DancingKitsune. Warning: Violence and foul language, and disturbing imagery are featured in the second half of this. If this bothers you, then do not read. Gabriel and Artimes are ariound 14-15 in this.

You’re lying next to me, asleep. I’m almost asleep myself, it’s a beautiful day. You had suggested we cloud-watch today because it was so cloudy out, and at first I was a bit hesitant, but I did it anyway. It gave me some time to think about stuff while we laid beneath one of you mom’s huge cherry blossom trees.

I feel you stir beside me and turn my head slightly to see you getting up. But there’s something odd about it; you look like a marionette being pulled up by its’ strings—completely limp but somehow supporting yourself. I lift an eyebrow and prop myself up on my elbows.

“Gabe? You okay?” I ask, and it’s not hard to tell that I’m worried about you. I do that a lot since the accident a year ago. You numbed-out from it too quick for someone who went through what you did, so of course I can’t help but worry.

“Mmh,” You mumble back to me as you walk back to the house. Your posture is more slouched than usual, and I see you stumble a bit over some of the over-grown roots. Your head jerks at the offending tree’s trunk, but only to loll back down. My brows furrow and I get up, following a few feet behind you.

Throwing open the French doors with more force than necessary, the glass rattling in its case moments after you open it. You carelessly leave it wide open after you go in, and this only makes me more concerned. I shut it gingerly after myself and follow you inside.

I follow you through the living room, up the first-floor steps, through the main hallway, past a Sabriel who’s looking back at you like you’re crazy—I mean, seriously, did you just walk past her without making any effort to start a fight?—through your doorway, up your spiral-stairwell to “the tower” as we call it. It’s only a terrace of your family’s Victorian home, but the name gives it some sort of mystique.

You walk into the center of the room and I follow you, shutting the door behind me. As I’m turning back, you grab my shoulders and slam me into the door with a vice grip. I wince in pain; the force of the stunt had be strong enough that I heard the door behind me crack like crazy. I honestly never expected you to be able to have this much power while in this state of mind, whatever that state may be.

Looking into your eyes, I notice that they’re heavily dilated, making your hazard-warning greens look dark and sinister. You have this manic, crooked grin on your face that doesn’t reach your eyes at all. It’s unsettling how not-you this expression is.

Then suddenly your head just drops, like a supporting string’s been cut and nothing can hold it up any longer. Warily I look down at you as your grip on my shoulders slackens until your hands simply slip right off of them.

I stand there, stock against the door, awaiting your next unexpected move.

A moment comes along, where I have the urge to say something to you, but before the words grace my lips you start laughing. It’s barely a rumble at first, and I almost think it’s not there. It gets louder and louder until your hunched over while clutching your waist. Your laughter reaching hysterical levels, and in all honesty— I’m really freaked out.

All the sudden, you stop mid-laugh. You’re still hunched over, grabbing at your sides, laughter frozen onto your face. Your eyes open, staring down at the ground, expression still there. Your eyes dart up to meet mine and I’m frozen in the spot.

“Forty-six, lover-boy.” You whisper out in this cracked and dried voice, as if you haven’t spoken in years. I furrow my eyebrows in confusion. I open my mouth to question what you mean, but before the words can even grace my lips your vice-grip returns at full force. Your nose is only an inch or so from my own and your nails dig painfully through my grey and black tee-shirt

“Forty-six things I could have done to you in this sparse time that I’ve graced you with my presence, and yet you have not noted our change.” He half-whispers to me in his raspy voice. All the while he’s grinning like some sort of maniac at me, and all I can do is stare back at him with eyes wide.

“I’ve been watching you from the inside, watching you from my charge’s eyes. I see what you two do, I hear what you two say. Darker knows everything.” The thing, Darker as it called itself, says as he slowly turns Gabriel’s face away from me, but his eyes always flicker back to mine. I bite the inside of my lip, and my eyes narrow. Gabriel—Darker – turns his face back to stare straight at me and smirks.

“Angry? Or upset? That your little Gabriel doesn’t tell you everything?” He whispers into my ear. A shudder of revulsion waves through me and I pull up my arms to push him off of me, but before my hands get a steady bearing on his chest he’s already moving.

Jerking me forward suddenly, slamming me back into the door—he pauses for barely a second to change his footing the slightest—then pulling me past his shoulder, and lets go. My body continues with the momentum of the throw and I’m yet again shocked at the strength that such a thin person could put into something. I pull my arms in front of my face in a defensive movement. I give a yelp of pain when my shoulder collides into the ground with a definite crack.

Picking myself up quickly into a half-sitting position, I grab my shoulder and almost recoil at the pain it sends through me. Darker is just standing there, looking as limp and boneless as ever, his head hanging down with his hair falling into his face. Between the pieces I can see his crooked Cheshire grin, but his eyes are hidden from me entirely.

“Want me to name some of them, lover-boy? I could have strangled you in the yard while you were falling asleep, or I could have smothered you after you had. I could have whipped around when you were following me in the yard, started nailing you in the face until your dear mommy couldn’t identify your maimed self at the morgue….” Every new suggestion he made, he took one sluggish step towards me. After each step, he would sway slightly in place, as if his body couldn’t hold him up properly.

Fearful, I hastily start scooting back with much trouble. I shake my head slightly and continue to look at him while doing little things to see how bad the damage to my shoulder was. After a few moments I gave up; I must’ve knocked it completely out of it’s socket, or maybe blew out the rotary cup, because I couldn’t move it at all.

Darker’s watching everything I do, it’s unnerving. His grin falls from his face and I have a feeling that he narrowed his eyes at me. “What do you want? What will make you go away?” I say to him, and his head snaps up so quickly that I was worried that he had hurt Gabriel’s neck by doing so.

“…..’go away’, huh? What will it take for me to go away?” You say in that ragged tone that’s filled with amusement. I can barely see your dilated eyes and your crooked grin peering from behind your hair, and the manic look is twisting itself more and more as the seconds go by. You start laughing again, quiet chuckles building into hysteria like the last time.

You saunter over to me, and it takes everything I am to stay calm at the manic look on your face. You stop when you’re a foot ahead of me, dropping to a crouching position so that we’re at the same level. I clutch my shoulder tighter out of reflex, and I see your eyes flicker to my shoulder before going back to stare me down.

“Hum… Do you really want to know what will make me go away, lover-boy?” He says, the look of the devil in his eyes. Warily, I nod my head. His manic grin softens and he reaches out his hand to cup the side of my face gently.

“Penance. Penance from the world…” he says even quieter than he had been speaking previously as he softly strokes the side of my face now. “The world, you see, is rotting and full of disgusting filth…” he says in what, if Gabriel was in control, would have been a sing-song voice.

My eyes struggle against the urge of looking at his hand, knowing that he’d notice it. “But Gabriel…. Dear, sweet Gabriel, is stained; all because of that vermin who couldn’t keep his grime-covered hands to himself… So, as the blemish upon his pure soul, I must do right… Do you know what that is, lover-boy?”

I shake my head, his hand that had been caressing my face gains slight pressure as it stills, and the soft look falls off his face as his head slowly lolls down. His downcast face betrays his piercing eyes, which never leave my face the whole time. “I must become filth to eradicate the damage done by filth.”

His nails scratch down the side of my face, digging deep down until they begin to draw blood. I wince in pain at this, but do not look away or try to stop him. I must hear what he has to say.

“I must rot and decay until there is nothing left to decompose. Only then will his spirit be purged of its sins…” He finishes, pulling his hand away from my face. My eyes flicker to it and I can see the red covering his finger tips; the same red that I can feel going down the side of my face.

By the time they get back to his face he’s grinning widely again, the soft look gone completely, as if it had never been there in the first place. He lets himself fall from his crouched position into a kneeling one and seats his hands on the ground in front of him. At the same time I was scooting back further and keeping my calm composure up. Our eyes never broke away.

“Forty-seven, lover-boy. It’s amazing how little you keep your guard up, just because I have his face. You’re such a child; so trusting and caring,.” He tells me, mocking tone growing stronger as he went on, “Keep this up and I will surely be the death of you.”

“After all,” he starts in a very ‘holier than thou’ tone, “I could have absolutely destroyed you by now. Like so many others.”

“Oh, really now? What could you have done to me?” I say, challenging his conviction. I know that this is a stupid idea to challenge someone who obviously didn’t care about me, but I couldn’t bring myself to care for it ether.

“Let’s just named a handful of them, just to humor you before I go…” He says in a mocking tone I couldn’t help but wonder what that meant, but I suppose that would have to wait for another time. “I could have smothered you, I could have straggled you.”

“I could have tied you down, I could have raped you.” I tense up when he raised his hand to caress my face again because of that. He smirks and continues on. “I could have hit you, I could have pushed you down the steps. I could have stabbed you while we passed through the kitchen!” He chuckles as if it had been some amusing joke.

“I could have cut you into pieces, I could have made you watch as I murdered Gabriel’s little sister. I could walk over to the window and throw myself out it. I could throw you out it. I could chain you down in this tower, where the walls and floor are soundproof, and leave you here to starve to death…” his caressing stops and he simply cups my face.

“I could do… so many things….” He whispers, his face drawing closer to mine until his mouth is close to my ear. “And there is nothing… Nothing… That you will ever be able to do, to stop me…”

He licks the blood from my scratches slightly and I shudder in disgust. He pulls away and sits his weight completely upon his kneeled legs and smiles darkly. His pupils undulate and his face is blank.

Then recognition appears on his face, followed quickly by horror as he covers his face with his hands. Feeling something wet, he looks at his finders to see my blood on them, and looks back at me. Tears fill his eyes and he starts to shake. You start to hyperventilate, I don't try to stop or calm you.

“What did he do…?” Is all you manage to get out before you pass out from the attack. I look down at your slightly trembling body with a blank face. It feels like all the pain, energy, and emotion's been drained away from me, and I just want to sleep now.

"What the fuck."