All roads lead to Mugenjou, or so it seems to Ban. The place casts a long shadow, far longer than its impossible height. You can try to escape it, but it will fall on you too, if you get too close.
He had entered it willingly, alone, not knowing what he sought. Maybe he had been hoping for solitude, or oblivion, or death. But he always believed in his own strength, to walk out again, untouched, should he chose to.
That is how he entered. He left - forever changed, no longer alone. Life now irrevocably tangled in Mugenjou's fate.
December's stars were so clear and bright, glittering like ice. Cold and distant, but when viewed like this they were beautiful.
The car's sunroof was down, midnight blue and the scattered fairy-dust that was the Milky Way the only thing above them. Thick blankets kept the freezing winter air at bay, and two bodies kept the heat better than one.
The stars - sparkling and shimmering, tiny pinpricks of light. Enough that the night was not terrifying or dark, but glowing. A new experience, or one long forgotten.
Watching the stars was magic.
Looking away from them was even better.
Evil eyes.
What they are is old magic. It's in his blood, but not in the way of the erythrocytes and leukocytes he learned about from heavy tomes on human anatomy.
It's in his blood, in him, and he can never scrub it out.
Never be rid of the epitaph - evil eyes.
Evil.
Rejected because of it, he had almost come to embrace it. The justice he could deliver; the extra twist of cruelty in his visions. The taunt. Did you have a good dream?
Then he found Ginji.
He can still fight. Can still deliver justice. But his power - it can be more than a weapon. More than destruction. (Lightning can wreak ruin. But cupped in a gentle hand, sometimes it is nothing but light.)
Defying the name and the curse, he can use it to bring a little kindness.
He can help.
Evil eyes.
He has made the lie of the name, and because it's a lie, it doesn't hurt to hear.
We don't tell anyone. Not even Kazu-chan or Shido. Ban-chan says they wouldn't understand. (I say they would, but it's easier if he thinks that's why.)
Sometimes - just sometimes - it's like I'm the shell of a chestnut; getting full. Like what's inside is going to come popping out, and I can't stop it. Except it's a chestnut in reverse, because it's the inside that's spiky.
And sometimes Ban-chan just hits me on the head (but not as hard as I know he can) and tells me to stop it.
And I do.
But sometimes. Only sometimes of the sometimes... It doesn't stop. And it hurts. And I know I can make it stop, but if I do - pop.
So then Ban-chan will hold me. He'll hold me and he'll hold everything inside. The spikyness. He'll stuff me and it and everything in a dream, so I can't feel it anymore.
What I can feel - I know it's Ban-chan.
It's beautiful. It's safe.
And he won't say it, not ever, but sometimes after, when the minute's up and if the popping feeling is all gone, then I'll see him smile.
Maybe he's right.
Maybe Kazu-chan and Shido wouldn't understand.
But only because they've never seen Ban smiling like that.
So it's our secret.
Sometimes. Sometimes Ginji gets it bad. It - call it Raitei or PTSD or... the shadow of Mugenjou. (Fucking Mugenjou.) He gets it so bad I don't know if he'll come out of it right.
The first time it happened, I panicked.
Yeah. Super heroic, I know, but when none of the usual stuff does anything... It always sucks, to get to that point. It's the same in fights. It sucks, and then it ends one of two ways: Snakebite or Jagan.
But it was Ginji, so that was one option out the window right there and. And I used the other on him.
Jagan. I used it on him even though he's - Ginji.
And it's always more than just throwing a dream at someone and hope it'll make 'em shit their pants. It takes - call it looking. Like when you aim - you have to look, right? But looking is usually nasty business - three a day is more than enough, thank you. And other people -- never mind.
Ginji.
I looked at him, because I can't not. And it was fucking beautiful.
It was Ginji. The idiot that I've already decided that I'm going to spend the rest of my life with, but to see him, like that - like only someone like me could...
So now, if it happens, I hold him. I grab him and then I hold him in a dream. And because it's him, that's all I do. Hold him there, and tell him. Tell him who he is. Until he remembers.
And sometimes, just sometimes... I want that minute to last forever. That minute when there's just me and him and nothing else.
Forever.