total zombie. There's an easy fix."

"What is it?" asks Aki.

The Angel Devil pops the cigarette into his mouth and sucks. He doesn't cough even a little.

"Die."